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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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Samizdata quote of the day

· Health & medical · Slogans & Quotations

“According to this theory of leadership, convictions don’t count for much: politics is a science, and leaders are little more than vectors, conveying carefully calibrated versions of externally-validated truths to the masses in order to secure maximum support and compliance. Reports from the cabinet subgrouping in charge of Covid policy suggest that the new ‘rule of six’ was chosen instead of eight not for epidemiological reasons, but for purposes of “messaging clarity”. It was thought that, since the number six was already out there, it should be retained for simplicity’s sake; eight would only complicate things. And so the lives of England’s 55 million citizens are to be drastically altered “for the foreseeable future” according to the principles of campaign science.”

– Freddie Sayers.

September 14th, 2020 | 43 comments - (Comments are closed)

It is good not to be surprised to see articles like this in the Times

· Health & medical · Self ownership · UK affairs

But it would be even better not to have to still see articles like this in the Times:

Cannabis failures show why we need to legalise all drugs

Ian Birrell writes,

Carly Barton is a former university lecturer who suffered a stroke at the age of 24. It left her feeling as if her bones had been “replaced by red-hot pokers”. Doctors prescribed opiates of increasing strength but they left her feeling “zombied” and still in severe pain.

In desperation she smoked a joint and discovered that cannabis dulled the pain, enabling her to live a productive life. But she did not want to be a criminal and could not afford to spend thousands of pounds on private prescriptions. So she came up with a simple idea: a “cannabis card” to show police officers that she used the drug for health rather than recreational purposes.

It is thought that another million Britons who endure conditions such as arthritis, cancer and multiple sclerosis self-medicate with this drug. This is why Barton’s concept has been backed by police officers fed up with wasting their time. “I did not join the police to arrest people who are unwell and trying to manage their symptoms,” Simon Kempton, a Police Federation board member, has said.

This is a significant step forward. But why does progress on drug reform depend on ordinary citizens pushed to the limit and police officers infuriated about squandering time and resources? The reason, sadly, is that politicians privately accept their war on drugs has failed yet lack the nerve to sort out the mess they created even as it fuels gang violence and inflames racial tensions.

He goes on to describe how the police in some areas are effectively giving up on enforcing the prohibition of other drugs as well. It will not be a surprise to you that I think the outcome is good, but I feel more than a twinge of disquiet about the law effectively being changed by the will of the police. Selective enforcement can as easily be a tool of the oppressor as of the liberator. To see what I mean, amuse yourselves by making a quick list of those who are and are not subject to the Covid-19 restrictions in your area.

Related posts:

  • There should be no law to forbid people parading in paramilitary uniforms
  • The equal oppression of the laws
    • September 10th, 2020 | 31 comments - (Comments are closed)

    Here we go again

    · Civil liberty, Law & Regulation · Health & medical · UK affairs

    ITV News reports,

    Social gatherings of more than six people to be banned in England to limit spread of coronavirus

    Social gatherings of more than six people will be illegal in England from Monday as the Government seeks to curb the rise in coronavirus cases.

    Prime Minister Boris Johnson will use a press conference on Wednesday to announce the change in the law after the number of daily positive Covid-19 cases in the UK rose to almost 3,000.

    The legal limit on social gatherings will be reduced from 30 people to six.

    It will apply to gatherings indoors and outdoors – including private homes, as well as parks, pubs and restaurants.

    September 8th, 2020 | 68 comments - (Comments are closed)

    Test results are not binary. Good tests are not all the same

    · Health & medical · Science & Technology

    Simon Gibbs of Libertarian Home renown has some interesting information about Wuhan Coronavirus testing.

    By the end of this article, I want you to be writing to someone and sharing this link. That person could be your MP, your employer, or if you are in a position of power, someone in your organisation who you will want to start making a plan. Preferably, all three.

    There is a lot of drama in comment sections and on the street about false positives and tests for The Coronavirus producing positive results for other coronaviruses, like the common cold. Usually this is understood to mean you should ignore the Government. I have some sympathy for that, obviously, but what I have come to understand about tests, however, is that they are not binary. They are not limited to producing yes and no answers – if the person using them allows for it.
    Usually the people doing tests don’t allow it, for reasons that are basically economical, but actually the missing subtlety is interesting. Tests can tell you how much virus is present – the “viral load”.

    There are two other interesting properties of tests:

    Specificity – a test with good specificity only detects SARS-COVID-2 i.e The Coronavirus, and not older or similar bugs

    Sensitivity – a test with good sensitivity will tell you if your body has ever come into contact with SARS-COVID-2 even if the “viral load” is small.

    There were, apparently, some issues with specificity at one point. The major issue at the moment is that most tests are far too sensitive.

    If you just caught the virus yesterday then you are probably not spreading it yet, but you’ll test “positive” because there are already a few thousand bits of virus DNA in the sample. If you had it in January then you will have stopped spreading at the very latest by mid-February but would still be testing “positive” in March, because there are still thousands of bits of virus DNA in the sample. Either of these results makes it unclear what you, as an individual, should do about it.

    What researchers have learned is that SARS-COVID-2, specifically, is mainly transmissible in a period between 1 to 6 days when your body is producing trillions of copies of the virus. If the test was able to tell you that you had trillions of copies in your body, then you would know what to do. You would know that tomorrow will be a bad day for you, and that going to a party today would make next Saturday a bad day for everyone at the party.

    The brevity of this period is easy to overstate. It might be up to six days long, but by day two of that period you will probably want to be in bed anyway, and limited transmission will actually happen after that.

    Testing as a means to stop transmission has only one day to do anything useful.

    → Continue reading: Test results are not binary. Good tests are not all the same

    September 1st, 2020 | 23 comments - (Comments are closed)

    Which do you want more, strict product liability or a Coronavirus vaccine?

    · Civil liberty, Law & Regulation · European Union · Health & medical · Science & Technology

    The Brussels Times reports,

    Coronavirus: Belgian experts ‘shocked’ as AstraZeneca seeks liability waiver for vaccine

    A pharmaceutical firm developing a coronavirus vaccine of which Belgium has already secured millions of doses has made the “exceptional” request to not be held liable for any potential side effects.

    As it enters the final stages of human trials in the development of a vaccine against the new coronavirus, drugmaker AstraZeneca has introduced several requests to be protected from future claims of liability.

    The request was received with surprise by some observers in Belgium, with, health and medical law experts in Belgium referring to it as exceptional or even shocking.

    Professor Thierry Vansweevelt is one of those most shocked.

    “There is a European directive on product liability,” Vansweevelt said. “Any producer who places a defective product on the market is responsible for that without exceptions. You can’t escape that.”

    For the sake of the people of Belgium, a country of which I am fond, I rather hope they can escape it. It is telling that even its supporters see this directive as something that people might want to escape.

    I saw this story on Reddit UK politics. It is usually a bit of a left wing hive mind, so I was relieved to see that the highest-recommended comment was by someone going by the name “LiteralTory” who said,

    I’m shocked he’s shocked. Developed under incredible pressure and speed. A novel mechanism of action compared to other vaccines. Going to be given to literally billions of people within months of release. Even extremely rare side effects could be numerous enough to destroy the company. And with no vaccine, who bears the risk? Governments, populations and economies. I can entirely see why in this instance they’d expect governments and populations to accept a certain share of the risk.

    Does this professor have no imagination not to be able to see that?

    August 22nd, 2020 | 52 comments - (Comments are closed)

    I look forward to next week’s study on the superiority of male leaders in economic crises

    · Health & medical · International affairs · Mindless "Inequality" Blather

    The Guardian reports,

    “Female-led countries handled coronavirus better, study suggests”

    Countries led by women had “systematically and significantly better” Covid-19 outcomes, research appears to show, locking down earlier and suffering half as many deaths on average as those led by men.

    The relative early success of leaders such as Germany’s Angela Merkel, New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern, Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen, Taiwan’s Tsai Ing-wen and Finland’s Sanna Marin has so far attracted many headlines but little academic attention.

    The analysis of 194 countries, published by the Centre for Economic Policy Research and the World Economic Forum, suggests the difference is real and “may be explained by the proactive and coordinated policy responses” adopted by female leaders.

    […]

    “In almost all cases, they locked down earlier than male leaders in similar circumstances. While this may have longer-term economic implications, it has certainly helped these countries to save lives, as evidenced by the significantly lower number of deaths in these countries.”

    […]

    She added that while female leaders “were risk averse with regard to lives”, locking their countries down significantly earlier than male leaders, that also suggested they were “more willing to take risks in the domain of the economy”.

    Now that the Great and the Good (you can’t get much greater and gooder than the Centre for Economic Policy Research and the Word Economic Forum) have officially endorsed the idea that sex based differences exist and it is OK to mention them, and that stance has been warmly endorsed by the Guardian, I look forward to reading the follow-up report on the superiority of male leaders when it comes to protecting the economy. After all, 99% of the time we are not in a pandemic and the economy is the political issue that most affects people’s lives.

    August 19th, 2020 | 10 comments - (Comments are closed)

    There are still some scientists left

    · Deleted by the Woke Media · Health & medical · Media & Journalism · North American affairs

    The BBC reports,

    Hydroxychloroquine being ‘discarded prematurely’, say scientists

    The Oxford University-led trial is aiming to enrol 40,000 frontline workers around the world.

    Investigators hope the large-scale, double-blind randomised study will show if early use of the treatment prevents the virus from getting worse.

    “We know now that it doesn’t work in treatment of hospitalised patients,” says Prof Nick White, one of the study’s investigators.

    “But it’s still is a medicine that may prove beneficial in preventing Covid-19.”

    The UK medicines regulatory body MHRA halted hydroxychloroquine trials, following a now-discredited paper in The Lancet claiming it caused harms.

    Trials resumed in late June but the investigators says these concerns over safety, and the drug’s politicisation, have made it difficult to get participants.

    I know nothing about medicine and have no opinion as to whether Hydroxychloroquine is any use in treating the coronavirus or as a preventative. But I know enough about the history of science to be deeply frightened by this:

    And social media companies have removed viral online posts by doctors who reject the scientific consensus, praising the drug’s effectiveness.

    I am just glad to see that there are still scientists such as Professor White who keep an open mind and are willing to go on the record as saying that the politicisation of Hydroxychloroquine may have cost lives. In fact there is no “may” about it: whether Trump is wrong or right on this occasion, the politicisation of science always costs lives. The politicisation of science is the cessation of science.

    August 6th, 2020 | 49 comments - (Comments are closed)

    MacAtlas shrugs

    · Health & medical · Opinions on liberty · UK affairs

    The well-known entrepreneur Mr Duncan Bannatyne has said – reports The Daily Telegraph – that he will never open another business in Scotland again. The Telegraph reports him thus:

    The Scottish entrepreneur said he would “never again” open a business north of the Border, adding: “I don’t know if many people would.”

    Further:

    Mr Bannatyne said his health clubs in Scotland have enough funding to stay solvent until the end of August, as they are cross-subsidised by his English gyms, but he could not provide any guarantees for September.

    His outspoken attack was echoed by the PureGym chain, which said it was “truly extraordinary” that the First Minister had “not ascribed any real priority to working with us and our sector” during the pandemic.

    The article points out that Ms Sturgeon announced her latest review of her lockdown exit plan for Scotland, which will see bingo halls, casinos and funfairs reopen on Aug 24.

    Snooker and pool halls, bowling alleys and driving lessons can also resume on that date, but indoor gyms and swimming pools were only provided with an “indicative” date of Sept 14.

    So that’s a ‘maybe’ plan for re-opening.

    Surely it isn’t a surprise to a businessman that a government doesn’t care about his enterprise? I can’t personally find a logical path to the suggestion in the article that the reason for the Scottish government’s indifference is something to do with independence:

    He said: “It’s unbelievable. There has to be another agenda. I don’t believe she has advice saying stadiums and bowling alleys are safer than gyms.”

    Asked about her “hidden agenda”, he said: “Independence is king. ‘We don’t care about anything as long as we get independence.'”

    How about it is simple disdain for business, that you find in pretty much any socialist? After all, offices are closed too:

    Business leaders also attacked her decision to push back the date of offices reopening until Sept 14 “at the earliest”, with the Scottish Chambers of Commerce (SCC) warning: “Further delays may result in permanent job losses and business closures.”

    And frankly, given the antics of the UK government giving every impression of targeting ethnic minority areas for ‘local lockdowns‘, why would you open a business in any other part of the UK either?

    July 31st, 2020 | 12 comments - (Comments are closed)

    Things that make you go “Mmmm…”

    · Civil liberty, Law & Regulation · Health & medical

    Whilst I would hardly describe Sweden as a bastion of civil liberty, when one looks at the place in 2020, the justification for a great many things in a great many other nations starts to look increasingly hard to credit.

    July 30th, 2020 | 48 comments - (Comments are closed)

    Someone made a profit from finding a cure for a deadly disease. This must never happen again.

    · Health & medical · Historical views · Mindless "Inequality" Blather · Self ownership

    Citizens for Financial Justice have a new article out!

    Who are they? You mean you don’t know?

    Citizens for Financial Justice is a diverse group of European partners – from local grassroots groups to large international organisations. Together, we aim to inform and connect citizens to act together to make the global financial system work better for everyone.

    We are funded by the European Union and aim to support the implementation of the Sustainable development Goals (sDGs) by mobilising EU citizens to support effective financing for development (FfD).

    A cosy arrangement. Thank God the UK is out of it. Here is the article:

    World Hepatitis Day: How Gilead Science Profits from Hepatitis Deaths

    Alternative title #1: How Gilead Science Profits from Ending Hepatitis Deaths

    Alternative title #2: How the Profit Motive Led Gilead Science to Find a Cure for Hepatitis C

    Guys, my apologies. I have to do some work – work work, can you believe that? – so when I remembered that I had already written a post that said what I wanted to say about about this lethal idiocy, I decided simply to post it again. It is seventeen years old. It does not require updating.

    Life is still tough for the owners of lazy slaves

    An extract:

    Now, just possibly you the reader aren’t very sympathetic. Just possibly you opine that the slaveowners had only themselves to blame – “Well, of course,” you are saying, “it’s no surprise that if people are forced to work for nothing then they don’t bust a gut.”

    So why do so many people expect these familiar laws of human behaviour to suddenly change when the time is now and the work to be done is AIDS research?

    In this link Stephen Pollard quotes Roger Bate, writing in the Wall Street Journal, as saying that AIDS drug development is trending downwards.

    Why the decline?

    Because the drugs companies no longer believe that they are going to get rich out of AIDS research. In fact they begin to doubt they will get any compensation at all. They read the newspapers, they study the speeches of politicians, and they sense that the popular wind is blowing against them. They think, probably rightly, that governments will either force them to sell at a loss drugs that were developed at huge expense or will bypass them and the law entirely by buying generic copies of patent drugs. Governments, after all, are the ones who can change the law when it is inconvenient. One minute the authorities will come down like a ton of bricks on pirate music or pirate videos. The next minute they will say that it is ‘unacceptable greed’ for companies to actually want to profit from patents on medical discoveries. I accept that there are subtleties and genuine conflicts of principle in the field of intellectual property – but the bottom line is that if pharma companies get nothing but abuse for the work they put in they bloody well won’t put in much more of it. Just as for the slaves, it’s no surprise that if people are forced to work for nothing then they don’t bust a gut.

    July 6th, 2020 | 12 comments - (Comments are closed)

    Samizdata quote of the day

    · Health & medical · Slogans & Quotations · UK affairs

    SAGE minutes make it clear that the public was explicitly petrified in order to ensure compliance with lockdown. Mind-control is objectionable in itself, but has a real cost in lives: before a policy lever like lockdown was pulled, where was the cost/benefit analysis, or was SAGE only thinking of covid-19? Lockdown, after all, affects not just this thing over here (covid-19) but also that thing over there (cancer, cardiac, sepsis, etc.).

    Through lockdown, A&E cardiac admissions have been as much as 50% down, so around 5,000 people per month have not been turning up at hospital with heart attack symptoms; heart attacks outside hospital have only a 1-in-10 chance of survival. Same story with strokes. And downstream, many cancers are touch-and-go even if you catch them early; give them a two month head-start and Stanford’s Professor Bhattacharya estimates the impact of urgent cancer referrals running 70% below normal levels will be around 18,000 deaths.

    – Alistair Haimes

    June 24th, 2020 | 23 comments - (Comments are closed)

    Samizdata quote of the day

    · Health & medical · North American affairs · Slogans & Quotations · UK affairs

    To be fair: I don’t eat food. Food here is so unsafe I decided years ago to subsist only on internet memes.

    – Perry Metzger, in response to this breathtaking absurdity.

    June 15th, 2020 | 24 comments - (Comments are closed)
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