Hi Chris,
I was wondering if you have had a chance to look at the proposed trial of a blood plasma treatment for Covid 19 in the UK. The treatment involves using blood plasma from recovered patients to treat people currently suffering from illness. It was developed by a team at a Cardiff hospital.
It would be great to hear your opinion on this particular treatment.
Thanks
Andrew Foster
The WHO has almost 200 member countries.
On 22nd Jan the WHO Director-General convened an Emergency Committee (EC) to assess whether the outbreak constituted a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). The member states on various committees make decisions and the Executive (including the DG) take action on those decisions.
So, at this meeting the 15 independent members (and 6 advisors) from around the world could not reach consensus on whether to call a PHEIC, the highest level of WHO alert. The opinions/votes of individual member countries are not known (secrecy provisions); it is understood that some felt that a PHEIC call was too extreme and would have preferred an alert that was not as major. But that’s not in their menu, and perhaps that’s a problem? Or perhaps they wanted to institute PHEIC, but some member states were under pressure from their governments? We’ll never know, and that lack of transparency is an issue.
The EC asked to be reconvened in 10 days.
On the 30th January the DG reconvened the EC. This was two days after the first reports of limited human-to-human transmission were reported outside China. This time, the EC members reached consensus and decided to declare the outbreak a PHEIC.
As soon as this happened, member countries started to implement their own action plans.
Immediately, many countries starting restricting travel from China, and some airlines stopped flying there. At this stage, WHO was against this approach: “Travel restrictions can cause more harm than good by hindering info-sharing, medical supply chains and harming economies. The WHO recommends introducing screening at official border crossings. It has warned that closing borders could accelerate the spread of the virus, with travellers entering countries unofficially.”
Unfortunately, screening at border crossings would not have worked. Due to the move to just-in-time ordering, western countries didn’t have enough tests (or PPE). Hospitals would not have coped with the influx of patients and many sick people would have had to be quarantined. (Countries, such as Singapore and Hong Kong, that were hit by SARS back in 2002-4 were well-prepared and knew what a pandemic would mean, but other countries were caught flat-footed.) Six weeks later, we also know that many infected people are asymptomatic for quite some time (like Patient 0 in Italy), so the screening would not have caught all carriers in any case.
From 16th to 24th Feb: The WHO-China Joint mission, which included experts from Canada, Germany, Japan, Nigeria, Republic of Korea, Russia, Singapore and the US (CDC, NIH) spent time in Beijing and also travelled to Wuhan and two other cities. They spoke with health officials, scientists and health workers in health facilities (maintaining physical distancing). The report of the joint mission can be found here: https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/who-china-joint-mission-on-covid-19-final-report.pdf From the report:
The COVID-19 virus is a new pathogen that is highly contagious, can spread quickly, and must be considered capable of causing enormous health, economic and societal impacts in any setting. It is not SARS and it is not influenza. Building scenarios and strategies only on the basis of well-known pathogens risks failing to exploit all possible measures to slow transmission of the COVID-19 virus, reduce disease and save lives.and
Much of the global community is not yet ready, in mindset and materially, to implement the measures that have been employed to contain COVID-19 in China. These are the only measures that are currently proven to interrupt or minimize transmission chains in humans. Fundamental to these measures is extremely proactive surveillance to immediately detect cases, very rapid diagnosis and immediate case isolation, rigorous tracking and quarantine of close contacts, and an exceptionally high degree of population understanding and acceptance of these measures. Achieving the high quality of implementation needed to be successful with such measures requires an unusual and unprecedented speed of decision-making by top leaders, operational thoroughness by public health systems, and engagement of society. Given the damage that can be caused by uncontrolled, community-level transmission of this virus, such an approach is warranted to save lives and to gain the weeks and months needed for the testing of therapeutics and vaccine development.These are strong words; about as strong as it gets. Was this report read, understood, and acted on in all countries? By 24th Feb, Italy had 219 cases and 5 deaths. Canada had 11 cases. Singapore, South Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan had already implemented strong (though varying) responses. In the US, on the 25th, all US Senators were briefed on the virus by the Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Homeland Security, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institutes of Health and the State Department. So yes, there are some problems. Having just one level of major alert--the PHEIC--is possibly an issue. Once declared, actions countries are likely to take in response are bound to cause major disruption. There would always be blow-back, and representatives or member countries would want not want to be seen to be crying wolf. The decision-making process requires consensus, which is always difficult when there are only two binary options--call the alert or don't. No middle ground. Even a single member country with a representative on the Emergency Committee could block the alert. And we would never know which country/ies chose to do that, so there is no accountability. It's too opaque. It's a less than ideal process. It will be up to member states to make these changes and let's hope they do.
I recently watched Dr. Mike Hansen give a detailed explanation of how the COVID-19 attacks and destroys cells that have the ACE2 receptor. I think it may mostly align with what Dr. Chris Martenson has been sharing in the Peak Prosperity videos with the exception of the hemoglobin/iron pathway. I wonder if Dr. Martenson or anyone else with medical or pathological credentials could comment on Dr. Hansen’s findings?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LV8wWhjTKRU
I am at my cardiologist and am shocked that I’m the only person wearing a mask. One woman snickered.
I wore a bandanna over my m95 just to be silly.
Also, they checked my temp before I went in.
Why the dearth of information coming out of California?
With its legion of homeless, and devil may care attitude concerning IV drug hygiene, you would think the numbers would reflect it.
But what numbers? They are virtually never mentioned, other than when people say they are doing a great job containing it.
Like China?
Thanks very much for taking the time to do this digging and describe the process at the WHO. I learned a lot by reading what you wrote (and I don’t have the time myself to do that kind of research). Seems like it isn’t so simple for the WHO to make rapid decisions or take decisive actions, since they rely on consensus. (Reminds me of the climate issues, with the IPCC, except that that has dragged out over decades now.) It is interesting that the WHO did (eventually) use pretty strong language in that February report, trying to warn the world. Better late than never? (And here in the US we jumped into action – just three short weeks later. </sarcasm>)
I am in CA, with family in other counties of California.
You aren’t missing a thing, for most of the state, so far, this is a big nothing going on. Except our kids aren’t in school, everything is closed, everyone is laid off, renters arent paying rent, the food banks have alot of business. So we tanked our economy.
Southern CA has a bigger outbreal, like L.A. county, but nothing like New York. I dont know why. We could speculate. We get more sunshine ( less vit D shortage), we have less polution ( excepting LA ), we have less obesity ? Or, maybe we have a less virulent strain ? There is a very good chance that many people have had it and got it mildly. We just dont know. And yet, they keep everything closed.
here is a link to confirmed cases and deaths in CA by county https://public.tableau.com/shared/NMWWFFGB2?:display_count=n&:origin=viz_share_link&:embed=y&:showVizHome=no
We are evidently going to have an easy-ish time of it. Only a smattering of cases (the state has been hovering at just under 200 active cases for a couple weeks – as many people survive or exit observation as are diagnosed, give or take), and the people who get sick aren’t getting as sick as elsewhere (like NYC). Lots of very powerful sunshine here (close to the equator) – kills the virus relatively quickly outside, and we also spend a lot of time outside and partially-to-mostly unclothed (vitamin D). Clean environment so immune systems aren’t compromised by background toxicity. And maybe we got a kinder strain.
Those are my theories. I don’t care if I’m right, I’m happy we’re evidently having an easier paddle of it here…
VIVA – Sager
A bunch of news stories came out today about large businesses applying for (and getting) monies out of the pool (the so-called PPP) supposedly dedicated to helping small businesses. That the banks favored the larger businesses’ applications.
A grant program (EIDL) that was, in my case, reduced from $10,000 (to help my small biz survive), down to $1,000 (to help just enough to not really help). Kind of moot, though, since although I filed my application about 3 weeks ago, and monies were supposed to get disbursed about 2-1/2 weeks ago, I’ve received nary so much as an email saying “hey, we’re working on it, hang in there!”
The unemployment insurance program, which was widened in scope to include the self-employed (me), is so overwhelmed by people filing that there is a several-month backlog. Most people I know cannot get through to file. Except I got “lucky” and got to file, only to be disqualified because I’m…self employed. I can appeal, but the process is evidently downright medieval. Part of the problem is a computer system in the UI department that runs on…COBOL. Oy. COBOL was no longer cutting-edge when I was born. And I’m ancient.
But that’s okay, the Fed Gov has also put a $600/week supplement out there for UI for everybody, including the self-employed. Sweet! I’m saved! Except…that payment is added on to whatever the state awards you. And I’m…disqualified.
At least the Fed Gov sent everybody a $1200 stimulus payment. Oh wait…no sign of that yet, either.
It’s like they’re daring us to start building guillotines… “Let them eat NETFLIX!”
Come another week or three, when people are have been flat-ass broke for a month-plus, and that second set of rent/mortgage payments doesn’t materialize, and people are starting to experience chronic hunger for the first time in their lives, and so on? Sh!t gonna get reeeeally real. Prepare accordingly…
VIVA – Sager
Trump a leader? Just about any modern politician…leaders? They’re not all bumbling buffoons, or evil overlords, but they so lack that singular something that qualifies as leadership that they have turned the term, ‘the political leader’ into an oxymoron.
You can see the California numbers on either the Worldometers site or on the Johns Hopkins dashboard. For the latter, if you click on the “Admin1” tab at the bottom of the raw numbers panel, you get a breakdown by US state. If you click on a state, you can see how the numbers moved over time, in a panel at the bottom right of the dashboard (at least on my computer screen). California numbers have been rising fairly linearly since the later part of March. Before then it was exponential but, presumably, restrictions put in place had the effect of moving the increases to linear. But they are still rising by about a thousand a day (bigger uptick yesterday).
So something IS happening in California but stopping the exponential increase may avoid the carnage seen in New York.
Sager, Damn! That is so harsh. You are one of millions having horrible problems. This is what happens when ‘leaders’ decide to defund essential agencies. I haven’t received my tax refund for 2018 yet. As I am in Canada my withholding is 37%. I am owed 17% of my income. I honestly don’t know if I will ever see a dime of it, there are so many problems with the IRS, which is also COBOL. It was in the midst of switching to modern systems when this s*** hit. Can you imagine working there?? Nightmare.
I hope so much that it works out for you somehow and if not that you are amply prepared. Best wishes to you!
Good to “see” you old friend. I guess you moved to Hawaii. I’m so jealous. Big island or Maui? Last I heard, about a decade, you were in New York state.
The wife and I almost moved to Maui, but we had a daughter and wanted to keep her close to family. Like idiots, we sold everything we had before having to change or mind.
I look forward to reading your writing again. Stay safe, brother…Jeff
From the CDC - as some states start to reopen, I wonder if any precautions in public spaces with air conditioning will be taken. Something else to keep in mind… and track.
https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/7/20-0764_article
As I understand, the post suggests that 14 day lag time might be a better fit than the 7 day lag time .
"on average, symptoms appear after about 5 (4 – 7) days incubation, so adopting day 7 a for when a case is confirmed would be about right. Day 21 (source Prof Neil Ferguson, Imperial College) is the accepted average lag from when the initial infection occurs until death.
On this basis, the total cases extracted from Worldometer on any day submittedly correspond with the deaths 14 days later (not 7 days later) to calculate a CFR."
(end quote)
If there is a 14 day delay between typical symptoms, until death for those who expire,
then the question in my mind is what could cause the 7 day difference?
Perhaps, it might typically take 7 days from symptoms start, to ask for & get approved for a test, get the test processed, and then get the positive test resulted added to the new cases report? Removing these 7 testing days from the 14 might explain why a 7 day lag time fits fairly closely to a somewhat consistent death percentage?
I don't know as I am neither a Doctor nor an expert. Just thinking out loud and learning a lot from all the info and posters here at PP.
Everybody stay safe and take care out there,
TruthSeeker