Online emergency meeting of British scientists and politicians tomorrow

[JanFebAnyMonth]

www.johnsnowmemo.com/summitdeclaration.html?fbclid=IwAR1ip9v81nlZUTBIN46cKEOhvqmr3n2ISfEGYsUI8WKkb7ZEMnoM6jUEwPQ

JOHN SNOW MEMORANDUM
EMERGENCY SUMMIT AGAINST MASS INFECTION
THURSDAY 8th JULY, 10:00 am

We are holding an emergency summit to outline our concerns about the UK government’s current strategy to abandon most restrictions in England on the 19th July in the midst of a surging pandemic. We have outlined our concerns in a letter to The Lancet (embargoed until 23.30hrs UK time on Wednesday 7 July 2021), now signed by more than 120 of the world's leading scientists. At the summit we will outline our grave concerns about the UK government’s dangerous and reckless strategy, and the urgent steps we need to take to protect the public.

PROGRAMME

Statement from Scientists and Medical Doctors
Professor Trish Greenhalgh, Professor of Primary Care Health Sciences, Medical Sciences Division, University of Oxford
Dr. Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet
Professor Kailash Chand, Honorary Vice President of the British Medical Association and former deputy chair of the BMA
Dr. Deepti Gurdasani, Clinical Epidemiologist and Senior Lecturer in Machine Learning, Queen Mary University of London

Q&A session
Panel will include all speakers and:
Dr. Rachel Clarke, NHS palliative care doctor and author
Sir David King, former Chief Scientific adviser and chair of Independent SAGE
Professor Susan Michie, Professor of Health Psychology, University College London and member of Independent SAGE
Caroline Lucas, MP, Former Leader of the Green Party of England and Wales
Richard Burgon, MP, Labour MP for Leeds East
Debbie Abrahams, MP, Labour MP for Oldham East and Saddleworth
Philippa Whitford, MP, Scottish National Party MP for Central Ayrshire
Barbara Keeley, MP, Labour MP for Worsley and Eccles South

This event will be livestreamed at: and on Twitter at @allthecitizens.

We will be taking questions from the press and public. Please contact us at [email protected] if you'd like to ask a question.

Please join us at 10am tomorrow

Summit reported on in Daily Express, Guardian and on inews.com, as far as I can see

www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/08/new-zealand-children-falling-ill-in-high-numbers-due-to-covid-immunity-debt

@RafaIsTheKingOfClay: "Have you read the ons study, what they look into, what symptoms and the level of illness they looked into?"

Well, that's a great question. And honestly, I hadn't, because I expected the top-level summary to be suggestive of conclusive underlying data if there was any.

But I have read it now, and it's a shocker.

For example, the 1.5% includes "long COVID [that] reduces ability to undertake day-to-day activities: Not at all".

There is some further breakdown, but not against the reported symptom.

Anyway, these are self-reported symptoms, not a clinical diagnosis.

So I stand by my initial conclusion, which is to say it's great to see this being investigated and reported upon. (This isn't a slight against the ONS's work by any means.) But really, the data so far shared is far from sufficient to declare an emergency.

@SonnetForSpring

I'm beginning to hate living in this country with all the hate spewed at people who are respected within their fields. Hate it. So awful.

Agreed!

@MercyBooth

I'm really interested as to how we ended up at such differing viewpoints. I've always agreed with everything you said under your previous username, and was often on the same threads and campaigning going back years against austerity, for disability rights etc. I was one of the people who came in for some vitriol last summer when I said I struggled to wear a mask due to my disability, so one of those presumably who contributed to your change of heart. I've always nodded along to your worry about social situations, poverty and government cuts/neglect.

And yet you'd probably see me as pro lockdown, because I can't see another way out that will help all the people we are both so concerned about. I've seen people greatly suffer through lockdown in myriad ways, through mental health, through covid and long covid, through loss of income. I lost my income myself back in march 2020. And yet I just don't understand how an anti lockdown position changes any of those things. To me, the idea of not locking down, of letting it rip, is much more likely to cause long term societal damage, especially in the poorest communities - that's where covid hits hardest already anyway. Not locking down would be so many degrees worse for those with cancer, with mental illness, with anything you need to access health services with. Lockdown has been awful for these too, but I'd argue that it's covid itself that has been the issue. It's covid that caused more cancer delays. It's covid that caused so much PTSD and mental illness. I don't see how you can separate out the two and say that without lockdown these things would have been better.

I'm just musing really because you're someone I've always identified with and yet on this I find myself poles apart. I'm no lockdown lover. I hate that term as much as I hate lockdown. I'm CEV and I hated shielding. I hate the whole thing.

But in all this time, I've never heard an answer from a lockdown sceptic that makes sense to me of what they think would happen if they got their way. I don't know if it's just to do with the way we're all wired, and that's why it's so polarised, because we simply can't see the other POV clearly.

But for me I'm really sick and tired of being told I only care about covid when it's all the thousands of knock on effects I care passionately about, and so want to end as soon as bloody possible, and therefore don't want stretched out by further waves caused by easing restrictions too soon.

For what it's worth I'm no zero covid fan, and I think it looks like the vaccines have mostly broken the link with deaths and hospitalisations, but I'm just not sure we're quite there yet. And, as someone who has lived with chronic illness all my life, I'm very wary about putting thousands of people in a similar position, and throwing them on the mercy of the uncaring DWP.

Just a few musings. I'd really appreciate reading your thoughts too.

@JanFebAnyMonth

Summit reported on in Daily Express, Guardian and on inews.com, as far as I can see

and also mentioned on the Scottish Government briefing today :)

Noone wants restrictions to go on and on forever.
I suppose the key is to gently take restrictions away, monitoring progress of the vaccination programme and putting the breaks on if necessary. Trying to get as many people double jabbed as possible before finally going for it.
What the UK govt are doing is doing it far too quickly without any monitoring.

@Madhairday I guess i come from the viewpoint that nobody seemed to care pre Covid (not meaning you obvs) There were some really hateful disgusting ableist posts on here last year towards people who cant wear masks and i didnt want to align myself with ppl who think this way. Ive been on here for ten years and i tend to recognise the Tory voters (even if they have NCed) due to their posting style and their sudden concern for community when they wernt bothered before made me want to vomit, The hypocrisy was astounding. So STARK. Im no fan of lockdown no. I did start out on the worried about Coronavirus threads. I did not start from an anti lockdown viewpoint at all. I was pushed there because i was absolutely disgusted by hypocritical comments and behaviour. But there is a whole grey area between no lockdown and let it rip. 85 year old DM breaking her wrist during lockdown and being unable to wash her hair for two months put the tin lid on it. While celebs got their hair done.

The guilt tripping over not seeing family at Christmas from Government and media while they AND certain journos and TV presenters got to do what they liked.
If there were less double standards and hypocrisy i dont think the public would be so divided.

One of the biggest supporters locally here of how everyone should wear a mask no matter what their disability or problem has an ex wife who had to flee to a Refuge. There are a lot of controlling bullies who are getting off on this.

Controlling bullies will always find something to get off on though, Mercy. Many will have rebelled in saying “No one’s going to tell ME what to do” and merrily gone around breaking every bit of guidance possible. They tend to choose their stance according to what’s going to achieve their aim (powered and control) most efficiently.

*willl have revelled in saying

The right talk about the deserving/non deserving poor and the left talk about the deserving/ non deserving NHS patient. Quite a disturbing parallel.

The disabled will suffer more than most by the removal of masks. People genuinely unable to wear a mask are a minority.

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/amp/entry/disabled-people-end-of-lockdown_uk_60e41063e4b0e01b6b222dac/

want to end as soon as bloody possible, and therefore don't want stretched out by further waves caused by easing restrictions too soon.

Yes. And yes re Long Covid. People are being condemned to chronic illness in a society where there's very little in the way of a safety net.

Interesting - for me by far the most othering and ablist comments I've read have come from people arguing that we shouldn't have locked down for a disease that (paraphrased) "only kills old people and people with underlying conditions". Statements like "ah but only a tiny number of people with no underlying conditions have died" have so often been made as a kind of gotcha to arguments for restrictions, and I think are quite revealing of a view that only healthy people are really real and actually count. I've found some of those things really disturbing to read. Similarly I've seen a lot of apparent concern about the poverty and mental health of people suffering under lockdown, from people who I suspect have never much thought about them before.

I think it all shows it's a bit easy to take against someone or a type of person for one thing they've said, and from then on to see everything they say as arguments made in bad faith, as insincere, as manipulative or whatever. Once you've done that, other people's perceived insincere or nasty motives can totally and irredeemably colour the debate, so even people who might usually agree end up disagreeing. Maybe we could all do with giving each other the benefit of the doubt a bit more?

Good post @tiltedtomatoes

DH has COPD and ischemic heart disease. He cant walk due to his lung function (or rather lack of) Hes always been more at risk due to this, from flu and even the common cold can floor him. The difference is no one cared before.
Ive been classed as his carer since 2006. Since the massive heart attack that nearly killed him. We have ALWAYS had to be careful. I really felt bloody patronized when we were being told to wash our hands and how to wash our hands. I know about disability. Because i live with disability by proxy. When i come back home from town etc, i go straight into the bathroom to wash my hands while i still have my coat/jacket on.

We dont all live in big cities either. I live in a small market town. Our local bus that goes round our estate is empty a lot of the time. So im usually at the back or in the middle with a driver behind a screen. And the most thats been on there is three more passengers besides me. Some of these rules have been completely disproportionate for small places.

[quote MercyBooth]@Madhairday I guess i come from the viewpoint that nobody seemed to care pre Covid (not meaning you obvs) There were some really hateful disgusting ableist posts on here last year towards people who cant wear masks and i didnt want to align myself with ppl who think this way. Ive been on here for ten years and i tend to recognise the Tory voters (even if they have NCed) due to their posting style and their sudden concern for community when they wernt bothered before made me want to vomit, The hypocrisy was astounding. So STARK. Im no fan of lockdown no. I did start out on the worried about Coronavirus threads. I did not start from an anti lockdown viewpoint at all. I was pushed there because i was absolutely disgusted by hypocritical comments and behaviour. But there is a whole grey area between no lockdown and let it rip. 85 year old DM breaking her wrist during lockdown and being unable to wash her hair for two months put the tin lid on it. While celebs got their hair done.

The guilt tripping over not seeing family at Christmas from Government and media while they AND certain journos and TV presenters got to do what they liked.
If there were less double standards and hypocrisy i dont think the public would be so divided.[/quote]
@MercyBooth

I agree with all you say there, especially about the rampant disablism. But interestingly I think one of the things that pushed me further towards a pro lockdown position was the disgusting ableism that was (and is) so rife, around the value of lives, and who we are locking down for. It made me as a CEV individual feel completely shit, like my life was worth far less than 'the young and the fit' - a phrase I saw again and again. It felt like 'the vulnerable' were being time and again marginalised and minimised and then blamed for wrecking healthy lives. And it still feels like that, especially on the anti vaxx threads. So I saw that, I saw the disgusting ableism round all the Great Barrington stuff, and all the anti shielders rhetoric, and it reminded me too starkly of anti scrounger rhetoric in the austerity narrative. So I dug deeper into what the science was saying and doubled down in what I saw as the only position that made sense in terms of both valuing lives and getting out of this pit.

The stuff you say about double standards - yes and yes. I have no love whatsoever for this government and know exactly what you mean about being able to spot the Tory, and their actions have been reprehensible and unfair. But I wonder if there's an element of throwing the baby out with the bathwater if we decide that just because they are breaking their own rules then the rules themselves have no value. To me that is like saying hey look, Boris didn't bother wearing a seatbelt, so why should I? I know that's simplistic, but it comes down to something like that.

I do agree if there was less hypocrisy there would be less division. But I think we should be following common sense - and majority science - rather than making our way through by rejecting mainstream wisdom because of that hypocrisy.

Would you say you are anti lockdown because you think that being pro lockdown means you are aligning yourself with Tories? That's not an inflammatory question, it's merely curiosity as to how we - who think similarly it seems - have come to such polarised positions.

It's good as well to be able to discuss these things without the bile we so often see on these threads.

I'm so sorry about what happened to your DM

@tiltedtomatoes

Interesting - for me by far the most othering and ablist comments I've read have come from people arguing that we shouldn't have locked down for a disease that (paraphrased) "only kills old people and people with underlying conditions". Statements like "ah but only a tiny number of people with no underlying conditions have died" have so often been made as a kind of gotcha to arguments for restrictions, and I think are quite revealing of a view that only healthy people are really real and actually count. I've found some of those things really disturbing to read. Similarly I've seen a lot of apparent concern about the poverty and mental health of people suffering under lockdown, from people who I suspect have never much thought about them before.

I think it all shows it's a bit easy to take against someone or a type of person for one thing they've said, and from then on to see everything they say as arguments made in bad faith, as insincere, as manipulative or whatever. Once you've done that, other people's perceived insincere or nasty motives can totally and irredeemably colour the debate, so even people who might usually agree end up disagreeing. Maybe we could all do with giving each other the benefit of the doubt a bit more?

Absolutely agree with all of this.

@neveradullmoment99

Noone wants restrictions to go on and on forever. I suppose the key is to gently take restrictions away, monitoring progress of the vaccination programme and putting the breaks on if necessary. Trying to get as many people double jabbed as possible before finally going for it. What the UK govt are doing is doing it far too quickly without any monitoring.

How much slower do you want? The easing of the January lockdown started in March. March to July is 4 months. That's on top of the other lockdowns. We've had restrictions in some form or other (mostly quite severe) for 16 months now.

A month ago, Boris delayed the final re-opening for a month. That was to wait and see if increased infections led to increased hospitalisations/deaths at the same rate as previously. They didn't.

By 19 July, all older/vulnerable will have been offered both jabs. The vast majority of adults will have had one jab and over half will have received both jabs.

It really is time to move on. The statistics show the people catching it are mostly teenagers and 20 somethings, that proves the vaccine is working. They're the people at least risk of serious problems and will mostly be asymptomatic.

Yes, I know some people can't be vaccinated and some have health issues meaning the vaccinations may not be fully effective (My OH has blood cancer and is in the latter group). But those people would have been at risk of flu every winter, at risk of norovirus, etc.

Just like the 3 million self employed who were excluded from financial covid support, "we can't help everyone" as stated by Rishi! The same applies for other groups of people affected by Covid. Not everyone can be protected (healthwise nor financially). Keeping restrictions for longer will make things worse for more people. It's all a balancing act, but the aim of the vaccinations was to protect those groups most at risk of dying and serious health issues - they're now protected as far as reasonably possible in realistic terms, let's move on.

Well it got a mention in the Telegraph

www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/moral-emptiness-epidemiological-stupidity-condemns-uk-covid/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr

‘Moral emptiness and epidemiological stupidity’: WHO condemns UK Covid policy

The comments come as more than 100 scientists sign a letter describing Britain’s strategy as a ‘dangerous and unethical experiment'

Excellent post tilted. There’s been some awful disablist stuff posted on here over the last year from those that want lockdowns to end regardless of the consequence. And it’s largely gone unchallenged in the spirit of ‘debate’.

Let’s face it this unlockdown in the face of rising infections has nothing to do with protecting the most vulnerable in society from the damage that lockdowns do. There are much better ways of doing that.

I'd like to remind a lot of posters on here, the Telegraph and the WHO if necessary, its not Britain's policy, its England's.

As you were.

I do wonder if disablist people if they ever end up being disabled would kill themselves to maintain their principles?

@SamusIsAGirl

I do wonder if disablist people if they ever end up being disabled would kill themselves to maintain their principles?

I think they'd struggle with their self-worth. If disabled people are a Burden and Not Really People to you, it would be an utter mind-fuck to become one, eh?