#uk covid 19

[humandisastersquad]

hey UK followers, go get your covid boosters ASAP before these bastards take away yet another covid protection. jfc

EDIT: ffs can y'all read the tweet and the actual article, not just the headline, it says how it's 'healthy under-50s' that they're cutting access to boosters for and eventually first and second doses. Yeah, most people who would have gotten them would have by now but there's many reasons that some people haven't and these options should still be open regardless.

This bullshit approach of taking away even the vax part of "vax and relax" is going to kill and disable people. It even quotes the fuckign health minister saying "as the transition continues away from a pandemic emergency response towards pandemic recovery". THERE IS NO RECOVERY WHEN SAID PANDEMIC IS STILL GOING!!!

and YES i know the sun is a murdoch rag that's lower quality than used toilet paper but i shared this particular tweet as a) the tweeter is a reliable and staunch anti-covid advocate and b) for once this piece of shit news source is telling the truth

finally, for those saying that this isn't a big deal as "most people are fully vaccinated", think again. Most vaccine immunity wanes after several months so defining "full vaccination" as having had a primary course nearly 2 years ago is outdated and lulling people into a false sense of security. In an ideal, science-informed, non-covid-minimiser world, we'd be having boosters every 4-6 months so that antibodies don't fall below effective levels.

Basically, this post should be a wake up call to those who haven't gotten their booster if they're eligible for it and for everyone to realise how much more fucked the approach to the pandemic is becoming. not only in the UK but everywhere else tbh

[halorvic]

The danger is clear and present: COVID isn’t merely a respiratory illness; it’s a multi-dimensional threat impacting brain function, attacking almost all of the body’s organs, producing elevated risks of all kinds, and weakening our ability to fight off other diseases. Reinfections are thought to produce cumulative risks, and Long COVID is on the rise. Unfortunately, Long COVID is now being considered a long-term chronic illness — something many people will never fully recover from. Dr. Phillip Alvelda, a former program manager in DARPA’s Biological Technologies Office that pioneered the synthetic biology industry and the development of mRNA vaccine technology, is the founder of Medio Labs, a COVID diagnostic testing company. He has stepped forward as a strong critic of government COVID management, accusing health agencies of inadequacy and even deception. Alvelda is pushing for accountability and immediate action to tackle Long COVID and fend off future pandemics with stronger public health strategies. Contrary to public belief, he warns, COVID is not like the flu. New variants evolve much faster, making annual shots inadequate. He believes that if things continue as they are, with new COVID variants emerging and reinfections happening rapidly, the majority of Americans may eventually grapple with some form of Long COVID. Let’s repeat that: At the current rate of infection, most Americans may get Long COVID.

[...]

LP: A recent JAMA study found that US adults with Long COVID are more prone to depression and anxiety – and they’re struggling to afford treatment. Given the virus’s impact on the brain, I guess the link to mental health issues isn’t surprising. PA: There are all kinds of weird things going on that could be related to COVID’s cognitive effects. I’ll give you an example. We’ve noticed since the start of the pandemic that accidents are increasing. A report published by TRIP, a transportation research nonprofit, found that traffic fatalities in California increased by 22% from 2019 to 2022. They also found the likelihood of being killed in a traffic crash increased by 28% over that period. Other data, like studies from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, came to similar conclusions, reporting that traffic fatalities hit a 16-year high across the country in 2021. The TRIP report also looked at traffic fatalities on a national level and found that traffic fatalities increased by 19%. LP: What role might COVID play? PA: Research points to the various ways COVID attacks the brain. Some people who have been infected have suffered motor control damage, and that could be a factor in car crashes. News is beginning to emerge about other ways COVID impacts driving. For example, in Ireland, a driver’s COVID-related brain fog was linked to a crash that killed an elderly couple. Damage from COVID could be affecting people who are flying our planes, too. We’ve had pilots that had to quit because they couldn’t control the airplanes anymore. We know that medical events among U.S. military pilots were shown to have risen over 1,700% from 2019 to 2022, which the Pentagon attributes to the virus.

[...]

LP: You’ve criticized the track record of the CDC and the WHO – particularly their stubborn denial that COVID is airborne. PA: They knew the dangers of airborne transmission but refused to admit it for too long. They were warned repeatedly by scientists who studied aerosols. They instituted protections for themselves and for their kids against airborne transmission, but they didn’t tell the rest of us to do that.

[...]

LP: How would you grade Biden on how he’s handled the pandemic? PA: I’d give him an F. In some ways, he fails worse than Trump because more people have actually died from COVID on his watch than on Trump’s, though blame has to be shared with Republican governors and legislators who picked ideological fights opposing things like responsible masking, testing, vaccination, and ventilation improvements for partisan reasons. Biden’s administration has continued to promote the false idea that the vaccine is all that is needed, perpetuating the notion that the pandemic is over and you don’t need to do anything about it. Biden stopped the funding for surveillance and he stopped the funding for renewing vaccine advancement research. Trump allowed 400,000 people to die unnecessarily. The Biden administration policies have allowed more than 800,000 to 900,000 and counting.

[...]

LP: The situation with bird flu is certainly getting more concerning with the CDC confirming that a third person in the U.S. has tested positive after being exposed to infected cows. PA: Unfortunately, we’re repeating many of the same mistakes because we now know that the bird flu has made the jump to several species. The most important one now, of course, is the dairy cows. The dairy farmers have been refusing to let the government come in and inspect and test the cows. A team from Ohio State tested milk from a supermarket and found that 50% of the milk they tested was positive for bird flu viral particles.

[...]

PA: There’s a serious risk now in allowing the virus to freely evolve within the cow population. Each cow acts as a breeding ground for countless genetic mutations, potentially leading to strains capable of jumping to other species. If any of those countless genetic experiments within each cow prove successful in developing a strain transmissible to humans, we could face another pandemic – only this one could have a 58% death rate. Did you see the movie “Contagion?” It was remarkably accurate in its apocalyptic nature. And that virus only had a 20% death rate. If the bird flu makes the jump to human-to-human transition with even half of its current lethality, that would be disastrous.

[fjeldmouse]

[lesbiansandgayssupporttheminers]

Hmmm I wonder what happened in 2020 that might have caused this...

This is literally what a lot of people were saying could happen during the pandemic.

And now Sunak wants to punish these people further. Fuck him.

[tomorrowusa]

Sorry France, but the biggest political event of the week will take place on Thursday in the UK. At the very least, it will herald a change in the right direction.

John Oliver outdid himself in the vid posted above . No spoilers from me! But please watch through the end. 😁

The last third of the vid describes how absolutely abominable the Conservative Party reign of the past 14 years has been. Most people in the UK already know this but outside the country the international community may not understand the full extent of the Tory rot.

Brexit, austerity, and tax breaks for the filthy rich did not bring prosperity to the UK. The US and the EU countries are currently doing better economically than Britain under the Tories. And the NHS (National Health Service) is verging on collapse with malnutrition spreading in the country. Easily preventable diseases like rickets and scurvy (fucking SCURVY!) have reappeared. As an aside, this is where America is headed if Republicans are returned to power in the US.

When COVID-19 struck the UK, the country had an inept leader who downplayed it and made matters even worse. Sound familiar? The already severely stressed NHS was barely able to cope while Boris Johnson and his powerful friends held parties in violation of pandemic regulations.

ABC Australia, BTW a top notch public broadcaster, describes the horrific mess the Conservatives created for Britain's NHS.

Britain's beloved NHS was kneecapped by the Conservative Party. Then the COVID pandemic hit

Yes, Labour's Sir Keir Starmer may be as boring as John describes. But do you really want somebody flamboyant and unintentionally entertaining like Boris Johnson just for the sake of amusement?

Sir Keir should be viewed as the captain of a competent team rather than as a fantasy superhero who will singlehandedly save the country. The Labour shadow cabinet has several members who have been described as progressive realists. David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, and Jonathan Reynolds are three shadow ministers who strike me as visionary and talented. Labour has ditched neoliberalism and regards fairness as a policy goal.

One way or another, Britain will begin to get relief by next weekend. Though the worse the defeat is for the Conservatives, the greater the public repudiation for the past 14 years of misrule. So every vote in every constituency is essential.

In addition to giving Labour a big majority, it would be nice to see the Liberal Democrats pushing the Conservatives down into third place in Parliament. That's more than just symbolic because the Lib Dems would then become the official opposition and the Tory successor to Sunak the Wet would be more limited with regard to power in Parliament – including number of questions allowed at the weekly Prime Minister's Question Time.

[indelibleevidence]

It's crazy that we're having our first general election since COVID hit, and all the politicians are like, 'Ah, yes, COVID - that historical event that is now in the past.'

It completely boggles my mind how the vast majority of abled people - yes, even hardcore leftists who think they support disability rights, but still don't wear a mask in public - are so willing to pretend this mass-disabling virus isn't still a threat. Not just to some people who are already disabled, or to the elderly, but to everyone, because the more times you get it, the more likely you are to have your physical and/or cognitive function impaired by it.

And this is somehow reduced in politics to 'we need to support people back to work' (whether or not they can actually do so), without any talk of making vaccines available to everyone in the UK again, or funding more research, or implementing better practices in the workplace to prevent COVID from spreading every time an employee gets it.

It's so depressing to watch, as someone who has had their life ruined and career destroyed by a post-viral condition. So many people are going to end up like me, and for what? Shareholder profits? Politicians have their priorities so, so wrong.

[tweetingukpolitics]

[northern-punk-lad]

I just to be an anarchist until the Covid pandemic happened

Like you want me to put trust in a society that threw a fit because they where asked to wear a mask

And a society that argue it was ok to let some groups of people die

[starmergeddon]

To someone who doesn't live in the UK and has only a very basic understanding of the different parties involved, pray could you provide a very brief rub-down of the election situation? Also a side question, where exactly did Rishi Sunak and the Tories in general fuck up? I've been getting a lot of British politics posts on my dash and I was curious. You seem like a reliable fellow to ask :)

Btw you really don't have to answer this ask if you don't want to or if it's too much work. In that case, could you point me in the right direction for some online resources I can refer to? Thank ye very much, cheers!

for context, I recieved this ask the day after the election, and somehow managed to miss it for 3 weeks. oops.

if you don't know how British elections work, here are three youtube videos from Jay Foreman which I recommend: how elections work, how elections don't work, and the bit that isn't elected at all

very long post under the cut...

the british political parties

like the US, the UK is a two-party state. unlike the US, the UK has more than two relevant political parties. here they are, in order of seats won this year:

Labour Party (411 (63.2%) seats, with 33.7% of votes)

won this year's General Election.

led by kid starver, queer harmer Keir Starmer, namesake of this blog.

was the Big Left-Wing Party. has recently become the Big Party which Doesn't Stand for Anything, Really, Except for Winning Elections and Hurting Transgender People, due to Starmer's leadership.

oddly patriotic. wants to establish "Great British Railways" and "Great British Energy". Nobody really knows yet what they mean by this.

former leader Ed Miliband is the man in my pfp, pictured failing to eat a bacon sandwich. Some speculate that this photo was the reason he lost the election in 2015.

Conservative "Tory" Party (121 (18.6%) seats, with 23.7% of votes)

tonight's Big Loser.

led by fishy, dishy Rishi Sunak, but not for long, because they're electing a new leader on Halloween.

was the Big Right-Wing Party. is still the Big Right-Wing Party, but is now also an Embarrassment.

they were in power for 14 years until this election.

Directly responsible for this country's decline over the past... 14 years.

their colour is more of a dark blue, but Tumblr doesn't let me do that.

Liberal Democrat Party (72 (11.1%) seats, with 12.2% of votes)

returned to its rightful place as the Third Party.

led by Sir Ed Davey, who spent the election campaign bungee jumping, playing Jenga, and paddleboarding.

is the Centrist Party that Nobody Really Cares About.

somehow is more left-wing than Labour.

Scottish National Party (SNP) (9 (1.4%) seats, with 2.5% of votes)

tonight's Medium-Sized Loser.

led by John Swinney, who was also their leader like 20 years ago.

unsurprisingly, is the Scottish Independence Party. is also more left-wing than Labour.

their colour is yellow, but Tumblr doesn't let me do that.

Reform UK Ltd. (5 (0.8)% seats, with 14.3% of votes)

Fascist Cunts.

led by Nigel Farage.

not actually a political party, for some reason.

enough said. (for now)

Green Party (4 (0.6%) seats, with 6.7% of votes)

the one I voted for.

co-led by Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsey.

the Actually Left-Wing Party. Their slogan is "real hope, real change" which sums it up.

Plaid Cymru (4 (0.6%) seats, with 0.7% of votes)

the SNP, but Welsh. (it's pronounced "Plad Cumry")

led by Rhun ap Iorweth. (pronounced "Rune app You're weth")

their colour is dark green, but Tumblr doesn't let me do that.

None of these parties run for election in Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK, but not part of Great Britain. NI is an entirely different situation which I don't know about.

so what actually Happened? Now that the scene is set, I'll go through the events that transpired, from the conservative landslide in 2019 to the conservative demise in 2024.

2019

the Conservatives don't have enough MPs who want to vote for their Brexit plan, so they call a snap general election. in the UK, our elections aren't at regular intervals. ONLY the Prime Minister decides when they happen, within a 5 year limit. this is important later...!

they win a massive landslide victory, with Boris Johnson as their PM. the SNP wins 48 out of 59 seats in Scotland.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn (affectionately known as Jezza) resigns, as does LibDem leader Jo Swinson.

2020

Keir Starmer takes over as Labour leader, and is immediately very boring. Labour gets more unpopular.

Jezza is kicked out of the Labour party, as are many of his supporters, on false allegations of antisemitism.

Boris finally "gets Brexit done" (this was his slogan.) The Tories get more popular. The Brexit Party changes its name to Reform UK, but they're still considered right-wing extremists

COVID happens. Everyone rallies round the flag. The Tories get more popular.

Boris gets COVID and nearly dies.

top conservative politicians hold parties in Downing Street, breaking their own lockdown rules, but shhhh! nobody knows about that yet! these keep happening until April 2021

The NHS begins to collapse a bit more than it already had, due to Conservative underfunding. The Tories get less popular.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak announces a program giving people discounts to eat out in restaurants. COVID cases spike. The Tories get less popular.

It's revealed that one of the top Tories, Dominic Cummings, broke lockdown rules by visiting family. The Tories get less popular.

End of year - Tories and Labour tied in the polls.

2021

the Queen's husband dies. She goes to his funeral, socially-distanced, alone. on the same day, more Downing Street parties are held.

not much else happens?? until December, when

people start to find out that the Tories were breaking their own rules by partying in Downing Street. Immediately, the Labour Party gains a 7% lead in the polls.

2022 - shit hits the fan

people are MAD about the lockdown parties. it's named Partygate and the police start to investigate.

Russia invades Ukraine. Boris tries to distract everyone by supporting Zelenskyy.

the police conclude their investigation. Boris Johnson becomes the first Prime Minister to have officially broken the law. as a firm punishment, he is fined.... £50. (so are Rishi Sunak, and lots of others.)

Everything gets expensive. Many people are now choosing between eating and heating their home.

Just after this happens, it's revealed that Johnson also gave promotions to a Tory who he knew had committed sexual assault. His cabinet revolts. He is forced to resign as Conservative Party leader. But because he is Prime Minister, he's the only one who can call an election, and he simply chooses not to! because he knows he'd lose!

The new Prime Minister is chosen not by the people, but by the Conservative Party members. people hate this.

Liz Truss beats Rishi Sunak in the final contest. She becomes Prime Minister.

The Queen dies.

Liz Truss crashes the economy. All hell breaks loose. The Labour Party now have a 25% lead in the polls.

The Daily Star starts a YouTube livestream - will Liz Truss leave office before this lettuce expires?

Liz Truss loses control of her MPs. She, too, is forced to resign, just 40 days after becoming PM! Because she doesn't have to call an election, she doesn't.

The lettuce won.

ONCE AGAIN it is up to the Conservative Party leadership to choose a Prime Minister... except nobody wants to be Prime Minister. Rishi Sunak becomes Prime Minister without being elected by ANYBODY

2023

not much extra happens, for a while. people are just sick and tired of the Tories

They decide it's a good idea to try and deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, because immigration is "too high".

Nicola Sturgeon gets bored of being a politician and resigns as SNP leader. Without a clear successor, the SNP destroys itself finding a new leader.

Nicola Sturgeon is also arrested on suspicion of having funnelled money out of the SNP to herself before she resigned! (she's cleared of suspicion, but the public gain a conception of the SNP being corrupt.)

Shit happens in Gaza. The Tories back Israel. Labour, having shifted massively to the right, also back Israel. People become unhappy with both of them, and still are today.

2024

A general election has to happen this year. The Tories are still 20% behind in the polls.

It's announced that the UK entered a small recession at the end of 2023.

Four asylum seekers are sent to Rwanda. They spent £700,000,000 on this.

Rishi constantly dodges questions about when the general election will be, simply saying it will come "in the second half" of the year. Most people think he means autumn.

He did not mean autumn. He calls an election for 4 July, but forgets to bring an umbrella in the process, and gets rained on.

Nigel Farage immediately takes control of Reform UK. (He's allowed to do that because it's technically a company, and as owner of said company he can do what he wants)

Reform UK surges in popularity, reaching 17% in the polls, just behind the Conservatives at 21%

Rishi leaves a D-day event halfway through to give an interview with a TV broadcaster, in which the multimillionaire claimed his childhood was hard because he didn't have Sky TV.

The Conservatives decide to cure their election woes by sending all 18-year-olds to National Service. (ie. military)

It's also revealed that many top Tories placed bets on the election being held on 4 July.

The Conservative Party loses voters to Labour on their left, and to Reform on their right.

election result analysis

where did it go wrong for the Tories? uh, everywhere.

where did it go right for Labour, though? depends who you ask...

voters decisively rejected the Conservatives, choosing either Reform, Labour, or LibDem instead.

however, they weren't enthusiastic about Labour instead. many Labour wins came about as a result of Reform splitting the right-wing vote in half.

polling suggests most people who voted Labour did so to remove the Tories from power.

Fewer people voted for Labour this year than in 2019, but they doubled their seats in Parliament. Our voting system is fucked.

The Green Party quadrupled its seat share. They have won in every seat they have targeted.

Five leftist independent MPs beat Labour in what were "safe" constituencies. One of them was Jeremy Corbyn!! What this shows is that people don't really like Labour, or that people really don't like Labour. They want something better.

The SNP is nearly wiped out in Scotland, despite getting 30% of the Scottish vote. Labour wins most seats in Scotland with 35% of the Scottish vote.

The "Party of Women" (which is literally just TERFs) got fewer votes than the Monster Raving Loony Party. Lmao.

19 people voted for Elmo in Keir Starmer's constituency.

More people voted for the Conservatives and Reform UK combined than they did for Labour. If Labour doesn't get its shit together, we could be in trouble.

what's happened since the election?

7 Labour MPs have already been kicked out of the party for voting to adopt measures to lift 1.6 million children out of poverty

pressure from Greens and independents led to Labour accepting the ICC's arrest warrant for Netanyahu and stopping some arms sales to Israel's genocide.

what happens next?

the Tories choose a new leader on Halloween. other than that? fuck knows lmao. what the 2019-2024 parliament tells us is that anything can happen. as mentioned before, we don't even know when the next election is.

where exactly did Rishi Sunak and the Tories in general fuck up?

you tell me

i also realise just now, after typing all that out, that you asked for a "very brief rub-down" of what happened............. yeah my bad

[listen-to-the-inner-walrus]

clown country [x]

[nando161mando]

Wow. This email from a UK hospital instructs healthcare workers not to test for COVID because it might keep them out of work for longer. What happened to "do no harm"?

(Source: Prof. Stephen Griffin)

https://www.reddit.com/r/HermanCainAward/

[generalelectionmusings]

[fromrusholmewithlove]

The man most responsible for Labour's victory last night is Boris Johnson because he killed all of his own voters

[deweydecimalchickens]

Everyone's desperate for Covid conspiracies. Here's what a real one looks like:

Knickers, dodgy-pills and fake-tan saleswoman Michelle Mone is made a Conservative life peer. For her contribution to society, presumably. We can't vote her out. We're stuck with her. She is in one of our Houses of Parliament until she or it croaks. She'd vote on our laws, which would be terrifying, if she ever bothered to turn up to work.

Mone uses her government links to bypass normal tendering processes and get the company PPE Medpro into the 'VIP lane' for government contracts during the Covid pandemic. PPE Medpro is not even incorporated as a company at this point, let alone qualified and experienced, but is subsequently awarded £200 million of government business to supply medical gowns. Mone insists she does not benefit from this so there's no possible impropriety.

The contract is waved through unscrutinised due to the public health emergency. Frontline healthcare workers are getting sick and dying because of the lack of safety gear. Contracts going through the VIP lane are 10x more successful than those going through the normal public tender process. Also the VIP lane will subsequently be declared illegal.

These gowns are never actually used, as they don't meet the British Standard and never make it through the medical regulator's process to get an exemption. The government is refusing to confirm this due to the 'commercial sensitivity' of the 'mediation' process, but it's widely reported. Also the British taxpayer is still paying money to store the things.

PPE MedPro deposits £29 million in an offshore trust. You get three guesses as to the beneficiary, and the first two don't count. Rhymes with 'Bone', as in what they've done to us.

This is what an actual conspiracy looks like. It's just capitalism and political patronage, which nobody finds very exciting. No Bill Gates microchipping your kids. Just rich fuckers passing money around and profiteering from misery and death while you all keep voting for them.

[lesbiansandgayssupporttheminers]

[dailyhistoryposts]

On This Day In History

January 31st, 2020: The United Kingdom ceases to be a member state of the European Union, though it continued to participate for eleven months during a transition period.

Data on the impacts of Brexit are scarce, due to the small amount of time and COVID-19, which also has strong impacts on the economy and international trade. Still, it appears that so far Brexit has been bad for the British economy on all counts, in line with the predictions of nearly every economist. It helped contribute to the current United Kingdom cost-of-living crisis.