Current Affairs Coronavirus Thread - Serious stuff !!!

[GwladysBlue]

If you type into Google "Boris Johnson touch and go" absolutely nothing comes up regarding the virus so I'll need to see where that line has come from.

3:35 in he says ‘things could have gone either way’.

Maybe I paraphrased but they’re words to the same effect.

 

[peteblue]

If only you could listen to yourself.
You’d probably believe Boris would fake his own death if it gave you an excuse to hate the Tories even more than you already do.

It‘s the absolute hatred that I can’t understand. I asked someone what Boris had ever done to him, there followed the usual waffle without actually being able to state anything. Everything is a plot and a lie, Boris just wants to murder people, even while he was in the ICU he was planning how to get rid of the NHS. Some people inhabit a very strange and sad world if this is their limit of human understanding.....

 

[Jebus_lives]

Anyone with 2 eyes can see China has been covering up all sorts but no one can say it as apparently its either racist and/or some western created conspiracy theory.

It is neither racist nor a conspiracy to say that China have not accurately reported their figures during the Coronavirus outbreak. Not sure why anyone would think it is.

 

[COYBL25]

'How China muzzled its Bat Woman: Beijing authorities hushed up the findings of a scientist who unlocked the genetic make-up of the coronavirus within days of the outbreak - which is vital for tests and vaccines'

A Chinese scientist who is the one of the world's leading experts on coronaviruses was 'muzzled' after unravelling the genetic composition of the new disease, which is crucial for developing diagnostic tests and vaccines.

The revelation will fuel fresh concerns over China's cover-up of the pandemic after it erupted in the city of Wuhan. Critics argue that Communist Party chiefs frustrated efforts to contain the outbreak before it exploded around the world.

At the centre of the new claims is Shi Zhengli, known as China's 'Bat Woman' after years spent on difficult virus-hunting expeditions in dank caves that have led to a series of important scientific discoveries.

The virologist was called back to her highsecurity laboratory in Wuhan at the end of last year after a mysterious new respiratory condition in the city was identified as a novel coronavirus – and within three days she completed its gene sequencing.

Her team's work, and several other breakthroughs in subsequent days, indicated the virus was linked to horseshoe bats found more than 1,000 miles away in Yunnan, a region of southern China.

Their findings showed it was similar to SARS, a respiratory disease that sparked an epidemic in 33 countries after emerging from China in 2002.

View attachment 83361
Shi Zhengli is known as China's 'Bat Woman' after years spent on difficult virus-hunting expeditions in dank caves that have led to a series of important scientific discoveries

Gao Yu, a Chinese journalist freed last week after 76 days of lockdown in Wuhan, said he spoke to Shi during his incarceration and revealed: 'We learned later her institute finished gene-sequencing and related tests as early as January 2 but was muzzled.'

The Mail on Sunday has learned that on that same day, Yanyi Wang, director of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, sent an email to staff and key officials ordering them not to disclose information on the disease.

She warned, according to a leak on social media confirmed by activists and Hong Kong media, that 'inappropriate and inaccurate information 'was causing 'general panic' – thought to refer to eight whistle-blowing doctors whose warnings to local citizens had led to their arrest.

Wang said the National Health Commission 'unequivocally requires that any tests, clinical data, test results, conclusions related to the epidemic shall not be posted on social media platforms, nor shall [it] be disclosed to any media outlets including government official media, nor shall [it] be disclosed to partner institutions.'

Eight days later, a team led by a professor in Shanghai who received samples from an infected patient, published a genome sequence on an open access platform.

His laboratory was closed for 'rectification' two days later.

At the time, the public was being told that no new cases had been reported in Wuhan for more than a week and there was no clear evidence of human transmission, although dozens of health workers were starting to fall ill with the disease.

In an online lecture last month, Shi Zhengli said her team found on January 14 that the new virus could infect people – six days before this fact was revealed by China.

On the same day, the World Health Organisation issued a tweet backing China's denials of human transmissions.

Shi's team released its data identifying the disease on January 23 on a scientific portal before publication the next month by the journal Nature.

It said the genomic sequence was 96 per cent identical to another virus they found in horseshoe bats in Yunnan.

Shi is a specialist in emerging diseases and has earned global acclaim for work investigating links between bats and coronaviruses, aided by expeditions to collect samples and swabs in the fetid cave networks of southern China.

She was a key part of the team that traced SARS to horseshoe bats through civets, a cat-like creature often eaten in China.

Bats have been linked with seven major epidemics over the past three decades.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology, based ten miles from the wildlife market blamed as the source of Covid-19, developed a £30million high-security laboratory after the SARS outbreak with French assistance.

It was the first laboratory in China with P4 status – denoting highest global biosafety levels – and contains the largest virus bank in Asia.
It was this fact that sparked now discounted conspiracy theories that Covid-19 was man-made.

Shi, the laboratory's deputy director, admits that when summoned back from a conference to investigate the new disease, she wondered at first if a coronavirus could have escaped from her unit.

She has warned about the danger of epidemics from bat-borne viruses. But she says she did not expect such an outbreak in Wuhan, in the centre of China, since her studies suggested subtropical areas in the south had the highest risk of such 'zoonotic' transmission to humans.

Shi told the respected science journal Scientific American last month of her relief when, having checked back through disposal records, none of the genome sequences matched their virus samples.

'That really took a load off my mind. I had not slept a wink for days,' she said.

For 16 years, she has plunged into caves and crevices filled with roosting bats in areas such as Yunnan and Guangdong, where SARS first erupted.

Her team took blood, saliva and fecal samples while also testing local people for antibodies.

There were initial suggestions that pangolins may have hosted the virus before it started infecting people in Wuhan five months ago, just as civets 'amplified' the SARS virus, but a study last week suggested human versions are closer to bat samples.

Wuhan's wildlife market was closed the day after China notified the WHO about a new pneumonialike virus.

However, party chiefs seemed more focused on the success of a key Communist Party meeting and looming New Year festivities, when millions move around the country. Lianchao Han, a pro-democracy activist based in Washington, said the Chinese government tried to block news about the virus.
He said: 'They thought it could be controlled, and also President Xi Jinping demanded not to spoil the Chinese New Year.'

As the disease spread and deaths mounted in China, one report appeared in the Beijing News identifying a researcher at the institute as 'patient zero' – the first person to be infected.

Shi was subjected to savage attacks on social media as the 'mother of the devil' and responded with a furious denial on her WeChat social media account, saying the new virus was 'nature punishing the human race for keeping uncivilised living habits'.

'I swear with my life – [the virus] has nothing to do with the lab,' she declared, telling those spreading false rumours to 'shut their stinking mouths.'

Shi has worked alongside many of the world's top experts on infectious diseases. 'She is a superb scientist and very nice person,' said James LeDuc, director of the Galveston National Laboratory, a high-security biocontainment centre in Texas.

Stopped reading at Daily Mail.

 

[peteblue]

3:35 in he says ‘things could have gone either way’.

Maybe I paraphrased but they’re words to the same effect.

Why are you so obsessed about his health...If Starmer unfortunately went into ICU next week, do you really believe that anyone on here would be saying, he’s just looking for sympathy, trying to hide, scoring a political point etc etc...or perhaps would we just hope he recovers and be pleased when he does......

 

[GwladysBlue]

Why are you so obsessed about his health...If Starmer unfortunately went into ICU next week, do you really believe that anyone on here would be saying, he’s just looking for sympathy, trying to hide, scoring a political point etc etc...or perhaps would we just hope he recovers and be pleased when he does......

Starmer isn’t the leader of a party that cheered when they denied a pay increase to health service staff, so forgive me if I don’t see the parallels here.

His government’s underfunding has played a huge factor in this disaster of a response.

Take the figurehead out of the way so he doesn’t have to answer any of the tough questions and not make the gaffes he is prone to make.

If you want to believe he is telling the truth, go for it.

 

[PITA]

It‘s the absolute hatred that I can’t understand. I asked someone what Boris had ever done to him, there followed the usual waffle without actually being able to state anything. Everything is a plot and a lie, Boris just wants to murder people, even while he was in the ICU he was planning how to get rid of the NHS. Some people inhabit a very strange and sad world if this is their limit of human understanding.....

Like you I fail to understand why people don't get him.

Sexism, vandalism and bullying: inside the Boris Johnson-era Bullingdon Club

Woman who recruited members during the club’s 80s heyday reveals the true extent of members’ destructive behaviour

www.theguardian.com

 

[roydo]

Take the figurehead out of the way so he doesn’t have to answer any of the tough questions and not make the gaffes he is prone to make.

So you still think it was a PR stunt? Really?

 

[mahermi1]

Why are you so obsessed about his health...If Starmer unfortunately went into ICU next week, do you really believe that anyone on here would be saying, he’s just looking for sympathy, trying to hide, scoring a political point etc etc...or perhaps would we just hope he recovers and be pleased when he does......

Let's be honest here, most on here, about 99%, including myself, wished him a speedy recovery. What doesn't help, with respect, is you and other Tory supporters, making him out to be Mother Teresa. I don't hate him, as you accused me of, or wish him harm. But I and most others on here have a different opinion of his capabilities, end of.

 

[peteblue]

Starmer isn’t the leader of a party that cheered when they denied a pay increase to health service staff, so forgive me if I don’t see the parallels here.

His government’s underfunding has played a huge factor in this disaster of a response.

Take the figurehead out of the way so he doesn’t have to answer any of the tough questions and not make the gaffes he is prone to make.

If you want to believe he is telling the truth, go for it.

Do I believe he was ill, yes I saw that with my own eyes. Do I believe he went to hospital, yes, unless it was the most elaborate set up ever seen with the Police and the NHS and Media all In it. Do I believe he was put on oxygen and placed in an ICU, yes, because if he didn’t someone just like you would have leaked it. Do I believe he will now spend time recovering and will be weak as a result, yes, because that’s how I felt when I came out of one. Now exactly which bits do you not believe......

 

[GwladysBlue]

So you still think it was a PR stunt? Really?

I believe he is being deliberately kept out of the limelight to avoid having to answer questions regarding the government’s extremely poor response to this crisis.

 

[roydo]

I believe he is being deliberately kept out of the limelight to avoid having to answer questions regarding the government’s extremely poor response to this crisis.

So by extension, you are saying the NHS were complicit in fabricating his illness?

 

[peteblue]

Let's be honest here, most on here, about 99%, including myself, wished him a speedy recovery. What doesn't help, with respect, is you and other Tory supporters, making him out to be Mother Teresa. I don't hate him, as you accused me of, or wish him harm. But I and most others on here have a different opinion of his capabilities, end of.

please point me in the direction of any post of mine making him out to be mother Theresa. I think you will find this is mostly contained within your own thoughts and not based on reality......no problem about thoughts on capability, I thought Corbyn an out and out fool and I think Starmer is an empty vessel, I believe Boris has more substance than either, but you don’t.....

 

[mahermi1]

please point me in the direction of any post making him out to be mother Theresa. I think you will find this is mostly contained within your own thoughts and not based on reality......no problem about thoughts on capability, I thought Corbyn an out and out fool and I think Starmer is an empty vessel, I believe Boris has more substance than either, but you don’t.....

Correct.

 

[canuckblue]

So by extension, you are saying the NHS were complicit in fabricating his illness?

There might be a run on tin foil in the UK if that's any indication.