Republican lawmakers have slammed their Democratic opponents for suddenly speaking in favor of lifting mask mandates, especially in schools, saying that the switch is just an attempt to boost their chances in the midterm elections.
Democrat-led New Jersey, New York, California, Oregon, Connecticut, and Delaware announced plans to roll back their mask requirements on Tuesday and Wednesday, with Illinois soon expected to join them.
The issue has been a major bone of contention between the two rival American parties during the pandemic. The Democrats have always defended face coverings as an essential measure to stop the spread of Covid-19, while the Republicans insist that the measure is of little use, especially for students, who face a much lesser risk of serious coronavirus infection due to their young age.
“I’d love to see whatever internal polling went around the Democrat Party last week – it’s certainly no coincidence that Democrat-run states are dropping mandates as fast as they can,” Rep. Kevin Hern, R-Okla., told the Daily Mail about the plans by Democratic governors to lift their mask requirements.
Hern was fully backed by Rep. Lisa McClain, R-Mich., who claimed that “the Democrats continually follow the political science instead of the actual science.”
“We’ve known for months that masking has been detrimental to our children. The science hasn’t changed in the last several months, the only change has been the overwhelming uproar over government mandates,” she said.
Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz, said it was “no surprise” that the Democrats have now decided to give up on mask mandates. “They had every intention of using Covid mandates to their advantage – especially when it comes to the polls – and have perfected playing politics in our everyday lives.”
However, Rep. Dan Bishop, R-N.C., suggested that the switch will likely be too little, too late. “Democrats forced masks on kids for two years and now they’re hoping that the rest of America will suddenly forget.”
The midterm elections, scheduled to take place in the US in November, are expected to be a tough test for the Democratic Party. Last month, a poll by Gallup revealed that 47% of Americans identified themselves as Republicans, compared to 42% as Democrats. The news figures contradicted the historic trend of Democrats outnumbering GOP supporters in the country.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said earlier this week that the number of cases and hospitalization in the US was still “too high” to think about lifting Covid-19 restrictions, adding that it continued to endorse universal masking in schools.
On Tuesday, CNN’s medical analyst, Dr. Leana Wen, who has always been a strong supporter of mask mandates, urged the CDC to follow the example of the Democratic states and lift the curbs.
“The CDC has already lost a lot of trust and credibility. This is their time to rebuild and remove restrictions as quickly as they were put in,” she argued.
Wen defended her new stance on face coverings by claiming that “circumstances have changed. Case counts are declining. Also, the science has changed.”
She faced a harsh backlash online, with prominent journalist Glenn Greenwald, who was among the critics, insisting that behavior like Wen’s was the reason behind the public loss of trust in what the medical experts have to say.
“As others noted, there is nothing in The Science™ that changed to justify Dem politicians suddenly ending mask mandates. All that changed is the political fear they have. Conflating ‘The Science’ with politics like this is a key reason many lost trust in public health experts.”
February 11, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | Covid-19, Human rights, United States |
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Less than a week after the UK proposed criminalizing the posting of some types of “knowingly false” information online, England’s National Health Service has taken down a social media video over inaccurate information.
Last week, NHS England posted a video on its Twitter account with more than half-a-million followers to promote vaccination in kids.
The video claimed that 1% of children will be hospitalized because of Covid, 136 kids in the UK had died because of Covid, and 117,000 children have “long Covid.”
The video went viral attracting comments and retweets from some of the most popular influencers in the health category.
But some, including Dr. Robert Hughes, a clinical research fellow at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, questioned the accuracy of the data.
“As both a parent and scientist who has been involved in research on symptom duration and severity of covid in children, the cited statistics didn’t make sense to me,” Hughes wrote in an article in UnHerd. “The idea that 1% of children with Covid are hospitalized for it didn’t pass the ‘sniff test.’”
The video also shared the story of a kid aged 11 that was suffering from long Covid. According to Hughes, the story contradicted the vaccination guidance in the UK, as it does not even recommend vaccination for that age group.
Additionally, there is not yet any substantial evidence to support that the vaccine prevents long Covid.
Hughes also notes that NHS England was silent when he and others questioned the accuracy of the data.
“Several people agreed with me, sharing their working for why these numbers are at best long outdated, may be orders of magnitude out, and risk undermining confidence in vaccine communications and uptake.
“But others seemed to dig in, praising both the content and tone of the messaging when challenged, and directing the discussion into an important, but different, one about the merits of extending Covid vaccination to children rather than the need for accurate and honest communication about vaccination,” Dr. Hughes wrote for UnHerd.
Hughes contacted the Office of the Statistics Regulator about the numbers. The Statistics Regulator agreed that it was important that the NHS provides accurate figures.
“It is important that figures provided by NHSE&I are accurate and reliable,” the Office of the Statistics Regulator said. “In this case the claim made in the video fell short of these expectations – we contacted NHSE&I and it acknowledged that the data were historic and had methodological shortcomings. We are therefore glad that the content has now been removed from Twitter.”
Before its removal, the video had already been widely shared.
February 11, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Progressive Hypocrite, Science and Pseudo-Science | Covid-19, NHS, UK |
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In the two weeks since the Freedom Convoy of Canadian truckers and their supporters began rallying in Ottawa to demand an end to all pandemic-related mandates and restrictions nationwide, it has become clear that this movement isn’t like other protest movements. And that’s a scary proposition for those in charge who thought that they’d manage and exploit this crisis on their own sweet time and schedule regardless of the actual science and reality on the ground.
There has long been an agenda to corral as many humans as possible unwittingly into a global dragnet through technological adoption. That’s what the revelations of National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden were about back in 2013. A technological panopticon provides those in charge with the ability to monitor and ultimately control or sanction dissidents or outliers as the state pursues the self-serving agenda of a select few. Algorithms that exploit this massive online presence enable the state to accurately craft propaganda to be deployed to vilify them in the eyes of the general population, while portraying the state as the great protector — all while selling citizens out to the interests of a select few elites. Essentially, people are manipulated into arguing against their own good.
For those citizens who aren’t seduced by the mere convenience of technology or the narcissistic allure of social media, the fear of terrorism or of Covid-19 more actively encouraged onboarding to these dragnets. And that was before it was flat-out mandated with government-issued QR code health and vaccine passes that linked directly to your identity.
But then a bunch of truckers noticed that the threat of authoritarianism in Canada and elsewhere was closer than it may appear in their mirrors. And these essential workers decided to park their essential tools until officials stopped treating essential freedoms like they were negotiable.
Because Canadian mainstream media is so severely lacking in truly contradictory debate and diversity of thought, the protests risked sparking an unprecedented new awareness for those who had been force-fed government talking points while they may have already been starting to wonder why their entourage was triple-jabbed and still catching the virus. They were probably beginning to question the real value of the sacrifices that they were forced by government into making over the past two years under the illusion of safety.
Into this mix comes a group of people who aren’t paid activists or troublemakers, but rather everyday people with real jobs — and ‘essential’ ones at that, as previously hailed by the governments themselves. This makes the truckers a different breed of dissenters from Black Lives Matters, Antifa, or French Yellow Vest protesters. And that explains why the rhetorical big guns are now being deployed against them. The truckers, by demanding that life go back to exactly the way it was before governments started instrumentalizing the pandemic, could undermine any agenda to exploit the crisis for globalist advancement. This would especially be the case if the Freedom Convoy movement spread around the world, as it’s beginning to do. Here in France, for example, convoys departing from various cities are reportedly scheduled to arrive in Paris beginning on February 11.
Former Bank of Canada and Bank of England governor, Mark Carney, a dual citizen of Ottawa and Globalistan, wrote in a recent Globe and Mail newspaper opinion piece: “[B)y now anyone sending money to the convoy should be in no doubt: You are funding sedition. Foreign funders of an insurrection interfered in our domestic affairs from the start. Canadian authorities should take every step within the law to identify and thoroughly punish them. The involvement of foreign governments and any officials connected to them should be identified, exposed and addressed.”
Unlike previous environmental protests that have raged in Canada to the detriment of the country’s future energy independence, and been backed by US-based think-tanks funded by American business interests close to Washington elites — all of which have apparently escaped Carney’s attention or interest — truckers don’t actually require ‘foreign funding’. They have actual jobs that pay quite well.
You’d think he’d know that, given his illustrious background as an expert in money. But good luck trying to exploit the ‘foreign bogeyman’ trope and attempting to find the scapegoat that you’re looking for. Carney is concerned about the ‘occupation’ by protesters, who are merely fighting against the government blockade of citizens’ lives for the past two years. And a bonus L-O-L for his effort to portray protests to regain basic freedoms as some kind of attempt to overthrow the government of Canada. Perhaps someone could provide him with a paper bag before he passes out?
Here’s your ground truth in Ottawa: “More than 100 Highway Traffic Act and other ‘Provincial Offence Notices’ were issued for offenses including excessive honking, driving the wrong way, defective muffler, no seat belt, alcohol readily available and having the improper class of driving license,” according to a Fox News report.
Well, you know what they say. Every hardcore coup d’état starts with a seat belt offense, right?
Meanwhile, US Homeland Security, already apparently attempting to ward off any potential future pushback against its own unpopular agenda, issued an advisory on February 7 conflating terrorism with “the proliferation of false or misleading narratives, which sow discord or undermine public trust in U.S. government institutions.” Would that include dissent against any government-approved narrative around the pandemic and related liberticidal measures?
Restrictions, mandates, and ‘vaccine passports’ in two Canadian provinces — Alberta and Saskatchewan — are now ending, premiers of both jurisdictions announced on February 7.
The rest of the world now runs the risk of these trucker movements gaining momentum, before the restrictions and mandates can allow for the full implementation of a lasting solution of tracking and surveillance capable of monitoring populist blowback to government insanity.
The rally race between truckers and globalists is on! And with nothing less than democracy and freedom at stake.
Rachel Marsden is a columnist, political strategist and host of an independently produced French-language program that airs on Sputnik France.
February 10, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Russophobia | Canada, Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine, Human rights |
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From the 1950s through the 1980s the CIA overthrew democratically elected governments and assassinated leaders in the U.S. and around the world in the name of fighting communism.
After the fall of communism, the CIA pivoted to fighting terrorism. After 9/11 their mission expanded considerably to include a global network of black sites where they conducted torture. They also engage in covert military operations on the ground inside a wide range of countries.
More recently, the CIA has expanded their mission yet again. We have evidence of coordination between the U.S. Department of Defense, Fauci, the EcoHealth Alliance, bioweapons labs in the U.S., and the Wuhan Institute of Virology (a Chinese bioweapons lab) to conduct gain-of-function research. This has all of the hallmarks of a CIA operation.
One could make the case that the CIA is now fighting viruses/pandemics in the name of national defense. But this effort CREATED the chimera virus that has killed more Americans than all foreign wars combined. Since the chimera virus was released, governments across the developed world, Pharma, and Big Tech have all worked together to control the message, surveil and censor the population, and smash any dissent. Again this reeks of CIA involvement.
So my question is, who/what exactly is the CIA fighting these days? My hunch is that the answer is us. Not just the medical freedom movement (although we are certainly targeted) but the general public. This seems like a class war and the CIA’s new mission is not to defend the U.S. per se but rather to defend the global ruling class from the peasants who might overthrow them.
February 10, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | CIA, Covid-19, United States |
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If you’ve ever felt like Google’s watching you, it’s because they, quite literally, are. “The truth is that contrary to Google’s representations it continues to systematically surveil customers and profit from customer data,” Karl A. Racine, the attorney general for the District of Columbia, said in a statement.1
He’s among four attorneys general who have sued Google for its deceptive practices in collecting location data from the public. The separate lawsuits allege that Google continued to track location data of its users even after they had disabled location tracking.
“Google falsely led consumers to believe that changing their account and device settings would allow customers to protect their privacy and control what personal data the company could access,” Racine said.2
Google’s Been Secretly Tracking People Since at Least 2014
Racine initiated an investigation into Google after a 2018 AP News report revealed Google was tracking people’s movements even when they’d opted out of such tracking.3 Google’s misleading claims to users regarding privacy protections available in their account settings have been ongoing since at least 2014, Racine’s investigation found.4
The AP investigation included a real-world example from privacy researcher Gunes Acar, whose location was tracked to dozens of locations over the course of several days, and the data saved to his Google account, even though he had turned “Location History” off on his cellphone.5
Location data collected by Google has been used in criminal cases in the past, including a warrant issued by police in Raleigh, North Carolina, to track down devices in the area of a murder.6 When you use an app like Google Maps, it will ask you to allow access to location, but it also tracks your location during use of apps that you might not expect. According to the AP investigation:7
“For example, Google stores a snapshot of where you are when you merely open its Maps app. Automatic daily weather updates on Android phones pinpoint roughly where you are. And some searches that have nothing to do with location, like “chocolate chip cookies,” or “kids science kits,” pinpoint your precise latitude and longitude — accurate to the square foot — and save it to your Google account.
The privacy issue affects some two billion users of devices that run Google’s Android operating software and hundreds of millions of worldwide iPhone users who rely on Google for maps or search.”
Tracking You Even When ‘Location History’ Is Off
At issue is the company’s continued tracking of its users even when Location History is turned off. “If you’re going to allow users to turn off something called ‘Location History,’ then all the places where you maintain location history should be turned off,” Jonathan Mayer, a former chief technologist for the Federal Communications Commission’s enforcement bureau, told the AP. “That seems like a pretty straightforward position to have.”8
Indeed, it states on Google’s Account Help webpage, “You can turn off Location History for your account at any time.” Only lower down on the page does it explain, however, that location data may still be saved even if Location History is paused:9
“If you have other settings like Web & App Activity turned on and you pause Location History or delete location data from Location History, you may still have location data saved in your Google Account as part of your use of other Google sites, apps, and services.
For example, location data may be saved as part of activity on Search and Maps when your Web & App Activity setting is on, and included in your photos depending on your camera app settings.”
Aside from hiding location tracking under settings users wouldn’t expect, like Web & App Activity — which is turned on by default — Google is accused of collecting and storing location information via Google services, Wi-Fi data and marketing partners, again after device or account settings had been changed to stop location tracking.10
In addition to the District of Columbia, the attorneys general of Texas, Washington and Indiana have also filed lawsuits against Google for their deceptive data collection practices. The suits allege that Google also pressured users to use location tracking more often because it claimed — falsely — that its products wouldn’t function properly without it.11
“Google has prioritized profits over people,” Todd Rokita, Indiana attorney general, told The New York Times. “It has prioritized financial earnings over following the law.”12 Texas, meanwhile, has also filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google that alleges it has abused a monopoly over ad space auctions to marketers. The suit joins those from more than a dozen other states that claim Google has maintained and abused a monopoly over searches online.13
Google Is Even Tracking Children
Google has been called a dictator with unprecedented power because it relies on techniques of manipulation that have never existed before in human history, according to Robert Epstein, a Harvard trained psychologist who is now a senior research psychologist for the American Institute of Behavioral Research and Technology, where for the last decade he has helped expose Google’s manipulative and deceptive practices.
They’re not only a surveillance agency — think about products like Google Wallet, Google Docs, Google Drive and YouTube — but also a censoring agency with the ability to restrict or block access to websites across the internet, thus deciding what you can and cannot see.
Google has also infiltrated education with its Google classrooms, usage of which skyrocketed during the pandemic, but many aren’t aware that even their children are being tracked. The attorney general of New Mexico filed a suit against Google for its educational tools in its classroom suite, helping to “break through the fog,” Harvard professor Shoshana Zuboff said:14
“[The suit is] identifying the huge amounts of data that they’re taking about kids, how they track them across the internet are they integrate it with all the other Google streams of information and have it as a foundation for tracking those children all the way through their adulthood.”
The suit was later dismissed, but the attorney general filed an appeal, maintaining that Google’s G-Suite for Education products “spy on New Mexico students’ online activities for its own commercial purposes, without notice to parents and without attempting to obtain parental consent.”15
Google Force Installed COVID-19 Tracking Apps
In another sign of Google’s dictatorial tendencies, it partnered with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health and Apple to create a smartphone app called MassNotify, which tracks and traces people, advising the users of others’ COVID-19 status.
While the tool claims to have been developed “with a focus on privacy,”16 the app suddenly appeared on Massachusetts residents’ Android phones out of nowhere, without consent. The feature must be enabled by the user for it to function, but it’s extremely disconcerting that the tool was automatically added to people’s cellphones, whether they intend to use it or not.
In China, COVID-19 tracking apps have been used as surveillance tools in collaboration with its social credit system, raising red flags that this force-installed app could be tracking residents’ movements and contacts without their knowledge and consent. The MassNotify app uses Google’s and Apple’s Bluetooth-based Exposure Notifications Express program.
The software framework was first released in April 2020,17 with the goal of allowing users who test positive for COVID-19 to report their results, which then sends out an alert to anyone whose phone crossed paths with the positive case and may have been exposed. The Exposure Notifications Express program acts as a blueprint from which states can implement their own tracking systems without having to develop their own individual apps.
While other states have required users to download an app to use the system, MassNotify was integrated directly into the operating system of Android phones.18 Such apps are based on technology developed by Apple and Google that was previously known as the “Privacy-Preserving Contact Tracing Project”19 and is now referred to as the Exposure Notifications API (application programming interface).
In a May 2020 Forbes article by Simon Chandler, he pointed out that while contact tracing apps “may be cryptographically secure,” they still “threaten our privacy in broader and more insidious ways,”20 namely encouraging you to keep your cellphone with you at all times and tracking your whereabouts while you do, and further “normalizing” the constant use of technology to dictate your freedoms and behavior.
Using ‘Trickery for Profits’
The attorneys’ general lawsuits against Google are seeking fines and an end to Google’s use of “dark patterns” that influence users to give up more and more personal data in order for the company to increase its profits. The suits allege that Google’s products are designed to pressure users to allow location tracking “inadvertently or out of frustration,” in violation of state consumer protection laws.21
“Google uses tricks to continuously seek to track a user’s location,” Racine said. “This suit, by four attorneys general, on a bipartisan basis, is an overdue enforcement action against a flagrant violator of privacy and the laws of our states.” The more data that Google collects about individual users, the more advertising dollars it can generate. But, Racine noted, “The time of trickery for profits is over.”22
In a similar lawsuit filed in 2020, Arizona attorney general Mark Brnovich also alleged that Google used deceptive practices to track its users’ locations. That suit stated:23
“This case concerns Google’s widespread and systematic use of deceptive and unfair business practices to obtain information about the location of its users, including its users in Arizona, which Google then exploits to power its lucrative advertising business. Google makes it impractical if not impossible for users to meaningfully opt-out of Google’s collection of location information, should the users seek to do so.”
Location data, meanwhile, can be used to reveal your gym memberships, health care visits, stores and restaurants you frequent or where you go to church. It may also be used to provide personalized ads on digital billboards as you pass by, and Google tracks and provides to its customers information about how well online ads work to drive people into brick-and-mortar stores.24
In addition to disabling as many location tracking apps as possible, and deleting your location history from your Google accounts, you can avoid additional Google products — and the privacy invasions they entail — using the following tips:
- Stop using Google search engines. Alternatives include DuckDuckGo and Startpage
- Uninstall Google Chrome and use Brave or Opera browser instead, available for all computers and mobile devices. From a security perspective, Opera is far superior to Chrome and offers a free VPN service (virtual private network) to further preserve your privacy
- If you have a Gmail account, try a non-Google email service instead such as ProtonMail, an encrypted email service based in Switzerland
- Stop using Google docs. Digital Trends has published an article suggesting a number of alternatives25
- If you’re a student, do not convert the Google accounts you created as a student into personal accounts
Sources and References
February 9, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular | China, Covid-19, Google, Human rights, United States |
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Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister of the UK, has, today announced that all coronavirus restrictions will be lifted in less than two weeks. This is a month earlier than initially proposed, showing the accelerating change in the narrative.
He said he plans to abolish the remaining restrictions in the UK, including the self-isolation rules after testing positive. It is not clear, however, whether this will also apply to the unvaccinated.
Mr Johnson said “I can tell the house today, that it is my intention to return on the first day after the half term recess to present our strategy for living with Covid”. What is this new normal that the Prime Minister has in plan? Surely living with Covid means going back to the old normal, not even thinking about Covid anymore?
In other parts of the world, Portugal, Greece and France are to ease travel restrictions and Italy is changing its mask mandate for outdoor areas. The EU is removing testing regimes for fully vaccinated travellers, again leaving the nasty after taste that the new narrative is to go back to normal whilst leaving restrictions on the unvaccinated.
Across the pond, in Canada, Saskatchewan Premier, Scott Moe, announced the end to Covid passes and masks, signalling a victory for the protesting Truckers. Will Trudeau realise which way the wind is blowing and cave in but try to spin a victory or will he double down?
Fauci has said that America is almost past the ‘full blown’ pandemic phase and will be winding down restrictions and masks ‘soon’.
Although Scottish First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, admitted that Scotland is entering a ‘calmer’ stage of the pandemic, she still decided that masks and Covid certification will remain.
The Scottish public, on the other hand, are saying enough is enough. Data from their Test AND Protect system shows that 91.5% of incomplete cases (purple), in the recent few weeks, are due to the public not responding to the surveillance calls.
It seems the narrative is collapsing and faster and faster each day. However, whilst this may be due to Omicron being more mild, I remain sceptical. The reasons being given are the same reasons many of us said restrictions were unnecessary in the first place. Now, all of a sudden, the corona fog is receding and everyone, in multiple countries and along similar time scales, is seeing the light. Or are they? Will all restrictions be removed or will they remain all but in name for the unvaccinated?
Will they remove all legislation to ensure none of these measures will never return again? If the legislation stays then it will be all too easy for restrictions to return when vaccines wane and seasonal illnesses return in the winter.
Will they remove all restrictions for everybody, including the unvaccinated? That means no additional testing regimes for the unvaccinated and no back-door use of Covid passes.
Or are we truly seeing the end of the pandemic? Some of the pharma documentation that I am about to write an article on may suggest that they see the writing is on the wall.
The next few weeks will certainly be interesting and the key will be to keep an eye on the small print.
February 9, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties | Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine, European Union, Human rights, UK |
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In Part 5 I look at the scientific literature on face mask use. I look at a lot of studies, but I am not undertaking an exhaustive review of all mask studies, which is an impossible task. However, I do review all the randomized controlled trials, which are the most credible trials. After that I look at a selection of the better trials and meta-analyses. I do focus more on those papers that conclude that there is little or no benefit to mask wearing. I have done this because academia, governments, health institutions and the media are currently giving such an appallingly one-sided view that a corrective is needed.
Also, many of the studies that pro-maskers refer to are not credible, or are not relevant to the real world, and a better evidence base is required.
Bear in mind, as statistician William Briggs says,
The burden of proof is entirely on those who make masklessness a crime: they are imposing, we are not. I have no obligation, none whatsoever, to show masks do not work. But, we have more than enough evidence they do not.
I also refer the reader to City Journal’s ‘Do Masks Work? A Review of the Evidence’, which demolishes some poor studies, including ones that the CDC has pushed. For example, the CDC has especially promoted an incredibly weak observational study which
focused on two Covid-positive hairstylists at a beauty salon in Missouri. The two stylists, who were masked, provided services for 139 people, who were mostly masked, for several days after developing Covid-19 symptoms. The 67 customers who subsequently chose to get tested for the coronavirus tested negative, and none of the 72 others reported symptoms.
The CDC’s spin was reported uncritically in media such as the New York Times.
‘This study’, the City Journal article went on,
has major limitations. For starters, any number of the 72 untested customers could have had Covid-19 but been asymptomatic, or else had symptoms that they chose not to report to the Greene County Health Department, the entity doing the asking. The apparent lack of spread of Covid-19 could have been a result of good ventilation, good hand hygiene, minimal coughing by the stylists, or the fact that stylists generally, as the researchers note, “cut hair while clients are facing away from them.” The researchers also observe that “viral shedding” of the coronavirus “is at its highest during the 2 to 3 days before symptom onset.” Yet no customers who saw the stylists when they were at their most contagious were tested for Covid-19 or asked about symptoms. Most importantly, this study does not have a control group. Nobody has any idea how many people, if any, would have been infected had no masks been worn in the salon. Late last year, at a gym in Virginia in which people apparently did not wear masks most of the time, a trainer tested positive for the coronavirus. As CNN reported, the gym contacted everyone whom the trainer had coached before getting sick—50 members in all—“but not one member developed symptoms.” Clearly, this doesn’t prove that not wearing masks prevents transmission.
5.1: The effectiveness of face masks: Randomized-controlled trials
5.2: The effectiveness of face masks: Other trials and studies
5.3: The effectiveness of face masks: reviews and meta-analyses
5.4: The effectiveness of face masks: preprints, commentaries, editorials and academic letters
5.5: The effectiveness of respirators in healthcare settings
5.6: The effectiveness of surgical face masks in surgical settings
5.7: Face mask harms
5.8. Relevant media reports (a small selection)
The main Face Mask FAQs page.
February 9, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | CDC, Covid-19, Human rights, New York Times |
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Yesterday, a number of important Democratic governors lifted mask mandates in their states. Almost to a one, they cited the changes wrought by the fast moving and relatively mild omicron variant of the SARS-CV2 virus as the prime reason for the change.
What none of them did was admit what “the Science” has shown for at least two decades, and has been clear through the last two years to anyone doing a modicum of independent research on the subject: masks have never been shown to fundamentally alter the spread of respiratory viruses within the general population.
What they did say almost to a one, like their counterparts in Great Britain, Denmark and other countries now dismantling previous Covid restrictions, was that the return to normality was greatly facilitated by the uptake of vaccines in the populations they currently govern.
Nearly a half century ago, a man named Ron Ziegler held the position now occupied by Jen Psaki. Like all presidential spokespeople before and since he was a serial dissembler.
But back then there were still a few journalists at the presidential court and beyond willing to do their jobs. And when one day in the midst of the Watergate scandal he used the passive voice construction “mistakes were made” in an attempt to explain away obvious breaches of honesty and ethics committed quite actively by the Nixon Administration, he was roundly mocked by the press corps.
Sadly, however, as I have argued elsewhere, this type of non-apology apology, which caused a scandal then, has become ubiquitous across our social landscape. And that’s a shame.
Why?
Because real apologies and expressions of accountability are important. Without them, neither the apologizer nor the aggrieved party ever experiences what the ancient Greeks considered a cardinal element in human development and human relations: catharsis.
This is especially so in the case of government entities. Without admissions of guilt, the assumptions and premises undergirding failed policies remain intact, lying fallow until such time as the government entity in question feels it opportune to deploy them again in the service of another misguided crusade.
This is what is currently occurring with the Covid hawks who have violated our fundamental rights time and again over the last two years.
These enemies of human dignity and freedom now realize that many of their former supporters among the citizenry feel exhausted, and in many cases, flat out deceived.
At the same time, however, they do not want to permanently relinquish the powerful repressive tools they have acquired during the two-year state of exception.
The answer?
One part of it, already mentioned, is the moderated limited hangout operation now being conducted regarding the use of masks in public. By relaxing these strictures while in no way addressing the fundamental fallacies upon which the masking policies were based, they ensure that mask mandates can be brought back when and if they deem it necessary to do so.
The second part, which is far more pernicious and consequential, is the effort to push a proposition that is at best quite tenuous in light of what actual scientific studies are currently revealing about vaccine efficacy: that without widespread injection uptake the virus would have never receded, and we would have thus never have gotten into a position to recover our freedoms.
Note the underlying logic here. We are not getting our freedoms back because they intrinsically belong to us and were unjustly stolen. We are getting them back because an important plurality of us have done what the “experts” and the “authorities” coerced us into doing.
With this approach there is no catharsis or healing, and certainly no acquisition of new wisdom and knowledge. What there is, is a sly reification of the infantilizing and anti-democratic ways of thinking that have predominated in our policy-making class throughout the pandemic.
Though many people, laboring under the mortal fear of being branded with the weaponized term of “conspiracy theorist,” are reluctant to admit it, the central concern of policy-makers throughout the pandemic has not been the health of our communities, but rather gaining enhanced control over where we go and what we put into our bodies.
There is nothing more central to the idea and practice of freedom than bodily autonomy. It is the basal freedom from which all others are derived. Without it—as the history of slavery starkly reminds us—all other liberties are comparatively ornamental.
For this reason, we must vigorously oppose this organized attempt to present the vaccines, which have been delivered to millions under rather severe coercion, as a great, if not the greatest, hero of the pandemic film.
Thomas Harrington, Senior Scholar at the Brownstone Institute, is an essayist and Professor Emeritus of Hispanic Studies at Trinity College in Hartford (USA) where he taught for 24 years. He specializes in Iberian movements of national identity Contemporary Catalan culture. His writings are at Thomassharrington.com.
February 9, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine, Human rights, United States |
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Despite nothing changing at all, CNN’s resident ‘doctor’ Leana Wen claimed this week that “the science has changed” and so COVID restrictions including mask mandates should now be rescinded.
Wen, who started to admit some weeks ago that masks don’t work in stopping the spread of COVID, stated that “the decision to wear a mask should shift from a government mandate to an individual choice.”
She added that kids in schools should not be forced to wear masks because it can be harmful and makes it harder for them to learn.
As recently as two months ago, Wen was advocating for the Biden administration to “further restrict the activities of the unvaccinated.”
Wen also previously entrenched a segregated society when she blamed people who hadn’t taken the jab for a COVID-19 “surge” while asserting “we can’t trust the unvaccinated.”
Wen also called for making it “hard for people to remain unvaccinated” by restricting their social freedoms.
She asserted that, “It needs to be hard for people to remain unvaccinated,” claiming that it wasn’t currently difficult (despite the group being demonized and discriminated against on a daily basis).
Wen also previously stated that children returning to school need to be forced to wear industrial grade face masks and should be subjected to weekly COVID tests until they are fully vaccinated.
Suddenly all of this has changed for Wen.
It just happens to coincide with the beginning of election season, and Democrats now moving away from lockdown policies they previously vehemently advocated over fears about being wiped out politically.
February 9, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | Covid-19, Human rights, United States |
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Not one to miss – the latest Israeli Vitamin D status vs Covid Severity study is not only stunning, but agrees with the similar studies I featured in April 2020!
Please subscribe and share! Odysee Channel: https://odysee.com/@IvorCummins:f
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February 9, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | Covid-19, Vitamin D |
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Endless COVID-19 booster shots are being presented as the solution to the pandemic, as repeated injections increase the level of antibodies in your body.1 In December 2021, for instance, Moderna reported that their COVID-19 booster shot increased the level of antibodies by 37-fold, and when a full dose was given — the same amount used for the initial shots — antibody levels rose 83-fold.2
Pfizer and BioNTech have also announced that their booster shots increase antibody levels, but to what end? Artificially inflated antibodies signal to your body that you’re always infected, and the resulting immune response could prove to be detrimental to your health.
Such a condition can only lead to a “death zone,” accelerating the development of autoimmune conditions such as Parkinson’s, Kawasaki disease and multiple sclerosis, according to tech leader and COVID analyst Marc Girardot, who urges a retreat from the vaccination “death zone” before it’s too late.3
Are Boosters Taking Humans to the Death Zone?
Mountaineers are familiar with the “death zone,” which describes the top portion of the world’s tallest mountains — areas of such high altitude that oxygen is scarce, where humans can only survive for a matter of hours. “The same principle applies to our immune system,” Girardot explains, referring to the intense response our bodies mount in response to infection.
The response includes a high fever to damage virions, T-cell elevations and increased antibody production to rid your body of “viral debris.” This is designed to be a temporary response; after the threat is neutralized, your body tamps down its immune response. Girardot states:4
“Once the infection is gone, a regiment of sentinels is left in the mucus to guard the entrance for the remainder of the epidemic, a few roaming sentinels with lifelong memory are set, and the rest wanes back down to bring peace and balance. It’s called homeostasis. The fever dissipates. T-cells self-destruct rapidly. And antibodies wane progressively.”
This is by design, as a perpetual fever and high levels of antibodies keep your body in a dangerous state. Just as chronic stress — keeping your body in an extended state of “fight or flight mode” — increases disease risks, so, too, do permanently elevated levels of antibodies. Girardot details three reasons why:5
“1. Too long a fever would end up breaking down all healthy cells, and so the remedy would be worse than the illness.
2. Perpetual specialized T-cells are also dangerous as they can start off-target attacks of healthy cells (as often occurs with immune checkpoint blockade treatments against cancer), and would be like leaving your home filled with a battalion of armed soldiers with their guns loaded and pin-less hand-grenades.
3. Finally, very high levels of antibodies with nowhere to go are also extremely dangerous. They can passively bind to receptors of healthy cells, and kickstart a cascade of autoimmune diseases. Land mining where you live.”
Decreased Antibodies Isn’t a Measure of Waning Immunity
Remember, your immune system is designed to work in response to exposure to an infectious agent. Your adaptive immune system, specifically, generates antibodies that are used to fight pathogens that your body has previously encountered.6 During normal infections, high fever and temporary T-cell elevations, along with elevated antibodies to the infection, gradually dissipate.
However, declining antibodies shouldn’t be confused with declining immunity. Early data on SARS-CoV-2 also found that antibody titers declined rapidly in the first months after recovery from COVID-19, leading some to speculate — incorrectly — that protective immunity against SARS-CoV-2 may also be short-lived.7
Senior author of the study, Ali Ellebedy, Ph.D., an associate professor of pathology & immunology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, explained, “It’s normal for antibody levels to go down after acute infection, but they don’t go down to zero; they plateau.”8
A biphasic pattern of antibody concentrations against SARS-CoV-2 was uncovered,9 in which high antibody concentrations were found in the acute immune response that occurred at the time of initial infection. The antibodies declined in the first months after infection, as should be expected, then leveled off to about 10% to 20% of the maximum concentration detected.
When a new infection occurs, cells called plasmablasts provide antibodies, but when the virus is cleared, longer lasting memory B cells move in to monitor blood for signs of reinfection.10 Bone marrow plasma cells (BMPCs) also exist in bones, acting as “persistent and essential sources of protective antibodies.”11
According to Ellebedy, “A plasma cell is our life history, in terms of the pathogens we’ve been exposed to,”12 and it’s in these long-lived BMPCs were immunity to SARS-CoV-2 resides.
Among people who have recovered from COVID-19, most of the participants had BMPCs that secreted antibodies specific for the spike protein encoded by SARS-CoV-2 at both seven months and 11 months after infection.13 This is evidence of long-lasting immunity,14 even if levels of anti-SARS-CoV-2 spike protein (S) antibodies decline rapidly in the first four months after infection.
There’s a Cost to Massive, Artificially Elevated Antibodies
COVID-19 shots are poised for a perpetual cycle of ongoing booster shots every few months. After up to two doses of the initial shot, and a third booster already on the roster, a fourth booster is already being discussed, including by Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel, who said that the efficacy of the third shot is likely to decline over several months, necessitating another shot soon thereafter.15
“Many politicians and vaccine manufacturers adamantly propose repeated injections, boosters every 3 or 4 months, as if waning antibodies were a sign of lost immunity,” Girardot said. “In reality, they are scapegoating the natural drop in antibodies. It is a smokescreen to hide their failure and the ineffectiveness of these intramuscular vaccines.”16
The reality is, repeatedly, artificially inflating antibodies comes with a cost. It’s known, for instance, that certain autoimmune diseases are seen alongside high levels of antibodies.17 Vaccine-induced autoimmunity is a well-known phenomenon, and molecular mimicry may be to blame.18
It occurs when similarities between different antigens confuse the immune system.19 There are often significant similarities between elements in the vaccine and human proteins, which can lead to immune cross-reactivity. When this occurs, researchers explained in Cellular & Molecular Immunology, “the reaction of the immune system towards the pathogenic antigens may harm the similar human proteins, essentially causing autoimmune disease.”20
In relation to COVID-19 shots, specifically, researchers wrote in the Journal of Autoimmunity, “Indeed, antibodies against the spike protein S1 of SARS-CoV-2 had a high affinity against some human tissue proteins. As vaccine mRNA codes the same viral protein, they can trigger autoimmune diseases in predisposed patients.”21
Already, case reports suggest that COVID-19 shots may trigger vaccine-induced immune-mediated and autoimmune hepatitis,22 and Girardot is concerned that repeated booster shots will only worsen outcomes:23
“In the case of an infection, the risk is relatively limited as the bulk of antibodies ends up binding to viral material circulating in large numbers. However, in the case of repeated doses, it’s very different.
After the second shot, it is likely that limited amounts of spike are produced as T-cells rapidly destroy production capacity. Thus, for most of us, large quantities of antibodies will inevitably be left idle circulating aimlessly, expanding exponentially (time x quantity) the risk of an accidental binding with catastrophic consequences.”
Natural Infection Produces Broad Immunity
Training your body to produce singular antibodies for one spike protein cannot compare to the protection provided by natural immunity, which occurs after recovery from an illness. Speaking with Daniel Horowitz, pathologist Dr. Ryan Cole explained that natural infection produces broad immunity that can’t be matched by vaccination:24
“A natural infection induces hundreds upon hundreds of antibodies against all proteins of the virus, including the envelope, the membrane, the nucleocapsid, and the spike. Dozens upon dozens of these antibodies neutralize the virus when encountered again.
Additionally, because of the immune system exposure to these numerous proteins (epitomes), our T cells mount a robust memory, as well. Our T cells are the ‘marines’ of the immune system and the first line of defense against pathogens. T cell memory to those infected with SARSCOV1 is at 17 years and running still.”
This may explain why a retrospective observational study published August 25, 2021, found that natural immunity is superior to immunity from COVID-19 shots, with researchers stating, “This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity.”25
Pharmaceutical companies and health officials are making plans for ongoing boosters, including combination shots that include, for example, a COVID-19 shot, a flu shot and a respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) shot, in one injection — coming in 2023 — to avoid “compliance issues.”26
Nearly two dozen pathogens are currently being targeted for the development of new shots,27,28 and it’s likely that you’re going to see a continued push for more jabs and boosters. Will humans’ immune systems, and overall health, be able to withstand such an assault? Girardot doesn’t think so:29
“Today, I would like to underscore the absolute lunacy of delivering these products to an entire population every 3-4 months. It’s nothing short of criminal. In my earnest opinion, repeated vaccine injections can only lead to one outcome: generalized illness and death …
The vaccination ‘Death Zone’ exists, and we need to urgently go back down in the valley, we need to stop vaccinating, stop boosting aimless antibodies and trust our immune systems.”
Sources and References
February 8, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine |
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Joe Rogan has just been cancelled. Again. It’s not about covid “misinformation” this time.
No, now he’s a racist.
Some enterprising young mind combed through 13 years and hundreds of episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience, and cut together around twenty instances of Rogan using “the n-word”.
This video was shared by award-winning musician India Arie, and used to explain her pulling her music from Spotify’s platform in protest of Rogan’s continued presence there.
Rogan claims that these clips are all taken out of context in his recent apology video, and none were ever intended to be racist. This may well be true… we can’t check for ourselves, because Spotify removed all the episodes.
These important bits of context were, naturally, removed from the viral video. Besides, it has since been said that context doesn’t even matter.
And you know what, they’re right. The context doesn’t matter, perhaps the intention doesn’t even matter, what matters is “Why now?”
Some of these clips are over twelve years old, and yet there have never been any calls to boycott Spotify or cancel his show until just the last couple of days.
Were they not racist before? Or was everyone just OK with the racism? Could there be something else behind this?
… but why bother pausing the hate-fest to ask questions, right?
The only message that matters is – Joe Rogan is a racist now, and streaming giant Spotify have pulled over seventy episodes of his show from their platform as a result.
Of course the cyber-torches and internet-pitchforks coming for Joe Rogan is nothing new. Having preached the tenets of a healthy lifestyle, promoted alternate Covid treatments, and invited dissenting experts onto his show, Rogan has obviously been on the establishment’s hit list for a while.
This reached a peak in January when ageing rock royalty Neil Young gave Spotify an ultimatum: Remove Joe Rogan’s “misinformation”, or take my music down.
Despite adding a weasely disclaimer to the beginning of the podcast’s episodes, Spotify essentially sided with Rogan, probably because they couldn’t be seen to bow to that kind of pressure, and because they figured most people had forgotten Neil Young was still alive.
In short, and despite other musicians like Joni Mitchell adding their voices to Young’s, the gambit failed and Rogan remained on the air.
Then, just last week, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki added fuel to the fire by announcing the President would like to see “more done” by tech companies to “limit the amount of misinformation” on their platforms.
Within days of that press conference, the viral video compilation of racial slurs had appeared, and Rogan is now a racist as well as an “anti-vax covidiot” or whatever they are calling us these days.
He’s also an object lesson in the entire purpose of cancel culture, and extreme identity politics in general.
I don’t know how many of our readers are gamers, or remember Half Life 2, but go with me here…
Around two-thirds of the way through the game you encounter giant insect-like aliens called Ant Lions, and soon afterwards get a special attack: The ability to “paint” enemies with pheromones which cause an unending swarm of Ant Lions to attack them.
Of course, the giant insects don’t know WHY they are attacking your enemies, they don’t sympathise with your aims and are not capable of understanding your plans, all they know is the chemical signals driving them to fits of rage.
You probably don’t need me to explain the metaphor.
This is the purpose of rampant, hysterical identity politics. You can paint your enemies as a target and watch the mindless swarm do its work.
As much as “cancel culture” is portrayed as a totally organic process, without any top-down control, this is simply not the case.
It is almost NEVER organic, and seemingly ALWAYS contrived.
If you need to be persuaded of that, simply look at who is immune to it.
Both Joe Biden and Justin Trudeau have got enough racist (or at least racist-seeming) scandals to get them cancelled if the process really was anything but a covert tool of maintaining the status quo. And yet still they stand.
To show how selective it is, we have examples of the same exact behaviour eliciting complete opposite responses depending on the person involved.
When Gina Carano compared the hatred of the unmasked and unvaccinated to the way Jews were treated in Nazi Germany, she lost her job and her agent.
When Margaret Hodge made similar comments about Corbyn’s Labour party, there was no rebuke at all.
It seems only people outside the establishment, or promoting the ‘wrong’ opinions, are ever in real danger of falling victim to ‘organic’ cancellation.
Indeed, one can be a totally white-bread member of the entertainment industry for years and be safe in the knowledge your racism/homophobia/misogyny etc will never really come to light, but step out of line on the wrong subject at the wrong time, and you will suddenly find yourself facing a tidal wave of past “sins” about to wash over you.
Look at Donald Trump, an insider to the bone when he was just a billionaire reality TV host, but then he ran against Hillary and became “literally Hitler” overnight.
Rogan is a perfect examplar of this phenomenon. Spend ten years going on about legalising weed, taking DMT and talking about martial arts and you can say “the n-word” as much as you want and nobody notices or cares. But the minute you even mildly interrogate an important media narrative, then the mob ‘organically’ remembers you were a racist the whole time.
The evidence of contrivance is obvious. Simply ask yourself: where did this video compilation of racial slurs actually come from? Who made it?
Rogan’s uses of “the n-word” are not new. They are all several years old and from 23 separate episodes, all multiple hours long. And there are almost 1800 episodes of the show to plough through if you decide to go searching. So making this video is at least two days’ work of simply watching the episodes – and that’s assuming you know where to start looking.
And that’s before editing or trying to make it “go viral”.
Was all this done on a whim by some bored pro-vaxxer?
Does that sound likely?
Far more likely is that it was created and deployed to discredit Rogan’s COVID-questioning without having to engage with the Covid sceptic evidence or arguments.
It’s even possible the video may even have already existed before the current controversy. After all, why create this climate of stifling sensitivity if you don’t have the tools to use it?
Perhaps most authors, actors, comedians etc. have a “tape” in the vault somewhere. A database of racism, homophobia or transphobia just waiting to be released when needed. A collection of neo-kompromat that works best as a deterrent, but is always ready to be loosed if needed.
Those people who do step too far out of their box are taken down, and act as an example to others. Ensuring everyone on the public stage is singing from the same hymn sheet.
Because that, it seems, is what cancel culture is for.
February 8, 2022
Posted by aletho |
Full Spectrum Dominance, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular | Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine |
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