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There is an interesting perspective to question about how long a pandemic will run if you look to the 1889–1890 pandemic called "Asiatic flu" or "Russian flu".
>>
In 2020, Danish researchers Lone Simonsen and Anders Gorm Pedersen noted that the clinical manifestations of the 1889 pandemic—runny nose, headache, high fever, severe chest inflammation, speeding up old respiratory diseases, and primarily killing elderly people—resembled COVID-19, a disease caused by a coronavirus, more than flu. They calculated that the human coronavirus OC43 had split from bovine coronavirus about 130 years before, approximately coinciding with the pandemic in 1889–1890. The calculation was based on genetic comparisons between bovine coronavirus and different strains of OC43. While their research had not been formally published as of November 2020, a team from the University of Leuven in Belgium performed a similar analysis of OC43, identifying a crossover date in the late 1800s.<<
>>However, there is not a scientific consensus that the 1889–1890 outbreak was caused by a coronavirus, with one analysis of the literature suggesting that the evidence for this cause is "weak" and "conjectural<<
Quote from: What we can learn from the dynamics of the 1889 ‘Russian flu’ pandemic for the future trajectory of COVID-19 by Harald Brüssow
What is certain is public knowledge of past major outbreaks is quite sketchy. Those interested in WWI might have heard of Spanish flu, I only came across Russian flu a few weeks ago.
Another that was news to me was the typhus outbreaks in London in the 1860s that killed 40,000 at a time when London had a population of 3 million.
In our neighbourhood is an abandoned graveyard that is being left to nature. It looks rather like a Hammer House of Horror film set with gravestones leaning over at angles under the gloomy trees. I noticed three gravestones of the same design in a line, touching each other and was intrigued as I had seen this in Commonwealth War Graveyards when several soldiers had died in a shellburst and it was impossible to identify which bodyparts belonged to whom.
Three children from the same family who died of typhus in March 1862
Interesting comment from
Quote:
Originally Posted by PanEuropean
Consider also that up until the 1960s, all adults had first-hand experience watching others in their community die from periodic epidemics of typhus, diphtheria, polio... all diseases that most people who are younger than 65 today have no experience of.
__________________ "For sheer delight there is nothing like altitude; it gives one the thrill of adventure
and enlarges the world in which you live," Irving Mather (1892-1966)
__________________ Grant Johnson Seek, and ye shall find.
------------------------ Inspiring, Informing and Connecting travellers since 1997! www.HorizonsUnlimited.com
__________________ Grant Johnson Seek, and ye shall find.
------------------------ Inspiring, Informing and Connecting travellers since 1997! www.HorizonsUnlimited.com
so few - deaths? Campbell's count is discredited there!
The question on death is a controversial one. It boils down to "what to count as covid related deaths?" For example when early 2020 the sh!t happened in NYC the excess death was x3 times of official covid-19 death rate. Not all of them were dying from covid-19, some from lack of health care, missed surgeries, anxiety, spike in suicide, etc. But many were dying at home without ever seeing doctor or getting tested. And car accident rate was down because people lost jobs and had nowhere to go.
The other aspect is when actually the pandemic started and how many people had died from it prior to 2020 without ever being diagnosed? Were there any distortions in the way death were counted early on? And if someone to die from leukemia tomorrow but got covid and died today, how to count it?
It is known statistical fact that during famine most of the people who do die have health issues and the death rate in following years sharply declines.. So if you look at annual deaths you would get one picture, but if you look at 5 year average picture will be not the same.
My guess it will take a few more years before we see true picture; more time is needed to perform statistical analysis. And even then it will be argued.
As for John voicing this heretic point of view he is a publicist and educator, his profession is to read scientific articles and explain them in layman terms. You don't have to agree but plz don't kill the messanger if you don't like message. Peace.
The question on death is a controversial one. It boils down to "what to count as covid related deaths?"
The other aspect is when actually the pandemic started and how many people had died from it prior to 2020 without ever being diagnosed? Were there any distortions in the way death were counted early on? And if someone to die from leukemia tomorrow but got covid and died today, how to count it?
It is known statistical fact that during famine most of the people who do die have health issues and the death rate in following years sharply declines.. So if you look at annual deaths you would get one picture, but if you look at 5 year average picture will be not the same.
My guess it will take a few more years before we see true picture; more time is needed to perform statistical analysis. And even then it will be argued.
As for John voicing this heretic point of view he is a publicist and educator, his profession is to read scientific articles and explain them in layman terms. You don't have to agree but plz don't kill the messanger if you don't like message. Peace.
You (and anyone else that's interested) might like to listen to the BBC's statistics programme's take on this. Here's the link:
As for John voicing this heretic point of view he is a publicist and educator, his profession is to read scientific articles and explain them in layman terms. You don't have to agree but plz don't kill the messanger if you don't like message. Peace.
He earned a Bachelor of Science in biology, a Master of Science in health science and a Ph.D. in nursing education.
And this kind of education is the reason why you have to look critical to what he says and how he argues. Because he understands more of medicine than the average person and because he has the capability to explain complicated issues in a simple way to these people.
But all these benefits together aren`t a proof that he is absolutely right in what he thinks and understands and in what he says and explains to his viewers.
It`s him who suffered more than once by interdisciplinary science knowledge gaps which ended in false conclusions. And by this way the messenger sadly kills his credibility.
He earned a Bachelor of Science in biology, a Master of Science in health science and a Ph.D. in nursing education.
And this kind of education is the reason why you have to look critical to what he says and how he argues. Because he understands more of medicine than the average person and because he has the capability to explain complicated issues in a simple way to these people.
But all these benefits together aren`t a proof that he is absolutely right in what he thinks and understands and in what he says and explains to his viewers.
It`s him who suffered more than once by interdisciplinary science knowledge gaps which ended in false conclusions. And by this way the messenger sadly kills his credibility.
Well for one he was less wrong than Dr Fauci and we still dealing with his opinions.
You need to take into consideration that it is developing body of knowledge; contradictory sometimes. This is a side effect of scientific method.
And yes if you expect to hear gospel every time he opens mouth John Campbell isn't the right source. Doesn't change the fact that omicron wiped out Delta and we are in endemic stage.
What kind of consequences do you think has a stage of endemic? It`s absolutely not a solution which will bring back your prepandemic life in a short period of time.
cyclopathic didn't explain his comment but I took it to mean that Dr Campbell has an excellent record on accuracy compared to the BBC who use unqualified (medically) reporters to prepare medical news stories. Even though my daughter had 20 years in BBC newsgathering I cringe sometimes at how wrong they get stuff.
-----------------------
I remember watching Dr Campbell's video of 20 January (above) in which the 17,000 Covid-only deaths figure was mentioned and I understood totally what he was saying. I was very interested in the 17,000 without comorbidities figure as this might give an indication why fatalities have been much lower in Morocco than the UK—could this partly be because Moroccans are less overweight and without diabetes?
I didn't think that in any way he was trying to minimise the overall number of fatalities due to deaths with comorbidities. In fact what he says right at the beginning of the video is that it is often thought that the most accurate way to look at deaths is the 127,704 excess deaths above the five-year average, and if you think of that, it would also include deaths through lack of medical treatment for other serious illnesses, as well as suicides.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grant Johnson
so few - deaths? Campbell's count is discredited there!
But the count IS accurate—it was released by the UK's Office for National Statistics in response to a freedom of information request. The problem is that a small minority might have misunderstood what Dr Campbell was trying to put over and the person to blame for the widespread press coverage was MP David Davis who picked up on "pretty interesting" and misunderstood this to mean that 2+2=64.
I also went back and watched Dr Campbell's video about Ivermectin and then tried to find out more information on the subject. It seems the jury may still be out. Five days ago the University of Oxford confirmed it was still running clinical studies on Ivermectin as part of its PRINCIPLE trials however wouldn't comment further until they are ready to report.
The scientific world has moved at a previously unimaginable speed to fight the pandemic with eyebrow-raising shortcuts and their efforts have undoubtedly saved millions of lives, not just through vaccines but also through complementary medicines and treatments. In normal times, scientific papers are only seriously considered when they have gone through formal peer-review and then published in a scientific journal, but in this fast-moving anti-Covid fight, academic preprints have been widely distributed so as to spread knowledge of possible findings as quickly as possible. Dr Campbell's videos have mentioned many of these with appropriate warnings that they haven't been peer reviewed.
Above all, we have to thank the Internet for providing the basis for the fast knowledge interchange without which we would probably still be without vaccines and medicines. I've linked an article I wrote over 20 years ago quoting heavily from Dr Vanavar Bush's 1945 paper for Atlantic Monthly that highlighted the problems scientists faced with data sharing in World War II.
__________________ "For sheer delight there is nothing like altitude; it gives one the thrill of adventure
and enlarges the world in which you live," Irving Mather (1892-1966)
I wrote the extract below on a Moroccan forum at the end of December, addressing the fact that new case statistics in Morocco were unlikely to be reliable with the onset of Omicron.
Quote:
The highest level of cases to date was August 2021 with a 7-day average of just under 10,000 per day. This might well be surpassed by middle of January but it's hard to predict the figures as the less serious symptoms of Omicron might mean many more cases are not reported.
And given that so many cases are asymptomatic or mild we just don't know where we are. So I've come to the conclusion that case numbers is **too crude** a way to judge the severity of the pandemic.
Moroccan hospital admissions with Covid were 33 today but we've learn from the UK that hospital admissions is not a valid way to judge severity as so many people are being admitted for other reasons (e.g. broken leg) and then tested and found to be positive, so included in the figures. Others caught Covid in hospital. So the two important figures to watch are (1) those being ventilated and
(2) the fatalities.
Two weeks ago I wrote here,
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Cullis
The fairly recent widespread rollout of free LFTs and the cessation of confirmatory PCRs tests definitely confuses the situation, which is why Zoe and REACT are probably better indicators" [for infection levels].
Although the UK government statistics are that new case numbers are down to 82,000 and still declining, the evidence from Zoe is that new UK case numbers are in fact rising with over 200,000 per day and over 2.4 million people currently infected. Zoe's Professor Tim Spector was on TV yesterday saying that the 'R' number is still over 1. Omicron BA.2 is said to be even more transmissible than BA.1 so this may remain at over 1 for some time.
I believe the disparity between government figures falling and Zoe figures rising is because new cases are now only getting reported to the government if they are serious enough to need intervention. In the last few weeks, eight people in my immediate nine-person extended family of two daughters, husbands and children have contracted Covid and tested positive on LFTs. Only one was reported to the government.
However, UK ventilation figures are encouraging. In early November there were over 1,000 (presumably Delta) patients in mechanical ventilation beds in the UK. By early January despite dramatically rising case numbers, this number had fallen to 900. It has since steadily subsided and now stands at 478.
The seven-day rolling average of UK deaths peaked on 16 January at 290 and has since fallen back slightly to 275. Whilst all fatalities are regrettable, this should be compared to January 2021 peak of 1,248 at a time when infection rates were probably less than half of today which implies that Omicron combined with vaccines (though a disproportionate number of those dying are unvaccinated) results in a death rate of less than ten per cent of the Alpha wave.
__________________ "For sheer delight there is nothing like altitude; it gives one the thrill of adventure
and enlarges the world in which you live," Irving Mather (1892-1966)
Have YOU ever wondered who has ridden around the world? We did too - and now here's thelist of Circumnavigators!
Check it out now, and add your information if we didn't find you.
Check the RAW segments; Grant, your HU host is on every month!
Episodes below to listen to while you, err, pretend to do something or other...
2020 Edition of Chris Scott's Adventure Motorcycling Handbook.
"Ultimate global guide for red-blooded bikers planning overseas exploration. Covers choice & preparation of best bike, shipping overseas, baggage design, riding techniques, travel health, visas, documentation, safety and useful addresses." Recommended. (Grant)
Ripcord Rescue Travel Insurance™ combines into a single integrated program the best evacuation and rescue with the premier travel insurance coverages designed for adventurers.
Led by special operations veterans, Stanford Medicine affiliated physicians, paramedics and other travel experts, Ripcord is perfect for adventure seekers, climbers, skiers, sports enthusiasts, hunters, international travelers, humanitarian efforts, expeditions and more.
Ripcord travel protection is now available for ALL nationalities, and travel is covered on motorcycles of all sizes!
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Horizons Unlimited is not a big multi-national company, just two people who love motorcycle travel and have grown what started as a hobby in 1997 into a full time job (usually 8-10 hours per day and 7 days a week) and a labour of love. To keep it going and a roof over our heads, we run events all over the world with the help of volunteers; we sell inspirational and informative DVDs; we have a few selected advertisers; and we make a small amount from memberships.
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