Coronavirus Pandemic: Apocalypse Now! Or exaggerated scare story?

[Jono]

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=552839085588733

Here's a link to yesterday's WHO briefing live on RT/FB by Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. He talks about the vaccine 'solidarity trial' being the beginning of the vaccine cure they have in the works. He also warns against using 'therapeutic' remedies... by that I'm guessing he's talking about the use of Vit C etc and other readily available drugs that have been shown to be effective.

 

[sToRmR1dR]

The daily life has been returning to normal in Wuhan.

Wuhan reopens subway, allows incoming traffic as it phases out 2-month coronavirus lockdown (PHOTOS)

The metro in Wuhan, the city where the deadly Covid-19 virus is believed to have originated, has opened its doors to 11 million residents after two months of lockdown. Trains are arriving in the city as life returns to normal.

www.rt.com

28 Mar, 2020

First train with medical supplies for Europe leaves Wuhan as China eases Covid-19 lockdown

Beijing has resumed its railway freight service between Wuhan and Europe by delivering medical aid to Germany as authorities work to lift strict quarantine measures after the number of new cases Covid-19 dropped.

www.rt.com

28 Mar, 2020

 

[Laura]

Coronavirus: Iceland’s mass testing finds half of carriers show no symptoms

As the coronavirus pandemic surges worldwide, each piece of data counts in the fight against the deadly pathogen.But significant findings about the

english.alarabiya.net

As of Sunday night, the country’s health authorities and the biotechnology firm deCode Genetics have tested more than 10,300 people. That might not sound like a large number, compared to the around 350,000 Americans who have been tested for coronavirus according to the COVID Tracking Project, but it is a far higher percentage of tests per capita - a ratio Icelandic authorities have claimed is the highest in the world.

But it is not just the numbers of people being tested that is unusual about Iceland’s approach.

Unlike other countries, where people are only tested if they exhibit symptons of coronavirus or have come into contact with known spreaders, the country is testing thousands of people from the general population who don’t exhibit any symptoms of the virus whatsoever – helping to reveal information about the nature of the pathogen and its symptoms.

While Iceland has only 218 confirmed cases among its tiny population, its testing program has produced crucial data about the coronavirus - that half of those who were tested positive have no coronavirus symptoms.

This confirms multiple pieces of scientific research that have shown that coronavirus is spread more through people with the virus who show no sign of being sick. Researchers from The University of Texas at Austin had found out that more than 10 percent of patients were infected by somebody who has the virus but does not yet have symptoms.

“Early results from deCode Genetics indicate that a low proportion of the general population has contracted the virus and that about half of those who tested positive are non-symptomatic,” Thorolfur Guðnason, Iceland’s chief epidemiologist, was quoted as saying BuzzFeed News. “The other half displays very moderate cold-like symptoms.”
[...]
Icelandic scientists say testing has already revealed that there are at least 40 mutations of coronavirus in Iceland, and the virus might develop to become more contagious, but less dangerous. These variants can also act as the fingerprints of the virus to trace its origin. Seven of the infected people were traced to an undisclosed football match in England, the team said.

 

[Laura]

The Coronavirus, Fear, and Poverty

In these Corona times, I often listen to Monty Python’s Always Look on the Bright Side of Life. This black cloud has a silver lining. With the virus roaming outside, teenagers deign to spend more time with their parents; wives are at home cooking dinners instead of hanging out with gorgeous...

www.unz.com

The virus worries are peanuts in comparison with the terrible consequences of the massive shutdown. The real economy will disintegrate, and the workers and the precariat will be ruined and impoverished. They will work for their daily bread or die. Only financiers will survive and prosper – financiers and their liberal troops. That is what they hope for. Fear and Poverty is our future if they have their way.

President Trump had made a valiant attempt to keep America functioning; but being accused by the New York Times of complicity in the mass murder of America’s senior citizens he acquiesced and allowed them to lock some states down. He still mulls over some way to save America, but will he dare? His British counterpart Boris Johnson has already surrendered after some initial resistance.

 

[Laura]

A Death Sentence, For Your Own Protection

Governments worldwide are censoring information about Coronavirus, obstructing testing, slowing cures, falsely imprisoning millions, destroying trillions of dol

www.anti-empire.com

The United States is under the strictest level of martial law in history. All borders are sealed. Tanks and armored personnel carriers now roll through the streets of New York City, San Diego and other cities.

The sheer folly and carnage of government overreaction to this threat will go down as unparalleled in American history.

These government responses to COVID-19 will almost certainly kill far more people than the dreaded disease itself.

When panic over the virus first hit American shores in January, officials at the FDA and CDC stymied private and academic development of diagnostic tests while pushing defective government tests.

As always, those within government, and prominent pro-government celebrities, are getting preferential treatment for testing and treatment.

 

[Laura]

A few highlights:

1. I was made aware that FB Fact Check claims “Shanghai did not officially recommend high-dose IVC for the treatment of Covid-19” (left on the above photo). Let me make it clear that not only Shanghai, but also Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, another major city in China, publicly endorsed high-dose IVC for the treatment of Covid-19. Those who does Fact Check, please be more careful.

2. Medicine in Drug Discovery, of Elsevier, a major scientific publishing house, published my article of Early and high-dose IVC in the treatment and prevention of Covid-19. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science...

3. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of NIAID, NIH openly recognizes the importance of Vit C in the fight against virus. https://youtu.be/xkyO1DTqoWQ

4. Dr. Tom Frieden, former CDC chief, recommend Vit D3 in the fight of covid-19. https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/forme...

5. Finally, it's great to hear that a NY hospital chain begin to recommend high-dose IVC for Covid-19 treatment. But their doses are too small and may not achieve the optimal results that high-dose IVC can offer. Worse, if doses are too small and the IVC treatment doesn't achieve the desired results, it may, again, be interpreted as VC is inefective. As this happened before.”

 

[Laura]

Edward Snowden's Warning: Surveillance Measures Will Outlast The Pandemic

Edward Snowden has a warning for those who are giving up liberty for a false sense of security: the temporary mass surveillance measures put in place will be anything but temporary. Snowden says that these measures are not worth giving up even more liberty.Nothing is so permanent as a temporary...

theduran.com

The real #covidiots

Those who rush to denounce others often reveal their own ignorance.

www.spiked-online.com

 

[Gwenllian]

Dutch Sott published a few articles of news outlets that contradict the narrative. It's good to see some people speaking out about where the economy is headed, journalists who have no inkling of statistics and so on, but propagate panic and hysteria instead, and hospitals that have to send away their patients with serious health issues and who without treatment could die.

Right-wing journalists like Wierd Duk and Joost Niemoller were completely taken over by panic and hysteria, but seemed to have changed their tune a little (I spend a lot of time on Twitter).

IMO, right-wing politician Thierry Baudet has turned into a very handsome wolf in sheep's clothing and has been clamouring for lockdown measures, but he could be just one of those dangerous authoritarian followers.

And the police have also started utilising a drone with a loudspeaker to admonish people on the beach (which was nearly empty) to practice social distancing (I think the source is genuine, but I could be wrong):

https://twitter.com/x/status/1243539717913788418

 

[Laura]

Renowned German Mathematician and Professor of Statistics Slams Dramatization of Covid-19

The media reports daily the new «number of infected», while everyone involved actually knows that they are far too low. The next part of the sentence then

www.anti-empire.com

It is now known as a fact that we do not even know the total number of infected people. If you have no symptoms, you will not be tested, and others will only be tested to a very limited extent. We know this.

But as soon as numbers are mentioned again, we pretend that we know them exactly.

What we know is the number of people who tested positive. The number of infected people is definitely much higher, but no one can say by what factor. To answer this, we would need a representative sample from the population.

Let’s play with the thought. What happens if in a year or two if the statisticians come to the conclusion that the situation had been assessed too negatively and that the draconian measures were actually not necessary? Wouldn’t this be the worst-case scenario for science? Could a politician then stand in front of his people and call for unpopular measures in climate protection, for example, with reference to scientific forecasts?

Nationally and internationally, we will discover a lot after the crisis, including the economic and social problems caused by today’s decisions.

Our health care system must not be geared entirely towards profit. There must be enough reserves, even if it is uneconomical in normal times. Intensive care units, which are already 80% full in normal times, are not sufficient. Even if this costs money, it is urgent to invest here. And if private corporations cannot or do not want to do so, then they have to be nationalized again. Health is just not a commodity, as attac stated long ago.


My second conclusion is that we should make sure that the media does not use the power of images to create emotions that affect our judgment. If you get pictures of coffins and end-of-life units from Italy or pictures of completely empty shelves, then their effects exceed the facts.

In Great Britain there was a debate about whether the country should pursue a strategy of herd immunity. This model was then rejected based on a single study from Imperial College. Politicians today rely randomly on believing the assumptions of individual scientists. Science should have replaced belief since the Enlightenment. Do you see a problem here?

For urgent questions, scientists who have proven themselves in the past should actually be consulted.


However, that is exactly where I want to express criticism. One often asks advice exactly from those who have been wrong in the past and some you also know have ulterior interests. At that time, the Robert Koch Institute was already noticed negatively. In other policy areas, such as the pension debate, even highly discredited people who have been proven to have made massive mistakes and to have ulterior interests, can appear again as so-called experts.


Here I almost feel sick when I think of the negative social consequences.

 

[Ocean]

Did you guys see this? It might be a hoax, but on many points the things this 'insider' tells seem totally plausible. However, what I don't agree with (at least yet) is how this insider is implying that the COVID-19 might not actually exist at all, that there is no novel corona virus. Still at the very least, this post is good 'food for thought'.

Many of you probably saw this. It was posted on FB by Pierce Corbyn (emphasis mine):

https://www.facebook.com/piers.corbyn/posts/3071049629614405

The case for non-existent coronavirus / zoonotic transmission

Unraveling the Mysteries of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus

Unraveling the Mysteries of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

MERS-CoV

This month’s issue of Emerging Infectious Diseases presents results of a study that provides evidence of MERS-CoV in dromedary camels in Egypt (18). Only 3 other reports of MERS-CoV detection in animals have been published: 1 in a bat and 2 in camels (11,12,19). However, these reports were based on limited genetic information. In contrast, on the basis of their sequence analysis of nearly the entire viral genome that showed >99% nt sequence identity with human MERS-CoV, Chu et al. provide the most compelling evidence thus far of MERS-CoV infection in dromedary camels (18). Although the authors also found neutralizing antibodies to MERS-CoV (or a MERS-like CoV) in most of the camels, they did not find serologic evidence of infection in the abattoir workers who had contact with the infected animals. This finding leaves key questions about zoonotic transmission unanswered. Most notably, it remains unclear whether zoonotic transmission of MERS-CoV occurs between camels and humans and, if so, what the directionality and risk factors are for such transmission. These lingering gaps in knowledge about MERS-CoV emphasize the need for more epidemiologic study to determine risk factors for human infection, more population-level data on the prevalence of MERS-CoV in camels, risk factors for infection and shedding in camels, and continued vigilance for other possible sources of infection.
Also, the camels tested were in Egypt and were locally reared or imported from Sudan or Ethiopia, countries in which no cases have been identified in humans.

 

[Jones]

Someone posted this before, it's excellent! Talk about exposure brewing... It's in German but with English subs.

The first 10 minutes show the empty hospitals and various doctors speaking out. Then there's an interview with a critical dentist (which I skipped), and around 37:20 it's more reporting from Berlin hospitals. Unbelievable! Note that there is a strict ban for all journalists to report from the hospital designated as the main "corona hospital", under penalty!

Take a look:

I get a 'removed for violating community standards' message on that video.

 

[Ruth]

Someone posted this before, it's excellent! Talk about exposure brewing... It's in German but with English subs.

The first 10 minutes show the empty hospitals and various doctors speaking out. Then there's an interview with a critical dentist (which I skipped), and around 37:20 it's more reporting from Berlin hospitals. Unbelievable! Note that there is a strict ban for all journalists to report from the hospital designated as the main "corona hospital", under penalty!

Take a look:

Uh Oh! Censorship. It must have struck a nerve!

 

[Ocean]

Someone posted this before, it's excellent! Talk about exposure brewing... It's in German but with English subs.

The first 10 minutes show the empty hospitals and various doctors speaking out. Then there's an interview with a critical dentist (which I skipped), and around 37:20 it's more reporting from Berlin hospitals. Unbelievable! Note that there is a strict ban for all journalists to report from the hospital designated as the main "corona hospital", under penalty!

Take a look:

Got this message :
This video has been removed for violating YouTube's Terms of Service

Wow that was fast! Can't have people knowing the truth.

 

[Anaise]

If you type "hospital vacío" or "empty hospital" in the Youtube search engine, you can find the same situation in many places.

 

[nicklebleu]

Just caught up with this thread again - phew!

Would like to give an update on the situation here down in Tasmania.

We have so far only had around 50 positive test results - all these were people coming back from cruises, most of them from the ship that docked in Sidney harbour about 10 days ago. So far there are no proven community acquired cases here, although one health worker has tested positive and this is being investigated.

The Tasmanian government has introduced the concept called “Fortress Tasmania”. Oh, the irony! Tasmania started out as a prison island, and now we have reverted back to one. But this time it’s even better, because people are actively defending their prison. The government in (I think) New South Wales (NSW) has set up a dob-in-a-neighbour hotline, where you can denounce people who are not ‘doing the right thing’ - and guess what, they’ve had about 800 calls the first day. This reminds me of the Gestapo story in (I think Würzburg) where the Gestapo HQ ‘oversaw’ around 1.5 Million citizens, but only with a staff of 7, because all they had to do is wait until the phone rang and someone denounced some neighbour. The Tasmanian government has put one on top - if you break the rules you won’t just get a fine, you will get a conviction!

Here in Australia some mild cases have been held in hospital, which to me doesn’t make any sense at all. You want these people to go home and if they get worse, take them back to hospital.

In the hospital where I work all surgery has stopped outside of emergency and super-urgent stuff. There are so far no patients requiring ICU, so everybody is bored and tense.

What I find interesting is the reaction of younger colleagues to the situation. They put themselves first - which is OK to a certain degree to take care of your own health, but some of them go to great length and are unreasonable, given the low-risk environment we are still in at the moment. They refuse to treat certain patients because they think that THEY are at risk, when the person is definitely low-risk. The young nurses are totally scared and loosing it, they demand more and more strict measures - in their eyes no patient should show up anymore at all.

It seems that this situation is polarizing people into extremes. Some people suddenly step up and you can see them shine, and a lot of others that were formerly ‘normal’ now go full narcissistic. Definitely very interesting to watch. And we are only at a very mild level yet - God only know how this will pan out if and when we get the real shit happening. Otherwise life goes on eerily quietly and most things look normal from the outside - apart from some widely quoted articles like toilet paper and junk food - the supermarkets are fully stocked.

The other thing that I was thinking about, given that some people think that this crisis was a good trial run for when the real pandemic hits - actually it may well have the opposite effect. Let’s pretend that the crisis down here in Australia is not going to pan out as forcast - mostly mild cases. But the whole thing has tanked the economy. 3 million people lost their job. Once the lockdown gets liften, it will take a long time for the economy to recover, at least to some degree. The government has put in place financial help, but who pays the bill? Then of course the politicians will say ‘We got off scot free because we instigated those extreme measures’, but I could imagine that people won’t swallow that pill all too easily. And then suppose a year later the real pandemic strikes. People will be having none of that - a classical example of ‘crying wolf’, because they lost all confidence in the government and don’t want to risk their livelihood destroyed yet again.

Reading Donjuan’s account was interesting - I could well imagine that certain regions are much more hit than others, maybe for reasons that are not readily observable at the moment.

Anyway, at the moment ‘all is quiet on the Western Front’ and I’ll check back in with news if anything changes.