Reposted from the Fabius Maximus Blog
By Larry Kummer, Editor / 25 February 2020
Summary: Epidemics are like wars in that truth is the first casualty. I see comment threads in which misinformation makes most readers know less than when they started. Meanwhile, this blockbuster good news from China is lost amidst the chaff.
First, a status report
From WHO’s February 24 situation report.
Outside China, there are 29 nations infected (1 new, 6 since Feb 3). There are 1,374 cases (261 new, 1,221 since February 3). This does not include the 695 infected and then quarantined on the Diamond Princess.
Blockbuster news from China
Here are excerpts from remarks by Tedros Adhanom, Director-General of WHO, at the February 24 media briefing. This is important news – contradicting guesses by the doomsters.
“We’re encouraged by the continued decline in cases in China.. …They found that the epidemic peaked and plateaued between the 23rd of January and the 2nd of February, and has been declining steadily since then.
That is good news, and not just for China. With no preparation and relatively primitive public health networks (compared to those of developed nations), the epidemic stabilized in roughly four weeks – probably due to China’s fast and large quarantines. That is good news, because other nations are relying on quarantines to contain the infection.
Also, this suggests that the doomsters’ predictions that the epidemic would prove uncontrollable in China – sweepting through to its four corners – are wrong. China’s 77 thousand cases sounds like a large number, but it is a small fraction of China’s 1.4 billion people. That is true even if the true number infected is twice as large, or even (implausibly) five times as large.
“They found that the fatality rate is between 2% and 4% in Wuhan, and 0.7% outside Wuhan.”
The fatality rate in the developed nations will certainly be lower than that in China outside Wuhan (medical facilities in Wuhan are overwhelmed), although the estimate of a 0.7% fatality rate might be wrong. Original estimates were over 2% (e.g., here). If proven correct, this is great news.
“They found that for people with mild disease, recovery time is about two weeks, while people with severe or critical disease recover within three to six weeks.”
That is also important news, as the length of time required for treatment of critical cases determines how quickly an epidemic overloads the hospital facilities of a region.
The Director gives the bottom line about the status of the epidemic: it is not a pandemic, yet.
“The sudden increases of cases in Italy, the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Korea are deeply concerning. There’s a lot of speculation about whether these increases mean that this epidemic has now become a pandemic. We understand why people ask that question.
“WHO has already declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern – our highest level of alarm – {on January 30} when there were less than 100 cases outside China, and 8 cases of human-to-human transmission.
“Our decision about whether to use the word “pandemic” to describe an epidemic is based on an ongoing assessment of the geographical spread of the virus, the severity of disease it causes and the impact it has on the whole of society.
“For the moment, we are not witnessing the uncontained global spread of this virus, and we are not witnessing large-scale severe disease or death. Does this virus have pandemic potential? Absolutely, it has. Are we there yet? From our assessment, not yet.”
See the WHO website for details about the meaning of “pandemic” (here and here).
The doomsters spread panic
The doomsters are multiplying faster than those infected with the diesase, spreading misinformation. They use graphs showing rapid growth in the small numbers of infected to make this seem like a major pandemic outside China. It’s not, at least yet.
They make bold statements about COVID-19 not justified by currrent research, especially comparing it to the flu. Most importantly, they assume developed nations will have the same rates of spread & mortality as China – despite our vastly better medical infrastructure.
Making this much worse is the same dynamic seen in the climate change debate: experts seeking their 15 minutes of fame by making statements (often quite wild) that are outside of the consensus, without mentioning that. In the early stages of the epidemic, there was pushback to this by other experts. Now, as in climate science, the pushback has stopped – encouaging more experts to fuel the hysteria for their own gain.
What next?
Epidemics are like wars in another respect: their outcomes are difficult to predict. But whatever happens, this is – as I said on January 25 – a historical milestone. The combination of global organization and high tech has allowed preparations during the past 54 days of an unprecedented speed and scale. Without these, by now we might be in the midst of a devastating global pandemic. This is progress.
But as usual, Trump wants to reduce our defenses to anything other than war. In the midst of the Coronavirus epidemic, President Trump proposed cutting funding to the World Health Organization by 53% and to the Pan American Health Organization by 75%. Madness.
It’s easy to follow the coronavirus story
The World Health Organization provides daily information, from highly technical information to news for the general public.
- There is their daily situation report, with detailed numbers.
- The Director-General of WHO gives frequent briefings, which are quite insightful.
- Their daily press briefings have more information. An audio goes up quickly afterwards. A transcript is posted the next day.
Posts about the coronavirus pandemic.
- The 2019-nCoV virus shows that we’ve built a better world.
- Hidden news about the epidemic sweeping across America! – How fake news drives out good news.
- Amazing but hidden news about coronavirus – Update about the epidemic, and why so few know the good news.
- Lessons from the coronavirus about climate change.
- Cut thru myths to see facts about COVID-19.
For More Information
Ideas! For some shopping ideas, see my recommended books and films at Amazon. Also, see a story about our future: Ultra Violence: Tales from Venus.
Please like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. Also, see these posts about epidemics…
- See the ugly cost of the next big flu pandemic. We can do more to prepare.
- Stratfor: The superbugs are coming. We have time to prepare.
- Posts debunking the hysteria about the 2009 swine flu in America.
- Posts debunking the hysteria about the 2015 ebola epidemic in America.
Films about scientists responding to global threats
In these films, we see scientists behaving according to their and our highest ideals.
When Worlds Collide
Contagion (2011).
Available at Amazon.
Available at Amazon.
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The usual news sites are spreading the “possible US virus spread” story line as they all point to “the US now has 57 infected”. None of them stop to think that 54 of those 57 infected cases allowed into the US were already known infected. There have only been 3 infected within the US, and those were found early on.
The early monitoring and restrictions put in place last month look like they worked well.
It will only turned out to have delayed the entry and spread unless somehow the whole disease goes away and we get very lucky before it does.
Many of the people infected in the past two weeks are only now getting sick, only getting sick enough to show up at hospitals at some point somewhere between any day now and another couple weeks.
Read between the lines.
This thing is in the world, and is very unlikely to be going away now.
But there are several bright sides I can think of.
One reason for people actually being able to be conned by some fake problem is due to a lack of any really serious actual problems.
Something that kills one out of every 50 to 100 people in the world over a period of a year or two seems to me to count as a real problem, while also making it very likely any particular one of us will be fine.
70,000,000-80,000,000 people.
That’s a lot.
But not percentage wise.
And if it is mostly people who smoke…oopsie daisy…they cannot say they wuz never warned!
And anyone given to sitting around wishing people were dead, this gives them their first real chance in a long time to get their wish for at least some of the people on their lists!
So there is that.
I can think of at least one really old guy I will not be shedding too many a tear for, myself.
Always look on the sunny side of life!
So far, my toast tends to fall butter side up.
But hey, iffen I kick the bucket, I am sure there are a few people who will smile smugly and laugh while they make a fresh bowl of popcorn.
at some point, when enough people have caught the disease and recovered, “herd immunity” starts to take hold, there are too few susceptible people left in the herd, for it to keep going exponentially. I suspect this is what’s happening in Wuhan. I also suspect the reported numbers are an order of magnitude lower than actual infections since there are probably many many people with natural immunity and/or who have had really mild cases that go unreported (and unremarked) .
The population in Wuhan is well into the millions. At last report there was 60 to 70 thousand cases in all of China. I’m pretty sure that is 4 or 5 orders of magnitude too small for any herd immunity to take effect.
I stopped reading when the Trump bashing started. Hard to decipher fact from fiction when the writer can’t keep personal bias out of it.
Mike, I agree. I’ve never made it through an entire article written by Kummer.
His bio on the website where he’s an editor says he spent 37 years in the finance industry, most of it at UBS. It also seems to indicate that he’s a “performative centrist”, whatever that means, maybe master triangulater? Won’t waste time on his future posts.
Yup…my interested waned sharply after that line also.
In his early posts, every time he criticized someone of the left, he felt it necessary to include an “of course the right does this too”. The problem was that most of the time he just put up this assertion without providing any evidence for it. The few times he did, the evidence was either mostly fictional or highly exaggerated.
As his swipes at Trump show, when criticizing someone more conservative than himself, he has never felt the need to provide “balance”.
Most socialists when pressed, call themselves centrists.
Seems that as long as they can find someone more radical than they are, this proves that they are middle of the road.
I was thinking today that in a place like the US, it may be better to get exposed and get it over with right at the beginning, before the beds all fill up, supplies running low, medical staff sick of one more patient, etc.
Too bad there are reports of people getting reinfected after having recovered.
Or could it be that the virus can be suppressed by the immune system to the point of no longer being detectable and can then later flare up again?
Or it could be those reports are mistaken.
Or not as they are reported.
I would not let that be the one bit of info out of China I am gonna take for granted as true.
Nothing is true based on one report.
So you got the cheque from the incompetent parasites at the Worldwide Holocaust Office as well did you?
WHO and CCP are directly responsible for the global death wave now occurring without a single doubt.
The cover-up, misdirection, lies and spin even of the virus origin (still to this day) says it all.
SPECTEMUR AGENDO
Shut the entire economy of 1.4bn down over a few hundred deaths initially? Seriously?
Still to this day prevent ANYONE independent from looking into the origin at ground zero? Seriously?
CCP and WHO locking the entire country down, but telling the world to do the opposite? Seriously?
There are documented interviews of university students in Wuhan in November who on social media were being warned by peers of a killer pneumonia virus.
WHO funding should be reduced to zero and their leadership frogmarched to the Hague, tried and then hung.
They need to be punished and cease to exist following this crime against humanity they have perpetrated.
Why is this commentator ‘Holly Elizabeth Birtwistle’ constantly trying to deny growing evidence?
Did he / she know what the situation would be like today if China hadn’t decided to lock people up in their houses / flats and to limit traffic between cities and regions to an absolute minimum?
How ignorant are we actually allowed to be?
J.-P. D.
The evidence isn’t growing; certain indices indicating the depth of the ‘pandemic’ are though.
Oh, and: China =/= USA WRT sanitary practices, food consumption practices, etc.
_Jim
It seems that you didn ‘t notice yet that the World is a bit more than the USA.
Ever heard of Africa, Asia minus China, America minus USA, and this small corner named Europe?
That reminds me a Middlewest farmer being asked some decades ago if he ever had been in Europe.
He answered: “Yurop? Wa’s that? C’na eat it?”
Rgds
J.-P. D.
re: “the World is a bit more than the USA.”
Revert to the mean: China =/= USA WRT sanitary practices, food consumption practices, etc.
Live in a sh*thole country, expect sh*thole problems. Clean up your ‘act’ in your country before giving lectures to others; Not even going to say ‘pleaze’. Germ theory is now well-known … no excuses.
PS. Where should I send bar soap, Blue Dawn and/or cleanser?
_Jim
What a dumb, arrogant reply!
Shame on you, Sir.
J.-P. D.
re: “What a …”
Truth as a salve is bound to sting; sometimes more, sometime less, given ‘conditions’ existing on one’s individual mind.
What? “Freedom of Speech” protects only those discussing cute kittens and fluffy puppy dogs?
The answer to your question is, incredibly ignorant.
Anything else you were wondering about?
oh pretty ignorant like the italians who wanted the masques/carnivale to keep going regardless
re:
Working to correct that; “Render Fat to Make Handmade Soap”
https://www.motherearthnews.com/homesteading-and-livestock/handmade-soap-zbcz1403
https://primitivesurvivors.com/diy-soap-making/
“The fatality rate in the developed nations will certainly be lower than that in China outside Wuhan (medical facilities in Wuhan are overwhelmed)”
This is called wishful thinking. If the virus spreads widely here (US), our medical facilities will also be quickly overwhelmed. There is little spare capacity in the system for emergencies such as this.
Hey, if Tedros says all is good I believe him ! I mean, its not like he has form for downgrading a Cholera outbreak to a bad case of the squits for political reasons right ?
For those of the esteemed readership in the UK, seeing cases popping up in north western Germany, and Holland, means its already here in Blighty. Buckle up and be at the supermarket when they open at 6am.
Remember the oft quoted truism from the ‘Hedge’, ”He who Panics first, Panics best” 🙂
WHO announced they are no longer using the term pandemic
Larry, you’ve got be kidding. Do you know who the head of the WHO is?. He was the third highest Ethiopian governmental official and a declared Marxist who not only covered up his countries cholera epidemic, but just hired the murderous dictator, Robert Mugabe.
The real reason you can’t trust WHO? Money.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/here-are-425-billion-reasons-why-who-refuses-call-covid-19-outbreak-pandemic
Follow the money, always follow the money!!
Here is a prime example of “Larry The Centrist”.
see
https://fabiusmaximus.com/2017/01/22/similarities-between-obama-and-trump/
and my reply to him:
https://fabiusmaximus.com/2020/02/21/2020-revolution/ (notice he didn’t make a reply to me)
CODETRADER 21 FEBRUARY 2020 AT 9:26 AM
Comparing Obama to Trump: You wrote, As we start a new era, see the similarities between Obama and Trump By Larry Kummer, Editor, 22 January 2017 “Trump won the presidency (with a minority in the popular vote) making a wide range of big populist promises — many of which will be difficult or impossible to fulfill (e.g., boosting employment in manufacturing, and rebalancing trade with China). Neither entered office with a plan to fulfill their promises.”
Unlike Obama, Trump Fulfilled his promises and has done much much more.
Once again, your smug, left leaning bias stands out like a sore thumb! MAGA!
+100
But as usual, Trump wants to reduce our defenses to anything other than war. In the midst of the Coronavirus epidemic, President Trump proposed cutting funding to the World Health Organization by 53% and to the Pan American Health Organization by 75%. Madness.
*****************
Yeah, he proposed those cuts BEFORE the current issue arose.
But here’s what the real situation is:https://www.breitbart.com/health/2020/02/25/fact-check-no-trump-did-not-fire-pandemic-specialist-or-defund-cdc/
VERDICT: Mostly false. The specialist was not fired; he quit. Some CDC cuts were proposed, but not implemented.
“Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg claimed at the Democrat debate in Charleston, South Carolina, on Tuesday night that President Donald Trump had “fired” the government’s pandemic expert and “defunded” the Centers for Disease Control:
One of the great problems today, you read about the virus, what’s really happening here is the president fired the pandemic specialist in this country two years ago, so there’e nobody here to figure out what the hell we should be doing. [Applause] And he’s defunded Centers for Disease Control, CDC so we don’t have the organization we need.
In reality, the pandemic expert — Rear Adm. Timothy Ziemer — left the National Security Council (NSC) voluntarily after then-National Security Advisor John Bolton was appointed.
Bolton disbanded the unit that Ziemer was supervising as part of an effort to downsize the bloated NSC staff. The purpose of the unit, which had overseen the global fight against Ebola, had largely been fulfilled.
It is true that Ziemer and his unit have not yet been replaced.
The Trump administration has indeed proposed cuts to the CDC, but they have not been passed by Congress.
Trump has not “defunded” the agency, and Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar has said that the new proposed budget would, in fact, prioritize the fight against coronavirus.
Recently, the administration reversed course, asking for $2.5 billion in emergency funding for managing the coronavirus.
QE EFFING D
Re: the US cutting funding to WHO, one could argue that in the midst of a potential pandemic health crisis is the very most likely time for OTHER countries to step up and commit more resources, thus balancing the contributions more fairly.
I think organizations like WHO benefit from having a wide revenue base, if not now then when?
Oh -“Serpenza” has a new China video, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbHxeOQA1Mc
While not directly addressing the Wuhan coronavirus, he spends a lot of time on the fascination with eating wild animals and dogs, feel free to skip the first 20 minutes or so. The rest is on hygiene practices in China, especially in rural China and truck stops. He blames the lack of hygiene, even for toilet paper and soap for one of the reasons the coronavirus has spread so well in China and less quickly elsewhere.
Compared to China, South Korea is a bunch of neat freaks.
See how fast it spreads in SK?
Yes hygiene is important, but even in a nation of constant hand washers (Korea)
this thing spreads like bugs will do.
we need warm weather fast
“we need warm weather fast”
That may be happening. Temperatures seem to be warming up quickly in the northern hemisphere. The ENSO meter even took a little jump the other day.
We are going to have a lot more information on the COVID-19 disease now that it is in countries that have adequate health care facilities and trustworthy reporting.
The rapid rate of infection in South Korea was caused by members of a death cult infecting large groups of people at a religious ceremony. That appears to be have been done on purpose.
I also wonder a bit about the Italy infections.
Iran has had elections last Friday. The government did not want rumors to get a high number of people that were voting. Nevertheless only a very low number of voters went to vote. Information about Corona has been suppressed.
On that Friday the 21st of February the TehranTimes stated that already THOUSANDS of people went to clinic and that already 735 people had been hospitalized:
““Based on latest experiments, 13 new cases of the coronavirus have been so far identified, of whom two have lost their lives,” the official said, IRNA reported.
He went on to say that over the past couple of days, thousands of people have referred to clinic and a total of 735 people with symptoms of influenza have been hospitalized.”
https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/445374/Iran-announces-13-new-cases-of-coronavirus-infection
The Jerusalem Post: “Iran’s government and media lied about coronavirus outbreak, riots erupt”
““The situation inside the hospital is very scary and terrifying,” one man tweeted. “Even the hospital medical staff, some of whom are infected with the coronavirus, are terrified.” ”
“Yet Iranians were urged by their government to congregate in confined spaces on Friday to vote. The regime wanted the turnout to grow beyond the 11 million who were estimated to have voted. ”
Source with a lot of information: https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Irans-government-and-media-lied-about-coronavirus-outbreak-riots-erupt-618431
The DATE of the detection is anecdotal and not representative of actual data. The decline in China’s reported numbers means nothing at all.
Remember that there was a severe increase in China’s reported numbers due to management change from “incompetent hiding” to “party line”… and that “party line” is just another word for “military oppression of a captive population of slaves”.
Tedros Adhanom needs to be fired AND caned in public for spreading truly dangerous lies.
A failing hospital in Italy has been connected with the recent outbreak:
“Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has tried to allay fears that the central government has no control over the affected regions after he was forced to admit that a hospital in the northern town of Codogno had mishandled the region’s first coronavirus case and had contributed to the deadly virus’ spread.”
Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/25/europe/italy-coronavirus-backfoot-intl/index.html
Furthermore:
An infected doctor from Italy is named as the reason for the locking of 1000 people in the hotel in Tenerife:
“The hotel guest who has been diagnosed with the virus is a doctor from Italy. According to the European press agency Europa Press, he comes from an area in northern Italy where hundreds of people are infected.”
Source (in Dutch): https://nos.nl/artikel/2324503-op-tenerife-duizend-toeristen-in-quarantaine-onder-wie-13-nederlanders.html
“The doomsters are multiplying faster than those infected with the diesase, spreading misinformation. They use graphs showing rapid growth in the small numbers of infected to make this seem like a major pandemic outside China. It’s not, at least yet. ”
Assumes we know the number of infected, is, that reported =actual number of infected. It is not. One needn’t be a doomster to presume that reported numbers are a fraction of the total. On the contrary.
Sweet revenge for Pangolins!
If this is true.
Pangolins are close to being driven to extinction in their native Africa due to Asians eating them and using their scales for folk magic.
They are the most hunted wild animal in Africa.
Stick it to the man, Pangolins!
https://images.app.goo.gl/YeVHmC59nDNbnaGp9
Antiviral activity is demonstrated by organic zinc, vitamin C (with routine) and antiviral drugs given immediately at the onset of symptoms.
The first sign of a virus attack is marked weakness and muscle pain.
Pity, that jibe at the end to the president. Made me read the piece again in a different mindset.
COVID-19 CORONAVIRUS OUTBREAK
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
All zoonotic viruses that attack the respiratory tract are deadly dangerous. This is not a human runny nose virus. In France, people aged 60 and 55 die. There is no age rule. Healthy doctors die.
Plus there was that one case of a baby being born with the virus in China.