General Coronavirus (COVID-19): Will Social Distancing Be Permanent?

[Card Slinger J]

"Human lives are worth more than anything else, we must never put anything above the saving of one human life." It's a commonly expressed feeling and I absolutely agree with the principle. Who couldn't agree with it If someone you love needs treatment which will cost a trillion dollars a day, you would rightly demand that the treatment be provided and down the cost. I would. But If you spend a trillion dollars a day saving Mr. X's wife or Mrs. Wise's husband or their two-year old child Zed they'll likely be nothing left to pay for any other health services. Hospitals will have to shut operations, cease, and there will be no medicines available for millions of people will die unnecessarily and that's the dilemma. Health care sources are finite and doctors always have to make decisions about how best to allocate those limited resources that's what triage is all about. In an army surgical unit doctors assess the incoming wounded and decide who gets to be treated first.

When the Coronavirus (COVID-19) first appeared, mathematical modelers looked at the small amounts of evidence available and concluded that millions of people were going to die. In Britain the mathematical model has concluded that 8 million people would be hospitalized and 500,000 would die. Showing all the skills of life insurance salesmen they sold this theory to the politicians and convinced them that their projections were accurate. Curiously the normally skeptical politicians needed very little persuading. The mathematical modelers were wrong of course but the politicians accepted what they were told and life changed. How the devil could they have all got everything so wrong? It was obvious back in February 2020 that the Coronavirus (COVID-19) wasn't going to kill us all. In mid-March I was vilified for recording a YouTube video in which I called the whole Coronavirus (COVID-19) Crisis the hoax of the century. I thought it was pretty obvious that the mathematicians were wrong.

The wise will at this point wonder whether politicians leapt on the nonsense because they saw an opportunity or whether the politicians were looking for an opportunity and waiting for the nonsense to be served up for them. The suspicions of the wise will be strengthened by the fact that this bizarre error was repeated all over the world and duly endorsed and encouraged by eager politicians and so the hysteria and the panic became global even though the bug was officially downgraded to flu level back in March 2020. Politicians and compliant journalists ignored this inconvenient truth because they didn't want their plans damaged. The next stage in this lunacy was for politicians, advisors, and health care chiefs to decide that the threat from the virus was so great that the health services should be devoted in their entirety to the care of patients with this one disease. They decided to clear the wards' cancel operations and build new hospitals.

Patients with cancer, heart disease, and other serious illnesses were shunted aside so that doctors and nurses could be ready to deal with the flood of coronavirus (COVID-19) patients. Suddenly the coronavirus (COVID-19) was the only thing that mattered. Patients with cancer were actually pushed aside to be ignored and forgotten. Doctors and nurses obediently cleared the wards and prepared themselves. The nation came to a halt, schools were closed, factories were shut, and shops were closed too. Even dentists and opticians were told to lock their doors and help keep the virus at bay. The panic was institutionalized and as a result there would be 28 million people on waiting lists for surgery by autumn of 2020. Many of them will die waiting for treatment that would have saved their lives. This abrogation of duty by healthcare bosses appalls and enrages me. The death rate has already started to rise in most countries not because of the coronavirus but because people are being denied medical care as hospitals and gp's struggle to cope with social distancing rules.

Nevertheless despite this there are already suggestions that social distancing will be permanent. In the U.K. the government and the supine media none more supine than the treacherous BBC (British Broadcasting Company) have raised the fear to terror and when Boris Johnson's government elected to slightly soften the lockdown in England the majority of the population reacted in horror and insisted on checking the doors, locking the windows, drawing the curtains, and crawling under their beds. Governments everywhere have boosted the fear by talking of a second wave of infection and having promoted the idea of a vaccine as the only savior confessing that there may never be one available. Politicians want to control us and they're doing very well. It's difficult to see how we're all going to escape from this fake crisis. Of course If this wasn't a conspiracy to turn us all into subdued apprehensive and obedient zombies they could announce that they'd made a bit of a mistake and that the coronavirus (COVID-19) is no worse than the flu (common cold).

Whoops sorry pardon the mathematicians meant well but they got their sums upside down. They're not going to say that ever. They could say that the coronavirus (COVID-19) has become less dangerous or they could say that their brilliant lockdown and social distancing policies have worked brilliantly and have saved us all so it's now safe to come out from under the bed. But they don't want to do that because they want to keep the threat of a second wave available to scare us with If we start getting cocky and comfortable and they don't want to get rid of social distancing because it's social distancing which give the politicians a massive amount of power. It's social distancing which is ruining our lives and which will weaken us as individuals. It's social distancing which will result in millions of job losses. It's social distancing which will wreck education for millions and most important it's social distancing which is wrecking health care in which will result in huge numbers of people dying unnecessarily.

Governments will enthusiastically promote social distancing as the only way to keep us safe but unless we stand up and fight and tell the truth, social distancing will be with us for years possibly forever and as a result our lives will be ruined in every conceivable way.

 

[Celever]

Ah, a videeo from the UK's favourite cult leader. I hope this was posted in jest.

Besides being one of the UK's few anti-vaxxers, he also writes frequently about how dementia is a myth, is a conspirator against the NHS claiming it intentionally kills its patients (killing more people than cancer!) and tries to lure people in with his pseudo-economics with the intention of turning them fascist, under a guise of humanitarianism. It's fun that he's now adding COVID-19 conspiracies to his arsenal of incredulous claims.

Let's dissect a little bit.

In Britain the mathematical model has concluded that 8 million people would be hospitalized and 500,000 would die. Showing all the skills of life insurance salesmen they sold this theory to the politicians and convinced them that their projections were accurate.

To date in the UK, just under 37,000 people have been confirmed to have died from COVID-19. That's nearing the 50,000 projected in the mathematical model, to the extent that we're likely to surpass the projected figure. What he claims as "8 million people would be hospitalised" was in actuality a claim that "preparations must be made for 8 million people to contract the virus". It's clear how he spun words there, and that his claims regarding deaths are blatantly incorrect.

It was obvious back in February 2020 that the Coronavirus (COVID-19) wasn't going to kill us all.

Here is where the manipulation tactics come into play. Using language such as "kill us all" is a number of different fallacies: partly it's appeal to emotion, drawing on the reader's feelings to drown out their rationality; partly it's manipulation of figures again, since we're nearing 50,000 deaths and we're clearly not all dead so it's got nothing to do with the aforementioned model; and partly it's appeal to false evidence, using the arbitrary date of February 2020 to form an implication of credence to his claim that something happened at some point to back up his claim. Nobody ever claimed that COVID-19 would kill us all, and that was therefore apparent before February 2020. This is nonsense.

The wise will at this point wonder whether politicians leapt on the nonsense because they saw an opportunity or whether the politicians were looking for an opportunity and waiting for the nonsense to be served up for them.

Note how he elevates his own position to the listener, even if a little subtly. Referring to the people on his side as "the wise" is a way of making people believe that he is wise without realising it in the same way as they would if he had said "I am wise and therefore I wonder...". It's also another manipulation tactic to make the audience agree with what he's saying, since it's a plural inclusive conjunctive that means that if the audience also realises how COVID-19 is a myth, then they too will be wise. It works sub-consciously, but it still works.

The suspicions of the wise will be strengthened by the fact that this bizarre error was repeated all over the world and duly endorsed and encouraged by eager politicians and so the hysteria and the panic became global

The panic has not been global. It has occurred in the majority of first world countries, where the virus has most affected, but in underdeveloped countries their COVID-19 measures were primarily restricted to closing borders to prevent the virus entering their territory, to little effect on the residents of those countries, as well as a short pseudo-lockdown to a much lesser extent to what we've seen in Europe. The other route, taken in countries like Vietnam, was a complete lockdown complete with the Government sending food to every family so they could survive comfortably without needing to leave the house. That eradicated the virus entirely without a single death, and lockdown in that country ended over a month ago. This is not a global hysteria or panic: better Governments than we have seen in Europe and America solved the COVID-19 problem promptly. This pandemic was mishandled by our Governments, but it was not opportunism by those politicians. It was ineptitude.

even though the bug was officially downgraded to flu level back in March 2020

From the WHO: "Globally, about 3.4% of reported COVID-19 cases have died. By comparison, seasonal flu generally kills far fewer than 1% of those infected." This is for a number of possible reasons and it does not necessarily mean that COVID-19 is in and of itself deadlier, but that humans haven't built up a resistance to the virus as we have for the flu simply because it's new. This means that a strong immune system is often an insufficient defence against the virus because when no one's immune system has encountered the virus before, everyone's at essentially a flat 0. That further means it kills people who wouldn't die from the flu, meaning it is clearly not downgraded to flu level.

Besides that, the same manipulation tactics are used: "officially" is appeal to authority which is particularly egregious considering no official did what he claimed, and March 2020 is another false evidence using an arbitrary date to imply that something happened to justify his claim, when it didn't.

Politicians and compliant journalists ignored this inconvenient truth because they didn't want their plans damaged.

This is a subtle ad hominem. Instead of justifying his claim that COVID-19 is no worse than flu, he skips that part and attacks the people who disagree with him for "ignor[ing] this inconvenient truth".

The next stage in this lunacy was for politicians, advisors, and health care chiefs to decide that the threat from the virus was so great that the health services should be devoted in their entirety to the care of patients with this one disease. They decided to clear the wards' cancel operations and build new hospitals.

"Lunacy" is used here for the fallacy of appeal to absurdity, drawing on the listener's feeling of common sense to discredit something that isn't actually absurd. This is also factually incorrect. Hospitals are still performing essential operations, as I would know because my Mother has been visiting hospital frequently thanks to a stomach stricture that necessitates a series of surgeries. Only one floor of my local hospital is devoted to COVID-19, accounting for the entire county of Gloucestershire. The other ~15 wards are operating normally.

And building new hospitals is never a bad thing. I'm not sure why he's framing an increase in healthcare capacity as a bad thing. Oh that's right: he thinks "doctors and nurses kill more people than cancer" (the title of a previous book of his).

The nation came to a halt, schools were closed, factories were shut, and shops were closed too. Even dentists and opticians were told to lock their doors and help keep the virus at bay.

Firstly, shops were never closed except for unimportant ones like garden centres. Using the general term "shops" to mean a small proportion of shops is a form of the "No True Scotsman" fallacy, redefining shops away from the general definition that the populace assumes. Factories were shut for a while but have since reopened, and schools continued teaching online so while the physical premises were closed the function of schools did not halt, which is intentional amphiboly. Using "even" to denote dentists and opticians is appeal to absurdity once again, trying to frame the closing of dentists and opticians as somehow more important than schools and factories which isn't strictly true (are glasses more important than education? really?) which is again trying to grant his point more credence than it has.

In the U.K. the government and the supine media none more supine than the treacherous BBC (British Broadcasting Company)

This is appeal to false authority. He simply accuses the BBC of being invalid for the purpose of discrediting what they have said, without justifying the point. It's the same as ad hominem except institutional.

Not to say that there aren't issues with the BBC, but "supine" and "treacherous" are inappropriate descriptors for it.

when Boris Johnson's government elected to slightly soften the lockdown in England the majority of the population reacted in horror and insisted on checking the doors, locking the windows, drawing the curtains, and crawling under their beds.

A false conclusion. Recoiling at a premature easing of lockdown =/= desire for a permanent lockdown. He omits "premature" from the premise because it invalidates his point.

Governments everywhere have boosted the fear by talking of a second wave of infection and having promoted the idea of a vaccine as the only savior confessing that there may never be one available

A slew of Asian countries have already eradicated COVID-19 entirely without a vaccine. No one thinks that a vaccine is the only measure that could solve the crisis because other measures have already solved it on a national level elsewhere. This is just nonsense.

Politicians want to control us and they're doing very well.

Ad hominem.

It's difficult to see how we're all going to escape from this fake crisis.

Appeal to absurdity.

Of course If this wasn't a conspiracy to turn us all into subdued apprehensive and obedient zombies they could announce that they'd made a bit of a mistake and that the coronavirus (COVID-19) is no worse than the flu (common cold).

This is just unsubstantiated assertion. It's not even argumentation. He doesn't justify his claim that "this [is] a conspiracy to turn us all into subdued apprehensive and obedient zombies" he just says it. Appeal to emotion, perhaps? No one wants to be a subdued apprehensive and obedient zombie. Or appeal to a lack of evidence? We can't disprove that that's truly the Government's plan, so hey it's probably true. But it's invalid nonetheless.

Governments will enthusiastically promote social distancing as the only way to keep us safe but unless we stand up and fight and tell the truth, social distancing will be with us for years possibly forever and as a result our lives will be ruined in every conceivable way.

Appealing to a sense of revolution, preying on dissatisfaction to form a following around him and his faulty opinions. COVID-19 isn't fake. Social distancing has succeeded in other countries and life has returned to relative normalcy (why wouldn't the politicians of those countries want in on this control that European leaders are apparently putting into use?). He's nothing more than a man who craves power and is willing to manipulate people into wrongfully granting it him.
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@Card Slinger J, if you truly believe this man then please read over my post and do some research, because you're being manipulated. If you posted this in jest, it's best not to spread this kind of content that can have serious repercussions for people's lives.

 

[Card Slinger J]

Well speaking of Asian countries that managed to eradicate COVID-19 without a vaccine, Japan somehow managed to contain the virus enough to where there's only been 50 confirmed cases thus far unless the number's gone up recently. Taiwan seems like they were doing pretty good for awhile until they were hit badly with a second outbreak from what I've been hearing. Based on some independent news outlets from YouTube, a Chinese lab experimented on ' highly pathogenic viruses' just days before the COVID-19 outbreak and that the World Health Organization (WHO) recently admitted that they never probed Chinese Wet Markets (such as the one in Wuhan) as well as Chinese testing facilities for virus experimentation.

 

[mirdo]

JESUS CHRIST.

Ok. Im still awake. So I will disect this.

Japan somehow managed to contain the virus enough to where there's only been 50 confirmed cases thus far unless the number's gone up recently.

Litterally a 5 minute Google.

Based on some independent news outlets from YouTube

This is the funniest sentence I've read in a while. This is the opposite of giving you credibility. YouTube litterally is a dutch oven of Conspiracy theory at the Moment. And "Independent News Outlet" at this stage is basically code for some Right Wing nuts who tell you that all of the "Mainstream Media" are lying with no exception and then use little to no sources and bring up theories that kind of sound like they could be right.

a Chinese lab experimented on ' highly pathogenic viruses' just days before the COVID-19 outbreak and that the World Health Organization (WHO) recently admitted that they never probed Chinese Wet Markets (such as the one in Wuhan) as well as Chinese testing facilities for virus experimentation.

The Chinese Lab is litterally a conspiracy Theory. There is no credibility to that.
Why would they probe the Wet Markets? Its litterally just Markets for Meat and stuff.
And Im pretty sure the WHO doesnt have the authority to probe that kind of thing to check the "Chinese Labs for Virus Experimentation". Cause that can be litterally anything. Could be testing for a vaccine for what ever or just all kinds of stuff. Im no Virologist.
Plus just because the WHO didnt check them doesnt mean that makes that theory true.

I know this isnt indebt as Cels Post was. But I think keeping fake (or shaky at best) information on the internet unchecked is dangerous.
All your post did was trying to torch hate against the Chinese and Distrust in Institutions like the WHO.
Is WHO an organisations thats perfect? Definitly not. Im not saying that.
But trying to turn the public against it is gonna be dangerous. Cause it lessens its power to have the power to investigate stuff and keep other Outbreaks in Check.

 

[Card Slinger J]

That's what I don't understand about the whole "criticism = racism" argument that people are going on about when it comes to the Chinese Government's involvement with this situation as well as the World Health Organization. I get what you're saying in regards to how dangerous it is turning the public against the Chinese Government and WHO while all I'm saying is If there's no accountability for what happened then we run the risk of another global pandemic similar to what we've already experienced.

That's like allowing the terrorists who attacked the United States on 9/11 to get away with murder just so they attack us again without doing anything about it and because we took action we're a lot safer now than we were before 9/11 even If the ends didn't justify the means. How many times we'll we have to trade in our freedoms for safety before we have nothing left? The worse these crises get the more government overreach there is. This is the second time it's happened since 9/11 only this time "New Normal" sounds more like a banner for "New World Order".

 

[Celever]

That's what I don't understand about the whole "criticism = racism" argument that people are going on about when it comes to the Chinese Government's involvement with this situation as well as the World Health Organization. I get what you're saying in regards to how dangerous it is turning the public against the Chinese Government and WHO while all I'm saying is If there's no accountability for what happened then we run the risk of another global pandemic similar to what we've already experienced.

That's like allowing the terrorists who attacked the United States on 9/11 to get away with murder just so they attack us again without doing anything about it and because we took action we're a lot safer now than we were before 9/11 even If the ends didn't justify the means. How many times we'll we have to trade in our freedoms for safety before we have nothing left? The worse these crises get the more government overreach there is. This is the second time it's happened since 9/11 only this time "New Normal" sounds more like a banner for "New World Order".

Oh man. I'm simultaneously confused and impressed at how you claim to get your information from independent YouTube journalists, yet sound unwaveringly like a FOX News broadcast.

Firstly, the culpability of this is not on the Chinese Government: it is on the North American and European Governments who allowed this virus to get so out of hand unchecked. Blaming the Chinese Government is ludicrous because it's predicated on the assumption that if China had gone "hey guys there's a deadly virus" then all of our Governments would've responded in a way that protects its citizens just on China's word. That would never happen, as evidenced by our Government's inaction when their own citizens had already begun dying from COVID-19. China cannot force our Governments to act, and so putting a modicum of blame on them for not governing our countries better than the people we elected to do so is flawed and circular.

What exactly do you blame China for? It's difficult to gauge how far in the conspiracy wormhole you are. Do you think the Chinese Government created the virus? That's a popular lie being spread.

And iirc I've actually replied to you regarding your 9/11 conspiracy theories before. It's a shame you didn't do further research and continue to spread far-right conspiracy theories and bigotry on a PG-13 Pokémon forum. You're actually the greatest example of fake news I've ever witnessed, looking back on all of your posts, since you buy into these egomaniacs trying to create cults of personality, and then spread the damage to places where it's completely unwelcome (a PG-13 Pokémon forum. Like, really?). And whether you support Trump's battle against fake news or you believe that fake news is why Trump got elected, being the fake news itself places you in a universally loathed position.

You don't have to stop believing conspiracy theories. That's your prerogative, though I wonder why you would continue to believe things when they're proved wrong by a google search, like whatever source told you Japan has had 50 cases. But regardless, do not post these crackpot theories on a PG-13 Pokémon forum. It is not only irresponsible, but potentially damaging to the lives of other members of this community. A reasonably sized forum such as this is a melting pot. There will be Chinese people on this forum, who may happen upon your racism. There are young children who don't know enough about the news or what's going on right now and who therefore might actually believe you and internalise some of the things you're saying.

Stop.

 

[Card Slinger J]

Look I apologize If I came off as being racist toward Chinese people when that wasn't my original intent. It's just that we're living in chaotic times right now where there's so much mass hysteria going on at a time when people want more clarity and truth where there's so much negativity within the mainstream news media right now. I'm not trying to come off as being a fake news propagandist when I'm just trying to get to the truth despite how skewed it may seem. The truth is that I have a terrible habit of allowing fear to cloud my judgment when it comes to talking about stuff like 9/11 or COVID-19 though is it wrong to be concerned about it? I didn't think it was. Is not knowing about something that could be true worse than being informed about something that could have a negative impact on our society?

It's no secret that microbial threats like coronaviruses will inevitably move from the bottom to the top of public-health priority lists. Just as the threat of domestic terror looms like what we've experienced on 9/11 and the Boston Marathon Bombings the same goes for infectious diseases like COVID-19 in our collective conscious. It has to If we have any hope of avoiding further drastic lockdowns and forever changing the way we interact with each other. You're right, the Chinese Government didn't create the virus when people just want to know the real source of where it came from to prevent a similar situation from happening again. I don't think anyone would want to go through another round of social distancing and quarantine given the tremendous cost it's had on the global economy and our way of life.

 

[Celever]

Look I apologize If I came off as being racist toward Chinese people when that wasn't my original intent. It's just that we're living in chaotic times right now where there's so much mass hysteria going on at a time when people want more clarity and truth where there's so much negativity within the mainstream news media right now. I'm not trying to come off as being a fake news propagandist when I'm just trying to get to the truth despite how skewed it may seem. The truth is that I have a terrible habit of allowing fear to cloud my judgment when it comes to talking about stuff like 9/11 or COVID-19 though is it wrong to be concerned about it? I didn't think it was. Is not knowing about something that could be true worse than being informed about something that could have a negative impact on our society?

It's no secret that microbial threats like coronaviruses will inevitably move from the bottom to the top of public-health priority lists. Just as the threat of domestic terror looms like what we've experienced on 9/11 and the Boston Marathon Bombings the same goes for infectious diseases like COVID-19 in our collective conscious. It has to If we have any hope of avoiding further drastic lockdowns and forever changing the way we interact with each other. You're right, the Chinese Government didn't create the virus when people just want to know the real source of where it came from to prevent a similar situation from happening again. I don't think anyone would want to go through another round of social distancing and quarantine given the tremendous cost it's had on the global economy and our way of life.

Alright, I also apologise for coming off strong but it seemed like you were going down the wormhole of "China created the virus so we should cease all diplomatic relations with them" and that would've been hugely problematic, so I wanted to "nip it in the bud". As for your points, though:

I think something that's forgotten in Europe and North America is that this is normal, on a global scale. COVID19 is just a variant of SARS, which was a pandemic in Asia only a few years ago. We all know about Malaria and Ebola, which have ravaged for over a decade in Africa with no sign of stopping any time soon because although we have the vaccine, no one is willing to fund the distribution of it across Africa in order to save lives. COVID19 is nothing special. In fact, it was a long time coming. The special thing is that we avoided all of the surges of deadly viruses since the Spanish Flu in Europe and North America -- the probability of us doing this was pretty low.

And to be existential about it, before democracy these plagues still happened and those just killed everyone because nobody knew how viruses worked or even knew it was happening until their village was hit with it. A plague every now and again will happen, and has always happened. At least it's not a meteor.

This is what I want to question here. You place avoiding future lockdowns at the top of your priority list moving forward, rather than having plans in place to minimise the death toll of the next pandemic. I would have those reversed, as lockdown is not only a fair but a good price to pay for life. Due to how viruses work, at least a short lockdown is the only definite solution to the virus. Was this one handled poorly? Yes. Socialist governments eradicated the virus in a couple of weeks by providing food, toiletries and even recreational items to everyone in the country so they would have no reason to go outside. Capitalist economies didn't want the supermarkets to lose too much profit, so forced their citizens to leave lockdown in order to eat, which is how the vast majority of people who have died from this virus contracted it in this first place. Avoiding another lockdown like this is undeniably a good thing, because it's been largely ineffective both at stopping the virus and maintaining the economy, which were its two aims.

But ultimately we will be affected by another virus because COVID19 is just one in a long timeline of surprise permutations of viruses that kill a large percentage of the population. We need to have structures in place to do an effective lockdown next time, where people don't have need to go outside period if they want to shield from it all. The economy pales in significance to deaths.

 

[Card Slinger J]

This is what I want to question here. You place avoiding future lockdowns at the top of your priority list moving forward, rather than having plans in place to minimise the death toll of the next pandemic. I would have those reversed, as lockdown is not only a fair but a good price to pay for life. Due to how viruses work, at least a short lockdown is the only definite solution to the virus. Was this one handled poorly? Yes. Socialist governments eradicated the virus in a couple of weeks by providing food, toiletries and even recreational items to everyone in the country so they would have no reason to go outside. Capitalist economies didn't want the supermarkets to lose too much profit, so forced their citizens to leave lockdown in order to eat, which is how the vast majority of people who have died from this virus contracted it in this first place. Avoiding another lockdown like this is undeniably a good thing, because it's been largely ineffective both at stopping the virus and maintaining the economy, which were its two aims.


But ultimately we will be affected by another virus because COVID19 is just one in a long timeline of surprise permutations of viruses that kill a large percentage of the population. We need to have structures in place to do an effective lockdown next time, where people don't have need to go outside period if they want to shield from it all. The economy pales in significance to deaths.

What I should've said earlier was to avoid future lockdowns and have plans in place to minimize the death toll of the next pandemic at the top of our priority list moving forward. I would like to think COVID-19 is a once in a generation event similar to the 1918 Spanish Flu but given the technological advances of the 21st century it's really hard to rule out the possibility of it happening again. I am curious as to what kind of extra precautions that small businesses can take to help themselves stay in business during the next global pandemic though unfortunately those precautions are too systematically limited to what they can actually handle. When your business is too reliant on cash flow you have to make risky decisions in order to get through a month while you're stuck between a rock and a hard place. That's the biggest problem with a lot of gaming / hobby stores nowadays providing people a place to play like Pokémon TCG where they need Organized Play funds to keep these businesses up and running.