COVID-19

[puede ser]

En cuanto a esta responsabilidad diluída, solo digo que quienes "apretáis" el botón de los confinamientos (Exp.Milgram) parece que creeis que os va a salir gratis, porque vuestra responsabilidad está tan diluída que es infinitesimal.
Sino, no se explica este suicidio a cámara lenta.

Lo que (¿también?) dijo el dr. Cavadas, con toda la razón es que la sanidad hay que pagarla y que por eso no se puede parar el país completamente. Y en eso estamos todos de acuerdo, en España no tenemos ahorros para parar el país totalmente y cerrar sus fronteras a cal y canto como sí la tiene China. Ni tenemos suficientes camas de hospital como si tiene Alemania. Estamos vendidos ante la enfermedad y si usando mascarillas o confinando de modo selectivo arañamos unas décimas a las cifras de mortalidad pues lo intentamos.

¿Había margen para dejar que el desmadre del verano durase dos meses?: fiestas sin mascarillas, ocio nocturno, paellas en los chiringuitos... Pues a mediados de julio podía ser discutible, pero viendo las cifras de ocupación de los hospitales y UCIS de hoy me parece que los prudentes tuvieron razon en frenar aquello.

Tú pasaste del "cada uno que se pague su seguro privado" al más tierno: "subamos los impuestos para tener una sanidad decente". Pero sabes perfectamente que la única materia imponible que queda es la inmobiliaria. Cualquier otra subida de impuestos en el momento actual sería aún más letal para la agonizante economía nacional. Incluso una subida repentina de la fiscalidad inmobiliaria produciría un efecto cascada en la economía igualmente peligroso.

Todas tus apreciaciones están escritas de forma cínica -en el sentido griego del término- no dejando posibilidad de respuesta ya que en tu argumentación te sitúas por igual en los dos lados de las contraposiciones contestando ya a cualquier posible objeción.

Lo que te ocurre es muy simple -y disculpa si soy aún más simple que tú- tu defensa de un capitalismo individualista choca con el reto que plantea el afrontar una pandemia. Suena como un tópico pero es la verdad: las consecuencias del virus sólo las podemos minimizar actuando unidos. Y este actuar unidos es algo que algunos confunden con ser "oficialista", "buenista", "vender tu libertad"...

Por supuesto que ha habido fallos garrafales en la OMS, en el gobierno español, en comportamientos individuales..., pero ello no quiere decir que haber dejado a cada cual a su libre albedrío hubiera tenido unos resultados mejores. Todo esto te sonará a socialismo, comunismo, fascismo o lo que sea pero no es más que la naturaleza humana: actuar en grupo y más en momentos en que se siente una amenaza. (Por supuesto que aquí lidiamos con el riesgo del "efecto manada" en el que algunos consideran enemigos o culpables a los que disienten. Las leyes vigentes y el sentido común tienen que proteger a los no-oficialistas).

Sé que muchos de aquí odian oír hablar de "ingeniería social", pero yo en este caso he echado de menos que no la tuviéramos pero de la buena, al menos en nuestro país. Como bien decía Wanderer primero se fío todo a los modelos matemáticos. Luego el mix de epidemiólogos, médicos y economistas; intentando llegar a términos medios que siempre se pasaron o bien de duros o bien de laxos.

Lo que ha faltado es psicología, pero no la que se estudia hoy en las facultades, sino la Psicología con mayúsculas, la que habita en las personas que realmente conocen al ser humano. Los verdaderos psicólogos deberían haber hecho ingeniería social y calculado mucho más finamente las capacidades humanas para tragar con resultados científicos dudosos -que lo son por naturaleza, no por fastidiar-; para saber convivir con la incerteza y la angustia; para transmitir esperanza basada en posibilidades reales...

Ya sé que todo esto diréis que es imposible por la corrupción de los poderosos y tal y cual; pero es que el cuerpo social lo formamos todos y la comunicación -en democracia- no va sólo de arriba para abajo.

[Lurker]

Sobre tu anécdota personal, no cabe duda que el objetivo era hacer caja. Por curiosidad, ¿cuánto te pedían por los tests?

125€ por la PCR, 70€ por los anticuerpos.

Te dijo lo que querías escuchar para no perder un cliente.

Ya lo sé, ya. Me resultó curioso cómo pasó de obligatorio a opcional, las formas, el timing y los motivos. Me resultó curioso que "no tuvieran" que poner en conocimiento de Sanidad que diera positivo. Me resultó curioso que no se fiara de las mascarillas. Y algunas cosas más. He contado eso, una anécdota, no pretendía establecer ninguna categoría. Es una de las muchas que hay, en este caso, veo lucro: paga o eres egoísta y pones en peligro al personal, si fuera por proteger al personal, dos opciones: lo ponen ellos o se niegan ellos a tratarme. Ninguna de las dos me fue ofrecida. Dijeron que no hacía falta cuando habían dicho que era obligatorio, sólo vi hasta dónde era, y era hasta donde pensaba que sería.

Vamos que ya están curados de espanto.

This.

La mascarilla tiene cierta utilidad en determinadas ocasiones, y es una medida barata y básica, evidentemente al aire libre y a distancia de gente es absurdo.

Usted y yo, en líneas generales, estamos de acuerdo en muchas cosas. Me alegro y le agradezco la aclaración. He posteado sobre mi opinión de las mascarillas en exteriores, con aquel estudio del NEJM.

(**) Lo cual es debatible hasta cierto punto y da para otro post muy largo que no tengo tiempo de escribir ahora mismo y además es algo off-topic.

¿Sabes que esto te ha colocado en las procelosas aguas del negacionismo más recalcitrante, o sea, el original? Voy a ponerme de tu lado aquí. Sobre esto no se puede disentir, está mal. La ciencia se hace por consenso, ¿o no lo sabes? Aunque hayas leído mucho y veas inconsistencias. Es increíble cómo precisamente a ti, Danny_M, te han pasado ahora al lado magufo. No doy crédito.

https://youtu.be/RCgEAmr42yI

Richard Lindzen, otro magufo más (?), para todos los públicos. Cambien cambio climático por lo que quieran, incluso COVID, por supuesto. Cada uno tendrá su línea roja: heteropatriarcado, la cuestión racial (es curioso ver cómo quienes más antirracista se consideran, más menciones hace a la cuestión de la raza, miren el NYT) y otras cuestiones. Ya hemos empezado a ver el inicio de una campaña de promo por la nuclear. En fin.

---

Del resto, prefiero el término escéptico a negacionista, yo no niego el virus, pongo en duda mucho de lo dicho y publicado, y aquí, si son honestos, todos lo han hecho. Que, personalmente, crea que Soros (miren con quién se hace selfies el señor Sánchez), Gates, la OMS, el Foro de Davos o Perico el de Palotes tengan interés en promover una determinada agenda aprovechando la coyuntura (como hacen otros grupos promoviendo agendas aprovechando otras coyunturas) o que piense que algunos actores estén sacando provecho de la situación no resta valor al resto de información que he posteado de carácter científico (que es mucho más de lo que hacen muchos aquí insultando, tergiversando o cogiendo una parte de lo que se escribe únicamente), prácticamente todo de publicaciones de prestigio. Agamben vio lo mismo que vio CHOSEN desde el principio y así parece que está siendo.

Se puede entender (y disculpar) una sobrerreacción por desconocimiento (aunque si muchos de ustedes lo vieron venir desde enero-febrero, pues no sé), no se puede entender lo que ha pasado en verano con los datos que se tienen desde abril, no se puede entender que todavía estemos con los asintomáticos, ni que los datos sean tan opacos (como lo de los hospitales y las camas ocupadas por otras cuestiones más positivo). Al mismo tiempo, se escuchan las declaraciones que se escuchan y los políticos con sus tramitas. No es normal. Y los medios en un universo paralelo contando historias de ciencia ficción.

Sds.

[CHOSEN]

@puede ser, estoy 100% de acuerdo contigo.

Pero sabes perfectamente que la única materia imponible que queda es la inmobiliaria.

No me cabe la menor duda.
Y también se que nadie va a pasar por ese aro.
Por eso prefiero pensar que la crisis del Covid servirá para movilizar parte de ese ahorro privado improductivo (atesorado) pero visto lo visto... empiezo a dudarlo.

-----> Piramidetaúd.

[cujo]

La atencion primaria está saturadisima, entre su propio trabajo + seguimiento covid.
Los profesionales cada vez mas quemados y no dan a basto.
En los hospitales se ve ya la segunda hola, y los esfuerzos y riesgos a los que se expusieron en la primera ola , no se va a volver a repetir.

Cuidaos y evitar caer enfermos, pues tenemos la sanidad destrozada y la segunda ola lo va a dejar mas claro aun.

Eso si, los profes de huelga, pero  los sanitarios tienen que dejarse morir... o los dependientes de fruterias o los policias ... en fin.

[lum]

La atencion primaria está saturadisima, entre su propio trabajo + seguimiento covid.
Los profesionales cada vez mas quemados y no dan a basto.
En los hospitales se ve ya la segunda hola, y los esfuerzos y riesgos a los que se expusieron en la primera ola , no se va a volver a repetir.

Cuidaos y evitar caer enfermos, pues tenemos la sanidad destrozada y la segunda ola lo va a dejar mas claro aun.

Eso si, los profes de huelga, pero  los sanitarios tienen que dejarse morir... o los dependientes de fruterias o los policias ... en fin.

No tengo noción de cómo está atención primaria ahora mismo, pero me creo lo que dices. Me han llegado más comentarios de los laboratorios de Micro donde estuve colaborando, y me han dejado muy preocupado. Esa gente está quemadísima, y me duele decir que los han quemado sin necesidad durante el verano. Deberían haber podido llevar una rutina normal durante todas estas semanas, normalizar rutinas, organizarse de una forma más eficiente sin tanta presión política... Pero claro, tenemos tantos gestores trepas metidos a dedo...

Tras la primera ola deberíamos haber intentado normalizar las cosas y usar medidas inteligentes, en vez de decretos de brocha gorda que es lo que se ha hecho. No es posible físicamente ni deseable (cada vez es más evidente) emplear los PCR para diagnosticar masivamente a la población en un momento de baja carga viral, que es el estado en el que estábamos (¿todavía estamos?). Probablemente (¡esto es un tema polémico entre los mismos expertos!) tiene sentido hacer pooling selectivo en ciertos sectores, residencias, etc, pero hay un límite razonable para esto y se supone que el test PCR es un elemento más de un diagnóstico clínico. En cambio, hemos tenido a todos estos microbiólogos y técnicos haciendo PCRs como locos, aumentando la probabilidad de error en los mismos por cierto, para hacer tests en pacientes completamente asintomáticos la gran mayoría de los cuales no desarrollarán la enfermedad, construyendo una métrica engañosa de "contagiados por covid" con la cual se ha sustentado la histeria de las últimas semanas y muchas medidas que no tienen sentido lógico y algunos nos tememos que tal vez sean peores que la enfermedad.

Cuando tuvimos un problema sanitario serio, nos lo tomamos a pitorrreo e hicimos la campaña del resistiré y los bailes. Cuando la primera ola pasó, en vez de usar la cabeza, recomponer y coger fuerzas, hemos sufrido una campaña de histeria colectiva sobrecompensando la inutilidad previa y constituyéndonos en la singularidad del continente. Las cifras económicas, las peores de la zona. ¿Ahora qué?

El sacrificio tiene un límite, hay personas que, como dice cujo, no volverán a hacer las mismas burradas si se dá una segunda ola. Porque al final uno tiene que mirar por su salud también, por mucha vocación que haya.

[cujo]

https://twitter.com/RafaAlonso61/status/1305742544848986113

En los centros de salud ya estamos empezando a ver con asiduidad pacientes Covid con baja saturacion y afectación pulmonar. Cada vez se parece más a marzo. Pronto tendremos que decir a los leves que no vengan, sin PCR ni estudio de contactos, y dedicarnos a los graves.

no se añadir twitts

[Maloserá]

Dejo una buena noticia. Suecia por ahora resiste la segunda ola. Y espero que  los suecos aguanten. anunque esto no quiere decir que hayan obrado bien (tampoco lo niega logicamente). Como decíá VVPP hace algún tiempo, si un amigo tuyo juega a la ruleta rusa y 'gana' no le felicitas. Y ojalá hayan acertado y podamos copiarles.

Ya hemos discutido aquí que el modelo de vida sueco tiene diferencias tan grandes en cuanto a numero de viviendas unifamiliares y cantidad de gente que puede teletrabajar que no se pueden extrapolar los datos y las medidas sin mas. Pero sigue siendo una buena noticia.

Hay algunos gráficos bien hechos en la noticia pero no los puedo copiar. El Guardian no tiene 'paywall'

Sweden spared European surge as coronavirus infections stay low

Chief epidemiologist puts low number of cases down to light-touch ‘sustainable’ approach

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/15/sweden-records-its-fewest-daily-covid-19-cases-since-march

While many European countries are seeing new cases surge to levels not seen since the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, Sweden – whose light-touch approach has made it an international outlier – has one of the continent’s lowest infection rates.

According to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the Scandinavian country’s 14-day cumulative total of new cases was 22.2 per 100,000 inhabitants on Tuesday, against 279 in Spain, 158.5 in France, 118 in the Czech Republic, 77 in Belgium and 59 in the UK, all of which imposed lockdowns this spring.

Twenty-two of the 31 European countries surveyed by the ECDC had higher infection rates. New cases, now reported in Sweden only from Tuesday to Friday, are running at roughly the rate seen in late-March, while data from the national health agency showed only 1.2% of its 120,000 tests last week came back positive.

Sweden also has fewer new daily infections than Norway and Denmark, its Nordic neighbours. Thirteen Covid-19 patients are in intensive care in Swedish hospitals, and its seven-day average of coronavirus-related deaths is zero.

“We don’t have the resurgence of the disease that many countries have,” Anders Tegnell, the country’s chief epidemiologist and architect of its no-lockdown strategy, told broadcaster France-24 in an interview, adding that the country was broadly happy with its overall strategy.

“In the end, we will see how much difference it will make to have a strategy that’s more sustainable, that you can keep in place for a long time, instead of the strategy that means that you lock down, open up and lock down over and over again.”

Unlike many countries, Sweden closed schools for the over-16s but kept those for younger pupils open, insisting on full attendance. Schools and universities are now open again.

It also banned gatherings of more than 50 people and told people over 70 and in at-risk groups to self-isolate.

Otherwise, the population of 10 million was asked, rather than ordered, to respect physical distancing and work from home if possible, which it largely did. Shops, bars, restaurants and gyms stayed open and the wearing of masks has not so far been recommended.

Tegnell has insisted the aim was not to achieve rapid herd immunity but to slow the spread of coronavirus enough for health services to be able to cope. He has also, however, consistently said Sweden’s strategy may prove more sustainable long-term.

The approach came under fire at home and abroad earlier this year as the number of deaths soared. At 574, Sweden’s coronavirus toll per million inhabitants is more than five times higher than Denmark’s and 10 times that of Norway and Finland, but lower than some countries that imposed lockdowns, such as the UK, Spain and Italy.

Tegnell told France-24 the country’s high mortality rate was not related to its overall strategy but rather to a failure to prevent the catastrophic spread of the virus in the country’s care homes, where the majority of Sweden’s 5,846 deaths occurred. “Of course something went wrong there,” he said.

The government said on Tuesday it was lifting its ban on visits to care homes for the first time in months from October. The minister for social affairs, Lena Hallengren, said: “It is a risk when we lift the ban. I now want everyone to take responsibility.”

Johan Carlson, the director general of Sweden’s public health agency, also said last week the strategy had been a success because it meant messages to the public had been clear and consistent, placing the emphasis on personal responsibility.

“The purpose of our approach is for people themselves to understand the need to follow the recommendations and guidelines that exist,” he said. “There are no other tricks before medical measures, primarily vaccines, become available. The Swedish population has taken this to heart.”

Jonas Ludvigsson, a professor of epidemiology at the respected Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, said: “Sweden’s strategy has been consistent and sustainable. We probably now have a lower risk of spread here compared with other countries.”

France on Saturday recorded 10,561 new cases in a single day, the highest since the pandemic began. Spain has also registered an alarming increase, earlier this month becoming the first country in western Europe to report 500,000 infections.

The Czech Republic on Sunday reported its biggest single-day increase in new infections for a third consecutive day, while the UK has also recorded a surge in the number of daily cases.

• This article was amended on 16 September 2020 to remove references to Sweden recording its lowest level of daily cases since 13 March, and to the country’s rolling seven-day average of new cases being 108 on 15 September. Because this week Sweden changed the way it reports new cases, to only reporting new cases from Tuesday to Friday, the rolling seven-day average of new cases taken early on Tuesday was distorted.

[breades]

Como decíá VVPP hace algún tiempo, si un amigo tuyo juega a la ruleta rusa y 'gana' no le felicitas. Y ojalá hayan acertado y podamos copiarles.

Esa metáfora no explica la realidad de la estrategia sueca. Es falsa. Nadie que juegue a la ruleta rusa sin saber dónde está la bala sabe lo que va a ocurrir si aprieta el gatillo, pero hoygan, el señor sueco ese sí sabía lo que hacía..

¿Por qué se empeñan en quitarle mérito?

Es acojonante. Un profesional cualificado que parece que ha hecho un trabajo congruente y con excelentes resultados ─visto lo visto─ y ahora resulta que tiene mucha suerte. No puede ser que sea tan duro reconocer que sus críticos han metido la pata hasta el corvejón con tanto prejuicio.

[Lurker]

Un estudio de Cambridge que explica que la mayor incidencia de fallecidos por COVID en algunos países podría deberse a temporadas de gripe más suaves de lo habitual en los dos años anteriores al episodio:

https://insight.jbs.cam.ac.uk/2020/flu-and-coronavirus/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=SocialSignIn&utm_content=%23COVID19

Esta hipótesis ya le estaban dando visibilidad algunas personas en Twitter:

https://twitter.com/FatEmperor/status/1280105813672148992?s=19

Yo pienso que es un factor a tener en cuenta. Que este año se hubiera presentado con un número de personas que en condiciones habituales no estarían.

Sds.

Está feo hacerlo, pero me voy a autocitar:

https://www.dn.se/sverige/tegnells-forklaring-darfor-dog-sa-manga-tidigt-i-sverige/

Tegnell's explanation: That is why so many died early in Sweden

"Sweden's high death toll can partly be explained by a mild flu season in 2019.

There's a strong connection between a low excess mortality in influenza and a high excess mortality in Covid."

Sds.

[cujo]

Un estudio de Cambridge que explica que la mayor incidencia de fallecidos por COVID en algunos países podría deberse a temporadas de gripe más suaves de lo habitual en los dos años anteriores al episodio:

https://insight.jbs.cam.ac.uk/2020/flu-and-coronavirus/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=SocialSignIn&utm_content=%23COVID19

Esta hipótesis ya le estaban dando visibilidad algunas personas en Twitter:

https://twitter.com/FatEmperor/status/1280105813672148992?s=19

Yo pienso que es un factor a tener en cuenta. Que este año se hubiera presentado con un número de personas que en condiciones habituales no estarían.

Sds.

Está feo hacerlo, pero me voy a autocitar:

https://www.dn.se/sverige/tegnells-forklaring-darfor-dog-sa-manga-tidigt-i-sverige/

Tegnell's explanation: That is why so many died early in Sweden

"Sweden's high death toll can partly be explained by a mild flu season in 2019.

There's a strong connection between a low excess mortality in influenza and a high excess mortality in Covid."

Sds.

Entonces no se porque tanta preocupación, ya me quedo mas tranquilo.
Los que debían morirse el año pasado  y lo lo hicieron por ser la gripe suave ya se han muerto con la primera ola, y ahora con la segunda no debería morir apenas nadie.
Me quedo mucho mas tranquilo.

[El_loco_de_las_coles]

Un estudio de Cambridge que explica que la mayor incidencia de fallecidos por COVID en algunos países podría deberse a temporadas de gripe más suaves de lo habitual en los dos años anteriores al episodio:

https://insight.jbs.cam.ac.uk/2020/flu-and-coronavirus/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=SocialSignIn&utm_content=%23COVID19

Esta hipótesis ya le estaban dando visibilidad algunas personas en Twitter:

https://twitter.com/FatEmperor/status/1280105813672148992?s=19

Yo pienso que es un factor a tener en cuenta. Que este año se hubiera presentado con un número de personas que en condiciones habituales no estarían.

Sds.

Está feo hacerlo, pero me voy a autocitar:

https://www.dn.se/sverige/tegnells-forklaring-darfor-dog-sa-manga-tidigt-i-sverige/

Tegnell's explanation: That is why so many died early in Sweden

"Sweden's high death toll can partly be explained by a mild flu season in 2019.

There's a strong connection between a low excess mortality in influenza and a high excess mortality in Covid."

Sds.

Entonces no se porque tanta preocupación, ya me quedo mas tranquilo.
Los que debían morirse el año pasado  y lo lo hicieron por ser la gripe suave ya se han muerto con la primera ola, y ahora con la segunda no debería morir apenas nadie.
Me quedo mucho mas tranquilo.

Efectivamente, veo que lo has pillado.

[Lurker]

Es largo, pero muy interesante, en la línea de CHOSEN (?):

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/china-covid-lockdown-propaganda

China’s Global Lockdown Propaganda Campaign

In the words of Simon Leys, paraphrasing the great sinologist László Ladány, even the most mendacious propaganda must necessarily entertain some relation to truth. In Wuhan in late December, Dr. Li Wenliang warned his friends that a new SARS-like illness had begun spreading rapidly. Li’s message inadvertently went viral on Chinese social media, causing widespread panic and anger at the Chinese Communist Party. On Jan. 7, Xi Jinping informed his inner circle that the situation in Wuhan would require their personal supervision.

Two weeks later, Xi personally authorized the lockdown of Hubei province based on his philosophy of fangkong, the same hybrid of health and security policy that inspired the reeducation and “quarantine” of over 1 million Uighur Muslims “infected with extremism” in Xinjiang. The World Health Organization’s representative in China noted that “trying to contain a city of 11 million people is new to science … The lockdown of 11 million people is unprecedented in public health history, so it is certainly not a recommendation the WHO has made.”

The CCP confined 57 million Hubei residents to their homes. At the time, human rights observers expressed concerns. As one expert told The New York Times, “the shutdown would almost certainly lead to human rights violations and would be patently unconstitutional in the United States.”

Regardless, on Jan. 29, WHO Director Tedros Adhanom said he was “very impressed and encouraged by the president [Xi Jinping]’s detailed knowledge of the outbreak” and the next day praised China for “setting a new standard for outbreak response.” Yet only six days in, the lockdown—“unprecedented in public health history”—had produced no results, so Tedros was praising human rights abuses with nothing to show for them.

In the infamous video pictured above, the ‘spontaneously collapsing’ man extends his arms to catch himselfOne video purportedly showed a SWAT team catching a man with a butterfly net for removing his mask
International COVID-19 hysteria began around Jan. 23, when “leaked” videos from Wuhan began flooding international social media sites including Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube—all of which are blocked in China—allegedly showing the horrors of Wuhan’s epidemic and the seriousness of its lockdown. Viral videos claimed to show residents spontaneously collapsing in the streets in scenes likened to the movie Zombieland and the show The Walking Dead. One video purportedly showed a SWAT team catching a man with a butterfly net for removing his mask. But in hindsight, this crisis theater is somewhat comical; in the infamous video, the “spontaneously collapsing” man extends his arms to catch himself.

Official Chinese accounts widely shared an image of a hospital wing supposedly constructed in one day, but which actually showed an apartment 600 miles away. Images of Li Wenliang on a ventilator, sometimes holding his identification card, were released and widely displayed by top news outlets around the world.

Images of Li Wenliang that were released and widely displayed by top news outlets around the world

In a viral tweet on Jan. 25, an epidemiologist with little background in infectious disease wrote, “HOLY MOTHER OF GOD, the new coronavirus is a 3.8!!! How bad is that reproductive R0 value? It is thermonuclear pandemic level bad.” This was the first of a monthslong series of dubious, widely shared tweets by the previously unknown Eric Feigl-Ding, prompting a prominent Harvard colleague to denounce him as a “charlatan.”

And then—success! Beginning in February, the CCP reported an exponential decline in coronavirus cases, until March 19 when they announced their lockdown had eliminated domestic cases entirely.

In its Feb. 24 report, the WHO waxed rhapsodic about China’s triumph. “China’s uncompromising and rigorous use of non-pharmaceutical measures to contain transmission of the COVID-19 virus in multiple settings provides vital lessons for the global response” (emphasis added). Scientists quickly began drafting plans in many languages to imitate China’s lockdowns. The New York Times immediately cited WHO’s report, forming a pro-lockdown stance it has clung to for months with surprisingly little introspection: “China ‘took one of the most ancient strategies and rolled out one of the most ambitious, agile and aggressive disease-containment efforts in history.’”

On Feb. 26, WHO’s Bruce Aylward of Canada—who later disconnected a live interview when asked to acknowledge Taiwan—put it bluntly: “Copy China’s response to COVID-19.” In April, Canada’s parliament summoned Aylward for questioning, but the WHO has forbidden him from testifying.

Within China, the CCP has long paid hundreds of thousands of social media propagandists and also pays for posts on an a la carte basis, totaling hundreds of millions of propaganda comments each year. More recently, these activities have gone global and escalated dramatically during the coronavirus pandemic. Social media companies have proven somewhat unserious about the gravity of the problem. When the State Department provided a sample of 250,000 accounts likely involved in coronavirus disinformation, Twitter refused to take action. These activities affect countries with little say in social media governance; a recent study found thousands of inauthentic accounts still promoting Serbian-Chinese friendship after Twitter deleted thousands of others. A former Facebook employee wrote “I have blood on my hands” due to the company’s routinely discounting malicious political activity despite its “disproportionate impact.”

On March 9, Italy, the first major European country to sign onto Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road Initiative, took the WHO’s advice and became the first country outside China to lock down. Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte had long advocated closer ties with China. Chinese experts arrived in Italy on March 12 and two days later advised a tighter lockdown: “There are still too many people and behaviors on the street to improve.” On March 19, they repeated that Italy’s lockdown was “not strict enough,” saying: “Here in Milan, the hardest hit area by COVID-19, there isn't a very strict lockdown ... We need every citizen to be involved in the fight of COVID-19 and follow this policy.”

Italy was simultaneously bombarded with Chinese disinformation. From March 11 to 23, roughly 46% of tweets with the hashtag #forzaCinaeItalia (Go China, go Italy) and 37% of those with the hashtag #grazieCina (thank you China) came from bots.

While analysts typically focus on finding as many inauthentic accounts as possible, the purpose of the following discussion is different—using simple investigatory methods to evince the intent behind Beijing’s disinformation, which appears to be far more insidious than analysts have recognized. Social media and analytics companies generally only detect obvious automated activity, while fake, personally managed accounts can be created with ease. This works out well for the CCP, which has always preferred the human touch.

Quote-tweets of user @manisha_kataki (1)Quote-tweets of user @manisha_kataki (2)Quote-tweets of user @manisha_kataki (3)Other suspicious quote-tweets of @manisha_kataki’s video explicitly implore leaders to copy China and lock down cities and countries (1)Other suspicious quote-tweets of @manisha_kataki’s video explicitly implore leaders to copy China and lock down cities and countries (2)Many of the same suspicious accounts showing support for Black Lives Matter
On March 12, Twitter user @manisha_kataki posted a video showing Chinese workers disinfecting streets, apparently admiring China’s strategy: “At this rate, China will be back in action very soon, may be much faster than the world expects.” As The New York Times’ Paul Mozur noted, this tweet was not shocking, funny, or newsworthy, yet it was shared hundreds of thousands of times. This caught the attention of Israeli company Next Dim, which flagged the activity as likely state-sponsored.

The collages shown here contain a tiny sample of the thousands of suspicious quote-tweets of @manisha_kataki’s video using many languages and dialects to complain in nearly identical terms about being told to “wash their hands” and denigrating other governments in contrast to China’s full lockdowns. Other suspicious quote-tweets of @manisha_kataki’s video explicitly implore leaders to copy China and lock down cities and countries. Many of these same accounts also frequently discuss racial divisions. Later in 2020, they show strong support for Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests, especially those surrounding the death of George Floyd. Racial justice is an issue of real concern to many citizens, both in America and throughout the world. But knowing that the CCP supported these protests, it’s worth pondering the likelihood that the frugal Xi would not be spending billions of dollars per year on foreign propaganda—and stepping up those activities—if he weren’t seeing results.

Some of these accounts are surely legitimate, but taken together they demonstrate conspicuous similarity that strongly suggests scripted, state-sponsored activity. Twitter responded to Mozur’s article by deleting 170,000 accounts, but at the time of this writing many of the suspect accounts are still active, and a search for hundreds of similar examples can be easily repeated with one click.


Abusive tweets directed at South Dakota Gov. Kristi NoemAbusive tweets directed at various governors and politicians
Abusive tweets directed at Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp

As more countries shut down, some suspicious online activity took a darker turn. When South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem famously refused to issue a statewide lockdown, suspicious accounts began filling her Twitter feed with abuse and graphic language to pressure her to do so. Upon closer examination, two of the accounts hurl similar abuse at governors thousands of miles apart.

This abuse of anti-lockdown governors continued for some time. When Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, the first governor to end his state’s lockdown, honored late Rep. John Lewis, his Twitter feed was stormed with conspicuous, vulgar language that often invoked his anti-lockdown stance.

Some CCP propagandists are identifiable by their advocacy for China’s policies and human rights abuses. The following user, @AmerLiberal, appears to be a model CCP propaganda account, showing strong support for China’s human rights abuses—including in Xinjiang and Hong Kong—and antipathy for China’s key rivals, India and the United States. The account strongly supports global lockdowns.

Though much of the CCP’s pro-lockdown influence was surreptitious, its overall stance in support of global lockdowns was explicit. In a video posted by China’s official spokesperson, a 7-year-old girl recites the importance of strict social distancing among children.

Tweets by user @AmerLiberalSong on social distancing among children tweeted by Chinese spokespersonJournalist for Chinese state media criticizing herd immunity strategies

In March, Chinese state media began describing the strategy of “herd immunity”—allowing the coronavirus to spread among the young and healthy—as a violation of “human rights,” an Orwellian formulation given that lockdowns are essentially a blanket suspension of rights.

Sweden’s skepticism toward the CCP predates COVID-19. In January, Beijing threatened Swedish trade ties over an award given to Gui Congyou, a Swedish publisher detained in China. Sweden did not back down and later refused to follow China’s lockdown model, opting for a herd immunity strategy. Thus, Sweden became a prime target of a Chinese campaign portraying it as weak against the COVID threat. In the words of China’s state-run Global Times:

Chinese analysts and netizens doubt herd immunity and called it a violation of human rights, citing high mortality in the country compared to other Northern European countries. “So-called human rights, democracy, freedom are heading in the wrong direction in Sweden, and countries that are extremely irresponsible do not deserve to be China's friend …”

Initially, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson also opted for herd immunity. But on March 13, suspicious accounts began storming his Twitter feed and likening his plan to genocide. This language almost never appears in Johnson’s feed before March 12, and several of the accounts were hardly active before then. Britain locked down on March 23.

Tweets accusing British Prime Minister Boris Johnson of genocide


Xi Jinping has frequently stressed global cooperation to fight COVID-19. In turn, the world has started to look more like China. Localities introduced tip lines to report lockdown violations and countries unveiled new fleets of surveillance drones; Chinese company DJI donated drones to 22 U.S. states to help enforce social distancing rules.

Speaking through official channels, the CCP has avoided literally telling other governments to “lock down.” Rather, the CCP has shamed governments for not locking down and relentlessly advertised its “pandemic response” (which, of course, means lockdowns).

In March, Chinese state media bought numerous Facebook ads extolling China’s pandemic response; all of them ran without Facebook’s required political disclaimer. On July 7, FBI Director Christopher Wray disclosed that the CCP specifically approached local politicians to endorse its pandemic response:

[W]e have heard from federal, state, and even local officials that Chinese diplomats are aggressively urging support for China’s handling of the COVID-19 crisis. Yes, this is happening at both the federal and state levels. Not that long ago, we had a state senator who was recently even asked to introduce a resolution supporting China’s response to the pandemic.
For decades, the CCP has co-opted scientists through its unparalleled overseas influence network, the United Front Work Department, which expanded dramatically under Xi. In June, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced that 189 of its grantees had received undisclosed funding from foreign governments. In 93% of cases, including that of Charles Lieber, chair of Harvard’s chemistry department, the undisclosed funding came from China. Likewise, the National Science Foundation, a smaller organization, reported 16–20 cases of undisclosed foreign financial ties; all but two were with China.

In a May interview for China Central Television, Richard Horton, editor-in-chief of the esteemed medical journal The Lancet, emphatically praised China’s lockdowns, saying: “It was not only the right thing to do, but it also showed other countries how they should respond in the face of such an acute threat. So, I think we have a great deal to thank China for …”

Horton’s praise is telling in light of the infamous retraction of a Lancet study on hydroxochloroquine and reports that promising journal articles on herd immunity have gone unpublished. In August, Horton doubled down in a full-throated piece that had surprisingly little to do with health:

The “century of humiliation,” when China was dominated by a colonially-minded west and Japan, only came to an end with the Communist victory in the civil war in 1949 … Every contemporary Chinese leader, including Xi Jinping, has seen their task as protecting the territorial security won by Mao and the economic security achieved by Deng.

The CCP has shaped scientific narratives by consistently promoting the falsehood that “China controlled the virus.” Of course, “China controlled the virus” is a baldfaced lie. China expelled journalists in March and its infection data is manifestly forged; U.S. intelligence has confirmed China’s data is intentionally misrepresented.

Nonetheless, China’s fake numbers have been paramount in scientific discourse. By demanding elite publications repeat the Orwellian lie that “China controlled the virus,” the CCP has normalized that lie for Western elites to repeat themselves, exploiting China’s fastidiously managed reputation and the fact that most Westerners do not yet know it as an untrustworthy, totalitarian state.

Tweets promoting the message that ‘China controlled the virus’

The fact that Chinese state media so widely shared a particularly credulous New Yorker article by Peter Hessler about China’s coronavirus response did not escape China expert Geremie Barmé, who cautioned its author that it reminded him of “another American journalist, a man who reported from another authoritarian country nearly a century ago … Walter Duranty …”

Within China, the CCP has pretended to believe its own lies only at its own convenience, reserving the right to use COVID-19 as a pretext for unrelated authoritarian whims—demolishing retirement homes, detaining dissidents and reporters, expanding mass surveillance, canceling Hong Kong’s Tiananmen Square vigil and postponing its elections for one year. In Xinjiang, where over 1 million Uighurs are imprisoned, lockdowns have gone on since January and have involved widespread hunger, forced medication, acidic disinfectant sprays, shackled residents, screams of protest from balconies, crowded “quarantine” cells, and outright disappearances.

The most benign possible explanation for the CCP’s campaign for global lockdowns is that the party aggressively promoted the same lie internationally as domestically—that lockdowns worked. For party members, when Wuhan locked down it likely went without saying that the lockdown would “eliminate” coronavirus; if Xi willed it to be true, then it must be so. This is the totalitarian pathology that George Orwell called “double-think.” But the fact that authoritarian regimes always lie does not give them a right to spread deadly lies to the rest of the world, especially by clandestine means.

And then there’s the possibility that by shutting down the world, Xi Jinping, who vaulted through the ranks of the party, quotes ancient Chinese scholars, has mastered debts and derivatives, studies complexity science, and envisions a socialist future with China at its center, knew exactly what he was doing.

[CHOSEN]

Propaganda pura y dura.
Pero al igual que los pasquines en la WWII, esto solamente engaña a quien engaña.

Con toda razón el deep-state en EEUU y UK empujaban en dirección contraria a los confinamientos, incluso erosionando la imagen de los dirigentes ante la opinión pública presa del miedo y la propaganda. Recordemos que el hospital full-equip (no hinchable) construido para la ocasión y retransmitido por internet -todo en una semana-, se empezó a levantar con apenas 10 o 12 fallecidos... para una ciudad con 60 millones de habitantes 
Era y es tan obvio, que EEUU directamente abandonó la OMS, una organización que fundó en el año 1948 recien ganada la guerra.

El caso de España es simplemente el de un gobierno POPULISTA que ni siquiera ha sido capaz de gestionar sus propias decisiones.

Puedo respetar que se equivocaran (o no). Puedo entender que no lo sabían (o si).
Pero no puedo perdonar que se encojan de hombros y escurran el bulto tan descaradamente.

[Lurker]

Propaganda pura y dura.
Pero al igual que los pasquines en la WWII, esto solamente engaña a quien engaña.

Con toda razón el deep-state en EEUU y UK empujaban en dirección contraria a los confinamientos, incluso erosionando la imagen de los dirigentes ante la opinión pública presa del miedo y la propaganda. Recordemos que el hospital full-equip (no hinchable) construido para la ocasión y retransmitido por internet -todo en una semana-, se empezó a levantar con apenas 10 o 12 fallecidos... para una ciudad con 60 millones de habitantes 
Era y es tan obvio, que EEUU directamente abandonó la OMS, una organización que fundó en el año 1948 recien ganada la guerra.

El caso de España es simplemente el de un gobierno POPULISTA que ni siquiera ha sido capaz de gestionar sus propias decisiones.

Puedo respetar que se equivocaran (o no). Puedo entender que no lo sabían (o si).
Pero no puedo perdonar que se encojan de hombros y escurran el bulto tan descaradamente.

Pues mire, más cosas en su línea (que no hace falta esta, pero por poner más peso en la hipótesis "ni tan contagioso", aun sabiendo ya como sabemos que en Brasil, por ejemplo, se va hasta noviembre del 19):

https://metro.co.uk/2020/09/11/new-evidence-shows-coronavirus-had-spread-to-the-west-before-christmas-13256899/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

New evidence shows coronavirus had spread to the West before Christmas

[CHOSEN]

Hombre, es que la historia de que un pueblito de Italia sin aeropuerto había sido la vía de entrada del virus a Europa es tan falsa como las gravísimas secuelas de por vida en jóvenes deportistas.