News Round-Up

• “Ontario judge grants injunction to end trucker bridge blockade” – Superior Court Chief Justice Geoffrey Morawetz said he was “satisfied” with the arguments made by attorneys on behalf of local officials and representatives of the auto industry, with the injunction going into effect at 7pm ET Friday to allow protesters time to move, reports the Independent.
• “The Ottawa ‘Freedom Convoy’ comes to France” – Facebook gave the French Government a helping hand by deactivating the accounts of all admins of the ‘Convoi de la Liberte’ group, which had over 350,000 members and was the main point of public contact for the initiative, writes Josie Appleton in UnHerd.
• “Austria becomes latest nation to ban ‘Freedom Convoy’” – Hundreds of vehicles were planning to bring Vienna to a halt today before police announced the demonstrations are not lawful, reports the Mail.
• “Some observations on the infection fatality rate of COVID-19” – Dr. Malcolm Kendrick analyses the complexities of calculating the IFR and suggests we have all been exposed to and ‘infected’ with COVID-19, probably all within the first year, implying the IFR and PFR (population fatality rate) are very much the same.
• “Mathematical Evaluation of Covid Vaccination Efficacy in England” – Mathematical analysis of UKHSA data in TrialSite News by Amrit Srečko Šorli and colleagues finds that infected vaccinated people are dying at a 14.5% percent higher rate than infected non-vaccinated people. 
• “Israel: World’s Exemplar For Pandemic Response, Now Indicates Global Failure” – Israel is arguably the most studied nation of the pandemic, and the data signals now emerging are extremely worrisome, writes TrialSite News.
• “Open Letter to the JCVI: Pause vaccines for children pending urgent review” – A follow-up from HART urging the MHRA urgently to investigate the acknowledged increase in all-cause mortality in males aged 15-19 since the Pfizer Covid vaccine rollout commenced in this age group in May 2021.
• “U.K.’s ‘gold standard’ Covid testing to be scrapped making it difficult to monitor virus spread” – The ONS Infection Survey is due to lapse in April and it will be either scaled back or phased out altogether if the Treasury does not sign off on funding for another year, reports the i.
• “Covid: Wales’ mask and isolation laws could end in March” – Self-isolation rules could become guidance rather than a legal requirement next month, reports BBC News.
• “Macron refused Russian Covid test in Putin trip over DNA theft fears” – French President Emmanuel Macron refused a Kremlin request that he take a Russian COVID-19 test when he arrived to see President Vladimir Putin this week, to prevent Russia getting hold of Macron’s DNA, Reuters reports. It’s one rule for them…
• “Taxman ‘rolled over’ on £4bn Covid loans fraud, say MPs” – HMRC’s efforts to claw back stolen taxpayer funds dubbed “unambitious”, reports the Telegraph.
• “How long can Japan keep foreigners locked out?” –  The implications of the blanket ban on entering the country weren’t thought through and it is proving difficult to unravel, writes Philip Patrick in the Spectator.
• “Ardern and Trudeau, the woke darlings of the Western world, are finally getting their comeuppance” – Facing protests and falling popularity, they are proof that it is wrong to prize empathy in political leaders above everything else, writes Douglas Murray in the Telegraph.
• “Too stupid for the truth” – Go on any site such as Full Fact or BBC Fact Check, and you will find there is very little ‘fact checking’ going on – 90% of their output is undermining factually correct reports that contradict the official line or their ideological stance, writes Andrew Hunt in the Critic.
• “A kinder, gentler authoritarianism” – Those who boast about being the most caring are often the most callous – and woe betide those who fail to comply with polite Covid diktats, writes Patrick West in Spiked.
• “Health ‘nightmare’ alert over Covid jabs injecting a heart-damaging toxin” – Neville Hodgkinson in TCW Defending Freedom reports on the worrying recent study in Cell that shows 96% of Covid vaccinees had the toxic spike protein circulating in their blood in the first day or two after the jab, and 63% still at day seven.
• “Health chiefs are tracking variant that’s Omicron and Delta merger” – In its weekly update the UKHSA revealed the ‘Deltacron’ variant had been detected in the U.K. and was “currently under monitoring”, having apparently evolved in someone who caught Delta and Omicron at the same time, reports the Mail.
• “SAGE warns scrapping compulsory isolation will ‘increase anxiety’” – SAGE subgroup SPI-B told No 10 to consider the “unintended consequences” before taking the decision to scrap compulsory self-isolation, masks, mass-testing and other remaining curbs, reports the Mail.
• “Antibodies in unjabbed Covid survivors ‘stronger than two vaccines’” – Researchers from the the Sheba Medical Center in Israel followed more than 500 people who had either just caught the virus or had recently received two jabs between 2020 and 2021, and found natural immunity is stronger than vaccine immunity, reports the Mail.
• “Britain to import 70% of gas as North Sea reserves run dry” – Reliance on foreign fuel will raise fresh questions over country’s strategic independence, writes Oliver Gill in the Telegraph.
• “It’s madness to ignore the answer to the energy crisis” – We are reaping the bitter consequences of 25 years of increasingly costly, stupid and self-defeating energy policies, writes Andrew Neil in the Mail.
• “The energy crunch is only going to get worse” – Thanks to vote-chasing politicians and populist gimmicks, investment has completely collapsed, writes Jeremy Warner in the Telegraph.
• “Running a heat pump hits £1,251 – 27% more than a boiler” – It is hundreds of pounds cheaper to heat your home using conventional means, such as a boiler, writes Will Kirkman in the Telegraph.
• “The World Economic Forum has lost the plot” – The WEF (aka ‘Davos’) has been pumping out some odd material of late, including the health benefits of cold showers and the lessons of animal privilege, writes Peter Franklin in UnHerd.
• “On Wikipedia, trans activists are always editing” – The world’s largest reference site is subject to a relentlessly partisan slant, writes Debbie Hayton in UnHerd.
• “Boycott Thatchers cider over director’s role in Edward Colston society, say activists” – Campaigners against the veneration of Edward Colston in the city of Bristol have called for a boycott of Thatchers Cider because its director joined a  merchants’ society with historic links to the slave trader, reports the Times.
• “The Yid Army must fight on” – If Tottenham Hotspur ban the Y-word, then they are letting the anti-Semites win, writes Spurs fan Frank Furedi in Spiked.
• “No, the Revolution Isn’t Over” – None of the fundamental drivers of ‘wokeness’ have relented, writes N.S. Lyons on the Upheaval.
• “The new ‘porn laws’ could be the vaccine passports of the internet” – An online passport would not only fail to stop children watching porn – it would be the most intrusive identity scheme of all, writes Silkie Carlo in the Telegraph.
• “WATCH: Boston Mayor Michelle Wu’s Livestream didn’t work out how she hoped!” – Citizens let her know how they felt about vaccine passports.

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