CV19 - Cure Worse Than The Disease? (Vol 18)

[Elysium]

JuanCarlosFandango said:

This is the sort of fine line I tread - on one side I agree with you that less is better and Sweden is to be applauded for a light touch. In the not insignificant way the Yugoslavia was far less awful than East Germany. Moderating the worst excesses of government is a worthwhile thing.

On the other side I can't accept that covid was a significantly dangerous disease that warranted any special measures. Not only because it wasn't deadly to most people statistically speaking, but because I don't want the government having those powers ever, for any reason.

I don’t think these things flow from one another. First exposure to COVID was undoubtedly dangerous to a minority of people. That minority was big enough to overwhelm healthcare if they all required support at once.

So the social threat was real. However, the role of govt was overplayed. We didn’t need them to tell us what to do and we should not have expected them to save us from an entirely external threat that, for once, was not the result of their incompetence.

For me there is a world of difference between being asked to change my behaviour for the welfare of the vulnerable and being forced to do it to a level that I found personally offensive.

JuanCarlosFandango said:

I'd rather take my chances with a deadly disease than with an over mighty state. To my concept of what I am and am not, I am a free individual who makes these choices and judges these risks myself. I can ride a motorbike, jump out of an aeroplane, sail single handed across the Atlantic and set off up a mountain in the middle of winter. I can bloody well choose whether or not to go out when there's a nasty cold about. I am not a farm animal to be herded around at their behest, those rights and liberties are not something I'd willingly trade to stop a government policy (the NHS) from failing.

Doing nothing absolutely was an option. In fact it was pretty much the plan, worked out by actual scientists and experts long before we had a pandemic. Experts who noted that panic, fear and disruption would do far more harm than good. And whose recommendations were thrown out by opportunistic politicians and The Science (TM) when they realised they could 'get away with it.'

The pandemic plan was never to ‘do nothing’. But there were many options that would have been less damaging and probably just as effective than lockdown.

Sweden show us how it could have been. I’ve been there and spoken with the locals who said that life during COVID was pretty much normal for healthy working people. That could have been us.

[jameswills]

The overreaction to the disease could have overwhelmed a health service, not the disease itself. Ventilation was the wrong course of action, which is resource hungry. Telling people to look after themselves and maybe eat better, drink better, take vitamin D and generally just treat it like a cold is not resource hungry, and would have done a better job at “saving lives”.

Now we have an overwhelmed, or basically a totally collapsed health service because of our reaction to it. It’s unforgivable, the data was all there, plain as day, for months.

[johnboy1975]

BrewsterBear said:

He's not alone though. The world has irrevocably changed for me too. I feel like the Wizard of Oz's curtain has been pulled. I mean, I knew that all governments were fetid pools of corruption, but I believed that, in the west at least, it was kept out of sight and punished when outed. Now I see that even when presented with concrete evidence of their incompetence, embezzlement, nepotism, hands in the till, and downright dishonesty they either lie about it or shrug their shoulders and nobody seems to care. Why are they not being held to account?

I feel like the contract I had with the UK government has been broken and there's no way to fix it. They still expect me to keep up my side by paying in far more than I take, but they have no intention of upholding their side by providing a free and fair society. They don't even hide it any more. That they still haven't rescinded the power to place me under house arrest at will is chilling. That even with messages written by ministers stating they know it was all political theatre, people still think it's "no biggie." It all makes me literally feel sick. I have never felt less proud to be British in my entire life and there's nothing I can do about it. I am politically homeless with the only choice being between a sh!t sandwich or turd on toast.

The West as I knew it is dying and it's terminal. Tearing itself apart over whether women have penises, how many genders there are, how much we owe ex-colonies for things done hundreds of years ago, how many masks can save just one life, how many years of my life I should give up so Doris can have an extra 6 months to cower behind her sofa bleaching her mail. Whatever the western dream was, it's over. And then people wonder why Putin had the temerity to invade. I feel like we've never been closer to WWIII.

My outlook on life, the world, and everything, has changed. In some ways for good and in others for bad. I'm travelling a lot this year and for the next few before they stop us doing that again, in the name of a new bug, new war, net zero, or whatever they like as nobody will stop them. Maybe I'll find a part of the world I feel I fit in better. Whatever the outcome, it's now me and mine first and f**k everyone else. The majority have proven themselves not worth attempting to save. If they're willing to accept the status quo then they're welcome to it. It saddens me to feel that way, but when people won't even help themselves then there really is no alternative.

Edited by BrewsterBear on Wednesday 29th March 04:01

Great post (sorry, just catching up)

Re my bold, absolutely. See the Led by Donkeys expose (in the thread "MPs for sale. Again")

Worth noting this lot got in on the promise of "levelling up"...instead you have MPs saying you can eat for 30p a day or whatever, whilst simultaneously (ok, not the same person) raking in 10k a day in consultancies

[chris watton]

johnboy1975 said:

BrewsterBear said:

He's not alone though. The world has irrevocably changed for me too. I feel like the Wizard of Oz's curtain has been pulled. I mean, I knew that all governments were fetid pools of corruption, but I believed that, in the west at least, it was kept out of sight and punished when outed. Now I see that even when presented with concrete evidence of their incompetence, embezzlement, nepotism, hands in the till, and downright dishonesty they either lie about it or shrug their shoulders and nobody seems to care. Why are they not being held to account?

I feel like the contract I had with the UK government has been broken and there's no way to fix it. They still expect me to keep up my side by paying in far more than I take, but they have no intention of upholding their side by providing a free and fair society. They don't even hide it any more. That they still haven't rescinded the power to place me under house arrest at will is chilling. That even with messages written by ministers stating they know it was all political theatre, people still think it's "no biggie." It all makes me literally feel sick. I have never felt less proud to be British in my entire life and there's nothing I can do about it. I am politically homeless with the only choice being between a sh!t sandwich or turd on toast.

The West as I knew it is dying and it's terminal. Tearing itself apart over whether women have penises, how many genders there are, how much we owe ex-colonies for things done hundreds of years ago, how many masks can save just one life, how many years of my life I should give up so Doris can have an extra 6 months to cower behind her sofa bleaching her mail. Whatever the western dream was, it's over. And then people wonder why Putin had the temerity to invade. I feel like we've never been closer to WWIII.

My outlook on life, the world, and everything, has changed. In some ways for good and in others for bad. I'm travelling a lot this year and for the next few before they stop us doing that again, in the name of a new bug, new war, net zero, or whatever they like as nobody will stop them. Maybe I'll find a part of the world I feel I fit in better. Whatever the outcome, it's now me and mine first and f**k everyone else. The majority have proven themselves not worth attempting to save. If they're willing to accept the status quo then they're welcome to it. It saddens me to feel that way, but when people won't even help themselves then there really is no alternative.

Edited by BrewsterBear on Wednesday 29th March 04:01

Great post (sorry, just catching up)

Re my bold, absolutely. See the Led by Donkeys expose (in the thread "MPs for sale. Again")

Worth noting this lot got in on the promise of "levelling up"...instead you have MPs saying you can eat for 30p a day or whatever, whilst simultaneously (ok, not the same person) raking in 10k a day in consultancies

Good posts, echoes my feelings exactly.

[Elysium]

jameswills said:

The overreaction to the disease could have overwhelmed a health service, not the disease itself. Ventilation was the wrong course of action, which is resource hungry. Telling people to look after themselves and maybe eat better, drink better, take vitamin D and generally just treat it like a cold is not resource hungry, and would have done a better job at “saving lives”.

Now we have an overwhelmed, or basically a totally collapsed health service because of our reaction to it. It’s unforgivable, the data was all there, plain as day, for months.

I agree that there were better things we could have done. However, that does not change the fact that the small minority of people requiring medical treatment because of COVID would have been beyond the capacity of the health service.

There are three ways to tackle this:

1. Implement measures to protect the vulnerable whilst allowing the rest of the population to become infected and recover.

2. Increase healthcare capacity to the levels required

3. Implement population wide measures to slow the spread of the disease, extending the duration of the pandemic, but reducing the peak.

We were told that the first two options were impossible, so we went ‘all in’ on the third. In fact, if you read Mark Woolhouse’s book you will see that his conclusion was that we massively over egged the pudding with lockdown because SAGE did not have the courage to wait to see if the behaviour changes they had recommended had worked.

The reality is that the most effective of these, working from home, had minimal societal cost.

Aside from the fiasco of the Nightingales we spent next to nothing on expanding healthcare capacity and instead spent almost double the NHS budget on furlough.

The problem that COVID caused was real, but our response was a failure on an unprecedented scale. The worst public sector decision making in living memory.

And that is why we should have never let them take our rights. They were not following the science, it was politics, spin and PR from the very beginning. An avoidable man made disaster

[jameswills]

I do mostly agree with what you’re saying (and always have done!), I just can’t accept the premise that Covid presented any threat at all to our health service such as the limited severity of the disease and limited to such a tiny and easily distinguishable minority.

Saying that wholeheartedly agree with the final few paragraphs, it’s a massive scandal. And the pressure needs to be continued to be applied.

Oh look climate change. Balloons. Putin. Boris and cake.....

[Elysium]

jameswills said:

I do mostly agree with what you’re saying (and always have done!), I just can’t accept the premise that Covid presented any threat at all to our health service such as the limited severity of the disease and limited to such a tiny and easily distinguishable minority.

Saying that wholeheartedly agree with the final few paragraphs, it’s a massive scandal. And the pressure needs to be continued to be applied.

Oh look climate change. Balloons. Putin. Boris and cake.....

The issue, I think, is the woeful lack of capacity in our health services.

If you were arguing that the NHS should have been able to cope I would wholeheartedly agree.

A disease of this nature was a foreseeable threat and we should have been able to handle it without torching our economy and human rights.

Sweden did.

[johnboy1975]

Elysium said:

Sweden did.

Are Sweden a useful indicator regarding excess deaths? Light touch lockdowns, but highly vaccinated, and they don't have high excess deaths post pandemic (I believe)

Which indicates to me it's the lockdowns / shutting down health provision rather than the vaccines.

Everyone knows I'm against the u18's getting jabbed, but it's hard to argue they are dropping like flies. My lad and girl don't know anyone between them, I've not heard of even a confirmed myocarditis case at my lads school (800 students, so maybe too small a sample?) let alone a death

[jameswills]

Elysium said:

The issue, I think, is the woeful lack of capacity in our health services.

If you were arguing that the NHS should have been able to cope I would wholeheartedly agree.

A disease of this nature was a foreseeable threat and we should have been able to handle it without torching our economy and human rights.

Sweden did.

Yep.

[johnboy1975]

This should be good.

Triggernometry interview John Campbell. Grifter central

[JuanCarlosFandango]

Elysium said:

The pandemic plan was never to ‘do nothing’. But there were many options that would have been less damaging and probably just as effective than lockdown.

Sweden show us how it could have been. I’ve been there and spoken with the locals who said that life during COVID was pretty much normal for healthy working people. That could have been us.

Doing nothing was one option that would have been better than what we did!

Yes I agree Sweden was better, but that horse has well and truly bolted as far as I'm concerned and there is no getting it back.

[JuanCarlosFandango]

Elysium said:

The issue, I think, is the woeful lack of capacity in our health services.

If you were arguing that the NHS should have been able to cope I would wholeheartedly agree.

A disease of this nature was a foreseeable threat and we should have been able to handle it without torching our economy and human rights.

Sweden did.

Ahhh but here we part company. Yes there is a lack of health capacity but that was an excuse. The issue as I see it is grabbing power and money on the back of a bunch of lies. Again I'd rather take my chances with any disaster than a government that behaves that way.

[Elysium]

johnboy1975 said:

Elysium said:

Sweden did.

Are Sweden a useful indicator regarding excess deaths? Light touch lockdowns, but highly vaccinated, and they don't have high excess deaths post pandemic (I believe)

Which indicates to me it's the lockdowns / shutting down health provision rather than the vaccines.

Everyone knows I'm against the u18's getting jabbed, but it's hard to argue they are dropping like flies. My lad and girl don't know anyone between them, I've not heard of even a confirmed myocarditis case at my lads school (800 students, so maybe too small a sample?) let alone a death

I have no doubt that a tiny proportion of people have been injured by the vaccine. Due to the enormous number of vaccines given this is a substantial group. But I don’t think it is tenable to argue that vaccination is driving excess deaths.

Sweden has no excess death, which I think is solid evidence that our problems are due to lockdown.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Some questionable posters stuck inside a few lockers at the gym! Although it was already in existence, the scheme for claiming damages for 'severe disability' caused by a vaccine against certain diseases has now been opened up to Covid19 jabees.

https://www.gov.uk/vaccine-damage-payment

[Grumps.]

Koyaanisqatsi said:

Some questionable posters stuck inside a few lockers at the gym! Although it was already in existence, the scheme for claiming damages for 'severe disability' caused by a vaccine against certain diseases has now been opened up to Covid19 jabees.

https://www.gov.uk/vaccine-damage-payment

It was 'opened up' in December 2020.

[LeighW]

Koyaanisqatsi said:

Some questionable posters stuck inside a few lockers at the gym! Although it was already in existence, the scheme for claiming damages for 'severe disability' caused by a vaccine against certain diseases has now been opened up to Covid19 jabees.

https://www.gov.uk/vaccine-damage-payment

John Cambpell posted an interesting video yesterday; Sir Christopher Chope speaking in the HoC. Oddly, the HoC always seems to empty when the issue of vaccine side effects is raised...

[cherryowen]

Not being a parent, I was totally unaware of the damage The Lockdown could do to kids both in education and prior to schooling. This is sobering reading:-

Ghost children: the pupils who never came back after lockdown

I wonder is this resonates with our resident teacher, V1nce F?

[James6112]

JuanCarlosFandango said:

Elysium said:

The pandemic plan was never to ‘do nothing’. But there were many options that would have been less damaging and probably just as effective than lockdown.

Sweden show us how it could have been. I’ve been there and spoken with the locals who said that life during COVID was pretty much normal for healthy working people. That could have been us.

Doing nothing was one option that would have been better than what we did!

Yes I agree Sweden was better, but that horse has well and truly bolted as far as I'm concerned and there is no getting it back.

Sweden did ok
This was because they are not idiots & took necessary precautions as a matter of course. Practised social distancing & behaved sensibly. Their bars were as quiet as ours. Sensible folk.
Unfortunately the average Uk citizen would have carried on regardless, like the all too common man-babies.
So stricter rules were required until the cavalry arrived (vaccines). The restrictions were entirely due to their pathetic mindset.

[BrewsterBear]

James6112 said:

Sweden did ok
This was because they are not idiots & took necessary precautions as a matter of course. Practised social distancing & behaved sensibly. Their bars were as quiet as ours. Sensible folk.
Unfortunately the average Uk citizen would have carried on regardless, like the all too common man-babies.
So stricter rules were required until the cavalry arrived (vaccines). The restrictions were entirely due to their pathetic mindset.

Wow. With all the evidence that lockdowns, masks, social distancing, and scotch eggs did absolutely nothing you still believe that restrictions were necessary? There are messages from government ministers admitting that it was all political theatre and you still think we should have stopped people carrying on with their lives? At the expense of a collapsed health system, ruined education for millions, ruined mental health for millions, a ruined economy, and £400bn wasted?

You're either a troll or not willing to admit to yourself you were conned. I despair.

[Evolved]

cherryowen said:

Not being a parent, I was totally unaware of the damage The Lockdown could do to kids both in education and prior to schooling. This is sobering reading:-

Ghost children: the pupils who never came back after lockdown

I wonder is this resonates with our resident teacher, V1nce F?

It resonates deeply with me. I had a son going through the latter years of high school, I saw first hand how damaging and reckless the nonsense was that they were dishing out! There has been a huge amount of damage caused not only to education overall, with pupils essentially missing key learning stages, but also to their self esteem and general social development. I still read the threads, regularly, and have to curtail myself at times reading things that are being posted by the usual clan of clowns. There has been irreparable damage caused by this whole situation that far exceeds the mammoth mountain of debt we’re now in.
It’s not that easy to forget when you’ve witnessed things first hand, that should never have taken place.