#zero covid policy

[panicinthestudio]

COVID rapidly spreads in China as government eases strict quarantine rules, December 27, 2022

China is grappling with the rapid spread of COVID-19 after the government began rolling back its zero-COVID restrictions earlier this month. Now, cases are spiraling across towns and cities, hospitals are overburdened, medical staff are outnumbered and crematoriums are running out of space. Judy Woodruff reports.

PBS NewsHour

There is no nuance left in politics or public health policy when there is either an absolute and strict inflexibility of zero COVID or wholesale dismantling of safeguards before the healthcare or support systems are prepared for the waves that have been forcibly suppressed. The political insistence on using their own less effective, non-mRNA vaccines based on the original strains rather than Delta or Omicron, coupled with a low vaccination rate of the vulnerable and elderly is not helping easing the transition at all.

The way they’ve been counting mortality from COVID diverged from nearly every other country since early 2020. A death had to be directly attributable to SARS-CoV-2 eliminating cases of many preexisting or undiagnosed conditions, chronic illnesses, and other high risk factors that may have been exacerbated by the virus which became listed as the direct cause or if they simply tested negative in the few days before dying. The policy as of this week will further limit the count only to deaths caused by pneumonia or respiratory failure after contracting COVID, in addition to dropping much of the remaining inbound quarantines and regular case counts becoming even more inconsistent with lived reality.

It appears the PRC was prepared to stay in suspended animation within an onionskin of self-isolation layers indefinitely, maintaining the appearance of control and adherence to policy that was left to different local officials to execute. Downgrading the classification removes the local, emergency-style powers to lockdown and quarantine which were used capriciously. Residential buildings, offices and commercial areas such as malls, and even theme parks could be suddenly cordoned without warning, causing panic due to the stringency of testing and knock-on effects if a positive case was found rather than fear of having contacted or contracted the virus. Becoming listed as a close contact or a complete stranger’s positive result could mean further quarantining and repeated testing, as well any change in one’s COVID passport status severely restricting mobility for work or education, travel, or even basic necessities. The protests spread because “dynamic zero” was anything but dynamic, refusing to change or amend course in preparation for a transition to an endemic or post-epidemic state. People were simply fed up and the building momentum was becoming a potential danger to a regime that had just renewed its own political mandates.

These things aren’t happening in isolation, China is also changing tact on its travel restrictions domestically and internationally. The Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macau have been trying to reopen ports and travel with the Mainland for years now for travel and economic reasons. Both were forced into accepting one-way policies where it was difficult for their citizens to enter China or even between one another, while rules were softened for travelers and politicians entering from and returning to the Mainland for short trips with the reason that the pandemic was less well-contained than within the Mainland.

As news of the highly visible current outbreak within China is continuing to emerge, the Hong Kong SAR is now proudly announcing agreements have been made with the Mainland to drop their travel restrictions posthaste. It’s being reported that many are travelling specifically for mRNA vaccines which are approved in Macau and Hong Kong.

[tomorrowusa]

The spy balloon isn’t hugely significant on its own, but it adds to the sense that Beijing’s competence has been exaggerated.

David Leonhardt at the New York Times.

There’s been a lot of hype regarding China this century. But a number of its actions suggest that its success has been overstated.

China is a totalitarian state. The government tries to micromanage the lives of its citizens. The way it handled the COVID-19 pandemic was an avoidable disaster.

The Chinese government foolishly refused to use mRNA vaccines produced in Europe and North America. Its own homemade vaccines were less effective and required the draconian “zero COVID” policy to keep the virus from spreading.

This article may explain why the Chinese government failed to effectively vaccinate its population when it could easily afford to.

Moderna refused China request to reveal vaccine technology, Financial Times reports

China has had a policy of forcing foreign companies to share their tech secrets as a prerequisite for doing business in China. Western businesses, salivating at the thought of massive profits on the mainland, mostly agreed. China was probably able to gather more tech know-how this way than through industrial espionage and hacking.

So Moderna (and likely BioNTech & Pfizer) wisely refused to hand their intellectual property over to the Chinese authorities. So the only people in China who eventually received the mRNA vaccines were foreign nationals who lived in the country.

As I noted a minute ago, China can easily afford the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines but the government has refused to import them because the companies would not submit to tech extortion.

When China’s zero COVID policy abruptly ended, the longstanding effort to extract intellectual property from the West severely backfired. Many of China’s top scholars, scientists, and intellectuals were among the numerous COVID-19 fatalities. It’s true that they were mostly elderly, but many still had years of productivity ahead of them.

In China’s Covid Fog, Deaths of Scholars Offer a Clue

Those are just the more famous ones. There are probably many additional less well-known scientists who died in recent months.

So the Chinese government is not only less competent than it would like the world to believe but it is also less competent than many anti-Chinese politicians in the West would like to have us believe.

[nepalniceties]

Study shows Covid infected in China reaches 900 million

Study shows Covid infected in China reaches 900 million

A study conducted by Peking University has revealed that around 900 million people in China have been infected with the Coronavirus as of 11 January. As per the report, 64% of the country’s population is estimated to have contracted the virus. Top three provinces with higher infection rate are Gansu province- with 91% of the people reported to be infected, followed by Yunnan (84%) and Qinghai…

[thistlecrimes]

Things I've learned from getting covid for the first time in 2023

I wear an N95 in public spaces and I've managed to dodge it for a long time, but I finally got covid for the first time (to my knowledge) in mid-late November 2023. It was a weird experience especially because I feel like it used to be something everyone was talking about and sharing info on, so getting it for the first time now (when people generally seem averse to talking about covid) I found I needed to seek out a lot of info because I wasn't sure what to do. I put so much effort into prevention, I knew less about what to do when you have it. I'm experiencing a rebound right now so I'm currently isolating. So, I'm making a post in the hopes that if you get covid (it's pretty goddamn hard to avoid right now) this info will be helpful for you. It's a couple things I already knew and several things I learned. One part of it is based on my experience in Minnesota but some other states may have similar programs.

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The World Health Organization states you should isolate for 10 days from first having symptoms plus 3 days after the end of symptoms.

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At the time of my writing this post, in Minnesota, we have a test to treat program where you can call, report the result of your rapid test (no photo necessary) and be prescribed paxlovid over the phone to pick up from your pharmacy or have delivered to you. It is free and you do not need to have insurance. I found it by googling "Minnesota Test to Treat Covid"

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Paxlovid decreases the risk of hospitalization and death, but it's also been shown to decrease the risk of Long Covid. Long Covid can occur even from mild or asymptomatic infections.

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Covid rebound commonly occurs 2-8 days after apparent recovery. While many people associate Paxlovid with covid rebound, researchers say there is no strong evidence that Paxlovid causes covid rebound, and rebounds occur in infections that were not treated with Paxlovid as well. I knew rebounds could happen but did not know it could take 8 days. I had mine on day 7 and was completely surprised by it.

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If you start experiencing new symptoms or test positive again, the CDC states that you should start your isolation period again at day zero. Covid rebound is still contagious. Personally I'd suggest wearing a high quality respirator around folks for an additional 8-9 days after you start to test negative in case of a rebound.

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Positive results on a rapid test can be very faint, but even a very faint line is positive result. Make sure to look at your rapid test result under strong lighting. Also, false negatives are not uncommon. If you have symptoms but test negative taking multiple tests and trying different brands if you have them are not bad ideas. My ihealth tests picked up my covid, my binax now tests did not.

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EDIT: I'd highly suggest spending time with friends online if you can, I previously had a link to the NAMI warmline directory in this post but I've since been informed that NAMI is very much funded by pharmaceutical companies and lobbies for policies that take autonomy away from disabled folks, so I've taken that off of here! Sorry, I had no idea, the People's CDC listed them as a resource so I just assumed they were legit! Feel free to reply/reblog this with other warmlines/support resources if you know of them! And please reblog this version!

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I know that there is so much we can't control as individuals right now, and that's frightening. All we can do is try our best to reduce harm and to care for each other. I hope this info will be able to help folks.

[auressea]

Where and How do we get new testkits? public health stopped supplying them-all the old ones have expired.

Some recent COVID-19 news

Growing Concern for back to school as data shows rising COVID cases in B.C.

A grassroots group of health professionals are calling for British Columbia to reinstate mask mandates in schools and hospitals to prevent a repeat “tripledemic” of COVID-19, RSV and influenza infections that pushed the province’s hospitals to the brink last fall.

And with data showing rising COVID-19 cases in B.C. and two new viral subvariants on the horizon, Protect Our Province B.C. says the province should act sooner rather than later.

The group is composed of more than a dozen doctors, nurses, researchers, teachers and professionals who advocate for evidence-based pandemic policies.

“We know from last year kids and schools were hit hard and if the goal is to keep kids learning in school we need to do what we can to prevent virus spread this fall,” said Dr. Lyne Filiatrault, a retired emergency room physician in Vancouver and a member of the group.

COVID response confounds SARS expert

As COVID-19 surges globally, a leading infectious disease specialist is confounded by the lack of pandemic mitigation measures in Ontario.

Q: What is your advice for people who want to stay safe this fall?

Dr. Dick Zoutman: “One is to be informed. I do recommend Dr. Tara Moriarty’s website — COVID19resources.ca,” Zoutman said. “We owe her a large debt.”

Second, when the latest COVID-19 vaccine is available, “get it,” he recommended.

Third, “buy N95 respirators and make sure you have plenty and have one with you all the time. And when you go into an indoor public space — be it a hospital, a bank, a grocery store, school — put it on. The best ones are the ones that go around your head, because they’re tighter.”

Fourth, antigen rapid tests must be made widely available. “If you have any symptoms, you need to test and isolate yourself.”

Finally, avoid indoor public places this fall, he said. “I haven’t eaten in a restaurant in almost four years, and I don’t intend to.”

[srilanka1234]

China says restrictions on its travellers abroad discriminatory: Warns countermeasures

[newscast1]

Taiwan offers support to China to deal with deadly Covid outbreak

Taiwan offers support to China to deal with deadly Covid outbreak

Taiwan has announced its decision to offer support to China to deal with the deadly Covid outbreak. Taiwan and China have repeatedly sparred over their respective measures to control the spread of Covid. New Delhi,UPDATED: Jan 1, 2023 11:50 IST A patient with Covid rests in a wheelchair in a hallway at Tangshan Gongren Hospital in China’s northeastern city of Tangshan. (Photo: AFP) By India…

[allforhopes]

The development of China’s Covid situation, overall, in line with expectation and under control, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs says.

China is confident to keep smooth and orderly shift in its Covid policy, Wan Wenbin, the spokesman of the Ministry says, responding to some western media’s recent defamation of its change in handing the Covid.

What underlies these tones is public trick and defamation full of prejudice and political manipulation with ulterior motives, which not only fails to get pass the factual scrutiny, but also betrays the truth. The international community has seen it very clearly without being misled.

“The truth is that, over the three years since the outbreak of the pandemic, the Chinese government has assembled all the resources and made its full efforts to safeguard each Chinese’s life safety and health, all along adhering to the principle of People First, Life First, withstanding round after round of impact, and effectively getting through the hardest times when the virus was the most rampant.”Wan says. On the perspective of entire globe, China has the lowest critical care ratio and mortality rate. Chinese’s average life expectancy is lifted from 77.3 to 78.2. In the context that the global Human Development Index has fallen for 2 years in a row, China’s HDI has climbed up the rankings for 6 positions.

Against the backdrop of plainly decreased pathogenility and virulence of Omiron variant, and continuously-increased capabilities in our medical care and treatment, pathogene testing , China has taken proactive and optimal measures to fight the pandemic, adapting itself to the timing and tendency, including the orderly introduction of Twenty Rules and New Twenty Rules, formulation of the proposals, adjusting the category B, management A of Corona virus to category B, management B, gradually refocusing its efforts on prevention of critical condition and preservation of health, a shift from previous epidemic prevention. These measures are scientific, timely and necessary, to safeguard the people’s life and health to the greatest extend, and lessen the impact of the pandemic on economic and social development as much as possible.

Each country undergoes an adaption period at the shift of its epidemic policies. China is no exception.

[theculturedmarxist]

In photos of 2023’s World Economic Forum- or Davos as it is commonly called, after the Swiss resort town where it annually occurs- you might not notice the HEPA filters. They’re in the background, unobtrusive and unremarked upon, quietly cleansing the air of viruses and bacteria. You wouldn’t know- not unless you asked- that every attendee was PCR tested before entering the forum, or that in the case of a positive test, access was automatically, electronically, revoked. And if you happened to get a glimpse of the strange blue lights overhead, you could reasonably assume that their glow was simply a modern aesthetic choice, not the calming buzz of cutting edge Far UVC technology- demonstrated to kill microbes in the air.

It’s hard to square this information with the public narrative about COVID, isn’t it? President Biden has called the pandemic “over”. The New York Times recently claimed that “the risk of Covid is similar to that of the flu” in an article about “hold outs” that are annoyingly refusing to accept continual reinfection as their “new normal”. Yet, this week the richest people in the world are taking common sense, easy- but strict- precautions to ensure they don’t catch Covid-19 at Davos.

These common sense, easy precautions include high-quality ventiliation, use of Far UVC-lighting technology, and PCR testing. You’ll also see some masks at Davos, but generally, the testing + air filtration protocol seems to be effective at preventing the kind of super-spreader events most of us are now accustomed to attending.

It seems unlikely to me that a New York Times reporter will follow the super-rich around like David Attenborough on safari, the way one of their employees did when they profiled middle-class maskers last month. I doubt they will write “family members and friends can get a little exasperated by the hyper-concern” about the assembled Prime Ministers, Presidents and CEOs in Switzerland. After all, these are important people. The kind of people who merit high-quality ventilation. The kind of people who deserve accurate tests.

Why is the media so hellbent on portraying simple, scientifically proven measures like high-quality ventilation as ridiculous and unnecessary as hundreds of people continue to die daily here in the US?

Why is the public accepting a “new normal” where we are expected to get infected over and over and over again, at work events with zero precautions, on airplanes with no masks, and at social dinners trying to approximate our 2019 normal?

We deserve better. We deserve to be #DavosSafe as the hashtag going around on twitter puts it. Your children deserve to be treated with the care that world leaders are treating each other. Your family deserves to be protected from the disease which is still- unlike the flu- the third leading cause of death in the US. We don’t deserve to be shoved back into poorly ventilated workplaces while our politicians and press assure us that only crazy people would demand to breathe clean air.

Clean water and clean food are rights we fought for; we have regulatory bodies that ensure we aren’t exposed to pathogens via our water supply nor our food. In 1854, John Snow famously conducted his Broad Street Pump study in London and demonstrated that cholera was water-bourne; however, it took decades for our public policy to catch up with our scientific knowledge.

A public health case study published by the NBCI describes the years that followed:

The first use of chlorine as a disinfectant for water facilities was in 1897 in England. The first use of this method for municipal water facilities in the United States was in Jersey City, New Jersey, and Chicago, Illinois, in 1915. Other cities followed and the use of chlorination as standard treatment for water disinfection rapidly grew. During the 20th century, death rates from waterborne diseases decreased significantly, and although other additional factors contributed to the general improvements in health (such as sanitation, improved quality of life, and nutrition), the improvement of water quality was, without doubt, a major reason.

Forty-three years passed from the initial demonstration that pathogens were being spread via water, and public action and regulation to halt disease.

Can you imagine, in the 1890s, being somebody who argued against cleaning the water?

Can you imagine, in those years of plentiful cholera, calling the people who demanded shit-free water “hold outs”?

One thing COVID realists are accused of is being “doomsayers” and “fearmongers,” so let me share a dose of optimism about the future with you. When we choose- whenever we choose- to get COVID under control, there’s an exciting new world awaiting us. One, not only without constant COVID reinfection, but where our kids can grow up free of colds, flus, RSV, and many other common bugs. And no, contrary to what you may have heard, staying healthy (shockingly enough) is not bad for children!

Once we choose to institute ventilation standards and introduce new technologies like Far UVC lighting- and embrace masking as an easy, kind, and useful tool to control outbreaks- we can bring every nasty airborne pathogen under control the way we did cholera. We didn’t have the science before; now we do. (I mean that quite literally; I can’t recommend enough the linked Wired article cataloguing the long journey to establishing that Covid is, indeed, airborne).

We face a stark choice; down one road, the one with zero infrastructure upgrades, no air quality regulations, and Covid safety only for those who can afford it, you and your family will get Covid this year. You will get Covid next year. You will continue to get Covid over and over and over again, as the health problems - like cardiac damage, viral persistance, and immune system dysfunction- continue to build up. (The billionaires, of course, will not).

Down the other road, we quite simply treat ourselves the way Davos would. We engage with what the science is telling us and we build a safer, better world for our kids. We embrace the lessons this pandemic is teaching us, and let go of things we now know are harming people. We stop clinging desperately to the idea that 2019 will come back if we just get the virus one more time, and we come together to achieve what we’ve been told is impossible: elimination.

The economic elite thrive on our divisiveness and blame casting. They don’t mind that we’re calling each other names, engaging in racial stereotyping, or leaving disabled people to die, so long as we keep their machine running. But we can choose to stop throwing blame at each other, and direct it where it belongs: at the powerful people who’ve left us to suffer, at the politicians who are whipping people into a frenzy over masks instead of over our millions of dead, at the talking heads on TV that work so hard to convince us: you want to get sick. It’s better than being a *weirdo* or a *hold out*.

We needn’t wait 43 years to redirect our energies. France and Belgium have already introduced new air quality standards, and DIY projects to build Corsi-Rosenthal boxes for schools and healthcare settings have popped up around the country. We have the science, we have the technology. All we need now is the political will and the solidarity to truly end the pandemic- the kind of solidarity the super rich always show with one another.

The billionaires at Davos don’t accept continual Covid reinfection. They demand better. It’s time we demand better too.

[afeelgoodblog]

The Best News of Last Week

🌍🌡️ - Climate Prophecy: The Forecast Is 100% Chance of 'Cool'

1. No cases of cancer caused by HPV in Norwegian 25-year olds, the first cohort to be mass vaccinated for HPV

Last year there were zero cases of cervical cancer in the population that was vaccinated in 2009 against the HPV virus, which can cause the cancer in women. The HPV virus is extremely common, basically everyone comes into contact with one version or another of the virus in their lifetime.

The vaccine was given to girls only out of an abundance of caution, they were the most likely to contract cancer from the viruses, and because there was limited supply.

2. ‘Every square inch is covered in life’: the ageing oil rigs that became marine oases

Built decades ago, California’s offshore oil platforms are home to a huge diversity of marine life. According to a 2014 study, the rigs were some of the most “productive” ocean habitats in the world, a term that refers to biomass – or number of fish and other creatures and how much space they take up – per unit area.

3. Vaccinations may have prevented almost 20 million COVID-19 deaths worldwide

Vaccinations estimated to have averted 19.8 million COVID-19 deaths worldwide in their first year, according to the latest Imperial modelling study.

In the first year of the vaccination programme, 19.8 million out of a potential 31.4 million COVID-19 deaths were prevented worldwide according to estimates based on excess deaths from 185 countries and territories.

4. Global climate policy forecast predicts ‘well below 2°C’ Paris Agreement climate goals will be met

They report only a 10% probability we exceed 2°C by 2050. Temperatures are expected to peak between 1.7°C and 1.8°C, which is consistent with the “well below 2°C” objective of the Paris Agreement in Art. 2.1c.

5. Young driver fatality rates have fallen sharply in the US, helped by education, technology

Crash and fatality rates among drivers under 21 have fallen dramatically in the U.S. during the past 20 years.

Using data from 2002-2021, the report says that fatal crashes involving a young driver fell by 38%, while deaths of young drivers dropped even more, by about 45%.

6. A Virginia woman was feeling sad. Her doctor prescribed her a cat.

7. Remote workers report saving $5,000 to $10,000 a year

What value would American workers place on the privilege to work from home?

In a 2022 survey by FlexJobs, 45% of remote workers reported saving at least $5,000 a year. One in 5 reported saving $10,000 a year. The savings average out to about $6,000 a year. The poll reached 4,000 workers in July and August of last year.

Three years into the remote-work revolution, research increasingly suggests that telework is a commodity, a job descriptor worth thousands of dollars in potential savings and improved quality of life.

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That's it for this week :)

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[triviallytrue]

Tbf you can make the argument that we relaxed about covid too quick and everyone should've pursued a China-style zero covid policy forever. And you'd be wrong (even China realized this was stupid), but it's an argument

What you can't argue is "the pandemic is still going on and everyone just magically decided to ignore that" because it is extremely blatantly false

[prolibytherium]

I drove 220 miles for this.

Today my Fargo quest becomes a reality. Any of my 278 tpotal followers happen to live in Fargo and want to have some sort of freakish encounter (nonsexual) in a Hornbachers parking lot . Not saying which Hornbachers if it's meant to be we will find each other on vibes alone

[dosesofcommonsense]

Foreign Aid, Renewable Energy, Earth’s temperature - ALL money laundering platforms that produce zero results.

Israel spends more on their New Jersey sized piece of land per capita than any other country. The US doesn’t have a secure border, but we sent $28B to Israel to reinforce their border. Israel has an Iron Dome. They know everything coming in and out. The US currently has an open door policy and Kamala and the Red Cross are telling people where to enter. We should support Israel, BUT we should not help any other country until we fix our own: take care of our troops, pay off our debts, pay out the retirements that have been built and help people create private retirement accounts not controlled or spent by the government, end homelessness, end hunger. IF we ever fixed all that stuff, then we can consider helping someone else…and to all the countries who hate us and burn our flag and seek our death, they don’t get a cent.

Renewable Energy DEPENDS upon oil. You cannot get renewable energy without oil. You cannot build it or maintain it without oil.

Climate. Carbon is good for the environment. Plants use it and give us oxygen. Cut carbon and people would die. It’s pushed globally by the same groups that brought COVID and the MRNA death sticks. They wanted to kill you, and it hasn’t changed. Why believe them this time after countless lies and attempts to kill you?

[matan4il]

Daily update post:

You might have seen me mentioning before the Palestinian Authority's "Pay for Slay" policy, where they pay Palestinian terrorists based on how deadly their attacks have been. Let me share something even worse: based on the Oslo peace accords from the 1990's, Israel collects the Palestinian tax money, and then passes it along to the PA. Which means, when Israel became aware of the "Pay for Slay" law (yes, turns out that it's a LAW, not just a program, that the Palestinian Authority pays terrorists... the same PA that now has the audacity to claim at the International court in Hague that Israel is committing a genocide, meaning the intentional destruction of, or a part of, a nation... I think a LAW that financially incentivizes terrorists to kill members of the Israeli nation fits), it also realized that Israeli authorities, paying with Israeli tax payer money for the work done by Israeli clerks tasked with doing this, has been collecting and passing along money that goes to pay Palestinian terrorists for having attacked, injured and murdered Israelis. In what world is that right? In what world is it moral to make a victim, through a "peace accord" participate in the payment to its victimizer? As part of the money collected by Israel and given to the PA, an annual 278 million dollars (!) are then passed by it to Palestinian terrorists for hurting and killing Israelis. The PA has already added Oct 7 terrorists, most of them Hamas members, to the list of those being paid thanks to the "Pay for Slay" law.

The annual payment was revealed thanks to a lawsuit by the parents of 26 years old Dalia Lemkus, who was stabbed to death in Nov 2014 by a Palestinian terrorist (he also injured 2 others. Dalia herself had survived a previous terrorist attack in 2006. On the day she was murdered, another Israeli was killed in a separate terrorist attack. I don't think most people realize just how intense Palestinian terrorism is). The lawsuit was filed against the PA, which has been paying him 3,300 dollars a month. This is Dalia, may her memory be a blessing:

I'm not gonna lie, I'm thinking about the fact that coincidentally, I've been at our Holocaust museum and education center since Nov 2014, with the purpose of helping to educate against antisemitism, racism, homophobia, every other type of generalized hatred that humans are capable of, and against genocide, which is the possible consequence of that type of hate. And a part of what's wrong with this world, is that even with me being a "veteran," I get paid less money a month than that Palestinian terrorist does for having murdered a Jewish woman based on that kind of generalized hatred. My income depends on how many tours, lectures or workshops I did that month, but in almost 10 years of working there, I have never had a month where I got a salary of 3,300 dollars, most months I don't make it to half of that, and I have had many months where my salary was zero (during Covid, and whenever the security situation is bad enough that no one comes to our museum). Don't get me wrong, I consciously made a choice to do this work, where my salary would be very low, because I wanted to do something meaningful, I'm not complaining, but I can't help thinking about the fact that a part of why antisemitism thrives, is because it IS socially and financially rewarded, clearly more so than fighting it. That was true before and during the Holocaust, and sadly has been true since as well.

I would love to understand how the evacuation of civilian Gazans out of the war zone is described as "ethnic cleansing" or worse, but not the evacuation of Ukrainian civilians out of those war zones, and not the evacuation of a Hamas-affiliated Al Jazeera "journalist" (who documented himself in southern Israel during Hamas' massacre), taken out of Gaza to Egypt, to be flown from there to Qatar, one of the two great financiers of Hamas (along with Iran). Qatar has not opened up its gates to wounded Gazan civilians. It's clear Ismail Abu Omar was given this special treatment precisely because he is a Hamas terrorist. What's scary about this possibility is that the IDF didn't know he was smuggled out of Gaza, begging the question, who else is Hamas smuggling out? Also, this is Hamas' middle finger to anyone claiming Gaza is closed off, and an open air prison or concentration camp...

Speaking of Qatar, it is currently hosting the swimming world championship. Israeli swimmer Anastasia Gorbenko won a silver medal, a huge Israeli achievement, but she got repeatedly booed by the crowd, including during the medals ceremony. Anastasia has a childhood classmate who is currently held hostage in Gaza. She dedicated her medal to him.

A TV report by an Israeli journalist (source in Hebrew) is about a Hamas document dated May 2023, which the IDF found, the summary of a Hamas leaders meeting. It details some of the considerations for the timing of "the big project," listing 4 Jewish holidays as possibilities for the massacre (including Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish year, and Simchat Torah, when the massacre actually took place), so it's clear Hamas was always going to use our holy days against us. Another thing mentioned is that Hamas must strike before Israel deploys Magen Or (literally: shield of light, but most publications in English refer to it as Iron Beam), the laser-based defense system meant to complement Iron Dome. The system has been making a lot of progress, enough that by Oct 2023 there have been reports on it becoming operational soon. The document mentions making Israel used to Hamas conducting large scale exercises close to the border, so that the commotion ahead of the massacre wouldn't look abnormal, and it also mentions making use of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the second biggest Palestinian terrorist organization in Gaza. It wasn't included in the plans, but was being relied on. In recent years, all of Israel's operations in Gaza have been against PIJ, and Hamas chose not to join them, the document indicates that this was done in order to reinforce the idea in Israel that Hamas is more interested in the wellfare of Gazans, than in killing Israelis. At the same time, the document warns not to let PIJ fuck up Hamas' planned operation.

I did not write about the private initiative of family members to send medications through international mediators to Hamas, meant for the hostages, for the simple reason that I did not for a second believe Hamas would give the hostages these meds. I didn't wanna get my hopes up, when logically, I was sure such initiatives were futile. Now, thanks to the IDF's operation in the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, we have confirmation that these meds were found in its pharmacy, with the names of the hostages on the unopened boxes, meaning the kidnapped Israelis never got them. We can assume the meds were kept in the hospital pharmacy, either to serve Hamas terrorists, or to be sold, with the money going to Hamas.

This is Matan ben Ari, the last Israeli injured on Oct 7 (out of thousands) to be discharged from the hospital on Dec 1, almost two full months after Hamas' massacre. People spontaneously gathered around to applaud him as he was making his way out:

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[covid-safer-hotties]

Reference saved in our archive

An interesting political preprint

Introduction

In the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia was the envy of the world. While other countries were overwhelmed by widespread transmission, staggering mortality rates and overrun health systems, Australia remained largely COVID-free. Dubbed the “hermit kingdom”, Australia quickly closed international borders in March 2020 and implemented a nationwide “shutdown” – the first of multiple lockdowns – to flatten the curve of transmission. Though initially slow to act, former Prime Minister Scott Morrison begrudgingly abandoned his neoliberal commitment to balancing budgets and small government for a Keynesian approach to ensure Australians could weather the storm. Public health measures started to ease in April as case numbers drastically decreased and Australia was globally hailed a COVID success. Australians emerged from 2020 with a newfound sense of camaraderie and hope for positive change after such a circuit-breaking catastrophe. Two years later, however, Australia faced widespread infection, mass disability and a 13 percent excess mortality rate for the first eight months of 2022. How did Australia transition so suddenly from zero-COVID to COVID-central?

This chapter will explore the ideology underpinning the federal government’s decision to “let rip”. I will begin my analysis by tracing the different approaches undertaken by the Morrison government, from the beginning of the pandemic to the Omicron wave. I will then identify three pillars of thought underpinning his “let it rip” policy – neoliberalism, prosperity gospel and social Darwinism – that I argue are one and the same. Lastly, I will examine the Albanese government’s response to COVID and the apparent acceptance of “living with COVID” by the Australian people, using a Gramscian analysis to explain this attitudinal shift.

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China slams 'distorted' reports on Covid response, eases further curbs

China slams ‘distorted’ reports on Covid response, eases further curbs

China will resume issuing passports for tourism in another big step away from anti-Covid controls, that isolated the country for almost three years, as it further eases curbs amid a massive spike in infection. A health worker waits for people to take swab samples to test for the Covid-19 coronavirus inside of a compound in the Jing’an district in Shanghai. (Photo: AFP) By India Today Web Desk:…