Covid and flu: new vaxx kerfuffle

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There are three new vaccinations currently on the agenda. Two are out now; the other is in clinical trials, but for how long? There is a debate about how to justify short-cuts in safety testing.

The first two are fresh booster Covid jabs which the US FDA authorised for emergency use last week. Made by Moderna and Pfizer, these are ‘bivalent’, i.e. a combination of the formulations against the original Covid-19 disease, with other ones to combat a couple of the newer Omicron variants.

Part of the information to support this decision is ‘nonclinical’ since the bivalent versions have not had the customary extensive testing, although thanks to mass vaccination there is plenty of evidence about the effects of the individual elements in them.

There is a parallel with the easier approval route for annual influenza jabs, as an article in Science magazine explains:

Influenza vaccines are updated each spring to try to match the strain most likely to circulate in the fall and winter. The reformulated shots don’t have to undergo new clinical trials unless the manufacturers significantly change the way they make the vaccine. A similar approach for new COVID-19 variants makes sense, says Leif Erik Sander, an infectious disease expert at the Charité University Hospital in Berlin. The changes to the mRNA are minor and providing updated vaccines as quickly as possible is “an ethical issue,” Sander says. “We need to allow people to protect themselves from a virus that we can’t fully control.”

The speeding-up may help protect the public but raises the issue of trust, as the writer goes on to say:

But there is a potential downside: Authorizing updated vaccines without clinical data could lower public acceptance. “If a variant booster is going to reduce overall uptake, that’s a potential problem” that could offset the gains in protection from the new vaccine, says Deborah Cromer, a mathematical modeler at the Kirby Institute of the University of New South Wales.

For the drug companies, Emergency Use Approval (EUA) not only gets their product earning money sooner but indemnifies them against lawsuits for damages. This is bound to raise suspicion that for Big Pharma, given carte blanche, profits could trump safety.

It must be stressed that there are definitely risks associated with vaccination against diseases. The UK introduced a compensation scheme in 1979 and the first Vaccine Damage Payments in respect of Covid-19 jabs were made in June this year.

Public confidence has also been damaged by previous over-emphatic Covid-related communications from governments, the use of social pressure to enforce mass vaccination and other strategies, and the associated campaigns of suppression of dissident voices.

There are signs that the government has rethought its position. Last December, the House of Lords voiced concerns about making vaccination mandatory for NHS staff; this April, the NHS deemed ‘non-urgent’ and merely ‘recommended’, jabs for children aged 5-11 who are not in a higher-risk category; and although twice as many people died this summer ‘with’ Covid as in the same period last year, we are no longer forced to wear masks, observe ‘social distancing’ or endure more of the lockdowns that have caused great and lasting damage to the economy and had negative side-effects on physical and mental health. Former Chancellor Rishi Sunak has recently said he never received a cost-benefit analysis of the proposed measures to tackle the pandemic; today we are paying the price.

Now about the third newbie vaccination. One jab-dissident is Dr Vernon Coleman, a retired British GP who has long been skeptical of the safety and efficacy of vaccines in general. This and his opinions on some other matters have earned him a carefully damning opening paragraph in Wikipedia (a crowd-compiled site notoriously vulnerable to misinformation and malicious use) as well as abuse, censorship by e.g. Youtube and so on.

Nevertheless, Dr Coleman has raised concerns over a new-style influenza vaccine (BPL-1357) that, it is hoped, will protect against many or all variations of the virus. Initial clinical tests were run on mice (but in the case of the Covid boosters, only 8 of them according to this anti-vaccine writer !) and ferrets, and the formulation is now undergoing a Phase 1 clinical trial with humans.

A standard Phase 1 trial is conducted on a small number of healthy people, with a control group taking a placebo. This can’t prove that the medication is safe for everyone, but at least (one supposes) it will indicate that it’s not extremely dangerous for young-to-middle-aged people in good condition and without certain risky lifestyle factors. Larger-scale and longer-term trials (often taking years) follow.

What concerns Dr Coleman - perhaps prematurely, but we shall see - is that as with Covid/Omicron, there may be a rush to get this vaccination cleared for rollout. The motive for the government is that influenza kills tens of thousands in the UK every year; for manufacturers, the commercial incentive is obvious.

The efficacy of Covid vaccinations at least, is clearly not complete. It is generally accepted that you can get and spread Covid despite the immunisation; even quadruple-jabbed President Biden came down with the illness recently.

As to risks, I myself have had the double jab and a booster, and each time I was not advised of any potential hazards; in short, I was not put in a position to give informed consent. Nurses were injecting us as though on an assembly line, raising up to £20 a time for the group practice. GPs were earning well into six figures during the pandemic.

With all these rewards for medical professionals and product providers, there needs to be a counterweight of extra caution to protect the interests of the patient. So the real issue is Hippocrates’ principle, ‘First, do no harm.’

COLOUR SUPPLEMENT: Robert Lenkiewicz (1941-2002), by JD

Lenkiewicz is ignored by the 'art establishment' because his work is figurative and as such is unfashionable and not "cutting edge" or "challenging" or whatever Artspeak is currently in vogue.

Based in Plymouth, he never courted the London art establishment, and became respected solely on his own terms - through hard work, skill, and his unique vision.

Lenkiewicz could well be ignored also because he liked to paint beautiful young ladies and he often put himself in the picture.

If Lenkiewicz is known at all it will be for his association with a Plymouth tramp by the name of Edward McKenzie, known as 'Diogenes'. After McKenzie's death, and with his prior agreement, Lenkiewicz took posession of the 'vacated premises' as McKenzie had referred to his corpse and had the body embalmed. It was then kept in the studio (in a drawer according to rumour.)

The City Council were somewhat agitated by this but Lenkiewicz reminded them that they had two Egyptian mummies in the City museum asking "Is it because mine is new?"

He also painted other tramps as well as others on the margins of society and, until the year before his death, he would provide a free Christmas dinner for the homeless.

Read more about this remarkable man here

https://www.robertlenkiewicz.com/about/biography-ii.html

The painter surrounded by his muses -

And the mural he painted on the wall outside his studio in Plymouth -

https://www.robertlenkiewicz.com/about/murals.html

UK Teen ISIS Bride: should she come home?

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Homework or terrorism? Tough choice!

You are a teenage girl in a British Muslim family. You go to school, and after that it’s homework and helping your Mum with her duties. Your family keep you safe because they know what boys will do with nubile girls given half a chance, and that would ruin you and dishonour the family.

Or you could run away and f*ck a hero!

Think carefully - hey, where are you going! Wait!

And so, on 17 February 2015, Shamima Begum and two of her school pals went to Syria to have husbands allotted to them, whom they would serve as the jihadis fought for what they saw as their noble religious cause; and who used this excuse to indulge in horrible violence and cruelty.

Aged only 15, Shamima went through a form of marriage with a Dutch convert to Islam, 23-year-old Yago Riedijk, who was later captured and as of last November was in a Kurdish detention centre, facing a six-year jail term for terrorism if and when he returns to the Netherlands. They had three children together, all of whom died in infancy.

Of the other two girls who accompanied Shamima, Kadiza Sultana reportedly died in a Russian airstrike on Raqqa, Syria; Amira Abase, together with another schoolfriend called Sharmeena Begum who had gone ahead of the trio, had been seen in Baghuz, Syria, but that town was obliterated in a US airstrike (18 March 2019) that killed many civilians.

It’s the tip of the iceberg. According to JAN Trust, in the 12 months to July 2015, 43 women and girls were seduced into leaving the UK for the Syrian warzone.

Now, we discover, Canada has been implicated in this people-processing. A man called Mohammed Al Rasheed, based in Turkey, was helping people like Shamima transit from the UK to ISIS in Syria but also passing their details to Canadian Intelligence. According to George Galloway, the just-published book that reveals this says that the then British Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, was told of this by Shamima’s lawyer five years ago but sat on the information.

What Javid did instead, responding to public anger at the allegedly treasonous and culpable association of this British female with the ISIS atrocities, was to deprive Shamima of her British citizenship on 19 February 2019.

The Government argued that under the British Nationality Act 1981 the children of foreign immigrants (Shamima’s parents came from Bangladesh) have less protection against such a deprivation but that Shamima would not thereby be made stateless (which would go against the UNHCR Convention of 1954.) The UK’s Home Office expert Dr Hoque referred to Bangladesh’s Citizenship Act, 1951:

This says that “a person born after the commencement of this Act shall be a citizen of Bangladesh by descent if his father or mother is a citizen of Bangladesh at the time of her birth”. It goes on to say that dual nationality is not permitted, so someone with another citizenship “ceases to be a citizen of Bangladesh” — but that proviso only applies to people over 21.

Dr Hoque said:

Until the age of 21, therefore, a Bangladeshi citizen continues to remain a citizen alongside being a foreign citizen.

For its part, Bangladesh refuses to accept her, or any militant.

So there she remains, stuck in limbo in Syria.

The Guardian newspaper is inclined to present Shamima as a victim of trafficking; Spiked’s Editor Tom Slater and writer Rakib Ehsan take the view that she was willing and aware of what she was doing.

Peter Hitchens reminds us that Shamima would have been rather more naive when she left the UK at age 15 and that it is ‘cruel’ to leave her stateless and abandoned; rather, we should bring her to the UK to face justice. Speaking on GB News, he emphasised the importance of holding to law and institutions, especially in cases where feelings run high; we can’t give in to the mob.

FRIDAY MUSIC: The Last Rays Of Summer, by JD

Summer is nearly over: autumn arrives on the 22nd. Following on from last week's bright and breezy summer music a wistful but beautifully melancholic musical farewell to the sun. Maybe summer next year will be more joyous.

Here's a bonus track; Summer Wine by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood -

.......fits the end of summer mood beautifully.

COLOUR SUPPLEMENT: Colombian Coffee Art, by JD

We have all seen those pavement artists on their knees with boxes and boxes of chalk beavering away to produce reproductions of famous paintings. And we throw a few coppers into their hats in appreciation of their efforts and as a thank you for brightening up our day.

But this is a piece of pavement art with a difference....

The image comprises 3,604 cups of café con leche each cup with a different amount of milk in the coffee thus providing the variations in colour to produce the illusion of the Mona Lisa.

OK it was a publicity stunt for a coffee maker in Chinchiná, Colombia but no less spectacular for that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinchin%C3%A1,_Caldas

WEEKENDER: Dumb Stupidity, by Wiggia

Donald Trump has been denigrated and called an idiot by those who want him removed from the face of the Earth, but he called this correctly along with much else.

It is often said we get the politicians we deserve. Recent events have proved that to be true, and the video below shows a classic example of a script reader clinging to the narrative, let them eat cake…

           https://twitter.com/RNCResearch/status/1561370651809792001

This seems to have been a week of stupid promises, as potential leaders officials, think tanks, ministers and businessmen offer silly solutions to the energy crisis as a way of being seen to be doing something, It should be said that as they are responsible for the majority of the mess we are in after decades of denying practical ways forward, preferring be in awe to the great green god, they should come up with solutions, but all I see is back of a fag packet knee-jerk reaction to  problem of their own collective making.

Perhaps as they get energy allowances they are not that bothered about what happens to the plebs, but they should be careful, in times past this sort of situation resulted in heads on pikes across Westminster Bridge; not likely to happen in what has become a largely apathetic nation, but who knows?

Onward, such a hopeful name, a government think tank, has suggested a halving of stamp duty to those who would install a heat pump. You can tell this was made up over a couple of Mojitos on the terrace at Westminster as none of the obvious downsides are mentioned.  

The rebate is an incentive to those being’ hesitant about adopting new technologies’; no, people are declining the fitting of heat pumps because without a suitably insulated property and underfloor heating the are an expensive mistake.

Naturally net zero and its addicts trump any sensible proposals. As a former environment secretary said ‘Liz Truss ought to know the devastating consequences of failing to reach net zero.’Do these bubble dwellers ever stop to think that if we actually reach net zero, we won't, that it will not make one jot of difference in the scheme of things other than reduce our standard of living?

James Kirkup writes a scathing article in the Spectator about Liz Truss' and Rishi Sunak's dismissal of solar farms. There is nothing wrong with solar power, apart from the fact that no sun no power and the much vaunted storage ‘that will save our nation’ is still a far distant fairy story; and how much will we ever be able to store for those long dark winter months when the sun doesn’t shine?

Kirkup goes into great detail about how cheap solar power is. It really isn’t: as I have said before, no renewables are cheap if you have to have a parallel source of energy on stand by for those dark windless days. Until renewables can stand alone, why don’t we invest in an energy source that works and gives us independence, or is that too simple?

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/sunak-and-truss-are-wrong-about-solar

Before the crisis, I received an email from a major energy supplier that claimed that all their energy was from renewables. They are not alone, several companies say the same. It is a blatant lie: no energy company can possibly have a choice in the source of their energy, they simply use a Renewable Energy Guarantee of Origin certificate REGO to enable them to say such twaddle.  

https://www.renewableenergyhub.co.uk/blog/does-your-energy-provider-genuinely-supply-100-green-electricity/

It enables companies to claim they are 100% green when they actually only need to have 30% in the mix. Wherever they claim to get their energy from, in fact all companies get it from the national grid which cannot stream different sources of energy. These companies take people for fools and get away with it.

From the above link…

‘Both Ecotricity and Good Energy source enough renewable electricity to match their customers’ usage though this tends to mean that their costs are higher and as a result their tariffs are more expensive.‘

So Kirkup's claim that renewables are cheaper than fossil fuels falls at the first hurdle as the green consumer actually pays more and gets the same energy as everyone else

The energy companies have themselves come up with a plan to ‘help’ the public. Keith Anderson, boss of Scottish Power, wants to help by setting up a government-backed (i.e. taxpayer funded) deficit fund running to £100 billion. Other companies are backing him and you can see why as the self-serving plan is popular: it effectively underwrites their businesses takes away risk of bad debts and takes away any windfall tax extensions.

It involves freezing the cap at £2000 for two years then covering the gap between the cap and the wholesale price of gas with the deficit fund. The repayment would be spread over ten to fifteen years with a mix of energy bills and taxation.

I am sure there is a better way of ‘helping’ those struggling with bills than this and it doesn’t involve giving ‘insurance’ to energy companies; again, the public are being taken for stupid.

Meanwhile Rishi Sunak, hoping to become PM, has issued this statement about how the Covid period was mishandled:

“This is the problem… If you empower all these independent people, you’re screwed… We shouldn’t have empowered the scientists in the way we did.” 

He concludes that had we not done so, and had we acknowledged trade-offs from the beginning 

“... we could be in a very different place… it could have been shorter. Different. Quicker. There were often times the officials would do a “pre-meeting”, decide what they wanted to push through, then ram it through in the main meeting with the PM/ministers.”

This process wasn’t helped when, on occasion, ministers would go into the key Covid meeting and be handed a set of 100 papers by officials, with no chance of being able to digest them before a decision was taken....

“Mr Sunak recalled the moment when Prof Neil Ferguson and his team at Imperial College London presented their Report 9, which claimed Covid casualties could reach 500,000 if no action was taken but would be reduced to 20,000 with a lockdown.”

As wriggle-free statements go it is quite good, but what it actually says they blindly took the path laid out for them by ‘experts.’ Not only have experts prospered on their misleading of the nation, but those who govern us just sat on their arses and signed anything put in front of them without any scrutiny. Now he wants us to believe it was none of their fault.

Why was Ferguson even invited to give his opinion? His track record in modelling was there for all to see. You, Rishi, along with others were a minister at the time but you failed to raise any alarms or resign in protest; nor did anyone else for that matter, so it’s bit late now.

Boris has no exit plan so has gone on holiday and laid low until he sees a further opportunity to gloss over his multiple failures and visits Ukraine again, promising them almost anything and telling the people back home they will have to ‘suck it up’ re energy prices as the Ukraine is more important than your granny dying of hyperthermia this winter.

Strange words from a Prime Minister whose prime concern should be his nation, his borders, and most importantly the safeguarding of his people, but when you are seeking a life beyond Westminster and a legacy all that goes out of the window.

Of course, Boris doesn’t pay any energy bills and as long as he stays an MP he can claim on expenses, while a growing number of people at the bottom of the pile will not be able to turn on the heating.

His and previous governments have pandered to the green lobby and become evermore reliant on importing energy to cover the shortfalls when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun stays in, rather than build our own infrastructure and be secure, and now he wants us to suffer to save Ukraine. 

They take us for idiots and get away with it.

FRIDAY MUSIC: Surfing Songs For Summer, by JD

These come from the late 50s or early 60s, from a more innocent and more optimistic time. And this was reflected in the music, bright and breezy. The guitar sound that set the tone for most of this music was invented by Dick Dale, King of the Surf Guitar' - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Dale

I have added a few other popular guitar based hits as, at that time, guitarists were starting to be recognised as stars in their own right and the music is still an influence to this day.