2020-08-01

With the future of our cities and our economy in peril, JOHN HUMPHRYS says: Let’s get to work on boom town Britain!

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-8582201/With-future-economy-peril-JOHN-HUMPHRYS-says-Lets-work-boom-town-Britain.html

John Humphrys—-made a career out of sneering at and insulting people. Please crawl back from whence you came!

Good to see you back at the top of the comments!

Boomtown Rats.

“Of the 137 Coronavirus-related Statutory Instruments laid before the UK Parliament which are subject to the negative procedure, 102 breach the 21-day rule.”

https://www.hansardsociety.org.uk/publications/data/coronavirus-statutory-instruments-dashboard

https://www.spectator.co.uk/podcast/what-s-behind-the-excess-deaths-statistics-

What’s behind the excess deaths statistics?

Lockdown.

The underlying approach is too convoluted and the statistics too unreliable to come to any conclusion.

https://www.sovereignman.com/trends/you-can-now-be-fined-jailed-and-assaulted-for-not-wearing-a-mask-28477/

You can now be fined, jailed, and assaulted for not wearing a mask

More

https://cbs12.com/news/local/florida-man-accused-of-firing-shots-inside-miami-beach-hotel-lobby-over-social-distancing

https://wsvn.com/news/local/police-man-allegedly-fires-gun-at-miami-beach-hotel-lobbys-floor-after-telling-mother-son-to-social-distance/
AND

https://nypost.com/2020/07/30/florida-man-accused-of-firing-gun-in-hotel-lobby-over-lack-of-social-distancing/

HawkAnalyst the the article you are referencing refers to The USA NOT the UK, do not want to put any more fear into UK based folk.

Lucky we don’t have guns here!

I’ve never really bought into the US rationale for mass gun ownership in the past. Now, if I had the opportunity, I’d be stockpiling guns and ammunition.

I understand that many are

Crossbows are legal though.

Yes. Interestingly, archery supplies, particularly crossbows went out out of stock very quickly at the beginning of lockdown.

With all the lunatics undermining, disbanding and defunding the police in the U.S., I’d but guns and ammo as well.

They would have been surrendered to “the authorities” long ago. And the snitches would have been having a marvellous time reporting owners to the SS, er, The Plod.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/31/herd-immunity-long-term-solution-covid-19-has-become-taboo-says/


‘Taboo’ herd immunity the only long-term solution to Covid-19, says expert

We know. Ask Sweden :o))

Police officer injured in mass street brawl after force called to break up 200-strong Eid street party in Ilford

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8581617/Police-officer-injured-mass-street-brawl-Eid-party-Ilford.html

Yaaaaahhhsss go London

Just to put this in context. Eid is a celebration, supposed to be a time for family and reflection and to give thanks. Imagine having the police come in to break up Christmas dinner. Imagine how you’d feel, and then how you’d resent having to feel that on that particular day

The violence broke out AFTER the police interfered.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/08/01/police-clash-youths-eid-celebrations-frustration-mounts-new/

Blame the curtain twitchers.

“While we appreciate this is a time of excitement and celebration for some, the sight and sound of such a large group was concerning and even distressing for others.”

Yeah, well, the sight, sound and smell of my neighbours’ barbecue distresses me, but I don,t call the police to break it up.

Blame the curtain twitchers …

Who quickly metamorphosed into snitchers.

One good thing to come out of this whole sorry mess is the fact that it is highlighting businesses that are the absolute pits when it comes to how they treat their customers.

Birds bakery, by first refusing to serve a ninety four year old who only had cash, and then by firing a member of staff who helped elderly people to get some food, have demonstrated to any decent person just how hard hearted, utterly disgraceful and indeed completely unacceptable their actions are.

I normally wouldn’t wish any business to go under in these horrible times but in the case of Birds I will make an exception. In fact, I would go further.and say that anyone who shops in these establishments and who is aware of their disgusting behaviour is just like Birds themselves—beneath contempt!

Yep, ‘Boycott Birds’

I used to buy Birds cakes occasionally. Never again.

Pluck Birds!

Un-pheasant Pluckers

Well said. We ate there and bought our packed lunches there during a holiday in Derby last year. Never again.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/87812

How Did Sweden Flatten Its Curve Without a Lockdown?

Smorgasbord,

Today’s update and news links give me hope. Incredulous MPs aghast at the Manchester lockdown, quite a number of anti-lockdown sentiment pieces in MSM. Anyone else feeling a turning point?

Definitely.

Yep, just a couple of anecdotes from a plague town here in Manchester.

Had our bathroom ripped out on Monday after a long wait. Plumber’s wife is in ‘at risk’ category so thought I would get a phone call from him postponing further work.No, he tipped up at 8, fully masked and carried on. Me ‘didn’t expect to see you today’ Him ‘it’s all a load of bollox, it’s all about Eid!’

Close friend and hysterical covid nut ‘well, we’re still going to look after grand kids while mother at work’

Not much but…..

Good stuff. May be invite the plumber to take his mask off if you haven’t already. He might be wearing to be polite to you.

Had that conversation….

Off to my granddaughters 2nd birthday party today with all of her relatives and grandparents. Ignore the bed wetters and get on with your life. Lots of Tory MP’s from the North are starting to put pressure on Hancock and Co. E-mail them and tell them your thoughts. I feel we’ve reached a tipping point, it’s time to fight back before we’re all living on benefits.

I feel a lot better today Mike after reading posts like yours I did email my local MP (and member of 1922 Committee) a few weeks ago with some…..facts and figures. No reply I’m afraid

They don’t work for us anymore, T. Prince.

It’s a lot.
It’s defiance of tyranny and oppression.
It’s caring fir your family.
It’s the right thing to do.

In the local shop this morning (5 in there, all non-masked) the owner was not a happy man. Somebody had asked him if he was more likely to give them the virus as he wasn’t English? His comments on blo**y propaganda and brainwashing were not suitable for any lady to hear. He has relatives in Manchester and said their feeling was that Boris was doing it just because he could and he needs to watch it if he starts to mess with Mancunians.

Never fear- we ladies love swearies!

I hope so but we seem to keep having false dawns before it’s snatched away again.

The MPs to date have been a disgrace how they will expect votes again I don’t know. They need to wake up look at the stats and get campaigning for normality and get us out of this nightmare of incompetence.

Couldn’t agree more. MPs have abdicated all responsibility of representing the people. I dare say there are millions in England who are against lockdowns and masks and yet there is a complete absence of MPs raising any of the logical questions all of us are asking on forums like these.

It’s an absolute disgrace.

Thank you for saying this…I was starting to think it was only me thinking this!

Hancock and Boris are getting away with this bllx because Parliament is on recess, they are not being held up to scrutiny by the MPs.

This being different to before the recess started in what way, exactly?

Not in my neck of the woods sadly.

Yep. I do.

“ The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.”

MPs will be bought to heel, the rest of us ignored

Not sure about a turning point. Anyway, two anecdotes from this morning. Young boy about 7, pulls his mask down and away from his face and coughs! You (dear reader) and I know that he’s highly unlikely to be infected so it doesn’t matter. But for the mask zealots, (a) at under 11 he isn’t supposed to be wearing one (b) I thought the main “benefit” was to capture droplets from coughs and sneezes (c) probably the discomfort of the mask was what made him cough.
So, mask zealots, what is the point? Johnson, Hancock, Whitty, you bunch of knobheads, WHAT is the BLOODY POINT?
On to Sainsbury’s. Waved in with my magic card (OK, I know I’m conceding to the government by using it). Staff about 50% masked, customers nearly all except for me, a young man and woman (not together), and an old fat geezer with mask hanging off one ear, a bit ironic since he’ll be doubly vulnerable.

Doubly vulnerable. Well he would be if there was any virus left!

Yes, just relatively more vulnerable.

The protests happening in Berlin right now will hopefully spread across the world.

it’s what we should do – get out from behind our keyboards and go tell them down whitehall … ooohh i forgot the useless MPs having not been in parliament for several months are now on the Algarve on their holidays.

Yep. If the Tory Red Wall MPs are waking up then it can only be A Good Thing! They should begin the pushback in Parliament.

Maybe in time they could break away and form a genuine populist party that works for the interests of the people.

Yep the Lockdown train has ploughed into the reality buffers. Many casualties.

Herd Immunity May Be Developing in Mumbai’s Poorest Areas
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-07-29/herd-immunity-seems-to-be-developing-in-mumbai-s-poorest-areas?cmpid=BBD080120_WKND&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_term=200801&utm_campaign=weekendreading

Around six in ten people living in some of India’s biggest slums have antibodies for the novel coronavirus indicating they’ve recovered from infection, in what could be one of the highest population immunity levels known worldwide.
The findings, from a July serological survey of 6,936 people across three suburbs in India’s financial center of Mumbai, may explain why a steep drop in infections is being seen among the closely-packed population, despite new cases accelerating overall in the hard-hit country.
“Mumbai’s slums may have reached herd immunity,” said Jayaprakash Muliyil, chairman of the Scientific Advisory Committee of India’s National Institute of Epidemiology, and the retired head of one of its premier medical colleges. “If people in Mumbai want a safe place to avoid infection, they should probably go there.”

New Delhi StudyGrowing immunity may also be behind the dip in cases in the capital city of New Delhi, said Muliyil, where a study in early July found that a quarter of the population had been exposed.
Epidemiologists generally believe that infection levels must reach 60% to create herd immunity. But exposure concentrated in the populations least able to socially distance, like slums, could still slow the overall spread of infection if those who’ve been better able to protect themselves continue to do so.

In Mumbai overall, new cases dropped to the lowest tally in almost three months this week, although the July antibody survey found only 16% had been exposed to the virus among those living in places where social distancing is more feasible, like apartment buildings and houses.
Hospitalizations seem to be going down in both of India’s hardest hit major cities, another indication their outbreaks may be easing.

Both Pakistan and Afghanistan seem to be close to herd immunity at least in urban areas, according to statistics and charts I’ve seen in the last couple of weeks (can’t remember the links, at least one was on Ivor Cummins’ Twitter page I think).

Both nations basically couldn’t afford a full lockdown even in the short term. The figures for Pakistan are apparently quite different (with less cases now) than in the neighbouring Indian states, so it’s not just a regional/climate thing (though it’s probably also due to different reporting and testing systems)

REPOST originally from peter t

-live (I think) protests from Berlin

demonstrating in Berlin against the pseudo -medical police state .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6B7MoFME5zc

This is VERY ENCOURAGING.

The line goes on for miles. There’s potentially thousands of them!

yes it is awesome!

wow, that`s wonderful. Wish we could have us a protest like that here.

If only we had something like that.

We would if we could be bothered!

Thanks. Looks large and very good natured. Have shared onwards.

I feel uplifted watching this!

(was originally posted by peter t on the last article)

Thanks Peter t. It is a powerful thing watching others standing so positively for a cause we know is right. Perhaps why the msm are *afraid* to show reports from events like it. It looks very large. Uplifting as you say!

Germany does have an advantage over us – no BBC! – I do wonder if the life of your first born is how far our “Government” needs to push to get a normal human reaction from us all. The sad swallowing of all of the Covid 19 rules/new normal etc hook line and sinker from most of the population is very worrying. We KNOW that governments have lied shamelessly in the past – WMD’s,cash for questions,expenses scandals and the other years Skripal “poisoning” not forgetting the shooting of Jo Cox and the subsequent whupping very quickly into prison of the man responsible. In short politicians have been shown to be proven liars over the last 30 years so why would they be believed totally now? Sorry rant over, just despair at the naive UK public.

cheer yourself up and watch the protest!

there are thousands there!

Dare I say hundreds of thousands?! There is no end to the people… high tens of thousands at the very least.

I think so!

RT are also broadcasting LIVE the protest in Berlin:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=x9_inV7Gy7U

there are LOADS of people there!

when the camera pans you can see how many people are there!

lady at the front with ‘for our freedom’ sign (and same in German)

There seems to be a lot more organised dissent and scepticism in Germany. There’s also a group forming a legal challenge to their Government’s response to the crisis, a bit like Simon Dolan’s but with a lot more support and funding.
It’s a pity the language barrier means that (unlike events in the US, Australia etc.) most people in the UK aren’t really aware of it.

Don’t know if this is going to get reported in the UK media, but with those numbers it will be very hard to present it convincingly as a fringe group of nutters and conspiracy theorists – though I’m sure the BBC will do their best!

Just heard it mentioned on the 5Live hourly news bulletin. All they said was the protesters weren’t wearing masks or social distancing!

How refreshing to see. Can’t see anything like that happening here. If it did, it’d be swiftly shut down by PC Peter Pisspot and his chums.

It will probably come as a big surprise to many Brits to see Germans giving an example on how to stand up for liberty.

and what a sight it is!

Not really a big surprise. They’ve been had once, so they know the script and are extra diligent as a result. Generally speaking.

Magnificent!

The MSM here in Germany are reporting on it in full-on propaganda mode. The camera lingers on the three skinheads who have turned up to imply that the demonstrators are all neo-nazis, the lack of masks and antisocial distancing is criticised, and the remaining news bulletins cover tiny demonstrations for woke causes in nowhere places in excruciating detail. Where masks were worn etc.

My recent decision in terms of living life within our new country’s increasingly corporatesque constrictions and regulations consists of…

* shopping in local independent shops and markets as much as possible
* going mask-less or if detect abuse nearby or I’m out with young daughter, wear a visor
* limiting purchases from Amazon. I am not enriching one megalomaniac’s pockets, when I can share with smaller businesses
* join or donate to free speech union and don’t take liberty and free speech for granted
* get my meditation practice going again and look outside to nature for inspiration of how human life should be lived; with freedom and peace

Excellent rules – and there are plenty of on-line options other than Amazon. I’ve bought my daughter books from Wordery recently, for example.

If you want some sanity – come to North Wales for a break. I travelled from North-East Wales to the north coast yesterday. Hundreds of families enjoying the vast swathes of sand, and I did not see a single mask all afternoon! And we don’t have obligatory masks in shops.

How long this will last, I don’t know, but enjoy it while you can!

Inspiring set of rules – thank you for sharing.

Hive is a good alternative for books and you can nominate an independent bookshop which gets a cut of online transactions.

You are doing absolutely the right thing. I’ve made some big changes already to live my life as freely as possible. No tv and definitely no paying a tv licence. Shopping as little as possible, preferably as you say in small shops and markets, realising that the things I used to do like eating out, pubs, going to cinemas and museums, and travel on public transport, are going to be severely restricted because I refuse point blank to wear a dehumanising mask or give my details to these places. I’m concentrating on hobbies, gardening, visiting quiet places in nature, learning, and keeping a sense of self and sovereignty. Most people I know are still suffering with corona hysteria, so I’m staying away from them too, for a while. I’m stepping away from all the evil and madness being bestowed on us right now, and living my life as I always have, as a free human being.

A fine set of rules to live by. I too have made changes. I refuse to wear a face nappy, so am using local shops ( which I did before anyway) as much as possible, now having our milk delivered in glass bottles too . Should have gone back to that years ago really, but it is very satisfying not collecting all the plastic for recycling and knowing you’re helping a local small business at the same time.

Good advice although given where I live local independent stores and markets are non-existent. However some people here might sense and opportunity to make a go at opening stores and setting up markets.

Come into town, overall very quiet for the time of year. Went to the pub, normally busy for lunches, dead quiet, maybe ten people in the whole place.
Boris is shutting the country down.
The town is terrible with dozens of empty shops. I live in Cornwall the main shopping town and it’s dire despite apparently hundreds of thousands of tourists.
Do him and the cock have any idea what they are doing?
M and S nearly everyone in a mask apart from me and the staff!!!
Craziest thing is the ten percent wearing masks when not in shops. Baaaaaaa !!!!

Glad there’s someone else from down here on the forum – I’m a few miles just across the border into Devon. I guess you were in the capital of Cornwall?

It’s been disheartening to see muzzle-wearing here at almost 100%. Looks as if our Northern brethren are in the vanguard of the fight against this.

Charity shop capital as its becoming! Worst I have seen Truro in 50 years. Unless Boris wakes up by the time he realises we are not all going to die of this we will not have an economy left. I am back into the office on Monday after months working from home but 9 percent of the staff have gone. Tip of the iceberg if him and his cock of a sidekick don’t get a grip.

Hell, I am sorry to hear that. I love getting the bus to Truro for shopping, across the wonderful countryside. The cafes, the independent shops as well as the chains, now a ghost town it seems.

Foreskin of a sidekick, purely there for cosmetic purposes…

I wonder if the tourist parts of Cornwall will catch up enough trade now to last the winter.

I doubt that Truro is atypical of almost every other city in England. And Boris must know this, but doesn’t appear to care.

I’m not sure we are any better up here – I’m in Sheffield and in Sainsbury’s yesterday I was the only shopper not masked up. All the staff were too apart from a few on the checkouts. It was pretty depressing really.

Well it seems that the people of Keighley are doing us proud. See McNamara’s post of about 17:10.

The 10% wearing masks outside of the shops are the hardcore true believers. Nothing can be done to win them over.

It seems that everybody else is either coerced by threat of a fine/not wanting to be seen to be breaking the law or whipped into line by peer pressure. If we can increase our numbers even slightly, and continue to act normally, I’m sure we can win over many of those who just go along with it all for an ‘easy life’. After all, the more confusing the ‘rules’ become, the less ‘easy’ life becomes trying to follow them all!

from above, Raj Bhopal, emeritus Professor of Public Health at Edinburgh University;

” Prof Bhopal argues that even if a vaccine is found it may not work well for older people and those with underlying health conditions…”

erm…. so any new vaccine may work on people who are not particularly vulnerable to the nasty cough but may not work on people who are vulnerable to the cough…

Yes, but there is that ‘may’ again (just can’t avoid those Mays, can one – and now there is to be a Sir to boot). It may never be found; it may be useless; it may turn everyone who takes it into a genius-level, very long-lived, exceptional athlete. Of course it ‘may’ not do any of those things!

so the vaccine may be a damp squib

Or, simply, never found!

inject the sheeple anyway, (may) release them from their fear

SARS-CoV-2 is a Coronavirus. So is the Common Cold. There will never be a vaccine for the Common Cold; why should COVID-19 be any different?

It won’t be.

You may be right.

Possibly.

But we’re all supposed to rush out and have it to protect the vulnerable, apparently.
This is the angle they’re gonna go for.

And I say fuck that, because I don’t come into contact with anyone over 70 on a daily basis and I’m very unlikely to. Neither do I work with old dudes. So no thanks, I shall be protecting myself first from big pharma negligence.

What’s the age range for ‘old dudes’?

Presumably what it is for the flu vaccine

Oh you mean personally?

Those who have very increased chance of dying from it. 70+

Meanwhile, Raj Bhopal, emeritus Professor of Public Health at Edinburgh University, says it’s time to reconsider herd immunity as the only long-term solution to COVID-19.

Err…. I thought we already had herd immunity. At least, that’s what many of your cited experts have been saying. Professor Sunetra Gupta (Oxford) was suggesting we might have been close to herd immunity back in March. This was always complete nonsense.

We are nowhere near herd immunity

While I accept prior T cell immunity is a ‘small’ factor, it’s not a credible explanation for the fact that none of my friends, acquaintances, family or neighbours have contracted the virus yet large clusters continue to pop up around the country. The likely reason is that large swathes of the country have not been exposed – yet.

Was the “surge” in cases in the North West that prompted the Government to impose a local lockdown on more than four million people due to 14 additional people testing positive? It certainly looks that way.

Partly – but there is a trend. The “positivity” rate for the most recent 2 week period (July 13th to July 26th) is 0.09%. I assume this is consistent with the overall pillar 2 tests which also show an increase.

On the plus side it’s possible that many of those tested are only experiencing mild symptoms. If that’s the case a herd immunity policy for the next few months (while Vitamin D levels are raised) might be a good idea.

There’s one other piece of Covid-News which upset me. According to a report in the -paywalled – Times, SAGE advisers proposed on July 2nd that the Army should be ‘on standby’ to intervene, that is: called in should violence erupt at a number of possible demos:
“The potential disorder could be on a greater scale than the summer riots that spread across England in 2011, massively increasing the threat to public health from coronavirus , it said.” ( https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/coronavirus-raves-and-protests-may-need-army-advisers-warn-jsbk5svn5 )

That they can even think of such contingency, never mind actually proposing it, should send shudders down everyone’s spine – especially since Johnson is utterly in thrall to SAGE.

I’m so confused over the stats. There’s ONS, NHS, DHSC, PHE…R rates, positive tests, cases, suspected cases, hospital admissions, deaths in hospitals, home, care homes.
I genuinely have no idea whether no people are sick or dying, dozens, hundreds, thousands.
I get that you can select stats to prove whatever point you want, but has anyone got a grip on what is closest to the actual truth please? I need to have some “go to” sources to send people to so I can convince more people to our side!

My favourite analysis site is inproportion2.talkingy.com. The most reliable (and internationally comparible) indicator is probably ONS all-cause mortality.

That as well

http://inproportion2.talkigy.com/

OK. It is initially confusing. But the fog clears after a bit of excavation to reveal some simple principles.

1. ‘Cases’ means f. all – they are simply the output mainly of highly questionable PCR tests that have a very loose relationship to actual disease. The test are measuring fragments of RNA – not illness.
2. There are consistent data available, even allowing for the dodgy ‘Covid’ definitions The Oxford CEBM site provides reliable death and hospital admission data as regularly updated tracking. They also publish interesting articles on aspects of what they show clearly to be not-an-epidemic.
3. In terms of official data (given the fact that any figures mentioning ‘Covid-19’ numbers are simply guess work because of the destruction of proper death registration procedures), the ONS weekly ‘all-cause’ mortality figures do give you a clear picture of what is happening. Epidemic anomalies show up in these figures, and they are what most of us use to get a handle on the situation in historical terms.
4. The ‘Swiss Doctor” site is probably the best of a a number of reliable sources for good information kept out of the media. It is a collecting point for well-referenced information :

https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/

The ONS do random(-ish) surveys of households and can probably be trusted the most.

Any result that tells you number of positives without telling you the number of tests and whom they tested (was it random, or anyone who turned up, or anyone in hopsital etc.) is literally meaningless.

I’m not as skeptical about PCR tests as some here– I think they work with about 70% sensitivity and 95% specificity at finding SARS2 and that SARS2 does cause Covid-19. But with prevalence as low as it is now is that makes them practically useless– how you do you find the <1% of real cases out of 5% false positives?

R is about 1 and will be forever and we should not be surprised by this. We have no way of measuring it or even estimating it that is more accurate than the a priori assumption that it’s about 1.

The most reliable thing to look at for a quick check of what’s going on is deaths on Worldometers (bearing in mind that people take a few weeks to die). That data’s far from perfect too but is the best we have.

Guy, thanks for the clarity of your posts. I asked a similar question on the last page, but then we switched to here, so will ask again in case anyone, like me, is confused by the positives. Which of the tests can tell the difference between Covid-19 and any other coronavirus (as in a cold)?

A well designed PCR test (and I have designed hundreds) will be selective for just the sequence you are looking for, and should certainly not pick up other coronoviruses.

That said they are not perfect. PHE estimates specificity at 99.9% (i.e. 1:1,000 false positives), which I think is reasonble (or at least feasible). I think it is much closer to that than the 95% cited above. If it were 95% then there would have been 10,350 positives yesterday out of the 207,000 pillar 1 & 2 tests. There were 880; a 99.9% specificity would mean around 200 were false positives.
(note the bizzare local lockdown decisions are based on opinion-poll like modelling of results from much smaller numbers of tests carried out on behalf of the ONS).

The PCR tests are looking directly for genes that are known to be unique to SARS2 out of all known coronaviruses so I would not expect that to be a big source of false positives.

But I did read somewhere about the WHO relaxing their criteria for how many genes to match on, but I can’t find it now. I still doubt that this is the biggest source of false positives with the PCR test (which is low, it’s just that with prevalence so low it needs to be really low to get meaningful results).

The best site for a clear, concise analysis of the facts all in one place is Swiss Policy Research:

https://swprs.org/

They’ve just added an August update. This is the site that the governments don’t want you to see.

The ONS weekly spreadshhet is probably the most reliable, there is an additional page that compare the ONS and NHS England stats. https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/weeklyprovisionalfiguresondeathsregisteredinenglandandwales

PS basic charts of the ONS stats
http://djclark.co.uk/WuFluPanic.html

My problem with the ONS is that they will count any death where SARS-CoV2 is mentioned on the death certificate, irrespective of whether that is the cause of death.
There is also the problem that excess deaths will be reported as being “as a result of SARS-CoV2”, rather than the more probable cause of health service shutdown.

Don’t be.(Practically) nobody is dying. (Practically) nobody is being hospitalised.

It’s all good.

Used to be Hector Drummond blog but he’s taking a break.

Now … I don’t have the figures in front of me, but I think that the statement : “ young people are no more likely to die of COVID-19 than they are of seasonal flu.” is too favourable to the government narrative.

I think that for the younger age-groups, deaths from Covid are less than for seasonal ‘flu.

yes, that is what I understood as well.

Yup. That’s why it’s a common cold not the flu which would be worse.

Yes, there is a stark contrast with the Asian flu epidemic of 1957/8 where several thousand children and young people died.

One of the barbers in the town getting their knickers in a twist:

We at the Barber Shop Co. are not carrying out in front of face services including shaves and beard trims.
There is no grey area on the government website which says it is illegal to carry out services in the Highest risk zone which is described as ;
The area in front of the face where splashes and droplets from the nose and mouth may be present, which can pose a hazard.
Perhaps it may be possible, for all our sakes, that an official voice can Engage, Explain and Encourage shops that are not following this national government regulation, to do so before Enforcement is actioned.
It is frustrating and actually alarming, in respect of our local health and not least our economy, that most of the barbers in our town follow the regulations yet others blatantly ignore them.

Again, I despair …

I was watching a Stephen King short yesterday. 2 Folks visiting an area of London where the barrier between ‘dimensions’ had worn thin and leakages kept occurring to, and from, the dark dimensions. It seems that these ‘worn’ patches have spread to include most of Britain (and, indeed, most other countries as well).

I hate the fact that they have presented this as doing it for *everybody’s* sake. They sure as hell aren’t doing it for mine. And the absolute pomposity is breath-taking.

As I said to my wife,no explanation is too far fetched or outlandish anymore.

There is no grey area

There is on my beard…

Barbers and hairdressers are becoming the biggest covid freaks,I thought dentists were bad enough.I watched two elderly gents going into a barbers a couple of weeks ago,it was more like they were going to work at Sellafield.
If the country had been full of the wimps we have now in the summer of 1940,they would have all been on the south coast waving little nazi flags.

And, they appear to be enjoying it. There’s absolutely no regret at having to enforce these stupid rules. The WhatsApp thread is awash with snidey, “we’ll show those pesky disease-ridden customers whose boss” type of stuff. It’s really galling. I hope they see a massive downturn in trade and that those flouting the rules clean up.

Yes, referring to ‘others’ is a give away isn’t it, he’s losing trade for sure!

Close second to dentists
Snivelling, cowardly little turds

My hairdresser, a young mum of three, is superb. The salon says she has to wear a visor but she wears no other PPE and doesn’t require customers to wear any either.

A d you are all still alive a pnd well?
Has anybody noticed this?

Either deal with beards or shut down.

GROW SOME BALLS

Can they shave those?

Lol, clearly angry because he’s losing trade to more sensible barbers who provide what customers want.

Probably just terrified of the local EHOs.

I’ve walked past several hairdressers over the last fortnight or so and its bizarre how many of them look like they’re carrying out open heart surgery not cutting or colouring customers’ hair.

Trouble is many people are desperate for that hair cut or colour so they put up with any insanity the hairdressers are prepared to throw at them. You can bet that if they’re told that they should wear a colander on top of their heads they would do it!

As for me. I’ve bought a pair of hair cutting scissors and will be cutting my own hair from now on. No more hairdressers for me.

Another excellent Lockdown Skeptics, thank you Toby for keeping me sane.

Now Chris Whitty talks as if he, not Boris, is Prime Minister, dictating that lockdown cannot be eased and Boris dares not squeak a word of his own in front of him.

This is the same Chris Whitty who knew the infection rate was falling when we entered lockdown in March and, 2 weeks later, knew that the effects of lockdown (lockdown, not the virus) could result in 200 000 deaths (according the report Toby unearthed).

Knowing that, Chris Whitty is campaigning to make those deaths a reality by extending the unnecessary lockdown.

It looks to me that no only should he be sacked, struck off and barred from any public role, but that a serious enquiry with serious consequences is needed. Its because he, and similar sage members, are unaccountable, unelected and incredibly arrogant that they can get away with it. This needs to change.

He must have been offered a knighthood.

Looks like he could do with a night out.

Oh I’d love to know what bribes these bitches have been offered to stay on the leash. Research funding until they retire I presume.

It’s because the politicians have practically no scientific or medical background among them, so these charlatan ‘medical advisors’ just say whatever they think will give them the most publicity and the politicians say, ‘Yes, no problem guv’.

I am itching to read about dozens of class action lawsuits flooding the courts in the coming weeks and months.

I’m not sure Whitty is so arrogant. He’s often looked very uncomfortable while delivering the party line and sometimes let the truth slip out.
It’s very possible there’s some sort of blackmail being employed and not just in his case. Big Pharma excel at that sort of pressure.
Threat to family – easy.

He’s been a huge disappointment. Vallance looks like he’s the one holding the pistol pointed at Johnson’s back (those dead eyes are really beginning to bother me, especially when they’re above a mask) but I’ve been half expecting Whitty to break ranks for months now. But… no dice. Jenny Harries is a little better, but it’s marginal. The medics, to be fair, have been fairly consistently at least ever so slightly better than the ‘scientists’. Still far from good enough.

Pharma=Medical Mafia. Legalized Drug Pushers.

Must have been offered cash in several brown envelopes.

That’s the sort of thing that happens in Third World countries.

How many of you are using the forums? We have so many great discussions, with some really knowledgeable info shared, and then it vanishes with each day’s update. Would it be a good idea on stuff where we are taking action, writing letters, etc to put it in the forum (or copy it to the forum), then we can find it again?

I’ve woken up this morning and I don’t think I’ve ever been so livid, not in the headless chicken kind of way, but cold hard anger, somebody needs to go to prison for this absolute travesty. We are destroying our country and civil society, we’re hurting children, the old and frail, causing widespread poverty, and the level of interference in our private lives has just got to stop.

I am the boss of me, I’m in charge of my life, my freedoms are inalienable, not in the gift of this shower of sh*t.

Even her Majesty’s Opposition don’t oppose, that’s their job, to the be the brake, they are as invested in a second wave as the rest of the arse covering b@stards.

F**k them.

From what I’m reading GPs, schools, HSE, Environmental Health, Local Authorities, retailers etc are all over reaching, are not risk assessing properly, not upholding Public Sector Equality Duty, are not equality impact assessing stuff properly, and we are living in chaos. How dare my GP refuse to give my elderly dad and his rapidly accelerating memory loss no care?

There are some extremely bright people here, who now know a lot, would the forums be a better way of organising our thoughts on specific topics?

Bec

Indeed; I still glance at forums, but the contributions are so numerous these days I can’t follow and don’t contribute.

Thematic organisation would be positive.

I did make an attempt to use the forums here a few weeks ago, along with the Lockdown Truth one https://www.lockdowntruth.org/forum but neither of them have really gained “critical mass” so I’ve gone back to posting here where most of the activity is.

Yes Lockdown Sceptics has its own forums, just thinking for topics where we are taking action, or there is info we need to refer to again, it would be easier to find stuff there?

It would.
Topics we’re taking action on sure.

I’d also find it very useful to have sections for many areas – an improved version of the ‘contents’ section Toby has here.

Beyond said contents section, information being spread across daily entires from Toby. They’re a great read. He’s done so much work collating. If only it could be pulled together – in a site section or in forums contributors can add to.

Sections such as…

Statistcs – (various sections) Toby references numerous, and contributors have sent many over the years.

Science – studies of mask wearing; studies/stats regarding immunisation/treatment SARS-CoV-2 & postive-sense single-stranded RNA viruses (a little science doesn’t go amiss when making a point).

Protests – (reports, planned, or individual etc)

Media – e.g. videos from doctors (I see one posted)

etc.

Though as the forums are so busy, none of us will read this or do anything….says hole-in-my-bucket-Henry.

I also wonder of the value of folk all using twitter, or do people select a different anonymity level here so would be concerned to?

Only it might be somewhat easier to follow and more use having the discussion in public where some of the excellent comments might go viral.

That said, Toby does attract a surprising number Trolls, so we might inherrit their vile outpourings.

I’m slow today – see whatyou mean. I hadn’t even realised there were forums here. Maybe

Could Toby highlight using them it in an article?

I tried searching (search at top of this page) to see what conversation was had on here about Dr Bobo Schiffman in view of his video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZocneYh4Mw

The search on this site returns nothing, yet a google search returns a link to someone mentioning it on 30th July. I realise now it was in the forums….
https://forums.lockdownsceptics.org/viewtopic.php?t=11

Spot on.

Agree with everything you’ve said 100%.

A thread on the forums of sample letters to MPs, shops etc would be good – people are posting great ones here but it would be good to have them all in one place so they are easier to find!

Has anyone any positive experiences of opticians? Name any good ones high street ones if there are any. I need new specs in a hurry! Thanks

ME TOO. And I still haven’t worked up the balls (or the time off) to go…..

Specsavers Lewes (sorta local) we’re good with eye test and spec selection.

did they muzzle and distance you?

I just sent this to Sir Graham Brady (I’ve emailed about three or four times since lockdown but never received a response)

Dear Sir Graham,

This is now the third or fourth time that I have emailed you as chair of the 1922 Committee with respect to the unnecessary lockdown that this country has experienced since March.

Imagine my dismay, when I awoke yesterday morning where I live near Keighley, to hear that Matt Hancock had disrespectfully Twittered that the North West was going to be locked down again because of an apparent surge in covid19 cases. Aside from the fact that announcing this on Twitter with three hours notice on the eve of Eid, among other things, shows a great deal of contempt for the people living in the area, the reason for this local lockdown is completely unfounded.

If tests increase, cases increase, but deaths are going down or are virtually zero and this is a good thing and ought to be celebrated. Instead, we have more fear mongering.

Besides, it would appear from ONS data that there have been very few extra cases over a six week period. There is no surge or spike or second wave in the North West, it simply does not exist!

The government overreach, nannying, control, power and fear mongering being exerted at the moment by Boris Johnson and his cabinet and so called ‘expert’ medical advisers is simply unacceptable and I respectfully urge you to exert whatever influence you have to end this madness now before the economy is completely destroyed and before any more people die from the lockdown policies.

I just implore you to do something about this situation that is being worsened by the bias of the mainstream media.

There is still such a thing as right and wrong and implementing further restrictions on the North West is simply wrong and ought to be reversed with immediate effect.

How is it that in the space of a few short months it now seems acceptable for the government to tell us what to do, who we should meet, how we should meet, who we can or cannot have in our own homes, how we can work, how we can travel, how our children can be schooled, how our health can be cared for, what we should do in places of worship and, more recently, what we should wear???

I respectfully ask you how has it come to this for a virus that by Chris Whitty’s and Boris Johnson’s own admission is mild and most people recover from? How? It is nothing short of despicable behaviour.

Yours faithfully,

What’s his email address? I want to write to him too. Well done.

altsale@parliament.uk

Thanks, done!

Great email!

Superb stuff. Could also include what e should eat, wear we can holiday and how we should travel about.

“Another senior Tory, with an affected northern seat, said: “I just think there remains a default position of extreme caution which jars with the reality that we may have to live with Covid for a very long time and we have to get on with life.””

A welcome glimmer of dawning sanity in at least one of our Morons of Parliament, at last.

I’m a frog and I’m being boiled!

At least you’re aware of the fact and looking for a way out.

hello

You know how ‘lockdown’ has killed 21,000 people, probably more? It’s funny, but I can’t find any reference to it on the BBC:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/coronavirus

Maybe it’s buried somewhere on their website, or maybe they didn’t report this outrage at all.

At least The Telegraph reported it:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/29/lockdown-has-killed-21000-people-say-experts/?utm_content=telegraph&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=Echobox&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1596228338

Can anyone find it on the BBC website?

did they ever report on the 200,000 possible lockdown deaths story?

I remember them getting in there with the 30,000 possible cancer deaths or whatever it was a few weeks back. Didn’t last long though.

posted previously by Nobody2020….

what could this mean?….

Banging on about how awful it was in Waitrose or how mad people are to wear a mask in a car on their own isn’t going to win anyone around to the sceptic view. Likewise, no matter how many heart rending stories about old people dying alone are recounted this is all just anecdote and of no real value in persuading the people that we’ve got to learn to live with the virus and not try and eliminate all trace of it before we creep out from behind the sofa.
Polls suggest only about 1 in 10 people are lockdown sceptics, our task is surely to convert more to the cause, preaching to the converted, I’m afraid, butters no parsnips! You need to get out there and push the key arguments for why the government is on a fools errand.
The key arguments are:
1.      Infections peaked in advance of the lockdown.
2.      No where in the world has there been exponential growth in either cases or deaths beyond the first few weeks.
3.      The UK has had the world’s 2nd highest number of deaths per head of population (2nd to Belgium). It’s hard to imagine that we would have had a spectacularly worse result without a lockdown. Various countries haven’t had a lockdown (Sweden, Belarus, Japan) & they’ve had fewer deaths than the UK, this suggests that the lockdown didn’t save many lives, they were lost anyway.
4.      Household in countries like; India, Brazil, great swathes of Africa and Latin America don’t have fridges or bank accounts, they have to shop daily, they live in crowded housing with poor sanitation, do we really believe that their lockdowns were more effective than ours?
5.      Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government and others find no clear correlation between stringency of lockdown and the number of infections.
6.      Recently there has apparently been an increase in positive tests but hospitalisations continue to fall.
7.      The whole government response has been a classic case of ‘mission creep’. The lockdown was initially just to ‘flatten the curve’ to save the NHS, it soon became apparent that the NHS was never threatened yet we’ve pursued a policy that is leading millions into economic misery.
8.      Recently there has apparently been an increase in positive tests but there has also been a huge increase in testing. The Government have been reluctant to tell us the rate of positive tests as a percentage of tests carried out on different individuals. It’s quite possible that the entire increase is made up of increased testing and false positives.
9.      It looks like more people are dying as a consequence of the lockdown than are being saved by the lockdown.
10.  The NHS & Government Actuaries forecast that 200,000 lives will be lost as a consequence of the lockdown of non-covid suffering people. Just suppose 20,000 lives were ‘saved’ by the lockdown that’s 10 non-covid caused by every covid life saved!
11.  It looks like the cost per life saved by the lockdown will come in at about £15m each.
12.  95% of all deaths have been of people with serious underlying health issues, it is these underlying health issues, all too often down to lifestyle choices that represent the deadly pandemic.
13.  As recently as 2017/18 there were 50,000 excess winter deaths, mainly from flu, this in an era when we had a vaccine.
14.  Adjusted for population 2020 looks like only being the 8th worse for excess deaths since 1993.
15.  Nurses, care workers, supermarket staff are not amongst the groups who have had the highest levels of infection yet they’ve worked right through the pandemic mixing with the general public and without masks in indoor settings.
16.  The average age of fatalities is the same as the average age at which people die of all causes.
Get people to question, get them to research a bit to realise for themselves that this is madness, that if we wish to have any prospect of funding the NHS into the future, of educating our children and employing our people we need to act like grown-ups and decide for ourselves what risk we’re prepared to take and not be dictated to by a bunch of out of touch politicians and scientists who’ve made such a mess of the whole business so far.

Is there really no MP or news outlet willing to ask these questions of HMG and Whitty at al? Scary if so.
What are they hiding?

Thanks Nick. Excellent summary. I’ve saved these to use later…

Great thanks. I’m skeptical about #3 though. You’d have to examine excess deaths above the 5 year average for each country to convince me that the UK has been that bad.

So what? It doesn’t matter how relatively good/bad the UK has been, the important point is do you believe it would have been any worse without a lockdown. The fact we still managed to be so apparently awful suggests anything we did or didn’t do didn’t make any difference.

Well you and I believe that but I think it’s important as it’s not what the majority of the UK population seem to. I feel like feeding the narrative that the UK has had a v high rate of deaths just fuels the belief that (i) we should have locked down harder/earlier (ii) the population is somehow to blame for doing such outrageous things as walking in the countryside (iii) we need to endure an extended lockdown and suffer a poor quality of life in order to somehow atone for the deaths and (iv) Brits are more diseased than other nationals and should not be allowed to travel abroad.
Reattributing as many of the excess deaths as possible (in the future as this is not going away) from covid-related to the true causes will only help to reassure the sheeples that the virus is not remotely as dangerous as they believe.

Most of these points are clearly the case. Only insights depending on definitions of ‘Covid’ are questionable, since these numbers are a movable feast.

The main problem, however, Nick, is that this is not going to be about rationality. We are way beyond that in the Brainwashed State, with the evil of the SAGE psy-ops sub-group the important factor.

I mean : who rationally would take anything on trust from a narcissistic Prime Minister whose sole accomplishment has been to bluster and lie his way towards his dream of power on the basis of no observable talent – except blustering, bullshitting and lying.

No – although the rationality is important, it has to be sparked by an anti-propaganda emotional appeal.

“Stay safe – trust your friends and family. Reject the Bullingdon Bully”

Rick H, yours is the counsel of despair. As soon as you go down the emotional appeal line you’re lost. The other side come back with; “but we’ve saved 450,000 lives by lockdown”, “you’re heartless and want people to die”. You have to show that the only way to save lives is end lockdown, the only way to save the economy is to end lockdown, that lockdown has killed people, continues to kill people & will kill many time more in the future. Keep it rational, forget the emotion, both sides play that game.

Problem is though Nick they’ll never believe it, why believe us conspiracy theorists over the Government that tells them the truth. Until they’re hit financially then they’ll never want change.

I agree and if some of us trusted our friends and family we’d be scuppered!

It’s not a ‘council of despair’. It’s the reality of mass psychology – long recognised as a major factor. You have to find a ‘hook’ to grab attention before you stand a prayer of getting over the facts. Anyone who has argued the rational case knows that it’s not enough on its own.

I’d change that to stay sane . Otherwise spot on.

These lockdown zealots will not be bothered by any of these points. The only time they will start to rebel against it will be when it starts to hit a large amount of these people financially.

At the moment it’s still a holiday for all these people as they’re getting furlough and bailouts. The tide will start to turn from today unless the government extends these schemes.

You’re not trying to change everyone’s mind. Act like a virus, we’re 10% at present, if everyone convinces one other person once a week then within 3 weeks we’re a majority.

Problem is that even though you tell people, they can’t comprehend that the Gov, NHS or MSM aren’t telling them the truth. These points are too complex for them to understand, so it has to be something such as money as that’s simple enough for everyone to understand.

exactly! people like my parents who trust the government has their best interests at heart and believe that radio 4 is the ultimate source of truth.

Also, I don’t think it can be 10% it’s more than likely 50/50 but too many of the 50% are ashamed to show it as everything is being made to look as though lockdown is the right thing to be doing.

That’s why it’s important to set the example of old normal, even by something as seemingly small as going maskless.

I half admire your optimism. Except it falls apart, given that we’re already 4 months into this – and people are wearing masks.

I’ve been spreading the word at every opportunity in that time.

I share the sentiment, but reason and arguments rarely change people’s minds.

I would favour starting a campaign to get Imperial College to sack Neil Ferguson on the grounds of incompetence, deceit and generally harming the public good.

The woke movement use public outrage to great effect, and they’re definitely not more than 10% of the population.

Anyone know how to start a Twitter firestorm?

No point. There are not enough non woke people on Twitter to light a candle never mind a fire storm. There’s a reason twitter outrage mobs always come from the woke left.

We don’t need more sceptics.
We just need more people to ignore the rules.
Most people- honestly- just need a little push to start doing so because they recognise the rules are now redonkulous.
The zealots are lost causes, don’t bother with them.
BUT you don’t need to create a sceptic (or coax one out of their
shell) in order to have influence.
In fact in a way argument is a bit redundant at this point.
Just act normally.
Just act normally.
Just act normally. (As far as poss)
The more people see you ignoring the rules and being uNbothered, the more it will spread. As Anna Brees said the other day “Like a good virus”.

Bang on! That’s our view at the moment. Model normal behaviour, give people permission to be normal. (That’s assuming we’re anything like normal )

You hit it. ACT NORMALLY.
That’s what most ordinary people want. I see lots of them in my tourist job and I’m certain of it.
The zombies have held the stage for far, far too long, but the act has been repeated so often that boredom has to set in soon.
Let’s ramp up the fearless!

Yes this is definitely the case, the majority want to be normal, it’s only a small hardcore who WANT to go along with the ‘new normal’.

I was in Prague recently, and sat in the lobby of the hotel I saw quite a few groups of (mainly French/German) tourists arriving to check in wearing masks. When the receptionist informed them that masks were not necessary, they happily took them off and I didn’t see any of them with them back on during my stay!

Excellent point excellently put
I don’t think polls are correct anyway, because there seems to be a disconnect between what people say when polled and what they actually do. Far more are quite happy to do what they have to do (and even what they want to do) and the authorities be damned, while still pretending to be good little lockdown zombies when asked.

I think the pollsters might possibly bother to actually ask the questions but they publish the results they want. Who can prove them wrong?

Remove any signs you can from floors and especially posts while out walking in the countryside!

I think we need to mix & match rational and emotional arguments. In Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, after Caesar’s murder Brutus appeals to the crowd using rational arguments but Mark Antony appeals to the their emotions, and the latter approach wins the crowd over.

I prefer simple action.
But yes if you must engage, do so IN PERSON and don’t get too emotional lol
I tend to go in with a cheeky eye roll like a kid in the dinner queue. If they eye roll back you know you can engage with the logic.
Honestly though. Action. Your behaviour and how they react to it is the best barometer. (I’ve seen enough people remove masks as soon ss they see someone else not getting shit for not wearing one).

Stalin knew a thing or 2 about this, he said “a single death is a tragedy, 1 million deaths is a statistic.”

Appreciate that list Nick! Helpful to have a concise summary to discuss….compared to the massive scream I want to unleash instead

I don’t believe the polls. Only 1 in 10 a sceptic? More like about 70% of the population.

Great summary. Have copied it into a word document.

What is the Poll question? How is it framed?

Nick I agree with all of your points and have used many myself in my efforts to convert the non-sceptics. But even without becoming emotional, I find that they just want to shut you down, tell you that you are wrong, or they don’t believe you. Then they revert to the accepted groupthink narrative – lockdown should have been harder, earlier, how lockdown was right because it saved so many people, why we need to keep up restrictions because of the supposed ‘2nd wave’… yada yada. I am utterly failing in my mission.

https://twitter.com/ZeitW/status/1289540285127487489/photo/1

From Berlin 1/8/20 . The German people have woken up and are protesting against the sham science authoritarian state . The British people still slumber….

The British will never wake up. We are not the people I thought we were.

1.3 million of them out protesting apparently!

There definitely seems to be a change in tone with the Telegraph’s articles today… and most of the comments are downright angry too.

The herd immunity article https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/31/herd-immunity-long-term-solution-covid-19-has-become-taboo-says/ does have a few disbelieving comments, based on the completely outdated “science” of 1% IFR and 60-80% herd immunity.

Hearing about the “red wall” MPs’ reaction was also heartening!

Hopefully the douchetool who ignored my emails for two months is beginning to take note

And this was a cracking article from Ross Clark https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/31/governments-dystopian-overreach-shows-slippery-slope-action/

But the editors seem to have done a good job of hiding it from the front page.

Must be a good article. The trolls were really out in force in the comments.

As far as I can see, ALL the comments on the Ross Clark article (mentioned below) are anti-lockdown, government etc – very heartening!

If this stupidity continues for much longer, I fear that my sanity might not survive: witnessed people wearing plastic face helmets walking about in the open this morning.

Bumped into a friend and neighbour, who tried to speak to me with paper mask in place.

I told her to take it off, which she did- into her pocket it went. She’s now ordered a space helmet as she can’t see properly with the mask on!

To follow this, a surreal ‘new library experience’: having negotiated the council website to confirm that a limited service is now available, I took the plunge.

5 books may be ordered from our local library, but only if they’re in stock.

Reservations are not allowed, and choice of books is limited to author and genre; in other words, a specific title cannot be offered.

48 hours’ notice is then required: I now have an appointment for 1pm on Tuesday, at which time the doors will open and I’ll be admitted, alone, to collect the books on offer.

Hand sanitising obligatory and it’s quite likely that the books I wanted will not be available, owing to the criteria now in force.

This is utterly, utterly bonkers and I feel for our hapless library staff, having to oversee this nonsense.

Upside down Covid World.

It’s Clown world and I want to get off and go back to the one I was on in February.
At our library you aren’t even allowed in,users have to wait at the door and someone who looks like they are ready for the mission to Mars fetches the books,wipes then down with some kind of gunk and puts them on a table for the poor diseased wretch to pick up.
They have what is like a small skip with a letterbox for infected,dirty germ covered books to be dropped in on return,this is twenty feet away from the library entrance.

Illiteracy, both cultural, political and social beckons. Control Creep is the ‘new normal’ and I hate it!

Did she ask you to take her to your leader?

Imagine having a Covid-19 epidemic in your town, and nobody takes notice. Well, this happened in:
Milano, Bologna (Italy) Dec 19, Jan 20, Feb 20
Alsace (France) Dec 19, Jan 20, Feb 20
Solrod (East Denmark) Feb 20
Santa Catarina (Southern Brazil) Nov 19, Dec 19
(Wastewater) Not mentioned the wastewater finding in Barcelona Feb 2019 as many (Balloux) thinks that finding has not been verified correctly.

This interesting finding above is consistent with spread from Wuhan end of Oct (Military Olympics). But why the delay in the spread in these countries by several months? Perhaps it was a competing low virulent strain at the same time.

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2007.07154.pdf

This is a fascinating hypothesis that LVS (low virulence strain corona) was spreading much earlier and probably already Aug Sept in China and worldwide. The origin was in another part of China much closer to the Vietnam border. Then in Wuhan Okt-Nov mutation occurred and the HVS (High virulent corona strain) now diagnosed as Covid-19 disease of Sars-Cov-2 occurred, competing with the already spread LVS.
HVS had an advantage of higher reproduction number than LVS and would outcompete in the end the LVS. However, if you got LVS early on you got immunity to HVS (natural vaccination) which explain the startling figures how little HVS was found in China outside Hubei province and also in neighbouring countries or any country with much contact with China. But even more favourable in such countries were in the ones which had lower population as herd immunity to LVS could be reached earlier which would stop much of transmission of the later HVS. We had two competing strains and having LVS very early on was protective for a severe HVS (SARS-Cov2) outbreak.

Interesting is also the discussion that when the two strains were circulating simultaneously and had exponential growth, then isolation and quarantine of the identified HVS was beneficial but social distancing was contra-productive. The reason being that both strains would be affected by social distancing and declining but the faster growing HVS would have an advantage and increasing more at the expense of the LVS.

The article is requiring extreme mathematical insight to understand it fully how they calculate and having no mathematical knowledge impossible to judge for me but intuitively this hypothesis seems to tie many knots together. Quotes from the article

“As in those cases of cross-immunizing strains, our model suggests that although both strains share cross immunity, the earlier strain has mild to no clinical symptoms, leading to it being yet-unrecognized and not raising world-wide alarm. However, when this LVS reached Wuhan, an accumulation of mutations occurred that gave rise to the emergence of a faster spreading and more pathogenic HVS, namely the currently identified SARS-CoV-2,which then spread from Wuhan to China and the rest of the world.”
.
“A likely possibility is therefore that cross antigenicity between the two strains might be dependent on cellular immunity, rather than humoral one. For example, previous studies on avian influenza HVS H5N1 protection by the LVSs H9N2[17, 18], H1N1, or H1N2[19] showed that the immunity was cellular rather than humoral immunity,and H5N1 antibodies were not found in chickens that were previously infected by low virulence strains .”

“Our results would similarly suggest that different opening strategies after lock-downs and social distancing would not considerably affect the overall infection levels, which is effectively dependent on the double-strain dynamics and not the containment measures responses (or the lack of them).”

 “The introduction of a precursor LVS can therefore explain the otherwise puzzling findings of the highest exposed countries showing low infection levels at late times (Fig. 1a), and the transition from initial fast exponential growth to a slow non-exponential level, and even an effective complete stop of the growth in all countries, although none of them have infection levels even close to those required for herd-immunity.”

Theory. A ‘new virus’, let’s call it SARS 1.5, emerged in early 2019, in let’s say Beijing or Shanghai hinterland. Not particularly virulent, and high-ranking officials in one of the SREs involved in various industries seeded it to other ‘global’ cities – note, for example, the mobile and technology industry has an annual conference at the end of February every year in Barcelona, plus various fashion meets in Milan, Paris and London in Q1 every year. It is not an issue, because nobody is seriously unwell – nothing to see. Except the Chinese perceive/know there could be a problem so they start to fast-track plans to create a vaccine. Now, where would that research be conducted, certainly not in Beijing or Shanghai, but where there is the only supposedly ‘bio-secure’ lab in China. Perhaps not so secure as might be expected – French rather than US intelligence sources suggested that (I think I read somewhere).

Makes sense there.

I read this a few days ago on the Cornel University website. At that point it hadn’t been peer reviewed. Has it now? Regardless, what they describe is certainly plausible. In fact, more than plausible. As they point out, the theory accounts for the lesser contagion in those countries with the highest traffic with China; the opposite of what you’d expect. This study, and responses to it, needs watching closely. I haven’t seen it reported in the MSM yet. I wonder why not?

Does this study account for the near 100% immunity among children?

No,they don’t discuss that aspect

Thank you, Toby. Great job as ever.

Listening to R4’s Any Answers now – just to take the temperature and see whether there’s a slight shift in the establishment view. Utterly utterly depressing- is there really no one- aside from subscribers to this site – who is questioning the restrictions? I feel like slitting my wrists. I seriously don’t recognise or love this country any more. We’ve just been described by a R4 listener as ‘whingers’. Is no one looking at the graph of admissions/ deaths?. Is no one able to differentiate between these and the ‘positive cases’.? Why is no one else asking the obvious question- what’s the actual reason and significance of these ‘cases’ – ie increased tests / false positives/ lack of serious illness amongst majority- ie nothing to justify shut down economy/ education/meaningful social and cultural life and all other health services for. As someone who’s still waiting ( after 6 months) for a serious neurological procedure due to the NHS’decision to shut down all non CO Vid procedures, I get particularly enraged when the public health argument is rammed down my throat. I’ve been visiting a major London hospital once weekly for the past 4 months and it’s EMPTY- ALL OUTPATIENTS clinics completely shut down- for 4 months! Only slowly opening up now. Maybe everyone’s on zoom but cannot believe proper diagnoses have been conducted across the board. Certainly no one’s been having blood tests as I’ve been the only patient in the blood clinic each and every time I visit. I wrote to the BBC months ago asking why none of this was being represented and got no satisfactory response. These people don’t really care about anyone else. Sorry for the rant but what I am most disappointed by is the failure of any of the so called sainted doctors to speak out on behalf of the thousands of patients whose health they know has been seriously damaged by the LD restrictions. Rant over … for now.

Think how stupid the average person is (think tail-gating on motorways, for instance).

Then consider that 50% are even more stupid.

Please don’t slit your wrists – but I know how you feel.

Don’t despair. The people you want to be listening to would never get on air on BBC radio
These would be the people on your local high street or breaking lockdown rules in their gardens oop north right now as we speak
(Seriously stop listening to the BBC. It will do that to you)

watch this instead!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=x9_inV7Gy7U

live protest in Berlin!

thousands upon thousands are there!

Experiencing unsusal youtube errors trying to access the Ruptly stream of the Berlin Protests. Not Ruptly ‘will resume shortly’ card. Youtube errors. Not encoutered before. Censorship?

could well be

it’s up for me now

however they seemed to cut off when the main stage screens showed all the crowds

rt seem to focus on zooming in on a very small section – so yes I could have just observed live censorship. did you see that?

Police have turned up and trying to break the meeting. Listen to the jeering!!

Police have taken the mic and the stage. People are entirely peacful booing . It is a wonderful day in Berlin. The crowd is unifying. Well done them. Incredible moments.

They were 1.3 millions!!!

The BBC isn’t the country nor does it reflect the country. It mistakenly believes it does. You listened to bbc and your reaction says everything – the BBC is anti life! I woukd suggest shutting the door on the BBC and manage your health. What good is it when every time we press the on button a deep anger is caused. Every other BBC production gives the same degrading experience. Break the shackles! Look here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6B7MoFME5zc
The stream has just ended but high tens of thousands probably many more more have been out in the streets in Berlin. Our BBC wont give you that news, it wants you to feel exactky as you do isolated, dispairing and without hope. All at the press of a button.

It is useful to listen to the BBC to see how they are propagandising but it takes effort not to be sucked down to tge low level of existence they operate at. Remember Saville, the BBC knew and did nothing – rise above them because they are nonce protecting scum, happy to steal licence fees from people with little to pay massive bonuses and dictste to the world how others shoukd live.

We are all better than the BBC.

Rants are catching – is it a covid symptom?

I was recently called into hospital for my “urgent” surgery which was delayed 4 months due to Covid. Except for 2 hours when there were two of us, I was the only patient on a six bedded unit.

Cancel your TV licence.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXcLqvFjMhE

Agree. Go for it, you’ll find it a liberation! And there’s the added satisfaction of knowing you are depriving the gov’ts propaganda arm of much needed funds!

Group cancelling. In well coordinated big bunches.

I feel exactly the same. I’m glad I’m not alone and have a great family because if I was alone I think I’d be struggling to see the point of a life with all the joy and freedom amputated from it.

I feel exactly same. I think we have been let down by the media, doctors, scientists and politicians…all of whom have a duty of care to the whole population. I feel at my wits end with my anxiety levels through the roof each time I have to go outside and it’s not because i’m afraid of the virus or the bloody mask-wearing brigade, it is the sight of what seems to be people’s passive compliance which leads to me wanting to scream at them in the street! I know some of them could be seen to be “making the best of things” or genuinely afraid but it makes me want to weep for the future for my children and grandchildren.

‘This country’ and ‘the BBC’ are not syonymous.

Can I suggest you neither watch nor listen to the BBC for the sake of your sanity? I now listen to Mike Graham on TalkRadio (Mon to Fri 10am til 1pm). Huge amounts of common sense. It will cheer you up.

Professor Carl Heneghan’s discussions on here (July 19th) and on The Spectator (July 31st) include talk of old fashioned fever or ‘isolation’ hospitals being single-story and not having lift-shafts (that push and pull air around).
I wonder if this site could pull together a list of hospitals where C-19 patients are put in inappropriate places, where the NHS has not learned any lessons (as otherwise claimed) and where we the general public should avoid if we get run over or have a heart attack?
I’ll begin the list by saying that both of Barnsley hospital’s ICU wards are in buildings that have lifts and that I have been told that Huddersfield Royal Infirmary’s ICU ward houses their C-19 patients in side rooms, off the main ward, with the same nice lady coming round asking if you’d like a cup of tea.

The thing is …. we are now well past the point of difficult isolation issues.

This may have been a medical issue back in April, but it is now, purely and simply, a political infection.

“political infection” is a great way of putting it

Covid-19 – The Political Plague

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666535220300306?via%3Dihub COVID-19 zugzwang: Potential public health moves towards population (herd) immunity
This the complete article referenced in Toby’s daily update by Bhopal,Edinburg
(Throw in the towel!)

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666535220300306?via%3Dihub

Actually, you can eliminate the vaccine option. Only a brainwashed numpty would take a vaccine that had not been extensively RC trialled over a significant time period.

So that leaves (a) population immunity (looks well ahead of any vaccine) and (b) just shrugging your shoulders and living with what remains of this moderate virus – like we do with many others.

It’s really quite simple, isn’t it?

But such is scientific illiteracy that many prefer to believe a narcissist with a track record of lying and exaggerated bluster, rather than the bleedin’ obvious.

It’s worse than that, many don’t trust Bojo but are still totally ok with Neil Ferguson.

It is straightforward, basic common sense – ‘bleedin’ obvious’ as you put it – and yet so incredibly difficult for people to grasp. You have to laugh at the absurdity of it otherwise despair just sets in.

Something like this has been posted before, but I’ve added a few bits of my own.

It’s just a mask.
It’s just on public transport.
It’s just in shops and public transport.
It’s just in all enclosed public spaces.
It’s just when you’re out of the house.
It’s just something you put on when you get up in the morning.
It’s just till a vaccine is produced.
It’s just till the virus is eliminated.
It’s just everyone wearing a mask everywhere, for ever.
It’s just control freakery.
It’s just collective insanity.
Or is it just a conspiracy?

The BBC today announced 120 Covid 19 deaths for yesterday. This is complete nonsense. This is the change in total deaths reported, most of these relate to weeks or months ago. NHS latest death data is available here https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-daily-deaths/ it shows 14 deaths over the past 3 days in all England hospitals, which include 5 where there was no positive test! That’s fewer than 5 per day!
Look at Cambridge University Centre for Evidence Based Medicine & see their data on hospitalisations and deaths. It shows that the rate of decline of deaths and hospitalisations has been absolutely consistent regardless of the supposed increase in infections.
https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/covid-19-uk-hospital-admissions/
https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/covid-19-death-data-in-england-daily-update/

As the the number of deaths have almost disappeared and have been so low for weeks the numbers on the vertical axis showing total deaths will have to be amended to show increments of 10 not 100

The other day, one of the graphs had a Y axis that went to 2.5 That’s “Two point Five”, in 0.5 increments. And these were individual deaths, not averages or anything. Damn virus is so sneaky, it can kill half of you!

Oxford – not Cambridge

This tweet more or less sums up the UK media since March – what they were saying versus what they could have been saying/asking:

https://twitter.com/Manquality2018/status/1289507042638667777

(annoyingly the image is pretty small – there doesn’t seem to be a high res version, so the text might be difficult to read)

Spot on (you’ll have to save pic and look in gallery if you don’t have a dinnertray phone)

Well apart from the covid deaths on the graph which are rather a combo of covid and lockdown deaths but hey….. Not Elon’s fault

Good reply from someone.

Yeah, just a little tiny bit.
It’s been going on here too (Italy) for 6 months.

And I think the (by now) very many people who are making a good living out of the permanent crisis won’t let it go.

If I recall Scottish schools are going back in a couple of weeks.
I wonder if that is driving Boris’s madness.
Another day in Scotland and no deaths.
Sturgeon looks better and better at managing a crisis and if the Scottish schools open and so does everything else it makes England look even more incompetent.
Politically Boris is already finished so I am wondering why he even cares.
Surely someone at Tory HQ is gunning for him, letters to 1922?
Or does Cummings just run everything and even Baker and the ERG have to do what they are told.

Otley Saturday report . I was scared, very scared as the town is so close to the Bradford lockdown boundary .I expected infected hoards to descent from the slums of Ilkley, roadblocks and temperature checks on the way in with loudhailers shouting “wear a mask even if outdoors”. How wrong can you be . Made unmuzzled purchases from several shops though Spoons was worringly quiet.

Otley is a relatively pleasant shopping experience and we visit now and again from Wakefield..

The message below the Youtube video says ‘RT is funded in whole or in part by the Russian government’. Wikipedia.
So is the BBC.

Didn’t you know? Gvt. funding is only acceptable when it’s one of *our*gvt.s

are you talking about the LIVE RT stream from Berlin?

RT are doing their best NOT to show the crowds it would seem. There are thousands upon thousands there!

The police keep on getting shouted down there, lol.

Arrests being made…

I can remember when you trusted the BBC and treated Pravda with about as much seriousness as Benny Hill. Now it’s the other way round.

Pravda living up to its name at last.

Does anyone know how to start a Twitter firestorm?

It would be good to create public outrage to get Neil Ferguson dismissed from Imperial College. That would get people’s attention and make them think a bit.

Anyone have any woke friends who can teach them how to stir up some social media outrage?

You clearly don’t know much about Twitter. You might as well suggest getting a head of steam up amount Labour Party members to defenestrate Jeremy Corbyn. There are not enough non woke people on twitter.

You mean Tory Party members to defenestrate the Cabinet – that shower are the ones that have done the damage, courtesy of the members’ doziness!.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/08/01/uk-facing-second-coronavirus-wave-no-sign-one-yet-scientists/

From the above article, Carl Heneghan, talking sense yet again…

Professor Carl Henegehan, director of the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine at Oxford University, said: “Across the board, normal life is not resuming because we’re still instilling a sense of fear in the community when cases are very low.

“If we didn’t have testing now we wouldn’t even be considering it a problem, because it’s so low. If this was an influenza outbreak, we would have called it finished by now and said we were through this wave, and we would have started to get back to normal.

“We would expect to see sporadic small outbreaks occurring after a major epidemic and, as long as we keep testing, those outbreaks will not get out of control. None of them have led to an overall increase yet.”

I am so so glad he said the words “If we didn’t have testing”

He’s on the Spectator Hot Shots Podcast today. Not before time they had someone with some gumption on there as Katy Balls and James Forsyth are a bit damp in the gusset department. Hopefully this indicates a change in tone.

I guess if we started a ‘don’t get tested, don’t feed the testing monster’ advertising campaign we would be jumped on by the powers that be?
This bowing to the great testing monster is the latest example of many with this virus where officialdom and science have not worked well together and have not really understood each other. There seems to be an acceptance of this testing as if it came down the mountain carved on tablets of stone when really it needs understanding and interpretation which is not happening except for a few exceptions such as Carl Henegan and the CEBM.

You may recall (it all seems so long ago now) that part of the pressure the media brought to bear in that idiot and big chief idiot (Hancock and Johnson) during the whole “test more test more test more” phase of the pandemic was along the lines of “they do lots of testing in Korea and Germany and their numbers look much better than hours, so clearly testing is an important way to stop people from dying” (I could never think of a logical reason why).

The worship we see at the altar of the god of test now is just people remembering this.

Given that they are not designed as tests, I will not be having one in normal circumstances no matter what. If I’m ill then I’ll rely on fluids and bed rest as for anything else. Only if it worsened to the point that I needed hospital would I accept it, and then only very reluctantly.

Note that Professors Heneghan and Gupta are not in the SAGE group of consistent wrongness and bollocks.

That’s because they’re heretics.

Just published
https://academic.oup.com/jpubhealth/article/doi/10.1093/pubmed/fdaa119/5878148
Factors determining different death rates because of the COVID-19 outbreak among countries “The results of the current study suggest that the crucial factor was the fast implementation of public events ban ”

Interesting seeing as Whitless et al were claiming before lockdown that this wouldn’t make a difference!

I thought the crucial factor was the proportion of fatties in the population?

When did you ever need to “manage” a beach, FFS!

Form The Telegraph live coronavirus feed:

Beaches are becoming “unmanageable” due to large swathes of visitors, local authorities have warned, prompting fears around keeping people safe in the water and social distancing.
Daytrippers are flocking to beaches across the country as many opt for a “staycation” in the UK amid uncertainty over holidays abroad.
The Coastguard had its busiest day for more than four years on Friday – when the UK recorded its third hottest day ever – as it dealt with more than 300 incidents.
In response to the influx, Thanet District Council asked people to avoid four of the area’s beaches, including Margate’s Main Sands, due to the number of visitors.
The Coastguard said the total number of UK incidents was 329, including 232 callouts for coastguard rescue teams, 129 for lifeboats, 22 requiring aircraft and three for a hovercraft.
It comes as Europe’s largest tour operator Tui extended the cancellation of all UK holidays to the Balearic Islands and Canary Islands until August 10 and all holidays to mainland Spain until August 17 following the Government’s decision to impose quarantine on all travellers returning from the country.

See I just read this and a massive smile appears on my face and I wanna go outside and dance in the sprinklers.

Managing a beach, just like managing a Summer’s day, is impossible. Fuck the gvt.!

In these hot days is the dissent stirring.

Like trying to manage a virus, I guess.

Beaches are full and this makes them worried about winter ?

Summer causes winter. It’s obvious. If you look at the data, it clearly shows that every single winter has been preceded at least 3 months before by at least one summer. Couldn’t be more clear.

Seasons have been coming in regular waves just as sure as the earth goes round the sun.

https://twitter.com/Covid19Crusher/status/1289499110806937600/photo/1
Panama.Death Covid-19 million people 7 day average. Is this a coincidence or not?Panama used HCQ then stopped (WHO,Lancet) then reinstituted it again.See dates for that.

https://twitter.com/Covid19Crusher/status/1289486058149892097
“Let it rip? On May 4, Armenia decided to put an end to the economically unbearable lockdown. Contagion skyrocketed. Two months later, new cases in are in free fall. The pandemic is running out of susceptible targets. More evidence of COVID-19 herd immunity, at a low threshold ”
 More and more examples of countries imposing lockdown very early then too costly and give up. Spike afterwards but not exceptional and coming down.

Interesting that even after May 3rd the transmission rate never exceeded 1.3, which by itself disproves Imperial modelling

I was behind this mask-less drunk in the CO-OP today, he was purchasing a large bottle of some kind of Cider. The chick behind the till says that’ll be 6 quid and the poor fellow pulls out a pocket full of change and a stinky old mask from his pocket and dumps it on the counter. Lots ten and twenty pence’s he had to count out. All the while this mask just sits their spreading his bodily fluids over the money and the counter. He scoops up the remaining change and the mask and puts it back in his pocket and meanders off into the day to get pished. Humans are never gonna be able to enact this sterile life they seem to think we all want to keep us safe. Why would we even try?

Way I see it, there are four main explanations for the dystopian nightmare we are living through. These are:

a) Covid-19 is one of the most deadly plagues the world has ever experienced and lockdown is the only rational policy. Or in other words, “they” are right and “we” are wrong. I don’t think this stands up to most scrutiny. The last estimate I saw of the ifr from the CDC was 0.26% so about twice that of seasonal flu (0.1%). It does seem to be highly infectious. However, in the main, it is only dangerous to those in well-defined groups i.e. the very old and/or those with existing health conditions. Surely the logical solution would be to isolate those at most risk and let the rest of the population build immunity?

We also have the example of Sweden, who had very mild voluntary distancing measures. They ended up with less deaths per million than the UK and cases and deaths are now falling away almost to nothing. Yes, they had more deaths per million than their closest neighbours. However, their falling death rates indicates increasing immunity so they will likely have little to fear from subsequent waves and won’t need to quarantine visitors (unlike New Zealand for example). They also have not trampled all over civil liberties or completely destroyed their economy (obviously their economy will still take a hit from the global downturn).

In the whole of human history, I don’t think there has ever been a response to a virus like this. In 1968/69, Hong Kong flu killed between 1-4 million people yet there was no lockdown, people went on with their lives as normal and the human race got through it and carried on. In fact, the WHO themselves advised against lockdowns under any circumstances. In the UK, it is estimated that the lockdown itself may cause 200,000 deaths, far more than the existing toll from Covid (~45,000). If you measure it in terms of life lost the difference is even clearer. The average age of people dying from Covid is about 80. In many countries, the average age of those dying is higher than the life expectancy of the country! That is not the case with those who die because of the lockdown – increase suicides, drug and alcohol abuse will carry away many young people. People who die due to cancer treatments being cancelled or late diagnosis due to screenings not happening, could have had many good years left. How on earth is this a rational response to a disease with a fatality rate well below 1%? This is mass insanity.

b) There is something they are not telling us. Governments around the world know something about Covid we do not. Maybe it’s a bioweapon that will mutate into a more deadly version? I’m no expert in the field but I don’t think the technology exists to create a virus that will mutate on demand after a set period. In fact, from what I understand, any modifications to a virus caused by human meddling actually tends to disappear in the natural course of events. Also, you have the example of Sweden, Belarus, and other countries that have not fully locked down. What happened there? Did they not get the memo?

(Part 2!)

Ok, so now we have the 2 likeliest explanations.

c) Global incompetence aided and abetted by groupthink. Until recently I believed this, as the alternative was both harder to believe and more frightening. The problem with this is how widespread these lockdowns are, even in countries that have little to no Covid deaths. There’s also the strange case of the care-homes. In many countries, suspected Covid cases were sent back into care-homes where they infected the most vulnerable and huge numbers of deaths were the result. This happened again and again, even though this should have been obvious from the beginning, certainly after it had happened in other countries. Why is the deathcount being exaggerated in so many countries? Why is there unprecedented censorship? Why are so many countries still imposing draconian lockdowns even though cases and deaths are plummeting? What is the worst that can happen? Why are we getting more and more restrictions on our liberty when the danger is receding?

d) Global conspiracy. I avoided this idea for some time as it seems the “craziest” option and is also the most sinister. However, for me at least, this is the only way I can get the pieces of the puzzle to fit together. In this theory, everything being done is to make life so unbearable for the masses that they will be desperate for the vaccine and will put pressure on any “anti-vaxxers” who refuse to take this rushed, experimental treatment. Start from this assumption and things make sense. The horrendous deathcounts in care homes were not accidental, they were intentional. The grossly exaggerated deathcounts are also intentional. The more deaths, the more justification for lockdowns, the more harsh restrictions the populace will accept in order to keep them “safe”. Take away the care home deaths and the overcounting and, in many cases, you’d be left with no more than an average flu season. The changing goalposts are intentional. Lockdowns must continue until the vaccine. First, it was to avoid overloading the health services, then it was to lower the deathcount, now it seems we must continue until there is not a single Covid case (obviously unachievable). The rubbishing of any potential treatments like hcq is intentional – if there is an effective treatment, the need for lockdowns and the vaccine diminish. The unprecented censorship of any alternative viewpoints is intentional. This is why Sweden has been vilified. Any suggestion that there is any alternative must be crushed.

There are 2 main objections to this view: 1) You’d need so many people in on it, it wouldn’t be possible or would get leaked, 2) Why would anyone want to do this?

For 1), I don’t believe you need absolutely everyone in on this. All you need is a few people in high places and a lot of “useful idiots” (and there’s no shortage of those!). Some politicians are in on it, most are not and will simply believe anything that Fauci or the WHO tell them.

2) is difficult. Why would any sane person want to do this? What needs to be remembered is that the people at the top of the tree are not exactly “sane”. They do not think the same way as normal people so do not have the same motivations. What sort of normal people sit around thinking about how they see the future of the human race in the next few years? And yet not only do these people do this, they actually produce material explaining this. It’s all out there in plain sight – id2020, agenda 2021 etc… The question is not whether they want a technocracy or not, we already know this. The question is whether they have the power and influence to do this. I think we are beginning to see the answer to that question.

Thanks. Plenty to think about. Remember though, we need to differentiate between deaths WITH coronavirus and deaths FROM (caused by) coronavirus. I strongly suspect most are the former, in just about every country.

Exactly. They are cooking the books. Why are governments all over the world trying to increase the deathcounts?

To scare people into accepting the vaccines and covipass..

Interesting analysis.

I’ve always had problems with simplistic conspiracy explanations. But if you reduce the idea to the common-or-garden “Cui bono?” or – even more simply “Follow the money”, and link it to the simple idea of privileged networks, the whole thing of “conspiracy” becomes a lot less unusual. The links are pretty obvious in this case.

Add in control of media, group-think, pole-climbing and sheer stupidity, and you’ve got what we’ve got, even using Occam’s razor to give it a shave.

Exactly. Although the link between IG Farben (now Moderna, making a Covid vaccine), Soros and Epstein was a new discovery for me this evening..

The motive that eludes you is really about control in the face of global chaos. It’s been pretty obvious since at least 2008 that the global financial system as it stands is unsustainable and when the dollar based system collapses it can either go with massive emmiseration and conflict or, the plan goes, it can be achieved by uniting the world under a new global order, a “reset.”
The idea is to minimise the chaos and panic by drip feeding a lesser case virus into retiring humanity to see the benefit and necessity of a global state.
Yes sounds Cooky but it’s what has been discussed fairly openly amongst those with power and influence. The WHO was a perfect vehicle to override national government autonomy as virtually all UN members are signatories and are required to be guided by their instructions during a pandemic. Hence you see the likes of Fauci and Whitty basically running policy.

I think one way to view it is as a kind of religion.

Homo sapiens has always been curious and wanted to figure out how to control things. This is great and has led to science and technology. But we also often don’t know where to stop.

We want to understand things so much that once we’ve run out of data we tend to create deities to explain what is still unknown and systems of rituals (often involving unnecessary sacrifice as if that were a virtue in itself) to control what is still uncontrollable.

We do understand the pandemic quite well but we can’t control it, and there is a strong religious desire not to just accept the sad truth that it is what it is and people will die. The only story that has a happy ending is the vaccine story. Never mind that we have already killed thousands more by the overreaction than the mere virus would ever have managed on its own.

The vaccine might work and save lives and that’s all good and I approve of vaccine research. But the reason everyone wants to believe in it so much is essentially religious. This might be the only thing that’s binding everyone together in this belief system. It doesn’t need a conspiracy: religions are a lot like viruses and spread by themselves.

We’ve commented before on how the media loves fear porn. But they never scaremonger about vaccines (and there are some very rational concerns about them). It’s not just fear that’s driving them. They aren’t cynical nihilists who just want to scare everyone. They want to believe in this myth of scientism, and, like all good religions, it contains enough that is close enough to the truth for people to believe in it.

The world has not had a world war since the second world war, now ‘we’ are supposed to be ‘fighting’ this enemy even if it is invisible. Gives the useful idiots

a default war footing to go mental. And we know how a good war resets economies.

Re d) , See Rockefeller Lockstep plan…

Mostly (c) but a bit of (d) is likely, on reflection. The WHO is heavily influenced by China and both have a common enemy in Trump whose re-election looked increasingly likely following the failure of various attempts by the deep state to evict him from office. Covid provided an opportunity for both to assert themselves via their natural allies in the US government against him. Shared hatred especially of the Judeo-Christian values underpinning, and supported in turn by, his presidency also brings in people like Soros, Gates and the BBC’s political commentators.

I’ve been thinking about b). I feel like it’s the only explanation. My bet is that it’s an accidental release from a Chinese lab (so no conspiracy theories needed, since that kind of leak has happened before). Govts around the world are panicking because it’s not a natural virus, so they don’t have a clue how it will behave or what it will do next.

But then how do you explain Sweden, Belarus and other countries that refused to lockdown.

Some countries have (a) better politicians and/or (b) more deeply embedded notions of democratic safeguards.

The bullshit about the UK’s ‘democratic’ traditions has always been self-promotion, not reality. I’ve always reckoned that, if Hitler had crossed the Channel, this country would have been well up in the league of hospitable environments, given the links amongst the establishment.

Fortunately, it didn’t happen, and the better instincts won out in 1945.

Belarus – not sure, other than Luka-whatsisname seems like he wouldn’t take any nonsense from anyone and is generally contrarian.

Sweden – they still did a lot more than you would expect for something like this. And Tegnell looked genuinely rather worried at times. They just didn’t panic quite so badly.

I don’t know, it might not be that – I just feel like there must be something that we don’t know…

Sweden played by the normal pandemic handbook. You can argue that that wasn’t warranted as it isn’t a true pandemic, but they did ‘the right thing’. So many other countries decided to follow China, despite having completely different government systems and despite the fact that China didn’t follow conventional procedures for a pandemic at all. The reckoning for these contemptible governments is coming, and they’re not going to like it one bit.

If you look at all causes mortality, Sweden is barely above Denmark and considerably below Finland, while Scotland (in many ways comparable to those nations) is far, far above Finland. Interesting no?

Telegraph quote “The ONS also admitted that it was unable to spot any regional differences”. Local lockdowns promoted by PHE. Presumably they are better at processing data than the ONS.

Given the findings of the CEBM Group on data from PHE, that’s the laugh of the week!

C L O W N W O R L D ©2020

Positive tests, 59 out of 116,026. Previous week 45 out of 114,674. That is a 30% increase in one week. Obviously something has to be done quickly.
Oh wait, that is a move from 0.039% to 0.05%. that is still a miniscule amount.
No it is 30% you must DO SOMETHING.
No that would be an unreasonable over-reaction.
That is what you said before the initial lockdown and now the media are telling you how wrong you were. Do you want that to happen again?
I suppose we should do something then. Can we limit it to places where we are sure to lose seats at the next election?…………………………..

“..the course of the disease appears no better than in Sweden, which has carried on near normal (the OECD expects 2020 GDP -6.7%).”

Capital Economics now expects only – 1.5% for Sweden.
And its support programs amounted to only 9% of GDP and will probably not even be drawn upon in full.
Even if, that means that the private sector contracted by 10% in 2020, skewed towards large exporters.

Whilst in the UK, Germany, France et.al, the private sectir will with their respective numbers have contracted by 25% in 2020, skewed towards small and medium sized domestic businesses.
Criminal!

Swedish Q2 GDP comes out next Wednesday, ours a week later. It’ll be a certainly interesting comparison.

The problem is, of course, that no economy can isolate itself in this situation – only ameliorate.

Indeed, and especially not trade-oriented Sweden. Some factories were still closed because of no supply. And I think shops and restaurants did reduced hours as well so there will be a hit from that. But I expect the recovery will be stronger from that than a complete full stop.

Bear with me for asking a silly question, but how exactly does the bbc compile its grossly misleading “daily death totals” when hospitals are reporting hardly any?

I understand completely that the attribution of Covid as cause of death is often nonsense, I want someone to explain to me clearly how they come up with these nonsensical totals as I STILL don’t understand it.

Well; they take the actual number, put it through a Neil Ferguson model and….
Hey presto

Or if they thing the actual number looks wrong or inconvenient they just put the number they think it should be in

In this case it’s not so much the BBC to blame for the fiction, it’s various elements of government. Today we have four deaths reported in hospitals, but 74 deaths overall. The question, then, is where did the 70 other deaths occur? Care homes, hospices, private homes? But surely, if the virus is about to see you off, you’d be in hospital, most likely on a ventilator, or is this assessment too simplistic? I assume what’s going on here is that the 70 extra deaths weren’t caused by bat flu at all, but were caused by some other condition, but the patient had a positive bat flu test. This situation, if true, is a scandal.

That about sums it up!

It’s still not clear to me whether people even need a positive test to be counted as a Covid death or just a reported suspicion/likelihood/ vague hunch….

The latter in many cases. Never believe any numbers pretending to deail ‘Covid’ deaths.

ONS states:

Yep and yet still:

Coronavirus (COVID-19) deaths are those deaths registered in England and Wales in the stated week where COVID-19 was mentioned on the death certificate. A doctor can certify the involvement of COVID-19 based on symptoms and clinical findings – a positive test result is not required.

Precisely. Look at this extract, again from The Telegraph coronavirus live feed (my emphasis):

Further four hospital deaths in England

A further four people who tested positive for the coronavirus have died in hospital in England, bringing the total number of confirmed reported deaths in hospitals to 29,342, NHS England said.

Patients were aged between 78 and 84 years old and all had known underlying health conditions.

Another five deaths were reported with no positive Covid-19 test result.

It beggars belief. How are they getting away with this?

The NHS separate the categories. In the past 3 days there were, in all hospitals in England, 9 deaths of people with a positive test & 5 who were deemed to have died of covid but not tested. That’s over 30% guessed!

I read somewhere that the body won’t be released quickly if it hasn’t got covid on the death certificate so pressure is out there on grieving families to agree to a Covid death even if it isn’t true at all. Might be a rumour of course.

I think there should be some independent market research to speak/analyse with those that verify deaths.

Families are certainly being pressured to accept the Covid lie, and are being overridden if they object.
Anecdotal, but comes from several sources.

That’s true.
Happened to a friend of mine whose mother died at home after being released from hospital following 2 negative tests. ‘ Covid’ on the death certificate allowed the body to be released quickly for a funeral.

They were reported in the Sun as being between 78 – 84 years old.

The numbers are coming from PHE. Considering the low figures coming from the NHS (hospital deaths) Scotland and Wales – both zero I think yesterday – you can infer that 90% of the current daily deaths are care homes or at home.

PHE numbers were supposed to be suspended while the over-reporting for classing anyone who ever had CV19 and dies as being a CV death was investigated, but this is the source according to the gov.uk website.

You will not usually get an accurate picture via the BBC. The odd occasion, like that Newsnight report on the north of England imaginary ‘spikes’, was an exception

I assume it’s the same way Wankock invents numbers as he goes along.

The BBC report the increase in deaths from the prior day not the number of deaths from the prior day. Most of the deaths reported by the BBC will have occurred weeks if not months ago.

Reflections on today’s itv racing coverage.

IMO clear propaganda/brainwashing on the agenda. Apart from presenters socially distancing all other presenters and jockeys masked when being interviewed, jockeys clearly uncomfortable with it as some kept fiddling with mask and holding it in place. All people in background also masked and clearly walking out of shot if not masked or clearly putting a mask on if in danger of being seen

Main presenter regularly mentioning social distancing i.e. ‘great to see people, all socially distancing of course’, smile to camera.

Big song and dance about a spitfire flying over with an NHS message painted on it, mention of names of the fabulous NHS staff to be nominated and painted on the spitfire for future fly pasts. Personally I’d rather see the names of the elderly killed by the NHS and released to care home to die on a spitfire or memorial.

1 other pundit saying that probably a good idea that 5k public not allowed to attend as if they spread virus it would be a catastrophe. MD of Goodwood hoping to be back to normal on 2022.

Clearly getting desperate and trying to maintain fear as the tide is turning.

Sickening stuff, and desperate as you say.

It has dawned on me that the behavioural scientists are helping to push policy through their understanding of torture as a method to exert total control over the population.

Basic psychology of torture.
You create a master slave bond more effectively when you restrict freedoms then relieve them rewarding them (even if the victims don’t now what they did to deserve the reprieve).
This is done to various levels of severity preferably unexpectedly and with little or no underlying rationality.
This keeps the captives or slaves in a constant state of stress and trains them to react to every instruction no matter how ridiculous.
Other methods include humiliation like forcing/instructing the victims to dress in certain clothing, to threaten their lives and those of their loved ones if they fail to comply, or to inflict more misery. To control movement and confine to small spaces, to isolate from other human interactions, to prevent medical attention when needed.

This is well documented stuff, nothing these sadists in behavioural science wouldn’t be well versed in.
Welcome to the training camp

Biderman’s Chart of Coercion:
https://www.strath.ac.uk/media/1newwebsite/departmentsubject/socialwork/documents/eshe/Bidermanschartofcoercion.pdf

“Control over victims face”
That was hooding in Gitmo, it’s masking on Covid1984…

It’s also masking in Gitmo. Do a google image search.

From today’s off guardian as it relates to Coercion, I think it relates well to the phenomenon we see now and the astonishing failure of rational counter arguments to get through (apologies if this is too long)

“Sargant found that a falsely implanted memory could help induce abnormal stress leading to emotional exhaustion and physical breakdown to invoke “suggestibility”. That is, one didn’t even need to have a “real stress” but an “imagined stress” would work just as effectively.

“It is not surprising that the ordinary person, in general, is much more easily indoctrinated than the abnormal…A person is considered ‘ordinary’ or ‘normal’ by the community simply because he accepts most of its social standards and behavioural patterns; which means, in fact, that he is susceptible to suggestion and has been persuaded to go with the majority on most ordinary or extraordinary occasions.

Orwell further states:
It includes the power of not grasping analogies, of failing to perceive logical errors, of misunderstanding the simplest arguments…and of being bored or repelled by any train of thought which is capable of leading in a heretical direction. Crimestop in short, means protective stupidity.”

“Blackwhite”, is the act of contradiction of plain facts,
it means the ability to believe that black is white, and more, to know that black is white, and to forget that one has ever believed the contrary. This demands a continuous alteration of the past…The alteration of the past is necessary for two reasons […] The subsidiary reason is that…he must be cut off from the past, just as he must be cut off from foreign countries, because it is necessary for him to believe that he is better off… [the precautionary reason] by far the more important reason for the readjustment of the past is the need to safeguard the infallibility of the Party.

The splitting of the intelligence which the Party requires of its members, and which is more easily achieved in an atmosphere of war, is now almost universal, but the higher up the ranks one goes, the more marked it becomes. It is precisely in the Inner Party that war hysteria and hatred of the enemy (virus and deniers) are strongest.

The process has to be conscious, or it would not be carried out with sufficient precision, but it also has to be unconscious, or it would bring with it a feeling of falsity and hence guilt…To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies – all this is indispensably necessary. Even in using the word doublethink it is necessary to exercise doublethink.

I always knew there was a good reason I’m a relative social outcast.

On an unrelated note, my phone’s predictive text thingy always ‘corrects’ social to suicidal (except oddly enough, that time just then) – should I be worried?

Evidently your phone needs psychiatric help.

Gave me a laugh – thanks!

The virtual couch.

So we’re abnormal.
Wear the badge with pride!

We are the 1 in 10

These gits are NEVER going to give up!! The Telegraph coronavirus live feed:

Hard decisions ahead as October second wave probable, says scientific adviser

There will probably be a second wave of coronavirus in October in the UK and “some hard decisions will need to be made about what restrictions need to be reintroduced”, a scientist advising the Government has said.

The BBC reports that Prof Calum Semple, who is a member of the advisory group Sage, made the comments after another scientific adviser said pubs or “other activities” in England may need to close to allow schools to reopen next month.

Prof Semple, from the University of Liverpool, said whether pubs or the hospitality sector will be “taking a hit in preference to education will be a political decision.”

Their audacity is breathtaking, we need a much bigger legal challenge or several strategic litigations, it doesn’t help that our opposition is about as much use as an ashtray on a motorcycle, by rights they should be doing this job.

I notice that Semple is yet another virologist.

It seems essential that both epidemiologists and virologists need to be looked at very critically, given the attention-seeking behaviour (rather than real scientific ability) on display in many cases.

There does seem to be a dangerous subset following in the Ferguson mould of lacking basic scientific skills in terms of assessing data and making a connection with the real world. Having a PhD or holding a professorship are not sufficient conditions for being let loose outside a narrow realm of research.

Funny you should say that. Immunologists don’t seem too bad, but they defer totally to the epidemiologists and modellers when it comes to calculating number of deaths, herd immunity threshold, etc. And that’s the difficulty: epidemiologists don’t include what the immunologists know, in their models. The epidemiologists stick to the same SIR model they learned about in their first ever lecture on modelling, merely embellishing it as time goes on, and don’t even know that the immune system has continuous, variable mechanisms for adapting to low doses of viruses, building up resistance and immunity without necessarily strong symptoms or the production of antibodies. It’s a joke. They get it totally wrong – as we see with Neil Ferguson EVERY TIME .

Then there are pathologists like Dr. John Lee and immunologist Beda Stadler. Presentations by these gentlemen may be found on YouTube

You really couldn’t make up this shit.

Let’s translate :

“We’re so much enjoying the limelight that we can’t let it go. We’ll need to ramp up any old infection this autumn as a major threat. Let’s start the softening up, now!”

No need to soften the zombies.They await the 2W as some barmy sects await the end of the world: quite undeterred by the endless postponements.

JohnsonTown massacre.

So, presumably the people being infected in pubs equals number of people being infected in schools and the overall number will then stay the same.
Since they are all closed, there can be no data whatsoever on school attendance related infections but who is keeping the statistics for pub related infections ? We need to know.

Agh shit they mentioned October.

Why October?

End of furlough.

Semple Simon Said.

Police Scotland’s last two chiefs resigned stating their job was untenable given the political meddling coming from the Government, who happen to be SNP.

Today we have this vile statement:
Police chief urges Scots to avoid northern England after coronavirus surge

Whilst the police have no enforcement powers, they are asking Scots to avoid areas of England which have seen a spike in Covid-19 cases

https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/scotland-coronavirus-northern-england-police-18699764

Boycott Scotland.

What the bloody hell has that got to do with the police?

Going to go out on a limb and say rank and file police scotland employee are lost and for want of a better word unhappy. The trades body tge scot pol federation are endlessly defending their members, 99% of scot police employees against snp diktats. The high ups in scot police are bastards political arse lickers. I do not understsnd their value system but suggest NLP has altered their capacity to cognitively act in accordance with moral norms.

Rank and file see it. They are too cowardly to voice. Like nhs staff too. With odd exception – in nhs not police scot apart from the two consecutive resigninations.

You have to be worried when this is the level of intelligence on display at the top level of the police!

Stephen Reicher, Professor of Social Psychology (not medicine, please note) at St Andrews University, who apparently advises both Johnson and Crankie about their response to covid19, thinks the strategy should be zero-covid – a refusal to believe in any acceptable level of covid infections and deaths in the community. I read that in The National, which is right behind the Scottish government. No wonder we’re in this mess when professors of social psychology set themselves up as experts on viruses.

Already do.
They can fuck off. (Preferably to the arms of their beloved EU where they belong)

Most of Johnson’s cabinet would be able to easily transition to employment with the EU.

Put down that bottle of Scotch Whisky and buy Gin instead.

Does anyone else suspect that MSM have been ‘allowed’ to put out some skeptical articles just so the 77s can brigade the comments?

They’ve certainly been out in force since Thursday evening. No normal person writes such puerile drivel.

Yes

Reading the comments in Janet Dayley’s excellent article:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/08/01/careless-words-could-cost-pm-goodwill-long-suffering-public/

Here’s a worrying one:

A friend of my daughter’s is in the Royal Marines…..he told her they were ordered at the end of 2019 to prepare for civil disturbance in the UK in 2020.

Though I can’t say I’m in any way surprised. They made it clear back in March that they had 20,000 spare troops hanging around.

My friend asked about our local lockdown and when I told her the stats, she noted that HMG’s action is provocative.

The medical situation seems pretty much done and dusted. It has been surprising how much confidence the medical profession has placed in their ability to create a vaccine for covid 19. That is because they know that a tried and tested safe vaccine already exists. They just have to complete testing, not a quick process:

‘The BCG vaccine has the potential to activate the immune response against the viral infection. The severity of the COVID-19 pandemic is very low with a slower spread in those countries that have the universal BCG immunization program. Australia, Germany, USA, etc., started the clinical trial of the BCG vaccine in Health Care Workers and the Elderly Population to prevent the infection of COVID-19. The correlation of BCG vaccination with COVID-19 has shown fewer confirmed cases with low mortality and a high recovered rate in universal BCG immunization countries.’

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7332934/

‘The current evidence about BCG vaccination and prevention of acute respiratory infections is of high quality, as it is supported by results from 2 systematic reviews (one including meta-analysis) and 4 RCTs, which provide a high level of evidence for prevention studies.’

https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/does-bcg-vaccination-protect-against-acute-respiratory-infections-and-covid-19-a-rapid-review-of-current-evidence/

So all we are witnessing now is simply pure politics, red in tooth and claw.

The main goal of the British Government is a good Brexit deal. That has just been put off until end October so the UK Prime Minister has accordingly dialled back on normality by Christmas. Britain will not get back to normality until the government is certain that the Brexit deal is working well…..unlikely before spring 2021 at the earliest. Quarantines etc to pressurise eu members in the meantime.

Over the other side of the Atlantic, the Democratic Party, and its serried ranks of media supporters, including the bbc and sky, both linked to U.S. companies contributing to Democratic party funds, is concentrating on the 03 November U.S Presidential election. So the hysteria in the U.S. and within our own state broadcaster and its major domestic competitor will continue at least until then. Because ‘weaponising’ covid 19 is the preferred strategy to remove Trump via trashing the U.S. economy……

What happens thereafter will very much depend on the result of that election.

Still, there’s always Bob Hope…oh, hang on…….

You missed out a caveat :

“ There is a lack of evidence that BCG vaccine protects against COVID-19.”

D

Yes exactly. I read the article to see what the evidence was… And it said there basically isn’t any except that mortality seems to be about half in countries that BCG everyone. But there could be other reasons for that. And you’d hope that a vaccine would work a bit better than only halving mortality.

The flu vaccine varies between 30% – 60% so not too dissimilar

Actually in 2017 /18 I think it was ..it was 15% efficacy Whoop whoop

Flu was exceptionally bad in Australia last year – 120,000 laboratory confirmed cases in South Australia alone, and thousands of deaths Australia wide. Compare that to the Australian coronavirus numbers and marvel at the stupidity. The only difference I can see in the way they’ve acted is that they actually care about this virus for some reason.

The care about this virus, because they are using it to control populations.

Didn’t people who’d had the flu vaccine get worse covid symptoms? Mind you they were probably in the vulnerable category.

Most of us of the vulnerable age will have had the BCG vaccination at school. So if it is a protection against COVID why are so many of this age group dying?

A study suggested immunity conferred only lasts approx. 60 years

‘ ‘Another controlled trial stated the efficacy of the BCG vaccine with long term protection, approximately 60 years of age after vaccination.’

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7332934/

Also underlying health conditions/treatment may suppress any immunity conferred.

And given net immigration every year of 400,000 every year since 1998, that is potentially 12 million immigrants of various ages who may or may not have had BCG vaccination.

Well that’s OK then, jabs when I was 12 or so, 71 now, so at least a year left….

I should have at least 5 to go.

I very much doubt that anyone BCG vaccinated and not immunosuppressed has anything to worry about, either from covid 19 or TB:

‘Analysis by decade yielded efficacies of 54%, 62%, 62%, 12%, and 48%. This suggests a slight waning over time that was statistically significant in men but not in women’

https://thorax.bmj.com/content/59/8/724

Those too young to have been BCG vaccinated have plenty of time to wait for the BCG vaccination trials to complete. But, by then, it will have become abundantly clear that covid 19 is no more dangerous than any other ILI (Influenza Like Illness) from which, by the way, I have twice contracted pneumonia (the first time aged 19, super fit) prior to the arrival of covid 19.

A great pity that Corporal Jones is not Prime Minister and that Private Fraser should have been promoted to Health Minister, a grave error in so many different ways….

Yes. Grasping at straws is no counter to straw men

Lack of evidence? Like using masks then.

Exactly.

You must have missed this bit:

‘They just have to complete testing, not a quick process:

‘Australia, Germany, USA, etc., started the clinical trial of the BCG vaccine in Health Care Workers and the Elderly Population to prevent the infection of COVID-19.’

Reference above

And this bit:

‘‘The current evidence about BCG vaccination and prevention of acute respiratory infections is of high quality’

Reference above.

Re evidence

‘We review evidence for a potential biological basis of BCG cross-protection from severe COVID-19, and refine the epidemiological analysis to mitigate effects of potentially confounding factors’

‘Results fail to confirm the null hypothesis of no association between BCG vaccination and COVID-19 mortality, and suggest that BCG could have a protective effect. Nevertheless, the analyses are restricted to coarse-scale signals and should be considered with caution. BCG vaccination clinical trials are required to corroborate the patterns detected here, and to establish causality between BCG vaccination and protection from severe COVID-19.’

https://www.pnas.org/content/117/30/17720

So, some testing required……or did I already mention that…..

‘Currently 3 clinical trials are active and recruiting to determine if BCG vaccination protects healthcare workers (HCW) during the COVID-19 pandemic; BRACE is a phase III RCT, conducted in Australia, that will recruit up to 4170 HCW to determine if the BCG vaccine reduces incidence and severity of COVID-19 [35]; and BCG-CORONA is another phase III RCT, conducted in the Netherlands, that will enrol up to 1500 HCW to reduce absenteeism among HCW with direct patient contacts during the COVID-19 [36]; and the BADAS study , a phase 4 randomized trial, is conducted in the US to determine if the BCG vaccine for healthcare workers acts as a defence against COVID-19, which will enrol 1800 participants’

https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/does-bcg-vaccination-protect-against-acute-respiratory-infections-and-covid-19-a-rapid-review-of-current-evidence/

Indeed. But I believe in consistency. My criticism of this whole Covid scam is that it has not adhered to basic principles of evidence-based medicine. The principles of rational enquiry hold across the board.

Remember – similar claims for a vaccine will start emerging soon.

This is a vaccine, tried and tested.

I believe in evidence……but evidence requires a hypothesis to support, and this is a hypothesis based on documented prevention against acute respiratory infections.

A null hypothesis of no association between BCG vaccination and COVID-19 mortality has not been confirmed.

As a consequence, three (expensive) reputable clinical trials have been commissioned.

High time for all and sundry to recognise that the ‘precautionary principle’ is the last refuge of a charlatan; already responsible for thousands (and counting) of lives lost before their time.

Re Vaccines, just seen this about Moderna who are making one of them: https://twitter.com/gingerfella4/status/1289617017847205888

Links to Fauci, Gates, IG Farben, Soros and Epstein…
I did not know that Soros owned IG Farben (company that made zyklon B use in the Nazi concentration camps) and then rebranded it as Moderna..

Regarding BCG trials:
‘It is possible that BCG-Tokyo would be preferable to BCG-Danish.’

The Lancet April 30, 2020

‘BCG Vaccination to Protect Healthcare Workers Against COVID-19 (BRACE)

Sponsor:
Murdoch Childrens Research Institute

Collaborator:
Royal Children’s Hospital

Information provided by (Responsible Party):
Murdoch Childrens Research Institute’

https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04327206

‘ Reducing Health Care Workers Absenteeism in Covid-19 Pandemic Through BCG Vaccine (BCG-CORONA)
Sponsor:
UMC Utrecht

Collaborator:
Radboud University

Information provided by (Responsible Party):
MJM Bonten, UMC Utrecht’

https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04328441

Prof. Dr. M.J.M. (Marc ) Bonten
‘He acts as paid consultant for Janssen Vaccines (payments to UMC Utrecht) and Merck Sharp & Dohme B.V. (payments to UMC Utrecht).
He has received speakers fee from Takeda (Nov 2019).
He is a member of the Expertpanel of the Stichting Dierenautoriteit Nederland.
He is a member of the cluster Infectieziektenbestrijding from ZorgOnderzoek Nederland.
He is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of GARDP (Global Antibiotic Research & Development Platform).’

University of Utrecht

Janssen Vaccines are owned by Johnson & Johnson.

‘ “In order to go fast, Johnson & Johnson – the people of Johnson & Johnson – are committed to do this and all together we say we’re going to do this not for profit. That’s the fastest and the best way to find all the collaborations in the world to make this happen so we commit to bring this at a not-for-profit level.’

Dr Paul Stoffels, J & J Chief Scientific Officer

Bob ‘Join the Peace Corps’ Hope? My mother worked as a maid for a rich Mormon family in Toluca Lake in the early 60s. The Hope family lived just next door. Thanks for the memory…

My lovely wife just sent this to me regarding HCQ from Newsweek. Did you guys see this. I missed it but apparently the basis for one state governor challenging for the right of doctors in his state to use this treatment.

OPINION
The Key to Defeating COVID-19 Already Exists. We Need to Start Using It | Opinion HARVEY A. RISCH, MD, PHD , PROFESSOR OF EPIDEMIOLOGY, YALE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH
ON 7/23/20 AT 7:00 AM EDT

https://www.newsweek.com/key-defeating-covid-19-already-exists-we-need-start-using-it-opinion-1519535

He is saying that there is massmurder being committed in the USA. That is pretty tough.

I just saw a post on Twitter saying that the reason for doing everything possible to ‘rubbish’ hydoxychloroquine is that *if* there is a treatment available, then (in the USA at least) they cannot circumvent the rules for vaccines, ie claim there is an emergency and get fast approval to use it.. Someone put it on Simon Dolan’s Twitter feed..

Link: https://twitter.com/KassandraKitson/status/1289575472926543873

Great new names for Whitty and Vallance in the Telegraph comments: TWhitty and Bedspread. I can’t think of them as anything else now.

Bedspread
Twhitty is niiiice. Whitless is my own personal ….. Thing.
Next week I’m gonna be Crispy Whitless wherever I go

Love it …. needed a laugh

Ive just been watching the coverage of the mass gathering in Berlin, it was strange to see so many people gathered together. I guess you’d have to go to a beach in southern England to see that many people in one place. I was hoping to see muzzle burning bonfires but then I realised nobody except the police was wearing one.
So what the heck have the Germans got to demonstrate against?!

If they were fewer, they would be jailed… doh…

Perhaps they’re more sensitive about totalitarianism.

Off to the pub tonight and whilst the governor is pretty laid back last time we visited he did request out names for t&t. I know I can opt out and will do.

If a customer or visitor informs you that they do not want their details shared for the purposes of NHS Test and Trace, they can choose to opt out, and if they do so you should not share their information used for booking purposes with NHS Test and Trace.

I am right in thinking this applies to Scotland?

https://www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-tourism-and-hospitality-sector-guidance/pages/collecting-customer-contact-details/ includes “Collecting customer contact details will be voluntary” .

Thank you

Just lie.
I really hope they share my ‘details’ with T&T. I really do.
Those poor contact tracers need a laugh.

Seems my local MP is actually working for his constituents!

A Conservative MP has revealed his frustration at the sudden return of coronavirus restrictions to his Kirklees constituency.
Colne Valley MP, Jason McCartney, has made the rare move of openly criticising his government on social media.
On hearing of the ‘local lockdown’ last night, Mr McCartney, a loyal supporter of the Boris Johnson, tweeted that he was “surpised and disappointed” that his rural patch was included.
This afternoon, he has revealed he held a Zoom call with the Health Secretary Matt Hancock to get answers for his constituents.
And he has claimed Mr Hancock has said the situation will be reviewed in a week.
Mr McCartney claimed infection rates in the Colne Valley were “very low”.

….. Only two parts of Huddersfield – Birkby and the Golcar and Scapegoat Hill area – have had positive cases in the week of July 20-26. Just three each.

…. Denby Dale councillor, Will Simpson, [Labour] has also written to the Health Secretary to complain that imposing a lockdown on the whole of the borough was “too crude”.
He said: “It fails to recognise the significant differences within its localities and inherently fails to provide the targeted response that would be ideal.”

https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/news/west-yorkshire-news/kirklees-mp-suggests-borough-wide-18696858

Somehow they seem to view each Northern county as one big city.

I wonder why. (Twats).

A lot of their recent explanations of muddled shite regulations included mention of ‘Pret’ and TfL. Well, I don’t fucking have those, cos I live where 87% of the population live – NOT IN LONDON. No fucking idea of what’s beyond the M25..

hear hear!

Last year sometime, there was an MP, forget who, that said most other MPs really had no idea where Liverpool or Sunderland were…

that I really beleive…

that’ll be because they never been up here!

A Zoom call. This is the difference between now and normal times. In normal times, you can grab and buttonhole a Minister over something affecting your constituency. Not so easy in a dictatorship.

To be fair to my MP, he was actially physically in the House of Commons last week, asking for more specific local info to avoid lockdowns such as have just been imposed.

A word of caution. Any protest is better than none, but it isn’t good if each MP demands that his constituency be exempt, without criticising the principle of lockdown per se.

Sadly it isn’t principle that’s gonna turn this thing, it’s convenience. Or inconvenience. People getting sick of it rather than getting sick.

So Johnson, Matt Hancock, Priti Patel, Prof Whitty, Michael Gove, Rishi Sunak, and Sir Patrick Vallance, are the new Cabinet that can make decisions which impact on millions of people without any debate. How has this Government been allowed to become a dictatorship that appear answerable to no one

My thoughts exactly. The covid crisis has been compared to WW2. But in WW2 there was a coalition cabinet. Here, we have one individual calling all the shots. Bearing in mind human frailty and fallibility, this hardly seems like a good idea. Especially when the ‘advisory’ team, at first sight, has so many conflicts of interest.

And when said individual had a brush with death due to his very questionable health, it does make you wonder how rationally he is thinking.

If you *had* had a brush with death, particularly with a respiratory complaint, would you really be in favour of masks?

Not if I were thinking rationally, no. I’ve seen precious little evidence that he has been though.
I have a lifelong (so far, I’ve a good way left to go as long as I don’t get knocked on the head) respiratory complaint myself, and nothing would make me wear a mask or force others to, but I AM thinking rationally.

Faith in masks is voodoo.
Increasingly likely primary method of transfer is contact transfer, masks are a distraction.
Singapore got its Nosocomial infection rate down to statistical zero by April by ignoring the mask cult and improving hygeine.

So we have a government that rules by voodoo.
Is Ferguson a closet hougan?. Wouldn’t surprise me in the least.

Not only a coalition cabinet, but also a fully functioning Parliament.

Regarding Toby’s mention of Professor Graham Medley – he who thinks we might have to close pubs so that children can go back to school; here are his latest pontifications (The Telegraph, my emphasis):

People with suspected coronavirus should be offered free accommodation by the Government to allow them to self-isolate away from loved ones, a leading scientist has said.

…..

Prof Medley said: “ Most of the transmission is occurring inside people’s homes . People have been talking about other alternative strategies, for example offering people the chance to isolate away from their homes, which I think is something worth considering as an alternative.”

So if that’s the case, why does he think there’s a need to close pubs? Who the hell are these people? Have they suddenly arrived on Earth from some alien “civilisation”?

He might have to replace Hancock as my Most Loathed Talking Head Of The Year.

Doesn’t that logically suggest the obvious solution? If most transmission is in people’s homes, then encouraging people to go outside more often is logical is it not? I know common sense isn’t that common but really!

Yes – surely we don’t really need any other measures, particularly masks in shops?

One laughs this week and sees it in the new guidelines next week. Is this like a WWII evacuation then?!

No, the govt has justified the impositions on various grounds including how incredibly infectious Covid is.
As the cruise ships show, 80% can expect not to get it / suffer any symptoms. This was on a ship with an older than average demographic.
This makes the govt impositioms even more ridiculous as their justifications can be shown to be invalid as well as probably illegal.

Like it how he’s afraid to call it out. The only reason there’s transmission in people’s home is because there’s 10, 20, 30 or 40 people living in those homes. It’s not being spread in homes where’s there’s 2-6 people!

So what do you suggest should be done about these overcrowded households?

Nothing at all.

Affordable decent housing.

I think it’s bollocks because we had the perfect incubator on the Diamond Princess, some people were sharing a room for 2 weeks with the infected and didn’t get it.
Infection rate on Princess was 17% meaning 83% didn’t show any symptoms / get it at all, so it’s more make it up as you go from govt.

Some people didn’t get it. But what matters is what happens to most people. I don’t think there’s any point arguing that sharing a room with someone doesn’t mean you aren’t likely to catch some of whatever viruses they might have from them. This is missing the point. It’s completely and utterly ridiculous for the government to go around saying whom free people can and can’t share rooms with in any circumstances let alone in the middle of a perfectly nice summer in peacetime where the birds are singing in the trees, there are no pandemics going on, and everyone should be fine.

Well they clearly have shit for brains, so more like subhuman.

He is a distinguished professor in his field. “Shit for brains” really?

“In his field”. Which is pretty limited – and that ‘field’ of modelling is full of shit.

Good at models. Can work out the square root of the surface area of a jam jar lid, but hasn’t got a clue how to get at the jam. A bit like army officers, 77 man.

So is Neil Ferguson. Allegedly.

He might be a genius in his meadow but the reast of us live in the real world.

Well, this will be the plan to have concentration camps for the asymptomatic, a la Spanish newspaper article the other day! Free accommodation wont be a hotel. Or is that too dystopian?

Hotels are for the boat people.

I agree. I find this suggestion sinister. Why give anyone this right over you?
It could start as “voluntary” and then, once the right conditions have occurred , become mandatory, and you could find yourself being forcibly removed from your home. How would they even prove you were infected? Or are we expected to just take their word for it?

Some of these ‘experts’ seem to to hark back to the old school Oliver Cromwell, Puritan approach to life that seems to linger in the UK psyche. It really irks some people that other people are enjoying themselves, having a beer, a laugh and talking to their friends. They are keen to find anyway they can to put a stop to this frivolity.
I fail to see any link between pubs and schools?
It will be a test of where Boris Johnson really stands as to whether he goes with this drivel or sends it packing?

So where do they go to self-isolate outside their homes? The garden shed perhaps?

Some kind of camp for those deemed by the government to be infected and therefore undesirable perhaps? Hmm… that sounds familiar, has it been tried before?

Are there any recently built buildings that have been standing idle? You know, built quickly to provide “extra capacity”?

*drum roll*

Self-isolating in a large field hospital?
Wouldn’t a hen battery be more suitable?

Nightingale Hospitals.

Another SAGE self-important pillock grabbing a bit more of the limelight. Another epidemiological ‘modeller’ of the Ferguson brand.

A “Professor of Infectious Disease Modelling”, whose alma mater is, wait for it, Imperial College London.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_Medley

There’s a whole group of them who are all alumni or acolytes of Ferguson. Adam Kucharski is another doom monger from these groups much favoured by the media.

The point he was making is that it is all a question of give and take and balance. You cannot just open everything at once if you want to reduce transmission. So there are choices which are driven by other priorities. For example, some might say schools are more important than pubs. It’s not so difficult to follow.

I read Toby’s piece today and despaired. He tries to attack or counter elements piecemeal and misunderstands the whole. I agree that the Government’s communication and some of the policies are awful. However, that doesn’t make the science and technical guidance wrong. Toby Young is of course far more learned and knowledgeable on infectious diseases than the most accomplished minds in the country – give me a break.

These ‘accomplished minds’ of the SAGE self-promotion club happen to have been wrong at every turn. Good scientists would have adapted to the actuality by now – but ‘good’ scientists in that wider sense don’t get anywhere near SAGE.

The record is pathetic.

P.S. If you can’t work out from the numbers by now that this infectious event is nothing particularly exceptional, and certainly not requiring the demolition of society, then you are, by definition, a pretty shit scientist

Rick, don’t feed the TROLL.

I disagree with your suggestion that it’s all a question of give and take and balance. That’s precisely what it isn’t with the likes of Medley and Whitty. They have one track minds. Basically, they want to take all and give nothing, if it means total eradication of the virus. I don’t doubt they are highly intelligent people, but they are incapable of seeing the bigger picture; a common fault with intellectuals.

Intellectuals usually lack common sense …

You clearly hate Tobys writing and hate being here so…..

Jog on? Please?

Actually no don’t go anywhere.
Your bosses might not be happy.

Transmission has been declining. at least in non-noscomial community settings, for about four months. There is no obvious spike in hospital admissions nor positive results from pillar 1 testing of the symptomatic. Results from an increasing quantity of pillar 2 testing of the non-symptomatic are not a genuine issue for multiple reasons- false positives, lingering viral debris, true asymptomatic infection etc.

Yes but the “science” and technical guidance _is_ wrong.

In general there is no reason why science or reason should dictate politics. As recent events have shown society does not always act rationally and there’s no ultimate reason why it should.

But this is the other way round. It’s politics dictating science, and it’s certainly within Toby’s area of expertise to criticise that.

This hiding behind credentials in fields like “the science of infectious diseases” is bollocks anyway. There is nothing in the epidemiology of what’s going on that anyone with basic scientific literacy and a bit of patience can’t keep up with.

The government’s actions amount to micro-management of the worst sort and this indicates weak indecisive poor leadership. This poor leadership is one reason why these witless so called experts feel able to come out with this ludicrous drivel. It indicates one of the huge problems that there has been with this virus with a yawning gap between the high level scientific thinking and the reality of operating in the real world. Bridging this gap should be the politicians job but they have patently failed to do this.

I’ll go with what you say. There is an expertise gap and poor leadership. I don’t accept the scientists and experts are “wrong” or spout drivel. Their facts and views need mush more context and other perspectives – not alternative facts with unproven treatments a la Trump – I mean economic views, societal views and other health outcomes. Our leaders all being PPE and not very good technically don’t know where to start on this. They seem crap at communications and politics.

I get called a troll from time to time. I am here because there is mismanagement and i am looking for another view. I find Toby’s approach crap. Really crap and worse than Johnson’s. The comments have a wider range of ideas than Toby. The comments are increasingly getting gummed up with quasi-conspiracy stuff and nonsense.

“Free accomodation” AKA Covid Camps.

Aah, what fluffy totalitarianism.

I believe members of a certain race were sent to camps for their protection at a certain point in Europe’s past. That worked out so well – not.

Zyklon B, used in those camps, was made by the company IG Farben, which was bought by Soros and renamed Moderna. Sound familiar? Moderna are making a Covid vaccine that Fauci is promoting.. Apparently Moderna’s biggest shareholder was a certain Jeffrey Epstein..

Yeah and Hitler’s son was the chief financial officer. They are all Iluminati of course…..

Have you been watching Utopia on Netflix? It sets all out there. The so-called script was just a leak from Government files….

I bloody LOVE that show

Yes, you can love something like that without thinking it’s real.

It’s fun to think about though when you’re not actually living through the twilight zone. That’s definitely the method I’d use if I was going population reduction on the world’s ass.

It’s on Amazon Prime now and HBO are remaking it…if Mr Rabbit & the Network let them.

I hate to say it, but the coronavirus legislation does allow for people suspected of having the virus to be removed from their homes…

Hmmm. Key words “offering the chance” !!

However, if they don’t take up the ‘offer’, they will be forced – so not much of a choice really, you either go voluntarily or they arrest you..

There was a TV series in the US called The Invaders. They stealthily, silently took over the country.

If Asda in Keighley is anything to go by this afternoon, this local lockdown in Yorkshire/Lancs is a step too far for Yorkies. No queues and no one-way system (well done Asda), lots of people not masked up (me included). No staff masked. Fair number of mask wearers with them pulled down. Maybe not quite social disobedience but at least some signs that some folks have had enough.

Good for the people of Keighley!

Seeing the same here (granted my home town is a tame beast but people round here have sense- and they aren’t buying it any more).

Excellent! Public finally standing up to the bully boys. Go Northerners!

Yes, Go Northerners! I’m proud of you.

If us lot down here in the far South West can’t muster. any fight then it’s up to you guys.

Interestingly my sceptic friend is a Northerner, says they know much more up there. Must be something in the air, or maybe the flat caps and whippets!

It’ll be Timothy Taylor’s Landlord.

We just don’t like bullshit.
Or bullshitters.

Yes. We don’t call a spade a digging implement adapted for being pushed into the ground with the foot.

Would would Trelawny think?

Yes, when you think how the Cornish fought in the Civil War.

Well this is why I can’t understand the extent of the compliance down here. I’ve always admired the Cornish for their kinda 2 fingers to London and all it stands for, their conviction that it’s they who live in god’s country and absolutely nobody else, yet I see them wearing masks outside in the glorious air. Maybe the penny will drop.

And in Shipley, the Energy Mill gym has said they’ll remain open despite the ruling that they have to close (whilst pubs stay open – makes perfect sense, of course). Brave and courageous – hope more businesses follow suit. Mr Young has been informed.

Yes, come on guys! Rebel!

That’s a WIN.
I’m counting on Bradford to stick it to them actually. Bradfordians take no crap.

I live in haworth usually go to morrisons but will give it a go next week

I’m in Riddlesden. Sainsbury’s was showing signs of promise last week, not checked since the interdict was reapplied.

Also spoons keighley nearly normal!

I am not sure I would use the word “normal” about the Spoons in Keighley. Normal for Keighley maybe.

I drove through Bradford today from Wakefield for a walk around Harden… didn’t see any signs of any lockdown and Bradford’s roads were as busy as ever…

Wakey is next. Bracing myself cause I would probably fall into that although not sure

Day out in Salford to visit the Imperial War Museum – meal afterwards; plenty of groups clearly from different households. No track and trace. Easy Peasy.

Must try harder next time, Hancock.

Don’t go abroad
You can can now go abroad
Stay at home
Don’t go abroad
Have a “staycation”
But don’t go to the beach (WTF??)
Don’t try and have any fun
Don’t go to school
Don’t question us
Trust in Boris

Just popped back to the Janet Daley’s comments section and all my “likes” have been reversed and the number of likes knocked back to ones and twos.

Perversely, this supports our case. The impression that most people are zombies us being manufactured, no truth in it.

That is my feeling too. Easy to make you feel like you’re the only one when it seems that everybody else feels a different way. Until you find a site like this one of course…

Found this on the London Standard too. Amusing really.

That’s happened to me several times on The Telegraph too. There are CCHQ attack dogs sent out regularly. Sign of desperation now I think.

Are they removing the up-votes or just cancelling with down-votes? I read but don’t comment on The Telegraph site, so would like to be clear about what’s going on.

I sometimes look at the ‘top’ comments on articles, and in my experience they are overwhelmingly of a sceptical stance.

In my opinion, even The Telegraph has been got at, or at least has accepted that it has to publish a quota of pro-government articles. They are easy to spot though, as the arguments are emotive rather than substantial.

Where are the Tory MPs that disagree with these lockdown policies (ERG brexit equivalent). Maybe they have all been locked away never to be seen again.

I have asked the same question twice in last 24 hours and not yet seen a good explanation.

I suspect Cummings runs the show and they are ALL scared of him.

Having seen some of the German protest on youtube just thought i would check coverage. BBC web does mention it although the wording implies that a high proportion are conspiracy theorists or right wingers (and some normal people!). Nothing on Guardian on line, Nothing on Mail on line (although big feature there on Black march in Brixton )
Cant bring myself to watch tv news

I just did a search online – came up with hits from the Daily Mail and the Indenpendant, plus a local Bournemouth paper

Evening Standard and Yahoo have it as well.

It took BBC on line only two paragraphs to pin the German protests on the far-right. Tedious.

Ah yes, the BBC with its incisive, penetrating analysis; can’t pull the wool over their eyes!

Don’t worry, sopel will be on at 10.00 telling us how Trump is doing everything wrong in a wascist manner and HCQ is really dangerous despite Morocco etc
This will be followed by some more condescending crap speaking to handpicked interviewees who are really happy about lockdown / muzzles and think yellow stars on muzzles would make them nicer.

Only far-right loonies want to go hug their grandma without being called psychopaths!

Apparently August 1st is Yorkshire Day. I’ve lived here most of my life and I never knew that!

Considering much of West Yorkshire is locked down, I’m not sure why we would celebrate.

What a pity we hadn’t organised a traditional Yorkshire rebellion against tyrannical rulers. To be fair, they never got us very far – though they certainly got the despots’ attention and response.

Don’t get sentimental about Yorkshire. It has its fuckwits, too.

As my Latin teacher said at his retirement do, there is a very thin line between sentimental and semi-mental!

They’re all comers-in!

Any news about the Hyde Park Rally this afternoon?

I have been wondering the same thing, I haven’t seen anything on MSM so far. I assume they are deliberately not covering it?

Ben Shirley posted an extensive report here about 9pm.

In Star Trek the Next Generation , the starship was often in grave danger -e.g. stuck in an asteroid field which drained the ships energy or in a time loop which they couldn’t escape from. And then in the last ten minutes it dawned on them that if they continued to do the thing that they thought was the right thing to do , they would never escape. So they did the most illogical (to them) thing and lived to go to warp speed another day. How do we get the crew of no. 10 to realise that what they need to do is to remove all restrictions?

Impossible, they are controlled by the Borg.

Mistake : You assume that they might want things to change.

I think it would take a time travel scenario eg times arrow or carpenter street. Someone needs to go back and show them the mistakes they made. Hopefully got the episode names right, making the most of the weather and pub!

We’re the ones in the time loop we can’t escape from.

And anyway, if the crew of the Enterprise was furloughed on 80% of their Federation Credits, or whatever, they wouldn’t give a toss either.

Well we’re certainly going where noone’s gone before

We cannae take any more, Cap’n.

They’re Star Wars fans instead and are getting drunk on the idea of crushing the rebels and bringing order to the galaxy.

But we all know how that ended.

Every time you think it’s over another three lousy sequels come along.

This young lad shows what he thinks of the BBC:

https://twitter.com/JenBartram?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1289283270534787072%7Ctwgr%5E&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2F

A positive thing for me today. Our neighbours, who have been very OCD about the virus, for example, asking us to take a flask of tea & our own mugs when we went round, have had a truly Damascene conversion.

They are now complete sceptics, raging at the incompetence of Boris, suggesting conspiracy theories to us and happily talking about brainwashing of the masses. In return, I suggested walking into the local Coop without a mask on – that is the next step for them!

Just need to keep chipping away. I think locking down Manchester & parts of Yorkshire will prove to be a mistake, but I think it is Whitty’s comments of a trade off between schools and pubs has opened many more people’s eyes to the complete idiocy of the government’s stance.

Can’t imagine many people agreeing with shutting the pubs again, so soon after opening. Might be one of the straws on the camel’s back. Pubs and the British, not to be separated, at any cost.

The schools will be the “straw”. If it’s safe for schools to open the whole farce will become clear. That is why the MSM press keep asking this question about schools as they fear the end of their constant stirring and fear mongering.

Scottish schools open in two weeks.

Game on.

Did we know about this protest going on outside the BBC at the mo? https://twitter.com/Charbrevolution/status/1289600241860317184

Did a quick search and can’t find any coverage yet. A couple of articles about a pensioner protesting outside BBC Newcastle yesterday over the liscence fee for over 75’s.

Encouraging to see this kind of thing, hopefully it continues.

My nearest BBC building is in Gloucester, would probably be the only person there is I tried to do a protest there!

That’s an interesting one, as originally Krankie was dragging her heels and talking about half the time in school and half on-line learning, but she was pressurised into the schools going back normally – no masks, no social distancing etc.

The thing is if Scotland do it & there’re no repercussions (which there won’t be), that will be another thing that Krankie will be perceived to have got right over the hapless Boris. And what pressure does it put on Boris for Englush schools to go back ‘normally?

I think it was UsforThem that got that through in Scotland – and Wales I believe..

I agree. Have just heard from a friend in Yorkshire and you are only supposed to go as a household to a pub and not meet another household. As she said, don’t think that’s going to happen!

If you go to the pub with your partner, that’s fine. And your neighbours can do the same. But if you see your neighbours in the pub, you mustn’t socialise with them. Simple.

And I’m sure the pubs won’t be policing it!

Sadly I still know people who post sanctimonious rants on Facebook about the disgusting, granny-killing plebs who do such things as go to the pub or walk past another human being at normal range (“They should stay at home! End of!”). One was even bleating about being scared to walk her dog past the pub at the end of the road, in case it got too rowdy. They would be truly delighted if the pubs had to close again and would lose no time in reminding everyone that they told them so…

If I owned a pub I would be truly suicidal at this point. Two months of opening and then shut for the winter again. Potentially your entire life’s work down the drain.

Scepticism has mutated into a rapidly spreading virus whose primary symptom is the willingness to talk to people about the epiphany

Exponential outbreak in the next few months? Someone do some modelling!

I think I’ve got the looks, but I can’t do that jerky catwalk strut thingy…

I did that this morning. I’ve calculated that 162,810,000 people will be sceptics by Christmas. This equates to 243% of the UK population.

Oh, yeah, based on your modelling. It’s actually 14 cases. But we’re all going to die tomorrow. I’ve been saying that since March 23rd. Pah!

This thread: https://twitter.com/timetowakeupsw1/status/1289573623074717696
has footage from protests in Berlin, Bulgaria and the Netherlands… Hopefully this Covid madness will be stopped before Christmas!

Hope at last!

We need a proper UK event like the Berlin one. Featuring Jonathan Sumpton, Toby Young, Peter Hitchens, James Dellingpole, Simon Dolan and many others. A celebration of truth and freedom but ultimately a great day out. I’d brave public transport for that!

I’d certainly try.

Good of you to join us, Professor Ferguson.

When I use phrases like ‘When this insanity ends’ to holidaymakers hereabouts, I get sympathetic murmurs. No objections or glares so far.
I suppose somebody might report me to the thought police, but I’ll take that risk.
Drip drip drip, infuse the message! Ears are open to it.

Result! Well done.

Yes, I think the schools v pubs idiocy is going to cause a lot of Damascene conversions!

Well, they could send the kids to pubs instead of schools, job done, probably just as educational.

Probably more so, considering the standard of education they get! They could learn to count with darts, pool and crib; learn weights and measures with the optics; chemistry with mixing cocktails – absolutely perfect schooling!

Why did Boris suggest all would be fine by Christmas a couple of weeks ago???

Because he knows it will go on to at least March 2021!

or until they have a vaccine.. I thought Parliament had to re-vote on the legislation after 6 months? Surely that would be in September?

Bizarre isn’t it? Yet more strange and inexplicable behaviour. You cannot predict which way he will go from one day to the next. It’s almost like he’s got a split personality.

It’s deliberate tactics.

Because he’s a habitual liar?

He “hoped it would be fairly normal by then”. That was simply to soften you up for the announcement later that it would not be normal. A bit like Gove saying we don’t need masks in shops. Then they did it. If they say now that something is not likely, be afraid… be very afraid.

Presumably on the advice of the psy-ops unit.
In effect, he was teasing us.
Repetitive teasing is cruel.
Prolonged repetitive teasing is torture.

Birds Bakery does seem to have a death wish. Perhaps the good people of Nottingham and Derby should grant that death wish and boycott the bakery to hasten its demise.

We should do the same for shops and services and from 8 August museums, galleries and cinemas that practise discrimination through harassing people not wearing muzzles or not accepting cash. When we vote with our feet and wallets and their sales and visitor numbers nosedive, they will regret the day they decide to alienate their customers and visitors.

What what have they done now?

I know the Arnold branch refused to sell a 94 year old lady bread last week because she only had cash, no cards.

See Toby’s post above. They’ve sacked one of their store managers because she used her own card to pay for things for elderly customers and accepted their cash herself.

What a set of *uckers.

The woman worked at the store for 40 years! She was helping people who only had cash, unless she was doing anything else such as charging £2 for a £1.50 loaf and pocketing the difference then this company needs sorting out.

Off to find an email address.

They sacked one assistant for not accepting cash and the recent one for accepting cash.
Deserve to die!

It’s ridiculous. It’s not as if she’s pocketing the cash.

This is what happens when you get by the book Nazis and unfortunately they’re prevalent.

Do we know her name? I would happily support a crowdfunding for her.

The manager’s name is Megan Metcalfe. Toby has the excerpt and the link to the BBC report above.

Phone numbers and email addfess for bastardbirdsbakery was posted in the comments on the day of the previous story.

It would be a huge shame if their shop windows had bricks chucked through them.

Yeah, very sad.

Big demo today in Berlin against corona dictation. 1.3 million demonstrators.!!!! This is a signal for the world!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTAm5Oc4fao

1.3 million demonstrators in Berlin against corona dictation. The mainstream said 15.000 people, what is a lie. Historical day for Germany.

When do the British go on the street fighting for their human rights?

Just musing, with my pal Mr. Beer. I think I’ve got this right – it doesn’t matter, because we’re going to ignore them, anyway. BUT! When they pass the actual laws for us here in the North West, if you have an adult child who lives with a partner, it will become illegal for your own child to visit you in your home or garden. Welcome to England. More beer.

If they do it to me it’ll be illegal to visit my parents again.
Took no notice last time – won’t this time either.

(That’s why my mum told me to come over this weekend actually – she’s afeard they’re gonna lock us down again and she won’t see me. Bless her, I broke the law for her last time, I don’t know why she suddenly starts caring now)

Just wrote to my MP, Philip Davies. Not sure where he stands on lockdown:

“Dear Philip

Another ill-thought-out, panic-driven, knee-jerk reaction by the government.

We are one week into the school holidays, and at the drop of a hat my daughter and her husband, and presumably hundreds of thousands of other families, have been told that their childcare plans for the summer are now illegal. We were supposed to look after our grandchildren while their parents go to work. Now we can’t. What are they supposed to do?

If this latest restriction had been properly considered they could have made an exception for childcare. Young children rarely get the virus and they don’t transmit it. Where is the risk/benefit analysis?

As for destroying Eid celebrations at the very last minute … what an absolute howler.

I had high hopes for Boris. We now know that he’s frightened, spineless and impulsive.  Time for a change.

Yours sincerely

Tim Light
Baildon”

Good Yorkshire message, short and to the point, why waste ink.

Sadly bugger all resistance on show here in Northern Scotland.

I make a point of testing the water with most people I encounter, and the usual vibe is support for Sturgeon’s ‘cautious approach’, plus critisism of those ‘reckless idiots’ who mass gather.
I’ve given up proffering a counter-view now, as it looks like they’re about to launch into that scream-and-point thing Donald Sutherland does in the Bodysnatchers film.

A frightening number of retailers and business also seem to be still closed, or open reduced hours.

Most disconcertingly, my local barber, now open again, has decided this is the time to increase the price of a haircut by 33%! (I mitigated that a bit with no tip, by way of a lesson in the law of unintended consequences (or that’s just what you get for taking the piss, pal – take your pick).

A sign of things to come?

Someone on here reported yesterday that their drinking establishment had increased prices by 15%

After their punters were trained for four months to buy booze much cheaper from supermarkets, you’d think the pub would realise that they should at least start with an introductory back-to-socialising pricing structure.
You have to give to get.

Wetherspoons reduced some beer prices after the VAT cut, even though it didn’t actually apply to the demon alkerol. Sam Smiths, long the champion of cheap beer, put their prices up by around a pound a pint!

I know what you mean, the Spiteful Nannying Party has managed to get their supporters lined up behind Nicola despite worse performance of Scottish care homes, BBC is busy memory holing that of course.
Personally:
Cordless trimmer £24 off tinternet, so that saves £10 a month, at my age and hirsuteness a No 3 – monthly is fine.
Bought home wine kit so thats £2.00 a bottle shortly and sod their minimum pricing.
Also means I can continue not wearing a mask more often.

Set Nessie on to the buggers!
Though, sadly, Nessie is far less monstrous than Nikki. They should change places, except that it would pollute the Loch.

Yes, I agree – our area is the same. People ‘happily’ wearing masks, although they look as miserable as sin. Lots of support for Krankie, even among people who wouldn’t usually give her a second look.

Mind you, you’ve got to admit that with Boris’ increasing ramblings, Krankie does cone across as ‘sane’ – even if she is not. We’ve really got to hope that Salmond goes on a very vengeful revenge mission as soon as possible!

https://t.me/GeorgsWzG/1113

In the middle of upticking many of the encouraging comments in Ross Clark’s aticle from yesterday, I came across this interesting observation:

I wonder if obedience to mask wearing is related in any way to social class? In this town we have two branches of the same supermarket, one in a middle class area the other in a poorer council estate area. I am told by one of the staff that in one shop mask wearing is universal (well, 99.9%), while in the other only about half the customers are wearing them. She said that the staff have been specifically told not to approach or challenge anyone at the less compliant store for fear of aggression, but at the other they will approach a non-wearer, suggest that you have forgotten, and offer to give a mask. I don’t suppose I need to say which is which.

And the first response!

No you do need to say which is which – in one there are people sticking two fingers up at authority and fighting for your liberties while you sit here being sanctimonious….

The encouraging thing was that pretty much all the comments on that article are anti-lockdown, anti-masks, anti Boris etc..

Definitely.

As I’ve said before two types of shop are gonna emerge – the ‘upmarket’ tow the line type, i.e. the big inner city or out of town supermarket, posh Waitroses, farmers markets etc. where everyone wears their masks like good little children
And the smaller, local shops where nobody gives a fuck. You’ll be able to go buy milk and bread without a mask, but not star anise, if ya get me.

Whilst supermarkets are now open normal hours here in the East Midlands shops still seem to be open reduced hours, 10:00 to 16:30 being common.

Is this the case elsewhere or are we just lucky?

Where in the East Midlands is that happening? I’m not aware of it, apart from on Sunday’s.

Lincoln

Shops used to open about 09:00 and close 17:00 to 17:30

Must just be a Lincoln thing, as I’ve not experienced it anywhere else in the East Midlands.

Hyde Park Report Pt. I

As planned, I went to the Hyde Park protest organised by StandUpX earlier today. I came back somewhat lacking in any sense of fulfilment.

It was at first necessary for me to break the law twice in order just to get to the protest, since I needed to travel to London by rail and visit the Co-Op for my lunch, and on both occasions I intended to take my face with me. The train ride was pretty depressing since, despite no enforcement of the mask rule, there was total compliance. See again Huxley’s warning about people loving their servitude. Perversely, in the Co-Op the self-service machines weren’t taking cash but the cashiers were. Surely that’s the wrong way round with regards to obsessively keeping ‘safe’? I had actually considered getting lunch from the Serpentine café but I checked beforehand and it wants £9.25 for a fish finger sandwich. They must be gourmet fish fingers. Anyhow, I later heard that the Hyde Park cafés weren’t accepting cash so they deserve to go bust.

The protest kicked off with a speech from Piers Corbyn, who would probably be a decent speaker if only he wouldn’t go off on tangents about Bill Gates and 5G, and therein lies my big bone of contention with the gathering. I knew the protests attracted the Bill Gates/5G lot but I didn’t realise the extent to which they would actually dominate the narrative. As for the people attendant, while some of them looked normal, there were plenty who looked like they hadn’t realised Woodstock was finished, anarcho-punks, Extinction Rebellion hangers-on and a few general raggle-taggle dreadheads. I was dressed smartly and conservatively in the hope of making the cause appear respectable, but I probably just harmed my own image.

Once Corbyn had done his bit, we had five minutes from a motivational speaker-type personality trying to get us to join in with a chant. He seemed to go down well and the crowd co-operated but I found the whole instance quite unsettling as it seemed to me as though I was witnessing just another kind of cultish collectivism, not all that dissimilar from the one we were there to oppose. I stood through the chants mostly in silence, because I was not going to echo sentiments I didn’t agree with, in whole or in part, and as a natural individualist that kind of behaviour simply does not become me. The biggest embarrassment was perhaps the man who shouted ‘Paedo!’ at the mention of Bill Gates. Naturally, I’m no lover of Gates but if anyone wants to call him a paedophile, the burden of proof is on them first of all, and then they need to explain how, even if it is true, it is relevant to lockdowns and masks. All that, sadly, set the mood for the event.

There’s no need for me to run through all the speakers but the best one was the whistleblowing ex-surgeon, late of the NHS, whom I think I can safely say was a reliable source of anti-Covid truths of the kind we need if we are to make our case honestly and effectively. Unfortunately, his work was undone somewhat by the following speaker, who gave us a load of channel-your-cosmic-energies, here-be-aliens claptrap. I pretended to take part in his meditation out of politeness, but it was a useless waste of time. There followed quite a good speaker who raised awareness of the imminence of martial law, and attacked the cultivation of the Stasi culture which instils fear in would-be dissidents.

When the march began, I got sick pretty quickly of the chanting of the StandUpX slogan ‘We are the people, we are the power, we are the 99 per cent’. More than anything else, I object to the last part because it’s completely untrue; there is now way Covid dissenters account for 99 per cent of the population. Any rebellious inclination I may have had on the march was quelled by the prevalence of smartphone cameras being waved about by the marchers. That was odd, I thought, in a protest partly concerned with the right to privacy and anonymity. I detest smartphones. The closest I came to any form of exhibitionism was giving a Village salute to a man in a Prisoner t-shirt, to commend him for his good taste in television. Besides that, I was fairly well cringing in the knowledge that I was shoulder-to-shoulder with a lot of people who obviously belong to Facebook pages for vigilante noncebusters.

The march first of all went to the BBC, which marked the day’s lowest ebb, being basically an excuse for people to indulge themselves in screaming “Paedos! Paedos!” at Television House for 15 minutes. Then everyone went off to Whitehall where another speakers’ platform had been set up opposite Downing Street. At Piccadilly Circus we bumped into a separate group protesting under the ‘Free Julian Assange (in every packet of cornflakes…)’ banner, and of course the StandUpX people decided to stop and support them, too. Well, yes, quite. Do give my warmest regards to Jules, but that’s not really what I turned up for.

I think it is pretty much impossible to have a protest where Bill Gates does not get mentioned, because the only reason the restrictions and lockdowns are carrying on, when the virus has pretty much gone from the UK, is because the end game is to force us to capitulate to the vaccine, covipass etc – and Bill Gates’ money is financing not only 7 of the candidate vaccines but also the media – in addition to his links to Whitty, Vallance, Hancock, Boris (and likely others..)

Unfortunately it’s the ‘Bagfull of Arseholes’ paradox.

Most of the people (present company excepted) who join rallies and protests do so for causes the arseholes hold dear. The rest of us are too busy at work, or don’t care about the woke nonsense they’re on about, or would just rather go to the pub instead.
So, on those very rare occasions an ‘alignment of interest’ occurs, completely by chance, you find yourself uncomfortably aligned with people typically in the opposite trench.

Philosophically you could just take the view that for some the point is the mass gathering itself, the reason being superfluous because they’ll hijack it anyway, and in the main most of the folk who agree with you do so in spirit, because we had to pick the kids up, cal at GT Tyres, take Winston our beagle to the vets about his lump etc etc.

I was dressed smartly and conservatively in the hope of making the cause appear respectable, but I probably just harmed my own image.

Lol bless you.

I feel the frustration. Good for you for still going though, I would have. It’s worth going just to show up I think, and hopefully there would have been some fairly sane people there amongst the loons even if it was 90% loons. I for one am glad people are mentioning Bill Gates because the dude’s a problem, I just wish they were mentioning him in a more….. rational manner rather than in the ‘mark of the beast’ vein. The 5G stuff sends me running for the hills though.

I’m ready to be proved wrong, 5G bashers, believe me, I am, do it. but something tells me you won’t be able to any time soon in the same way Doris won’t be able to prove his lockdown worked.

But hey….. anyway. Any experience is a valuable experience right.

Hyde Park Report Pt. II

Incidentally, an observation from the march was that we were met with waves of support from bus drivers and dustmen, which just goes to show that the union leaders and Guardianistas aren’t as au fait with the needs of the workers as they’d like us to think.

Once at Downing Street, we got a bit more Corbyn and then there was an odd religious speech from a coloured gentleman with a large golliwog pinned to his lapel. Returning to my earlier observation about collectivism, I was struck by the unexpected extent of religious fervour running through this protest. I thought religious sentiment had all but disappeared from British public life, so I did wonder at the conviction of the many voices invoking the name of God. For what it’s worth, I’m not without religious sentiment myself, concurring with Hamlet’s advice that “There is more in heaven and earth, Horatio, than is dreamed of in our philosophies,” but I part of my was inclined to doubt the piety of these people when they’re not consumed with fear or indignation.

The protest was still going at 6pm, when the a speaker started banging on about some kind of Whitehall paedophile cabal, and I took that as my cue to leave. Sadly, I have come to the conclusion that if the media and general public wants to believe that lockdown sceptics are all a band of swivel-eyed conspiracy nuts, it’s because the most vocal and attention-grabbing among them are.

Members of StandUpX are correct in perceiving the erosion of our civil liberties and they are perspicacious enough to see where we’re heading with a cashless society, health passports, martial law and so on. Beyond that, they need to reign themselves in a bit because, as a moderate, I felt alienated by their preoccupation with probably unsubstantiated conspiracies with tenuous links to lockdowns and masks.

I will support them as long as they protest for those things which are right and true, because my conscience commands that I must, but I am not one of ‘their’ 99 per cent. There is a dire need for some organised intellectual opposition to the lockdown and masking, because StandUpX is not an intellectual movement. There are plenty of people fit to head such a movement like Brendan O’Neill, Peter Hitchens, Toby Young, Simon Dolan, James Delingpole or Lord Sumption, but for the time being I think we’re best organising ourselves into local groups using the Keep Britain Free forum, which I hope will remain free from StandUpX lunacy as long as they don’t end up falling foul of Facebook thoughtcrime rules.

I have never been a protest march person (and never been on one ever) but it looks like this was one to miss. It is not clear from what you say what their aims were apart from some strange accusations that have nothing whatsoever to do with our current issues. But well done for making the attempt to attend.

Thanks for your detailed report and sorry you had such a disappointing day.

I’m too far from London to attend such events but I’d noticed their previous rallies had involved a lot about 5G which is no doubt important but I don’t think should be the priority right now, when all that really matters is our freedom in general.

I think it’s important we find a way to hook up with sceptics in our local areas and work at a mor grassroots level. How we do that safely, I’m not entirely sure. Any suggestions gratefully received.

And this is why Whitty is an evil threat to our Children’s future. Does he have children?

Guess what….

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/aug/01/now-teachers-sound-alarm-over-plans-to-reopen-schools

That “article” is just a load of disinformation strung together.

Typical Groan.

But the Guardian are left wing and Boris is right wing. So can anyone explain why the Guardian are doing Boris such a favour every day?

Boris is right wing?

Evidence, please.

Boris has just given his younger brother, former junior Cabinet minister, Jo Johnson a seat in the Lords. Jo Johnson is married to a Guardian journo. Boris Johnson is a metropolitan Liberal paired off with another soppy Climate Change activist.

Because Uncle Bill is paying them to do it.

Boris is right wing in the same way I am a man.
He’d like to be, but just doesn’t have the stones.

The Groan ‘left wing’? You’ve really not been paying attention. Since the scott Trust sold out on principles and Viner became editor, the ‘paper’ is known mockingly as ‘The House Journal of MI6’ aka – the black-propaganda feed for the establishment with a veneer of ‘liberalism’.

No. He’s a bachelor.

So he is not qualified to advise on the matter. He simply hasn’t a clue why we need kids back to school. My god what is he really saying. This is distressing to our children and their futures.

I read that he, aged 15, was with his father (a diplomat) when his father was shot dead in Athens in the early 1980s,but he never speaks of the tragedy. No person could be unaffected by such an event. I suspect they he suffers mental torture.

A confirmed one?

‘ Paul Hunter, professor in medicine at the University of East Anglia, said it had become clear that there is a link between closing schools and controlling the spread of the virus. “The evidence is clear that schools are important in the spread of Covid-19,” he said. “Our studies show that, across Europe, closing schools was the single factor most strongly associated with drops in infection rates.”’
This is simply NOT true – Sweden’s schools remained open and the virus spread no faster than anywhere else…

So who is sponsoring Hunter to pedal these lies?

Just looked up his bio here: https://people.uea.ac.uk/paul_hunter/info?type=activities
This is amongst his ‘activities’: Chair of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development/World Health Organization expert group on “Approaches to establishing links between drinking water and infectious disease” 1999
So bit of a link to the WHO…

He’s apparently got a job lined up with the WHO. Just waiting to move on from CMO of UK once things are “sorted”.