rocket_scientist

A bit of a "weekend reporting" trend showing?

With less than 50,000 cases in the UK, that's less than 0.1% of the population who have tested positive. With more than 99.9% of us not having the virus, is it proportionate to ask 50,000,000+ of us to be in lockdown? That's billions of pounds per day being lost with devastating effects being created. Of course the woeful testing levels mean that some of the 99.9% can be currently infected or have recovered from having it but is the cure becoming worse than the problem? Is the problem big enough to merit such an extreme response? 17,000 on average die of the flu each year in the UK and one year recently had 27,000 deaths. Will that many die of this virus? Highly unlikely given the data and trends in other countries, even including the fact that the Covid deaths are being inflated by those dying with the virus rather than from the virus. I can't remember a lockdown when the flu was wiping out people in previous years. The biggest question is WHY? What is the underlying agenda of the government? To save lives? Do we believe that? Are they even in charge? Why are they introducing us to draconian house-arrest measures, dramatically taking away many of our liberties and throwing billions of our wealth down the drain? Does our personal "wealth" even matter in where we are going? Lots of questions. Very thin on answers.

I'm getting scared now. Is this virus planned? What will be in the vaccine that they will force on us? Will martial law be fully implemented this month? I don't think everything is what it seems.

Ok let's have a go... The key is testing. The "immunity passport" idea has merit. When the antibody tests and whether currently infected tests become widely available, the immune and the non-infected have no need to be isolated. The requirement to ensure that the virus doesn't recur is ongoing (until the science understands the nature of Covid-19) of course so regular individual testing is the key to unlock. A piece of paper isn't going to cut it, as that spastic Hancock mooted and they have to embrace technology and App-base it, mandatorily although recognising that some don't have smartphones. Once the App is functioning, there's your data tracking and contact tracing doing all the work for you. Infected people are immediately quarantined and everyone within their range since the date of their last test is urged to immediately retest. This all assumes that tests can be made available and are easy enough to self-diagnose, which currently isn't the case of course, particularly in the presently infected category. But that's the critical blueprint. Identify who's positive, who's negative and who's "passive" i.e. currently negative and possibly immune.

I was there too and thoroughly enjoyed it, one of the best games at Pittodrie this century. Let's be honest though, the first two goals were tragic defensive errors. The third was a very intelligent pass from May completing an excellent interchange but I didn't see GMS as "unplayable". The first goal was my highlight, a phenomenal cross field ball by Kenny McLean and a great cut back (by GMS if I mind) for Shinnie to drive home.

This is what an exponential growth curve looks like. Hoping for a plateau at some point in the next week or so. Edit: correction, this graph will only "plateau" when people stop dying. I meant that the infections number should plateau and then come down as the total number of infected reduces. But I don't trust the infected numbers as there has been a minute fraction of the population tested (due to government incompetence) so we are flying blind, without a fucking clue how fast and widespread this disease spreads.

Not as simple as that. Lockdown isn't just an economic consequence. Many will have run out of money already and millions of others will do so in the next month or so. The results of lockdown will kill a bigger number when we take into account the stress and the depression and the mass unemployment etc. How can minimum wage people and gig economy and other low paid workers pay for food now that they have no income and trust me, the government won't be capable/may not even want to get their welfare state functioning properly. I'm already preparing for massive civil unrest when the desperate have no option but to be desperate. Fortunately we don't have guns in the UK (and I predict a bloodbath in the US) so I've only got a super-sharp flick knife and a hammer to protect me and my family and whilst these effects of lockdown aren't being discussed yet in the debate, it's a personal view that I see coming. Your points about the "fictional economy" are good ones. I wish I could have similar faith that this fundamental basis could be challenged but for the fact that the capitalist globalist agenda - which I misspelled globalust just now, poetically or ironically - uses finance as a crucially important tool for mass control. I agree with the principle that we could save the economy but we can't save lives and I struggle to fully comprehend where the Hitchens end of the spectrum sits with regard to basic humanity. I think they are right in pointing out that the global Covid death figures have been inflated by people dying with the virus rather than from it - I gave two specific examples last week on our own doorstep, in Aberdeen Royal Infirmary - but the lack of proper care to existing non-infected patients is killing many more, wholly down to the panic measures that Hancock's NHS are working under right now. TV is not data. Their argument has been supported by insiders saying that London hospitals ARE coping (and that Excel won't be required) but of course it's essential to prepare for worst case contingencies. As I say, there's a massive whole debate going on which includes experts in law, in medicine, in economics etc. and whilst Piers champions the total restriction of all liberties for all people, I would be alarmed at how certain he is on everything but for the fact we know he's a total penis, without a big intellect and is desperate to present himself as uber-humanitarian and a man of the people whereas the truth is that he's just a slut for self importance. Fuck knows where the truth lies but it can be found with intelligent critical thinking. Some countries are getting it right. We, and the US, are getting everything so wrong.

His "point" is that Lord Sumption and the professors from Stanford and Mainz universities (I linked them above) are questioning the sanity of total lockdown. They're not the only ones. Frederick Forsyth also asked the same question (which I'm sure I also linked above) and many others, including the president of the US, know that economic lockdown can't last for months on end. The debate is how many will have died anyway/would be saved by lockdown v. the trillions it costs to lockdown. As Hitchens correctly points out, dissent and opposition is essential for proper debate, a fundamental tenet of a functioning democracy. It's a debate worth following. If you have some spare time on your hands, I recommend that you follow it.

Aye, tragic numbers and at the time of posting, 64,957 have been reported as dying with the virus. The data trends show that the US and the UK are losing the highest percentages in the last week. By this I mean that their and our total deaths are rising at a bigger proportion than every other country in the world. The US death figure reported today was the worst national daily loss of any country thus far and I expect they will have the highest number of fatalities globally at some point well before the end of this month. I guess a good question would be why? It's the same virus hitting the same human bodies. The virus doesn't recognise nationalities or ethnicity. Of course there will be reasonable contributory factors such as air quality, age demographics and smoker rates in Northern Italy but in the case of the two worst accelerating countries it may well be directly correlated to the "strategies", or rather the lack of them in both our countries. Boris was going for zero lockdown, "take it on the chin" and herd immunity before a total U-turn almost two weeks ago and Trump similarly wasn't in favour of lockdown before being advised to finally take it seriously. Even then, there's still 7 or 8 states not in lockdown and as we've seen again today in England, the Westminster government's advice or recommendations or instructions (or whatever the fuck they're doing) isn't being adhered to on a total level. Once again tonight, Trump showed his impatience and repeated his "the cure can't be worse than the problem itself" and I'm following the fascinating debate in the UK on whether or not the cost of lockdown is ultimately going to be "worth it". It's a pity that Piers Morgan and Peter Hitchens happen to be the beacons for these two opposing views as both are rather unfortunate personalities that I find distaste coming very naturally for but the truth may well come somewhere between them or indeed may attach to one of them when all's said and done, even though they couldn't be any further apart and are at completely extreme ends of the spectrum. In due course we will learn whether total lockdown or zero lockdown was the best strategy. There actually may not even be an in-between on this one. I am inclined to go with total lockdown as early as possible - which was at least 2 /3 weeks earlier than Boris went for - and then releasing after 3 weeks. I'm not infected (I'm sure) and have had very little opportunity to be infected since the pubs shut so after 3 weeks of social isolation, I can't even see how new cases can occur (if we aren't mixing with anyone). That assumes the "science" that the virus either makes us real sick or goes away within 3 weeks and also assumes that a well-organised country can test quickly and efficiently. In fact the testing on a wide enough scale is the key to it all, the data determining the whole economy. It's all a massive fuck up and I reckon God's karma is punishing us for electing such bad, unintelligent administrations. The data trends do show that we in the UK should hit a plateau in the middle of April but that assumes that we are all capable of staying at home. The US may well be the last country on earth to start to see the end of exponential "death growth" although I'm watching Sweden with interest too. If they start to explode in the next week or two, their "top of the mountain" may be last. Or then again the poorer countries will start to get a big volume of pain in May. Fuck knows. The only certainty to me is that the US and the UK will be the first five members of the 10,000 club whereas the data says that both Italy and Spain will be over the worst imminently, if they're not already. Remarkable virus. Respect. It moves with maths. I wish it never came of course as there's the relatives and friends of 65,000 grieving just now and it will be in the millions before it's finished. I'm just praying that my family's two front line workers don't get infected. That's a lie. I don't pray, being agnostic. Love and peace and good luck to you and yours.

One man's bias is another man's truth. I think that the current crisis has extinguished the last straw of any possible doubt concerning the character of Trump, unsurprisingly given that adversity always exposes true character and this assumes there was any doubt left. I can't imagine a more perfect Dunning-Kruger example than him but what I don't get is that his approvals rating is not zero. He is clinically insane. His "joke" about "not that kind of model" yesterday when talking of hundreds of thousands dead didn't just fall flat, it bombed due to being the most crass and disgusting piece of narcissism ever uttered. Not to mention "our stockpile" and "nasty question" (again), the bizarre federal recommendation on face "masks" (scarves) but him going to lengths to say he won't be following the guidelines, all within the last 12 hours!

Nobody can predict precisely when the lockdown will be released. I'm more intrigued with the arguments that there shouldn't have been one anyway. We were heading for a financial depression? The last one had a concrete reason for it and was well explained in the film The Big Short. What was going to be the reason for the next one? Before the virus of course. It's going to be hell on earth financially and socially for the next few years at this rate.

I've no idea. In amongst my looking at a bunch of stuff, I tripped across some wifie giving some workers a lecture and it may well have been Openreach guys. I've no idea if the work they were doing was 5G or not, and I doubt she could've known either. It wasn't even something I read. It was a 20 or 30 second video I saw. Even if she was a looney tune, I can hardly imagine "this type of bollocks" can have any effect whatsoever on the responsibilities of the government, which is to ensure that new technology introduced widely across the UK isn't harmful. Surely everyone knows most stuff online is a pile of bollocks? It's all about sifting through the haystack looking for the stuff that can point us towards truth. After 2 or 3 hours only of sifting, I'm already convinced the technology is potentially very dangerous and I look forward to hearing from properly qualified and/or properly informed persons (of which I'm not, yet) giving their views. Too busy picking my jaw off the deck after Trump's latest gaffes. He's amazing. These were before tonight's further incredulity: - https://www.rawstory.com/2020/04/our-dunning-kruger-president-trumps-arrogance-and-ignorance-are-killing-people/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

A wifie in London approached hired grunts laying "fibre" in the last couple of days. New 5G masts have been erected all over the UK this week. This may be the most opportune time for implementation.

France will be 4th and by the time Boris's Buggered (us) become the 5th nation to lose 10,000, the USA may well be leading the death race. But nobody's counting the deaths properly. Included in the figures, including in NHS Grampian are elderly patients who died of cardiac arrest or kidney failure but because they had tested Covid-positive, didn't get the usual treatment they would normally have got but for a decision to let them die.

Osterholm was on CNN an hour ago. He again re-emphasised that we (the US) need a national plan and said that the lockdown is going to last months not weeks. He also pointed out that new infections in China and South Korea are now spiking since they relaxed their social measures. Unlike these fucking cretins doing the UK and US daily briefings, Michael Osterholm speaks with great intelligence and a deep authority based on decades of experience. Hancock just spins shit and knows less about medicine and healthcare than most.

Superb post Tom. That's what I like, learning from others who have knowledge in areas I don't. My instinct is screaming red alerts over 5G. The demand for it is indeed coming from those who's motives I don't trust. I said last month that we need some intelligence in government. None of these clowns could articulate anything is as persuasive a constructed argument and with clarity in observations as you did. Tom W for PM. Then give Scotland independence (by decree), destroy the House of Lords and steal as much as you can from England up to the amounts they have been stealing from us, with interest of course. And take a shit on the floor in Buck Palace on your way out.

I don't know if that article said - cos I'm too lazy to re-read it just now - but it's a different ballpark between 4G and 5G, a different game, a different planet. From memory it's going for 6 GHz to 120 or 300 but whatever the number, it's mentally bigger. Not that I know if this is a danger in itself but I strongly suspect that it will be.

https://www.sciencetimes.com/amp/articles/22300/20190603/5g-technology-is-considered-a-global-health-risk-by-some-scientists.htm

That's way too specialist for me to read every word far less comprehend but why are you so convinced that it would have an "insignificant" impact on humans (and birds)?

https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2020/03/theres-powerful-evidence-this-great-panic-is-foolish-yet-our-freedom-is-still-broken-and-our-economy.html

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/The-evidence-on-Covid-19-is-not-as-clear-as-we-think/amp?__twitter_impression=true

If there was any potential for harm, politicians ought to exhaustively research the matter. As far as I can tell, they've not even started in many cases. The use of the term conspiracy theory annoys me. It's used primarily by the accused, an intellectually lazy generic attempt to shut down open debate and discredit the accuser. There is no doubt that some/many/most "conspiracy theories" are the product of losers with too much time on their hands and blessed with overly-fertile imaginations but genuine concerns and anomalies should be dealt with or explained. For example, what fuel and how much of it powered the astronauts back from the moon? What caused WTC 7 to collapse? In this case, the only stuff I had read about 5G before yesterday was about a year ago when the trees in the centre of Sheffield were being cut down supposedly as they interfered with 5G technology. That seemed too far-fetched to pique my interest back then but given the wild assertions arising this week - and they probably are totally wild given the losers who have been quickest to side with the Covid correlation - I thought it worth examining. After a couple of hours of research, I'm genuinely fearful of the technology and eagerly await the intelligent research into it, something I'm not able to do as I'm not expert in the field.

I've gone back to what my instinct was telling me the first time. I have NO idea what's going on but something ain't ringing true for me. For the record I can't believe it's related to 5G.

Incredible how "alternative theories" grow legs and incredible how quick they get closed down. https://amp.theguardian.com/media/2020/apr/02/uk-media-outlets-told-not-to-promote-baseless-5g-coronavirus-theories?utm_term=Autofeed&CMP=twt_gu&utm_medium=&utm_source=Twitter&__twitter_impression=true https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/technology-51646309?__twitter_impression=true

Hancock just lied on QT. The university labs have NOT been involved. They were asked to but the government (via the various bodies) never came back to them. Particularly galling when he's bigging up the private sector, spending money and ignoring free volunteers.