Stop all the clocks, put away your smartphone,
Liars stop lying with your lies overblown,
Silence the fools and muffle the spin
Bring out the coffin, untruth did win.
Let the planes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message 'Our Country is Dead'.
“Keep the lies simple, repeat, they’ll accept”
The Leave liars won, all has been wrecked
There was the North, the South, the East and West,
I loved my country, it felt best,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
But liars lie, authoritarians rise. I was wrong.
Our lives are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up your hopes; they’re over, they’re done,
Pour away our rights; the lies weren’t withstood;
The end is near now and nothing will come to any good.
• • •
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Why did the government allow sporting events to continue in early March? Cheltenham. Liverpool-Madrid. Why did they stop contact tracing on March 11th? Why did they only announce lockdown on March 23rd?
A quarter of a million people attended Cheltenham and then went on to spread COVID-19 around the country.
Cheltenham and Liverpool became hotspots of COVID-19.
Why did government let these events continue?
Remember, the govt at this time were talking about herd immunity. It is hard to credit the idea that govt wanted people to become ill & die but people became ill & died.
Between the 11th & 23rd there more than 3 doublings of COVID-19 cases.
‘many care homes say they believe the British government made a crucial early mistake: It focused too much attention on protecting the’ NHS ‘at the expense of the most vulnerable in society, among them the estimated 400,000 mostly elderly or infirm people who live in care homes’
‘A UK government spokesman defended the strategy. “This is an unprecedented global pandemic and we have taken the right steps at the right time to combat it, guided by the best scientific advice.”’
‘The charges focus on four areas: that healthcare workers struggled to access personal protective equipment, that Britain was too slow to implement a lockdown, that it bungled testing, and that vulnerable care home residents were not properly protected.’ smh.com.au/world/europe/b…
‘Says Martin McKee, professor of European public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine & an adviser to the World Health Organisation: "The countries that moved fast have curtailed the epidemic. The countries that delayed have not. It's as simple as that."’
‘Dr Richard Horton, editor in chief of The Lancet medical journal, is even more damning: "The handling of the COVID-19 crisis in the UK is the most serious science policy failure in a generation."’
Let’s look back to March 14th when Europe had become the centre of the COVID-19 pandemic, France had locked down and the UK had not. The number of cases in the UK had reached 1,140. Number of deaths had doubled in one day from 11 to 21.
1/n
More than 200 people had died in Italy between 13th and 14th March. At the time, this was shocking. 1268 people had died in total of COVID-19 in Italy. The first reported case in Italy had been on February 23rd and March 7th for the UK, about 2 weeks later.
2/n
By now the WHO had declared Pandemic on March 11th, already several weeks after they had declared a public health emergency of international concern on January 30th when the outbreak had gone international. The spread of disease was rapid and deadly between these two dates.
3/n
‘There are profound questions to be answered, about why Johnson’s government stood alone among the countries of the world, pursuing that herd immunity approach, and why, when they realised stricter measures were needed, the lockdown was still delayed.’ theguardian.com/world/2020/apr…
On January 30th: the WHO announced a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC). ‘The WHO stated then, as it has emphasised throughout, that this highest state of alert required an immediate response.’
Action was warranted immediately... but Brexit.
‘In the absence of a vaccine, the WHO insisted that the virus should be addressed like the operation mounted in South Korea, with extensive testing, tracing people with whom a person testing positive has had close contact, and isolating all of them, “to interrupt virus spread”.’
‘The basic principles of public health, and the daily mantra of the WHO – to find the virus, test, trace and isolate, to promote social distancing, and to do it all at speed – appear to have been effectively disregarded.’
‘A balanced scientific advisory group would at the minimum include experts working at the frontline of the pandemic, such as those in public health, primary care and intensive care.’
‘Whatever was discussed by Sage during February led to an alternative strategy, laid out by Boris Johnson, Vallance and Whitty at the beginning of March:’