Confused Man Wears Mask In Spite of Having Had Virus Months Ago
This picture really does take the biscuit. Why is Boris bothering to wear a mask when he cannot possibly be infectious or catch COVID-19, having had the virus and recovered. Like me, he has the antibodies. Nicola Sturgeon may have made mask wearing in shops mandatory in Scotland on Friday, but no such rule applies in Uxbridge. So what is the big man thinking? Is this a signal that he’s about to follow in Sturgeon’s footsteps? The Mail seems to think so.
In the early days of the outbreak the UK Government argued that scientific evidence that the masks reduced transmission of the airborne virus was “weak”.
But rules requiring people to wear face masks on public transport in England came into effect on 15 June.
On Friday Mr Johnson said “the balance of scientific opinion seems to have shifted more in favour of them than it was, and we’re very keen to follow that”.
“I do think we need to be stricter in insisting people wear face coverings in confined spaces where they are meeting people they don’t normally meet.
“We are looking at ways of making sure that people really do have face coverings in shops, for instance, where there is a risk of transmission,” he said during a Facebook Q&A.
Gawd help us if he does decide to wet the bed over masks. One reader – let’s call him Tony – has already been in touch to say the very thought of having to wear a nappy on his face every time he leaves the house is making him feel suicidal.
Send Tony some love in the comments.
Stop Press: There seems to be a great deal of confusion about whether face masks should be worn in some of Britain’s most popular galleries and museums. You’ll be required to wear one at the BFI Southbank when it re-opens on September 1st, as well as the Royal Academy, while the National Gallery merely “encourages” visitors to wear one and the Tate doesn’t require them at all. Go figure.
When We Have Herd Immunity, Boris Will Face a Reckoning
I have a piece in the Telegraph today, arguing that the reason the virus is burning itself out in Britain, Europe and parts of America is because we’re on our way to achieving herd immunity in those areas.
At the beginning of March, a lively debate took place about whether Britain should pursue a strategy of “herd immunity” – allowing coronavirus to spread until so many people had developed antibodies that it no longer posed a threat to public health – or place the entire country under lockdown. As is well-known, Boris Johnson initially embraced the former, saying the public needed to take the virus “on the chin”, then performed a U-turn and imposed a full lockdown on March 23.
But recent data coming out of New York reveals that this was a false dichotomy. Sixty-eight per cent of people who took antibody tests at a clinic in the Corona neighbourhood of Queens received positive results, suggesting that, in this area at least, the population is already close to achieving “herd immunity”. This is in spite of the fact that New York imposed one of the strictest lockdowns in the United States.
This fits with other data showing that the life cycle of the epidemic in each region or country where there’s been a viral outbreak follows a very similar pattern, regardless of whether or not a lockdown was imposed or how severe it was. For instance, if you plot the rise and fall in the number of new cases in Sweden on a graph, and then compare it to the same data in the UK, the two lines are almost identical, in spite of the fact that Sweden never imposed a lockdown. The same is true if you compare the trajectory of the virus in the 43 US states that locked down with the seven that didn’t.
The Telegraph wasn’t able to reproduce the graph I had in mind because it appeared in the Spectator. But this is the one I was referring to, which was in an article by Lockdown Sceptics contributor Alistair Haimes.
The fact that the pattern is so similar, regardless of which non-pharmaceutical interventions were made, suggests the reason the R rate has fallen to below one in these areas has nothing to do with the lockdowns and everything to do with the fact that a majority of people have now been exposed to the virus and either had natural immunity or caught it and are now immune. As I point out in the article, that’s good news because it means the chances of a ‘second wave’ happening are virtually nil. But it’s bad news for Boris.
As it becomes clearer that the British population will soon achieve herd immunity, just as the population of Corona has, and the lockdown has done nothing to mitigate the impact of the virus, people will begin to ask tough questions of the Government. And Boris won’t be able to say we only know this now with the benefit of hindsight because he recognised the wisdom of the “herd immunity” strategy back in March. Whatever his excuse is, it will have to be better than that if the Conservatives are going to survive the reckoning.
Worth reading in full.
Escape to the Costa Blanca
A Scottish reader has been in touch about his escape to Spain. Not quite the idyll he was expecting…
I thought I would give you a quick insight into life in the Costa Blanca, Spain. We escaped Nicola (Bane) Sturgeon a few weeks ago, thinking we were smart. We have had a great time here, but there are potential signs of things to come back in the UK:
1. The wearing of masks is obligatory in all shops. I watched a guy getting manhandled out of Lidl yesterday because he was attempting to cover his mouth with his T-shirt. My wife and I were smirking until I was approached by the same hit squad who had so efficiently dispatched him. I was wearing my usual bandanna, but this was obviously not up to the required standard for this supermarket and I was accompanied out faster than a lizard finds the shade. So now it appears masks have to be of a specific type. Could it happen in the UK next?
2. A new hotel and restaurant opened up on the waterfront in our town. Lovely job. Three days later it was closed down. All the furniture was removed and it was completely de-fumigated. Apparently, the owner was suspected of having Covid. Turned out, he didn’t. He had had a car accident two days before and wasn’t feeling too well. He got a complete decontamination exercise for his trouble. Hysterical. Not seen anyone in it since!
3. It’s great that the shops are open, but it’s becoming a health hazard for your hands. You have to disinfect on entry and exit. Visit five shops and that’s a lot of chemicals. And how my hands are suffering. Dry and itchy. I tried to pretend to have a squirt on them the other day and the “doorman” reprimanded me for it. Scary…
4. It is becoming increasingly bizarre to see waiters having to wear masks in restaurants while the customers don’t. In this heat (up to 40 degrees) it’s downright dangerous. Most of them look completely pissed off wearing them. Will there be a health fallout from such intense mask wearing?
5. When we did a runner a few weeks ago we just about had the plane to ourselves flying out of Glasgow. We thought we were the smart ones. But Nicola’s decided that we have to serve two weeks solitary when we return, e.g. quarantine. She can’t be beaten, but we won’t give up trying!
Perhaps it isn’t all Wee Krankie’s fault. One of her public health advisers, Professor Devi Sridhar, is a bedwetter par excellence. She took to Twitter recently to warn of “constant outbreaks” as lockdown restrictions ease across the country. She said the virus was likely to be present in the UK until at least the spring of 2021 and that if people returned to their normal patterns of behaviour “we will get an uptick for sure”.
I know the economy is suffering and jobs are being lost. I recognise the toll that lockdown has taken and I’m not ‘pro-lockdown’ at all.
In fact my worry is about a second lockdown and how to avoid this happening. Lockdown/release cycles will destroy society and the economy.
That’s a new one on me: I’m so worried about the toll the lockdown is taking that I think we should continue to strictly maintain it to avoid having to re-impose it.
Canaries in the Mine Update
I’m publishing a third article in Dr Rudolph Kalveks ‘Canaries in the Mine’ series today. Dr Kalveks, who has a PhD in theoretical physics, has used a standard tool in epidemiology – the Susceptible–Infected–Recovered/Resolved or (“SIR”) model – to analyse the lifecycle of the virus in different countries and he concluded in the first article in the series that in Europe and America the pandemic was approaching the end of its life and a “second wave” was unlikely. He looked at the data again in the second article in the series and saw nothing to change his mind, and he’s done the same in the third. Again, the data confirms his initial hypothesis:
Notwithstanding that populations are not homogeneous, so that there may remain local groups of vulnerable individuals who may continue to benefit from continued sheltering, the simple message for UK policymakers is that the historic data from the Coronavirus pandemic does not at present provide evidence to support the continuation of substantial restrictions on the normal functioning of our society and economy.
Worth reading in full.
Letter in Harpers Raising Alarm About the Intolerant Left Makes it Harder to Deny Cancel Culture
I appeared on Sky News earlier to debate Guardian columnist Owen Jones about cancel culture, following the letter that appeared in Harpers last week signed by 153 left-wing writers and intellectuals. Owen tweeted on July 5th that he didn’t think cancel culture existed, in spite of the fact that a couple of weeks ago he led demands for Oxford University’s Deputy Director of External Affairs to be fired “by the end of the day” because he’d tweeted something disobliging about Owen’s friend Ash Sarkar.
It’s like the leader of the Red Guards at the height of the Chinese Cultural Revolution saying, “Struggle sessions? What struggle sessions?”
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:
- ‘Welsh pubs and cafes to reopen indoors on 3 August‘ – Welsh pubs, cafes, bars and restaurants can open with outside seating from Monday, indoors from August 3rd
- ‘Quarantine rules end for dozens of destinations‘ – Rules are being relaxed for arrivals from 75 countries and British overseas territories, although travellers from Spain still have to quarantine on arrival in Scotland (see above)
- ‘Multiple errors in the New York Times article about Sweden’s corona strategy‘ – Good takedown of the misleading New York Times piece headlined: “Sweden has become the world’s cautionary tale.”
- ‘Sickest coronavirus patients could be injected with lab-made antibodies to help fight off infection‘ – Story in the Telegraph about an experimental new treatment. I first read about this at least six weeks ago
- ‘We’re keeping the flirty young things apart, say publicans‘ – According to the Times, publicans have been struggling to keep young people from snogging
- ‘COVID-19 is not a “serious and imminent danger”. Risk assessments might be‘ – Employment lawyers Jackson Osborne point out that the HSE’s Covid risk assessment approach is fundamentally flawed
- ‘Jeremy Hunt interview: “The scientific advice was wrong — there was group-think at the top”‘ – I got my hopes up when I read that headline, but in fact he means the Government didn’t lock down early enough. Yawn
- ‘Global socio-economic losses and environmental gains from the Coronavirus pandemic‘ – The first comprehensive study of the pandemic by a group of international academics shows consumption losses amount to more than $3.8 trillion, triggering full-time equivalent job losses of 147 million
- ‘People WON’T obey lockdown again‘ – SAGE has warned that it will be a lot harder to get people to stick to the rules if a full lockdown is reimposed
- ‘Civil servants are told to read up on Dominic Cummings as overhaul looms‘ – Turns out, the Cabinet Office has drawn up a 20-page synopsis of Dominic Cummings’s famously prolix blog posts so incoming officials can brief themselves on the great man’s thoughts
- ‘What’s the true cost of lockdown?‘ – Good piece in the Spectator by Dr Waqar Rashid, a consultant neurologist at St George’s University Foundation Hospital NHS Trust, about the psychological toll
Small Businesses That Have Re-Opened
A few weeks ago, Lockdown Sceptics launched a searchable directory of open businesses across the UK. The idea is to celebrate those retail and hospitality businesses that have re-opened, 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. Now that non-essential shops have re-opened – or most of them, anyway – we’re now focusing on pubs, bars, clubs and restaurants, as well as other social venues. As of July 4th, many of them have re-opened too, but not all. 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. Don’t worry if your entries don’t show up immediately – we need to approve them once you’ve entered the data.
Note to the Good Folk Below the Line
I enjoy reading all your comments and I’m glad I’ve created a “safe space” for lockdown sceptics to share their frustrations and keep each other’s spirits up. But please don’t copy and paste whole articles from papers that are behind paywalls in the comments. I work for some of those papers and if they don’t charge for premium content they won’t survive.
I know it becomes difficult to navigate the comment threads after 24 hours. One alternative to continuing to post below my updates is to move to the forum on Lockdown Truth. The creator of that site has extended a warm welcome to everyone here.
Shameless Begging Bit
Thanks as always to those of you who made a donation in the last 48 hours to pay for the upkeep of this site. It usually takes me several hours to do these updates, which doesn’t leave much time for other work. If you feel like donating, however small the amount, please click here. And if you want to flag up any stories or links I should include in future updates, email me here. (Please don’t email me at any other address.) I’ll try and get another update done on Tuesday.
And Finally…
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
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Toby, you say that Johnson had Covid-19 – do you not find it quite extraordinary that a man released from intensive care was pictured a week or two later doing press-ups?
I do not believe he had it at all.
How time flies, BJ went into IC on 7th April, the press-ups interview was published on 28th June. More than ‘a week or two’.
Thanks — you’re right.
Maybe so, but I still don’t believe he had it.
What he had was “mild ICU”. He spent time there just being watched and sniffing extra oxygen, and not intubated. If that’s all you get you are fine once you kick the virus.
I think he just had surgery to remove his brain. Minor operation, very small organ.
The larger organ, unfortunately, is what he is lead around by.
Do you mean Cummings…?
Surely both of them have the same drain brain.
It is made from heavy metal? Oh, led?
Makes sense!
I didn’t know he had one.
Replaced with a lizard brain, no doubt!
I’m starting to think he’s been replaced by a woke clone.
I’ve often wondered if there was a psychosomatic element to Johnson’s illness.
I won’t be surprised if there is. Not to mention having a new OH and baby would I suspect cloud his brain and judgement.
He was in ICU but never on a ventilator. It’s the use of a ventilator that is so debilitating for many months afterwards. It can take 12 months to recover just from the use of a ventilator – let alone whatever else you were suffering from making a ventilator necessary
I think he had a mental breakdown, and needed rest and recuperation out of the public eye for a couple of weeks.
And Bill Gates wanted him out of the way.
His MK Ultra programming needed re booting so he would no longer have any morals or conscience to get in the as he and Prick Hancock destroy Britain.
Providing he had any to start with.
I think his election campaign proved him completely devoid of both morals and conscience.
Interesting thought
Hadn’t thought of that one. It would explain a lot, including that new ‘I think I may be on dodgy ground here’ look when he’s been talking about certain things. Whatever happened, his brane has certainly not been functioning in the same way it was last autumn/winter.
There was something weird he said afterwards: “They gave me litres and litres of oxygen”. As if the main descriptive term for oxygen is its “litresness”. To me, it seemed like a line fed to him by a medic rather than something a real person would actually say. Like being shot at and saying “There were grammes and grammes of lead heading for me”.
Yes, I can’t think of specific examples, but I’ve noticed that he’s been ‘a lot less than fluent’ in what he’s had to say, and in the way he’s said it, on a number of occasions in recent weeks. Maybe it’s just sleepless nights with ‘t baby? (Though I’d be surprised if they haven’t a maternity nurse in to do all the night shifts, at least.) Whatever the case, something about him has changed.
UK government to invest £170,000 in elite sex-parties firm, with taxpayer holding equity stake – media report
https://www.rt.com/uk/494404-sex-parties-government-funds/
Phew. Shopping done today, more than usual, should keep us going for several weeks while I sort out online alternatives if our usual haunts submit to the mask culture. Just as a reminder of the arrogance displayed by some shops, a barber in Clevedon is now open, with a sign outside his shop. “by appointment only. No mask, no service”. Very abrupt and in yer face. I’d tell him to shove it. There is really no need for such wording on people’s boards. Hope he goes bust. But he won’t. Mind you, there was no one in there on both the occasions I passed by, and it is a Saturday….in the past he’s been queued out the door.
Same here , they can all get stuffed. I will not wear a mask . I will keep my money until this madness is over …and I don’t mean any virus
That’s exactly what I am going to do and they can all get stuffed!
The polar opposite of a friendly welcome, that sign!
If he’s no business, then hopefully he will go bust.
‘You went off the rails into insanity’: BAFTA takes heat online for imposing diversity quotas for Games Awards contestants
https://www.rt.com/uk/494370-bafta-games-diversity-online/
Boris looks such a plonker wearing the ill fitting blue face nappy. I had a deja vu of a stag party where the chubby host ended up with the strippers blue silk thong stretched over his head .
He really has been a disappointment.
OMG I can’t get that picture out of my head, Peter!
If this is an attempt by Boris to make us all feel safer when we shop or work (and most of us have been happy to shop and work since March, without wearing a face nappy) what sort of message is it trying to portray? You wouldn’t want to visit somewhere where a bullet proof vest was a requirement because that wouldn’t be a safe place, would it?
This chap solved the problem in February. https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/video-shopkeeper-coronavirus-face-mask-union-jack-thong-a4371761.html
I thought it telling that of the other three people in the picture, two were completely maskless and the other had tucked his under his chin!
It also looks like one of those pointless and useless surgical masks. that masks is fine in a surgery scenario situation but as for stopping the virus? Nah. Just a load of totalitarian control freak BS. The demonstrably racist fascist dirty filthy cheating lying cheating Chinese must be falling over themselves laughing.
‘disappointment’?
Please accept the Annie Award for Understatement of the Year!
Peter, you can have the Miriam Medal as 2nd prize for the same achievement!
Also, isn’t it time Toby Young could come up with something better than calling Johnson a ‘bedwetter’ when he is apparently about to introduce such a draconian, humiliating, antisocial and destructive measure as the epidemic is now over. Surely you could risk speculating just what the man’s game is?
We all know this is not about a virus and not about our safety. I’m not sure that it ever was.
As I said below the previous post, Guantanamo Bay prisoners were kept kneeling, apart, hooded and forced to wear the same blue face masks that you see everywhere now. Well, it made us think when we saw the photo.
Of course. it is not about the virus. It’s all about the vaccine and keeping the fear factor going until they’ve got enough of Gates’s toxic special brew to genocide us all at one sitting. The UK government has been up to its stinking armpits in this whole wretched corona farce since day one. We are in very desperate trouble.
They’ll be telling us to wear orange next!
We’ve got a similar picture in our front window, highlighting the mask and with the slogan ‘As worn in Guantanamo since 2002’
I posted earlier but if you refuse to wear the mask does that mean that Boris intends for people to starve or wear a mask, is he actually saying and is it the case for the Scots that if you refuse to cover your face in a shop, you cannot by food and that is supported by the British Government?
The terrifying thing is, some earnest highly paid focus group probably met late into the night to discuss the best design for the PM’s face mask for this shot, to instill optimum voter confidence. “PPE mask?” “No, too contentious.” “How about a rainbow?” “No, no, let’s make it … NHS Blue!!!”
Conservative blue??? Let’s face it, he would never wear a red one!
Krankies had to be fashioned out of the corner of an old shopping trolley bag. I believe the mask is a statement about the simplicity of the wearers brain.
He ought to have a very red face.
To be fair he looks a plonker even without one.
Gawd. I can’t unsee that!
Zoinks!!!
His mask looks like a jockstrap!
That’s because his face looks like a ,,,,,,,,,,,,
Well, it is covering a prick.
Mandatory face masks will be introduced in England next week, I have no doubt. Boris can’t lose with this one. If he makes them mandatory then when there isn’t a second wave he (and all the face mask fans as well ) can say it was entirely because people had to wear masks everywhere. If there is a second wave then he can spin it that a second wave was always predicted and how much worse it would be without mask use. How can anyone prove different – just like with Ferguson’s crappy model back in March.
Mask wearing seems to be what a majority of the public want – why would he go against that when he’s already let the media and the public bounce him into a lockdown? I think he knows it will have no actual impact on virus spread but if it’s what the public want and (he thinks) will persuade people back into the shops and pubs then it’s an easy decision for him.
The question is – will the Welsh Government continue to resist the pressure against face masks? If England shift position I can’t see them holding out for long but they’ve said they would require further scientific evidence before changing their stance. However as so many researchers seem determined to prove face masks are a game changer I’m sure a piece of research will appear soon
Wow, are you telling me that our anti-mask hopes rest with the Welsh government?!
They’ve been surprisingly militant in their assessment of the efficacy of face masks. Given their ultra cautious approach in every other aspect of the lockdown it’s beyond unexpected.
Not disagreeing – I called it a few days ago -masks next week. But he can lose. If people outright reject en mass. Its not the woke Scottish with the scot nat fan base he’s dealing with. Police cannot enforce. Social shaming unlikely in England. I think there’s room for a massive misjudgement at this stage of their game.
Do you think people will reject it outright though? I have no faith in the majority of the British public. Certainly the overwhelming view point I see from my Facebook friends is that everyone should wear face masks at all times. Of course social media is probably not the best place for assessing real world attitude but even so I think once it’s mandatory people will comply.
Yes. Huge pockets of folk. Much more so than here. Genuinely. Liverpool, Leeds, Manchester, Sunderland, Walsall, Wolves, Stoke… these are places with sensible no nonsense folk in them. Hartlepool, Whitby! I sound like a lemon jelly tune but! I grant you Ipswich and Bath might go along.
The sell isn’t comolete in my estimation.
But as I said, I did call it as a done deal by next week.
I am originally from Manchester…its no longer as you say…Chorlton,Withington,Didsbury etc are full of woke PC loons.
If 61% are in favour of deleting their isn noses and mouths, that leaves 39% who are not.That’s a lot of unhappy humans. They need nudging.
Think its time to ditch your facebook friends….with friends like thsese…….
Very few people have been wearing masks here (present at bus stops under the chin but virtually none before 15 Jun ).
Today there were even less than usual in supermarkets.
It’s almost a tacit response to ‘no mask’; ‘no antisocial distancing’
How about sending truckloads of masks to the BBC, #10 Downing Street and the House of Parliament for starters? Pick them at the Underground and deposit them in boxes at a makeshift pickup station where you exit?
Most people in Yarm where I live are not wearing masks. This suggests to me that in Yarm at least people don’t want to wear them as if they did they would be wearing them. I am so angry and disillusioned with Boris Johnson.
A disappointment to some, but for others he has lived down to expectations.
I thought he looked as if he’s got a pair of knickers on his face!
I look at Boris and all that comes to mind is that somewhere there is a village missing its idiot.
Serbian police arrest 71 protesters, including Brit, as mayhem over Covid-19 restrictions continues
https://www.rt.com/news/494478-serbia-belgrade-protest-arrests/
Ruptly youtube continue to stream live the protests. Peaceful presently.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/coronavirus-in-japan-tokyo-rejects-lockdown-despite-surge-dnrsstppc
Coronavirus in Japan: Tokyo rejects lockdown despite
Coronavirus: Sweden’s death rate falling faster than the UK’s
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8505699/amp/Swedens-coronavirus-death-rate-falling-faster-UKs.html
In that Mail-on-line article they poll 61% want masks, as in Scotland.
This is ‘The Science’ the Government follows, so, it’ll be an announcement on Monday for England then.
but also in The Daily Mail:
Coronavirus: Sweden’s death rate falling faster than the UK’s
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8505699/amp/Swedens-coronavirus-death-rate-falling-faster-UKs.html
I don’t believe these polls. If this is true, why is it that where I live in Essex no more than 5% are wearing masks to shop. If they were worried enough to report their preference for masks, they’d be wearing them now, wouldn’t they?
I see YouGov have just put out another poll stating that “only” 38% of British people wear masks, compared with much higher percentages elsewhere in Europe:
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1281638035462004739
This is absolute bollocks! I’ve been out and about quite a bit recently and I would estimate fewer than 5% wear masks. These polls as misleading at best, downright lies at worst.
Agree – 5% max in my area
Same in Yarm on Teesside
virtually no one was wearing them in Scotland before she made us and now almost everyone is wearing them.
Inside I agree. Outside not so much and also early days… let time pass and people think bugger it, this truly is pointless and no police doing anything (they can’t). There’s a lot of good in junk rules being brought in for people to see through them and grow past them. Patience! Hope!
Boris is in a cracking position. His masters want him to do it. He knows the population won’t follow suit. Bring in a law tgat people flout immediately isn’t the best way to look strong.
Sturgeon feels untouchable, she needs kicking out.
Kicking certainly, and I can think of a few more locations.
Keep Kicking Marxists…someone has a breitbart profile with that name lol
Yep, I’m wearing them in shops too now. Ineffetually perched on the end of my nose so my breath bypasses the mask and doesn’t fog up my glasses. So they’re quite tolerable to wear this way. I’ve had to wear a fair variety of masks in my chequered work history, from dust masks to full breathing apparatus, so I’m pretty much au fait with how to make a mask work, if there’s any significant risk I know full well how to wear the thing properly. In the meantime I’m basically pretending to wear one.
‘in Europe’… where in Europe? Certainly not everywhere..No Scandinavian countries have mandated masks, nor are they likely to!
I think 38% SAY they wear them to the pollsters. But when they go out…. they actually don’t.
I think the polls are skewed and the papers are happy to report them.
And of course pollsters always tell it like it is.
Went to the park this afternoon. It was busy. No masks, except for one South Asian man whose wife and kid were maskless.
If this is accurate why are – my very rough estimate, in my local area – only 10-20% of people wearing one when out shopping currently?
I’d say about….. maybe only 1 in 50 round where I live.
Much less than 5% in my locality. Did a big shop on Thursday, saw just one masked plonker in a mask in the car park. None in the supermarket, including staff.
None at all in Aldi last night.
Don’t trust these polls and surveys, must be fake.
I don’t see all that many of them about where I live, but I suspect that many of the worst covid bedwetters are barricading themselves inside their homes.
So while the figure does seem really high, it may be that those out on the streets are less fearful anyway.
This makes no sense. If 61% wanted compulsory muzzling there is nothing to stop them having warn masks for the last 3 months yet I would say no more than 5% of people wear them in south Derbyshire where I live.
Whichever side you take in the lockdown debate you take, you would expect the virus to fall off more quickly in a country which didn’t lockdown, having experienced a bigger wave of cases in the first place. I’m definitely an opponent of lockdown however I’m disappointed that Sweden hasn’t experienced a greater decrease in covid mortality, it seems more likely that lockdown or lack of has made no difference to the curve.
“people will begin to ask tough questions of the Government” – yeah, right.
Re Toby’s cancel culture discussion on sky
This is the correct link
The one he has takes you to the Ice Cold in Alex lager clip … (unless John Mills is Toby and Sylvia Sims is Owen Jones
It´s been cancelled
Coronavirus furlough windfall for big businesses
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/coronavirus-furlough-windfall-for-big-businesses-pkw8zh92z
The law of unintended consequences
Paywall! Give us the juicy bits please …..
Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, has defended the £9 billion bonus scheme that will pay £1,000 to companies for each worker taken back from furlough.
Labour has criticised the policy, saying that it would subsidise firms that planned to bring workers back anyway and was not a big enough inducement to prevent redundancies.
The plan was also questioned by Mel Stride, the Conservative chairman of the Treasury select committee, after it emerged that officials had refused to sign off the plan because they were uncertain of its value for money.
Here Cheezilla:
Shares in some high street companies rallied as investors caught on to the prospect of a one-off boost from furlough bonuses in January.
JD Wetherspoon, which put 43,000 people on furlough, is potentially eligible for £43 million, if all employees returned within the timeframe. Also likely to benefit are Marks & Spencer, which furloughed 27,000 workers, and Next, which furloughed 44,000.
In a letter to the chancellor, Jim Harra, head of HM Revenue & Customs, said that while there was a “sound policy rationale” for the scheme he was “unable to reach a view that this represents value for money”. Under spending rules officials are required to request a written ministerial direction for any policy where they cannot demonstrate value for money from the taxpayer.
Robert Joyce, of the Institute of Fiscal Studies, said while it was not a “small” subsidy it might not be enough to make a difference. “In a normal time that is not at all a small subsidy, but it is a lot less than we had been providing through the furlough scheme and in these times it is doubtful how many jobs that might save if labour demand continues to be very weak.”
Thanks H.A.
Interesting video https://youtu.be/7NCD6lvxlKY from Tony Heller about the number of virus’s that emanate from the place called Wuhan. 1996, 2009 and the latest.
Boris and his cabinet should face a ‘reckoning’ now
I’m sharpening my flaying knives and studying pictures of St Lawrence on the gridiron.
Boris and his cabinet are desperate, flailing around blaming everybody but themselves: supposed sweat shops, care homes, Sage, PHE. Good grief, even Jeremy Hunt is accusing the ‘Science’ of groupthink. Overall, not a pretty sight, but it shows the heat is being felt.
There is no heat because there is no opposition. And if you have no opposition you can do what you want with alacrity.
A friend of mine has been telling me about the abrupt mental decline over the last few weeks of two elderly neighbours, who each live on their own.
‘Reckoning’? I hope that bastard Johnson swings for what he’s done.
Sadly the same is true of my 90yo father. Former managing director of a multi national company his decline, particularly verbal reasoning, in the last 3 months has been shocking. Confined to his flat, unable to master basic IT, his children and grandchildren forbidden to visit until last weekend, no church, no friends, no trips to town on his scooter. He seems to have filled his time writing lists in respect of his funeral arrangements. He’s just given up.
That is very very sad and hard to hear. I feels so angry as I am in a similar situation with my father living in a care home
Thanks. My heart breaks for them both. Sending you a virtual hug. If we were in the same room it would be a real one!
Very sorry as well. My father-in-law lives on his own and while he’s fairly competent with IT and is in better shape this year than he has been two years ago, he’s fed up and wants his life back.
My dad is at the point where he’d rather have a few weeks of normal than a year or two of continued isolation. Reminds me of a quote from Steel Magnolias “I’d rather have five minutes of wonderful than a lifetime of nothing special”.
Yeah, my father-in-law said as much – he misses going to concerts and eating out. He went to central Edinburgh for the first time in three months and he noticed how depressing everything was.
And that’s without bumping into wee Jimmie.
That’s very sad to hear and it makes me angry that lockdownistas still think the right thing was done.
NO! NO! NO!
If only a prime minister still said that in the house of commons lol
So sorry for you. They embarked on this hideous lockdown it would seem without any thoughts of the consequences on the economy, education, health including mental health and what it would do to elderly people. It’s inforgivable.
That is appalling. And the worst thing, for the rest of us, is the thought of how many people could tell, and are telling, the same story.
You and the others must come forward as witnesses when retribution comes. It reminds me of how the Nazis murdered the disabled by gassing them. Our current Nazis’ method is slower, but just as sure.
“Death by a thousand cuts”
There will be no retribution unless there is vocal and plentiful opposition. Currently I don’t see it. It’s a friendly p[lace being here but it isn’t proportionate. Sturgeon has videos of kids thanking her for saving their lives. Most people are brainwashed and are lost to any cause. Which is the point I think.
I think there’s always a difficult trade off to be made with the health of elderly parents and this applies in non covid times too. Basically, are we just shielding them from risk just to give them a few more joyless months of life. In the case of my very frail Dad, he loved seeing my kids, but often enough he would miss seeing them for fear of being laid low by the bugs they were carrying. Now I think he just should have seen them anyway, coldly put, the benefits outweighed the risks. Or put another way, if you’re so decrepit that you’re likely to die anyway, why not enjoy the time you’ve got?
It feels like this point is a duration tipping point. A few middle aged friends are finding things more difficult as of about a week ago.
Somebody needs to make it very personal.
Disturbing echoes of life on the Costa Blanca here on the north coast of Kent. A friend had supper at a formerly excellent local gastro pub recently. Food served on paper plates, drink in plastic beakers, coffee in cardboard cups and names and phone numbers demanded. So an attempt to escape the insanity for a few hours proved anything but. Yet ‘spoons and the local (non-chain) Italian restaurant have provided food, drink and a welcome at least as good as in the past. Let’s hope that the panicking gastro pub comes to its senses before it’s too late.
Well clearly, keeping well away from the gastro is the order of the day.
Giving personal details is voluntary. Its tyere on uk gov website covid advice to hospitality
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/maintaining-records-of-staff-customers-and-visitors-to-support-nhs-test-and-trace#how-records-should-be-maintained
Apologies if you know already, good to keep this circulating.
Reposting, as it was posted just before change over:
Hello All,
Firstly, thank you so much for all the kind words last night. It’s been very encouraging having you here. (And another thank you to Toby for creating this space for us).
Meeting in person has been proposed, and I am volunteering myself to do some organising… we’re on the road at the moment and could do several locations, but also, because my identity online is very easy to check out, and I think – rightfully so – people may have hesitation about sharing identifiable info. If you google TyLean…. you will find me. (I may have dropped in the search engines having lost interest in the social media game).
Please email tylean at tylean dot com. if you want to meet in real time – let me know the geographical area you’re happy to travel and rough dates/times you can meet. Also you can email if you are happy to host and/or have suggestions for a good venue.
So far, somewhere in England near the Welsh Gulag border is looking a promising location, but can revise as I get a better idea of who’s in.
Thank you!
That’s brilliant, TyLean, you’re a star.
As soon as Gulag Wales acknowledges the existence of Other People, I’m on.
I’d be happy to do a meet up as well. Lockdown Sceptics unite!
I’d be happy to meet up with fellow lockdown sceptic. I live in Yarm on Teesside.
I’m in London.
nope – top of the google search page … interesting web site .. interesting artwork!
Thank you!
Sounds like an interesting idea
I may have to organise my escape from the East Midlands open prison though …
Loughborough here.. ready & waiting
Swadlincote here. Happy to support and help!
Tunnel john.. that would be the inspiration the community needs a tunnel from Liecester to the Welsh Marches, unless you can pull a Colditz and build a glider in your attic. Come to think, arriving in a pommel horse might be the way..
We do have a tunnel in Leicester out from lock down zone. Used to train coal here from coalville way. Any way I prefer the option I took Friday night. Drive out of here for a night at a mates in West bridgford. Any police stopping me would have been told where to go…
Humanity always finds a way!
Thanks for the responses everyone! I have had some emails as well from people keen to meet but who don’t comment. I actually “watched” without commenting for many weeks, so that’s good news…. there are a more people with us than we realise!
I’ll give it to tomorrow morning before I work out logistics to see if anyone else pops up interested. Plus…. it’s been an insane 24 hours, and my brain is fried, lol.
Really looking forward to meeting you all!
Devon
I’d be happy to do a meet as well. I live on the Pest side of Windsor. Please forgive me if I wear a mask while moving around London – it’s for protection from facial recognition software.
Great idea! Buckinghamshire/northants borders.
Sounds a grest idea…i’m down bristol way but happy to travel…
I have a very nifty badge on a lanyard stating I’m except from wearing a mask. Who’d have thought it would be this easy? The lanyard is wide and orange and has “MASK EXCEPT” printed on it in a repeated pattern. The badge is solid plastic and slots into one of those holders people in offices put their passes in.
Wore it yesterday in a supermarket. I was the only person, bar a sprightly looking elderly woman, who wasn’t wearing a mask. The shop was very busy. I did get a few eyeballs from afar, but on the most part, everyone ignored me like they were ignoring everyone else. This “don’t look people in the face” thing is new, right?
The girl on the checkout looked absolutely broken and kept adjusting her mask while handling people’s purchases…
I also had to pop into a local small supermarket today and dropped the lanyard over my head before going inside. The shop had a sign on the door referring to the Scottish Government’s “guidelines” – not laws – on face coverings being required.`
Again, no one paid me any heed, including the two members of staff standing near the entrance, both wearing masks. This time I was served by an assistance who wasn’t wearing a face covering. I was tempted to ask her why…
From these two excursions it seems in Scotland the face covering “law” isn’t being enforced to any degree and it relying, as Sturgeon wants, on public cooperation.
Hi Mark. Are you able to say where you got your badge and lanyard? If possible I’d like to get one. Many thanks.
You can find them on eBay.
Just ordered 2. Best to be prepared! I was just going to carry one of my husbands spare inhalers and pretend to be asthmatic but this is even better.
I have mind in car, ready to go whenever I need it.
My oldest told me that he wandered into a shop on Friday evening to pick up beers, didn’t wear a mask, no one said a thing.
Just like Face from the A-Team (what an apt name). Act like you’re everything you do is legitimate and people won’t question you.
Right there with you Tony – since last night I’ve been contemplating some kind of drastic hunger strike rather than be forced to shop for basic goods with a muzzle/nappy on. Such is the inhumanity of it all.
So Boris wants to muzzle every customer in England, no doubt to reassure the bedwetting contingent that voilà – this magic piece of material over one’s mouth and nose stops the virus dead in its tracks, and now we can all safely spend some of that lovely money in pubs, hairdressers and eateries in order to boost the ailing economy.
An economy whose throat this reckless government is determined to keep its boot firmly planted on. Anyway, here’s a solution to kick-start the economy, Boris. It costs you nothing. It won’t take away any more of our precious freedoms. It doesn’t come in the form of a syringe, which may disappoint the Bill Gates’ of this world. Call a press conference. Gather the nation around their TVs. Invite all of the corrupt mainstream media to attend. And you come clean.
Come clean about every last bit of it. The dodgy models, the decision to go into lockdown, the utter failure to lift restrictions when it was abundantly clear the virus was receding, the colossal failure to protect nursing homes, the heinous waste of taxpayer’s money that is test and trace, the cruel deprivation of an education for millions of our children, I could go on.
Most of all, and the whole point of this intervention, you need to tell the millions of people you’ve petrified with relentless fear-porn and Covid-propaganda that actually, the virus is nowhere near as lethal as first thought. Healthy under 65s have an infinitesimally small risk of death due to this disease, and its presence outside hospitals is virtually non-existent save for a few asymptomatic cases.
Of course none of this will happen, because you know that would require you to immediately fall on your sword, and give up the one job you’ve dreamed of holding since your school days. Ironically however, by not doing this and doubling down further on this ridiculous charade, further plunging the nation into crippling debt and killing tens of thousands due to delayed cancer treatments and the like, you have already cemented yourself as the worst Prime Minister in living memory.
You have set a timer, counting down the days til the truth will be exposed and soon, every man, woman and child will know of the awful deeds you and your cabinet have enacted during this pandemic. That, Boris, will be the end of you and the rest of your days can be lived under a cloud of eternal shame.
Hear, hear, excellent! This is what I wrote to my MP on 23 May.
‘If HMG could admit that it has made a terrible error people could in time forgive it and accept that its catastrophic decisions were made with good intentions although based on what turned out to be bad advice.
If HMG cannot admit this it will be unforgivable.’
Not in living memory. That’s only about sixty years. How about worst Prime Minister since before Walpole?
Like, worst ever!
To think we thought Theresa May was bad..
Excellent post.
Hear, hear. He can still salvage his reputation with a mea culpa but I seriously doubt that he will admit that he’s made a mistake. I can imagine him holding on to dear life until he’s stabbed at the back by his fellow MPs who finally have had enough.
Or if our citizenry reenact the 1848 revolution and forcibly remove him from No 10.
If the 1922 Committee were really to think long term, they would start to move against Boris. At present he is just about holding the reins. In a few weeks time when the scale of economic devastation becomes more apparent, the mood of the nation could get very ugly indeed. What then?
Perhaps, aware that the Conservative Party will be unelectable for twenty years, they prefer to hang on and take their chance. But they could consider their duty to the country and start a process from which some of them might emerge with honour.
One hopes and I can imagine that the mood among the 1922 committee is turning ugly. However I suspect they are biding their time, after all he who wields the knife will never inherit the crown.
Mr Bart and I have been talking about the possibility of rioting and where it can start. I believe that it can start anywhere but if it was in London, the shops along Oxford and Regent Streets should start playing nice with customers because they can be the targets for possible revenge when the mood turns really ugly.
There will be some discussion going on, you may be sure…
When Boris was in hospital, they were planning to replace him with Jeremy Hunt or Sajid Javid, according to Mason Mills..
I don’t think that there is an honorable politician alive in the country at present, no matter which colour or hue. And they know that. No matter which way we vote, we’ll get sh*te and they know that. There’s not a piece of bog roll between them. They should be ashamed, but they never ever will. We, the electorate, are just a mild irritation to there corrupt, free loading lifestyles. We have no chance
Simon Dolan said he’d pay for anyone willing to stand up as an Independent at local elections. Anyone interested?
Duty, honour, this lot????????
Over a million people filled the streets in 2002 to protest invading Iraq. It has been eerily quiet ever since. How about some good old bloody mindedness folks? Put on masks, flood the streets of London and then toss those masks in the air in unison in front of #10 and the House of Parliament. I’m rooting for all of you.
Well done. The truth clearly expressed. It does help to know that there are honest clear thinkers out there.
It’s good to read thoughts like yours Scotty87.
Thank you, Basics. I find it difficult to contribute to this forum as much as I’d like due to having 3 kids under 5 including a nearly week-old daughter!
I mostly just have my rant and leave it at that, but I do very much enjoy browsing the glut of fantastic content always guaranteed in the comments section here.
Keep writing for your children’s sake! When they grow up they’ll be able to boast that their mum (hope I’m not misconstruing situation!) was one of the voices of the Great Liberation.
Haha I’m a proud dad Annie but thank you for your kind words. If I can post just a mere fraction of the quality you have added to this forum over the last few months, I will certainly call that a success!
Congratulations to your wife and yourself on the birth of your latest baby!
Thank you kindly, Tim. Scary time to be bringing kids into the world, but it gives you a burning desire to fight this madness which is further crippling our society with each passing day.
Boris could be taking a massive bung from Scamazon.
That should be printed on a million flyers and distributed nationwide!
Wonderful post. For me, the smallest salve of comfort in these ruinous times will be if Johnson finally gets his reckoning and suffers the legacy of being the worst PM in history, after wanting the job for so long and even having the opportunity to rise above the madness and cement his status as a Churchillian leader (original herd immunity strategy). He has blown that opportunity.
Thank you, Poppy. You are exactly right – and to think how much he would be revered by huge sections of society if he had chosen the herd immunity option!
Deaths due to lockdown would be non-existent, domestic abuse and child abuse wouldn’t have horrifically spiked, the mental health of the nation would have been largely preserved, the economy would be in a far better state than we currently find it…the list goes on.
Johnson is a coward who doesn’t believe in very much. This crisis of his own making has ruthlessly exposed his incompatibility with high office.
A coward like the cowardly lion in the Wizard of Oz.
Spot on, Scotty! I won’t forgive or forget his loathsome, damaging, cowardly actions.
Excellent analysis. I agree Bottler Johnson is the worst PM in living memory; I didn’t think Bliar could be surpassed in that regard, save, perhaps, by Komrade Corbynov. Well, we dodged a bullet only to be kiboshed by a mortar. At this point I feel a political orphan so I send a heartfelt plea to Nigel Farage to get the Reform Party up and running ASAP. There must be plenty of his former BP colleagues (rational actors every one) who could play a useful part.
Only one point where I disagree:
I fear that won’t happen. We’re in a situation like that described by James Thurber in his account of ‘The Day The Dam Broke’ – we have a populace that largely believed the lie, and went along with the mass hysteria. They will not easily admit their error, their stupidity, their culpability. And so the lie of Covid-19 will persist for many years because it affords greater psychological comfort than admitting they were fools.
An excellent post! If only Boris had the courage to do it, I think there would be an awful lot of people who might be prepared to forgive (if they wouldn’t forget) the last three months. We can but live in hope…
Theresa May signing us up to net zero made her the worst PM ever.
Then in December, Boris could have thrown that out. He didn’t so that instantly made him as bad as May.
But now he has gone a step further with this lockdown.
So if this was a game of “Top Trumps British Prime Ministers” Boris Johnson would definitely be the card that would make your heart sink when you drew it.
If Tony is reading, Courage mon ami!
Chin up, Tony. It is always darkest before the dawn.
Hey Tony, don’t worry – the fact that you have been worried just means you are a human being with some self respect.
Just say you’re exempt. Lying is very easy when the people you are talking to don’t deserve the truth. Say you are vulnerable to hypercapnia (which we all are of course). Or say you’re not a deviant into public bondage.
The law gives exemption if wearing a mask causes severe distress. No need to explain, though, just plead exemption.
Yes Tony, take heart from all the lovely people here. We all have so much sadness but together we will help each other. Keep your chin up Tony we need you
Carry this around on your device (if you have one) before it gets taken down
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQo79HRUksk&feature=youtu.be
This video was very good.
Perhaps we should invest in these Oxygen monitors and go out in force and offer to monitor muzzled people’s oxygen levels – they may start to get it then.
Could also buy the finger ones.
There was a great video of an American women who had gone for a post covid check up and been forced to wear a mask who’s oxygen reading was about 90/ The Doctor said to take off the mask and sit for 5 minutes before testing again. It went up to 99. Boy was she mad!
Thanks Everyone,
But I will wait to see what BS our beloved leader brings in on Monday – if it’s just shops then I just won’t go in any!!
But if it’s everywhere – then I know there is no way out of this – the legislation is in place for a minimum of 2 years (and he won’t let that go) and the population is now brainwashed into this – so masks will be here to stay
Ironic that he said only days ago that kids won’t have to wear them when they go back to school.
This dystopian new normal is not worth living in, and there just aren’t enough of us to over turn things.
Just don’t wear one, the law caters for your severe distress. The Nazis back down when challenged. Totally unenforceable if mandatory outdoors, so don’t worry about that. Just avoid Spain, and you’ll be OK.
Don’t let the buggers win, Tony! Every positive thought you have is a poke in their nasty little piggy eyes.
It,s really, really time we started meeting up. Tiny needs sane people and so do we all.
Hang in there Tony, please. Possible plans afoot to fight back big time and I don’t mean riots.
Hoe exactly could Jezzer have been a worse PM than BoJo the Clown?:
At this point, I’m starting to wonder that myself.
Jezzer would have brought in the red army by now
Pre-op rules are keeping people from vital surgery, warns senior doctor
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/11/patients-postponing-elective-surgery-draconian-pre-op-coronavirus/
Under NHS England guidelines any elective patient due to have those operations should only be admitted to hospital if they remain asymptomatic having “isolated for 14 days prior to admission along with members of their household”. Even then, they should have a “pre-admission test” to double check that they do not have Covid-19.
This is absolute fucking madness. Anyone thinking this is justified needs locking up – not for crimes, for insanity. (And then for crimes once they get out!)
Yes this is correct. Medical friends are telling me they have extended times of nothing to do because people don’t want to self isolate for 14 days or are afraid to go anywhere near a hospital in fear of catching the terrible virus. Very very poor.
My husband had been having a few stomach issues back in March and was due to have a private procedure (camera down throat) on 1st April to rule out cancer. This was cancelled and the hospital phoned yesterday – earliest appointment 5th August and whole family to self isolate for 14 days beforehand. We have 3 teenagers – no chance are they staying in. Fortunately all symptoms have cleared up which is lucky as a 4 month delay on a diagnosis could be life changing. Wondering if I can get a refund from Bupa for my lack of medical cover during all this!
Just lie to them. They deserve no better.
Looks like they’ve run out of Old People to cull and now need to start on the Ill People. Delaying cancer operations is a good start on that goal.
And if they die in the interim, who bloody cares, eh?
If mask-wearing in shops becomes mandatory, I shall do all my shopping online. Mask wearing (as in cloth masks often touched) is unhygienic, impedes communication, impedes vision thru steamed specs, is hot and unpleasant, and perpetuates fear. As well as being unnecessary. I’m astounded any conservative govt would even contemplate it.
Already I’m gravitating to Tesco who have relaxed somewhat, and for pubs where phone numbers are not taken. The best thing the govt could do is say: “Right, as you were,” and let everything open and anyone attend.
If so, those who are vulnerable or anxious (or fearstruck through repeated propaganda) would not go anywhere; understandable. But everyone else would (swiftly boosting business and revenue). After a few weeks of no increase in covid deaths it would become apparent the risk is negligible – as in well below a bog-standard annual flu-season, and thus reassured everyone could get back to normal.
We need normality. Not just for our personal well-being, but for human contact with families & friends, care of our vulnerable,, schools, leisure, cancer care/screening, normal health service, normal courts/legal processes, and normal work, enterprise, investment, optimism, happiness.
Keep it up Toby.
We’re taking action against the government over face covering.
Please help if you are in the media/PR business.
We need to use this to at least shift public opinion.
Look at the latest post. More information coming regularly. Thanks
Good luck.
Thanks
All the best!
Thanks
Can only offer cash when required as have no relevant expertise, but go it!!!
Have shared onwards.
Mr Bart and I went to Central London today as a very popular place for afternoon tea was doing an offer so we booked a table to have a long delayed joint birthday celebration. The following were our observations:
Walking down Piccadilly and Regent Street, it wasn’t as dead as it was a few weeks ago but still not that many people and barely anyone going inside the shops. Walked past Waterstones, Hatchards, Gap, L’Occitane and a few more big name stores and they were pretty devoid of customers. Even the Royal Academy wasn’t exactly heaving unlike last January when we went to see the Picasso exhibition.
If Boris thinks that mandatory muzzles will get more people out and spending then he’s very mistaken, if anything that would spell the death kneel of Central London and the various high streets up and down the country.
The thing most likely to get people out and about is seeing other people out and about in as normal fashion as possible.
Exactly. There was more of the normal behavior along the Soutbank – no antisocial distancing and hardly any muzzles.A few food trucks have set up shop and Westminster council even provided portaloos for people to use.
This is a decent rebuttal against face mask wearing if you’re healthy:
https://twitter.com/angiebUK/status/1281973694575910923
Don’t know how to link multiple images so have posted the most pertinant one for those who don’t have a Twitter account.
It also made me think. The argument for masks is that they may help in case you’re infected. But they definitely do not help if you’re healthy and can in fact be detrimental to health.
I remember an eminent doctor who used the analogy of face mask usage by healthy people as like building a chain link fence to stop mosquitoes
I think the point is if you’re healthy the mask isn’t protecting anybody and it’s actually bad for your health.
Exactly. It’s very much an immunity suppressant and impedes proper breathing. No wonder people I’ve seen wearing them constantly touch their face because they’re struggling to breathe and probably already have too much CO2 in their systems.
My phone decided to go for a burton this morning, so rushed into town this afternoon to the O2 shop. I have recurrent problems with my hearing, which have flared up again recently. I swear to God, she had to repeat everything to me 2 or 3 times behind her face nappy. Really was hard work making out what she said. Would have just left, but I needed a phone, and it would have been the same anywhere else. Would love to have told her to just take her stupid mask off because it muffled her voice, but it wasn’t her fault — she looked as pissed off to be wearing it as I would be.
Witnessed a similar incident today as well, waiter who was muzzled had to repeat what he said 2-3 times to a customer who was hearing impaired. Felt sorry for both as it was clear that the waiter was pissed off with having to wear a muzzle and customer apologetic at having to ask him to repeat to her what he’s just said.
I see this as one fatal reason why the mask is doomed. Even the most hystercally scared won’t endure repeating everything. One lady on the street today in full face visor and mask asked me for directions. Simply could not hear a word. She’ll reflect in time how fast she was to pull the mask down to get her words heard.
I do have a bit of a hearing problem but if I come across anyone in a mask I have to talk to I just tell them very loudly I can’t hear them and could they remove their mask. Everyone so far has complied. Some happily so.
I’m no expert but… so could compulsory mask wearing cause a spike in cases?
Let’s keep an eye on Scotland…
How?
People wearing masks repeatedly will be reducing their immune system function and also breathing back in any viruses they would otherwise have expelled through breathing freely..
I don’t think either of those things would cause a spike but both are genuine concerns.
If everyone wore masks all the time (and that reduced transmission) it would reduce immunity and matters might then be worse (from other viruses) when everyone took their masks off at some point in the future, presumably after having been vaccinated for Covid but not for anything else.
Breathing your own virus back in is a concern because it might give an already infected person a lung infection when previously they just had a basic cold (upper respiratory tract) but it wouldn’t increase the total number of people infected (although some of them might test positive for longer and that might be interpreted as a spike).
No masks guy.
That may be so, but that won’t cause a spike in cases of a virus that barely even exists in Scotland.
Might cause a spike in chest infections though.
The Scottish crest has fallen! What a sublime and unintended put down to all the macmask wearers! So true John!
Thank you. My mother is a Scotswoman.
I don’t think anything much will cause a spike anywhere in the UK (apart from small and unimportant fluctuations) as it looks like we’re basically at herd immunity.
Could masks cause a spike in a place that had very low immunity? Possibly yes if the confidence they gave people exceeded their actual ability to limit spread.
Could possibly get face masks tested for germs to see what they come back with?
Greetings from a new convert..For a while I was a neutral but I’m a data nerd and comparing Sweden and Norway’s infection curves on the John Hopkins site and realising they were exactly the same took me here.
One related issue to get the ball rolling. Why, when NHS figures for Covid 19 deaths are down to 20 or 30 daily do we get daily figures averaging three times that number? Per the ONS, care home deaths are pretty limited nowadays, so they can’t be the source and there is no audit trail or any further details from PHE. I can only suppose that these are individuals who tested positive but were either unaffected or too ill with other complaints to be worth treating. Either way they shouldn’t be in there. I rather fear that Government and Civil Service statistical incompetence is placing a serious millstone around its – and our – necks.
I think that sometimes the reporting of the deaths is delayed by several weeks.
If you’re asking about death figures the numbers most people see, on Worldometer for example, are reported deaths. These are deaths that happened sometime in the past dating back weeks.
The graph for the actual day people died looks very different and there is a lag between when the deaths reported are reconciled with when they happened.
Thanks!
Just want to say welcome to the site
!
Seconded! Always pleased to meet a new recruit!
Welcome to the club! The more the merrier!
The ruling against Simon Dolan in court seems a likely contributing factor in Johnson’s announcement on masks. I can’t imagine it would have happened if the decision had gone the other way.
I’m wondering if the two cases being brought regarding the closure of churches have also contributed to the mask decision – whether churches will now be told they can re-open, if people wear masks.
The case being brought by Christian Concern will be of particular sensitivity for the government, as they are invoking our Magna Carta rights – I somehow don’t think the government will be wanting the subject of our constitutional rights discussed!
If the churches are re-opened before the case reaches court, the judge will just be able to say a judicial review is unnecessary because churches are no longer shut..
I hope Christian Concern do not accept the wearing of masks as a pre-condition of opening of churches, which would seem to me to defy common sense. But yes, this may well be the government’s thinking – which does not say a lot for the government’s thinking. I am supporting the case brought by Christian Concern, and would personally not be happy about having to wear a mask.
My local Catholic Church (which I attend) started holding daily services with Holy Communion last Sunday – no masks required.
Thank you for the info – I shall check locally.
How utterly wonderful!
Our Anglican and free churches are still tightly shut ( can’t open because of the impossible ‘precautions’), but the Catholic church us now open for private prayer and they welcome all comers. Bless them! If they re-start services I’ll be there. I don’t accept all their doctrine, but God is in their brave and generous hearts.
the CofE won’t do anything ’til the local imam approves it.
I long to be able to snortingly dismiss your comment.
But it’s just too plausible!
Write to them to ask them not to agree to that, they need to consider all side.
I don’t go to church so can’t honestly say I’d go otherwise I’d email them myself.
It would be ridiculous anyway around me as the two churches near me are large and have few parishioners so there’d be no problem with social distancing.
I was set upon by 2 stooges on Twitter yesterday. I wondered where the third one went.
The Guardian: Man plans to sue NHS after cancer surgery delayed due to coronavirus.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/jul/11/man-plans-to-sue-nhs-after-cancer-surgery-delayed-due-to-coronavirus
There are no winners here. It’s a total F-Up what’s happened/happening.
I met a friend today who is a pathologist. She described seeing things now that she’s not witnessed before. Advanced stage cancers which should have been caught weeks ago. She said it was unprecedented and frightening. The backlog will take months to clear.
Lockdown zealots don’t want to know though
Sadly, there will be a cancer epidemic.
This is so sad was so avoidable
It begins…..
Is there a reliable way for a non twitter user to extract all the tweets from a given account? Supposing an account is being used to cause fear in a nations physche and someone wanted to record the account. Is it techincally feasible?
I am thinking in terms of the reckoning to come. Thanks for any suggestions.
I don’t think you need a Twitter account to view someone’s tweets. And even so, you can always set up a fake Twitter account.
Thanks. I find it impossible to follow with threads spirallying out wards. If there was a way to capture the content such as page sucker that would really enable me to study – a kind of firm set of tweets. I will spend time uograding my tech skills. This account is doing serious damage to a nation.
It’s probable Brigade 77 our own arm propaganda corps that is being used by Boris to keep everyone terrified.
13th Signals too.
I’ve seen people on Twitter asking for an unroll to do just that. Never done it myself so Googled it for you:
https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/25/21152579/twitter-thread-easier-full-text-reading-unroll-how-to
Excellent Nobody thank you. Unroll is the concept.. new word to me. I aim to plot against events. I suspect to find correlating tweets with events to give some insight into how deep unelected appointed ‘experts’ have gone to shape a nations thinking. Unrolling will be just the thing.
I htink there is something called an unroll or roll up where they condense things. Not sure if each tweet needs to be numbered though beforehand.
To be fair to Boris, he’s probably wearing a mask to lead by example. You can argue all you want about whether or not wearing a mask is good, but the government position is, wrong or right, for better or worse, that masks should be worn. So Boris is following his own guidelines, at least in this respect.
You can call him wrong, deluded, ignorant, but at least you can’t call him a hypocrite in this particular instance.
“To be fair to Boris”
But I don’t want to be fair to Boris.
He’s misinformed, incompetent and completely out of his depth. I want him out of number ten as soon as possible.
If we were fair to Boris, it would be to offer him a choice between hanging, guillotining or de-fenestration.
I would add shooting or being forced to reenact Sisyphus for the rest of his life among the options.
Oh the latter, the latter.
And read Albert Camus’s The Myth of Sisyphus while doing it.
And the general public allowed to boo and pelt him with rotten food, stones, rubbish and milkshakes.
Make that window nice and high.
No, no choice for Bottler, just as we’ve been afforded no choice since this entire farce began. I recommend that fine old English tradition: hung, drawn and quartered. And that it also be applied to the rest of the rogues in Westmonster and the devolved administrations. After all, Bottler Johnson shouldn’t have the fun all to himself.
Problem is, who have we got to replace him?
To an extent I am not sure it matters. If he goes, which is unlikely to happen soon, the key thing is that the reason for his going must be made clear – that the wrong course of action was taken, and it was all a huge mistake.
Sadly, what is more likely is that he will either stay, because the opposition are so useless, or he will go but be replaced by more of the same.
Not one f***ing MP has spoken up, so I don’t much care who replaces him, unless whoever it is publicly apologises for the damage done.
“not one MP has spoken up” …. it’s just mind boggling to me that no one, not one single solitary MP has had the guts to say that this whole farce, the complete eradication of many of our most basic civil liberties were swept aside. The very fact that not one of our elected representatives has raised the slightest concern is, to say the least, VERY CONCERNING!
Steve Baker had a bit of a stab at it and then seemed to back off.
I could probably trap the hedgehog living in our garden at the moment, if anyone wants ?
“misinformed, incompetent and completely out of his depth”
Absolutely right.
He’s a populist what do you expect. No substance at all.
Of course you can call him a hypocrite it’s fucking photo op
That’s all he is doing. Photos. He’s certainly NOT running the Cabinet
He is an ABSOLUTE hypocrite!
He is standing amongst un-masked shop staff, sporting a blue bag on his silly, silly face and begging to be loved by the MSM.
“lead by example.”
He had the opportunity to show leadership at the start of this – his Churchill moment – and he panicked and blew it. Everything since then has been a combination of cowardice, and arse-covering. They love the power and are shit scared their blunder will be exposed and their careers finished.
He is utterly cynical. He knows very well masks are useless, he knows very well Leicester didn’t have a real problem and it was manufactured.
It’s all theatre.
He is much worse than a hypocrite, much worse than wrong, deluded and ignorant.
As someone said earlier, he’s the worst Prime Minister since before Walpole.
Also the PM doesn’t go shopping, he has people to do it for him. As we have seen, the insane they make up for us do not apply to them, which is standard operating procedure for despots.
“arse-covering”, yes indeed, since about the beginning of April
Bollox. He loves gimmicky photo ops. It’s probably the last time you’ll see him wearing one.
Er, yeah you can call him a hypocrite since he’s been going along with the whole masks have a limited effect line all along and now is changing his tune, according to the shifting science of course! He’s a buffoon, the worst and most devastatingly incompetent PM this country has ever known.
BS – they’ve been highly sceptical about mask wearing until about a week ago.
A fixed poll sad somewhere that masks were good and he believed it for the virtue signalling and pat on the back he’d get for it
And yet here you are – voraciously reading every post (that means hungrily…) and taking time out from masturbating and eating Pringles to type a few unintelligible gobbets of shite. You can’t get enough of us, can you?
Your mother (that’s her in the lounge just above your head) must be so proud…
Grant MM, the Muzzled Moron…and super Gimp
Superb takedown. Grant goes to the doctor: “Doc I’m worried about my cock, it’s orange”. Doctor, concerned Grant may have been the victim of an industrial accident asks Grant what he does for a living to which Grant replies”Oh I don’t work, I just sit in my mum’s basement all day reading lockdown sceptics, wanking and eating Wotsits”
First weekend in our house in Pembrokeshire since house arrest. Small coastal village village not far from Tenby, very popular with tourists.Expected it to be a ghost town, but it was heaving! Local brewery pub was doing take-outs. First cask-conditioned beer for four months! Heaven! Lots of people in party mode! One sad, masked guy out of hundreds. No anti-social distancing at all! Such a boost to the spirit!
Hey, you’re in my part of the world! Welcome! Enjoy!
I visited Pembrokeshire with my Cotswold girlfriend just before Christmas in 1976. Saw the pre-Christmas parade and took a tour of Pembroke Castle. I still have the brochure that I bought there.
Pembroke Castle is great. So is everything in Pembrokeshire, apart from the usual quota of zombies, who dominate the local media ( avoid).
I do hope you appreciate the nasty-notice-free footpaths that I have been sanitising for you at great personal cost (in dogshit bags).
Hi Annie, I live in Montreal, Quebec, Canada now. Pembroke Castle is now a far away memory that I still cherish. I have reread the brochure that I bought there many times in the past forty years.
Pure fear porn:
https://metro.co.uk/2020/07/10/43-local-areas-where-cases-coronavirus-are-soaring-12970913/
Take Southampton for example. The shocking headline reads that cases have increased a staggering 1087% as they have jumped from 0.4 per 100k to 4.8 per 100k. Holy crap!! We have risen from 0.00039999999999999996% of the population to 0.0048000000000000004%.
Lock yourselves away, the end is nigh.
Or maybe increased testing? Either way fuck all to worry about.
The map itself is literally like a slice of doom painted in guache in a 1940s propaganda unit…! Stunning. There is a connection between press and local press in all this. Our local rag did exactly the same story for 15 areas around the city giving huge 15% figures and so on. It was soon worked out that the areas matched carehome locations. Next day, the 8 areas where covid had never been. Bit of a shocker that!
New Zealand looking to seal its borders for years to come with any visitor locked up in their cell for 2 weeks and to undergo multiple tests.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2020/07/new-zealand-to-quarantine-people-for-months-maybe-years-as-covid-19-rages-around-world-epidemiologist-michael-baker.html
By heavens – still, as they walk about upside-down, what else would you expect?
Jacinda Ardern is insane.
Boycott New Zealand!
The decent moderation of today will be the least of human things tomorrow. At the time of the Spanish Inquisition, the opinion of good sense and of the good medium was certainly that people ought not to burn too large a number of heretics; extreme and unreasonable opinion obviously demanded that they should burn none at all – Maurice Maeterlinck
Stop buying their lamb and they will be bankrupt inside 6 months.
Isn’t all their lamb Halal these days?
It has always struck me as very odd that we import lamb from the other side of the globe when the English countryside is crawling with them.
Field lice.
Hey, back off! Our local sheep are far more intelligent and better-looking than our local zombies – and the latter provide neither meat nor wool.
Your local sheep taste better than the zombies too.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/11/second-wave-covid-swedish-approach-will-have-right-along/
If there is a second wave of Covid, the Swedish approach will have been right all along
The catastrophe never arrived. As in most other European countries, Sweden saw a peak in Covid-19 deaths in the first half of April followed by a steady decline. Shown on a graph, the pattern of mortality is indistinguishable from that of many countries that locked down. Its daily death toll rarely exceeded double figures and has been below 30 since mid-June. As in Britain, half the deaths were in care homes and two-thirds of those who died were aged 80 or over.
……………….
It is now considered gauche to compare Sweden to Britain, Italy, Spain or any other country that had a higher death rate. You are only allowed to compare it to its immediate neighbours where the death rate is lower. Mention the UK or, heaven forbid, Belgium (which locked down a week before the UK and has the highest COVID-19 death rate in the world) and you will be told that they should have locked down sooner. The proposition becomes unfalsifiable. Heads they win, tails you lose.
“If there is a second wave of Covid”
I’m going to make a prediction. There won’t be.
Oh, I think there will be a second wave. It’ll be manufactured of course (after all, look how the media seems to no longer report deaths but infections – always go with the largest, scariest number), but it will be there.
Or failing that, they make comparisons using a rolling average deaths per million on a chart. The one I saw conveniently stopped on the 19th June, when Sweden had just added a load of historic care home deaths. Hmm. They’ll try anything to twist the stats. Anything.
The peak we saw was probably the second “peak “
The idea that the world suddenly managed to catch the first peak is daft.
The peak was simply an increase in awareness and a change in the rules to maximise the number of cases seen. Every flu like symptom was to blame for every death
On a positive note, played a full game of cricket today. It was great to be playing again. We had spectators so had to virtue signal the hand sanitising every 6 overs but many faked it. A doctor on the team backed up much of what the Surrey doctor said but would not go far as to say ambulances were blue lighting.
Vast majority thought measures an absolute pile of shite. One player involved in testing (blood rather than pcr) and interesting said that evidence suggests that antibodies are expected to last 8 years.
Used the opportunity to mention some stats and figures and got good response from those that had never questioned anything.
Oooh, dear, I do hope you sanitised your balls.
There was copious amounts of ball sanitising and we are all safe and well. Thank you for your concern Annie
Is there much ball tampering at the level you’re playing at?
Great news that you’re back playing. Amateur horse sports re started this week. I didn’t attend myself but I know lots of people that did. One event had 1000 entries on it’s first day! People are really keen to get back out there.
Sport Endurance won’t restart endurance riding because riders and Marshals are too fearful of the virus. We ride 700kg of unpredictable horseflesh at speed across open country. The marshalls stand miles apart on bleak open terrain often in pouring rain or burning sun. And we’re scared of a not very fatal virus?!
Another endurance rider
I used to be, but prefer trotting in circles these days 
There seem to be quite a few horse riders/horse carers on here, including me. I wonder if it’s because we have spent our lives realising it’s more important to live fully doing what you enjoy, than being frightened of every little risk?
I’m here, because the horse needs a rest from time to time, but anybody who is totally occupied with sensible equine matters is fine by me!
Encapsulates the entire insanity. My riding instructor used to face death or serious injury on a daily basis, backing horses she had never seen before, but the Bug has her literally cowering in a corner. She’s in her thirties and as healthy as a …
Re every 6 overs! This miraculous croni can count overs now! It is a remarkable little fellow.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/11/learn-workers-rights-will-count-little-no-work/
We’re about to learn that workers’ rights will count for little when there’s no work
Staff could get legal right to work from home, says Matt Hancock
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/07/10/government-could-pass-new-law-give-staff-legal-right-work-home/
“This could be a government backed right to loaf on your sofa.”
That’ll be good. Such a shame I work in heavy manufacturing.
…. and would result in more job losses
This song from The Kinks:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0d0MYMl5a8
Urgh what a nasty piece of human excrement you are. You’ve exceeded even your own very low bar. Keep it coming because, reading what you bring here, makes us right and you’re… well you’re just scum
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/11/government-preparing-ease-restrictions-using-public-transport/
Government preparing to ease public transport restrictions to get people back to work
Last week, the Department of Transport removed from its website the guidance that public transport should be avoided to prevent the spread of coronavirus. It continues to urge people to work from home wherever possible, consider “cycling and walking before using public transport”, and avoid rush hour travel.
I wonder if that was on the back of Bojo being accosted by someone about lack of buses when he was walking around in his constituency. Read it somewhere
He’s a populist don’t you know.
Dear GrantM
I really think you should stop posting abuse here. It’s not healthy. I think you should try to find something else to do. I’m honestly not trying to be patronising or snarky here. I disagree with your views, in so far as you have expressed any, and I get the impression you disagree with some of mine, but I think we should agree to differ.
Please argue a case, for something you sincerely believe in, without resorting to abuse, and you’ll get some reasoned debate. Otherwise I hope you can find something more life-affirming to do, as this cannot be good for you.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/11/asymptomatic-patients-should-tell-gp-have-covid-antibodies-case/
Asymptomatic patients ‘should tell GP if they have Covid antibodies in case of long-term effects’
Kate Ellison
11 Jul 2020 7:06PM
Anybody else as sick of all this as I am?
.
Sunak photographed carrying plates of food around in an enclosed space, no mask then Johnson photographed in a shop a couple of days later, mask on. Now we hear he’s likely to announce masks will be mandatory in shops at the same time as social distancing, so why wont masks be equally important in restaurants? Oh, because you wouldnt be able to eat
It’s all the biggest load of bs I’ve encountered in my life.
No doubt if you test positive to antibodies for the Wuhan flu you’ll have to declare it on your life insurance, just another way for them to scam the masses.
Boll**ks to the lot of them.
You can’t see a GP these days anyway. But regardless, how will this work? If your leg falls off in 2040, will they blame that on an asymptomatic infection you had 20 years ago?
Dies of Covid19, 40 years later
Just never get tested. Ever.
At this point in time they can’t force you unless you’re coughing and spluttering all over the place. And if you’re doing that, you should be in bed.
It’s all a means of getting our data to sell. Black gold – worth billions
https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/leicester-news/belgium-government-warns-citizens-not-4317640
Leicester is the only UK location to have been put in a “red zone” of risky destinations in Belgium’s travel advice.
Also placed in the red zone are regions in Portugal and Spain.
I’m sure that’ll devastate the Leicester tourist industry, Hawk …
Visiting those high end factories where FAST fashion is made!
Government won’t reveal Leicester’s test and trace stats
https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/leicester-news/government-wont-reveal-leicesters-test-4315141
The Government has said it will not share the number of people being contacted by test and trace staff in Leicester and Leicestershire – despite the current outbreak and local lockdown.
LeicestershireLive asked the Department for Health and Social Care for a breakdown detailing how many people in the city and county have received calls from the call centres set up to track down people who have been in contact with those who test positive for coronavirus.
The Public Health England report that put Leicester into lockdown, revealed Leicester cases “form part of a current study on the utility of backward contact tracing which is being piloted across England”.
It stated Leicester city residents have been included in the pilot but revealed just 11 cases have completed the study successfully – the target was 50.
I read somewhere that they were going door to door in one area in Leceister (think I saw it on twitter) and the narrative made it clear they were to comply
Chinese virologist accuses Beijing of coronavirus cover-up, flees Hong Kong: ‘I know how they treat whistleblowers’
https://www.foxnews.com/world/chinese-virologist-coronavirus-cover-up-flee-hong-kong-whistleblower
Looks Like Sweden Was Right After All
https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/looks-like-sweden-was-right-after-all/
In other words, Sweden is rapidly approaching the endgame which means that restrictions can be dropped entirely and normal life can resume. They will have maintained their dignity and freedom while the rest of the world hid under their beds for months on end. They won’t have to reopen their primary schools because they never shut them down to begin with. Numerous reports indicate that young children are neither at risk nor do they pass the virus to others. Most Americans don’t know this because the propaganda media has omitted the news from their coverage. Here’s a clip from the National Review which helps to explain:
The Diamond Princess is so very inconvenient for the lockdown zealots. Have tripped up so many using that ship and its Covid problem.
That I’ll fitting blue face mask reminds me of a posing pouch my husband once got in Secret Santa. Maybe if Bojo tucked in a rolled up pair of socks, it would look more impressive? It worked for my hubby
No joke. Daily T. some weeks ago was solemnly explaining how to make a mask out of an old sock.
I am disappointed by your use of foul language. But perhaps you are suffering from Tourette’s.
I wonder whether Grant M’s diatribe, referring to lockdown sceptics as selfish, followed on from the Guardian’s injunction to us all to cover our face with masks. This would then be standard SJW stuff: the moral imperative has been set and everybody who even dissents is evil and to be cancelled. It seems at least possible to me that Boris Johnson may also have bee
ninfluenced by a growing demand for mask-wearing; whether it makes any sense from an objective point of view is of course beside the point.Pulling a close fitting filthy rag full of pathogens across your nose and mouth cannot be good for you but that’s what the “government” want us to do.
GrantM comes here for attention sometimes Phil.
Twins separated at birth? Nicola and Wee Jimmy
https://twitter.com/dht1690/status/843600495042269186/photo/1
“‘Civil servants are told to read up on Dominic Cummings as overhaul looms‘ – Turns out, the Cabinet Office has drawn up a 20-page synopsis of Dominic Cummings’s famously prolix blog posts so incoming officials can brief themselves on the great man’s thoughts”
Anything on how as soon as he joined the SAGE meetings the lockdown order was instantaneously made? Based on nothing but bollocks from Neil Ferguson and Dom’s fear of Spanish Flu?
The descent into mad Maskism really spends the end for this government. They’ve turned victory into defeat,confidence into cowardice and the economy into mincemeat.
Right people.
Calm down.
This is all drivel and we all know its drivel.
The best option in not to get angry but ignore it.
I live in London and travel on the Tube and buses unmasked.
I have been stopped a few times on the Tube (never buses) and simply present this (I’ve printed out loads of them):
The Health Protection (Coronavirus, Wearing of Face Coverings on Public Transport) (England) Regulations 2020 – Reasonable excuse
4. For the purposes of regulation 3(1), the circumstances in which a person (“P”) has a reasonable excuse include those where—
(a)P cannot put on, wear or remove a face covering—
(I)because of any physical or mental illness or impairment, or disability (within the meaning of section 6 of the Equality Act 2010), or
(ii)without severe distress;
British Heart Foundation
https://www.bhf.org.uk/for-professionals/healthcare-professionals/blog/coronavirus-and-heart-conditions-what-patients-are-concerned-about#mask
Should I wear a mask to protect myself from coronavirus?
‘No. Wearing a mask if you have a heart condition is not recommended as it could / may make breathing more difficult.’
Once that is displayed I have never had an issue. You are under no obligation whatsoever to prove any of this.
Simple.
It’s even better when on the tube the conversation goes like this after being questioned:
Me: Are you a married man constable?
Constable: Yes
Me: Are you embarrassed to tell your wife what you do for a living? Well you should be. Harassing people going about their business and threatening them with little bits of paper because they are not wearing a face nappy. You are an embarrassment. You should be ashamed of yourself. Is this why you became a police officer?
Constable: Just doing my job
Me: Go away and leave me alone.
The look in people’s eyes (I was going to say faces but they were muzzled and I couldn’t see) when they hear this interaction is amazing. Given this was the Piccadilly line with foreigners going to Heathrow, seeing a policeman being spoken to in this way was a shock to them.
I’m going to Loch Lomond on holiday in 2 weeks and have these prepared for North of the Border:
The Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions) (Scotland) Regulations 2020
PART 5 Interpretation and expiry
(b) any person under 70 who has an underlying health condition, including but not limited to, the conditions listed in schedule 2
SCHEDULE 2 Underlying Medical Conditions
2. Chronic heart disease, such as heart failure.
8. A weakened immune system as the result of conditions such as HIV and AIDS, or medicines such as steroid tablets or chemotherapy.
Don’t get mad.
Ignore them
Not all conversations with the police would go that way and after your arrest they could check on your social media posting and prove your objection was political. At the least you’d have over a year of worry you might end up in prison. Oppression is effective as we see all around the world.
Piffle
Yep, sorry OKUK, have to agree with Scotty on this one.
Well when we see the mass protests against mandatory mask wearing I’ll be proved wrong won’t I? How are the mass protests going in Scotland?
Who was talking about mass protests?
I had a 20-25 minute discussion with a local plod, asking him at one point whether he had joined up to enforce a police state. (He said he was only obeying orders.).
If everyone has a polite but firm conversation, when approached by plod on these matters, they’ll be back investigating trans-hate offences before you know it.
I can’t believe your naivety. The police have orders of the day. If they didn’t arrest you it’s because they were told to go easy. If there are no mass protests that means the oppression is working.
Naivety. Anything’s possible. You might be a perceptive human being.
If they didn’t arrest me it’s because they didn’t have anything to arrest me for. I couldn’t resist suggesting he go off and pursue some real criminals as a parting shot.
There are no mass protests because for four months, we have not had a free or even a balanced voice. Oh, and because at least 80% of our brothers and sisters are lazy, stupid, or both.
I think you are kind of making my point for me except I would say most people are not lazy or stupid just genuinely frightened – often more for their families than themselves.
After four months, with oodles of internet, what other than laziness or stupidity (fear ?) justifies them not having educated themselves ?
(Trauma-based mind control via the media notwithstanding.).
I hope you reminded said Plod that the old “I was only following orders” defence didn’t work so well at Nuremberg in ’46…
I hope you and Scotty are right… I want to be wrong like I have never wanted to be wrong in my life. But read about Spain above. Watch youtube videos in American counties. It’s coming this way, too.
Goddamn I hope you’re both right.
Spain <> UK. Some of them even think Sergio Ramos isn’t a cunt.
USA is obviously v big – I’m sure things vary from the conformist to the Constitutional there.
Should it come, there is always the exemption route, the hermit route, or the “At least I can give the magistrate some useful information.” route.
Liberal use of the C word never won an argument.
Worked for Derek and Clive.
You c*** – it never f***ing did.
At the end of the day “mandatory” still only means “guided insistence”
Afraid not. Mandatory means legally enforceable. With fines, etc.
I intend to write “This is what fascism looks like 2020” on mine.
I’m with Scotty on this.
Scottish Gov advice:
http://www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-phase-3-staying-safe-and-protecting-others/pages/face-coverings/
Says:
“You may also have a reasonable excuse not to wear a face covering if, for example:
you have a health condition or you are disabled and a face covering would be inappropriate because it would cause difficulty, pain or severe distress or anxiety”
I reckon the fact that “The Science” tends towards evidence that masks are bad for your health is a cause for “anxiety” without the need for further evidence of any medical condition other than “being a human being who needs to be able to breathe safely”.
Politics is all about who controls the language. Perhaps we should call them pathogen rags rather than masks.
Let’s call Covid19 Microbe Aggression.
Someone called them “vanity hammocks”
They say every cloud has a silver lining, all remains is to discover whether it is sunshine or lightening. For many the easing of the lockdown seems worse than entering into one, and the government are indeed heading for a day of reckoning.
There may be time to do something about it – I don’t mean the government they will have to take their chances now. I mean the many business managers and employees wallowing in a sea of fear of one kind or another. There have been a couple of articles by different authors having a unique insight in the U.K. workplace. One by an occupational physician, and the other by an employment lawyer – together, in my view, join the ‘dots’ that banish that fear.
First the workplace is not a hazard: https://dailysceptic.org/covid-19-as-a-workplace-hazard/
This is later reinforced with what a reasonable man or woman would recognise as a common sense and pragmatic approach to reducing risk in the workplace: https://dailysceptic.org/covid-19-as-a-workplace-hazard-part-2/
Finally, the equally pragmatic counsel of the lawyer offers concrete examples about how to deal with the consequences of that fear spilling over into the workplace: http://www.jacksonosborne.co.uk/2020/07/covid-19-is-not-a-serious-and-imminent-danger-risk-assessments-might-be/
The difference between possibilities offered by experts and MSM and reasoned probability is your sanity.
From feeling positive at the real common sense on display on these comments … to disgust at BBC ‘reporting’ ….
This on their current news pages:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-53371441
Professor Trisha Greenhalgh from Oxford University, who argued for widespread use of face coverings in April, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme the vast majority of scientists “are now persuaded by the evidence” that wearing masks in crowded places can reduce transmission.
Asked about the suggestion that face masks benefit others more than the wearer, she said: “Broadly speaking, if I’m wearing a face covering it might protect you 80% and it might protect me 20% or 30%.
“There is a little bit of protection for the person wearing the face coverings but it’s not nearly as much as it protects other people from the droplets coming out of the person’s mouth.”
It’s a shame they never share any of this science with us… just models and saying ‘look – Japan’ but they know full well most people don’t look past the statements.
I find it more and more sinister how they can just lie and treat us as if we’re below their level. Urgh.
Today was a bad day… had to go to Next to take something back – hand sanitizer was compulsory and I was grumpy about it but later apologised to the door lady (I only grumbled) because I know it’s not her fault but I may send off an email to Next.
Later on visited a very nice cafe, an independent but was shocked when they asked for our contact details – I had thought this was only a pub thing so was caught off guard and didn’t want to start an argument with my wife so let her give our details. Next time I may say no thanks. However it is one of those places which is truly independent and they are lovely so would hate them to suffer economically.
Later on, walking by a green space on a residential area and spotted one of those red covid signs ! Sigh!
Need to go figure out what type of ‘mask’ I will wear if made to! Eg a paper bag or maybe a plastic one and write on it ‘you wouldn’t recommend suffocation with one of these – so why a mask?’
It’s been sinister for a long time.
I just gave a fake name and telephone number when asked for mine. I pointed out it was optional but the waitress already looked terrified at speaking to a human so it was easier to make up information…
If Matt Handcock gets this virus, the contact tracers will need to visit pubs and restaurants all over the land.
Didn’t he get it a week or so into lockdown?
Allegedly.
Remember that Lord Lucan’s real name was Richard John Bingham and his address was 46 Lower Belgrave Street, London, SW1W.
Folk who say “look, Japan” (or any other Asian country) don’t seem to realise, or conveniently overlook, that face masks became popular there to keep diesel smuts out of their respiratory tract, especially in cities. It had nothing to do with preventing the spread of disease.
And don’t forget too that mask wearing in Japan has lead to all sorts of psychological problems especially with their menfolk.
She’s another one who used to be at UCL as a professor – which has major links back to you all know who by now.
And oh look who’s doing an interview a while back at the Queen Mary University in London where the good professor also used to work:
https://www.qmul.ac.uk/events/digital-library/items/a-conversation-with-bill-gates.html
OK let’s have some alternative names for these masks. I’ll start:
Pathogen rags
Snot blockers
Germ gatherers
Hidin’ Bidens
Saliva divers
I’ve noted people using “face nappies” as well…
Face Nappies is a good one…. it implies that shit spews forth from their mouths.
I am partial to sanitary towel references, too…. not sure why, but it amuses me.
Clampons?
HAHAHA!!!
Subjugation Attire
I guess “slavewear” says it all…
Pathetic Prosthetic.
I like it!
(Biological) Culture Canceler
Has a double meaning.
WIFI – Weak Individual Face Indicator
Vernon Cole is referring them as ‘naps’ in keeping with the nappies analogy.
DavidC
CO2 inhaler
Compliance appliance
Oxymoron
Thinking of a slogan for my car window:
DO YOU PEE THROUGH YOUR NOSE AND POO THROUGH YOUR MOUTH?
No?
THEN WHY ARE YOU WEARING A NAPPY ON YOUR FACE?
Yeah but replace pee with piss and poo with shit and let’s get real. Otherwise you’re being too polite to the (putative) opposition and, if they abuse you for not wearing a mask, the enemy.
Vanity Hammocks especially if they’re the Boden or Cath Kidston kind.
Submission missionary
Masks for masochists
Insanitiser
Burkah
Half-past midnight in a town in central Spain. The temperature is over 30C but strollers are nearly all wearing face nappies. This is physically uncomfortable of course, but gut-churning for those of us horrified that nearly everyone accepts muzzle-wearing just because the government and media say it is a good idea and frown at those few who dont comply.Actually, here the law mandates masks only at ranges closer than 1-2 metres but more and more local authorities are making them obligatory in all public space, so you risk a fine if you sit alone on a park bench or stroll along the beach with your mask down and nobody in sight. So watch out Britain, this is coming your way
That pretty much speaks to the point I made below about the power of oppression.
You know what kills me about Owen Jones….. He wrote the book The Establishment, which is brilliant. I highly recommend it despite the author. He should KNOW…. that this newfound “power” is at the behest of the establishment, and the cancel culture left are actually pawns doing their biding…. he literally wrote the book!!
There are always establishments, always elites. The important question is: how afraid are they of the people?
At the moment, not very afraid. But that can always change in an instant.
I tried to read that book but couldn’t get to the end. He makes some good points but I found it a little tedious him attributing every little thing to the Establishment.
In these times, I’d be much more inclined to reach for Foucault and his theories on power / knowledge-production which provides a more holistic and philosophical outlook compared to Jones’ perennial underdog / bitter outcast stance. And I’m a (centre) lefty – or was until I became outright anti-government.
I’d rather read Foucault as well to be truthful, but perhaps part of my praise of The Establishment rests in my dislike and low expectations of Owen Jones?
I don’t know what it is about OJ – he seems to annoy everyone apart from a small, very vocal minority on the far left. His heart is in the right place but he doesn’t ever seen to get it. I’d like to see him pissed up throwing a traffic cone at a taxi. Then (and only then) I might start to warm to him
It’s all a con. In the Australian state of the People’s not so Democratic Socialist Wannabe Republic of Victoria there is now an illegal house arrest for a fortnight with the borders of NSW and South Australia being shut. However the Premier, a real dope who took 7 years to do his 3 year Arts degree, gave three days warning of the impending illegal house arrest. That gave the Australian Football League teams based in Victoria time to move interstate with their families and managers and various hangers-on. If it had been such a dire emergency it should have been illegal house arrest immediately. But no, it gave the money making machines time to relocate and take their supposed Chinese killing grandma Wuhan Virus Flu with them. It’s not a problem it seems where money is concerned.
By the way, the cowardly Prime Minster is loaning the Australian Defence Force to help patrol the respective state borders, which are either a creek masquerading as a river or lines in the dirt. Will be interesting if any ADF member shoots and kills a member of the public; that would be murder as they ADF pers are not sworn constables for the states in which they operate. It is also possible if any even touch a member of the public they could be liable for common assault. It’s all a giant con.
In the League of Shame I’d put that photo of Boris in the blue face rag in the top ten along with Obama’s deep bow to the Saudi monarch and Nixon shaking hands with Mao, a man responsible for the unnecessary and unjust deaths of tens of millions.
I trust The Plod, wearing their own real masks bought from China of course, immediately went to Boris’ corner store and arrested those other three in the photo for “killing grandma”.
Of course Nicola Sturgeon (not exactly a Scot’s name is it? according to https://www.houseofnames.com/sturgeon-family-crest “The Sturgeon family’s name is derived from the ancient Norman culture that was established in Britain following the Norman Conquest of island in 1066. Their name originated with an early member who was a person who resembles a sturgeon having derived from the Old French word esturgeon, and indicates that the original bearer bore some fanciful resemblance to the Northern European fish of the same name.”) is a nationalist and a socialist. Now where have we seen that combination before?
If she used her head to nod less and think more I am sure the people of Scotland would be better governed.
lol
Many of the mediaeval wars – England vs Scotland, England vs Wales, England vs Ireland – were decided depending upon whose Normans were the best on the day. Can I also point out that the Norman Conquest was of England, though Normans did end up in every corner of the British Isles. And the Kingdom of Sicily for some strange reason.
Sicily before England in fact
Germany?
Emergency call-out to Toby: please start a Free Citizens Party and scare the bejezus out of the Crap Conservatives so they begin to behave like a sensible government rather than the crazed ape outfit that is currently on offer. Who knows? – perhaps a sensible Free Citizens Party would consign Boris’s Crap Conservatives to oblivion.
I’ve definitely had enough of this nonsense. The sight of Boris in the blue mask was the final straw. Let’s enourage Toby to stop the rot and start a new party that will defend our freedoms. Can I suggest anyone who agrees copies and pastes the following at the beginning or end of their post:
Come on Toby – stop the madness and start a Free Citizens Party now!
I think it’s pretty obvious that Toby is too busy with his work and the FSU to start a party. If we want to start a party then we ourselves need to become more organised and all become one so we can more effectively fight this. This is why I’ve bed pushing using a forum rather that comments here to get organised to do this.
Yes, we have to share the load. I don’t know how he juggles the way it is tbh. He has a lot on his plate.
Anyone any idea how many tons of face masks are being thrown away after use every day? I saw a headline the other day (I can’t recall where it was now, I should have retained it) about the number being thrown into the sea and the potential danger for marine life (specifically whales).
What an absolute clusterfuck.
DavidC
I’ve seen plenty abandoned in supermarket car parks and on pavements. Perfect playthings for toddlers…
I work on/in the sea. Loads of them on beaches and floating about. Plastic free and environment stuff long been abandoned by the normally self-righteous. This along with the impending cholera outbreak due to closed toilets.
Quite. Noticed (most) toilets were open in the Lake District yesterday and some have reopened in North Wales. I’m lucky, so long as I take care about what goes in, I’m something of a camel. But walking past public toilets for the most part smells almost as bad as waste ground in a Third world country.
Loads of them in my area – encounter them and gloves during my walks and litter picking. Its disgusting.
Someone I know shared this on her Facebook page:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/science-environment-53287940/coronavirus-the-masks-you-throw-away-could-end-up-killing-a-whale?fbclid=IwAR0PySc5V5etHzMvZAr8BK1b49T22d-0d33w6rxkfqgIFBB4Rwt7OD74qs4
That’s the one, thanks Bart.
DavidC
You’re welcome.
So it’ll come to this in some people’s minds now:. Choice between killing your grannie or killing a whale. Jesus, let’s have some discernment and joined-up thinking.
.. and no hazard waste bins to throw them in; isn’t that interesting?
I am sure that many people have been driven away from the BBC’s Radio 4-da-Woke and have been seeking refuge in the apolitial world of classical music. Faint hope. On a long car
journey today I discovered that the Stasi-like BBC is closing off all escape routes. There are now enforced Mao-style self-criticism sessions on Rado 3 during what used to be music schedules. During these “discussions” elitist followers of classical music abase themselves and criticise their failure to achieve equality of outcome in all aspects of classical music . Reference was made to how Covid 19 had exposed inequalities
.
On Classic FM too, I noticed yesterday. News all about Covid, and all BS (had me shouting and having to take extra care with my speed), and had one intriguing ad from the government warning us about misinformation. Non-stop propaganda.
Hence why I’ve been boycotting them, its basically YouTube for me now and my CD of the Ring Cycle.
Which orchestra, which conductor?
Thanks :o))
Try Radio Swiss Classic, just music with erudite introductions in German plus a playlist on the website.
Yes I’ve been there before and confirm it’s good. But of course not available on a normal radio. We should all put Internet radio sets onout Santander list.
A few years Back BBC sacked off Mike Harding’s folk night. He knew his stuff, was awesome and had a great following. He covered the tradition of folk music and knew the culture inside and out. BBC cleasned the the established tradition and replaced with an awful woke modern folk programme with faux tradition and rootless radio friendly unit shifters. This had a marked effect on the culture of Folk Music.
Sorry off topic.
This shopkeeper is surely a reader of Lockdown Sceptics? Wonderful!
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/5799786/coronavirus-scotland-glasgow-shop-no-face-masks/
That’s a great sign and its not surprising. A few years’ ago there was a shop in Glasgow that was robbed and the criminals were wearing niqabs!
I would use a sign that simply says “no masks required, I don’t mind if you don’t mind. It’s your choice.”
Agreed. It’s all about freedom to choose, if they want to waste their money and time on a mask, then they should be free to do so, but nobody should be forced to. And those who are ill and symptomatic should just be staying at home, like I would hope anyone with flu symptoms would do…
Good sign glad to see it, but christ that article is disgusting. ‘shocking sign’, ‘gross and terrifying sign’, Ffs-why are the media so attached to this nonsense mask campaign?
Masks
The government’s chances of re-election are largely going to depend on the state of the economy
For as long as the mountain of restrictions are in place, the economy will be hampered
To abolish all of those restrictions and return to normal without admitting it was all a mistake, why wouldn’t the government make masks mandatory everywhere all the time?
It seems like a no brainer. The only question is, how far they will go? Will it be all premises of any kind, indoors and out? Or will it be absolutely everywhere? Either way, if you want to do anything apart from a walk in the park, you’ll be forced to wear a mask.
I suspect the decision has been made. The latest Vodafone ad on TV features random people wearing masks outdoors
If we’re lucky it may get phased out in time for the next election as a goodwill gesture, assuming the pandemic has very obviously burnt itself out
I think you are engaging in a lot of wishful thinking there.
They will not impose masks and then abolish all other restrictions. They will impose masks, impose more masks, impose more restrictions and more lockdown until all small and medium business has been wiped out. They will continue with the terrorising of the population and force medical testing and treatment on people. The masks are just the next stepping stone to tyranny not some sort of path back to freedom.
Wishful thinking? Well I certainly don’t wish for it.
A path back to freedom? I would not regard it as freedom.
Yes the government wish to perpetuate the state of fear, but if they can do this while minimising damage to the economy they increase their chances of being re-elected.
Its sounds like you are saying the government want to make us wear masks so they have an excuse to list all the other restrictions. It sounds like you think the government want to save to economy even if only to save themselves at the next election. You say “If we’re lucky it may get phased out in time for the next election as a goodwill gesture” I refer to all of this as wishful thinking. I don’t mean to say you are wishing for mandatory masks, but that you seem to be hoping they are doing it for a purpose that might be in a round about way of benefit to us.
In my opinion we were a long way from freedom even before lockdown, but we were a hell of a lot closer then we are now. If the government started lifting restrictions after imposing one last stupid diktat then we would be heading back in that direction even if we never actually quite got there.
I don’t see any reason to suggest that the government could care less about the economy or re-election.
I don’t think a politicians ‘success’ is directly determined by winning elections but rather by their subservience to certain agendas. If they do the ‘right’ things they will be given help to win elections and when they eventually loose they will be given opportunities and riches such that its not such a bad thing anyway – look at Tony Blair for example. As a result re-election is not such a concern to them.
At the moment elections can be suspended – they could just prolong the next election indefinitely on some spurious health grounds…
Their strategy – as far as I can see at least – is simple. Convince people that there was a pandemic and that the ‘social measures’ worked. The strategy has worked very well so far, I’d say.
Indeed- going completely back to normal risks having to answer awkward questions
The idea that mandatory masks will save the economy is wrong. They will deepen the damage.
You’re assuming there’s going to be a next election
Are they taking selfies?
‘Multiple errors in the New York Times article about Sweden’s corona strategy‘ – Good takedown of the misleading New York Times piece headlined: “Sweden has become the world’s cautionary tale.”
In this round up article writer Emanuel Karlsten compares the death rates for per million of sweden and usa and bashes NYT article that they calculated the numbers wrong and to save the swedish model he writes NYT is wrong because usa covid deaths are very very under counted so deaths per million usa and sweden are almost equal, citing
” In the US, there have been early reports of the death toll being up to 50 percent more than has been reported, and that the country has had huge problems differentiating diagnoses of those who died with or from Covid-19.”
Hmmm, i am a true supporter of the swedish model but to save the numbers of swedish model by claiming usa is under reporting the covid deaths is funny.
They are reporting, every and anybody dying of anything as covid if they were only positive even asymptomathic. This is over reporting at its best and will truly compensate the missing under reported cases grossly.
Secondly even if a sweden supporter one must acknowlege to sweden’s fuck up in the care home covid preventation measures and causing mountain load of deaths which then contributed to their 70ish % of covid deaths.
Sweden acknowledge that they lost control of care homes. They are far from alone in that of course, but at least they admit to their mistakes. Unlike some countries I could mention.
I don’t know why people consider the USA as a country for the purposes of comparison. Each state is effectively a small country and it would be more appropriate to look at it that way.
Even in the UK the Scottish Government trying to compare 5M people to 55M in England is ridiculous. Look at us we’ve virtually eradicated the virus in Scotland whilst seemingly oblivious to the fact the virus is virtually eradicated in vast swathes of England, even London with 9M people.
Exactly. Although I’d quibble with the word ‘eradicated’ in London, I’d say burned out. Everyone there who was likely to get it has had it by now, and recovered, or died. Herd immunity reached.
Whereas for Scotland and NZ, if normality returns, it might be expected to run through their urban populations just as it did in London. So I wouldn’t say it’s been ‘eradicated’ in Scotland. More like ‘ held at bay’ . If they manage to protect their frail and elderly, they could do a lot better than England though.
I think a lot of the mismanagement stems from having such a London -centric government. England’s towns and villages never needed the measures adopted to prevent viral spread from Heathrow and the Tube.
I think you should rename your shop “The Naughty Step”. Has a great ring about it!
That should make it easy for me to spot the cafe when I visit!
The Old Normal is even better! Puts the message out simply.
Toby: had a flick through the comments on your Telegraph article. One from Jullianne Roberts caught my eye, this paragraph in particular:
“Young implies that the government could have refused to lockdown like the Swedes, but it could not. Teachers were already refusing to go into school, and Macron was threatening a total embargo on people and goods into and out of the UK if the Brits did not impose a lockdown (the EU was determined the big boys here would all go down together on this issue- no significant dissenters to prove everyone else wrong, and worse still, steal a march on the rest of them.)”
I know Micron threatened a ban on UK travellers, is it true that he threatened an economic embargo too? If that is true, I’m afraid that is a casus belli as far as I’m concerned.
Perhaps time to destroy that Channel Tunnel?
That is a good point. I tend to concede to the argument that the government’s hand was effectively forced on 23rd March – MSM screaming for a lockdown, the mob screaming on social media, scary scenes of overloaded hospitals in Italy, and teachers refusing to go to school and Macron throwing his weight around as you say. I still think going into lockdown was absolutely the wrong decision and I thought that right from the very start, on 23rd March, but given the situation and that we knew less about the virus than we do now, it was understandable why the government chose to go into lockdown.
However, it’s the fact that 4 months later, when we have so much more data pointing to the virus being less virulent than originally thought and the apocalyptic predictions of 500k dead have not materialised, that the government has still not admitted that it made a mistake in imposing the lockdown. That’s the nub of the issue. It’s all well and good making a mistaken policy decision but it’s the fact that they now cannot admit that mistake and are actually doubling down on it, despite the fact that we can see the ruinous consequences of that decision unfolding all around us – e.g. massive job losses, cancelled treatments, a mysterious spike in excess deaths not attributed to Covid, etc.
This isn’t a criticism of what you’re saying, which I tend to agree with. However, the thing is that Johnson said on 3.3 that the disease was mild for most people and most will fully recover and Whitty said more or less the same on 11.5. So, between those two dates you’d have thought they’d know more about the virus, and they do, yet they still say it’s mild and that most people, even those in the highest risk groups, will recover. In other words, what they knew before lockdown and what they know now hasn’t changed, for most people it’s a mild disease and it doesn’t affect them, which all the numbers seem to indicate.
Yes I agree with you as well. This is why I have always been a lockdown sceptic because the data was always there but I guess what I meant was that there is now more of the SAME data, showing that it’s mostly mild, which should be even more convincing. But I suppose that lends weight to the argument that the lockdown was a political decision.
And they keep on doubling down on that original “three weeks”.
How valid was the idea we didn’t know much coronavirus as a justification for lockdown. I saw an article on the BBC website dated the 14th of March saying 8 out of 10 people will only get mild symptoms. I understand that on the 19th March the government declared coronavirus as non lethal. To the best of my knowledge the government never used lack of knowledge about coronavirus as a justification for lockdown.
Four months later with restrictions still in place there is a massive elephant in the room lockdown supporters need to answer. The purpose of quarantine is to isolate sick people until their symptoms have cleared. The entire population was placed in quarantine for months with only slow lifting of restrictions eg shops in England couldn’t open until the 15th of June. If the population was placed in quarantine for long periods, you would expect the disease would have cleared from their bodies by now. Despite this we are told there is a still a danger from coronavirus and restrictions must be stay in place. How do you explain this if lockdowns are so effective?
The problem we have is that the UK death toll is 50-60k whereas some countries have had a few hundred.
This is why the goalposts have changed. It’s no longer relevant what the characteristics of the virus are, it could have an IFR of the cold and it wouldn’t make a difference now.
The health advisors will be saying we could have had no deaths and will be pushing for zero deaths moving foward.
Logically if we knew the IFR was 0.5% (for arguments sake) and shielding care homes would result in half the death toll we have (bringing it down to below the toll of seasonal flu) then there is no country on earth that would have shut down their economies let alone be calling for eradication of the virus.
Unfortunately logic seems to have been sanitized from existence.
On the observation that some countries have had few deaths (per 100k population), someone else observed that they were those with a much younger population profile. I expect those like the UK, with comparatively high death rates, are developed countries with sophisticated health and social care, managing in normal circumstances to keep the very elderly and ‘frail’, i.e.with diabetes, organ transplants, cancer treatments etc, alive and functioning in their midst.
But we all know the figures are incorrect. We just need to prove it
I agree with you that there was never a lack of knowledge, hence why I have been a lockdown sceptic from the very beginning, but given the proliferation of ‘health and safety culture’ and the ‘precautionary principle’, I wouldn’t be surprised if the government locked down ‘just to be on the safe side’ and ‘just to get a bit more data’. As I said in my reply to Kevin above, we have more data, but it’s more of the SAME data we had in March, which should convince anyone who reads it that the virus is mild for the vast, vast majority of people who get it.
There is indeed an elephant in the room but as I said, I think it all stems from the culture of the precautionary principle and how the government is now seen as solely responsible for keeping everyone ‘safe’, at the expense of practically everything else in life. So no one is allowed to get infected, let alone die. No one at all.
But the fact that everything seems so conflicting, e.g. scientific advice back in early March – just goes to show that the lockdown was an enormous mistake that has caused more damage than it has prevented. The fact that everything and all the regulations are so conflicting and arbitrary should wake the public up to the fact that the ‘science’ isn’t being followed at all.
Talking great sense as usual Poppy.
I wonder how would people feel if lockdown was applied in other situations where draconian measures are introduced which cause enormous damage but the problem remains. Let’s say the government introduces a law saying that all buses must stop operating and go to garages for repairs as there is a possibility buses have dangerous faults. The buses spend months in garages. The unavailability of buses causes enormous problems for people dependent on buses. Large numbers of people being unable to travel causes economic damage and bus company staff face job cuts. When the buses finally come out of garages the government says the buses may still have faults and there limits how often buses can travel, how fast they can travel and how far they can travel. The government says buses can be recalled to go back to garages at any time. Would people accept this.
Sweden did not lock down and their deaths are not worse than the UK’s..
Ah, but you are not seeing the truth Poppy, the only reason we don’t have 500k dead is the decisive and selfless action from our glorious leaders and NHS
dancers,heroes.That is what the history books and school curricula will tell you anyhow.
Yes, but we were sold the lockdown on the basis of it being to flatten the curve and only being for 3 weeks – and yet over 3 months later, there are still many restrictions..
It was a lie…and I suspected so at the time.
I wonder what happened to the 1000s of fabric masks made during lockdown by well meaning needlewomen to donate to the NHS? There’s a mountain of them somewhere!
Probably ended in some landfill now after gathering dust in a warehouse and rendered unusable.
That’s a good idea. Create a mountain outside no 10
Yes, because you’re supposed to change them every few hours (like nappies!!)
And wash them at high temperatures so not exactly kind to the environment either.
probably stored in the large warehouses they built months ago at great expense and never used .. I think they were called Nightingale wards
They became depots instead
If Masks do become compulsory in shops I can see this backfiring spectacularly and causing yet more damage to the retail sector. He seems to think that fear of the virus is the only reason keeping people away from retail. Whereas he current rules regarding shops are also encouraging people to avoid them with all the other rigmarole required to enter them. Maybe its time for an organized boycott to get the retail sector onside against the imposition of this rule. if this is implemented if people were encouraged to shop online and not use brick and mortar establishments as much as possible for all expect essentials this might be enough to panic Johnson giving how much he was startled into reopening hospitality. Support could also be given to local business who do online orders or operate click and collect so you could collect the item from the door without entering and having to wear a mask.
Simon Dolan is quoting Gove saying masks will not be mandatory, but in the comments people are saying Boris’s friends in retail will do the job for him and decide to refuse entry to the unmasked.. But I’m thinking if owners of smaller shops do not mandate masks, then they will get more custom (and maybe more than they would otherwise have got). But if it is up to shops whether people are masked, then surely it will also be up to hairdressers etc to make their own decisions?
They make up laws then pass it down the chain of command for the people at street level to do the dirty work and enforce them. If you refuse to cooperate, you will be fined a sum of money or have your business shut down.
Was in Richmond today and while the cafes and ice cream parlours were doing a fairly good trade but the clothes shops were pretty much deserted. One even had the gall to put a sign outside that said “no mask no entry” and surprise, surprise – no customers!
Good. I hope they go belly up. Glug! Glug!
Calling up an order and collecting the goods at the door was how my tobacconist stayed in business after the Quebec governmnet declared it non-essential.
The amateurish scientific trials showing that masks work are all ignoring math, the size of the virus and the ridiculously low probabilities that they might ever prevent an infection, reality, that the Masks aren’t worn as perfectly as in these trials most of the time, and the negative health side effects of wearing them.
The only reason to impose them in general is fascist herd control, obedience and oppression.
An additional reason for Johnson and his rabid Brexiteer allies is the same as for the ridiculous quarantine: to deliberately damage the economy as much as they can get away with this year, so that it can rebound more, crediting their no deal Brexit for it, next year.
Crimes against the people.
Johnson is not a brexiteer…he just thought that was the way to No 10….he was right but what a f___ up he has made of it once he was there!
“Muzzled sheepdog looks bewildered. Where’s his owner gone?”
”Don’t worry boy, he’s on his way back from Barnard Castle, won’t be long”
I would have liked to have heard what Owen Young had to say had to say on Sky News.
My early morning walk today: what a depressing experience.
Rubbish everywhere; gull breeding season in full swing so noise ,mess and general mayhem prevail.
Another shop has closed and those that are still in business now have bossy mask notices posted outside.
A walk along the largely deserted sea front raised my flagging spirits : fresh air, sunny and plenty of wading birds and terns to watch, along with the resident heron and some eiders.
On the way home, I exchanged greetings with a pleasant lady who was shocked when I told her about tonight’s planned Sturgeon clap fest.
She agreed that masks were a waste of time, and told me that bus journeys are awful; masks are obligatory and cause great discomfort.
She also remarked on the disappearance of normal sociability: people not making eye contact; no casual conversations at bus stops or in shops and stations : a pervasive air of suspicion and avoidance.
And masks and gloves discarded all over the place;so much for plastic reduction.
She knows people like us who object but are frightened to speak out.
What an awful and thoroughly unnecessary state of affairs; all because of our blundering ,arrogant politicians and their chosen ‘experts’ and ‘the science’.
I fear that I shall only be welcome in 2 shops now, badge or no badge.
The lady I spoke to confirmed that she is only shopping when necessary and I’ve just done an online order; my second.
How much more economic and social illiteracy will we have to endure?
Finally, a tip for relief of anxiety and insomnia : topical application of magnesium helps; either as lotion or spray.
Keeps me ticking over, more or less, so worth a try for all who are suffering.
on a more uplifting note. went for my usual morning walk round town park (not Scotland!!) . Beautiful day. Lakes like glass. Anglers out in force. Fed the swans.. Saw the heron. First time ever saw Kingfisher and a hawk (maybe a Buzzard). Joggers and dog walkers. no masks, no swerving, everyone says hello. Then to mini mart for newspapers. Again no masks. no gloves, everyone happy .
It was almost as if the world was normal. Shame our government doesnt think so
Lucky you! All those birds.
The zip and dart of a Kingfisher blue arrow is quiet something. Wonderful, how can your day get better…!
A kingfisher? Fantastic! The sight of them even if its just a bright blue arrow is a thing of beauty and a reminder that nature marches to the beat of its own drum and is not constrained by the power of man made law and the diktats of parliaments.
kingfisher was across the lake.. just saw a flash of blue and orange as it changed position. It is so quiet at 6 am (even quieter when angling was banned) I have watched the ducks and coots grow up. Coots are fascinating and very tame. Also two lakes each have a resident swan. These will come when i whistle . The morning walk is all that has kept me sane over the last few months
Quite agree kh; and of course, the pests like the f..ing gulls and pigeons are breeding and making the most of the fly tipping which is proliferating : I reported 2 eyesores a few days ago and both were dealt with, but the general environment here is becoming shabbier and shabbier.
And what can be pleasurable about shopping when one is confronted by the lists of regulations?
I see Trump has appeared in public for the first time wearing a mask
He has been a disappointment, and my expectations were low
It’s funny. Boris looks embarrassed (and so he should be) in his mask — just plain foolish, whereas the sort Donald Trump has been shown wearing says, “I’m serious about this, so don’t mess with me.”
Indeed, though he is not a serious person
Trump changes with the wind. Remember he’s come from a TV background where popularity and ratings matter. His Twitter accounts shows that he models himself on a social influencer.
Apparently Trump was visiting wounded soldiers at a medical facilty and wore one out of respect for the fear of the soldiers.
He was visiting military in hospital
I have my face covering with me at all times. I all ways have since I was a little boy. My mum supplied me with a clean face covering for me to take with me at all times. I continued with this practice as a become an adult. Now nearly 68 I still continue the practice. Should I cough or sneeze or have a runny nose , I just reach for my face covering. As Tony Hancock sang the slogan ‘coughs and sneezes spread disease trap your germs in a handkerchief’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qmBivUlPXE&t=5s
WHO saying asymptomatic people will not spread illness
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQTBlbx1Xjs&feature=emb_title
They tried to backtrack on this
Maria Van Kerkhove says she accepts models show up to 40% of infections come from asymptomatic people. I guess they prefer the models to the tests.
https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-detail/q-a-how-is-covid-19-transmitted
“Current evidence suggests that COVID-19 spreads between people through direct, indirect (through contaminated objects or surfaces), or close contact with infected people via mouth and nose secretions. These include saliva, respiratory secretions or secretion droplets. These are released from the mouth or nose when an infected person coughs, sneezes, speaks or sings, for example. People who are in close contact (within 1 metre) with an infected person can catch COVID-19 when those infectious droplets get into their mouth, nose or eyes.”
But how are asymptomatic people supposed to spread coronavirus. If they do not cough or sneeze or have a runny nose.
Was this not the reason for lockdown healthy infected people would kill there granny.
Is this not the scare about cases. The more infected the greater the dander even if they have no symptoms.
I prefer my temporary face covering . If they become compulsory in shops then I shall resist the best I can. I will offer my temporary face covering as an alternative. If not acceptable will make excuse , breathing , phobia .
“Maria Van Kerkhove says she accepts models show up to 40% of infections come from asymptomatic people.”
I too accept that models can show all sorts of things, from millions of dead from coronavirus to runaway greenhouse global warming.
Doesn’t mean I accept the models are accurate though.
If they knew how it was spread they wouldn’t be using models to guess at it. All this suggests is that they’ve looked at the data and tried to work out a best fit guess (that’s what it is).
If you look at the data and it looks like the spread of infection is far from even then there are 2 reasonable conclusions:
They’ve decided that option 1 is the most likely because 2 is unproven even though option 2 actually makes the most sense.
Ah, GruntM has arrived. Bearing, as usual, no actual arguments or engagement with the points being discussed, only crude ad hominem attacks in coarse language. As I’ve said before I don’t normally stoop to the old ad hom, but in your case Grunt I’ll always make an exception, as – being the denizen of the lower end of the bell curve that you so obviously are – it seems to be the only language you understand. Furthermore my ad homs are a tad more elegant that your approach of calling someone a ‘c*nt’. Chin chin.
Sweden is the only country that has treated and still treat its citizens as responsible adults and with respect rather than oppression.
That alone answers the question of whether their approach was and is correct.
As Tegnell has said: What difference would a lockdown have made on care home deaths?! Zero.
Sweden was and is thinking about the poor quality of the available science:
e. g. the PCR Tests are seriously flawed, social distancing is based upon a high school trial of a 14 year old, there is zero evidence for school closures necessity or effects and the ones for masks are for the birds, and sheep.
They were and are also the only country thinking and caring about their young and about the millions of people in the 3rd world which our lockdowns will have killed in the end!
If everyone had responded like Sweden, the Corona death rates would probably be the same, if not lower in many cases, and there would be no economic and financial devastation and none of the other collateral damages like the now expected 35. 000 additional cancer deaths in the UK alone.
Their economy has suffered because of the lockdowns around them, but it is still holding up much better and less costly to repair than all others.
If their GDP falls by 7% as some expect, this will amount to a contraction of 16% of the private sector with the planned government spending increase of 9% of GDP.
Countries like Germany who are expected to contract by 7%, will have seen a collapse of private sector GDP of 23% at least at their planned and incorporated government spending increases of 16% of GDP.
THOSE are the numbers that display the true extent of the financial damage of our lockdowns, not headline GDP numbers.
And that is before the £50!billion cost for a vaccine which the government allegedly has committed to paying at a dosage rate cost of £650.
For a vaccine that is rushed in any cases, like the flu vaccines doubtful to be effective, lowering immunity to upcoming viruses and possibly needing to be repeated annually or even more often and for all of the upcoming viruses again as well.
And if it’s a rDNA vaccine, its longterm effects on the vaccinated person’s own DNA and what that could result in is a huge wildcard.
So huge, that they are often not even tested on animals and test persons are advised to refrain from engaging in reproductive activities.
How comforting, especially for parents soon having to decide whether they want their children to get a shot.
And with herd immunity reached at 15-20% already, as currently found out, those vaccines and their financial and ethical dilemmas would have been entirely unnecessary anyway.
Imerial college vaccine trial update. Prof Shattock Skynews Sophy Ridge
Prof Shattock’s points:
15 people (UK) have had the experimental juice injected. Soon “200-300” people will have.
Bexause covid 19 has dropped in uk it is very hard to test effectively in uk. And so they are going to move to S America or Africa.
Vaccine might be declared found by early next year after which there will be a big gap of supply lead time.
GAVI SEPI WHO all needed in the effort to juice up the entire world. Billions.
He thinks local lockdowns will be with us for a long time.
He also “isn’t the right person to ask about mandatory masks” but never the less goes on to say yes clearly they are of some help in close spaces.
Not certain, but I think ‘the Oxford vaccine’ (Astra Zeneca) is already being trialled in Brazil and South Africa. ‘Volunteers’.
https://childrenshealthdefense.org/news/the-bill-gates-effect-whos-dtp-vaccine-kills-more-children-in-africa-than-the-diseases-it-targets/
https://www.globalresearch.ca/mass-sterilization-kenyan-doctors-find-anti-fertility-agent-in-un-tetanus-vaccine/5431664
‘Lucky’ Africa…
https://childrenshealthdefense.org/news/the-bill-gates-effect-whos-dtp-vaccine-kills-more-children-in-africa-than-the-diseases-it-targets/
https://www.globalresearch.ca/mass-sterilization-kenyan-doctors-find-anti-fertility-agent-in-un-tetanus-vaccine/5431664
On the point about moving the trials to S America or Africa.
The UK covid rate is so low they cannot trial their vaccine because none of the, count them, 15 people are likely to encounter covid to see if it works. None of the 200-300 (count them also) are likely to encounter Covid either.
The claim has been BAME groups are more likely to contract covid. Africa seems to have done the same as other continents, with individual countries fairing much better than, say, British nations.
200-300 people. What an absolute piss poor figure to use by a proffessor. Any other line of work 200-300 is a sign no one really gives two hoots about the process. In academia it appears 200-300 is all the public deserve.
Professor Shattock I say from your attitude and interview you are a danger to my health and I will not ever be administering your ‘product’ into my body.
This article is a reminder of what we are up against:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/11/rumours-and-threats-what-happened-when-covid-19-shut-our-pubs
You would think that the owners of a ‘vaping bar’ might have a balanced attitude towards Covid, just as they clearly do towards vaping. But no, they are fully bought into the Covid thing, and don’t complain when a person without symptoms tests positive for C19. They deep clean their own premises and even do all the ‘tracing’ themselves out of a sense of duty.
However, this doesn’t stop the town getting out its pitchforks, spreading rumours about the infected person, etc. Clearly the residents think that Burnham is Covid-free and that the infected one should be cast out. There is no notion whatsoever that we’ve all been exposed to it already, and already have some resistance or immunity. There is also no sense of people shrugging their shoulders and thinking “If I get it, I get it”; that life isn’t worth living unless we can collectively do that (which is what I believe).
Burnham seems to have its fair share of people without opposing thumbs …
Football has been going on for a few weeks now, well longer than the coronavirus incubation period.
To my misfortune I caught the end of the local news the other evening and saw the sports report – lots of spitting when running round and then cuddling and hugging in a group hug each time a goal was scored so my question is:
why are the football players not all dropping of coronavirus with teams decimated?
I’m delighted theyve not been cos I stupidly thought the powers that be could use it to highlight how we can all go back to normal.
Stupid me. If I recall, there was a bunch of hysterical reporting, and some dumbass players, claiming they shouldn’t be restarting and it’s a disgrace etc – those same commentators have failed to return to the topic and hold their hands up, of course, ditto re: the busy parks, beaches and protests. Instead of accepting the reality, they’ve moved onto campaigning for masks instead. Bunch of twats.
Another great question to ask pro-lockdown, ‘we’re all going to die’ types!!
Two Bars Two Experiences.
Just to add to peoples comments and observations about pubs.
First one, noticed it was open on the way back from hardware store with #2 son. Been waiting for this to open as it’s the best pint of Guinness in West London. Sign on door suggesting social distancing in place. Walk straight in, straight up to the bar. No other signs, no one-way system, no masks, no gloves, no screens. Nowt. A bottle of hand gel on the counter. Two people behind the bar with no masks. Order my drinks, pay by card, wait for it to settle as I lean on the bar. Barman slides a book along the bar to me and suggests I may want to write my name and contact details. I provide false details but he doesn’t even bother to look I’ve written anything. I notice other people open it and close it without even writing anything. Get my pint and go and stand outside in the sun with my son. Lovely. Went for another one and all was perfectly normal. In fact nicer than normal as the bar was smelling of fresh paint and a lovely French polished bar surface. Owners had taken the down time to do the place up. I’ll be back several times next week.
Second one, that night with the wife. Large Fullers establishment. Signs galore on the way in. Rope across the door, desk with two masked staff inquiring if we’d booked. No, but there may be room. Names please. False names given. Please use the hand gel. No, my hands are clean. You need to use the hand gel. Er, no I don’t. By now the wife is not happy with me. I explain my hands are clean, I’ve just left the house and I don’t want to use their gel. They look at each other and one goes to mutter to another masked staff member behind the bar. They come back and tell me I need to use the gel. I suggest in that case if I need to use the gel they need to show me their GDPR policy as regards collecting names and contacts. Met with blank looks and she goes to mutter with the other bar staff. Another muzzled staff member comes over and asks what I want. I say I’d like two glasses of Rioja. Doesn’t go down well. I ask for the GDPR policy again. By this time the wife has left in embarrassment. Muzzled woman leaves to get the GDPR policy who is actually the 6 foot 2 Duty Manager. I introduce myself but he refuses to give his name. He suggests we go outside to discuss this. I agree. I suggest this entire scenario is ludicrous. He suggests we are in the middle of a pandemic. I suggest we are at the end of a complete over reaction to a virus which peaked in March. He stares blankly at me. He suggests I need to use their gel and provide names to enter. I suggest I won’t. He suggests maybe that is not the pub for me. I wholeheartedly agree with him.
Wife and I buy wine from shop and go home and drink it on the balcony.
Wife really not happy with me.
Letters and emails to Fullers composed.
On the bright side, you witnessed the ‘open and close’ of fellow skeptics using a sign in book – they are out there!
Thanks for writing, I like it especially when people get to suggesting to one another.
Sanity does exist out there. It’s all around you if you look. If there is hope it lies in the Proles. Orwell. 1984. We are all Proles now.
Yeah, but the Proles ‘loved Big Brother’.
Ni, they just didn’t think about the setup at all. That’s why no rebellion was possible: the notionally free( the Proles) ‘had no intellect’ and no impulse to rebel. All Party members were brainwashed.
Our challenge is to be Proles with intellect, or Party members with unwashed brains.
Having been in a few pubs since last week, I’ve seen plenty of scepticism about. The thing about the books for keeping customer details is the pen provided by the pub. WHAT ABOUT THE PEN?
It’s all too absurd for my little head to take.
Always prominently finger or adjust your face nap before using the pen. Help boost herd immunity!
I’d be asking the staff how often the pen gets disinfected – let’s create another annoying job for them to do, because it might lead to them removing the pen. If people can’t see a pen they won’t write in the book. But if you have to ask for a pen, ask to see it sanitised.. Let’s be as obstreperous as possible
When I went to one of my local hostelries last week, the answer to my question of why more draconian measures now than there were the day before lockdown (actually there weren’t any measures, just wash your hands) I was told because the virus was far more dangerous now than it was then. Duh. Which is why they are opening the bars. You can’t argue with stupid. Needless to say I didn’t go in. (Still haven’t since.) .
Will masks make it worse?
If all the blurb about handwashing is right, the virus is mainly spread by contagion rather than by aerosols.
Muzzle wearers, particularly long-suffering shop staff – but soon all their customers- frequently touch and/or adjust their face naps to ease the inevitable discomfort.
If they are infected (unlikely but, if not, what’s the expletive deleted point of muzzling?) the virus will transfer from their fingers to anything they touch – products, payment cards, door handles…
Therefore: More masks = more infections.
Here in SW France muzzle wearing appears to be on the decline.
In our local supermarket down to around 30% last week, from maybe 50% a couple of weeks ago.
Few in evidence on the streets of our market town but still a few paranoiacs, mainly but not all elderly, wearing them in rural areas. I give them a wide berth and a sympathetic ‘poor you’ smile.
The waiters who were serving us yesterday kept touching their faces and adjusting their muzzles because they were clearly having trouble breathing. Ditto people I’ve seen in the underground and hairdressers, I still remember one poor woman holding out the muzzle away from her face to get some oxygen into her system.
Don’t these establishments realise that they could be liable if a customer becomes ill or passes out while in their premises because of the muzzles?
You need a fair and impartial judicial system before those establishments need worry about liability. Vaccine manufacturers are immune from liability, not a great problem to widen the list to include those ‘promoting our health’.in other ways.
Vaccine manufacturers aren’t immune from liability in the EU:
https://law.emory.edu/elj/content/volume-67/issue-3/articles/liability-vaccine-injury-united-european-world.html
Although of course now we’ve exited, no doubt US pharma will want us to ape the US immunity as the price of a trade deal.
Exactly. Previously only symptomatic cases were contagious, and that contagiousness is limited because coughing in public has a similar effect to shouting about Ali’s snack bar. Now those (one in >4000) with the virus and without symptoms can spread it around via constant touching of their saliva-drenched muzzle. Critical thinking is rarer than the virus.
I would say 90% of people I see wearing a mask touch or adjust them at some point, which immediately renders them at best ineffective, and at worst dangerous, for the reasons you give.
If our great leader wants us to return to normal he’s going about it in a strange fashion. I, like many other people I speak to, are avoiding businesses that are going over the top with their Covid approach. Walk away folks and shop, drink and eat elsewhere, the message will hit home soon. A tenner off a crap meal will never get the high street back on its feet, scrap all social distance guidance and allow ‘normal’ to resume and people will flood into town centres. It’s almost criminal that we’ve brought the economy to its knees and yet we’re still depending on herd immunity to see the virus off, you couldn’t make it up. Anybody want to take a bet that the public inquiry takes at least 5 years to report.
If the inquiry goes anything like Simon Dolan’s judicial review, I’m not holding my breath on the outcome.
We need a govt scalp post haste. This is all becoming a little too intolerable.
Well said. They will try to frustrate any inquiry that will implicate them for their incompetence and refusal to admit their shortcomings.
We must not allow that. However they should be reminded that if they escape their comeuppance now, they will get it in the next life and there is a special place in Hell waiting for them
Hot tip: buy shares in whitewash producers!
We’re not allowed to use the word “whitewash” here any more.
Mea culpa. What’s the PC (newspeak) alternative?
‘Distemper’ just doesn’t cut the mustard…
No idea…
In the short term getting the economy back off its knees is not the aim. The aim is to subjugate us and when that subjugation is complete and we are grateful for the scraps they throw us then they can revert to a form of slave employment. At this stage of the ‘outbreak’ (i refuse to call it an epidemic) no-one can rationalise the insidious support of the universal wearing of masks, yet it is gaining alarming momentum and the imagery is shoved down our throats every minute. (See above). Those who are still putting this down to gross incompetence are way, way off the mark. And once a population’s subjugated is complete (see 1984) there is no potential for an uprising against the theft of our freedoms we once took for granted. Indeed, most people have willingly relinquished their freedoms for alleged ‘safety’ so the subjugation is already half way there. The last thing the powers that be (and I don’t pretend to know who exactly they are) want is a robust economy. A robust economy signals freedom and that is not ‘their’ raison d’etre. Complete and utter social control (so far by stealth) is nearer the mark. . .
61% of people polled vote for serfdom. I just made that up but it’s nearly true.
I feel they may well just be *pretending* they want things to go back to normal.. According to UK column the aim is to re-purpose society, for schools never to re-open, for people to work from home, for long- distance travel to pretty much cease (the whole green agenda). But they cannot yet be too open about that, so they are taking a circular route at the moment, by just pretending to want people to go back to work, and for things to be ‘normal’, whilst at the same time making it as unappealing and difficult as possible.
In the past week, two things have happened to me that have again highlighted the awful impact of this prolonged lockdown.
First, my 88 mother-in-law has been taken into hospital. In severe pain and unable to put weight on her legs. Thankfully there is nothing ‘sinister’ underlying, but the biggest issue? Muscle wastage. After 14 weeks of not being out of the house and too scared to walk any further than the 10 metres to the end of her garden once a day, she has effectively seized up. At least two weeks in hospital while they give her physio etc., and she gains the confidence to get back home.
Secondly (and I posted this in a thread earlier) I met a pathologist friend yesterday who told me (unprompted) that she was seeing things she never thought she would see coming into the lab. Horrific cases of well advanced cancers that have gone well beyond anything she would normally see.
Our initial mantra was to ‘save the NHS’. The cost to the NHS of this backlog and knock on effect to human health is immense. The human cost and lives lost unimaginable; how many elderly people are like my mother-in-law? Where will we ever see the stats for this? Nowhere. We will keep seeing the number of new cases of corona every day though…a whopping 7 yesterday in Scotland.
It’s appalling. Will those responsible ever see justice visited on them?
YES. YES. YES.
I have been helping a person of a similar age. As you say the restriction on mobility, that singular element, has had a profound effect. Currently trying to help by encouraging outings to the post box or to put the rubbish out.
The very people they were supposedly trying to “save” have been damaged the most. It’s incredible.
It’s outrageous.. A friend of my mum found out the other day she has pancreatic cancer, she has been suffering for ages and been constantly ‘fobbed off’ by both her GP (offered antibiotics!) and another specialised nurse (she has diabetes). Eventually she went to A&E, which led to the diagnosis..They were all too laid back about it and now she has to *wait* for an appointment to find out what treatment (if any..) they will offer her.
Oh yes… the GP “fob off” and plead ignorance. Pass word along… report them to the GMC!
Most odd that they don’t care about the group that we were constantly told needed to be protected. This is getting beyond a joke now.
I’m reminded of that line in the musical Les Miserable
Madame Thenardier:(to a male customer) ” I used to dream that I would meet a prince, but God Almighty, have you seen what’s happened since
Some of us thought we were getting Churchill, we actually got Billy Bunter in a face nappy
Oh, how life disappoints
And look what happens at the end: Thénardier moves to America, with his daughter Azelma: where he becomes a slave trader!
How did Madame move with ‘his’ daughter? Was transgender surgery available in France at that time?
Not Madame – she had died in prison – but Monsieur T, the “prince” of her dreams
Was she recorded as a covid death?
He reminds me now of Buster Blood Vessel from Bad Manners; the court jester .
Caption competition – Lip up fatty !
Hi there. I’m a long term visitor of this site and I need some advice. My partner and I have very different views on this sh*tshow of a lockdown. He very much accepts the MSM narrative and I of course, don’t. My boyfriend and I live in separate households. He lives with a close relative who is in their 70s. During the lockdown I was cut off from everyone I love, and I found that difficult. It’s only recently that we’re spending time together under the same roof, and only when it was ‘allowed’ and socially distanced. I want our physical relationship back and he wants to wait for the govt to effectively to say that it’s okay! I don’t know what to do, is anyone else in this situation?
Bin him, it’ll never work.
Agreed. Not worth the effort.
Look out for some one with a mind of his own. You’ll be happier.
He lives with his mother, oh god preserve us. Dump him. I’m available, we could have a lot of fun together. Get in touch
I love how this forum has turned into an advice/agony column – the other day it was tips on removing ear wax
Sceptics are omniscient, didn’t you know?
Challenge him about being under the same roof, but at a ‘safe distance’.
Alternatively, say you need time to think about the way this is damaging your relationship and hint that you’ll go your own way for a while.
Test the waters.
Is he open to looking at other sources of information? Eg the swprs one (https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/), which is basically facts, with direct links to their sources..
It is not an ‘in your face’ anti-lockdown site, so is maybe more ‘acceptable’ to those yet to see the truth!
I don’t think you should bin him immediately, maybe try and persuade him of our side of the argument, there’s more than enough evidence. And you are in a relationship with him for a reason – you love him and have things in common, and see a future with one another.
However, if he’s genuinely socially distancing from you after 4 months apart and actually obeying the government’s arbitrary, inconsistent and dehumanising rules, then he may be a lost cause and will not be persuaded. Imagine allowing the government to regulate your sex life and not think it’s totally ludicrous! There will be many, many more people out there who will treat you much better if he’s not going to change his ways.
Start talking about barge poles.
Oh come on. Do dinner, 6 oysters, big fat steak and chips, apple pie with ice cream, bottle of wine, youll soon find out if he really fancies you – he can take a shower before he goes home, can’t he?
Get rid.
He clearly does not care about you…bin the bed wetter now!!
Find another boyfriend. God knows, there’s no shortage of them.
Yours affectionately,
Margery Proops II.
He’s a control freak. No woman should ever have to plead for sex. Run away quickly…
Can I suggest that one way of approaching the mask insanity (already inflicted on us poor buggers in Scotland) is to get one of these as your ‘face covering’
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Plague-Doctor-Mask-Steampunk-Halloween/dp/B07Q245DGM/ref=pd_ybh_a_7?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=7S0XZCP8KP5VKYQSCDVK
It complies with the letter of the bloody stupid law, whilst simultaneously taking the piss. And, as a bonus, it should also frighten small children. Mine’s already been delivered and I’ll be road testing it this evening.
An alternative, if you don’t facing looking like something from a Hieronymus Bosch triptych, would a be a V for Vendetta mask. The sight of lots of those in the shops should send a suitable message to our would-be Chancellor Sutlers.
And for the ladies, how about a niqab. Accessorised with halter top and ‘Daisy Duke’ shorts (I have fond memories of the 70s). What shop could turn you away? They wouldn’t want to appear islamophobic after all, would they? Chin chin.
Gather up a posse and pay a visit to the bank ala Money Heist.
Speaking of a posse. I’m hoping that to get an active sceptic community going in central Scotland so we can meet physically and carry out a little civil disobedience en masse.
I’ve already thought of a great way for a group of co-ordinated people to put a stop to Sainsbury’s ridiculous rule of only two people allowed in their filling station shops.
It’s amazing what half a dozen dedicated people can quietly and passive-aggressively achieve!
I wish you every success – this is surely what’s needed, small localised groups across the country but with a focused and coordinated game plan.
There are plenty of normal masks available on e.g. Etsy with slogans printed on them like:
This mask is as useless as our politicians.
This mask is useless.
Worn under protest.
Freedom instead of fear.
Etc.
That should do.
It protects your eyes as well, which is extra safe.
I think we should all wear one of those latex masks of Boris!
My 4-year-old is obsessed with Bubonic Plague. He’s been begging me to get one of those masks since Christmas. Obviously, they don’t come in kid sizes, so he wants me to get one for myself to wear for his amusement. Knowing him though, he would be scared despite saying that he won’t be, so I haven’t ordered one.
Got one a few weeks ago.
You would’ve thought having had a serious life changing illness that Andrew Marr would realise life is too short to spend living in abject fear, surrounded by draconian rules. Not so. He’s one of the chief “lock us up forever” cheerleaders at the Big Bedwetters Corporation (BBC).
Perhaps there’s a reason why these BBC *intellectuals* choose not to see what’s going on around them. I don’t just mean the treatment Eamon Holmes got for suggesting to think alternatively. I get a sense much is hidden about the clear bias these people routinely display.
The German government has put into law on 3.6.20 that the pandemic will only be declared over when there is a vaccine available.
A perfect pretense for restricting freedom and oppress the saner part of the population for many years to come/for good.
‘available’ is rather ominous, no?
I read a report that said Astra Zeneca are going ahead with production of so many gazillion phials or whatever ‘in case the vaccine works’.
Ominous… and interesting in that the criteria for it being a pandemic are not being fulfilled any more, if they ever were….
And then it wont be declared over until everyone has been vaccinated, and then it wont be declared over because people are still dying because the vaccine doesn’t work and then it wont be declared over because politicians are enjoying it too much.
Why isn’t he wearing a mask then? He is not alone in the TV studio, nor in the make-up room or anywhere else in the building..
Caption competition:
‘This round’s on me’ :pub empties rapidly.
Time for a pint. I’ve been running around like a blue arsed fly all day.
Not a caption, but I notice in both pics of Boris the indentation of the mask over his mouth. He is clearly inhaling through his mouth which would suggest that the mask is obstructing his nose.
It’s the mask equivalent of a camel toe!!!
That was the first thing I noticed too. It looks like an awful mask!
I noticed that too.. Boris has now made a rod for his own back though, in that he will have to wear a mask in public all the time now, because otherwise he will look like a hypocrite and send out mixed messages. Woe betide him if he is pictured getting into a car and taking the mask off, or indeed removing it at all anywhere where there are other people, because he might infect them! Or at least that is what they are saying to us….
But hopefully he will experience the negative effects of wearing a mask and the message will then change.
He’ll only have to wear a mask when he next pulls a pint or goes shopping. Which I doubt happens very often.
Might be interesting for someone to follow him about for a few weeks and see if they can catch him mask-less.
Will Hancock now be wearing a mask? Chris Whitty? Patrick Vallance? All politicians, including in Parliament? If not, why not?
That’s what my eyes went to, too.
Blue funk
Blue f..k up
The Goons return ;Bluebottle lives!
How do I drink this?
“Think I’ve had a stroke”
Cbeebies reveal new tellytubby
Next time I go in a Fullers pub I’m going to shit myself in protest
I’m boycotting Fullers bubs from now on.
So much for Rebellion IPA!
I have to wear this mask because otherwise you’ll see right through me.
This is the last time I let Carrie make me a home-made face mask out of a pair of her knickers.
Just seen Michael Gove on Andrew Marr Show. He seems to be saying that masks WON’T be mandated by law in England. Perhaps Boris was just flying a kite to see how the public reacted to suggestion that masks should be mandatory and has decided that it’s not worth the effort.
I really hope so. I thought it was a bit odd that they kept saying they needed to be more “insistent” about it rather than just saying they were thinking about making it compulsory.
I think Boris will ‘insist’ in his next fireside chat, but there will be no….. mandating. Simply because enforcement would be am absolute mare, and the potential for civil unrest amongst members of the public against each *other* would be too disruptive at this point in the ‘covid recovery’ plan.
It seems like Dom Cummings’ focus groups, as well as his monitoring of ‘public opinion’, have yielded results. I wonder if the strongly anti-mask comments on that Telegraph article about possible mandatory masks in England a couple of days ago had anything to do with this, given that the Conservatives’ core voter base reads that newspaper.
I wonder if I’m doing anything useful shouting into the social media/Telegraph comments section voids constantly, all it does is make you feel hopeless and angry. There is always the outside chance that they are listening I suppose.
Paul, keep it up, every little helps!
Do you check to see how many upticks you get? I suspect it’s a lot. Not that you should be obsessed with ticks – but it shows you are being listened to. Of course you are. You are helping every time you post. Hammer hammer hammer at the buggers!
I write a direct email to his nibbs the PM and my MP every time some new piece of malarky is threatened. I too doubt it makes any difference to outcomes but I feel like I am at least actively participating in what’s left of our democracy. Its gotta be useful – speaking up for the truth – where ever we can. Keep at it. And it’s so British isn’t it? I’m really, really angry – I shall write a letter!
Exactly – I thought this too!
We can’t read anything into this – apart from the fact that, as Politician, he’s probably lying.
Looking at the picture below, perhaps Boris realised that they’re horrible things to wear and make you look like a twit.
Is this true?
Can’t see them backing down – since Jimmy Krankie is saying mask are here to stay!
The Sun says it. It must be true!
Here to stay? has she been kind enough to tell us for how long, or is she suggesting permanently? I wouldn’t put that past her. Certainly the editor of The Guardian thinks they should be “part of everyday life” or the “new (permanent) normal”.
One of the links on here goes to The Sun that says they should be permanent
It seems the logic going forward will be “we won’t make masks mandatory…as long as everyone wears one”. Much like in March, when we were told if we were good little boys and girls tougher measures wouldn’t need to be brought in. After that, someone somewhere came within 6 feet of another person and we all had to be locked down.
Yes, also like what Matt Hancock said about the tracking app..
Someone needs to sit him down and explain what the word “voluntary” actually means…
Well everyone won’t be wearing one, because even if all the other 7 billion or so people in the world are wearing one there will be one that isn’t, and it will be me, and I will be right and the 7 billion will be wrong. End of.
Aren’t there law suits pending re. compulsory mask wearing?
Yes – which may explain this!
Even if the government win cases in court, it is nonetheless a lot of time and effort for them to prepare and fight each case, so they may now be looking to avoid them..
You shouldn’t go to the pub became the pubs are closed. I’m hoping that “you should wear a face nappy” doesnt become “You must wear a face muzzle”.
I can’t think of any reason why the government would NOT mandate mask wearing. It solves a lot of problems for them. Everything can get back to normal, if we all wear masks all the time, because masks protect us so their dirty secret is safe but the economy can start to recover. Unless they are going to suspend general elections, they will need to face the public in 5 years time and won’t want huge unemployment.
–although they’ve done so many u-turns that you can never be sure!
When Michael Gove becomes your saviour it is surely time to end it all.
Yeah, I’d believe that weaselly little shit.
It’s been a long time since I’ve slapped Gove…. https://www.producthunt.com/posts/slap-michael-gove
We need one for Bojo and Handjob
If what that female Prof from Imperial College (God help us!) was saying on the Marr Show about the virus hanging as a viable virus in the air for an hour (at least) after being spluttered out ready to infect us is correct, shouldn’t we all supermarket workers be infected or dead by now?
Yes, they should
I could not believe the tripe she was coming out with.
Why is the BBC putting out stuff like this? They must know that the science is not clearcut. Why frighten everyone?
The BBC has an agenda – it clearly thinks that putting the world into permanent pandemic mode serves that agenda. Their role in this shameful episode is second only to the government’s and Parliaments in terms of culpability.
Because that’s the clear agenda.
Did you read the SAGE piece in Toby’s links?
Because that’s their job (despite the fact we pay for them.) . It’s what Goebbels did to facilitate Hitler’s/Third Reich’s agenda. Same difference.
Look up the Pyramid of Evidence used by science. I would doubt that this is anywhere past level 6/7. File as untrue until proven.
If true, we must nearly all have come into contact with it by now (after all, supermarkets have been maskless throughout), and trying to contain or eradicate it is a ridiculous idea.
Also, usually they come up with results like this from using machines in a climate-controlled lab, which they then like to extrapolate to the real world.
Exactly. Any attempt to contain or eradicate is doomed to failure. End of the human race. Don’t panic!
I think Canute proved this many years ago-though the story is that he knew he couldn’t stop the tide, he just wanted to prove to those who thought he could, that he couldn’t. Saint Jacinda, Wee Jimmy and Drayford are going to find this out.
Exactly!
You have. It is. Unless you happen to live or work in a healthcare facility, factory, slaughterhouse. Or travel regularly for more than a short ride on an enclosed mass transit system.
Either scientists have wiped the slate clean and are starting from scratch in collating knowledge of viruses or this virus is unique in defying all previously understood laws of nature.
All based on one Chinese woman, and discredited on 4 February 2020. That’s right. February.
“A report in one of the world’s most prestigious scientific journals of asymptomatic transmission of Wuhan coronavirus, 2019-nCoV appears to have been made in error, leading scientists to question if the new virus spreads as easily as feared.”
https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/crucial-report-claiming-coronavirus-transmittable-before-symptoms-appear-may-be-wrong/ (04 FEB 2020, 12:37)
Some scientists are mindful of funding sources or their political masters, some are just enjoying the power and glory they now have.
We should have all died in the storms.
Actually, I bet she’s right. I still think I had the thing in April.
A good thing to say to anyone who appears to have believed what she says!!!
According to the ONS “Coronavirus deaths by occupation”, check-out operators are 86th on the list.
I’ve wondered about the perspex screens protecting checkout operators. Presumably if an infected customer sneezes or coughs going through the checkout process, the screen prevents any water droplets containing virus hitting the checkout operator. But presumably if (per the aerosol theory) some virus from the splutter (excuse the language) hangs in the air as aerosol particles the particles could drift up and over the perspex screen and be breathed in by the checkout operator. So the screen doesn’t really protect.
We are given contradictory information about how Covid spreads. We were told if someone coughs or sneezes the droplets are heavy and don’t travel very far.
Anyone on here with more virus-related knowledge than me (I’m actually a biology graduate but it was nearly 20 years ago now!) I’m still puzzling over this asymptomatic spread thing. I’ve never heard of any other virus that can supposedly cause no symptoms in so many people, but yet they are still so capable of spreading it that we all need to be permanently masked up for everyday interactions such as passing someone in a shop. How can this actually be possible? If these symptomless people are not getting symptoms because their T cells fight it off before it can get a hold, surely you would only be able to pass it on for a very short time and with very close contact?
Similarly, say you’re vaccinated against flu, and you encounter a strain that was actually included in the vaccine that year. The vaccine doesn’t stop you from breathing in the virus so it will enter your throat and nose and would presumably be present there should someone decided to stick a swab up your nose. You would therefore be a “case” and have an “infection” but the virus wouldn’t be able to get a hold in your body as your immune system would destroy it pretty quickly. But up until this point, wouldn’t you theoretically be able to infect another by coughing or sneezing? But yet we are told that being vaccinated will stop us getting ill or passing it on…
I think this article by an eminent Swiss Immunologist may help to answer your question. The other problem is that I’m not sure what the PCR test is actually measuring. As far as I can tell it was never intended as a diagnostic test and may be detecting bits of virus RNA rather than live viruses. https://medium.com/@vernunftundrichtigkeit/coronavirus-why-everyone-was-wrong-fce6db5ba809
All very good questions – I’ve been wondering this as well. The case for mask-wearing by all falls if you cannot pass the virus on if you are yourself asymptomatic..
This whole episode reminds me of 1986 when there was an outbreak of bacterial meningitis around the Stroud area. Several teenagers sadly died and it became known for obvious reasons as “the kissing disease”. It appears that up to 10% of us could be carrying the meningococcal bacteria in our throats at any one time and if we had (very) close contact with someone who carried it, we might be unlucky. A girl at the school where I was teaching at the time was one of those unlucky ones and died. The school never closed though.
With Covid, I see this “asymptomatic spread” as being part of the fear narrative. There weren’t enough people becoming seriously ill and dying with Covid even at its height, (when you consider that only about 300 under 65s with no KNOWN co- morbidity have died) so by suggesting that, even if you were healthy, you could be a granny killer simply ramps up the fear and guilt in people.
Interesting; In 1987 my sister’s best friend (aged 16) got bacterial meningitis and died. The school did not close, but all of her class (it was a girls’ school) were tested. The risk was very low, because it happened within a couple of days of the start of the autumn term, so few girls had met each other in the days before, but the school obviously had to act. It was very sad, and particularly traumatic for the class in question..
I don’t remember anyone being tested at the school where I was teaching. It was 100 miles from Stroud anyway and apparently the girl who died had friends there and had attended a party recently.
It’s also struck me that Covid has “replaced” sepsis and meningitis in being the threat to look out for. Our local ambulances were always plastered with advice about recognising sepsis or meningitis and the need to get to hospital immediately. Likewise there were plenty of tragic stories in MSM. With Covid, if you thought you had it, you were advised to stay at home until your lips were turning blue (well almost!)
We have never attempted to use these types of tests in this way with any other virus before so we do not know what is normal – we have no baseline. There is no reason to believe that what we are seeing is a unique property of this particular virus.
Yes, my thoughts exactly. I’d love to see it done this way with the flu to get some sort of comparison.
It would certainly help make more sense of the numbers but I would prefer they forgot the whole idea and focused on treating peoples cancer and other serious disease.
Hopefully one day we will have the technology to sample and properly sequence all the viruses present on and around a person in such a way and at such a cost that it could occur continuously and then we could learn a great deal. Hopefully we will also have gained the wisdom also not to use this capability as an excuse to violate peoples natural rights. Right now though the technology is just to crude to be of any real use. It like being able to take a black and white photo from one location on planet earth each year and then trying to reconstruct the history of the human race.
Isn’t it funny that the only way to gain widespread adoption of mask wearing isn’t to post legitimate scientific evidence, debate and discussion, moreover it is to emphasize that you “aren’t protecting yourself you are protecting others”. Typical social engineering 101 – get the idiots to do the enforcement through snitching, aggression and shaming – what a lovely country we live in…
It’s time we turned the table on some of these virtue-signalling chumps and got organised. Use their own nonsense against them eg. choose a particular pub chain (not Spoons as they’ve been okay) and report them to ICO for a data breach as there are names and numbers left at the door / likely stored insecurely.
There are that many rules and guidance, I’d like to see some targeted individuals picked out for not sticking by them to the letter. Hoisted by their own Petards.
Have you read the Mail article Toby linked above? (People won’t obey lockdown again).
What a load of fearmongering misinformation. Absolute disgrace.
If you feel up to it, there’s plenty of room for some intelligent counter-comments.
He doesn’t look like a bank robber does he? What’s his view on the wearing of a burka these days?
Years ago, I remember the Beeb screening a laudatory programme about. courageous Afghan women trying to defy the burka tyranny. How very brave these women were, to resent having their faces covered and their personalities eliminated.
Yeah.Years ago that was.
The Sun: masks not mandatory (Gove).
And all of the comments moaning that it should be enforced as ‘you might not know you have it’ – since when is a virus spread from a person who is asymptomatic!? Why are people so quick to throw stones in fear, do your own research for christ’s sake.
Some of the commenters are shills. Most of the rest have been brainwashed by the government at taxpayers’ expense. HMG has a powerful and sophisticated propaganda machine.
Shills such as the 77th Brigade funded by our own taxes. Its nice to live in a world where we are forced to pay tax to pay someone to subject us to constant fear and coercion.
Maybe they’ve been reading the DT comments page after their article on mask-wearing!
– only ‘encouraged’
Cue pictures of thumbscrews and heretic’s forks!
Dutch State TV releases usual COVID-19 death porn. Story on Saturday 12 July:
Healthcare workers on the Dam square: ‘This is hitting hard’
Dozens of health care workers stood on the Dam (Amsterdam) this afternoon to commemorate the death of 13 colleagues, as a tribute.
Nurse Annemarie: “Anyone who claims that it is still a flu should really start thinking”.
Comes with a video (in Dutch) in which this nurse states that 17.000 of her coworkers have had COVID-19 and that 13 died because of COVID-19. Of course, 13 is not nice, nobody wants medical staff to die at/because of work. But how many people actually work in (relevant) medical professions in the Netherlands?
Well, they don’t mention that in the video but the Dutch office for statistics CBS has a page on exactly that. The complete total (incl. even administrative staff etc.) in 2018 was 1.36 million, but if you use the more relevant categories (Ziekenhuizen en overige medische specialistische zorg; Universitair medische centra; Huisartsen en gezondheidscentra) you get 319.000 (again incl. other staff in those specific categories). Since they don’t state which group they mean, it could be 17.000 with COVID-19 of which 13 died from a total of anywhere between 300.000+ tot 1+ million workers.
Again, nobody likes medical staff to get ill or even worse die, but is 13 deaths out of hundreds of thousands to even more than a million really so unbelievably terrible…? If you take 13 as a percentage of 17.000 cases it is still just 0.08%, let alone what percentage you would get at the total number of (relevant) workers.
Compared to the whole of the Netherlands, in which the official IFR is (according to Dutch minister for public health, on 25 June) 0.32-1% that 0.08% sounds remarkably good to me. It is almost as if working in health care actually saved you from a COVID-19 death…
It starts to feel as if Andy Warhol’s “15 minutes of fame” has now arrived at the medical professions.
Original direct link: https://nos.nl/liveblog/2340300-massale-betoging-tegen-coronabeleid-israel-overleden-zorgmedewerkers-herdacht#UPDATE-container-46330241
Oh crikey, our NHS ‘heroes’ will probably be doing the same soon…..
I’d been interested in seeing how many health care workers die of flu each year for comparison. Anybody got any data on that?
How many health care workers died in the same period in previous years?
13 may be more or less than the average.
I wish I had more specific data, I even had to gamble of which group/number the 17.000 came… But still, whether it is more or less than previous years or more or less than the flu, under all circumstances it is simply a very low number. However, to organize a demonstration for these 13 deaths is, I am sorry to say, a bit overdone.
The other day I read another Dutch COVID-19 story, about “heroes of the health sector” and their memories of their time during the COVID-19 “crisis”. People were talking about their memories of the disaster, how difficult it all was. You’d think the stories would be about dead people on the floor, doctors collapsing and dying, of nurses writing their wills, but no, none of that.
One even had a story how irritating it was to come home after work and to find that due to hamstering he couldn’t buy “a piece of meat” because he “also liked my piece of meat” and he thought hamstering was anti-social because he couldn’t buy his meat after work. Now if that is your very worst memory of a disaster you know you haven’t been in a disaster. And sorry to say so but no disaster means no hero either!
I love your language, first noticed it when you quoted something called ‘flockimmunitet'(?), now ‘hamstering’ for (?) hoarding?
Don’t know any Dutch, but hoarding in Swedish is the equivalent of ‘hamster-ing’ when translated, and there is also a verb ‘to hamster’ stuff, if you translate it literally. Herd immunity in Swedish is ‘flockimmunitet’ (so ‘flock’ immunity as opposed to ‘herd’)..
I honestly thought “to hamster” had by now also been used already in Britain.
However, flockimmunitet is as Carrie mentioned, indeed Swedish, not Dutch, so that can’t have come from one of my texts.
The Dutch for herd immunity is literally translated “group immunity” in English. That’s because when the government still wanted to do the sensible thing (like the Swedes!) the term “herd” was deemed too negative, so they came up with “group”. But after the British government panicked, our government panicked too.
I wonder if their deceased colleagues were as overweight…..
Oh that was my first thought!!!
To be honest: that’s not why I took that particular screenshot (it was the best overview shot), but I did have exactly the same thought!
Another one I realized a few minutes ago: 13 out of a million or so co-workers, that’s almost 30 times better than the general Dutch population at 358 COVID-19 deaths per million. They should be celebrating and dancing: “The gods spared most of us!” In a way this is almost ungrateful…
Indeed..
Just a comment on lockdown truth: I think it’s a great idea but it’s so slow it’s virtually unusable. Also I just tried to post a comment but after 5 unsuccessful attempts I gave up. Am I doing something wrong?
Lockdown sceptics. com works much better
Lockdown Truth is Wix…. which is a problem.
I can’t seem to get LockdownSkeptics.com to send me a verification email.
Not to be too alarmist, but I think it’s sensible to be spread across multiple websites that we – the users – own. (Rather than platforms such as Reddit). Even owning our own websites, if they aren’t hosted in the correct locations (like NearlyFreeSpeech), then there is a real risk of being “disappeared.”
If we are all engaging on multiple websites, then if any one of them goes down for any reason (which could be as simple as the site owner not paying the bills or as extreme as the host deleting it), then we aren’t starting from scratch again in terms of networking.
Thanks TyLean. I also share your concern about security. (Paranoia just one more side effect of lockdown)
I’m mostly giving up. This place is basically unusable after a few hours and there’s no conversation happening on the forum. I think I’ll just retreat back into the place where I’m the only sane person in a world gone mad.
Don’t do that, we like to hear from you! What are you using, is it the hardware or your broadband?
My husband and I (mostly my husband at my behest) are in the process of building a new website. ResistNewNormal.Net….. it’s not functional yet! I will post when it is.
Having just read through the Canaries in the Mine piece and its updates, I am a little disappointed that no mention was made of the supposed ‘surge’ in coronavirus cases in Victoria over the past few weeks, despite a paragraph being specifically devoted to Australia in the latest update.
As best as I can see, Australia didn’t really have an outbreak (almost all were returned travellers and a small number of their contacts), but now Victoria (Melbourne mostly) has an actual community outbreak. I notice that it hasn’t changed the parameters of the SIR modelling though.
What is never mentioned is that Victoria is conducting a frankly ridiculous number of tests (overtaking New South Wales in raw numbers a few days ago, despite having a noticeably smaller population), and the proportion of ‘positives’ has not changed at all (still at 0.3% of the number tested – over a million, which is a sixth of the population of the state).
So I would be interested to see specific mention made of it in future updates, as it has frequently been reported (in my opinion erroneously) as a ‘second wave’, despite Australia not really having had a ‘first’ one!
“ actual community outbreak”
You may have access to more information than I do. It’s commonly agreed that the number of positive tests is an underestimate given that the sampling is not random, so for example here the relevant authorities use various means (surveys, sampling?) to estimate the true number of people who would test positive. So if you do more testing, you will find more people who test positive, therefore merely taking that increased number and calling it an outbreak is not accurate. You’d really need to work out whether the ratio of positive to negative tests indicated that your previous estimates of the true number of positive people actually showed an increase. Given the ulterior motives of authorities and media when reporting “outbreaks”, the exact basis on which they make these assertions is generally not given, therefore I don’t put much faith in it.
“ I don’t put much faith in it.”
Surely you mean ” I don’t put*any* faith in it.”
The magic of amplifying unsourced bits of RNA.
‘Outbreak’ as a term is not like ‘epidemic’ or ‘pandemic’ in my opinion – it is subjective, but I think a connected cluster (however small) is still reasonably called an ‘outbreak’. I have no faith in the methods they use because the ‘tests’ are nothing of the sort – nonetheless, I would say there is clearly something going through the community even if just a cold (it would be stretching credulity to suggest otherwise), they just made the decision at the beginning to be hysterical instead of stopping to think things through, and it has been the same almost globally ever since.
The MSM are trying to create equivalence between cases, infections and deaths. If there were an island that had had no covid-19 at all and no visitors in or out, there would be no cases. As soon as they opened up travel to and from the outside world, they would get cases. Initial success in suppressing the spread of infection does not indicate that you have ‘beaten’ the disease. You have merely delayed it. They need to get infected otherwise they will never develop immunity.
Of course, which is why I tend to think it may perhaps not be such a bad thing at all. Melbourne at least could end up with no excuse to fear this pathetically mild virus (there is of course no reason to fear it, but there are plenty of excuses used). The Victorian government’s arrogance and incompetence may have a positive side-effect (another if it guarantees it will be voted out of office – I don’t need my mother and sister having to put up with rubbish government while I’m not there – I certainly won’t be living in Australia again myself if I can help it, so corrupt left wing governments there won’t bother me personally).
Welcome to the Bright Side, DDS!
You should know me from Guido Nick! And that I have been on the Bright Side from the very beginning! I’ve rarely posted on here, but am a regular reader.
I just thought it was a shame that despite Australia having a paragraph in the Canaries in the Mine update there was no mention of this supposed ‘surge’, even just to debunk the scaremongering.
I have grave doubts about the not-to-be-used-to-diagnose-coronavirus ‘tests’ that everyone is using, and wonder if it’s just a cold going around, since a positive result (assuming it’s not false) seems to indicate the person has any one of multiple viruses from Asia depending on the precise method used.
Also (despite the fact it’s due to government incompetence) if it makes authorities finally realise that it spreading is not the apocalypse, it will hopefully mean Australia will be less fucked than New Zealand. The country needs desperately to reopen (the borders for tourism and travel I mean, as only Melbourne has anything resembling a full lockdown left) and if they’re still all wetting the bed over a minor virus that will come back if we let people live normal lives again that’s not going to happen.
Look to NZ and Australia as a guide to what a zero COVID Scotland might look like. The wrong direction would be any increase in numbers…
Scotland’s Covid ‘elimination’ approach superior to England’s, say leading scientists
https://bit.ly/3ejMph9
National clinical director Jason Leitch said yesterday: “Yes, increased cases, hospitalisations, ICU [intensive care unit[ admissions could potentially relate to what we do, of course it could.
He warned that if cases continue to rise, it could see Scotland’s emergence from lockdown go into “reverse gear.”
“Advisors could potentially tell the First Minister to go backwards. I, of course, don’t want to do that but that has to be available to us if these numbers go in the wrong direction.”
Who agreed to “elimination”? What happened to “flatten the curve”? Bastards. Why can’t people tell they’ve been had?
People flippantly demanding laws for masks etc don’t seem to realise that once it’s there the only way out is if the virus is eradicated. Which could be never.
I’ve just tried to discover if there is a time limit to wearing masks in shops in Scotland. There isn’t any apparently. “For the foreseeable future” are Ms. Sturgeon’s words. At best this policy will only keep the virus at bay – it can not eliminate. I’m much surprised there seems not to been more hard questioning on the possible time span. Are we buying into this forever? Would that not be a worse futurity than aught the virus could wreak?
How long till Scotland can ‘eliminate’ Sturgeon?
It won’t keep the virus at bay because masks don’t effing work. There isn’t a time limit because she (and her handlers) want the Scots to be totally submissive. It’s politics, not health.
Forever unless reason is returned. Vaccine up for covid then flu will have us masked up. They cannot discuss masking for flu at the moment for obvious reasons.
Not sure if I saw it here but:
‘How did we get from “we must flatten the curve” to “our way of life must change forever”?’
You did see it here – I posted it – but I got it from Simon Dolan’s Twitter
When did we last implement lockdown? – that was already our way of life changing forever. Allowing the state to violate out natural rights in such a way was going to scar the country in a way from which it can never recover.
I never agreed to ‘flatten the curve’, I don’t think the ‘flatten the curve’ idea ever justified lockdown. Where did this concept of lockdown suddenly emerge from? Who in their right mind would take a curve presented by Niel Furgeson seriously given his track record anyway.
By accepting the violation of our fellow citizens most basic human rights for any reason we invited everything that follows. Its funny how often I have heard people say ‘I dont agree with what he says but I would defend to the death his right to say it’ – well it seems when it comes to the right to leave the house and move freely its quite another matter.
I would like to see Sturgeon flattened
And she will just love it if the advisers tell her to increase lockdown. We live in a police state up here.
Not cases, positive test results. Let’s not fall into that media trap. Cases require medical intervention. This is one example of how the media keep up the fear. Not cases, stress that.
Thanks bella. Not cases. Positive tests. Not ill. Not anything other than a tick on a test form.
I make a prediction, especially after Wee Jimmie’s proclamations today that she’s thinking about quarantining every visitor to Scotland for 14 days: with any rise in the daily figures of those that have tested positive for Wuflu, she will panic and lockdown Scotland completely again.
She knows she is funded by the UK government & doesn’t care two hoots for independent businesses, so it is no skin off her nose. Plus it means she could close the border with England, which would play to her independence goals.
The only answer by Boris (if he’s even got the b***s to do it) would be to withdraw all funding to Scotland & call her bluff.
You think you’ve got it bad in England, but believe me it is far, far worse, living in the Peopke’s Republic of Scotland.
Truly . Awful living in this globalists experimental state. RoS
Latest ONS estimation :
“We estimate that an average of 1 in 3,900 individuals within the community population in England had COVID-19 at any given time between 22 June and 5 July 2020.”
Shiiittt! I’m scared!!!!! Where’s me mask?
That means that I have to kiss only about 4000 random individuals in order to embrace a Corona virus. I might then cohabit with it … then I might get love-sick because of it … which I might not get over quickly … and I could ultimately die of this infatuation.
What’s the bottom line odds of ‘really bad things happening’? Any offers?
“ What’s the bottom line odds of ‘really bad things happening’?” Pretty low if you consider that for most healthy people the virus causes no serious problems.
To answer my own question – I think it’s crudely somewhere around a 1.5m to 1 chance of dying from Covid-19 on average IFR estimates.
After that …. I began to lose the will to live, anyway
… but I think it must be about 600000 : 1 chance of developing a serious (hospitalizing) dose.
I’m never going to cross a road ever again, I soooo scared by these sort of odds.
You have to kiss over 20000. The chances of you catching it are at most 20% of those interactions
Which makes the clamour for the wearing of masks even more grossly sinister.
I just found this information on the ONS website; it’s a downloadable spreadsheet with deaths from Covid-19 by occupation.
The highest deaths are among “Taxi and cab drivers and chauffeurs” I thought it interesting that nurses are only 19th on the list, I really thought they would be at the top.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/causesofdeath/datasets/coronaviruscovid19relateddeathsbyoccupationenglandandwales
Most deaths would state ‘retired’.
I’d have thought supermarket workers would be at the top!
Despite the MSM propaganda over the last few months I have seen various sources looking at the rate of death in the NHS and concluding it was normal. From a population of over a million people there is going to be people of all ages dying quite frequently – if the MSM wish to try and make out that these are now all covid deaths they can make it look like NHS staff are dying from covid all over but I don’t think the actual data ever backed up this claim.
I’ve had a look at these tables. They are meaningless. Typists and keyboard operators have one death taxi drivers etc have 119. That says bugger all really. Taxi drivers and chauffeurs have more contact with lots more people so maybe more likely to have carried the virus or had a positive test, doesn’t mean it killed them. And relative to all causes of death the ratio is no different than that of authors and translators and actors and entertainers. So meaningless.
Sending some love to Tony! I’ve been there…. it’s hell. It’s not good for you to carry the load alone. Good on you for saying something to Toby.
Just putting it out there, if anyone is feeling like they are getting to the brink, you can email me tylean@tylean.com to unload. Humans heal humans, and an email can save a life.
Thanks for that – really really feeling bad – hope Gove’s announcement is true because if they do become mandatory I just won’t make it.
Tony, it’s time to be defiant. Let that be your raison d’etre. Don’t give up without a fight. If you think you’re not going to make it (god forbid, there are bigger challenges we will face) then at least go down fighting. In the meantime you are amongst comrades here. No-one on this site but the weird troll that appears now and again is in favour of masks as far as I can tell.
YES YOU WILL. Because you will defy the buggers and we will be with you.
What can they do to you worse than what they’ve already done? Only what you let them. Don’t let them. Bugger them.
I’ve been out by the sea at a busy beach all morning and I can tell you that what everybody now wants, except the drivelling Covizombies under rhe bed, is the old normal and lots of it and right now. And that’s what we will get, if we don’t give in.
Oh I really hope you are right, but all I see round West London are masked clowns lapping up the restrictions and being herded around like sheep. Everyone compiling to Boris and Co’s every wish. No one seems to want a life.
Oh please be right – I am so down right now, all I see is morons that hang on Boris’ every whim.
We all have down days. Please remember you’re not alone.
courage mon brave. You are not alone. And this too will pass… Big hug.
Where is your shop – I’ll head over for some sanity!
Only one frit???
Thanks, what’s a frit?
I used to live in fair Saffron Walden. I saw quite a few cafés come and go over the years.
One was wall-papered with pages of a comic featuring Dan Dare. The last sheet had him and his faithful sidekick in dire straits. I never did find out how they escaped!!
When I come back to visit old friends I will indubitably drop in to your heroic establishment!
Just liked your FB page and hopefully can pop in for a cuppa sometime soon.
Have liked your Facebook page and hope to visit soon.
Stay strong. We’re all in the same boat and you’re not alone.
Thanks, trying but really fearing the dystopian future being created.
I know how you feel as I find myself being on and off the same boat as you are but the truth will come out and the day of reckoning is coming.
Feeling that even if Gove is right and they don’t make them compulsory tomorrow, its only a mater of time as there are just to many bedwetters!
I go out and it seems supermarkets, the roads and parks are getting busier – close to normal levels, I assume the bulk of people are out and about now. I only see about 1-2% wearing masks at the supermarket. I find it hard to believe half these people are out not wearing masks and seeming unconcerned with social distancing while simultaneously wanting the government to force them to have to wear masks. I think the apparent demand for mask wearing is mostly being manufactured by the MSM and government.
As a key worker I have been driving about West London and unfortunately masks are everywhere, took the dog out this morning and even some 20 odd year olds were doing some football training – 2 of them in masks!!
Hello Tony, perhaps you need to get out of London more if you can. I posted yesterday that it’s a very different scene in my neck of the woods because we don’t have tubes, trams or buses crammed to the ceiling with passengers, even though it’s a sizeable city. Very, very few people wear masks here and those that do look as if they could be on the vulnerable list. I made the point that many of these rules, like social distancing and mask wearing on public transport, were made with London and the other big metropolitan areas in mind. In our large shopping centre it is very easy to keep well away from anyone else, even on a Saturday. Even in normal times, I would hate to have to shop in Oxford Street on a regular basis anyway. Remember if it would cause you distress to wear a mask, you are exempt from doing so.
That is sad to hear ! I live outside London.
The mask wearing seems to have taken on a virtual signalling / morally superior tone mainly due to the media and celebrities. Unfortunately, the young seem to be very easily influenced by social media, training wearing a mask is plain stupidity. I also find it dystopian seeing so many people wearing masks.
Yeah, it’s a fashion accessory for kids. Like the brownshirts.and swastikas.
It doesn’t help that many people parade their virtue through social media, posting selfies of themselves or with someone wearing muzzles. They think they look like they care and we’re supposed to applaud them but actually I pity them for being easily led and swallowing the propaganda whole.
So the bed wetters can wear them. Making it mandatory may well backfire. Let’s see how it goes in Scotland. Ironically it’s the bed wetters who are sustaining the narrative that the virus is still deadly which it isn’t (and never was except to the extremely vulnerable, as is the common cold) and is now virtually non-existent. So it is the bed wetters who are building their own (and ours if we don’t fight) prison.
Science isn’t about balance of opinion (whatever that is supposed to mean). It is about empirical studies that test hypotheses. In this case the hypothesis would be that masks significantly reduce the transmission of viruses, specifically the coronavirus. The research on this issue is limited and does not show a benefit. But what has happened recently is that the corporate media have increasingly been pushing the notion that face masks are beneficial: that is the balance of opinion that has changed.
On 4 March Chris Whitty said:
On 23 April Patrick Valance said:
The reason that was the position of both SAGE and the government’s senior medical and scientific advisors was because there is no evidence of benefit. The science has not changed. Here is a study from February 2020: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/jebm.12381
It shows even N95 are not effective. And the government’s Guidance, it should be noted, is the cut up an old T-shirt to make a face covering.
The wear face coverings messaging has nothing to do with any scientific research on virual transmission. It is about controlling behaviour: something the government has been following the scientific advice on.
And this, which I posted on yesterday’s comments, but is worth putting it here as well:
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/face-masks-should-there-be-a-cover-up-
Another collation of RCT’S:
https://www.sott.net/article/434796The-Science-is-Conclusive-Masks-and-Respirators-do-NOT-Prevent-Transmission-of-Viruses
Exactly – it is BEHAVIOUR that they want to control, and only this studies that they are using to make policy!
Actually the research on this issue is more extensive than you might think and not one paper I gave read (out of about a dozen going back sometimes long before this virus) bears evidence that masks are effective against viruses (virii?). Therefore the ‘balance of scientific opinion having shifted in favour of them’ is pure bollocks. More propaganda.
The research paper I cited has a long list of previous studies, all of which showed there was no evidence that wearing face masks reduces the transmission of a virus.
Yes, indeed.
The sceptical lockdown view stands or falls on 2 pieces of data, the IFR (infection fatality rate) and the level at which herd immunity is achieved. Ferguson & the Imperial team claim the IFR is about 0.9%, Levitt and others seem to suggest 0.25 or lower. If we take the number of deaths to date to be 44,000 then at an IFR rate of 0.9% something like 4.8m (7.2% of UK population) people must have been infected. If the rate is 0.25 then about 18m (27%of the population) must have been infected. There is also the debate around at which level we reach herd immunity, 20% or as high as 80%? It seems remarkable that at this stage we still don’t know the answer to either of these questions.
As wearing masks lowers blood oxygen levels and increases CO2, it would be interesting if people were to start proferring the excuse for car accidents that they momentarily lost consciousness due to wearing a mask because they believed govt propaganda
The serious point is that the current bullshit about masks turns medical protocols on their head.
The norm is that benefit from any measure should outweigh the harm. It’s the basis of the Hypocratic Oath : ‘Do no harm’
In the case of face masks in normal environments, the evidence is such that there is no established benefit.
The harms caused by discomfort (at the lowest), restriction of oxygen and re-breathing of carbon dioxide and social disruption are, however, a fact.
I presume ‘Hypocratic Oath’ wasn’t a typo because there sure is a lot of hypocrisy going on out there.
Just found this (maybe already posted). It does not bode well if you live in Scotland, but just look at the comments ….
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/5798685/coronavirus-scotland-nicola-sturgeon-face-masks-2/
Couldn’t agree more – couldn’t find 1 pro mask comment there – wonder if BoJo and Krankie will look at that, combined with the DT, behaps they may think again – oh sorry what am I thinking they are NEVER WRONG.
Krankie only reads the abysmal Glasgow Herald (used to be a great broadsheet, now just nationalist propaganda) and The National (sister paper of the Herald, started in 2014, tiny circulation), official organ of the SNP
We went to the carpet shop on Friday,an independent one not a chain.Pleasant normal experience,no distancing etc,staff and customers happily mingling.Paid for the carpet and then came the insane part to spoil the atmosphere.The chap said he had to ask me some ‘Covid safety questions about ourselves and our house for the protection of the carpet fitters’ !,as he said it he gave me that ‘yes,I know,this is bollocks’ look.
He asked if we were feeling well today ?,had we had Covid ? or virus symptoms ?,was there anyone vulnerable in our house ?,our answer was yes to the first one and no for the rest and he then said I’ve got to read this bit to you,’when the fitters are at your house they will be wearing face coverings and you must remain behind a closed door in another room and must not socialise with them and you will need to sanitise the room they have been working in ‘,I beg your f***ing pardon ! ‘ or words to that effect was my response and I told him that we will decide what we do and how we treat people in our own house thankyou very much.The chap agreed it was ridiculous and offensive but it was being forced on them by the company providing their public liabilty insurance.
When the fitters arrive at our house the first think to happen is they will be offered a cup of tea and some cake !.
To be fair to the shop,the chap I dealt with agreed it was a load of cobblers but he had to say it to me,orders from above as usual.I don’t think it was the first time he had received a reaction like mine to it !.I would expect the fitters will be perfectly normal when they come,most tradespeople have their heads screwed on properly !,we had an electrician at home last week and he was a total sceptic and we had a good talk about the ongoing lunacy.
I had the chap round to service my gas boiler last month. I was told all the same nonsense. As it happened as soon as the chap arrived he lowered his mask and we had a good chat… but was a bit disappointed to find his discarded mask on my front path after he had left.
Had some carpet fitters round last week – all sceptics, happy for tea and biscuits, no masks, wanted to know where to find out more info so all nice and relaxed.
Anyone who owns a cafe or pub business should insist in either full hazmat suit including forced air breathing hood or fuck all. Big sign stating useless and potentially harmful muzzles, so come in with either all the right gear or non at all. Having pointless PPE is more hazardous than none at all easy for a good risk assessment.
I’m amazed at Northern Ireland. There’s no marching today for the 12th.
Hundreds of years of marching through all sorts, the siege of Drumcrue and the like, the standoffs and bitterness at the Parades commission.
All beaten by Covid-19.
Total loss of identity.Maybe not a very nice identity, but what else do they have?
Be nothing, it’s safer.
Last night was the first decent night sleep I have had in ages, and this morning, I woke up like normal… not trembling and soon to burst out in tears whilst making my breakfast.
What has changed…. well some of us agreed to meet in real life, and just knowing that real human contact with people who are not behaving like drones is on the horizon has made a big difference.
We are a social creature…. the power in what is being done to us is IMMENSE! And I’m glad we’re taking power back.
As the comment thread gets unruly here, just posting again that anyone who wants to meet, please let me know the range of where you’re happy to travel. We have people reading who don’t comment (or people who do comment who are – rightly – hesitant to post too much private info). You can email me: tylean@tylean.com. If you have any hesitation about who I am, I invite you to google me, so you know I’m not secretly GrantM, lol!
More soon! Thanks everyone!
I’m on the south coast and pretty limited with transport (no car) but I would be happy to meet. A lot of what you say makes sense but you talk about taking power back while you acknowledge what is being done to us is IMMENSE. You don’t exaggerate. So taking power back is also a HUGE ask. I am a creature who is used to isolation (live alone, work alone) but even I am noticing that some brief human contact is boosting my morale no end. This is psychological warfare, but because there aren’t body bags lining the streets people aren’t noticing. I can stay at home for ages quite happily but being under house arrest, although it amounts to the same thing practically, is an entirely different, insidious and belittling state of affairs.
Indeed Bella. I also live alone (retired) and quite happy in normal times. But with lockdown conditions it is totally different. I have been going out all the time during lockdown for Tesco shopping and regular afternoon walks, just like normal – ignoring that fact that I am a ‘vulnerable’ over 70er. But having to queue outside Tesco and being guilty if I went out more than once a day makes it so much different. We have weekly church services on Zoom but it is not the same, you need to meet people in the flesh, it means so much to us singletons.
I shouldn’t feel guilty about going out more than once a day. At the height of this nonsense I was going out seven, eight times a day (more than I would normally) out of bloody mindedness. (After all what difference would it have made? More stupid reasoning.) And sitting where I shouldn’t sit. Never once saw a blue meanie. I mean, let’s face it, we have been had and people don’t get it.
I am shropshire and have a car.
Anyone in Yorkshire, look me up.
Or rather, just tell me in a post if you fancy a drinky poo
I’m a bit busy and broke to go further afield but locally yeah ofc
I’m up for meeting. Was in the process of extending my social circle and leaving my comfort zone, but lockdown put paid to that. Am near Basingstoke, but don’t mind travelling a bit.
Would be lovely to meet you. Any sceptics here in London?
Can get there, easily enough, what kind of venue would you favour? RA Friends room, V & A ditto?
I’m boycotting museums and art galleries at the moment. A park would be OK with me.
This may be posted elsewhere but in case you haven’t seen it and this needs to be widely known:
https://notrickszone.com/2020/07/12/just-use-a-mouthwash-stupid-new-british-study-suggests-oral-rinsing-effective-against-covid-19-spread/
This is really fun, looks like you could get everyone back to work on the Tube if you ‘strongly advised’ them to have a good gargle with neat vodka as soon as they arrived. And then again before going home, and again after they got home. Could make a great excuse for mask refuseniks too, ‘ it’s OK officer, smell my breath, I’m using the medical alternative to kill the bugs’:
https://doi.org/10.1093/function/zqaa002
Can’t quite believe it’s not a spoof though, it’s Issue 1, Volume 1 of a glossy looking Oxford Journal but the researchers credited work for Boots the Chemists…
So we need to be offered hand sanitiser and then mouth wash to enter a shop now. My wife might spot an opportunity to save some money here!
A photo from a workplace in Guatemala, taken from the Telegraph live feed.
?imwidth=1240
The dystopian future is here and is coming to a place near you soon.
Not much air circulation there. I bet it’s a breeding ground for disease.
I live in mid Wales. On Thursday I did my usual weekly shop in my nearest Tesco. I would say that not more than four people were wearing masks in the store which had about 20 customers in total. Everyone kept to the prescribed distancing, nodded and smiled to each other and shopping went smoothly and pleasantly. I was unloading my trolley at the checkout when in came a woman — middle aged I would say — wearing a face mask. She took one look around and literally screamed (in a Brummie accent): ‘Why aren’t you wearing masks? You’ll kill us all. You’ll kill us all… Oh God, oh God.’ And she rushed out. What chance do we have when there’s people like that who seem to be in the majority even if not so extreme in their reactions? I just hope that Drakeford sticks to his guns as far as masks are concerned.
At least she rushed out instead of making you all put up with her histrionics while you finished your shopping. Unless they just don’t understand risk at all (which I’d say is fairly likely anyway), I just don’t understand how people like that manage to pass on their clearly defective genes.
I would have howled with laughter.
All those going off to the seaside with the kids for a welcome break please take note: RNLI want everyone to attend lifeguarded beaches, they spent ages getting ready and people drowned whilst they were playing catch up. Only procedure change is around PPE and CPR. Aquatic rescue or paediatric CPR should include rescue breaths and if possible oxygen. RNLI have issued protocols and guidance to lifeguards to not give rescue breaths or oxygen. This is not the position of all lifeguards just the organisation. This means you or your child have a much reduced chance of survival from a drowning incident. Think about how many pennies you put in the rattled tin or ‘lifeboat’ on the counter of your local chippy. Write to them and complain, your life may depend on it. Would have been nice for them to publicise this dramatic downgrading of capability.
I’m at a loss for words.
I gave up contributing to the RNLI when they put that anal-retentive idiot management twat in charge who promptly “sacked” 2 volunteers for taking a saved from drowning victim to hospital in their own land rover as the NHS said it would be at least an hour before an ambulance could get to them.
Same ex-corporate idiots taking over all charities now.
A favourite photo of mine is a hunky lifeguard in a red onesie staring sternly out to sea wearing a face mask AND a visor and one of those daft plastic aprons.
Lifeguards and lifeboat men I know will just get on and do their jobs and ignore RNLI.
Noble rescuers, so quick to save their own lives at the cost of yours.
It’ll look really good, won’t it, when one of them stands back and lets a child die?
Just in case you’ve missed it, this Grauniad/Observer item flags up the latest in the Scary Fairy narrative, aimed at keeping up the programme of social control.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/11/revealed-20-areas-at-most-risk-of-local-lockdowns
Leicester was the prototype : just watch out for a performance near you.
(Anyone who can count will recognise the bollocks)
If they don’t want to be locked down they need to stop going for tests
Given that people already wear masks on public transport, there’s a delicious irony about this DT article.
They’re going to have to reassure us that it’s safe “out there”, while their other hand is telling us it isn’t, hence the need for masks.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/11/government-preparing-ease-restrictions-using-public-transport/
…. many people remain reluctant to return to their daily commute and are still following lockdown advice to avoid public transport unless absolutely necessary.Last week, the Department of Transport removed from its website the guidance that public transport should be avoided to prevent the spread of coronavirus. It continues to urge people to work from home wherever possible, consider “cycling and walking before using public transport”, and avoid rush hour travel.
…. One Whitehall source said: “It is costing a great deal of money to run all these train services with so few people on them.
“Different departments are looking at ways to ease in the message of avoiding public transport. ….There is some debate about how best to get the message across that the Government wants to allow more people to travel.”
It will be interesting to see what devious contradictory bollox they manage to come up with!
“….There is some debate about how best to get the message across that the Government wants to allow more people to travel.”
How about just being honest and explaining that we need to get more people travelling and that the risk from the virus is now very low? Why do they need to spend weeks working out how to do it?!
Because they have spent months deliberately pushing fear.
It was a rhetorical question, sadly I know the answer all too well…
Why?
Where do I start ………..?
One Whitehall source said: “It is costing a great deal of money to run all these train services with so few people on them.”
No surprise there.
Ironic after Thatcher’s policy to run down British Rail in order to sell it off cheap to Tory cronies.
City trams here are often counted running with a single passenger. No biggy though, simply get a government grant of £9 million to keep them running.
“It is costing a great deal of money to run all these train services with so few people on them.”
I always thought that was the British Rail corporate strategy and their motto was ‘Life would be great, if it wasn’t for the customer’
Mrs Thatcher was against the privatisation of the railways. That is why it only took place once Major took over…..and, as with so many other things, made a complete dog’s breakfast of it.
And now the railways have been renationalised because the government is really good at running things….or not really?
Are foreign state railways Tory cronies lol?
I’m starting to realise what’s going on: we are being ruled by children.
There are no adults in the room making responsible decisions.
I wonder what would happen if we formed a cabinet of actual kids and see what they would do?
No school. Ever.
Free sweets for all under 12. When we reach 12, we’ll extend it to 13. Then 14. 15. 16. 17. 18…
No fixed bed times.
No bath nights unless really stinky.
No green vegetables. Especially not sprouts.
Minimum pocket money £100 per week.
Not much different really, except there’s more zeroes on the real politicians’ pocket money.
Regarding statutory instruments, according to the Hansard Society there have been 133 so far related to Covid. https://www.hansardsociety.org.uk/publications/data/coronavirus-statutory-instruments-dashboard
We are being ruled by SIs now
Dysfunctional children who stamp their feet until they get their own way.
My children are more rational and responsible then this. We are being ruled by tyrants.
Has the Scottish Law/statute been found regarding mandatory wearing of facemasks in shops yet?
I believe the power is by way of a statutory instrument even though the holyrood parliament spoke of it as being law.
Legislation.gov.uk is exceptionally hard to navigate on a phone.
I did see that statutory instruments were passed on the 10th. Introduction to the instruments it says these measures have been brought in as they are seen* to be proportiate to the prevailing threat to people. *by MSPs.
Not found tge location of the text about face coverings in shops. Any pointers would be welcome. Thank you.
Regarding statuary instruments, according to the Hansard Society there have been 133 so far related to Covid. https://www.hansardsociety.org.uk/publications/data/coronavirus-statutory-instruments-dashboard
We are being ruled by SIs now
SIs not law Carrie yes.
Stat Instruments are law, enforceable by fines etc. As opposed to guidance, which isn’t.
I thought statutory deals with legal matters. Law being a much more fundamental principle separate from arguably arbitrary matters.
The face covering in shops fines are based on the fining structure for antisocial behaviour. This is arbitrary human legal instrument. Not what I understand law to be.
For example:
For the purposes of these Regulations—
(a)the form of a fixed penalty notice,
(b)the effect of a fixed penalty notice, and
(c)the procedure that applies to a fixed penalty notice,
are the same as those that apply to a fixed penalty notice given under section 129(1) of the Antisocial Behaviour etc. (Scotland) Act 2004 F14, as provided for in sections 129 to 134 of that Act [F15and sections 226B and 226I of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995]F16 , subject to the modifications in paragraph (7).
Law appears to have a foundation based in human decency and reason. This stuff isn’t that.
Why do you think a Statutory Instrument is not law? See:
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/understanding-legislation
Because
The ‘common law’ means the substantive law and procedural rules that have been created by the judges through the decisions in the cases they have heard. … Statute law, on the other hand, refers to law that has been created by Parliament in the form of legislation.
Is the first official definition I could find. Legal versus lawful.
Personally I would go further and say much of judicial law relies on maritime law which is to say legal or contrivance of state.
Certainly I’m not an expert, clearly so. But I’m clear fining a child (parents/guardian) for going into a shop without a mask, which is ultimately the senario we live with here, is not of common law.
It is an arbitrary contrivance with a fee/fine scale derived from unrelated statutes of antisocial behaviour. Why choose antisocial behaviour fining system, or another such as fines for speeding or unpaid tax?
Legal statutes are a separate thing from good common Law. Not to say statutes are all bad, but they can easily be badly constructed.
It’s not proportionate to cut oxygen and increase C02 in a person’s blood supply (x 5mil) while going about daily tasks to keep at bay Covid19. Nor is it just to impinge on our personal liberty to speak clearly and express ourselves visually.
The current official prevelance is of 19 new cases, 330* in hospital and 3 in ICU per 5 million reported today in Scotland. The forecast at the point of passing the amendment in the Scottish Parliament did not give reasonable concern for the economic impact to merit passing a bill that causes five million people to alter behaviours traditions and customs.
Common law does not get us to this point whereas Statute law does. MSPs unqualified and fed a diet of fear briefings by got-at and/or compromised experts quickly corrupt the statute books.
At least that’s how I see it.
*yes 33 is at it again.
You might have got confused. Case law is the set of rulings from court judgements that set precedents for how the law has been interpreted and applied in certain cases. The link above does explain how it works, I recommend it. Until someone goes to court on some aspect of interpreting the Scots Stat Instrument, there is no case law on the subject.
This is interesting re SIs: A Statutory Instrument may come into effect as soon as it has been made. However, there is a convention – ‘the 21-day rule’ – by which, wherever possible, a Statutory Instrument which is subject to the negative procedure is laid before Parliament at least 21 calendar days before it comes into effect.
Of the 112 Coronavirus-related Statutory Instruments laid before the UK Parliament which are subject to the negative procedure, 89 breach the 21-day rule.
If an SI comes into effect before it is even laid before Parliament, a requirement is triggered under Section 4 of the Statutory Instruments Act 1946 that the government formally notify the Speakers of the two Houses of this fact and explain the need for such urgency. (This applies to both ‘made negative’ and ‘made affirmative’ SIs.) Such notifications are recorded in the official record of parliamentary proceedings.
So far, ten Coronavirus-related SIs have come into effect before they were laid before Parliament and have had notifications recorded accordingly…
Here is a link to the Scottish Coronavirus Regulations from March, incorporating into the text ALL the (I think 7) sets of amending regulations up to the latest made on 9 July which brings in the shop shit. Have a read and post any specific questions and I will do my best to help.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ssi/2020/103/contents
The Regulations are made in the form of Statutory Instruments, a type of subordinate legislation made under powers contained in the parent Act (Coronavirus Scotland Act 2020, I will add a link to that). The Regulations can be challenged in the courts by way of judicial review but (although legally qualified) I’m not an expert on that.
Thank you greatly Gillian. Your expertise has saved me considerable frustration. I am most grateful to you.
The ‘proportionate restrictions’ to mitigate against harm to the people is obviously one area of suspicion. I need to understand the debate and the data that informed that debate. I suspect the data is not published.
Anyway, I shall read the links you’ve kindly replied with Gillian.
To be clear not wearing in shops is Illegal and not unlawful. To my understanding.
The relevant text lifted from The Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions) (Scotland) Regulations 2020 from legislation.gov.uk
F5Requirement to wear a face covering in a shop
6B.—(1) Except to the extent that a defence would be available under regulation 8(4), no person may use a shop without wearing a face covering.
(2) Paragraph (1) does not apply to the wearing of a face covering—
(a)by a child who is under the age of 5,
(b)by a constable acting in the course of their duty,
(c)by an emergency responder (other than a constable) acting in their capacity as an emergency responder,
(d)by a person responsible for a shop, or an employee of that person, where—
(i)there is a partition between the person or employee and members of the public, or
(ii)a distance of at least two metres is maintained between the person or employee and members of the public.
(3) For the purposes of paragraph (1)—
(a)a person uses a shop when—
(i)they are in a shop whether or not for the purposes of shopping, and
(ii)the shop, or part of the shop, is open to the public,
(b)a person who is responsible for a shop includes the owner, proprietor, tenant and manager of that shop.
(4) In this regulation, “shop” means a building, room or other indoor establishment used for the retail sale or hire of goods or services but does not include—
(a)restaurants, including restaurants and dining rooms in hotels or members’ clubs,
(b)cafes, including workplace canteens,
(c)bars, including bars in hotels or members’ clubs,
(d)public houses,
(e)banks, building societies, credit unions, short-term loan providers, savings clubs, cash points and undertakings which by way of business operate a currency exchange office, transmit money (or any representation of money) by any means or cash cheques which are made payable to customers.]
And since there are so many exceptions then masks in other places will do no bloody good whatsoever..How stupid do they think we are? Well very stupid in most cases. And they’re right. The sheep are convinced they are protecting you and turn on non-wearers..
100% bella. It is truly lunatic.
Convinced you ought to be protecting them.
Not much turn, I should imagine. Remember ‘being savaged by a dead sheep’?
Here is a link to the parent Act which contains the powers to make the regulations:
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2020/7/contents
‘where the person cannot put on, wear or remove a face covering—
(i)
because of any physical or mental illness or impairment or disability (within the meaning of section 6 of the Equality Act 2010),
(ii)
without severe distress,’
This is from section 8, f4(d).
I suggest that all of us serfs in Sturgeon land memorise this and have it to hand in the event of a challenge.
I’m going to wait for my badge to be delivered before attempting to run the gauntlet in any local shops-apart from the green grocer.
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ssi/2020/103/contents
It can be found at the link above, which Gillian kindly posted.
Thank you Gillian.
As to the Dear Leader’s masks for the foreseeable future, this is scientifically illiterate, socially damaging and control creep dressed up as Elf and Safety.
Enough already!
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ssi/2020/103/contents
Masks on 6 year olds is proportionate. No. It. Is. Not.
Let me know when the protests are I am going.
So, we can do the hokey cokey in a club, mix and mingle in a cafe-subject to daft distancing -and behave badly in a bank, but without the need to do the masquerade.
Who the hell wrote this piece of mind numbing horse shit, with its many exclusions?
Milo Minderbender is alive and well and directing operations at Holyrood.
And the masquerade will not, apparently be imposed in England.
Perhaps we should organise a sceptics’ shopping expedition south of the border.
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/5799786/coronavirus-scotland-glasgow-shop-no-face-masks/
I think this Glaswegian shopkeeper should win Toby’s treasured ‘sceptic of the week’ trophy.
“This is the store policy for our employees safety.”
Now that’s a GOOD boss!
I was hoping Glasgow would rediscover its teeth at some point!
I turned that into a post here. I wish everyone thought like that person.
I’m with Tony – I can’t get used to the idea of wearing a mask in public. I’ve completely stopped doing the family shopping because it makes me feel panicky.
There are no scientific studies on universal mask-wearing by the general public. Therefore, we have no idea whether they do more harm than good. This should’ve been studied carefully before issuing edicts.
As someone has pointed out on here, they wear masks in China and it didn’t stop it there!
I’m with you and Tony on this one. The only shop I’ll go into is the garage to pay for fuel for my car. All the so called safety measures like one way systems, queuing, masks etc make me feel extremely anxious.
Is the BBC testing permanent social distancing propaganda?
This is what Andrew Lawrence thinks about masks. Brilliant. One of his best:
https://youtu.be/ViKDf6UIXl0
I think this is possibly the best one yet – absolutely spot on!
Yes, really cheered me up
He helps me to maintain a semblance of sanity. And he’s very funny.
Brilliant
I’ve just created a petition on change.org – Relaxed about Coronavirus – UKhttps://www.change.org/relaxedaboutcorona19
Please sign and share!
The UK government and its devolved branches are restricting people’s freedom on an unprecedented scale, in the name of protecting us from the Corona19 virus. Having endured around four months of virtual house arrest and an unprecedented shutdown of public life (announced as necessary to ‘flatten the curve’ [of hospital admissions]), we are now being forced to obey further and permanent draconian rules and restrictions including wearing masks, restrictions on our right of assembly, worship in churches, sing, visit pubs, restaurants, sports & leisure centres, use cash and so on. In a further invasion of our privacy, we are expected to give our personal contact details wherever we go. Many people are concerned that the next stages will include mandatory vaccination and the abolishment of cash, tracking our every transaction….
Signed!
Estonia is the anti-corona hysteria holiday place to be?
More corona hysteria from the Dutch State News Agency: one of their correspondents/journalists, normally working in Belgium, went to Estonia. Turns out the Estonians have a very stable personality. The correspondent however has an obvious case of corona phobia…
Here are some examples (computer translation) from the text:
Traveling in corona time: ‘The old normal feels uncomfortable in Estonia’
On a terrace in Tallinn where we have lunch, the waitress places me at a table that I find way too close to another table with guests. It’s quiet so I’m getting a new place. Estonia is relatively less affected by Covid-19. 69 people have died and the number of infections per 100,000 inhabitants is half that in the Netherlands. There have been several days when no new infections were registered.
Note: this is I think wrong. Estonia has 69 deaths total, which is 52 per million. The Netherlands has 358 per million. I thinkEstonia’s rate is not half, it’s 1/7th… Am I right here or am I making a mistake?
Article continues:
The rest of Estonia has also had a lockdown light, with restaurants/pubs that had to close at 22:00, but was otherwise open as usual. Schools closed and national borders were also closed. Stickers on the floor remind us of the time when two meters had to be kept. Nobody still does that.
(…)
Mouth masks? Not here
Now I live in Belgium myself. That country was hit relatively hard and although the figures are also going down there, the government decided this weekend to require masks in all shops, museums, places of worship and cinemas. In any case, mouth masks were ubiquitous, even outside. When I come to the Netherlands, I find the lack of it a relief. But in Estonia I suddenly find it intimidating, that old normal.
(…)
Corona is over here, and I wonder how hard it will be to switch up again on a second wave. And is that perhaps the value of those mouth masks that suddenly become mandatory in Belgium: you keep the attention there.
With that in mind, I say goodbye to the ecologists. It is only when I get back in the car that I realize that I shook hands with them. I am shocked. I dive into the hand gel in my bag. And that also frightens me. The old and the new normal compete for control over my behavior.
So, the Dutch press is just as mental as the British press. Especially that stupid reasoning towards the end of “wearing a mouth mask is helping you to remain vigilant”. That’s the full-blown COVID-19 version of Stockholm syndrome! However, notice the one glimmer of hope: he does still yearn for the real (not old!) normal.
Oh, and if Toby Young is still looking for a place to go on holiday: if you choose the right moment with regards to weather, Estonia might be the place to be…
Original link in Dutch, or a computer translation through Google. Copyright photo by NOS/Sander van Hoorn
Good post. Insane journalist. Very revealing and blatant in to see the translated words. I haven’t yet heard their old normal being dismissed in such obviously mind moukding ways here in UK yet. But that is possibly because i avoid as much as I can of their propaganda. A considerable thank you for posting, you’ve really added some colour.
Imagine being allowed to drive a car with a mind as full of daffodils and zebras as the Dutch journalist.
Face masks is just the hare being run today by the government to district attention from the real story
The real story is the mass manslaughter by the NHS of people in care homes (I know the NHS don’t run the care homes but they forced infected patients on the care homes, killing tens of thousands as a result)
That stopped April 15th. Subsequent FoI requests to some hospital trusts suggest that c. 20% of those tested before a proposed discharge were actually infected, of whom all were asymptomatic at the time (wouldn’t have been considered for discharge otherwise). Studies suggest that agency workers moving from home to home were also significant disease vectors. It’s a moot point how much difference it made.
Just as important seems to have been management within the home, so those which isolated, kept all staff on site, were able to keep deaths low. But it was mismanaged by government, by failure to advise, prepare and supply homes with tests, PPE etc.
The tests were poor quality so many may very well have carried the infection without testing positive.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/exclusive-nhs-using-flawed-covid-19-test-missing-25-of-positives/
Added to which, rushing aged patients out of hospital with, in many cases, no definite bed for them elsewhere no doubt caused any number of excess deaths both with and without covid 19.
‘…rapid covid-19 testing was not available to help clinicians assess the risks to care homes.”
https://www.hsj.co.uk/policy-and-regulation/discharges-to-care-homes-increased-year-on-year-during-critical-period/7027765.article
While they may find you a “vaccine” to assuage your panty wetting fears, you will find there is no cure for stupid. So you are screwed.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/06/17/90-coronavirus-laws-rules-imposed-without-parliamentary-scrutiny/
Are people finally waking up?
Oops, sorry, old article from June. Just saw it on twitter and misread the date. Don’t know how to delete
Had a feeling of deja vu when reading that then saw it was dated 17 June. Think I saw recently the number is up from 90 to around 133.
Yes, 133 to date. You can see them all on the Hansard society website: https://www.hansardsociety.org.uk/publications/data/coronavirus-statutory-instruments-dashboard#scrutiny-procedures
.
So we have to organise and fight back. Question is, how?
https://www.lockdowntruth.org/post/face-mask-legal-action
Thanks. Happy to lend my time where I can but don’t work in PR
Thanks for the offer.
What are your professional strengths?
It was a photo opportunity, just another look at me I’m signalling my virtue!
We have just returned from visiting my brother. Went to his local pub no masks, no one way arrows, no 2 mtr, in fact it was quite normal except for sanitiser by the doorway. Just perfect!
Was it a chain/brewery pub or fully independent?
Just the hand sanitiser to get rid of.
Been out on the bike, with the better half, to take her around some villages near where we are moving to soon. Stopped at a pub in a nice village, sunny afternoon , the garden was very full with people, no one wearing a mask everyone smiling and happy. The staff were unmasked, very happy & talkative. I went into the pub just to have a look. No barriers, no masks. You could get your drink at the bar. I chatted to the owner, within a foot of each other, to thank her for having not gone down the antisocial route. She replied that it’s her livelihood & wants the custom. She’d been to other pubs in the area who are fully into the madness & agreed with me that if they didn’t change their attitude they would be shut!
I thanked her again & told her I’d definitely be back. A thoroughly lovely experience!
Sounds great, Miley. Name and location, or are you going to keep it all to yourselves ?
THE STATE FUCKS US, BUT DOESN’T PAY!
Sorry, couldn’t resist it, some news items are simply too good to be ignored.
Short text from Dutch State News: in Germany prostitutes are angry that they still can’t legally work due to German COVID-19 rules. The strange thing is that in both the Netherlands and Belgium prostitutes are hard at work and no, they haven’t turned out to be mass spreaders (sorry, really couldn’t resist it) of COVID-19. Yes, the German lust for order and rules is in more than just a Freudian sense pretty much “anal” these days.
So understandably the German prostitutes are angry. How normal is this new normal if even the oldest profession in the world, which has kept working under all historical circumstances including wartime (especially so one might add) can’t ply its trade…?
The very short text (original comes with video!) reads:
German sex workers protest against corona measures
Sex workers took to the streets in the German city of Hamburg. They demand reopening of the brothels. The sex workers had to resign in March because of the corona virus outbreak. Shops, restaurants and bars are open again, but sex workers are still not allowed to work.
Text in the screenshot taken from the video reads “Der Staat fickt uns, aber zahlt nicht!” which means “The state fucks us, but doesn’t pay!” Also note that the person in the video is NOT wearing a state approved mask! Time for a proper spanking. (Sorry, couldn’t stop myself there.)
Another slogan you can read (see 00:22 in the video) is “Bordellzimmer sind keine Massenveranstaltung” or “Brothel rooms are not mass events”. Which technically speaking is true, even though they are of course mass spreading events. (Okay, okay, I won’t do it again, I promise!)
I have been in contact with Simon Dolan over the past couple of days.
Looks like he has put bits of the slave masks picture on his twitter today.
Brilliant, getting a lot of attention.
Go Simon.
I’m glad he has posted about the government’s latest data and DNA-gathering plan, ie to go door-knocking the population and offer people virus tests in their homes. Hope people refuse!
Hi. I may be mistaken but did somebody in government or maybe SAGE say masks on transport were just to make people FEEL safer so as to get them using public transport etc?
If you can remember if and who that was could you reply with a link?
Thanks
The PM said it, a month or more ago
Thanks
The government is still actively discouraging people from using public transport. Even tough everyone is wearing a mask and therefore protected from spreading the virus, if you get on a bus or train you’re taking up a 2 metre bubble and denying it to an essential worker.
It does seem interesting that the pressure for mask wearing seems to be coming from the media and questionable “public surveys” rather than “following the science”. Is it now government policy to enact whatever is most popular, fed by twitter, Facebook, BBC and newspapers?
This has been the case since the beginning. Government “policy” has been entirely led by the media narrative. I have worked in print and internet media for 40 years and it was immediately plain to me that this was happening.
The damage has been incalculable. At present, I would be happy that justice had been served if all involved were reduced to a life of penury and remorse. But if my anger is raised further, I expect I will be among the crowds cheering when lampposts are repurposed.
My contempt for Johnson, Hancock, and their cohorts grows stronger by the day. I fear the day of reckoning. So should they.
Of course it is. We have a populist government.
We have a government that manufactured consent and then claimed ‘It’s what people want.’
And, come October, they will be a very un-popular government!
https://masks4all.co/
https://www.masks4all.org.uk/
Co-Founder and leader: Jeremy Howard, Distinguished Research Scientist at USF; Founding Researcher at fast.ai; Member of the World Economic Forum’s Global AI Council
The World Economic Forum rears its ugly head yet again. They had a meet up in January, just before it kicked off in Europe. I followed this thread from the Swiss Policy Research site: https://swprs.org/
Here’s info on the Global AI Council.
https://venturebeat.com/2019/05/29/world-economic-forum-launches-global-ai-council-to-address-governance-gaps/
“The Global AI Council will be cochaired by Microsoft president Brad Smith”
What does everyone reckon? Social Engineering on a global scale?
Yep, that’s why we locked down in the first place.
Of course it is.
Otherwise, they would have stuck to the sensible but unfortunately by Vallance miscommunicated policy of managed, aka Swedish not Belarus style, herd immunity in the first place.
(Although Belarus is doing just as fine.)
I like this one in The Telegraph live feed (my emphasis):
Continuing on the issue of face masks, here is a really interesting perspective from Rowland Kao, a professor of veterinary epidemiology and data science at the University of Edinburgh.
In a comment to the Science Media Centre, Prof Kao said that the importance of face masks will potentially rise as we move towards more regular inside gatherings. Here’s what he said:
I expect he draws his conclusions from that large body of research involving pigs, sheep and cattle wearing face masks.
Yes, but that won’t stop Boris using it to make this nightmare come true – feeling bad about this again now, the media aren’t going to let this drop – they are determined to make it happen
Think about the Cummings affair how the press rumbled on with that. They do want the masks, but the issue is can they pass a weak law no one abides by? This would end their authority. Like you Tony I think it is a done deal but there is hope, even if passed people can then stand up – in ways actually presently they cannot.
A distraction is needed to give the press a new bone. Can’t someone tumble a statue or something.
It won’t happen in England. It’s a red herring. To distract us from Cummings’s proposals for sweeping reorganisations of the NHS, our defence capability, education and local government, (to amalgamate councils and achieve even greater London centric control).
A ploy which is being remarkably successful, judging by the commentary here.
Personally, the thought of this shower attempting any one of these things, even if they promised to lock Grayling and Lansley away in a cage for the duration, gives me goosebumps.
Perhaps another BLM protest is in order?
Burn Lousy Masks?
And we are determined to stop it happening. Chin up!
The media thought we were all going to die of AIDS, it eventually petered out. And after 9/11 we were all going to get bombed to misery. Went on for weeks and far less digital programming then.
After 9/11 all sorts of new rules came in which have been kept in force to this day. Like having to unpack you bags and partially undress at airport security, having secret intelligence services taking over the job of the police, up to 42 days detention without charge, Prevent programmes in every school, ATCOs, and so on.
The Terrorism Threat Level has never gone below Substantial, no 3 on the scale, which means “an attack is likely”.
https://www.mi5.gov.uk/threat-levels
The Covid Peri-O-Meter is based on the same scale and is never likely to go below 3 either.
Tony, you do sound as if you could use a break from the MSM. Go for a walk, meet some friends, do some DIY, read some books, etc. etc.
Try not to think about it too much. A lot can happen in a few weeks. Remember that it’s only been 3 odd months since we went into lockdown.
At the moment time feels like watching a kettle boiling but I have faith that sense will prevail.
Dark thoughts are returning big time now, all this mask of all lobbing etc.
Looks like the dystopian future is here – don’t think I’m going to see tomorrow – all preparations have been made – I.ve got the gas cylinders, bag and pills. Ready to go now – just can’t see things getting better.
Don’t do it Tony! Call someone..
We’ll try to fuck them up…wait to see how we do!
Call 116 123, Samaritans, now.
Vet.
Now, this doesn’t support your disgust nor mine, but it used to be the case that vets could do procedures to people but not vice versa. I am certsin that no longer stands true.
Is the vet talking out a sign of desperation? We hear of this growing concensus that health and science professionals have been incredibly and absolutely wrong about masks. To the point of allowing a pandemic to sweep around the world while actually routinely saying masks are rubbish – and here are the papers proving masks are no use to control influenza. Where are the same scientists now? We have no papers about how good masks are at stopping c19 but we do have a vet.
Do you know, I don’t think it wouldn’t take much to crumble these bullies.
But it’s gone!!!!!! Aaaaggghhhhh!!!!
I think the best image for the uselessness of masks is that of trying to stop mosquitoes with a chain-link fence.
And then quote the infection rate within the population : 1 in c.5000 – FFS.
Anyone cowering in terror and wearing a mask with these fact in mind are quite welcome to all the self-induced knicker-wetting discomfort that they self-generate! But not the right to inflict it on the sane.
There may be some evidence that masks have some effect but the evidence does not say they are necessary. There’s a very big difference between the 2.
The evidence suggests that driving at 1mph can reduce road accident deaths but it’s not necessary.
All they have to do is look at Sweden to see empirical evidence that mask wearing is not necessary or even the states in the USA that never locked down.
Here in Sweden I was comforted this evening when an acquaintance of mine posted a collage on Facebook, of photos of people using crazy items as masks (in some cases totally covering their heads), and got responses commenting how crazy these people were. No one that responded to the post advocated that we wear masks here – phew!
What’s the general concensus in Sweden on how other countries are dealing with the virus? Are people glad that they’re not having to argue about being forced to wear masks or getting locked in their homes like in Australia?
Just curious as to the Swedish perspective on the rest of the world.
Blah blah … masks …sheep .
…Have you any drool? Yes sir, yes sir, 3 masks full.
Can anyone on here help with some advice please. I’m a key worker in social care and have recently been informed that from next month the organisation I work for will be insisting all staff have a weekly swab test for Corvid 19 even if they are asymptomatic. This is the last thing I want and I’m wondering whether I have any rights at all to refuse this invasive and unnecessary test or whether refusal will result in a disciplinary and dismissal.
I assume this imposition is not in your contract of employment? If so, your employer could be on difficult ground. However, a common tactic, at least in industry, when they want to impose something on the staff (I’m thinking of drug testing, for example) is to issue a new contract of employment, and if you don’t sign it, they say that you’ve decided to leave the company. The vast majority of people accept this sleight of hand because it’s too much effort to take it to a tribunal. I suggest in the first instance you state that you are not happy with the proposal and what do they suggest – initially just get a feeling for what the lie of the land is.
You could try emailing your problem to the lawyers here:
laworfiction@gmail.com
See their website, laworfiction.com
Or to Francis Hoar or Robin Tilbrook – Robin’s contact details usually appear at the bottom of all Toby’s posts here..
took the day off on Friday to try some of the pubs in Soho. Quite relaxed,no masks and some were happy just to insist on a name and telephone number. Went to two Samuel Smiths pubs and no restrictions at all!
The only problem came when I tried to visit bars outside of the centre. At Clapham Junction I stopped off to visit Project Orange. This is a classic dive bar. Metal is the soundtrack here. They usually have a big screen showing a live concert from years gone by. So you would think with alternative lifestyle cred they would be a little relaxed with the guidelines. Sadly no. I was greeted at the entrance with a sign that said “no mask,no entry”. I went in to be greeted by someone in a visor who escorted me to a table. I ordered my drink but, as I was wearing a mask,he couldn’t understand me. Mask removed,stayed for one and moved on.
I know we have a section showing businesses that stayed open during the lockdown. Maybe we need a new section (especially for pubs,bars) for ones who are most zealously following the guidelines.
Good points.
It’s new to them too so perhaps helping them be human in their service is a worth while occupation. Some need help but do get it.
it will be interesting to follow as Clapham Junction has quite a few bars-once some bars break ranks like in Soho the customers will vote with their feet
I think for my part if I saw ‘no mask, no entry’, I’d be telling the bouncer ‘then your business has “no customer”‘.
I must be getting old. I wouldn’t dream of going anywhere where they need a bouncer!
Meanwhile let’s not forget to continue to celebrate our world beating NHS.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/shrewsbury-maternity-scandal/shrewsbury-maternity-safety-inquiry-deaths-nhs-a9613141.html
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-53307593
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1300044/Matt-Hancock-coronavirus-NHS-track-trace-app-cost-waste-taxpayer-money-apple-google
I’ve just been perusing the comments, and come up here to say that I think there’s a case for moving on, now, from the term ‘bed-wetter’. It’s becoming one of those words that causes the brane to stop thinking creatively. (And no, I haven’t got any bright ideas, as I write this, as to what it might be replaced with. Perhaps someone else here has?)
Hysterical, if that’s a word and you spell it so.
What they are. ‘Remainers’.
No. Don’t confuse the two issues. Not all lockdown sceptics are brexiteers!
Precisely. In fact, the whole impetus of this nonsense comes from the Brexit Branch of the Tory Party!
The impetus for this nonsense comes from above our government. Did the brexit branch of the tory party manage to influence all western nations to follow the same suicidal path? Not a single MP has put up any real resistance – they are all culpable.
I was a Remainer thank you very much! Though not in a particularly over-zealous way, admittedly.
I think the term suggests that those afflicted are reacting in an unreasonable and disproportionate manner to a small threat and blames the afflicted for their affliction.Yes, the threat does not justify the reaction, but that reaction has been induced by a dishonest government and media and the reaction is in proportion to the dishonest hype. We need to get these people to go beyond what they hear from the government and MSM and being rude about them doesn’t help with that.
Well, it’s not because they’re wet, it’s because they trust the BBC and the rest of the MSM. They’ve never had any reason not to, as far as they know. Brexit ought to have shown them a reason, but apparently not. They don’t see any reason, therefore, to think for themselves.
So I call them ‘drones’.
Drones are powerful deadly weapons designed to rain down Hell Fire on people taking non essential walks in the Peak District, or the 7th and 8th person in your garden.
A faintheart. A feeblemind. A trembloid.
No doubters
The unquestioning
Media munchers
Could just call them Bedders, as in Sh*t the Bedders. Also a homophone of Betters.
I always thought “snowflake” was an apt description!
I am not personally keen on that term, but I these are issues on which people feel strongly and I can understand the anger, and feel it myself.
But ideally one would want to focus on winning the battle. So is using that term helping us or not? I would say not. Consider the weak points of the “enemy”, the arguments they are more susceptible to.
We should be ruthless, and not get distracted by anger, but use it to fuel the honing of arguments.
Branch Covidians was the best one I heard
Scaredy-cats.
I have yet to check through comments beyond those immediately below to see what else (if anything) might have been suggested yesterday evening, but of the suggestions made immediately below, I personally would favour ‘the unquestioning’. It’s the most neutral. Being angry and frustrated about the situation, and trying to figure out what, if anything, might realistically be done about it, is one thing; sneering amongst ourselves at those who haven’t the wherewithal (for whatever reason, or combination of reasons) to ‘think for themselves’, question, scrutinise what they’re told by the government, the media, etc., is something altogether different — ‘unhelpful’.
Haven’t been able to edit the comment above. First and third lines: “below” should be “above”.
So, if mask wearing in a shop in necessary, why not in a supermarket? Surely that is a shop?
That’s how it is . Supermarkets are shops.
My muse has gone all Scottish. Sorry about the spacing – gremlin in computer.
The Muse wishes it to be known that the below song is in no way aimed at the noble and dauntless Scots who frequent this site, or at any other opponent of the Poison Dwarfess:
Seems appropriate
So – Gove has said that he thinks muzzles might not have to be mandated, and he thinks the good sense of the people will be enough.
This COULD mean that some of the spat bile that the very idea generated may have penetrated the government mask
a tiny bit.
Or, it could mean Gove, by no means the thickest of the Cabinet, has sensed that Boris is losing the dressing room and is vulnerable. Is Gove on ‘manoeuvres’? Maybe he’s remembering the last time he stabbed Boris in the back and missed an artery. His aim could be better this time.
It’s a toss up which scenario is closer to the truth. I’m a bit tempted by the latter one.
Since I have been alive every PM has been worse then the last. Gove certainly has his work cut out to maintain that tradition but I sense he might be up to the job.
lol
Ah, you young-un – I remember Heath (and Wilson)!
The first PM I was old enough to be aware of was Thatcher, so things have definitely improved but that’s not saying much!
Thatcher was the first PM I was aware of to and while I spent most my life hearing how terrible she was the older I get and the more I learn the more it seems she was actually a better PM then anyone who followed.
Do you really think Boris is losing things – no one from any party not even the 1922 committee seem to be able to do anything against Cummings (sorry I mean Boris).
Simon Heffer wrote that during Boris’s illness, there was a “bitch-fight” in the cabinet. Is it possible that the divergent advice coming from government is due to a power struggle? Boris says we need to get back to work, Hancock discusses a “right” to work from home. Somebody was pushing for mandatory masks in shops, Gove appears on TV and leaves it to the individual. I don’t think Gove is trying to stab Boris in the back, I think it’s the Health Secretary who is over-reaching himself. Then again, it could just be incompetence.
Hancock is definitely displaying megalomaniac traits.
This is the latest one, clearly aimed at harvesting more data and DNA: https://twitter.com/simondolan/status/1282294106606252034?cxt=HHwWhMC9ncbsz8sjAAAA
Why are they STILL so obsessed with finding every single possible case in Leicester?!
My money is still on masks coming in. It has been decided upon long ago as can so clearly be see by the theatrical process of fake interviews with mps actually saying they agree with the interviewer’s question that masks should be worn.. Yes masks were the plan and still are. If they put them in shops then other venues must follow. But, the ray of light is I see them concerned about the fact it is not policeable. They have to be certain the social shaming programme is fully in place. That is where they are at the moment.
Have people taken the idea they will be policing each other or not?
All of it is very far away from preventing a public health disaster during a plague. This is not about anything like that as we all know.
I fear you are right – night night time is coming for me, it’s still my line in the sand.
You’re welcome here Tony anytime, get a break.
My thoughts about the depression of it all. I think I accept there are bastards in the world and rearranged my world to stop rubbing against them. I found certain changes can be made after accepting the unfairness we are born into. No point slogging on if their system is broken. So much fantastic adventure is still available to each of us just by truly switching off from them toying with our worlds. I say I’m pretty lucky in that I can find absolute pleasure in listening to the wind in leaves of trees, or watching a bird hop about – those kinds things make my day. Not everyone is the same but those simple things are all I need. Standing under the sky, my sky, on a good hill is special too.
Thanks, I just got a new camera to try and give myself a purose – but things are looking real bad at the moment – masks4everone – OMG we are stuffed now. Don’t think I will see tomorrow the way I feel now!!!
Call 116 123, Samaritans, now.
Past that sorry
Just try it. Press the buttons, speak to them.
Are you in UK? Where?
Yes London
Come on Tony, you have a lot of allies here. Do you suffer from depression anyway? No shame in that.
There are 67 million people in the UK. Don’t think for a minute they’ll all be wearing masks. There are more dissenters than you think. And don’t believe the polls.
OK, decided to see what our beloved leader announces tomorrow, just so many sheeple wanting this utter crap
Here’s what I say. Give yourself time. Clearly it’s not good to be looking day to day as you are. So stop that – it changes nothing other than gice yourself a month with your camera. Set a target. One picture a day say, or a diary for the month. Not saying things will be better or worse. But by simply giving yourself time to focus on the challenge of creating a good photo to two can’t be bad. Photography is a great way to waste hpurs waiting and observing.
Trick is to say bugger it and give yourself time.
Spot on
Mason Mills posted it would happen way back on 3rd April, joking (grrr) that masks would be a popular Christmas present…
But they still have to deal with people who are exempt for medical reasons. Imagine someone who drops dead because they are shamed for not wearing a mask because their condition was acute anxiety and a panic attack induced a coronary. That’ll put the cat amongst the pigeons.
In-for-me, in-for-me!
I’m praying they don’t force us dancers to wear them for dance competitions. The thought of trying to do a ballroom jive in a mask is not a pleasant thought!
Can see lots of competitors collapsing mid dance
can you do a paso doble whilst maintaining appropriate social distancing??
Not totally no, well you could but I don’t personally see the point. At some comps they have kids sections already where they dance solo so no partner and it just looks so strange.
Ballroom and latin dance for me you need a partner as that’s the interaction between two people. If they bring in solo comps for adults then I’m not going.
When does the next season of clapalong (ugh) Strictly start?
Andrew Lawrence on masks:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViKDf6UIXl0
I get the distinct feeling that as one thing is relaxed another 2 restrictions are put in place and we are literally being herded towards some very nasty dystopian future by being distracted. Really getting nervous about things, Boris really doesn’t want normal.
Trying to dig themselves out of the hole they’ve put us all in without admitting they got it completely wrong.
I start to relate to that.
Something else must be going on which they don’t tell us yet.
There a lot of detailed articles on the fundamental flaws of the PCR test available in German.
E.g. it’s a two part test, search and confirm, but most tests now seem to omit the much more important confirm part.
The cases in the slaughterhouses suggest susceptibility of the test to the harmless Coronaviruses in animals.
Lockdown critical doctors offered to run a more specific test on the positively tested there at their cost to check for this/rule it out, but the government of NRW refused, and even the billionaire owner Toennies, who is the most hated man in Germany at the moment, refused, although he could have been whitewashed hereby.
Add in what’s coming out on HCQ currently and the math on masks futility, and this smells far too strong.
I do like hearing all the random percentages different people like to claim the mask reduces the infection by – “10-20% for yourself but 80% reduction of infection to others” all the way down to a 5% benefit. Make up your minds!
Seen Simon Dolan’s Twitter page wit the lates data and DNA-harvesting wheeze – they are now sending out people to do Covid tests in people’s homes… *very* important that people refuse this! https://twitter.com/simondolan/status/1282294106606252034?cxt=HHwWhMC9ncbsz8sjAAAA
Yeah, but a lot of people do and we are many and they are few. Stand up, stand up, stand up for your rights as the great BM said.
Boris was heavily hinting mandatory masks a couple of days ago, but Gove seems to have backed off and is placing more emphasis on persuasion. Sounds like there’s a bit of a split in cabinet. And the body representing independent shops is distinctly cool, saying mandatory masks will put off some customers. Maybe we’ll escape the horror.
Theory 1: the government has been badly advised that customers are staying away because they’re scared of catching the virus, and if everyone wears masks they won’t be so scared.
Theory 2: “they” want to keep the crisis mood going at all costs, to soften people up for compulsory this, that & goodness knows what else in future.
But Give was effectively implying if you don’t comply then we’ll make it mandatory.
*Gove
Could be either Theory 1 or 2.
What they don’t realise is how people are being put off going to the shops, pubs, hairdressers.
A friend of mine went to Manchester at the weekend. Most of the place was closed and boarded up.Tried 2 places to get a drink but had to book, finally sat down at one, pub forcing them to give full details including address and then to download an app to order from a comprehensive bar menu. Only accept cards (no tips for the staff then), they left after 25 minutes trying to order but not succeeding. Those who had stayed had all bought jugs of beers. They aren’t the only people I know who’ve said they aren’t going back until things normalise.
They left Manchester without going in to anywhere else because everything was too much hassle and they said they won’t be going back ever again and these are friends who used to go to the city a couple of times a week at least.
It seems to suit the hospitality industry for the moment to get customer details so they can use them for marketing efforts. BAD PLOY.
The CBI need to get together with businesses and protest against the measures, otherwise they’re all going to be out of jobs too if no business operating.
Another friend went to a hairdressers. She was given a mask, it broke, then another broke, they let her go maskless as probably too expensive otherwise. The person who did her hair is having to work 13 hour days to try and make the type of money they were making before in 7 to 8 hours. No cash so no tips either.
HOSPITALITY – WAKE UP TO THE FACT THAT YOU ARE ALIENATING YOUR CUSTOMERS
BUSINESSES GENERALLY NEED TO WAKE UP TO THE FACT THAT THEY WON’T BE IN BUSINESS IF THEY CONTINUE WITH THESE DRACONIAN MEASURES. I FOR ONE AIN’T GOING TO ANY OF THEM.
Just putting this out there. I read an article a couple of days ago, where the PM of New Zealand has now declared the country completely “Covid free”. They haven’t had a single positive test for two weeks. They have now relaxed all restrictions including anti-social distancing. Sounds too good to be true right? BUT…
– I’m aware NZ have completely shut their borders indefinitely so what does that mean for their tourism industry?
– What happens if a single positive carrier gets into the NZ. As they’ll have no herd immunity, could that start off a new spread of Covid within their country? Are they a ticking time-bomb waiting to happen?
– What would have happened if all countries had closed their borders immediately, but still allowed the indigenous population to live freely within their own nations?
They’ve now set a precedent whereby they have to shut their borders as soon as somebody sneezes.
If a new virus appears somewhere on earth they have to shut down immediately.
AIUI, They will still have to quarantine new arrivals from overseas – so there will be no tourist industry.
They can’t afford to stop the quarantine as they have had so few cases that they’ve built no local immunity.
Or have I got this wrong?
You are absolutely correct.
Potentially they may have to quarantine for a decade as a vaccine may never be invented.
Its why the Swedish approach and the UK approach before the bedwetters got control was correct for all.
https://softwaredevelopmentperestroika.wordpress.com/2020/07/06/sweden-is-back-to-normal/
Just come back from a 2-way trip to eat with the wider family and have a walk.
The good news : the odd mask-wearer is the one who is looking a right berk. Keep up the non-compliance and make them feel odd!
I have been looking at the exemptions to mask wearing in Scotland. These include “banks, building societies………undertakings which by way of business operate a currency exchange office…” . This would mean that most Post Offices are exempt from the requirements. However near where I live one Post Office is situated in a newsagents (W H Smith) while another one is inside a Spar shop so is it mask free entry to these places? Then there is a nearby M&S which includes a currency exchange; it also has a cafe (another exemption) in the premises. so again does the mask wearing requirement apply?
Hurried legislation is often poor legislation and I reckon a good lawyer would rather enjoy these Regs.
Great thoughts Guirme. Excellent. I will put that on my list of places to visit and question, never occured to me.
Hopefully the laworfiction website’s lawyers will be on it!
Well bollocks to them. If I have to wear a muzzle, I’ll bloody well make sure I wear it in the bank.
And dark glasses and a big hat pulled well down!
Just been out with OH to a country pub we often frequent, for a lovely relaxing meal. It felt more or less normal-no-one in masks and the owner and staff were keen to chat to us and welcome us back. The kitchen staff have to wear visors but those waiting on had chosen not to do so. The beer garden was full and except for fewer tables inside, it could have been any normal Sunday before lockdown-apart from the “toilet etiquette” that is.
On each table was a perspex holder containing a set of rules about using the toilet entitled “toilet etiquette”. It involved waiting to be told when you could enter the toilets, washing your hands first, sanitising the toilet and dispenser both before and after using the toilet, cleaning the handle and lock, then not touching anything again before you left the cubicle to go outside and wash your hands again. My OH was worried that he might forget one of the eight rules so would have to take them with him if he wanted to use the loo. I pointed out that these rules were aimed mainly at the ladies as they had no choice but to use a cubicle.
In all fairness, the owners are caught between a rock and a hard place in trying to make everyone feel safe, so although we had a good laugh between ourselves at how silly the whole thing was, we couldn’t fault their efforts. Needless to say, we both held on until we arrived home!
How are they going to check that then – follow you in and watch??
My OH said something to that effect, albeit rather more crudely!
Surely if they’ve provided the info and you’ve had the opportunity to read it, duty will have been done, the EHO can tick the relevant box and everyone can relax.
When was the last time that a UK government mandated what you could or could not wear? My daughter reckons it was in the 18th century after the ’45 Jacobite uprising.
Could mask wearing be Sturgeons Culloden?
For those who haven’t worked it out wearing of the kilt was banned.
And bagpipes were considered an “offensive weapon”. But these laws didn’t last very long.
I guess the argument goes you wear a seat belt?
Various paramilitary/terrorist group outfits have been banned quite recently.
The subtle difference is that you wear a seatbelt to protect yourself. We’re being told to wear a facemask to protect others.
A fairer comparison would be wearing a straight jacket.
I agree. Focused on mandatory wearing not purpose. Straight jackets is a good comparison.
Not to protect other people..
Yeah, but I don’t have to get in a car. I do however have to go out to earn my living to buy food and pay for my shelter.
..and yet Sturgeon wasn’t wearing a mask herself..
There is this: Motor Cycles (Wearing of Helmets) Regulations 1973 (S.I., 1973, No. 180), dated 7th February 1973 which came into force on 1st June 1973. A lone active sceptic named Fred Hill was sent to prison for non-compliance.
https://bit.ly/2ZnO0hL
Just been watching Grand Prix highlights on C4. The presentation of the trophies at the end was done by robots. As if what we’ve had so far is not bad enough, now it’s ‘I, Robot’. The idiocy of world governments in this lockdown has unleashed consequences that they will not be able to control.
Switch it off! Sorry! Just my instant reaction to the obvious tech virtue signalling. Thanks for posting its good to jeep up with how much there is to despise it the world! Will greta be popping up soon with a ‘how dare they’ scowl in the direction of robots and F1 in general?
Surely robots delivering the trophies fits in pretty well with F1 ?
Robot specs, lap times, cornering abilities. mpg, etc., will provide hours of endless fun for the petrol heads.
Saint Greta will be having conniptions if the robots are petrol-powered.
Cleverly posted this on yesterday’s page. Just sent this to the letters page of the spectator – more in hope than in expectation:
Sir,
In her otherwise excellent article, Kate Andrews refers to Covid turning “our world upside down.”
Not so. Our world has indeed been turned upside down, not by the virus itself but by the overreaction of many western governments, our own included. It may have been understandable at the end of March that any government would be panicked by public pressure and international example – not to mention the catastrophist modelling of certain academic bodies – into imposing quarantine on an entire population, but the continued obsession with the virus is irrational.
The science has become clearer over time and shows with high probability that we are not facing a virus that is epoch-defining in its lethality or transmissibility and yet our government persists in pretending otherwise and is ably assisted by continuing terror stories produced by the majority of media outlets, most notably the BBC and the Guardian. The economy can never return to normality while a proportion of the public are too scared to leave their houses and the rest would rather steer clear of the dystopian unpleasantness we are forced to endure in shops, cafes, pubs and restaurants. The encouragement to wear “face coverings” cannot help to give confidence, as it creates a sense of abnormality for all.
I fear that a “v-shaped” economic recovery is now beyond reach. Nonetheless, if Messrs Johnson and Sunak genuinely hope for a recovery of any kind, now is the time to begin admitting to the public that we have little to fear and that we can return to normal as long as we take care of those among us who are old or sick or both.
Yours faithfully,
True but will never happen – they have already decided our fate.
But they lack the ability to organise the proverbial in a brewery, so I wouldn’t worry too much.
Yes,,except they are the handled not the handlers. Look up the food chain to Bill Gates et al.
Very good letter. Hope it gets published.
A friend has just sent me this – not sure if it’s already been posted here?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1qTi6GKIhU
It has, but no matter. Serious Germans, albeit in an unofficial capacity, an improvement on our less than competent lot.
Gillian made a really strong point in reply to Hoppity’s questioning of the tag bed-wetter. Gillian made the point that being derogatory only serves to entrench positions. This has given me a genuine question I feel its worth asking.
How do mask wearing people see things going from now on? What are the expectations of people like GrantM for the future? Do they still feel that normal life will return?
I’m asking for opinions genuinely not wanting to sound mean towards people who have been scared silly by all this. The out look for people following the official line might be very bleak indeed if the have foresight.
Today I spoke with a distant friend who does not speak or read much English. I’ve tried to update them – but quite literally they had no idea really of the what and why. They are extremely depressed.
People laugh at the naive reaction of listeners to Orson Welles War of the Worlds. However reflecting on the guile and cunningby Welles to release such a disorientating scheme I have sympathy for those who were disturbed.
I think a lot of people have been so scared into thinking everyone is going to die that they don’t see the need to question what they’re being asked to do.
I also think that people still think it’s temporary and they have to do the anti social distancing, one way systems and masks etc for a period of time but life will go back to the old way.
And I think people believe that they are doing all of the above to save everyone else’s life. Whilst we should care about others lives we should not be made to be or feel 100% responsible for them all of the time. My opinion, others may have a different viewpoint.
Thanks. I still find it hard to imagine people feeling we are all in so much peril. I do think you are right that people do feel that way. Surely, for most, that terror will wear off.
If we return to normal normal I would feel as though two separate worlds have been lived for this period of time.
I see that concious switch to make each of us feel responsonsible directly for killing others by not complying with the government lockdown was a strong and central component in their physcological operation against us.
I agree with your perception about caring but not guilt tripped or coerced into curtailing public life. We depend on each other – nin functioning lockdown isn’t deoending on each other.
How about all these virtue-signalling caring people who make unnecessary trips in their cars contributing to premature deaths. Ban all cars I say.
Amb, I tend to agree with you when you say a lot of people think this current situation is temporary. Just listen to the radio or watch TV and you really wouldn’t know what’s going on outside.Adverts still offer great things,TV presenters are still ‘happy clappy’, Amazon will still deliver (as will most high-street chains even though their shops are shut),despite a bit of a blip to start with, Tesco’s shelves are full even though you have to follow silly one way systems, I still get emails telling me of cheap flights and holidays etc. etc.
Now if it had been p*ssing down for the past 100+ days, internet had disappeared, you weren’t getting paid to sit on your arse and you had to walk miles to find bread, I think people would be a bit more inquisitive as too whether we are being sold a pup or not…just a thought
I don’t think lockdown would have been possible pre internet.
Not sure it’s possible now. Not long term anyway. They couldn’t even manage it in a prison.
Yes, agree, people think every rule is a) temporary and b) that they’re selfish if they don’t go along with it..
I suspect THEY think we’re selfish if WE don’t go along with it!
Same principle applies to vaccines and it’s false. If vaccines work then it shouldn’t bother anyone else that I don’t get vaccinated. If masks work same principle applies – don’t understand why people don’t get this. I used to get furious with people who wanted other’s kids to be banned from school if they weren’t vaccinated. When I pointed out that that would imply that vaccines can’t be very effective then they went apocalyptic. You can’t educate people because no-one wants to be divested of their opinion.
On that vaccinate me to save who point – what is the logic of that? Doctors have explained it to me, I’ve read the concept of all requiring vaccines for them to be effective, but what is the logic?!
I think a lot of people are relishing the situation and would love it to continue. This is the most exciting thing that’s happened to them since Danny got blown up on Emmerdale (I invented that but you know what I mean). There’s been a lot of self important snitching, reporting of visits to supermarkets where nobody was sticking to the one way system, asserting that schools shouldn’t open because ‘it’s too soon’.
I live in a small seaside town, now inundated by tourists, so the permanently worried have been able to ratchet up the hysteria about ‘the rules’.
“This is the most exciting thing that’s happened to them….”
I think there’s a lot of truth in this. Odd, as you’d think people would rather believe good news than bad.
There are a lot of seemingly dumb or odd people in the world. Who knew?
For sure some are dumb and some are odd. But the root cause is that they’re unevolved.
One of the upsides of this bollox is that it gives them a large number of opportunities to evolve.
Nothing wrong with being odd. It’s the well-meaning who are the dangerous ones.
It’s one to tell the grandchildren. The year the world made huge sacrifices by doing nothing in particular and wearing masks to save the world. That’s why my grandchildren I am telling you this from inside a plastic bubble.
I’ve been lucky to escape the lockdown enthusiasts! Not sure why that is actually! Only one bemasked selfie coming to me through contacts!
Thats another angle though I’ve not thought about – this does play into the narc phenomenon. As you say become king and queen of the lockdown and virtue signal the heck out of things.
Done with cynicism or with real fear?
Neither, IMO! Simply that the routine of lives has been altered, different roles have had to be assumed. Change can be exciting, no thinking or reasoning needed. Start a food bank, deliver meals to the shut ins, sew masks, feel important.
Good chat. You’ve explained the sewing machine and box of old rags set up on a city stoop. Actually make your own mask inintiative going on. Its so alien to me, but now I understand some possible reasoning.
YES…. all people with no lives who love drama.
As strange as it may seem, I think a lot of people are going along with it precisely because there is very little danger to them. They will just get on with life and justify it to themselves as just a minor inconvenience because that’s really all it is to them.
I have felt that about some people I’ve encountered. No threat level percieved just getting on with whatever they told to do. Not ‘sheep’ just not upset by either the virus or the measures. I found these people had means of employment unchanged.
Its odd as I’m still working, have been throughout in public sector further education so I’m on my full salary, working from home etc and I probably should be over the moon with what the government has done.
But luckily I have a brain and am rather independent minded so I’m not good at being told what to do without a very good reason.
Bring back normal life before I go insane please.
My employers learned years ago not to saddle me with inane stupidities or idiots who assumed they were my boss but actually weren’t. They also discovered (much to my own surprise, as I’ve long considered myself to be a misanthrope) that I’m very good with people new to the job. They also know I’m not a rule taker for the sake of things. I know what I have to do, I know that my boss dishes out the work, and do what’s dished out to the best of my ability. Somehow we seem to work all right together.
I think it’s also because most people believe that “science” means experts publishing a paper and then it’s true.
They don’t take time to look at what the scientific method is, that it allows highly hypothetical work to sit right alongside heavily empirical, evidence based testing and verification. Because as long as your method is consistent to the assumptions made it is valid scientifically.
Publishing a paper means that it was deemed good enough to enter the discussion, not that it is correct in the sense that real people think correct is. It’s got a long way to go and may not get there at all.
The media are silent about it. Politicians are silent about it. Even look at what happened with Neil Ferguson’s model that was ripped apart by actual software testers. It might be good for hypothetical play but it is dangerously unethcial to apply this to the real world.
Yet that’s what happens. People are blind to this because they believe the mountain to climb to “disprove” the experts is too large. But the burdern of proof is on the claimant.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. And models or studies are NOT evidence.
People don’t seem to think about *which* scientists are being used by the government, and why, and if those scientists might have an agenda, something to gain from coming to the ‘scientific’ conclusions they do..
Science is science is science! For an example see brian cox programmes .. totally impenetrable. A reputation for being wonderful, but I think a disastorous communicator.
Comprehesion is not possible and so critically thinking to discuss isn’t possible, and yet I believe people know right or wrong about a lot of what these experts say.
I see science as an elite field and that it is not common among the general population to have a grasp on. Who’s fault that is would be a long conversation. But the result is this unquestioning religious-like quality described briefly by ‘the science’.
You hit the nail on the head when you say extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The government has introduced a draconian lockdown where the economy has been shut down and basic activities we take for granted eg seeing family and friends have been criminalized. The justification deserves to come under scrutiny. How does the characteristics of the coronavirus justify the lockdown eg the mode of transmission, how infectious the disease is, the fatality rate, the severity of symptoms. Where is the scientific research to back up claims. It is argued asymptomatic carriers can spread the disease. Where is the evidence to support this? What is the justification for closing businesses? For instance, in hotels guests stay in separate rooms and don’t mix.
The majority are not willing to ask questions.
So we are sceptical about the lockdown, and we seem to have investigated the issue more than most people. Why? What is it about our 15% of the population that makes us different from the remaining 85%? I’d really like to know.
I suspect it’s something to do with ‘critical thinking’. Not raw intelligence or IQ which, it seems to me, can be remarkably shallow, but something to do with taking an idea further and exploring the possibilities in depth. Maybe very slowly – in my case.
I think we can see freedom ebbing away before our eyes, but many ‘intelligent’ people can’t. We probably all have friends and relatives that we thought we knew, but have been shocked to find are fully Covid-compliant. At one time I would have assumed that they had made a mistake: I could ask them “Have you thought about how long this will go on for? How long do you think would be acceptable?” and they might answer and/or begin to realise that something was awry. But I no longer think it is the case. I’m not even sure that if the government told them they would have to carry on wearing masks and staying in their houses for ten years, that they would object. Or whether they would recall dimly that the original aim was “Flatten the curve for three weeks”…
I am at a loss to explain it. It is much more frightening than the idea of a government overstepping its limits, where at least the population can make its feelings known. When the population itself effectively demands strict punishment from a government that has given itself emergency powers, there is nothing any of us can do about it.
Spot on.
Unfortunately you are right, we are being “herded” to the new future and the resistance (us) are being warn down bit by bit. There is no going back now, and I can see no way out. Only two choices – put up with it or …..
I think there’s an old Jewish proverb – whenever you have to choose between two alternatives, chose the third.
Intelligence, curiosity, wisdom. Genuine wisdom is a rare thing, one of the reasons I like Morgan Freeman so much, a wise man – watch his Oford Union appearance. His response to being asked about being African American is great.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFKlbYeXBQ8
DavidC
It’s puzzling
There’s probably no easy answer, but we can try to chip away at people’s fixed ideas
It’s a very difficult time but I think we should try to stay sane and be patient
Or go mad and rebel
I think our best technique is to point out the illogicalities of the various rules in a non-threatening, almost jokey way..less confrontational and might make people think..
People don’t want to think. Nor do they want to change their mind because that would mean admitting they were wrong. And they would rather live in emotional penury than admit they were wrong. Look at the government.
Barney agree. Call it ‘critical thinking’ or jut plain old ‘curiosity’ like why would anyone want to lobby for everyone on the planet be forced to wear masks?
“Interestingly, the demand for a worldwide obligation to wear masks is led by a lobby group called “masks4all” (masks for all), which was founded by a “young leader” of the Davos forum”.
https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/
I find it scary that people won’t question what’s going on and woe betide you if you’re sceptical about it and actually dare to have a different opinion. It’s like by having a different opinion on lockdown, masks etc that you’re suddenly condemning the entire population to death.
It’s so utterly ridiculous now and needs to be stopped. Though I’ve no idea how you do stop it?
I totally agree! Perhaps we should start a lobby group for nomasksatall.com…
I know people who didn’t seem fussed at the thought that the government could tell them not to see their own families and elderly relatives indefinitely. That’s what shocked me most, that they would just happily sit back and potentially never see them again, under the guise of “saving” them.
In terms of what makes the 15% different, I think being a natural contrarian is a good starting point – that drive to question and argue against everything, which isn’t actually always a good thing!
I have never understood people who slavishly support the lockdown without questioning it.
Oh yes it is !!
Interesting comparison today between two rival coffee chains in Winchester.
Costa – the number of arrows outdoors all pointing in different directions was comical. Wish I’d taken a photo. When I went inside, the seating area was closed off. They had huge Perspex screens stretching to the ceiling, similar to the security glass that tellers sit behind in banks. When I spoke to the girl behind the counter, she couldn’t hear me through the Perspex. I gave up. Ridiculous!
Nero – A couple of token Perspex screens on the counter, both small and not overwhelming. Friendly server who smiled and spoke to me like a human being. Their seating area was open. I had a laugh with the girl serving me, about the arrow system on the floor. Their arrows actually made sense and were much more subtle.
Obviously I disagree with all of this, but it’s interesting the huge variation between brands on interpreting how to make their businesses “Covid-secure” vs a welcoming environment, customers will actually want to come back to.
Johnson&co can do anything illiberal they want, as they don’t have to fear losing voters who are upset about that to any of the even more illiberal parties left of them.
I do hope anti-Lockdown, pro common sense, truly free speech and citizens rights parties do spring up eventually, but I won’t hold my breath and in FPTP UK they face a lost cause anyway.
Add in a bit of FOMO and hedging/backside covering in case infections do go up again, at least half the Tory voters being Corona bedwetters too now, and that the government are quite happy to see any/more economic damage this year to make Brexit look less worse/better next year, and the mandatory mask wearing chicanery sadly looks like a certainty.
True, though even with FPTP UKIP and then the Brexit Party frightened the Tories into a referendum and then into backing Brexit.
Wearing masks is NOT without opportunity costs in the form of increased health risks for the wearer, that us being neglected here.
The asymptomatic positive person case has been debunked recently.
The (weak) trials called ‘science’ that did show efficacy ignore the reality of mostly sloppy wearing which reduces it significantly.
The virus is much smaller than the gaps in the fabric and will therefore go through anyway.
All the trials showed was that the aerosols with the virus might fly a bit less far, that’s it.
If you add in the low infection rates, the low probability to meet someone infected, the even lower one to meet him closely, and the much lower one to meet him at the distance the aerosol flew less than without a mask, the mathematical folly, and true reason for wishing them to be worn, becomes clear.
It’s like demanding that all people in a car must wear fireproof padded suits and a helmet, to prevent a dozen otherwise occurring deaths per year.
‘It’s like demanding that all people in a car must wear fireproof padded suits and a helmet, to prevent a dozen otherwise occurring deaths per year.’ – Good comparison, that shows how ridiculous wearing a mask is,,
Had a similar ‘on another discussion’ when someone said we should wear a mask even if it saved one life. I asked has he now locked his car in the garage in case he hits someone stood at a bus stop.he replied that he took ‘safety precautions’ by wearing a seat belt….!!??
I understand that A-level and GCSE grades are estimated by teachers this year.
If this has been the case for me, my grades in most subjects including Maths, Science and English would have all been a couple of points down at least. I think many students will wonder what might have been, had they been allowed to sit the exams they had spent a couple of years preparing for.
The 4 exam boards found that teachers had ‘overestimated ‘, not underestimated, the majority of grades; resulting in the need to bring them down .
They are to be allowed to sit them if they feel hard done by.
Now why would anyone want to lobby for everyone on the planet be forced to wear masks?
“Interestingly, the demand for a worldwide obligation to wear masks is led by a lobby group called “masks4all” (masks for all), which was founded by a “young leader” of the Davos forum”.
From the Mask for All site:
“About Us:
#Masks4All is an all-volunteer org that started and powered the movement for people and Governments to follow the overwhelming scientific evidence that shows we need to wear homemade masks in public to slow COVID-19.
Now that this is widely accepted as a fact by Government, news, and health leaders, we’re focused on getting masks to be required across the U.S. and the world.”
“Jeremy Howard, Co-Founder & Leader
Distinguished Research Scientist at USF; Founding Researcher at fast.ai; Member of the World Economic Forum’s Global AI Council”
And if you check out the WEF’s Global AI Council website…
“The Global AI Council will be cochaired by Microsoft president Brad Smith and Dr. Kai-Fu Lee, CEO of Sinovation Ventures and former president of Google China. “
Well, well, what a surprise – not!
There’s a UK version too…
masks4all.org.uk
“Sign the petition created by Dr Wei Chi to call on the UK government to bring mandatory mask laws to the UK. “
Just sent them a foul email
Good! Hope you’re okay
Have you seen the make up of the group?
XR Activist
A staunch climate and environmental activist
A long-term, politically engaged representative
A digital activist using her background in digital marketing to campaign for real societal and political change.
Nothing at all to do with masks then….
Sounds like the makeup of the company responsible for the dodgy data used in the HCQ publications in Lancet that were retracted. One of them was a porn star if I remember correctly.
Same circus, different clowns…..
“Because there’s now a global consensus and the science behind masks limiting COVID-19 spread is almost universally accepted as a fact, this science page is unlikely to be updated frequently going forward.”
Sounds familiar…?
“Stay at home! Wearing masks shouldn’t make you go outside of your house more than necessary. All the official guidelines still apply”
Our Mission
masks4all.org.uk
The science is settled…
IT’S NOT DANGEROUS AND IT’S GONE!!!!
FFS!!!!
And on the Masks for All site, check out the photo of David Keating, President of the Institute for Free Speech… A picture is worth a thousand words!
Can’t even get photos of them wearing real masks, all photoshopped
Spotted that too. Human race at its worst on display in those photographs.
Has Gate’s grubby little paw prints all over it………
Of course – did you see the link to Microsoft as well? “The Global AI Council will be cochaired by Microsoft president Brad Smith and Dr. Kai-Fu Lee, CEO of Sinovation Ventures and former president of Google China. “
Makes me want to puke. I have no issue with these people being disappeared.
Who thinks they have a reasinable right to want each human to wear a mask.
Related
For anyone interested canadian Amazing Polly gives an amazing history of Eugenics and what happened to that movement post ww2 in her latest well researched video on youtube.
It’s not about masks.
“Stay at home! Wearing masks shouldn’t make you go outside of your house more than necessary. All the official guidelines still apply”
Our Mission
masks4all.org.uk
I don’t fear that group at all. But I will say those people are extremely dangerous. More than happy to fight them. Lose or not. There is a bunch of anti human dangers. Positively laughing at their arrogance is the least we all can do. I’ve cirulated as wide as I’m able. Lift the lid off their little plan. Sturgeon looks stupid with these guys in the background. Has boris been got at be these clingons?
The founder is clearly a really serious scientist:
https://mobile.twitter.com/PetrLudwig/status/1255428783798190086
I was about to tweet “piss off!” at that but decided i don’t want trolls after me…
I wouldn’t even pee on him if he was on fire…..
“Petr Ludwig #Masks4All Retweeted
Cam Woodsum #Masks4All #TestAndTrace
@CamWoodsum
·
24 Apr
#Masks4All has been shared 260,000 times over the last 30 days and has reached 1.1B people. 30 days ago, ~10 countries recommended masks, now the world almost universally agrees they work, 50+ countries have made them MANDATORY and 8/10 of the most powerful countries recommend.”
We should all be very afraid.
Masks4plebsnotcelebs would be more accurate.
If you put a plastic bag over your head and tape it tightly around your neck you will not contaminate anyone. That is a fact!
Ha ha ha that’s funny until you realise it’s probably real!
It’s a new family sit com: “Meet the Bubbles”…
Are you still able to edit this out, not helpful to some here?
Hong Kongers arrive in UK to start their new life.
“Wish we’d bloody stayed in Hong Kong,” grumbled one.
Fake science. Fake photos. Fake emotion. Probably put the website together from a yacht in the Med or Caribbean.
It’s not about masks.
“Stay at home! Wearing masks shouldn’t make you go outside of your house more than necessary. All the official guidelines still apply”
Our Mission
masks4all.org.uk
Davos is where the World Economic Forum meet annually.
And what a surprise they were one of the sponsors for Event 201 – planning for the Plandemic which took place in October last year.
https://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/event201/about
We now have the coronavirus industrial complex as many companies benefit from the current situation eg manufacturer of masks, perspex screens, sanitizers, disinfectants. In addition during lockdown companies benefit if their competitors are out of business. For instance, supermarkets may get increased alcohol sales if pubs can’t open. If companies benefit from the coronavirus, they may lobby governments. A company like Amazon and supermarkets could lobby the government to impose lockdown as it prevents competitors from operating.
I’m a key worker and need to use PPE (mask, gloves and approns) at certain times in my work; I also work with health staff. My question is, why, seemingly, is no one challenging how unhealthy it is to wear masks? There is evidence that is non-Covid related for this! I have also been told by health staff (nurses) as well as, like you, done my own research, leading me to believe that wearing masks for a longer than necessary, makes things worse. What I have not heard the govt. and all the other so called experts etc. talk about is how to “safely” dispose of used PPE. We have been instructed that it has to be removed in a certain sequence, avoid touching it at all costs, then bag it for disposal. When I asked “where” I was to then put the bag of used, potentially infected. PPE, I was told “service users home bins or your car to take home” and put in my bin. When I am leaving a ward, the PPE is put into hospital incinerator bags. So, I wonder why all this mask wearing makes people feel any safer because if you have come into contact with some infectious person and it is already on you and your mask, you’re going to take it home with you anyway! Too much BS if you ask me!
Wearing a mask is akin to wearing a gun.
My gun protects you, your gun protects me. Neither of us know when the gun will be needed, if ever.
A fair comparison?
No. Complete and utter rubbish. Your filthy face rag endangers both you and me.
You serious? Protects me against what exactly?
The vast majority of mask wearers are constantly fiddling with them and so are transferring pathogens from the mouth-nose area to their fingers,whether gloved or not it doesn’t matter.
It’s been said many times before but why now?
Exactly.. Probably to keep us in fear till they have finished making enough vaccines to start a mass vaccination roll-out..
Only if your gun and my gun had no bullets,so no one was protected.
Well that’s the point isn’t it. The argument that guns protect people is contentious and highly specific to circumstances. Much the same way that masks are being argued that they protect everyone.
It was a silly comparison. Gun usage is discrete. Mask usage is not. You are always using your mask while you have it over your mouth and nose. You are not always using a gun when you have it i.n a holster on your person. As soon as you put a mask on it starts collecting pathogens. Moreover the warm humid and sugary environment of the mask is perfect for the rapid growth of pathogens The sugar comes from your saliva
So you’re agreeing with me.
If you were being ironic please attach irony quotes in future.
Sorry I can tell from the responses that I probably should have put some sort of explanation in my original post to make it clearer what I was trying to say.
What gets to me,with all this mask wearing propaganda that we are being fed at the moment,is that it is the opposite of what we were told by the government and science at the start.Have people no memory?
It makes me appreciate the genius of Orwell
Oceania is at war with Eurasia.Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia
Sunday afternoon trip to Chichester. Lovely weather, city quite busy, maybe 10% masked.
Turner’s Pies – ignored arrows, no masks/sanitiser, big Perspex between staff/customers was all. Pies fantastic !
Nero – no masks/sanitiser. Perspex screen. All fine, but card payment only. Needed caffeine, so guiltily complied.
Montezuma Chocolates – staff visored up, £8 pound for 80g chocs (!!). Decided my wife deserved them, so stumped up. Cards only they said. No thanks we said and left.
TKMaxx – staff visored but otherwise normal. Sanitiser offered entering and leaving. Maybe 30-40% of customers masked here. Cash taken.
Cathedral – closed. Chickenshits.
Bishop’s Palace Gardens – wonderful spot, recommended for a visit ! Mixture of tree, grass, shrubs, flowers, formal, country garden, and old city walls. Did not see a single mask in here.
Ooh, and the public toilets were open.
ITV News tonight, Like all the MSM, downplaying links between Covid spread and mass immigration. They report on lockdown of a farm with 200 workers but failed, to mention they are nearly all East European migrants. Similar approach was adopted re spread of Covid in slaughterhouses.
“downplaying links between Covid spread and mass immigration”
I am against mass immigration – I don’t like our countryside being filled up with houses – but I can see no connection whatever between mass immigration and covid spread.
The vast majority of immigrants arrived here long before cv19.
I seem to recall that they flew in a couple of plane loads in the middle of lockdown…..
It’s not mass immigration per se necessarily (although I believe illegal Chinese work gangs in Italy Spain and UK have played a part in its lightning spread) – but with mass immigration goes a lot of multi occupied accommodation with often several peple sleeping in one room, often poor health care and poor working conditions that favour virus spread.
In Italy there were a large number of Chinese workers in the leather factories, who all went ‘home’ to China at Christmas and then came back to Italy, bringing the virus with them..
Trip to National Trust today. Had to book in advance for parking. Only late slots available. On arriving found only two hours before they lock the car park at 4pm. WHY? Does COVID prowl on balmy summer evenings perhaps? The refreshment kiosk shut at 3. COVID starts to attack people drinking tea at 3.05, you see. Groovy lines, Karen notices, and arrows everywhere. Shop shut. Why, exactly? Toilets limited.
Meanwhile, the head of the NT in England doesn’t seem that bothered, IMNSVHO, about nonsensical rules to limit people’s enjoyment and so continue to trash NT income which is undergoing a catastrophic shortfall. No hurry, it seems. She wrote in The Telegraph in May: ““We estimate that our losses could amount to £200m this year.”
Boris, the Boy in the Blue Suit, should be asked “And when did you last meet your nation’s needs?” The ” Man in the Mask” photo was unforgiveable and never will be forgiven. To use one of Boris’s classical allusions, it’s as if Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon and then decided it was safer going back to the other side. I am afraid Boris has made himself the object of real ridicule as opposed to BBC-confected ridicule we had grown used to.
What is the official government line on c19 antibodies ‘fading’ in time? I understand Tcells are more important. But there was considerable talk of antibodies ‘not lasting’. No evidence of reinfections but it was a claim they made. What became of that story, does anybody know?
I saw something about that today! There is so much info out there and most of it contradictory or mutually exclusive. I am guessing that immunity function is relative to rate of mutation as with cold viruses and flu.
It’s a story that conveniently went AWOL Always suspicious.
Antibodies will fade into the background if the body doesn’t encounter the same disease again, and may fall enough to require a boost at some point.
If the CV19 virus mutates enough that the body doesn’t recognise it again, you’ll get another immune response, and possi fall ill, as we do with a regular cold.
Most people don’t get the flu more than once in their life, even though there are different strains that appear each year. They might get a much milder form instead.
Regarding this particular virus, I suspect that the “scientists” don’t know enough yet to predict what will happen with our antibodies. It’s only been around a matter of months and it’s impossible to tell. What we’re hearing is speculation. They don’t yet really know.
It’s the King’s College, London study:
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.09.20148429v1
I make my regular call to Toby to establish a Free Citizens Party that will take on the PC globalist free speech haters, the mandatory mask mafia and the divisive Far Left who deface the Cenotaph and statues of our national heroes like Churchill. People say Toby’s too busy with the FSU to be able to devote that much time to a new party – well the FSU won’t necessary if there is an effective political party standing up for free speech. It could be an all digital party. We need a broad party that will bring together people like Douglas Murray, Julia Hartley-Brewer, Allison Pears on, Trevor Philips, Rod Liddle, Claire Fox and Brenden O’Neil.
The FSU is fighting for individuals on a case-by-case basis who have been no-platformed and cancelled and have just lost their jobs, are facing expulsion, etc. It is effectively filling the gap of “actual” unions that are failing their members. Those people can’t wait for an election that – quite frankly – will never win any power. (How many seats does the Brexit Party or UKIP have?) It’s a major divestment of time (to the tune of a full time job) for 100’s of people to start a new party and actually do something with it. There are dozens – possibly hundreds – of parties in the UK. Most of them, you have never heard of. Only a tiny minority have ever won a seat.
In any case, someone else is already doing this: https://www.keepbritainfree.com/ He has offered to pay the fees for anyone willing to run in the next election.
“Keep Britain Free is a new movement representing the millions of people who want to think for themselves and take responsibility for their own lives.
We are not a political party. We are a group of independent thinkers who seek to influence politicians come polling day.”
The issue that I see now is that there’s little to distinguish between Labour and the Tories, leaving many voters without any credible alternative to vote for. There is now a gap for a conservative party, with an emphasis on freedom of speech, etc. UKIP may have had only one seat in Parliament, but 4 million votes put enough pressure on the Tories to give us the Brexit referendum. Voting is the only way to exert enough pressure on any of the parties to change tack. The BxP also gave both main parties a good kicking in the EU election, enough to make sure that Brexit happened. We have to do the same again now to get back our free speech, and our other freedoms. A pressure group is not enough.
Hidden away in a new article tackling ‘English’ daring to transport c19 into Scotland is a tiny bit about Scottish Care home deaths. The astute will notice the mechanisms of SNP at work. They go like this, yes Sotland care homes have been a disater, we did put c19 into homes killing many, but The English did it more, worse and betterer.
From the gusrdian:
“The Scottish government has been criticised for its policy early in the pandemic of discharging hospital patients into care homes without being tested for coronavirus. Almost half (46%) of Covid-19 deaths in Scotland have been connected to care homes, according to the National Records of Scotland.
“Asked about her government’s record, Sturgeon said she regretted and apologised for every death from Covid-19. But she added: “What I absolutely refute is that there was some particular problem in Scotland or that we didn’t take great care.”
“She said excess deaths in care homes were lower in Scotland than in England, with Scotland attributing more of them to coronavirus.”
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jul/12/no-immediate-plan-to-quarantine-english-visitors-says-sturgeon
She could also point to Governor Cuomo’s (Democrat) record in New York as well, or Governor Whitmer (Democrat) in Michigan, to their success in killing off so many of their elderly in care homes.
Funny how the Left everywhere had followed the same policy, with the same results.
What does that say about Hancock and PHE??
UK test numbers overstated by 2 million.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p08kdnbp
I’ve just read some of the comments below Toby’s article in the Telegraph.
Oh, dear.
It seems that many people are choosing to believe that the virus is far more deadly than it is, and that the lockdown and destruction of our economy was worth it, and probably should continue indefinitely.
We’re all doomed, doomed, I tell you….