Dec 192021
 
 December 19, 2021  Posted by at 10:12 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,


Vincent van Gogh Sunflowers 1887

 

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Pravda (CTH)
Netherlands To Enter Lockdown As Nations Across Europe Tighten Curbs (G.)
Omicron Surge is Mostly Due to Ramping Up Testing (DS)
Ivermectin Prophylaxis For Covid-19 Reduces Infection, Mortality Rates (RG)
Pandemic Could Be Solved Quickly If Politics Thrown Out: Dr. Ben Carson (ET)
Ex-FDA Officials, Medical Experts Flog Feds For Politicizing Covid (JTN)
Pfizer Says Pandemic Could Extend Through 2023 (K.)
Fauci, Collins Colluded To Smear Experts Who Called For End To Lockdowns (DM)
Time To Take Away The Hall Pass We Gave Doctors And Scientists (Alexander)
The Scientists Hunting For The Next Variant Of Concern (ZH)
CDC Data Missed Millions Of Unvaccinated Americans (ZH)
CNN Doctor: Wear Masks At Home And Take Tests On Christmas Morning (SN)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Funniest video in a while.

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Pravda (CTH)

Interesting short segment from Sky News interviewing the smiling U.K. Health Minister Gillian Keegan about the intense U.K. response to the Omicron variant and the new restrictions announced by government officials. Great Britain is preparing for hundreds-of-thousands of Omicron cases. Video prompted to 05:42 just watch for around 45 seconds. No commentary from me needed. WATCH:

Read more …

No omicron to speak of, infections falling fast, but let’s ruin Christmas regardless.

Netherlands To Enter Lockdown As Nations Across Europe Tighten Curbs (G.)

Nations across Europe moved to reimpose tougher measures to stem a new wave of Covid infections spurred by the highly transmissible Omicron variant, with the Netherlands leading the way by imposing a nationwide lockdown. All non-essential stores, bars and restaurants in the Netherlands will be closed until 14 January starting Sunday, caretaker prime minister Mark Rutte said at a hastily arranged press conference Saturday night. Schools and universities will shut until 9 January, he said. In what is surely to prove a major disappointment, the lockdown terms also rein in private holiday celebrations. Residents only will be permitted two visitors except for Christmas and New Year’s, when four will be allowed, according to Rutte.

“The Netherlands is going into lockdown again from tomorrow,” he said, adding that the move was “unavoidable because of the fifth wave caused by the Omicron variant that is bearing down on us.” It wasn’t just the Dutch seeking to slow the spread of Omicron. Alarmed ministers in France, Cyprus and Austria tightened travel restrictions. Paris canceled its New Year’s Eve fireworks. Denmark has closed theatres, concert halls, amusement parks and museums. Ireland imposed an 8 pm curfew on pubs and bars and limited attendance at indoor and outdoor events. London mayor Sadiq Khan underscored the official concern about the climbing cases and their potential to overwhelm the health care system by declaring a major incident Saturday, a move that allows local councils in Britain’s capital to coordinate work more closely with emergency services.

Irish prime minister Micheal Martin captured the sense of the continent in an address to the nation, saying the new restrictions were needed to protect lives and livelihoods from the resurgent virus. “None of this is easy,” Martin said Friday night. “We are all exhausted with Covid and the restrictions it requires. The twists and turns, the disappointments and the frustrations take a heavy toll on everyone. But it is the reality that we are dealing with.”

Read more …

Trick of the trade.

Omicron Surge is Mostly Due to Ramping Up Testing (DS)

Reported infections in the U.K. have suddenly spiked in the last three days, up from 59,610 on Tuesday to 78,610 on Wednesday, 88,376 on Thursday and 93,045 on Friday. Looking at the data regionally, the spike is currently much more pronounced in London, the South East, the East of England, the East Midlands and the North West than it is in the North East, Yorkshire and the Humber, the South West and the West Midlands. It’s not clear at this point if it is going to continue to rise, though the last three days’ counts don’t appear to indicate continued sharp growth. It is also so far largely an artefact of massively increased testing, as the graph below with data for the U.K. up to December 16th shows. Similar is true for Scotland. Positive tests have spiked.

But positivity is up only a little due to the large increase in testing. How significant is it that the spike began on Monday December 13th, the day after Boris Johnson’s Sunday press conference when he warned everyone about Omicron and told them to get their booster jab? There was a huge surge in demand for booster doses starting that Monday and continuing throughout the week. Could the fact that this surge coincided with a similar surge in both testing and positive tests be more than coincidence? Perhaps people got tested before getting their booster, or just because of the dire warning of a new threat.


We would normally expect a spike in winter viral illness at this point in December, so there is nothing particularly unusual about it. In this regard, it’s worth noting that the Covid deaths trend for the U.K. is currently very similar to normal winter flu deaths at this time of year. However, the recent announcement of the Omicron variant raises the question of the role it might be playing in the surge.

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Not if Twitter has any say in it…

Ivermectin Prophylaxis For Covid-19 Reduces Infection, Mortality Rates (RG)

Background: Ivermectin has demonstrated different mechanisms of actions that could potentially protect from both COVID-19 infection and COVID-19-related comorbidities. Based on the existing literature and safety profile of ivermectin, a citywide program of prophylactic use of ivermectin for COVID-19 was implemented in Itajai, a Southern city in Brazil in the state of Santa Catarina. The objective of this analysis is to evaluate the effects of the use of ivermectin for prevention of COVID-19 infection, risk of dying and mortality, compared to non-users.

Materials and methods: This is a retrospective analysis of registry data from the medical based citywide COVID-19 prevention with ivermectin program, between July 2020 to December of 2020. The whole population of Itajaí was invited for a medical visit to compile demographic and medical parameters. In the absence of contraindications, ivermectin was offered as an optional treatment for 2 days every 15 days at a dose of 0.2mg/kg/day. Patients’ preferences and medical autonomy were preserved. Ivermectin users were compared with the comorbidity-matched population of non-users for COVID-19 by age, sex, COVID-19 infection rate, and COVID-19 mortality rate. Results in terms of mortality were adjusted for all relevant variables and Propensity Score Matching (PSM) was calculated.

Results: A total of 220,517 subjects were included in the analysis; 133,051 (60.3%) ivermectin users and 87,466 (39.7%) non-users. COVID-19 infection occurred in 4,311 (3.2%) treated subjects, and 3,034 (3.5%) non-treated subjects. This evidence showed a 7% reduction in COVID-19 infection rate with use of ivermectin: COVID-19 infection rate ratio (Risk ratio (RR) of 0.93; 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.89 – 0.98; p = 0.003). A total of 62 deaths (1.4% mortality rate) occurred among users and 79 deaths (2.6% mortality rate) among non-users, showing a 48% reduction in mortality rate (RR, 0,52; 95%CI, 0.37 – 0.72; p = 0.0001). Risk of dying from COVID-19 among ivermectin users was 45% lower than non-users (RR, 0.55; 95%CI, 0.40 – 0.77; p = 0.0004).

Conclusion: Prophylactic use of ivermectin showed significantly reduced COVID-19 infection rate, mortality rate and chance of dying from COVID-19 on a calculated population-level analysis, which controlled for all relevant confounding variables.

Read more …

 

 

“..or we can take every little mutation and every little change and try to make it into a crisis so we can frighten people and control their lives more..”

Pandemic Could Be Solved Quickly If Politics Thrown Out: Dr. Ben Carson (ET)

“We’ve been having tunnel vision” dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Ben Carson told EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders” program. “Let’s throw the politics out. We could solve this problem pretty quickly,” he stated in an interview that will premiere on Dec. 18 at 7 p.m. New York time. “Let’s open this thing up to all the different mechanisms,” said Carson, a renowned neurosurgeon who was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom—the highest civilian award in the nation—in 2008 for his work. He retired in 2013 and ran for the presidency in 2016, before serving as the secretary of Housing and Urban Development during the Trump administration.

“Let’s look around the world at things that work. Let’s look at the fact that on the western coast of Africa, there’s almost no COVID. And let’s ask ourselves, why is that? And then you see, it’s because they take antimalarials, particularly hydroxychloroquine. Let’s study that. Let’s see what’s going on there. “Let’s listen to these physician groups who’ve had incredible success with ivermectin. Let’s look at the results with monoclonal antibodies. Let’s look at all of these things. Let’s put them all in our armamentarium so that we don’t have a one-size-fits-all system.” The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) at one time had authorized hydroxychloroquine for treating certain COVID-19 patients but quickly revoked the emergency use authorization (EUA) in June 2020, claiming no data showed its effectiveness.

The FDA hasn’t approved or issued an EUA for ivermectin to treat COVID-19, citing the same reasons. Using hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin to treat COVID-19 patients has been highly controversial. Some studies show, and some doctors claim, that hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin can effectively treat COVID-19 patients. A vaccine confidence insight report (pdf) from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) labeled such claims as misinformation or disinformation. “COVID is a virus. Viruses mutate. That’s what they do. And they will continue to mutate,” Carson said. Carson pointed out that fortunately, most of the time, viruses become a little weaker with each mutation. “We can admit that and deal with it, or we can take every little mutation and every little change and try to make it into a crisis so we can frighten people and control their lives more,” Carson said.

Read more …

But there’s only one Science.

Ex-FDA Officials, Medical Experts Flog Feds For Politicizing Covid (JTN)

The federal agencies in charge of COVID-19 response are taking hits from former officials and high-profile medical professors for “sidelining experts,” not conducting basic research, and mischaracterizing evidence related to vaccines and masks for young people. The Biden administration is getting a pass for “extreme political pressure” that “appropriately” prompted outrage against its predecessor, two FDA alumni wrote in The Washington Post Thursday. Former Office of Vaccines Research and Review Deputy Director Philip Krause and former acting Chief Scientist Luciana Borio protested three recent actions authorizing boosters for people as young as 16.

“Before last month, the standard practice was for the agencies to convene standing outside advisory committees, whose members inspect the relevant data, debate it and vote,” they wrote. Earlier debates and votes suggest that “at least some experts would probably have voiced opposition,” and the refusal to hear them out “could hurt the credibility of these agencies.” They criticized the FDA’s “unpersuasive” explanation that authorizing boosters for 16- and 17-year-olds “does not raise questions that would benefit from additional discussion by committee members.” Exigency is “the exact circumstance when expert discussion and interpretation of the data can make the biggest difference,” the duo wrote.

Krause left the FDA in apparent protest of the White House sidestepping the agency to promise booster shots across the board. He soon joined a public letter warning “there could be risks if boosters are widely introduced too soon, or too frequently,” with implications for “vaccine acceptance.” The White House is “acting seriously reckless,” University of California San Francisco medical professor Vinay Prasad tweeted, echoing Krause’s argument. “If the last administration did this, all experts would be outraged. Principles only matter when they are inconvenient.”

Johns Hopkins University medical professor Marty Makary, who agrees boosters can harm low-risk groups, blasted the feds for too much “speculation” and too little research on the Omicron variant, just their latest pandemic failure. “In fact, most of our COVID findings have come from Israel and scientists abroad,” he wrote in a New York Post op-ed Dec. 8 decrying “turtle-speed bureaucracy.” It’s baffling that the National Institutes of Health or CDC has not “mobilize[d] any of their 7,000-plus scientists” to quickly answer how antibodies from vaccines and natural immunity respond to Omicron, said Makary, editor-in-chief of MedPage Today. There’s not even a “real-time data dashboard” on Omicron cases.

“Perhaps [Anthony] Fauci could have done fewer media interviews and university lectures … and instead personally overseen an NIH Omicron-antibody-binding experiment,” he said. Makary blasted the CDC for consistently releasing “tardy and incomplete data, missing key information on risk stratification, the role of obesity and a breakdown of child deaths by comorbidity as we imposed blanket restrictions on 72 million children.”

Read more …

Who cares what Pfizer says?

Pfizer Says Pandemic Could Extend Through 2023 (K.)

Pfizer Inc said on Friday the Covid-19 pandemic could extend through next year and announced plans to develop a three-dose vaccine regimen for children ages 2 to 16, a move that could delay its authorisation. The US pharmaceutical company made its comments as European countries geared up for further travel and social restrictions and a study warned that the rapidly spreading Omicron coronavirus variant was five times more likely to reinfect people than its predecessor, Delta. Pfizer executives said the company believed that by 2024, the disease should be endemic around the globe, meaning it would no longer be a pandemic. The company projected that “Covid will transition to an endemic state potentially by 2024.”

Prior to the Omicron variant, top US disease doctor Anthony Fauci forecast the pandemic would end in 2022 in the United States. Announcing plans to develop a three-dose regimen for ages 2 to 16, Chief Scientific Officer Mikael Dolsten told a conference call that results of three doses among people older than 16 showed that approach offered greater protection. “Therefore, we have decided to modify each of the pediatric studies to incorporate a third dose to the series and seek licensure for a three-dose series rather than a two-dose series as originally anticipated,” the company said.

Pfizer developed its Covid-19 vaccine with Germany’s BioNTech SE. The companies have been developing a version of their vaccine tailored to combat the Omicron variant, but have not decided whether it will be needed. They expect to start a clinical trial for the updated vaccine in January, the Pfizer executives said. The risk of reinfection with the Omicron variant is 5.4 times higher and it shows no sign of being milder than the Delta variant, a study by Imperial College London found, as cases soar across Europe and threaten year-end festivities. Past infection may offer as little as 19% protection against reinfection by the new variant, Imperial College said, noting that the study of hundreds of thousands of cases, including 1,846 confirmed as Omicron, had not been peer reviewed.

Read more …

‘three fringe epidemiologists’

Fauci, Collins Colluded To Smear Experts Who Called For End To Lockdowns (DM)

Dr. Anthony Fauci and the head of the National Institute of Health (NIH) colluded on a way to discredit an alternative plan to deal with COVID from a group of experts, released emails reveal. The emails, some of which were tweeted out on Saturday by Phil Magness, senior research faculty and interim research and education director at the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER), show Fauci and Francis Collins attempting to coordinate a ‘devastating takedown’ of the Great Barrington Declaration. AIER, a libertarian think tank, sponsored the declaration, which largely abandons lockdowns in favor of a herd immunity strategy that allows life to return to normal.


In an October 8 email from Collins to Fauci, the head of the NIH calls the GBD the work of ‘three fringe epidemiologists’ that ‘seems to be getting a lot of attention.’ Collins adds that ‘there needs to be a quick and devastating published takedown of its premises. I don’t see anything like that online yet – is it underway?’ Later in the day, Fauci sends Collins a Wired op-ed that refutes the notion of herd immunity stopping the pandemic. Collins then sends Fauci an op-ed in The Nation also trashing the GBD.

A few days later, Collins emails Fauci a Washington Post op-ed he’s quoted in headlined ‘Proposal to hasten herd immunity to the coronavirus grabs White House attention but appalls top scientists.’ Collins – working under former President Donald Trump at the time – said ‘my quotes are accurate but will not be appreciated in the [White House].’ Fauci responds: ‘They are too busy with other things to worry about this. What you said was entirely correct.’ Later, Gregg Gonsalves – the writer of The Nation op-ed – sends Collins an email thanking him with a subject line that includes saying legendary AIDS activist Larry Kramer ‘would be proud.’ Collins responds with a smiley face.


The GBD – authored by previous DailyMail.com contributor Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford University, Sunetra Gupta of the University of Oxford and Martin Kulldorff of Harvard University, calls for individuals at significantly lower risk of dying from COVID-19 – as well as those at higher risk who so wish – to be allowed ‘to resume their normal lives.’ That would mean allowing people in low risk groups to go to offices, hang out in bars and restaurants and go to sporting and entertainment events. The centerpiece of the declaration, according to Dr. Bhattacharya, is a call for increased focused protection of the vulnerable older population, who are more than a thousand times more likely to die from COVID infection than the young. The declaration makes no mention of social distancing, masks, tracing, or long-term Covid cases but suggests that increased infection of those at lower risks would build herd immunity.

Read more …

Dr. Paul Alexander names a few more ‘fringe epidemiologists’.

Time To Take Away The Hall Pass We Gave Doctors And Scientists (Alexander)

Had it not been for the likes of McCullough, Fareed, Zelenko, Tenenbaum, Oskoui, Urso, Littell, Malone, Vanden Bossche, Yeadon, Ryan Cole, Kulvinder Gill, Francis Christian, Trozzi, Phillips, Palmer, Hodkinson, Bhattacharya, Heneghan, Kulldorff, Bridle, Mallard, Bernstein, Risch etc. to me, take the whole lot of the million doctors and fire them all…every one damn of them, they have caused this by being silent and being on the take…yes, I know many from CDC and NIH and even FDA who told me they cant speak out because of fear of losing their appointment and grant…yes, this be about money…grift and graft…they have all benefitted and of course the top dog Bourla of Pfizer with his buddy Fauci…imagine this grifter Bourla saying we are criminals because we question the efficacy and safety of the vaccines…this piece of untermensche s***….

The Canadian and UK and American doctor, yes Kuntsler, have shown themselves to be among the most dweeb, pusillanimous, weak, cowardly, craven, money hungry, grifters, stiff necked idiots and fools…money whores to the pharma…selling out the good populations for benefit to yourself…you sick twisted set of doctors…you dont see it yet but your gravitas id now DOA…and you did it to you. you had it all and now are worth nothing. you helped destroy your careers, your name, EBM, research, all of it…you did this…you joined a devious scheme and history will recall and remind you always of what you did. you are utterly corrupt and I tell you in your face here…corrupt untermensche.

Yes it the doctors we used to revere and admire, that have lost all credibility along with the entire research establishment, the medical publication process, the journal editors, all of them were and are on the take in some manner…their silence got them something and we will come to learn in time…fire these bastards, all of them. These losers oh I meant doctors and scientists in the US and Canada and UK etc…sucking on the teats of NIH grants and CIHR grants…losers the whole bunch of them should hang heads in shame…abject failures….it is their disastrous unscientific illogical and specious policies that have harmed populations…children hung themselves and it was this Trump was fighting against and Atlas…I know I was there. Atlas did many things to stem the tide of the massive deaths in the nursing homes and deserves big credit…I know, I was there.

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Brought to you by Pfizer. Bought for you by Pfizer.

The Scientists Hunting For The Next Variant Of Concern (ZH)

America has some of the most advanced medical research capabilities in the world. So why is it that a small group of labs in South Africa seems to be a step ahead of everybody else when it comes to sniffing out new variants? The group first gained notoriety for discovering the beta variant and alerting the world to its presence. But most people probably became familiar with Alex Sigal, Tulio de Oliveira and their work at a gene-sequencing laboratory in the South African port city of Durban when they announced the discovery of the omicron variant, the latest “variant of concern” while Americans were enjoying their Thanksgiving dinner. What is it that makes their lab so successful? Well, it looks like Bloomberg has finally found the answer in a profile of the Africa Health Research Institute, as it’s formally known.

South African scientists became experts at combating viruses almost by necessity, They have been hard at work fighting AIDS, Turburculosis and other viruses – work that has made them a magnet for the world’s best epidemiologists. Because of this, Sigal’s lab has become a kind of training ground for scientists across the continent. It was the first to test omicron against blood plasma from people who’d received two doses of the Pfizer jab. They also developed a theory claiming that immunodepressed people might be breeding grounds for mutants since they’re so vulnerable. One reason for its success with finding new variants: South Africa has set up a network of seven genomic surveillance labs with one at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases and six at academic institutions. Sigal works with Tulio de Oliveira, the Brazilian head of the gene-sequencing laboratory Krisp.

“There’s a lot of technical capacity in South Africa to do genomic sequencing of pathogens because we’ve built up that expertise over many years for HIV and TB,” said Richard Lessells, a Scottish infectious diseases specialist at Krisp. “Very early on in the pandemic, we recognized that genomic sequencing and genomic surveillance was going to be very important.” Since the discovery of omicron, many of the scientists working in the lab have been dealing with sleepless nights. “I’ve been working to get the Pfizer vaccine efficacy study ready,” said Sigal, who becomes animated when he watches a time-lapse video of the omicron variant attacking cells. “I worked through the night.” Put another way: the more variants they “discover”, the more prestige and funding they will be rewarded with.

Read more …

“..CDC data show 240MM people with at least one shot – about 72.5% of the population. But it also says only 203MM have been fully vaccinated, or 61.3%..”

CDC Data Missed Millions Of Unvaccinated Americans (ZH)

What a surprise – the CDC and states across the country have been over-counting the number of American adults who have been fully vaccinated. Here’s how Bloomberg explains this accident (because what kind of person would do this on purpose?): “in collating reams of data on vaccinations, the US has counted too many shots as first doses when they are instead second doses or booster shots.” Here’s the tell: CDC data show 240MM people with at least one shot – about 72.5% of the population. But it also says only 203MM have been fully vaccinated, or 61.3%, an 11-percentage-point difference that is far larger than in other developed countries. So, either Americans are so lazy – or perhaps don’t want to endure another series of adverse reactions – that they won’t show up to get their second dose, or there’s something wrong with these numbers.

And it might not surprise you to learn that a number of state and local officials believes it’s the latter. “State and local officials say it’s improbable that 37MM Americans got one shot without completing their inoculations. Instead, they say, the government has regularly and incorrectly counted booster shots and second doses as first doses.” Their conclusion is that both fully vaccinated and completely unvaccinated are officially undercounted. As for the precise number miscounted, that’s unknown, but revisions in data from three states – Illinois, Pennsylvania and West Virginia – found enough over-counting of first shots to suggest that there are plenty of unvaccinated people nationally who’ve mistakenly been counted as having received a dose.

One of the biggest gaps identified was in Pennsylvania, where CDC estimates of first doses for the elderly exceed the state of Pennsylvania’s estimate by about 850,000. If changes are made to the national data on the scale of Pennsylvania’s revisions, this would mean increasing the number of Americans who are unvaccinated by more than 10MM. “The truth is, we have no idea,” said Clay Marsh, West Virginia’s Covid czar.

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“..Schaffner took to CNN to express his horror at Americans having fun at football games, complaining that they were “breathing too vigorously.”

CNN Doctor: Wear Masks At Home And Take Tests On Christmas Morning (SN)

A resident doctor on CNN told viewers Thursday that they should all be wearing masks at home around other family members and everyone should wake up on Christmas morning and rather than open presents, take COVID tests. Dr. William Schaffner also said that these restrictions should apply to everyone, even those people who are double and triple vaccinated. “I recommend that we hang our stockings with care,” Schaffner stated, adding “We have to be careful because we are all going to get together, we should all be vaccinated and preferentially boosted. We should wear our masks if we are uncertain.”


“Another thing we could do is we could all get tested the morning of our getting together,” Schaffner further urged, before sharing a heartwarming story of how his own family did that for Thanksgiving. “We were all negative. It worked out just fine,” the doctor declared. Earlier in the year, Schaffner took to CNN to express his horror at Americans having fun at football games, complaining that they were “breathing too vigorously.” Schaffner declared “People are cheering and enthusiastic, exhaling with vigor; if there are people infected, they can infect people around them … Nobody was wearing a mask … I’d be very surprised if we didn’t have outbreaks.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

London Dec 18

 

 

Paris Dec 18

 

 

 

 

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  • #95634

    Vincent van Gogh Sunflowers 1887   • It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Pravda (CTH) • Netherlands To Enter Lockdown As Nations Across Europe Tigh
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle December 19 2021]

    #95635

    “Given OSHA’s clear and exercised authority to regulate viruses….”
    WTF?! So I woke up at 4am with this:

    “Manifest” Destiny?

    When considering the non-trial of Ghizzy,
    (And those grim little honeypot deals)
    I can’t help but wonder
    If something brewed under
    The sixth circuit court of appeals.

    And anybody else out there making insane decisions…

    #95636
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Following yesterday: “It’s not clear yet if Omicron is a milder variant. But its rapid spread is certain to overwhelm hospitals, experts say” –CNN

    Um, CNN. If it’s a milder variant, it would NOT be “certain” to fill up hospitals.

    “Can vaccinated people get infected with the Omicron variant?” –CNN

    Answer: Absolutely yes, we’ve known from the first case, months ago.

    “If Omicron doesn’t seem to cause severe disease so far, why are doctors concerned?”

    Answer: Shut up, shut up, shut up! Get back in your hole and make me money!

    “Does “fully vaccinated” mean two shots or three now?”

    Answer: “…Forget about what the definition is.” We’re an Empire now and create our own Definitions. …You think I’m joking. Click the link.

    “Can a PCR or rapid test tell me which type of variant I might have if I have Covid-19?”

    Answer: No, nor Covid at all. It was known to be useless in June and is being removed later this month for being a complete failure. …Just kidding, CNN said it works great.

    “If we don’t know how well vaccines and boosters work against Omicron, why are doctors urging everyone to get vaccinated?”

    Answer: “All of the previous variants, which have also had differences in the spike protein, have responded to vaccines” That’s why there’s no Delta, silly! What Delta? Gawd, you’re so suspicious n stuff.

    News I missed: 100% vaccinated Cruise Ship infected with Covid. Just all of them so far. Since that’s an experiment with “data”, it’s not “Science.” Science is about my feelings.

    100% vaccinated NFL gets infected with Covid.

    Shots work. That’s how you can be sure. And that one I didn’t miss: every footballer dropping dead on the pitch. They really, really work.

    “A poorly matched flu shot could mean a bad flu season on top of a Covid surge” –MSNBC

    Apparently their vaccines don’t work? Not the Flu either, which is another Coronavirus?

    “Opinion: I’m a transgender woman in America. I shouldn’t have to live in fear” –CNN

    Why not? The rest of us do. You special or something?

    Schrodinger’s White: “Keanu Reeves was one of few Asian stars of ‘The Matrix.’ That’s not the case in the revival.” –MSNBC

    He’s Asian now? Apparently they like him today. Tomorrow when they don’t his race will change. It’s part of the 13-year-old girl popularity we live under. “We create our own reality now” A world of 100% Karl Roves. Just as kind and twice as pretty.

    “‘She believed’: Holmes didn’t intend to deceive, defense says in closing arguments” -MSNBC

    When you’re rich, lying just happens! How was I to know the tests never worked once for all the years and years we had them and the thousands of stock promotions I made? Who can really tell the difference between “Working” and “Totally never worked once” anyway? Certainly not the FDA or CDC. They’re my regulators, so I don’t see why they’re picking on me. Fix your own house.

    “The Smug Practice of Tipping Needs to End” – MSNBC

    Don’t you make enough already? Know your place, peasant! PMCs Karens don’t “Tip”. I want to see your manager. If I were just back home safe in my pajamas, I’d log in and show you what for.

    “US Builds Software to Predict China’s Response to Military Action”

    Considering how much computers have improved life, how well their predictions work, as well as how resistant to tampering, I don’t see any reason not to trust them completely with this. I say, tie them into The Button.

    The 16 US Cities that Hit All-Time Homicide Records this Year”

    We know which 16 cities and which parties. The irony is that homicide had been falling for years.

    “Survey Calls Facebook “Worst Company Of 2021”

    What? They’re a company? I thought they were the government. My bad.

    “Ireland imposed an 8 pm curfew on pubs and bars”

    The ‘Rona is our god! The ‘Rona knows! …I’ve been at this so long I’ve run out of jokes, because they’re the joke.

    ““We are all exhausted with Covid and the restrictions it requires. The twists and turns, the disappointments and the frustrations take a heavy toll on everyone. But it is the reality that we are dealing with.”

    No, that’s textbook psychological warfare to break human will. It’s also not the “reality” at all. If it were, those requirements would have worked once somewhere they were tried, and the top lockdown countries wouldn’t be the top Covid countries, leaving Florida, Texas, and Africa in a relatively healthy state.

    Omicron Surge Is Mostly Due to Ramping Up Testing (DS)”

    We haven’t proved that Omicron testing is false, but it would be strange if they’d changed their stripes. Also why would I want to know if I had it? I’m not sick or going to a hospital, so what’s the point?

    Stats out on how the U.S. counting vaccinations is completely false. Because: reporters, can’t think straight or name facts, I was unclear on the process of this article, but they seemed to be overcounting by at least 10%. That is, they claim 70%, and some places name 60%. I’ve seen both from official sources so it seems nearly certain they don’t know within 10%. Now, if it’s also officially overcounted, the numbers are really 50-60% vaccinated. That might match politics, but contrary to CONSTANT reporting, it’s not political. (Because “If they printed it, it’s False“) Old people are vaxxed, who are Republicans and Conservatives, and young and Black people are not, who are Democrats. But I somehow feel there’s a certain elegance to it, that for some reason it’s still going to match the “sides” – whatever they may be.

    I can confirm this is true, and going back months, because Joe n pals said we passed 70% vaxxed months ago, which equals herd immunity according to Fauci’s drug-addled, ever-changing, kaleidoscopic, made-up Scienz. Then pushes vaccination as if NO ONE is vaccinated. It’s over: you won, gentlemen. You’re at herd immunity, you’ve vaccinated all you need to, there’s only the madmen and stragglers left. Yet 3, 4, 6 months later they’re acting like only 20 people are vaccinated. In a nation of pathological liars, that’s the best confirmation of truth that you will ever know. The numbers are way, WAY below 70%. I don’t know how that can be, but they are.

    Naturally the issue may be that they’ve vaccinated only “themselves”, Blue Zones, PMCs, Federal Employees. Which AGAIN is a confirmation that the vaccine is deadly. From 50 years of watching them, tell me: if they had just made all themselves and their voter base safe, and all the Red Deplorables and their voter base were about to die, would they fight tooth and nail to save Trump supporters? Put them in jail at the doorway of their business in order that they might vote Red next year? I propose no. So again, in a nation of liars, where every thing from every body is a lie, this is your sure and perfect confirmation. They have mostly vaccinated themselves and are safe. Yet they are feverish to save the Christian Right, gun owners, and all red states? Really? Use your egg, and your noggin’.

    “viruses become a little weaker with each mutation.” Ben Carson is so last century. Don’t you know we decided yesterday that this is the #Opposite of 10,000 years of evidence? As according to our religion and feelings. Which is “Science.”

    Ex-FDA Officials, Medical Experts Flog Feds For Politicizing Covid (JTN)”

    I’m not too worried about the politicalization, but they have failed and suspended all their own internal processes, that is to say: Science. If you cannot present facts and arguments for debate, there is no Science. If you don’t follow your processes, there is no legal weight and authority either. That is to say, so long as they do this, all their “recommendations” – which aren’t laws to begin with – are not “real”, and should be entirely ignored as rogue elements until they go back and follow their own internal “laws” and procedures. That’s the same as if their Twitter account was hacked and told everyone to put a fork in their eye for safety. No process was followed, just “One guy said”.

    Who would think that I would ever be defending bureaucratic process? Shows what war does to people. Now look what I’ve done. I have to live with this act for the rest of my life.

    “Fauci, Collins Colluded To Smear Experts Who Called For End To Lockdowns (DM)”

    That’s great and good to know, but “collusion” is not a crime. Defying Congress to have a deadly virus constructed by the Chinese military, then releasing it on the world and killing hundreds of thousands by covering it up, is. Can we start with that? The one fixes the other. Oh also preventing cures and pushing fatal medicine on 200k gay guys.

    Schaffner took to CNN to express his horror at Americans having fun at football games,”

    Still waiting for Texas’ suberbowl, superspreader event. But the ‘Rona is tricky like that. After multiplying in Texas, it quietly took a plane to Michigan and New York.

    OSHA. I didn’t realize OSHA were doctors and regulated medicine. What do we have the AMA, NIH, and CDC for?

    #95637
    Veracious Poet
    Participant

    Yeah, that 6th circuit ruling bit makes -0- sense to me, like an alien wrote it.

    Now OSHA has a “regulate viruses” mission statement?

    It’s like waking up in a whole new episode of the Twilight Zone :-

    #95640
    oxymoron
    Participant

    The meaning of the name Schaffner is Manager of an estate or Conductor or Guard.
    I think he actually feels I am on or part of an Estate he is managing. When in fact he is managing to get stressed about not fullfilling his name sake.
    What a dickhead.

    I have been busted on a building site as unjabbed and have been shamed (cue tiny violin). The owner of the building cancelled a big party for tomorrow and declared it unsafe as I am a potential infection source. No Joke. He was VERY angry and told me as a gay man (in his 60’s) he has been through the devastation of the AIDS epidemic and the damage wrought by those liars and those that were not protected.
    He is triple jabbed and I am as they say au naturel. And we know how the New Normals feel about Nature.
    OOH dirty poopy.
    I reckon I’ll just wear a full-body condom tomorrow.

    It’s gunna be awkward. BOND. SOCIAL BOND. I’m Maxwell Smart.

    #95642
    chooch
    Participant

    Another Dr. D-ism

    “Protecting the vaccinated from the unvaccinated.”

    The purpose of the mandate is to protect unvaccinated people. The rule’s premise is that vaccines work. And so, OSHA has explained that the rule is not about protecting the vaccinated; they do not face ‘grave danger’ from working with those who are not vaccinated.

    #95643
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    I like to make comparisons. I like to turn things inside out and upside down, move them outside their officially labeled designations and see what a thing actually is, i.e., what it can do under differing contexts and perspectives. It’s been getting me in trouble since I was 16 and has gotten worse with age. I call it social Tourette’s.

    So… until I turned 18, it was unquestioned standard social-state policy that at age 18 I would be “eligible for the draft”: the USA gov could decide to force me to serve at least two years in its military operations or face jail, a slandered public record, and probably a fair bit of abuse aka torture.

    This was standard since at least the American Civil War.

    So I just want to compare that with today’s vakzinazi policies and note that being treated as profit-generating guinea pigs, while awful, strikes me as less imposing and morally-spiritually-physically invasive than legally coercing a young man to go overseas, kill or be killed, and how about some village-scale genocide with napalm and machine gun fire while we’re at it? Then let me come back home a moral-spiritual wreck with major drug addictions and maybe a broken body.

    I just want to separate the probably physical consequences of covidiotic vakzinational government tyranny (maybe as bad as Geert van den Bossche, with whom I agree, says it will be) from it’s civil illiberty aspect.

    Is requiring potentially all Johnnies to go kill overseas as bad as requiring potentially all Johnnies and Jeanettes to get a vaccine or forfeit various civil liberties?

    ***

    “I reckon I’ll just wear a full-body condom tomorrow.”

    Formal Attire

    I’m sure you’ll be a hit. As for that tiny violin, may I offer my applause? Standing up to public ridicule is apparently harder than going overseas and killing strangers cuz some asshole with too many shoulder chevrons told you to. I say this based on how draft-dodgers/resisters were treated before My Lai opened that can of worms so folks could watch ’em wriggle on live TV. Most people found it easier to go with the social flow… until they found themselves quivering in a rice patty trying to hold their new best friend’s guts from feeding the fishies. If we’ll agree to kill/be killed innocents/by innocents abroad, including shitbombing entire cities, largely on the basis of social pressure, surely we’ll submit our children to Mammon under the dubious illusion that doing so will keep them and us safe?

    wdg

    Mass Formation has always been the main structure of society, best I can tell. But now they have new weapons of Mass Media Destruction by which to carpet-bomb the brains of the hypnotically media-addicted (99% of everyone outside of a monastery?)

    I wish I could be a tiny drone that followed oxy for a few days and studied oxy’s style. Grace under pressure is, like, my favorite attire — whether I’m naked, clothed, above ground or in my grave. I suck at it:
    adf “After mistakenly purchasing a display stand Charlie is apprehended by a store clerk (Albert Austin) and a detective”

    …but even the losers get lucky some times. Robert Fripp was literally tone-deaf when he first started playing guitar. Now he’s a major guitar legend.

    a toast

    #95644
    sumac.carol
    Participant

    Historical analysis in the BMJ on how pandemics end. Consistent with Elliott waves, it is a social phenomenon, not a physical one.

    https://www.bmj.com/content/375/bmj-2021-068094?fbclid=IwAR0cQa1fFIFh4ksk95xGv6uYeaO6yQWt3fZzZiVappVFfbF-WIIrHqDslWQ

    #95645
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “I want to see your manager. If I were just back home safe in my pajamas, I’d log in and show you what for.”

    Thank you for that, Dr.D. It triggered a deep slow-burn grin that didn’t manifest into a LOL until this sentence. Takes a lot to do that to me these days: (cue garishly loud violin alert) I’m fighting either two or three diseases (awaiting biopsy results) with high morbidity rates for my age and I spend a lot of time in my jammies.

    I’d Rather Wash My Mouth with Soap… but no Lifebuoy, pls

    I asked Santa for an upgrade into Battle-Action Danger Jammies with laser epaulettes and night-vision catheter goggles:

    wdf

    #95646
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    In Soviet Amerika, you inoculate the vakzine!

    My head is still aspoding:

    What’s Your Warrior?

    Somebody just draft me and get it over with awreddy.

    #95647
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    And a memory of a mighty War on Terror under the all-seeing smile of God in a Mexican wrestling mascara:

    The Poor Man Institute

    #95648
    chooch
    Participant

    “I like to make comparisons. I like to turn things inside out and upside down, move them outside their officially labeled designations and see what a thing actually is, i.e., what it can do under differing contexts and perspectives.”

    You do this well.

    Like the Bollywood vibe, that should give oxy something to chuckle about today.

    #95649
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    sumac.carol: regarding this pandemic’s end: I wonder if it’s manifold artificial enlargement and artificially-extended duration won’t result in, paradoxically, a rather sudden end? With or without toe social upheaval that sudden large events usually create?

    #95650
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    chooch:

    Some of us can’t even wear a mask safely

    My wife protects me from an enormous amount of trouble but I make her laugh.

    #95651
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “What? They’re a company? I thought they were the government. My bad.”

    You mean there’s a difference?

    fhg

    #95652
    chooch
    Participant

    Your thoughts, comments and jokes will be read with a deeper context given the circumstance you have shared. Wishing you (and wife) well.

    #95653
    Henry
    Participant

    I am currently reading the book Ordinary Men, which is the true story of Reserve Police Battalion 101 of the German Order Police, responsible for mass shootings and round-ups of Jewish people for deportation to Nazi death camps in Poland in 1942. It is a dark example of how Mass Formation works. I would highly recommend the book.

    Browning argues that most of the men of RPB 101 were not fanatical Nazis but, instead, ordinary middle-aged, working-class men who committed these atrocities out of a mixture of motives, including the group dynamics of conformity, deference to authority, role adaptation, and the altering of moral norms to justify their actions.

    Three groups emerged quickly within the battalion: a core of eager killers. This plurality carried out their duties reliably but without initiative, and a small minority evaded participation in the acts of killing without diminishing the murderous efficiency of the battalion whatsoever.

    While this book discusses a specific Reserve Unit during WWII, the general argument Browning makes is that most people succumb to the pressures of a group setting and commit actions they would never do of their own volition.

    Milgram adduced a number of factors to account for such an unexpectedly high degree of potentially murderous obedience to a noncoercive authority. An evolutionary bias favors the survival of people who can adapt to hierarchical situations and organized social activity. Socialization through family, school, and military service, as well as a whole array of rewards and punishments within society generally, reinforces and internalizes a tendency toward obedience. A seemingly voluntary entry into an authority system “perceived” as legitimate creates a strong sense of obligation. Those within the hierarchy adopt the authority’s perspective or “definition of the situation” (in this case, as an important scientific experiment rather than the infliction of physical torture). The notions of “loyalty, duty, discipline,” requiring competent performance in the eyes of authority, become moral imperatives overriding any identification with the victim. Normal individuals enter an “agentic state” in which they are the instrument of another’s will. In such a state, they no longer feel personally responsible for the content of their actions but only for how well they perform.23 Once entangled, people encounter a series of “binding factors” or “cementing mechanisms” that make disobedience or refusal even more difficult. The momentum of the process discourages any new or contrary initiative. The “situational obligation” or etiquette makes refusal appear improper, rude, or even an immoral breach of obligation. And a socialized anxiety over potential punishment for disobedience acts as a further deterrent.24 Milgram made direct reference to the similarities between human behavior in his experiments and under the Nazi regime. He concluded, “Men are led to kill with little difficulty.”

    — Browning, Christopher R.. Ordinary Men (p. 172). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

    #95654
    absolute galore
    Participant

    Boz wrote: But seriously, who the fuck cares? We were having fun until you turned it into a scholastic trivia contest. Yeesh. Cook your own goddam ham and stay the fuck away from my Xmas dinner, son.
    Good god awmighty, is there any trivial thing we won’t niggle each other around here?0

    That’s precious coming from the king of niggling other commenters. But I’m sad to be disinvited to your Xmas dinner. I was looking forward to being regaled by tales of your barroom prowess. Oh well. I guess I’ll have to make do with your writing workshop submissions here on TAE;^)

    #95656
    those darned kids
    Participant

    there once was a new virus from wuhan,
    with the nastiest spike they could glue on.
    with his nih money,
    he infected real funny,
    and gave big pharma a beautiful gift they could chew on.

    #95657
    ctbarnum
    Participant

    Guy has an idea. Like this gentlemen, I’ve found the best way to keep my sanity in the craziness if through mockery.

    “I think the best way to illustrate absurdity is with absurdity.”

    https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/man-thrown-united-flight-after-using-red-thong-mask

    #95658
    zerosum
    Participant

    Repeat War
    The enemy keeps repeating.
    The enemy believes in the childish game of repeat
    The looser stops repeating.

    Omicron doesn’t need money
    The sniffles doesn’t need an ICU
    Omicron will not need a time out
    Omicron will make a touch down

    Omicron will be your savior
    Omicron will go down the chimney
    Omicron will be under the Xmas tree
    Omicron will bring Xmas cheers
    ———-

    (I cant compete with the creations of commentators at TAE
    I can only repeat)
    Its a repetition war.
    I’m repeating.
    I’m not repeating as many times as the enemies.
    South Africa: Only 1.7% Hospitalised From Omicron Compared to 19% during previous wave.

    In England, Professor Chris Whitty appears to be ignoring data out of South Africa to make doomsday predictions about there being over 4,000 hospitalisations a day from Omicron.

    There is also a continuing obsession with insisting it is “too early” to make judgments on data coming out of South Africa despite such data for weeks confirming that Omicron is mild and isn’t causing hospitals to be overwhelmed.

    Is the truth hidden

    Who, here, believe that the numbers of un-vaccinated are the majority in the hospital, and in ICU with covid
    ( did you noticed that I did not ask if you believe that the un-vaccinated are the majority of people getting the virus)
    I went looking for the % vaccinated by age groups
    (of course, you all know that world wide that the majority of people who are getting the virus and who are dying. (senior)

    https://covid19tracker.ca/provincevac.html?p=BC

    Go to the bottom chart
    (add the partial and the full – for 20 nov (those with a 3rd shot not counted)
    80+ have more than 100% (99.54 + 3.220)
    70-79 have more than 100% (98.13 + 1.66)
    60-69 have 91.37 + 1.88

    Do you remember, that the herd immunity number, was suppose to be to give you protection from the virus. 70%
    Now …
    78.562%
    of all people, ( + 5yrs old) in British Columbia are fully vaccinated

    82.773%
    of all people ( +5) in British Columbia have received at least one dose

    Omicron arrived just in time to scare/convinced the sheeeepps to get another jab that only helps the rich get richer

    #95659
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    A small miracle of genius regarding modern humanity and our relationship with the divine unknown:

    Inside Out

    ***

    No dinner for you, abs galore.

    ***

    Thanx, chooch. btw, I really dig your handle. ‘chooch’ is a major keeper.

    #95660
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    Regarding the hospitalizations graph, posted above:

    Q: Even if the Covid cases (in red) use only 5% of the hospital beds, aren’t most of the recent Covid hospitalizations unvaxxed?
    A: No.

    The most recent official published data (covering the past few weeks) indicates that less than half of the NHS Covid hospitalizations are “not vaccinated.”

    Table 9. COVID-19 cases presenting to emergency care (within 28 days of a positive specimen) resulting in an overnight inpatient admission by vaccination status between week 46 and week 49 2021
    https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1041593/Vaccine-surveillance-report-week-50.pdf

    #95661
    Figmund Sreud
    Participant

    Interesting. The Menticide Manual : A Series
    … by a German writer and cultural critic.

    Yes. Here is the starting point:

    Foreword

    The easiest way to destroy a man in body and soul is to harm him in all ways and forms imaginable and claim it‘ll be good for him. This demonic logic, its inversion is telling him that doing good would actually be bad for him, creeps into our mammal brains through early childhood dreams.

    In these particular childhood dreams, which all humans experience versions of, the paralyzed dreamer is the victim of a brutal injustice or a fatalistic accident; say he is being raped in the bushes or is being gradually squashed by a tank or cartwheel while a consolidating voice, maybe his mother or maybe a passer-by, is assuring him that “it’ll soon be over” and that “all will be fine.” This nightmare is the result of childhood trauma: an abusive experience, a great injustice, an incomprehensible horror… yet the world around us seems just fine with it!

    All tyrants abuse their underlings‘ childhood traumas and tell them “it is for the best of you” and that “the pain goes away, I promise.” Only one more round of beating, one more war on terror, one more crackdown on dissidents, only one last state of emergency and we are through with it.

    As adults we learn to cope. We tell ourselves that what does not kill us makes us stronger or that life is suffering anyway. If that’s what it is, and this experience is universally shared by most human beings, it follows that indeed we may inflict on each other the most horrible things and do not even need to pretend “it’s for your best,” because it goes without saying that it could not have been for anything otherwise.

    Most readers will be aware of genocide, the destruction of a genus or group, and of homicide, the killing of a body. We know the many ways a group or a person can be eliminated: slowly through torture and poisoning, quickly through cuts, holes and strangling – murder! What remains a taboo in literature and the news though, is the various ways we are able to kill reason, logic and sanity – menticide!

    This concise text will introduce to our distinguished readers the most deadly ways to subvert, to demoralize, to lobotomize and finally to liquidize someone‘s brains… until they are reduced to nothing more than another helpless Schizo Fran or Mona Loser ready for suicide or the local madhouse.

    … and here is latest of the series ( with links to all previous segments at the end). Introductory sentence:

    Have you ever sucked on plastic? Sure you have. It has no smell. Astroturfing is big corporations or the government replacing organic stuff with synthetics and nature with replicates.

    The Menticide Manual – Astroturfing

    The Menticide Manual – Astroturfing

    fwiw,
    F.S.

    #95662
    phoenixvoice
    Participant

    Henry:
    “ The “situational obligation” or etiquette makes refusal appear improper, rude, or even an immoral breach of obligation. And a socialized anxiety over potential punishment for disobedience acts as a further deterrent”

    I am deliberately entering that sort of situation this afternoon. My liberal church is holding its first in-person, all-invited event — a social at a park. Masks required, provided if you don’t come with one. I will show up. I plan to stay 20-30 minutes. I will politely refuse a mask. To many, I will be committing an “immoral breach of obligation.” I will be listing to what I see as a higher moral imperative — I DO NOT comply with mask mandates except in very narrowly defined situations where non-compliance prevents me from getting something that I (or my children) immediately need and which cannot be easily obtained another way. So, I wear a mask when indoors asking for a food box at the food bank and when accompanying my daughter to her dermatology appointment. I do not wear one in stores that say I should, nor at the kids’ optometrist. What I need in this situation is to see if my erstwhile community will accept me as I am now, or, who in the community is amenable. If it goes poorly, at least I will have some closure.

    Ah, Oxy, you are an inspiration. I don’t live someplace that has gone so batshit crazy. I can attend this event secure in the knowledge that since it is held at a public city park, none can be barred from being there and Arizona says that localities can’t impose mask mandates.

    I look at photos and videos of protests, and I know *why* that isn’t happening here, in Arizona — there is currently no visceral need. The state imposes no restrictions on the masses. The feds insist on masks on public transportation, employer vax mandates, etc., but so far many are switching jobs to avoid them and the AZ attorney general is addressing the vax mandates.

    It is horrible that I cannot visit the long-time client and friend in a care home since I am not vaccinated, but that one thing is not enough to get masses in the streets. (And I have attended a couple protests, so it did impel ME…but not enough others.)

    #95663
    zerosum
    Participant

    Manchin and BBB bill
    Will vote NO
    Machin is front man against socialism. Capitalist, rich, should not pay for services for the poor and needy.
    I was raised to believe that all gov. were there to collect the money and spend it for the socialist needs of their societies.
    I guess that I was lied to, all my life.
    Capitalist only approve taxes that gives them a benefit.(make only consumer pay not them)

    #95665
    Noirette
    Participant

    Switzerland. The media is blaring about the deadly 5th wave.

    CH is at ‘wave’ three if one looks at deaths, not cases.

    Hyping the super dangerous Omicron (only 2 % (est.) of infections and zero deaths) plus … the hospitals are overwhelmed, and “almost all” planned surgeries have been cancelled!

    This chart below (from a main MSM newspaper site, based on Gvmt. data, correct, afaik) shows that CH has never had all its ICU beds filled, between 40% and (today) 20% empty beds.

    The interesting bit: see how the total % of occupied beds does rise over time, in a slow straight-line incrementation (I suspect that is because the no. of beds has been diminished – which is the case in France, for ex, closings continued during the ‘pandemic’ !) ..

    …The % of covid beds (pink) varies greatly within the total. When there is a lot of Covidians, all other patients needing intensive care drop dramatically, without being “chased away” by covid, so to speak, as there are always spare beds.

    Can covid-19 infections prevent or attenuate brain trauma, horribly burned patients, general sepsis, etc.? The answer would appear to be …no, except indirectly in case of strong ‘lockdown’ (CH, first ‘wave’, March 2020), as in such conditions, physical trauma — car crashes, mountain accidents — other..) sink to zero or almost. But, that is not enough to explain (imho) what one sees on the chart.

    Is there a sort of psycho-socio explanation, e.g. when Covidians are hogging beds, it is just ‘natural’ for it to be felt, agreed, without discussion, that some other patients don’t need the ICU? This might play a small role? Or do we explain this uniquely by over-diagnosis of Covid?

    My impression from this chart (and other nos. etc.) is that if so, the over diagnosis stretched beyond ‘respiratory illness’ (of any type, cause) and was deliberately engaged in by hospital staff (admins..)

    The CH Gvmt. ICU data for 17 dec shows USI (ICU) beds %: Covid 34, All other 48, Empty, the rest.

    Note, the nos. are minuscule, and % make no sense. For ex. Geneva Canton has a population of half a million ppl and 56 ICU beds, 15 of which are occupied by Covidians, 10 are empty, rest: Other.

    https://www.covid19.admin.ch/fr/hosp-capacity/icu

    Great Santa Stories bosco. 🙂 WES, I guess Santas are above all the ‘rules’? Maybe their ‘beard’ is as good as a ‘mask’? Who knows. Anyway here they are allowed to roam free in supermarkets… 🙂 by special dispensation, as all we pleb custo

    #95667
    zerosum
    Participant

    Repeat War
    Play it safer
    Recommend/Tell everyone in your circle of life
    Boosting your Immune System
    Tools/dose (zinc, Vitamins C,D etc)
    Before vaccines
    Before getting covid
    After vaccine
    After getting covid

    #95668
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    Once one focuses one’s life on god, lunacy is inevitable. Being willing to acknowledge miracles, to look for them, to see them, impels one to see miracles in everything ,and everything one does, as a miracle. While this is true, is perhaps even THE existential truth that what we call spirituality ever seeks, acting upon this in any significant degree will soon land you on the street, in jail, a psych ward, and definitely kicked out or church even if you’re its pastor. True men of God notoriously go nuts and are best euthanized as Jesus was before succumbing to unholy madness we don’t even want to imagine much less know. A man as human as God’s Only Begotten Son would naturally be could wreak some seriously awful madness, if only because so many humans would try to follow His loving lunacy and we always.fuck.things.up. ALWAYS. We’re bad enough as individuals, but in groups, lord have mercy! As it was, others took that momentum and in time created the Holy Roman Catholic church, a core hive of evil that hardly bothers to conceal itself other than wearing fancy robes with heavy bling.

    Better, I say, one wait until old age to truly follow God as one’s sole guiding light, one’s personal will o the wisp. Old men can’t stir up that much trouble. Most they can do is maybe create an orphanage out of thin air or start some backwoods/downtown ghetto church that goes far enough to do some serious good but not far enough to do the inevitable serious bad we humans do once we think we’ve got a grip on this right/wrong thing and delude ourselves into believing that we are morally driven beings when our morality is at best just a car stereo we distract ourselves with while running all over the road and half the countryside.

    Can I get an amen? 😉

    ***

    Meanwhile, I believe I see the Final Solution to the growing national anxiety/depression complex caused by the Great Big Unavoidable Fucking Everything but especially the repercussions of covidiocy:

    Scholarly articles for ‘microdose psilocybin anxiety’

    A recent upsurge of interest. I believe Big Gov/Big Pharm/Big Media see the $$money$$ in Big Soma.

    Rather than promote major healing sessions with psychedelics, which would trigger enormous cognitive backlash as de facto sheeple were truly awoken, yea, even from things like wokesterism, they’re pushing microdosing, daily doses, nice 365/year profit streams for whoever patents more-or-less synthetic psychedelic blends with cannabis, shrooms, peyote and god knows what else blended to suit a given profile.

    Oh, they’re so close (in their minds) to that socially engineered trickle-down utopia. The folly of arrogance is too big to really see entirely, I think. The mountain of agglutinous (I made that word up) ego, that forms the enormous pyramid that features TPTB at its increasingly bouncy and jumpy apex, is simply too massive and wiggly to see without surveillance drones working in global tandem (which concept is enough to give a dead Rothschild new wood).

    Soma Told Me I Should Come

    ***

    P.S. Speaking of niggling, Triumvirat, what’s with opening posts starting with “Uh no” when you lack even remotely conclusive proof of your counter opinion? ‘I disagree’ works and is not full of shit.

    #95669
    Alexander Carpenter
    Participant

    I have a request for this commentariat: around a year (or two) ago I read a report about a long-term, large-scale, observational, empirical analysis of the overall health in countries that were heavily childhood-vaccinated (not covid, but all vaccines) compared to countries that were minimally vaccinated. It found that although in the heavily-vaccinated countries the incidence of the diseases that were explicitly vaccinated-against was lower, the overall health of the populations was also lower, with other disorders higher than in the less-vaccinated countries. As I recall, Japan was one of the less-vaccinated countries, and the US was one of the most.
    But I can’t find a reference to that paper. Do any of us have access to that study (or something similar), with a link to it?
    There are all sorts of sanctimonious red-herring noise and excuses about the ethics of RCT studies, but that does not apply to an observational-overview study, but could provide an excuse to suppress this one (and similar).
    Please advise.
    Thanks…

    #95670
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “I guess Santas are above all the ‘rules’? Maybe their ‘beard’ is as good as a ‘mask’? Who knows. Anyway here they are allowed to roam free in supermarkets…”

    I have a dark crimson skullcap, printed with Buddhist runes, given me by a friend. It has a wee bell I attached to give our parrot something to chew on while she shits on my chapeau. It has a coyly Sanataoid elfin aspect. Worn with my red tartan Pendleton lounging robe and bright red Crocs, I emit a mas vibe even in August. People like me when I wear the red hat.

    Since shaving will soon be a no-no for my disintegrating skin, I’m thinking it’s time I embraced my inner Santa. Plus I can cross busy streets without looking both ways.

    Santa Fly

    #95671
    John Day
    Participant

    @Boscohorowitz, from last night:
    Head hair grows about 6 inches per year. Willie Nelson’s braid ends are old.
    Really good Santa story.
    “I don’t”, teaser @ the end…

    #95672
    DarkMatter
    Participant

    @Henry
    Ordinary Men sounds very interesting. Thanks for writing about it. It seems like we as a society talk about the Nazis a lot and that book make me think we do it because it makes us feel better about ourselves because we
    falsely believe we could never be like them and are superior. I figured out a while ago that when we say something about someone else (including or maybe especially saying something about God) we are mostly saying something about ourselves. This even applies to this comment: I am really saying that I am superior to other people who say bad things about others in order to make themselves feel superior. It’s turtles all the way down.

    #95673
    those darned kids
    Participant
    #95674
    those darned kids
    Participant

    wow, he was on duty, but there was no ambulance to take him to calgary, 34km away.

    Alberta paramedics mourn unexpected death of one of their own

    #95675
    oxymoron
    Participant

    Okay, late for work. Change of plans – the dude won’t have more than 1 of us in the house – so my attempt at Ice Skating (genius chooch) will have to be deferred. Bosco you made a brilliant point regarding military versus medical service. That one really helped trigger the internal bullshit-o-meter. Best not to make a big deal about how special and precious one is being to RESIST when the only big deal is the effort of non-conformity or the resistance to social pressure which is a little heroic but again no big deal.
    Very interesting thoughts from the commentariat today. I do wish for good health and happiness for you all.
    It is nice to be in someone else’s thoughts when you know you have their support. I think God is like that. I remain in the original ontological thought of allness during the time I think I am specific and not generalized. Then when my thoughts become more inclusive and abstract I return or dissolve back into that non-specific God thought.

    As for being watched for my skills in handling others fears angers and weirdness – I am a mixed bag and not as generalised in my Charity and compassion as I would like but I don’t give myself too much of a hard time about it.

    Now off to work for a 9 am start

    #95676
    those darned kids
    Participant

    Fauci: Pfizer’s Possibly Game-Changing Covid-19 Pill Won’t Be Widely Available For ‘Months’

    “it is a very complicated synthetic process to make the drug.”

    i guess lipid nanoparticle encapsulated synthetic mrna is much faster..

    #95677
    those darned kids
    Participant

    methinks canadians are gonna have to ditch that cloth mask in the glove box for n95 masks.

    #95678
    WES
    Participant

    TDK:

    I suspect Pfizer’s pill contains ivermectin so naturally they don’t want to introduce it too soon and hurt their vaccine sales.

    #95679
    Veracious Poet
    Participant

    i guess lipid nanoparticle encapsulated synthetic mrna is much faster..

    Why yes!

    Genetic modification devices encapsulated with graphene oxide are so easy & cheap to manufacture, huge profit margin for the “special” people.

    It’s the gift that keeps giving!

    #WINNING #KA-CHING!

    Nevermind the sloppy QC re: dosage concentrations, it’s all good cupcake 😉

    If free isn’t cheap enough for you, we’ll get the gubermints to throw in some other free stuff too…

    Have you watched Big Bird’s awesome pep talk about the mRNA vaccines yet?

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