This is why the Prime Minister's insistence on Friday afternoon that he would still go to the footy the next day, as he announced he was advising against such gatherings from Monday, was such a strange look. Technically, he was acting in line with the chief medical officer's advice and there's no doubt he doesn't want to stir up too much unnecessary panic. But it appears to have misread the public mood.

Read more:

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03-15/coronavirus-scott-morrison-footy-...

See also: as the nation shat itself...

London: In the weeks since coronavirus exploded around the globe it has become increasingly apparent that this freight train simply can't be stopped.

Lockdowns, school closures and flight bans will go some way to reducing pressure on hospitals but these measures will not halt widespread transmission. Health authorities warn hundreds of millions will probably get infected and the vast majority will survive. Some of society's most vulnerable will still bear the brunt, however, and the death toll could be very high.

On that basis, some difficult decisions must be made. Britain has made some tough calls already but their go-it-alone approach carries significant risk and is proving divisive.

In crude terms, Boris Johnson's government is mounting the argument that the outbreak is now so far gone that it is actually desirable for people to get infected. And a lot of people – potentially up to 70 per cent of the country's population, or roughly 47 million.

A risky strategy? Very. At complete odds with the rest of the globe and the World Health Organisation? Definitely. Politically unpopular? Absolutely. But sensible? Quite possibly.

Britain's approach has three core elements: enact social distancing measures much more slowly than other countries; shield at-risk groups like the elderly and sick from contact with the general population; and then let COVID-19 slowly sweep through everybody else.

The latter approach is called "herd immunity" – a phrase likely to enter the lexicon shortly in the same way as "flatten the curve". Herd immunity describes a scenario where so many people become resistant to a disease – either through vaccinations or exposure – that it becomes much harder for the virus to spread through the rest of the population. Mass immunity could effectively cause the virus to burn out over the course of one or two seasons, or buy time until a vaccine is developed and distributed.

Read more:

https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/herd-immunity-why-britain-is-actuall...

Is the idiot Johnson betting that the pandemic will hit the lower classes more than the upper crust, thus increasing his proportion of the voting base? We know that Johnson is a friend of the GMO, insecticide and pesticide industries, so this "laissez-faire" attitude goes along nicely...

See also:

Your house is on fire, and the people whom you have trusted with your care are not trying to put it out. Even though they knew it was coming, and could see what happened to the neighbours as they were overwhelmed with terrifying speed, the UK government has inexplicably chosen to encourage the flames, in the misguided notion that somehow they will be able to control them.

When I first heard about this, I could not believe it. I research and teach the evolution and epidemiology of infectious disease at Harvard’s Chan School of Public Health. My colleagues here in the US, even as they are reeling from the stumbling response of the Donald Trump administration to the crisis, assumed that reports of the UK policy were satire – an example of the wry humour for which the country is famed. But they are all too real.

Read more:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/15/epidemiologist-bri...

Read from top.

Every Briton over the age of 70 will be told "within the coming weeks" to stay at home for an extended period to protect themselves from coronavirus.

When it happens, they will be asked to stay home for "a very long time", Health Secretary Matt Hancock said.

The government is to release social distancing advice for elderly people on Monday - but they will not yet be asked to self-isolate for long periods.

Fourteen more people have died from the virus, bringing deaths in the UK to 35.

Mr Hancock told the BBC that manufacturers were being asked to help produce medical equipment, such as ventilators, to help with an expected surge in demand by the NHS.

He also said hotels could be converted into makeshift hospitals, while the government has begun negotiating with private healthcare providers to obtain thousands of extra beds in private hospitals.

The number of confirmed UK cases of the virus has reached 1,372, with 40,279 people tested, according to the latest Department of Health figures.

Almost all of the new cases were in England, but 34 new cases were announced in Wales, 32 in Scotland and 11 in Northern Ireland.

Most of the 35 coronavirus-related deaths in the UK have so far been people aged over 60 and with underlying health conditions. 

People self-isolating with mild symptoms of the virus are no longer being tested. The government says tests will primarily be given:

• To all patients needing hospital treatment for pneumonia, acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) or a flu-like illness
• Where an outbreak has occurred in a residential or care setting, for example long-term care facilities or prisons

IF YOU LISTENED closely this week, behind the terrifying clamor of Covid-19 sweeping across the planet, you might’ve heard the sound of war nearly breaking out again between the United States and Iran.

On Wednesday, the birthday of assassinated Iranian Gen. Qassim Suleimani, a barrage of rockets slammed into the Camp Taji airbase north of the Iraqi capital of Baghdad. The attack killed two Americans and a Briton, while wounding 14 others. A day later, U.S. forces in Iraq hit back, carrying out airstrikes against Kata’ib Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed Iraqi militia that it blamed for the attack. It is a safe bet that the violence between the United States and Iran will not stop there. Already on Saturday morning, reports emerged of another attack at the same base that wounded three more U.S. service members.

Despite a terrifying pandemic that has overwhelmed entire cities in Iran and now looms over the United States, the crisis between the two countries that began when the Trump administration exited the 2015 Iran nuclear deal shows no sign of abating. The possibility of war in the midst of a global public health crisis is, to put it mildly, outrageous. Iranians are believed to be among the most numerous victims of the Covid-19 pandemic. Their government’s decision to risk a conflict at this moment is both mystifying and galling.

But Iran’s grim determination to hit back against the United States regardless of its people’s suffering does illustrate an important point. It puts paid to a major Trump administration justification for the controversial assassination of Suleimani in a January drone: deterrence.

In the immediate aftermath of Suleimani’s killing, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told CBS’s “Face the Nation” that “the entire strategy has been one of deterrence,” claiming that the drone strike against the general had sent a decisive message to the Iranian government that would force it to refrain from future acts of aggression.

But if deterrence really was the strategy, it’s been a resounding failure. Even before this week’s deadly attacks, rockets have continued to periodically rain down on U.S. bases in Iraq, as well as the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. Iran has indicated in public statements that it plans to take what it views as a full revenge for the killing of Quds Force chief Suleimani at a time of its choosing. The deadly attack on Camp Taji suggests that they are not bluffing.

There is historical context to consider as well. Since the 1979 revolution that brought the current government to power, Iran has shown that it is willing to endure a tremendous amount of punishment to achieve its strategic goals.

During Iran’s war with Iraq in the 1980s, then-Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini continued to battle Saddam Hussein long after his attempted invasion of Iran had been repelled. Hundreds of thousands on both sides were killed over years of grueling World War I-style trench warfare, all in dogged pursuit of Khomeini’s goal of forcing the Baathists from power and placing an Iran-friendly government in Baghdad. (The Iranians would have to wait until 2003, when the United States graciously accomplished this goal for them.)

Today, even amid a cataclysmic public health crisis that is said to have killed hundreds of Iranians, including several top political and military leaders, the Iranians show no sign of relenting on what they view as their primary geopolitical interests. Their continued attacks on American targets in Iraq suggest that they are pushing forward toward their main strategic goal: ejecting American troops from Iraq.

In an article about the recent violence, Afshon Ostovar, a professor at the Naval Postgraduate School and author of “Vanguard of the Imam: Religion, Politics, and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards,” wrote that the Iranian-backed militia attack on Camp Taji and the U.S. military response “fits right into the aims of Kata’ib Hezbollah and Iran.” The attacks by U.S. aircraft help increase public anger in Iraq against U.S. military activity there and lay the groundwork for a broader confrontation that might force the United States to leave for good.

Iran and its Iraqi allies “have more Iraqi deaths and destruction to fuel their effort to expel U.S. forces from the country,” Ostovar wrote. “They also have cause to respond further, if they wish, in order bait the U.S. into additional aggressive acts on Iraqi soil. Yet, doing so would compel the U.S. to respond in kind, and the cycle of escalation would continue toward certain conflict.”

Read more:

https://theintercept.com/2020/03/15/coronavirus-iraq-us-iran/

Read from top.

THEMES

CentCom: Control of the "Greater Middle East"

4086 ARTICLES

See:

https://www.voltairenet.org/mot2301.html?lang=en

Read from top.

See also: lest we forget till the next war...

'The world is f—d': Granny reacts to empty store shelves

March 17, 2020

When this elderly woman saw rows of empty shelves at a store in Melbourne, Australia, her response was priceless. “The world is f—d!” she said while shopping with her grandson.

See more:

https://nypost.com/video/the-world-is-f-d-granny-reacts-to-empty-store-s...

Read from top...

Prime Minister Scott Morrison launched a full scale dressing down on Australians who are stripping supermarket shelves to hoard food and groceries during the coronavirus outbreak.

Announcing the next stage of public health measures in attempts to limit the virus, Mr Morrison on Wednesday morning demanded people "stop hoarding", declaring it "un-Australian".

Read more:

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/stop-doing-it-it-s-ridiculous-pm...

Who does his shopping? ASIO? Hillsong? Dutton? The Police?