Advertisement
Published: September 30th 2021
Covid-19
Students lining up in Brazil for a virus jab. This is a paragraph out of the very first Covid-19 blog written and published on 29
th March 2020. It never crossed my mind that, 18 months later, it would still be a case of banging away on the keyboard for this 48
th blog edition, trying to make sense of this pandemic which has changed so much of the world we once knew. And for good measure, the word “lockdown” is still front and centre of many countries world-wide as they do their utmost to control this unpredictable scourge of our modern times. What is truly terrifying is the fact that we are no closer to the origins of Covid-19 although a book entitled
“What really happened Covid-19
The Covid-19 mantra which will be around for a long time. in Wuhan” written by Aussie journalist, Sharri Markson, hit the bookshelves today, 29
th September 2021. She has led an 18-month probe and calls for China to come clean about what happened in the laboratories of the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Suddenly, there is renewed interest in this yet to be unanswered question and perhaps, finally, there will be a full-scale investigation into what really happened. After all, this is where risky experiments which involve engineering viruses to make them more infectious or lethal is carried out. The sinister motive is often to pioneer vaccines to be ahead of the game for profit! Some seriously big hitters have been interviewed and the author has done huge in-depth research. Added to this book, Sky News Australia, recently aired a documentary wherein it was revealed that the first cases in Wuhan may have occurred as early as July 2019, and on 12
th September 2019, the Wuhan Institute deleted its virus database containing genetic sequences of 22,000 coronaviruses. Will these revelations be enough to apply wrist braking pressure on the Chinese? Time will tell. They are inherently secretive and the WHO has been “captured” by the Chinese by way of generous cash injections in
Covid-19
Who would have predicted....? recent years.
Globally, vaccinating people has increasingly slowed down as the anti-vaxxer brigade dig in with an array of conspiracies about the origins of the virus and the dangers of vaccines. The resistance is intensifying daily as governments and corporates attempt a narrative that suggests that if people refuse vaccinations, the repercussions could limit their freedoms and lead to loss of employment. It is already affecting travel across borders and there is a growing clarion call that certain social activities will only be possible if one has been vaccinated. Suddenly, we are hearing of “vaccine passports” and the need to have a Covid-19 free test certificate to allow some form of free movement. As with the need to vaccinate, these measures make sense and are designed to increase protection against the virus.
Australia remains an interesting country in terms of their fight against Covid-19; almost half their population continues to suffer under a severe, ongoing lockdown, people are likely to get fines for not having a good reason for being further than the allowable radius from their homes, in Sydney, now in week 14 of lockdown, only an hour’s exercise outside one’s home is allowable per day. The Government appears to be heavy handed and talks about fully reopening only when 80 percent of adults are vaccinated. Problem; currently only 42 percent have had the shot. They trumpet the low virus spread and fatality rate (1,256 deaths per 100, 000 cases) as key reasons for the continued lockdown. The debate flowing from the Aussie and other governments harsh actions is increasingly about the growing authoritarianism of the politicians. Where are the real limits of what they can decide in the so called “best interest” of their citizens? In
America, the Governor of New York state, praised the good works of those companies that had produced the vaccines stating that they were in answer to her prayers beseeching the good Lord to deliver them. This is what Bloomberg Prognosis had to say on this topic;
“When sub-mediocre politicians start citing Jesus as rationale for tyranny and endless harassment, they have scary things in mind for us all.” Seems more than half the American people resent the power of the White House, Congress and the media to torture the public spirit with endless Covid-19 rules.
Europe has demonstrated very clearly the benefits of the vaccination-led model. Quarantine-free travel and domestic freedoms were largely restricted to immunized people. By way of example,
Ireland, has
moved from having the worst outbreak at the start of 2021, to one of the least infected nations across the world. What did they do? Well, only immunized people are allowed inside restaurants and bars. The Irish are not going to forego a pint of their famous Guinness Stout, so 90 percent of the adult population is vaccinated. Cheers! No travel restrictions for vaccinated visitors. Recently, both
Norway and
Singapore have lifted restrictions and chosen the route of “living with the virus.” The Norwegian Government has cited “public fatigue” as a key factor in their decision. They have adopted the philosophy that the virus is not going to go away, it is relatively mild, the vulnerable will need to be vaccinated and protected and people must learn to live with Covid-19. At the other end of the spectrum,
New Zealand, has retained its strict curbs to keep the virus under control but the Delta variant has spoilt the party. Their challenge is that only 37 percent of the population has had two shots. What then appears to be the key learning from the multitude of “strategies” employed across the globe to contain this beast? Increasingly, it seems to be the ability of a nation to achieve a high vaccination rate and then prevent those not vaccinated from gathering and raising the risk of spreading the virus. It has been scientifically proven that those vaccinated and who become infected do not, as a rule, suffer severe illness and death. And here in sunny
South Africa, only
15 percent of the adult population has been vaccinated. For good measure, our oxygen thieving medical “geniuses” in government, keep pronouncing that we will achieve a vaccination rate of
60 percent by the end of this year. Absurd!
Africa is potentially a massive problem for the entire world as this virus continues to forge ahead. Firstly, we are the least vaccinated continent with roughly 3 percent fully vaccinated. Secondly, two variants to date (Beta, South Africa and C.1.2, Nigeria) originated on this continent. The scary thing is that scientists believe they have found a possible reason; Africa is home to the most immunocompromised people on the planet due to HIV/Aids. A study of an HIV-positive woman in South Africa, who got infected, then harboured the virus for 216 days, during which it mutated 30 times. South Africa has the world’s biggest HIV epidemic with 8.2 million people infected. Bottom line; the longer Covid-19 persists in its host, the longer it sheds, or reproduces and that’s when it mutates. The only solution to this alarming scenario is to step up inoculation rates which is a massive problem. It raises a troublesome scenario; whilst the rest of the world may well achieve a measure of taming this virus, Africa will struggle and possibly present further variants whose impact could be worse than the delta variant. In this scenario, Africa could need to be isolated as a continent with potentially catastrophic results impacting economies, health and freedom of movement. What is alarming is that this information was carried on the Bloomberg Prognosis site. Glenda Gray, the President of the SA Medical Research Council is quoted in this article. But here’s the conundrum; this scientific prognosis gets no airtime in South Africa. None!
Meanwhile, our political landscape in
South Africa continues its downward trajectory. It is truly mind boggling how a morally bankrupt and completely broken governing political party can be allowed to systematically put the knife into our country and show so little remorse and conscience. We hit an all time low on the international stage when Rampahosa (Ramabeggar?) recently appeared at some UN conference and used his allotted time to castigate those present for the vaccine “apartheid” being practised by leading countries (denying unfettered vaccine access to Africa). And for good measure, he lashed out about the need for slavery reparations completely forgetting that slavery was abolished some 150 years ago and that it is largely in Africa where certain slavery practices continue to this day. Of course, the begging bowl was out with requests for cash “injections” into poor, struggling African countries. Unfortunately, most donor countries have seen what happens to the aid funds which are quickly snuffled by those in power. Embarrassing? I suspect most South Africans couldn’t be bothered or didn’t even read the reports on this sad moment. So much for the man who was going to make a difference after the plunder of the Zuma years! Bizarrely, we have a local government election on 1
st November. Only 27 out of roughly 270 municipalities currently have a clean audit with most failing dismally to serve their communities due to theft, corruption, maladministration, sheer incompetence, poor to non-existent service delivery and so on. In a normal democracy the clowns responsible for this unbelievable mess would be voted out of power. Sadly, this will not happen. The masses will vote for more of the same and the shambles will mutate and continue.
Covid-19 will be with us for some time. How long, no one knows. It is an appropriate moment to bow out with this final blog which I hope my grand-children will read one day and reflect on an event which changed the world forever for all of us who lived at this moment in time. To those who have read some of this stuff, thanks for enduring and I hope it has been mildly interesting.
“Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all.” – Emily Dickinson
Advertisement
Tot: 0.247s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 10; qc: 29; dbt: 0.1114s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Barrie
non-member comment
Thanks Tim
I have really enjoyed your well researched and beautifully crafted blogs. I look forward to the next series!