Facebook - "So, a 90% effective Covid vaccine has been developed. One week too late for his administration. Operation Warp Speed was a risky deal - to fund the production of vaccines before they are even proven effective, accepting the risk of millions of wasted doses being thrown away. Yes, yes, I'm probably being dumb. No one wants to risk association with a loser these days, getting called a whole bunch of names in the process ranging from racist to sexist just for the crime of holding on to one's ethics. But here on my page, I give credit where it is due, and before it is written out by the media and winners of history. [Additional note: For avoidance of doubt, Pfizer was not funded by Operation Warp Speed in the development of their vaccine. However, Pfizer did have the assurance of having their vaccine pre-ordered. I am of the opinion that such confirmed orders have the effect of mitigating Pfizer's risk.]"
Facebook - "Moderna has a vaccine too, and this time, it has unquestionably taken R&D funds from Operation Warp Speed. But fear not, for history has already been rewritten in the last two days.
*Wikipedia screenshots on Operation Warp Speed, with edits to no longer mention Trump*"
China finds coronavirus on packaging of Brazilian beef - "The Chinese city of Wuhan said on Friday (Nov 13) it had detected the novel coronavirus on the packaging of a batch of Brazilian beef, as it ramped up testing of frozen foods this week as part of a nationwide campaign."
We already know that fomite transmission is insignificant, so you have to be a China shill to believe this
"China punishes Brazil for halting Chinese vaccine trials. This is the same shit with Australia - making up charges to suspend exports from Australia."
Jabs do not reduce risk of passing Covid within household, study suggests - "People who are fully vaccinated against Covid yet catch the virus are just as infectious to others in their household as infected unvaccinated people, research suggests."
Vaxholes will still pretend that the unvaccinated are super dangerous and harming others, since they equate unvaccinated to infected and vaccinated to uninfected
Community transmission and viral load kinetics of the SARS-CoV-2 delta (B.1.617.2) variant in vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals in the UK: a prospective, longitudinal, cohort study - "Vaccination reduces the risk of delta variant infection and accelerates viral clearance. Nonetheless, fully vaccinated individuals with breakthrough infections have peak viral load similar to unvaccinated cases and can efficiently transmit infection in household settings, including to fully vaccinated contacts."
The paper referred to above. Vaxholes will then pivot to claiming that since the vaccinated are less likely to be infected, vaccines still reduce transmission - while at the same time claiming that the fact that most covid cases are in the vaccinated doesn't mean anything, since the vaccines were never intended to reduce infection, only serious disease
Ontario doctor critical of COVID-19 response ordered to halt practice - "An Ontario doctor and outspoken critic of the pandemic response who was previously banned from offering COVID-19 vaccine and mask exemptions has now been suspended... The CPSO has directed that physicians have a professional responsibility to not communicate “anti-vaccine, anti-masking, anti-distancing and anti-lockdown statements and/or (promote) unsupported, unproven treatments for COVID-19.” Kilian, of Owen Sound, has been vocal in her criticism of COVID-19 vaccines, and how the medical community and governments have responded to the pandemic."
Of course, this doesn't mean there's a "consensus" because medical and scientific professionals are afraid of losing their jobs
New Thinking on Covid Lockdowns: They’re Overly Blunt and Costly - WSJ - "Prior to Covid-19, lockdowns weren’t part of the standard epidemic tool kit, which was primarily designed with flu in mind. During the 1918-1919 flu pandemic, some American cities closed schools, churches and theaters, banned large gatherings and funerals and restricted store hours. But none imposed stay-at-home orders or closed all nonessential businesses. No such measures were imposed during the 1957 flu pandemic, the next-deadliest one; even schools stayed open. Lockdowns weren’t part of the contemporary playbook, either. Canada’s pandemic guidelines concluded that restrictions on movement were “impractical, if not impossible.” The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in its 2017 community mitigation guidelines for pandemic flu, didn’t recommend stay-at-home orders or closing nonessential businesses even for a flu as severe as the one a century ago. So when China locked down Wuhan and surrounding Hubei province in January, and Italy imposed blanket stay-at-home orders in March, many epidemiologists elsewhere thought the steps were unnecessarily harmful and potentially ineffective. By late March, they had changed their minds. The sight of hospitals in Italy overwhelmed with dying patients shocked people in other countries.
And yet past flus were more deadly than covid. Delaying herd immunity just prolongs the pain
China locks down 13 million people in Xi’an after detecting 127 Covid cases - "The snap lockdown on Thursday comes little over a month before Beijing is set to host the Winter Olympics. All residents in Xi’an are barred from leaving their houses except to buy living necessities every other day or for emergencies, while travel to and from the city is suspended save for in exceptional circumstances requiring official approval. All non-essential businesses have also been closed... The lockdown has separated family members with no notice."
The price of covid "success". Good luck for the Olympics. At least as of now, they are not going to quarantine the vaccinated on arrival, so there's going to be an explosion of cases, plus the exemption will not be politically popular. Even if they do quarantine the vaccinated, there will most probably still be an outbreak. But then probably no one is going to go to the Olympics. Tokyo didnt require a quarantine, and covid spreads more in the winter
Beijing Olympics: China to Ease Covid Guidelines for Athletes in Bubble - The New York Times - "Currently, all overseas arrivals to China must undergo quarantine."
Quarantine laws in China could kill NHL participation in Olympics: report - "“If an athlete tests positive, you cannot leave China until cleared by local health authorities. Maximum quarantine could be 3-5 weeks.” Sportsnet’s Jeff Marek reported on Saturday night’s Hockey Night in Canada broadcast. “If an athlete does test positive and is symptomatic, to get out of quarantine, [they] need to be symptom-free and pass two COVID tests within 24 hours. If asymptomatic, they can be allowed out of quarantine with two negative tests at 24 hours apart.”"
They pulled out after that
China Sticks to Covid-Zero Policies, Despite Rising Pressure to Ease Restrictions - WSJ - "China is adhering to its playbook of neighborhood lockdowns, location tracking, weekslong quarantines and indefinitely delayed visas, in an effort to eradicate every single case of the virus. The country was again carrying out mass testing and imposing domestic travel restrictions this week in some areas, including Beijing, to stem the spread of an outbreak after a retired couple from Shanghai who were on a cross-country trip tested positive for the virus on Oct. 17. Chinese authorities reported 43 new confirmed Covid-19 cases on Monday, in which 29 were locally transmitted. Officials have yet to say when their strategies might shift, even with about 76% of the population fully vaccinated. While the policies have been successful at largely keeping Covid-19 out for most of the pandemic, the travel restrictions are beginning to wear on foreign workers and businesses, who argue that adhering to the strict policies will carry mounting costs for China’s economic growth, which is already slowing. “It’s not an issue, it’s the issue,” said Ker Gibbs, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai, who cited one of the business group’s recent surveys where 45.1% of respondents said Covid-19 restrictions had hurt operations. Asia Securities Industry & Financial Markets Association, the industry group in Hong Kong, said in its open letter to the government that 48% of firms they surveyed are contemplating moving staff or functions out of Hong Kong due to these operational challenges caused by the uncertainty over when quarantine restrictions will be lifted. The group, which counts as members more than 150 companies in the financial services industry—including some of the largest Wall Street and Chinese banks—said 73% reported experiencing difficulties attracting and retaining talent in Hong Kong, a third of whom rated the difficulties as “significant.”... the day after the financial industry group called on Hong Kong to provide an exit strategy for its zero-Covid-19 policies, the Hong Kong government said it would be removing most quarantine exemptions, which had previously been extended to diplomats and senior executives. It will further require patients who had recovered from Covid-19 and tested negative to spend an additional two weeks in hospitals, bringing the policies into closer alignment with the mainland... “International travel is important, international business is important, but by comparison the mainland is more important,” the city’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, said earlier this month, referring to a more open border with the mainland. Visitors from Hong Kong currently need to quarantine when they enter the mainland. Mainland China has been even more strict in some ways. Many foreign executives have had their dependent visas delayed, keeping many people from seeing their families... The policies are also rippling outward. Ships have routinely been held up in ports such as Shanghai as crews are tested for the virus, for example, creating supply-chain disruptions... The restrictions have also meant that tourists from the mainland have been grounded, which has been particularly devastating for economies in the region such as Thailand that rely heavily on them... But Chinese officials have so far offered no hint that they are deterred by the potential for further economic damage... “This policy is also still very popular in China and receives strong public support: People are very proud of how well state leaders have controlled the virus,” said Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York... clinical trials showed vaccines made by Sinovac Biotech Ltd. and Sinopharm to be less effective overall than the mRNA vaccines made by Moderna Inc. and Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE, although the Chinese vaccines have been shown to be effective at preventing severe cases of the disease. The World Health Organization has recommended a booster shot for those over 60 who have received Sinovac or Sinopharm. Major events set for next year give China additional incentives to keep the virus under wraps. China is hosting the Winter Olympics, which are scheduled to open on Feb. 4. China will hold its 20th Party Congress next fall, when Mr. Xi is expected to secure an unprecedented third-term as the leader of the Chinese Communist Party. “The approach helps bolster party legitimacy ahead of that,” said Mr. Huang. “Abandoning ‘Zero Covid’ now is tantamount to admitting the former approach doesn’t work.”"
Why China Is the World’s Last ‘Zero Covid’ Holdout - The New York Times - "The rest of the world is reopening, including New Zealand and Australia, which also once embraced zero tolerance. China is now the only country still chasing full eradication of the virus... The government’s strict strategy is the product of a uniquely Chinese set of calculations. Its thriving exports have helped to keep the economy afloat. The ruling Communist Party’s tight grip on power enables lockdowns and testing to be carried out with astonishing efficiency. Beijing is set to host the Winter Olympics in February. For many Chinese, the low case numbers have become a source of national pride. Xi Jinping, China’s leader, has repeatedly pointed to the country’s success in containment as proof of the superiority of its governance model. But experts — both in China and abroad — have warned that the approach is unsustainable. China may find itself increasingly isolated, diplomatically and economically, at a time when global public opinion is hardening against it... When Zhang Wenhong, a prominent infectious disease expert from Shanghai, suggested this summer that China learn to live with the virus, he was attacked viciously online as a lackey of foreigners. A former Chinese health minister called such a mindset reckless. Professor Ong said the government was afraid of any challenge to its narrative of pandemic triumph. “Outbreaks have become so commonplace that it’s really a non-event,” she said. “But the Chinese authorities want to control any small potential source of instability.”... China’s economic growth is slowing, and domestic travel during a weeklong holiday earlier this month fell below last year’s levels, as a cluster of new cases spooked tourists. Retail sales have proven fitful, recovering and ebbing with waves of the virus. The country may also suffer diplomatically. Mr. Xi has not left China or received foreign visitors since early 2020, even as other world leaders prepare to gather in Rome for a Group of 20 summit and Glasgow for climate talks... roughly 10,000 tourists are trapped in Ejin Banner, a region of Inner Mongolia, after the emergence of cases led to a lockdown. As consolation, the local tourism association has promised them free entry to three popular tourist attractions, redeemable within the next three years."
Perhaps this is by design, since Xi wants China to be insular and reject the rest of the world and its ideas
China doubles down on COVID-zero strategy - "An expansive compound of buildings covering the equivalent of 46 football pitches was recently erected on the outskirts of Guangzhou, China’s bustling southern metropolis. The sprawling complex of three-storey buildings contains some 5,000 rooms and is the first of what is expected to be a chain of quarantine centres built by the Chinese government to house people arriving from overseas as it forges ahead with its zero-tolerance approach to COVID... the appearance of the quarantine centre nearly two years after the trauma of Wuhan has left some wondering why China is not relaxing its virus strategy now that the vast majority of its one billion people have been fully vaccinated... “It’s been almost two years since I last saw my parents, but the ridiculously expensive flight ticket and the prolonged quarantine time are making it difficult for me to return home,” Yang lamented of his failed efforts to try to go back to China... the government banned people from transiting in a third country to return to China if there was a direct flight from their original departure place. Coupled with a notorious flight arrangement policy that allows one airline to operate only one flight per week from any specific country that is aimed at controlling the number of international arrivals, the moves have driven up the cost of air travel. “Flight tickets used to cost about $150 to fly from Bangkok to Chengdu,” a Chinese national who has been stuck in Bangkok for more than two years and is from the southwestern city told Al Jazeera. “Now I’d call myself lucky if I manage to find a ticket for less than $3,000.” Different destinations in China also apply different quarantine measures: the shortest quarantine is 21 days, in cities such as Shanghai, where arrivals are put under 14 days of centralised quarantine followed by seven days of home isolation. Cities such as Beijing require a further seven days of “health monitoring” on top of the 21-day quarantine. Additionally, in countries such as the United Arab Emirates and Iraq, the Chinese embassies, which are in charge of distributing the green code, have instructed passengers to self-quarantine for 14 days before departure. That means some travellers could end up spending nearly a month and a half in some form of quarantine. Apart from restricting international arrivals, the government is also determined to prevent its citizens from travelling abroad. The immigration authority issued a “do not travel unless it is necessary and urgent” guidance earlier this year, with the interpretation of “necessity and urgency” varying at different border control points. Under the guidance, the government stopped issuing passports to people without “urgent and necessary reasons” to leave the country; and those who try to leave the country “without urgent and necessary reasons” are also being barred from departing. Beijing’s doubling down of the strategy has inevitably brought havoc to many – not just Chinese nationals, but to members of the international business community who might live in China or do business there. A similarly punishing regime in the semi-autonomous Chinese city of Hong Kong has drawn warnings that it could undermine the territory’s status as a global financial hub. It has not deterred the government there; it insists its focus is to be able to reopen its border with the mainland and on Wednesday removed almost all exemptions on Beijing’s recommendation... if every other country moves to ease its approach to COVID-19 and allow more international travel, while China maintains its highly risk-averse approach it would appear an outlier, says CFR’s Yanzhong Huang. The strategy that was once a demonstration of the superiority of the Chinese model would just “show its inferiority to the more realistic alternative""
When you know your vaccines don't work
UK economy to grow faster than China’s for first time since Mao - "China was the first big economy to rebound to its pre-Covid GDP, but now Beijing’s iron-fisted zero Covid policy is expected to hold the country back as the nation’s factories and ports are routinely forced to shut by new outbreaks. A crunch in the property market, centred around troubled developer Evergrande, will also remove a key driver of growth. Meanwhile, enforced limits on energy-intensive aluminium smelters intended to conserve scarce power resources have hit output, something the investment bank expects to continue or intensify. Such low growth will pile pressure on China’s leaders, BNP Paribas warns, particularly with the crucial 20th party congress on its way and a reshuffle of top officials - excluding President Xi - expected."
Covid hystericists will still claim lockdowns work and China is proof
Communist Party culture of fear makes China the last redoubt for 'zero-Covid' lockdowns - "As winter sets in yet again, China has clocked more than 600 cases, pushing authorities into renewed frenzy. Beijing has refused to lift border controls and continues to enforce its Covid-19 containment strategy – centralised quarantine, mass testing, contact tracing, local lockdowns, mandatory masks – despite achieving a 75 per cent vaccination rate in the country of 1.4 billion people. "Most governments in the world have had the underlying principle that public health measures that disrupt the community, whether it’s lockdown or other kinds of social distancing, are needed to buy time until vaccines can be offered to everybody,” said Ben Cowling, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Hong Kong. “But in China, there is a different perspective; they’re going to keep it at zero.”... authorities stopped two high-speed trains travelling to Beijing, because a single passenger on each was considered a close contact of a confirmed case. All 350 train travellers were shuttled into centralised quarantine, even though none were confirmed to be at risk or positive... Local officials have gone so far as to chain people into their homes during lockdowns and anyone found to be non-compliant have been arrested and thrown in detention. Pharmacies are also required to report individuals coming into buy over-the-counter cold and flu medicines as those symptoms could potentially indicate coronavirus; those failing to do so have been shut down... Authorities are taking no chances – partly because their careers are on the line; if cases are found in their patch, they’ve almost always been sacked as punishment. There’s little indication that Chinese authorities will relax coronavirus controls anytime soon given a spate of upcoming high-profile events... The government has also built permanent quarantine facilities in cities like Guangzhou for overseas arrivals – often Chinese nationals returning home given the border closures – to fulfill requirements to isolate for as long as 28 days... Propaganda – and officials – have gone so far as to scoff at what they perceive as the lax measures used by Western governments, accusing leaders elsewhere for simply letting their people die. “Australia has recently announced a new policy of ‘living with the virus,’” boasted state media. “This allows for infections and deaths to occur rapidly.”... For now, the government has been able to engineer continued public buy-in but it’s unclear how long that could last especially as the disruptive measures have started to hit economic growth. China's economy has seesawed all year, posting a stunning 18.3 per cent growth in the first quarter compared to last year, and moderating to 7.9 per cent in the next quarter before slumping to a new low of 4.9 per cent in the most recent quarter. Politically speaking, China is also growing increasingly isolated at a time when geopolitical tensions are on the rise. Mr Xi, for instance, chose not to attend the recent G20 meeting in Rome and the Cop26 international climate talks ongoing in Glasgow"
Covid hystericists claim that lockdowns work if they are enforced. Apparently China is not brutal enough, apparently
Thousands of guests locked in Shanghai Disneyland after woman tests COVID-19 positive - "A small county in eastern China’s Jiangxi province turned all its traffic lights to red after one case was detected, breaking the province’s 610-day Covid-free track record. The move, which local authorities said was an emergency measure aimed at reducing mobility, was decried on Chinese social media, where dissent is typically censored. It was soon repealed and the lights resumed... In Beijing, the escalating restrictions are having farcical consequences. Some residents who leave the capital have reported not being able to come back because they are recorded as recently being in the city, parts of which are currently classed as high risk because of a small outbreak. Stranded at airports and train stations around China, many have taken to social media to ask for help and to criticize the rules. Perhaps nowhere is the full force — and increasing absurdity — of China’s devotion to Covid Zero evident than in the small southeastern city of Ruili, on the remote border with Myanmar. People there have been locked down four times in the past seven months alone. The 268,000 residents are largely barred from leaving as the virus keeps creeping over from Myanmar, where it is rampant... Local media over the weekend reported about a baby who had been tested as many as 74 times for Covid since September last year, with mass testing of entire cities and populations a key part of China’s toolkit."
China is going to be cut off from the rest of the world for the rest of time
Singapore Falls Down Covid Resilience Ranking Due to Slow Travel Recovery - Bloomberg - "Singapore now occupies the lowest spot ever in Bloomberg’s Covid Resilience Ranking for a former No. 1 as the city-state confronts a trail-blazing, but polarizing, shift to living with the virus. Ranked in pole position in April and never lower than 19th until now, Singapore has tumbled 20 places in the past month to No. 39 on October’s lineup as it sees record cases and deaths. While vaccination coverage is one of the highest in the world and overall death toll one of the lowest, it scores poorly in most other indicators: strict domestic curbs have crimped mobility and stringency metrics, while a slow travel reopening and flight capacity recovery is still far behind that of Europe and the U.S. This worst-of-both-worlds situation is likely to be temporary transition pains, as Singapore forges an unprecedented path to being among first Covid-Zero countries to pivot to treating the virus as endemic. If it succeeds, it will have the distinction of being one of the only places in the world to normalize without waves of death."
Fully Vaccinated 35-Year-Old Heather Greeley Dies of Coronavirus Waiting for Last-Ditch ECMO Treatment - “Heather did everything right, she did everything she was supposed to do and is now suffering because people didn’t do their part.”
Since the media likes to obsess over stories of unvaccinated people dying...
As usual, vaxholes don't believe the vaccines work
Flu deaths could hit 60,000 in worst winter for 50 years, say experts - "Flu deaths could be the worst for 50 years because of lockdowns and social distancing, health chiefs have warned, as the NHS launches the biggest ever flu vaccination drive. More than 35 million people will be offered flu jabs this winter, amid concern that prolonged restrictions on social contact have left Britain with little immunity. Officials fear that this winter could see up to 60,000 flu deaths – the worst figure in Britain since the 1968 Hong Kong Flu pandemic – without strong uptake of vaccines. There is also concern about the effectiveness of this year’s jabs, because the lack of flu last year made it harder for scientists to sample the virus and predict the dominant strains. Health chiefs said the measures introduced over the past 18 months to protect the country against coronavirus would now put the public at greater risk of flu."
Clearly the solution is to lockdown again! Every life is precious!
Covid may no longer be the most 'significant' threat to health, Dr Jenny Harries says - "Covid may no longer be the most “significant” threat to health, Dr Jenny Harries has said. The chief executive of the UK Health Security Agency said today that Covid was possibly no more dangerous than flu, as she warned that there would be a lower immunity to the illness this year. She said: “It is important to remember that for an average flu season it's about 11,000 deaths a year, it’s somewhere between four (thousand) to 22,000 over the last four to five years. “So we are starting to move to a situation where, perhaps Covid is not the most significant element, and many of those individuals affected will of course have other comorbidities, which will make them vulnerable to serious illness but other reasons as well.”"
We risk being frightened back into lockdown - "England can lay claim to being one of the most liberal Covid societies on earth, save for the few that have removed restrictions altogether. Here, it sits in refreshing contrast to much of the West. Italy, the first European country to impose a national lockdown, crossed another unhappy Rubicon last week. Its legislators enacted far-reaching laws requiring vaccine passports or a negative Covid test for the entire national workforce, both public and private, if they wish to earn a living. President Biden has announced a similar wave of vaccine mandates in the US, requiring all employees of the state and of larger private firms to be either vaccinated or tested regularly. French citizens must show a health pass to take a long-distance train, or even to enter a restaurant, while police patrol outdoor cafes carrying out random vaccine passport checks. In "liberal" Canada, Justin Trudeau has banned unvaccinated children as young as 12 from travelling. With its curfews, draconian bans on protest and travel restrictions, Zero-Covid Australia has descended into a nightmarish police state. Even within the UK, Wales and Scotland are notably more restrictive (Scottish children over the age of 12, for instance, must wear masks at school). In England, those rules which do remain, such as mask-wearing on public transport, are in practice largely voluntary. Recent findings from the consultancy Kekst CNC by the pollster James Johnson suggest a corresponding sea change in public opinion. Far fewer of us now believe that controlling the virus at all costs should be the country’s top priority while a greater share than ever favour the once-heretical belief that protecting the economy matters more. Given the UK’s widespread vaccine uptake, and a “vaccination dividend” thought to be disrupting the link between cases, hospitalisations and deaths by as much as 90 per cent, this seems logical. The end of furlough, rising inflation and a cost-of-living crisis has certainly fixed minds, while each day brings new reminders of the collateral health damage of lockdown. There’s doubtless an overall sense of “Covid fatigue”, too, just as Britons eventually tired of talking about Brexit all the time. But it’s also due to a decided shift in government rhetoric. The public generally followed the advice of politicians and official scientists during the pandemic. Not having them out there each day saying how terrifying everything is can only have made a vast difference. This is not enough for some politicians, or that rich vein of commentary which consists of highlighting rules in more draconian countries and hinting, none too subtly, that Britain should follow suit. The recent spike in case numbers is driving this narrative... A strong element of culture-war pantomime remains: while Labour MPs invariably wear masks in the Chamber, Tories – with a few exceptions – don’t. Having attended both party conferences, I can attest that neither side bothered to cover their faces away from the main Chambers and out of sight of those pesky TV cameras. Yet arguments over lesser issues like masks may shift vital political capital away from more important interventions, such as building up ICU capacity and doubling down on booster jabs for the most vulnerable as their immunity wanes. This, above all, should be the focus of any "Plan B". The trouble with “panic mode” isn’t just that it sparks fear, it is that it often prompts rash over-correction for the wrong problem, while ignoring the major concern."
All the covid hystericists were predicting that after Freedom Day, Britons would start dying off, and calling Boris Johnson an evil murderer. When that didn't happen they rationalised their failed prophecy by saying it was because school was out and the dieoffs would come when kids returned. I wonder what their subsequent cope was
There is no case for new Covid restrictions - "why are the UK’s Covid rates so high? Those demanding greater action say it is because the UK is ‘running hot’ with a ‘vaccines only’ policy, while other countries have ‘vaccines plus’ strategies – incorporating mask mandates and vaccine passports. This view does not hold water. Scotland and Wales, unlike England, have kept their mask mandates in place and have introduced vaccine passports. Yet their Covid rates are just as high as in England... Booster jabs not only increase antibody levels, but data from Israel suggest that they can also stall a rise in infections. Not everyone needs a booster jab, however. Most ‘breakthrough’ infections in young, vaccinated people are mild and these will strengthen their immunity to Covid. New treatments, including Regeneron’s antibody mixture and Merck’s molnupiravir pill, will help to keep patients out of hospital, so we should start using them urgently. We must also maximise the number of hospital beds and prepare for a rough winter in the NHS. The challenges for the health service will include Covid, a backlog of patients and a likely resurgence of other respiratory viruses. These viruses were suppressed by last year’s lockdowns, but they are now returning, finding susceptible people with diminished immunity. But beyond all of that, there is a great deal we should definitely not do. We should not activate ‘Plan B’. There is no evidence that it will achieve any good. The evidence in favour of masks is weak. And introducing mask mandates has never led to a step change in Covid cases. My objections to vaccine passports are even stronger. They are illiberal and discriminatory. Plus, they are largely futile, given the extent of Covid infections among the vaccinated. Data from Public Health England show that most adult Covid cases (though not deaths) are now among the vaccinated. Excluding the unvaccinated minority from large events is therefore unlikely to bring cases down by much. ‘Plan C’ – ie, more lockdowns – should be ruled out unequivocally. It begs the question of when do we ever stop. I did not support last winter’s lockdowns, as I considered their collateral damage to be disproportionate. But I could understand the logic of those who said that because vaccines were around the corner, we should just be patient for a few more weeks. Now we are wiser to the limits of these vaccines, and there are no further vaccine breakthroughs in sight. To argue for another lockdown now is tantamount to arguing for indefinite and recurring lockdowns, despite all the collateral harms they cause to society. This would clearly be unsustainable. An NHS that is ‘protected’ by indefinite lockdown could not survive very long. The NHS needs a functioning economy to sustain it... from an ethical standpoint, vaccinating kids against Covid begs the question: since when was it children’s duty to protect their elders? Ultimately, there are three brutal and unavoidable facts we have to contend with. Firstly, SARS-CoV-2 is here to stay. ‘Zero Covid’ is unattainable. Secondly, the vaccines are extremely valuable but they are imperfect. The protection they confer is incomplete and transient. Thirdly, we will never develop the kind of herd immunity that squeezes Covid cases down to minimal levels, as with measles or rubella. Instead, as with common-cold coronaviruses, we are destined to live with the virus in a messy ‘dynamic equilibrium’ of occasional infection giving us immunity, followed by waning immunity and then reinfection. This is what ‘living with Covid’ means. And if you haven’t caught the virus yet, you will in time. When it happens, I hope your infection is mild and blunted by the vaccine. Occasional pandemics of respiratory viruses are simply part of the human condition. Boosters and new treatments will help the vulnerable. But new restrictions will merely delay our journey to reaching a dynamic equilibrium, at great cost to society...
David Livermore is a professor of medical microbiology at the University of East Anglia and is on the editorial board of Collateral Global."
Revealed: The devastating impact Covid-19 and lockdowns had on physical activity - "one million more people became inactive. The drop-off was especially alarming among young people, with some 446,000 fewer people between the ages of 16 and 24 deemed active compared to the most recent reporting period before the pandemic. Of the entire adult population, some 12.5 million people (27.5 per cent) averaged less than 30 minutes of even moderately intense exercise a week. The Active Lives survey, which was published by Sport England, provides the most extensive annual analysis of activity trends and found that existing inequalities relating to ethnicity, socio-economic status and disability were worsened during the various national lockdowns"
Since covid is more deadly to the unfit and the fat, this is a great self-fulfilling prophecy. No wonder covid hystericists love lockdowns
The NHS isn't facing another Covid crisis and Sajid Javid knows it - "In January, 30 per cent of hospital beds were occupied by Covid patients. Now it’s 6 per cent. So it’s not a crisis. It’s not even close. The huge difference is that, back in January, hardly anyone was vaccinated. Now, 93 per cent of adults are estimated to have antibodies so any new wave of Covid will, as was originally envisaged, meet a wall of vaccinated people. Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer, is even arguing against vaccine passports, telling colleagues that they may help vaccine-hesitant countries but could mess things up here. A papers-please ID-card system, he tells colleagues, may breed resentment and give vaccines a bad name. Contrary to the BMA’s jeremiads, hospitals are doing well. The latest NHS figures show more empty hospital beds (4,940) than beds with Covid patients (4,901). Covid patients do need more resources but it’s worth remembering that even last year, the NHS never did melt down. At the Covid peak last April, at least a third of hospital beds (and ventilators) lay unused, as did the overflow Nightingale centres. Matt Hancock tended not to pass this information on. It suited his purposes to talk about an NHS on the brink as he thought such scary messages encouraged lockdown compliance. Javid sees it differently: his message is one of reassurance. Covid alarmism, he thinks, can deter millions of patients from seeking the help they need and result in avoidable deaths. His priority now is to keep all healthcare moving and get the waiting list falling – which means keeping calm about Covid... This will be the first cold season in which Britain learns not how to suppress the virus, but how to live with it. To bring back restrictions in a fully vaccinated nation – and one not facing an emergency – risks ushering in a new way of life. These would be new rules not for a pandemic, but for winter. We’re about to test the “new normal”."
Lockdown fanatics should be ashamed of themselves - "At the start of this week, certain people, such as the Labour Party and the “Independent Sage” group of scientists, were calling for coronavirus restrictions to be brought back. They warned that, without them, the NHS would collapse this autumn and winter. They were wrong. As cases have since trended downwards, some of them have gone strangely silent. These prognosticators of doom have been wrong time after time after time. And not just a little bit wrong – epically wrong, all while morally condemning their more accurate opponents. As cases rose in early July, in the run-up to England’s full reopening on July 19, restrictions advocates said that it was inevitable we would reach 100,000 cases per day. Keir Starmer released a video statement in which he declared that “Boris Johnson’s recklessness means we’re going to have an NHS summer crisis. The Johnson Variant is already out of control.” A set of academics wrote a letter to The Lancet condemning the reopening as a “dangerous and unethical experiment”. What happened next was that cases crashed, immediately after July 19, in precisely the week my model said that would happen. In late August, after a small rise as behaviour adjusted to the absence of restrictions, cases started falling again. But restrictions advocates were unfazed by their failures of a few weeks before. Next they declared that if restrictions were not reimposed in the autumn, there would be 300,000 new cases per day, with 100,000 per day being inevitable and 200,000 likely... despite being hideously wrong both in the summer and as regards September/October, restrictions advocates still expect us to believe their new prognostications of doom"
The lockdown myths need to be challenged - " The first myth is that the UK has had the highest Covid death rate in Europe and that this is mainly due to locking down too late in both waves. While it is true that we were highest after the first wave, the situation has changed significantly. Ranked against EU countries, the UK is 11th on Covid deaths and 15th on excess deaths. Many claim that thousands of lives would have been saved if we had locked down earlier in the first wave, but almost every country with a higher death rate than the UK did lock down early. This gave them very small first waves in spring 2020 but these were followed by very large second waves in the autumn/winter 2021. really happening Raghib Ali 23 October 2021 • 7:00pm Calls are growing for restrictions to be introduced in response to rising Covid cases and hospital admissions. While these calls are undoubtedly well-intentioned, I believe that they are often based on certain myths or misunderstandings of the evidence that lead to the effectiveness of lockdowns and restrictions being overestimated. The first myth is that the UK has had the highest Covid death rate in Europe and that this is mainly due to locking down too late in both waves. While it is true that we were highest after the first wave, the situation has changed significantly. Ranked against EU countries, the UK is 11th on Covid deaths and 15th on excess deaths. Many claim that thousands of lives would have been saved if we had locked down earlier in the first wave, but almost every country with a higher death rate than the UK did lock down early. This gave them very small first waves in spring 2020 but these were followed by very large second waves in the autumn/winter 2021. Similarly, the claim that the UK made the same mistake in the second wave and that thousands died due to the failure to have a “circuit-breaker” lockdown last October isn’t supported by the evidence. Wales – which did have one – ended up with similar Covid and excess death rates to England. The current myth is that the UK has the highest Covid rates in Europe now and this is due to our lack of vaccine passports and mask mandates. But these comparisons are flawed. First, because they are based on case rates and ignore the fact that the UK does a lot more testing (test positivity rates also need to be compared – the UK is about average). Secondly, because other countries are at different stages of their third waves and their immunity will wane later than in the UK because their vaccine programmes started later. The other problem with this interpretation is that Scotland and Wales (which are more valid comparisons) kept their mask mandates and recently brought in vaccine passports, but their rates have been higher than England’s... The next myth is that only restrictions or lockdowns bring down cases, hospital admissions and deaths. This is clearly not true given what happened in July and September when there were no restrictions and cases fell, most likely due to people voluntarily changing their behaviour in response to risk. The last myth is that “going early and going hard” with restrictions is always better than waiting. Again, given what happened in July and September when a huge surge was predicted by many, that would have been the wrong advice. Cases actually fell significantly."
Coronavirus in UK: Britons, Unfazed by High Covid Rates, Weigh Their ‘Price of Freedom’ - The New York Times - "For some who objected to Britain’s recurring lockdowns, the return to normalcy was both welcome and overdue. But some said the tensions between freedom and security could easily resurface. “The intensity has gone out of the debate, but it will come back if there is another wave,” said Jonathan Sumption, a former justice on Britain’s Supreme Court who has been an outspoken critic of the lockdowns. “If it does come back,” he added, “we’ll then be in the position that even the vaccines don’t work. What is the exit route?”"
Clearly, eternal lockdown is the only solution
