Scepticism and “Moral Panic”

Here in Romania we’re effectively under Martial Law – which, most immediately, means that we have to justify our every journey with a signed form and that I, as someone of pensionable age, can only shop (with ID and that form) for the 2 hours between 11am and 13.00

Quite what the military hardware and soldiers now on the streets are supposed to contribute beats me – presumably the esteemed President assumes that everyone is as lawless as himself and the country would collapse in chaos without them. My partner is in Bucharest and saw no sign of the military in her journey to and from the open market which is still open

But I am deeply concerned by the licence which the military has now been given to ride roughshod over what is left of Romanian (and foreigners’) freedoms – not just of movement but of expression.

I was intending to drive to Lidl tomorrow lunchtime but the car has a Bucharest number plate which gives me a reasonable probability of being stopped - with explanations required for my certificate of residency having a Bucharest address! Under Martial Law the system can do anything to you and you have no redress…..So I may well just stay at home……

For the past 4 weeks, my fellow-blogger Boffy has been one of the very few voices to express some scepticism about what he called, on his Feb 25 post, a “typical moral panic”.

You can see why authorities want to stop the spread of the virus – but…… if 80% of those who contract the virus suffer no serious ill effects, let alone all of those that do not contract it, why on Earth is the global economy, and normal life being brought to a standstill because of it? 

There are likely to be far greater ill effects, and even deaths as a result of bringing the global economy to a standstill, by telling people who have no symptoms to self-isolate…. than there would ever likely be even with a pandemic.

Scepticism has a very honourable tradition – indeed my glossary of weasel words used by the state and politicians – Just Words – usually has that term in its sub-title

But the term has been tarred recently by its use by right-wing denial-ists – such as Trump and Bolsonaro.

Boffy is, however, a proud Marxist and his arguments have made a great deal of sense….namely that, as those of pensionable age were at greatest risk, they should have been strongly encouraged to self-isolate; and that the total shut-down is counter-productive ie could ultimately cause even more deaths if labour shortages lead to loss of power and sanitation….

He’s had some 5-6 good posts over the past 4 weeks – relating to statistical and economic issues for the UK. Let me start with his Covid19 by numbers post

What we know from Italy is that the reason it has such high mortality rates, despite having implemented a closing down of society, is that the virus appears to have got into the health system itself.

This is rather like the spread of MRSA in hospitals, in Britain, some years ago. Because those in hospital, or similarly in care, are, by definition, those already in the high risk groups, if you allow the virus to spread into these environments, you will get much higher mortality rates.

Not only do you get a spread from patient to patient, but you get spread of patient to health or care worker, and from them to other patients, unless the health and social care workers are provided with the adequate personal protective equipment, and every patient is adequately isolated from one another.

This does not appear to have happened in Italy, but we also know that health workers and care workers are not being provided with adequate PPE in Britain either. ….

The comments about Italy are borne out by this article in Open Democracy by an Italian

Last Saturday Boffy’s post dealt with the economic consequences of a total UK shut-down

UK government policy, in relation to COVID19, is leading quickly to economic, financial and social disaster on a scale not seen for at least a century. The UK government is not alone in that; the same is true for the policies being introduced in France and other EU countries, as well as in the US, Canada and elsewhere.

It is a populist response to a mass panic, and as with all such responses, it is ill-thought out, irrational and counter-productive. It is like the moral panics that have arisen in the past, for example, when crops failed or cattle died, which blamed it on witches, or failure to appease the appropriate gods, and thereby led to witch hunts like those at Salem, or led to increasing numbers of human sacrifices to appease the gods. …..

The idiocy of the government policy is that, as production and supply is unnecessarily brought to a halt, and as online deliveries cease, those of us in the 20% of the population who are actually at risk of serious consequences from the virus, and who would, therefore, place a burden on the NHS were we to be contaminated, are being forced to have to break our self isolation, in order to go to the shops to try to find food, and other vital supplies, as our own stock disappears! I have been in a better position than most to have prepared for self isolation, because I did have a stock in advance, but that stock is quickly dwindling. I expect that many pensioners, are already having to break any self isolation they might have wanted to exercise, simply in order to get the food they need to be able to live from day to day. …….

The fact that the NHS is being overwhelmed is not an indication of the particularly rampant nature of COVID19 infections, but is a direct consequence of the fact that the NHS itself is not fit for purpose, and compares badly with the socialised health care systems of much of Europe. It is top heavy, bureaucratic and inefficient with far too much money spent on expensive prestige projects, and not enough spent on primary care, and on medical and nursing staff and equipment, which is being demonstrated now in relation to the lack of ICU beds, of respirators, and of the staff to operate them. It has been made worse by 10 years of austerity, just as the NHS was laid low by 18 years of Tory government in the 1980's and 90's. 

His last long post explored why the UK health system seems to be breaking at the seams…

In any year, we might expect that a part of the average 500,000 deaths are people who die at home, and are not themselves a drain on health services. But, by the nature of mortality, we would expect that the largest part of that 500,000 people are elderly people, or people who have some serious medical condition that eventually leads to their death, either directly or as a result of complications, secondary infections, and so on. Let's say that only half of the 500,000 people who die, were receiving hospital treatment at the time of their death. Then the actual current deaths of 422, represents an increase of 0.17%. That is such a small increase as to be statistically insignificant.

Comment

The obvious question all this raises is – who on earth would have an interest in panicking world leaders and their societies (apart from, for example, pharmaceutical and IT companies and weapons dealers)? 

Or is this an example of the networks I discussed a month or so ago creating something which noone in particular has any control over?