I have always been very fond of this photo, for reasons which are perhaps obvious. We are left to right Celia, Stuart, Neil, Craig and throughout our childhood we really were that close and that happy. The reason that I post this now is that my mother always told me she was amazed how good we looked in the photo, because it was taken when we were all off school sick with Hong Kong flu.
The Hong Kong flu pandemic of 1968/9 was the last really serious flu pandemic to sweep the UK. They do seem extraordinarily regular – 1919, 1969 and 2020. Flu epidemics have much better punctuality than the trains (though I cheated a bit there and left out the 1958 “Asian flu”). Nowadays “Hong Kong flu” is known as H3N2. Estimates for deaths it caused worldwide vary from 1 to 4 million. In the UK it killed an estimated 80,000 people.
If the current coronavirus had appeared in 1968, it would simply have been called “flu”, probably “Wuhan flu”. COVID-19 may not be nowadays classified as such, but in my youth flu is definitely what we would have called it. The Hong Kong flu was very similar to the current outbreak in being extremely contagious but with a fairly low mortality rate. 30% of the UK population is estimated to have been infected in the Hong Kong flu pandemic. The death rate was about 0.5%, mostly elderly or with underlying health conditions.
But there was no massive panic, no second by second media hysteria, over Hong Kong flu. Let me start being unpopular. “Man in his 80’s already not very well from previous conditions, dies of flu” is not and should not be a news headline. The coverage is prurient, intrusive, unbalanced and designed to cause hysteria.
Consider this: 100% of those who contract coronavirus are going to die. 100% of those who do not contract coronavirus are also going to die. The difference in average life expectancy between the two groups will prove to be only very marginal. That is because the large majority of those who die of COVID-19 will already be nearing the end of life or have other health problems.
Let me make this important statement. I write as somebody whose heart and lungs are damaged and in poor condition, following the multiple bilateral pulmonary emboli which nearly killed me in 2004, which mysteriously appeared at precisely the time the UK and US governments were desperately trying to get rid of me as Ambassador, just a couple of weeks after I had been finally cleared of all the false charges with which the British government had attempted to fit me up. I was in a coma for days and subsequently given a maximum of three years to live (read Murder in Samarkand for the full story). If I get COVID-19 I expect I shall be fairly quickly gone off on my next adventure.
But I am OK with that. I have lived an incredibly full and satisfying life. I have no desire whatsoever to die – I have a wife and children I love deeply and I have important political battles I wish to fight. But human beings are not supposed to live forever and one day my time will come.
What worries me about the current reaction to coronavirus, is that it seems to reflect a belief that death is an aberration, rather than a part of the natural order of things. As the human species continues to expand massively in numbers, and as it continues casually to make other species extinct, it is inevitable that the excessive and crowded human population will become susceptible to disease.
As we see the catastrophic effects of human beings on the environment, including on other species and the climate, I am genuinely perplexed as to what are the underlying assumptions and goals of humankind. Do we really believe that medical science could and should eliminate all disease? There are numerous, well-funded medical scientists working very hard on research into the idea that ageing itself is a process that can be prevented. Because that is a notion very attractive to wealthy westerners, more money is being spent on preventing ageing than on fighting malaria and other tropical diseases. Where does this end? Do we really want a world – or at least a wealthy word – where everybody gets to be a centenarian? What are the effects of that on overall population, on demographics, economics and the allocation of finite resources including food and housing?
The mass hysteria around the current coronavirus is being driven by a societal rejection of the notion that the human species is part of the wider ecology, and that death and disease are unavoidable facts, with which it ought to be part of the human condition to come to terms. Let me offer a comforting thought to those of you who have bought into the hysteria. I have no doubt whatsoever that mortality rates from the coronavirus are being exaggerated. They are all based on extrapolation from those who have been tested, but there exists a very large population of people, worldwide, who have or have had the coronavirus, whose symptoms have been those of a cold or non-existent, who have not put themselves forward for testing. The Hong Kong flu had a mortality rate of 0.5% and I believe that ultimately COVID-19 will prove to be very similar. Just like flu once you get it, the only difference being it is more contagious so more people will get it.
Yes wash your hands, bin your tissues, keep things clean. Don’t hang around someone who has the flu. Take advantage of everything modern medicine can do to help you. But don’t be too shocked at the idea that some sick people die, especially if they are old. We are not Gods, we are mortal. We need to reconnect to that idea.
All human deaths are individual tragedies. I wish all solace and comfort to the grieving, and in no way wish to minimise the pain of individual loss of anybody of any age (I lost my own mother not long ago), or that even a small number of child deaths in particular will be dreadfully painful. My deepest and heartfelt condolences go to all the bereaved, and my warm regards go to all the sick and the worried. But the perspective of the wider place of human life in the cosmos is a help in grieving. The purpose of this blog remains not to shirk from saying what might be unpopular. I do hope people will start to consider COVID-19 in a more measured way.
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Denmark just annouced they will close the borders for visitors/foreigners not working/living in the country.
Italy confirmed cases of Covid-19 = 17660
number of deaths in Italy = 1266
this really is a pandemic
now centered on The Alps
“My latest piece: Liberal ideology & virtue signaling put before people’s HEALTH, as Macron, Merkel defend open borders amid Covid-19 spread”
https://twitter.com/NeilClark66/status/1238559302375350273
Nick, unlike you, is not generally anti-immigration just saying.
So contrary to me, you are pro open borders even during this time with the Corona virus?
Straw man here. Just read what you wrote and reflect.
SA
You still mad because I dont agree with your views when we argued this months ago?
Are you embarrassed that you are pro open borders during the pandemic times?
Since you do not recognise your straw man argument I shall try to explain this to you in simple terms.
Neil Clark has written about the foolish policies of Macron and Merkle in not closing borders because of the corona virus epidemic. He said he is critical despite the fact that he is not opposed to immigration but that this was a different situation that requires closing the borders. In all of this Neil’s stance is actually very close to mine.But I disagree with Neil in that the corona virus has really little to do with immigration but something more to do with Schengen which is more relevant. However you Jack would like to draw up the bridge and live in little Britain whatever the excuse. Your Straw Man argument is simply this: I no where said that I do not support closure of the borders should be carried out because of the corona epidemic, in fact I think it is a sensible thing to do now, nothing whatever to do with immigration. But of course your answer was so typically straw man argument that it must be a classic case on this website. Have a lovely day.
SA
Migration is not only about arabs, africans which you seems to believe but people between any country.
Thanks for your answer, you finally agree with me that open borders is not a trivial issue.
No I never thought it was a trivial issue. Trivialisation occurs when you think it is a bad idea across the board because “our borders are swamped and our jobs are taken from us and our girls marry foreigners”.
Actually immigration has never been uncontrolled but the government does not tell you. In the last few years there has not been any sizeable reduction in immigration from non-EU countries which we were not ‘obliged’ to take in through being members of the EU. Regulations also do exist as to what benefits any non-resident could have whether from the EU or not. The freedom of movement was simply that people could move as long as they self support. Instruments are available to not support those who do not contribute to the economy whether they are from the EU or not unless they are asylum seekers. It was incompetence from successive government that has lead in some cases to rises of immigration. The Brexit debate about immigration is a spurious one and done only to whip up chauvinistic, not to say, racist sentiments.
Now back to current straw man. Did you think that you have been successful in diverting the original discussion to another topic?
SA
Being proective of the border is the most important thing a nation is set to establish.
Being pro open border is to depart from that very important goal and as we now see, that departure play a huge part in the spreading of this virus. Why else do you think nations all over the europe close flights and borders?
Now Mr Jack another diversion, closing borders is really about stopping foreigners from infecting us. Oh do move on.
SA
Apparently you have missed that the border closures is not about race but where the biggest virus outbreak is at the moment.
You don’t even see your false arguments. Ignorance they say is bliss.
SA
Believing that the reason nations block their borders now is because they are racist is a delusional worldview.
Use your common sense like everyone else do judging what is happening.
Intelligent blocking or regulating of borders is of course the right approach worldwide and has been implemented. Using a faulty argument to blame immigrants for all our ills and to vote to shoot yourself in the foot whilst not addressing the problem, because it was not a problem created by the EU, is just folly. No go along and do something else. I think we have both exhausted this subject.
Again, migrants is not just africans, arabs as you seems to believe.
Its not racist to block chinese as the russians did nor is it racism that US block european nations, nor will it be racism if europe block flights from the middle east carrying refugees.
Not everything in this world is related somehow to racism. It really cloud the perspective people need to take these days. Racism is not even on the agenda because its totally irrelevant subject to bring up.
And just to add, african nations banning brits’ and americans is not racism.
Uganda restricts travel from 16 countries including UK and US because of coronavirus
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/12/africa/uganda-restrict-travel-coronavirus/index.html
The Donald has very recently said his ban on Europeans flying to America, may have to soon also apply to British people, as Covid-19 seems to be running amok in the U.K., as well as in mainland Europe.
Europe is now the eye of the storm, according to the Who.
Italy = 17,660, Spain = 5232, Germany = 3675, France = 3661, United Kingdom = 798
These figures for the U.K. are very underplayed,
as the U.K. government have said, only very ill people taken into the health care system, with respiratory problems will be tested
for Covid-19.
The Who want as many people as possible to be Covid-19 tested, they say, only by doing this, will the spread of the disease be able to be mapped and understood.
“These figures for the U.K. are very underplayed,”
Really? This is the sort of things only Countries like Iran do, not a democracy like ours. Also in any case what you do not know, does not hurt you surely. If we do not test we can keep the figures of those infected down as ostriches very well know, and it keeps them safe from danger.
See also my other comments
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/forums/topic/corona-virus-governemnt-takes-the-st-augustine-approach/
forgot to add ‘sarcasm alert’.
“These figures for the U.K. are very underplayed,
as the U.K. government have said, only very ill people taken into the health care system, with respiratory problems will be tested”
Indeed that is why i.e. grandchildren are most likely the transmitter to the old people.
Since kids, youngsters are not tested they risk being The transmitter of the virus to the unbeknownst eldery crowd.
Problem with being tested is it only proves your not infected up util that point. The next person you meet after being tested could be the one that infects you.
I like the way they do it in the US, drive by tests, = you can do it as many times you feel the need to.
” you’re not infected ”
Some NHS hospitals have set up drive through testing.
That is true. But it also true for being diagnosed with a myocardial infarction, syphilis or a stroke. So should we stop testing for those?
No of course not. Testing saves lives. I was just drawing attention to the shortcomings of testing in these circumstances.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-51883201
A schoolgirl who fell ill during a school trip to New York died of sepsis, American authorities have said.
Anastasia Uglow, 17, from Bristol, was found unconscious at the Holiday Inn Express hotel on 19 December.
The Bristol Grammar School sixth form student was pronounced dead at Mount Sinai hospital.
An investigation in New York found Miss Uglow died of “bronchopneumonia and sepsis complicating [an] influenza upper respiratory infection”.
The students had been on a trip to New York and Washington DC.
The people who will be taken in to hospital, in the U.K. will only be those suffering from sepsis or urgent breathing difficulties.
Once you are in intensive care your demise if it happens, will most likely be sepsis.
I’ve had sepsis, you almost never make a full recovery.
Most old people die of pneumonia or sepsis, whatever they put on the death certificate. If you get sepsis, at the most you have a few days to live, unless you are on intravenous treatments.
So, if you are doing as the U.K. government request, self isolating, don’t over look sepsis.
Yes, that is one of the problems of self isolation. It may be a short while from developing mild symptoms to becoming very ill and it may be twenty four hours before your next visit is due from the district nurse or remote delivery who may knock at door and get no answer and move on.
Spain is now on maximum alert.
Coronavirus cases in Spain have risen by 1,500 to more than 5,700, public health officials say.
Airlines are no longer flying to Spain – too risky.
No wonder Donald Trump stopped European country flights, this is the new centre of the virus.
Russia only have 45 cases, I suspect the real number is unknown and far greater. At the same time they did ban Chinese tourists, workers quite early on.
Even Trump is now taking it seriously, but not our own PM.
Trump has an election coming up and needs to be in control of the American penguindom.
Even if Johnson was facing an election, he probably wouldn’t have to care less, because the Brexit-capped British are so far down the line with their DailyMail-inspired xenophobia that they would of course instantly forgive him for having the blood of tens of thousands on his hands.
Backed by pseudo-scientists, which he must have paid handsomely to speak the bullshit that they do, and performing his little Dr Cagliari experiment on the herd that the British have allowed themselves to become, Boris has become even more invincible, unaccountable and untouchable.
Ten more people in the U.K. have died in the last 24 hours after testing positive for coronavirus, bringing the total number of deaths to 21.
The U.K. government’s chief medical adviser said the patients were all in “at-risk” groups from across England.
The total number of confirmed cases in the U.K. has reached 1,140 while 37,746 people have been tested.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51889957
This is out of control.
Shut the stable doors – now.
Wow, soon it will be like the Black Death, millions dying on the streets. And then there’s “Climate Change”. And what about Yk2? Yk3! Now I’m off to change my undies.
Steve
I bet that those chinese and italians that had the same attitude you have now, will without a doubt have changed their attitude by now. Dont you think?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/17/how-do-we-face-coronavirus-common-decency-is-our-only-hope
Looks like The Guardian has got a new chief apologist for Tory cruelty.
‘Slagging off Boris Johnson seems another form of denial. Would Jeremy Corbyn be doing any better? If scoring party-political points at a time like this is your priority, you have the incurable virus of self-righteousness. Sorry. People will die in huge numbers, and it is true, of course, that inequality and austerity kills. This is not new information, but this virus is new and how we behave cannot be based on how we behaved three months or even three days ago. We don’t have enough ventilators, hospital beds or the testing that seems more important than ever in how we move forward; arguing and point-scoring won’t help with those essential, urgent practicalities.’
Just reading this one paragraph is enough to make one vomit.
Moron alert: nobody said it was about point-scoring, but just about spelling out the truth that bad government kills. She doesn’t seem to understand (or want to understand) the basics, and shouldn’t be in journalism with idiotic views like this.
Italy’s health system is overwhelmed:
– “We’re close to the point of no return for intensive care beds in Lombardy. We have 15 to 20 intensive care beds left. With 85 new people entering ICU every day and 2 or 3 leaving, we’re close to the point of no return. “There are no more ambulances” – Lombardy Welfare Councilor Gallera added – “and therefore someone will have to wait late in the evening.” [source] 732 patients are currently treated in intensive care in Lombardy, and 76 new deaths were reported in the region today [source]
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#news
Thats a good site by the way^ on current events in different nations.
Spain on Total-Lock-Down
no people or planes in or out, even cafes shut.
The Italian PM was boasting in the press the other day that cases and fatalities were greatly reduced in northern Italy and declining.
Spain is imposing a nationwide lockdown in a bid to tackle the coronavirus, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has confirmed. It prevents citizens from leaving their homes except to buy food and medicine and for work or emergencies.
The government announced the new measures at a news conference on Saturday and they are set to come into effect on Monday morning.
The measures, which Sanchez called “extraordinary” and “drastic”
‘Nationalize factories & industries!’ De Blasio kicks panic up to 11 calling coronavirus ‘war-like situation’
https://www.rt.com/usa/483147-de-blasio-coronavirus-death-nationalization/
Extreme measures needs to be done, americans seems to realize this,
, Merkel, Macron, Boris and other leaders in the west are hardly visible these days.
Thank you for this thoughtful article.
Oh dear me, why did I read the comments. It’s the usual full-time doomsday cultists jerking off, glen and Clarj the most notable, I suppose it’s all going to be used to justify a new rash of nuclear reactors, so safe we can put them in nursery-schools. It’s not the climate, it’s the weather, it changes. But it is the radiation, nuclear and electromagnetic now reaching disrupting the brain, the nervous systems. It’s the pollution of soil, air and water. The MS of AM radio dj’s, ww2 radar station operatives, it’s the BBC. It’s the zombies walking into traffic glued to their phones, or careering round bends their dashboards replaced by sat-nav screens they need to find their way back to their cells, eyes on the tiny fonts on their Fisher-Price Activity-Centres. It’s glyphosate to poison the soil and the food. It’s aspartame/sucralose once only licensed to make rat-poison palatable to rats, now it’s in everything. It’s martial-law and suspension of the always illusory ‘democracy’. It’s a cull folks, of us folks, of old-folks, of wisdom, of memories, an elimination of superfluous worn-out worked to near-death proles. I knew if they didn’t cut the old-age pension to the bone, and steal the public-sector superannuated pensions too, they’d have to do something more drastic. They came for the younger sick already, called it ESA. It was never a question of whether they were mad enough and evil enough to it, that’s a given thing. In conclusion, nothing.
When this sort of thing happens, a reboot usually does the trick.
France to close restaurants and cafes and nightclubs.
France will shut shops, restaurants and entertainment facilities from Sunday with its 67 million people told to stay home to help fight the rapid acceleration of the coronavirus in a country where the number of cases has doubled in 72 hours.
91 dead in France which is a 2% mortality
United Kingdom
has 21 dead, while only 18 are recovered, giving the U.K. a mortality rate of 1.84%
doesn’t look promising.
National Health Service of U.K.
is to be put on a wartime footing.
The mortality rate is meaningless because we don’t know how many are infected.
What we have is called the case mortality rate.
Well, there are possibly thousands more cases in the United Kingdom, than our government are letting on.
However having 18 recovered and 21 dead is startlingly bad odds.
No because it is still early on in the infections. If you look at the Chinese figure you will see more people recovered because China started off early. At this stage these figures don’t mean much and with such relatively small numbers in terms of statistical error.
You need to take a deep breath and stop panicking, dude. It’s a bad does of flu which affects the same groups as normal flu: the elderly and infirm. Your breathless regurgitating of MSM bullshit doesn’t help anything except the spread of hysteria. As the author of this wonderful article said, we need a bit of humility and common sense. Now go take a Mogodon.
No it is not the flu at all, try to say that to the italians, chinese or why not the austrians, spaniards or soon a relative of yours?
People all of all ages is affected and most elderly have diseases so do many young people, have they not the right to live in protection from this virus?
Some adds.
20 new cases in Estonia
35 new cases
First 3 cases in Guam
30 new cases in France
13 new cases in South Africa
29 new cases in the Philippines
15 new cases in Finland
6 new cases in Jordan
102 new cases in the United States
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#news
An unmentionable outcome of Brexit and Coronavirus contagion
is likely to be the utter collapse of the Eurozone.
The E.U. is like a startled rabbit bemused by the double juggernaut hurtling towards Europe.
They are unable to act as a group, it is now every nation for themselves.
After the contagion has run its course, it will be glaringly obvious that the Euro is a busted flush.
Exactly. I am very critical of the EU but I believed that in a crisis EU would would act together. No.
Some nations do not even carry out tests, some nations close down schools, some close down borders. That is , one nation do exacte opposite what the other nation is doing.
Spain is particularly dangerous.
6391 victims
5678 recovered
196 dead
The are rampaging.
No people allowed in or out, people to stay indoors until further decree.
Looks like U.K. is moving towards Marshall Law.
Almost 370 new deaths in Italy past 24 hours.
Far too many still believe that this is just a flu. No a regular flu do not kill this fast, do not seed this fast and this is only in the start of this mess.
Number of cases outside China has now exceeded 80,000, surpassing China’s total
Many of these nestle the Alps
Europe has almost reached 2,000 deaths over the last few weeks.
It is very unfortunate for the people of the UK and the USA to have two incompetent lying morons in charge when a pandemic hits. Idiots voted for idiots to be in charge. Sigh.
No matter someone’s age or their current health all people should be valued. It is not acceptable to dismiss people because they are old or sick.
If going to ground for several months will save me from succumbing to the coronavirus and relieve pressure on the NHS, I am ready to do so. A bigger problem is Mr Pau! Who has yet to reach the big 70 and is determined to carry on playing bridge meanwhile..
He is not alone in this. Many of his bridge addict cronies are intent on doing the same. All that shuffling and passing cards across a small table and changing seats, I cannot imagine anything more likely to transfer germs. But an addict is an addict even at the card table.
i was intending to go and stay with my sister but one of her husband’s work colleagues has just been diagnosed with COVID-19, so that no longer seems such a good idea. I suppose I shall just have to rely on my immune system to see me through.
Mrs Pau!
I have a 91 year old relative who is insisting on continuing to go to play bridge twice a week with his old chums. Not very wise.
Quite frankly anyone calling events an overreaction/panic/hysteria are just wrong. The reaction has been to slow and insufficient.
Whatever happens he hasn’t got much time left so he may as well spend it doing something he enjoys.
Kempe
How do you know that is the case. Do you moonlight as the grim reaper or something.
He is in perfect health and plays golf twice a week. He could live for another 10 years.
Cubby
These two countries led by two of the biggest pompous liers seem to think they are immune from the virus because of some kind of arrogant exceptionalism. At least Trump has now woken up after being completely disgraced over this but our government seem to be hiding behind faulty science as if it is the holy grail, notwithstanding that scientisits often disagree, especially when something is new and there are many unknowns
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/forums/topic/corona-virus-governemnt-takes-the-st-augustine-approach/
SA
I agree.
Trump has gone from it’s a hoax, to its only a mild flu just continue to go to work, to a national emergency in about two weeks.
Johnson was too busy thinking about Brexit and his bung a bob to make Big Ben bong to see what was happening in China.
Both are guilty of criminal incompetence. Idiots voting for idiots with funny hair styles who I wouldn’t trust to successfully order a Chinese takeaway never mind learn lessons from China’s experience.
Trump never claimed the virus is a hoax, he claimed the democrats would use it as the new hoax (earlier the russian hoax) against him.
Jack
Bit of revisionism there Jack. I saw him say it was a hoax.
To be fair to Jack, whom I do not normally defend on account of his defence of closed borders and defence of Trump, he is right, Trump used the expression that the democrats were going to use it as a hoax, not that the virus was a hoax.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/29/us-expands-iran-travel-restrictions-over-coronavirus-raises-advisory-for-regions-in-south-korea-and-italy.html
Cubby
No you certainly did not.
It is fake news,
Trump Didn’t Call Coronavirus a ‘Hoax’
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/fake-news-trump-didnt-call-coronavirus-hoax-february-28-129237
Jack, you need to check your sources before quoting them as being the truth.
Nationalinterest.org is a neo-con hard right site. Needless to say, it is going to give a highly slanted version of any story, and can be guaranteed to make it favourable to Republicans and their various causes.
Trump most definitely called it a ‘new hoax’, just as he had consistently downplayed it until doing a 180 last week and pretending he’d been on top of it all along.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/28/trump-calls-coronavirus-outbreak-a-hoax-and-links-it-to-immigration-at-rally
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/28/trump-says-the-coronavirus-is-the-democrats-new-hoax.html
It’s understandable enough there are apologists and stooges for Trump who want a bit of hasty revisionism.
Glenn-UK you also need to check your sources. The Guardian has become notoriously partisan and is not beyond giving a biased slant to its reporting. But in this case Trump called it a ‘Democrats’ hoax’ and latter on said that it may be big or it may be small but he will act accordingly. He was referring to the politicising of the infection. I am no apologist for Trump BTW.
glenn_uk
It is a fact, it doesnt matter which source one use, check SA’s CNBC link declaring the same thing.
Come on. What was the messages all these MAGA-hat wearing freaks heard?
Jack
I didn’t say that Trump didn’t say it was a hoax by the democrats. I heard him say that as well. So to summarise. I heard Trump say it was a hoax – full stop.
I also then heard him subsequently say later on it was a democratic hoax. Trump just lies 98% of the time. The remaining 2% of the time are racists comments.
So Jack with respect do not tell me what I heard.
Cubby
Well you were wrong then in your interpretation, what can I say? Believe what you want regardless of the truth then.
Jack
I did not interpret anything. Trump said it was a hoax – full stop – hardly my fault the man is an idiot. Why do you think everybody should go about interpreting what you think he means or try and make sense of the absolute nonsense he spouts.
Similarly he said recently no flights from Europe. He then said that was meant to exclude the UK. So using your logic all the people who heard the first statement should have read his mind and realised the UK was not in Europe. Give it a rest you are defending an idiot.
Jack you were not in the room with me when he said the virus is a hoax so just wind your neck in.
Cubby
You are deluding yourself thinking everyone but you know the interpretation.
You are misinformed on the flights too, US banned Schengen nations intially,
“The entry ban will not affect the UK, Ireland and other non-Schengen countries are unaffected as well as US citizens coming from the Schengen Area to the US.”
https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/news/trump-bans-nationals-of-26-european-countries-from-entering-us/
After the soaring numbers in UK, Ireland he later banned those nations too.
As of yesterday 41,123 persons had been diagnosed in countries which share the Alps.
Today France shuts down Alps ski slopes.
This number is substantial.
More than half as many who were diagnosed in all of China, just in a hot spot surrounding
the Alps.
Crude Oil now dropped to 30$/barrel.
World trade hitting the buffers, train companies asking for hand-outs as travellers don’t want people coughing over them.
Coronavirus infections outside China pass 87,000; case numbers in China stand at 80,860
Germany closes the border it shares with five other countries.
Only today has France shut their ski-slopes.
Yet weeks ago it was plain that ski centres were the epicentre of virus spreading in Europe.
Until recently almost 100% of people who were diagnosed positive in England had caught it skiing in the Alps.
Just between Austria and Switzerland, they have almost four thousand victims, and these countries are tiny.
Craig Murray is romanticising a time when a “flu” swept through the UK every few years and wiped out tens of thousands of working class people. I don’t think this is a politically healthy viewpoint in any sense of the word.
We have the technology and collective power to minimise human suffering from all sorts of diseases now, including the Corona virus. The only reason this virus is so deadly in some places is due to a lack of medical facilities to treat people. This is the responsibility of the governments and the capitalist class who have starved public hospitals of funds. This is why the disease will be such a disaster in poorer countries who lack virtually any quality health care.
If governments didn’t waste trillions on weapons how much more public hospitals would there be? If resources were shared equally around the world, the developing world would not be at such risk? If essential services, transport, power, housing etc were controlled for and by the people then the disruption caused by dealing with a virus could be accommodated. Instead we see trillions wasted trying to prop up Wall St and ordinary people losing their jobs and homes due to the economic crisis. This is a crisis created by capitalism, not panic.
Of course capitalist governments will use this as an opportunity to build up police and military measures, that’s what they do. However Leftits don’t need to go to the other extreme and say the whole thing is an overreaction and lets just “let nature do its work” through the virus by letting older humans die en masse! This is the eugenic philosophy of Boris Johnson who thinks its “desirable” to just let the virus spread through the population and see who survives.
Nor do I support the callous isolation of older people without massive social support being given to them. Again this is the Tory not the socialist response to such a crisis. If people need to be isolated from others for a period of time, they must be supported.
We need to fight for a world where whether you are a child from Gaza, an old person in Manchester, an African exposed to Malaria, a working in a mine or an uber drive, your life is valued. and you have access to what a human needs to thrive. It is a pity that Craig Murray cant join the dots and see the same system that kills people without a second though in war and persecutes Assange for revealing these crimes, is the same system that doesn’t fight tooth and nail to save the lives of ordinary people, whatever their age, in a global pandemic.
Davey
Agree wholeheartedly.
Venezuela has just been denied a $5bn loan from the IMF.
Perhaps they are scared of the government spending it on the people?
Or more to the point scared of their US masters.
Johnson’s antics are reflective of this – protecting the riches of the people he works for.
He is not willing ( not yet anyway ) ready to help the non rich people.
Perhaps his close ‘ Super – Forecasters can tell him when the looting and rioting will start in London?
It is inevitable if you refuse to pay the poorer people an income.
this government should have stayed in the 3 foot end of the Swimming Baths – they are way out of their depth here.
Italy almost 28000, Spain almost 10000, Germany 7000+
France 6500+ Switzerland 2000+
United Kingdom 1500+
Old people to be put on Lock-Down in U.K. – soon
France to become a police state as from lunch time Tuesday.
Former Pakistan cricketer Shoaib Akhtar has lashed out at who he regards as responsible for the coronavirus and blamed China solely for the outbreak.
“I don’t understand why you have to eat things like bats, drink their blood and urine and spread some virus across the globe … I’m talking about the Chinese people. They have put the world at stake. I really don’t understand how you can eat bats, dogs, and cats. I’m really angry,” Akhtar said in a video posted on his Youtube channel.
https://gulfnews.com/sport/cricket/watch-pakistans-shoaib-akhtar-lashes-out-at-bat-eaters-china-1.70385630
After this outbreak is cleared (if it ever will..) there must be some change of attitude in China and a more defensive attitude against the eating culture in China in the rest of the world to contain this threat.
This must never happen again.
Any odds on who will be the first national leader to trumpet how they’ve exceeded their carbon reduction emission targets for 2020?
Brent Crude at four year low
Price dollars per barrel($/barrel)
29.55
Mostly done to coronavirus.
This could be as big a crash as the 1929 Wall Street Crash, which followed on from the Spanish Flu Pandemic.
Nine years later. I think it would be a stretch to suggest the two were connected.
It was mostly knock-on effect from first world war/Spanish Flu
covered in a fair bit of greed.
All non-urgent operations in England will be postponed from 15 April 2020 to free up 30,000 beds to help tackle coronavirus,
NHS England has said.
The emergency policy will be in place for at least three months.
Germany has ballooned to 8064 victims
United Kingdom, a shade under two thousand.
Agree with Mr Murray
This is just a virus like all other viruses, some worse than others.
Has anyone done an analysis of the cost of millions of people losing their jobs as a result of this shut down? We are not talking about the black death here!
The media are complicit in destroying our jobs and economy and should be held to account.
The question is why are governments going along with this like headless chickens? Where is the debate? Where is rational thought?
The lastest report from the WHO estimates a 0.7% death rate but an overestimate as mild cases are not reported.
https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/who-china-joint-mission-on-covid-19-final-report.pdf
If the govt were really interested in helping people and knew anything about health at all they would recommend or provide vit D3 and vit C for all. Levels of vit D are low in the witner due to lack of sun which is why we get flu in the winter not the summer. This will combat the virus successfully in the majority of people.
There is a lot more to this than meets the eye.
Suggestions of a cash less society being imposed since the central banks have destroyed the bond economy with near zero interest rates and the chickens are coming home to roost.
Without cash you can’t withdraw money from your bank when they impose negative interest rates on your account.
There are other scenarios and of coure duing an ’emergency’ the govt can do what it likes, a very dangerous situation for the people to be in
When I worked in gravity wave astronomy. I remember being aware there was a correlation of plagues and Solar Cycles. Newton knew about this and that is why he went to stay the country.