NHS Refused to Treat Elderly Patients During Lockdown
A Sunday Times Insight investigation has revealed the extent to which the elderly were neglected by the NHS during the full lockdown.
As part of a three-month investigation into the Government’s handling of the crisis during the lockdown weeks, we have spoken to more than 50 witnesses, including doctors, paramedics, bereaved families, charities, care home workers, politicians and advisers to the government. Our inquiries have unearthed new documents and previously unpublished hospital data. Together, they show what happened while most of the country stayed at home.
There were 59,000 extra deaths in England and Wales compared with previous years during the first six months of the pandemic. This consisted of 26,000 excess fatalities in care homes and another 25,000 in people’s own homes.
Surprisingly, only 8,000 of those excess deaths were in hospital, even though 30,000 people died from the virus on the wards. This shows that many deaths that would normally have taken place in hospital had been displaced to people’s homes and the care homes.
This huge increase of deaths outside hospitals was a mixture of coronavirus cases – many of whom were never tested – and people who were not given treatment for other conditions that they would have had access to in normal times. Ambulance and admission teams were told to be more selective about who should be taken into hospital, with specific instructions to exclude many elderly people. GPs were asked to identify frail patients who were to be left at home even if they were seriously ill with the virus.
In some regions, care home residents dying of COVID-19 were denied access to hospitals even though their families believed their lives could have been saved.
The sheer scale of the resulting body count that piled up in the nation’s homes meant special body retrieval teams had to be formed by police and fire brigade to transfer corpses from houses to mortuaries. Some are said to have run out of body bags.
NHS data obtained by Insight shows that access to potentially life-saving intensive care was not made available to the vast majority of people who died with the virus. Only one in six COVID-19 patients who lost their lives in hospital during the first wave had been given intensive care. This suggests that of the 47,000 people who died of the virus inside and outside hospitals, just an estimated 5,000 – one in nine – received the highest critical care, despite the government claiming that intensive care capacity was never breached.
The Sunday Times points the finger at Chris Whitty, England’s Chief Medical Officer, as the architect of this policy.
The chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, commissioned an age-based frailty score system that was circulated for consultation in the health service as a potential “triage tool” at the beginning of the crisis. It was never formally published.
It gave instructions that in the event of the NHS being overwhelmed, patients over the age of 80 should be denied access to intensive care and in effect excluded many people over the age of 60 from life-saving treatment. Testimony by doctors has confirmed that the tool was used by medics to prevent elderly patients blocking up intensive care beds.
Indeed, new data from the NHS shows that the proportion of over-60s with the coronavirus who received intensive care halved between the middle of March and the end of April as the pressure weighed heavily on hospitals during the height of the pandemic. The proportion of the elderly being admitted then increased again when the pressure was lifted off the NHS as COVID-19 cases fell in the summer months.
Is this the Government’s version of “Focused Protection”? Instead of using our national health service to shield the elderly, it shielded the NHS from the elderly.
Worth reading in full.
How the Grinch Stole Christmas
Professor Lockdown appeared on the Today Programme yesterday morning and was full of his usual good cheer. The MailOnline has more.
Professor Ferguson, whose modelling led to the original lockdown in March, said earlier today that schools may have to be closed to older pupils if restrictions on households mixing fail to stem the rise of infections, and that it will be a “political judgement” as to whether regulations are relaxed over the festive season.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme: “It risks some transmission and there will be consequences of that. Some people will die because of getting infected on that day.
“But if it is only one or two days the impact is likely to be limited. So that is really a political judgment about the cost versus the benefits.”
It follows the prospects for a family Christmas descending into further confusion yesterday, as Downing Street insisted that relatives should be able to gather – but a minister warned it will not be “normal”.
Professor Ferguson added: “That (banning households mixing) should have a significant effect but as yet we have been unable to see it definitively.
“If we go beyond that there is a limit to what we can do in terms of reducing contacts, short of starting to target, for instance, the older years in schools and sixth form colleges where we know older teenagers are able to transmit as adults.
“Of course nobody wants to start moving to virtual education and closing schools even partially. The challenge may be that we are not able to get on top of the transmission otherwise.”
So Christmas is cancelled and schools will have to close again if we want to “get on top” of transmission.
I guess no one has told Professor Ferguson that infections fell in almost half of England’s local authorities last week.
Meanwhile, Professor John Edmunds – the SAGE member who was passionately advocating for herd immunity back in March – has backed up Professor Lockdown.
The idea that “we can carry on as we are” and have a normal Christmas “is wishful thinking in the extreme”, a Government scientific adviser has said.
Professor John Edmunds, a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), said “radical action” would be needed to stem the rise in coronavirus cases, particularly in regions with high incidence of the virus.
Prof Edmunds, who told MPs on Wednesday that tens of thousands of deaths could occur during this wave of the pandemic, said further measures are needed to bring cases down.
He said that a circuit-breaker is needed across the whole country or at least in areas where incidence is high.
“The only way that we can have a relatively safe and normal Christmas is if we take radical action now to reduce incidence – at the very least in high incidence areas – and keep the incidence low across the country by implementing a package of measures to reduce social contacts,” he said.
“The notion that we can carry on as we are and have a Christmas that we can celebrate normally with friends and family is wishful thinking in the extreme.”
Edmunds conforms to George Santayana’s definition of fanaticism – “redoubling your effort after you’ve forgotten your aim”.
Stop Press: Sweden’s state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell says it’s fine to make arrangements for Christmas celebrations with close family now that restrictions for the over-70s have been lifted. Answering a question on Swedish TV about recommendations for Christmas, he said: “A small family party with your children and grandchildren, especially if you can keep your distance from each other, won’t mean you’re taking much of a risk.”
Vaccine Guinea Pigs Revealed
According to the Mail on Sunday, NHS staff are due to start receiving a coronavirus vaccine within weeks.
An email sent by an NHS Trust chief to his staff, seen by the Mail on Sunday, reveals the Health Service is preparing for a national vaccination programme before Christmas.
It can also be disclosed that the Government has introduced new laws that would allow the UK to bypass the EU approval process if a safe and effective jab is ready before the end of the post-Brexit transition period on December 31st.
The move will boost optimism that a ‘game-changing’ vaccine will soon allow Boris Johnson to relax the social restrictions which have crippled the country since March.
In his memo to staff earlier this month, Glen Burley, chief executive of George Eliot Hospital NHS Trust in Warwickshire, wrote: “Our Trust, alongside NHS organisations nationally, has been told to be prepared to start a COVID-19 staff vaccine programme in early December.
“The latest intelligence states a coronavirus vaccine should be available this year with NHS staff prioritised prior to Christmas.”
So NHS staff will be given a vaccine that has bypassed the EU approval process and whose manufacturers will be exempt from any liability should there be any unforeseen side effects.
Let’s hope it’s not mandatory.
Riot Police Crush Anti-Lockdown Protest
The Territorial Support Group – the paramilitary wing of the Metropolitan Police – brutally dispersed a group of peaceful anti-lockdown protestors yesterday, much like they did in Trafalgar Square on September 26th. The MailOnline has more.
Armed police officers have dispersed large crowds of anti-lockdown protesters at Trafalgar Square following a march through central London on Saturday, which saw thousands gather against coronavirus restrictions.
Demonstrators called for an end to the ‘tyranny’ of pandemic restrictions and voiced their opposition to vaccines and paedophilia, playing Michael Jackson’s greatest hits via a PA system as they marched.
At least 10 people were led away in handcuffs by officers at Trafalgar Square, and Piers Corbyn, brother of former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, also attended the protest who once again joined demonstrators after appearing at court charged with flouting coronavirus rules.
Protesters refused to wear masks and wielded signs demanding an end to restrictions on personal freedom imposed as part of efforts to control COVID-19.
One banner being wielded by a protester on Oxford Street read: “Martial law coming, think it’s still about health?” while another depicted a mask with a cross through it alongside words which read, “love not fear” and “unite not divide”.
The anti-lockdown demonstrators also marched down Northumberland Avenue, while large crowds also gathered outside Buckingham Palace, prompting police to be deployed.
They should have worn BLM T-shirts.
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: A reader has provided an eye-witness account of her encounter with TSG officers in Trafalgar Square yesterday.
At about 4.10 pm the Square was nearly empty of protestors, they having set off on another circuit of the streets about 15 minutes previously. The centre of the Square began to fill with uniformed people (all of them masked, not remotely social distancing) and I overheard a single voice set up a chant against the police – so I moved towards them but by the time I arrived the voice had already stopped.
Everything seemed very calm so I gently patted one of the flat capped men on the arm and said, “Hello.” He turned to me and I said, “I’m just saying a friendly hello.” Incomprehension on his face so I repeated myself. A couple of others were equally mystified by my words. The first drew over one of the others and we set up a conversation, but he spoke in very halting English, very heavily accented. I don’t remember what I said next but he didn’t understand me and in turn attracted the attention of a burly English policeman. He replied: “This isn’t the time for friendly hellos there’s an extremely dangerous global pandemic on and I can arrest you for not social distancing.” I replied: “That’s not true, there’s no dangerous pandemic.” He was thrusting his head towards me and repeating himself and I replied, “Please move further away from me. I don’t want your filthy air from your dirty disgusting mask all over me.” He said no he’s not moving away, and continued to threaten to arrest me for not social distancing and I continued to ask him to move further away until a calm bystander intervened.
I then surveyed the general scene, looking round at the uniformed people and realised that quite a few of the flat capped people were non-British. In Trafalgar Square. Against me. My head started to spin and I must have looked bad because I suddenly had three very concerned voices (proper British bobbies) all asking me if I was okay. I said I was having a panic attack, one of them asked if I’d like to be helped out of the square, so I thanked him and he gave me his arm and led me to safety in the most gentle and helpful way possible.
On the way, I tried to talk to him about the Common Law to no response – so then I said that if the British bobby and the British people find themselves on opposite sides then we are done for. At which point he looked round at me, eye to eye, and agreed.
Interesting about the TSG officers not being able to speak or understand English very well. Is the Met importing riot police from other countries? If anyone knows more about this, contact us here.
Two-Week ‘Circuit Breakers’ Don’t Work
Hugh Pennington, Emeritus Professor of Microbiology at Aberdeen University, says Scotland’s two-week ‘circuit breaker’ lockdown hasn’t worked, as is clear from Nicola Sturgeon’s plan to keep most of the ‘circuit breaker’ restrictions in place for the foreseeable future. The Telegraph has more.
Earlier this month Nicola Sturgeon promised her mini-circuit breaker would be a “short, sharp” shutdown of Scottish pubs and restaurants to bring coronavirus under control.
For only 16 days, the First Minister said, bars and restaurants would be restricted from serving alcohol inside and closed altogether across the country’s central belt, which includes Glasgow and Edinburgh and is home to 3.4 million people.
Little more than two weeks later, Ms Sturgeon announced a change of plan.
To the anger of the hospitality industry, she extended the restrictions for a further week. And on Thursday, she announced the measures would be replaced – rather than relaxed – with a new five-tier lockdown system under which thousands of pubs and restaurants face damaging restrictions for the foreseeable future.
The news was devastating for Scotland’s struggling pubs, already on their knees.
Emma McClarkin of the Scottish Beer & Pub Association, said: “We were told that these measures were to be ‘short’ and ‘sharp’ but now the Scottish Government have gone back on that, leaving operators feeling betrayed.
“Scotland’s pubs and bars have repeatedly been subject to some of the most penalising restrictions in the world, but without the evidence to back it up. The situation cannot continue.”
According to industry calculations, two-thirds of hospitality businesses could be mothballed or go under in the coming months, with more than 50 per cent of jobs lost…
Hugh Pennington, Emeritus Professor of Microbiology at Aberdeen University, said: “There’s the old argument that if we hadn’t done (the mini-circuit breaker), cases would have gone up faster. But that’s a guess, and the figures haven’t come tumbling down.
“They were always going to have difficulty in knowing how effective it was because the figures wouldn’t have come through to really give them an indication as to whether it was having any effect at all.”
Prof Pennington criticised Ms Sturgeon for claiming the restrictions would be in place for only 16 days, given the time-lag in recording positive cases, adding he suspected it had been cast as a short-term measure to avoid a major backlash from businesses.
“It’s got to be statistically significant, it’s the figures coming down that they’re looking for. To expect that would happen within 16 days was unrealistic. At a guess, I’d say her reason for saying that was so she could say ‘I’m going to make things tough, but it’s only for 16 days’, to get people to buy into it.
“If you close the pubs, you’re going to stop pub outbreaks. You’re addressing little bits of the transmission route, but not really getting at the fundamentals, which is making sure people who have the virus, and their contacts, are kept away from everybody else by self-isolating.
“They said it will be a couple of weeks and we’ll turn the corner. But many people have doubts about that, because as soon as you release from it, you go back to square one. There’s too much virus about for the effect to be so big that you really start driving the numbers down.”
Worth reading in full.
Public Confidence in Government at All Time Low
According to Opinium, approval of the Government’s handling of the pandemic has fallen to its lowest level since March. Half (50%) of UK adults now disapprove of the Government, while only 29% approve. The pollster went into more detail in an email:
The public are divided on the clarity of the new tier system. Only 50% think the system is clear and 44% think the measures are unclear. More significantly, a third (34%) of the UK aren’t confident that they know what the rules are in their area…
Half (50%) of those living in Greater Manchester approve of the way Andy Burnham is handling his job as Mayor. His net approval rating of +25% is significantly higher than Boris Johnson’s nationally at -14%.
Looking at how the various leaders have handled the crisis, 32% approve of how Boris Johnson has handled his role, 47% disapprove. Chancellor Rishi Sunak is seen more positively (46% approve, 26% disapprove) while Labour leader Keir Starmer is narrowly net positive with 35% approving and 29% disapproving. The worst marks are reserved for Health Secretary Matt Hancock, with only 26% approving of his performance through the crisis and 48% disapproving.
Hancock with an approval rating of -22%?
Who would have thunk it?
Dr John Lee Wins Lockdown Debate
Ivor Cummins has posted a video on his YouTube channel of Dr John Lee debating Dan O’Brien, an Irish journalist, and Tomas Ryan, a Professor of Neuroscience and advocate of ‘Covid Zero’, on RTE. Needless to say, Lee wins hands down. Cummins has provided some amusing subtitles when the neuroscientist is speaking.
Worth watching in full.
Stop Press: Another hero of lockdown, Dr Clare Craig, was on Julie Hartley-Brewer’s show on TalkRADIO on Friday. Also worth watching.
Postcard From Rhodes
Guy de la Bédoyère, a long-time contributor to Lockdown Sceptics, has sent us a “Postcard From Rhodes“, where he’s managed to get away for a week’s break. Sounds like a lot of fun.
Our hotel, picked at random from the tour company website, turned out to be largely filled with high-risk overweight Brits aged mainly 60 plus. Judging by their accents, I’d say most of them are Tier 2 and Tier 3 refugees who’ve clearly had enough of Covid misery. If they are going to die imminently as the tabloid apocalyptic-headline-competing members of SAGE keep telling us, they’re determined to expire in the sun, stuffed by the all-you-can-eat buffet breakfast and dinner. Loafing by the pool in 28 Celsius heat under a blazing sun, the sweat poured off them in rivulets. Three growing-old-disgracefully ladies in their late sixties went for a spot of topless sunbathing which must make quite a difference from the opportunities currently available in Liverpool or Cardiff.
Worth reading in full.
Round-Up
- “Public opinion is turning against lockdown and Labour’s cynical Covid opportunism” – Dan Hannan’s latest column in the Telegraph
- “Isolation for test and trace could be halved” – The 14-day isolation period for contacts of those infected with COVID-19 could be halved over fears about levels of compliance with the Test and Trace system
- “Seven-day Covid quarantine – and none for jet set” – According to the Sunday Times, if you arrive in the country by private jet and you’re a mover and a shaker in the business world, you won’t have to quarantine at all as part of plans to “promote global Britain”. That’ll go down well on the Labour benches
- “Government scientists have blown apart their own case for lockdown” – Janet Daley argues that the admission that even a vaccine won’t end this doom-loop ought to lead to a change of approach
- “Tory-backed group launches ‘Defund the BBC’ campaign” – A Tory-backed group has launched a campaign to ‘Defund the BBC’ by telling homeowners how to “legally cancel” their licence fee
- “Politicians’ reluctance to quantify Covid’s threat harms all” – Good piece in the FT by Graham Loomes, a Professor of Economics and Behavioural Science at Warwick Business School, suggesting that if you compare the quality-adjusted life years lost as a result of another lockdown with the quality-adjusted life years saved, the game isn’t worth the candle
- “Backlash over Wales’ ban on buying ‘non-essential items’ in supermarkets” – Euronews reports that the Welsh are furious about ‘non-essential’ items being taken off sale in supermarkets, including books, children’s toys and Christmas cards
- “Why so many believe in the Covid Cult” – Karen Harradine analyses the “mass delusional psychosis” that has gripped the nation since March
- “The Nine Errors of Thinking identified in Factfulness” – Dr Hugh Willbourn writes about the light Hans Rosling’s book can throw on the current Covid madness
- “To say there’s no trade-off between health and the economy during lockdown is a convenient delusion” – Good hard-headed piece in the Times by Philip Aldrick
- “How the MEAN psychologists got us to comply with coronavirus restrictions” – A deep dive into the techniques of the Behavioural Insights Team by Gary Sidley in Coronababble
- “The world needs Jordan Peterson more than ever” – Douglas Murray praises the Canadian psychology professor in UnHerd
- “What Mary Whitehouse got right” – Louise Perry praises the original conservative cultural warrior
- “The armed wing of cancel culture” – On the Spiked podcast, the team discusses the beheading of Samuel Paty, the northern lockdown and Critical Race Theory
- “Hippocrates cancelled” – Professor Ramesh Thakur in Spectator Australia on how health bureaucrats and complicit doctors are now guilty of crimes against humanity
- “To Save People From Covid, Puerto Rico Shuts down 911 call centers” – From the “you couldn’t make it up” department
- “Epidemiologists Stray From the Covid Herd” – Interview with Prof Martin Kulldorff and Prof Jay Bhattacharya by Tunku Varadarajan in the Wall St Journal
Theme Tunes Suggested by Readers
Four today: “The Penny Has Dropped” by Wim Oudijk, “Open Your Eyes” by Goldfinger, “I Saw the Light” by Tod Rundgren and “I Aint Gonna Stand For It” by Stevie Wonder.
Love in the Time of Covid
We have created some Lockdown Sceptics Forums, including a dating forum called “Love in a Covid Climate” that has attracted a bit of attention. We have a team of moderators in place to remove spam and deal with the trolls, but sometimes it takes a little while so please bear with us. You have to register to use the Forums, but that should just be a one-time thing. Any problems, email the Lockdown Sceptics webmaster Ian Rons here.
Sharing stories: Some of you have asked how to link to particular stories on Lockdown Sceptics. The answer used to be to first click on “Latest News”, then click on the links that came up beside the headline of each story. But we’ve changed that so the link now comes up beside the headline whether you’ve clicked on “Latest News” or you’re just on the Lockdown Sceptics home page. Please do share the stories with your friends and on social media.
Woke Gobbledegook
We’ve decided to create a permanent slot down here for woke gobbledegook. Today we thought we’d highlight Simon Heffer’s column in today’s Sunday Telegraph, which is about the capture of the National Trust by the woke cult.
It has seemed for some years as though the National Trust has a death wish, as it dumbs down its properties and uses them more and more for publicity-seeking stunts. The fact that it has compiled a dossier of properties linked to “colonialism and slavery” appears to confirm my fear.
Apparently, the Trust’s “experts” – few of whom, on the basis of what this says about their expertise, would deserve even the lowest class of history degree from the worst imaginable university – say that around a third of its properties are associated with the “sometimes-uncomfortable role that Britain, and Britons, have played in global history”.
Yes, the good old National Trust – once the haven of well-preserved stately homes, woodland walks, and tea, jam and scones – is now determined to become part of that noisy elite minority that can’t let a day go by without engaging in an act of self-flagellation, and reminding us what a shocking country, and people, we supposedly are.
The Trust seems not to understand that its role is to conserve our historic houses, artefacts and landscapes: it is not the administrator of some nationwide re-education programme. The “list of shame” about slavery and colonialism is a typical example of the ignorance of those in charge. First, there seems to be some confusion of the two terms. Most British colonies, and almost all of those in Africa, were established after slavery was abolished. Once definitions of iniquity become so loose, it is easy to shovel the reputations of almost any historical figure you like into them.
So visitors to Bateman’s, Rudyard Kipling’s house in Sussex, will need to brace themselves for a description of the wickedness of the man who gave us the phrase “the White Man’s Burden”. One would never have thought that a man who was the most popular writer of his age, revered by millions in this country and around the world – and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature – would have to be placed at a bargepole’s length from the present generation.
But, inevitably, the focus of the outrage has been Chartwell, Winston Churchill’s country house in north Kent. Churchill, whose minor achievement of managing our victory in the Second World War seems to count for nothing today, is condemned because while he was trying to stop Hitler’s programme of genocide and near-apocalyptic destruction, he failed to respond adequately to the Bengal famine.
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: The headmistress of Benenden has apologised for using an “offensive” word in a school assembly. That word was “negro” and she used it when explaining that Black History Month began life in 1926 as Negro History Month. Did she really need to apologise for that?
“Mask Exempt” Lanyards
We’ve created a one-stop shop down here for people who want to buy (or make) a “Mask Exempt” lanyard/card. You can print out and laminate a fairly standard one for free here and it has the advantage of not explicitly claiming you have a disability. But if you have no qualms about that (or you are disabled), you can buy a lanyard from Amazon saying you do have a disability/medical exemption here (takes a while to arrive). The Government has instructions on how to download an official “Mask Exempt” notice to put on your phone here. You can get a “Hidden Disability” tag from ebay here and an “exempt” card with lanyard for just £1.99 from Etsy here. And, finally, if you feel obliged to wear a mask but want to signal your disapproval of having to do so, you can get a “sexy world” mask with the Swedish flag on it here.
Don’t forget to sign the petition on the UK Government’s petitions website calling for an end to mandatory face masks in shops here.
A reader has started a website that contains some useful guidance about how you can claim legal exemption.
And here’s an excellent piece about the ineffectiveness of masks by a Roger W. Koops, who has a doctorate in organic chemistry.
The Great Barrington Declaration
The Great Barrington Declaration, a petition started by Professor Martin Kulldorff, Professor Sunetra Gupta and Professor Jay Bhattacharya calling for a strategy of “Focused Protection” (protect the elderly and the vulnerable and let everyone else get on with life), was launched last week and the lockdown zealots have been doing their best to discredit it. If you Googled it on Tuesday, the top hits were three smear pieces from the Guardian, including: “Herd immunity letter signed by fake experts including ‘Dr Johnny Bananas’.” (Freddie Sayers at UnHerd warned us about this hit job the day before it appeared.) On the bright side, Google UK has stopped shadow banning it, so the actual Declaration now tops the search results – and my Spectator piece about the attempt to suppress it is among the top hits – although discussion of it has been censored by Reddit. The reason the zealots hate it, of course, is that it gives the lie to their claim that “the science” only supports their strategy. These three scientists are every bit as eminent – more eminent – than the pro-lockdown fanatics so expect no let up in the attacks. (Wikipedia has also done a smear job.)
You can find it here. Please sign it. Now over 600,000 signatures.
Stop Press: A piece in the Science and Technology section of the Economist tries to summarise the debate between the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration and the John Snow Memorandum. It’s biased towards the latter, of course, but less so than most pieces in the mainstream media. Worth a read.
Judicial Reviews Against the Government
There are now so many JRs being brought against the Government and its ministers, we thought we’d include them all in one place down here.
First, there’s the Simon Dolan case. You can see all the latest updates and contribute to that cause here.
Then there’s the Robin Tilbrook case. You can read about that and contribute here.
Then there’s John’s Campaign which is focused specifically on care homes. Find out more about that here.
There’s the GoodLawProject’s Judicial Review of the Government’s award of lucrative PPE contracts to various private companies. You can find out more about that here and contribute to the crowdfunder here.
The Night Time Industries Association has instructed lawyers to JR any further restrictions on restaurants, pubs and bars.
And last but not least there’s the Free Speech Union‘s challenge to Ofcom over its ‘coronavirus guidance’. You can read about that and make a donation here.
Samaritans
If you are struggling to cope, please call Samaritans for free on 116 123 (UK and ROI), email jo@samaritans.org or visit the Samaritans website to find details of your nearest branch. Samaritans is available round the clock, every single day of the year, providing a safe place for anyone struggling to cope, whoever they are, however they feel, whatever life has done to them.
Shameless Begging Bit
Thanks as always to those of you who made a donation in the past 24 hours to pay for the upkeep of this site. Doing these daily updates is hard work (although we have help from lots of people, mainly in the form of readers sending us stories and links). If you feel like donating, please click here. And if you want to flag up any stories or links we should include in future updates, email us here. (Don’t assume we’ll pick them up in the comments.)
Special thanks to graphic designer and Lockdown Sceptics reader Claire Whitten for designing our new logo. We think it’s ace. Find her work here.
And Finally…
Got a cracker for you today: Cassetteboy’s latest, a mash-up of Boris’s Covid nonsense set to the tune of “Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick”. Must be a huge amount of work to put these together, but, boy, is it worth it. Cheered me up no end.
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First ?
I’m sickened to be second!
But who is thirsting to be third ?
You mean the Irish third, so known for its bronze colour?
Well let’s get this off to a nice optimistic start. Everything is going the sceptics’ way! Yay!!
Let’s put it this way- can anyone point to anything that is currently happening that undermines the sceptical position? I really can’t think of anything.
If the Danish mask study says they work, we’re in trouble.
If that were the case it would have been published far and wide asap.
https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/5/19-0994_article
The proper science on masks outside of a hospital setting. This CDC policy document applies to influenza, but there is no reason to assume it wouldn’t apply equally to Covid-19. It is based on 14 randomised controlled trials and it clearly says that masks and hand washing/cleansing have no measurable effect in reducing influenza transmission.
but washing your hands now and then is still quite a good thing to do, what my mum said anyway.
Wash your hands as obsessively as you like, but you’ll still get the flu.
Possibly the majority of people only viewing the world through the MSM and having no idea that there actually is an alternate narrative. My whole family is locked in step and any counter argument is just silly conspiracy talk. Brutal trying to reason with this mindset!
Yes, most people believe it all without question.
i’ve been back in the uk/south coast for a month now. i’m exploiting every opportunity i can to speak to people about the situation and i’m being heartened by how many people are questioning the restrictions as well as the whole msnarrative. some have swapped links with me and my postman stops for a pro freedom chat if he has time. so i think it’s a mixed picture.
I’ve not even had anyone say ‘best to be on the safe side’ for some weeks now.
This is exactly what is happening, speaking to people at work they ask me “where are you getting your information ?”. That was when I realised that the censorship really had worked. I have printed an information pack that I will be handing out next week.
great idea, i’ve been thinking about that kind of idea
Are you sharing that information pack anywhere please?
Sorry took so long to reply. My info is a combination of documents, mostly from Centre Of Evidence Based Medicine, and some other writings from here. I have not finished it yet but will try to link it when I have.
Any chance letting us see it here?
That’s great to hear Rich. There are definitely pockets of resistance just waiting to be seeded properly.
Does the silly conspiracy talk include Nobel Laureate expert immunologists and virologists??
Nah they just think anything online must be suspect unless it’s major media stamped as approved
apart from the fact that we’re still waiting to be given permission to get on with our lives as normal, not a prescribed not ‘normal’ rather than enough of us refusing to play that game and getting on with our lives freely
People RISE UP Against Welsh Lockdown
Mahyar Tousi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FQWnb8QENg
Thanks Great video
Nice to see, but although Boris and the crooks in whitehall and westminster definitely need deposing, the Welsh might be better taking the protests directly to wherever that slimy communist Drakeford is lurking. The Welsh local government needs to see that locals do not accept totalitarianism, they actually enjoy it when people who should be going after them go shout at London instead.
Perhaps it would an idea if from here on the first posted a piece of verse, proverb, quotation or the like which might serve as an epigram for the day?
Always the best time
For a really good rhyme.
If you wake feeling surly,
Put a good rhyme on early.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CGtCdRJn-IN/?fbclid=IwAR2hEE6Vnr-4QvZdLMyay3cKLoQjAOahJtpsPGOk6vTcu_AS93DvtehzrIs
The only thing we ahve to fear is fear itself
Keep batting guys
From Toby’s top story:
If this is true and The Times has proof, could we be looking at Negligent Homicide? (IANAL)
Or maybe Criminally Negligent Manslaughter?
Does anyone know if The Times mentions whether Scotland and Wales had the same policy, or did the same thing?
I’m sure you will find it was across the globe. The over 60s are seen as being economically unviable now and a burden to be disposed of by any foul means, of course this excludes the rich and the powerful.
Didn’t the Nazis have the same attitude ? So the LibLabCon and Sage are not much better
I don’t think the nazis had a thing against the old as such, just the physicality and mentally ‘deficient’ who they killed off before the Jews and the rest, eagerly aided and abetted by the medical establishment.
200 million people have died under the various marxist regimes we have seen. Way dwarfing the NAZI’s (who were of the letft not the right)
Interesting how the narrative never talks about the communist atrocities!
Soylent Green!
Or murder.
I think we knew about this anecdotally at the time, the ‘do not resuscitate ‘ scandal was certainly in the MSM.
Good to have at least one name to start with.
I quite agree and I think Whitty should be hanged.
However, denying treatment to the old, in case of shortages, has been NHS policy for many years. They calculate by ‘life-years’. Treating a young person saves more life-years than treating an old person, so if there’s only room fir one, the older person gets the chuck. An example I remember hearing is kidney dialysis. If there weren’t enough machines, the old person would be told ‘unfortunately you are not suitable for this treatment’.
With Covid, it’s ‘unfortunately you are not fit to live, though we’re going to use the threat to you as propaganda to terrify the herd into obedience, hooray, killing two birds with one stone.’
PS.. From the NICE.org glossary: the ‘Quality-adjusted life year’:
A measure of the state of health of a person or group in which the benefits, in terms of length of life, are adjusted to reflect the quality of life. One quality-adjusted life year (QALY) is equal to 1 year of life in perfect health.
QALYs are calculated by estimating the years of life remaining for a patient following a particular treatment or intervention and weighting each year with a quality-of-life score (on a 0 to 1 scale). It is often measured in terms of the person’s ability to carry out the activities of daily life, and freedom from pain and mental disturbance.
How is this bad? They are saying that the lived experience of a person, their quality of existence is to be assessed as well as the time you can give them! As in, will they be able to do anything, hear, speak, move! Not just be alive! This is crucial in compassionate health intervention! What would you have otherwise, I know, loads of old people forced into isolation for months, alone without their loved ones in case they get a virus! That’s what a pursuit of surviving over quality of life looks like, you’d prefer that?
Well said. There’s existence and there’s Life.
Would you rather the younger person was prioritised last? Even if they had a much greater chance of pulling through? The elderly don’t have the same capacity to survive serious illness so having escalated their care they would sadly often die anyway. Age by number is not the thing, biological age and capacity to fight back from a significantly weaker starting point has always been the thing. Of course if you have one bed for two people you should pick the one that you have the best chance of saving! Usually that will be the younger person, not always but usually that’s why we need to shelter the elderly FFS! Look at what happened in Italy, trying to ventilate all those old folk, when it clearly doesn’t work, it’s just cruel and futile.
I’m not saying what Whitty and the NHS have done is right, it’s all been totally disproportionate and has led to many avoidable and lonely deaths.But your point is not true for the NHS before in my experience, quite the opposite.
Thing is though the NHS were denying treatment to the elderly ‘in case’ they got overwhelmed which they never did.
Only one hospital in London got overwhelmed but that was because it was the regional specialist unit.
Right, I did say this in my response.
Isn’t the NHS overwhelmed every winter? Usually it’s the government’s fault and the opposition screams and gibbers accirdingly. This year Covvie makes a most convenient scapegoat, seeing that Labour don’t want to speak out against the concentration camp policy.
And yes, Cruella, you do have to ration care, because the NHS is an organisation with finite resources chasing an infinite need. We could pour our entire GDP into it and it still wouldn’t be enough. But most people won’t believe this. So maybe a bit of honesty about QALYs would be opportune. (I almost wrote ‘would be healthy’!)
No Annie, on the whole the NHS does not decide to escalate care in the elderly because of bed availability but based on the individuals survivability and yes, the young will often take priority. It’s a clinical, physiological judgement. In fact the NHS is overwhelmed every winter because it strives to keep increasing numbers of very old people alive and doesn’t ration care, as you put it but can and does keep the elderly alive well beyond any quality of existence. The NHS is not a single cell organism, you’re talking about individual doctors etc making clinical judgements about the person in front of them. I thought the whole problem with this horrible year has been that the government and remote politicians have intervened in this relationship, passed blanket legislation and many people have died consequently.
reason is that the NHS operates in the dark ages using drug based medicine. It is the wrong paradigm and cannot cure chronic disease. That is the problem
My concern is ‘ the exclusion of the elderly’. Many are assuming severe illnesses, but this exclusion may have also included many who had an illness that could be resolved by, say, a course of IV antibiotics, which would only be achieved through hospital admission. For example, a urinary tract infection, particularly if catheterised, can result in high temeratures and a very unwell person, but equally resolved by the treatment mentioned. Denying such treatment would likely result in a deterioration, most likely not reversed. Try not to assume thise denied hospital care were ill with terminal medical conditions. To deny people routine treatment, antibiotics, IV fluids, wound care, diabetes control, hypertension control etc., resulting in their demise or serious compromises of their health is gross negligence, manslaughter or worse if consequences in intended denied treatment are known.
This is a very difficult and emotive area on which to enter into public debate, it’s so easy to misinterpret what is said and what is meant. But for those who have experienced the care of the very elderly and frail, I will relate where I believe I was wrong, and why. I have had years to reflect on it. My over 90 mother was in a care home, deteriorating in the months following the death of my even older father (who died in the course of an operation to replace his broken hip – at the age of 95 – which rather weakens the argument that the NHS is reluctant to treat the elderly). She became almost bed bound, didn’t really want to eat, or speak much. The GP who visited regularly said she was becoming dehydrated. I told him noone should let a dog die like that, and he gently said that in that case he would arrange her transfer to hospital for IV fluids. She spent 3 weeks there in a noisy, unfamiliar environment, getting rehydrated but becoming ever more distressed, eventually being discharged back to her care home on Christmas Eve. She died 6 weeks later.… Read more »
Sylvie , thank you for that very moving comment. As a primary care physician who deals with the problems you describe on a daily basis I know very well the scenario you have detailed. The daughter/son sees their frail dearest as they were 40 years ago and just wishes them to be how they were then. Accepting that life is finite and sometimes the best thing is not to transfer the very sick elderly patient to the local hospital is difficult for all involved but hopefully with time such decisions can be seen to be the best and kindest option in some cases.
I took my mother privately for IV fluids. She is also very frail but not in a care home. My father was in a home and I used to take him out to visit private GP’s as I found he got much better treatment than from the care home GP
Its best to learn to look after your own health and not rely on the NHS
The point is that the claim of the Establishment is that we, the sceptics, are the granny killers whereas they are locking everyone down to ‘save granny’.
In reality, this is just a PR cover up for the actions of the Establishment which will ultimately result in greater deaths across the entire population base, including ‘granny’. Unfortunately, the majority of the population will fall for for this spin.
maybe the granny’s should have a vote as to whether they want to be locked away from their loved ones whilst the futures of their grandchildren are completely destroyed?
A lot of the elderly deneid treatement were people who had simple problems that hospitals could easily and reliably fix, if this was just those with serious covid (serious cases almost never survive however long you try to keep them alive for) deneid treatment that would make sense, but what our NoHelpService has been doing is denying reliable and easy treatments to the elderly to make room for covid cases who would be resource hungry (futile as it is ventilation takes a lot of equipent and nurse time), unsaveable, and never even materialised.
ventilation was the wrong treatment which is why so many died. We know hydroxychloroquine and zinc work as well as vit D. Intensive care beds are not needed for long with the correct treatment if at all. Oxygen is whats needed and anticoagulents as well. Its incredibly unlikely that any young people would have needed an ICU bed for covid. Its the sick and elderly who might need them so there is no choice to be made.
With such a large number of deaths is it not a Crime Against Humanity?
and it’s another aspect of the utter madness. so the overt priority is the world shuts down to shield the elderly but the reality is that they are treated in a totally inhuman way they are kicked out of hospital, refused hospital or even gp care locked in the nursing homes or their own homes and allowed no visitors even if they are ill or dying
A horrific diagram was posted on a French forum showing the huge spike in prescriptions of Rivotril, also known as Clonazepam, during March and April. This is the drug that is administered to people to “put them to sleep.” Someone has found the official figures on the Ameli site, the equivalent of the National Health. The spike more or less exactly matches the spike in deaths during that period. Here is evidence indeed that old people were being deliberately killed. https://cv19.fr/2020/10/24/leuthanasie-au-rivotril-en-chiffres/
and it’s just interesting to be aware of the depopulation agenda of the wef/new world order etc
Deliberate killing of over seventies should have been investigated years ago. There was the Gosport Memorial Hospital, Stafford General and many other cases.
Definitely worth sending this to the Sunday Times team.
Yes @Jane in France. Was just reading up on this. Interesting article in FranceSoir too that is linked within your link showing this spike in clonazepam dispensed after a Public Heath decree described action to be taken, coinciding precisely with peak covid deaths. http://www.francesoir.fr/opinions-tribunes/chronique-covid-ndeg33-combien-de-morts-sur-ordonnances-dans-les-ehpads-ou Here, given our Whitty’s triage protocol which basically excluded the elderly from hospital care alongside the emptying of the hospitals to care homes and batch DNR orders we might expect to see a similar spike if we looked at the prescribing data perhaps? Worth a rummage I reckon. If admissions are higher now it may in part be because the brakes have been taken off elderly admissions? Hmm, maybe. So…scenario forming in my head…the immensely high spike in UK, Spain, France, largely caused by throwing the elderly under the bus is followed by a case made that stopping free association across the whole of society will prevent a repeat of an event that was not caused by free association but by strict age gating access to the NHS as policy. Now why would they push a less than honest narrative now when the cause of high mortality wasn’t so much viral illness per se but a… Read more »
Rivotril is an anti epilepsy drug which is also prescribed for severe anxiety and xanax weaning. It is very addictive.i presume the prescriptions were for people who were scared sh.tless thanks to the extreme lockdowns of the time, disgusting msm news of non stop, hourly death counts (never ever saw something like that in my life ever) and complicit goverments. The horror show deliberately painted on the msm was so insanely scary that even as a sceptic and a msm disbeliever from the start , i had my few rough anxiety ridden days…somebody has to pay for what is been done to people
Which also goes to prove that the stories people were sharing online was closer to the right-hand anything the government and its advisors were telling us, or what the mainstream media waterproofing. It’s all a bit stable door now. Most of us knew fairly early on that things weren’t right. It’s only taken the Times six months to catch up.
It’s all in the Amnesty report that is being ignored by the MSM and politicians and the main political parties:
https://www.amnesty.org.uk/care-homes-report
You can download the report and read at your leisure.
Stinks like genocide and crimes against humanity.
I have sent links to tear report to various MPs, the Labour and conservative central offices but no response from anyone.
Quelle surprise.
It already has been, look up Liverpool Care Pathway (which they did to my mother). Not sure what else they could have done really, she was 95 and very frail, fell and smashed her pelvis.
Nevertheless I know people who could have been saved and weren’t and others who had heroic procedures which still left them semi-vegetables. I don’t know what the pattern is, I suspect it varies with factors like number of patients vs number of hospital beds
this is very odd since largely the only people needing intensive care for covid are over 80! As the NHS is not treating anything else and will not treat the most ill with covid then what is it doing?? Is it now completely empty? Is it going to be completely shut down? What is the plan??
I know this has been recommended before, but the Delingpole Yeadon podcast is essential sceptic listening. And it is such a pleasure to hear an intelligent person allowed to speak at length.
https://delingpole.podbean.com/
Listened to it in full a couple of days ago. Succinctly confirms most of what’s been said here @ LS.
Final word from Mike Yeadon
‘The Pandemic isn’t over because SAGE say it isn’t.’
Yes, I have just written to my MP plus some others on the basis of this podcast.
Here is the body of my letter should you wish to use it: May I urge you to listen to this Podcast interview by James Delingpole with Dr Michael Yeadon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbMJoJ6i39k Dr Yeadon is the former Chief Scientific Officer and and Vice President, Allergy and Respiratory Research Head, with Pfizer Global R&D and co-Founder of Ziarco Pharma Ltd. In this interview, as you will hear, Dr Yeadon makes a number of things clear. The evidence shows that the Covid ‘Pandemic’ has followed the normal Gompertz curve and is currently in rapid decline. The current wave of ‘cases’ is mainly due to the faulty PCR test which has an unacceptably high false positive rate probably greater than 80%. (Incidentally it is remarkable that the government has not published any data on this false positive rate). These positive tests are not being followed by large number of hospitalisations. In fact the bed occupancy level in most hospitals is below the average for this time of year. There is no reason to expect a second wave of infections since epidemics do not follow this pattern. Dr Yeadon makes it clear that these facts must be known to Sr Patrick Vallance and he therefore concludes that… Read more »
thanks for this, i’m arranging to have a virtual meeting with my mp
Listened to it the others day. Dr Yeadon explains his points in a clear, concise way.
Should be required listening to the Powers That Be who still continue on their destructive path.
As I mentioned the other day, it is completely inconceivable that Patrick Vallance is not aware of the existence of T cell immunity. He was head of R&D while Shingrix, GSK’s biggest pipeline product – a vaccine for shingles that RELIES ON T CELL IMMUNITY FOR ITS EFFECT – was developed and approved.
He was responsible for pharma rather than vaccines, but there is absolutely no way that he didn’t know how it worked. WHY is he lying? We all know he is.
The weird thing is he started off being lucid & sensible, back in March talking about herd immunity, but something has changed over the spring/summer. Either he has gone senile or he has been got at.
And don’t tell me it’s his piffling £600k in GSK shares. To him that is nothing. Certainly not worth selling his reputation for.
Thanks, Sophie.
Sent this information to my Guildford MP, along with the Mike Yeadon video.
The whole of sage have turned from being reasonable to the most fervent lockdown fanatics.
Why has this happened?
To enhance and prolong their own self importance.
Ivor Cummins also on a recent Triggernometry
I would also highly recommend that episode.
It was a brilliant podcast but I don’t think those I forwarded it to will have listened to the whole 2 hours.
As both myself & karenovirus below have pointed out – the best line comes at the bitter end. Within that one phrase lies our only hope of salvation. It won’t be by marching, spreading the word, or any other actions we are bravely making that change will come. The population have been made too compliant. Sage is the key and must be made to change its tack. We must make that happen.
Posted yesterday, just as we got a new page up. Needs posted here, too.
How soon they forget.
Jonathan Van-Tam (Liar!):
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-52153145
Those were the days.
The final days of the Enlightenment.
Well as we know The Science wasn’t quite up to snuff back then but now they’re got It sewn up tight and certainty reigns as far as masks go.
I’m in utter disbelief now every time I head out into public. The wearing while alone outside or while driving folks are not just once in a while occurences anymore. People really fear the Rona is just waiting to attack them in open air.
And in the rain as well. I went out for a walk yesterday and saw a guy wearing one. The virus must have been crawling inside his mask for protection from the rain.
I actually saw a guy at a pedestrian crossing in the pouring rain, pick up a leaf off the floor and press the crossing button with it and then threw it on the floor. My wife and I were in stiches of laughter at the lunacy of it, imagining the numerous other bacteria of dog pi$$ and god knows what it probably had on it. They have done a real job on the masses, common sense and logic are no longer in action.
Unfortunately, it’s those brainwashed masses who are now keeping us in this mess.
Confession, in the early days when much of the talk was about the virus being on surfaces, I wore gloves for such things as pressing crossing buttons. I can’t remember when I stopped wearing them, maybe late April.
I did think about the risks of pressing the button in the very early days, and would wash my hands at first opportunity (with soap and water – none of this alcohol gel rubbish). However as the data quickly confirmed the risks to be infinitesimal I stopped even thinking about it. The funny thing was that when approaching a crossing I would often notice people stepping into my slipstream, hoping to capitalise on me pressing the button for them.
We never wore gloves but we did use our homemade hand-sanitiser after getting off the bus etc (oh happy days before the mandatory muzzles!) for a few weeks until we realised we were being irrational. 😉
BTW, Edward, I noticed in passing – looking for an image on a previous thread – that you’d posted directly to us a couple of days ago about your visit to New Mills and Whaley Bridge. Apologies for missing it at the time. We visit Whaley Bridge fairly regularly and I think you may have been unlucky. We do see some muzzles on the street but really not many and it’s very rare to see them on the canal path.
If you come up this way again, consider letting us know and we could meet up for a coffee somewhere. MW and AG
I bet that though you wore gloves you never approved of lockdown though. There is a big difference between thinking that a minor inconvenience of gloves is “worth it” to stop an, at the time thought, rather significant but not particularly dangerous, and thinking that destroying society is worth it to stop such a virus, or thinking as the lockdownists now insist, that shutting down society is worth it to stop a virus which for most “sufferers” is not flu-like but milder than a common cold.
I sometimes believe some people actually love wearing them, I cannot explain otherwise why you see people with them on where even the diktats do not require them. I went to a cash machine the other day, located at a supermarket. Got back to my car and just watched people leaving the supermarket, some were whipping them off as soon as exiting, others kept them on, even while emptying their groceries into the car, and some drove off with them still stuck to their faces. A group were chatting outside, all masked up, mostly with those cheap, black stretchy things … think I will stick to online ordering.
I agree, why would you wear one even when there is no need to, yet so many do. They must really love them.
Conformity – see Asch experiment – and virtue signalling.
Read an article in my local rag (owned by REACH plc who has the monopoly over most of the local newspapers around the country, so no surprise there) that a man had been removed from a big shopping centre for refusing to wear a mask as he had an exemption, and was subsequently thrown out of the centre by police and security. The exact full story was, as usual not given but it was the comments that were truly sickening, purportedly from the general public and overwhelmingly baying for this man’s blood for putting THEIR lives in danger! They wanted all exemptions removed and for people to be banned from leaving the house if they don’t wear a mask! Normally these articles barely attract any comments but this one seemed to attract every single coronaphobe in the county. The thumbs ups were in hundreds, anyone who dared to oppose this was verbally slaughtered by the righteous and holier-than-thou mask devotees. As I’m reading though I’m getting a whiff of something mechanical about the comments and how similarly dreary they all sound, all them parroting from each other. 77th Brigade, anyone, or troll bots? As I say it’s Reach-owned and I… Read more »
It’s not a term that I seen used in the comments on this website but it’s called “astroturfing”: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/astroturfing
It’s a technique that I have seen used time and time again by the anti-smoking lobby. As you note there is a certain “mechanisation” about the comments, almost as if they are picking them off a list.
I think you’re both right. These kind of articles and the comments are almost certainly fabricated. They seem to abound in these syndicated gutter-press not-at-all-local rags. Even if there’s some truth behind the incident, there is obviously more to it and, as you say, it is a good example of astroturfing. 77th Brigade or similar will be responsible for the fake comments. MW
I reckon that the SS are flooding sites with cut and paste flames because the narrative is beginning to suffer’
Today’s first item isn’t a point in the sceptics’ favour AFAICT. The implication is that the NHS could very well have been overwhelmed if it hadn’t adopted this grizzly triage system.
The logic’s a bit tighter this time. People weren’t sent to hospital. If they had been, the hospitals would have been fuller. I don’t see how you can argue with that.
That’s the logic of the madhouse.
We won’t treat you because we may be become overwhelmed and not be able to treat you.
This is not new.
A few years ago my daughter needed treatment but because they couldn’t give her an appointment in 4 weeks which was the rule at the time they wouldn’t offer an appointment.
It’s a bit like buying new clothes or other items and not using them to avoid them wearing out – I have known people with that attitude.
But at the same time all the new temporary hospitals that were built to cope with potential overcrowding were barely or never used. The one at SECC in Glasgow was never used and is in process of being dismantled now which makes no sense if things are allegedly getting out of control up here again.
Our local Covvie stash occupies part of a holiday camp (Bluestone). Its identity is concealed by naming it only in Welsh at the gates.
It has never been used. We are told that holidaymakers were all really enthusiastic about it all through the summer.
I wonder if they’d have been so keen if it had been full of Covvies.
It’s worth reading the Amnesty International report to place this into context. The reason why so many people in old people’s homes got ill is because of the lockdown and taking infected patients out of hospital and seeding the homes. It’s likely there would have been tens of thousands fewer deaths if we’d done nothing.
And every country did the same. It was orchestrated to kill off as many elderly people as possible, I am convinced it was the Agenda, and not content with doing it once they want to do it again!
If you were creating a virus in a lab to reduce population and improve overall health then one which killed only elderly, obese and people with serious illnesses already and was relatively harmless to almost everyone else you would think you’d done a good job.
Yes!
And the corollary is why are there so many obese/diabetic/seriously ill people now compared to in the recent past?
And why the increase only since high carb low fat diets were invented and the only fat you were allowed was industrially produced omega 6 seed oils?
We are told to eat the most profitable diet and then we need the most profitable drugs as antidotes. Then we die prematurely of covid so we don’t collect our pensions. What could possibly go right?
Surely you jest, our NHS is envied the world over.
Envied by managers of other health services who are irritated by having to put larger proportions of their money in to frontline staff rather than growing their backroom bureaucracies.
The NHS ran at no more than 40% capacity during the “pandemic” and that unused 60% cost the lives of many thousands. The “triage” amounted to “clear off if you’re not here to die of Covid.” So you can stuff your triage where it belongs.
Do you have a source for that statistic?
And please calm down, it’s not *my* triage.
Read the Nurses’s story here on LS and then do your own research, as it seems you have plenty more to do. About triage, why are you pushing the government’s ludicrous fairy tale, that we’ve all heard a thousand times before? In case you haven’t noticed this site is called Lockdown Sceptics.
You specifically said the NHS was at most at 40% capacity. Let me repeat: do you have a source for that statistic? Or did you pull it out of your ar$e?
I’ve read every post on this site since mid-July. So yes, I’ve read that nurse’s testimony. And I believe it. But that’s one nurse in one hospital. I have a cousin who tells a very different story of the hospital where she worked, and you must realise there are plenty of stories like that too. You can’t reasonably dismiss then all as propaganda.
The restrictions on ordinary life we’re living through are horrifying and unjustified. But we don’t do ourselves any favours by endorsing every self-contradictory set of “sceptical” arguments we can think of.
I can attest to this , the beds on my ward were half empty for months… they created an extra theatre list to play catch up about two months ago, it has now been cancelled because they know we’re gonna get hit by Covid again’
We weren’t hit the first fucking time.
They have deliberately restricted treatment and kept beds empty ..
Let’s call it what it is:
institutionalised medical neglect.
I said it out loud to the Nurses last night and watched the expressions on their faces as it started to sink in.
Now hopefully they can experience feeling as demoralised and disgusted as I do.
If anyone knows of a network of NHS workers organising against this please help me get in touch with them .
There is evidence that they would not have been overwhelmed if early-stage treatments such as HCQ had not been denied.
They were never overwhelmed, there was always capacity, even if the treatments were generally poor.
Since its Sunday
I think this may have had an appearance some mo ths ago.
Search YouTube ‘ dead zone 2003 ‘
Click 2nd vid called ‘preview ‘ but it’s either a very amateur preview or a mash up
Key words
Virus
From China
Like SARS
Coronovirus
Wear a mask
(Exponential chart in background)
Lockdown
Chloraquinine
Qtip test
Spooky or spoof ?
In plain sight
Someone knew their stuff. But it was just a film ……………
Wow!
From the video the line “Chloroquine suppresses the enzymes”
The link below (which relates to Sars, from research carried out in 2005) indicates that Chloroquine has direct action on ACE-2, which is considered as the receptor used by Sars-CoV (and Sars-Cov2) into cells, and so inhibits the ability of the virus to enter the cells. ACE-2 is actually an *enzyme* that happens to sit on the membrane of these cells.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16115318/
“the drug appears to interfere with terminal glycosylation of the cellular receptor, angiotensin-converting enzyme 2. This may negatively influence the virus-receptor binding and abrogate the infection”
Fine, so they will go back to buying grandads birthday card at the corner store.
Re NHS staff being ‘offered’ the vaccine first.
A large proportion of NHS staff routinely refuse the normal winter flu jab despite coming under enormous pressure from management to do so.
They will know better than most that no novel vaccine can be regarded as safe until it has been field tested for years.
Will be interesting to see their uptake of it.
Who will do their work if the vaccine is a killer?
It strikes me as completely insane to vaccinate all key workers first with this rushed crap.
Whilst it’s merely unethical to use the vulnerable as Guinea pigs.
Or, they will all get placebos anyway, like the politicians will for sure.
The virus can be eradicated and the placebo vaccine be deemed an efficient and safe success, simply by standardizing the PCR tests to a suitable Primer and low ct number.
Another indication for that is the vaccine patriotism: in a real pandemic, no one would care where the antidote came from, and efforts would be bundled.
That’s why the propaganda doesn’t say ‘Get vaccinated and it will save your life.’ It says ‘Get vaccinated and maybe we’ll let you out
of the concentration camp.’
‘then you’ll get ill and die later’ is what they’re NOT saying!
They’re not genuinely interested in looking after our health, so if there are fewer healthcare workers that’s fine by them.
I heard a few medical people say this over the years, the doctors are not trained to look for cause of illness or actually cure it, they are just trained to treat it.
So that Pharma can make lots of money.
They’re not all bad. I knew a consultant back in the eighties who noted that many “genetic” diseases were becoming more common so there must be an environmental factor expressing the genes. He had also pretty much worked out “metabolic syndrome”, but this was back in the eighties so naturally he believed (saturated) fat was to blame. Oh well.
After the head of our local practice retired she recommended a particular doctor. He turned out to be a divot but had obviously memorised all NICE guidance and PCT rules and didn’t think anything else was required.
Interesting how many competent doctors (Michael Eades, Richard Bernstein) trained as engineers. Then there are engineers like Ivor Cummins who know more than many trained doctors . . .
There is no need for a vaccine according to what Mike Yeadon said in the Delingpole podcast. This is because the recovery rate is 99.9% also a vaccine will only treat symptoms, it will not stop infection or of course possible death.
I agree that a placebo may be what they actually plan to exit the madness
Lucky them eh? I’d imagine you’ll be unemployed by refusing this early batch. Water, sugar and food colouring surely are the only ingredients. They can’t possibly have IT already…good lord
I know one high-up NHS staff member who refuses to take it out of safety concerns.
It will be interesting to see whether they try and engineer this so that it is effectively compulsory for them to get a jab in order to do their job?
I don’t think they would dare. They are short of staff as it is.
A friend now retired was a high end nurse and went on to be manager of a care home (a good one). She had to have compulsory vaccinations to keep her jobs and noted some of them caused side effects. Interestingly some of the ones she had previously without problem caused side effects when later repeated, I think hep B and one of the flu vaccines
If they do, they’ll have to use a saline solution.
Great way to convince the public that the “real thing” is safe!
In which case they might as well have done that in April: roll up your sleeves folks, here’s some vaccine (pure dihydrogen monoxide with special NaCl additives). Then they could have ensured every PCR tests done anywhere afetr that point gave a negative result, they could have convinced people the virus had been wiped out, it is mild enough, and gives complications only in those near death anyway, that no-one looking at the hospital use and excess death stats since May would see any indication of an ongoing pandemic.
It is a BS piece of propaganda; all part of the process to soften up the populace for a vaccine.
Can they sue if something bad happens to them after taking the vaccine?
There is no recourse without power.
I expect there is clause in their contract saying no.
Workers with adults with learning difficulties have to sign waivers in case of being injured by clients challenging behaviour
No but you can claim through this:
https://www.gov.uk/vaccine-damage-payment
Thousands of our vulnerable elderly shuffled out of their armchairs every Thursday evening to clap for an NHS that was secretly plotting to let them die a painful, undignified death at home, simply because a few callous & inhumane panjandrums decided that they weren’t worth saving.
“Don’t kill Granny – that’s our job”
Well when you’re at war and the wounded are overflowing your capacity to treat them all, you treat only those worth saving and leave the mortally wounded to die.
In this war, covid casualties are the only priority and the politics of saving just one life do not extend to all those other pesky ways that people suffer and die.
this could be a great poster
Highly recommend this video with Randy Hillier a Canadian MPP. In the first 20 minutes he goes into the specifics of what happened in the long term care centers in Canada.
He gets into the details of the administrative aspects of how direct decisions were made that brought about the slaughter of thousands in nursing homes. Those mass deaths of the elderly were not simply brought on by medical malpractice, though there was plenty of that, there decidedly was not some aberrant viral event, these deaths were caused by the result of calculated policy directives that were made.
These very same policy directives, or some variant of, were pushed forth and followed in numerous locales across the globe resulting in the piling up of bodies throughout care centers.
These decisions need to be investigated everywhere they occurred and the course of those directives needs to be exposed.
Sorry folks but this was not just sheer “stupidity” or “accidental.” These were crimes.
https://odysee.com/@lestu-dio:d/covid-19-criminal-mismanagement-randy:2
Tory MP makes disgraceful comment about pubs and cafes offers to provide children with free lunches during holidays after the government decided not to.
North Devon MP Selaine Saxby posted on Facebook
‘I am delighted local businesses bounced back so much after lockdown that they are able to give food away for free and hope that they will not be asking for any more government support.’
The Apology is in todays Local Live online
(Mirror group news).
The post has been deleted but “regrets” expressed by the MP has sparked even more anger after she claimed her comment had been ‘taken out of context’.
(Oh really Selaine, so what was the real context ?)
The rest of her apology was anything but, just moans about the recent level of abuse levelled at her ‘and my staff’ (no Selaine, it’s aimed at you, your staff just open the envelopes).
This is not intended to reopen the debate about free school meals but to illustrate once more how our governing class is so out of touch.
The London demo in Toby’s text.
Late yesterday LS contributor Basics posted a link to Mahyar Tousys YouTube report on this ( he posted 2, both well worth watching).
The Mail report linked by Toby has no comments, why might that be ?
There is a short vid on sky news YouTube
‘Coronovirus Hundreds attend anti lockdown protest in London’
From the comments
1. There were thousands
2. Sky news ‘there are hundreds of fish in the sea’
And dozens more like that.
Louise from SORUK posted a video describing how the demo was over and most people had started to drift off homewards. She said there were a few groups still hanging about the Square chatting. Lots of ordinary police there but as far as I’m aware, the SPG arrived when it was all pretty much over.
I wasn’t there, so am just going on alternative video footage but here’s a still from Louise’s closing video.
If I can find the video again, I’ll post it.
I seem to recall how proud I was of Wales just a few months ago. No mask mandate and great reports here of the English folks popping over for a break from coronaphobia.
And now this…
Sign should read YOUR GOVERNMENT HAS GONE INSANE – WE OF SPINELESS RETAIL CORP. ARE JUST GOING ALONG WITH IT ALL. GOOD DAY. 🙂
Boycott the supermarkets as much as possible for rolling over on this instead of leading the resistance as they should have done.
Big retail can always be counted on to play by the rules, especially when a few govt lawyers could take them down for non compliance.
Big retail is in a perfect position to break rules and be untouchable, what government is going to dare to take down the thing which keeps people fed, bread and circuses remember. if the bread supply decides not to obey diktats, refuses court demands, defies fines… what precisely dare a government do to them? Guess it has to fall to heroic members of the public like Gwilym Owen to do something about this crap, you should look in to how to help him.
The supermarkets should realise and fast that “We was only following orders” don’t wash anymore since 1946.
As I’ve said before I don’t understand why they’ve never fought this from the word go and many of their staff even resorted to bullying and harassing customers under the guise of yep, “we was only following orders.”
Boycott is the only language they understand. When people vote with their feet and wallets, they will do a U turn.
Before the Covid bollox, I was proud of Wales, enthusiastic about all things Welsh, proud to live here and proud to say I could speak the language after some zealous study. And proud of my half-Welsh blood.
Now the whole lot makes me feel sick. Hearing the NHS-worshipping goons caterwauling the national anthem was utterly revolting, and since then the meanness, the cretinous conformity, the cowardice, the stupidity, the nasty anglophobia and general moronic subhumanity that surround me have finished the job. I’m ashamed of being half Welsh.
And I’m not too proud of my English half either.
It’s not the country or the people (although I’m starting to worry about many people’s mindsets right now) but the government’s desire to completely destroy us a nation.
Boy am I proud of my Swedish roots
I happen to know a thing or two about masks and safety. Why? Because for 25 years I was the editor of an award-winning trade magazine called HazMat Management that covered such topics as pollution prevention and compliance with health & safety laws. We routinely published articles on masks, gloves, respirators and other forms of personal protective equipment (PPE). Now let me tell you a few things about that mask you’re wearing.
https://markcrispinmiller.com/2020/10/that-mask-is-giving-you-lung-cancer/
I’m not wearing it.
I’m going to print out some copies of that article to give to friends who are brung forced to poison themselves in order to keep their jobs. They can pass it on to the swine who do the forcing.
Screenshot for the same purpose.
Might that account for some people who have never smoked dying of lung cancer ?
<snigger> In 10 or 20 years time the health outcomes of the mask wearers might be indistinguishable from me as a smoker. Yeah, fuck ’em.
As a side note smoking has never definitively been proven to cause lung cancer it remains a statistical probability of increased risk.
This should be sent to every teacher in the land.
Concluding section:
… let me just state this doesn’t end for me when the lockdown ends or the masking ends. No, this ends for me when every politician and bureaucrat who inflicted this travesty, this crime against humanity, on the population of Canada (and other affected countries) is in the dock, and faces their misdeeds in a court of law.
And as for those of you who have put masks on young children, I will have a long memory on that score. A very long memory.
I’ll second those thoughts. And if necessary help crowd-fund the prosecutions.
Me too.
Yes, I am prepared to dedicate the remainder of my life (I am over 70) to helping to bring these miscreants to justice.
AFAIA operation rooms are not supplied with extra oxygen per se but they maintain positive air pressure to keep out nasties from the rest of the hospital. In other words ‘bad air’ from the rest of the hospital; is pushed out by the positive air in the operating room. A bit like some people will do with a desktop computer to keep out dust. Negative pressure in a computer (more fans sucking out than in) = better airflow, better cooling, but dust gets into the computer over time meaning poorer cooling. Positive air pressure (more fans sucking in than out) and cooling is slightly compromised but less dust is brought into the case (as long as you have filters on the front fans) meaning better cooling over time.
I am happy to be told I am wrong.
Wouldnt you need to supply the room with extra oxygen to maintain positive air pressure?
As in Pump more air in than leaks out, like PC cases
Air is pumped in, not oxygen.
Thanks for this. Have saved it and am tempted to leave copies in my work staff room.
No problem.
I checked his bio, he is genuine.
Guy Crittenden is an award-winning journalist and author with special experience in industrial ecology and the evolving circular economy.
The founding editor of environmental business magazines HazMat Management and Solid Waste & Recycling decades ago is returning to help organizations with their communication, PR and strategic planning needs
…. the emerging science of virology now understands that viruses aren’t even passed person to person. I know that sounds incredible, but it’s the case that the virus is in the air, you breath it in, there’s no way to prevent that short of living in an oxygen tent, and if you have a strong immune system you’ll be fine, and if you have a weak immune system you may have to deal with the effects of your immune system working to restore balance within your metabolism.
Yes how to have a robust immune system is the key factor missing in all of the mainstream bollocks. And probably the most important thing you can do
If they ahem a greys tinge as well ti sounds like the problem is due to increasing CO2 in their breaths.
From the roundup ‘how the MEAN psychologists got us to comply’.
Coming to LS from personal blogs that tend to be right of centre, climate sceptic and pro Brexit I presumed that most here would be similar but was quickly proven to be wrong.
Not only are our politics diverse so are our backgrounds and circumstances.
What is it about being lockdown sceptics that makes us so ?
My personal dislike is being ‘nudged for my own good’ or lied to in truth.
Whenever I see an ordinary member of the public with a regional accent talking at me straight to camera I know I’m being bolloxed.
Same goes whenever I see a government slogan in three parts which always reminds me of
Ein Volk Ein Reich Ein Furhrer.
The particular lie that woke me up to The Great Deception was seeing ambulances tearing around empty lockdown streets with sirens blaring for the sole purpose of ramping up the atmosphere of fear.
I first assumed that they were taking covids to hospital but from Toby’s lead item seems they were taking non Covid bodies to the morgue.
I’ve often wondered why we are immune.
It’s as if covimbecility were a mental virus to which we are, for some reason, resistant.
There are various theories on assessing personality types, all praised by some and derided by others but overall they all tend to indicate that there is only a minority of people whose natural reaction is to challenge the status quo, people who never progressed beyond the toddler stage of asking ‘why’ about everything. People who see no reason why we cannot overturn things and do it all differently, people who are inclined to come up with innovative solutions.
Society needs these people but not too many of them, if everyone was like that society would never work. When we had a go at this sort of personality assessment at work I always came out on the challenging freethinking innovating end of the spectrum. They agreed they needed people like me but not too many of them they could not cope! I suspect this site has a high proportion of people who fall into this category of personality types.
It,s a good thing there aren’t too many of us, then!
A former employer tried one of those personality tests to aid in recruiting the sales force.
It didn’t seem very conclusive so after 12 months they tested the personalities of the 5 top long term sales people.
Each of them were completely different.
Test abandoned
I think personality tests are all made up guff to give the HR types a justification for their hiring and so they can run training courses that further justify their existence.
The curious v. the incurious.
I very rarely watch TV and if I do it is a drama like “Father Brown” on catch up. If I watched the news I’d be throwing my laptop through the window. My former cleaner was reduced to quivering wreck by the news.
Personally it’s Aspergers.
The part of my brain that deals with social behaviour is broken and I have no conception of the importance of social conformity or social status, let alone ties, hats or football. Also my motor control is affected.
The upside is that I have an obsession with patterns and detail and can easily spot when something is wrong,
Critical thinkers as opposed to sponges. Always starting at the sceptical stage I find is a good way to be, you convince me rather than the other way around.
For me it was 911. I was a researcher at Imperial College in the Mech Eng Dept at the time. Not one of us could understand why the THREE steel framed skycrapers all came down into their own footprint at freefall or near freefall speeds. No idea who was flying the planes. But demolition was used to make the wound appear greater.
Similar for me. I was bullied and ostracised in school because I was good at academic subjects, but hopeless at games. The converse would have made me a class idol.p. I suppose I just got used to being in a minority of one and having to do my own thinking,
Similar for me. The more I got laughed at at school for daring to not follow the herd the lower my opinion of those laughing at me became and more determined I was to never give in. I have carried on with that attitude ever since. There are a large number of people I work with who regularly insult me for refusing to go out binge drinking with them, some of whom are in 40s or 50s. If any of them ever end up in hospital for alcohol related reasons they will get both barrels of ‘I told you so’ speech from me. At the end of the day it’s everyone’s own decision how to lead their life but they want to deny me that right.
It would be the same if someone had a go at me for not wearing a mask, refused to have a proper discussion about it and then they ended up unwell due to mask wearing.
This is a bit off topic but the irony is that I actually work for a spirits company. As part of our staff ‘code of conduct’ we are supposed to promote responsible drinking. At one point I met with two members of our main company board and had a really good discussion about this as I had got the impression that it was all talk and very little action. Shortly afterwards they put out a really good memo ahead of Christmas party season to all staff which contained a lot of the stuff from our discussion. I then got told off by my department manager for encouraging two other members of staff in team who were talking about how drunk they were intending to get at Christmas lunch to read it. One them actually replied that the board ‘could stick their memo up their a***’. The manager in question is usually one of the worst behaved so it was a classic example of ‘I believe in free speech as long as I agree with you’
Pre video I was lightly mocked for often going to central London cinema clubs and not getting back to the local until gone 10pm. I was ‘accused’ of going to see porno movies when in reality I wanted more than what the Odeon and ABC cinemas had to offer.
I took mineral water with me to a meetup yesterday. But then I probably was the most boring person in the group.
My path with alcohol is unusual. In my student days I reacted against the drinking culture and didn’t drink alcohol at all, also being against it on health grounds. However on some continental holidays I would have a beer with a meal and came round to the view that this was a pleasant and civilised thing to do. There was also the “red wine in moderation is good for you” thing. I rarely have alcohol at home but enjoyed a glass of wine with a restaurant meal or a pint of beer in a pub – until all the ludicrous covid-related restrictions came in. It seems I can pretty much take or leave alcohol, but I would like pubs and restaurants to get back to normal.
That’s a good healthy attitude to have. I don’t touch alcohol myself but have no issue with anyone having a glass or two of wine or beer with a meal, exactly the sort of responsible consumption I am supposed to promote (see my other post).
I really have no time for those that go out with intention of consuming large quantities of alcohol. Ignoring the health aspects of it I just find them embarrassing to be in company of.
In answer to your question, I think its because being the oldest of three sisters I bore the brunt of my parents going “one rule for you another one for your sisters.”
When I queried this, I was told that because I was the oldest, I was expected to set an example. Even then I thought this was bollocks and they didn’t like it when I fought back saying “your rules should apply to us three otherwise none at all.”
Ditto.
I’ve used this anecdote before but my guess is the majority of people on here are “watch wearers”:
When I was a child I used to wear a watch so I could tell the time. There was always someone who would constantly ask for the time and then ask again minutes later.
I would always think to myself, if the time is so important to you why don’t you get a watch?
This type of person grows up always relying on other people to get them through life. There will be exceptions as always, if you can get through life using other people as a shortcut then some may consider that smart.
However, for the majority they never educate themselves enough to be independent of others. I see it all the time now, mostly online as this is where it is most noticeable. Instead of searching for an answer the default is to ask somebody to give them the answer or find it for them.
Now I must admit that I no longer wear a watch but I certainly don’t need to ask somebody every 5 minutes for the time.
I am a “watch wearer”.
In the scouts some of us collected all the stuff you need for a comfortable life out camping.
Others did not. We did not lend them our stuff.
Nothing wrong with asking the time, as long as you keep your 2 metres distance.
What time is it Eccles?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctM_Rvgjfpo
Don’t believe them
Don’t believe them
Question everything you’re told
Stiff Little Fingers, Suspect Device, 1978
Heard it when I was a kid and it stayed with me.
Doesn’t make for an easy life, but once you get it you have no choice.
PS. One of the verses:
They take away our freedom
In the name of liberty
Why can’t they all just clear off
Why can’t they let us be
They make us feel indebted
For saving us from hell
And then they put us through it
It’s time the bastards fell
Had the album, got the CD.
Spot on!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKsN5cj9ehs
That’s the album version, preferred by a lot of people as it’s rawer. I actually preferred the single version:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZedI0NPU6U4
Still got a couple of copies of the single, and the album
The B side, Wasted Life is also great, and contains another apposite verse for now:
Still they come up to me
With a different name but same old face
I can see the connection
With another time and another place
They ain’t blonde-haired or blue-eyed
But they think that they’re the master race
They’re nothing but blind fascists
Brought up to hate and given lives to waste
Also Mr Lydon:
Blind acceptance is a sign
of stupid fools who stand in line
Pistols, EMI, 1977
I don’t run with the herd either.
For me it was a couple of experiences in school when I was in year 4 (so I must’ve been 9).
One teacher tried to put makeup on me for a school play. I told her to do one. I think then (as now) the thing that surprised me was how everyone else just went along with it.
The other was a bullying, overly authoritarian supply teacher who was stepping outside of her bounds. The majority begrudgingly went along with it, but me and a couple of friends felt strongly – we spoke up and she got sacked.
I’d be more proud of my ability to resist if it were equalled by my ability to convince others to follow suit ha.
I’m a bit of a multi-sceptic – eurosceptic (since the Maastricht Treaty), climate change sceptic (I believe there is some human influence on the climate but it’s being exaggerated and used to push various agendas), a dark matter/dark energy sceptic (my background is in maths and physics, no particular expertise in cosmology but the “experts” in that area seem to be excessively certain that dark matter is the only plausible explanation of the discrepancy between the observed amount of matter in the universe and observations of gravitational effects; they have postulated Weakly Interactive Massive Particles which is just a fancy way of saying the same thing, “we think there’s a lot of stuff around that we can’t detect in any way”. Other possible explanations are regarded as “fringe”.)
I seem to have wandered off topic. Of course I’m also a lockdown sceptic!
I started when I looked at 911 too. Far too many inconsistencies. And an “exercise” to defend against such an attack on the same day. Then 7/7 also had an “exercise” on the same day too. Playbook or coincidence?
Then you look at the whole history of medicine….and the suppression of natural health care.
But we have more power than we know. We are harnessing it in forums like these, marches, protests, conversations. Chip, chip, chip away all
I’m left leaning too. I dislike being told what to do.When I was a child every cold landed me in hospital with pneumonia, but my parents were told I should go out for walks in the fresh air. We had visitors as long as they were well. I smelled a rat when we were told to “Stay home and save lives” .It just made no sense. How dare they take my civil liberties to “protect” me from a virus when as a child any virus could kill me but I was not locked up.
My mum trained as nurse during WW2. If I ever turned up sniffling she would chuck me in the garden saying what I needed was fresh air and sunshine.
In his Talk Radio interview Peter Hitchens describes the fall of the totalitarian regimes of the Eastern Bloc. All powerful one momaent gone the next After years of oppression the people rose up because they had nothing left to lose. All it took was a spark. Very often the leaders were oblivious to what was coming their way. In Romania that moment was captured on film. All of a sudden, in a second the crowd stopped clapping and started booing I have heard what I believe to be the tipping point. Mike Yeadon in a public forum has called Vallance a liar and challenged him to sue. The passion, honesty and integrity of Yeadon is inspiring. I do think this is the moment The march will be back, twice the size it was yesterday. No amount of police battoning will now suppress the people But what is it the end of? Simple answer. Thirty years of a corrupt and inept parliament stuffed with lying dishonest people. Corrupt to the core of their bones So corrupt and dishonest that they thought they could get away with banning the sale of children’s clothes and kettles So corrupt and dishonest that they thought… Read more »
It was Ceausescu who experienced that sudden revulsion, It ended with a bullet.
Mad Mark Dripfeed grows more like Ceausescu every day.
So did Colonel Gaddafi and he came to a very messy end.
https://imgur.com/DjMwroQ
Problem is what to replace them with ?
Was it Churchill who said something like ‘we’ve tried everything else and Democracy is the least bad option’?
This is what Democracy has brought us to.
At the risk of going off the Lockdown Sceptics agenda, in my view to protect the union of the UK we should reform the Government of this country, each region should be a devolved authority like Wales and Scotland, the whole panoply of County Councils and district councils needs reformation. The way the states run in the USA or the Landers run in Germany would be a step in the right direction. The south West of England where I live has a population and economy much the same size as Scotland, therefore no reason why we cannot run the same way as Scotland.
Previously the idea of regional government was done on the basis of an extra tier of Government, we need more radical change than that, less tiers of Government with a key focus on the Regions. Central government for Defense, security and Foreign affairs.
Getting back to the Virus; public health actions should be done on a regional/local/community basis by consensus and cooperation not authoritarian diktats from Downing Street.
Interesting ideas. However, local diktats csn be just as authoritarian as central ones. Don’t we know it here, under Josef Stslin Dripfeed!
Fair comment but I would be seeking for a policy of public health by consensus. local and community action and public cooperation with no public health actions done by authoritarian legal actions. If the authorities did not have the option of legal action on public health policy they would be forced to be more creative and progressive and to achieve objectives by positive actions not by negative restrictions.
Probably all a bit pie in the sky but I have just walked round our little plot of land in North Devon, picked a few of the last autumn raspberries to have with my breakfast muesli and feel like I am living in the Garden of Eden and so dreaming of utopia is easy to do!
The American ideal of states controlling their own destinies was based on having a well-educated citizenry. In the 1800s, the economy was largely based on what would probably be called yeoman farmers who owned their own land. Most could read, were literate and well-(self)-educated, largely through reading books and pamphlets. The famous Sullivan Ballou letter, written by a Union officer during the American Civil War, is an example of the level of literacy we had then. He was a lawyer and a politician, but our standards were higher in general back then. Public health by consensus would have worked with that population. In fact, that was how public health was managed. Central authority was weak to non-existent. Now educational standards are quite low. When I last taught in America, in Indiana in 2018, I was quite depressed by the low literacy and maths skills of the majority of the students. I compare that to when I started teaching in the late 70s when students were still capable of understanding complex ideas. What we are seeing now is public health by consensus, through psychological manipulation of a population unable to understand complex information and with little ability to examine math and… Read more »
The destruction of the grammars in this country has destroyed the education of millions of children.The result is a dumbed down population which is easier to manipulate.
Those yeoman farmers could enjoy the King James’ Bible as light reading!
While a degree in PPE clearly doesn’t make you fit to govern, looking at the sheeple of today, I agree with your assessment CBees.
So true… I lately read a few older English books published around the turn of the 20th century (late 1800s / early 1900s), and it amazed me to what extent even ‘light’ literature (fiction) took for granted a level of culture from the audience that is simply unthinkable today. References to classical mythology that would leave today’s self-professed intellectuals scratching their heads in incomprehension, or to lesser-known philosophers whose ideads were apparently common knowledge back then, to local historical events and their repercussions, extensive metaphors referencing significant past political developments, etc. The average op-ed piece in today’s supposedly high-brow newspapers looks positively inane in comparison, whereas the ‘regular’ papers or the news are nothing short of infantile.by any standards. Not to mention the fact that many people seem to experience the world mainly through their smartphones nowadays (they don’t even look at what’s going on around them anymore). Yet another case of ‘garbage in, garbage out’ I fear…
I think pretty much the whole problem we have now is that way too much power has been given to total idiots. I don’t think we can have rule by consensus when the majority of the population are very ill informed very badly educated, know virtually nothing about anything at all.
I talked to a young guy (16-18?) a couple of weeks ago about a laptop issue on the phone and honestly I could hardly understand a word he was saying. It was incredible.
His language skills were just atrocious. I think he was a native English speaker but what he was saying wasn’t English it was slangy young person language. Like nothing I had ever heard before. So strange. I put it down to literally lack of speaking practice.
Sounds lovely, wonderful part of the world.
Devolution has helped nationalism, and has been bad for the Union. The more power is devolved the more irrelevant Westminster seems. Westminster is blamed by nationalists seeking independence.
In theory, we are bound together as a nation by having MPs from every corner of the land in Westminster, rather than having separate little kingdoms. I would rather England was not split into separate states.
I could see some value in Super Counties responsible for public health, transport, education, infrastructure, emergency services, welfare and the like.
Well worth debate, but what happens at the borders?
Guard towers and razor wire
‘A beautiful, big wall’ ?
Yes car free zones for the new nonsense e-scooters and bikes. The current system is bad but left wing super councils is one of the best things Maggie ended.
Aren’t our local NHS foundation trusts organised a bit like that now? We have to traipse about all over the county just to get a CT scan that my local dentist can do onsite.
You are not so bad in the SW. There are many more Dripford’s who would love more power in the current County Councils. Giving that power to our council here is Nottingham would be a disaster of huge proportions. We only get small turnouts for anything but national elections in the UK, small turnout is mainly postal voting, where activists come and collect to dispatch. No thanks.
The SDP are supporters of further devolution. Worth having a look at their New Declaration on their website.
UK Column have been doing articles on this recently. They have been keeping an eye on it for several years.
It sounds really good in theory, especially when it’s so obvious how out of touch Whitehall is. However, UK Column make a strong case for its being more of a creeping global communist agenda in practice.
Interestingly, the aim is to start the creep in Cornwall.
If you think breaking up the UK into four separate countries is not necessarily a great idea, then imagine chopping England into even tinier pieces. Airstrip One accomplished!
Have a look here: https://www.metropolis.org/about-us
The model already exists, namely the Channel Islands. The 4 nations could manage their own affairs with the UK responsible for defence and foreign policy. Orkney and Shetland could enjoy autonomy from Voldemort (she who must not be named).
I’m all for parliamentary democracy. However that is not what we have now.
What we have is a corruption of parliamentary democracy
The default position from all MPs of whatever party is to lie. You only have to see them open their mouths to know what’s coming next
I accept there are a handful of exceptions like Mr Swayne and Philip Davies
They have got away with it for so long now they really thought they could imprison us without trial
They really thought they could get away with banning the sale of blankets and children’s clothes in winter
They must step aside
If they do not step aside, we will sweep them aside and woe betide them
Once the blue touch paper is lit there will be no turning back.
What this crisis has revealed is the utter corruption of our entire political establishment.From the 2 major parities who represent no one but their own greed and lust for power to our bought and paid for media mouthpieces.
The uselessness of the monarchy has been revealed and the rest of our institutions have been shown to be rotten to the core.
We are paying for years of neglect of the political process.
What we need is libertarian democracy, democracy with limits on those in power ensuring they cannot intrude too far in to the lives of the masses, limits putting clear bounds on where a government has no ight to legislate. Any other type of democracy soon becomes a simple tyranny of the majority.
They forgot that the ‘great reset’ includes thier removal by violent and sudden unilateral action that will be unstoppable. 😎
Pitchforks and garrotes anyone?
I have heard what I believe to be the tipping point. Mike Yeadon in a public forum has called Vallance a liar and challenged him to sue. The passion, honesty and integrity of Yeadon is inspiring. I do think this is the moment
He may be passionate but he’s completely lost it now. He’s far too convinced that he’s 100% right. No-one can be that certain and, in any case. he has clearly over-estimated the level of immunity in the population – as has Sweden, by the way.
Note Carl Heneghan doesn’t indulge in Yeadon-like histrionics and is far more measured. He’s also been pretty quiet recently and I suspect he’s thinking that events are not unfolding exactly as he expected.
You’re an irony machine.
‘….he has clearly over-estimated the level of immunity in the population – as has Sweden, by the way.’
What evidence are you relying on for that statement?
No need to present evidence when he’s…
Read his tweets. There’s never any room for doubt in his assertions.
That’s not true. He regularly says that he may be wrong and invites informed discussion
Sweden’s case numbers are rising again. The UK’ s case numbers are rising. hospitalisations are rising and deaths are rising. The same has been happening in France & Spain for a while. It’s happening in Belgium the Netherlands, the Czech republic and several other countries.
Case numbers are rising again.
So bloody what?
Christ- don’t you know what the PCR test is?
Clearly Mayo has bought in to the PCR lie, the poor thing.
How are you defining ‘case’?
Overall all cause mortality in England from ONS latest weekly figures have been plumb normal for the time of year since the end of May.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/weeklyprovisionalfiguresondeathsregisteredinenglandandwales
“Case numbers are rising.”
I don’t mean to be rude, but… how can you be such a complete and utter moron? Are you really in the – admittedly large – group of ignorant, intellectually lazy people that haven’t yet understood positive tests don’t mean sick people?
I keep pointing out, we don’t have a government problem, we have a idiot population problem.
“He’s far too convinced that he’s 100% right. No-one can be that certain”
Apart from you.
I do think that Yeadon’s approach is likely to be a turn-off for believers, however much I value his opinions and admire him for taking a stand. I have no idea whether his estimation of immunity is more or less accurate than any other.
I don’t think Heneghan being quiet means much at all. As far as I can tell he is working tirelessly and methodically – quality over quantity. He probably also recognises that too much exposure makes it easy for people to tune out. Better to speak once you have something valuable to say.
So Yeadon has got balls as well as evidence. Heneghan has evidence, but he is restricted to lobbing a few grenades from the trench and then keeping his head down. The difference is that Heneghan is still in the academic system, while Yeadon is of independent means. By the way your knowledge on Sweden is breathtaking. Tegnell must be on the phone most days.
That is not what he said. Yes he said that he is convinced he is right, but he also said that if he is proved wrong he will apologise and ‘pay the fine’
Your comment is a gross distortion of what he said
Nice to see someone else going against ‘the narrative’ that seems to dominate here
Interesting comments. I have thought some of the same, although from a different perspective. Yes, Dr Yeadon is passionate. He’s clearly very angry and frustrated, and this leads him – in my view – to throw caution to wind and sometimes overstate his case. As you imply, no proper scientist can be 100% certain. Having said that, I find his estimates/back-of-the-envelope-calculations on UK immunity entirely plausible. Carl H. is an interesting one. I suspect he feels just as passionately at Dr Yeadon, but that he realises that in these circumstances if his work is to gain full traction he must at all times appear calm and measured. I admire him for this self control, as I don’t think I could have managed it. We can only speculate on why he’s been quieter lately. My guess is that he understood tat he couldn’t maintain his previous level of media exposure and not, sooner or later, come in for a bit of a fall. I reckon he’s merely biding his time, and will strike again when he thinks the time is right. I’ve seen nothing to suggest that (biological, as opposed to political) events aren’t unfolding broadly as Carl H., and Dr… Read more »
Soft genocide and foreign goons in the Terrorist Support Group?
Toby, you excel yourself.
I wasn’t sure if the interviewed person was being a bit racist toward BAME Police Officers or whether they really were non UK or Commonwealth citizens dressed up as Stazi goons.
Whatever and whoever they are is unimportant.
They’ll ALL be going to prison once we catch up with them.
That’s nothing more than wishful thinking. They have all the cards and we think truth and reason matter, who wins? History shows it isn’t always the good guys.
As for the police, it is very much important for many reasons; no foreign police force should operate on UK soil and if they are citizens then they are failing their English requirements set out by just about every force in the UK.
I agree. If we have reached the point that the state is deploying the C21 equivalent of Hessian mercenaries against its own people, then we have a serious problem. This behaviour has been characteristic of despotic regimes throughout history – most obviously in the C19, when European powers swapped troops to crack down on domestic opposition. Indeed, that basically is how the Habsburg monarchy stumbled into the C20.
Do we have any statesman of the calibre of Pitt the Elder, who came to Parliament in his terminal illness to speak against the deployment of mercenaries to police the English colonists in America? Doubt it. By the way, it turned out not to be a clever move.
Yeah my thought process was the the same – not racist as such but I wondered whether it might simply be that the person’s first language was Romanian or something.
Gotta be honest, I tend to be slightly suspicious of someone who chooses to strike up a conversation about common law with a police officer / TSG person.
Maybe the crooks (is it still Cressida Dickhead) at the top deliberately picked thugs for this TSG operation who were less likely to be able to realise what the protesters were on about? If the thugs they send in don’t speak english very well they’ll likely just see the demonstrators as “obstacles to be cleared” rather than as “hang on, I agree with that sign”.
Very odd, what was the point of Toby putting it in? The kind British bobbies (Dixon of Dock Green) versus uncouth foreigners – not a great insight
Were they identified as BAME? Could have been Polish or Belgian. Foreign is a big place.
At the first demo where the SPG battered people with batons, several witnesses said they spoke with central European accents.
I’m sick of people thinking this is all just some over zealous ministers getting power drunk. It’s not just our country that has done it. Many nations have done it without question, why? Perhaps we shouldn’t all be so complacent to deny that this is orchestrated in some way to meet their political ends. Some of the first laws passed had nothing to do with virus management but everything to do with controlling of people, long after any virus has gone. Using out of the blue virus scare to pass laws they couldn’t via climate hysteria. This is all an experiment to see how we react for the next one. Power is never surrendered, its taken back and unfortunately that’s historically a bloody affair. The UK, Scotland in particular, is just so meek, weak and over trusting that we would let this all go if we got back to ‘normal’ tomorrow. I don’t have all the answers but clearly one of them is to SEVERELY limit government power, reinstate the power of the individual and deem in law that no rights shall be infringed. The US Bill of rights is based on laws from the UK, but here we don’t… Read more »
Build Back Better is the global mantra for that
According to the Sunday Times then the NHS has broken dozens of laws with impunity and broken completely the NHS constitution, one sentence stands out :
Everyone countsWe all have a responsibility to maximise the benefits we obtain from NHS resources, ensuring they are distributed fairly to those most in need. Nobody should be discriminated or disadvantaged and everyone should be treated with equal respect and importance.
Daily I feel ashamed of being a part of a once proud nation of people.
Keep the faith.
It will finish as quickly as it started.
Let’s hope so John. Those responsible must be made to pay!
Savour this gem of an analogy from Hugh Willbourn:
“The destiny instinct is … the idea that things are as they are for ineluctable, inescapable reasons: they have always been this way and will never change.” This dire mistake set in right at the beginning of the panic about Covid-19. The first absurd, inflated estimates of possible death were taken as gospel, and many people who should know better still take them as meaningful and relevant. It is as though Neil Ferguson had declared that the moon is made from green cheese, and as a result all the moon rock samples brought back by the Apollo mission must be declared fakes.”
Good morning Wales!
Thank so so much for the extra business.
Kind Regards
Jeff Bezos and all the Amazon team.
Exactly! This is the biggest single wealth transfer in history.
Christmas cards are non essential…unless you get them from moon pig.
Im anti Moonpig after my great niece’s birthday card arrived a week after her birthday!
My five ‘exempt’ lanyards (to give away to the deserving) took three weeks to arrive from Amazon after their algorithm suggested I might also be interested in designer masks and cheap visors !
Try Etsy. Small cottage businesses. I’ve always had good stuff there and you can filter for U.K. based sellers.
You’ll be getting my business. Send the bills to Dripfeed.
Warning to Welsh shoppers: the Curst Minister and the Welsh Assembly are not essential. Don’t buy them.
And the mop shop in Ludlow (if you can get here).
Ps the stationary shop (not essrntial) has rebranded its stock Paper Products (essential).
I expect Ludlow was packed with Welsh shoppers yesterday. It’s about 14 miles from the border and there are a lot of very small roads. Don’t suppose the Welsh Plod have enough woodentops to guard every crossing.
eBay! eBay! eBay! I’m in England but just placed another order this morning with a small business using their marketplace.
It does seem as if the Times are just catching up, finding information we have known about for months on here, the NHS triage guidance being a good example, this has been out there for anyone with the willingness to see, the problem is most of our media has the professional curiosity of a common sloth.
True, it’s real journalism for once. Good to see it though.
Is it a once off or will thy now question the narrative? my bet is on the 1st one
I’ve been vocal in my criticism of journalists all through this (alleged) pandemic. But is it the heads of the media who are preventing proper investigation, and are we seeing the start of a breakthrough from the stifled reporters?
Better late than never!
Thumb screws tighten against German resistance Corona Transition https://corona-transition.org/eilmeldung-verein-von-prof-sucharit-bakhdi-unter-staatlichem-beschuss DeepL translation BREAKING NEWS: Prof. Sucharit Bakhdi’s association under state fire Posted on October 23rd, 2020 by VG The tax office withdraws the non-profit status of the association MWGFD e.V – without giving reasons.The Passau tax office has given the association “Doctors and Scientists for Health, Freedom and Democracy e.V.” (MWGFD) revoked its non-profit status. This means that donations to the organization can no longer be deducted from tax. This is reported by t-online.The most prominent members and founders of the association are Professors Sucharit Bhakdi and Stefan Homburg as well as the doctors Wolfgang Wodarg and Bodo Schiffmann.”In order to advertise its positions, the association had, among other things, booked newspaper advertisements across Germany,” writes t-online and: “The only source of income are donations, Homburg spoke of individual donations of up to 25,000 euros. “Opinion of the reaction: The Passau tax office did not justify its decision, the association announced. From our point of view, the decision of the tax office is politically motivated and serves only as a means of repression. In this way, it is hoped that the donations that the association used to raise awareness about Corona… Read more »
Soft censorship, shame on Germany.
Heil Covid!
New simpler message from government.
SEND NUDES!
That Tomas Ryan is a gimlet-eyed maniac. I have come to the conclusion that some of these titled people enjoying their moment of being listened to are advocating lockdowns because they are psychopaths who enjoy the suffering of others.
Here is an interesting discussion of the latest development s in covid dystopia by two Christians: Dave and Steve:
https://www.bitchute.com/video/AJmdDvpZXl7J/
I like these guys!
Thanks.
I never understood who it was thought would staff the Nightingales. We are told that they were primarily (if not exclusively) for ventilated patients. While there were many NHS staff twiddling their thumbs during that time they would not have been those with the training to care for patients on life support. It always seemed like an inexplicable vanity project to me. Of course, before long we knew that we would not have vast numbers of otherwise healthy young people dropping like flies – I think the fear of that was behind the Nightingales.
Bozo likes vanity projects, nothing mundane for him, he has to be the centre of attention when he’s not hiding behind the sofa.
The NHS are not heroes the delivery men are, those who moved the food and supplies across country to stock up the shelves in our supermarkets, not forgetting our postmen who continued to work despite this scamdemic.
The government and the NHS failed on every level and are still failing!
And the bin men. Collect every week and always a cheery word with the dogs. Heroes. There have been weeks where the postie, the binman and the supermarket delivery person were my only human contact.
Amen to you both. And the street cleaners as well – my local council sent cleaners once a week to tidy our sorry excuse of a park.
They are the real heroes not those in the NHS.
Our council withdrew all help from our park groundsman!
That’s a shame. My local council are middling but at least they manage keep the bin collections and the park reasonably tidy.
And the staff inside the supermarkets!
Not forgetting binmen , road sweepers and sewage workers.
They didn’t even start on our Nightingale until 3 months into lockdown by which time it was obviously all over.
I rather think the Nightingales were intended to be mortuaries. However the health trusts couldn’t bring themselves to use the ‘m’ word – Nightingale has a much nicer ring to it.
That had certainly crossed my mind. And when the superb Desmond Swayne pointed out recently that insufficient toilets had been built in this facilities for the use of conscious patients it seemed to me that there had never been an expectation of recovery.
Yes it was the lack of toilets that got me thinking…..
DEAD giveaway!
They’ve had lots of time to prepare for the “second wave.”
Surely they’ve had all summer to retrain those doctors and nurses from the redundant wards.
“Seven-day Covid quarantine — and none for jet set”.
Risk Of Covid-19 Transmission On Planes ‘Virtually Non-Existent’ For Mask Wearers
Recently reported were the positive findings of a study in exposure to Covid-19 when flying. A US Dept of Defence study out earlier this month, states the ‘aggressive air filtration’ (HEPA) ‘lead to the near-immediate dispersal of particles carrying the infection’. The article goes on to say ‘that it would take a minimum of 54 hours of sitting next to someone (on a plane) with Covid-19, to be exposed to an infectious dose.
I feel like they don’t need to include the last three words in the title.
Exactly. How would the air filtration system be different if you were maskless?
Don’t know where they got that from, if there was Covid on a plane masks would not stop it and the revenitlation would make it worse (as if that mattered).
If I’ve understood correctly, the HEPA filters on planes are very effective and could potentially limit re-ventilation risks.
Clever virus
We need to remember that many elderly people at the end of their lives who contract respiratory viruses, pneumonia etc. are just too sick to benefit from ICU admission. Doctors have always made this judgement. When I was a junior doctor, broncho-pneumonia was known as “the old man’s friend.” If you watch Ivor Cummin’s recent Irish update video, he says that 90 odd percent of Covid deaths in Irish hospitals at the peak of the pandemic were too frail to be admitted to ICU.
Residents of care homes and their families were being pressured into signing DNRs! Some doctors were signing them without even consulting them! Frankly I’m disgusted with the NHS and their part in all of this.
That’s acceptable. I know of elderly people who died because they were too frail to undergo whatever treatment they needed. It would have been painful, horribly intrusive and degrading for them. That’s a bit different to a blanket instruction that amounts to “cull all the old”.
Another point I have not read here is that it’s very, very common for older people to fear admission and dying in hospital, even when it’s deemed ‘in their best interest’ by medics and relatives.
Ive worked in Adult social care for years and my own mother was a case in point she died in front of me unable to breathe but pleading for me not to call an ambulance. The thought of dying in hospital attached to machines is a very real fear.
In no way though do I condone what’s been going on in this pandemic.
“Riot Police Crush Anti-Lockdown Protest”. Only DM seem to be reporting on this.Clarification courtesy the excellent Mike Yeadon;
I regret to say this is true. I was shocked recently to discover that EVEN MPs DONT SEEM TO KNOW ABOUT THIS:
https://ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0025/193075/Note-to-broadcasters-Coronavirus.pdf…
The text reads: However, we remind all broadcasters of the significant potential harm that can be caused by
material relating to the Coronavirus. This could include:
• Health claims related to the virus which may be harmful.
• Medical advice which may be harmful.
• Accuracy or material misleadingness in programmes in relation to the virus or public policy regarding it.
We will be prioritising our enforcement of broadcast standards in relation to the above issues. In these cases, it may be necessary for Ofcom to act quickly to determine the outcome in a proportionate and transparent manner, and broadcasters should be prepared to engage with Ofcom on short timescales
There is a short vid on sky news YouTube ‘hundreds attend London anti lockdown protest ‘
Corrected by numerous commenters as ‘thousands’
Vid from Mayur Tousi on You Tube. Apparently more to follow.
https://youtu.be/IXVg7YBsAgE
I mentioned it early on but can’t post links from Android so thanks.
I went on a student march against the fees that were coming circa 1998/1999. I was in that crowd and was in awe at the number of people. I remembered the size of my school hall and how it fitted 800 students. And tried to imagine that amongst the huge huge huge procession I was in. I estimated that I was in a crowd of more than 10,000. But mine was not the only procession. The press later downplayed it as a few thousand etc.
Calculating a crowd size is best done by calculating the area then multiplying that by the number of people per m2. If you’re waltyou struggle to get more than 1 person per m2, if standing still maybe 2 per m2.
Trafalgar Sq is only about 70m x 70m, let’s call it 5000m2 so 10000 people is about the max.
We weren’t in Trafalgar Sq. we were marching through London.. but I get your point.
Drone photos analysed by programs ? I bet the bad guys know exactly how many people were there.
Censorship Chinese style! Boris can GFH!