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ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: obvert


Without good journalism, a free press, we veer toward authoritarianism. It's very surprising to hear so much critique of it here.

I can't speak for the others, but I yearn for a free and independent press. We don't have it and with the current media we are veering to authoritarianism.

I do read and listen to all sides, and I consider myself an independent thinker. See WITPQS link above for more detail.

You are misconstruing at least my argument. Very badly.

Explain what a "free and independent press" looks like?

Who will fund it? Who will create it? If there is so much demand for it, why doesn't it exist already?

Have we ever had what you imagine as a "free and independent press?"

I've read the link you mention above. Nothing unexpected.

Everyone here posting critiques of the "media" are from the US, and every day fewer and fewer international forumites contribute to this thread. Anyone else notice that? Well, I've had a good number of PMs explaining why. Consider that for a moment.

This is not a US forum. Its international. There is a lot of good information here. If I post to counter the continual, daily rants about journalism it's because I'm afraid (from afar) of what I see happening in the States. Sorry, that's just honest. If we don't trust journalism, we are left without good sources of information to counter the intentionally misinformed information from many other newer sources.

Lowpe, you've been a great opponent and friend over the years here, and I'm trying really to understand, but I'll stand up for what I believe too. Sorry if I've misunderstood your view.

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

Correct Coronavirus NUMBERS will never be known and will be "area fire". Results may give a better picture than numbers.
After a surge in Annual Death Averages the number may drop due to people who died months earlier due to CoVid19.

This repost of a letter written to CDC from

Kenneth Stoller
International Hyperbaric Medical Association

show how "US data on influenza deaths are false and misleading."


https://aspe.hhs.gov/cdc-%E2%80%94-infl ... ection-rfc

Very interesting read. Again, profit seems an important factor in how medical decisions are made.

It is definitely true the public health authorities enlist the media to scare people about influenza but it's not to make money. Acute care hospitals would actually "benefit" from more hospitalized influenza cases. Vaccination reduces costs to the healthcare system. Even so, they really should be more objective in their announcements. This coming flu season it will be more important to immunize against flu because every patient with influenza is going to be indistinguishable from COVID without expensive and dangerous (to the healthcare teams) testing.

With this pandemic still rising in some parts of the world, and with many countries now considering how to reopen, a new article from the Guardian espouses a healthy pessimism may help us prepare. I feel so much better now. [;)]

Well, I don't really. The idea of so much suffering everywhere is not pleasant, and if this is going to keep us from normality for a long time, it's going to be hard on everyone. We do have to come to terms with acceptance though, that this has changed our world irrevocably. It will get better, but in fits and starts.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/ ... to-prepare

Last week, Chris Whitty, the UK chief medical adviser, said that social distancing would have to continue at least all year, while Canadians have been told to expect limits on travel and gatherings for likely around a year and a half. Donald Trump recently admitted that America’s pandemic guidelines – which he initially claimed would be null by Easter – would likely remain into summer and, enigmatically, “beyond that”. Some regions are considering how to gradually reopen their economies, yet the experiences of Asian countries where infections surged as restrictions eased serve as cautionary tales. Dozens of experts have attested there will be no quick return to our previous lives.

Now that we are no longer at the beginning of this pandemic but in the seemingly interminable middle, the more relevant question to ask is not “when will this end?” but “how can we cope with this dragging on?”

One healthy thing you can do is to pre-emptively curb disappointment by readjusting your horizons, says Dr Amelia Aldao, a psychologist specializing in anxiety. Some of us may still have our hopes fixed to an event in the future – a July wedding we half-expect to attend, or a September getaway we think might just work out - and that can be problematic, says Aldao. “The way things are shaping up, there’s a lot of uncertainty – what’s going to be open? Is there going to be a second wave [of outbreaks]?” We just don’t know.

If you have a half hour to spare, this is interesting on Sweden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_cont ... e=emb_logo

Professor Johan Giesecke, one of the world’s most senior epidemiologists, advisor to the Swedish Government (he hired Anders Tegnell who is currently directing Swedish strategy), the first Chief Scientist of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, and an advisor to the director general of the WHO, lays out with typically Swedish bluntness why he thinks:

- UK policy on lockdown and other European countries are not evidence-based
- The correct policy is to protect the old and the frail only
- This will eventually lead to herd immunity as a “by-product”
- The initial UK response, before the “180 degree U-turn”, was better
- The Imperial College paper was “not very good” and he has never seen an unpublished paper have so much policy impact
- The paper was very much too pessimistic
- Any such models are a dubious basis for public policy anyway
- The flattening of the curve is due to the most vulnerable dying first as much as the lockdown
- The results will eventually be similar for all countries
- Covid-19 is a “mild disease” and similar to the flu, and it was the novelty of the disease that scared people.
- The actual fatality rate of Covid-19 is the region of 0.1%
- At least 50% of the population of both the UK and Sweden will be shown to have already had the

I don't know why folks from other countries are staying away from the thread, if that's so. I haven't seen any forumite, American or otherwise, criticize the leader or the health practices of another country (with the exception of a few posts by UK folks about their own leader and country). Everyone has been respectful of Italy, Spain, France, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, UK, Japan, Korea, etc. (Well, there is one notable exception - China.)

But there have been many criticisms of America, American leaders, and American healthcare. Those have come from American forumites and those from other countries. That's probably because the US is a "superpower" and therefore a more obvious target. Okay. But don't suggest that we're being unkind/inhospitable to others here. We're simply defending what we think, what we know, what we believe in.

ORIGINAL: obvert
Explain what a "free and independent press" looks like?

One that is equally hard/questioning on the issues and doesn't attempt to change my mind but rather gives me the information to make an informed decision.

I limit my comments to the US press because that is what I understand.

I actually happen to know the long time editor of Phila largest paper, now retired. He would be the first to tell you that journalism moved from reporting to shaping information to impact change. Heck, he is a strong proponent of it and also that this policy shift hurt their bottom line substantially.

You may find it interesting, and not intuitive from your perspective, that I consider myself a Washingtonian American. I dislike both political parties. [:)]

Obvert is right! Everyone stop defending themselves. [;)]

Cases ramping up in Orange County, Calif. My wife's hospital just doubled their COVID ICU size with the help of FEMA.

My colleague admitted a patient with Kawasaki's Disease two days ago. High fever, conjunctivitis. COVID PCR negative but IGG antibody POSITIVE. The toddler had a bad case of coronary aneurysms (a serious complication of KD). Children's Hospital reporting a surge in KD patients (an uncommon condition).

Perhaps this is a post-infectious complication of COVID?

Playing the victim card is SOP for the Left.

Nothing to see here folks. just keep moving on.

I respectfully request we be allowed to criticized the Chicoms. It's the only good thing about COVID.[:)]

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

Obvert is right! Everyone stop defending themselves. [;)]

Cases ramping up in Orange County, Calif. My wife's hospital just doubled their COVID ICU size with the help of FEMA.

My colleague admitted a patient with Kawasaki's Disease two days ago. High fever, conjunctivitis. COVID PCR negative but IGG antibody POSITIVE. The toddler had a bad case of coronary aneurysms (a serious complication of KD). Children's Hospital reporting a surge in KD patients (an uncommon condition).

Perhaps this is a post-infectious complication of COVID?

This is something the Guardian reported on here about a week ago. It scared the crap out of us, except it has been reported to be a very rare complication post-Covid in children. We hope that is the case as nurseries and primary schools prepare to reopen, anyway.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/202 ... d-globally

The first cases came to light this week when the NHS issued an alert to paediatricians about a number of children admitted to intensive care units with a mix of toxic shock and a condition known as Kawasaki disease, an inflammatory disorder that affects the blood vessel, heart and other organs. So far 19 children have been affected in the UK and none have died.

On this note, since we're expecting, literally any moment now, what have the rates of infant infections with Covid been in the States? I haven't found much on it here.

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

I respectfully request we be allowed to criticized the Chicoms. It's the only good thing about COVID.[:)]

The Chinese Government? Please do!

Interesting the info (not sure if you saw it a page or two ago) that France has found a case of Covid from December. If it was in France then, it was likely also in Italy and in the UK at least, and most probably in NYC. Seriously high flu cases in NYC in December. This is when Wuhan local administrators were still trying to avoid making the central government aware there was a problem. Yet it was already out and about in Europe!!

Another post about high and early flu in CA from a SF paper, but that variant was supposedly hard on under 50s and children, and had very different symptoms, so probably not Covid, but who knows, right?

Best wishes, Erik, with respect to the pending delivery. I hope Mrs. Obvert and all will do great. Do you know whether the baby is boy or girl?

ORIGINAL: Lowpe

ORIGINAL: obvert
Explain what a "free and independent press" looks like?

One that is equally hard/questioning on the issues and doesn't attempt to change my mind but rather gives me the information to make an informed decision.

I limit my comments to the US press because that is what I understand.

I actually happen to know the long time editor of Phila largest paper, now retired. He would be the first to tell you that journalism moved from reporting to shaping information to impact change. Heck, he is a strong proponent of it and also that this policy shift hurt their bottom line substantially.

You may find it interesting, and not intuitive from your perspective, that I consider myself a Washingtonian American. I dislike both political parties. [:)]

Well I support that, but I also find that in a lot of reporting from major sources. It is probably different when I'm not exposed to a lot of the discourse about "media" in the States and the various sides. I also just stick to the ones that I find good reporting from, and only occasionally look at a random smattering of others.

The UK has news sources that are very self-consciously aware of their position on issues, and they all have a place in the dialogue. Most everyone is aware of the biases, but there is still good journalism in most of the major rags. The BBC also tends to ride the centre line pretty well, so that's a help.

I don't publish my political views or preferences, but it seems many have already decided where I stand on issues and which side of the fence I'm on. It's always interesting to me since none have it quite right. The defining issues in the States are very different than those in other places, so a lot can be misinterpreted.

Thanks for the explanation and continued open dialogue. I never mind differing on ideas with anyone as long as we can still converse and debate issues openly. That's what it's all about. [:)]

Italy, Spain, Netherlands and Belgium all reporting increases today, but still modest numbers compared to the previous high points.

Ditto NY, but most other states that have reported are up, for the day. For some reason probably linked to the preceding weekend, last Tuesday saw a spike and this one likely will too.

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Best wishes, Erik, with respect to the pending delivery. I hope Mrs. Obvert and all will do great. Do you know whether the baby is boy or girl?

Thank you. Really, I appreciate that.

The little one is a boy, and he's going to be big. We do have name chosen and we're all ready. Just need to get him out safely soon!

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

Pre-existing conditions:

BMI>26...anyone? Anyone?

High blood pressure...anyone?

Neither of these I find comforting. [:)]

Lean, mean, F'ing Machine. Got to keep my girlish figure!

I suffer from low blood pressure, from my Mother's side.

I am pretty sure there is something wrong with you. [:D]

Iam a treasure trove of research for Psychiatrists and could still supply years of material for PHD Psychology candidates.

"No we are NOT!"

"He is right, yes we are."

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn





Lean, mean, F'ing Machine. Got to keep my girlish figure!

I suffer from low blood pressure, from my Mother's side.

I am pretty sure there is something wrong with you. [:D]

Iam a treasure trove of research for Psychiatrists and could still supply years of material for PHD Psychology candidates.

"No we are NOT!"

"He is right, yes we are."

Just keep finding reports for us. You're doing a bang up job and I've even gotten used to the BOLD. [:D]

'The new normal': Ex-FDA chief warns U.S. may not be able to lower coronavirus infection rate
"The most likely scenario is that cases go up, not down," Gottlieb said.
May 5, 2020,


https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politi ... t-n1200146


"“I think that we need to understand this may be the new normal," Gottlieb said in an interview with Savannah Guthrie on NBC’s “TODAY” show. "We may not be able to get transmission down much more. I hope we can.”

"The most likely scenario is that cases go up, not down," Gottlieb added. "And so we need to think about what it looks like in the country if we have transmission of this virus and we try to get back to some sense of normalcy.”"

ORIGINAL: obvert
I also just stick to the ones that I find good reporting from, and only occasionally look at a random smattering of others.
....

Thanks for the explanation and continued open dialogue. I never mind differing on ideas with anyone as long as we can still converse and debate issues openly. That's what it's all about. [:)]

I don't limit my reading, being older and semi-retired, I read, listen, and watch it all.

Nothing wrong at all with differing opinions. In fact, should be encouraged.

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake




I am pretty sure there is something wrong with you. [:D]

Iam a treasure trove of research for Psychiatrists and could still supply years of material for PHD Psychology candidates.

"No we are NOT!"

"He is right, yes we are."

Just keep finding reports for us. You're doing a bang up job and I've even gotten used to the BOLD. [:D]

Thanks. There are so many things at play right now. I feel like Iam at the market listening to the fishmongers on the eve.

Some of the behavior I see in people while Iam out is depressing. What will people really be like when times get bad.