Berthe Morisot The old track to Auvers 1863
RFKjr
https://twitter.com/i/status/1472536661116563457
Spectator Editor Fraser Nelson tweets with Graham Medley—chair of COVID modeling for UK Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE).
Turns out SAGE doesn’t model mild scenarios, because those don’t require government actions. The gov’t sees only extreme scenarios.
• My Tweets With The Chairman Of The Sage Covid Modelling Committee (Nelson)
The latest Sage papers have been published, envisaging anything from 200 to 6,000 deaths a day from Omicron depending on how many more restrictions we’ll get – up to and very much including another lockdown. Earlier today I had an unexpected chance to ask questions of Graham Medley, the chair of the Sage modelling committee. He’s a professor at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) which last weekend published a study on Omicron with very gloomy scenarios and making the case for more restrictions. But JP Morgan had a close look at this study and spotted something big: all the way through, LSHTM assumes that the Omicron variant is just as deadly as Delta. ‘But evidence from South Africa suggests that Omicron infections are milder,’ JP Morgan pointed out in a note to clients. Adjust for this, it found, and the picture changes dramatically:-
“Bed occupancy by Covid-19 patients at the end of January would be 33% of the peak seen in January 2021. This would be manageable without further restrictions.’ So JP Morgan had shown that, if you tweak one assumption (on severity) then – suddenly – no need for lockdown. Why was this scenario left out? Why would this fairly-important and fairly-basic fact on Omicron modelling not presented by SAGE modellers like Prof Medley to ministers – and to the general public? I was thrilled for the chance to speak to him on Twitter. It was kind of him to make the time (he’s still going, as far as I can make out). The Spectator data hub has a page devoted to past Sage modelling vs actual, and I wanted to make sure I was not being unfair to Sage in my selection or presentation of those charts.
The latest Sage paper-drop – the 6,000-deaths-a-day one – refers to ‘scenarios,’ not predictions. Prof Medley emphasises the distinction: saying something could happen is not saying that there’s a realistic chance of it happening. But then why do SAGE modellers publish some scenarios and not others? I then jumped to ask Prof Medley.
Revealingly, he seemed to think my question odd: if it’s quite plausible that Omicron is mild and doesn’t the threaten the NHS, what would be the point of including that as a ‘scenario’? He seemed to suggest that he has been given a very limited brief, and asked to churn out worse-case scenarios without being asked to comment on how plausible they are. “We generally model what we are asked to model. There is a dialogue in which policy teams discuss with the modellers what they need to inform their policy.” Might this remit mean leaving out just-as-plausible, quite-important scenarios that would not require lockdown? “Decision-makers are generally on only interested in situations where decisions have to be made.”
Note how careful he is to stay vague on whether any of the various scenarios in the Sage document are likely or even plausible. What happened to the original system of presenting a ‘reasonable worse-case scenario’ together with a central scenario? And what’s the point of modelling if it doesn’t say how likely any these scenarios are? From what Prof Medley says, it’s unclear that the most-likely scenario is even being presented to ministers this time around. So how are they supposed to make good decisions? I highly doubt that Sajid Javid is only asking to churn out models that make the case for lockdown. That instruction, if it is being issued, will have come from somewhere else.
Mild. A four letter word.
• New York, UK: Covid Case Records, Hospitalizations And Deaths Remain Low (JTN)
Authorities reported record-breaking COVID-19 case counts in multiple major regions across the world late this week, offering further signs of the omicron variant’s high transmissibility. However, hospitalizations and deaths attributable to the disease remained much lower than earlier surges, suggesting a shift in the pandemic after roughly two years of natural immunity and about a year of vaccinations. The United Kingdom had two back-to-back record-breaking days this week, posting case numbers tens of thousands higher than the earlier one-day record almost exactly a year ago in January. New York State had a less-dramatic yet still firmly record-breaking day as it struggles with its own surge there.
Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office said the has set another single-day positive COVID case record with nearly 22,000 positive cases reported in 24 hours, abc7ny.com reported Saturday. Yet in both cases, hospitalizations and deaths have remained markedly lower than in lower surges: In New York deaths have risen slightly since the beginning of the month but have continued on the largely flat trajectory they’ve held since the summer. Deaths in the United Kingdom have remained similarly low, and hospitalizations in both regions are lower than in earlier surges. “The omicron symptoms have been very mild,” Yves Derouseu, the emergency services director at Lenox Hill Hospital, told NBC4 New York. “The impact on those vaccinated has been clinically mild. It’s not converting to admissions to the hospital, or deaths.”
The study is at the link. The text here is Robert Malone’s summary of it (https://rwmalonemd.substack.com/p/omicron-today).
• The First 785 SARS-CoV-2 Omicron Variant Cases In Denmark (ES)
Denmark, as of December 9, 2021. Denmark has one of the highest RT-PCR testing capacities in the world and screens all positive RT-PCR tests with an Omicron-specific PCR – allowing screening for Omicron. There have been 785 SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant cases identified in Denmark. The earliest Omicron cases in Denmark occurred before South Africa announced the emergence of this variant. Most cases were fully (76%) or booster-vaccinated (7.1%); 34 (4.3%) had a previous SARS-CoV-2 infection. The majority of cases with available information reported symptoms (509/666; 76%) and most were infected in Denmark (588/644; 91%). One in five cases cannot be linked to previous cases, indicating widespread community transmission. Nine cases have been hospitalized, one required intensive care and no deaths have been registered.
Highlights:
· 1.2% of cases have been hospitalized
· 0.3% in intensive care
· 0% deaths.
· 83% were fully or booster vaccinated, 17% not vaccinated (including 2.6 vaccine started)
· 4.3% had previous SARS-CoV-2 infection
· 91% have no travel history, 9% reported travel
My take: this study is important because although there are studies and spokespeople from South Africa stating similar results, the Danish population in terms of age, body weight, life expectancy, etc. is more similar demographically to the US population. This Danish study suggests that Omicron will affect the American population similarly.
The circle is round. If you can’t tell the difference bwteen Covid and a cold, you must get jabbed.
• Runny Nose, Headache, And Fatigue Are Commonest Symptoms Of Omicron (BMJ)
The UK government has been urged to update its list of symptoms for covid-19, after early data showed that cold-like symptoms were the most commonly reported by people with the new omicron variant. Data released on 16 December by the Covid Symptoms Study,1 run by the health science company Zoe and King’s College London, show that the top five symptoms reported in the app for omicron infection were runny nose, headache, fatigue (either mild or severe), sneezing, and sore throat. This initial analysis was based on positive cases in London, which was selected because of its higher prevalence of omicron than in other parts of the UK. The government still lists fever, cough, and loss of sense of smell or taste—which were the most common with the alpha variant—as the covid symptoms to watch out for.
Tim Spector, lead scientist on the Zoe Covid Study app, who has been calling for the list of symptoms to be updated since the emergence of the delta variant,2 said a change was overdue. “The messaging from the government is just not clear on this,” he said. “I think most people know what cold-like symptoms are. I would probably just add [to the list]: ‘Have you got cold-like symptoms?’ We need to educate people, go back to the basics, and say that if you’ve got cold-like symptoms keep away from people. You shouldn’t be waiting for the three classic symptoms.” To compare delta and omicron, London data were selected from a week where delta was dominant (a sample of 363 cases from 3-10 October 2021) and compared with the most recent data (847 cases from 3-10 December 2021).
This initial analysis found no clear differences between delta and omicron in the early symptoms (three days after testing). Spector said it was vital that members of the public were aware of the symptoms to look out for, particularly in areas such as London that have very high rates of omicron infection. “If you do have symptoms of a mild or bad cold, it’s highly likely that you’ve got covid if you’re in an area like London at the moment,” he said. Spector said the UK was now an international exception in not listing cold-like symptoms as likely indicators of covid infection, noting that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organization, and European countries such as Spain and France had all updated their advice. “The UK is the odd one out,” he said. “They should amend it if the majority are presenting that way.”
And after all that “mildness”, the CDC and Fauci think it’s still Halloween…
• CDC Forecast: Covid Cases Will Jump By 55%, Deaths Will Surge By 73% (DM)
Grim new figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have predicted that US COVID-19 deaths will soar by 73 per cent to 15,600 a week by January 8, and that cases will rocket to 1.3 million a week by Christmas Day. The agency revealed projections on Wednesday afternoon that show America will suffer up to 15,600 new Covid deaths a week as of January 8 – or 2,228 deaths per day – a 58 per cent increase from 8,900 deaths currently being recorded each week, equivalent to 1,285 deaths a day. Another CDC prediction estimates that between 620,000 and 1.3 million Americans will have been diagnosed with Covid by the week that ends on December 25 – Christmas Day. That represents a 55% leap on the 840,000 cases that have been recorded over the last week.
Omicron will likely become the dominant Covid strain in the coming weeks, and cause a massive surge of cases shortly after Christmas, one expert has warned, likely fueling the surge the CDC predicts. Dr Gregory Poland, a top epidemiologist at the Mayo Clinic told DailyMail.com that an Omicron-fueled surge in cases could be right around the corner. ‘As best any of us can model, we will have an explosion of cases after the holidays in the in the early-to-mid-January timeframe,’ he said. ‘This variant is hyper transmissible, it spreads exponentially in an environment of cold weather, massive holiday get togethers, no masking and insufficient immunization.’
He believes it will become the dominant strain in the UK – which recorded a record 78,610 cases on Wednesday – in the coming days, and that the U.S. will follow around two weeks later. Cornell University in upstate New York is suspected to be home to the first US Omicron cluster, after 930 students were diagnosed with the virus in recent days. The college says every one of the positive tests it has sequenced so far has been the Omicron variant. A Cornell spokesman hasn’t said exactly how many Omicron cases have been identified, but added that they expect most, if not all, the 930 cases to be caused by the new variant.
There is absolutely nothing to justify a warning like this.
• Fauci Foresees Potential Record Death Rate From Omicron (NW)
Anthony Fauci, chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden, said on Sunday that record-breaking death rates could occur as the COVID Omicron variant spreads across the U.S. Fauci made an appearance on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, where host Jake Tapper pressed the leading infectious disease expert on where he believes the pandemic is headed. Tapper asked, “Do you expect new record high numbers for cases? And what about hospitalizations and deaths?” “Yes, well, unfortunately, Jake, I think that that is going to happen,” Fauci replied. “We are going to see a significant stress in some regions of the country on the hospital system, particularly in those areas where you have a low level of vaccination, which is one of the reasons why we continue to stress the importance of getting those unvaccinated people vaccinated.”
The Omicron variant was first reported by researchers in South Africa last month, after being detected in several southern African nations. It was detected in the U.S. earlier this month and has now been reported in most states. Experts predict that it will overtake Delta as the dominant variant in the U.S. in a few weeks. Fauci predicted that the country is in for a difficult time as the Omicron variant continues to spread and take over. “It is going to be tough,” Fauci said. “We can’t walk away from that, Jake. We can’t, because, with Omicron that we’re dealing with, it is going to be a tough few weeks to months as we get deeper into the winter.” Fauci also refuted the notion, expressed this week by Vice President Kamala Harris, that officials did not see COVID-19 variants coming. He reiterated that what is surprising about Omicron is not that it happened at all, but rather the number of mutations it seems to possess.
“We definitely saw variants coming,” he explained. “What was not anticipated was the extent of the mutations and the amino acid substitutions in Omicron, which is really unprecedented. It kind of came out of nowhere, where you have a virus that has 50 mutations, 30 of which are in the spike protein, and 10 or 12 of which are in the receptor binding domain. I mean, to me, that’s really quite unprecedented.”
“You’ll be told that your loved one cannot stay off the oxygen support long enough to get nutrition, and then you’ll be told they are not tolerating the feeding tube.”
• COVID-19 Protocolists are Killing People. By-Demand NOW (Lyons-Weiler)
Once your loved one is admitted for COVID-19 to a hospital full of protocolists, monoclonal antibodies are no longer an option. No reason is given, it’s just protocol. Once your loved one is admitted to a hospital full of protocolists for COVID-19, you cannot get the doctors to vary from the protocol with options other than those they are told they can use. Those options? -O2 support -Lovenox -Remdesivir -Vitamin D&C -Nasal cannula feeding tube -Intubation (ventilator) -Palliative care -Comfort care -Cremation, or relocation for embalming. If your loved one does not want Acetaminophen (e.g., Tylenol, or Ibuprofen (e.g., Motrin), but instead wants aspirin, it’s a no-go. Aspirin, by the way, helps break up microclots in the lungs. You’ll only get push-back on the risk of bleeding with long-term use.
COVID-19 is an acute condition. But hey, they have their protocols. Forget about Ivermectin. Forget about Hydroxychloroquine; the faked studies and Fauci tanked that option with bullshit logic. Forget about N-Acetyl-Cysteine, which helps the body increase O2 saturation levels. Forget about The COVID-19 Frontline Doctors protocols, I-MASK+, MATH+, and forget about Dr. Peter McCullough’s amazing dynamic and multi-faceted approach to treating COVID-19. Forget about all of these unless you are in a conservative county and can get a conservative judge to back patient choice. If you have time. And you won’t. Your loved one will be on oxygen support, like a bipap, maybe for a day. And then some doctor will start talking about how important it is they get some nutrition.
You’ll be told that your loved one cannot stay off the oxygen support long enough to get nutrition, and then you’ll be told they are not tolerating the feeding tube. Then they will tell you they want to intubate your loved one because feeding them is easier that way. You’ll learn that no one comes off the ventilators. Protocolism is killing people. Protocolists are killing people.
“We have taken this step and proceed from the fact that it will no longer be possible to somehow brush it [the security proposals] off.”
• ‘The Moment Of Truth Has Come’ For Russia & NATO – Moscow (RT)
Moscow’s new proposals for security guarantees are aimed at averting a potential military conflict with NATO, Russia’s deputy FM has said, noting that the country’s relations with the US-led bloc have reached a tipping point. The comprehensive deal, proposed to the US and NATO this week, serves the best interests of all the parties involved, and is designed to avoid a potential military showdown through political dialogue, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko said Saturday. “[By proposing the deal] we make it clear that we are ready to talk about how to transform a military or a military-technical scenario into a political process that will strengthen the military security of all states within The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Euro-Atlantic area and Eurasia,” Grushko told the Soloviev LIVE YouTube channel.
Should the West ignore Moscow’s attempt to rein in the tensions, Russia will resort to “creating counter-threats” of its own, the minister said, referring to potential deployment of new weapons systems within Russia’s borders. “It will [then] be too late then to ask us why we’ve made such decisions, why we’ve deployed such systems,” he said. Arguing that increasingly strained Russia-NATO relations have reached “the moment of truth,” which calls for a “fundamental decision,” the minister stressed that the ball is now in NATO’s court. “We have taken this step and proceed from the fact that it will no longer be possible to somehow brush it [the security proposals] off.”
The idea of a comprehensive, legally binding security agreement with the West was first floated by Russian President Vladimir Putin. The two separate draft documents, presented by Russia to Brussels and Washington on Wednesday, laid out the main principles of peaceful coexistence of Russia and the US-led military bloc in Europe, Moscow said. Unveiling the proposals, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov explained that Russia insists on written guarantees since the ties with the West currently suffer from “an almost total lack of mutual trust.” Ryabkov pointed out that many verbal promises, given by Western politicians to Russia back in 1990, including NATO’s pledge to not expand eastwards, have been subsequently broken.
“..property, will be seized and people’s ability to purchase enough food not to starve, will depend upon them holding an up-to-date vaccine passport..”
• Israeli-led Central Bank Simulation Preparation For Great Reset – Yeadon (DT.nz)
A banking crisis simulation conducted recently in Israel is preparation for the ‘Great Reset’, according to Mike Yeadon, former chief scientific officer for Pfizer and pandemic critic. The 10-day simulation concluded on 9 December in Jerusalem, and invovled central bank representatives from Israel, USA, UK, UAE, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Thailand, as well as representatives from the IMF, World Bank, and Bank of International Settlements. The simulation was based on a catastrophic cyber attack scenario, in which the entire world financial system was brought down, leading to a ‘run on banks’ requiring emergency liquidity in multiple currencies, paralysing the global financial system. Targets would included foreign exchange markets, bond markets, loss of data integrity and compromised transactions between exporters and importers.
The solution to such an event would require international cooperation and coordination of monetary policy. Measures would include a coordinated bank holiday, debt repayment grace periods, SWAP/REPO agreements and coordinated delinking from major currencies. Dr. Mike Yeadon believes the simulation is a front for a planned financial reset, which he expects to take place sometime after March 2022.= The financial reset itself is the actual manifestation of what the head of the World Economic Forum (WEF) Claus Schwab has called The Great Reset, where ‘You will own nothing and be happy’. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is a ‘graduate’ of the WEF. Yeadon believes electronic representation of individual currencies will end, and that it is entirely possible people will lose everything they think they own by way of financial assets.
Yeadon believes other real assets, mostly property, will be seized and people’s ability to purchase enough food not to starve, will depend upon them holding an up-to-date vaccine passport. According to Yeadon, that’s the ultimate tool of coercion: VaxPass or starvation. According to a post on Yeadon’s Telegram channel: • Banks will close for several days, and online banking will be offline. People won’t be able see their balances. • ‘Debt holidays’ will be implemented, including the cancellation of debts, noting that one person’s debt is another person’s savings. • ‘Coordinated delinking from major currencies’ will see the end of balances in USD, GBP and EUR. Individual currencies will presumably be rebased and ‘severely haircut’ into Central Bank Digital Currencies.
Yeah, yeah, demise of the dollar and all that. What gives this guy’s ignorance away is this quote: “China has invested trillions of *dollars* into its Belt and Road Initiative..”
• China & Russia Are Ready To End US Dominance Of Global Finance (Diesen)
De-dollarisation, the reduced reliance on the US dollar as a reserve and transaction currency, is immensely challenging as the dominant role of the US dollar has defined the international financial system for more than 75 years. The dollar has continued its strong position for three main reasons: the huge size of the US economy, the preservation of the dollar’s value by keeping inflation low, and the open and liquid financial market. As the US economy is in relative decline, inflation is out of control, and its financial markets are used as a weapon – the foundations for the enduring role of the dollar are quickly coming to an end.
A financial partnership between China and Russia, the world’s largest energy importer and the world’s largest energy exporter, is an indispensable instrument for dethroning the petrodollar. In 2015, approximately 90% of trade between Russia and China was settled in dollars, and by 2020, dollar-denominated trade between the two Eurasian giants had almost reduced by half, with only 46% of trade in dollars. Russia has also been leading the way in cutting the share of US dollars in its foreign reserves. The mechanisms for de-dollarizing China-Russia trade are also used to end the use of the greenback with third parties – with advancements being seen in places such as Latin America, Turkey, Iran, India, etc. The US has been pumping out dollars to the entire world for decades, and at some point, the tide will change as the sea of dollars return home with increasingly diminished value.
[..] China and Russia have also developed their own rating agencies and replaced the dominant position of Visa and Mastercard in their respective countries. This new financial architecture is complemented with an energy partnership and a technological partnership as neither China nor Russia wants to be reliant on American high-tech industries as they move into the fourth industrial revolution. Furthermore, China and Russia seek to avoid US-dominated transportation corridors. China has invested trillions of dollars into its Belt and Road Initiative for new land- and sea corridors, while Russia has advanced a similar but more modest program that includes developing the Arctic as a maritime route in partnership with China.
Lord Sumpton
No one described lockdown madness with grander eloquence than former UK Supreme Ct Justice Lord Sumption: “We have moral reasons…for not wishing to be like China…now…what began as a public health crisis is…an educational crisis…and social crisis on top of that.” 168/ pic.twitter.com/Li6Mlb9BU7
— Michael P Senger (@MichaelPSenger) November 18, 2021
Scripted?!
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