This is good work – the list of absurd comments particularly eye-catching. To me almost all the types of actors of importance – including the scientists, you don't mention daszak – seem covered in disgrace.
1 ) Masks ( I mean cloth and surgical ) - have a VERY mixed set of reviews. Before the pandemic they showed almost zero benefit. During the pandemic there was a huge push for them - to the censoring of anyone who suggested that they were NOT a benefit ( cloth and surgical ) - Now in some cases people were suggesting that they were ineffective and so people should not even bother wearing them. I feel this was incorrect. It was that they were so ineffective that people should stay away from one another UNLESS they had a viable GOOD mask ( n95 etc ).
2 ) Things are still not better now. Places with strict lockdowns/masking requirements are not faring better than many other places ( you can choose winner and losers across the board on either side )
3 ) We still don't understand the Vaccine - which is effective at slowing the rate of spread of Covid-19. How long will the booster last? Why does it seem more effective to get vaccinated after having had Covid? etc and so on.
4 ) The WHO is political. It is why I disagree with being part of it. Just saying. They literally politicize science.
5 ) What are the long term effects of these vaccines? <shrug> this does not mean that the results will not show that they are not benign and far better than death. BUT... we don't know. We believe they should be fine. That is part of the issue with vaccine hesitancy. Instead of saying - "We do not know all the long term effects these vaccine may have, however we do know that it slows the Covid spread by a large degree. We do not know how long the potency lasts, but hopefully if there is a broad enough adoption it will slow the growth." Nope, instead it was "Very Safe" well word choice matters. when I hear very, I hear - not completely safe. Then I have to start making a cost benefit analysis. Do I give it to my children if it is not NEARLY 100% safe? As a parent I am fine taking a vaccine that has not been around for a while to see what it does to me ( I had a bad reaction but I am told that is atypical but we don't have all the data for that either, my case to my knowledge, has not been reported to VAERS because the system is overwhelmed and who's responsibility is it ANYWAY the patient? the doctor? they don't know. )
The issue with politics is that science is a process. We still do not have all the answers. I expect a post-mortum on masks to show that cloth masks were close to worthless. That Surgical masks slightly better. That catching Covid young will probably be worth more than the vaccine as far as long term anti body and t-cell reaction to the virus in the future. That vaccination - while a great tool - should have taken a second seat to REAL therapeutics.
Covid-19 has become or will shortly become an endemic. What it has really taught me is that public policy does not know what to do either once the virus becomes wide spread enough. We concentrated on a vaccine rather than on a therapeutic - which was a mistake - and that we have allowed hundreds of thousands of Americans to die regardless of who is in 'office'.
Hydroxychloroquine has been routinely given as a malaria prophylaxis for decades and is extremely safe. I took chloroquine for 2 years as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Philippines 1977-1979. It was routinely given to everybody and hydroxychloroquine is an even safer variant of the compound.
I suggest this article as one indicator as to why people distrust the scientitic establishment: The 60-Year-Old Scientific Screwup That Helped Covid Kill - https://www.wired.com/story/the-teeny-tiny-scientific-screwup-that-helped-covid-kill/. It describes the fatal errors made by the CDC and WHO in reporting the way in which covid is transmitted., with the correct mechanism only being acknowledged in spring 2021.
COVID 19 happened to break out where the Wuhan Institute of Virology is, a lab where Chinese researchers had housed the closest wild relative from caves 1000 miles away and do gain of function research and people had warned this could happen and the labs were known to have inadequate safety procedures and data was destroyed and a cover up took place blaming Trump for a racist conspiracy theory (article in Lancet among others).
Trump was more on the right side of these issues than the scientific establishment, in my understanding. He's generally a narcissist and pathological liar. Unfortunately, the opposition seems to have thought it a good idea to attack fire with fire.
3 or 4 years ago Barry and Honey Sherman from Ontario Canada, were murdered in their home and all the cameras in and outside the house did not catch anything (amazing). They owned a pharmaceutical company. They were producing hydroxychloroquine, a lab in Taiwan caught fire and it also was producing hydroxychloroquine. I believe, Pfizer and the other drug companies wanted to make the money from their vaccine and had the Shermans killed. Look how many billions of dollars those companies are making and whom are getting the profits, the share holders and who are the share holds, the elite. If the Shermans were making hydroxychloroquine, a few years before covid came out, they and other people knew it was going to be let out into the world. Just look how fast a vaccine was produced. They already had the vaccine ready before hand. How can a vaccine be made so fast. It takes years to perfect.
I think there may be another important, non-biological aspect to the wearing (or not) of masks. If I encounter anyone in an enclosed public space who is not wearing one, I prefer to assume that – the ‘medically exempt’ notwithstanding – they don’t care whether or not they infect me. So, they have conveniently flagged their attitude and marked themselves as someone to be avoided. I don’t mean this to sound flippant; I really think it’s a relevant factor.
Or maybe all those hundreds of (mainly young) un-masked people thronging around the local mall last weekend – as if the pandemic were just a tiresome Thing Of The Past – are just far better informed than I am.
Amazing work, excellent information, sources and analysis,
This is good work – the list of absurd comments particularly eye-catching. To me almost all the types of actors of importance – including the scientists, you don't mention daszak – seem covered in disgrace.
An excellent article, Natasha.
You highlight the, generally, poor quality of political leadership we are all dependant on. Depressing.
Hmmmm... so here in are a few thoughts.
1 ) Masks ( I mean cloth and surgical ) - have a VERY mixed set of reviews. Before the pandemic they showed almost zero benefit. During the pandemic there was a huge push for them - to the censoring of anyone who suggested that they were NOT a benefit ( cloth and surgical ) - Now in some cases people were suggesting that they were ineffective and so people should not even bother wearing them. I feel this was incorrect. It was that they were so ineffective that people should stay away from one another UNLESS they had a viable GOOD mask ( n95 etc ).
2 ) Things are still not better now. Places with strict lockdowns/masking requirements are not faring better than many other places ( you can choose winner and losers across the board on either side )
3 ) We still don't understand the Vaccine - which is effective at slowing the rate of spread of Covid-19. How long will the booster last? Why does it seem more effective to get vaccinated after having had Covid? etc and so on.
4 ) The WHO is political. It is why I disagree with being part of it. Just saying. They literally politicize science.
5 ) What are the long term effects of these vaccines? <shrug> this does not mean that the results will not show that they are not benign and far better than death. BUT... we don't know. We believe they should be fine. That is part of the issue with vaccine hesitancy. Instead of saying - "We do not know all the long term effects these vaccine may have, however we do know that it slows the Covid spread by a large degree. We do not know how long the potency lasts, but hopefully if there is a broad enough adoption it will slow the growth." Nope, instead it was "Very Safe" well word choice matters. when I hear very, I hear - not completely safe. Then I have to start making a cost benefit analysis. Do I give it to my children if it is not NEARLY 100% safe? As a parent I am fine taking a vaccine that has not been around for a while to see what it does to me ( I had a bad reaction but I am told that is atypical but we don't have all the data for that either, my case to my knowledge, has not been reported to VAERS because the system is overwhelmed and who's responsibility is it ANYWAY the patient? the doctor? they don't know. )
The issue with politics is that science is a process. We still do not have all the answers. I expect a post-mortum on masks to show that cloth masks were close to worthless. That Surgical masks slightly better. That catching Covid young will probably be worth more than the vaccine as far as long term anti body and t-cell reaction to the virus in the future. That vaccination - while a great tool - should have taken a second seat to REAL therapeutics.
Covid-19 has become or will shortly become an endemic. What it has really taught me is that public policy does not know what to do either once the virus becomes wide spread enough. We concentrated on a vaccine rather than on a therapeutic - which was a mistake - and that we have allowed hundreds of thousands of Americans to die regardless of who is in 'office'.
This is an excellent article, but I'd like to recommend the one below for a rather different view of the WHO:
https://archive.ph/If1WN#selection-821.0-821.56
Hydroxychloroquine has been routinely given as a malaria prophylaxis for decades and is extremely safe. I took chloroquine for 2 years as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Philippines 1977-1979. It was routinely given to everybody and hydroxychloroquine is an even safer variant of the compound.
I suggest this article as one indicator as to why people distrust the scientitic establishment: The 60-Year-Old Scientific Screwup That Helped Covid Kill - https://www.wired.com/story/the-teeny-tiny-scientific-screwup-that-helped-covid-kill/. It describes the fatal errors made by the CDC and WHO in reporting the way in which covid is transmitted., with the correct mechanism only being acknowledged in spring 2021.
COVID 19 happened to break out where the Wuhan Institute of Virology is, a lab where Chinese researchers had housed the closest wild relative from caves 1000 miles away and do gain of function research and people had warned this could happen and the labs were known to have inadequate safety procedures and data was destroyed and a cover up took place blaming Trump for a racist conspiracy theory (article in Lancet among others).
Trump was more on the right side of these issues than the scientific establishment, in my understanding. He's generally a narcissist and pathological liar. Unfortunately, the opposition seems to have thought it a good idea to attack fire with fire.
3 or 4 years ago Barry and Honey Sherman from Ontario Canada, were murdered in their home and all the cameras in and outside the house did not catch anything (amazing). They owned a pharmaceutical company. They were producing hydroxychloroquine, a lab in Taiwan caught fire and it also was producing hydroxychloroquine. I believe, Pfizer and the other drug companies wanted to make the money from their vaccine and had the Shermans killed. Look how many billions of dollars those companies are making and whom are getting the profits, the share holders and who are the share holds, the elite. If the Shermans were making hydroxychloroquine, a few years before covid came out, they and other people knew it was going to be let out into the world. Just look how fast a vaccine was produced. They already had the vaccine ready before hand. How can a vaccine be made so fast. It takes years to perfect.
Admirably informative. Thank you.
I think there may be another important, non-biological aspect to the wearing (or not) of masks. If I encounter anyone in an enclosed public space who is not wearing one, I prefer to assume that – the ‘medically exempt’ notwithstanding – they don’t care whether or not they infect me. So, they have conveniently flagged their attitude and marked themselves as someone to be avoided. I don’t mean this to sound flippant; I really think it’s a relevant factor.
Or maybe all those hundreds of (mainly young) un-masked people thronging around the local mall last weekend – as if the pandemic were just a tiresome Thing Of The Past – are just far better informed than I am.