International COVID-19 Megathread

[Zinneke]

In the Belgian news they're talking about the lockdowns lasting between 2 and 6 months

Unsustainable, but I think you mean social distancing.

[Zinneke]

I just read an article on the border controls Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern have established to keep people (tourists) from other German states out. Weird stuff. The Balkanization of Germany has begun.

I can hear the Saxons partying from here

[Zinneke]

Call the Dutch bluff, collapse the euro, watch their savings go tits up.

[Zinneke]

In the latest episode of "China hoodwinking Europe", the millions of respirators Finland ordered from China at a cost many times that compared to normal times have proven to be inadequate for hospital use.

The rest of the world should really demand that China pay compensation for this pandemic.

Meanwhiel Merkel and Macron begged for masks and have given them a one way ticket to our digital data in exchange.

[Zinneke]

Big relaxation here as of next Saturday. Among other things, brothels can reopen, although obviously both employees and clients must wear masks for the duration of their appointments. Real serious stuff, but I genuinely can't stop laughing about it.

There's plenty of sex positions that don't require close facial contact. Whether the Swiss know about them or not yet is another matter though...

[Zinneke]

Complete chaos in UK government comms department in the last 24 hours

So it's Tuesday?

[Zinneke]

It’s probably less of a problem in the big countries with powerful leagues with lots of TV money, but the professional football and hockey teams are starting to howl with rage that they need to start letting normal-ish crowds back at matches. Their income consists virtually entirely of gate money, so the risk of another 6-12 months of maximum crowds of 1’000 could (so they say) very possibly kill off professional sport entirely in Switzerland

Belgian clubs are facing a similar problem. They are also heavily reliant on transfer fees to cover costs and the market is for sure going to dry up.

I'm  not expecting to be inside a stadium until 2021. Extremely sad but popping the modern football bubble is probably better than more debt.

[Zinneke]

A 31-year old man has died in the City of Salzburg.

It's the 41st death in the state and must be one of the youngest in all of Austria.

I'm only aware of 2 other deaths under the age of 60 since the start of this.

https://www.salzburg.gv.at/themen/gesundheit/corona-virus

Out of how many cases?

[Zinneke]

The current standard for lockdowns now appears to be:

Anything vaguely enjoyable: Banned or severely curtailed.
Anything dull and will-sapping: Carry on as normal (with a mask).

Yes I think its fairly obvious work is being prioritised over someone's tourist holiday. I wonder why?

I personally think there's a lot of online experts who have been unfairly criticising virologists as if they know better or as if they are seeing the virologists are not. The fact is like most public policy the virologists give a series of options to politicians, the politicians decide based on what to prioritise.

One of the major issues Europe has had was a lack of border infrastructure to enable us to properly monitor the spread of the virus across borders. Island nations with the only realistic access being airports have in contrast been extremely effective at countering the virus. What a ludicrous idea that we should allow half of Europe to go skiing, mix with each other and then go back to their home countries because its their middle class routine and because Austria, in almost Tender-like fashion these days, becomes all parochial and whiny over the fact their tourism season is going down the toilet (where was their solidarity with Spain, whose economy is getting wiped out by lack of tourism too)

Right now most travel should be strictly for work placements, and reuniting family. Not going on a ski jolly.

I sometimes really wonder what the reaction had been like if we had a virus that resembled SARS with the spreading capacity of Covid. Our total lack of discipline and common sense and our attraction to atharaxia on this continent has exposed us in the face of this virus. Let's hope we get a grip.

[Zinneke]

A leading Fidesz MEP was caught using his parliamentary immunity to escape a fine for violating Belgian lockdown rules by having a 25-man gay orgy in a bar right in front of a Brussels police station, as you do.

[Zinneke]

A leading Fidesz MEP was caught using his parliamentary immunity to escape a fine for violating Belgian lockdown rules by having a 25-man gay orgy in a bar right in front of a Brussels police station, as you do.

Had to be them, OF COURSE it did

Did he claim it was all the fault of George Soros afterwards?

Given he apparently tried to escape from the window I think he was in too much of a rush to comment on the issue

[Zinneke]

Finally we are growing some minerals.

[Zinneke]

The antivaxx demos in France are sickening (no pun intended). People using Nazi symbology, priests getting involved, just a general black hole of idiocy.

[Zinneke]

54,674 new infections reported in the UK today. That's... something.

That's... totally irrelevant.

As long as the healthcare system is not at risk of collapse, and most people aren't dying (especially younger ones), no one should care.

Same reason we don't panic about influenza cases. Not a high risk to the system, and not many deaths.

What if a vaccine resistant variant develops?

[Zinneke]

https://www.twitter.com/ESYudkowsky/status/1425619567703773184

But yeah the world will continue to drive a 500km/h supercar of globalism without the seatbelts and breaks required in their new technical monstrosity, because Western populates got a bit tired of ThE sAnITaRy DiCtAtOrShIp

[Zinneke]

https://www.twitter.com/ESYudkowsky/status/1425619567703773184

But yeah the world will continue to drive a 500km/h supercar of globalism without the seatbelts and breaks required in their new technical monstrosity, because Western populates got a bit tired of ThE sAnITaRy DiCtAtOrShIp

This is literally a once in a century event though? I do not expect any new pandemics after covid at least until the 22nd century. At that point there will be very few if any Atlas posters left; including myself (doubt I'll live to my 100s). We need those factories and stuff now. We don't need to keep having them in the 2040s or 2050s. There is no need for pandemic preparedness. A pandemic already hit, and the next one isn't due until decades from now

Umm that's not how viruses work? Especially when certain governments fund weird experiments and have open wet markets for 1 billion man economies? That didn't exactly exist on such a scale before.

There's also the speed at which an undetected virus can spread. I think the movie Contagion showed exactly the existential issue in that sense.

[Zinneke]

These are just the official statistics:

Russia’s COVID-19 deaths set daily record

Gee I wonder why Putin is building up a military stand off with the West again?

[Zinneke]

The level of incompetence of the Belgian government knows no bounds : tomorrow will be the 3rd successive meeting revising lockdown rules in 15 days, all to change a couple of things there and some major things here...all little measures that have previously had little impact and when the previous measures have barely been evaluated yet. BUT EXPONENTIAL FUNCTION. BUT MY FRIEND OF A FRIEND SAID HER SCHOOL WAS LOCKED DOWN.

13 seats from a Nazbol majority...

[Zinneke]

Hopefully this is the last winter? You mean like last year we did a 6 month autumn-winter curfew because " it won't happen every year"...sorry but I don't believe for a second that we won't see similar case loads every winter/ travel period followed by a government response...how about addressing some structural issues like increasing healthcare capacity? Or prioritising vaccinated people for ICU beds?

Can we just aknowledge that had the big pharma people not found a vaccine (unlikely I know) there would be a case for locking down every single winter until we did, to save healthcare capacity? Instead of actually, increasing it?!

Just an example, Belgium STILL has a numerous fixus for medical students despite the pandemic exposing how strained health workers are.

[Zinneke]

Hopefully this is the last winter? You mean like last year we did a 6 month autumn-winter curfew because " it won't happen every year"...sorry but I don't believe for a second that we won't see similar case loads every winter/ travel period followed by a government response...how about addressing some structural issues like increasing healthcare capacity? Or prioritising vaccinated people for ICU beds?

Can we just aknowledge that had the big pharma people not found a vaccine (unlikely I know) there would be a case for locking down every single winter until we did, to save healthcare capacity? Instead of actually, increasing it?!

Just an example, Belgium STILL has a numerous fixus for medical students despite the pandemic exposing how strained health workers are.

Yeah, the bottom line is that doing this every winter is not going to be acceptable to most people.

Not only that, what's unacceptable is how some things get banned and other things are just casually allowed. Case in point : the whole Christmas office party is allowed in UK but work from home is enforced. people are still allowed to pray indoors in a non-ventilated room, or have beers in in Belgium in a café by the hundreds yet just now my Church, the football stadium, has been ordered to be fan free despite being open air. There is zero logic to any of this other than who has the best lobbyist to keep their sector open (and I sympathize with every industry and cultural organisation, including churches, affected). It's just a total bust and when a real pandemic comes knocking or when real measures will be necessary for other catastrophic events social compliance will be at an all time low because of how insane the communication and saturation of our patience has unraveled.

Never has the word Omnishambles been so adequate in the way the public health and politicians have struggled with this.