It’s now clear the Black Lives Matter protests didn’t cause a second wave of COVID-19, but there’s still a bit of community transmission around in Victoria. The horrific numbers out of the United States put that blip into perspective, though. Plus more of the latest coronavirus news.
Black Lives Matter did not cause an outbreak
Let’s just say it one more time for the people at the back: more than 14 days later, there has been no recorded community transmission of COVID-19 from the Black Lives Matter rally.
While four people in Victoria who attended rallies later tested positive, there’s no evidence they infected anyone while protesting. There have been no cases with any connection to the numerous other rallies held in other states.
This is in spite of stern warnings from politicians, the media and some public health officials about the risks of a rally potentially causing a second wave. While politicians and reporters have tried their hardest to pin the blame for Victoria’s recent clusters of new cases, the evidence just doesn’t stand up.
What to do about Victoria then?
Victoria’s spike in new COVID-19 cases continues, with 17 new infections recorded in the last 24 hours.
So far, the origin of 11 of those cases is, worryingly, still under investigation, and Premier Daniel Andrews says there is “significant community transmission” involved.
Victoria’s plan to curb its rise in infections could be through tough enforcement of physical distancing rules, an increased police presence, and an army of doorknockers making sure people do the right thing.
Health Minister Greg Hunt this morning flagged the possibility of localised lockdowns in the six Local Government Areas worst affected. In NSW, Premier Gladys Berejiklian responded by urging residents not to travel to Melbourne, although the border still remains open.
America is tired of losing
The United States’ catastrophic failure to control the COVID-19 pandemic continues.
There are now more than 120,000 deaths in America, and 20% of all new infections worldwide are in the US. Talk about a “second wave” is misplaced, because for much of America, the first wave is far from over.
Half of US states are experiencing a growth in cases. And now, the pandemic is ripping through red states.
Texas hit its 11th straight daily record for patients in hospitals, but Governor Greg Abbott wants to keep the state open for business.
Florida passed 100,000 cases on the weekend. In Arizona, one in five tests conducted is positive.
The world’s smallest Hajj
Saudi Arabia has announced the Hajj will be strictly limited this year.
The annual pilgrimage to Mecca, which traditionally draws over two million people, mostly from overseas, will be limited to Saudis and foreign nationals living in the Kingdom.
A limited Hajj has seemed inevitable for some time — Mecca tends to be bursting at the seams during the pilgrimage, making physical distancing impossible.
Saudi Arabia suspended the Umrah pilgrimage to Mecca in February, and a number of Muslim countries, including Indonesia and Malaysia, had already withdrawn from the Hajj. The loss of overseas pilgrims could be a major financial blow to Saudi Arabia.
“BLM Covid transmission” – again we see elements of the media rolling in BS politics – yet ‘the media’ (including Media Watch and Q&A) seems quite happy to leave “the media” out of ‘what’s wrong with the system’, they continue arguing for “freedom of the press” as though they are faultless in this morass.
[Last night Q&A – Smethurst raised the elitism of Assange not being ‘of them’? Does she read Murdoch’s rags – including the one she edits (Sharri Markson FFS) to see what “they” are?]
“Freedom” for that compromised cohort to carry on the way they do – spreading the crap they do? And wonder why ‘the established media’ is losing ground and trust?
Your laziness is showing here, just like all the Australian media. 1. this virus is no more than flu, WHO, the CDC, the UK, EU and Chinese health departments all knew that in March.
2. the peak was over before most nations slammed shut. Now there are 46 nations with less than 10 cases.
3 . the word pandemic means nothing more than it’s on all continents, it does not signify anything else and never has. The word is not doing anything but sitting around waiting for lazy journalists to look it up.
4. the USA, like most places has had clusters, around the New York’\New Jersey region mainly and those pretty hysterical pictures we saw of lined up ambulances were not people going into hospital, they were people being taken and and sent off to care homes without medical care. That is where most died, but the average age is 83 and all but 1% had up to 4 co morbidities. In Massachusetts health department they have a magnificent dashboard proving 98.6% of deaths may have had the virus but it did not kill them, they died of heart attacks, cancer and so on.
5. The UK and US have been caught double counting, the CDC ordered for some reason that all cases be marked Covid and whistleblowers in the health system have shown around the world that the US were doing that because hospitals were being paid up to $39,000 in funds to do it for all medicaid patients.
6. global studies have shown that the field hospitals in the UK, US, Wales and other places have scarcely been touched, and have been massively white elephants. In Wales alone they spend 166 million pounds on them and treated just 46 patients.
All these studies and facts are availalbe but all Australian media think the .02% of cases here are so catastrophically bad they have to write 49 million words a day about it.
Grow up Australian media, this is tedious drivel beyond measure. Go and find some facts.
Have to agree with you MarilynS. Are people that blind that they can’t see behind this greatest ruse in history. I am just staggered. You can hear the crickets at those emergency hospital extensions set up to cater for all covid patients. It’s apparent also that in NY and LA that ambulance drivers have been told to drive around with their sirens on just to add a bit of tension even though they don’t have any patients on board. And the doubling of statistics, well anything but an amputated leg goes down as covid…for the life of me.
Thank god someone else with a brain. I am 67 and managed to live through epidemics of measles, mumps, chicken pox, rubella and whooping cough without the nation being shut down every year.
Every year we have hundreds of thousands of flu cases here, about 15% of them every year are coronas and I have had many colds so it’s a fair bet at least 1 in 4 of them were caused by coronaviruses. All this hysteria and paranoia over nothing much proves the case I always held that gen X were not fit to lead a dunny cleaning team.
What they really mean when they say there is no vaccine available is that the opportune time to introduce it is not available yet. There needs to be a greater threat and more calamity world wide so that all opposition is snuffed out under the weight and severity of the threat.
When that stage finally arrives, perhaps marshal law at least in the US, there will be no refusing it. The same mandate will be played out here.
I see where WA has legalized forced vaccination under the 2016 Health Act. Looks like Barny Barnette was ahead of the health game-plan. This legislation will back fire if they ever tried to enforce it and would turn the moderate “Pro Choicers” into dedicated “Anti Vaxxers.” Iam not sure about the other states.
But the end goal of all this covid is certainly either vaccine/RFID/ electronic tatoo or something similar.
I am 64 and I hope to live a lot longer. I also lived through all the illnesses you mentioned MarilynS. Although what that has to do with Covid 19 escapes me. The biggest danger I see is people like MarlilynS who continue to insist this is all a hoax. It is time that QAnon is declared a terrorist organisation in Australia as the type of dangerous misinformation people like MarilynS spread is the most dangerous threat we face. The USA is a good example of what happens when idiots like MarilynS are empowered to spread their dangerous cult beliefs in main stream media. CRIKEY take some responsibility and at least respond to the type of rubbish you are allowing MarilynS to spread. (She?) is dangerous.
To the tag team duo of Marilyn S & Faux Head…For your own mental & physical health, one can only hope that you can both fight really well, and run really well, in real life .Sprouting that sort of bullshit about coronavirus is downright dangerous ..Thank goodness ,for the safety trolling zone of the internet ,eh ?
Yet it’s not bullshit, it’s well documented, the UK stuff has been shown on both Panorama and Horizons TV shows, empty hospitals, old sick people shunted out of hospitals and left untreated and forced to sign DNR’s, they are trying to force the disabled into signing them too. Wales reported spending 166 million pounds on field hospitals that treated just 46 people, not one of the other emergency hospitals have been used. Same in the USA as shown by both whistleblowers, other media and even Frontline.
In the USA they shunted people known to be sick from hospital to aged care homes, now the homes are shunting them out to broken down hostels to get paying patients. These things are easy to find in both MSM and indie media around the world, everywhere but here where all our media, even indie media, are force feeding us the mindless crap.
In your previous commenting life here you were a refugee-ranter, abusive, foam flecked and given to casting nasturtiums far & wide.
Now this incarnation.
Why does the term agent provocateur come to mind?
Dangerous comments. marilynn I hope you watched tonights ABC News. You would see then that Covid 19 IS REAL and is very dangerous. You are very dangerous because the sort of misinformation you are spreading will kill people. CRIKEY PLEASE. Dont publish comments that are so mischievous.
In a world where everyone was of the same rude health you’d be right. When are you going back?
You are the lazy one. Getting your information from a well known cult who specialise in mad conspiracy theories IS NOT RESEARCH. Crikey are you so desperate for subscribers you allow this type of dangerous information to be printed? Would you let me write that injecting bleach is a good idea? You need to make some effort at responsible publishing. MarilynS is dangerous. Especially now. Look at Victoria and what is happening because people listen to the MarilynS’s of the world.
Marilyn,
You raise a number of points in your comment, none of them productive and all wrapped in conspiratorial theories. For many of your major claims, you have not provided a single reference point or actual piece of evidence to support your theory.
1. Yes, both COVID-19 and Influenza are viruses and both can cause similar symptoms but they are different viruses with COVID-19 being something new that our immunity has not had a chance to process and adapt to, this makes it more dangerous to those who become infected with a higher death rate than Influenza viruses. There were a lot of unknowns in March, which caused the greater anxiety and caution shown by leaders, there is still a great deal unknown about this virus, including debate around incubation periods and transmissions methods but we could safely say we know more about prevention now than we did in March as we have had months of concentrated research.
2. Can you please define peak? In Australia, the infection rate continued to climb through March which forced the closure of businesses to reduce the potential transmission, the rate continued to rise there after, predominantly due to the incubation period, before subsiding. Australia closed its borders on March 18, the infection rate continued to rise an “Peak” with a daily new case rate of 528 new cases on March 29 (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/australia/), from that point onward, we have been lucky enough to see our trend head downwards until a recent rise in Victoria.
3. The definition of pandemic, as defined by the WHO is the worldwide spread of a new disease. No one is arguing otherwise but the classification is a trigger for countries to enact their Pandemic plans and to take the virus seriously, up to the point the WHO declared the pandemic, the common rhetoric was that it was something just in China and would not spread through human contact.
4. Not sure if you have looked at an infection map recently but Texas and Florida are pretty big growing clusters. While I have not had a chance to research the average age figure you stated (uncited) I did find interesting stats on the Massachusetts Department of Public Heath Dashboard (https://www.mass.gov/info-details/covid-19-response-reporting Daily Dashboard for June 23, 2020) that showed 16 deaths occurred Confirmed to COVID-19 and 0 Probable. They define Confirmed and Probable as “Patients with a positive molecular test for COVID-19 are counted as confirmed. Patients with a positive serology/antibody test and either COVID-like symptoms or likely exposure to COVID-19 are counted as probable cases.Patients who did not have a laboratory test but whose death certificate listed COVID-19 as a cause of death are counted as probable deaths.” Often a disease, such as cancer, is not the actual cause of death, it is the contributor that severely lowers the immune system for other diseases to do the job. Also, on Massachusetts, they are 4th overall on Cases per Million people in the US (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/) so not sure if they are hiding very much at all.
5. The UK were reporting testing numbers incorrectly (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/tens-thousands-coronavirus-tests-have-double-counted-officials/) as they counted each swab (both nose and mouth) for a single person. They also counted the test at home kits they sent out, regardless of them being returned. Can you please provide evidence where this was ordered by the CDC?
6. In Australia we have hospitals at the ready that have, luckily, not been inundated through exponential growth in this virus. All countries prepared for worst case scenarios and there are lucky locations in UK and US that have been far less affected than others, places of lower density populations have obviously also seen lower transmission rates.
It is your conspiracy theory rhetoric that continues to help spread complacency and ignorance through out the community and puts all of us at greater risk of the virus spreading out of control. All the actions that have taken place are to put in place controls to limit the spread of a potentially deadly virus that we still do not properly understand and do not have a vaccine for, the attitude should not be “so what if i get it”, it should be “if i have it, who might i transmit it too”.
Greg hunt was saying today that the blm marches made people feel able to relax their care within communities, nothing to do with Morrison trying to force states to open up borders apparently.
The transmission riots has already become an indissoluble meme for the RWNJs, just like pink batts and arsonist bushfires.
What’s that old saying about B/S being on a national tour before truth gets out of its dole bed?
Chairman Dan and his Leftist Victorian Govt have some interesting questions to answer. The Cedar Meats outbreak news delayed and then downplayed – anyone knowing that the cedar is on the national flag of the Lebanon might have had suspicions that a good Labor donor and ethnic mate of the Andrews Govt was involved.
Now we have multiple clusters of outbreaks related to ‘ethnic’ communities – the Vic Health Minister was waffling under questioning by Fran Kelly this morning about why ‘ethnic’ communities in outer suburbs did not get the COVID health warnings in their native tongues.
Gee, is there anyone on the planet who does not know something about COVID-19, hand washing and social distancing etc? Remember these same ‘ethnic’ communities are well connected enough to arrange the hire of Melbourne lawyers while floating off Christmas Island.
Or is it that even the ‘ethnics’ can see the hypocrisy of stopping citizens fishing and beach walking and golfing while allowing tens of thousand BLMs to noisily rally in central Melbourne without enforcing the law.
I am trying to think of a link between Victorian Labor’s ethnic branch stacking and Covid clusters – but surely a well furnished female investigative reporter could probably find fertile ground there too.