News Round Up
- “Is Boris right about a third wave?” – In the Spectator, Ross Clark asks if the third wave on the continent really is going to wash up on our shores. It is being driven primarily by the Kent variant, after all, so “if anything we should expect the wave to be in the other direction”
- “Why I broke lockdown rules” – Neil Ferguson explains why he broke lockdown rules in the Telegraph. Apparently it was something to do with the surreal experience of suddenly becoming a public figure
- “Enough with this forever lockdown” – “Despite our vaccine successes, officials are saying restrictions could go on for years. We must reject this,” says Professor David Paton in Spiked
- “It’s time for companies to park the Covid excuse” – Companies should stop blaming Covid for poor service, says Emma Duncan in the Times
- “The data is clear: the Government must move the lockdown roadmap forward” – “The data are manifestly moving ahead of the dates,” says Christopher Snowdon in CAPX. “The Government should acknowledge it”
- “The idea of ‘zero Covid’ is an illusion” – The most likely scenario is “seasonal outbreaks with lower mortality rates”, according to Peter Piot of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
- “Will I ever escape lockdown?” – “The Covid jab is effectively useless for people with cancer like mine,” writes Stephen Pollard in UnHerd
- “UK to trial treatments to prevent transmission of virus, which could help the most vulnerable” – inews reports on two new clinical trials that will evaluate prophylactic treatments for COVID-19 in care homes and for those with compromised immune systems
- “Aids, Covid and the same blunders all over again” – Recent ‘jab jingoism’ is a cause for alarm, says Neville Hodgkinson for the Conservative Woman. He has “previously seen how the world of science, media and government can lose their heads in a kind of shared psychosis when facing a major new medical challenge”
- “Bill Gates’ group warns of 16 diseases that could spark pandemic after Covid” – CEPI, an organisation founded by Bill Gates, is warning authorities about 16 diseases that could be responsible for another pandemic, the Irish Sun reports. Only 16?
- “Is shutting down Britain – with unprecedented curbs on ancient liberties – really the best answer?” – Peter Hitchens’s column in the Mail On Sunday a year ago, urging politicians, the press and the public to stop and think a bit before locking everyone in their homes
- “The worst public health intervention ever devised” – Watch Dr Oliver Robinson on the Pandemic Podcast today live at 5pm to discuss the failings of lockdown. He is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Greenwich and the author of an interdisciplinary review into lockdown policies
- “EU split over block on jabs bound for UK” – European countries are split over whether they should block jabs from going to Britain or not, the Daily Mail reports
- “Lockdown confusion: France’s new COVID-19 rules raise questions, satisfy few” – Nearly a third of France’s population are living under new Covid rules, France 24 reports, but they are shrouded in confusion
- “The vaccine-hesitant man of Europe” – Large swathes of the population of France are reluctant to get the vaccine. Yasmeen Serhan at the Atlantic investigates why
- “COVID-19 vaccine offer” – Krispy Kreme are offering a free original glazed donut, one per day, to customers who produce a vaccine record card. An interesting approach to public health…
- “Restaurant owner, defying COVID-19 restrictions by Virginia Dem. Gov. Ralph Northam, scores legal victory” – The Blaze reports good news from Virginia where a judge denied the state’s request for an injunction to close Gourmeltz restaurant in Fredericksburg
- “The final push to restore freedom” – The lockdowners are losing, says Robert E. Wright at AIER, calling on all lovers of liberty to help restore freedom
- “Japan bans foreign spectators from Tokyo Olympics” – The FT reports that the Tokyo Olympics will take place without overseas spectators
- “Wuhan Institute of Virology ‘highly probably’ the source of COVID-19” – Sky News Australia interviews David Asher, former lead investigator at the US State Department, who spearheaded a taskforce for the US government into the origins of COVID-19. He says the lab leak theory should not be discounted
- Sam White, a writer based in Tokyo, brilliantly sums up the attitude of the pro-lockdown, pro-maskers on Twitter
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The Atlantic view of France from across the pond is interesting, but it made we wonder if there is anything like it a bit further north on his side, i.e. Quebec. Looking on the bright side, the established French attitude might put a stop to the concept of ‘jab certification’ being abused, at least in the EU.
One of the top comments on Telegraph piece about Ferguson
“Locked us up for over a year but he couldn’t last a week without going over to “see” someone’s wife.
We may not be experts but he has a 100% fail rate for his modelling. How anyone can trust him is beyond me.”
Not sure why the Ferguson piece in the DT has been ‘showcased’. It is really about how Ferguson got it right a year ago and takes us no further than his comments on LS a couple of months ago. Ignoring him is the way to go!
As we know from Lord Sumption yesterday, ‘It is next to impossible for those involved in the (Lockdown) decision to change their minds.’ What do so many of those who habitually refuse to admit they are wrong have in common? ‘A trademark of a narcissistic personality disorder or even a person with a high number of narcissistic traits is this strange problem with accountability. Not only do narcissists lack the ability to give and truly mean empathy, but they consistently blame others for their own mistakes and feelings and have an uncanny way of turning things around and making it someone else’s problem. You are the crazy one, not them. You are at fault, not them. If you show them clear evidence of something they have done, they will deny it or say they don’t remember it.’ Psychology Today 12 Jan. 2019 And who are those most likely to have narcissistic traits? ‘Those higher in narcissism are disproportionately taking part in the democratic process, according to new research published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin’ Psypost 30 Sept 2020 But narcissism is also widespread in society, particularly within developed democracies. ‘Our results showed that grandiose narcissism was higher and self-esteem was lower in individuals who grew… Read more »
“As we know from Lord Sumption yesterday, ‘It is next to impossible for those involved in the (Lockdown) decision to change their minds.’”
I don’t think this is narcissism – I think its perfectly human and normal to be unable to accept that something you did was a monumental mistake. You will always look for evidence that you were right and others were wrong. The switch from believing you were saving people to you were actually killing them would be too much for the human mind to bear.
As the evidence mounts of the harms of lockdown – here and around the world – lockdown supporters will be a dwindling bunch until they just end up as the rump of those who actually made the decisions or provided the justification for them.
You are, of course, entitled to your view that it is ‘perfectly human and normal to be unable to accept that something you did was a monumental mistake.’
That is most certainly not a view that I share.
‘One of the most crucial characteristics of a morally centered, responsible, and mentally healthy individual is the ability to be accountable for one’s actions and feelings.’
‘Do we all have moments in our lives where we mess up and don’t fess up? Of course, we can all make this mistake. But emotionally healthy people work on accountability and teach accountability to their children. It’s a monumental character-building lesson of life, and maybe the most important one.’
https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/the-legacy-distorted-love/201901/lack-accountability-in-narcissists
And guess what?
‘..narcissism does appear to be a primary driver for the desire for followers, which in turn drives tweets.’
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/345078944.pdf
A minute’s silence to remember all those who lost their lives to Covid!
What about all those who have lost their jobs, businesses,marriages, mental health AND LIVES to lockdown?
There is a black country dialect expression: ” It turned ma bally over”
or more mainstream: “Pass the sick bucket”.
a minutes silence for the 450 million jobs lost or the 78 million extra people in the most vulnerable bracket or the 73 billion days of school lost (and the school diners that go with it)
a minutes silence for the end of the western model of freedom, tolerance and pragmatism
Well said, Steve.
its frightening what ‘we’ have done
WFP, WHO, UNICEF, UN etc all point towards a catastrophe of child deaths in the developing world