Tag: covid
School face masks worn in England to avoid Covid row with Scotland – claims
Ex-Education Secretary said unions ‘really do just hate work’ during Covid pandemic
Government considered ‘exterminating’ pet cats at start of Covid pandemic, says former minister
THE Government considered “exterminating” all pet cats amid fears they could be spreading Covid, a former health minister has said.
Lord Bethell said the concern about pets underlined how little was known about the disease at the outbreak of the pandemic in 2020.
Lord Bethell revealed ministers had considered culling all of Britain’s domestic cats at the start of the Covid pandemic[/caption]
He told Channel 4 News: “What we shouldn’t forget is how little we understood about this disease.
“There was a moment we were very unclear about whether domestic pets could transmit the disease.
“In fact, there was an idea at one moment that we might have to ask the public to exterminate all the cats in Britain.
“Can you imagine what would have happened if we had wanted to do that?
“And yet, for a moment there was a bit of evidence around that so that had to be investigated and closed down.”
Lord Bethell was Matt Hancock‘s deputy in the Department of Health and Social Care from 2020 to 2021.
It comes after a Covid row erupted after 100,000 pandemic WhatsApp messages to and from Mr Hancock were leaked.
In one of the biggest unofficial disclosures of government data, it was revealed children in England were forced to wear face masks to appease Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.
And Mr Hancock stands accused of ignoring scientific advice on testing the elderly and frail moving into care homes.
Last night, Downing Street was at panic stations amid fears Prime Minister Rishi Sunak might be dragged into the row over the messages, leaked to the Daily Telegraph.
And Mr Hanock’s allies said he was considering legal action over claims he ignored pleas from the country’s top doctor, Prof Sir Chris Whitty, to test those entering care homes from the community.
His spokesman said it was “flat wrong” he had rejected the idea of giving Covid tests to everyone.
According to the messages, at the time in 2020 Mr Hancock insisted it was “not currently possible” to test all arrivals in care homes.
Despite saying testing for all was “obviously a good, positive step” he then told an aide it “muddies the water”, with tests necessary only for those coming from hospital.
Figures show more than 43,000 care home residents died of Covid between 2020 and 2022.
Ex-Sunday Times journalist Isabel Oakeshott, who previously described lockdowns as an “unmitigated disaster,” said she leaked the messages as she feared the official Covid inquiry would be a “colossal whitewash”.
Lord Bethell dismissed claims Covid decisions were made via messaging.
He said: “This partial glimpse gives a misleading impression.”
NHS England set to miss two key targets of COVID recovery plan, new report warns
Matt Hancock ‘rejected Chris Whitty’s advice on care home testing’ as Covid ravaged Britain
MATT Hancock rejected Chris Whitty’s advice to test “all people going into care homes” as Britain was hit by the Covid pandemic.
Leaked WhatsApp messages reveal the ex-Health Secretary at first welcomed the chief medical officer’s suggestion as a “good positive step”.
Mr Whitty gave his advice early in April 2020 — about a month into the pandemic[/caption]
But he then changed his mind.
He told officials he only wanted to test people entering care homes from hospital — not those from the wider community.
In messages leaked to the Daily Telegraph, Mr Hancock said doing both would “muddy the waters” — asking officials to “tell me if I’m wrong”.
Mr Whitty gave his advice early in April 2020 — about a month into the pandemic.
Mr Hancock introduced guidance that made testing mandatory for those entering from hospital.
But guidance calling for those coming in from the community to be tested too was not introudced until August 14.
A total of 17,678 people died of Covid in care homes in England between April 17 and August 13.
Last night a spokesperson for Mr Hancock said: “The story spun on care homes is completely wrong. What the messages show is that Mr Hancock pushed for testing of those going into care homes when that testing was available.”
The WhatsApp messages also revealed he and his team set up a group chat called “crisis management” to deal with the comms fallout after
The Sun revealed he had broken lockdown rules and was having an affair with his aide, Gina Coladangelo.
A spokesperson for Matt Hancock said: “It is outrageous that this distorted account of the pandemic is being pushed with partial leaks, spun to fit an anti-lockdown agenda, which would have cost hundreds of thousands of lives if followed.
“What the messages do show is a lot of people working hard to save lives.
“The full documents have already all been made available to the inquiry, which is the proper place for an objective assessment, so true lessons can be learned.
“Those who argue there shouldn’t have been a lockdown ignore the fact that half-a-million people would have died had we not locked down.
“And for those saying we should never lock down again, imagine if a disease killed half those infected, and half the population were going to get infected – as is happening right now with avian flu in birds. If that disease were in humans, of course we’d want to lockdown.
“The story spun on care homes is completely wrong. What the messages show is that Mr Hancock pushed for testing of those going into care homes when that testing was available.
“Instead of spinning and leaks we need the full, comprehensive inquiry, to ensure we are as well prepared as we can be for the next pandemic, whenever it comes.”
Jacob Rees-Mogg ‘had a Covid test for one of his children couriered to his home amid a shortage’
Matt Hancock rejected Sir Chris Whitty’s call to test all residents going into care homes for Covid
Covid most likely DID leak from Wuhan virus lab causing pandemic, US report says
Virologist Disputes WSJ Report on a Minority Opinion Suggesting Covid ‘Lab Leak’ Origin
DevNull127 writes: Four U.S. agencies have concluded that the Covid-19 virus originated at the Wuhan market, the Wall Street Journal reports. The U.S. National Intelligence Council reached the same conclusion. Then there’s two more agencies (including America’s CIA) that are “undecided.”
But there is one agency that decided — with “low confidence” — that the virus had somehow leaked from a lab. (And the FBI also decided with “moderate confidence” on that same theory.) “The new report highlights how different parts of the intelligence community have arrived at disparate judgments about the pandemic’s origin,” writes the Wall Street Journal — adding that unfortunately U.S. officials “declined” to give any details on what led to the Energy Department’s position.
The Wall Street Journal also notes:
Despite the agencies’ differing analyses, the update reaffirmed an existing consensus between them that Covid-19 wasn’t the result of a Chinese biological-weapons program, the people who have read the classified report said….
Some scientists argue that the virus probably emerged naturally and leapt from an animal to a human, the same pathway for outbreaks of previously unknown pathogens. Intelligence analysts who have supported that view give weight to “the precedent of past novel infectious disease outbreaks having zoonotic origins,” the flourishing trade in a diverse set of animals that are susceptible to such infections, and their conclusion that Chinese officials didn’t have foreknowledge of the virus, the 2021 report said.
Also responding to the Department of Energy’s outlying position was a virologist at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization at Canada’s University of Saskatchewan, who posted a series of observations on Twitter:
The available evidence shows overwhelmingly that the pandemic started at Huanan market via zoonosis. I have no idea what this evidence that Department of Energy has is. All I know that it is “weak” and resulted in a conclusion of “low confidence”.
It reportedly comes from the DOE’s own network of national labs rather than through spying. But I do know that to be consistent with the available scientific evidence, the DOE has to explain how the virus emerged twice over 2 wks in humans at the same market the size of a tennis court, over 8 km & across a river from the only lab in Wuhan working on SARSr-CoVs….
Claims of a progenitor at WIV are pure speculation & unsupported by evidence…. Despite 3 years of a global search for this evidence, it has not materialized, while evidence supporting zoonosis associated with Huanan has continued to stack up. At some point, an absence of evidence might just be evidence of absence.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.