Covid

Babylon Bee:2020 Rated Worst Year Ever, Provided You Never Lived At Any Other Time In History

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From the Babylon Bee

U.S.—Across the country, there is general consensus that 2020 has been the “worst year ever.” According to studies, 82% of Americans agree that 2020 has been a terrible year of unprecedented suffering and misery. Experts confirmed that 2020 was indeed the worst year, provided you have never lived in virtually any other time period in all of human history.

“We noticed that most of the respondents who called 2020 the worst year also enjoyed delicious food being delivered to them for 8 months while they sat on their couches with the air conditioning on and binge-watched shows the whole time,” said one researcher.

“While we understand it hasn’t been easy, we also found very few instances of Viking raids, Black Plague, famine, world war, using rotary telephones, needing to look things up in a physical dictionary, slavery, people being burned at the stake, walking miles to school, living in caves, sleeping on the ground, ice ages, Nazi holocausts, civil war, infant mortality, global floods, ethnic cleansing, using leaves as toilet paper, using leeches as medicine, using wooden mallets as an anesthetic, fighting wild saber-tooth tigers, cannibalism, occupation by the Persian Empire… what was I talking about again? Oh yeah– most people in 2020 never experienced any of those things, so comparatively speaking it’s been a pretty decent year!”

“Worst. Year. Ever.” Tweeted one local man who has been making more money than most Zambians make in a lifetime — all from the comfort of his computer. 

“Can 2020 be over yet??” Tweeted a New York fashion executive whose preferred candidate just won the presidential election. 

“I just can’t anymore. Ugh!” exclaimed another after Uber got his dinner order wrong.

The only exception was one oddball who walked out of his front door and took a deep breath of the morning air. “Thank you, God, for this amazing air!” he said. The oddball has been detained for further scientific study to figure out what the heck is wrong with him.

Spiked: Was Sweden Right About Covid?

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Was Sweden right about Covid?

Lockdown-free Sweden has recorded its lowest rate of positive Covid tests since the pandemic began.

SPIKED

10th September 2020

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TopicsPOLITICS SCIENCE & TECH WORLD

It is now clearer than ever that Sweden was justified in taking a liberal approach to Covid-19.

 

Last week, Sweden conducted a record number of tests for coronavirus (more than 120,000) but found a record-low proportion of infected people – just 1.2 per cent, according to a report from Reuters.

This is down from 19 per cent in the spring. What’s more, Sweden’s current position contrasts sharply with the surge in infections in countries like France
and Britain.

 

 

The director-general of Sweden’s health agency, Johan Carlson, said: ‘Our strategy has been consistent and sustainable.’ He added that Sweden probably has a higher rate of Covid-19 immunity in the population when compared to other countries, adding that, ‘I think we benefit a lot from that now’.

Sweden did not enforce lockdown, and yet its death rate has been lower than that of a number of countries which did, such as Spain, Italy and the UK. Its rate of spread of coronavirus is also now the lowest in Scandinavia.

Another boost for Sweden’s no-lockdown policy came last week, as Johann Giesecke, a prominent opponent of lockdown and one of the behind-the-scenes architects of Sweden’s policy, was given a major position at the World Health Organisation.

spiked has consistently argued against lockdown as a means to defeat Covid – and has challenged the attempts by lockdown fanatics to talk down Sweden’s liberal approach.

As many other European countries start to re-tighten their restrictions as we head into winter, it looks as if Sweden’s sensible, measured and sustainable approach is working.

 

Full article here

Caldron Pool: ‘Staggering’ Numbers of People Have Turned To God During the Pandemic, Researchers Say

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From caldronpool.com

Numbers of people from the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom have been reassessing their lives, turning to God, and praying more during the coronavirus pandemic, recent surveys have revealed.

Numbers of people from the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom have been reassessing their lives, turning to God, and praying more during the coronavirus pandemic, recent surveys have revealed.

In Australia, researchers have found individuals have been praying more during the COVID-19 crisis, suggesting the pandemic has led many to reassess their priorities in life, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.

Of 1002 people surveyed in July, more than 35% said they were praying more, 41% said they were thinking about God more than they had before, and up to 25% said they were reading the Bible more than they used to.

Almost half of the participants said they thought more about mortality and the meaning of life.

Social researcher Mark McCrindle told the SMH: “The research is showing that this COVID situation has rattled Australians and got them thinking about the big purpose of life. It’s got them re-prioritising their life.”

In March, a US-based national survey revealed that almost half of Americans believe the virus is a “wake-up call” from God.

The poll, which was commissioned by the Joshua Fund, an Israel-based evangelical organisation, found over 43% of Americans believe the global coronavirus pandemic and economic meltdown is a sign of coming judgement and/or a wake-up call for us to turn back to faith in God.

Of the respondents, 25% of self-identified non-Christians agreed.

Almost 22% of all non-Christians responding to the poll admitted that the crisis has caused them to start reading the Bible and listening to Bible teaching and sermons online, while more than 29% of the respondents also believe the crisis reveals that “we are living in what the Bible calls the last days.”

The Pew Research Center released similar findings after surveying 11,537 Americans between March 19 and 24. According to the report, “more than half of all U.S. adults (55%) say they have prayed for an end to the spread of coronavirus.”

“Large majorities of Americans who pray daily (86%) and of U.S. Christians (73%) have taken to prayer during the outbreak — but so have some who say they seldom or never pray and people who say they do not belong to any religion (15% and 24%, respectively),” Pew Research reported.

Meanwhile, in the UK, a survey revealed a ‘staggering‘ number of 18-24 year old’s have been turning to God during the pandemic.

The survey, conducted by Savanta ComRes, interviewed 2,244 UK adults aged 18-plus. The findings revealed 45% of 18 to 34-year-olds and 49% of 25 to 34-year-olds prayed more during the month of July. That figure rose to 55% in the month of August.

According to the Telegraph, Google data reveals the pandemic has prompted a surge of interest in God, with a 50% increase in searches for prayer.

In March 2020, the share of Google searches for prayer surged to the highest level ever recorded, surpassing all other major events that otherwise call for prayer, including Christmas and Easter.

Josh Williamson, pastor at Newquay Baptist Church said: “As the old saying goes, ‘there are no atheists in foxholes,’ and it also seems that is the case when a pandemic causes people to examine their own mortality.

“I’m not surprised that people are thinking about God as the reality of death looms large; deep down in all of us is the knowledge that God exists, but what happens is that people push down that knowledge by ignoring what is plainly known,” he said.

“A crisis has a way of bringing that knowledge back to the surface.”

Pamela Geller: Sweden Beat Covid Without A Brutal Lockdown

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Pamela Geller writes:

Sweden Refused to Lockdown: They Were Right, New Cases Plunge, Very Ill Approach ZERO

By Pamela Geller – on 
WUHAN VIRUS: CORONAVIRUS

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“In many ways the voluntary measures we put in place in Sweden have been just as effective as complete lockdowns in other countries,” Anders Tegnell, the chief epidemiologist at Sweden’s public health agency,

Sweden is a case study in what to do next time. Their results are eye-opening Lockdowns, destroying our economy, millions unemployed, neighborhood Stasi, Covid Karens, — not necessary.

It’s what the rational among us have been reporting for months.

 

 

Bloomberg: As other countries face renewed outbreaks, Sweden’s latest Covid-19 figures suggest it’s rapidly bringing the virus under control.

 

 

“That Sweden has come down to these levels is very promising,” state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell told reporters in Stockholm on Tuesday.

The Health Agency of Sweden says that since hitting a peak in late June, the infection rate has fallen sharply. That’s amid an increase in testing over the period. “The curves are going down and the curves for the seriously ill are beginning to approach zero,” state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell said.

 
 

Herd immunity.

 

Sweden COVID-19 Death Rate Lower Than Spain, Italy and U.K., Despite Never Having Lockdown (Newsweek)

While novel coronavirus cases have spiked across several parts of Europe, including Spain, France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, Sweden—where a countrywide lockdown was never issued—continues to report a downward trend in new cases and new deaths.

……the infection rate has fallen sharply. That’s amid an increase in testing over the period. “The curves are going down and the curves for the seriously ill are beginning to approach zero,” Tegnell said.

Swedish Covid Cases Trend Down

Source: Health Agency of Sweden

The development follows months of controversy over Sweden’s decision to avoid a full lockdown. The unusual strategy coincided with a much higher Covid-19 mortality rate than elsewhere in the Nordic region.Per 100,000, Swedish deaths even exceeded those in the U.S. and Brazil.

I Looked Up What Happened When Sweden Refused To Shut Down – They Were Right, We Were Wrong

By Josh Manning,The Western Journal,Published August 1, 2020:

Sweden did it.

The Nordic country defeated COVID-19 without seeming to break a sweat — fever-induced or otherwise. They effectively showed that Fauci & Co. were completely wrong about a shutdown being necessary to save civilization as we know it.

While that accomplishment should be lauded and their efforts duplicated around the world, the media has instead chosen to blast the Nordic state and paint a dismal picture that simply doesn’t exist.

A few examples (among many, many others) are below:

CBS Newsdeclared: “Sweden becomes an example of how not to handle COVID-19.” Similarly, theUniversity of Virginia Health Systemissued a news release titled: “Lack of Lockdown Increased COVID-19 Deaths in Sweden.”

Taking a stab at prognostication,Newsweeksaid: “Sweden COVID-19 Deaths Linked to Failure to Lockdown as Country Prepares for Second Wave.” Always eager to bravely embrace the status quo,The New York Timesran a piece headlined: “Sweden Tries Out a New Status: Pariah State.”

Finally,Business Insiderreported: “Sweden’s coronavirus death toll is now approaching zero, but experts are warning others not to hail it as a success.”

It’s all awfully prickly from a leftist media that used to adore Sweden’s welfare state. The reason for the barbed headlines is simple — Sweden dealt with COVID-19 in its own way.

The country didn’t truckle to the tyranny of over-educated, under-experienced experts. It didn’t implement authoritarian policies designed as much to break spirits as to break the pandemic. And it didn’t turn its voters into quasi-prisoners.

In other words, Sweden responded more or less the way the rest of the developed world has responded to contagious diseases until 2020, which just happens to also be President Donald Trump’s re-election year.

What were Sweden’s results?

 

Read the full article here

Jo Nova: WA Secession Looking Popular

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Jo Nova writes that hard borders are popular in the West:

Freedom and hard borders are 96% popular — a third of West Australians want to secede

A telling incident in Western democracies about borders

Western Australia, WA. Map.The electoral power of strong borders is vastly underestimated.

Western Australia has hard borders at the moment, and no coronavirus — other than a few cases getting caught in the mandatory quarantine. That’s 2.5 million people who are almost living a normal life.  This is not to boast (we wish you could be here), but to point out how politically popular closed borders are in the current pandemic. The Premier is wildly popular, polling close to 90%. To all the people who said “states can’t close borders” the message is that it’s bonkers not to close borders. When the Commonwealth government joined the bizarre High Court push to force them open, the pushback was ferocious. A poll today showed that West Australians are fed up. The West Australian collected 245,000 signatories to a petition supporting the border closure.

Not only do 96% say the borders should stay shut, but when asked, a whopping 34% of Western Australians said the state should secede. How fast did it come to that?

Never, have I seen such vitriol towards the Commonwealth from WA. …the Commonwealth’s decision to effectively join hands with Palmer in the Federal and High courts risked making Morrison and the Federal Liberals public enemy No.1 here in WA. It beggars belief that the Morrison Government would ever let it get to this point, that the Federal Government would ever be part of any legal action to force WA to open its borders.

– Joe Spagnolo, Columnist, The West Australian (Paywalled)

Presumably that anger will be lower now that the Commonwealth has pulled out of one of the most stupid cases they were ever involved in.

WAxit: Exclusive new survey results show one in three West Australians wish to secede from the nation

The West Australian

Exclusive polling conducted by The West Australian showed 34 per cent of the 837 people surveyed this week support the move for WA to become a separate nation.

Close to three quarters of West Australians said that since the COVID-19 pandemic the Federal Government has put the needs of the eastern states ahead of West Australians. More than 35 per cent of those canvassed by Painted Dog Research strongly agreed with the statement that Canberra is too focused on the needs of the eastern states which has been to the detriment of WA.

Only last week Scott Morrison was saying he was sure WA would lose in the High Court and he had some mealy mouth words about doing it to protect us. But faced with a Liberal Party wipe out coming in WA elections, and the growing debacle of “open borders” on the East Coast, where infections are spreading, he finally backed down. The question is, what was he thinking in the first place?

 

Read the rest here

Covid Models Were Wrong, and Modellers Unwilling to Learn!

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From the University of Sydney:

Did COVID-19 models get it wrong? Professor Sally Cripps explains

Leading statistician analyses COVID-19 modellingRenowned University of Sydney statistician, Professor Sally Cripps, examines the efficacy of COVID-19 modelling as part of an online analysis with colleagues from Stanford University and North-Western University.

Did COVID-19 models in the United Kingdom and the United States get it wrong?

As part of an online discussion between an international group of researchers, including Stanford University Professor of Medicine John P.A. Ioannidis and Northwestern University statistician, Professor Martin A. Tanner, University of Sydney statistician Professor Sally Cripps discusses the efficacy of the two countries’ COVID-19 modelling efforts, with recommendations on how countries – including Australia – can better prepare for uncertainty.

In April, Professor Sally Cripps alongside US colleague, Professor Martin A. Tanner found that over 70 percent of US states had death rates that were inconsistent with IHME predictions. Credit: Centre for Translational Data science. 

“COVID-19 models got it wrong in that they failed to forecast with any degree of accuracy daily death counts even when the forecast was for one day in advance. In addition they failed to accurately quantify uncertainty,” said Professor Cripps, who is the Director of the University of Sydney Centre for Translational Data Science and the ARC Industrial Transformation Training Centre for Data Analytics for Resources and Environments. 

“But that doesn’t mean all modelling is bad or ineffective. In fact, what this scenario represents is an opportunity to learn and do better. Modellers have tried to justify their faulty models rather than learn from their mistakes.” At the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, societal lockdown was the sensible thing to do. Australia acted swiftly in that regard, but now we need to find a way out. 

“At the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, societal lockdown was the sensible thing to do. Australia acted swiftly in that regard, but now we need to find a way out.

“Though lockdowns minimise COVID-19 deaths, there are many studies which show that lockdowns increase domestic violence, as well as increase deaths from cancer and heart attacks.

“We need to develop models which have multi-criteria functions that allow governments to better understand a measure’s effect across all of our society.

“We also need access to reliable data, and models that are validated and continuously reappraised for their performance in real-time.”

As of 26 June 2020, COVID-19 had claimed almost 125,000 lives in the United States and over 43,000 in the United Kingdom.

DISCLOSURE:

Professor Cripps conducted an analysis on the efficacy of COVID-19 modelling efforts as part of an ongoing online discussion with international colleagues, Stanford University Professor of Medicine John P.A. Ioannidis and Northwestern University statistician, Professor Martin A. Tanner. The discussion has been published by the International Journal of Forecasters. 

Bill Muehlenberg: We all should be alarmed

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The Rise of Statism and the Reduction of the Individual

We all should be alarmed at government overreach in the corona crisis:

“Gathering outdoors is the next freedom to be restored,” said a front-page article from the Daily Telegraph. Um, am I the only one who was shocked by that sentence – and others like it? Gosh, isn’t that swell of the State to allow us to go outside a bit. So very kind of them.

Um, since when was it the right of governments to simply take away our right to freely assemble as we decide in the first place? Am I now supposed to grovel before the State and thank them profusely if they take away my right to eat or breathe and then ever so graciously give it back – if I behave?

I have said it before and I will keep saying it (no matter how much the alarmists dislike me for doing so): The two most shocking things about the corona crisis are these: one, the absolute speed and ease in which governments have shut down and locked down entire nations; and two, the ready, eager and unquestioning acceptance of all this by the masses.

BTW, I have been saying this for several months now. However, just moments ago I saw a brand-new article by Dennis Prager in which he says this: “But the ease with which police state tactics have been employed and the equal ease with which most Americans have accepted them have been breathtaking.” Hmm, we sure seem to be on the same page here.

And all this has utterly shocked me and saddened me. Yes it really has. Worse yet, I fully realise that the only thing so many folks are worried about is when their beloved footy team will be playing again. But there actually are some things that matter a whole lot more. Like freedom. Like the individual. Like democracy. Like the rule of law. Like the ability to think for oneself and ask questions.

But far too many folks really do not seem to give a rip that so much of this is being taken away from us. The masses just do not seem to care. The sheeple could not be bothered with even raising an eyebrow here. Too many simply trust the government implicitly. ‘My country right or wrong’ has now morphed into ‘My State right or wrong.’

And even more shocking is how many Christians have fallen into line here. ‘Well the government said it, so it must be right. Who am I to question?’ And, ‘Why are you so worried about technology? What could ever go wrong?’ Hmm, why do I suspect that far too many of these naïve, apathetic and undiscerning believers would just as happily intone, ‘The State is my shepherd’?

Or as Ben Davis has recently put it:

Our Government in Canberra,
Hallowed be thy name,
Give us this day our daily support payments,
And increase our debts.
Lead us not into temptation to violate your stay at home orders,
But deliver us from COVID-19.
For the power and glory are yours,
Amen

Yes, there is a place for taking sensible precautions, for some government intervention, and for some limited restrictions on our liberties. I have been saying this from day one as well. But we seem to have gone far beyond this. If the State tells us to download a questionable app, most folks will do it. If the State tells us to snitch on our neighbours, most folks will do it. If the State tells us that we cannot leave our homes unless the State allows us to, most folks will do it.

And when Big Tech and the Big State get into bed together and fully support each other in this draconian overreach and abuse of power, then you know we really are getting to the end of freedom as we know it. I have been documenting this for quite a while now, but for too many folks it simply goes in one ear and out the next.

Let me offer just one scary case in point of what we are up against. For a few days now I – and millions of others – have shared a very important, fact-filled video of two California doctors sharing informed, balanced and evidence-filled concerns about the accepted narrative on corona.

They have dared to ask how a nation-wide lockdown makes any sense, based on all that we now know about COVID-19, how it spreads, who is really at risk, and so on. It was seen over 5.5 million times. But then YouTube decided that you – the people – are too stupid and it is too dangerous to have a video like this being seen.

So they pulled it. The head honcho said that only points of view that go along with groups like WHO will be allowed. Um, if anyone thinks that WHO has handled this whole crisis well, they need to go to the back of the class. Here is just one of many pieces on the appallingly bad way that WHO has dealt with this: thefederalist.com/2020/04/09/why-the-who-is-a-danger-to-public-health/

And see this damning expose of the head of WHO: www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/04/10/5-shocking-facts-about-who-chief-tedros-adhanom-ghebreyesus/

But the censors and mind-controllers at YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and so on have all decided that certain ideas and points of view are now verboten. The people will NOT be allowed to get a differing point of view. You will only be allowed to hear what the State thinks you should hear. But I refuse to submit, and the full 68-minute video can be seen here: newtube.app/user/anthony/GlkxUvo

Please watch it and share it. One article explains the situation with this pulled video:

Drs. Dan Erickson and Artin Massihi … decried California’s COVID-19 related lockdown in particular on medical and economic grounds. Part 1 carried the heart of the doctors’ remarks in about 50 minutes…. They focused on their own experience and widened the discussion to take in California generally. They made many of the same points we have been making here over the past month, but tied the discussion to their experience as physicians and owners in the business of treating patients in need of urgent care.

Laura Ingraham invited Dr. Erickson on for a segment of her FOX News show last night, and she got action! As events transpired, she was able to report in real time that YouTube had removed the viral part 1 video following the segment — for violating YouTube’s terms of service, of course. www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/04/was-it-something-he-said-4.php

Another Fox News host who has constantly been trying to sound the alarm on all this is Tucker Carlson. This short video clip is also must-viewing and must-sharing: video.foxnews.com/v/6152742822001

In it examines the collusion of Big Tech and Big Government, discusses the censored video, and then says this: “Of all the many ironies of this moment, so many of them bitter, the hardest to swallow is this one: As we fight this virus, we are becoming far more like the country that spawned it – we are becoming more like China. It’s horrifying.”

I mentioned just above a new piece by Dennis Prager. Let me speak to it a bit further. In it he offers these 4 signs of a police state:

No. 1: Draconian laws depriving citizens of elementary civil rights.
No. 2: A mass media supportive of the state’s messaging and deprivation of rights.
No. 3: Use of police.
No. 4: Snitches.

He concludes the article this way:

It is said that about 1 in every 100 East German citizens were informers for the Stasi, the East German secret police, as superbly portrayed in the film “The Lives of Others.” It would be interesting, and, I think, important, to know what percentage of New Yorkers informed on their fellow citizens. Now, again, you may think such a comparison is not morally valid, that de Blasio’s call to New Yorkers to serve a Stasi-like role was morally justified given the coronavirus pandemic. But you cannot deny it is Stasi-like or that, other than identifying spies during World War II, this is unprecedented in American history at anywhere near this level.

This past Friday night, I gathered with six others for a Shabbat dinner with friends in Santa Monica, California. On my Friday radio show, I announced I would be doing that, and if I was arrested, it would be worth it. In my most pessimistic dreams, I never imagined that in America, having dinner at a friend’s house would be an act of civil disobedience, perhaps even a criminal act. But that is precisely what happens in a police state. townhall.com/columnists/dennisprager/2020/04/28/our-dress-rehearsal-for-a-police-state-n2567744

Lastly, let me take that final point about snitching and share what another writer has said about it:

That is not America. In East Germany, the Communists built a collective of informants. In the Soviet Union, informing on your neighbors and even your parents proved your loyalty to the state. This behavior has no place here. We’re Americans. Our first allegiance is not to the state, but to each other. In America, treason is not a betrayal of the state, but of the rights of the individual to be free of the state. Socialists betray the individual to the state and their pandemic response reinforces that first betrayal of the individual. It is no coincidence that the 1-800-INFORM phenomenon has taken root in the blue parts of the country. The culture of informants values the collective and suppresses the individual.

To the socialist, governments never fail. The experts are always wise and the public officials all-knowing. Government only fails because individuals subvert, sabotage, and undermine its well-meaning efforts. The informant helps the authorities redirect the blame for their failures by locating individual scapegoats. A nation of informants can only arise in a socialist system where people put the state first. They scowl and plot against their neighbors, spying and informing on them for the freedom they feel in their souls. The pandemic is a threat to the body of the nation, but 1-800-INFORM threatens the soul. thewashingtonstandard.com/1-800-inform-report-your-neighbors-to-authorities-its-the-un-american-way/

There are so many things happening right now that should concern every single one of us. And what concerns me so very much is that so few people seem concerned at all!