After a few months of the Hallett pantomime, we are quite clear what the Covid Inquiry is not about – evidence-based policy.
The obsequiousness to modellers, distortions of the precautionary principle, character assassinations, Teflon flip flops and swear words are ample evidence that the U.K. taxpayers are being taken for a ride.
Next time will be worse: the precedent for depriving citizens of their civil rights, abandoning the elders and muzzling entire populations on the basis of no evidence and no real expertise has been set.
We have received many public and private messages of support, and we think the time has come to stop the media circus and get down to answering why evidence was ignored, why gaps were filled with models and Hancockisms and why we did not fill the evidence void with clinical trials designed to answer urgent questions. We still have time, and that is what we should be doing now, not tomorrow, but now. To paraphrase the head of WHO: test, test, test. Dr. Tedros was referring to PCR, which, when mismanaged, distorted everyone’s perception of the threat. He now should repeat the phrase to refer to plugging the many gaps in our knowledge.
It seems that even Private Eye’s MD shares this view.
If we are going to spend 200 million on a ‘gold standard’ pandemic inquiry it needs to determine what the ‘gold standard’ pandemic management should have been for Covid, and should be for a future pandemic. And it should do the science before it determines how far off the U.K. was from best practice.
Our readers know how far the U.K. was from best practice based on personal experience and what they have read in Trust the Evidence.
However, rather than going on about the Hallett Inquiry and its biased chair, let’s look at what could be done now to prepare humanity for the possible ravages of whichever next respiratory agent.
We have documented the prominent role played by nosocomial infection with SARS-CoV-2 found in up to 40% of people admitted for reasons other than Covid.
A retrospective study using data from 2015 to 2021 was conducted in a paediatric hospital in the USA, looking at the effects of a bundle of interventions against hospital-acquired respiratory infections.
The authors report a 68% decrease in infection over the period using caregiver screening, symptom-based isolation, personal protective equipment, hand hygiene, staff illness procedures and monitoring of environmental cleanliness. All these measures were enhanced when the pandemic started.
The infection decrease is marked, but it is what you would expect from an observational study. This mix of interventions has yet to be tested in randomised trials. Some may work, but we don’t know which ones and by how much.
The forthcoming influenza and respiratory viral theme park season is near and would provide an ideal testing ground to advance science and knowledge. Alternatively, good old rhinovirus is always on hand.
The US researchers found that:
Rhinovirus emerged as the predominant cause of HAVI [healthcare-associated viral infections] during the pandemic period. It was the only reported respiratory HAVI in our cohort for an entire year with HAVIs due to all other respiratory viral pathogens virtually eliminated. This finding corresponds with what was observed in the epidemiology of communal viral activity during the [2009 influenza] pandemic, and is widely reflected in both reports of significant increases in hospitalisation for respiratory infection secondary to rhinovirus, and in the persistence of rhinovirus/enterovirus detection despite stringent public health measures.
Many treat this RNA agent with contempt, perhaps because no licensed remedies exist. However, rhinovirus is always present and circulating with peaks of up to 35-40% positivity in surveillance, creating epidemics without apparent seasonal patterns. It also likes to coinfect, so it is a menace. Like most respiratory viruses, the illness is mostly mild, but it can cause serious pathologies, especially in those with asthma or chronic obstructive airways disease, and also can reinfect people who had recently been infected by a different serotype (there are over 150 rhinovirus serotypes). So, it is the near-perfect proxy for respiratory viruses as targets for preventive physical interventions.
Activists tried to obstruct the carrying out of research trials to fill the evidence gaps during the pandemic and partly succeeded in creating a climate of intimidation.
However, they would have a difficult time objecting to such a design on ethical grounds as the comparator would be current practice. If we are willing to educate ourselves rather than submit to the will of influencers and activists, we may learn some valuable lessons.
We could do all sorts of trials with different packages or bundles of measures, and it would probably cost a lot less than the KCs’ fees for the rest of the inquiry and infinitely less than the 37 or so billion wasted on mass testing or the equivalent stolen from the exchequer by criminals. It also might educate some folk about science and the progressive accumulation of knowledge.
Once again, do write to your MPs, as now is the time.
Dr. Carl Heneghan is the Oxford Professor of Evidence Based Medicine and Dr. Tom Jefferson is an epidemiologist based in Rome who works with Professor Heneghan on the Cochrane Collaboration. This article was first published on their Substack, Trust The Evidence, which you can subscribe to here.
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Brilliant idea!
I know what…..why don’t we set up an R&D establishment and call it: ‘The Common Cold Unit’
‘It is therefore arguable that in the case of infections like coronavirus or rhinovirus colds, which are normally quickly self-limited, the best approach would be to relieve the patient’s discomfort and disability and leave their immune system to take care of the virus.’
A view from the common cold unit, D.A.J. Tyrrell June 1992
Thank you for mentioning the Common Cold Unit and the impossibility of stopping the spread of these viruses. Any real scientist would know this.
“It seems that even Private Eye’s MD shares this view.
There was no pandemic.
Yes and all of the data support that assertion, therefore now it is irrefutable fact, which just further confirms this Covid Inquiry is just purely farcical. I’ve got a link about that, and it’s also safe to say that Joel Smalley really hates Piers Morgan, so I’m in good company there;
”In March 2020, the erstwhile PM, bumbling buffoon, Boris “BoJo” Johnson, ignorantly and foolishly declared that COVID was the “biggest threat this country has faced for decades”…
…without checking the mortality records of the last few decades.
A few months in, gullible, ignorant, virtue-signalling, fools like Piers Morgan (chief Dunning-Kruger Effect) got upset when you stated that COVID was “just a bad flu”, dogmatically impotent to justify his spleen, reverting to name calling, transference and hand waving away of data and analysis.
But guess what you see when you do check the evidence!
A novel, deadly pathogen wreaking havoc across all demographics of society, resulting in “unprecedented” excess death as Matt Hancock would pitifully mutter?
Well, if you’re still even remotely in that camp, I’m sorry to burst your bubble (yet again) – COVID was indeed just a “bad flu”. Although, to be completely frank, nowadays, I’m not even sure what that means or if it really has any material implication in terms of mortality.”
https://metatron.substack.com/p/covid-the-biggest-threat-faced-in
Thank you tof.
So we have the civil servants working from home or the beach. we have MPs not in the chamber for significant discussion about totalitarian mandates for a non existent pandemic and now we find out perhaps they should have been doing some useful risk decease management because our sea and rivers are riddled with ecoli. !! Who plays in the sea, yes children who were not at risk from covid yes children. But anything else other than covid that really does threaten citizens is fine by them, as all they are doing in this inquiry is allowing a get out of jail free card “lockdown earlier charade” but useless at best parliamentarians and trusted sources were to blame for a long list, of which the covid inquiry should be exposing but it is colluding to point the gaze elsewhere,
I would not call it a panto it is a tragedy play in reality.
Few were at risk from the cold or flu – the aged and those with co-morbidities. Yet the fascists locked down an entire country over an IFR of 0.3% – engaged in outrageous data fraud, terror, propaganda, police fascism, coercion, murdered with midazolam, issued fake tests for fake cases, demanded no stabs no life, closed schools, made the sheep wear face anus wraps….and not a single politician, political party or this wretched fat Hammerhead-Hallett wants to acknowledge any of it. Not a single public figure outside of Bridgen says anything. Why is that? Pharma money, bribes, death threats? Occam’s razor to the rescue.
Just promote measures to boost the functioning of the immune system – diet, vitamins, minerals. Cheap, effective & simple.
Sorry! How foolish of me to think that the health & well-being of us all is the goal….
On another note, I’m dumping this thread reader post here to provoke critical thinking about how easy it is for folk to fall prey to propaganda on what ever subject, even those with critical thinking skills & intelligence which was on display during the covid lockdown saga, who have fallen prey to a different propaganda psyop which also threatens our freedoms.
Made me think.
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1726656619973693626.html
BB, I stopped reading at ”….the genocide being committed in Gaza…” Seems to me you’re attempting a not very subtle steering of the thread onto a wholly different topic. And when you hint at ”folk” with critical thinking skills and intelligence around particular subjects ( that’d be Covid, ‘climate change’ etc ) are you referring to the posters who are fully onboard in refuting all the pro-narrative garbage the MSM outlets, such as the Beeb, have been spreading non-stop but they suddenly 100% lap up and treat anything coming from the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health as accurate and basically the Gospel? Or is your inference that people have fallen for propaganda only aimed at certain posters on here?
I do have to marvel at the mental gymnastics some on here use to justify the murder of 13,000 plus civiians and the carpet bombing of Gaza, not to mention the missing 6,500 or so, no doubt buried to death under the rubble.
Then there’s hundreds of thousands of Palestinians with no home to return to .
Anyone might think Israel wanted to eliminate them all.
Oh, but that’s only the figures from Hamas, maybe in reality there’s only about half a dozen or so dead.
But, anyone pointing out the bleeding obvious genocide is automatically a Jew hater and an embracer of Hamas.
one may be able to criticise the Israelis for several things but genocide is not one of them when the population of Gaza has increased from 200,000 in 1948 to 2.3 million now. I will not bother with describing the mentality of anyone who cannot be utterly shocked by the bestial behaviour of Hamas,which is quite beyond even the usual behaviour of terrorists targeting the defenceless
What on earth has the population of Gaza increasing since 1948 got anything to do with wether genocide is being carried out now??.. Absolute moronic post..
Heres the UN definition of Genocide….
The definition contained in Article II of the Convention describes genocide as a crime committed with the intent to destroy a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, in whole or in part.
I think you’ll find, if you care to think clearly, that what is occurring in the middle east right now fits the definition rarther accurately
What do you think the Palestinian chant of “from the river to the sea” means”???
Yawn yawn yawn….
I could fill this page with a myriad of Zionist ideologies that make that look utterly insignificant.. But we can’t talk about that can we now…
Apply some historical context fgs
Again, there’s that giant elephant shaped Islamic death cult in the room you so conveniently ignore. You just carry on shovelling and swallowing the heaps of propaganda tumbling out of its backside.
Why are you unquestioningly taking the words of a gleefully mass murdering, burning, raping and torturing fanatical religious death cult at face value?
” Islamic death cult”….
Try carrying out some research on Zionism…
Thanks for the tip. Just doing that now. Yep, nowhere in the literature on Zionism does it mention wiping Muslims off the face of the Earth from the river to the sea or the instruction to kill all Muslims.
I also couldn’t find any evidence of Jews paragliding into surrounding Muslim countries then beheading, disembowelling, burning alive, torturing and raping thousands of men, women, children and babies whilst on the phone to their mothers gleefully bragging about it like they’ve just won the Bake Off.
Why don’t you buy a luxury mansion in Qatar and join Hamas?
Mogs,
I’m sorry that you stopped reading there. I posted it because we are all subjected to military grade propaganda on all political topics & to point out that this can happen to even the best of minds & folk. It’s aimed at all of us, to question, to challenge ourselves on all the battle fronts which are being waged against us.
As an example think about Ian Rons – great on covid, great on free speech, blind spot on Ukraine/Russia & called out on this by many BTL.
We’ve been stirred up about all of the threads which have come together in this latest horror of Gaza/Israel. The mass migrations, the divisions & hatreds fomented by the MSM, the war on terror which engendered a hatred of others have been used against us. Yes there are some abysmal situations happening in various countries & awful no go areas & crimes. These have been created by the politicians with there actions or inaction to cause trouble.
So knowing that the emotional responses to the Gaza/Israel situation have been stoked & long in the planning & that when an emotional response is elicited, neurologically there is no possibility of a cognitive response to that emotional response as the amygdala, where emotional responses are triggered, has no neural connection to the cerebral cortex where cognitive function occurs.
It’s exactly the same playbook as used during covid. That is the reason for posting the thread. That is the reason I addressed it to all of us as we’re all human, we all respond with our emotions to certain triggers which differ for each of us meaning that each & every one of us is susceptible to being played.
I was not directing this at any one individual or any one topic. Any of the events happening around the world currently will trigger a response. We need to be mindful that if we respond emotionally, then our critical thinking skills will not & cannot be engaged. It is a reminder to be cautious & aware that what happened to others during covid could happen to any one of us on another subject.
BB
I skimmed the rest, but when an article opens with that sentence about Israel committing genocide then you know the entire thing is starting from a specific bias, so you’re hardly likely to be getting a balanced and impartial take on things. Then the author goes on to state that Andrew Bridgen, Toby Young and Laura Dodsworth are “hacks”, “liars” and “opportunists”, which is highly inaccurate and disrespectful. Any coincidence they’ve come out in support of the Jewish community?
Then we get references to “the apartheid State of Israel”…the whole thing is one-sided from the outset. Anti-Zionist and pro-Muslim/Palestine. I’ll let people make up their own minds. No surprises though that there’s zero mention of the war crimes the Jihadists committed or that they kill their own civilian people, directly and indirectly.
The point was well made, about our vulnerability to political tactics. It often doesn’t really matter too much, but during the panic a few years ago, I thought that something like that probably occurred in places like Germany in the 1930s, with lots of people falling in to the wrong crowd, as it were.
Yup who’d have thought history can repeat itself in the age of social media.
The article was penned by Simon Elmer. Ordinarily I think Elmer is an interesting writer but this article is in my opinion off the mark.
I am not taking sides in the Gaza conflict because I don’t know where the truth lies. Israel has a lot of explaining to do and particularly regarding the security “lapses” – yeah right – on October 7th. Hamas strike me as barbarians. However, there is no doubt in my mind that islam is a serious threat to the people of this country. Muslims are being deliberately planted in towns and villages all across the UK and are a dangerous threat to Britain and its way of life. So I want an end to immigration and repatriation of those refusing to bow to England and St George.
There is little to commend in Elmer’s article.
Yep, and despite homeless British people sleeping rough or stuck in moldy flats this is the sort of digs these incomers are scoring. No wonder they’re playing hell at the old RAF base in Wethersfield and they don’t want to get shifted onto a barge. Not when they’ve got this to look forward to, courtesy of their pals uploading footage like this. They’ll all have high hopes! We’d pay good money for accommodation like this;
https://twitter.com/Steve_Laws_/status/1725489342477468125
“I am not taking sides in the Gaza conflict because I don’t know where the truth lies. Israel has a lot of explaining to do and particularly regarding the security “lapses” – yeah right – on October 7th”
Were you not aware of world affairs and the Palestinian situation prior to the 7th???..as that would assist your decision making re the truth…
And anyone who believes the narrative that the IDF didn’t show up for 6 hrs after 29 breeches of the Gaza fence because they were all relaxing by the pool with their pants down with the understanding all was quiet on the Gaza border will believe absolutely anything and has been had hook line and sinker… Again
Provide the evidence for your assertion.
What “evidence” do you need… Anyone remotely capable of critical thinking skills can soon conclude..
29 breeches of the fence, hrs and hrs for the IDF to show up.. 1 year of planning, Warnings from Egypt, Mossad intelligence know absolutely everything, apart from what was going to happen on the 7th, yea right.. You must be either having a laugh or thick as..
Why don’t you provide evidence of the msm /Israel narrative that it was a “security failure”…. I bet you can’t dig up a shred of evidence supporting such….they are the very LAST outlet you’d believe… Well obviously not… People learnt nothing from the Covid scam and global lies.. Feking nothing
Suppose you still think Russia blew up Nord stream pipe line too..
And Santa’s coming down your chimney in 5 weeks time
That was obviously suspicious but Netanyahu being a globalist happy to sacrifice a few hundred citizens to create an excuse for conflict doesn’t mean anything else but that. We can only guess at the globalist agenda in which he was playing his part. It doesn’t mean that Hamas are suddenly OK or that ordinary Israelis are genocidal.
Point to my post(s) and tell me where I’ve stated that “Hamas are OK or that ordinary Israelis are genocidal”..
What is it with you lot… You’ll be calling me “antisemitic” next..
Furthermore, the ordinary Israeli knows damn well what happened on the 7th and that their globalist war mongering leader has sold them out..
And this didn’t start on the 7th of October, I’m sick of the constant rhetoric that aligns with this utter moronic nonsense… As I replied to the post.. Are people unaware of the historical context.. Obviously they are.
As for “suspicious”…. If thars the most accurate term you think applies here then you’re deluded too
Why is now the time to contact my MP when he maintains the position that?
Despite being contrary to the available evidence and looking uninformed at best, at least he’s consistent which is more than can be said of the governments top advisers.
My own MP is still in total denial!
If you stop acting like a chump then they will stop feeding you the chump food. They pay a lot of attention to metrics and the sad reality is that their agenda picks up upon this.But we should be very encouraged by the fact that taken in aggregate, consumption of mainstream news across the western world has dropped by about fifty percent in the last five years. In terms of young people I remember reading that the average under 25 person doesn’t even expend five minutes a day reading or viewing the BBC. We shouldn’t assume that our victory will be in ten years time. We have already made remarkable progress.If you understand the battle you won’t care how long it takes.
There’s even less point in writing to my MP than usual – and I’ve written to him often. He normally parrots the Party line and now he is to stand down at the next election, so I can’t even threaten to not vote for him.
This is an awful situation – represented by a seat- warmer; a uniform carrier with no more skin in the game. I ventured in my last letter to suggest that as he was already a Sir, and was unlikely to seek preferment, he therefore had nothing to lose by voting against the government just this once but to no avail.
(It was about Net Zero and he still banged on about the need for decarbonisation)
Nadine Dorries’ book reinforces the understanding we have on here that British democracy is a nice notion that died long ago
Ditto. His initials wouldn’t be AB would they?
It needs a major MSM newspaper, e.g. Times, Sunday Times, Telegraph, Mail, to splash this biased farce of a pantomime across the front page, repeatedly to apply sustained pressure. Only when it’s right in front of their noses will Hallett, Sunak, Valance, MPs, Guardian, BBC, Ch4, Sky, etc. begin to understand. They can only deny and whitewash for so long.