China took and is taking massive economic hits in its drastic martial/medieval response to the SARS-CoV2 outbreak.
China reacted to this like it was a bio-weapons attack. (not saying that it was, but we've established to an acceptable level of confidence that it was at the very least a "gain of function" accident.)
Neither wing of the one party American system is psychologically capable of
conceiving the kinds of measures the situation may demand. The U.S. is grossly under prepared on any level to deal with either an objective biological threat, or, the mass hysterical infodemic threat that SARS-CoV2 has already clearly demonstrated itself to be.
Ensuring profit
is the one and only goal of any response American governance is capable of mustering. So what it comes down to is this. American political leadership MUST pretend that this outbreak is nothing worse than a bad strain of the cold or flu, period.
Now, we've already established in Washington state and in Illinois - that community spread with no known travel is underway. So it's here and it's propagating.
Knowing America as you do, do you expect American infection rates to mirror cruise ship levels ~20% or Korean Tard levels ~80% infection rates?
If you get 50% of the population infected all at once, we're done.
We don't have the means to do bulk testing.
We have limited capacity to treat people who go past flu-like symptoms.
If you try and force everybody to stay at home you may as well just switch off the lights. The real problem - however - will be the number of poor people still well enough to crawl to work.
For tens of millions it is show up for work or sleep in the car.
Not to mention the ones who show up for work everyday but are still forced to sleep in the car.
If the most severe aspects of the outbreak run like wildfire through the
elderly, poor, and homeless demographics - American elites will
consider this an unanticipated windfall and begin proclaiming their
exceptionalism.
It would be too sweet if the rich, elderly attendees of an elite cocktail/dinner party came in contact with servant peasants infected with SARS-CoV2 and they spread it around to all the sleek party attendees. A fair number of the rich and affluent getting sick and/or dying might shake things up a bit.
So the trick now is to try and draw out the process.
Though it will be a hard slog, if you can keep the infection rate below 5% - you may have the resources to manage care rationing and prevent more massive outbreak and economic disruption.
We shall all soon see. The chickens have surely come home to roost!
wired | Nearly 750 years ago, Marco Polo famously undertook several voyages from
Venice across the Mediterranean Sea, overland through Persia and
Central Asia to the court of the great Kublai Khan, grandson of Genghis
Khan and founder of the Yuan dynasty, which presided over perhaps the
largest empire in world history. The Mongols nurtured the Silk Roads of
commerce that spanned the medieval world from China to Italy—until the
Black Death spread along them in the same direction, wiping out nearly
half the world’s population.
It is, of course, far too soon to make such dire predictions about Covid-19.
But a striking overlap exists between the path of today's viral spread
and the path that emerged in the 1300s. These parallels tell us
something crucial about the present state of geopolitics. Trade routes
and infrastructure expand imperial influence; interruptions along them
heighten awareness of our vulnerabilities. If we’re smart, we respond by
creating sensible frictions to avoid being dominated by a single
hegemon.
The
14th-century plague is said to have originated in northwestern China,
with bacteria contracted from marmots. Hebei Province bore the brunt of
China’s plague fatalities, with 5 million of its residents perishing in
the 1330s. Making its way westward via Silk Road merchants and caravans,
the plague took several years to reach Persia, where it killed the Khan
overlord Abu Said as well as half the population. In 1347, it entered
Europe via Italy’s port of Genoa.
Now compare that to what we’re seeing today with Covid-19. This time around, the source of illness may have been pangolins or bats instead of marmots. It started in Wuhan,
which just happens to be Hebei's capital. The coronavirus reached Iran
in a couple of weeks, and so far has infected hundreds of people, even
the country’s deputy health minister. Next to Iran, the next worst
outbreak is in Italy, with more than 300 cases and rising quickly—and
likely spreading through Europe exactly as the plague did centuries ago.
It
is, perhaps no coincidence that, in the past two decades, China has
been the origin of SARS, the swine flu, and now the Covid-19
coronavirus. Nor should we be surprised that Iran and Italy have
emerged, once more, as waypoints for pandemic spread. What do Iran and
Italy have in common today? They are two major anchors of China’s Belt
and Road Initiative—also known as the 21st century’s new Silk Roads.
I'm not a virologist and don't pretend to be. But I can read a fugging manual with the best of them, and understand what I've read. That said, slowly reread the nature paper from 2015 yourself.
Therefore, to examine the emergence potential (that is, the potential to
infect humans) of circulating bat CoVs, we built a chimeric virus
encoding a novel, zoonotic CoV spike protein—from the RsSHC014-CoV
sequence that was isolated from Chinese horseshoe bats1—in
the context of the SARS-CoV mouse-adapted backbone. The hybrid virus
allowed us to evaluate the ability of the novel spike protein to cause
disease independently of other necessary adaptive mutations in its
natural backbone. Using this approach, we characterized CoV infection
mediated by the SHC014 spike protein in primary human airway cells and in vivo,
and tested the efficacy of available immune therapeutics against
SHC014-CoV. Together, the strategy translates metagenomics data to help
predict and prepare for future emergent viruses.
Shi Zhengli - you know you done f'd up....,
Mebbe what I'm watching from other "gain of function" virologists is a poster-child instance of the Weinstein's Distributed Information Suppression Complex?
The Proximal Origin of SARS-C0V2
virological |Since the first reports of a novel pneumonia (COVID-19) in
Wuhan city, Hubei province, China there has been considerable discussion
and uncertainty over the origin of the causative virus, SARS-CoV-2.
Infections with SARS-CoV-2 are now widespread in China, with cases in
every province. As of 14 February 2020, 64,473 such cases have been
confirmed, with 1,384 deaths attributed to the virus. These official
case numbers are likely an underestimate because of limited reporting of
mild and asymptomatic cases, and the virus is clearly capable of
efficient human-to-human transmission. Based on the possibility of
spread to countries with weaker healthcare systems, the World Health
Organization has declared the COVID-19 outbreak a Public Health
Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). There are currently neither
vaccines nor specific treatments for this disease.
SARS-CoV-2 is the seventh member of the Coronaviridae
known to infect humans. Three of these viruses, SARS CoV-1, MERS, and
SARS-CoV-2, can cause severe disease; four, HKU1, NL63, OC43 and 229E,
are associated with mild respiratory symptoms. Herein, we review what
can be deduced about the origin and early evolution of SARS-CoV-2 from
the comparative analysis of available genome sequence data. In
particular, we offer a perspective on the notable features in the
SARS-CoV-2 genome and discuss scenarios by which these features could
have arisen. Importantly, this analysis provides evidence that
SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct nor a purposefully manipulated
virus.
Say What?
The genomic comparison of both alpha- and betacoronaviruses (family Coronaviridae
) described below identifies two notable features of the SARS-CoV-2
genome: (i) based on structural modelling and early biochemical
experiments, SARS-CoV-2 appears to be optimized for binding to the human
ACE2 receptor; (ii) the highly variable spike (S) protein of SARS-CoV-2
has a polybasic (furin) cleavage site at the S1 and S2 boundary via the
insertion of twelve nucleotides. Additionally, this event led to the
acquisition of three predicted O-linked glycans around the polybasic
cleavage site.
FoxNews | "Yes, we are thinking about [the] southern border, we have received a
lot of power on the southern border over the last couple of years from
the courts but we are looking at that very strongly," Trump said at
the press conference.
The rare appearance in the White House press
briefing room came shortly after news of the first death in the United
States from the new virus and a terrible week on the stock market over
fears of the outbreak.
"There's no reason to panic at all. This is
something that is being handled professionally," Trump assured, while
also acknowledging more cases in the U.S. are "likely."
The president said there are 22 patients in the United States who have coronavirus.
"Unfortunately, one person passed away overnight," Trump said, speaking to a case in Washington state.
“She was a wonderful woman, a medically high-risk patient in her late
50s. Four others are very ill. Thankfully 15 are either recovered fully
or they're well on their way to recovery. And in all cases, they've
been let go in their home.”
Shortly
before Trump spoke, Washington state health officials confirmed one
person had died from the new virus; the first person to die from the
disease in the United States. She was not infected by travel abroad,
officials said.
Trump also said Saturday that most healthy people
would be able to pull through should they contract coronavirus:
"Additional cases in the United States are likely. But healthy
individuals should be able to fully recover.”
newyork.cbslocal | With the coronavirus outbreak affecting at least 40 countries, many travelers are concerned about what’s being done to contain the virus.
At JFK Airport, jetlagged passengers typically in a rush to
clear immigration are now appalled by a lack of screening, especially
compared to procedures in the countries they just left.
Emily Ferrara and Blair Haworth just returned from Florence, Italy,
where their study abroad program was canceled because of the virus.
There are more than 300 cases there, one of the largest outbreaks
outside China.
Yet, the students told CBS2’s Christina Fan they weren’t asked a
single question about potential symptoms once they landed in New York
City.
“We didn’t even get checked. Like we’re used to being in Florence
where you get your temperature checked. Here they didn’t do anything,
which is kind of crazy,” Ferrara said. “Considering, like, how much the
cases have spread so fast, like, they should definitely be taking more
precautions here.”
Currently, the United States is only conducting health screenings for passengers who are flying in from China.
But Dr. Teresa Amato, the chair of emergency medicine at Long Island Jewish Forest Hills, says the idea may not be effective.
“I think it’s becoming increasingly difficult given that people are
infected with no symptoms and travel areas are becoming more and more
widespread with the virus,” she said.
In addition to airport screenings, some passengers believe there
should be more travel restrictions from countries other than China.
President Donald Trump weighed in on the idea at a press conference
Wednesday.
“At a right time, we might do that. Right now, it’s not the right time,” he said.
SMH | Was Australia about to put the cash flow of its universities ahead of
the peoples' health in the middle of a pandemic? Was the Morrison
government about to bungle the coronavirus response as badly as it did
the bushfires?
As MPs and senators returned to Canberra this week
for a parliamentary sitting, it was a topic of lively
concern. Government members knew that the universities had been
agitating behind the scenes for the China travel ban to be relaxed as
soon as possible. Some 100,000 of their Chinese students are caught by
the ban and the unis want them back in Australia. Paying fees.
The
Chinese government had been complaining about the ban for weeks, too.
Australia had been "discriminatory", according to the Chinese embassy in
Canberra. In multiple meetings across the government, every week with
the politicians who have let them in, China's officials have been
pressing their case hard.
The travel ban was decided immediately
after the US made the same call. Beijing instantly lashed both the US
and Australia on that occasion – the Chinese Communist Party's official
mouthpiece, People's Daily, calling it "racist".
But,
of course, that decision now looks very wise, more so with each passing
day. The WHO followed suit 10 days later. When Morrison announced the
China travel ban four weeks ago, there were about 7000 infections
disclosed by Beijing.
By Thursday this week that number had
ballooned to 78,000. The number of countries announcing travel bans has
grown proportionately, and mostly they have acted too late.
The
political capture of the WHO means, in effect, that it's every country
for itself. It also underlines the central importance of keeping
politics and other extraneous pressures out of the decision-making
processes on a medical matter. Likewise, China's early political
cover-ups and bungling wasted precious weeks in containing the virus.
The
Australian system for dealing with communicable diseases is less prone
to politics. Morrison hid from the bushfires; he had no such option on
the coronavirus. The Chief Medical Officer, Murphy, does not need the
government's permission to invoke the Biosecurity Act. He informed
Health Minister Greg Hunt on January 20 that he was triggering the act,
automatically setting in train a pre-ordained process of monitoring and
advice.
greatgameindia | For those who may not know, The Integrity Initiative is
an anti-Russian propaganda outfit funded to the tune of $140 million by
the British Foreign office. Throughout 2019, leaks have been released
featuring documents dated to the early period of Trump’s election,
demonstrating that this organization, already active across Europe
promoting anti-Russian PR and smearing nationalist leaders such as
Jeremy Corbyn, was intent on spreading deeply into the State Department
and setting up “clusters” of anti-Trump operatives. The documents reveal
high level meetings that Integrity Initiative
Director Chris Donnelly had with former Trump Advisor Sebastien Gorka,
McCain Foundation director Kurt Volker, Pentagon PR guru John Rendon
among many others.
The exposure of the British hand behind the scenes affords us a
unique glimpse into the real historical forces undermining America’s
true constitutional tradition throughout the 20th century, as Mueller/the Five Eyes/Integrity Initiative
are not new phenomena but actually follow a modus operandi set down for
already more than a century. One of the biggest obstacles to seeing
this modus operandi run by the British Empire is located in the belief
in a mythology which has become embedded in the global psyche for over
half a century and which we should do our best to free ourselves of.
Myth of the “American Empire
While there has been a long-standing narrative promoted for over 70
years that the British Empire disappeared after World War II having been
replaced by the “American Empire”, it is the furthest thing from the
truth. America, as constitutionally represented by its greatest
presidents (who can unfortunately be identified by their early deaths
while serving in office), were never colonialist and were always in
favor of reining in British Institutions at home while fighting British
colonial thinking abroad.
Franklin Roosevelt’s thirteen year-long battle with the Deep State, which he referred to as the “economic royalists who should have left America in 1776″, was
defined in clear terms by his patriotic Vice-President Henry Wallace
who warned of the emergence of a new Anglo-American fascism in 1944 when he said:
“Fascism in the postwar inevitably will push steadily for
Anglo-Saxon imperialism and eventually for war with Russia. Already
American fascists are talking and writing about this conflict and using
it as an excuse for their internal hatreds and intolerances toward
certain races, creeds and classes.”
The fact is that already in 1944, a policy of Anglo-Saxon imperialism
had been promoted subversively by British-run think tanks known as the
Round Table Movement and Fabian Society, and the seeds had already been
laid for the anti-Russian cold war by those British-run American
fascists. It is not a coincidence that this fascist Cold War policy was
announced in a March 5, 1946 speech in Fulton, Missouri by none other than Round Table-follower and the butcher of Bengal, Winston Churchill.
nature | "Therefore, to examine the emergence potential (that is, the potential to infect humans) of circulating bat CoVs, we built a chimeric virus
encoding a novel, zoonotic CoV spike protein—from the RsSHC014-CoV
sequence that was isolated from Chinese horseshoe bats1—in the context
of the SARS-CoV mouse-adapted backbone. The hybrid virus allowed us to
evaluate the ability of the novel spike protein to cause disease
independently of other necessary adaptive mutations in its natural
backbone. Using this approach, we characterized CoV infection mediated
by the SHC014 spike protein in primary human airway cells and in vivo,
and tested the efficacy of available immune therapeutics against
SHC014-CoV"
So they create a "chimeric" SARS-CoV virus that can cause disease (in humans)?
They continue:
"we synthesized the SHC014 spike in the context of the
replication-competent, mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone (we hereafter
refer to the chimeric CoV as SHC014-MA15) to maximize the opportunity
for pathogenesis and vaccine studies in mice (Supplementary Fig. 2a).
Despite predictions from both structure-based modeling and pseudotyping
experiments, SHC014-MA15 was viable and replicated to high titers in
Vero cells"
So they "maximize the opportunity for pathogenesis". Very interesting...
And then they continue saying:
"To test the ability of the SHC014 spike to mediate infection of the
human airway, we examined the sensitivity of the human epithelial airway
cell line Calu-3 2B4 (ref. 9) to infection and found robust SHC014-MA15
replication, comparable to that of SARS-CoV Urbani (Fig. 1c). To extend
these findings, primary human airway epithelial (HAE) cultures were
infected and showed robust replication of both viruses"
So in the last paragraph they have found that the new chimeric virus
they have created (they called it SHC014-MA15) "show robust replication"
in human cells. A great success I guess...
But they continue with the research and say:
"We next analyzed infection in more susceptible, aged (12-month-old)
animals. SARS-MA15–infected animals rapidly lost weight and succumbed to
infection"
So they test the new chimeric virus (they call it SARS-MA15 and also
SCH014-MA15) in mice and they saw a high pathogenicity in the lungs of
the animals, more acute in older ones
Then they continue with the trials of the SHC014-MA15 chimeric virus:
"Similarly, antibodies 230.15 and 227.14, which were derived from
memory B cells of SARS-CoV–infected patients13, also failed to block
SHC014-MA15 replication (Fig. 2b,c). For all three antibodies,
differences between the SARS and SHC014 spike amino acid sequences
corresponded to direct or adjacent residue changes found in SARS-CoV
escape mutants (fm6 N479R; 230.15 L443V; 227.14 K390Q/E), which probably
explains the absence of the antibodies' neutralizing activity against
SHC014. Finally, monoclonal antibody 109.8 was able to achieve 50%
neutralization of SHC014-MA15, but only at high concentrations (10
μg/ml) (Fig. 2d). Together, the results demonstrate that broadly
neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV may only have marginal efficacy
against emergent SARS-like CoV strains such as SHC014."
So it seems that the new chimeric virus they created is quite resilient to the antibodies normally used to treat SARS
Still more about the risks of chimeric virus:
"the creation of chimeric viruses such as SHC014-MA15 was not
expected to increase pathogenicity. Although SHC014-MA15 is attenuated
relative to its parental mouse-adapted SARS-CoV, similar studies
examining the pathogenicity of CoVs with the wild-type Urbani spike
within the MA15 backbone showed no weight loss in mice and reduced viral
replication23. Thus, relative to the Urbani spike–MA15 CoV, SHC014-MA15 shows a gain in pathogenesis
(Fig. 1). On the basis of these findings, scientific review panels may
deem similar studies building chimeric viruses based on circulating
strains too risky to pursue, as increased pathogenicity in mammalian
models cannot be excluded"
So they recognize they have created a very dangerous chimeric virus
with a high pathogenesis, easily transmitted in human cells and hard to
fight by antibodies, and they said at the end "building chimeric
viruses based on circulating strains too risky to pursue, as increased
pathegenicity in mammalian models cannot be excluded"
Say What?
At the end of the article they finally said:
"Coupled with restrictions on mouse-adapted strains and the
development of monoclonal antibodies using escape mutants, research into
CoV emergence and therapeutic efficacy may be severely limited moving
forward. Together, these data and restrictions represent a crossroads of
GOF research concerns; the potential to prepare for and mitigate future
outbreaks must be weighed against the risk of creating more dangerous
pathogens. In developing policies moving forward, it is important to
consider the value of the data generated by these studies and whether these types of chimeric virus studies warrant further investigation versus the inherent risks involved "
So I have some questions:
a) What are the probabilities that an strange new SARS virus, never
seen before, very easily transmitted and very pathogenic, started
exactly some hundred meters from the same research lab where theses
people were creating chimeric viruses one day and the following?
b) What are the probabilities that a new "wild" virus be so similar
to this chimeric virus created in 2015 for this study? Could it be a
self-fulfilling prophecy?
c) What are the probabilities that the Wuhan Virology Instute have
developed a very accurate test for the brand "new" virus in just some
days after the outbreak? Do they have some knowledge in advance of what
kind of virus it was?
slate | Responsible outlets have covered the conspiracy theories, attempting
to debunk them. But even some experts don’t seem immune here. One
rejected the idea of the virus being a biological weapon and praised the
Wuhan Institute of Virology as a “world-class research institution that does world-class research” to the Washington Post at the end of January. Less than a month later, he was tweeting sympathetically about a New York Post opinion piece claiming the SARS-CoV-2 virus, the virus that causes COVID-19, had escaped from the same lab.
These kinds of conspiracy theories thrive on our fear of the
uncertain, on our tendency to demand absolute proof that something is not
the case—and it’s difficult to prove something 100 percent false. Even
scientists can get sucked into this: During the Ebola outbreak, a
colleague and I tried to address concerns about ebolavirus “becoming airborne,”
a theory based on the argument that because no one could prove it
absolutely couldn’t happen, we should act as if it was happening.
FP | South Korea initially seemed to have the COVID-19 epidemic under
control, armed with efficient bureaucracy and state-of-the-art
technology. However, since Feb. 18, the number of coronavirus cases in
South Korea has exploded to more than 1,700 as of Thursday. The battle
plan against the epidemic was derailed by the oldest of problems:
religion and politics.
When it came to preparation, it helped that South Korea had one hell
of a practice run: the MERS outbreak in 2015 that caused 38 deaths. At
the time, the incompetent response by the conservative administration of
then President Park Geun-hye put South Korea in the ignominious
position of having the greatest number of cases outside of the Middle
East. The fallout, which contributed to the public distrust of
government that culminated in Park’s impeachment and removal, pushed the
South Korean government to significantly revamp its preparation for the
next viral event.
South Korea has been preparing for
a potential new strain of coronavirus since as early as November 2019.
Without knowing what virus would hit the country next, the Korea Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) devised an ingenious method
of testing for any type of coronavirus and eliminating known
strains of coronavirus such as SARS or MERS to isolate the new variant
of coronavirus.
For the first four weeks of the outbreak, South Korea marshaled
high-tech resources to respond aggressively while promoting
transparency. The government tracked the movements of travelers arriving
from China, for example by tracking the use of credit cards, checking CCTV footage, or mandating
they download an app to report their health status every day. For those
infected, the government published an extremely detailed list of their
whereabouts, down to which seat they sat in at a movie theater.
The info was also presented (with names removed) in an interactive website
that allows the public to trace the movement of every single individual
with coronavirus. To be sure, there were real privacy concerns—as when one unfortunate patient
in Daejeon had news of their visit to a risqué lingerie store blasted
to every smartphone in their city. Yet on balance, these disclosures did
much to calm the nerves and prevent unnecessary panic in the
population. By Feb. 17, South Korea’s tally of COVID-19 patients stood at 30, with zero deaths. Ten patients were fully cured and discharged, with some of the discharged patients declaring the disease was “not something as serious as one might think.” The government seemed ready to declare victory.
That all came to a crashing halt last week thanks to the 31st case.
Patient No. 31, discovered on Feb. 18, was a member of a quasi-Christian
cult called Shincheonji, one of the many new religious movements in the country. Founded in 1984, Shincheonji (whose official name
is Shincheonji, Church of Jesus, the Temple of the Tabernacle of the
Testimony) means “new heaven and earth,” a reference to the Book of
Revelation. Its founder Lee Man-hee claims to be the second coming of
Jesus who is to establish the “new spiritual Israel” at the end of days. The cult is estimated to have approximately 240,000 followers, and claims to have outposts in 29 countries in addition to South Korea.
Shincheonji’s bad theology makes for worse public health. Shincheonji teaches
illness is a sin, encouraging its followers to suffer through diseases
to attend services in which they sit closely together, breathing in
spittle as they repeatedly amen in unison. If they were off on their
own, that might be one thing—but according to Shin Hyeon-uk, a pastor
who formerly belonged to the cult, Shincheonji believes in
“deceptive proselytizing,” approaching potential converts without
disclosing their denomination. Shincheonji convinces its members to
cover their tracks, providing a prearranged set of answers to give when
anyone asks if they belong to the cult. Often, even family members are
in the dark about whether someone is a Shincheonji follower. The net
effect is that Shincheonji followers infect each other easily, then go
onto infect the community at large.
It is not yet clear exactly how Shincheonji cultists were infected
with COVID-19 in the first instance. (KCDC said Patient No. 31 is likely not
the first Shincheonji follower to be infected, given the timeline of
her symptoms.) Although investigations are still pending, South Korean
authorities have been focusing on the funeral of the brother of Shincheonji’s founder held in early February. Shincheonji has 19 churches in China, including in Wuhan, and it may be possible that followers from around the world attended the funeral.
youtube |Barely more than a week ago, South Korea’s coronavirus outbreak appeared to be contained as the number of confirmed infections stabilized at 30. Sensing a turning tide, many Seoul residents took off their surgical masks and resumed riding the subways and shopping at malls.
Then, on Feb. 17, a 31st case surfaced at a health clinic in Daegu, a city about 150 miles south of the capital where the vast majority of known infections were located. An unidentified 61-year-old woman, who lived there and occasionally commuted to Seoul, tested positive for the novel coronavirus.
It seemed like a standard case until public health authorities started tracing the patient’s tracks.
What they learned shocked them: the woman had, during the previous 10 days, attended two worship services with at least 1,000 other members of her secretive religious sect whose leader says the end of days is coming.
Within 24 hours, the nation’s number of confirmed cases started multiplying exponentially. The tally rose by 20 during that period, doubled the following day and then doubled again on the third day.
By Wednesday, the count skyrocketed past 1,000 -- a more than 30-fold increase in a week that prompted the government to raise its health alert to the highest level. At least half of the new cases are linked to the sect called the Shincheonji -- which translates to “new heaven and land” and whose members worship side-by-side in cramped spaces.
“What made this case so much worse was that this person spent a considerable amount of time in a very crowded area,” said Kim Chang-yup, a professor for health policy at Seoul National University. “There’s growing fear and resentment among the people right now.”
South Korea’s health ministry said Wednesday it was launching a manhunt for more than 212,000 members whose names were provided by the sect. Korea’s Centers for Disease Control & Prevention already is screening 9,300 sect members, in addition to those who attended the two services. On Wednesday, it expects to conclude tests of 1,300 sect members showing symptoms.
Reuters | An So-young had a gut feeling that the 31st person in South Korea to
test positive for the coronavirus might be a member of the controversial
religious sect she quit four years ago.
The person, dubbed “Patient 31,” was the first of an explosive wave
of cases that made South Korea’s outbreak the largest outside of China.
What caught An’s attention was how health authorities were struggling to
track the woman’s movements before she was tested.
“That’s
their culture, they have to hide their movements, and that’s why I
guessed she was with Shincheonji,” An, 27, said in an interview,
referring to the Shincheonji Church of Jesus.
Patient 31 attended
services at the church’s branch in the southeastern city of Daegu this
month, staying for two hours each time, before testing positive on Feb.
18.
The South Korean disease control chief Jeong Eun-kyeong said
the church’s services, where thousands of people sit on the floor,
shoulder-to-shoulder, for hours, could have contributed to the surges.
“You
would be 5 centimeters away from the person who sits next to you, and
have to say ‘Amen’ after every sentence the pastor speaks - it’s the
best environment for the virus to spread,” said An, who is now a
theology student.
In a media interview, Patient 31 said she did
not refuse to be tested. But health authorities said she sought care at a
traditional medicine hospital in Daegu after a minor car accident,
where a medical worker who treated her later tested positive for the
virus. While running a fever, she went to a buffet at a hotel and the
church services.
Shincheonji is in the biggest crisis in its 36-year history, as
hundreds of members have tested positive for the virus, SARS-CoV-2. All
of its 210,000 known followers are being tested amid unprecedented
scrutiny from authorities and the public.
After initial
resistance, the church released the addresses of 1,100 facilities around
the country - 82 churches and 1,018 “affiliates,” - and asked the
public to avoid making “groundless criticism.” It was the “biggest
victim of the virus,” it said.
Calls by Reuters to the church’s headquarters seeking comment went unanswered.
During
a visit to the Daegu branch on Friday, a man who identified himself as a
member said he was the only one there and told Reuters that “all of our
9,000 members are taking self-quarantine measures in compliance with
the government instruction.” He said the building was disinfected twice
last week.
Interactive graphic about the spread of coronavirus inside South Korea: here
SCMP | The new coronavirus has an HIV-like mutation that means its ability to bind with human
cells could be up to 1,000 times as strong as the Sars virus, according
to new research by scientists in China and Europe.
The discovery could help to explain not only how the infection has spread but also where it came from and how best to fight it.
Scientists
showed that Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) entered the human
body by binding with a receptor protein called ACE2 on a cell membrane.
And some early studies suggested that the new coronavirus, which shares
about 80 per cent of the genetic structure of Sars, might follow a
similar path.
But
the ACE2 protein does not exist in large quantities in healthy people,
and this partly helped to limit the scale of the Sars outbreak of
2002-03, in which infected about 8,000 people around the world.
Other
highly contagious viruses, including HIV and Ebola, target an enzyme
called furin, which works as a protein activator in the human body. Many
proteins are inactive or dormant when they are produced and have to be
“cut” at specific points to activate their various functions.
When
looking at the genome sequence of the new coronavirus, Professor Ruan
Jishou and his team at Nankai University in Tianjin found a section of
mutated genes that did not exist in Sars, but were similar to those
found in HIV and Ebola.
“This
finding suggests that 2019-nCoV [the new coronavirus] may be
significantly different from the Sars coronavirus in the infection
pathway,” the scientists said in a paper published this month on
Chinaxiv.org, a platform used by the Chinese Academy of Sciences to
release scientific research papers before they have been peer-reviewed.
“This virus may use the packing mechanisms of other viruses such as HIV.”
According to the study, the mutation can generate a structure known as a cleavage site in the new coronavirus’ spike protein.
The
virus uses the outreaching spike protein to hook on to the host cell,
but normally this protein is inactive. The cleavage site structure’s job
is to trick the human furin protein, so it will cut and activate the
spike protein and cause a “direct fusion” of the viral and cellular
membranes.
Compared to the Sars’ way of entry, this binding method is “100 to 1,000 times” as efficient, according to the study.
Just two weeks after its release, the paper is already the most viewed ever on Chinarxiv.
jrnyquist | As everybody knows, according to the views propagated by Western
scholars, humanity as a whole originated from one single mother in
Africa. Therefore, no race can claim racial superiority. However,
according to the research conducted by most Chinese scholars, the
Chinese are different from other races on earth. We did not originate in
Africa. Instead, we originated independently in the land of China. The
Peking Man at Zhoukoudian that we are all familiar with represents a
phase of our ancestors’ evolution. “The Project of Searching for the
Origins of the Chinese Civilization” currently undertaken in our country
is aimed at a more comprehensive and systematic research on the origin,
process and development of the ancient Chinese civilization. We use to
say, “Chinese civilization has had a history of five thousand years.”
But now, many experts engaged in research in varied fields including
archeology, ethnic cultures, and regional cultures have reached
consensus that the new discoveries such as the Hongshan Culture in the
northeast, the Liangahn Cutlure in Zhejiang province, the Jinsha Ruins
in Sichuan province, and the Yongzhou Shun Emperor Cultural Site in
Hunan province are all compelling evidence of the exitence of China’s
early civilizations, and they prove that China’s rice-growing
agricultural history alone can be traced back as far as 8,000 to 10,000
years. This refutes the concept of “five thousand years of Chinese
civilization.”
Therefore, we can assert that we are the product of cultural roots of
more than a million years, and a single Chinese entity of two thousand
years. This is the Chinese entity of two thousand years. This is the
Chinese nation that calls itself, “descendants of Yan and Huang,” the
Chinese nation that we are so proud of. Hitler’s Germany had once
bragged that the German race was the most superior race on earth, but
the fact is, our nation is far superior to the Germans.
During our long history, our people have disseminated throughout the
Americas and the regions along the Pacific Rim, and they became Indians
in the Americas and the East Asian ethnic groups in the South Pacific.
We all know that on account of our national superiority, during the
thriving and prosperous Tang Dynasty our civilization was at the peak of
the world. We were the center of the world civilization, and no other
civilization in the world was comparable to ours. Later on, because of
our complacency, narrow-mindedness, and the self-enclosure of our own
country, we were surpassed by Western civilization, and the center of
the world shifted to the West.
In reviewing history, one may ask: Will the center of the world civilization shift back to China?
Comrade He Xin put it in his report to the Central Committee in 1988:
If the fact is that the center of leadership of the world was located
in Europe as of the 18th Century, and later shifted to the United States
in the mid-20th century the center of leadership of the world will
shift to the East of our planet. And, “the East” of course mainly refers
to China.
Harvard | Two of the world’s biggest threats may someday be reduced by wires
thousands of times thinner than a hair but capable of detecting a single
virus. The specter of worldwide viral epidemics is always with us, so
detecting them quickly offers the possibility of saving thousands of
lives. The pathogens also can be stealthy biological weapons, making
their positive detection a vital national defense requirement.
“We want to find a single virus before it finds you,” says Charles
Lieber, Hyman Professor of Chemistry at Harvard University. Tests
recently completed in his laboratory show that these unimaginably thin
nanowires can sense and distinguish between viruses that cause flu,
measles, and eye infections. Lieber believes future versions will be
able to spot HIV, Ebola, SARS, West Nile, hepatitis, bird flu, and other
dangerous viruses.
“Viruses are among the most important causes of human disease and are
of increasing concern as agents for bioterrorism,” Lieber says. “Our
work shows that nanoscale silicon wires can be configured as detectors
that turn on or off in the presence of a single virus particle. Such
detectors could be fashioned into arrays capable of sensing thousands of
different viruses, ushering in a new era for diagnoses, biosafety, and
quick response to viral outbreaks.”
“Nano” refers to a “nanometer,” one billionth of a meter, four hundred billionths of an inch, or about 10 atoms in size. One hundred
thousand wires, each 20 nanometers long, would fit on the head of a pin.
The Department of Defense, Office of Naval Research, and National
Cancer Institute all supported Lieber’s research, and at least two
commercial companies have shown interest in manufacturing nanosensors.
In his office, Lieber shows visitors a two-inch-square silicon and
metal chip containg an array of nanowires and two pinhead-size entry
ports through which blood, saliva, or other bodily fluids can enter. Air
samples put into a fluid solution would also be tested this way.
On March 16th 2008 I called out and subsequently rejected the Great "Unifier" after he made his responsible negroe speech and repudiated Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Like Obama, Cheat Bootyplug is a nobody selected by elites from sociopath central casting for the purpose of installing a republican blue dog as the head of the DNC corporatist shill party. Bootyplug is toast with Black and Latino voters, so I'm not quite sure who his handlers thought he could "unify" with his glib, empty rhetoric.
Kennedy was the first to inform the audience of the death of Martin Luther King, causing some in the audience to scream and wail. Several of Kennedy's aides were even worried that the delivery of this information would result in a riot. Once the audience quieted down Kennedy acknowledged that many in the audience would be filled with anger, especially since the assassin was believed to be a white, and that he had felt the same when his brother John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. These remarks surprised Kennedy aides, who had never heard him speak of John Kennedy's death. Kennedy continued, saying that the country had to make an effort to "go beyond these rather difficult times," and then quoted a poem by the Greek playwright Aeschylus. To conclude Kennedy said that the country needed and wanted unity between blacks and whites, asked the audience members to pray for the King family and the country, and once more quoted the ancient Greeks. Despite rioting in other major American cities, Indianapolis was calm the night after Kennedy's remarks, which is believed to have been in part because of the speech. The speech itself has been listed as one of the greatest in American history, ranked 17th on American Rhetoric's Top 100 speeches in the 20th century. Former US Congressman and media host Joe Scarborough said that it was Kennedy's greatest speech, and was what prompted him into entering into public service. Journalist Joe Klein has called it "politics in its grandest form and highest purpose," and said that it "marked the end of an era" before American political life was taken over by consultants and pollsters. It is also featured as the prologue of his book, Politics Lost.
libertyblitzkrieg | It’s important to understand the ruling class doesn’t actually fear
Trump or Sanders individually — any one person can be dealt with. What they really fear is you.
They fear people flocking to unapproved candidates and then talking
about things the establishment doesn’t want them talking about. This is
the main reason the whole Russiagate fantasy was unrolled against Trump
and pushed hysterically by mass media.
By ensuring “the resistance” to Trump revolved around some invented
intelligence agency narrative, the power structure was able to prevent
large numbers of people from talking about anything real or significant
for four years straight. Although it didn’t remove Trump from office, it
successfully reduced hitherto thoughtful people into emotionally broken
mental midgets.
This is the reason the exact same tactic was just unrolled against Bernie Sanders, with Jeff Bezos’ Washington Post reporting
the day before the Nevada caucuses that Russia is also supposedly
helping Sanders. It’s ridiculous, but you have to understand the
strategy here. If Sanders can’t be prevented from winning the
nomination, the establishment needs a plan B, and that plan appears to
be Russiagate all over again. These people aren’t very creative.
When it became clear Trump couldn’t be stopped he was smeared with
being a tool of the Russians, and the same seeds are being planted
around the Sanders campaign. It doesn’t matter how preposterous it is,
the primary goal is to ensure nobody ever talks about anything
important. Absent Russia hysteria, a Sanders vs. Trump matchup would
quickly become a battle of who’s more populist, and issues that make
so-called elites very uncomfortable would become widely discussed. The
ruling class doesn’t want the public talking about such things so they
need to turn the election into a complete circus if Sanders can’t be
blocked. Instead of talking about economic insecurity, healthcare, the
cost of college and wars for empire, the goal is to make Sanders and
Trump spend the entire campaign season arguing about who hates Russia
more.
The important takeaway here is how completely terrified and decrepit
the ruling class of this country really is. They have no argument or
philosophy about anything important. As such, their only tactic is to
overwhelm the public with nonsense and invented narratives in order to
divide, befuddle and control the masses while keeping the imperial
oligarchy running exactly as it has for decades. Once you see the game,
it’s impossible to unsee it, but the good news is we all possess within
ourselves the power they fear most. The power to think for ourselves and
to reject ridiculous lies.
downwithtyranny | This is a small point that leads to a larger one. Consider what Mike
Bloomberg is building within the Democratic Party, within the DNC.
According to the following analysis he's turning the DNC into an
anti-Sanders machine, a force loyal to himself, that will operate even
after Sanders is nominated, even after Sanders is elected, if he so
chooses.
With that he hopes to limit and control what Sanders and his rebellion
can do. It's the ultimate billionaire counter-rebellion — own the Party
machine that the president normally controls, then use it against him.
Our source for this thought is Glen Ford at Black Agenda Report.
Ford is one of the more vitriolic defenders of radical change in
America, but in this analysis I don't think he's wrong, at least in
making the case that Bloomberg is giving himself that option. But do
decide for yourself.
Here's his case:
Bloomberg Wants to Swallow the Democrats and Spit Out the Sandernistas
If, somehow, Bernie Sanders is allowed to win the nomination, Michael
Bloomberg and other plutocrats will have created a Democratic Party
machinery purpose-built to defy Sanders -- as nominee, and even as
president.
The details of his argument are here (emphasis added):
Bloomberg has already laid the groundwork to directly seize the party
machinery, the old fashioned way: by buying it and stacking it with his
own, paid operatives, with a war-against-the-left budget far bigger than
the existing Democratic operation. Bloomberg’s participation in
Wednesday’s debate, against all the rules, is proof-of-purchase.
In addition to the nearly million dollar down payment to the party in
November that sealed the deal for the debate rules change, Bloomberg has
already pledged to pay the full salaries of 500 political staffers for
the Democratic National Committee all the way through the November
election, no matter who wins the nomination. Essentially, Bloomberg will be running the election for the corporate wing of the party, even if Sanders is the nominee.
independent | Michael Bloomberg called Goldman Sachs bankers his ‘peeps’ and promised to defend them, leaked tape reveals. Presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg is being criticised for telling bankers he would have defended them as president in a leaked audio from a private Goldman Sachs event in 2016.
At the event, Mr Bloomberg first described the
audience as his “peeps”, and said that had he run for president that
year, his “first campaign platform” would have been “to defend the banks.”
But, he added, “you know how well that’s gonna go down in this country”.
Mr Bloomberg then defended the banks more
seriously: “Somebody's gotta stand up and do what we need. A healthy
banking system that's going to take risks because that's what creates
the jobs for everybody. And nobody's willing to say that.”
The audio was uploaded to hosting platform Soundcloud and sent to CNN
and several journalists. The sender used the email address and username
“CancelGoldman”, and claimed to have worked at Goldman Sachs for 14
years.
The Bloomberg campaign has confirmed that the audio is real. In an email to CNN,
spokesperson Stu Loeser said that much of what Mr Bloomberg said was in
jest, and that his remarks were of an analytical standard almost
unheard of in current politics.
theatlantic | When last in power, Bloomberg presided over the mistreatment of
Democrats who sought to protest Republicans, violating the
constitutional rights of hundreds of dissenters.
At the time, Bloomberg was a first-term Republican mayor of New York.
The GOP hoped that holding the 2004 Republican National Convention in
the city, a site of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, would help reelect
George W. Bush. Protests in deep-blue New York were inevitable.
Bloomberg had months to prepare.
And he did. Nearly as soon as the convention location was announced,
the police department that Bloomberg presided over launched a secret
mission to infiltrate protest groups, TheNew York Times later reported:
For at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention,
teams of undercover New York City police officers traveled to cities
across the country, Canada and Europe to conduct covert observations of
people who planned to protest at the convention, according to police
records and interviews.
From Albuquerque to Montreal, San Francisco to Miami, undercover New
York police officers attended meetings of political groups, posing as
sympathizers or fellow activists, the records show.
Some people planned to break the law during protests,
but in hundreds of secret reports, the NYPD “chronicled the views and
plans of people who had no apparent intention of breaking the law,”
including “members of street theater companies, church groups and
antiwar organizations, as well as environmentalists and people opposed
to the death penalty, globalization and other government policies.”
theintercept |I am one of the many women Mike
Bloomberg’s company tried to silence through nondisclosure agreements.
The funny thing is, I never even worked for Bloomberg.
But my story shows the lengths that the Bloomberg machine will go to
in order to avoid offending Beijing. Bloomberg’s company, Bloomberg LP,
is so dependent on the vast China market for its business that its
lawyers threatened to devastate my family financially if I didn’t sign
an NDA silencing me about how Bloomberg News killed a story critical of
Chinese Communist Party leaders.
It was only when I hired Edward
Snowden’s lawyers in Hong Kong that Bloomberg LP eventually called off
their hounds after many attempts to intimidate me.
In 2012, I was working toward a Ph.D. in
sociology at Tsinghua University in Beijing, and my husband, Michael
Forsythe, was a lead writer on a Bloomberg News article about
the vast accumulation of wealth by relatives of Chinese President Xi
Jinping, part of an award-winning “Revolution to Riches” series about
Chinese leaders.
Soon after Bloomberg published the article on Xi’s family wealth in
June 2012, my husband received death threats conveyed by a woman who
told him she represented a relative of Xi. The woman conveying the
threats specifically mentioned the danger to our whole family; our two
children were 6 and 8 years old at the time. The New Yorker’s Evan Osnos
reports a similar encounter in his award-winning book, “Age of
Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth and Faith in the New China,” when the
same woman told Osnos’s wife: “He [Forsythe] and his family can’t stay
in China. It’s no longer safe,” she said. “Something will happen. It
will look like an accident. Nobody will know what happened. He’ll just
be found dead.”
The experience was especially terrifying because it came just months
after the murder of a British businessman, Neil Heywood, who was
poisoned by the wife of a senior Chinese leader, Bo Xilai, according to
Chinese state media. His body was reportedly discovered in a hotel in
the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing. While our family spent the
kids’ summer vacation in 2012 outside of China, Bloomberg executives
kept my husband busy in nonstop conference calls about how to maintain
our security. I had recurring nightmares about my young children getting
beaten up or killed. I desperately wanted to speak publicly about the
death threats, feeling it would give us stronger protection, but
Bloomberg News wanted us not to say anything about it while the company
conducted its own internal investigation. I had been loyal to the
company ever since my husband and I married in 2002, and I didn’t want
to jeopardize his job. I stayed silent until October 26, 2012, when
another (unrelated) story was published in defiance of the Chinese
government. I decided to tweet that we had received death threats after
the Bloomberg story on Xi Jinping.
Within hours of my tweets — the original and my replies to questions —
a Bloomberg manager called my husband and said, “Get your wife to
delete her tweets.” I did not delete them, but I also did not tweet or
speak publicly about the death threats again. I did not want to anger
the company because we needed it to relocate us to Hong Kong, where our
children would be safe. As we finished the remainder of our time in
Beijing, applying for schools in Hong Kong and preparing for our move, I
lived in constant fear. Would someone get to our children while they
were on their way to or from school? Who was watching and listening to
us? I obsessively pulled down all our window blinds at night in case
Chinese security agents were watching us. I was careful not to speak
loudly about our plans in our home or on my phone in case we were
bugged.
In August 2013, I finally relaxed as we flew out of Beijing and moved
to a temporary apartment in Hong Kong. I thought that our yearlong
nightmare had ended. But things would soon get even worse.
My husband had been working for many months on another investigative
report for Bloomberg about financial ties between one of China’s richest
men, Wang Jianlin, and the families of senior Communist Party
officials, including relatives of Xi. Bloomberg editors had thus far
backed the story. A Bloomberg managing editor, Jonathan Kaufman, said in
an email in late September 2013, “I am in awe of the way you tracked
down and deciphered the financial holdings and the players. … It’s a
real revelation. Looking forward to pushing it up the line,” according
to an account published by the Financial Times.
Then Bloomberg killed the story at the last minute, and the company
fired my husband in November after comments by Bloomberg News
editor-in-chief Matt Winkler were leaked. “If we run the story, we’ll be
kicked out of China,” Winkler reportedly said on a company call.
theintercept |In October 2014, on a stage in San Francisco in front of a
live audience, Katie Couric asked Mike Bloomberg whether he had ever
“sexted on Snapchat.” The former New York City mayor, speaking alongside
Snapchat co-founder Evan Spiegel at the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit,
joked that he “couldn’t answer the question.” But the question prompted
Bloomberg to describe his views on data collection, and a personal
“Richard Nixon lesson” about record-keeping.
What followed was a lighthearted discussion of digital privacy, in
which Bloomberg, now a candidate in the Democratic presidential
race, praised the National Security Agency and said he doesn’t have a
problem with apps selling users’ personal data, as long as consumers
understand what is happening.
“Look, if you don’t want it to be in the public domain, don’t take
that picture, don’t write it down. In this day and age, you’ve got to be
pretty naive to believe that the NSA isn’t listening to everything and
reading every email,” Bloomberg said. “And incidentally, given how
dangerous the world is, we should hope they are, because this is really
serious, what’s going on in the world.”
Bloomberg’s comments in 2014 came more than a year after the first
disclosures of documents by NSA contractor Edward Snowden, but before a federal appeals court ruled
that the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records was illegal.
Bloomberg did not describe any specific NSA program or form of data
collection in detail, but the lighthearted conversation contains
insights into his views on digital privacy.
Bloomberg mentioned Snowden by name, saying that because hackers or
whistleblowers can obtain and leak records, he joked that he has a rule
against keeping records. “And when you write something, you take a
picture and somebody leaks it,” Bloomberg said. “How many times does
that have to happen before you realize it’s gonna happen again and it
could happen to you? And so whether it’s Snowden or some hacker or
something, it’s what I call the Richard Nixon lesson: Don’t record it.”
imperial.ac.uk |Dr Sangeeta Bhatia,
report author, explained: “We compared the average monthly number of
passengers travelling from Wuhan to major international destinations
with the number of COVID-19 cases that have been detected overseas.
Based on these data, we then estimate the number of cases that are
undetected globally and find that approximately two thirds of the cases
might be undetected at this point. Our findings confirm similar analyses
carried out by other groups.”
As of 20 February 2020, over 74,000 cases of COVID-19 (formerly
2019-nCoV) have been reported in China (with 2121 deaths). Over 1000
cases have been confirmed in 29 regions and countries outside mainland
China (including Hong Kong SAR and Macau SAR).
Dr Natsuko Imai,
report author, said: “We are starting to see more cases reported from
countries and regions outside mainland China with no known travel
history or link to Wuhan City. Our analysis, which extends and confirms
previously released analysis by other groups using flight volumes from
Wuhan City and the reported number of COVID-19 cases, demonstrates the
importance of surveillance and case detection if countries are to
successfully contain the epidemic."
Exported cases vary in the severity of their clinical symptoms,
making some cases more difficult to detect than others. Some countries
have detected significantly fewer than would have been expected based on
the volume of flight passengers arriving from Wuhan City, China.
Gina Cuomo-Dannenburg, report author, added: “We compiled data from a
variety of publicly available sources, such as national and provincial
ministries of health and local news, to determine information about
travel history, exposure and symptom onset of individual patients
observed outside of mainland China. We would like to thank countries for
their continued transparency in presenting information on new cases,
and would like to encourage communication of patient outcomes going
forward to present a true picture of severity and clinical
presentation.”
Based on comparisons with Singapore only, 63% of cases are estimated
to be undetected. Comparing with Singapore, Finland, Nepal, Belgium,
Sweden, India, Sri Lanka, and Canada, 73% of cases are estimated to be
undetected.
Rejuvenation Pills
-
No one likes getting old. Everyone would like to be immorbid. Let's be
careful here. Immortal doesnt include youth or return to youth. Immorbid
means you s...
Death of the Author — at the Hands of Cthulhu
-
In 1967, French literary theorist and philosopher Roland Barthes wrote of
“The Death of the Author,” arguing that the meaning of a text is divorced
from au...
9/29 again
-
"On this sacred day of Michaelmas, former President Donald Trump invoked
the heavenly power of St. Michael the Archangel, sharing a powerful prayer
for pro...
Return of the Magi
-
Lately, the Holy Spirit is in the air. Emotional energy is swirling out of
the earth.I can feel it bubbling up, effervescing and evaporating around
us, s...
New Travels
-
Haven’t published on the Blog in quite a while. I at least part have been
immersed in the area of writing books. My focus is on Science Fiction an
Historic...
Covid-19 Preys Upon The Elderly And The Obese
-
sciencemag | This spring, after days of flulike symptoms and fever, a man
arrived at the emergency room at the University of Vermont Medical Center.
He ...
