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Professor Lockdown Strikes Again

by Toby Young
19 March 2021 3:18 PM

Scarcely a week passes without Neil Ferguson popping up to issue a dire warning about the risks of opening up too soon. This morning, he appeared on Radio 4’s Today programme to warn about the risk posed by the new South African variant which he linked to the resurgence of the virus on the continent. His solution? Ban summer holidays. MailOnline has more.

Professor Neil Ferguson warned today that Britain must keep out the South African variant of coronavirus amid spiralling cases in Europe, suggesting foreign holiday plans may have to be shelved.

The SAGE adviser – dubbed ‘Professor Lockdown’ because his gloomy modelling of the first wave spooked ministers into the spring shutdown – said the troubling Covid strain was accounting for a “significant” amount of new cases on the continent.

He stopped short of calling for an outright travel ban but hinted that tough surveillance and quarantining at airports and borders would need to remain in place.

MailOnline notes that Professor Ferguson is assuming that vaccines are our only protection against infection from SARS-CoV-2.

But antibodies make up just one part of the immune response to Covid – for example white blood cells also play a critical role.

Worth reading in full.

Stop Press: A new study out of Oxford has concluded that the Covid vaccines are more effective against the Brazilian variant than previously thought and may be effective against the South African variant, too. The Times has more.

The study from Oxford, which has yet to be peer reviewed, suggests that the antibodies created by existing jabs and by natural infections can still neutralise the Brazilian and South African variants. This happened at lower levels than recorded with a strain that circulated during the first months of the pandemic.

Worth reading in full.

Tags: Brazilian VariantNeil FergusonSouth African Variant

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6 Comments
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steve_w
steve_w
4 years ago

Ferguson’s modelling was a large part of the reason half the world locked down which will result in 10s of millions of kids dying. I don’t think at this point he can be particularly objective. Best ignore

12
0
RickH
RickH
4 years ago

Let’s be fair. Ferguson is becoming useful : we know beyond doubt that anything he proposes immediately validates its opposite proposition. He is like a contrary weather vane of scientific validity.

The correlation is too strong to be coincidental; his wrongness is a consistent thing of wonder.

15
0
steve_w
steve_w
4 years ago
Reply to  RickH

Like the Pyramids at Giza, Ferguson’s wrongness will be standing millenia into the future

6
0
karenovirus
karenovirus
4 years ago

Yet another ferguson diversion for the msm to salivate over. Many know this was all over after 3 weeks of lockdown 1. Everything since then has been fear porn or phoney commiseration.

Most others knew it was over by 3rd week of June 2020 (ONS London stats oft quoted).
Everything since then has been mendacious bollocks designed to reload the gravy train, cover arses or maintain myriad little tinpot dictators.

How they have the gall to pretend that we are anywhere else except at the end of the second seasonal return is beyond me.

See yesterday

‘Slow outdoor walkers X times more likely to get the Covid.’

Give me strength.

20210317_041022.jpg
8
0
Ozzie
Ozzie
4 years ago

We can also ignore anything this man says because it is the BBC that is interviewing him – the BBC are obsessed with keeping this cr*p going. Not sure why the Mail generate a story out of an interview on another MSM platform – fills the pages I guess.

2
0
karenovirus
karenovirus
4 years ago
Reply to  Ozzie

Over half of the BBCs own loyal followers no longer believe their random lies (this one about imaginary third wave, which if memory serves, we were already in the middle of during January; confusing ain’t it ?).

20210320_122955.jpg
1
0

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