The Great Barrington Declaration has been signed by over 5000 scientists and 10,000 doctors and argues for the lifting of general lockdowns on the grounds that they have a greater negative impact on public health than Covid19. It also points out that the lockdown impacts most on the poor and the young while Covid19 impacts the old and the rich. It points out that children are more likely to die from influenza than Covid19. It is worth a read and is food for thought.
The Great Barrington Declaration
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I've long been of the opinion that the people with the power and the money, and so the loudest voice, are the people most as risk of dying from this and so have led the reaction to this disease. Those with the least power and the least money are disproportionately impacted by the lockdown; one in four under 25's have lost their job as a result of the lockdown. If the impacts were reversed we would be having a totally different conversation.
I read it. It's fantasy \ aspirational stuff to be honest.
No attempt made to really explain how we handle multi-generational households, or households say with a vulnerable parent and school aged child.
This is one of their actual proposals: "nursing homes should use staff with acquired immunity"
How do they acquire this immunity?
What if you don't have enough staff with immunity?
What about nursing home staff who are themselves vulnerable, or have vulnerable family members?
Fantasy stuff.
And thousands of scientists signed this statement?
4% of covid deaths in the US were under 65s with no co-morbidities such as heart disease etc.
This is not a risk free disease to working age people.
I read a criticism elsewhere which said you can tell it is written by epidemologists - Immunologists are thrashing it as it assumes people once infected are immune for years afterwards as as given, when we have no firm idea on this.
They should have just outlined the public health impacts of the restrictions, lockdown etc and stuck to that.
No attempt made to really explain how we handle multi-generational households, or households say with a vulnerable parent and school aged child.
This is one of their actual proposals: "nursing homes should use staff with acquired immunity"
How do they acquire this immunity?
What if you don't have enough staff with immunity?
What about nursing home staff who are themselves vulnerable, or have vulnerable family members?
Fantasy stuff.
And thousands of scientists signed this statement?
4% of covid deaths in the US were under 65s with no co-morbidities such as heart disease etc.
This is not a risk free disease to working age people.
I read a criticism elsewhere which said you can tell it is written by epidemologists - Immunologists are thrashing it as it assumes people once infected are immune for years afterwards as as given, when we have no firm idea on this.
They should have just outlined the public health impacts of the restrictions, lockdown etc and stuck to that.
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Should we lift all restrictions on smoking in public because children are too young to develop lung cancer???
I don't know why that 'fact' is in any way relevant.
The problem is that there's no attempt by immunologists and others to explain how the current policies will be paid for, are sustainable or are and will impact on public health in the short to medium term. If 25% of the highly paid people on NEPHT, who have 100% job security, were going to lose their job and possibly their homes and were going to see a escalation of mental health issues, addiction issues, domestic abuse etc within their own families then I suspect they would hold different views on how to treat this.
Public Health is about more than Covid19. It is about the health and wellness of the population at large. The current policies we have in place are economically and socially unsustainable and are based on a false certainty that we will have billions of doses of a 80% plus effective vaccine in the short term. If that isn't fantasy/aspirational stuff I don't know what is.
I presume you know that smoking isn't a virus so I don't know how that is relevant.
We don't close schools when there's a flu outbreak.
Edit; In the context of the impact of Lockdowns on children this is worth a read
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It seems relevant, if you are comparing public health measures and assessing the impact of a disease on different demographics.
My point was, you cannot just look at the impact of a disease on one demographic in assessing what public health measures it warrants.
If you just looked at the impact on children, you might conclude coronavirus should be less of a public health concern than flu - and that would be assuming there are no long term effects to coronavirus infection we haven't yet discovered.
If you look at the impact on all demographics, it is clear that coronavirus is a higher order of threat - as we have no vaccine at all, nor prior immunity to strains and quite possibly it is just a more severe disease.
We haven't closed schools in this phase, but we closed them in earlier phases - as much as the risk to children, as for the risk that they would spread it to more vulnerable demographics. They are open in this phase because of their essential purpose.
Any non-essential collection of people with the same risk would not be permitted.
Immunologists don't have to explain how it will be paid for.
That is up to governments to balance - and to judge what the immunologists & epidemologists are telling them and to balance that against what is economically feasible.
Epidemologists stressing to governments that the restrictions have public health costs which need to be factored into those decisions - that's what they should be doing.
But...
Epidemologists assuming that infected people retain protection long term and that we should base public health policy on this assumption - fantasy stuff.
Epidemologists assuming that infected people don't have any long term health issues - fantasy stuff.
Epidemologists suggesting as a practical solution that nursing home staff should be hired from the infected - fantasy stuff.
And... if we want to talk about the societal impact of the lockdown, while domestic abuse incidents increased by 25%.
Residential burglaries were down by almost 60% (59.7%) and burglary elsewhere reduced by half (49.2%).
Crimes against the person were down by over a quarter (27.4%).
Drop in most reported crime but rise in domestic abuse
Gardaí say Covid-19 has led to significant reductions in most reported crime in March and April of this year.
Let's imagine if coronavirus hit children the way it actually hits over 65s and those with pre-existing conditions.
And let's imagine over 65s were mostly immune to it.
If we had had hundreds of children dying in the spring, we'd have been in lockdown.
So if you're trying to sell the theory we're in lockdown because the old and rich are most vulnerable to this, I think this little thought experiment shows it how false the theory is.
I think that's the biggest problem with nphet they are not affected themselves by the restrictions, it's very easy to recommend heavy restrictions when you and your colleagues will not pay the price, the price will be paid predominantly by small businesses. Then when the corona infections go down due to those restrictions you get all the kudos, there was a bit of that with Tony holohan.
Contrast that with the captain of the titanic who when the ship was going down made decisions that saved the most vulnerable ,the women and children, yet he and the top brass went down with the ship.
Contrast that with the captain of the titanic who when the ship was going down made decisions that saved the most vulnerable ,the women and children, yet he and the top brass went down with the ship.
I'd prefer if the captain of the ship hadn't sunk it to be honest. Maybe a captain who wasn't thinking of losing his job for travelling slower through dangerous waters wouldn't have hit that iceberg.
It would be wrong of NPHET to consider the economic cost of it, that's not their job and it would contaminate their advice.
It's up to the government to take the advice from NPHET and other experts and balance that in their decisions.
The pilot of a ship guiding a vessel into port shouldn't be thinking about whether the captain will lose his bonus for arriving late.
Sure, but I assume they assume that they will continue to be paid.
And socially viable. Recessions kill people too. They don't kill well paid and economically billetproof State employees though.
I agree, but other than vague lip service I see no evidence of them doing so.
Really? Assuming that it is likely that people will have a resistance to a disease they have already contracted and recovered from is fantasy stuff? I don't hear anyone of note suggesting that everyone who gets it will be immune but it would be bizarre to think that some form of immunity is likely.
Really? A small minority of people will have long term health issues, just as an even smaller minority of people will die from it, but give the vast weight of evidence that to date the vast majority of people make a full and complete recovery within a few weeks why do you think it is fantasy stuff to think that the vast majority of people make a full and complete recovery within a few weeks?
Yep, that does sound strange.
Addiction, mental health issues, suicides etc all increase during a recession. This will be no different.And... if we want to talk about the societal impact of the lockdown, while domestic abuse incidents increased by 25%.
Residential burglaries were down by almost 60% (59.7%) and burglary elsewhere reduced by half (49.2%).
Crimes against the person were down by over a quarter (27.4%).
Drop in most reported crime but rise in domestic abuse
Gardaí say Covid-19 has led to significant reductions in most reported crime in March and April of this year.www.rte.ie
Good example. We would have closed schools and made children stay at home. The rest of the country would have continued as it.
The old are the rich.
Maybe a captain who wasn't in danger of drowning would be less concerned about the ship sinking.
So will the epidemologists? So what?
Either their advice is sound on medical grounds or it is not.
So this angle of attack is just scurrilous nonsense with no merit or logic.
Yes it's fantasy stuff, this is a new disease, we just don't know how the cycles of infection, strains, mutations, antibody resistance will play out.
"Some form of immunity" is not the basis for a practical policy.
How many times have you had colds and flus and adenoviruses and rhinoviruses?
How many cycles of infection would we have to go through?
How many people do the epidemologists think it's acceptable to die during these cycles while her immunity is gained "for some time"?
It's fantasy stuff to think we have any real conception of the long terms effects of this disease.
I just signed it as a PHD in Nowhere University with a made up name - well I would have if I confirmed the email. That tells you everything you need to know about the "5000 Scientists and 10,000 doctors".
But the broader question about this fringe outfit is that they make the assumption that there are little to no long term impact of Covid for people who recover
Ceist Beag
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Well not sure about that Joe, the first class women and children maybe but certainly not the most vulnerable third class passengers, so not sure I would be quoting the titanic as an example of the most vulnerable being the ones prioritised!
They are giving advice which has no negative impact on themselves. Public Health is about more than viral infections.
Assuming that we'll have an effective vaccine "soon" isn't either.
You are comparing over 200 different DNA and RNA viruses to a single RNA virus. How is that relevant?
Okay, so now we are at the crux of it. The answer is to balance the number of people who will die as a result of no lockdown against the numbers who will die as a result of a lockdown. Do remember that there are now 25,000,000 in Pakistan alone at risk of starvation due to the lockdowns in rich Western countries. There is no scenario in which Covid kills more people than the lockdowns we now have in place and in the longer term the lockdowns may just lengthen the curve but not really reduce the total deaths.
Really? It's a respiratory disease in the Coronavirus family. Millions of people have contracted it and recovered from it. Are you suggesting that it will act vastly differently from other viruses within that family and that the millions of people who have been examined have some disabilities which have all been missed?
What about the listed signatories, both immunologists and epidemiologists, do you think they are crackpots?
What evidence is there that there will be any significant long term impacts of Covid on the vast majority of people who have recovered? Some people suffer long term effects of Flu and other diseases which the vast majority of people recover fully from.