Putin Tested Regularly For COVID-19, Controversially Resumes In-Person Meetings
Russia saw its single biggest one-day spike in COVID-19 cases Monday, at 954 new cases – amid a current total of 7,497 confirmed cases and 59 deaths – most centered in Moscow.
Despite the Russian capital by far seeing most cases, nearly all of Russia’s 140 million plus citizens are currently in “home isolation” even though some regions have yet to see a single case in the geographically expansive country.
Meanwhile, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday that President Vladimir Putin is being tested regularly for COVID-19 after previously shaking hands with Moscow doctor Denis Protsenko, himself shortly after confirmed for the virus, which caused Putin to work remotely in isolation since the March 24 encounter.
Image via EPA/TASS
Speaking of Putin, Peskov said, “[He gets tested] as often as his doctor sees fit,” without going into details. “I do not deal with the matters of the president’s medical care,” he added.
The response arose after Putin appeared to loosen up his self-isolation regimen, given on Monday top officials from the country’s far east traveled to the Kremlin to meet with Putin in person.
According to TASS, “Peskov noted that Putin’s decision to hold a meeting with Presidential Envoy to the Far Eastern Federal District Yuri Trutnev and Minister for the Development of the Far East and Arctic Alexander Kozlov at the Kremlin is not a violation of the self-isolation regime.”
“Yes, he [Putin] did come to the Kremlin yesterday,” Peskov said, while adding the president “does not visit public places and does not meet a large amount of people.”
Putin’s visit to a Moscow hospital March 24, via Sputnik.
Peskov emphasized this includes not only Putin himself being subject to regular tests, but anyone in his presence or who enters his office for a meeting. “All precautionary measures are being taken.”
In a speech to the public outlining the extension of a national paid work stoppage on Monday, Putin said some less-impacted regions will be able to loosen policies as local conditions see fit.
“There are regions where not a single case of the disease has been identified, although there are fewer of them as time goes on,” noted Putin.
Moscow hospital director Denis Protsenko, later confirmed for coronavirus, shaking hands with the Russian president in late March, via TASS.
No doubt, Russian leaders are closely watching the condition of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who was moved to intensive care yesterday. Johnson is significantly younger (at 55) than the 67-year old Russian president.
“I would like to express my sincere support at this difficult moment for you,” Putin was quoted as saying in a Tuesday message to Johnson. “I am sure that your energy, optimism and sense of humor will help to defeat the disease.”
Living under lockdown restrictions, prevalent in nearly every state, is about to get a whole lot worse. The government in the United States and Canada has decided to take away the guesswork in the stores that are still open and decide for you what’s “essential” and what’s not.
When I have gone to the store to pick up groceries (I’m still getting fresh produce while I can), I also like to pick up a couple of things that are pleasant diversions: magazines, a crossword puzzle book, coloring pencils, some craft supplies. It’s nice to have some things that are enjoyable on hand to keep lockdown from feeling so grim and torturous. If the store is already open, getting a sunny yellow pillow for the living room is a pick-me-up, not a frivolous jaunt to a place I wasn’t already going. When we had a birthday in the family, we even picked up a few small gifts on our regular trip to the grocery store to provide a sense of normalcy.
But the days of getting a random item to brighten a family member’s day may be numbered. The government (at least in some places) wants to make this already unpleasant time as dismal as possible for us all.
Vermont has started a worrisome trend.
Vermont has decided to choose for you what is essential and what is not, banning the sale of non-essential items at stores like Target, Walmart, and Costco.
The Agency of Commerce and Community Development (ACCD) is directing large “big box” retailers, such as Walmart, Target and Costco, with in-store sales of food, beverage and pharmacy, as well as electronics, toys, clothing, and the like to cease in-person sales of non-essential items in order to reduce the number of people coming into the stores.
“Large ‘big box’ retailers generate significant shopping traffic by virtue of their size and the variety of goods offered in a single location,” said Agency of Commerce and Community Development Secretary Lindsay Kurrle. “This volume of shopping traffic significantly increases the risk of further spread of this dangerous virus to Vermonters and the viability of Vermont’s health care system. We are directing these stores to put public health first and help us reduce the number of shoppers by requiring on-line ordering, delivery and curbside pickup whenever possible, and by stopping the sale of non-essential items.” (source)
Retailers are asked to close certain areas of the stores, rope them off to deny access, or pull non-essentials from their shelves.
So a store you’re already at is telling you that grabbing some hand lotion to soothe your dry, cracked skin from the constant application of hand sanitizer is non-essential? Getting a book to read while you’re locked down is against the rules? You can’t do a home improvement project while you’re stuck at home?
I fail to see how this is going to stop the spread of a coronavirus if the shopper is already at the store and the employees are also already at the store.
In fact, it seems to me that this would be helpful to our gasping and dying economy. But what would I know? Dinesh Iyer, Assistant Professor of Management at Rutgers School of Business-Camden, says the stores don’t need our frivolous little purchases.
“I think the economy can wait,” he said. “Most corporations have access to debt and finances that are not available to the common folk.”
Corporations can “leverage their assets and tide through difficult times” by borrowing larger sums of money at lower interest rates and more frequently than you or I can,” he said.
“We have an opportunity to do all the things around the house that we have been putting off, spend time with family, learn a new skill,” Iyer said.
“The online shopping can wait,” Iyer said. “But if you must, you can always add the items of interest to your wish-list. And after the crisis, if you still need it, go for it. In the meantime, conserve the resources. You will be saving lives.” (source)
It’s rather curious how Iyer thinks us “common folk” will be able to do those things around the house and learn new skills without the supplies to do so.
One of the most alarming things is that garden supplies are considered non-essential.
Of all the times in the world you need most to plant a garden, now is the time. But in Vermont’s directive, even the sale of garden supplies is non-essential.
…showrooms and garden sections of large home improvement centers should be closed. (source)
And readers shared this photo from a store in Vermont.
The government of Vermont says that it isn’t really accurate.
Recent pictures circulating on social media appear to be from a box store which has roped off access to “non-essential” areas of the store, per guidance from ACCD, with various seed packets behind the roped-off section. As stated above, agricultural seeds have been deemed “essential” in Vermont per the Governor’s executive order, however a homeowner’s access to seeds has been modified to meet the Governor’s executive order.
We’re hoping that retailers and consumers alike restrict in-person shopping to items that need to be purchased in-person and are of a time sensitive nature. While the state recognizes the importance of gardening as a source of food for many Vermonters, the ability to browse for seeds and purchase them in person doesn’t outweigh the risk of spreading the virus. Retailers can continue to make seeds available online, delivery and curbside. (source)
Okay. You can just buy them online…or can you?
Buying seeds online isn’t an option either.
Almost every seed company readers in the preparedness community have tried to make purchases from has said, sorry, but we’re just selling to commercial operations this year.
Johnny’s Select Seeds has the following announcement on their home page:
Here’s what you can expect as of March 31st, 2020:
At this time, we are accepting new orders only from commercial farmers shipping to the U.S. and Canada and international wholesale customers. We plan to resume taking orders from all customers on April 14th. This restriction applies to all orders placed via our website, phone, and email. This was a difficult decision and we apologize for the inconvenience.
Commercial Farmers only: Please login to your website account before placing your order or call our contact center at 1-877-564-6697 for assistance. If you have forgotten your password, you can find information on resetting your password here.
Orders placed with our standard shipping option prior to March 31st, 2020 may experience a shipment delay of 5–10 days. Commercial orders placed on or after March 31st, 2020 may experience a shipment delay of 1–2 days.
You may experience a longer than usual response time when you phone in your order, call on us to answer growing questions, or email us to make inquiries.
We have closed our retail store in Winslow, Maine, and will not be hosting farm tours until further notice.
We remain honored that you have chosen Johnny’s. Whether you have been buying from Johnny’s for 25 years or this is your first order, please know that we care deeply about helping you through the challenges of this coronavirus outbreak. Call or email us if you need growing advice or help finding products. (source)
So…you can’t get seeds from your local Walmart garden center if you’re in Vermont and you can’t order seeds from seed stores. Good luck with that garden you were hoping would help see you through this disaster unless you’ve already got seeds put back from previous years.
What can we expect?
I think it’s extremely likely that Vermont’s idea will catch on and spread across the country. Just like lockdowns began in a couple of areas then spread state by state, don’t be surprised when this trend does also. The province of Ontario in Canada has just closed all their hardware stores and is limiting purchases only to curbside pick-up. Here’s what you need to be prepared to see:
Don’t expect that you’re going to be able to pop over to Lowes or Home Depot to pick up seedlings – or even seeds – for your summer garden.
Don’t expect that you’ll be able to replace your children’s flipflops or sandals for the summer regardless of the growth of their feet – this could be considered “non-essential.”
Don’t expect to be able to replace clothing for growing children – at least not in person.
Don’t expect to get any summer toys for the kids to play with while they’re in the back-yard – non-essential.
Don’t expect to be able to buy a bigger size of pants because you ate all your quarantine candy. You’re going to have to squeeze yourself into your old pants.
Don’t expect to be able to get the fabric to make masks – remember? Craft supplies are non-essential.
Really, don’t expect anything. Because for some reason, it seems like governments want to make an already difficult and stressful time even worse by taking away the possibility for any kind of pleasant past-time unless you already have all the supplies you need for that.
This senseless crackdown not only makes things even more unpleasant, but it takes away even more streams of revenue for struggling businesses. And more than that, it’s limiting our ability to be as self-reliant as possible, leaving people to fight it out at the grocery store for dwindling resources with few options for creating our own food supplies.
Those living in Vermont have unfortunately missed their window for anything but mail order. For the rest of us, if there are some things you were hoping to get – be it new curtains, paint for the living room, tile for the bathroom, pots for your container garden, or the supplies to make a new chicken coop – you’d better get it now before your state follows the lead of Vermont.
“Historic Moment” – Robo Van Shuttles COVID-19 Tests At Mayo Clinic In Florida
At a time when America’s hospital systems are overwhelmed with COVID-19 cases and deaths, one hospital system in Florida is using autonomous vehicles to transport medical supplies and test kits.
The Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida, recently announced that self-driving shuttles would transport COVID-19 tests from a drive-in testing clinic to the processing lab.
Autonomous shuttles help transport COVID-19 tests at Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida
According to Mayo’s press release, “health care resources and staff are stretched thin,” and the hospital system believes robots can help limit exposure to the virus and free up healthcare workers’ time.
Mayo says four shuttles have been in operation since March 30. The program is in partnership with the Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA), Beep, and NAVYA, all working together to ensure autonomous vehicle safety.
“This development is a historic moment for the Jacksonville Transportation Authority,” said Nathaniel P. Ford, Sr., CEO of JTA.
“Along with our partners, Beep, NAVYA, and Mayo Clinic, we are leveraging our learnings from three years of testing autonomous vehicles through our Ultimate Urban Circulator program. Our innovative team saw this as an opportunity to use technology to respond to this crisis in Northeast Florida and increase the safety of COVID-19 testing.”
Kent Thielen, MD, CEO of Mayo Clinic in Florida, said, “Using artificial intelligence enables us to protect staff from exposure to this contagious virus by using cutting-edge autonomous vehicle technology and frees up staff time that can be dedicated to direct treatment and care for patients.”
The proliferation of autonomous vehicles to transport infectious disease tests and medical supplies suggests that the pandemic could be the trigger for major hospital systems across the US to embrace an age of automation. We’ve noted on several occasions that robots will displace at least 20 million jobs through 2030. However, the virus crisis will likely speed up this transformative period, and instead of happening over ten years, it could come a lot quicker.
It’s been found that seven years ago, Dr. Anthony Fauci expressed that he was encouraged by lab tests involving a combination of drugs that included hydroxychloroquine in antiviral experiments on a SARS-like coronavirus that had emerged at the time.
Some observers are seeing that as puzzling…
Fauci, NIAID director and current Coronavirus Task Force rock star, has long been widely looked to as the nation’s ultimate authority on infectious diseases. As such, his record and history of public comments are especially subject to scrutiny and critiques at a time such as the current societal upheaval sweeping the globe.
An ongoing point of contention being amplified by the media is Fauci’s cautious present-day perspective on the use of hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for COVID-19, while so many others are eager to embrace the encouraging indicators of its potential effectiveness against today’s novel coronavirus.
“We don’t have to start designing new drugs,” a process that takes years, Fauci says. “The next time someone comes into an emergency room in Qatar or Saudi Arabia, you would have drugs that are readily available. And at least you would have some data.”
“Even though the treatment hasn’t gone through definitive trials, Fauci says, “if I were a physician in a hospital and someone were dying, rather than do nothing, you can see if these work.”
Fauci, now so sour on hydroxychloroquine (+/- azithro) for covid19, despite its clinical promise, gushed in 4/2013 when a coronavirus [MERS] antiviral combo [ribavirin /interferon-alpha)] tested “only in cells in lab dishes” prevented viral replication! https://t.co/c9aN1b0nvZpic.twitter.com/KBTLDUeIUW
President Trump has repeatedly expressed his hope for hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), even as Fauci has been careful to temper Trump’s enthusiasm for the drug’s prospects.
On Friday, Fauci provided a nuanced explanation of his views on HCQ as a coronavirus treatment when he appeared on “Fox & Friends.”
Brian pushes back, saying civilians & drs in some countries are taking HCQ for coronavirus, and wondering if people already on it are getting the virus. Fauci says “we really don’t care” if people *think* it works, “that’s not the issue,” & we should protect those already on it. pic.twitter.com/iPDDBLDhRV
The Fox News hosts directed Fauci’s attention to a recent Sermo poll of more than 6000 physicians in 30 countries in which 37 percent rated HCQ as the “most effective therapy” in treating the novel coronavirus.
“We don’t operate on how you ‘feel,’” Fauci commented, pointing out that the survey measured feelings or opinions.
“We operate on what evidence is and data is.”
“Fox & Friends” also played a clip of Dr. Mehmet Cengiz Öz directly asking for Fauci’s thoughts about HCQ’s promise as suggested in a “Chinese study from Wuhan, reflecting statistically significant improvement in recovering from fever, from cough, and from pneumonia as well.”
“That was not a very robust study,” Fauci replied. “It is still possible that there is a beneficial effect, but the study that was just quoted, on a scale of strength of evidence, that’s not overwhelmingly strong. It’s an indication, a hint of it.”
He added:
“So although there is some suggestion that there is a benefit there, I think we’ve got to be careful that we don’t make that majestic leap to assume that this is a knockout drug. We still need to do the kinds of studies that definitively prove that any intervention, not just this one, but any intervention is truly safe and effective.”
“But when you don’t have that information,” the doctor added, “it’s understandable, and I grant that … it’s understandable why people may want to take something anyway, even with the slightest hint of it being effective, and I have no problem with that.”
The 79-year-old Fauci has served as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since 1984, having served under six U.S. presidents, beginning with Ronald Reagan.
“I’d Rather Stay Unemployed Than Risk My Life” – Grocery Store Workers Strike As COVID-19 Deaths Soar
As we’ve been warning over the last several weeks, the beginning innings of social unrest in the Western world could be developing. Millions of people have just lost their jobs, the economy has crashed, and suicides and domestic violence are increasing, this is all the characteristics of a recession, if not a depression in the second quarter.
Last week, Amazon and Instacart workers kicked off strikes to demand safety equipment and better pay amid the virus pandemic that has left some of their colleagues in the hospital, infected with the deadly virus. Amazon employees walked out of a Staten Island warehouse on Monday, the second week in a row. We noted last week how strikes and protests would likely spread “to other businesses.”
And we were right, now workers at some Massachusetts grocery stores will protest on Tuesday morning to demand medical equipment and the need for hazard pay as their probabilities of contracting the virus are high.
Organizers told WCVB Boston that employees from Whole Foods, Stop & Shop, Trader Joes & Shaw are expected to join the rally, scheduled for 1100ET outside the Whole Foods at 348 Harrison Ave in Boston.
The organizers are requesting that employers provide workers with “hazard pay of time and half for the duration of the COVID-19 crisis.” During the protest, workers are expected to abide by Massachusetts’ social distancing rules and stand 6 feet apart from others.
The protest comes as major supermarket chains across the country are starting to report an increase in virus cases and deaths.
On Monday, a Trader Joe’s worker in Scarsdale, New York, an employee at a Giant store in Largo, Maryland., and two Walmart employees from the same Chicago-area store have just died in recent days after their exposure to COVID-19, the companies said on Monday.
Some experts are saying the rise of virus cases and deaths at supermarkets across the country is because companies did not adequately prepare workers for a public health crisis:
“One of the biggest mistakes supermarkets made early on was not allowing employees to wear masks and gloves the way they wanted to,” Supermarket analyst Phil Lempert said. “They’re starting to become proactive now, but it’s still going to be much tougher to hire hundreds of thousands of new workers. We’re going to start seeing people say, ‘I’ll just stay unemployed instead of risking my life for a temporary job.'”
Strikes and protests aren’t limited to an Amazon warehouse or Instant cart workers and or supermarkets, but now spreading to the fast-food industry.
McDonald’s workers in Los Angeles staged a strike on Monday, demanding face masks and hand sanitizer after an employee tested positive for the virus.
Bartolome Perez, 30, a cook at the McDonald’s, told Fox 11 Los Angeles that a fellow employee tested positive.
“We’ve been pleading for protective equipment for more than a month now, but McDonald’s is putting profits ahead of our health,” Perez said.
Perez claims that McDonald’s has yet to pay for any healthcare costs associated with testing employees. The restaurant has been shut down for sanitation.
Amazon and Instacart strikes last week have inspired the beginning innings of protests among low-income/low-wage workers, as it appears employees of Target’s delivery service Shipt will also strike on Tuesday.
And here’s some bad news that we outlined about the global COVID-19 infection curve on Monday, it appears the US is still in the exponential rise phase (acceleration), which means more people will get infected and die.
The evolution of the pandemic is social unrest, already developing with strikes and protests at major companies.
The intrusion of some wholly extraneous event – like a pandemic – into any given status quo doesn’t necessarily break it, in and of itself. But it exposes cruelly the shortcomings and workings of the existing status quo. It shows them, as not just stark naked, but also with its dark backstage of barely legal, dole-outs to business, and Wall Street friends, suddenly spotlighted.
Fyodor Dostoevsky sets out in The Brothers Karamazov an allegory that can be applied to our times, but was set in Seville, in the most terrible time of the Inquisition, when fires were lighted every day to the glory of God (rather than today’s ‘glory to Mammon’), and in that splendid auto da fé, when wicked ‘heretics’ were burnt alive. It was published in 1880.
Into this city an entirely extraneous (shall we say non-human) event occurs, that deeply unsettles society: Citizens are suddenly snatched-up from their humdrum daily slog to see the status quo afresh – but now with eyes wide open.
The Grand Inquisitor of Seville is outraged. This extraneous occurrence risks spoiling his carefully contrived status quo:
“Oh, we shall persuade them [the citizenry of Seville] that they will only become free when they renounce their freedom to us, and submit to us. And shall we be right, or shall we be lying? They will be convinced that we are right … Receiving bread from us, they will see clearly that we take the bread made by their hands from them – [only] to give it back to them … In truth they will be more thankful for taking it from our hands – than for the bread itself! Too well, will they know the value of complete submission! We shall show them that they are weak, that they are only pitiful children, but that childlike happiness is the sweetest of all.
“We will indulge them their sins; allow them to occupy themselves with their vices. We will monitor everything, regulate everything, order and legislate for everything – and be their conscience too – so that they do not have to trouble themselves to think, overly; or, to be obliged to make decisions. They exist only to serve us, the élite who rule over them: The millions, numerous as the sands of the sea, who are weak, must exist only for the élite, who rule over them. In this mystery, says the Grand Inquisitor, “lies the great secret of the world”.
Well, here we are: We have an extraneous event: Covid-19. It is different, of course. The Inquisitor literally burnt-out the threat (alive), to the existing order in Seville. Similarly, our ‘Elect’ of today, are equally agog to preserve the status quo. And for reasons very similar to those of the Inquisitor.
Today’s élites face, however, a much more complex paradigm: We are speaking here more of the consequences of Covid-19 on collective human psychology, rather than about the efficacy of any actions taken, or not taken, by the Fed, or G7 Central Banks. The threat in Seville, fundamentally, was about psychological transformation: The Seville ‘event’ induced citizens to question meaning in their lives – and to doubt human agency (and élite ‘agency’, in particular). It didn’t end well in Russia – or for the Inquisitors, ultimately.
The issue for governments – at bottom – is how to resurrect an economy that has been placed into hibernation. Western leaders are fearful that if it is not awakened – and quickly – there may be permanent damage to the infrastructure of the real economy – and consequently, a series of defaults leading to a possible financial crisis, or implosion (i.e. curtains for the status quo). So, we hear a lot now about the cure being worse than the disease, i.e. a locked-down economy can be more harmful than letting people die of Covid-19.
But the paradox here is that élites have no agency. This is not the War on Terror. There is no one to blame (though the U.S. would like to pin Covid-19 on China): ‘We didn’t start it’. ‘Death’ came to us – an event from ‘the beyond’. Combatting it has been declared ‘a full war’ nonetheless. There is nothing tangible, no real enemy ‘to fight’ – just a shape-shifting virus, that virologists tell us is not ‘alive’, but represents organisms that lie at the very edge of life. Such entities cannot literally be ‘killed’.
And how to fight this war? Where is the battle plan? There is none. There can be none (beyond mitigating the reach of death). Dr John Ioannidis, Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at Stanford University, tells us that the modelling on which government plans for its ‘military’ campaign wholly depend is worthless:
“The data collected so far on how many people are infected and how the epidemic is evolving are utterly unreliable. Given the limited testing to date, some deaths and probably the vast majority of infections due to SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) are being missed. We don’t know if we are failing to capture infections by a factor of three or 300. Three months after the outbreak emerged, most countries, including the U.S., lack the ability to test a large number of people and no countries have reliable data on the prevalence of the virus in a representative random sample of the general population …”.
Mortality rates, too, are similarly all over the place: As researchers debate what’s causing Italy’s 10%+ mortality rate, one thing is indisputable: mortality rates are climbing. Virtually every nation that has a large number of reported cases has continued to see mortality rates climb. In Spain, the mortality rate now stands at 8.7%. Ten days ago, it stood at 5.4%. In the Netherlands, the mortality rate stands at 8.3%. Ten days ago, it stood at 3.8%. In the United Kingdom, the mortality rate stands at 7.1%. Ten days ago, it stood at 4.6%. In France, the mortality rate stands at 6.7. Ten days ago, it stood at 3.9%.
Death, in other words, it seems, may be getting the upper hand in this ‘war’.
And yet, behind the governmental fear for the financial and economic status quolies another ‘demon’: mass hysteria and revolt, by those who, now unemployed, haven’t the money to buy food. Again this – the psychology of a rioting mob – is a figment of collective psyche. It can’t literally by killed by soldiers. This psyche is already beginning in the south of Italy where people, who say they are hungry and have no money, are storming supermarkets, and looting food. (It is only food, for now, but soon, it will be raiding for money).
Social disorder and riot is likely to spook governments even more than the deflating balloon of their economies. But isn’t this what the ‘War on Death’ paradigm is about? Police on the streets; the army patrolling; martial law; and the criminalisation of unauthorised movement: It is mounted in readiness for the prospect of popular revolt: against the fear that the Paris – mainly immigrant – banlieues, or the Italian Mezzogiorno, will explode.
The Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies recently warned that a “social bomb could explode at any moment” over Western cities. That is because the evolution of the pandemic, which has crashed the American economy into a depression, could result in social unravelling in major metros, specifically in low-income areas.
A governmental desperation – stemming from the risks of social and economic disintegration – is likely to push governments to gamble on either an early-ish lifting of social-distancing, or a partial lifting. But the same dilemma applies: governments will be doing this ‘blind’, or on the basis of empirically flawed modelling.
And a gamble it is. The Signier Laboratory gives us this illustration of the possible maths behind ‘distancing’:
This, like most current models, is guess-work in terms of the underlying assumptions (such as a rate of infection of 2.5). But its’ message is clear. Going for partial opening or localised opening will invite some sort of Phase Two. China already is experiencing this – and has had to lockdown Jin Province, after it had just opened Hubei.
Where then does the balance of advantage lie for desperate leaderships? Who knows? A phase II may arrive anyway; the virus might mutate (as happened in August 1918, with Spanish ‘flu), and become more (or less) lethal. What makes Covid-19 infection particularly difficult to manage or predict is that it drops infection from day ‘0’, yet the carrier will not experience any sense of having been infected (or being ill at all) until 5–8 days later. Yet all that time, he or she will be 100% infectious – and potentially spreading a new phase. (There is no general testing for antibodies).
Governments likely will ease distancing anyway to alleviate the social and economic pressures. They will have their fingers crossed that Covid-19 does not return in a new phase to ‘thumb its nose’ – and make a nonsense of all these measures. It is a gamble – and these governments’ credibility will be on the line – whatever they choose. They are becalmed between Scylla and Charybdis: no good options.
So, where does this take us? To a (not unexpected) schizophrenia. On the one hand, there are those – so in thrall (in the J B Yeats sense) to the status quo – that anything other than a rapid re-instatement of ‘normality is beyond their reach. Mental retort sealed shut. As one example:
“One well known set of UK asset managers this morning [yesterday] are blithely predicting a V-Shaped recovery from the third quarter onwards …They think QE Infinity packages have “resolved” the debt bubble, the equity market is now realistically priced for a global recovery, governments have mitigated the damage, and we will see a massive jump in sentiment, activity and repressed demand when the lockdowns end, and economies reopen – with a leap of unfettered joy”.
This line of thinking holds that what is happening in the U.S. and Europe is not a real recession. The economic fundamentals were great. We shut down the economy only because of Covid-19. So, if we were just to start it back up again – everything will be fine.
But, just as heavy doses of refined sugar may impact the human brain in a manner similar to addictive drugs by releasing dopamine, the brain’s “reward” chemical. So too, since 2008/9, we have what Dan Amoss calls, a ‘sugar-rush economy’.
So, the prescription inevitably – to maintain the status quo – is more sugar, more spending and more money printing. And if the effect starts to wane, the reaction is to ‘double the dose’. It is all wishful thinking. It’s a part of the delusion. The economy wasn’t fine. Since 2008, the Fed has fed a sugar-rush economy. It’s a bubble. That’s the problem. And the bubble may have been fatally pricked.
What happens, when finally, we are released from lockdown: We will walk out – still blinking – into the daylight, but it will be a very different world. We will see that human agency – i.e. our governments – were wholly unable to have wrung a scintilla of victory from this war. Recriminations will multiply. If death has retreated – finally it will be because nature, and biology, willed it. There is, of course, human agency – but there are other forces at work in this Cosmos of ours, that can make human Promethean hubris appear pathetic.
It was just such insight that so unsettled Seville, in Dostoevsky’s allegory. The extraneous ‘intrusion’ into their city jerked into consciousness half-forgotten memories of what it is to be fully human, and recalled a different mode of human potential. Intimations of mortality, often do that trick (too), of course.
What follows will be a more hesitant, cautious world. Shocked economically, and at our root we will, I suspect, be much more careful in the future: credit cards will be cut in two; we will try to save more, and we will adapt ‘downwards’. Will we go out and spend liberally? A pent-up ‘jump in sentiment’? No. The experience for all has been chastening. Who now sees the future with any certainty? Every aspect of life is going to be changed. Some of the smaller businesses will open, but many will remain shut. Many of us will continue to work from home. Many of us won’t work at all – and may never work again.
But what seems to be searing the public consciousness is of a different mode: Empathy during the pandemic – there was none. (Recall the comments how Covid-19 striking down Hubei would be good for America). Solidarity – there was none (at least from the EU, to be sure); Leadership – there was none, yet semi-legal corruption – abundant. Trump has taken charge of the U.S. Treasury, which in turn, now fully controls the dollar printing presses of the Fed. Trump is King Dollar. He can print whatever he likes. Give it to whomsoever he wants (via the Treasury’s secretive Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs)), outsourced to Blackrock Fund. The U.S. Budget now is toast.
“Would you want to be a Democratic candidate running against [a Trump] spending USD2 trillion on infrastructure in a weak economy? Good luck with that!”
Eyes wide open: Where is our moral compass – as well as our common humanity?
The mask is off: Is this the point of inflection for the global order, when the western hyper-financialised system is unable to reform itself, refuses to reform itself – and yet is unable to sustain itself, as it once was?
Will the system – so busily engaged in looking after itself – even notice that the world doesn’t believe in it anymore, not even one jot?
“Sickest Part Of A Sick America”: The Region Where Health Officials Fear The Worst COVID-19 Devastation
After New Orleans last month emerged as the United States’ new southern epicenter for the coronavirus pandemic, threatening other states across the region, a review in Bloomberg Law of how the South as already “the sickest part of America” could be hit hardest before the crisis eventually wanes paints a very bleak picture.
Home to the highest rates of obesity, hypertension, heart attacks, and strokes, combined with expansive rural and impoverished areas that have poor health care access, the South is especially vulnerable for a “virus that is particularly lethal for people with underlying health conditions,” according to the report.
“Covid-19 is going to be a disaster in the Southeast,” Aaron Milstone, a Tennessee pulmonologist, told Bloomberg Law. “We’ll see higher morbidity, which is getting sick from the virus, and higher mortality, which is dying from the virus.”
Rural South file image via Medium.com
Further, the report reads, “Four of the five states with the highest diabetes rates are in the South. And eight didn’t expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, leaving thousands of families without access to routine care, even as financially troubled rural hospitals wither away.”
These are factors that might help explain the recent surprise explosion of cases in Louisiana, in addition of course to the fact that Mardis Gras – which ran in total from January 6 to Fat Tuesday on February 25 – witnessed one million plus tourists and revelers from outside states and countries descend on the Big Easy. Concerning Louisiana, Bloomberg Law observes further:
That prediction is already playing out in Louisiana, which saw Covid-19 infections and deaths soar in New Orleans after weeks of Carnival celebrations ended last month. Of the 239 Covid-19 fatalities there, 40% had diabetes, 25% were obese and 21% had heart problems, according to state figures.
The Bayou State saw another jump in coronavirus numbers Monday: more than 1,800 cases in a single day, to a total of 16,284 confirmed cases. Over 4,000 of these are in New Orleans.
“We, in general, have a sicker population, and we are concerned that our outcomes in the Covid-19 pandemic are going to be worse because of that,” Joseph Kanter, an assistant state health officer, described.
Map and data via The Guardian/Johns Hopkins CSSE
Describing further of what the report dubs “the sickest part of the country,” it profiles the greater general vulnerability further:
Those conditions run rampant in the South, according to the nonprofit United Health Foundation. For example, Mississippians are 85% more likely to die of cardiovascular disease than Minnesotans, and 41.9% of Arkansans have high blood pressure, compared with 24.5% in Utah, according to the organization’s America’s Health Rankings report. The region also has a large African-American population, which is disproportionately prone to the underlying conditions.
The authors conclude the southern governors should have acted much faster to declare blanket ‘stay at home’ emergency orders state-wide, which some like Florida were very slow to do, and still with some hold-outs.
That was just one conclusion from Simon Dixon, CEO of cryptocurrency funding platform BnkToTheFuture, in the latest episode of financial news program the Keiser Report on April 7.
Dixon: “World’s largest regulated Ponzi scheme” is dying
Discussing the global coronavirus epidemic and its impact on global finance, Dixon warned that the health aspect of the crisis was by no means its worst.
“I don’t want to be dramatic, but this is a global reset in the financial system,” he told host Max Keiser.
Coming after, he said, was a massive “scrambling” for power by governments and central banks. Taxpayers and those forced to rely on fiat money will pay the price.
Dixon continued:
“I think we’re going to see a real attack from central banks on traditional banks as we inevitably experience the ginormous consequences of essentially the world’s largest regulated Ponzi scheme.”
After coronavirus: “A horrible, worse version of fiat currency”
The theory argues that central lending institutions will allow banks to die and instead allow citizens to open digital currency accounts directly with them.
As a result, control of money, and hence people who are forced to use it, will become so easy that the world will enter what Keiser describes as “neo-feudalism.”
The birth of this dire state of affairs will be helped by coronavirus — banning cash because of concerns over infection is one such example.
“You’re going to end up with a very, very horrible, worse version of fiat currency to the one we have now, created by banks as debt,” Dixon continued.
As Cointelegraph reported, Keiser as well is no stranger to warning consumers about the unavoidable collapse of fiat hegemony.
“I have a moral responsibility to keep my 2011 #BTC HODL’ed,” he tweeted over the weekend.
“To legitimize any fiat debt-coupons in any way now… When we are on the edge of victory, would be a crime against humanity.”
Last week, Keiser likened gold to “toilet paper for the rich” as the industry underwent a severe liquidity squeeze. Bitcoin, he and many others contend, is the “hardest” money that has ever existed.
Cointelegraph has additionally touched on the characteristics which serve to make Bitcoin a much safer long-term investment than gold.
Yale Students Demand Automatic ‘Pass’ Due To COVID-19
Students at Yale are demanding a “universal pass” this semester due to coronavirus, after the college switched to virtual classes. This means no grades, deadlines or benchmarks for the Ivy League students, according to Yale grad Esteban Elizondo in a New York Post Op-Ed.
As representatives of one of America’s most important institutions, I assumed Yale students would rise to the occasion and lead their communities during a crisis. Instead, they see an international health disaster as an opportunity to nullify the one meritocratic standard the college has left: grades.
Their call for a Universal Pass betrays a mindset spreading among too many Yale students: “I should be shielded from every crisis.”
Any trouble in the world is apparently too great an emotional load for my peers to bear. Parkland shooting? Time to walk out of class. Climate change? Let’s have a school-wide “strike.” Coronavirus? Just cancel grades. That’s the only solution. –New York Post
According to Elizondo, Yale – “led by mollycoddler-in-chief Peter Salovey” – is feeding a defeatist mentality which trains students to expect that the university will drop academic standards at the drop of a hat. After President Trump was elected, for example, professors bent the knee when students demanded midterms be canceled due to their mental health.
Instead of a “universal pass,” Yale administration has offered students the option of a “Pass/Fail” grading system – but the students, including the Yale College Council Senate, are still demanding that every student be given a the no-questions-asked, no-effort-required universal pass where everyone gets a “P.”
Harvard, meanwhile, has adopted an Emergency Satisfactory/Emergency Unsatisfactory (SEM/UEM) grading system for spring semester.
Universal Pass, unsurprisingly, has been framed as a fight for low-income students. Infantilizing the disadvantaged is a typical activist behavior at Yale. Whether protestors are “striking” because of climate change’s effect on indigenous communities or pushing for the nullification of grades because a slipping economy will harm low-income students, the demands of elite Yalies always conveniently line up with those of the underprivileged.
But, in reality, this latest crusade is just an excuse to do less work and abolish academic standards altogether. In my four years at Yale, I was consistently shocked by the creative excuses used by my peers to skip classes and exams. It’s quite brilliant, really — get out of class and virtue signal by arguing it’s a way to “advocate” for low-income students. I wish I had that type of ingenuity in second grade. You can only fake a stomachache so many times. –New York Post
Elizondo argues that the Universal Pass actually hurts disadvantaged students by “ending their ability to distinguish themselves based on merit,” while helping rich kids with connections pursue postgraduate opportunities, as prestigious employers and top-tier grad schools are more likely to overlook a ‘passing’ grade during a difficult time.
The author concludes by suggesting that the real motives for easing standards have nothing to do with coronavirus at all.
“What students really want is to jettison grading permanently so they don’t have to work so hard. It’s nothing but laziness and virtue signaling disguised as activism.“
On April 5, a series of large explosions rocked the village of al-Kastan in southwestern Idlib injuring 8 people, including 3 members of the so-called White Helmets. According to local sources, an ammunition depot located in the civilian area inside the city became the source of the explosion.
Al-Kastan is located near the town of Jisr al-Shughur, controlled by the Al-Qaeda-linked Turkistan Islamic Party. The exploded weapon depot likely belonged to the terrorist group or persons affiliated with it.
On the same day, the Turkish military established three new ‘observation posts’ around Jisr al-Shughur. They are located at the villages of Baksariya, al-Z’ainiyah and Furaykah. Idlib militants see Turkish positions as an important defense line that would allow containing possible Russia- and Iran-backed anti-terrorist operations in the area.
The 46th Regiment Base of the Syrian Army in western Aleppo came under Turkish artillery shelling. In response, Syrian forces struck position of Turkish-backed militants near Kafr Amma. The attack on the 46th Regiment Base became a third incident between the Turkish military and Syrian troops in less than a week. On April 3, two Syrian soldiers were killed in a Turkish artillery strike on their positions near Tell Abyad.
On April 4, Iraq’s largest resistance groups released a joint statement calling the US military “occupation forces” that “respect the language of force only”. In the statement, Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq, Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba, Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada, Kata’ib al-Imam Ali, Harakat al-Awfiy’a, Saraya Ashura, Harakat Jund al-Imam and Saraya al-Khurasani added that recent attacks on US forces and facilities in Iraq were only a “minor response” to the US aggression and the decision to carry out full-scale attacks was not taken then.
Two days earlier, on April 2, Usbat al-Tha’ireen, the armed group that claimed responsibility for rocket strikes on Camp Taji and other US positions, released a 3-minute long drone footage of the US embassy in Baghdad’s heavily-fortified Green Zone. This is the largest and most expensive embassy in the world, and is nearly as large as Vatican City.
The US Central Command officially confirmed deployment of Patriot air defense systems in Iraq. However, the US military announced that it will not provide “ status updates as those systems come online” for security reasons. At least two Patriot batteries are now located in at the US military bases of Ayn al-Assad and Erbil. Two more Patriot batteries will reportedly be deployed soon.
As part of its plan to redeploy forces to larger, more fortified bases, the US evacuated its troops from the al-Taqaddum Air Base in the province of al-Anbar. It became the fourth US military facility abandoned in Iraq within the last few weeks. The previous ones were located in al-Qaim, Kirkuk and al-Qayyarah.
Iraqi sources say that the US actions demonstrate that Washington is preparing for a new round of military confrontation with Iran and its allies in the region. Recently, President Donald Trump stated that the US was expecting attacks by Iranian-led forces on US troops and facilities, claiming that Iran will ‘pay price’ for this. Following the statement, Iran deployed additional anti-ship missiles and multiple rocket launchers on the Qeshm Island in the Strait of Horumz.
