God help us, it’s finally happened. Later today, Matt Hancock – it would be him – is due to announce that face masks will be mandatory in all shops from July 24th, with the police empowered to issue £100 on-the-spot fines to anyone who doesn’t comply.
To coincide with this fresh hell, I’ve posted a round-up of all the evidence concerning face masks by an anonymous contributor on the right-hand side called “Masks: How Effective Are They? An Update“. Most of the evidence suggests the case for mandatory mask wearing outside healthcare settings is weak, particularly the non-surgical, re-usable cloth masks that the Government is insisting on. Here’s a typical paragraph from one of the articles linked to in the new round-up:
Sweeping mask recommendations – as many have proposed – will not reduce SARS-CoV-2 transmission, as evidenced by the widespread practice of wearing such masks in Hubei province, China, before and during its mass COVID-19 transmission experience earlier this year. Our review of relevant studies indicates that cloth masks will be ineffective at preventing SARS-CoV-2 transmission, whether worn as source control or as PPE.
There was a good Newsnight report by health correspondent Deborah Cohen last Friday, which included contributors making the case for and against mandatory face coverings. Making the case for were Oxford Professor Trish Greenhalgh and Royal Society President Sir Venki Ramakrishnan and making the case against were Nottingham Professor Robert Dingwall and Oxford Professor Carl Heneghan. Needless to say, the latter were far more convincing.
Heneghan pointed out that there was little evidence from randomised control trials showing masks were effective and it was odd for the Government to be mandating a public health measure that isn’t based on RCT evidence. He also said that if masks are used repeatedly, rather than disposed of daily, someone with a viral infection can re-infect themselves when they put the mask back on.
Robert Dingwall was even more scathing:
It doesn’t matter whether the evidence is effective or not. The demand is that governments do something and what we’re seeing here I think is the latching on to the idea that masks are something that a government could do which is cheap, which is symbolic, but which is probably not particularly effective.
But the most interesting thing in the report was the following scoop by Deborah Cohen:
The debate is deeply political. Newsnight understands that the World Health Organisation committee that reviewed the evidence for the use of face coverings in public didn’t back them. But after political lobbying, the WHO now recommends them.
After the report was broadcast, Trish Greenhalgh took to Twitter to criticise it. She complained that Newsnight hadn’t used all of her interview (has she never done a pre-record before?) and that interviewing scientists on both sides of the debate, as opposed to just her side, “sows confusion and could cost lives”. “We need responsible journalism or programmes could/will cost lives,” she tweeted.
This is essentially the same argument that Ofcom made when it issued its coronavirus guidance and which the Free Speech Union is seeking to challenge in the High Court. The evidence that a particular Government regulation will be do more good than harm is inconclusive, but nevertheless it’s wrong to allow people to criticise that regulation just in case it is as effective as the Government claims. If it is – even though we don’t know whether it is – then public criticism of it will mean people are less likely to comply and that, in turn, will cause harm. It’s a bad argument because it’s conditional upon taking it for granted that the Government is right and you can’t ask members of the free press to do that.
Deborah Cohen took to Twitter to defend herself and made a good job of it. “She tried to warn me off talking about the evidence saying people would die if I did that,” she said of Professor Greenhalgh. But she pointed out that the Danish Health Authorities do not currently recommend wearing face coverings in non-healthcare settings, pending the outcome of an an ongoing RCT with 6,000 participants. The bottom line is, you’ll only put people at risk by presenting the case against mandatory face masks if they do more good than harm and the evidence for that is threadbare, at best.
Deborah also doubled down on her scoop: “We had been told by various sources WHO committee reviewing the evidence had not backed masks but they recommended them due to political lobbying. This point was put to WHO who did not deny.”
Recommended them due to political lobbying.
One of the most depressing things about this Government’s diktat is that it will mean people are even less likely to go shopping than they were when non-essential shops were allowed to re-open on July 4th. It’s as if the Government is determined to destroy the high street. First, it insisted on the closure of non-essential shops; then it allowed them to re-open, but only on the proviso that they put ridiculous social distancing measures in place, such as limiting the number of people that can be inside at any one time and insisting that anyone entering use hand sanitiser; now they’ve decided to make the shopping experience even more unpleasant. It’s the final blow, surely? Who will bother to go to a shop when they can get everything delivered to their front door?
The question no one seems to be asking is: Why do we need to worry about interrupting transmission of the virus when almost no one has it any more? The number of new cases in the UK yesterday was 530. People remain infectious for a maximum of 10 days, so that’s 5,300 infectious people in the UK at the moment. If we assume that 60% of them are symptomatic and will stay at home, that’s 2,120 people who could be out shopping, or one person in every 31,604. That’s an infinitesimally small risk.
So what is the bloody point?
Stop Press: David Crowe, who wrote the first round-up of the evidence on mask wearing for Lockdown Sceptics, has died of cancer. RIP David.
Academy of Medical Science Issues Apocalyptic Warning
This cannot be a coincidence. On the day the Government announces face nappies will be compulsory, the Academy of Medical Science has warned that unless we start making “intense preparations” before next Winter, the NHS will be overwhelmed and up to 120,000 people will die from coronavirus. Sound familiar? The Guardian has the story.
Senior doctors and scientists convened by the Academy of Medical Sciences said on Tuesday that, without urgent action, a resurgence of cases this winter could overwhelm the NHS when services are already stretched because of flu and other seasonal pressures.
The experts were commissioned by Sir Patrick Vallance, the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser, to model a “reasonable worst case scenario” for COVID-19 this winter. Their report, which has been shared with ministers and local health authorities, calls for immediate efforts to prepare for a second wave.
Compiled by 37 experts, the report stresses the worst case scenario is not a prediction of what is likely to happen, but a description of how the outbreak may evolve if infections are allowed to surge and little is done to prepare the NHS and social care services.
“The modelling suggests that deaths could be higher with a new wave of COVID-19 this winter, but the risk of this happening could be reduced if we take action immediately,” said Stephen Holgate, Chair of the expert group and Professor of Immunopharmacology at the University of Southampton.
“With relatively low numbers of COVID-19 cases at the moment, this is a critical window of opportunity to help us prepare for the worst that winter can throw at us.”
Take action immediately! Critical window of opportunity! Achtung, achtung! Face masks on, comrades.
Hideous Mask Statue Unveiled in Latvia
This hideous monstrosity was unveiled in Riga, Latvia yesterday, presumably to remind people of the need to be constantly vigilant against the risk of a “second wave”.
Have a guess as to how many people in Latvia have died from COVID-19? 31. And I don’t mean yesterday. I mean in total.
Another Twitter Spat
Dr Adam Rutherford, a left-wing science journalist, launched a rather unpleasant attack on me on Twitter on Monday morning, which began: “It is so perpetually exhausting to have to correct these medically and scientifically illiterate pub bores that somehow have national voices gifted to them not by talent or knowledge, but by virtue of nothing other than their volume.” It was a reference to my Telegraph piece on Saturday in which I claimed the population of the UK would soon achieve herd immunity.
He continued:
Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge
Herd immunity does not work like this – as we teach in GCSE biology. Individual immunity, typically via vaccination, prevent the spread of a contagious disease through a population when a majority of that population are immunised and this cannot infect others when exposed to it.
We don’t know if this will work for COVID-19, as a) there is no vaccine b) symptomless infection occurs c) we don’t know if having had the disease confers immunity… d) or if it does, with any permanence e) vaccine-less herd immunity (with the previous crippling caveats) will require more people to get the disease, and therefore more people to die f) I believe exposure rates in the U.K. are currently around 5%, 17% in London. Herd immunity requires >80%.
Apologies if I’ve made any errors here, this is not really my area of expertise. Please do correct me below.
What @toadmeister has done here is to confidently and loudly mistake ignorance for knowledge, because the facts don’t fit his preconceived ideology. Dangerously so.
I suppose the broader point is that in science we are trained to and predisposed to perpetually identify where we are wrong. Look at your work and ask ‘how am I wrong about this?’
Without that you are an ideologue.
This is exhausting because of @Painpoint‘a 4th Law of Thermodynamics: ‘The amount of energy required to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude larger than required to create it.’
He then added an “addendum” from someone he described as “m’colleague on immunity” – Professor Francois Balloux, Director of the UCL Genetics Institute – although the word “colleague” is misleading, as are the repeated references to “we” scientists, because Rutherford is a journalist not a scientist. To be precise, he’s a journalist who thinks he’s a scientist. The “addendum” is a twitter thread posted by Professor Balloux on June 30th about the new evidence that’s come to light about Covid immunity, i.e. that being in possession of IgG antibodies is only part of the story. Balloux’s thread is good, although for Rutherford to link to it at the end of his jeremiad against me was odd because it contradicted several of his claims, such as the idea that you can measure “exposure rates” with seroprevalence data.
I wouldn’t normally respond to such sophomoric abuse, but Rutherford is the presenter of Inside Science, Radio 4’s flagship science programme, and many other people on Twitter also took issue with my Telegraph article, accusing me of peddling “dangerous” misinformation based on my poor understanding of COVID-19. Consequently, I did respond. If you’re on Twitter, you can see my response here. If not, I’ve posted it below:
I was preparing a rebuttal Adam, when I saw you’d posted a response from @BallouxFrancois at the end of your thread that rebuts nearly all of the points you’ve made. As he says, surveys that measure the prevalence of IgG antibodies (which you refer to) are an unreliable way of gauging the percentage of a population that has been exposed to SARS-CoV-2. Seroprevalence surveys are unlikely to detect IgG antibodies for asymptomatic or mild infections.
For instance, a Spanish seroprevalence survey found that 2.5% of asymptomatic patients tested positive for IgG antibodies in a point-of-care test and 2% in an immunoassay; for symptomatic patients, the figure was 16.9% for both tests. See Table 2 here. This and other similar findings are important because if many more people have been infected than seroprevalence surveys indicate that means the infection fatality rate is far lower than originally indicated.
The @WHO initially estimated it at 3.4%; @neilfergie and team estimated it at 0.9% and built that assumption into their modelling; the @CDCgov’s best estimate was 0.26%, and it will likely continue to fall (although the @CDCgov did raise its estimate on July 10th). As Dr John Lee, a former Professor of Pathology, wrote recently in the @spectator: “It could yet settle closer to 0.1 per cent – similar to seasonal flu – once we get a better understanding of milder, undetected cases and how many deaths it actually caused (rather than deaths where the virus was present).”
To properly assess the extent of immunity in any given population, and the continuing threat posed by the virus, we need to take into account T cell immunity mediated by exposure to other coronaviruses, as @BallouxFrancois says.
According to a paper in Cell, ~70% of recovering COVID-19 patients studied had CD8+ T cells and 100% had CD4+ T cells. In addition, the researchers detected SARS-CoV-2-reactive CD4+ T cells in ∼40% – 60% of unexposed individuals, suggesting cross-reactive T cell recognition between circulating “common cold” coronaviruses and SARS-CoV-2. See here.
A preprint last month from a team at Oxford came to a similar conclusion.
Of course, we don’t yet know how much protection T cells provide, but the fact that the number of infections and deaths is falling in all European countries that have eased lockdown restrictions, as well as in those European countries that avoided lockdowns altogether, in spite of most seroprevalence surveys showing that <10% of the populations in those countries have IgG antibodies, suggests something is functioning as a prophylactic against the disease – referred to as immunological “dark matter” by Professor Karl Friston at @ucl.T cell mediated immunity could be that immunological dark matter. It would explain why young people are less susceptible to the virus – the reservoir of programmable T cells declines with age. In a recent article in the @ConversationUK, a Professor of Genetic Epidemiology and a Professor of Epidemiology speculate that T cell mediated immunity could mean a “population can achieve some sort of immunity to the virus with as little as 20% infected – a proportion well below the widely accepted herd immunity threshold (60-70%).”
If that’s the case, the UK could have achieved herd immunity already – remember, seroprevalence surveys only measure the percentage of the pop that has developed IgG antibodies, not the percentage that’s been exposed to infection.Another recent study, this one from the University of Nottingham, estimated the disease-induced herd immunity level is around 43%.
You made the point in your thread that we don’t know if having had the disease confers immunity. True, but the fact that there hasn’t been a single, uncontested case of reinfection is a reason to be optimistic. IgG immunity may fade, but even undetectable levels of IgG antibodies would mean a person who did become reinfected would likely get a milder version of the disease than they had the first time, as @BallouxFrancois says. He also points out that T cell mediated immunity is “extremely long-lived”.So suggesting that the UK will soon achieve herd immunity, as I did in the @Telegraph, does not make me “scientifically illiterate” or “ignorant” or a “pub bore” or “dangerous”, as you claim. You write as if there is a single scientific consensus on SARS-CoV-2 – “the science” – and anyone who dissents from it is an ideologically-driven purveyor of fake news. In fact, there’s very little about the virus, particularly its prevalence and lethality, that is uncontested. Rather, there’s a wide range of views, each with eminent scientists to back them up, along with plenty of research and data.
You often present yourself as an exemplar of best practice when it comes to scientific debate and inquiry, but then, in the next breath, engage in furious, ad hominem attacks on those who disagree with you. It’s as though your self-important, attention-loving self gets the better of your dispassionate, scientific self. For a journalist claiming to be an advocate for the better public understanding of science, this sophomoric name-calling is counter-productive. Perhaps take a break from Twitter? //ENDS
Nicola Sturgeon: “Write Nothing Down.”
A reader in Scotland sent three emails to his local MSP, hoping he might throw some light on the dictatorial approach of Nic Sturge-un. Eventually, he got a reply and it contained this jaw-dropping revelation:
It is clear that the Scottish Government have not been transparent with the public as they have implemented new measures as we ease lockdown. The Scottish Government must release the scientific evidence that has been used for the key decision making in Scotland throughout this health crisis and as further measures as relaxed.
Following an FOI request, it was revealed that the First Minister did not have any written scientific advice during the first few months of the coronavirus outbreak, and so none could be made available to the public. Nicola Sturgeon said instead that the scientific advice that she had received had all been orally, by the National Clinical Director, Jason Leitch, and the Scottish Chief Medical Officer at the time, Catherine Calderwood, and so there was nothing to be released.
No written scientific advice! That’s incredible. But presumably it will make it easier for the First Minister to dodge the blame when there’s a public inquiry in Scotland about the fact that more people have died from COVID-19 in care homes than in hospitals.
A Death in the Family
A reader writes with some sad news:
I didn’t want to post this on the page, because it feels ghoulish and like an exploitation of the dead, but at the same time, I want people to know that this is happening.
We had a death in the family yesterday morning. My husband’s grandfather. He was 92 but of completely sound mind and health. Never got sick. He has been deeply emotionally affected by Project Fear since the start of the hysteria and lockdown, and despite restrictions being lifted – because of his age group – they remained social isolating. He was not even seeing their daughter (my mother-in-law), because she devised a system of getting them groceries without communicating in person at all by leaving it in a car in the car park! Four months locked away.
We weren’t told this on the phone when we got the news of his death, but we just learned… it was suicide. He was muttering all week that he had “had enough” and he couldn’t take it anymore.
So there we have it… I don’t know a single person who has been sick with Coronavirus. I know one person (who was pregnant) who tested positive but was asymptomatic (and then separated from her newborn baby for two weeks). And we’ve had a suicide from lockdown (and social isolation) in the immediate family.
I’m mad as hell. This can’t go on. How many have we already lost with this cruel torture?
Round-Up
And on to the round-up of all the stories I’ve noticed, or which have been been brought to my attention, in the last 24 hours:
- ‘Deaths of children with special needs in Kent raise concerns over school closures‘ – Horrific story in the Guardian. Five special needs children in Kent have committed suicide while their schools remain closed
- ‘German study finds no evidence coronavirus spreads in schools‘ – Yet more evidence that closing schools was completely pointless
- ‘The BBC’s pandering to wokedom will cost it dear‘ – Times columnist Clare Foges is worried about the Beeb. I give it less than 10 years
- ‘Man Wearing N95 Mask Passes Out While Driving Car, Crashing into Pole‘ – Turns out, wearing a surgical mask behind a wheel can make you pass out
- ‘COVID — The Lies We Don’t Question‘ – Good round-up of Covid BS from Lockdown Sceptics contributor Omar S. Khan
- ‘LA teachers union says schools can’t reopen unless charter schools get shut down, police defunded‘ – Crikey Moses. Make our lot look reasonable
- ‘When will the madness end?‘ – Excellent piece by Jeffrey Tucker, Editorial Director for the American Institute for Economic Research. Fantastic opening anecdote
- ‘If it’s Not “Cancel Culture,” What Kind of Culture is it?‘ – Conservative American journalist Matt Taibbi calls the Woke uprising the “all-stick, no-carrot revolution”
- ‘Germany The COVID-19 Extra Parliamentary Inquiry‘ – Opening salvo from the group of German scientists carrying out the unofficial public inquiry. Not a bad idea…
Small Businesses That Have Re-Opened
A few weeks ago, Lockdown Sceptics launched a searchable directory of open businesses across the UK. The idea is to celebrate those retail and hospitality businesses that have re-opened, as well as help people find out what has opened in their area. But we need your help to build it, so we’ve created a form you can fill out to tell us about those businesses that have opened near you. Now that non-essential shops have re-opened – or most of them, anyway – we’re now focusing on pubs, bars, clubs and restaurants, as well as other social venues. As of July 4th, many of them have re-opened too, but not all. Please visit the page and let us know about those brave folk who are doing their bit to get our country back on its feet – particularly if they’re not insisting on face masks! Don’t worry if your entries don’t show up immediately – we need to approve them once you’ve entered the data.
Note to the Good Folks Below the Line
I enjoy reading all your comments and I’m glad I’ve created a “safe space” for lockdown sceptics to share their frustrations and keep each other’s spirits up. But please don’t copy and paste whole articles from papers that are behind paywalls in the comments. I work for some of those papers and if they don’t charge for premium content they won’t survive.
I know it becomes difficult to navigate the comment threads after 24 hours. One alternative to continuing to post below my updates is to move to the forum on Lockdown Truth. The creator of that site has extended a warm welcome to everyone here.
Shameless Begging Bit
Thanks as always to those of you who made a donation in the last 48 hours to pay for the upkeep of this site. It usually takes me several hours to do these updates, which doesn’t leave much time for other work. If you feel like donating, however small the amount, please click here. And if you want to flag up any stories or links I should include in future updates, email me here. I’ll try and get another update done soon.
And Finally…
Discussion
Comments
This week across the site:
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Excellent information! Did you know that there are two types of different INFLUENZA VACCINES?? Those for medical staff and people under 60, and a special one for people over 60 and more, that besides all the other adyuvants, it has ESQUALANE snd FORMALDEHID or someting of the like, 2 elements not good for health. You can investigate this, please! You will get the answer on why so many elderly people died! It was planned to do so as an OBJECTIVE of the IMF. because elerly people are a big ECONOMIC BURDEN FOR SOCIETY. Another reason to KEEP THEM ISOLATED, so they get really ILL and EXTREMELY DEPRESSED.
Have any of you actually done a Bayesian analysis of this as Michael Gove has suggested in his recent Ditchley Lecture?
Hi, I’m a bit out of the loop as I’m on holiday for five days in barnard castle of all places! Anyway, I’ve been trying to detox my phone and internet use but I’m just on here for someone to briefly fill me in on what on earth is going on? Where has the figure of 120000 deaths in a harder second wave coming from and is anyone vigorously opposing face mask? It’s got to the point now where we must more openly challenge this nonsense. I will not wear a face mask, not because I’m some kind of crazy libertarian but because they are totally unnecessary and are nothing but a sign of subjecting. Thanks for the catch up anyway.
From what i recall, it’s another group of “scientists” coming up with another random generator prediction model to frighten people into submission. By the time it’s proven to be false, the economy will have been destroyed, but people will be too scared to do anything except do what the government says.
The prediction is that the second wave will be far worse than the first one. I have no idea what they’ve based this on, and I suspect, neither do they.
I have but just now been listening to Mr. Hancock on Radio 4. I’m jolly glad to hear him speak of “face coverings” rather than a masks. Because yesterday I invested in a face vizor which looks ridiculous on me as it necessitates wearing a pair of lensless plastic specs to hold it in place. Ten euros!
I imagine many a Mr. Plod and many a Mr. and Mrs. Busybody will think it not good enough but will they deign to challenge me? Evenso, I still feel to don it is an act of surrender. Only fearlessness will defeat the bind we’re in.
Toby Young,
In the “Roundup” section of this post, you refer to Matt Taibbi as a “Conservative American journalist.” Please don’t be misled. Taibbi may have become lately a profound critic of the Left, but he is no conservative. Not now, not ever as far as I know.
Another row with a lockdown zealot this evening. You can give them all the information, counter arguments and facts in the world, but they cannot be convinced. We are fighting a losing battle trying to make people see sense. They just come back with “it’s to keep people safe”, or “tell this to families of the x thousand people who have died”, blah blah blah, and similar emotive and falacious arguments. So,… I decided to plot the UK death rate from the last 70 years. The per-capita death rate for 2020 including those attributed to CoVID, rightly or wrongly (WRONGLY!), is about the same as the background death rate from 15/20 years ago. Going to show them the graph tomorrow and simply say, why weren’t you permanently wetting yourself back then like you are now?
It’s an emotional response from them. They haven’t been reasoned into it, so they can’t be reasoned out of it. You have to come up with something that appeals to their emotion rather than their reasoning, maybe something more visual rather than just facts and figures, e.g. the woman featured in the BBC documentary recently, who died of cancer because the NHS had switched all its attention to CV19. What about her children, or the thousands of others who will be in a similar situation….
Just found this on my Twitter feed. There were 5255 COVID-19 deaths recorded yesterday according to Worldometer.
Now imagine the attached image is a menu of death. The Grim Reaper tells you that you have to lockdown, give up your job, lose your business, wear a mask, basically all things associated with mitigating the spread of Coronavirus. Just to have COVID-19 taken off the menu so that no patrons have to eat the dish. It’s a bit off and simply not recommended he tells you.
After which the full menu will be available to every diner presenting at the restaurant. What you didn’t realise is that all the other dishes are equally disgusting if not more so, but you can live happy knowing that you stopped people having to try the one dish that wasn’t recommended.
Lol great analogy.
Let’s cancel death by respiratory virus!
Actually I suppose it’s like taking Covid off the menu, but forcing everyone to eat all the other dishes en masse then being surprised when they die – not of a respiratory virus!
Boris Johnson needs to resign – I wish there was a march or demonstration for us to protest against him robbing us of our civil liberties – The masks are the final straw – I will certainly resign as a member of the Conservative party. This is now a police state.
Here’s a thought. Apologies if this has been covered before and I’ve just missed it. Apologies also if I’m missing something fundamental – feel free to beat me over the head with my own stupidity as I’m not a virologist and neither would I call myself a scientist.
I read an article the other day linked from this website that seemed to indicate that a large proportion of people in a non-covid exposed population demonstrated a degree of T cell immunity to Covid-19 (‘cross reactivity’). One needs to be careful in reading too much into this, and this research is very much a work in progress, but it at least raises the possibility of cross-immunity from other types of coronavirus.
A look on Wikipedia (as I said, I’m not really a scientist) indicates that there are 7 human coronaviruses. Two are not circulating in the UK (MERS and SARS), one is Covid-19 and the other four cause common colds. According to an article describing work on Coronaviruses at the Uni of Glasgow, these other coronaviruses are common. The article did leave the door open to the idea that one type of coronavirus (e.g. a benign one) could protect against another… Read more »
I posted something the other day about this. I can’t remember exactly what I wrote but it was along the lines of:
Suggestions of cross immunity from previous exposure to other coronavirus.
We pursue a zero exposure strategy, thus making us more susceptible to future coronavirus.
The measures taken in future need to be stronger to counter the effects of susceptibility.
Rinse, repeat…
It’s basically a downward spiral of worse outcomes unless we take stronger action each time. Eventually there will be no remedial action that we can take that gives us a better outcome than taking no action.
I think I know what you’re suggesting and I think you’re right.
I also AM suggesting that we do nothing.
(Except shield the elderly and encourage vulnerable demographics to look after themselves)
Sunetra Gupta was talking about this in an interview. She thinks that international travel is a good thing, in that it keeps everyone’s immune system ‘topped up’ with the latest virus variants. In the past, devastating epidemics would occur where populations had effectively been in isolation due to the lack of travel in those days.
“If we have massive reduction in exposures to many benign circulating viruses, is this a good or a bad thing?”
Many immunologists would say that its a bad thing. You don’t get a healthy immune system by not being exposed to antigens in the environment. The best example I can think of is what happened to the native Americans who first came into contact with the Spanish conquistadors. 90% of them died, because they had no immunity to the viruses the Spanish carried with them.
Awesome article by Allison Pearson in the Torygraph:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/compulsory-face-masks-proof-british-bulldog-has-become-scaredy/
Sorry, probably a paywall and it’s late so no juicy quotes from me now I’m afraid.
Brilliant article by Allison Pearson in the Torygraph this evening.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/compulsory-face-masks-proof-british-bulldog-has-become-scaredy/
Sorry if there’s a paywall but it’s late so no juicy quotes for me this time.
Night night all.
Disappointing article by Patrick O’Flynn in the Spectator, who basically says that the idea that masks don’t do anything was never plausible, and he doesn’t seem to care about the libertarian aspect at all.
And even Brendan O’Neill in Spiked seems a little half-hearted, as though being anti-mask is a little too close to being a right wing conspiracy theorist for comfort, and therefore his objection to mandatory mask wearing is more intellectual than heartfelt.
Oh Brendan. Why, why, why.
In the midst of a cancel culture pandemic it is imperative for the vulnerable to shield themselves from the contagion.
I have been suprised about Patrick O’Flynn and Rod Liddle.
However I thought Brendon was good on the free speech angle. He said that this is something we should be allowed to discuss and not submit to. He says:
“We have to talk about this. We cannot let mask-wearing become the ‘new normal’. Masks are horrible. They’re stuffy and claustrophobic. They make it hard to read people’s faces. They alienate us from each other even more, hiding smiles and discouraging chit-chat. And they actually worsen the culture of fear by spreading the idea that our fellow citizens are walking diseases who must be muzzled and kept at a safe distance. Only people comfortable with the contemporary social atomisation that has been intensified by the lockdown would embrace mandatory mask-wearing with no questions whatsoever. “
Oh ok. Not a bad as I thought. Still hot, Brendan. #lockdownthirst
😀 indeed!
If he was one of the panelists on The Moral Maze I might go back to listening to it again. Although I like Andrew Doyle, I am so bored of the others on that programme.
Sad. I have respect for them both. For me this couldn’t be a clearer fight over personal liberty. The government is making us wear something that makes us feel bad and if we don’t comply we won’t be able to buy food. And the government’s claims are based on extremely dodgy science.
Sign and spread the word. Repeal Corona Act
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/313310
Vernon Coleman today.
The screw is tightening
https://youtu.be/8vTM1NU6NZU
As good and relevant as he ever was.
Time for me to issue my regular appeal to Toby to set up a Free Citizens Party that will:
– Oppose lockdown ideology and end the mask madness,
– Enshrine free speech rights.
– Create effective recall and referendum rights to stop elites hijacking the democratic process.
– Defend, promote and celebrate our culture.
– Work for the prosperity of all citizens rejecting all oligarch interests.
I listen to “London Calling” with T.Young and J.Delingpole. A few weeks back they mentioned that there were rumours going round about a new party and that there was a desire for one, but there was no obvious candidate to front it. I am hopeful though..
Cometh the hour, cometh the man or woman or non-binary…I don’t care as long as they can get us out of this mess.
Indeed they did. Shortly after Simon Dolan was on The Delingpod. Pure coincidence. Innit?
They’re having a “second wave” in Israel, apparently. And they’ll be fighting the virus all of next year (from The Telegraph):
Israel coronavirus outbreak likely to continue until the end of 2021, says minister
The coronavirus outbreak is likely to continue up until the end of next year, Israeli defence minister Benny Gantz said on Tuesday, adding that Israel could need to operate designated quarantine hotels until that time.
“The working assumption has to be that operations will continue until the end of 2021, that is, the entire year next year will also be all about the crisis,” Gantz said at an online meeting.
There are more than 41,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in Israel, and energy minister Yuval Steinitz – who is a political ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – yesterday called for an immediate lockdown of up to two weeks after a renewed outbreak followed the easing of restrictions.
So what might be causing this “renewed outbreak”? Well have a look at the Wikipedia article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Israel
In particular, look at the graphs at the bottom of the article; start with New cases per day (scroll right and left). It really does like like a “second wave”. Then… Read more »
But we’re going to have a completely safe vaccine by Christmas, aren’t we?
They’ve had 371 deaths and 183 in critical care in a population of 9M people and they’re panicking.
Israel has had 40K confirmed cases, but going by the CDCs 0.26% death rate the deaths show they’ve had more like 146K cases.So between 0.4% and 1.6% of Israelis have caught it, any second spike will be because they have tried too much to suppress the virus rather than letting it spread more naturally. See also New Zealand, where they had to panic when the virus got reintroduced because two Brits turned up. And Australia which by restricting liberties hard, early on, kept the virus rare and have ensured any flare ups have the potential of seedinh whole new epidemics (hence the authorities’s brutal repression of Melbourne skyscraper residents). Second waves ONLY happen if you try to utterly eliminate the virus, can the lockdown zealots not see that the more they cower the longer they must fear second waves for. They see Israel, Australia, New Zealand and the Phillipines as shining examples, I see countries trapped in terror at how one little cough can undo all their (pointless) hard (oppressive) work.
There’s no good reason for masks in shops or elsewhere. While common sense says it will block the virus science says the evidence is weak if at all. Why is this because science is all about truth and not about what seems right. Quite often the answer science gives is counterintuitive to what one would expect for example there’s articles saying smoking protects against covid-19. It may well do but until experiments are done no one really knows, and this is what should happen before forcing any one to wear masks.
Common sense does NOT say it will block the virus!
In their own words:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19/offices-and-contact-centres#offices-6-1
Don’t try to make sense of anything anymore. It is pointless. You’ll just get frustrated and angry like me.
Anyway, here’s an extract:
It is important to know that the evidence of the benefit of using a face covering to protect others is weak and the effect is likely to be small, therefore face coverings are not a replacement for the other ways of managing risk, including minimising time spent in contact, using fixed teams and partnering for close-up work, and increasing hand and surface washing.
It’s all a lot of Whitehall nonsense. Self important civil service bedwetters.
I understand that JP. I was just highlighting the fact that the proposed policy of mandating the use of face masks in public places is at odds with the statement “the evidence of the benefit of using a face covering to protect others is weak” taken from their health and safety guidelines that were updated just 4 days ago.
One could take from this that ‘evidence’ is no longer a factor when proposing new policies/guidelines.
Indeed. I was just expressing frustration Howie, not attempting to “correct” you in any way 🙂
Sorry. Me too. (shameful face)
Criminalizing people for nothing but a glorified Pascal’s wager
AAARGH!!!! Just noticed this:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/07/14/face-coverings-public-places-consideration/
Face coverings in all public places under considerationThe proposal which could see masks encouraged in offices is being considered amid fears over a second wave
Lots of encouraging comments.
This is a good one: ‘If I have to wear a mask whilst in the office, the environment must therefore, be considered unsafe.
These are valid grounds on which not to attend your work environment, legally, and without recourse.’
Nice.
They are trying to have it both ways. The places we want you to go to are safe. But they’re only safe if nobody is allowed to breathe.
Talking of TV – has anyone else seen HMgov’s commercial – I thought I was dreaming, I was close to nodding off actually. The tag line was: UK’s New Start – Let’s Get Going. It was a series of people in various work situations all smiling i.e. no muzzles. What the f**k?
Words fail me.
Just noticed, double three-part slogan there! It’s like primary school all over again. The govt think the population have a collective age of 7. Why can’t they talk to us like we’re competent adults?
Is it me or are there two HM governments right now? The fascist communist authoritarians who love the lockdown and want to keep ramping up the fear even as the virus wipes itself out (thanks herd immunity, funny how we could have got it without the traitorous lockdown though), and the few who realise that have a functioning economy is the bedrock for keeping life livable (even if they are too brainless to realise the importance of liberty too) and come up with “eat out to help out” but don’t have the balls to really get the economicnecessities in the spotlight? If any MPs among the few are thinking of a coup then they’d have the backing of many sceptics, have coward Boris shoved on those back benches where he can use his muzzle to stop himself spluttering authoritarian drivel.
😂After 4 months.. we should be wearing masks. Spot on timing! Rapid decision making!
“Junior government minister of obsequious ….” 😀
https://twitter.com/prospect_clark/status/1283131737116213252?s=20
That looks interesting!
There’s growing evidence in favour of the public wearing face masks according to the media. Well is there? Here is some such supposedly compelling “evidence” sent to me on Facebook: https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2020-07-08-oxford-covid-19-study-face-masks-and-coverings-work-act-now# This is just a lame attempt to link supposedly favourable outcomes across the world to public facemask wearing policies, while ignoring such outcomes as Sweden and Wuhan. So, no actual evidence at all. The most shocking bit about this otherwise lame and easily refutable piece comes in the middle, where it effectively states that public policy has been hampered by over reliance on actual science! There has been an ‘over-reliance on an evidence-based approach and assertion that evidence was weak due to few conclusive RCT (randomized control trial) results in community settings, discounting high quality non-RCT evidence’. The post attests. In other words science is not producing the answers we require, we will make them up anyway!
This made me laugh:
https://twitter.com/CovidSkip/status/1282800162151292929
Maybe I should start wearing a saucepan over my head. After all, one is more likely to die when hit hard by a falling object.
Priceless! Still laughing. Thanks.
Like many I will avoid the shops as much as I can. I have also learned that I can, legitimately as it turns out, claim a medical exemption to the muzzle but I do still intend to wear my niqab (up yours Boris) purely to sh1t up the sheeple. if we must wear some infernal face covering can I suggest we all make them as ludicrous or annoying to the zealots as possible. Not only do we need a laugh but it is well known that the one thing totalitarians really hate is being ridiculed.
A friend of mine is thinking of a plague doctor’s mask plus cloak.
There was a man in Norfolk going round in a plague mask. The local police were desperate to arrest him as they claimed he was frightening the locals.
I was thinking that another idea would be the full Venetian carnival rig complete with this:
https://www.camacana.com/en-UK/bauta-mask.php
http://themascherade.com/contents/en-us/d5_Page_5.html
Well all it says is a face covering, no one said it doesn’t have to just cover the nose and mouth.
I like the idea, might be the way forward a totally ridiculous mask.
If enough people either refuse or take the piss then hopefully people will realise how stupid this all is.
Actually yes, let’s take the piss. I have a couple of Halloween masks which would be great to wear for jollies.
Take the piss anyway if it helps you cope with it, irrespective of what others think.
Ironically the virus can enter through the eyes, they don’t tell you that one.Wonder why? So you can bet the idea is not to protect people.
Shhhhhh ! Or goggles will be mandatory next month. 🙂
By that reasoning Boris, Wancock and the Fergoid should all have been arrested several times over by now.
That is a personal favourite of mine. I was going to use it in our village scarecrow completion but that has now been postponed until next year in case people walking round the village in the open air looking at scarecrows spread “the virus”.
Cue rolleye emoji!
Me too. My plague mask as winging its way to me in the mail as we speak.
I was thinking snorkel or even a full frogman suit from the 1930’s.
The 1930s frogman suit could be annoying if they tell you the item you want is in aisle 37 but it’s actually in aisle 4. 😂
This is on the way. Combined with my MAGA hat, should upset a Karen or two.
ITV News: Hundreds of coaches form convoy in Blackpool to highlight effect of Covid-19 | ITV News.
https://www.itv.com/news/granada/2020-07-14/hundreds-of-coaches-form-convoy-in-blackpool-to-highlight-effect-of-covid-19-on-the-industry
“Coach companies have said that they are currently operating at just 2% of their capacity..”
Goodness!
No school trips!
COVID has had no effect whatsoever on the coach industry. It’s the government’s response that’s caused the problems.
Latest headline on the Telegraph website. It’s behind a paywall but I will post in full if anyone wants to read it (and weep).
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/07/14/face-coverings-public-places-consideration/
Face coverings in all public places under consideration
The proposal which could see masks encouraged in offices is being considered amid fears over a second wave
Fears of a second wave that they are creating…
Yes seems to be a general MSM script today. If – as claimed by the Lockdown Lunatics – that no one has immunity, then mask wearing is not going to stop a second wave!
The article makes little sense. Offices are not public places. Or do they mean outside?!?
If this is anything to go by, they clearly haven’t a clue.
Mr Eustice said: “When it comes to workplace environments, because people are in the same company throughout the day, there are not lots of people coming through the venue as you have in a retail environment; the risk of transmission is therefore lower.”
Just seen it suggested on News at ten.also talk of a second lockdown in Blackburn.These bastards will never let it go.As must as I admire and appreciate Toby Young for his work on this blog it must be obvious to anyone that there is something very unpleasant behind the government actions and it can not be just incompetence and arse covering.
As has been asked earlier on today’s thread, why is this march to a dystopian future obvious to us but is oblivious to the masses?
In my view, the ever changing narrative is too much for most people to grasp. In many people’s heads, today is normal. They are unable to compare life today to what it was like pre-lockdown because the goalposts have moved. A lame excuse but one that fits the world of the plugged in, always on, consumer society where ‘here and now’ is all that matters to them.
In Orwell’s 1984 (required reading for all lockdown sceptics of course) people literally have no access to the past owing to the all pervasive propaganda. We seem to have reached that point. The BBC are very good at distorting the past e.g. conflating the Winter of Discontent with Thatcherism, and then making it sound like the EU rescued us while in fact we entered a deep recession immediately after joining the EU (or EEC as then was)!
Maybe that’s it. Many probably have no concept of what propaganda is. Unless you have read about it, one may never understand why you wouldn’t trust what you see, hear and (to a lesser extent thesedays) read.
Fear + unrelenting Propaganda.i was fortunate in studying Russian history at college and dystopian novels in English so have a basis on which to reject the narrative being forced on us.The general public has not the grounding or historic knowledge to resist.also they are all being bought off at the moment,full bellies rarely rebel.
I’ve found this response everywhere from ordinary people right up to the cleverest. I recently viewed a video blog of various scientists, all the scientists bar one seemed to view corvid-19 as some sort of interesting subject.The scientist who saw covid-19 as more than an interesting subject complained that other scientists told him to shut up. They didn’t even want to discuss his numbers the intelligent thing to do as they frightened. And this is the problem we’ve all become like sheep instead of asking questions we now except what the media and government tells us.
No, it’s just incompetence and arse covering. But you are entitled to your opinion.
It’s the need to be seen to be doing something. Anything! Even if it contradicts what you were saying the week before.
Any politician these days knows the media is there, ready and waiting to tear apart the slightest sign of weakness or inaction, because you’ve got to keep generating those clicks after all. Just…waiting, to gain firm information on which to base policy decisions, is no longer an option.
I refuse to believe that our leaders are that stupid.from the start I have been torn between cock up and conspiracy.Leicester was the final straw for me.Ramping up the testing then locking up the city on the strength of it.how can you explain that.
Also i was told by someone who worked in the home office that they were planning for a 12 week lockdown 2 weeks before March 23.make of that what you will.
As we keep on saying night after night after night after ruddy predictable night more testing will bring more cases (which aren’t actually ‘cases’ but test positives.)
Just read something about Blackburn which said they would significantly increase testing in the area, which they expect will lead to another local lockdown because of the “rise in cases”.
We are in the world of Johnson’s ‘whack a mole’ world where they crack down on local ‘outbreaks’.
My borough of Blackburn and Darwen could be next on his ‘hit list’. My OH won’t be bothered mind, she’s been practicing social distancing for years.
Cheezilla posted this earlier: ‘Conservative, James Davies, also broke ranks …. by asking if masks should now be introduced in bars and restaurants. “No,” said Matt [Wankock] firmly, thereby ensuring he will be back in the Commons within a matter of days to make masks in bars and restaurants compulsory.’
John Crace, Grad.
Anything that they say definitely won’t happen, definitely will happen! “Expert Opinion” or “The Science” can change whenever they want it to.
And the law can be changed by SI now – likely to happen *after* Parliament goes on its summer recess too, so as to avoid any scrutiny or debate..
Well most of the scrutiny and debate is because the government isn’t being authoritarian enough. Asymptomatic non-mask wearers need to visit the local incinerator head first. Otherwise they could kill just one person.
Just purchased a face mask exemption lanyard on disability horizons.com. No doubt others have already checked out this and similar sites. The list of exemptions is long and varied and essentially covers any type of distress or anxiety which pretty much covers the emotional state of many on this site today.
Good for Gove though, still not wearing a mask to the shops (photo in article).
Well it isn’t mandatory for 10 days.
Liz Truss virtue signalling is a different kettle of fishiness.
The media just doing what they do, trying to reassert their hold over government, with apparently some success. They could never force people to wear them outside.
I believe in Spain they have now made masks mandatory even outside.
Link please …
And, by the way. That cannot be enforced in depopulated areas, such as the countryside.
The police have complained that they are unable to enforce this in shops.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-health-coronavirus-spain-masks/spains-catalonia-makes-masks-compulsory-in-public-at-all-times-idUKKBN24919K
Thanks. That is scary. They will have trouble with enforcement though in some circumstances. Sadly, no doubt many people will obey without question.
I have been dreading this. I could fucking cry. There is only one way I can see out of this — this is not a world I want to live.
Know exactly how you feel Adam, it’s an alien world and I don’t want to live in it. I don’t know how to stop it all either.
None of us want to live in this mad world Adam but don’t give up. Be strong. We’ve been here before as a nation…in the 1600s Puritans banned Christmas and Hot Cross Buns, and basically anything that appeared to be “merry making”. Our culture survived the ideological assault, and we revived. I am sure you have the support of everyone here. Don’t be downhearted.
Rise up. This is your time.
I feel the same Adam. Most mornings I wake up and wish I hadn’t.
If this happens I’m definitely getting arrested lol
It would be a very effective way for sceptics to find each other.
Lol. The Covid-1984 dating service
There are some very encouraging comments!
Maybe Gove has pocketed his y-fronts as an emergency mask. I thought his photo’s juxtaposition with Liz TRUSS was rather unfortunate.
I make no claim to originality, but the following has recently become clarified in my mind.
Theory 1. The UK government is inexperienced, inconsistent and incompetent. Their policies on Covid-19 have been shaped by a mish-mash of scientific, medical, economic & behavioural advice of variable quality, plus dubious opinion polling, with no overall strategy. Johnson’s judgment has been impaired by his spell of illness and/or his partner Symonds. The similarities in policies across different countries can be attributed to international groupthink.
Theory 2. A globalist elite led by (choose one or more) the Chinese Communist Party, Gates, Soros, Bezos et al. is directing the policies being implemented by national governments. Another strand is extreme environmentalism and its Greta puppet. The aim is first to control the people, then impoverish them and reduce their numbers. Hence physical retail and the cash economy are being destroyed, allowing personal expenditure to be monitored and controlled. The masses will no longer be able to consume or travel around, while of course the elite will continue to do so as they consolidate their power.
I still lean towards Theory 1, but I no longer dismiss the adherents of Theory 2 as cranks. It… Read more »
Your theory 2 is closer to the truth: https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/uncategorized/they-are-deliberately-trying-to-bankrupt-businesses-to-recreate-a-marxist-world/
Unfortunately it seems 2 is more likely..
See event 201, Davos, Lockstep, agenda 21 and 30..
Re Theory 2, it doesn’t have to be a conspiracist theory. There is a commonality of interest. We’ve seen unlikely alliances before now: Hitler and Stalin, Stalin and Churchill, Nixon and Mao…In the 1920s and 1930s there was a lot of support from business, the media and mainstream politicians for Fascism.
Did anyone see the political propaganda slot on ITV tonight? I don’t mean the news! – I’m referring to a direct statement from ITV to viewers regarding racism in the UK. A very worrying 1984-style development, directly instructing people what to think.
When was that? Between programmes? or part of the ‘news’?
Between programmes. I think it was about 9pm. Just after the ads. Wasn’t paying much attention. Thought it was one of those Godawful Nationwide ads. But then realised this was ITV directly telling us what think. Voice over with text appearing as yellow on black.
Time to complain!
To Ofcom? You have a rich sense of irony!
No, to ITV…
It was on at least twice.between programmes almost like a party political broadcast for black lives matter.frightening
It wasn’t some content free Yorkshire Tea style message of support for BLM, it was making a whole series of tendentious claims and telling us what we MUST believe.
Outrageous..
Is it BLM that are paying for it? We have a right to know..
Somebody has paid a fortune for that! Does BLM have such resources? Scary!
I don’t think it was an advert. It was credited as a statement from ITV.
Watch the first bit and this is what we have ahead of us. 3mins 20 onwards in particular
https://dollarvigilante.com/blog/2020/07/12/divide-conquer-how-racism-is-being-used-to-distract-from-the-great-reset-and-collapse/
OKUK that’s a very good point, commonality of interest. I still am doubtful that the CCP would want to destroy western economies as their own prosperity depends on exporting their stuff. Also the Huawei thing suggests that Johnson isn’t Beijing’s puppet.
No he has always been Washington’s puppet
The Chinese, quite reasonably one might even say after those two Opium Wars want to turn tables and show they dominate the world economy.
I think Theory 2 is on the table when you have the conditions of Theory 1 in place, as we certainly have. The adherence/promotion of ‘the science’, aka the ICL modelling that is supported and being pushed some of those you mention, would not have persuaded a competent, confident and experienced government.
I think theory 1 is exactly what’s happened. A mix of incompetence, bowing to pressure from the left, groupthink, and basically Boris doing whatever it takes to be liked by people. He is spineless and gutless.
I think it’s more complicated than that. His decision to back Brexit resulted in him being a target of personal abuse and he had Far Left fanatics outside his house confronting his children. Yes he wanted to be PM but that’s hardly unknown among politicians.
The longer this lunacy goes on, the more ridiculous and illogical the edicts, the more I start to look again at theories I would have dismissed a few months ago. Pretty soon, I’ll be believing that Boris and the rest of the government are all lizard people.
Lol!
Theory 1, plus a cynical desire (Cummings-led) to be re-elected at any price, would seem to explain the actions taken thus far.
Feed the fear, take action by fiat (unregulated by Parliament) to minimise the (already negligible) risk, then take credit for protecting the public from the “second wave”.
All the while, deflecting criticism of the catastrophic outcome to date (unnecessary deaths and economic meltdown).
This playbook is, depressingly, working a treat, as there is no parliamentary opposition to make an opposing voice heard.
Theory 1 explains it neatly enough. No politician these days wants to admit they don’t have the answers; add 24 hour rolling news idiocy and hey presto.
Theory 2 is strictly for those allowed nothing sharper than crayons.
So what do they do they get up to at those Davos forums and Bilderberg conferences or when they meet on their yachts in the Med – swapping photos of the Grandkids?
If it stops decorations being put up in shops in September, I must admit that Covid has its’s benefits
Essentially, everyone has a different threshold at which point they can no longer buy THIS level of incompetence on a global level.
I have always had an extremely low opinion of humans and considered most of them slightly more intelligent and competent than shit-slinging monkeys. They dropped below even my exceedingly low bar many months ago. In short – no one can be this stupid. I am restraining myself to a great degree here just how strong my opinion is on this.
For me personally, there are other factors that align with my own research rabbit holes in critical psychology….. the overlap is astounding. It’s far too much to get into here. We have been steadily marching down this Orwellian road for a long, long time. There is also a financial collapse aspect (another rabbit hole of mine) which was mentioned earlier by someone else, but I don’t think this is quantitative easing for the masses. We’re likely heading for hyperinflation and the rich have already made off with the gold. 2008 was never dealt with. The reckoning for that has been in the cards for a long time. And then there is the crisis of “medical science” ….. perhaps… Read more »
I think it’s broadly 1, with the prime movers and shakers of 2 having ‘input’, shall we say. (Follow the money).
The elites are sticking their oars in in order to make money by perhaps prolonging the situation and milking it for all it’s worth.
I think that’s my current view – 1 with a bit of 2.
The only evidence I have against theory 2 is that Sweden (clap for them not the NHS, Sweden show us how to beat panicdemics), a country with no nuclear arsenal and a relatively small military (though sensibly all their arms and equipment seem to be manufactured by them not by allying with other nations to do it for them) and not home to any vast industrial or financial centre, has been able to resist. In a global conspiracy you’d usually think that either they’d have succumbed too, or that quite a lot more similar countries would have taken a stand (as it is only a very small number have avoided crooked lockdowns). But I’m turning to this evidence a lot more to comfort myself than because I actually feel confident that theory 2 isn’t the case.
This is serendipity in action. The world’s power base is more diffuse than either the democratic or conspiratorial models propose. There are vast number of rich lobbyists , think tanks, corporate interests and political fads. This has been opportunity for everyone of those to attempt to extract personal gain and of course many are in alignment.
Then there’s Theory 2 on steroids – Covid-19 is version 1.0 of a genetically engineered biological weapon, deliberately released as an experiment. Version 2.0 will have much higher infectivity and mortality and will be released to reduce the population. I don’t believe any of that, but it would make a good plot for a novel.
When you consider the science around masks and then see what kind of nonsense about making homemade masks is being peddled in the U.S., the degree of delusion about their efficacy is crystal clear.
This is mask-making advice from a Stanford anesthesiologist:
Our studies show that, if constructed properly with high-quality materials, a homemade cloth mask can function as well as or better than a surgical mask. Based on our studies, the WHO now recommends a cloth mask of at least three layers of different materials. The outermost layer should be made of a fabric that is at least somewhat water resistant. That can be a fabric that is a combination of cotton and polyester, nylon or rayon. The middle layer should either be a polypropylene — a spunbond material used in some reusable grocery bags, mattress covers and craft projects — or three-ply disposable facial tissues like Kleenex. Finally, the innermost layer should be a wicking material to draw moisture away from the face. One hundred percent soft cotton works well here.
A tiny fraction of people are going to make masks like this (which would have to be washed and dried after each use, so you’d need many). Few can afford the disposible surgical masks–and what a waste generator. These “experts,” who are ranging outside their areas of expertise… Read more »
I really agree with your message about fear, just when you thought things were getting back to normal. They ramp up the fear factor and destroy a million retail jobs. Why? Does this government consider the consequences of its actions. It made masks compulsory on public transport but it hasn’t increased passengers, the most I see on buses is three is that because the sight of masks frightens people from travelling. I believe the sight of masks at shops is simply designed to frighten us, after all why wear masks of there’s no infections. Lastly I’ve come to the conclusion Boris is murderer he’s already killed 44000 now he’s determined to kill off millions of jobs and together 100000 of lives from cancer,heart disease as well as hip old etc.
I haven’t travelled by public transport after the masks became compulsory. Walked everywhere so far. Hoarding up food currently, so that I could survive for at least couple of weeks without going to any shops.
I think Boris is displaying symptoms of PTSD and possibly the bipolar disorder his mother suffered from.
I’ve been describing this as genocide in the MSM comments sections.