Maarten De Cock Profile picture
May 13 7 tweets 3 min read
New paper by @linseymarr & @Jon_Samet

“One..key lesson learned from the COVID19 pandemic became clear..: the need to embrace the management of indoor air as a primary tool for controlling transmission of respiratory pathogens..through ventilation, filtration and disinfection.”🧵 Image “Studies in schools have illustrated that mitigations aimed at removing virus from the air were associated with reduced transmission of COVID-19.” Image
May 10 4 tweets 2 min read
“Strong and consistent evidence for a predominantly airborne mode of transmission emerged early in the pandemic but was denied or downplayed by WHO and national public health bodies for years.”
1/4

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“…dominant voices in the infection prevention and control community did not grasp the basics of airborne transmission and failed to listen to people who did.”
2/4
May 7 5 tweets 2 min read
At the time when @WHO was assuring the world: “COVID-19 is NOT airborne”…

…a ‘return to office’-document for WHO staff in Geneva stated:

Ventilation system has been modified
• increased volume of external air
• no recycling of air
• filters rated as high as we can go…

🤔 Image Source: ficsa.org/fileadmin/user…
Apr 28 7 tweets 3 min read
That @WHO press conference on the terminology of airborne transmission was apparently not something journalists were very interested in, to say the least… "Handwashing..was important in SARS-CoV-2".

One of the examples during this press conference which makes clear that the @WHO will never admit that they were responsible for public health misinformation (“NOT airborne”) with disastrous consequences, let alone apologise for it.
Apr 22 5 tweets 2 min read
“…when sciences evolves, you have to change your advice.”

Well, @JeremyFarrar, then show us the evolving science that explains this change:

👉Febr. 2020: “Airborne… the pattern is clear”(@LawrenceGostin, @WHO Director)

👉March 2020: “FACT: COVID-19 is NOT airborne”
Image FACT: this was NOT about science. It was about politics, PPE shortages and the Infection Prevention and Control leaders trying to prevent at all costs and AGAINST all scientific evidence, the recommendation of airborne precautions in hospitals.
Mar 16 10 tweets 4 min read
“We used an established risk analysis tool for differentiating natural and unnatural epidemics (…) to study the origin of SARS-COV-2.”

Result:

“𝐚 𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐡𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐚𝐧 𝐮𝐧𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐚𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐚𝐥 𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐒𝐀𝐑𝐒-𝐂𝐨𝐕-𝟐.” 🧵
Image “…not all of the initial cases were linked to the local wet market, pointing to the possibility that the (…) market was a source of an amplification event rather than the origin of SARS-CoV-2.”

“coronavirus research appears to have been conducted under BSL-2 and 3 at the WIV.” Image
Mar 1 5 tweets 2 min read
New Chinese study examines aerosol distribution of a laboratory spill and the probability of a laboratory acquired infection with SARS-CoV-2.

“A series of laboratory infections have raised concerns about the incidence of laboratory infections.” (1/5)

link.springer.com/article/10.100…
Image “Data summarizing the past 219 laboratory infection incidents showed that 73% of laboratory-acquired infections were caused by aerosol spills (Pedrosa & Cardoso, 2011).” (2/5) Image
Feb 27 4 tweets 2 min read
You can report this @WHO post as 'EU illegal content'.

Choose 'Risk for public security', because this includes 'risk for public health'.
Image Will be interesting to see what they do… @X @WHO Image
Feb 13 4 tweets 2 min read
1803 📖

"An epidemic raged in Glasgow, and there was scarcely a family, high or low, which escaped attacks from it. But at Glasgow they have an exceedingly well-appointed, well ventilated prison, and in that prison there was not a single case of epidemic…” (1/2) Image “…and in consequence of the overcrowding of the hospitals, which killed some two thousand people, they took forty cases into the [well ventilated] prison, and not one of them spread.”

Found in “The Constitution of Man in Relation to the Natural Laws” by George Combe, 1803. Image
Feb 11 7 tweets 3 min read
Recent review in The Lancet🧵

Between 2000 and 2021:

“Laboratory acquired infections (LAIs) in 309 individuals in 94 reports for 51 pathogens.”

“16 accidental pathogen escapes from laboratory settings (APELS) were reported.”

*biased results: reliance on public available info. Image “Procedural errors represented the leading cause of laboratory-acquired infections (LAIs)..followed by unknown causes.. needlestick injuries..spills..not stated..splashes..broken vials..or animal bites.”

“…procedural errors were also the most common cause of fatal outcomes…” Image
Feb 1 4 tweets 2 min read
‘The consequences of a lab escape of a potential pandemic pathogen’ (Frontiers in Public Health, 2014)

“What is the likelihood that one of these viruses will escape from a lab and seed the very pandemic the researchers claim they are trying to prevent?”🧵
frontiersin.org/articles/10.33…
Image “The risk of a man-made pandemic from a lab escape is not hypothetical.”

“The historical record reveals lab-originated outbreaks and deaths…”

👉“Ironically, these labs were working with pathogens to prevent the very outbreaks that they ultimately caused.” Image
Dec 13, 2023 8 tweets 4 min read
Highly recommended article by Prof. Raymond Agius.
@ProfEmer

“Weak public health guidance, which did not recognise dominant airborne transmission, was applied to workplaces, leaving workers and others unprotected…”

👉 mattioli1885journals.com/index.php/lame…

Image “…in spite of prior scientific knowledge, UK government preparation was pathetic; the official narrative advocated measures directed against non-dominant modes of transmission (e.g., fomites) while practically ignoring airborne transmission (aerosols).” Image
Nov 1, 2023 9 tweets 4 min read
Published in @TheLancet on January 24, 2020 (!)

Chinese scientists warned the world:
👉“Airborne precautions..are strongly recommended”

The @WHO refused to do this & also ignored the letter👇from @GlobalNursesU to @DrTedros (Jan. 30, 2020) asking @WHO for airborne precautions.
Image Source: thelancet.com/journals/lance…
Oct 29, 2023 8 tweets 4 min read
Cambridge Disinformation Summit, July 2023:

@WHO’s Dir. of Comm. @gabbystern is confronted with WHO’s own misinformation by someone from the audience.

The bold questioner is… the great film producer Gale Anne Hurd (The Terminator, Aliens, The Walking Dead, …)

👏@GunnerGale
The reply of @gabbystern however avoids the whole issue.

She doesn’t answer why WHO claimed “COVID19 is not airborne” and why it took them so long to correct this.

In fact @WHO’s misinformation is STILL online, and they simply refuse to delete it or even to add a correction.
Oct 25, 2023 5 tweets 2 min read
Bioaerosol scientist @brosseau_lisa:"This whole discussion about aerosols is something...infectious disease physicians…don't want to talk about...I think it frightens them."

Why is this even accepted?

Would we allow engineers to build bridges if they’re afraid of mathematics? Source: youtube.com/live/mCpjnh9cz…
Oct 24, 2023 4 tweets 2 min read
On 30 January (!) 2020, Global Nurses United wrote @DrTedros a letter demanding @WHO to call for

“airborne precautions to be implemented when health care workers are caring for patients with possible or known 2019-nCoV infections.”

They were ignored.

👉 nationalnursesunited.org/sites/default/…

Image 👇
Oct 23, 2023 8 tweets 4 min read
🧵February 7, 2020.

@DrMikeRyan on the cruise ship outbreak :
“Let’s be careful not to overreact..Remember, in SARS..this disease isn’t airborne..[😳]there was a great scare that this was airborne..It didn't turn out to be so..
a cruise ship is a very particular environment.” Transcript of this press conference (PDF download): who.int/docs/default-s…
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Oct 19, 2023 6 tweets 3 min read
“What is the right message?”

Febr. 10, 2020. CBS Chief Medical Correspondent @DrLaPook shows Anthony Fauci the article “Coronavirus is airborne, Chinese official confirm.”

“we will be reaching millions of people. I'd love to get the latest and greatest public health message.”🧵
Image The article is correct and is based upon a press conference held on Feb. 8, 2020 by the Shanghai Municipal Government and confirmed that the new corona virus can be transmitted through aerosols and people may be infected by inhaling virus aerosols.

nzherald.co.nz/world/coronavi…
Image
Sep 19, 2023 11 tweets 6 min read
🧵“Rebreathing exhaled air has been considered to facilitate he spread of infection…”

“Many studies have associated high CO2 level with high probability of infection spread in indoor spaces.”

“The @WHO has *not* developed guidelines for indoor CO2”🤔

sciencedirect.com/science/articl…
Image “The proposal to achieve CO2 levels of 1000ppm..will not only help achieve WHO guidelines for providing children with healthy indoor environments, it will also provide a low-cost intervention for helping control the TB epidemic in areas of high prevalence”
journals.plos.org/plosone/articl…
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Sep 7, 2023 5 tweets 2 min read
Massachusetts, Act of 1888:

‘Every public building and every schoolhouse shall be ventilated in such a proper manner that the air shall not become so exhausted as to be injurious to the health of the persons present therein.’

The inspectors went from school to school with… 🧵
Image …their 19th century portable CO2 meters: ‘air-testers’ made by the German Professor Wolpert.

If these tests showed insufficient ventilation, the inspector wrote an order and later revisited the school, tested the air again to see whether the ventilation was indeed improved. Image
Jul 22, 2023 7 tweets 3 min read
In the Journal of the Boston Society of Medical Sciences, anno 1896:

announcement of a method allowing portable CO2 meters “devised for practical use in school-rooms, factories and stores.”

“…can be carried in the pocket (…) to be used when desired.”

https://t.co/yn4wyeh276ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…
Image In an 1899 article, Dr. Fitz explains his new, practical method of measuring CO2 in more detail.

Some “ready methods” (no lab necessary) already existed, but they were or not accurate enough, or not fit for schools because they were “beyond the technical skill of the teacher”.🧵 Image