May 172020
 


Dorothea Lange Plantation overseer and his field hands, Mississippi Delta 1936

 

A Third Of COVID19 Hospital Patients Develop Dangerous Blood Clots (BBC)
China Adds Long-Term Organ Damage To List Of Effects Of COVID19 (SCMP)
May 16 Update: US COVID-19 Test Results (CR)
Llamas Could Be Our Secret Weapon Against Coronavirus (G.)
Lack Of Immunity Makes China Vulnerable To Another Wave Of Coronavirus (CNN)
Battle Looms At WHO Amid Pressure On China Over Coronavirus Inquiry (SCMP)
Trump Hints He May Reverse Course And Restore WHO Funding (F.)
Q2 US GDP Forecasts: Probably Around 30% Annual Rate Decline (CR)
Difficulties Abound On NYC’s Road To Reopen (Xinhua)
Brennan Claims Release Of Names Is ‘Abominable Abuse Of Authority’ (Fox)
Had Enough? (Jim Kunstler)
Economic Growth: Who Needs It? (Ms.)

 

 

• Over the past 24 hours US had +23,117 new cases (total 88,851) and +1,277 new deaths.
Note: both numbers are still well below White House predictions for the summer of 30,000 and 3,000, respectively

• Reported global new cases yesterday reached 100,184, new high.

• Russia reports 9,709 new coronavirus infections (yesterday: 9,200)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Note: new global cases yesterday 100,184

Cases 4,743,181 (+ 97,795 from yesterday’s 4,645,386)

Deaths 313,703 (+ 4,723 from yesterday’s 308,980)

 

 

 

From Worldometer yesterday evening -before their day’s close-

 

 

From Worldometer

 

 

From SCMP:

 

 

From COVID19Info.live:

 

 

 

 

This by now is obvious. But I have my doubts over the following: “..This change in the blood is the result of severe inflammation in the lungs..”, because I haven’t seen any proof that it’s the immune system which makes the blood clot. Far as I can see, the stickiness could occur (e.g if virus impacts hemoglobin) before the blood reaches the lungs, and maybe even worsen the inflammation.

A Third Of COVID19 Hospital Patients Develop Dangerous Blood Clots (BBC)

Up to 30% of patients who are seriously ill with coronavirus are developing dangerous blood clots, according to medical experts. They say the clots, also known as thrombosis, could be contributing to the number of people dying. Severe inflammation in the lungs – a natural response of the body to the virus – is behind their formation. Patients worldwide are being affected by many medical complications of the virus, some of which can be fatal. Back in March, as coronavirus was spreading across the globe, doctors started seeing far higher rates of clots in patients admitted to hospital than they would normally expect. And there have been other surprises, including the discovery of hundreds of micro-clots in the lungs of some patients.

The virus has also increased cases of deep vein thrombosis – blood clots usually found in the leg – which can be life-threatening when fragments break off and move up the body into the lungs, blocking blood vessels. [..] “With a huge outpouring of data over the past few weeks I think it has become apparent that thrombosis is a major problem,” says Roopen Arya, professor of thrombosis and haemostasis at King’s College Hospital, London. “Particularly in severely affected Covid patients in critical care, where some of the more recent studies show that nearly half the patients have pulmonary embolism or blood clot on the lungs.” He believes the number of critically ill coronavirus patients developing blood clots could be significantly higher than the published data in Europe of up to 30%.

The professor’s blood sciences team in the hospital has been analysing samples from patients showing how coronavirus is changing their blood making it much more sticky. And sticky blood can lead to blood clots. This change in the blood is the result of severe inflammation in the lungs, a natural response of the body to the virus. “In severely affected patients we are seeing an outpouring of chemicals in the blood and this has a knock-on effect of activating the blood clotting,” says Prof Arya. And all this ultimately causes a patient’s condition to deteriorate. According to thrombosis expert Prof Beverley Hunt, sticky blood is having wider repercussions than just blood clots – it’s also leading to higher rates of strokes and heart attacks. “And yes sticky blood is contributing to high mortality rates,” she says.

Read more …

Which may all occur because of the impact on hemoglobin.

China Adds Long-Term Organ Damage To List Of Effects Of COVID19 (SCMP)

Understanding is growing of the effects of Sars-CoV-2, the official name of the coronavirus that causes Covid-19, on the organs of patients – even after they apparently recover. While most patients, especially those with mild and moderate symptoms, can recover without long-term consequences to their health, studies indicate that those with severe symptoms can have organ damage and require a much longer time for rehabilitation. The commission said some Covid-19 patients might also develop heart problems such as angina and arrhythmia – conditions that could result directly from the virus or arise after a patient has been bedridden for a long time. The guidelines also list potential mental health problems resulting from Covid-19, including depression, insomnia, eating disorders and various changes in cognitive functions.


Other problems identified in the guidelines include muscle and limb-function loss. But kidney damage was not among the conditions named, despite a number of studies citing it as a potential long-term consequence. According to a study published in the journal Kidney International on Wednesday, one-third of 5,449 Covid-19 patients surveyed by researchers at Northwell Health, the biggest health provider in New York state, developed acute kidney failure. Lead researcher Kenar Jhaveri, associate chief of nephrology at Hofstra/Northwell in Great Neck, New York, told Reuters that 14.3 per cent of those with kidney failure required dialysis. There have also been reports of the coronavirus attacking the skin, the central nervous system and blood vessels, resulting in clogging and strokes.

Read more …

The myth that 1 million tests per day would be enough is persistent. A myth because it would take a full year to test everyone.

May 16 Update: US COVID-19 Test Results (CR)

The US might be able to test 400,000 to 600,000 people per day sometime in May according to Dr. Fauci – and that might be enough for test and trace. However, the US might need more than 900,000 tests per day according to Dr. Jha of Harvard’s Global Health Institute. There were 356,994 test results reported over the last 24 hours. This data is from the COVID Tracking Project. The percent positive over the last 24 hours was 7.0% (red line). The US probably needs enough tests to keep the percentage positive well below 5%. (probably much lower based on testing in New Zealand). NOTE: A few states are apparently including antibody tests with virus tests. The Covid tracking project is working to straighten that out.

Read more …

Just let them spit in your face and you’re fine.“In addition to larger antibodies like ours, llamas have small ones that can sneak into spaces on viral proteins that are too tiny for human antibodies..”

Llamas Could Be Our Secret Weapon Against Coronavirus (G.)

The solution to the coronavirus may have been staring us in the face this whole time, lazily chewing on a carrot. All we need, it seems, is llamas. A study published last week in the journal Cell found that antibodies in llamas’ blood could offer a defense against the coronavirus. In addition to larger antibodies like ours, llamas have small ones that can sneak into spaces on viral proteins that are too tiny for human antibodies, helping them to fend off the threat. The hope is that the llama antibodies could help protect humans who have not been infected. International researchers owe their findings to a llama named Winter, a four-year-old resident of Belgium.

Her antibodies had already proven themselves able to fight Sars and Mers, leading researchers to speculate that they could work against the virus behind Covid-19 – and indeed, in cell cultures at least, they were effective against it. Researchers are now working towards clinical trials. “If it works, llama Winter deserves a statue,” Dr Xavier Saelens, a Ghent University virologist and study author, told the New York Times. To any llama aficionado, this news should come as no surprise. The animals have developed a reputation for healing. Llama antibodies have been a fixture in the fight against disease for years, with researchers investigating their potency against HIV and other viruses.

And their soothing powers go beyond the microscopic. Llamas have become exam-season fixtures at a number of top US colleges. George Caldwell, who raises llamas in Sonora, California, brings his trusted associates to the University of California, Berkeley, UC Davis, Stanford, and other northern California universities and high schools, where their tranquility is contagious, helping students overcome end-of-term anxiety. “When you’re around a llama, you become very calm and at peace,” one Berkeley senior said at a campus event last year.

Read more …

CNN has an article on Dr. Zhong Nanshan, the Chinese government’s senior medical adviser, who, as featured prominently at the Automatic Earth at the time, infamously claimed in late January that the epidemic would be over in 10 days, so early February.

Lack Of Immunity Makes China Vulnerable To Another Wave Of Coronavirus (CNN)

China still faces the “big challenge” of a potential second wave of Covid-19 infections, the country’s top respiratory authority has warned, with the lack of immunity among the community a serious concern as the race to develop a vaccine continues. Dr. Zhong Nanshan, the Chinese government’s senior medical adviser and the public face of the country’s fight against Covid-19, also confirmed in an exclusive interview with CNN on Saturday that local authorities in Wuhan, the city where the novel coronavirus was first reported in December, had suppressed key details about the magnitude of the initial outbreak.

China has reported more than 82,000 coronavirus cases, with at least 4,633 deaths, according to data from the country’s National Health Commission (NHC). The number of new infections surged quickly in late January, prompting city lockdowns and nationwide travel bans. By early February, China was reporting as many as 3,887 fresh cases a day. A month later, however, daily cases had dropped into the double digits — while in the US, the number of daily infections skyrocketed, from 47 new cases on March 6 to 22,562 by the end of the month. Having now largely contained the virus, life in China is slowly returning to normal. Lockdowns have eased and some schools and factories have reopened across the country.

But Zhong said Chinese authorities should not be complacent, with the danger of a second wave of infections looming large. Fresh clusters of coronavirus cases have emerged across China in recent weeks, in Wuhan as well as the northeastern provinces of Heilongjiang and Jilin. “The majority of … Chinese at the moment are still susceptible of the Covid-19 infection, because (of) a lack of immunity,” Zhong said. “We are facing (a) big challenge, it’s not better than the foreign countries I think at the moment.”

[..] Three US companies are already testing their vaccines on humans, according to the World Health Organization. They’re still in phase 1 or phase 2 trials, which typically involve giving the vaccine to dozens or hundreds of study subjects. Zhong said three Chinese vaccines are under clinical trials in the country — however a “perfect” solution was likely to be “years” away. “We have to test again and again and again … by using different kinds of vaccines. It’s too early to draw any conclusion which kind of vaccine is available for this kind of coronavirus … that’s why I suggest that the final approval of vaccine (will) take much longer,” he said.

Read more …

China’s going to stall.

Battle Looms At WHO Amid Pressure On China Over Coronavirus Inquiry (SCMP)

The World Health Organisation has been on the front line coordinating the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. When its decision-making body gathers, virtually, for its annual meeting on Monday, it will have another battle on its hands, as tensions escalate between China, the United States and other countries over Beijing’s response to the outbreak. The coronavirus will be the focus for the World Health Assembly meeting, to be attended by all 194 WHO member states plus observers, and where policies and budgets are reviewed and approved. But all eyes will be on how countries – including the US, Australia, Canada, France and Germany – pursue an investigation into China’s handling of the pandemic within the framework of the global health body.

That could include taking the Chinese government to the international court. Leaders of these countries have already made clear that they want an inquiry, including investigating the origin of the virus, whether it was initially covered up by China, and if Beijing was slow to tell the world that the virus was being transmitted between humans. The WHO has itself been under fire, attacked for praising China’s pandemic response as “transparent” despite Beijing’s suppression of whistle-blowers and information at the start of the outbreak. Under the WHO constitution, the global health agency can refer unresolved disputes to the International Court of Justice in The Hague, the main legal organ of the United Nations. But health and legal experts said that was unlikely – and even if it did happen, the ICJ would not be able to enforce a decision.

“The WHO has never taken another state to the ICJ, and I do not anticipate that,” said Steven Hoffman, professor of global health, law and political science at York University’s Global Strategy Lab in Toronto. “If it happens it will be unprecedented.” Atul Alexander, assistant professor of law at West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, said it would be impossible to enforce a decision by the ICJ as it would need to be enacted by the UN Security Council, where China has veto power as one of five permanent members. “China would have to consent to the jurisdiction of the ICJ, which is never going to happen,” Alexander said.

Read more …

Only, that’s not what he said: “Have not made [a] final decision. All funds are frozen.”

Trump Hints He May Reverse Course And Restore WHO Funding (F.)

President Donald Trump said his administration was considering restoring partial funding to the World Health Organization Saturday morning after suspending U.S. support a month ago in a row over how the group has handled the coronavirus pandemic. On Friday evening, reports began to surface that Trump was prepared to restore about 10% of previous U.S. payments to WHO, reported to roughly match China’s share. Trump hit back at those reports Saturday morning, saying in a tweet that “this is just one of numerous concepts being considered… Have not made [a] final decision. All funds are frozen.”


He announced he would withhold U.S. funding from the WHO on April 14, and accused the group of “severely mismanaging and covering up” the coronavirus pandemic, and said he wouldn’t consider funding until a “60-to-90-day” investigation was completed. WHO officials and China have denied Trump’s claims. The U.S. was the group’s biggest financial supporter, and reportedly provided about $400 million to $500 million of the WHO’s $4.8 billion budget, or about 15%. According to NPR, the U.S. was already nearly $200 million behind on payments to the WHO when Trump announced he would halt future contributions.

Read more …

We’re going to have to look at how sick the economy was beforehand, or we’ll never get any wiser.

Q2 US GDP Forecasts: Probably Around 30% Annual Rate Decline (CR)

Important: GDP is reported at a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR). So a 30% Q2 decline is around 7% decline from Q1 (SA).
• From Merrill Lynch: “We are tracking -5.2% qoq saar for 1Q GDP and expect a -30% qoq saar plunge in 2Q. [SAAR May 15 estimate]”.

• From the NY Fed Nowcasting Report “The New York Fed Staff Nowcast stands at -31.1% for 2020:Q2. [May 15 estimate]”.

• And from the Altanta Fed: GDPNow “The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the second quarter of 2020 is -42.8 percent on May 15, down from -34.9 percent on May 8. [May 15 estimate]”

Read more …

Chinese trolling. Still, reopening New York is a major gamble.

Difficulties Abound On NYC’s Road To Reopen (Xinhua)

Life came to a grinding halt for about 8.3 million residents in New York City when a statewide “PAUSE” order went into effect to curb the spread of COVID-19 nearly two months ago. So far, schools, businesses, and Broadway theaters have been shuttered, with health care workers fighting tirelessly to save lives in overwhelmed hospitals. On Friday, five regions in the central and northern parts of New York state reopened following a phased strategy. Those regions, largely remote and account for less than one-fifth of the state’s population, have not been hit hard by the pandemic. New York City still has to wait, as it has not met the requirements for reopening in new hospitalization, share of total hospital beds and ICU beds available — three of the seven benchmarks set by the state government.


Mayor Bill de Blasio said this month that the city would not see eased restrictions before June, and a true reopening will be “a few months away at minimum.” Despite a flattened curve, the data in New York City remain staggering. By Saturday afternoon, the city’s health department has reported 189,031 cases, more than those of countries including France and Germany. A death toll of 20,576 accounts for nearly a quarter of the national total. “While the (daily new) case count appears to be decreasing, there is still a need for it to go lower, and to have the ability to detect and trace the contacts of cases to prevent a major resurgence in the virus,” Jeff Schlegelmilch, deputy director for the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University’s Earth Institute, told Xinhua.

“In a densely populated place like New York City, none of these things are simple, and all of this needs to be done at a large scale with quick reaction to changes in conditions,” he noted. Experts and officials underlined the significance of testing at the beginning of the crisis in early March. Both the mayor and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo have repeatedly vowed to expand testing capacity, especially in lower-income and minority communities. After more than two months’ efforts, however, the supply still falls short of the demand. “Lack of widespread testing was our Achilles’ heel from day one,” said de Blasio on Thursday. “We’re still playing catch-up.”


Also on Thursday, the mayor announced that any person with COVID-19 symptoms as well as anyone who has been in close contact with a confirmed case is now eligible to receive a test in New York City, which means these basic containment measures have never been fully conducted in the epicenter of the pandemic. Notably, the importance of contact tracing was largely ignored or deemed a mission impossible by local officials. During a press briefing on April 3, New York City’s Health Department Commissioner Oxiris Barbot said contact tracing was “not a good use of our resources” and the city has gone “past the point of contact tracing.” It was not until late April that both Cuomo and de Blasio announced their plans to hire thousands of people to get trained to be contact tracers. The tardy response at the local level reflects the whole picture of the nation. “The United States in general is behind the curve, literally and figuratively, in terms of testing and contact tracing,” said Schlegelmilch.

Read more …

Is this just desperation? He’s one of the names, after all. He wanted to unmask Flynn, but doesn’t want to be unmasked himself.

Also, I’m so tired of hearing how the Russians are going to try again. It shows you how an absolutely dead meme can live on as a zombie in partisan media.

Brennan Claims Release Of Names Is ‘Abominable Abuse Of Authority’ (Fox)

Former CIA director John Brennan, one of the officials who sought to “unmask” Michael Flynn during the presidential transition period, claimed Thursday the release of Obama-era names was an “abominable abuse of authority.” He called the recent actions by the Department of Justice to drop the case against Flynn combined with the release of names “blatant political corruption at the highest levels of U.S. government.” “When you have the administration– the White House, the attorney general, the acting head of the intelligence community all acting in concert to try to advance the personal interests of Mr. Trump… I think this is very, very serious,” Brennan told MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace.

“I’m just hoping that individuals like Chris Wray who is a remarkable public servant, will continue to stay strong in the face of this type of abominable abuse of authority,” he said. Brennan, however, was not pressed by MSNBC’s Wallace and Brian Williams on why he sought the name of Flynn in the intercepted phone conversations of Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Rather, he lashed out over the disclosure of the names of the Obama administration officials who purportedly requested to “unmask” Flynn’s identity. Brennan also said he feared Trump officials were not going to stop Russian interference in the presidential election.

“As we have talked about the upcoming November election, how the Russians and others are going to seek to try to once again interfere and influence the outcome, I just am very concerned that some of those at the very top are not going to fulfill the duties that are entrusted to them by the American people,” Brennan remarked.

Read more …

How desperate is Obama’s renewed attack on Trump? What’s with the timing?

Had Enough? (Jim Kunstler)

Last weekend, in a well-leaked conference call, it appears, Judge Sullivan took marching orders from former President Obama who suggested snaring General Flynn on a perjury rap for withdrawing his guilty plea, and whaddaya know, the stratagem laid itself out this past week like a fully-crafted macramé, all the little tufts and knots neatly in place – thanks to the busy little fingers of Lawfare attorneys burning the midnight oil all week to get the thing hoisted up on the wall. The tortured logic of the scheme was really something to behold: by withdrawing a guilty plea Flynn had entered under oath, he would be guilty of lying to the court about being guilty in the first place, and therefore had perjured himself. Imagine the interior of the legal minds responsible for that: dank chambers of rot crawling with centipedes and mealybugs of subterfuge.


The judge’s transparently perfidious moves revealed the desperation of Mr. Obama and scores of former and current officials allied with him, who are themselves liable for prosecution in the unraveling tapestry of RussiaGate. There is a sentiment welling up in this land that enough is enough with these devious pranks of crooked lawyers, and today, being Friday, would be an excellent moment for the DC District US Court of Appeals to issue a writ of mandamus for Judge Sullivan to cut the shit and get on with his bound duty to put the Flynn case to rest. A nice added touch, if necessary, would be to kick Judge Sullivan’s seditious ass off the case and replace him with a judge who understands established law and precedent.

Read more …

Always a relevant question, but perhaps not most appropriate when the walls are caving in.

Economic Growth: Who Needs It? (Ms.)

Ardern hasn’t claimed to be post-growth, but her government’s aim of well-being provided a simpler, faster response to the pandemic than U.S. officials worried by GDP. In early March, with only eight reported cases of COVID-19 in a population of 4.8 million people, New Zealand anticipated the impact on an economy dominated by tourism. They quickly created a twelve billion Kiwi (NZ$) stimulus package (about $7.3 billion in US$), equal to about four percent of their nation’s GDP. Ninety percent of those Kiwi’s went directly to people for income support, wage subsidies, and tax relief for small businesses. Only a fraction went to their airline industry.

By comparison, in late March, the US reported 136,880 cases of COVID-19 in a population of 327 million. Our $2 trillion CARES (Coronavirus Aid, Relief & Economic Security) stimulus equaled 9.8 percent of GDP, yet only thirty percent, or about $604 billion, was slotted for direct payments and expanded unemployment benefits. Some mortgage and student loan payments were suspended, but not forgiven. Fully a quarter of CARES money went to big corporate loans, mostly for airlines to the tune of about $58 billion. A set aside for “national security” is widely believed to be for Boeing—remember them?

The Small Business Administration (SBA) got $350 billion, nearly 20 percent, but almost entirely for loans, and to businesses not as small as most women-owned micro-businesses. Another quarter of the CARES Act increases health and education funding through state block grants, municipal funding and increases for SNAP and WIC food programs. All bring with them a world of bureaucratic complications for the majority women in this crisis.

Read more …

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Home Forums Debt Rattle May 17 2020

Viewing 29 posts - 1 through 29 (of 29 total)
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  • #58881

    Dorothea Lange Plantation overseer and his field hands, Mississippi Delta 1936   • A Third Of COVID19 Hospital Patients Develop Dangerous Blood C
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle May 17 2020]

    #58882
    John Day
    Participant

    As promised: http://www.johndayblog.com/2020/05/answers.html
    The first signs that something terrible had gone wrong with the security at the Fort Detrick bio-defence facility fifty miles north-west of Washington DC were when cases of a previously unknown and serious respiratory illness appeared at a retirement village on the western outskirts of the capital in July 2019. The first cases were noted on June 30th amongst the 260 residents of the Greenspring Assisted Living unit, with the infectious disease later affecting 19 staff and taking the lives of some older residents…
    ​ ​I propose that the scheme devised in desperation last summer for this “diversionary tactic”, was to send the Fort Detrick Virus with the soldiers set to compete at the Wuhan games in three months’ time, while trying to keep a lid on the domestic epidemic until the new year, and a lock on the inquisitive media. Rehearsing for the subsequent global pandemic called for “Event 201” to prepare participants for what they might have to face, and bring their organizational and media responses into line…
    ​ ​Whether this theory is the correct one may not yet be proven, but it does provide an explanation to the conundrum of the genie that was accidentally released from the bottle but intentionally released from Wuhan. And we must all now suffer the consequences of that US “culpable manslaughter” as we learn to live with their engineered Genie.
    https://ahtribune.com/world/covid-19/4152-american-genie.html

    The juxtaposition of images in the news of farmers destroying crops and dumping milk with empty supermarket shelves or hungry Americans lining up for hours at food banks tells a story of economic efficiency gone mad. Today the US actually has two separate food chains, each supplying roughly half of the market. The retail food chain links one set of farmers to grocery stores, and a second chain links a different set of farmers to institutional purchasers of food, such as restaurants, schools, and corporate offices. With the shutting down of much of the economy, as Americans stay home, this second food chain has essentially collapsed. But because of the way the industry has developed over the past several decades, it’s virtually impossible to reroute food normally sold in bulk to institutions to the retail outlets now clamoring for it. There’s still plenty of food coming from American farms, but no easy way to get it where it’s needed.​..
    H ow did we end up here? The story begins early in the Reagan administration, when the Justice Department rewrote the rules of antitrust enforcement: if a proposed merger promised to lead to greater marketplace “efficiency”—the watchword—and wouldn’t harm the consumer, i.e., didn’t raise prices, it would be approved. (It’s worth noting that the word “consumer” appears nowhere in the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, passed in 1890. The law sought to protect producers—including farmers—and our politics from undue concentrations of corporate power.)1 The new policy, which subsequent administrations have left in place, propelled a wave of mergers and acquisitions in the food industry.​..
    Slaughterhouses have become hot zones for contagion, with thousands of workers now out sick and dozens of them dying.4 This should come as no surprise: social distancing is virtually impossible in a modern meat plant, making it an ideal environment for a virus to spread. In recent years, meatpackers have successfully lobbied regulators to increase line speeds, with the result that workers must stand shoulder to shoulder cutting and deboning animals so quickly that they can’t pause long enough to cover a cough, much less go to the bathroom, without carcasses passing them by. Some chicken plant workers, given no regular bathroom breaks, now wear diapers.5 A worker can ask for a break, but the plants are so loud he or she can’t be heard without speaking directly into the ear of a supervisor​…
    ​ Under normal circumstances, the modern hog or chicken is a marvel of brutal efficiency, bred to produce protein at warp speed when given the right food and pharmaceuticals. So are the factories in which they are killed and cut into parts. These innovations have made meat, which for most of human history has been a luxury, a cheap commodity available to just about all Americans; we now eat, on average, more than nine ounces of meat per person per day, many of us at every meal.7​ …
    Unfortunately, a diet dominated by such foods (as well as lots of meat and little in the way of vegetables or fruit—the so-called Western diet) predisposes us to obesity and chronic diseases such as hypertension and type-2 diabetes. These “underlying conditions” happen to be among the strongest predictors that an individual infected with Covid-19 will end up in the hospital with a severe case of the disease; the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have reported that 49 percent of the people hospitalized for Covid-19 had preexisting hypertension, 48 percent were obese, and 28 percent had diabetes.9
    Why these particular conditions should worsen Covid-19 infections might be explained by the fact that all three are symptoms of chronic inflammation, which is a disorder of the body’s immune system. (The Western diet is by itself inflammatory.)​…
    ​ In addition to protecting the men and women we depend on to feed us, it would also seek to reorganize our agricultural policies to promote health rather than mere production, by paying attention to the quality as well as the quantity of the calories it produces. For even when our food system is functioning “normally,” reliably supplying the supermarket shelves and drive-thrus with cheap and abundant calories, it is killing us—slowly in normal times, swiftly in times like these.

    The Sickness in Our Food Supply

    Globalization and Financialization Are Dead, and so Is Everything That Depended on Them​, Char​le​s Hugh Smith
    ​ ​Globalization and financialization have been losing momentum for years. Under the guise of “opening markets,” globalization has stripmined every economy that can’t print a reserve currency and hollowed out economies globally as only globally competitive sectors survive globalization. The net result is that once vibrant, diversified economies have been reduced to fragile monocultures completely dependent on global flows of capital and spending for their survival.
    https://www.oftwominds.com/blogmay20/globalization-dead5-20.html

    #58883
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Dorothea Lange Plantation overseer and his field hands, Mississippi Delta 1936

    Now there is a picture that speaks volumes……….

    #58884
    John Day
    Participant

    Here is the explanation for the clotting, by Dr Seheult on Medcram. It’s a medical lecture.
    I’l briefly summarize:
    SARS-CoV-2 attacks the endothelial cells that line the blood vessels, triggering inflammatory response and the clotting cascade, so clots form in the small arteries and arterioles..
    It is the inflammation in the blood vessels that is the core, underlying pathologic process, affecting vascular organs like lungs and kidneys, and prompting heart attacks and strokes, too.
    Zinc, antioxidants, ACE-2 receptors, blood types are all addressed. Thanks to Nurse Practitioner Marjorie for introducing me to Dr Seheult’s lectures.

    #58885
    lasttwo
    Participant

    Any chance of a third party president anyone? anyone? any ideas? who would you write in? I know I can not vote for trump and biden seems dangerously close to dementia. America there has to be a better leader than these two lumps. do you think the elite are intentionally choosing weak and crazy leaders so the needed change cannot happen?. Voter turnout should be at a record low. also what the elite want.

    #58886
    John Day
    Participant

    Why is China not giving out vitamin-D like free condoms in New Orleans?

    #58887
    John Day
    Participant

    @lasttwo
    Write in Jesse Ventura?

    #58888
    lasttwo
    Participant

    excellent article on the current food supply situation . Pollan’s book Omnivores Dilemma is an outstanding read also

    The Sickness in Our Food Supply

    #58889
    zerosum
    Participant

    Eye of the beholder
    Truth is hard to prove

    What is that color, …. pink or grey?

    Capitalism is good is a competition is a war is a monopoly is a destroyed world
    Socialism is bad is a parasite is a virus is ….

    Two side is democrats is republican

    ” …. covid-19 exacerbate mental health problems”

    #58890
    lasttwo
    Participant

    John Day-
    thought a lot about Jesse, interesting case and he may run as green party candidate. He did win with the reform party for governor so not a stranger to third party politics. Could probably out debate trump.

    #58891
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    John Day: Why is China not giving out vitamin-D like free condoms in New Orleans?

    Excellent question.

    “Vitamin D deficiency is prevalent among all age groups in China”
    The High Prevalence of Hypovitaminosis D in China
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4554140/

    “Vitamin D inadequacy is common among the elderly, especially within the Asian population.”
    Vitamin D status among the elderly Chinese population
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5237548/

    #58892
    lasttwo
    Participant

    If the covid virus is man made. there is no telling the long term impact. If it is nature made the chart above is still pretty worrisome. I keep looking at the counts but my statistical training tells me the sampling is incorrect. If you want to know the defect rate you would normally have to:
    1) Have a known and reliable way to test
    2) Pull a random sample from the population
    3) The sample size needs to be large enough to gain a confidence level of say 99%

    We do not seem to have #1 so the others are irrelevant. but still 2 and 3 are also not being done.
    So WE KNOW NOTHING. Just numbers on a spreadsheet. .

    If you had a reliable accurate test and you took a RANDOM sample for a population of 330,000,000 the sample would have to be 6524789 to get a 99% confidence level. at a .05 confidence interval. That would accurately describe whats happening. The thing that makes it more difficult and outside my scope is the changing nature of the problem a person could be well today and sick tomorrow. but with a random test we would actually know a lot more. just testing sick people is almost worthless.

    #58893
    WES
    Participant

    Lasttwo:

    Statistical math is pretty much useless against something like this coronavirus. Especially, if you introduce people into the equation! Then you vere into the dismal science of economics!

    The only hope is to try and reduce the spread of the virus back down to a level where health authorities can employ their isolation and tracing capabilities.

    Based upon my visit to the local Home Depot store yesterday, where only about 50% were wearing masks, many not wearing masks properly, I would say we are a long, long way from reaching that point here in Ontario.

    #58894

    Oddly enough, I don’t trust a face I can’t see.

    #58895
    WES
    Participant

    I find it interesting that those who spied on Flynn don’t want the law applied to themselves.

    They only want their law.

    Maybe they should have thought this through before embarking down the path they took back in 2012 or so.

    Their path did not lead them where they wanted to go. Instead it eventually lead to exposure of their deeds.

    So far they have been very lucky. None of them have been charged or jailed. None are ever likely to be either.

    Only the people they have acused under their law have been charged and jailed.

    The perfect justice system, if you are corrupt!

    #58896
    kimyo99
    Participant

    @ john day ‘which for most of human history has been a luxury’

    if you limit ‘history’ to the last 2,000 years, then you are corrrect. however, if you look at the previous two to three million years, the time before agriculture, you will find that it’s meat eating which made us human.

    today’s diabesity epidemic is a result of carbohydrate consumption, you must know that. it has nothing to do with meat. the villain is the bun, not the burger. in addition, the bun contains glyphosate, high fructose corn syrup and is ‘fortified’ with folic acid, which many cannot process properly. what the body needs is folate. where do you find that? in meat.

    Eating Meat Made Us Human, Suggests New Skull Fossil

    “I know this will sound awful to vegetarians, but meat made us human,” said researcher Manuel Domínguez-Rodrigo, an archaeologist at Complutense University in Madrid.

    Past research suggested prehuman hominids such as australopithecines may have eaten some meat. However, it is the regular consumption of meat that often is thought to have triggered major changes in the human lineage, the genus Homo, with this high-energy food supporting large human brains.

    Meat-eating was essential for human evolution, says UC Berkeley anthropologist specializing in diet

    Without meat, said Milton, it’s unlikely that proto humans could have secured enough energy and nutrition from the plants available in their African environment at that time to evolve into the active, sociable, intelligent creatures they became. Receding forests would have deprived them of the more nutritious leaves and fruits that forest-dwelling primates survive on, said Milton.

    Her thesis complements the discovery last month by UC Berkeley professor Tim White and others that early human species were butchering and eating animal meat as long ago as 2.5 million years. Milton’s article integrates dietary strategy with the evolution of human physiology to argue that meat eating was routine. It is published this month in the journal “Evolutionary Anthropology” (Vol.8, #1).

    #58897
    Lonnie_King
    Participant

    Aloha Raul:

    You write “This by now is obvious. But I have my doubts over the following: “..This change in the blood is the result of severe inflammation in the lungs..”, because I haven’t seen any proof that it’s the immune system which makes the blood clot.”

    I suggest you look into Antiphospholipid Syndrome. For whatever the precise initiating cause is, we can develop antibodies to the phospholipids on the platelets circulating in our blood which causes them to clump or CLOT together. The Catastrophic version of this disease killed my wife of 46 years.

    #58898
    Glennda
    Participant

    Thank you, John Day, for that great medical video from medcram.com
    I plan to watch more of those to up grade my vastly out of date physiology education.

    Green party? I hope they run Jesse Ventura.
    But it Biden’s handlers bring in some of Bernie’s ideas, and gets Elizabeth Warren to run as VP, who knows… it might be acceptable.

    #58899
    Figmund Sreud
    Participant

    Survey of interest, perhaps?

    Last Friday, “The Virus” survey – that nobody else has had the courage (or stupidity) to present – was fronted to regular posters on one particular website [ https://www.greaterfool.ca/ ]. Today, the results were presented. Six-thousand-seventy-three unique responses, … one-hundred-thirty-nine reported death in the family or relations [question number 3 ].

    Link to the survey’s results: https://www.greaterfool.ca/2020/05/17/dont-be-so-sure-2/

    Best,

    F.S. – Calgary, Alberta.

    #58901
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    @ John Day
    “cases of a previously unknown and serious respiratory illness appeared at a retirement village on the western outskirts of the capital in July 2019”

    Local news story, July 12, 2019:

    The symptoms usually start with a cough. In less than 2 weeks, a mystery virus at Springfield’s Greenspring Retirement Community has gotten 55 residents sick. Twenty have been hospitalized — some with pneumonia — and two people have died... …Dr. Schwartz says the community is taking proper steps and thoroughly cleaning the facility while Inova Health and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention work to figure out what kind of a virus this is and how it is spreading. “These panels have looked for several of the most common pathogens and they have been negative so far,” said Dr. Schwartz.
    https://wjla.com/news/local/mystery-virus-greenspring-retirement-cdc-va

    Washington Post, July 19:
    Third person has died after respiratory illness outbreak at Greenspring Village, Fairfax officials say
    CDC has tested 17 samples but has so far failed to identify the cause.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2019/07/17/third-person-has-died-after-respiratory-illness-outbreak-greenspring-village-fairfax-officials-say/

    From the official website for the Health Department at Fairfield County:

    July 11 update
    A specific cause has not yet been identified but additional tests are being done by the Virginia Department of Health and Inova Health System.”

    July 15 update
    No cause for the illnesses has yet been identified, but the Health Department is working with the Virginia Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to conduct testing for viruses and bacteria that may cause respiratory illness.”

    July 16 update
    “Results of testing by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are still pending”

    July 17 update
    CDC tested 17 specimens from ill Greenspring residents. No cause for the outbreak was identified.

    July 19 update
    “Additional laboratory testing from CDC has not identified a specific cause for the increase in respiratory illness.”

    July 26 update
    “Despite extensive testing of multiple specimens, no specific pathogen was identified as the cause of the outbreak.”

    July 29 (final update)
    “Results of earlier testing submitted to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicated rhinovirus, a virus that causes the common cold.

    https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/health/outbreak-investigation-assisted-living-facility-springfield

    #58905
    zerosum
    Participant

    Someone is hiding something/not telling the truth.
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2019/07/17/third-person-has-died-after-respiratory-illness-outbreak-greenspring-village-fairfax-officials-say/
    July 17, 2019 at 2:43 p.m. PDT
    A third person has died following an outbreak of respiratory illness at a Fairfax County assisted-living facility that began more than two weeks ago, county health officials said Wednesday.

    The outbreak at Greenspring Village in Springfield also spread to the unit’s staff, affecting 19 employees, Fairfax County Health Department officials said.
    The notice that went out on July 10 from Donna L. Epps, an administrator at Greenspring, said several residents had been having symptoms of respiratory illness, including fever, coughing and body aches. Epps’s notice, which says the symptoms recede in about five to seven days with treatment but have caused pneumonia,
    This outbreak differs in that it is occurring in July whereas most outbreaks of this kind are in the winter/flu season.
    Look … the official story …. were new test made on those who were sick in July?

    https://www.vdh.virginia.gov/coronavirus/
    The outbreak was first detected in China in December 2019.
    On March 7, 2020 the first case of COVID-19 in Virginia was announced.

    #58906
    John Day
    Participant

    @Doc Robinson,
    Thanks for chasing that down. If you read the story, the CDC seems to have been captured at the outset. We do know that the DoD is running America’s COVID Pandemic response together with the CDC since early this year, and that all meetings are classified.
    I had a patient almost die in the local teaching hospital for the med school over late November to early December 2019. The only thing their testing found was “coronavirus”, which is the other “virus that causes the common cold”.
    Think there might have been one little intentional miscommunication from the CDC in late July?


    @kimyo99
    ,
    Michael Pollan’s words. I don’t have his email.

    #58909
    kimyo99
    Participant

    @ john day: these are your words:

    Since 2001 I don’t eat any critters at all, which was a lot harder, and my body gained weight from eating more cheese and low-protein foods. High protein meals reduce appetite.

    your personal experience confirms pollan’s error. both he and ancel keys are wrong. the food pyramid is wrong. it is long past time to discard the cholesterol/saturated fat mythology.

    #58910
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    After at least 2 weeks of testing in July 2019, the CDC reportedly didn’t identify the cause of the outbreak, “despite extensive testing of multiple specimens”. A few days later, rhinovirus was indicated when the county health department wrapped up its investigation. It took that long for the CDC to identify a rhinovirus as the cause?

    #58911
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    The CDC tested 17 samples, but “had not been able to identify” the cause of the outbreak, and noted that “several” samples tested positive for rhinovirus.

    “Working with the county health department along with the Virginia Department of Health, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tested 17 samples taken from ill residents, but as of July 19, the agency had not been able to identify a specific cause for the sudden uptick in respiratory illness from either that initial testing or additional laboratory testing.

    CDC test results uncovered several bacteria known to “colonize” the nose and throat but may not be the cause of infection, and several specimens tested positive rhinovirus, the respiratory virus most frequently found in humans and the main source of the common cold, according to the Fairfax County Health Department.”

    http://www.fairfaxtimes.com/articles/three-dead-amid-respiratory-illness-outbreak-in-springfield/article_ce2c4b14-afd8-11e9-959b-7f6fe03817ca.html

    #58913
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    In July 2019, the Virginia Department of Health issued a warning about an increase in respiratory illnesses in multiple regions “across the Commonwealth”.

    “Since the end of flu season in May, the Virginia Department of Health has received increased reports of respiratory (breathing) illness across the Commonwealth greater than observed in previous summers. Most of the reports have occurred among older adults and those with chronic medical conditions in assisted living and long-term care facilities.”

    https://www.vdh.virginia.gov/news/public-relations-contacts/archived-news-releases/2019-news-releases/virginia-department-of-health-warns-residents-of-increase-in-respiratory-illnesses-2/

    #58916
    John Day
    Participant

    @kimyo99
    Good research. Those are my words there. I made that transition for spiritual reasons, same as not killing and eating other people.
    I’m ok. My health is remarkably good.
    We each make a lot of decisions in life, for a lot of reasons, and each of us walks a unique path.

    @Doc Robinson,
    Good research!
    If you test a lot of people in June and July you are bound to find some rhinovirus, no?
    Not the cause, was it?

    #58917
    lasttwo
    Participant

    But it Biden’s handlers bring in some of Bernie’s ideas, and gets Elizabeth Warren to run as VP, who knows… it might be acceptable

    Shameful day when the president needs a handler but I reckon the current one does too. The VP pick will be important and warren or gabbbard would be a god choice..

    #58919
    lasttwo
    Participant

    Based upon my visit to the local Home Depot store yesterday, where only about 50% were wearing masks, many not wearing masks properly, I would say we are a long, long way from reaching that point here in Ontario.

    luckier in NS we are almost there but unless we close the borders it really does not matter

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