Hello from Flanders, Belgium. Very comparable situation here. 92,3% of people older than 18 yrs have been vaccinated. 96,1% of population older than 65. And yet, cases are up 11%, hospitalisations 25% (ICU beds 40% up), deaths 14%.
2 hospital doctors from Antwerp and Turnhout have literally admitted on regional television
that the majority of patients are now fully vaccinated. The ICU in the Antwerp hospitals is completely filled with vaccinated people.
But of course there is no change of direction. I will be very surprised if we do not enter into a sort of lockdown / extension of our version of the corona passport to companies.
great comment. in Germany, it is obvious that authorities hope to prevent another lockdown, but if political demand grows great enough and/or, they can't contain the press hysteria, it may happen regardless. what a complete mess.
Same here. Two mayors have already 'gone rogue' and declared all indoors activities forbidden, and they get support from the governor of their province. The government (federal or Flemish - complicated situation here because they don't always agree) will likely say 'oh we want to avoid chaos on a local level, better to take national measures then' like the Corona passport for companies or use some sort of 2G rule.
Welcome to the tiny Flemish UnVaxxed club. Ex-covid'er here and choice based on common sense. This last thing becomes a very rare find those days. I've the impression that citizens of some of the former Soviet states are more sensitized against falsehoods.
It is a very small club indeed…but I do know a few members, all very nice, open minded and friendly people. Branded as antivax, idiot, dangerous, selfish and extreme right by the government and some commentators. I salute your common sense!
No you are just plain old crazy. Stark raving mad is all the people doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. I'm crazy too and happy to be that way.
How so? It is clearly seasonal and we've done lockdowns 3-4 times, now New and Improved with curfews because that'll solve it. We've done masks and two masks. Now we're doing shot after shot after shot because it's bound to work at some point.
But give Ivermectin and other early treatments a try? No way. That early treatment stuff is just an old medical fad. Follow Da Money!!!!
If 70-80% of people are vaccinated/recovered and have the pass, they don't really care about the other 20%-30%. Even more, some of them may have empathy, but even bigger percentage are probably rather hostile and are perfectly ok with "punishing" the other group.
this is presumably why they are approaching the booster issue very carefully. fewer and fewer will opt in to every additional dose, widening the natural base of opposition.
I wonder something about vaccine "efficacy", which is somehow related to boosters.
The studies I have seen generally exclude the period until 2 weeks after the second shot. Maybe even more importantly, these studies do not go beyond 6 months.
However, the efficacy curves in these studies, while indicating waning efficacy, do not seem to "flatten" to zero. Instead, if one was to extrapolate these curves to the future, one would (apparently) enter negative territory.
Hence...
There could be an interesting dilemma coming up for vaccinated people:
a) To keep immunity, booster ad vitam eternam, with each booster increasing the chances of (immediate) adverse effect.
b) No booster, but immunity is decreased (significantly ?) for an unknown amount of time.
There have also been other theories with outcomes unknown at the moment.
Some people argue that current vaccines are not two dose vaccines, but three and therefore the efficacy remains over longer period. (Raghib Ali in the recent UnHerd interview)
The problem is that they are finding all these things out now as opposed to during the vaccine development and clinical trials.
We probably won't know anything for many years: long terms consequences of COVID, long term consequences of vaccines, long term natural immunity, etc.
There probably is a critical point at which the uptake will fall. The question is what is the breaking point at which governments give up on mandates.
Say that you have 80% uptake at for each dose and you require boosters every year, you would be at 51% uptake after 2 years. And that's a long time away.
On the other hand, the flu vaccine uptake in the US has been continually climbing for the past 30 years and the uptake in the past decade has been quite high. So, perhaps when people accept that boosters will be needed (or be required), the hypothesis that uptake drops will not hold.
This doesn't include the vaccine risk itself. The flu vaccine is relatively benign if ineffective. People aren't experiencing severe side effects. These so callled vaccines are hardly benign, and the downside to taking them may be cumulative. No one knows for sure.
Remember that media propaganda steers public opinion to the idea that someone who hasn’t kept up with the interminable “booster” regime is “unvaccinated”.
There is a window of opportunity to awaken some of the double-jabbed before they succumb to the booster or die narrative. We take it.
I read yesterday that the UK will soon change the definition of fully vaxxed to mean three jabs...as Israel has already done. Governments won't even attempt this if only a small portion of the population has taken the 3rd dose.
The US is already doing this. You aren't fully vaccinated until you have the third dose, and they are getting people used to the idea that they will have to have boosters every six months. They started giving shots to kids 5-12 this week and plan for toddlers by Feb. 2022.
I still want to know -
- what is in the vaccines that is driving the governments around the world to mandate all citizens have one?
- why are global governments so driven to have ALL their citizens have these vaccines if it's not an ingredient in the vaccine?
- what effect will there be on those who choose to be unvaccinated who later need blood transfusions and receive blood from people who have mRNA vaccines?
I think part of it is contractual as most countries have simply entered into a slave contract with Pfizer where the latter reaps all the benefits. For instance, should the state acknowledge that the vaccine has serious side-effects then the state needs to defend Pfizer over its own people in a potential lawsuit (as far as I understand it).
The vaccines are also a simple short-term political solution to a complex problem. From a political standpoint, it's simpler than to fix the healthcare or recommend people to take Vitamin D or lose weight.
I’ll tell you what is in the vaccines that is driving the governments around the world to mandate all citizens have one: PROFITS. Which means fat donations to all those politicians doing the mandating, and fat donations to all those media whores doing the propagandizing.
I live in the US. They have not changed the definition of fully vaxxed...yet. I don't know how many have chosen to take a booster. I've heard the uptake is low so far.
Yes, the FDA has granted an EUA shots for children 5-11. How many parents will be stupid enough to do this remains to be seen.
I don't know why governments all over the globe are compelling or coercing people to take jabs that don't stop infection or transmission and don't provide protection against severe disease for very long. It isn't about a virus or health. It's control.
Whether the jabs contain ingredients we don't know about remains to be seen. They do contain billions of copies of mRNA instructions to make billions of copies of the spike protein, which we know is biologically active and can damage the endothelial cells that line all blood and lymph vessels in the body. That's seems bad enough.
We need to confront people everyday with data and facts backed up by links. I spent sometime last night and this morning trying to shake some Kiwis and Ozzies from their vaxx stupor.
I don’t share your belief that mandates are about a vaccine. Rather it appears to be the magic carpet tyrannical leaders are utilizing to enable a one size fits all global society.
Yeah that is a depressing read, especially since disease management isn't really a thing within the union. It's clearly not about health. My only hope is that they have jumped the gun too fast with ineffective vaccines and a vaccine passport that have pissed off a lot of people. I think they would have more success had they just slowly implemented it over a period of years, but then they hadn't gotten away with all the draconian stuff...
...and by counting their stupid "Cases" with them, we legitimise their freakshow! There is no such thing as a "PCR Test" not even when using a ball of (extremely contaminated) snot. Antigen testing is to medicine what a child's chemistry set is to Dark Matter; toys and unproven fantasies.
Laugh at the stupid bastards, learning the rules of their game will profit us nothing, and they will always find a new way to cheat..
The buffoonish actions of the politicians and public health officials are what one would expect from he useful idiot class. This is about conditioning individuals across the globe to comply, so they can usher in draconian controls in the name of "the environment". In reality, these people are simply the tools of the latest round of sociopathics to stain the march of humanity away from the stone age. The resistance to these anti-life lunatics in the US has gone from lukewarm to warm and is clearly moving to hot. Expect the resistance to boil over into a clear majority over the next 12 months. Do not comply. Continue speaking truth.
The worst part is the waiting. It’s tough feeling so negative with that burning pit in your stomach wondering, what numbers are they going to need to see before the veil is lifted? And I know it won’t lift for everyone, just enough so that the majority see the truth and we can finally stop this. Our pediatrician is literally trying to shame the kids in his practice into getting the jabs. I’m talking about the 5-11 year olds! When you live in a state where you know the politicians are particularly keen on mandating shots as soon as possible, the stress is incredible.
This is so horrible I can't stand it. That mandate is coming down in California. I don't have kids, but as hard as it would be, I'd quit my job and move or home school or do whatever it takes to keep that poison out of my kids. Hoping all the best for you.
Left CA in '78. Miss it terribly but so glad I'm not there. Still have family there and can't visit because of mandates. Stand strong. In NC our governor, Cooper, follows everything Newsom does. There are lots of people resisting. We can save our nation AND CA!
I grew up in a communist country and live now in Germany. I tell you I have never seen such an arbitrary discrimination. My son is a teenager and as unvaxxed he is banned from visiting the local cinema. He also must submit to testing in the school at least twice a week while his vaccinated peers who can freely spread the virus don't have to.
Tell him to be proud of being an individual who thinks critically for himself. I got thrown out of a community book club this week - a group of old ladies who met to discuss books! Totally worth it! I didn't like their book choices anyway. Your son can watch movies online, he will know the truth and be more mature than his friends. Resist.
Thank you Zuzu! He will take something from these times for sure - I hope it is really the art of thinking for himself and not blindly following the herd. It is a hard lesson though - being different as a teenager is not easy. We all know it :)
In case he is not in a mood to defend his point in some weird conversations I told him to just say that his awkward father is against the covid vaccine. This turns everything around and makes him a victim - teenagers like this sometimes :)
I know from school experience how difficult it is to be a person who has a different point of view than the crowd. It's often lonely and makes you question your values and beliefs. It's still difficult as an adult. What I also know is that it did teach me to think for myself, not follow the herd, kept me out of a lot of trouble, made my beliefs stronger because I knew why I valued them. All those years also made me tough in spirit preparing me for adult life which isn't easy, which you know, so I didn't cave under pressure that was far beyond anything I imagined I'd ever encounter. I didn't fly through adversity with ease by any means but I did slog through helping family and friends who were going through desperate times. Being able to think for yourself, know what you believe, stand firm under stress, ignore the pressures of the herd does so much to prepare you for life. It's good he's learning this now to get him ready for life. He'll be the leader one day when the herd is scattered looking for direction and hope.
Thank you zuzu! Really appreciate your reassuring words. Not very happy to admit I am not completely out of the herd and still need some peer feedback just to make sure I haven't gone mad or paranoid
New Paediatrician? How will we know if it also takes Pharmafia kickbacks for every dose? Aw, shucks, of course they all do... You know, like administrating Frauci's previous killer drug, Remdesivir, earns the hospital another "20% bonus on the value of claim submitted"? Even though it kills almost every client?
I am preparing myself that it will get worse until the flue season is over (beginning of April). I expect pressure will rise steadily to get the vaccine. Merkel blamed the unvaccinated just now, and she never says anything explicitly unless she really wants to rile people up.
That's what I keep thinking....that 50 years from now, people will look back on this time and say, "WTF was THAT madness all about? What were they thinking??" But now, I'm not so sure that this is just passing madness, and not permanent evil.
Well, I was listening to Prof. Desment of Belgium yesterday ... he said that in some villages, Switzerland included, they were so thorough in their elimination of "witches" that they literally killed of all their women! Yikes! Hadn't heard that before.
A bureaucrat at a desk? How I wish! Actually, this whole pot of covidiot poopie was written up by a team led by three oncologists and a psychiatrist. Three cancer vultures and a shrink, not a virologist or pandemic specialist in sight. Let that sink in...
Do you happen to have any take on Sweden? Our cases have been relatively flat for like 2 months and we are basically the only country in Northern Europe that haven't seen a sharp uptick. We also never had a significant Delta wave during the summer like in the Netherlands or the UK. It's especially interesting to compare the southern region of Skåne (where I live) with Copenhagen/East Denmark. In Copenhagen cases have soared lately, while Skåne has remained flat for a long time, and we're practically neighbors. Sweden's vaccination rate is basically in line with Germany's while Denmark is higher at 75%. If I should guess: the fact that we kept schools open the whole time must have contributed to a higher degree of natural immunity that reached a sufficient level before the full scope of the mass vaccination. Also restaurants were open the whole time (alhough with a curfew for half a year), so that might have contributed a bit as well.
Since Sweden has not been on lockdown, I suppose most have been in contact with the virus and made antibodies naturally. Countries with the heaviest lockdowns (like Belgium) have now the highest numbers in sick people. My dad got a third shot 2 weeks ago and the government has already bought a fourth.
Isn't it strange, that the places with the most draconian curbs on human liberty, are also the ones finding the most new "Cases" to justify and "legitimise" their rape of our liberties?
What you think comes first; the scary numbers or the tyrannical excesses? Think there's any Positive Feedback there? ('Positive' here has very negative connotations).
Antibodies are not the prime life of defense: T-cell immunity and Natural Killer Cells are. Antibodies are just correlate of cell immunity and only if someone had a serious infection they pop their electrostatic head up. It is just convenient to work with them because T-cell immunity is too complex to play with.
I will have to formulate this differently. Their immune systems reacted and got stronger. They went outside and had fun while the rest of the world lived in anguish. Their relaxed bodies did not pick up the sickness. The rest of the world seems one nest of anxiety.
Right so, the Swedes met the virus at bars and cafes and they did not get sick.
Here is why that happened.
The first reason is their the first layer of their immune system, the innate immune system. Their natural kill cells, the macrophages and all their buddies, they just started wiping out any viron they could find on their way, living a debris of proteins around them, no questions asked. Anything non-self was being wiped out.
Some epithelial (lung) cells though got infected. This is when the second layer of their immune system has to step in.
Because of cross-reactivity with other past coronaviruses (SARS-COV-2 is now the 7th endemic coronavirus NOT a novel one other than the spike protein change) there is a LOT of residual memory in the T-cells.
The cell immunity remembers part of proteins (the N-protein) for example. Their role is to kill the opponent AND any of our cells that have been captured by the enemy.
Here is how the second layer plays out.
Virus infects air epithelia cells. During the first exposure of our immune system there were virons running around. They got attacked by the innate system that has left pieces of virus (proteins etc) floating around.
These pieces are collected by the spies of our system: long, octopus like dendritic cells that collect those pieces for intelligence. They then head down to one of your lymph node and they present these fragments to T-cells
"Look T-cells what I found, have you seen this piece before ?"
One T-cell goes: "Yes maam, I have seen something similar"
Dendritic goes: "Ok I want you to make 300 copies of yourself and go back to the lungs. Once there kill the enemy and as many of our own cells you find find preparing this type of virus. I want the entire procedude SHUT DOWN.
It then adds>
Also I want you to make 100 copies of yourself but these time use them as coaches for our b-cells. We are going to be doing cleanup when this mess is over and we also need to have some third layer memory set up for this.
T-cell goes: "Maaam yes maam" and of it heads with its brother in arms for to defend us.
This happens within HOURS after exposure, the fight ends fast and clean without any thing more than 'feeling slightly under the weather'.
When all is over, some T-cells stay permenantly in the lungs with that memory. That is why second time you get infected usually is cleaned up faster than the first
Yeah there were some study listing fear/anxiety as one of the ”comorbidities”. Locking people in their homes and scare the hell out of them def don’t enhance their immune systems.
I think that they kept children unmasked under the age of 12 and schools open has created a great fire break with the healthiest part of the population. The US is also missing a great opportunity to leave the college kids unmasked to help vast swathes get herd immunity with little downside.
Maybe it's the music. Abba's "Don't Shut Me Down" wasn't a big hit, but maybe reflected their national attitude. Sweden is showing us the way to give tyrants everywhere their "Waterloo."
I don't think this is true. The federal government and the president are constrained unless martial law is declared, but governors of states have broad authorities. I live in Pennsylvania. We stripped our governor of his powers in a referendum in May.
Probably true, but it hasn't stopped many boneheaded actions by the Federal Government. I'm not lawyer, but everything I've read says the Feds have no authority to mandate vaccines in private industry nor individual States*. Authority over Federal civilians, military, etc. I don't know. An early tip-off that something is not quite right were the exemptions on the Legislative, Judicial branches and Postal Workers. Government overstepping its authority is hardly a new problem, of course.
Individual States have powers to compel vaccinations. There is a Supreme Court decision so affirming.
Governors have the rights not reserved for the Federal Government, or the people. They do not have the right to abrogate the Constitution. They don’t have the right to deprive people of their lives or property without due process. 95% of the crap they’ve done is just that. In addition, there’s a medical principle of informed consent. You can’t mandate a drug if the patient cannot access information about it. None of these emergency use drugs come with any sort of insert telling the public about the contents or effects. Therefore, informed consent is *impossible*.
I remember early in the pandemic (March 2020), Knut Wittkowski was strongly arguing for having the schools open and basically letting the virus go through children.
But, I have seen papers saying that children don't spread much to begin with. So, I wonder whether having kids immune would really change anything. It would if they were large spreaders.
I still think that travel is a big contributor to spread. Every summer Europe goes nuts with travel and vacation. This summer wasn't an exception. But maybe Sweden is just enough removed from this spreading vector. Correct me if I am wrong, but Sweden had pretty severe restrictions for getting into the country (even for EU citizens) while all other Europeans were on their way to beaches and back.
My best friend is German and lives in Sweden. They never had restrictions that were worse than the rest of the EU. Instead, the media vilified Sweden and talked endlessly about the risks of traveling there even when they had consistently this summer some of the lowest rates. The brainwashing is unbelievable.
It's been quite bizarre. It's funny though, now the liberal corporate press is just ignoring Sweden. Recently, Wall Street Journal wrote an article about how it's like to live with the endemic virus - and they picked Portugal, which still have covid passes in some settings and mask mandates. Meanwhile, Sweden has been COMPLETELY open since Sept 29, but it's like we don't exist. :) It's just like the hosts in the HBO series Westworld which have been programmed to not see certain things that go against their defined boundaries of reality.
Yes and no. It's been fairly easy to get in within the EU, but harder from a non-EU country. However, there's has been no test requirement when entering from a Nordic country for quite some time, so I assume lot of tourists have been traveling to Copenhagen airport and then taken the train to Sweden. Plus, Denmark haven't generally required a pre-boarding test so that's a nice little trick if you wanna escape to the south of Sweden without a covid pass :D (How much that have contributed to the spread is another matter).
As for the schools being open: I know from a few teacher friends that there has been a lot of infections where teachers have spread it to other teachers, so I guess that have brought up the natural immunity somewhat. Combined that with teachers generally have a better immunity from being exposed to a lot of kids and I guess you have a pretty good situation for amassing immunity.
Yep, I’m in the U.K. and know two families with kids at university in Sweden and they all did the Denmark then onto Sweden trick for visits this summer
Peak Kafka. The contortions being undergone in order to try and continue to scapegoat and blame this on the unvaccinated are becoming painful and embarrassing. Unfortunately, I think it will continue until every last person is pinned down and jabbed. Scapegoating is a primal need which overrides any rationality. I read this wonderful piece by Charles Eisenstein which talks about it so well: https://charleseisenstein.substack.com/p/mob-morality-and-the-unvaxxed
I suspect you may be right. Linked, quite possibly, to shortened attention spans and the easy anonymity and transcience of social media - which enables a cut-and-run substitution for well-reasoned argument.
Ah, yes! That is a good way of looking at it. Humans as monoculture. I like it. Grown leggy and lank and completely unable to sustain ourselves in our sun-deprived, health-deprived, nutrition-deprived urban feedlots. Propped up by convenience-food, treadmills and vitamins. Cortisol-driven existences waiting for collapse.
Mountains of evidence accumulate to be summarily ignored by the panicked population, propaganda media, and government tyrants. The solution will only come from litigation, political action, or rebellion. We're seeing some of all in the US. Things will get worse before they get better.
Justthenews.com reports this morning that 27 states have joined a suit against the joe mandates, which are predominantly, but not exclusively, states with repub AG or governor. Litigation is seldom responsive to abuses quickly enough to matter, but it strengthens resolve, and slowly convinces the terrified that resistance is not futile. As we saw in the US elections last week, dems are quickly losing support. Continued irrational oppression will guarantee a sweep in congressional elections next year. As the captive incumbents and their propagandists begin contemplating their termination, they'll become more rational. But it won't work. The emotions will inevitably shift from terror to revenge as we figure it out. It might be resolved peacefully. Probably not.
A healthy friend of 50 had COVID but got vaccinated anyway (according to Dr. Peter McCullough's podcast, that's the worst case scenario for side effects). Several months later he got a massive heart attack, almost died, received 6 stents and is in rehab. Apparently, it has nothing to do with the vaccine. I can totally can imagine him agreeing to a booster. Survival of the fittest...
I too often jump to conclusions 😀. I'm just a layman, but I speak from basic biology knowledge and some first-hand experience. The Covid-19 shot may give immunity against one virus, but nature has made quite a few more pathogens available. Cold and flu as well as less-frequent respiratory infections may cause cough. As can many non-infectious reasons: allergy, etc.
My husband had his pericardial sac removed - pericardiectomy - in 2016. It was traumatic to say the least and it could only be done at the world-renown Cleveland Clinic.
Persistent cough is always present with pericarditis, and probably myocarditis.
Also, I have noticed a lot of commercials of new digital-device heart monitoring "apps". Wonder who is invested in that? and why the push now.
Someone's who recognize an opportunity BUT would think that won't go over very well for the cover-up minded folks.
Watch that be squashed just as CGM's (continuous glucose monitors). It's not just the sick-care system that saw CGM's as deleterious to their profit margin but BIG AG, as their cheap-to-make highly addictive products were at risk.
It is the commitment fallacy. Once you put $100 0000 to some pyramid scheme, the eventual next $30 000 request does not feel so bad. You are already committed.
This vaccine business will get even worse once the kids are more less vaccinated by group pressure. Then the parents really are committed!
I usually compare it to the Concorde fallacy. It took 22 years before it stopped flying, although they knew for years that it would never be a profitable project. But nobody can lose face.
They had a mutually assured destruction contract from the start. If either of the countries quit, the quitting party would have had to pay all the costs so far incurred to the other party. Technological marvel but then the 1973 oil crisis made the plane way too expensive to fly and too many cancellations.
It was profitable for the two airliners during the last decade because of targeting only the luxury segment.
Yes, also called the sunk-cost fallacy. Even so, at times it's a valid concept, but only when the cost (downside) has an upper limit. For example, the old English proverb: You may as well hang for a sheep as for a lamb.
Modern day Goebbels would just love Twitter and Facebook. He would not use fear so much this time. He would use instead the virtue signalling people, embellish and strengthen that mental group pathology. Feed on peoples' desire to be smarter and so special and progressive and tell everybody else online about it!
Obama used this to the max. No "progressive" journalist in the MSM actually checked what the hell his admin did behind the scenes because he was a woke dream come true, a real salvation man. That kind of stuff is dangerous.
This vaccine phenomena started the same way. All of sudden it was a progressive, a woke thing to do, when it was "Trump's dangerous poison vaccine" just few months before. The Biden admin used that mental pathology the same way as Obama in presidential elections to get elected.
If this ends in a good way, there will be still a lot of angry people, committees, testimonies, tons of accusations and investigations, tons of lawsuits, compensations, jail time to a lot of people and "never again" declarations. If in a bad way, a permanent tyrannical left-green wing regimes all over the western world.
Make no mistake about it, this is the largest, most dangerous and most lethal medical catastrophe ever during peace time!
This is WWIII just with different weapons. I’m sure some will say this is hyperbole but to the individual who is desperately fighting to feed their family while avoiding the vaccine roulette, this is war being waged upon us.
I found some chart that ranked natural immunity in each state in the US and that is what I have been using to try and track potential hot spots for this winter. I ignore the vaccination rates except to calculate in a little something extra for the hubris that accompanies some of the vaccinated, making it a bigger hot spot.
Yes, I agree, but some states locked down so quickly and ushered in vaccines so quickly, they have surprisingly low natural immunity rates. I believe VT and Maine were particularly low. My state was only 45%.
Ok here is the chart for the expected US natural immunity rates(it was posted Sept 5 but links the source)- I follow 2 people on twitter specifically for data. Obviously Gato Malo on substack too, but on twitter @ianmSC and this quiet account PLC@Humble_Analysis.
I'm not entirely convinced. If you look at Spain, they had a massive spike in positive tests in summer 2021. I've been told by people that live there that was mainly young people getting it.
Spain was totally locked down in Spring 2020, except for Madrid. But since then schools have been in session uninterrupted (with masks), restaurants open and in most regions life has been pretty normal.
I would guess they now probably have natural immunity in the general population.
Did you know California has a secret immunologist? Her name is Dr. Erica Pan and her study blood test study of previous infection and antibodies was stopped in June of 2021. At that time it showed the state reached about 85% Seroprevalence. Keep in mind most (over half) antibodies tests she used DID not see the S Protein but used the N Protein from previous infection.
But natural immunity is a long way away! With 6.5% of positive cases (official count) that's not much. Of course, the real exposure to virus is much higher than that, but still.
This is something that is definitely not well understood -- what do you actually need to reach herd immunity? One of the issues is whether you need to have a symptomatic infection to gain natural immunity. If you were symptomatic, you definitely developed
antibodies. But if you were asymptomatic, maybe your innate immune system was good enough to prevent more serious case, but then maybe your antibodies are not there.
So many people may have tested positive or were exposed to the virus but were asymptomatic: do they contribute to herd immunity?
Antibody tests are a poor way to measure natural immunity, T-cell tests (like T-Detect COVID) are the gold standard. People who have successfully fought off the virus (even with very mild symptoms), will not get it again. And if people were infected by one of the now practically extinct variants, they are still immune to Delta.
Yes, sure, I understand all that. I am talking about people who are completely asymptomatic (but tested positive -- without a test they wouldn't even know).
I haven't seen many papers discussing natural immunity at individual level for people with very mild or asymptomatic infection (ie, do you need to have a symptomatic infection to gain immunity) and also not much about herd immunity (apart from generic theories based on R0, etc.)
I am watching our own numbers here in South Africa with bated breath. According to one of the medical aid providers, their actuary has extrapolated that possibly 80% of the country has already been exposed. And we have a relatively low vaccination rate which started very late (although increasingly coercive measures are being deployed by companies, who are acting as proxy enforcers for government). If the 80% prior exposure is correct, and if the other 20% has been mopped up by vaccinees, then there should theoretically not be too large a fourth wave (I acknowledge the hubris of my assertion - as am no statistician!). Although, of course, the authorities and good-behaviour police are salivating at the prospect of a fourth wave, and the opportunity to terrorise the populace for even longer. Well, let's see what happens. Watch this space.
That's what's so puzzling about this: if 80% have been exposed and have some resistance/immunity and 20% have some protection due to vaccines, then serious cases should stop rising or at least stabilize.
For now, the rates have plummeted and we are in a trough - i.e. we have exited the third wave, which was delta-driven. If much of the remainder of the populace remains unvaccinated and we don't see a significant fourth wave, maybe we will have reached some sort of herd immunity which we can attribute partially to infection-induced immunity. Rather than the drug-peddlars claiming full credit which, face it, is the likely purpose behind the mandates (i.e. to piggy-back off any infection-induced immunity, given the poor efficacy results of the pseudo-vaccines).
You point out succinct proof that covidiocy is bollocks; South Africa's "Cases" clearly track American and British cycles. Murdoch &co own the SA media, and the geniuses don't actually understand enough basic natural science to know South Africa is in the opposing hemisphere, implying 6 month lagging "spikes", so they keep "spiking" us at the wrong times, when they shape the SA "narrative".
I tell you; just laugh the stupid bastards off the stage!
India, Sweden and California speak to the idea that the previously infected have immunity. Look at current case loads and you will see they are way down and all blood tests show that the people who did the low estimates should be questioned.
Hello from Flanders, Belgium. Very comparable situation here. 92,3% of people older than 18 yrs have been vaccinated. 96,1% of population older than 65. And yet, cases are up 11%, hospitalisations 25% (ICU beds 40% up), deaths 14%.
https://covid-19.sciensano.be/sites/default/files/Covid19/Meest%20recente%20update.pdf
2 hospital doctors from Antwerp and Turnhout have literally admitted on regional television
that the majority of patients are now fully vaccinated. The ICU in the Antwerp hospitals is completely filled with vaccinated people.
But of course there is no change of direction. I will be very surprised if we do not enter into a sort of lockdown / extension of our version of the corona passport to companies.
great comment. in Germany, it is obvious that authorities hope to prevent another lockdown, but if political demand grows great enough and/or, they can't contain the press hysteria, it may happen regardless. what a complete mess.
Same here. Two mayors have already 'gone rogue' and declared all indoors activities forbidden, and they get support from the governor of their province. The government (federal or Flemish - complicated situation here because they don't always agree) will likely say 'oh we want to avoid chaos on a local level, better to take national measures then' like the Corona passport for companies or use some sort of 2G rule.
And still, I am unvaccinated. I must be mad.
We, the ones who understand, are most certainly mad to those who wish to keep their heads buried beneath the sand.
Welcome to the tiny Flemish UnVaxxed club. Ex-covid'er here and choice based on common sense. This last thing becomes a very rare find those days. I've the impression that citizens of some of the former Soviet states are more sensitized against falsehoods.
It is a very small club indeed…but I do know a few members, all very nice, open minded and friendly people. Branded as antivax, idiot, dangerous, selfish and extreme right by the government and some commentators. I salute your common sense!
No you are just plain old crazy. Stark raving mad is all the people doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. I'm crazy too and happy to be that way.
It's not insanity if you are dealing with a non-deterministic system. 🤓
How so? It is clearly seasonal and we've done lockdowns 3-4 times, now New and Improved with curfews because that'll solve it. We've done masks and two masks. Now we're doing shot after shot after shot because it's bound to work at some point.
But give Ivermectin and other early treatments a try? No way. That early treatment stuff is just an old medical fad. Follow Da Money!!!!
You are perfectly all right. Many stand behind you.
I am from Germany too and I firmly believe they will blame the next lockdown (which I am certain will come) on the unvaccinated.
Thank you for the update. My family lives about 10 km south of Antwerp.
Regarding the interview of the ICU doctor of Antwerp hospitals, he mentioned at the end of his interview that ALL covid patients are vaccinated.
That is correct. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J012FQZ-YK0
Insanity is trying the same thing hoping for different results.
Question: when you say the cases, hospitalization and deaths are up, does this mean up from the same time last year, or up from last week or month?
https://www.hln.be/binnenland/overzicht-hoe-evolueren-de-coronabesmettingen-ziekenhuisopnames-en-overlijdens-bekijk-hier-de-laatste-cijfers-uit-belgie-en-uw-regio~aea1699e/?utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_userid=&utm_source=hln&utm_content=daily&ctm_ctid=16f74cb186970f994fc6bf8ee2ba2c52
Here are the graphics. Do not pay attention to the maps they have not been updated in months. Watch hospitalisations and deaths at the end
Compared to the previous week (comparing the daily average of the last 7 days with the daily average of the 7 previous days).
For some reason, there is not a comparable report from exactly the same period 2020 (only for the week November 13, 2020, and I think we had the peak of infections already behind us). https://covid-19.sciensano.be/sites/default/files/Covid19/COVID-19_Weekly%20report_20201113%20-%20NL_HD.pdf
What may be helpful for Belgium is the very significant first wave, peaking 1 Nov 2020, owing to the lack of organization of the government.
It means that a lot of Belgians build immunity BEFORE the vaccination campaign started.
Consequently, I would expect Belgium to fare better than, say, Germany, in the coming weeks and months.
Thank you.
The fallacy of two weeks to flatten the curve was the frog getting in the pot. They aren’t going to lift the lid. We have to tip it over.
How?
If 70-80% of people are vaccinated/recovered and have the pass, they don't really care about the other 20%-30%. Even more, some of them may have empathy, but even bigger percentage are probably rather hostile and are perfectly ok with "punishing" the other group.
this is presumably why they are approaching the booster issue very carefully. fewer and fewer will opt in to every additional dose, widening the natural base of opposition.
I wonder something about vaccine "efficacy", which is somehow related to boosters.
The studies I have seen generally exclude the period until 2 weeks after the second shot. Maybe even more importantly, these studies do not go beyond 6 months.
However, the efficacy curves in these studies, while indicating waning efficacy, do not seem to "flatten" to zero. Instead, if one was to extrapolate these curves to the future, one would (apparently) enter negative territory.
Hence...
There could be an interesting dilemma coming up for vaccinated people:
a) To keep immunity, booster ad vitam eternam, with each booster increasing the chances of (immediate) adverse effect.
b) No booster, but immunity is decreased (significantly ?) for an unknown amount of time.
There have also been other theories with outcomes unknown at the moment.
Some people argue that current vaccines are not two dose vaccines, but three and therefore the efficacy remains over longer period. (Raghib Ali in the recent UnHerd interview)
The problem is that they are finding all these things out now as opposed to during the vaccine development and clinical trials.
We probably won't know anything for many years: long terms consequences of COVID, long term consequences of vaccines, long term natural immunity, etc.
There probably is a critical point at which the uptake will fall. The question is what is the breaking point at which governments give up on mandates.
Say that you have 80% uptake at for each dose and you require boosters every year, you would be at 51% uptake after 2 years. And that's a long time away.
On the other hand, the flu vaccine uptake in the US has been continually climbing for the past 30 years and the uptake in the past decade has been quite high. So, perhaps when people accept that boosters will be needed (or be required), the hypothesis that uptake drops will not hold.
This doesn't include the vaccine risk itself. The flu vaccine is relatively benign if ineffective. People aren't experiencing severe side effects. These so callled vaccines are hardly benign, and the downside to taking them may be cumulative. No one knows for sure.
The adverse effects from flu injections seem limited to the elderly.
No, one of the several bad effects, myocarditis, hits the young, in particular young men.
They will start to care when they see massive severe illness and death in the "fully vaccinated" and there are no unvaxxed around to blame.
Remember that media propaganda steers public opinion to the idea that someone who hasn’t kept up with the interminable “booster” regime is “unvaccinated”.
There is a window of opportunity to awaken some of the double-jabbed before they succumb to the booster or die narrative. We take it.
I read yesterday that the UK will soon change the definition of fully vaxxed to mean three jabs...as Israel has already done. Governments won't even attempt this if only a small portion of the population has taken the 3rd dose.
The US is already doing this. You aren't fully vaccinated until you have the third dose, and they are getting people used to the idea that they will have to have boosters every six months. They started giving shots to kids 5-12 this week and plan for toddlers by Feb. 2022.
I still want to know -
- what is in the vaccines that is driving the governments around the world to mandate all citizens have one?
- why are global governments so driven to have ALL their citizens have these vaccines if it's not an ingredient in the vaccine?
- what effect will there be on those who choose to be unvaccinated who later need blood transfusions and receive blood from people who have mRNA vaccines?
I think part of it is contractual as most countries have simply entered into a slave contract with Pfizer where the latter reaps all the benefits. For instance, should the state acknowledge that the vaccine has serious side-effects then the state needs to defend Pfizer over its own people in a potential lawsuit (as far as I understand it).
The vaccines are also a simple short-term political solution to a complex problem. From a political standpoint, it's simpler than to fix the healthcare or recommend people to take Vitamin D or lose weight.
I am also wondering about blood transfusions and how this would potentially impact the unvaccinated. Very good question.
I’ll tell you what is in the vaccines that is driving the governments around the world to mandate all citizens have one: PROFITS. Which means fat donations to all those politicians doing the mandating, and fat donations to all those media whores doing the propagandizing.
I live in the US. They have not changed the definition of fully vaxxed...yet. I don't know how many have chosen to take a booster. I've heard the uptake is low so far.
Yes, the FDA has granted an EUA shots for children 5-11. How many parents will be stupid enough to do this remains to be seen.
I don't know why governments all over the globe are compelling or coercing people to take jabs that don't stop infection or transmission and don't provide protection against severe disease for very long. It isn't about a virus or health. It's control.
Whether the jabs contain ingredients we don't know about remains to be seen. They do contain billions of copies of mRNA instructions to make billions of copies of the spike protein, which we know is biologically active and can damage the endothelial cells that line all blood and lymph vessels in the body. That's seems bad enough.
We need to confront people everyday with data and facts backed up by links. I spent sometime last night and this morning trying to shake some Kiwis and Ozzies from their vaxx stupor.
I don’t share your belief that mandates are about a vaccine. Rather it appears to be the magic carpet tyrannical leaders are utilizing to enable a one size fits all global society.
These mandates are certainly not about public health.
The EU had been working on vaccine passports long before COVID-19 pandemic:
https://ec.europa.eu/health/sites/default/files/vaccination/docs/2019-2022_roadmap_en.pdf
Yeah that is a depressing read, especially since disease management isn't really a thing within the union. It's clearly not about health. My only hope is that they have jumped the gun too fast with ineffective vaccines and a vaccine passport that have pissed off a lot of people. I think they would have more success had they just slowly implemented it over a period of years, but then they hadn't gotten away with all the draconian stuff...
...and by counting their stupid "Cases" with them, we legitimise their freakshow! There is no such thing as a "PCR Test" not even when using a ball of (extremely contaminated) snot. Antigen testing is to medicine what a child's chemistry set is to Dark Matter; toys and unproven fantasies.
Laugh at the stupid bastards, learning the rules of their game will profit us nothing, and they will always find a new way to cheat..
It is a form of totalitarian takeover. Shoshana Zuboff saw this coming - the "marketization" of private information and individual decisions.
A nice concise overview in English may be read here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/04/shoshana-zuboff-surveillance-capitalism-assault-human-automomy-digital-privacy. Note the date of the article - October 2019, less than half a year before her dire predictions turned out to become reality.
As our dear host hails from Germany, a very interesting podcast in German language can be found here: https://www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/shoshana-zuboff-ueberwachungskapitalismus-steuert-das.1264.de.html?dram:article_id=431006
The buffoonish actions of the politicians and public health officials are what one would expect from he useful idiot class. This is about conditioning individuals across the globe to comply, so they can usher in draconian controls in the name of "the environment". In reality, these people are simply the tools of the latest round of sociopathics to stain the march of humanity away from the stone age. The resistance to these anti-life lunatics in the US has gone from lukewarm to warm and is clearly moving to hot. Expect the resistance to boil over into a clear majority over the next 12 months. Do not comply. Continue speaking truth.
United Non Compliance. That's it.
Hopefully this insanity will end much sooner.
Thank you for brilliantly understanding us. Resist.
The worst part is the waiting. It’s tough feeling so negative with that burning pit in your stomach wondering, what numbers are they going to need to see before the veil is lifted? And I know it won’t lift for everyone, just enough so that the majority see the truth and we can finally stop this. Our pediatrician is literally trying to shame the kids in his practice into getting the jabs. I’m talking about the 5-11 year olds! When you live in a state where you know the politicians are particularly keen on mandating shots as soon as possible, the stress is incredible.
This is so horrible I can't stand it. That mandate is coming down in California. I don't have kids, but as hard as it would be, I'd quit my job and move or home school or do whatever it takes to keep that poison out of my kids. Hoping all the best for you.
We're leaving for Utah.
Left CA in '78. Miss it terribly but so glad I'm not there. Still have family there and can't visit because of mandates. Stand strong. In NC our governor, Cooper, follows everything Newsom does. There are lots of people resisting. We can save our nation AND CA!
People who didn't grow up in a communist country have hard time grasping this:
"You cannot comply your way to freedom."
You are never complying hard enough.
I grew up in a communist country and live now in Germany. I tell you I have never seen such an arbitrary discrimination. My son is a teenager and as unvaxxed he is banned from visiting the local cinema. He also must submit to testing in the school at least twice a week while his vaccinated peers who can freely spread the virus don't have to.
Tell him to be proud of being an individual who thinks critically for himself. I got thrown out of a community book club this week - a group of old ladies who met to discuss books! Totally worth it! I didn't like their book choices anyway. Your son can watch movies online, he will know the truth and be more mature than his friends. Resist.
Thank you Zuzu! He will take something from these times for sure - I hope it is really the art of thinking for himself and not blindly following the herd. It is a hard lesson though - being different as a teenager is not easy. We all know it :)
In case he is not in a mood to defend his point in some weird conversations I told him to just say that his awkward father is against the covid vaccine. This turns everything around and makes him a victim - teenagers like this sometimes :)
I know from school experience how difficult it is to be a person who has a different point of view than the crowd. It's often lonely and makes you question your values and beliefs. It's still difficult as an adult. What I also know is that it did teach me to think for myself, not follow the herd, kept me out of a lot of trouble, made my beliefs stronger because I knew why I valued them. All those years also made me tough in spirit preparing me for adult life which isn't easy, which you know, so I didn't cave under pressure that was far beyond anything I imagined I'd ever encounter. I didn't fly through adversity with ease by any means but I did slog through helping family and friends who were going through desperate times. Being able to think for yourself, know what you believe, stand firm under stress, ignore the pressures of the herd does so much to prepare you for life. It's good he's learning this now to get him ready for life. He'll be the leader one day when the herd is scattered looking for direction and hope.
Thank you zuzu! Really appreciate your reassuring words. Not very happy to admit I am not completely out of the herd and still need some peer feedback just to make sure I haven't gone mad or paranoid
Maybe you should share this with him..
https://www.pitribe.com/posts/covid-vaccine-side-effects-father-screaming-vaccinated-son-icu-89391087492083
(Original tweets have been deleted, but father is still hung up on the cost issue, I am sorry to say.)
Surprising that he acts like it’s merely expensive, rather than a certain curtailment of his son’s life.
Thank you!
So, so sorry to hear this about the kids. I expect more or less the same once they allow the vaccines for children where I live.
Time ti find a new pediatrician
New Paediatrician? How will we know if it also takes Pharmafia kickbacks for every dose? Aw, shucks, of course they all do... You know, like administrating Frauci's previous killer drug, Remdesivir, earns the hospital another "20% bonus on the value of claim submitted"? Even though it kills almost every client?
I am preparing myself that it will get worse until the flue season is over (beginning of April). I expect pressure will rise steadily to get the vaccine. Merkel blamed the unvaccinated just now, and she never says anything explicitly unless she really wants to rile people up.
Keep tossing the witches into the water to see if they float. We're living through the Salem Witch Trials.
That's what I keep thinking....that 50 years from now, people will look back on this time and say, "WTF was THAT madness all about? What were they thinking??" But now, I'm not so sure that this is just passing madness, and not permanent evil.
People are going to look at pictures where everyone is masked and just burst out laughing
That assumes that the history will not be re-written.
I had an ancestor who was accused of being a witch during that time. I'm in good company, I'm not afraid.
Well, I was listening to Prof. Desment of Belgium yesterday ... he said that in some villages, Switzerland included, they were so thorough in their elimination of "witches" that they literally killed of all their women! Yikes! Hadn't heard that before.
This shit's gotta stop.
These "rules" do not come from SCIENCE or even sober medical analysis, but from some bureaucrat sitting at a desk.
A bureaucrat at a desk? How I wish! Actually, this whole pot of covidiot poopie was written up by a team led by three oncologists and a psychiatrist. Three cancer vultures and a shrink, not a virologist or pandemic specialist in sight. Let that sink in...
Sitting on his thumbs, at his desk.
Do you happen to have any take on Sweden? Our cases have been relatively flat for like 2 months and we are basically the only country in Northern Europe that haven't seen a sharp uptick. We also never had a significant Delta wave during the summer like in the Netherlands or the UK. It's especially interesting to compare the southern region of Skåne (where I live) with Copenhagen/East Denmark. In Copenhagen cases have soared lately, while Skåne has remained flat for a long time, and we're practically neighbors. Sweden's vaccination rate is basically in line with Germany's while Denmark is higher at 75%. If I should guess: the fact that we kept schools open the whole time must have contributed to a higher degree of natural immunity that reached a sufficient level before the full scope of the mass vaccination. Also restaurants were open the whole time (alhough with a curfew for half a year), so that might have contributed a bit as well.
Still waiting for that winter wave though!
Yes, I have watched with much interest. I agree, there must simply be higher levels of natural immunity in Sweden.
Since Sweden has not been on lockdown, I suppose most have been in contact with the virus and made antibodies naturally. Countries with the heaviest lockdowns (like Belgium) have now the highest numbers in sick people. My dad got a third shot 2 weeks ago and the government has already bought a fourth.
Isn't it strange, that the places with the most draconian curbs on human liberty, are also the ones finding the most new "Cases" to justify and "legitimise" their rape of our liberties?
What you think comes first; the scary numbers or the tyrannical excesses? Think there's any Positive Feedback there? ('Positive' here has very negative connotations).
Antibodies are not the prime life of defense: T-cell immunity and Natural Killer Cells are. Antibodies are just correlate of cell immunity and only if someone had a serious infection they pop their electrostatic head up. It is just convenient to work with them because T-cell immunity is too complex to play with.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1197130094 have a look
“the government has already bought a fourth” - and there it is, right there, one of the primary motivators of the lunacy: money.
I will have to formulate this differently. Their immune systems reacted and got stronger. They went outside and had fun while the rest of the world lived in anguish. Their relaxed bodies did not pick up the sickness. The rest of the world seems one nest of anxiety.
Right so, the Swedes met the virus at bars and cafes and they did not get sick.
Here is why that happened.
The first reason is their the first layer of their immune system, the innate immune system. Their natural kill cells, the macrophages and all their buddies, they just started wiping out any viron they could find on their way, living a debris of proteins around them, no questions asked. Anything non-self was being wiped out.
Some epithelial (lung) cells though got infected. This is when the second layer of their immune system has to step in.
Because of cross-reactivity with other past coronaviruses (SARS-COV-2 is now the 7th endemic coronavirus NOT a novel one other than the spike protein change) there is a LOT of residual memory in the T-cells.
The cell immunity remembers part of proteins (the N-protein) for example. Their role is to kill the opponent AND any of our cells that have been captured by the enemy.
Here is how the second layer plays out.
Virus infects air epithelia cells. During the first exposure of our immune system there were virons running around. They got attacked by the innate system that has left pieces of virus (proteins etc) floating around.
These pieces are collected by the spies of our system: long, octopus like dendritic cells that collect those pieces for intelligence. They then head down to one of your lymph node and they present these fragments to T-cells
"Look T-cells what I found, have you seen this piece before ?"
One T-cell goes: "Yes maam, I have seen something similar"
Dendritic goes: "Ok I want you to make 300 copies of yourself and go back to the lungs. Once there kill the enemy and as many of our own cells you find find preparing this type of virus. I want the entire procedude SHUT DOWN.
It then adds>
Also I want you to make 100 copies of yourself but these time use them as coaches for our b-cells. We are going to be doing cleanup when this mess is over and we also need to have some third layer memory set up for this.
T-cell goes: "Maaam yes maam" and of it heads with its brother in arms for to defend us.
This happens within HOURS after exposure, the fight ends fast and clean without any thing more than 'feeling slightly under the weather'.
When all is over, some T-cells stay permenantly in the lungs with that memory. That is why second time you get infected usually is cleaned up faster than the first
Here is where you can find out more
1) JC https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1197130094
2) https://youtu.be/lXfEK8G8CUI?t=252
Thank you ! This is explained in language a non-medical person can understand. I am going to copy this, and save it for future use, if you don't mind
Wow that is a great explanation for those of us who don't know a t-cell from a cake of soap! Thank you.
Yeah there were some study listing fear/anxiety as one of the ”comorbidities”. Locking people in their homes and scare the hell out of them def don’t enhance their immune systems.
I think that they kept children unmasked under the age of 12 and schools open has created a great fire break with the healthiest part of the population. The US is also missing a great opportunity to leave the college kids unmasked to help vast swathes get herd immunity with little downside.
Maybe it's the music. Abba's "Don't Shut Me Down" wasn't a big hit, but maybe reflected their national attitude. Sweden is showing us the way to give tyrants everywhere their "Waterloo."
The Swedish government was prohibited by their constitution from implementing many of the measures used elsewhere in Europe.
So was the government in the U.S. and many State governments in the U.S. - but they all did it anyway, and nearly everyone just went along with it.
I don't think this is true. The federal government and the president are constrained unless martial law is declared, but governors of states have broad authorities. I live in Pennsylvania. We stripped our governor of his powers in a referendum in May.
Probably true, but it hasn't stopped many boneheaded actions by the Federal Government. I'm not lawyer, but everything I've read says the Feds have no authority to mandate vaccines in private industry nor individual States*. Authority over Federal civilians, military, etc. I don't know. An early tip-off that something is not quite right were the exemptions on the Legislative, Judicial branches and Postal Workers. Government overstepping its authority is hardly a new problem, of course.
Individual States have powers to compel vaccinations. There is a Supreme Court decision so affirming.
Governors have the rights not reserved for the Federal Government, or the people. They do not have the right to abrogate the Constitution. They don’t have the right to deprive people of their lives or property without due process. 95% of the crap they’ve done is just that. In addition, there’s a medical principle of informed consent. You can’t mandate a drug if the patient cannot access information about it. None of these emergency use drugs come with any sort of insert telling the public about the contents or effects. Therefore, informed consent is *impossible*.
Most of all, ministers cannot rule by degree or over specific agencies (but I’m sure they would like to change the constitution now)
Hello André
Here is a graph showing excess mortality for European countries 2019-2021. Sweden is an outlier and Norway is an even bigger one.
https://i.redd.it/hdva2drqsrx71.jpg
This chart should be kept up-to-date and shared as much as possible !
Is there a reddit where it was published initially ?
I don't know. I found it on another blog with great information about the pandemic:
https://www.rintrah.nl/it-doesnt-matter-that-you-got-it-right-because-people-like-matt-yglesias-dont-care-about-whats-true/
I remember early in the pandemic (March 2020), Knut Wittkowski was strongly arguing for having the schools open and basically letting the virus go through children.
But, I have seen papers saying that children don't spread much to begin with. So, I wonder whether having kids immune would really change anything. It would if they were large spreaders.
I still think that travel is a big contributor to spread. Every summer Europe goes nuts with travel and vacation. This summer wasn't an exception. But maybe Sweden is just enough removed from this spreading vector. Correct me if I am wrong, but Sweden had pretty severe restrictions for getting into the country (even for EU citizens) while all other Europeans were on their way to beaches and back.
My best friend is German and lives in Sweden. They never had restrictions that were worse than the rest of the EU. Instead, the media vilified Sweden and talked endlessly about the risks of traveling there even when they had consistently this summer some of the lowest rates. The brainwashing is unbelievable.
It's been quite bizarre. It's funny though, now the liberal corporate press is just ignoring Sweden. Recently, Wall Street Journal wrote an article about how it's like to live with the endemic virus - and they picked Portugal, which still have covid passes in some settings and mask mandates. Meanwhile, Sweden has been COMPLETELY open since Sept 29, but it's like we don't exist. :) It's just like the hosts in the HBO series Westworld which have been programmed to not see certain things that go against their defined boundaries of reality.
Yes and no. It's been fairly easy to get in within the EU, but harder from a non-EU country. However, there's has been no test requirement when entering from a Nordic country for quite some time, so I assume lot of tourists have been traveling to Copenhagen airport and then taken the train to Sweden. Plus, Denmark haven't generally required a pre-boarding test so that's a nice little trick if you wanna escape to the south of Sweden without a covid pass :D (How much that have contributed to the spread is another matter).
As for the schools being open: I know from a few teacher friends that there has been a lot of infections where teachers have spread it to other teachers, so I guess that have brought up the natural immunity somewhat. Combined that with teachers generally have a better immunity from being exposed to a lot of kids and I guess you have a pretty good situation for amassing immunity.
Yep, I’m in the U.K. and know two families with kids at university in Sweden and they all did the Denmark then onto Sweden trick for visits this summer
Michael Yeadon said something about children NOT being strong spreaders in a video on lifesitenews
The bureaucrats are afraid for their jobs now. Watch out...
I do not rule Russia: ten thousand clerks do. - Nicholas II of Russia
Thank you for your work. You are one of my go-to sources for analysis and perspective on The Plague.
thank you mr mahoney :-)
Peak Kafka. The contortions being undergone in order to try and continue to scapegoat and blame this on the unvaccinated are becoming painful and embarrassing. Unfortunately, I think it will continue until every last person is pinned down and jabbed. Scapegoating is a primal need which overrides any rationality. I read this wonderful piece by Charles Eisenstein which talks about it so well: https://charleseisenstein.substack.com/p/mob-morality-and-the-unvaxxed
The whole progressive movement world wide is built upon nothing but psychological defense mechanisms. Evidence based reason is dead.
I suspect you may be right. Linked, quite possibly, to shortened attention spans and the easy anonymity and transcience of social media - which enables a cut-and-run substitution for well-reasoned argument.
City vs rural. Old as civilization.The West is a monoculture with more factory-farmed than free-range humans. Die off inevitable.
Ah, yes! That is a good way of looking at it. Humans as monoculture. I like it. Grown leggy and lank and completely unable to sustain ourselves in our sun-deprived, health-deprived, nutrition-deprived urban feedlots. Propped up by convenience-food, treadmills and vitamins. Cortisol-driven existences waiting for collapse.
Mountains of evidence accumulate to be summarily ignored by the panicked population, propaganda media, and government tyrants. The solution will only come from litigation, political action, or rebellion. We're seeing some of all in the US. Things will get worse before they get better.
Justthenews.com reports this morning that 27 states have joined a suit against the joe mandates, which are predominantly, but not exclusively, states with repub AG or governor. Litigation is seldom responsive to abuses quickly enough to matter, but it strengthens resolve, and slowly convinces the terrified that resistance is not futile. As we saw in the US elections last week, dems are quickly losing support. Continued irrational oppression will guarantee a sweep in congressional elections next year. As the captive incumbents and their propagandists begin contemplating their termination, they'll become more rational. But it won't work. The emotions will inevitably shift from terror to revenge as we figure it out. It might be resolved peacefully. Probably not.
To your point - from Ivor Cummins YT channel (until taken down)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vUJKgtinvg
One of the commenters on this video: "Dutch is my native language. The chief physician says: "in principle all patiënts on ICU are vaccinated".
And in reading the comments on that video, someone had mentioned that a colleague has developed a cough and has tested negative for the crud.
May be time for people to familiarize themselves with coughing and heart failure
https://www.verywellhealth.com/coughing-and-heart-failure-cardiac-cough-explained-3896488
A healthy friend of 50 had COVID but got vaccinated anyway (according to Dr. Peter McCullough's podcast, that's the worst case scenario for side effects). Several months later he got a massive heart attack, almost died, received 6 stents and is in rehab. Apparently, it has nothing to do with the vaccine. I can totally can imagine him agreeing to a booster. Survival of the fittest...
"This is not a pandemic, it is an IQ test"
Well, I know very smart people that got scared into vaccinating. So it's more of a pandemic of the cowards
Yes, it truly is the Age of the Survival of the Fittest - physically, mentally and emotionally
I too often jump to conclusions 😀. I'm just a layman, but I speak from basic biology knowledge and some first-hand experience. The Covid-19 shot may give immunity against one virus, but nature has made quite a few more pathogens available. Cold and flu as well as less-frequent respiratory infections may cause cough. As can many non-infectious reasons: allergy, etc.
YES!
My husband had his pericardial sac removed - pericardiectomy - in 2016. It was traumatic to say the least and it could only be done at the world-renown Cleveland Clinic.
Persistent cough is always present with pericarditis, and probably myocarditis.
Also, I have noticed a lot of commercials of new digital-device heart monitoring "apps". Wonder who is invested in that? and why the push now.
Someone's who recognize an opportunity BUT would think that won't go over very well for the cover-up minded folks.
Watch that be squashed just as CGM's (continuous glucose monitors). It's not just the sick-care system that saw CGM's as deleterious to their profit margin but BIG AG, as their cheap-to-make highly addictive products were at risk.
I saw it. It was 35 seconds long. I knew it would disappear.
Please don't let the CBC know you are here- you will be censored and we will never get to hear your artistry over the airwaves again!
It is the commitment fallacy. Once you put $100 0000 to some pyramid scheme, the eventual next $30 000 request does not feel so bad. You are already committed.
This vaccine business will get even worse once the kids are more less vaccinated by group pressure. Then the parents really are committed!
I usually compare it to the Concorde fallacy. It took 22 years before it stopped flying, although they knew for years that it would never be a profitable project. But nobody can lose face.
They had a mutually assured destruction contract from the start. If either of the countries quit, the quitting party would have had to pay all the costs so far incurred to the other party. Technological marvel but then the 1973 oil crisis made the plane way too expensive to fly and too many cancellations.
It was profitable for the two airliners during the last decade because of targeting only the luxury segment.
I never flew on one, but I lived near one airport in USA that had service. You definitely knew when it was taking off! 😃
Thank you - I did not know about this clause in the contract.
Yes, also called the sunk-cost fallacy. Even so, at times it's a valid concept, but only when the cost (downside) has an upper limit. For example, the old English proverb: You may as well hang for a sheep as for a lamb.
‘But it would have been so much worse without the vaccines, masks and lockdowns!’
Modern day Goebbels would just love Twitter and Facebook. He would not use fear so much this time. He would use instead the virtue signalling people, embellish and strengthen that mental group pathology. Feed on peoples' desire to be smarter and so special and progressive and tell everybody else online about it!
Obama used this to the max. No "progressive" journalist in the MSM actually checked what the hell his admin did behind the scenes because he was a woke dream come true, a real salvation man. That kind of stuff is dangerous.
This vaccine phenomena started the same way. All of sudden it was a progressive, a woke thing to do, when it was "Trump's dangerous poison vaccine" just few months before. The Biden admin used that mental pathology the same way as Obama in presidential elections to get elected.
If this ends in a good way, there will be still a lot of angry people, committees, testimonies, tons of accusations and investigations, tons of lawsuits, compensations, jail time to a lot of people and "never again" declarations. If in a bad way, a permanent tyrannical left-green wing regimes all over the western world.
Make no mistake about it, this is the largest, most dangerous and most lethal medical catastrophe ever during peace time!
This is WWIII just with different weapons. I’m sure some will say this is hyperbole but to the individual who is desperately fighting to feed their family while avoiding the vaccine roulette, this is war being waged upon us.
Correct. The educated avoid reality with rationalization (data). They will begin to melt emotionally when the children start dying.
Have you seen Squid Game? It’s exactly what is happening with the vaccine.
Looks like Germany is heading for natural immunity - despite the politicians' best efforts.
I just hope they won't manage to flatten the curve until fall 2022.
I found some chart that ranked natural immunity in each state in the US and that is what I have been using to try and track potential hot spots for this winter. I ignore the vaccination rates except to calculate in a little something extra for the hubris that accompanies some of the vaccinated, making it a bigger hot spot.
It's mostly seasonal.
Yes, I agree, but some states locked down so quickly and ushered in vaccines so quickly, they have surprisingly low natural immunity rates. I believe VT and Maine were particularly low. My state was only 45%.
Charlotte - I wonder about Washington state.
Last year I knew hardly anyone that got it. Now? I currently know 15 people that have it!!
Ok here is the chart for the expected US natural immunity rates(it was posted Sept 5 but links the source)- I follow 2 people on twitter specifically for data. Obviously Gato Malo on substack too, but on twitter @ianmSC and this quiet account PLC@Humble_Analysis.
https://twitter.com/Humble_Analysis/status/1434690815075311620
I'm not entirely convinced. If you look at Spain, they had a massive spike in positive tests in summer 2021. I've been told by people that live there that was mainly young people getting it.
Spain was totally locked down in Spring 2020, except for Madrid. But since then schools have been in session uninterrupted (with masks), restaurants open and in most regions life has been pretty normal.
I would guess they now probably have natural immunity in the general population.
You might like this as well.
https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/Pages/COVID-19/Sero-prevalence-COVID-19-Data.aspx
Dr. Erica Pan is the state epidemiologist and deputy director of the California Department of Public Health Center for Infectious Diseases
Did you know California has a secret immunologist? Her name is Dr. Erica Pan and her study blood test study of previous infection and antibodies was stopped in June of 2021. At that time it showed the state reached about 85% Seroprevalence. Keep in mind most (over half) antibodies tests she used DID not see the S Protein but used the N Protein from previous infection.
https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/Pages/COVID-19/Sero-prevalence-COVID-19-Data.aspx
Dr. Erica Pan is the state epidemiologist and deputy director of the California Department of Public Health Center for Infectious Diseases
But natural immunity is a long way away! With 6.5% of positive cases (official count) that's not much. Of course, the real exposure to virus is much higher than that, but still.
This is something that is definitely not well understood -- what do you actually need to reach herd immunity? One of the issues is whether you need to have a symptomatic infection to gain natural immunity. If you were symptomatic, you definitely developed
antibodies. But if you were asymptomatic, maybe your innate immune system was good enough to prevent more serious case, but then maybe your antibodies are not there.
So many people may have tested positive or were exposed to the virus but were asymptomatic: do they contribute to herd immunity?
Antibody tests are a poor way to measure natural immunity, T-cell tests (like T-Detect COVID) are the gold standard. People who have successfully fought off the virus (even with very mild symptoms), will not get it again. And if people were infected by one of the now practically extinct variants, they are still immune to Delta.
Here is an excellent summary of studies on natural immunity to date: https://brownstone.org/articles/79-research-studies-affirm-naturally-acquired-immunity-to-covid-19-documented-linked-and-quoted/
Yes, sure, I understand all that. I am talking about people who are completely asymptomatic (but tested positive -- without a test they wouldn't even know).
I haven't seen many papers discussing natural immunity at individual level for people with very mild or asymptomatic infection (ie, do you need to have a symptomatic infection to gain immunity) and also not much about herd immunity (apart from generic theories based on R0, etc.)
I am watching our own numbers here in South Africa with bated breath. According to one of the medical aid providers, their actuary has extrapolated that possibly 80% of the country has already been exposed. And we have a relatively low vaccination rate which started very late (although increasingly coercive measures are being deployed by companies, who are acting as proxy enforcers for government). If the 80% prior exposure is correct, and if the other 20% has been mopped up by vaccinees, then there should theoretically not be too large a fourth wave (I acknowledge the hubris of my assertion - as am no statistician!). Although, of course, the authorities and good-behaviour police are salivating at the prospect of a fourth wave, and the opportunity to terrorise the populace for even longer. Well, let's see what happens. Watch this space.
That's what's so puzzling about this: if 80% have been exposed and have some resistance/immunity and 20% have some protection due to vaccines, then serious cases should stop rising or at least stabilize.
For now, the rates have plummeted and we are in a trough - i.e. we have exited the third wave, which was delta-driven. If much of the remainder of the populace remains unvaccinated and we don't see a significant fourth wave, maybe we will have reached some sort of herd immunity which we can attribute partially to infection-induced immunity. Rather than the drug-peddlars claiming full credit which, face it, is the likely purpose behind the mandates (i.e. to piggy-back off any infection-induced immunity, given the poor efficacy results of the pseudo-vaccines).
You are also entering summer season, and seasonality plays a big role. Many claims about success of measures are just due to seasonality.
"You are also entering summer season..."
You point out succinct proof that covidiocy is bollocks; South Africa's "Cases" clearly track American and British cycles. Murdoch &co own the SA media, and the geniuses don't actually understand enough basic natural science to know South Africa is in the opposing hemisphere, implying 6 month lagging "spikes", so they keep "spiking" us at the wrong times, when they shape the SA "narrative".
I tell you; just laugh the stupid bastards off the stage!
Yes, you are absolutely right.
India, Sweden and California speak to the idea that the previously infected have immunity. Look at current case loads and you will see they are way down and all blood tests show that the people who did the low estimates should be questioned.
https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/Pages/COVID-19/Sero-prevalence-COVID-19-Data.aspx