Oxford University Scientists Demolish Government Case for Second Lockdown
Professor Carl Heneghan and crew at the Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine have been working overtime at the weekend pushing back against the Government narrative.
The Mail yesterday published their demolition of the Government’s paper-thin case for imposing yet more emergency restrictions to try to suppress and eliminate this virus. Entitled “The only ‘circuit break’ in the pandemic we need now is from the Government’s doom-mongering scientific advisers who specialise in causing panic and little else“, they don’t hold back.
Today, our bewildered Prime Minister and his platoon of inept advisers might as well be using the planets to guide us through this pandemic, so catastrophic and wildly over-the-top are their decisions.
Now we look set to repeat the pattern of what happened six months ago when they first panicked the country into shutting down, except that this time it has been given a fancy title – operation ‘circuit break’.
Whatever the name, it may be a grave error with terrible consequences for the health of the British people and for the health of the country. How can we possibly be making the same mistake – again?
Why is it that the Government is once again in the grip of doom-mongering scientific modellers who specialise in causing panic and little else?
They address head-on the comparison with Spain, pointing out that the second ripple in Spain appears already to have peaked:
Take the latest reliable data from Spain (up to September 3) which does not indicate any sort of upward curve in infections, let alone one coming to get us here in Britain.
In fact, the data shows that the number of Spanish cases did grow last month – but then reached a plateau.
Some of Spain’s 17 provinces are already past the peak infection (when considered by the date that symptoms began), while the proportion of completely asymptomatic cases in Spain is on the rise. [See the graphs here, pp9-10.]
Anyone who has clinical experience of dealing with respiratory viruses knows that the only certainty is uncertainty itself.
Yet our PM, and his Dad’s Army of highly paid individuals with little experience of the job at hand, continue to behave as if they are acting on the basis of certainty.
Instead, they move from one poorly designed, rash decision to another, driven by the misguided belief that we are experiencing a ‘second wave’, following Spain’s ‘trajectory’ and just ‘behind the curve’ there.
Most people now have colds, not Covid, they say – though that in itself creates problems for our overstretched testing system:
The good news, then, is that anyone going down with a new respiratory illness is likely to be suffering from a cold – not Covid.
But the rhinovirus presents us with a problem, too. Because the symptoms of a cold mean many of us will need a Covid test.
And increased Covid testing is picking up dead – entirely harmless – fragments of virus as well as genuine infections. So many of the positive results we think we are getting might not be positives at all.
Our inability to accurately report the most simple measures – the proportion of positive tests that were asymptomatic or the date at which the symptoms began, for example – is a major problem for our intelligence gathering.
And the result is a confused, rudderless Government lost in a swamp of poor statistics and ill-informed recommendations.
Worth reading in full.
The CEBM’s full consideration of the situation in Spain is here. There are also other new pieces from Carl Heneghan and co in the Speccie on the impossibility of the Government’s apparent aim of eliminating the virus, and in the Telegraph on the problems with testing. Plus a video on Sky here on the non-existent second wave.
Stop Press: Even the BBC is letting some sceptical comment through. Here’s their health correspondent Nick Triggle yesterday:
The idea of curbing the spread of the virus to stop the NHS being overwhelmed brought people together in the spring.
But what is the aim now the NHS was not overwhelmed? Suppression of a virus that clearly can’t be suppressed without a huge cost to society?
As Prof Robert Dingwall, a government adviser, put it last week, this virus is here “forever and a day” and the public may just be growing comfortable with the idea that people will die – just as they accept that people die of flu ever year.
If only someone had pointed this out before.
The Only Thing Unprecedented About This Pandemic is the Hysteria
Tim Black has written an intriguing piece on spiked comparing the world’s reaction to COVID-19 with 20th century pandemics such as the Asian Flu. Fascinating, and a clear indictment on our present hysteria.
When, in July 1957, British prime minister Harold Macmillan told a Tory Party rally that the British people “had never had it so good”, supplying the postwar period with its famously optimistic gloss, one historical fact tends to be overlooked: the world was in the grip of a pandemic.
Influenza A virus subtype H2N2 – known as the Asian Flu – had emerged in China in the winter of 1956-7. By April, Hong Kong had reported 250,000 cases. By June, India had recorded over a million. Later that summer, as Macmillan was basking in the postwar boom, the Asian Flu hit Britain and the US. By the time the pandemic had been contained in 1958, it is estimated to have killed about 1.1million people worldwide, including over 30,000 in the UK and over 100,000 in the US.
Yet there Macmillan was, painting a rosy picture not just of the present but of the future, too. The Labour Party was similarly unconcerned by the pandemic raging outside its door, preferring instead to address other matters it deemed more pressing, from the make-up of the Shadow Cabinet to arguments against unilateral nuclear disarmament, for which shadow foreign secretary Nye Bevan was heckled at that October’s party conference – held, as it happens, when UK deaths from Asian flu were at their peak.
Likewise, media coverage of the pandemic was restrained. As the historian Mark Honigsbaum wrote in the Lancet: “There were few hysterical tabloid newspaper headlines… Instead, the news cycle was dominated by the Soviet Union’s launch of Sputnik and the aftermath of the fire at the Windscale nuclear reactor in the UK.”
In fact, the 1957-58 influenza pandemic barely seemed to register as anything other than a public-health problem. The approach, led by local and regional medical authorities rather than central government, was pragmatic, and perhaps a little fatalistic. “We will have our epidemic of influenza, of a type not very different from what we know already, with complications in the usual age groups,” remarked Ian Watson, Director of the College of General Practitioners’ Epidemic Observation Unit in June 1957.
Worth reading in full – although Lockdown Sceptics got there first, of course.
The End of the Union?
We’ve received an email from an academic at a Scottish University. He thinks the most destructive legacy of the Boris’s epic mishandling of the coronavirus crisis might be the break-up of the United Kingdom.
Thank you so much for this website. You have helped to preserve my sanity during this time of global madness. I am a politics lecturer at a Scottish university, so the hardest thing about this is seeing that very few people value liberal democracy, having no problem when democratic governments took away their freedom with so little (if any) hard evidence to support lockdowns and mask requirements. Even though some recent literature showed that support for liberal democracy was in decline, especially among young people, I was still surprised at what happened and am increasingly alarmed at where things are going. Critical thinking went out the window in March and is still hard to come by, but your website seems to be bringing some rational thought back into this benighted world. I remain hopeful that a new Prime Minister could change things. Otherwise, I cannot see any way out of what was the biggest overreaction in history. The basic problem is that governments cannot admit that they overreacted to the hysteria instigated by the media and wrecked the economy and healthcare services, along with causing serious damage to our freedom. I do not believe the conspiracy theories and fear that their advocates are harming the efforts of those of us who stick to the evidence. I have interviewed enough politicians to know that many are prone to groupthink and following the herd. Here in Scotland, independence now seems closer than ever. Unionist politicians, both here and in London, are handling the situation very badly. Nicola Sturgeon seems to have a Svengali effect on most of the Scottish population, while Boris Johnson appears to be all over the place. While the economic, democratic and health costs of the coronavirus hysteria will last for years, the biggest cost of all might be the territorial integrity of the UK.
A Dentist Writes…
More on mask mouth. A dentist tells us:
Mask mouth: no surprise, as if the nose is partially or fully blocked mouth breathing is required.
Simplified: Mouth breathing dries saliva, which is the body’s mouth cleaning and tooth protection mechanism. Mask wearers should be advised to chew sugar-free gum to encourage saliva ‘injections’ in the mouth.
“I Had Been in Active Labour for Eight Hours on My Own.”
A reader who recently gave birth has written to tell us of the appalling experience she had having a baby in a London hospital in the locked down NHS.
I found out I was pregnant in January. I was able to go to my 12-week scan with my mum and husband, which was wonderful. However, that was the last time I was able to have anyone accompany me to any antenatal appointments.
I attended a routine blood pressure clinic when I was 38 weeks pregnant, where I was told my baby had stopped growing properly, and that I needed an urgent induction that day. All of this news was given to me to process on my own without my husband being present.
My contractions started the next day, but my husband had to leave at 7pm, as visiting hours were only between 2pm and 7pm.
My waters broke at half past midnight. I remember feeling incredibly alone. I called my husband and asked him to come in as we live a 20-minute drive from the hospital, but the midwife told me he wouldn’t be allowed with me until I was dilated more than 4cm and was transferred to the labour ward. This stressed me out considerably but I was already too exhausted to argue so I told my husband to go back to bed.
I then sat on my birthing ball in my cubicle, put my headphones in and bounced my way through increasingly painful contractions. My waters continued to break and I didn’t know what to do and couldn’t reach my call bell because of the pain. One of the other patients must have rung their bell for me because the midwife came and checked on me and I asked for gas and air. My contractions continued to ramp up. I was texting my mum and sister at this point and they were like a virtual support team but no substitute for the real thing sadly.
The midwife came back at around 2:30am and I asked to be transferred to the labour ward for an epidural, as I knew that if the pain continued escalating at the current rate I wouldn’t be able to cope for much longer. She agreed that I could go, so I called my husband again and told him to come.
The head midwife then came and said that I needed to stay on the antenatal ward because there was no space for me on the labour ward, and that I needed to have the pethidine injection in the meantime. I asked if my husband would be allowed in because I had told him to come and she said we could “negotiate”. I had the injection before being transferred to a side room with my husband who had just arrived. I had been in active labour for eight hours on my own.
I don’t remember much of the next four hours – my next memory was of being rushed down to the labour ward to have a spinal and an epidural. I gave birth to our daughter at 1:18pm.
We were then transferred to the postnatal ward at 5:30pm. I managed to have a very quick shower in my room on the labour ward, thank God, because all the showers on the postnatal ward had signs saying they were out of order, presumably because of Covid.
My husband then had to leave me at 7pm with my new baby, after almost three days of no sleep, on a ward of new mothers, which was also understaffed. Of course I did not sleep at all. I still had a catheter and a cannula in, neither of which I required any further, and I had to chase the midwives throughout the night to ask when they were be removed, until they eventually did so at 5am the next morning. This meant that I had a painful right hand and I also had to carry around both my catheter and my new baby with me whenever I went anywhere.
There was nowhere easy to change her nappy, so I ended up doing it in her cot and praying she wouldn’t make a mess. This again, while having a catheter that I had to hold because it hadn’t been secured to me, and not being able to put any underwear on. I was bleeding down my legs as I walked around because the sanitary pad I had wasn’t secured. I felt like I was in a nightmare and if I had had my husband there he would have been at least able to help while I rested.
I had also sustained a second degree tear, which had been stitched whilst I was on the epidural. I had forgotten about the tear until later on when I started to ache and realised that I didn’t know how to care for the wound. I asked the midwife, and she just told me not to sit on it. I had to ask for extra painkillers because I was in agony.
The midwife brought me formula when my baby cried and she told me off because I was not feeding her. I just needed someone to help me latch her – my husband had tried just before he left but without much success.
They also had to check my baby’s blood sugar before every feed. I had said I wanted to feed her at around 8pm, and then had to wait three hours for the test to be done, by which point her blood sugar was dangerously low. I was then told off for this.
My husband was allowed back on the ward at 2pm the next day and I just prayed for his arrival. Fortunately, we were discharged that afternoon.
A week after the birth I had to go back to the postnatal ward for two nights due to my high blood pressure not being controlled by my medication. I took my baby with me. I had to look after her on my own while I was extremely ill, and had to constantly chase for medication and regular monitoring to be done.
As you can see, there were multiple instances before and after the birth when I needed an advocate and someone to support me; not to mention when I was experiencing intense pain for hours alone. Fathers are not an added extra, they are a necessity.
This is a snapshot of my birth story under current guidelines. I am sure there are many more stories which are more horrific than mine. I hope more women don’t have to go through this kind of experience. It tainted my first day with my baby and has certainly had a traumatising effect on me. The Government need to lift all restrictions on maternity wards immediately to avoid any further unnecessary traumas.
A campaign #butnotmaternity has been started on social media and there is a petition to sign here.
Stop Press: Another reader has been in touch with an insight into how the NHS is preparing for the second wave by yet again depriving ordinary healthcare of resources:
My son in law is an experienced senior nurse and does occasional shifts at the local, large and prestigious hospital in the A&E department.
He tells us of the following: day the hospital – buildings and staff – have been divided into red and green facilities and teams, in preparation for the coming second wave: red being Covid-only staff, green being all other staff.
My son-in-law was allocated to the red team. They have all been idle, without a single Covid patient anywhere in the hospital as of September 18th.
The green team, however, have been rushed off their feet, without even enough ‘green’ porters to move patients about the hospital.
As a consequence, my son-in-law was asked to find a private place to change from his red team uniform to a green one in order to help out. He has not been re-allocated to the green team and will resume his red team allocation on his next shift.
It’s quite likely that he is not alone in being asked to do this. He says he feels the whole scenario in the hospital is something from a French farce.
French Hospitals At “Tipping Point” – But What Does That Mean?
The leader of an A&E union in France is quoted in the Telegraph claiming that France is in the midst of a “second wave” and hospitals are “at tipping point”. But what does that mean? It is yet another vague metaphor, the sole purpose of which appears to be to spread alarm, like “second wave”, “surge” and “spike”. Britain, too, is at “tipping point”, according to Health Secretary Matt Hancock yesterday.
So are hospitals in France about to run out of beds – is that what it means? Nothing of the sort. The truth comes out further down the page, when the report quotes the head of healthcare in Paris, rather than an excitable union boss.
Less alarmist, Aurélien Rousseau, head of the Paris region health agency, said that while “tension levels have reached maximum levels”, “we will not see a remake of the first wave, rather a second season of the epidemic”.
On the plus side, patients were better treated, less often hospitalised or placed on ventilators in intensive care and for shorter times, he said. Hospitals will be sorely tested, however, because “there is no question of deprogramming non-Covid treatment”.
The infection rate in the French capital now stands at 160 per 100,000 inhabitants, but the R level remains stable, he added.
Some 20% of intensive care beds are now occupied by patients with Covid, he said.
Ladies and gentlemen, the second wave.
And how’s our own second wave getting on?
How long do you think until they accept it’s over?
Back To (Nearly) Normal in Bergamo
A reader has returned from a trip to Bergamo, one of the worst hit cities in the world in the spring, with some encouraging news.
I’ve just returned from a three week trip to Bergamo. You would think the “Chernobyl” of the virus would be a scary place. Exactly the opposite: groups of adults and students mixing in any numbers enjoying the autumn sun, a large market set up in the central square. All the restaurants are as normal, no arrows, plastic screens, one way systems, etc. Just good food as you’d expect and normal waiter service second to none. Whilst mask wearing is compulsory in shops, in the street as you’d again expect in Italy half the population seem to wear the mask as a fashion item around their wrist. We had a lovely time and not once did we see the fear that seems to stalk every street in the UK. And no quarantine to boot upon return. At least the Italians haven’t forgotten la dolce vita!
The Real Science of Covid
One of our most diligent correspondents, from the moment Lockdown Sceptics was set up, is a financial researcher and fund manager who wishes to remain anonymous. Many of the best papers and articles we’ve linked to in the past five months were sent to us by him. He’s now accumulated a mountain of data on the disease and we asked him to assemble it in one place, organised under different headings, which he’s very kindly done. We’ve published it here and given it pride of place at the top of the right-hand menu and called it “The Real Science of Covid”. For those familiar with the Swiss Doctor, it’s a bit like that except, if anything, even more thorough. For sceptics everywhere, it’s an indispensable resource.
To give you a sense of just how useful it is, here’s the section entitled “The Collateral Damage From Lockdowns is Vast and Will Kill Millions”:
Lockdowns are the moral equivalent of carpet bombing, ineffective with vast collateral damage.
Disruptions to food due to lockdowns may kill more from hunger than Covid.
Covid is not the only illness in the world and millions will die from interrupted care, for example from tuberculosis and HIV, as the New York Times reports.
“COVID-19 risks derailing all our efforts and taking us back to where we were 20 years ago,” said Dr. Pedro L. Alonso, the director of the World Health Organization’s global malaria program.
It’s not just that the coronavirus has diverted scientific attention from TB, H.I.V. and malaria. The lockdowns, particularly across parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America, have raised insurmountable barriers to patients who must travel to obtain diagnoses or drugs, according to interviews with more than two dozen public health officials, doctors and patients worldwide.
Unicef warns on the consequences of poverty and malnutrition for kids could harm millions.
According to a stark report published in Lancet Global Health journal on Wednesday, almost 1.2 million children could die in the next six months due to the disruption to health services and food supplies caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
The first famines of the coronavirus era are at the world’s doorstep U.N. warns.
COVID-19 could reverse decades of progress toward eliminating preventable child deaths, WHO warns.
The Gates Foundation estimates that the response to Covid has set back vaccination 25 years.
Furthermore, there is good reason to believe that lockdowns increased deaths of the vulnerable and elderly.
This is true in much of the world. Here is a study looking at how lockdowns drove excess deaths for non-Covid illnesses.
Interrupting medical care kills people. More people died in Denver of unattended heart attacks during lockdown than from Covid.
New cancer diagnoses collapsed in the United States as the coronavirus pandemic first hit. Almost all diagnoses collapsed in the UK as well.
And same was true for heart attacks and strokes in the NHS in the UK.
Analysis of NHS data reveals the deadly consequences of the government’s messaging to “stay at home, save lives, protect the NHS”. During the lockdown, there was a near 50 per cent decline in admissions for heart attacks. The risks of COVID-19 outweighed the risk of seeking NHS care despite worsening symptoms for many people: 40 per cent more people died from lower-risk treatable heart attacks than usual. For strokes, the situation is further exacerbated by living alone and not having visitors as 98% of emergency calls for strokes are made by someone else.
The economic damage is also horrific.
The World Bank estimates over 71 million will be plunged into extreme poverty due to lockdowns/quarantines
The United Nations has warned that response to Covid is reversing decades of gains in poverty, healthcare and disease
More Than Half of US Business Closures Permanent, Yelp Says. Half of black businesses in the US have been wiped out.
Worth reading in full.
Round-Up
- “The power-mad clowns of the Johnson Junta want to TOTALLY suppress a coronavirus – which has never been achieved in history” – Peter Hitchens’s latest – and it’s a corker
- “You can’t cover up why face masks are wearing a bit thin” – Neil Oliver in the Times detects lockdown fatigue
- “Preserving society must be our priority” – Strong editorial in the Telegraph arguing we “cannot remain stuck in this cycle of despair, where every uptick in infections brings increasingly authoritarian and repressive measures”
- “Could Boris quit?” – Patrick O’Flynn in the Spectator wonders whether Boris still feels he’s the right man for the job
- “Why I refuse to take part in ‘re-education’ that tells ordinary people they are racists” – Ben Bradley MP takes a brave stand in the Mail against the divisive and dubious unconscious bias training being inflicted on employees everywhere, and now on MPs
- “Council banned staff from smoking at their desks at home” – How working from home becomes being bossed around in your own home
- “We no longer want to be governed by fear” – France may be beginning to move away from Covid hysteria and this letter from medics may be one reason why (may need Google translate, depending on your French)
- “Surge in demand for supermarket delivery slots amid new lockdown warnings” – Panic is back. Quick, grab the loo roll…
- “A Proposed Origin for SARS-CoV-2 and the COVID-19 Pandemic” – Jonathan Latham and Allison Wilson wonder why the laboratory leak hypothesis has been so quickly dismissed when the evidence in favour is far from weak
- “Time for the PM to take back control from unaccountable advisers – and bring in the Armed Forces” – Disturbing call from Sir Bernard Jenkin MP to bring in the army, also echoed by Tobias Ellwood MP. Laurel and Hardy?
- “England-wide Covid lockdown needed ‘sooner rather than later’, says former adviser” – Neil Ferguson pops up again to try to wreak yet more havoc on the world. What did we do to him for him to wreak such a terrible revenge?
- “‘Last chance saloon’: Britain given final warning to avoid new lockdown” – More threats and blame from Matt Hancock. Also Chris Whitty here
Theme Tunes Suggested by Readers
Two today: “NO EVIDENCE” by Comethazine and “Why Can’t They Understand?” by David P Bailey
Love in the Time of Covid
We have created some Lockdown Sceptics Forums, including a dating forum called “Love in a Covid Climate” that has attracted a bit of attention. We’ve also introduced a section where people can arrange to meet up for non-romantic purposes. We have a team of moderators in place to remove spam and deal with the trolls, but sometimes it takes a little while so please bear with us. You have to register to use the Forums, but that should just be a one-time thing. Any problems, email the Lockdown Sceptics webmaster Ian Rons here.
“Mask Exempt” Lanyards
We’ve created a one-stop shop down here for people who want to buy (or make) a “Mask Exempt” lanyard/card. You can print out and laminate a fairly standard one for free here and it has the advantage of not explicitly claiming you have a disability. But if you have no qualms about that (or you are disabled), you can buy a lanyard from Amazon saying you do have a disability/medical exemption here (takes a while to arrive). The Government has instructions on how to download an official “Mask Exempt” notice to put on your phone here. You can get a “Hidden Disability” tag from ebay here and an “exempt” card with lanyard for just £1.99 from Etsy here. And, finally, if you feel obliged to wear a mask but want to signal your disapproval of having to do so, you can get a “sexy world” mask with the Swedish flag on it here.
Don’t forget to sign the petition on the UK Government’s petitions website calling for an end to mandatory face nappies in shops here.
A reader has started a website that contains some useful guidance about how you can claim legal exemption.
And here’s a round-up of the scientific evidence on the effectiveness of mask (threadbare at best).
The Care Home Scandal – A Call For Evidence
Lockdown Sceptics has asked an award-winning investigative journalist, David Rose, to investigate the high death toll in Britain’s care homes. Did 20,000+ elderly people really die of COVID-19 between March and July or were many of them just collateral lockdown damage? With lots of care homes short-staffed because employees were self-isolating at home, and with relatives and partners unable to visit to check up on their loved ones because of restrictions, how many elderly residents died of neglect, not Covid? How many succumbed to other conditions, untreated because they weren’t able to access hospitals or their local GP? After doctors were told by care home managers that the cause of death of a deceased resident was “novel coronavirus”, how many bothered to check before signing the death certificate? The risk of doctors misdiagnosing the cause of death is particularly high, given that various safeguards to minimise the risk of that happening were suspended in March.
David Rose would like Lockdown Sceptics readers to share any information they have that could help in this investigation. Here is his request:
We are receiving reports that some residents of care homes who died from causes other than Covid may have had their deaths ascribed to it – even though they never had the disease at all, and never tested positive. Readers will already be familiar with the pioneering work by Carl Heneghan and his colleagues at the Oxford Centre for Evidence Based Medicine, which forced the Government to change its death toll counting method. Previously, it will be recalled, people who died of, say, a road accident, were being counted as Covid deaths if they had tested positive at any time, perhaps months earlier. But here we are talking of something different – Covid “deaths” among people who never had the virus at all.
In one case, where a family is deciding whether to grant permission for Lockdown Sceptics to publicise it, an elderly lady in reasonable health was locked in her room for many hours each day in a care home on the south coast, refused all visitors, deprived of contact with other residents, and eventually went on hunger strike, refusing even to drink water. She died in the most wretched circumstances which were only indirectly a product of the virus – and yet, her death certificate reportedly claims she had Covid.
I’m looking for further examples of 1) elderly people who died as a result of the lockdown and associated measures, but whose deaths were wrongly attributed to “novel coronavirus”, and 2) those elderly people who clearly died from other causes but whose deaths were still formally ascribed to Covid because they once tested positive for it, even after the counting method change.
If you have relevant information, please email Lockdown Sceptics or David directly on [email protected].
Samaritans
If you are struggling to cope, please call Samaritans for free on 116 123 (UK and ROI), email [email protected] or visit the Samaritans website to find details of your nearest branch. Samaritans is available round the clock, every single day of the year, providing a safe place for anyone struggling to cope, whoever they are, however they feel, whatever life has done to them.
Shameless Begging Bit
Thanks as always to those of you who made a donation in the past 24 hours to pay for the upkeep of this site. Doing these daily updates is hard work (although we have help from lots of people, mainly in the form of readers sending us stories and links). If you feel like donating, please click here. And if you want to flag up any stories or links we should include in future updates, email us here.
And Finally…
Discussion
Comments
This week across the site:
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Can I ask what maybe a simplistic/naive/scaremongering question re masks; Do ISP 13485-2016 and the like 3 ply Disposable Protective Masks shed fibres on the inside caused by facial movements. If so these would then be inhaled and will they do harm to the lungs? If so are we setting up another Asbetsosis like calamity?
Would appreciate your thoughts.
Many thanks
Neil
I was last on this site a couple of months ago when I was suffering from an implosion of the mind due to a myriad of problems (all Lockdown/mask related) for which there appeared to be no solution.
However, there are always solutions. Some may not be nice, some may be difficult and some may be right under one’s nose (and no, I’m not talking about a mask).
I’m glad to say that I’m now able to see a mask wearer and not go medieval on their sorry hide. I’ve been out and about without getting arrested which is a good thing. I am able to deal graciously (relatively) with simpering, lockdownistas of my acquaintance without resorting to a snarling Tasmanian Devil.
Agreements have been made that lessens the likelihood of me turning green and ripping my clothes to pieces before going, yep you guessed it, all medieval on their sorry arse.
I am now in a happy place of controlled, simmering agression that can be alleviated with the words, “Down boy. Good dog.” and the like.
Now that I have quelled the demons and quenched the fire. What have I missed?
Just seen this highlighted in UK Column news from earlier today. What’s this all about?
http://www.30days30ways.com/
NHS are advising people to prepare to flee their homes. What!?
It’s at the end of this UK Column broadcast – https://youtu.be/l4z-XZ8GhAI
Apparently deleted from Twitter very quickly. Not sure if if was legit or not. I am deeply concerned that words like “curfew” and “evacuation” are once again being normalised. We have witnessed the power of repetition taking its deadly effect all around us.
Seems legit https://twitter.com/wandbc/status/1307645934021554177
“Don’t worry, we’re not trying to scare you. This is part of our contribution to the #30days30waysUK campaign – a month-long national campaign.”
Translation:
“We know who you are, and where you live. If you are not with us, you will be crushed.”
If you had the choice to go back in time to January 2020 and live on an alternate timeline where things carried on pretty much as they were before, rather than this carnival of insanity and evil, would you take it?
I have considered this so many times, and I can honestly say that I would probably choose where we are right now. Boredom is non-existent. Every moment of every day is painfully electrifying, and completely unpredictable. I have never felt more restricted, yet at the same time never more alive, than right now.
Back to things as they were for me- no contest
I actually really enjoy life working from home, other than that everything is worse
I miss travelling. But I cannot imagine travelling anywhere in these conditions, so I no longer have any desire to do so.
Travelling is a basic freedom, it is a key feature of the ‘North American Dream’ which has been such a part of our culture, as Johnny Cash puts it;
Well, I know I had it comin’
I know I can’t be free
But those people keep a-movin’
And that’s what tortures me
I’ve been everywhere, man
Crossed the desert’s bare, man
I’ve breathed the mountain air, man
Centuries ago you had to have the permission of the Lord of the Manor to leave your village, the freedom to travel was hard won. The other great freedom is the freedom of association with family, friends and anyone you wish to meet. Both these freedoms were victims of lockdown and for me the loss of them, as with Johnny Cash ‘that’s what tortured me’. Are we about to loose those again? I guess we will find out later today?
I never thought it would be Boris Johnson who would take away so much of our fundamental basic freedoms!
what utter shite bro but if you can convince yourself that the destruction of everything that is holy is good then you must have had a shit life before this
Hmmm,
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-54242634
All pubs, bars, restaurants and other hospitality venues in England must have a 22:00 closing time from Thursday, to help curb the spread of coronavirus.
Well, just let me be the first to say (well, at 12:20am anyway) …
Just fuck off, Boris, Valence, Cummings, Whitty, et all … just fuck right off!
You illiterate, innumerate, lying, conniving bunch of arrogant, ignorant fucking nobs.
There – feels a tad better.
No mention of masks at all times with straws for drinking? Sounds like a minor victory.
Instead of having to shit through a mask and a straw at the same time, it seems (according to exclusive sources close to government), that we are going to be trusted to choose between the mask and the straw, unless we are in local lockdown areas. Praise be! Is not Hancock, and his master Boris, good to us! I think we should have a whip round and get them something nice as a token of gratitude.
How gracious of our wondrous masters to grant us such liberties. I’ll happily shit in someone else’s mask whilst they are still wearing it. Might even boost their flagging immune system to do so.
I think we all felt better for that!
And if it’s all about “saving lives” why are schools being kept open, turning every under 16 into a potential granny killer (on the government’s logic)?
And if graphs from other countries are so important, why won’t they show us the Swedish one?
Breaking. Carl and Sunetra have had the call.
Did we know this?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/21/fightback-against-spike-in-coronavirus-thrashed-out-at-no-10-summit
So it looks like there was a battle and Johnson sided with caution, thankfully.
Hence Whitty and Vallance just went and said whatever they wanted to cause more fear.
What a mess.
“Sided with caution”? Is this tonight’s script?
I’ve been doing more than this by default and to avoid mixing with zombies since March:
“people should again stay at home except for essential shopping and exercise and also avoid public transport.”
Khan is going for the jugular in London with masks everywhere in public, so this has to be a feature of tomorrow’s “cautious” approach.
Hotrod always does the same: comes on here with his one line scripted pro-lockdown sound bite (coupled with a bit of confuse a cat sceptic-sounding camouflage) before disappearing and never engaging in debate. In my experience real sceptics are only too happy to debate – we value free speech and the exchange of opinions. Tonight Hotrod’s scripted sound bite was “Johnson has sided with caution”. Absolute bollox. Johnson is risking total societal breakdown.
His could be her of course…
How many people in this comments section are for real? None of us will ever know for certain, but the percentage seems to me to be higher here, and freer from trolls, than anywhere I’ve ever come across. As conditions deteriorate, so will our exchanges, but for the last 6 months this has been something unusual.
I’m real! I’m real! I’m real! Baaa! Baaa!
Oh dear. I need to get reprogrammed. Back soon.
The vast majority of contributors are genuine here and happy to engage in free and sometimes robust debate. But I think a few more dubious commenters have been taking part recently. Not passionate pro lockdownists but propagandists trying to insert pro lockdown messages while posing as sceptics. It’s reasonable to call them out I think.
This kind of disagreement normally surfaces via the conspiracy/incompetence schism, which I can understand. I’ll gladly go all the way with the wildest speculation, so it is good to be reigned in every once in a while by a more level-headed approach. Weird is winning the Olympic gold medal of everything in 2020 though, so alternative thinking has never had a more nourishing environment.
Name them and give an exact breakdown of your thinking. Otherwise it’s just bullshit!
Tonight Hotrod told us Johnson had “sided with caution” but wrapped it up in sceptic-sounding verbiage. They did the same last night. Flew in and flew out and were careful to not respond to questions, same as tonight.
IMHO OKUK is a troll…
I haven’t seen anyone attack anyone so aggressively as they did me this evening even though I’m just doing my bit to stop all this nonsense…
If you’ve built the Covid-19 Assembly website, and the Lockdown Truth website as well, your efforts deserve huge credit. You’re doing more than I have, by a huge margin.
Bro i’ve not decided about you but you arse licking post for lockdown truth isn’t winning me over. He’s an obvious shill, like Bono and that other cunt, i can’t remember his name, he knows who he is, boring as fuck, comes over as all old but i just get the feeling you know?
You advertise a poll for non-sceptics on a sceptics site and you decline the opportunity to reproduce the questions from the survey here, so still encouraging sceptics here to go to your site. If you can explain that, go ahead…
i love a good bust up, can i add your forum was shite and i’ve found OKUK not to be a troll. You appeared and instantly tried to get folk to go to your piss poor site, seems suspicious to me. Oh and you’re dull as fuck, really fucking boring. Anyone who has the word truth in their name is man obvious cunt. Oh and posting on a forum isn’t doing a god damn thing. Take me for instance i’m not doing anything at all except ignoring the whole fucking thing and going about my day. Your life and what happens to it means less than nothing to me. Your posts say fuck all and they say it without any style or imagination whatsoever. What else? Oh yeah the kettles boiled
If anyone can find a previous Hotrod post that doesn’t wrap up a pro Lockdown soundbite in sceptic camouflage, I’d be interested to see it.
Whitty and Valance…could have been a good comedy duo act back in the 70s – sadly that style of comedy (exaggerated nonsense and taking the piss out of our French and Spanish neighbours) is now very dated.
Their names do have that ring about them, but there the similarity ends. Morecambe & Wise etc. did not obliterate a nation state, its people and its entire history.
They would have, though, in “these troubled times” — killing grannies around the country by causing a nationwide outbreak of that lethal (if unmasked) aerosol-lobbing “laughter” stuff.
just ignore their nonsense and go about your day and if you come into contact with the police it’s always the right thing to do by saying not a word to them, only speak with your lawyer. never say a word, ever. You’ll end up incriminating yourself even when you’re innocent. Unfortunately the police aren’t serving the public no more but are serving the tyrants that have taken over our parliament and therefore you can’t trust them. in fact you can’t trust anyone who takes a government job, from the police to the NHS to the council, maybe trust the fire brigade but after that, nah
Local beat (on foot in London if you can believe it, and not PCSOs either) tried to engage me the other day for a “friendly conversation”. I ignored them. If we cross paths again they will be issuing me with a Fixed Penalty Notice for not being a slave.
https://twitter.com/FrancescoLari/status/1308019245951918085
“In the meantime France, with 10K+ cases/day, is RELAXING restrictions. Classes will be closed only if at least 3 children are positive at the same time. Quarantine has already been lowered to 7 days.”
“Sweden: always right. Other northern countries+Germany: saw Sweden was right now following it. France+Italy: masks to keep WHO happy, open everything. Spain: open everything/total lockdown in alternate weeks. UK: fear+lockdown till mates finish the vaccine and make ££££”
https://twitter.com/FrancescoLari/status/1308113910063656963
Masks to keep WHO happy is still totally unacceptable. From now on they are the WMO (World Mask Organisation).
I don’t know if this was missed but the False Positives question was asked perfectly by one MP to Hancock
https://www.desmondswaynemp.com/ds-blog/false-positives/
https://twitter.com/DesmondSwayne/status/1306516264500842496
Should be explosive stuff but most MPs must be scratching their heads.
ChiMPs at the chimps tea party.
https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1308082772293103617
The whole twitter thread worth reading. An age protected strategy is urgently needed now.
“I worry the current suppression strategy will completely fail in the winter, due to increased transmission of C-19 and a few other reasons. Somewhat perversely, the strategy pursued until now maximises the risk of a large death toll in winter.”
The reason is that the more SD measures of the gov now, the more risk of spread later in the winter.
Michael Yeadon makes it personal.
https://twitter.com/MichaelYeadon3/status/1308164533735821315?s=20
That’s a strong message all right. Be good if he actually reads it.
Always about the vaccine and what comes with it.
Hi all
Please could you get a few non-sceptics you know to complete this survey? It’s been produced by the former lead psychologist of Cambridge Analytica (I know!). It could be the first step to unpicking the mess HMG and the MSM have made of people’s heads.
We need at least 400 non-sceptics to complete it to get an idea of what’s going on. It would be great if you could aim to get 5 people each to do it.
Thanks a million.
Great work. I am not on good terms with any non-sceptics, so will need to make a big effort to convince any of them to assist.
Literally everyone I know in the real world is a non-sceptic… 🙁
You have chosen well. With only one honourable exception the best I can muster is a few borderline cases who go along to get along even after I’ve given them the full treatment. It’s been a real eye-opener actually, all other relationships I have with family or friends have been irrevocably diminished by this. Most of them I will never meet in person again (which they don’t yet realise).
It’s difficult. I have to put them in two camps. The ignorant who I could probably forgive long-term and the w***ers who I’ll happily never see again!
Strange world you inhabit. I know of no-one – NO-ONE – who isn’t suspicious of this shit
Where do u live? I may move there!
Weren’t you the guy previously trying to get us to log on to a rival forum? What happened to that?
You mean the forum that Toby was promoting every day because he didn’t have one?
Rival? We’re all on the same side.
Then list the questions in your survey here…
Yep…suspicious is the relevant word here.,
??
1. You are promoting a survey for “non sceptics” claiming their motivation is a mystery.
2. Rather than go to a non sceptic pro lockdown site to get people to complete the survey, you come to a sceptic site!
3. You don’t list the survey questions here, so encouraging sceptics from here to log on to the survey, to find out what it’s about.
4. You previously encouraged sceptics here to log on to a rival lockdown forum.
5. You claim not to have come across any fellow sceptics in your personal life, whereas nearly everyone here has.
I call all the above odd.
I never used the word mystery. I’m trying to use the scientific method to understand motivations. This site is pro-scientific method. This survey was designed by a leading behavioural scientist.
Have you looked at my website? I want to use sceptics to speak to their non-sceptic friends and family etc to change their minds. I’m not about to go on the Guardian and promote this. It’s readers of this site who can change minds one by one.
As I said, Toby was promoting my forum every day until he set up his own. We’re not rivals, we’re on the same side.
I’m very sorry but I don’t know any sceptics in the real world. I live in a small town and my family are non-sceptics. I work with non-sceptics.
Your trolling of me is definitely “odd”.
I repeat my question to you: what have you done to help end this nonsense?
And anyone who thinks that opinion surveys reflects the “scientific method” doesn’t understand science.
77
What a demoralising thought for the sceptic community here…but nearly everyone who comes to this site seems to know at least one sceptic, so it’s odd you don’t.
OKUK
I worked 14 hours straight on this today. I have just sat down to relax and you’re doing this.
What have YOU done to stop this madness?????
List the survey questions here so we can see them without having to log on to the survey site. Why won’t you?
Why would I just list questions on this site? It’s a survey. Take the survey or don’t take it. It’s up to you. Don’t you want to help end this craziness?
Why would sceptics take a survey designed for non sceptics?
Why wouldn’t you list the questions here, given you are publicising it on a sceptics site but you are not expecting sceptics to visit the survey site?…at least I presume you aren’t. ..
You seem proud of your survey – can’t see why you wouldn’t share the questions.
The survey is for everyone, I’ve done it, and it allows a broad range of responses. A survey made for an echo chamber, like the YouGov ones, is useless as a way of understanding how people are thinking. Follow the link and answer the questions and you can get your point across.
That’s convenient except Lockdown Truth stated specifically at the outset it was a survey designed to find out how non-sceptics (“400” minimum no less) felt about issues related to Covid. Take it up with him if you think he was wrong about the target audience for his own survey.
77
Nobody mentioned that till you did…and now you’ve mentioned it twice! Odd and odder. If you can explain why it’s so difficult for you to set out the survey questions here on Toby’s site, this would be easily resolved.
Thanks!
done it
I’ve done it and forwarded it, but as of a few weeks ago I no longer know anybody who is not sceptical to one degree or another.
I don’t know any non-sceptics. In fact I wouldn’t even talk to them, you can’t make them change their mind
How TF do you get through to a disciple? They want to be what they are. The alternative is heresy and having to do your own thinking.
Why are you promoting this?
I don’t understand your question.
I want to understand the motivations of non-sceptics. Only then we can focus on changing them. If I had £20 Billion pounds to spend it wouldn’t be so crucial but with zero budget we have to focus our resources.
And I’m promoting this because it is my project and I want to end this utter madness.
What are you doing about it?
You need a survey to tell you their motivations? But a lot of sceptics are going to click on your survey to find out what the questions are…why not just list the questions here? They will be of interest to real sceptics.
Any straightforward contributor here would have no problem listing the survey questions.
??
Who lists survey questions on a forum?
You’re suggesting that I’m not a “straightforward contributor”. Have you looked at my advisory Board?
77
I can do this. Since I am quite cowardly I am not open with everyone on my rabid scepticism, although I am getting bolder. Hence I can send this to a few people. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks!
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10220958574465603&id=1578426990
This is the sort of stuff that is being pumped out by Public Health in Ireland.
Considering the report of transverse myelitis in Oxford C-19 vaccine trial,perhaps interesting to publish a report of the same diseases in a case of C-19.There is supposed to be 3 cases of transverse myelitis in C-19 published according to the article.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7275168/
That’s interesting.
Vallance says you might be allowed to have it for Christmas, but only if you’re good.
In the US they seem to be very disappointed by the UK regulators according to this article. Perhaps explains the talking down recently of vaccine coming very soon in the US.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/09/20/human-trials-oxford-vaccine-hold-us-spinal-cord-disease-fears/
This article posted by Carrie is also very disturbing if you think the vaccine would be available soon
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2020/09/21/coronavirus-vaccine-patent.aspx?cid_source=dnl&cid_medium=email&cid_content=art1HL&cid=20200921Z1&mid=DM660562&rid=969575901
No wonder Belinda is smiling and laughing in all her interviews this year:
“A vaccine with those reaction rates could cause grave injuries in 1.5 billion humans if administered to ‘every person on earth.’ That is the threshold that Gates has established for ending the global lockdown.“
Good…or stupid?
And given the age of victims, probably many more that go undetected.
This site focuses, understandably enough, on the British situation. However, Covid-19 is a global pheomenon.
Those who tend to cockup theorising in the UK emphasize British particularities, whilst those of a similar persuasion elsewhere presumably emphasize their own national factors.
The cockup theorisers fail to account for the fact that, in my opinion, the narratives are basically the same everywhere, with the variations minor by comparison.
Measures may sometimes be relaxed in some places, only to be tightened up again, but I see no sign of a retreat in the narrative.
Indeed, there can be no retreat in the narrative, given that all institutional and governmental credibility has been invested in it.
Whatever the ultimate outcome of all this, it has now gone past the point of no return.
Great post. This point CANNOT be emphasised enough!
A cynical mind might say there is a script!!
That’d make me cynical then. Or realistic.
Even across the administrations today it was the same message. We have a Sinn Fein Deputy First Minister here in Northern Ireland cranking up the fear message from Westminster word for word.
The comments on her warm up social media posts last night were almost 90% anger, maybe 20% of those truly sceptical of the overall narrative.
Excellent point, the global nature of this eclipses anything I have ever seen before. Astonishing homogeneity of response across all continents and cultures, with very few exceptions.
Do not underestimate the role our communications technology has played in facilitating this. Most of us are exposed every day, and respond in kind, to a tsunami of information that previous generations would have found impossible to process.
For me that negates the cock up theory..The fact that all governments across the world have been incompetent in exactly the same way.That leaves the question of who is controlling our government and what for.It does sound fantastic but I can’t see any other explanation.
Isn’t the problem that all governments followed the reaction on social media which the MSM also followed. The problem is that the opinion on social media was largely dictated by all these Chinese bots, remember the 170,000 accounts from China deleted a couple of months ago that were found to have dictated policy in the UK. The deleted accounts are only the tip of the ice berg and there are millions more currently being used to dictate policy.
Bots on social media are the equivalent of artillery in WW1 or air power in WW2. WW3 is being fought primarily in the digital arena.
Covid-19 is a (fucking unfunny and sick) joke, and the vaccine has always been the punchline.
My wife had an interesting conversation with her masseuse (an old friend) this evening.
Her friend told her that she had been out with another friend, a senior care nurse at a Midlands hospital and the conversation centred very much around this CV19 shit show.
The nurse said that her hospital is empty and has been for months. Said that she has seen one or two patients with suspected CV in all that time – all the rest, empty! Told her that this whole situation is bollocks and has been from day one. Totally made out to be worse than it is.
She then went on to say that back in March, the whole hospital was visited by The Suits and everyone were made to sign NDA’s then and there, no reading, or debate. Sign or out.
Our sister in law is also a care home helper. She is tested every week. No-one in her care home or her whole circle of colleagues has tested positive, ever. Every death that happens in the home is automatically posted as CV. No test.
Seems that upper management in the NHS Trusts are complicit in this across the country if other similar… Read more »
That all rings true in relation to my observation and Occam’s razor in terms of analysis.
Having to sign without reading is disgraceful. Might give rise to a defence of duress for any whistleblowers mind.
We need the name badges of these ‘Suits’.
This is fascinating information. Playing Devil’s advocate for a second, if this NDA was universal in the NHS, is it conceivable that there would not be many more rumours like this doing the rounds? Especially given that the NHS is the 5th largest employer in the world. We are talking nearly 2 million people here. Could they all have been cowed into submission and silence for this long?
I have read other anecdotes of NDA’s but did not save the links unfortunately. Not widespread news but they are there.
An NDA is a powerful deterrent.
Yes, it carries the threat of criminal charges if broken. If just 1% of NHS employees had blown the whistle though, this would be 20,000 cases.
I’m bound by (off the top of my head) around 20 corporate NDAs that I’ve signed myself. Nothing to do with this stuff, but I would have to be very, very sure of my moral ground and of media support before I breached any of them (I don’t actually have any moral imperative to breach any of them, to be clear).the threat of being arrested by the FBI next time I went through US immigration aside, I wouldn’t want to be permanently bankrupt and unemployable.
It doesn’t compare but I have already jeopardised a 20-year career, and the prospect of ever being employed again (owing to my age), by being the only employee in my company who refused to sign the face coverings policy. This is a small price to pay for making a small stand against the insanity.
It’s worthless.
Did you ask her how she would prove this to anyone?
I didn’t. This is 3rd or fourth person. The important point for me was that the masseuse was a little bit Lockdown-tastic at the start and has since seen the light. I added this because the NDA situation made me remember the other articles i had read about other nurses being asked to sign them.
I appreciate it could all be hearsay.
It would be helpful to get hold of a copy of the NDA mentioned by the nurse and make it public. As an NHS employee myself, not been asked to do this, nor have colleagues at hospitals in adjacent counties.
Yes, it’s no good if just an internet rumour. We need evidence
Great to see the NHS represented on here. You have confirmed my suspicion that this may be Chinese whispers. I have slagged off your employer on here more than once, and often forget that this is read by real people like yourself who work for them.
Any piece of paper signed in those conditions is legally worthless.
Ooof. Not an encouraging day overall. Took car for some recall work – Eastbourne Honda dealer was a nightmare – stand about 10′ feet away (behind the line. NO, THE RED LINE !). Put keys in plastic bag. BBC propaganda bollocks showing on large screen.
While waiting went to the local Morrisons. Dire – queue system, hand gunk proffered, one way system designed by failed model railway engineer. Deciding I didn’t need to walk 30 yards to enter the queuing system, ducked under tape. (Nobody was coming down the ‘correct’ channel). Ooh, bad move. Head Karen had a meltdown. Apparently they’ve done a survey across 100 stores (!), this is apparently what Morrisons customers want.
B&Q, fine, virtually normal.
Picked up car, went to Battle. Very bad move. It must be one of the leading covidphobic place in the UK. Prior booking essential for the deserted Abbey. Big posters in the square, “local lockdown heroes”. Maybe a dozen or so ? Then, every shop or cafe seemed to have its own version of these posters. (They have knitted covers for the traffic bollards – flowers, patterns, the full works. This added to the sense of unreality.). Decided to… Read more »
Hastings was always more rough and ready than the more genteel Eastbourne and affluent Battle. Is there a pattern developing here?
Yep, good point Richard.
🙂
Nah. But maybe we met in the ice cream shop.
Fear porn on ITN.Teeing us up for more restrictions tomorrow.Also holding out ‘hope of a vaccine by the end of the year.The reporter actually called it the stuff of dreams.Its not even a theory that they are continuing the fear game until the vaccine is ready.Its fact
It’s so in your face. Turned off after 5. Look out the window, the world is not coming to an end.
I swear it’s psychological warfare on a massive scale. They tee up narrative in the preceding weeks, asking Hancock “Can you rule out a second lockdown?” And the media won’t move on till we get a second lockdown.
I only watch to see what they are planning.It is no longer news but Government propaganda.I now know what life was like behind the iron curtain
The Russians developed techniques for coping. We will too.
It’s been psychological warfare on a massive scale for over 6 months.
By the end of the year indeed. Anyone who doubts this message is telling where this is all headed needs to pay more attention.
Freedoms to come at a cost for everything you want to do.
Forget the vaccine MOONSHOT is what this is all about.
My god.
https://inews.co.uk/news/politics/daily-moonshot-tests-covid-nhs-paid-by-public-655089?ito=twitter_share_article-top
Moonshot is the precursor to the vaccine.The end game is a tattoo with your vaccine history embedded in your skin.Track and trace,temperature checks are just conditioning to prepare us to except this is what you have to do to access public life.
Pay for the privilege of being totally enslaved. Could it get any more obvious?
https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2020/09/10/martin-mckee-will-boris-johnsons-moonshot-become-lost-in-space/
No need to worry!!!
MOONSHOT looks like one of Cumming’s aberrations. If you look at his blogs the man is a total fantasist. He and Boris make a dreadful pair. They live in a kind of parallel science fiction universe far removed from practical reality.
Moonshot
Moonspaff
Moneyshot
Moneyspaff? Too crude?
Exponential??????????
Yep : Corruption of language = corruption of thought = lying.
Remember Blair. Then remember his nemesis – Eric Blair.
Is anyone else been getting sleeping issues? I don’t get much now, usually anxiety keeps me awake for hours. Some nights, usually when the next diktat is due, I’ve not had any sleep at all. And without this pleasure I feel even worse. The sadistic bastards must be doing this to thousands if not millions.
I haven’t slept properly since March.
No more than 4 hours a night during the week (often with beers), then I crash at weekends when things are generally a little quieter.
On the plus side I have grown familiar with the movement of the planets when I go out for a smoke. I especially enjoy the rise of Venus around 3.00-4.00am, which I generally use as my guide for finally calling it a day.
Yes, similar to what you describe…
Likewise
Do you try to get exercise every day?
“The sadistic bastards must be doing this to thousands if not millions.”
… and that’s but one symptom.
We should not forget the evil done. There needs to be a reckoning.
Nuremberg style trials, and prison sentences as a minimum.
I’m lucky, I can always sleep. Probably the only thing I’m really good at.
I’m able to sleep well most nights, but I have this constant dread when waking up in the morning when I remember I don’t live in Sweden and that our government is beyond incompetent and cruel.
I have a constant dread when I go to bed that I will wake up the next morning.
Oh no! Still here!
I find it helps to drink yourself semi-conscious first. My liver and my heart don’t like it much, but at least I’m unconscious for around 8 hours a day.
Doubtless insomnia will soon be touted as a distressing symptom of Long Covid.
Anyone not sleeping well needs to fix that as a priority. Given normal exercise, good diet, and hydration, then taking a break somehow is essential.
Usual options are there – meditation, yoga, budo, gardening, art, craft, reading, studying, animals, nature, etc. Oh yes, getting bladdered occasionally too. 🙂 (Other entheogens are available …).
If we’re going to win this we need all the reasonable people at their most effective.
I need to get back into entheogens, especially natural. They have the potential to provide me with insights into the insanity that I have not yet been able to reach via alcohol intake.
Shizer, I am similar – I haven’t had a proper, non-anxiety filled (sober) night’s sleep since mid June.
Anybody live in Cornwall? I was thinking about going down there to escape the new normal, how is it down there? Are the locals all paranoid and covid crazy or are they a bit more relaxed?
I wouldn’t go there. I have heard absolute horror stories.
They make sausages from tourists …
more likely to be Pasties
True. Anything bar carrots, I understand …
Cornwall had its busiest summer in years this year. Where are the dead bodies?
In the Tamar 🤣
I live there. Less muzzles on the streets than I recently saw in Hertfordshire but a definite anti visitor feeling among some less intellectually abled residents! Also without wanting to sound like some kind of whinging local it’s busier here than I’ve ever known it at the moment!
Please correct me if I have got this wrong, but when this hoo-haa started there was something actually happening, we may think the response was wrong but it was a response to deaths and hospital cases. But at the moment naff all is happening, very few people dying, hospital cases up and down a bit, but at low numbers, as the old songs says;
”ain’t nothing shaking but the leaves on the tree”
All looks fine to me but witless Witty has gazed into the tea leaves and has had a vision of doom and gloom and we all have to suffer.
He must have listened to the wrong music, I’d rather go with Van Morrison;
Don’t worry about tomorrow
That ain’t gonna help you none
Don’t worry about tomorrow
That ain’t gonna help you none
You’ve gotta live and take each day as it comes
Give it a few weeks and there won’t even be leaves on the trees.
“when this hoo-haa started there was something actually happening,”
Actually – track it back, and there was relatively little actually happening.
But it was a reasonably plausible scenario that something was about to kick off.
Then something did happen – largely in London. There was a notable spike in mortality … which quickly faded without breaking any records as the familiar gompertz curve revealed itself.
What did break records was the lie and panic industry thereafter.
I finally got a reply from my MP:
He very clearly hadn’t read my e-mail, in which I gave many reasons why the measures are not proportionate at all. Well, I suppose that’s what you (think you) can afford to do when you’ve got a ~14000 vote majority.
I sometimes wonder whether single-question emails to MPs are more effective. Skewer them on one strong point?
I did the same though, wrote a long email to a councillor – I’ll probably get a weak reply or none at all but it was quite cathartic.
In fairness to him, he is correct, the Coronavirus Act is proportionate and temporary. But it is also almost entirely symbolic, as all the restrictions are brought in under the Public Health Act. The Coronavirus Act is a sideshow.
The coronavirus act grants imdemnity to people it shouldn’t, if I’ve understood correctly?
I am beginning to think that some of the people leading this have one arm behind their back.
Do exactly what we say or we will tell the world about that night in the hotel with those two young ladies, do you remember that conference? We have video if you want to be reminded how much fun it was.
Blackmail for political influence is as old as the hills.
The Lolita Express flight logs will be going a long way to keeping the leadership in line and on message.
Indeed. How is Guislaine doing, been very quiet these six months.
Nothing conspiratorial about it either. J. Edgar Hoover had enormous influence on American politics for 50 years using his private dossiers on Senators and Representatives. In turn, the Mafia were given a free ride by him owing to the compromising material they held on his transvestite activities.
Check out the Tim Dillon podcast with Whitney Webb
https://youtu.be/udH8rIaC33k
I suspect – on some level – it may be a factor in the mix. Was reading the other day, a journalist (proper one, not MSM, @ArrestAnon social media) had compiled a list of the people Trump had put away for child sex trafficking or related crimes: it numbers in excess of 300+ paedos, nearly 14,000 for trafficking crimes!
A certain vaccine enthusiast will be featuring!
Belinda and Melvin, naturally. The world’s favourite friendly philanthropic couple, spreading good will and love.
Just some?
More abuse aimed at my wife for not being muzzled in a shop today.
In the queue a woman behind my wife said to her kids,’huh,that’s it I’m not shopping in here anymore if they are going to let people not wearing masks in !’.
You can easily swap the words ‘people not wearing masks’ with,say,’Jews’ and you realise how low this country has sunk so rapidly.
You should have reminded the woman that some people have reasons why they cannot wear a mask and by talking the way she spoke she could be committing a hate crime.
I would’ve turned round, told her I’m exempt, and warn her that talking about me in such a manner is discrimination against the disabled and a criminal offence.
Not to mention appalling manners, and a very bad example to her kids.
More of the same coming our way just walking down the road in the fresh air once they are made mandatory everywhere.
If anyone tries it on with me, I know a few decent spots where there is no CCTV coverage where we can discuss our differences face-to-mask.
How would they even police wearing masks outdoors? Will the Stasi – sorry, Covid marshalls – be deployed to the countryside where there’s more livestock than people? At this rate the animals will have to wear masks too
It will be left to the people to police themselves. As soon as this is brought in we will see a massive uptick in mask usage outdoors, from less than 10% to 75% or above, overnight.
Man in macdonalds protesting loudly about 4 young lads not wearing masks .They told him they don’t have the authority to query them.Continued protesting him got him ejected without his breakfast
Good
A possible response might be “well that would suit me just fine because the sight of pathetic, muzzled, bedwetting idiots like you makes me feel physically sick”
Shows the effectiveness of Goebbels-esque propaganda.
I’d have turned round and said “Good! More loo roll for the rest of us then!”
The problem is by taking two points you can fit any curve you want between them, although the simplest is a straight line. It could be exponential, but only if the increase is the seventh root of two per day. You cannot infer anything from the two points, you need a third point. If the third point is twice the second then it’s exponential, but if the third point is the second point plus the difference between the first and second points then it’s linear. There is one curve worse than an exponential curve and that is the tangent curve which shoots off very rapidly to infinite and beyond.
What does a tangent touch? What does a sine lack? How have I got to the grand old age of thirty-eight without ever asking that question?