161580
The Weekly Sceptic Live The Weekly Sceptic Live The Weekly Sceptic Live
  • Log in
The Daily Sceptic
No Result
View All Result
  • Articles
  • About
  • Archive
    • ARCHIVE
    • NEWS ROUND-UPS
  • Forum
  • Donate
  • Newsletter
The Daily Sceptic
No Result
View All Result

China Announces Lockdown Plans for the Flu as Washington Post Tells Americans to Prepare for the Same

by Will Jones
10 March 2023 3:46 PM

Chinese officials want to bring in lockdowns to combat the flu, leaving many furious about a prospect of returning to the strict restrictions seen during the COVID-19 outbreak. The Mail has the story.

The city of Xi’an, in Shaanxi Province in central China, said it may enforce lockdowns “when necessary” if an outbreak of the common flu virus poses a “severe threat”.

The emergency response plan for the city published on Wednesday is intended to combat the rising number of influenza cases in the country, as COVID-19 cases continue to fall.

Authorities in the Chinese city have not suggested that a new set of lockdowns are imminent, but locals in the area have still dubbed the plans excessive.

China’s zero-Covid lockdown plans were implemented throughout the country during the pandemic and were seen as extreme by many.

The plan by the Xi’an local government accounts for four levels of flu outbreak. If the common virus was to reach a critically high level, lockdowns would likely be reinstated. 

During the pandemic, Chinese residents were not allowed to leave their homes. Some were not even allowed to got shopping for food or crucial supplies.

The city of Xi’an was placed under some of the strictest lockdown measures by authorities until restrictions were rapidly eased across the country in December last year following mass uproar.

Reacting to the prospect of a return to enforced lockdowns, social media users in China on Weibo said the common flu was a normal virus and did not require lockdown measures prior to Covid.

The BBC reported one user saying “life went on as per normal” when influenza outbreaks hit.

Another said China’s local governments had become “addicted to sealing and controlling”.

Speaking to the BBC, Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, said: “To local residents who were traumatised by the lockdown measures not long ago, the return to the same draconian method in coping with flu outbreaks is by no means justified.”

Worth reading in full.

Well, China set the pattern last time, so will it do so again?

The Washington Post seems up for it. In a post to mark the third anniversary of the pandemic, titled ‘America shut down in response to Covid. Would we ever do it again?‘, Joel Achenbach softens up Americans for the return of restrictions. He writes:

An incalculable number of lives were likely saved by delaying what would have been the natural spread of the virus. That gave doctors more time to develop techniques and drugs for treating patients in the brutal period before vaccines helped lower the fatality rate.

“It is entirely plausible that we might have seen a million or more dead before anyone had the chance to be vaccinated, had we done nothing,” suggests Harvard epidemiologist William Hanage.

In public health, though, success is measured against counterfactual outcomes: hypothetical infections, conjectured suffering, imaginary deaths.

By contrast, the pain of the national shutdown — businesses going under, weddings postponed, protracted isolation of the elderly, learning losses among schoolkids —is glaringly obvious. Critics of pandemic restrictions contend that the cure was worse than the disease. In response, Republican-dominated legislatures in many states have passed laws limiting public health interventions, such as vaccine or mask mandates.

“An incalculable number of lives were likely saved by delaying what would have been the natural spread of the virus.” Good grief. Is it really 2023 and a national newspaper will still print such blatant misinformation? With so many studies now making clear that restrictions had no clear relationship with outcomes, where are the fact checkers when you need them? Presumably reading the latest work of fiction from Neil Ferguson et al.

The success is also in no way “counterfactual” or “hypothetical”, of course: that’s why we have studies that compare how different jurisdictions fared with different policies. And these studies and the data they draw on are clear: policies did not have a significant impact on outcomes. Is Achenbach really still claiming, in March 2023, that we simply can’t know what would have happened had we not imposed restrictions (but “likely” vast number of lives were saved)? Yes, he is.

Note also how Achenbach assumes attitudes to lockdown are political, that it is Republicans who oppose restrictions. The political framing of these issues has never been helpful as it has made what should be questions of science and evidence tribal. Is it any wonder citizens are fleeing lockdown-happy blue states for free red ones?

Achenbach ends by warning, like China, that flu may require lockdowns in future: “There are more pathogens out there poised to spill into the human species. A novel strain of avian influenza, H5N1, already has seized the attention of scientists as a potential spillover hazard.”

The WashPo even wheels out the ‘man collapsed in Wuhan street and died from deadly virus’ image from January 2020 to adorn its ludicrously lockdownphilic piece.

Oh dear.

Tags: ChinaCOVID-19FluLockdownUnited StatesWashington Post

Donate

We depend on your donations to keep this site going. Please give what you can.

Donate Today

Comment on this Article

You’ll need to set up an account to comment if you don’t already have one. We ask for a minimum donation of £5 if you'd like to make a comment or post in our Forums.

Sign Up
Previous Post

Exposing America’s Censorship-Industrial Complex

Next Post

News Round-Up

Subscribe
Login
Notify of
Please log in to comment

Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.

29 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

NEWSLETTER

View today’s newsletter

To receive our latest news in the form of a daily email, enter your details here:

 

DONATE

PODCAST

Nick Dixon and Toby Young Talk About the Attack on Kellie-Jay Keen by Trans Rights Activists, the BBC’s Perverse Insistence on Calling a Rapist “Her” and the Brutal Cancellation of Alfie Brown

by Will Jones
28 March 2023
1

LISTED ARTICLES

  • Most Read
  • Most Commented
  • Editors Picks

Britain’s Backlash Against LTNs: Fed-Up Residents Torch Road Blocks Hours After They Were Installed

28 March 2023
by Will Jones

In Defence of Andrew Bridgen’s Speech to Parliament on the Risks vs Benefits of Covid Vaccination

28 March 2023
by Norman Fenton, Clare Craig, Martin Neil, Jonathan Engler and Mr Law

The Great Food Reset Has Begun

28 March 2023
by Will Jones

The Dumb Chain of Events that Brought Face Mask Tyranny to the West

28 March 2023
by Eugyppius

News Round-Up

28 March 2023
by Will Jones

In Defence of Andrew Bridgen’s Speech to Parliament on the Risks vs Benefits of Covid Vaccination

31

The Bad Science Behind Sadiq Khan’s ULEZ Anti-Car Crusade

30

The Dumb Chain of Events that Brought Face Mask Tyranny to the West

25

Britain’s Backlash Against LTNs: Fed-Up Residents Torch Road Blocks Hours After They Were Installed

18

News Round-Up

35

In Defence of Andrew Bridgen’s Speech to Parliament on the Risks vs Benefits of Covid Vaccination

28 March 2023
by Norman Fenton, Clare Craig, Martin Neil, Jonathan Engler and Mr Law

The Dumb Chain of Events that Brought Face Mask Tyranny to the West

28 March 2023
by Eugyppius

The Bad Science Behind Sadiq Khan’s ULEZ Anti-Car Crusade

28 March 2023
by Ben Pile

Mainstream Media’s New Obsession: Labelling Criticism of 15-Minute Cities ‘Conspiracy Theories’

27 March 2023
by Rebekah Barnett

Almost Everything Is “Institutionally Racist”

27 March 2023
by Noah Carl

POSTS BY DATE

March 2023
M T W T F S S
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
2728293031  
« Feb    

SOCIAL LINKS

Free Speech Union
  • Home
  • About us
  • Donate
  • Privacy Policy

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

RSS

Subscribe to our newsletter

© Skeptics Ltd.

No Result
View All Result
  • Articles
  • About
  • Archive
    • ARCHIVE
    • NEWS ROUND-UPS
  • Forum
  • Donate
  • Newsletter

© Skeptics Ltd.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Create New Account!

Please note: To be able to comment on our articles you'll need to be a registered donor

Already have an account?
Please click here to login Log In

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
wpDiscuz
You are going to send email to

Move Comment