Westministenders: The Virus

[RedToothBrush]

Its like living in a Bad Disaster B Movie.

If you thought Brexit on your TV every day was Bad, The Virus is a whole new level.

The 5pm broadcast with Johnson and friends, and the public infomation video with the unblicking Chris Witty (who has such unfortunate mannerism he makes me think he's me a Dr Who alien akin to the Slitheen).

Who knows what will happen. Just that everything has changed and our entire economy is now on life support whilst we figure out how to deal with the crisis and what on earth our exit strategy is.

Johnson has however refused to join a joint EU purchase scheme designed to assist countries through the crisis.

Meanwhile the US is about to go nuts... so what does that do to a trade deal?

More money for the NHS? More hospitals?

Well its possible that might just happen...

"Bozo is deemed to be doing a good job because "

Historically, people normally support their leader / government in a dangerous crisis;
patriotism and sometimes nationalism tends to rise

Leaders around the world - left, right, centre, democracies, dictatorships - are nearly all experiencing this boost in confidence and popularity

The effect will last unless / until they screw up.

The populists in several countries are waiting in the wings for any disastrous death toll and / or economic crash
(Hungary unfortunately already has their nationaöist populists in govt)

Looks like dictatorships will be strengthened rather than weakened

Maybe C-19 is the new Kings Evil.

Maybe we'll all be queuing up for Boris touch before we know it.

We started WW1 with Squiffy Asquith and WW2 with Chamberlain. Both had to be removed.

What we need now is a leader who is hard-working, laser-focussed, resoluted and determined, open to the best advice and not partial to the latest off-piste gimmickery. Basically, we need Theresa May.

Or Keir Starmer....

Basically, we need Theresa May.

Hands up anyone who thought they’d say that at any point in the last 4 years?

I definitely think May would have done a better job than Johnson, although the bar has been set low. Her dogged approach and hard work would have been better than Johnson's efforts to date. I definitely think that she would have been OK in a time of stability - wouldn't have done anything spectacular, but ploughed on and not done anything bad either.

Still Johnson wanted to be PM. Now he's got there he has to take the rough with the smooth.

Mays excuse for being a bit shit was her determination - rightly or wrongly - to keep the Tory party together.

What's Boris' excuse ?

It's almost as if they were listening which SAGE scientists were listened to

At least May would have had a work ethic...

I was talking to a supplier in Africa this morning and they bought a large stock of masks and other medical equipment for their employee hospital in mid January.

I think this emphasises how tardy European and US governments and businesses have been.

Also, do not let me post anywhere else on Mumsnet or I might get banned.

Fuck me but the stupidity on here is as dangerous as the virus.

Yes Mistigri we should have been busy planning for this and purchasing in January. Instead BoZo was proudly telling the nation he had been shaking hands with everyone in a hospital where COVID patients were .

I've just ventured onto a few other boards and having to stop myself too. I've had to remind myself this could become my new Brexit on social media -ie the average person gives no shits at all, while I spray my millions of shits all over the place for months while everyone sits back twirling their fingers around their ears when they see my posts. I am done with the "let's share how many people survived!" posts though.

Back in January he was more interested in getting Brexit done.

I shit you not, I have seen his supporters on my feed saying "Lets Get COVID done!" with a sycophantic ramble about wonderful Boris has been their title. I had to check if they were being sarcastic the first time I saw it.

Oh good Lord, you mean they couldn't even come up with a new cheery soundbite for the epidemic?

There have been persistent doubts raised about Chinese data

If Western modellers have indeed been using false China data, it has likely skewed their forecasts:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/china-concealed-extent-of-virus-outbreak-u-s-intelligence-says

China has concealed the extent of the coronavirus outbreak in its country, under-reporting both total cases and deaths its suffered from the disease,
the U.S. intelligence community concluded in a classified report to the White House, according to three U.S. officials.
....
the thrust, they said, is that
China’s public reporting on cases and deaths is intentionally incomplete.

Two of the officials said the report concludes that China’s numbers are fake.

Get Covid done? Christ, I'm not sure what that even means.
I suppose we should be grateful the words oven-ready aren't being used (yet) in relation to CV.

I occasionally wander onto other threads and quickly stagger back here.
Tonight's gem, spotted somewhere on MN, is:

There is no fact in science

Ultimately it's hard not to say that the failure of the West is in part failure of a capitalist way of running society.

I disagree about Theresa May. She wasn't open to the best advice - she had those awful advisors, Timothy and the other one, and blocked everyone else. And in a time of peace etc she would have persisted in her nasty anti-immigrant agenda.

Auld ha ha, I spotted that too, and left the thread. Thank goodness for this thread, a little chink of sanity in the pandemic of ill-informed opinion swilling around on other threads and beyond MN.

It seems there was a deliberately defined cap to testing NHS staff: 15% only

Beth Rigbyy@BethRigby*

NEW: NHS England has sent a letter to all trusts saying govt has now lifted 15% cap on staff testing.

Any science fans left - despite the fact vacuum ?

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse ...

www.zerohedge.com/health/shocking-magnitude-65-tremor-just-hit-idaho-continues-alarming-trend-western-quakes

(and I had to look up why seismic activity near Yellowstone is Not A Good Thing ...)

There is no fact in science

Dear god, what was that about?

Floods, plague and earthquakes. Africa has an unprecedented locust problem, too.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-51618188

At this rate we will be seeing the four horsemen of the apocalypse on TV as crisis experts.

TheElements
It's on a thread where people are grappling with the notion that CV cases in Italy are not falling despite being in lockdown for 3 weeks.

Catchy little phrase...