Service Suspension Notice

[BTD]

Have any of you deniers actually tried to get an appointment with a doctor, or gone to the hospital for something recently? Well, let me just say that "things are different". Covid as threatened out health care as we know it, and will continue to as long as people keep repeating this nonsense about "free up the economy because who cares about a few old people".

Are restrictions too little, too late? Probably - maybe - who knows? But the US doesn't look like a shining example right now.

We don't have resources to test absolutely everyone, or vaccinate everyone twice, right now. Is that not obvious? Just try to get through it and try to look after yourselves, OK?

Excellent, more anecdotes and straw man arguments. At least on my behalf. I am not saying “who cares about old people”. I am saying the data doesn’t show (so far) any evidence that lockdowns work. And in fact there is evidence that they not only do not work but also increase overall and covid mortality in the long run. I have provided some references above. No one has yet provided evidence that they do in fact work. It keeps getting pushed because it “must” be true, or “I can’t think of why it wouldn’t work” or “it feels like it should work”.

I don’t know, maybe the reason they don’t work is because the population doesn’t listen to the stay at home orders. Given the evidence lately it would seem likely that even those telling us to follow the guidance aren’t following it. Or maybe some other mechanism explains it. But it doesn’t matter. After almost a year of lockdowns the data shows that in practice they don’t have any statistically significant effect on mortality.

Communism doesn’t have any ideology that when it is in force tens of millions should die. But it seems to happen whenever communism is tried. Are they just not doing it right? What matters is the practical application.

Covid is not a hoax. It is not nothing. It disproportionately effects those over 65-70 and those with serious co-morbidities. In those cases it is worse then a bad flu. For a younger individual it is about on par with a bad flu.

And about the hospitals near capacity. No doubt they are, as they are every year during this time.

Now watch this....I’m about to back up the arguments I just made using evidence and data. It’s kinda neat actually.

BLT.20.265892.pdf

(858.21 KiB) Downloaded 60 times

37999E0D-C641-4EF5-98DD-9339B462829E.png (479.87 KiB) Viewed 3367 times

C078B990-1A7A-4516-880A-47F12E33F09D.jpeg (164 KiB) Viewed 3367 times

[Curiousflyer]

The fact that you have no idea why schools need to be open shows how narrow minded and brain washed you really are.
Canadian male youths are 14 times more likely to die from suicide than COVID-19. That’s using case fatality rate. Using infection fatality rate (the only one that truly matters) that jumps to 60 times more likely to die from suicide.

[BTD]

Mbav8r

I’ll get back to you on the updated studies. We just got a new puppy yesterday.

In regards to New Zealand. I can’t say lockdowns didn’t work maybe they did. What I can say is that I don’t know if that is the reason the numbers fell. Do you have any evidence that it was the lockdown that was the cause and not some other factor? It has to be demonstrated before it should be believed. Let’s not do the argument from incredulity/ignorance thing again.

So I don’t have an answer about New Zealand, maybe it was lockdowns maybe it wasn’t. As a counter example, Sweden has had the least strict lockdown measures of all, and their death per million rate is less than France, Italy, the UK, and Spain all of whom have done strict lockdowns. What does that mean? I don’t know. We need some evidence to support any claim that is made about them.

You posted before my response above, so I’ll reiterate, it could be the reason lockdowns don’t seem to work is because the population doesn’t listen. I don’t know. But the reasoning behind it isn’t relevant to this part of the argument.

As to hospital overload. I’m sure it is bad in places. As it is every year.

58C008A8-1C26-4A0B-985F-43E619969C29.jpeg (885.96 KiB) Viewed 3333 times

[mbav8r]

The fact that you have no idea why schools need to be open shows how narrow minded and brain washed you really are.
Canadian male youths are 14 times more likely to die from suicide than COVID-19. That’s using case fatality rate. Using infection fatality rate (the only one that truly matters) that jumps to 60 times more likely to die from suicide.

Thanks, as I said I don’t have kids in school nor do I have a degree in child psychology so, as I said, some study somewhere said they needed to be but does not diminish that this appears to be the main difference between the measures taken during the first wave and second wave.
As for why I believe the health experts(brain washed), it probably has something to do with the authorities taking the residents of Manitoba one by one to a black site, water boarding and hours of heavy metal music under extremely bright lights for days and days, I finally submitted and won’t dare contradict, ever again.
You should be careful, if it hasn’t happened to you yet, it will eventually, all ....hang on someone is at my door

[mbav8r]

Mbav8r

I’ll get back to you on the updated studies. We just got a new puppy yesterday.

In regards to New Zealand. I can’t say lockdowns didn’t work maybe they did. What I can say is that I don’t know if that is the reason the numbers fell. Do you have any evidence that it was the lockdown that was the cause and not some other factor? It has to be demonstrated before it should be believed. Let’s not do the argument from incredulity/ignorance thing again.

So I don’t have an answer about New Zealand, maybe it was lockdowns maybe it wasn’t.

Have you tried searching studies that confirm lockdowns work or just ones that back up your opinion?
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)32153-X

“Defining who is vulnerable is complex, but even if we consider those at risk of severe illness, the proportion of vulnerable people constitute as much as 30% of the population in some regions.8 Prolonged isolation of large swathes of the population is practically impossible and highly unethical. Empirical evidence from many countries shows that it is not feasible to restrict uncontrolled outbreaks to particular sections of society. Such an approach also risks further exacerbating the socioeconomic inequities and structural discriminations already laid bare by the pandemic. Special efforts to protect the most vulnerable are essential but must go hand-in-hand with multi-pronged population-level strategies.”

“Japan, Vietnam, and New Zealand, to name a few countries, have shown that robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal, and there are many such success stories. The evidence is very clear: controlling community spread of COVID-19 is the best way to protect our societies and economies until safe and effective vaccines and therapeutics arrive within the coming months. We cannot afford distractions that undermine an effective response; it is essential that we act urgently based on the evidence.”

[Splash]

I don't want to participate in the ongoing debate that has derailed this thread, however, here is an interesting and unbiased article worth reading. It seems to put things into perspective.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/scie ... e-with-it/

[Tdicommuter]

Cancel culture is a problem right now on society and take a moment of what you are writing and reading to actually ask yourself " is it possible I may be wrong?" There is absolutely nothing dangerous, harmful, or ill-willed about asking questions about what we are doing as a country. It's Infact more dangerous to democracy to have it forbidden to challenge norms, and question authority. It is that drive that causes decision makers to re-evaluate their choices. Blind faith, or expulsion are ideals adopted by authoritarian states not democratic ones.

The issue I have with lock down is the same I had in March. What's the next step? I agree we cannot condone people to die simply because it's bad for the economy to be closed. However if there is a plan to shut down... What's the next step in the plan? I don't think its too much to ask almost a year into this what is the next step? The reality is that a lock down is not eliminating the virus. It will never go away and at this point will need to go through the population one way or another. Part of the reason right now our second wave is so bad is because not enough people contracted the virus through the first wave. If you try and view this pandemic through a lense of zero deaths is the acceptable number you will look foolish in the end.

Hypothetically let's say we get through 50 percent of inoculations and the virus shifts again (as proven to have happened already), and our vaccines are no longer effective. What then? Keep the world closed indefinitely? What needs to happen now is people need faith that a plan a, b, c, d and being drawn up. Beyond simply close everything until we sort things out.

Finally, societal compliance is a big hamper/helper through this. My opinion (right or wrong) about Canadians is we have seen our leaders do a sub standard job at getting Canadians to follow directives. Why is that? They are bad leaders. It's easy to follow a leader when their motivations are easily accessible, and lead by example. People are not trusting what is being said, we have not had a perfect leader, and our compliance rates reflect what people think of their leaders. Trust is easily lost, and hard to regain. When you keep quoting New Zealand, Jacinda is leading by example. Justin drove through two closed borders to his cottage for Easter and posted pictures.
No matter how this ends we need to starting demanding better leaders and accountability because moving forward every tax dollar will count!

[mbav8r]

Cancel culture is a problem right now on society and take a moment of what you are writing and reading to actually ask yourself " is it possible I may be wrong?" There is absolutely nothing dangerous, harmful, or ill-willed about asking questions about what we are doing as a country. It's Infact more dangerous to democracy to have it forbidden to challenge norms, and question authority. It is that drive that causes decision makers to re-evaluate their choices. Blind faith, or expulsion are ideals adopted by authoritarian states not democratic ones.

The issue I have with lock down is the same I had in March. What's the next step? I agree we cannot condone people to die simply because it's bad for the economy to be closed. However if there is a plan to shut down... What's the next step in the plan? I don't think its too much to ask almost a year into this what is the next step? The reality is that a lock down is not eliminating the virus. It will never go away and at this point will need to go through the population one way or another. Part of the reason right now our second wave is so bad is because not enough people contracted the virus through the first wave. If you try and view this pandemic through a lense of zero deaths is the acceptable number you will look foolish in the end.

Hypothetically let's say we get through 50 percent of inoculations and the virus shifts again (as proven to have happened already), and our vaccines are no longer effective. What then? Keep the world closed indefinitely? What needs to happen now is people need faith that a plan a, b, c, d and being drawn up. Beyond simply close everything until we sort things out.

Finally, societal compliance is a big hamper/helper through this. My opinion (right or wrong) about Canadians is we have seen our leaders do a sub standard job at getting Canadians to follow directives. Why is that? They are bad leaders. It's easy to follow a leader when their motivations are easily accessible, and lead by example. People are not trusting what is being said, we have not had a perfect leader, and our compliance rates reflect what people think of their leaders. Trust is easily lost, and hard to regain. When you keep quoting New Zealand, Jacinda is leading by example. Justin drove through two closed borders to his cottage for Easter and posted pictures.
No matter how this ends we need to starting demanding better leaders and accountability because moving forward every tax dollar will count!

I don’t know if you’re directing the first paragraph at me but if the majority of the world is doing some type of lockdown or form of it, I’m going out on a limb and say there is some scientific consensus and a few, in the grand scheme, outliers don’t sway my opinion.
I do however agree with most of your post, one thing, I believe they have been planning for mutations of the virus and I believe with the delivery method of the vaccine perfected, it’s much easier to create a new one. Here is an interesting article;

https://time.com/5927538/covid-19-mutations-vaccines/

“The good news is that if the mutant strains do become resistant to the current vaccines, the mRNA technology behind the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna should enable the companies to develop new shots without the same lengthy developing and testing that the originals required. “The mRNA platform is eminently flexible to turn around”

[mbav8r]

I don't want to participate in the ongoing debate that has derailed this thread, however, here is an interesting and unbiased article worth reading. It seems to put things into perspective.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/scie ... e-with-it/

Interesting read, bottom line, until the vaccine and antibody response hits 70%, control of the spread seems to be the message

[BTD]

Mbav8r

I’ll get back to you on the updated studies. We just got a new puppy yesterday.

In regards to New Zealand. I can’t say lockdowns didn’t work maybe they did. What I can say is that I don’t know if that is the reason the numbers fell. Do you have any evidence that it was the lockdown that was the cause and not some other factor? It has to be demonstrated before it should be believed. Let’s not do the argument from incredulity/ignorance thing again.

So I don’t have an answer about New Zealand, maybe it was lockdowns maybe it wasn’t.

Have you tried searching studies that confirm lockdowns work or just ones that back up your opinion?
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)32153-X

“Defining who is vulnerable is complex, but even if we consider those at risk of severe illness, the proportion of vulnerable people constitute as much as 30% of the population in some regions.8 Prolonged isolation of large swathes of the population is practically impossible and highly unethical. Empirical evidence from many countries shows that it is not feasible to restrict uncontrolled outbreaks to particular sections of society. Such an approach also risks further exacerbating the socioeconomic inequities and structural discriminations already laid bare by the pandemic. Special efforts to protect the most vulnerable are essential but must go hand-in-hand with multi-pronged population-level strategies.”

“Japan, Vietnam, and New Zealand, to name a few countries, have shown that robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal, and there are many such success stories. The evidence is very clear: controlling community spread of COVID-19 is the best way to protect our societies and economies until safe and effective vaccines and therapeutics arrive within the coming months. We cannot afford distractions that undermine an effective response; it is essential that we act urgently based on the evidence.”

Well that is something at least heading in the right direction of evidence.

Although what you have posted in and of itself is a memorandum put together by a group of scientist and health care professionals. It is exactly the same but opposite as the Great Barrington Declaration, which last I checked had 32 co signatory health experts and 11000 signatures from health care professionals and that was a few months ago. But it doesn’t matter, in either case.

So the question then becomes okay so what now. I try my best, perhaps not perfectly, to follow the evidence and not an ideology. As such, there are references throughout that memorandum that I have to follow up on to see the data. And I will do that. If I am wrong, I am wrong and I need to revise my position.

However, I see one potential issue right off the bat. Here:

“Japan, Vietnam, and New Zealand, to name a few countries, have shown that robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal, and there are many such success stories.”

They have not included a reference like they have throughout the rest of the document. I have seen at least one study along the way showing in the case of Japan, the likely cause of lack of mortality is due to better metabolic health and that lockdown had little or no impact. However, I will have to see if I can find that now.

Alternatively we could put the authors of the John Snow Memorandum and The Great Barrington Declaration in a room to fight it out and follow whoever is victorious.

[mbav8r]

Mbav8r

I’ll get back to you on the updated studies. We just got a new puppy yesterday.

In regards to New Zealand. I can’t say lockdowns didn’t work maybe they did. What I can say is that I don’t know if that is the reason the numbers fell. Do you have any evidence that it was the lockdown that was the cause and not some other factor? It has to be demonstrated before it should be believed. Let’s not do the argument from incredulity/ignorance thing again.

So I don’t have an answer about New Zealand, maybe it was lockdowns maybe it wasn’t.

Have you tried searching studies that confirm lockdowns work or just ones that back up your opinion?
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)32153-X

“Defining who is vulnerable is complex, but even if we consider those at risk of severe illness, the proportion of vulnerable people constitute as much as 30% of the population in some regions.8 Prolonged isolation of large swathes of the population is practically impossible and highly unethical. Empirical evidence from many countries shows that it is not feasible to restrict uncontrolled outbreaks to particular sections of society. Such an approach also risks further exacerbating the socioeconomic inequities and structural discriminations already laid bare by the pandemic. Special efforts to protect the most vulnerable are essential but must go hand-in-hand with multi-pronged population-level strategies.”

“Japan, Vietnam, and New Zealand, to name a few countries, have shown that robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal, and there are many such success stories. The evidence is very clear: controlling community spread of COVID-19 is the best way to protect our societies and economies until safe and effective vaccines and therapeutics arrive within the coming months. We cannot afford distractions that undermine an effective response; it is essential that we act urgently based on the evidence.”

Well that is something at least heading in the right direction of evidence.

Although what you have posted in and of itself is a memorandum put together by a group of scientist and health care professionals. It is exactly the same but opposite as the Great Barrington Declaration, which last I checked had 32 co signatory health experts and 11000 signatures from health care professionals and that was a few months ago. But it doesn’t matter, in either case.

So the question then becomes okay so what now. I try my best, perhaps not perfectly, to follow the evidence and not an ideology. As such, there are references throughout that memorandum that I have to follow up on to see the data. And I will do that. If I am wrong, I am wrong and I need to revise my position.

However, I see one potential issue right off the bat. Here:

“Japan, Vietnam, and New Zealand, to name a few countries, have shown that robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal, and there are many such success stories.”

They have not included a reference like they have throughout the rest of the document. I have seen at least one study along the way showing in the case of Japan, the likely cause of lack of mortality is due to better metabolic health and that lockdown had little or no impact. However, I will have to see if I can find that now.

Alternatively we could put the authors of the John Snow Memorandum and The Great Barrington Declaration in a room to fight it out and follow whoever is victorious.

I guess I could go back but I’ll just ask, you say and site studies that are against lockdown, what are the alternatives.
Herd immunity has been attempted in some areas but has been abandoned as far as I am aware, it is hard to keep track really.

[BTD]

Have you tried searching studies that confirm lockdowns work or just ones that back up your opinion?
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)32153-X

“Defining who is vulnerable is complex, but even if we consider those at risk of severe illness, the proportion of vulnerable people constitute as much as 30% of the population in some regions.8 Prolonged isolation of large swathes of the population is practically impossible and highly unethical. Empirical evidence from many countries shows that it is not feasible to restrict uncontrolled outbreaks to particular sections of society. Such an approach also risks further exacerbating the socioeconomic inequities and structural discriminations already laid bare by the pandemic. Special efforts to protect the most vulnerable are essential but must go hand-in-hand with multi-pronged population-level strategies.”

“Japan, Vietnam, and New Zealand, to name a few countries, have shown that robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal, and there are many such success stories. The evidence is very clear: controlling community spread of COVID-19 is the best way to protect our societies and economies until safe and effective vaccines and therapeutics arrive within the coming months. We cannot afford distractions that undermine an effective response; it is essential that we act urgently based on the evidence.”

Well that is something at least heading in the right direction of evidence.

Although what you have posted in and of itself is a memorandum put together by a group of scientist and health care professionals. It is exactly the same but opposite as the Great Barrington Declaration, which last I checked had 32 co signatory health experts and 11000 signatures from health care professionals and that was a few months ago. But it doesn’t matter, in either case.

So the question then becomes okay so what now. I try my best, perhaps not perfectly, to follow the evidence and not an ideology. As such, there are references throughout that memorandum that I have to follow up on to see the data. And I will do that. If I am wrong, I am wrong and I need to revise my position.

However, I see one potential issue right off the bat. Here:

“Japan, Vietnam, and New Zealand, to name a few countries, have shown that robust public health responses can control transmission, allowing life to return to near-normal, and there are many such success stories.”

They have not included a reference like they have throughout the rest of the document. I have seen at least one study along the way showing in the case of Japan, the likely cause of lack of mortality is due to better metabolic health and that lockdown had little or no impact. However, I will have to see if I can find that now.

Alternatively we could put the authors of the John Snow Memorandum and The Great Barrington Declaration in a room to fight it out and follow whoever is victorious.

I guess I could go back but I’ll just ask, you say and site studies that are against lockdown, what are the alternatives.
Herd immunity has been attempted in some areas but has been abandoned as far as I am aware, it is hard to keep track really.

Well... there could be limited non pharmaceutical interventions short of lockdown that could be shown to be effective I suppose. (I am not saying there is).

But if it can be shown that lockdowns aren’t effective at the goal, and if it can be shown that they actually increase overall mortality (especially if they disproportionately effect younger persons who lose more quality adjusted life years) and have negative public health impacts, economic and societal impacts, an argument could be made that the best course of action is to do nothing. I am not making that argument now though.

Pre covid is gone now. But in simplistic terms If lockdowns end up increasing mortality by 1000 deaths and not locking down with covid kills 500. Well then it’s obvious in that case which path should be taken. Especially factoring in the quality adjusted life years lost in each case. However, real life is more challenging and nuanced then that.

So the alternative may be carry on as usual if overall impact on society will be less.

I tend to be very careful about my positions and not adopting a burden of proof if I’m not intending on proving it.

In the grand scheme I am not making the claim “lockdowns don’t work therefore let’s let everything rip.”

I am responding to the claim “we need to shut everything down as it is the only way to stop covid”. I reject that claim until it is proven. And rejecting that claim isn’t the same as believing the opposite.

[EPR]

The fact that you have no idea why schools need to be open shows how narrow minded and brain washed you really are.
Canadian male youths are 14 times more likely to die from suicide than COVID-19. That’s using case fatality rate. Using infection fatality rate (the only one that truly matters) that jumps to 60 times more likely to die from suicide.

Wow, where did we go wrong? I would have given my left testicle back in the day if I could stay home from school everyday, and this was well before the internet! (hmmm, maybe that's the problem)!

[EPR]

Vaccines are the only way back to normalcy! Unfortunately Trudeau was busy negotiating a deal with China during the 5 months (Dec-Apr) that the rest of the world were ORDERING vaccines from Pfizer and Moderno. China backed out of the Trudeau deal, and now we as a Country are at the back of the line to order approved vaccines! Now, all Provinces are desperately SHORT of vaccines and can't vaccinate quickly enough, at this rate we'll all be vaccinated in 2034!

I'm not a fan of trudeau we we have ordered like a dozen shots per Canadian

You are so wrong and mislead, sorry.. but maybe get a brain and do some research gtappl!

[gtappl]

Vaccines are the only way back to normalcy! Unfortunately Trudeau was busy negotiating a deal with China during the 5 months (Dec-Apr) that the rest of the world were ORDERING vaccines from Pfizer and Moderno. China backed out of the Trudeau deal, and now we as a Country are at the back of the line to order approved vaccines! Now, all Provinces are desperately SHORT of vaccines and can't vaccinate quickly enough, at this rate we'll all be vaccinated in 2034!

I'm not a fan of trudeau we we have ordered like a dozen shots per Canadian

You are so wrong and mislead, sorry.. but maybe get a brain and do some research gtappl!

Please @#$! off to the hole you came out of.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... n-anywhere

Boom, you're WRONG

[altiplano]

That's a nearly 2 month old article.

Our vaccination rate has stagnated because we won't have a significant amount of vaccine available to Canadians for several months. They might have ordered a bunch, and we got an initial supply, but they ordered too late and a meaningful delivery is way down the road.

Just watch us fall down the list.

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covi ... tribution/

Romania has vaccinated at a higher rated than Canada.

[dhc#]

Sad but true.

[Old fella]

Followed by O'Foole to our rescue...........

[jpilot77]

Followed by O'Foole to our rescue...........

Can’t be worse than Trudeau at this point. The vaccine rollout might be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

[Old fella]

Followed by O'Foole to our rescue...........

Can’t be worse than Trudeau at this point. The vaccine rollout might be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

No doubt, then again O’Toole wouldn’t do any better than what JT is doing now. I can go back to the Pearson years when John Diefenbaker was yelling at ole Lester. O’Toole yelling at JT and if roles were reversed JT would be yelling same stuff back at the Toole. Provincial Premiers- well they blame everything on something else for their woes, they fight amongst themselves a fair amount and they yell at a current sitting PM regardless of his/her political stripe. None of these Premieres are any better than their counterparts. Christ, I flew a couple of them around in my way back other life, I probably saw more PMs and Premiers in real life than you did. Sorry, but I have been around to long to be told or believe any different .