China Locks Down Thousands in North to Contain Growing Outbreak (bloomberg.com) 129
China locked down a county that has seen the most Covid-19 cases in the nation's latest delta outbreak, as an initial flareup in the northwest quickly spirals into a nationwide surge. From a report: Ejin, a county in China's Inner Mongolia region, asked its 35,700 residents to stay home from Monday and warned of civil and criminal liabilities should anyone disobey the order, state broadcaster CCTV reported, citing a local government statement. The small county bordering Mongolia is the current outbreak's hotspot, home to nearly one-third of the more than 150 infections found over the past week in the mainland. The lockdown comes a day after a warning from National Health Commission officials that the outbreak would continue to worsen after spreading to 11 provinces in about a week. China reported 38 Covid infections on Monday, half of which were found in Inner Mongolia.
The capital Beijing -- which has seen a dozen new cases traced back to the northwest -- has all but banned entry by people arriving from anyplace in the country that's reported locally-transmitted Covid cases. People who have to visit Beijing from these areas must provide a negative Covid test conducted no longer than two days earlier, and undergo two weeks of unspecified health monitoring.
The capital Beijing -- which has seen a dozen new cases traced back to the northwest -- has all but banned entry by people arriving from anyplace in the country that's reported locally-transmitted Covid cases. People who have to visit Beijing from these areas must provide a negative Covid test conducted no longer than two days earlier, and undergo two weeks of unspecified health monitoring.
Weld some people into their homes (Score:1, Flamebait)
and black-bag some citizens off the street.
That ought to fix it.
If all else fails, you can always start issuing quotas to the local physicians for how many covid cases they're allowed to report that day.
And besides, in a country of 1.something billion, who's going to miss a village of 35,000?
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Don’t you know doctors were writing down Covid for people who died from heart attacks? Of course I’m being sarcastic. If you ask why there’s never a real answer.
I generally don't agree with rightwingnutjob (Score:2)
But, what they said is what the CCP has been doing since the start. There is plenty of video that has escaped to YT and elsewhere if you care to look instead of playing piglet for Xi Jing Pooh.
Wumaos are extremely aggressive at trying to flag and takedown YT video but there are still lots of places to find examples.
people being sealed in [youtu.be]
quarantine camps and forced testing [youtube.com]
millions unable to leave their homes [youtube.com]
This is very cursory, it's not my job to educate you.
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I really don't know what your point is... In the "covid camps" video "unsanitary covid test" clearly has a replaceable plastic shield. These videos are just complete and total bullshit. You can even tell by the nasal voice this "journalist" uses and the way they show just 1 or 2 seconds of a video and fill in the rest of the narrative. We already know that China is doing massive testing and has much more strict lockdowns.
so I don't know what I'm supposed to learn from any of these videos except that China
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Meaning, every video you posted is directly linked to CIA funding mean to propagandize US citizens against China for the purpose of US imperialism and the perpetuation of the military industrial complex. But, please, keep guzzling down that sweet sweet, deep-state, CIA propaganda.
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingnutjob (Score:2)
Oh look...the CCP shill has identified himself.
Here's a moral question: if you had to shill for "American imperialism" or the CCP, which would you rather do and why?
Here's a practical question: if you had to shill for the CCP or the US, and got found out and had to gtfo, do you think you'd do better for yourself if you GTFO'd from the west to china, or the other way around?
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingnutjob (Score:2)
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingnutjob (Score:2)
So when I read stuff on dw or bbc or other foreign sites, or read books written by European or Asian academics and historians, that's gone through the cia reality distortion field too? Neat!
Get help dude.
Not every helicopter you see in the sky is sent there by the cia to spy on you jacking off to grainy videotapes of baywatch.
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingnutjo (Score:2)
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingnutj (Score:2)
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingnut (Score:2)
Very grainy tapes, I take it?
Capitalism doesn't equal freedom, but freedom results in capitalism if it's actual freedom: freedom of thought, freedom of association, freedom of movement, freedom of speech, etc.
Capitalism can exist without freedom, but as a political/economic system it's more accurately described as fascism.
Marxism didn't require any outside punishment to collapse. It did so of its own volition. East Germany was being propped up by the Soviets, West Germany was being propped up by America. No
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingnu (Score:2)
Why don't we allow Afghanistan, Korea, China, Bolivia, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, Iran, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Cuba, Mexico, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, (and the list goes on) to have the freedom of choice? You really should read Lenin's thoughts on imperialism. Capitalism allows for relative freedom for certain classes of people with
Re: I generally don't agree with rightwingn (Score:2)
I don't think you understand what capitalism is.
It's not top hats, monocles, and manservants to dress you for the evening. It's people being in control of themselves and their labor. Some do better than others through skill and luck. That's okay.
Let's agree on definitions.. (Score:2)
Re: Let's agree on definitions.. (Score:2)
No cupcake, *humans* are violent and imperialistic creatures. Communist states and pre-industrial tribes engaged in wars of conquest. And they had quite high body counts, as recently as the previous century.
Capitalism merely enables material prosperity. And enables humans to do their thing more effectively. A miraculously wealthy communist state would rack up exaclty the same kinds of body counts abroad. Almost all were poor, so they racked up their body counts at home.
Re: Let's agree on definitions.. (Score:2)
If I've got a few thousand saved up, and I open a business...am I a capitalist now of I invest that couple k into equipment for my business?
There are one-man lawn care companies where an investment of a few thousand into a lawnmower and trimmer and leaf blower that fit into your truck is the start of something that turns into a sizable business in ten or 20 years.
Are those people capitalists?
Or is there some vague and unspecified amount of cash and cashflow that let you pass as a communist if you're under,
Re: Let's agree on definitions.. (Score:2)
Re: Let's agree on definitions.. (Score:2)
I was born into a communist system and was raised by people who lived most of their adult lives under a communist system. Then we came here and have lived for the past 30 years under a capiralist system.
I understand both well enough to compare their merits and their demerits and make an informed choice.
You grew up under a capitalist system, have reaped all of its benefits to the point where you take them for granted, and read about a mythical utopia in a book produced by propagandists with an axe to grind,
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And besides, in a country of 1.something billion, who's going to miss a village of 35,000?
Well, it's for sure no more than a mere rounding error, but damn... yeah, the free press sucks when it doesn't support your narrative, and it's only the suckiest way of doing things until you consider all the other alternatives.
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Republicans didn't seem to miss 757,000 fellow Americans [worldometers.info] out of only 330 million.
What a horrible and completely baseless thing to say.
Oh no! (Score:2, Flamebait)
Someone fly them some goat paste. That will do the trick.
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You do know that Ivermectin is used to treat humans too, right? And that Joe Rogan was prescribed the human version, right?
You do know Ivermectin is used to treat parasites, right? That is has no effect on viruses, right?
Re:Time to panic buy. (Score:5, Informative)
Re: Time to panic buy. (Score:1)
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Re: Time to panic buy. (Score:5, Insightful)
When you get inoculated against COVID the medicine you receive is a vaccine. It belongs to a new class of molecular engineered vaccines, but it's still a vaccine.
The pandemic remains a pandemic whether or not "most people" feel it's not anymore. New cases continue to arise everywhere except a few island nations; that's a simple fact.
It's true that many people who have immunity, either through infection or vaccination, can lead a more or less normal life with minimal risk. But the SARS-COV-2 virus has some unique features that make it particularly well suited to persist and spread even when many people have some degree of immunity. It can still infect you enough that you spread it to other people, even if you are unlikely to have a severe case.
The practical consequence of this is that COVID-19 will continue to seek out the remaining vulnerable people for the indefinite future. Those who have neither had COVID-19 nor a vaccination, and those who have an underlying medical condition that compromises their immune system remain in mortal danger.
It's possible to "move on" emotionally from a crisis mindset after you've had your vaccine, but it doesn't mean the problem is gone. It may not matter to you if some cancer patient gets seriously ill or dies from COVID, but it surely matters to that person's friends and family.
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Not all cancer is not a death sentence. In fact many cancers that *were* a death sentence thirty years ago are quite survivable now.
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if they were counting cancer/covid deaths as covid now they were doing it then.
and we still supassed that giant pandemic in deaths and still counting even with a vaccinne and the internet so we can communicate outside of the readonly newspaper. denial is for the weak
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Most people have moved on from covid being a pandemic.
A pandemic really does give a shit what people think.
There are enoculations (not really vaccine)
Sorry. I don't know about the rest of your post, but I can only take so much stupid per word before I tune out, and you managed to do that only part way into your second sentence. No doubt the rest of your post is of equal quality content.
Does anyone really believe China's numbers? (Score:5, Insightful)
The official number reported by China (population 1.4 billion) is that it's had only 109,000 COVID cases since the beginning of the pandemic.
Compare Germany, where the population is 17 times smaller (only 83 million). It has self-reported 4.5 million COVID cases since the beginning of the pandemic.
I certainly don't believe China's numbers, but if you do, please reply and I'll listen to your arguments with an open mind.
(Posting as AC because stuff on the internet is forever, and I don't want my future Chinese Communist Party overlords to know that I'm a subversive. : )
Re: Does anyone really believe China's numbers? (Score:1)
Re: Does anyone really believe China's numbers? (Score:4, Insightful)
+1, the reported numbers from China are laughably low.
But, enthusiastically repeated by the U.S. media and Democrats back when Trump was in office.
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+1, the reported numbers from China are laughably low.
As it is for New Zealand and Taiwan. Laughing at you very much because they followed sensible health strategies which allowed them to get vaccinated before the virus got into heavy spread. Partly by simply following basic health measures that any country could have done, China completely controlled the epidemic for the whole time the original and alpha variant were dominant.
I've said before on here that, if China was lying in the way the COVID fantasist keep claiming it would be possible to tell. The soci
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Hmm, wonder if Taiwan and New Zealand have anything really obvious in common that helps them keep the virus out of the country.
Meanwhile, we have covid hotspots in Texas because people caught crossing the border are being released into the country without being tested.
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Not depending on trucks crossing the border? Not having treaties and such allowing Americans into their country?
Here in BC, we had a lot of problems with Americans thinking they had a right to cross the border and play tourist. They'd claim they were going to Alaska. Then there is all the essential traffic that New Zealand and Taiwan don't have but ties N. America (and I guess Europe is similar) together.
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The society is not enough isolated for the kind of secrets that North Korea and friends can keep
North Korea continues to claim zero covid cases [nationalinterest.org]. We can tell that's not true.
China, however, is not open enough to determine whether the loss of 21 million cell phone subscriptions as of April 2020 [kmov.com] can be attributed to deaths. The Australian expert said "it's too early to answer those questions." She did, however, highlight China's "long history of lying about death tolls."
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China, however, is not open enough to determine whether the loss of 21 million cell phone subscriptions as of April 2020 [kmov.com] can be attributed to deaths. The Australian expert said "it's too early to answer those questions." She did, however, highlight China's "long history of lying about death tolls."
And it turns out ... she was wrong. Or alternatively, since China's economy is recovering those people are coming back from the dead via a very clever secret coronavirus re-animation program. The 21 million was pretty clearly caused by closing down of businesses at the start of the pandemic.
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Also, why would you think the Chinese Communist Party would care about you? China does not invade countries, so how are they going to get to be your "overlords"?
I'll listen to your arguments with an open mind.
Re:Does anyone really believe China's numbers? (Score:4, Insightful)
China does not invade countries, so how are they going to get to be your "overlords"?
Nice sleight-of-hand wording there. Oh sure, the CCP does not invade countries. They just declare them to have been part of China and then invade what was really just another piece of China all along... Isn't that right, Tibet, Hong Kong, Taiwan, etc?
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Learn some history, dipshit.
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I guess it's time to give most of Israel back to the Palestinians then... and a good chunk of northern Spain to the Basque... and North and South America to the First Nations and other indigenous peoples, etc. Heck you could argue most of Europe should belong to the Holy See as it's probably the closest thing to the heir to the Roman Empire. If you want to go by who historically controlled the land, just about no modern state is legitimate.
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I guess it's time to give most of Israel back to the Palestinians then... and a good chunk of northern Spain to the Basque... and North and South America to the First Nations and other indigenous peoples, etc.
Yes, these are all good suggestion. Especially the last one. Also Hawaii should be freed and California/Texas be returned to Mexico.
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The Qing government lost control to the Nationalists, which then lost control to the Communists. They've never let go of the claim or control of those territories.
If Taiwan became the official China tomorrow, they'd also claim Tibet, Hong Kong, and various islands, seas and border territories.
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Learn some history, dipshit.
That particular A/C is posting as A/C because he's frightened of his "future Chinese Communist Party overlords..." but lives in America so he's an idiot.
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They just declare them to have been part of China and then invade what was really just another piece of China all along... Isn't that right, Tibet, Hong Kong, Taiwan, etc?
You must be referring to Hawaii. All of these places you mentioned belonged to China, voluntarily, long before Hawaii was occupied by the (white) American invaders. Oh by the way China wouldn't be this huge if the Mongols and the Manchurian didn't invade China (and subsequently got absorbed by the Han civilization.) China hasn't needed to invade anyone else, unlike the Europeans.
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Hawaii was occupied by the (white) American invaders
I guess Hawaiians don't mind. There is a Texas secession movements [wikipedia.org] article -- but if there's a Hawaii secession movement, it's not notable enough to warrant an article.
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Nice sleight-of-hand wording there.
But you're American. Care to explain how any of that affects you?
I don't want my future Chinese Communist Party overlords to know that I'm a subversive.
You're not a subversive, you're an idiot.
Why we should care (Score:2)
Why would you care? What possible difference could China's covid numbers make to you?
It is more ethical to report honest case counts and other data to the international community, than to report massively falsified data.
I suspect you realize that, but you're pretending not to to be a jerk.
But if you're not pretending, it would be appropriate to ask: why don't you care about ethics?
I've heard lots of criticisms of Trump, but an accusation that his administration reported falsified pandemic data to the international community is not one of them.
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I certainly don't believe China's numbers, but if you do, please reply and I'll listen to your arguments with an open mind.
Did it ever occur to you that they only report the numbers they know about?
Same in Thailand, ridiculous low numbers reported. But obviousley every 2nd or 3rd one who gets COVID dies to to it - oops: obviously they do not know how much people are infected, get infected, have curves of infected per day or per week etc.
Why do you think China has a better overview on its numbers. What the f
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Look at USA: do you believe "their numbers"?
Yes. Excess mortality closely matches the reported covid deaths in many countries, including the US. In early 2020 in NYC, the numbers were too low, same in Wuhan.
Today, some places like Russia or India are reporting numbers far too low. But US and Chinese numbers of deaths appear accurate. Infection numbers are a different matter.
The Economist has a good article, with updated data:
https://www.economist.com/grap... [economist.com]
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Interesting. Unfortunately, no China in that list.
Everybody knows the early numbers in China were unreliable, but even the worst estimates are too low to show up in national excess mortality, in a country of 1.4 billion. China was slow to react, but when they did, they did it properly, and stopped outbreaks beyond Hubei. Many other countries were similarly successful in 2020 - Australia, Singapore, Taiwan etc, so no need for conspiracy theories that China was hiding a national epidemic.
But here is a study of excess mortality in China in 2020:
https://ww [bmj.com]
No one believes it? (Score:2)
Look at USA: do you believe "their numbers"? No one does.
The U.S. has reported 45,616,284 positive COVID tests. Would you admit it's a stretch to claim that "no one" believes that's a good-faith estimate? LOL
I'm curious... since you don't believe that number, do you think the U.S. has overreported, or underreported?
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Underreported obviously.
Just read what was posted on /. the last months. Hospitals in Georgia not reporting any COVID deaths because "administration says so".
Nurses and doctors forbidden to wear masks outside of a surgery room.
Just like China: the US does not even KNOW how bad the infection is running, how many have/had it and how many died. They did everything to get accurate reasonable numbers impossible.
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I certainly don't believe China's numbers, but if you do, please reply and I'll listen to your arguments with an open mind.
Yes, I can very easily believe the current numbers (not early Hubei numbers), because I live in Western Australia, which remains Covid-free. No masks, no restrictions, no infections.
Arrivals from infected areas, if allowed, are subject to 14-day quarantine. If we can do it, a more authoritarian state like China certainly can.
We are hoping to keep the pandemic out for a couple more months, touch wood, until the vaccination rate reaches 85 or 90%.
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Even with 90% vaccination rates, Delta can fill up the ICU wards and it is hard to get much past 80% vaccination rates based on our experiences in Canada.
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hard to get much past 80% vaccination rates based on our experiences in Canada.
But it can happen. NSW (the most populous state, with Sydney, and where Delta spread first) is now up to 85% fully vaxxed, and 93% first dose.
UK has 93% either vaccinated or infected, and the US is heading the same way.
My state will need to see some deaths before some idiots get vaccinated, but nothing like the million dead that the US will soon have.
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Are there that few children in NSW?
It is the problem with numbers of vaccinated, total population or eligible population. I was talking total and you seem to be talking eligible (actually I was somewhat confused too). Here it is over 72% of the total or close to 83% of the eligible that are totally vaccinated (77%, 88% with one dose). Thing is in some areas it is much lower and that last 3% of the eligible happened a lot slower then the first 80% with Provinces like Alberta quite a bit lower then the averag
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you seem to be talking eligible (actually I was somewhat confused too). Here it is over 72% of the total or close to 83% of the eligible that are totally vaccinated
Yes, I think those are age 16+. The 12-15yos have not long been eligible here, but soon the 16+ and 12+ numbers should be similar.
Children rarely burden the health system, and are less likely to transmit, so vaccination levels of children have little effect on when we will open up in WA.
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It's amazing what difference a competent response can make.
New Zealand and Australia also locked down. Closed their borders. Tested, quarantined and did contact tracing. Do you believe their numbers?
China was also dealing with a less contagious strain until just recently.
Australia has just seen what happens if you let your guard down and let Delta in and spread. They have given up on their zero covid plan.
It will be interesting to see if China can get on top of this like the previous outbreaks, or if th
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I don't buy the conspiracy theories about China having many more infections than reported. If their numbers were similar to Germany's per head of population, there would be mass graves. Visible from satellite. Or incinerators going 24/7 all of a sudden, and mountains of ash. People in China would likely have noticed and details slipped out on social media or to journalists. It's not that tightly locked down, e.g. we have actual video of Uighur forced "re-education" camps.
China isn't new to this, they have h
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I don't buy the conspiracy theories about China having many more infections than reported. If their numbers were similar to Germany's per head of population, there would be mass graves. Visible from satellite. Or incinerators going 24/7 all of a sudden, and mountains of ash. People in China would likely have noticed and details slipped out on social media or to journalists. It's not that tightly locked down, e.g. we have actual video of Uighur forced "re-education" camps.
China isn't new to this, they have had pandemics to deal with before. They also had extremely hard lockdowns, well enforced. They put the support in place too, e.g. a friend who returned to Shenzhen had to quarantine for 2 weeks and the local government brought her groceries and anything else she needed.
China isn't alone either, other countries managed to do similarly well. Singapore, Taiwan, New Zealand, Australia, South Korea. Even the mid-ranking ones like Japan did a hell of a lot better than most of Europe and the US.
Let me help you understand:
Singapore: on an island, well-guarded border to rest of island
Taiwan: island
New Zealand: island
Australia: island
South Korea: essentially an island as there's no real border crossing with NK, no other borders
Japan: island
Do you see something in common with all of those?
The US has a porous southern border that would be bringing the virus in repeatedly even if we locked down all other travel. Europe is just as porous. You cannot compare the US and Europe to islands that can simply
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On the other hand, the UK is an island and is doing really badly. Currently nearly a quarter of all the COVID infections in the world are happening in the UK.
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The UK is an island with a big tunnel into it from Europe. It's not doing any worse than other similar countries, and it's really not comparable to someplace like Taiwan.
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The UK is an island with a big tunnel into it from Europe.
The UK has Boris. And one of the highest infection & death rates in the developed world.
This is because their PM refused to act early on and impose lockdowns (until it was too late).
Any suggestion that they would have controlled it, except for re-seeding from overseas arrivals is ridiculous.
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Canada also has a porous southern border, yet one of the big problems is airports and using the honour system when it comes to travelers quarantining on arrival.
Need to do more then close the land border to keep it out.
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I don't have a conspiracy theory to push here but your evidence is foolish. They have construction projects going on all over the country, there's lots of opportunities to hide lots of bodies. Hell, they could grind 'em up and mix them in with whatever they're using to reclaim the desert. We're talking about a nation that breaks criminals up for parts and sells them, the whole idea that they would balk at hiding lots of bodies is ridiculous.
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Oh look, I see the pro-China mods have begun earning their pay, fifty cents at a time [wikipedia.org].
Organlegging [wikipedia.org]
Execution van [wikipedia.org]
The FACT is that China's government gives zero fucks about human life. It is not even valuable, let alone sacred, if it does not support their narrative. Which is why my comment got modded down.
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incinerators going 24/7
That is exactly what was reported. Wuhan's Crematoriums Are Filling Thousands of Urns With Coronavirus Remains Each Day [vice.com]
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The UK is an island and also the worst hit in Europe. Currently nearly a quarter of world wide infections are in the UK.
Re: Does anyone really believe China's numbers? (Score:2)
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That's my point. Being an island alone is not enough, it needs a competent government too.
China, of course, has tight border controls.
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The numbers could be true, if China's draconian lockdown measures have been effective. In the initial stages, the kind of lockdown they imposed would not be acceptable in Western democracies, which had to be rather less stringent, for fear of widespread civil disobedience.
However, the Chinese Communist Party does have a record of hiding facts that don't suit their narrative, so I also have my doubts.
This is a pity, because if China's lockdown policies were effective, we could not prove that, because we don'
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I certainly don't believe China's numbers, but if you do, please reply and I'll listen to your arguments with an open mind.
I don't believe they are quite that low. But I don't believe they are too much higher either. You can do a lot when you rule your country with an iron fist. While the USA and much of Europe is busy crying about "muh freedoms" and while every new rule in Germany is met with 10s of thousands of protestors in Berlin, China said "stay at home, if you come out we'll arrest your sorry arse and throw you in jail". And they did.
Go back and look at the pandemic photos of Chinese major cities. It was like the rapture
Stay at home? (Score:2)
China said "stay at home, if you come out we'll arrest your sorry arse and throw you in jail". And they did.
Thing is, though, in no country did people ever just "stay at home."
In every country, people had to go out to markets to get food after, at most, a few days of being locked down. Otherwise, starvation deaths would have exceeded COVID deaths.
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There's a difference between situation normal, and stay at home to control outbreaks. Yes plenty of countries effectively locked down their population. Again look at pictures of Beijing, saying that wasn't a true lockdown is completely disingenuous. Or look to any country with a relatively low incident rate of COVID. Australia: You can be fined $1500 for travelling more than a few km from your house. Don't like your local supermarket? Tough shit, that's what you're eating or face a fine. Heck my parents wer
Re: Does anyone really believe China's numbers? (Score:2)
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Other countries (not the US) have tried drastic lockdowns after the disease had spread widely. And no democracy can be as effectively drastic in locking down as the totalitarian state China was able to. So, although I don't trust China's government reporting on number of cases, and I especially don't like their one-p
Re: Does anyone really believe China's numbers? (Score:2)
China s number may not be that underreported. They acted quickly and draconian to a level that would be barely conceivable in western countries. That helped a lot.
Plus nobody acting like a baby about wearing masks. Granted HK had super dangerous Sars 20 years ago, the population here did not need encouragement to wear masks. But anyway masks are a part of north asian culture when you feel sick.
Plus nearly closing borders with 3 weeks mandatory quarantine.
Hong Kong specifically d
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I wish that western countries were as tough early on, we would have substantially solved the pandemic months ago.
If just the US and UK had got their act together properly and Johnson and Trump had shut down travelbefore India got infected, the Delta variant would probably never have arisen in the first place. Even with the Alpha variant we can see now that a vaccine plus elimination strategy would have been pretty easy.
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I wish that western countries were as tough early on, we would have substantially solved the pandemic months ago.
Because... Trump and Johnson run the entire world?
C'mon. Because they run the high transit countries that SARS-COV-2 spread through to get to India. If they had acted fast and hard then India probably wouldn't have got the disease in the first place and could have been isolated if it did.
Trump was having trouble closing off US boarders because the left kept resisting.
Trump never requested a closure, he requested limiting of Chinese arrivals. As president he could easily have done an actual, non selective closure, in which case complaints against the "left" (whatever the hell that is,
Is this Nobel Prize winner crazy? (Score:2)
I'm strongly against pushing the "twas a Chinese lab plandemic built by Fauch's Stormtupers from the genes of a 5G lamppost" type craziness
What do you think about Nobel Prize-winning virologist David Baltimore? Crazy? He pointed out,
Within the SARS-CoV-2 genome there is an insertion of 12 nucleotides that is entirely foreign to the beta-coronavirus class of virus that SARS-CoV-2 is in. There are many other viruses in this class, including the closest relative of SARS-CoV-2 by sequence, and none of them have this sequence. The sequence is called the furin cleavage site.
In order to infect a cell, the spike protein on the surface of viruses like SARS-CoV-2 needs to first be cut, or cleaved. The cut needn't be terribly exact, but it needs to be cut. Different viruses attract different kinds of cellular "scissors," so to speak, to make this cut; the furin cleavage site attracts the furin protein providing the most efficient way to make a cut. You don't need a furin cleavage site to cut the protein, but it makes the virus more efficiently infectious.
So where did it come from in SARS-CoV-2? There are other viruses that have furin cleavage sites, other coronaviruses, though not the family of beta-coronaviruses.
And at one point this Nobel Prize winner said, "When I first saw the furin cleavage site in the viral sequence, with its arginine codons, I said to my wife it was the smoking gun for the origin of the virus."
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What do you think about Nobel Prize-winning virologist David Baltimore? Crazy? He pointed out,
[etc.]
That those were a bit speculative but not unreasonable comments at the time they were made. Now that we have found much closer coronaviruses in Laos which include proteins closer to those of SARS-COV-2 it looks like they were wrong. I don't consider even the lab theory to be 100% ruled out, just quite unlikely compared to alternative theories.
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You're saying that beta-coronaviruses of natural origin that have furin cleavage sites have been recently found in Laos?
That's news to me. I couldn't find this information with Google, either. Got a link? Thanks
You shouldn't make it political, because... (Score:2)
there are plenty of other people who could have acted better and earlier (e.g. lots of state governors, including Cuomo, most of the Republicans
The governor most criticized by the so-called left, DeSantis of Florida, currently has the lowest per-capita infection rate of all 50 states (8.67 per 100,000). Wish I was there right now, instead of Colorado, one of the worst infection rates (45 per 100,000).
The governor second-most-criticized by the so-called left, Abbot of Texas, has one of the lowest infection rates (15 per 100,000).
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You truly are a Luckyo
Texas is #17 in death rates and Florida is #9 [worldometers.info]
Neither were hit hard early on when we didn't know what to do. They managed to catch up even after vaccines were prevalent. That's some achievement...
(Colarado is #43 for those playing along at home)
It's a shame you post anon so few people will see your answers.
Cure for overpopulation (Score:2)
You might be right about overpopulation. The best cure for that is to grow the global economy. In every country that has transitioned from third-world status to first-world status, the birth rate plummeted -- dropping below replacement rate.
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Trump shut down travel to China in January of 2020, and was called Xenophobic for doing it.
Trump did not shut down travel. He allowed travel but banned Chinese people. Almost irrelevant because the travel he allowed was all the infected people coming back. Check the executive order. When you do that you will realise you have been tricked. Whoever you get your news from is lying to you and you should assume everything you think you know is lies and a) check back to the original source then b) switch to the opposite political side for the base of your future news whilst trying to find some more
So what's your solution? (Score:2)
He allowed travel but banned Chinese people.
What do you think he should have done --
- Not allow U.S. citizens to return home?
- Bar citizens from all countries, even those that had extremely low infection rates at that time?
The question is probably irrelevant. Once a country gets a single case, numbers grow exponentially from that point forward. Draconian travel restrictions might have shifted the curve to the right by a few weeks, but the inevitable cannot be delayed indefinitely.
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What do you think he should have done --
- Not allow U.S. citizens to return home?
- Bar citizens from all countries, even those that had extremely low infection rates at that time?
The question is probably irrelevant. Once a country gets a single case, numbers grow exponentially from that point forward. Draconian travel restrictions might have shifted the curve to the right by a few weeks, but the inevitable cannot be delayed indefinitely.
Another false dichotomy; there are very few times when there are only two choices and if someone is showing you two points of view and claiming "balance" you should think they are tricking you.
What they should have done is copied the policy which Taiwan put in place and which worked also for New Zealand later. Allow people back but only through managed quarantine only to such states as could provide and would guarantee a complete set of managed quarantine places. This would have allowed US citizens to retur
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You should read your own link. NPR uses the word "restricts". "subject to screening" - but not subject to quarantine - it does use that word but then it actually says "heightened monitoring for 14 days". That's actually a completely different thing.
If you read the interviews with the people arriving from China at the time, almost all of them were sent straight home.
The bit you really want though is this
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Hong Kong specifically did not need to lock down because of careful population attitude. There were 12300 cases, for 7M people in a superdense area, that is a feat.
You are saying that Hong Kong's infection rate -- 165 per 100,000 -- is a good feat. I agree.
Well the rate claimed by mainland China (which has multiple superdense areas) is 6.95 per 100,000. One twenty-fourth of Hong Kong's feat. How can you believe it?
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Lockdowns don't work because people ignore them. In China, it's different. People in China actually
...get the doors of their apartment complex welded shut [www.cbc.ca].
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People in China actually respect their government and understand that government scientists know what's best.
What are you, five? Governments care about Governments, specifically their own. If you can align their cares with yours, it works out. If you can't, it's just another dictator dictating.