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Category: Covid-19

Don’t trust anybody! Covid-19: Astra Zeneca Blood clots

14 March 2021Written by Joerg Steegmueller

The newest information that reached Irish media is that all vaccinations with the Astra Zeneca vaccine have been put on hold over a risk of blood clots, that affected 4 patients in Norway and a few more in other countries. www.rte.ie/news/2021/0314/1203889-niac-recommends-suspension-of-use-of-astrazeneca-vaccin/

Sounds like a sound and responsible decision, right? Duty of care and all that. Well done, boys!

But then you look at the BIG picture and think back to February and also think about what else is going on and suddenly you realise that there is probably a lot more going on. AGAIN!

Here are the facts and conclusions:

Norway had 4 (FOUR!!) cases of blood clots. They are all in hospital and are being treated. In Austria one person died from a blood clot and one if in hospital, in Denmark one died (a second one is in hospital) and in Italy possibly also one death has been reported.

So that is a total of maybe three deaths and five people in hospital. 8 people out of 17 million administered vaccines. Maybe it is even 30 patients as the article mentions when referring to the European Medicines Agency (EMA).

That’s still not a lot and a link to the vaccine is far from clear, but yes, it probably makes sense to pause a clinical trial if you have some deaths. (Oh, you think this is NOT a clinical trial? Hmm, think again!! It is a mass trial and nothing else but an experiment!)

But let’s move on and remember January. We found out at the end of January that 33 elderly people in Norway died shortly after receiving their Covid-19 vaccination from Pfizer/BioNTech. But we were told quickly that this has NO relevance (www.wired.co.uk/article/norway-deaths-coronavirus-vaccine) because the patients were elderly and would have died anyway. :-O

We don’t even know if there were other deaths elsewhere in the world. Or maybe we do but we aren’t told? We don’t know in what state of health they or the others that possibly died elsewhere were in. We now their age and a conclusion was made. We just discarded the 33 old people in Norway and moved on. Not for a second the vaccination programme was halted.

This time a number of countries halted the Astra Zeneca vaccination and MANY countries followed quickly, because if ONE country stops it and someone dies in ANOTHER country the politicians and “experts” and the country where people died will be blamed. Publicity-caused ripple effect!

A blood clot is something serious, but there seem to be a number of different blood clot-caused issues that could have killed the patients and pulmonary embolism or deep vein thrombosis are the main ones.

As a side note: Between 1981 and 1999 a total of 5408 patients were admitted to hospital with venous thromboembolism (deep vein thrombosis) after they were on international flights according to a study www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC261739/. That is 5408 in 18 years or 300 per year. Have you heard of halting all international flights until the matter is investigated further?

But back to the vaccines:
The significant difference between the end of January and now is that at that time there was not much other choice available. So, we better keep going.

This time, however, we are in a situation where Astra Zeneca just can’t supply ENOUGH vaccine and governments around the world try to “fix” that problem or explain it SOMEHOW. The Irish Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Micheal Martin even thought it was prudent to seek a meeting with the CEO of Astra Zeneca to discuss the problem. As if the CEO was giggling while sitting on a stash that he doesn’t want to release to the governments of the world UNTIL Micheal Martin told him off..

So Astra Zeneca can’t deliver and there won’t be many vaccinations. People in Ireland and other countries are getting annoyed and governments try to make the process faster, but can’t and they get a lot of pressure from their people. And just in that moment a reason pops up that gives PERFECT justification to all countries to stop the use of that one vaccine for a week or so. Breathing space for politicians!!

Is anyone surprised that they JUMP On the opportunity to halt the vaccination? In one week there will be more doses, so this breathing space nicely shuts up all the complainers in media and public for a little bit.

Don’t trust ANYBODY in this Covid game!!! Everybody has an agenda!

Covid-19, Overexaggerations, Taoiseach Agenda, Astra Zeneca, Blood clot, deep vein thrombosis, Michael Martin

Trust in authorities during Covid times

27 February 2021Written by Joerg Steegmueller

I have to admit that when it comes to authorities (governments, “experts”, “expert” groups, WHO and official groups with an agenda) I am extremely suspicious regarding their credibility and reliability and I question nearly everything.

Many do the best they can, but is the best they can maybe very biased information? We saw that the WHO gave totally wrong advice right from the beginning for the wrong reasons. We were told that masks are not needed and won’t help, because they were concerned that any other information would “hoover up” all the masks and then nothing would be left for healthcarers. Then the WHO told us that spread of the virus through aerosols is not an issue, now we know it is the MAIN issue.

So if you can’t trust the World Health Organisation, then you can’t trust anyone.

But does that really apply to local governments? Even to ours? Yes! And you sometimes just have to find one or two contradictions to find out that they have NO clue about what they are telling us.
In this case it is the “mandatory quarantine list”. On Friday 13 more Central and South American countries were added to that list (www.thejournal.ie/mandatory-quarantine-countries-5367064-Feb2021/) and you might be surprised that with the odd exception of Austria the countries on the list are all from outside the EU. As if EU countries have no virus problem!? Sure they do! But it is seriously complex to forbid EU citizens to travel within the EU, so we will quickly add the non-EU countries and give the EU countries a different treatment.

When you look through the list further and ponder over every country, you will find Mauritius on it! Mauritius is a small with just a fourth of the population of Ireland. It is an island about 2000km away from Africa. From 1810 until 1968 it was occupied by the Brits and that will be relevant in a moment.
Mauritius has NO virus problem! The total cases since the beginning was 610 and the total deaths was 10. Cases per 1 mio population is 479, whereby in Ireland we have 43,879 cases per 1 mio population. So WHY is Mauritius on that list? There are not even direct flights from there to Ireland.

Well, on 21 Dec 2020 Mauritius has decided to ban people from the UK to enter their country (travelbans.org/africa/mauritius/). A decision that made a lot of sense, considering the situation in the UK. As a payback, the British “if you step on my toes, I will step on yours”-government has banned people from Mauritius to enter the UK from 09 Jan 2021.

And why does Ireland ban people from Mauritius, because our great government seemingly just copied the British list unchecked. FAIL!

It is a tiny, close to irrelevant issue, but if you can’t trust on the super simple things, can you trust on the big things??

Covid-19, Politics authorities, Fail, Mauritius, Travel restrictions, trust, WHO, World HEalth Organisation

Covid-19 Fines – Have they lost it?

13 February 2021Written by Joerg Steegmueller

For the speedy resolution of wars, insurgency and other conflicts, the concept of “Winning Hearts and Minds” is used in modern times. It means that one side is trying to win the conflict not by the use of superior force, but by making emotional or intellectual appeals to convince supporters of the other side.

The idea behind it is that if you convince the other side of the sense of your actions, then you need to fight less and you will ultimately be MUCH more effective, efficient AND there will be less victims.

Our (previous) government made a weak attempt in using this strategy in early days. We were told that laws can’t be enacted to prevent people from breaking the lockdown and Simon Harris kept telling us that we should just hold together for one more push before things would get better.

The current government is clearly taking a different route. Laws are suddenly possible and they are in place and are used a LOT. This week the RTE News reported that the crazy amount of 4500 people have been fined for breaching Covid-19 regulations. www.rte.ie/news/coronavirus/2021/0205/1195336-garda-restrictions-fines/

The total amount of serious crimes that lead to a charge or summons in 2019 was just measly 550 and out of more than 16,000 burglaries that happened, it seems that just 13 were punished appropriately, based on Central Statistics Office details. www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/ep/p-rcd/recordedcrimedetection2019/crimesleadingtochargeorsummons/

I really hope that I am misinterpreting the numbers and that someone can tell me that I made a big mistake, but if not, then this means that breaking the (random) 5km movement restriction is pursued with significantly more vigor than burglaries. :-O
I think we can clearly say that the government has lost the support from the people. Maybe a serious “Winning Hears and Minds” approach would have us in a different place?

Corona Virus, Covid-19, Politics 5km, burglaries, government, hearts and minds, Lockdown, Nonsense, Travel restrictions

The Corona Files: Social Distancing & Lock Down

21 March 2020Written by Joerg Steegmueller

Sobering Statistics

The Corona Virus is continuing its rampage!

At the time of writing this, there have been 271,620 infections with 87,363 recovered. And sadly 11,280 people have died. That is more than 57 (!!) Ryanair plane loads full of people and imagine how shocked we would be if only ONE plane crashed.

Risk Group or Not: Prevent!

So in actual numbers it is terrifying and a lot of us have started to feel quite anxious or at least concerned about the impact that the virus could have on our own life. It is still the case that the majority of fatalities are in an older age group and/or with people that have some underlying illnesses, but there are plenty of young people that have heart issues or asthma or other circulatory problems that could be badly affected.

If you are in a higher risk group, stay away from other people and wash your hands really well when you have touched items outside in areas where potentially infected people have been and don’t touch your face until you have washed the hands.

With these steps, you will drastically reduce the risk! You will not have to wear a mask, but if you feel safer with a mask or a scarf, then wear it. Fear and anxiety is a bad thing and it doesn’t make sense to suffer it just because you don’t want to be seen with a mask.

If you are super healthy and could have a guarantee that there are no health issues that could require you to be put on a ventilator, it would be best for you and for society as a whole to get infected asap, then completely isolate until the symptoms are totally gone and afterwards be safe from the virus AND not have the risk of being a carrier anymore. Unfortunately, though there is no such 100% guarantee.

There is very good news about immunity: Research on monkeys has shown that immunity will be achieved after an initial infection and once immunity has been achieved, then the monkey who is a second time exposed to the virus will also not pass it on to others anymore. But this research has only been done on a small test group of monkeys and we don’t know either if us human beings react exactly the same as monkeys.

Social Distancing

So to protect the risk groups, the concept of “social distancing” has been developed. The name is very unfortunate, it should be physical distancing or spatial separation, because we don’t want to move away socially from our friends, colleagues and families. But for the rest of this post I will still – reluctantly – use the bad term.

The idea behind social distancing is perfectly expressed in the graph below by @garrywarshaw.

By infecting less people initially, even the multiplication (or compound) effect of an infection chain a significant reduction of total number of infections can be achieved. This is the one and only reason for social distancing.

It does SLOW DOWN the spread of the virus. Social Distancing doesn’t stop it and it also doesn’t stop that we might get infected eventually. But a calculation by a university in the UK showed that just protecting the elderly (for example by locking them away) would not be enough. There would still be 8 times more hospital beds required than they have available.

With a drastic slow down on the other hand, the cases that need to be admitted to hospital will be looked after correctly. A lot of us will still have to get infected to achieve a immunisation (herd immunity) of a larger group of people. So our attitude to an infection has to change! Nobody wants to have a 2 week long bad flu wth the risk of a hospital stay and a low – but still higher than zero – risk of death, but if we accept that it is NOT the worst case scenario if we get infected.

Stigma of Infection

Right now, it seems as if people really think negatively of someone who gets infected. :-O I call that an “Infection Stigma” and it makes absolutely no sense. Getting infected doesn’t mean the person misbehaved, it also doesn’t mean the person is and will remain to be dangerous forever, it doesn’t mean that that person has done society a dis- service and it doesn’t mean that the person will probably die anyway. Not at all!!

The person will most likely survive; has helped society to reach herd immunity faster and does not pose a risk once the two weeks of symptoms are over.

So please stop stigmatising people who got infected by the virus and stop panicking over the possibility that you might get it.

Will we have a lock down?

Nobody wants a lock down really. A lock down means that nobody is allowed to leave the house or apartment anymore unless it is to go to work, to buy food or to go to a doctor.

A lock down is NOT needed where people stick to the social distancing rules. But where people don’t adhere these rules, the only other way to ensure that they stay away from each other is to force them to stay inside.

I saw some pictures from Spain, where a cyclist was fined for going on a training cycle on his own. Yes, he broke the existing law and that is what he was fined for. But the law that he broke didn’t help to improve the Corona virus situation in the slightest. He was NO danger to himself or anyone. In Bavaria in Germany where a moderate lock down is implemented from today, the rules have been created better: You are still allowed to go for a walk as long as it is on your own or only with the people that live with you.

I can understand why the Spanish government used their all-encompassing law, it is MUCH easier to control than a more differentiated law. But this whole situation could take quite some time and rules only make sense if they help improving the situation.

So what can we do in Ireland to avoid a lock down? Simple! Adhere to the Social Distancing rules!!

When will it all be over?

This is one of the most difficult questions to answer. Virologists think that in about 2-3 months it could be over…at least for now. The problem is that when winter returns, the virus could come back.

There is another possible scenario and that assumes that the limitations or restrictions to life are less severe (e.g. schools will restart for higher classes at some point and work will resume) in that case, the restrictions could be lifted then applied again, then lifted and applied again. Whenever the virus comes back the infections will be allowed to rise and then will be controlled through the application of restrictions again. In this on-off scenario, the whole Corona / Covid-19 issue could go on for around 2 years. :-O

I heard about faster tests and a vaccine. Is that true?

Yes and no! Faster tests are being developed at the moment. They will probably be very similar to a pregnancy test where you pee on a strip that tells you instantly through a colour change if you have the virus or not. This is not as easy as it sounds because it has to have a high reliability. But research is on the right path and will probably have a solution relatively soon. Then tests will have to start, which will take another bit. Until then we only have the relatively cumbersome lab test that checks the presence of the virus in a throat swab and – as far as I know – that also can detect antibodies as indicators that you had been infected.

A vaccine is also not too far away from being developed. But even when scientists found a vaccine, that doesn’t mean that you will be able to get it. Currently vaccines needs to go through a very long and expensive trial process, which could delay the availability for patients for another 12-18 months based on current regulatory rules. But maybe the rules will have to get changed so that at least health professionals can be vaccinated earlier. But there is a risk of severe side effects and politicians have to decide if they want to accept this risk (and insure the vaccination producer against it).

What should I do for now?

Three things:
1) Stay upbeat and positive by creating a new routine during the isolated living
2) Adhere to all Social Distancing rules and if necessary, obey the lock down.
3) Keep in close contact with people that live on their own, with elderly people and with anybody else who could do with your support. Isolation is a challenge for most people and we need to be there for each other to get through it. Be proactive with your friend. Don’t wait for them to tell you they need help, but contact them regularly to check if they need anything.

We all go through the same situation and a shared experience can pull people together and will provide the support needed so that everyone can get through it. If you are strong, provide the support and if you are challenged ask for support! Let’s help each other and be there for each other!!

Corona Virus, Covid-19, Dublin, Environment, Health System, Irish, Media, Politics Corona Virus, Coronavirus, Covid-19, immunisation, immunity, infection stigma, lock down, physical distancing, social distancing, spatial separation, vaccine

The Corona Files: An explainer

13 March 2020Written by Joerg Steegmueller

5 Comments

After the Coronavirus reached Italy and created havoc there, it was only a matter of time when it would arrive in Ireland and so it happened and – through visitors in Italy – the virus made it to our little island.

And like in most European countries the confusion was huge at first, the demands on politicians were massive and finally the Taoiseach had not other option but to also declare the closure of schools and universities and cultural institutions.

This is a completely unprecedented situation that nobody in this whole world has any experience with, so there is no real right or wrong yet and I think our politicians have done the best they could.

You might be very worried about this virus, so let me explain what one of the most eminent SARS experts in Germany, Virologist Prof. Dr. Christian Drosten, says about the Corona Virus /Covid-19, which has a lot of similarities to the SARS virus.

He explains that it is expected that nearly every one will get infected at some stage over the next few months. For kids, there seems to be an indication that they are only carriers and will not experience severe symptoms. Then there is the age 12-65 where the symptoms will be a general weakness, a persistent cough and – in most cases – a raised temperature. But after about 2 weeks all is over and they will recover. And then there is the groups of elderly people from 65 years of age. In this group it is expected that unfortunately up to 20 or 25% of infected people will die. The virus itself doesn’t kill, but the body (especially the circulatory system) will be so challenged after around 5 days with symptoms, that it will not be able to continue to work in weaker people or people with an pre-existing heart problem and a few other issues. They and younger people with other underlying health problems will be the people that need to be looked after in a hospital.

After the first phase, the Containment Phase, didn’t succeed and the virus could not be contained. We entered the Delay phase. In this phase the focus is on delaying the spread of the virus (not stopping it!). There is no way to stop it, but if all people that could get infected would get infected around the same time, the health system would collapse. (I saw a calculation that described that the UK, for example, would need over 1 million hospital bed if the spread couldn’t be delayed, but they only have 140,000 beds.) So currently they are ONLY trying to delay the infection.

The experts are expecting that the infections will continue until September or even longer. :-O And that nearly all of us will get infected at some time over this time. So all the current limitations, including school, university closures and closures of all cultural institutions will unlikely end on 29 March.

Most flu viruses don’t like the warmer weather, but it seems the Corona virus can handle it, so there is a high probability that the virus will not “disappear” over the summer and then come back in autumn/winter, but that it will stay with us.

In that case – and if it ha immunisation as a result – it would be positive for the healthy among us to get it early on, but the problem is that for a period of 2 weeks BEFORE you show any symptoms, you can already infect people. So this is the dangerous period during which you should stay away from all weak and elderly people.

No vaccines will be available until probably next year, so we can’t hope for that to sort the situation.

In general, try to stay upbeat and try not to panic. Prepare yourself mentally that this virus will be with us for quite some time (And we thought Brexit was an endless story!?) and that the current or some other social distancing rules will either stay in place or will come back again in a few weeks. Oh and stay healthy as much as possible so that you will get over it fast when the virus hits you.

And here is some advise on how to behave in the next few weeks or months:

1. An infected person would have to cough, sneeze or – and we all do that – spit while talking. The droplets fly through the air and would have to land on your face to infect you directly. If you keep a distance from the people you talk to, there is a good chance that the droplets fall on the ground and will be harmless for you.

2. If an infected person coughs into their hands and then touches a doorknob/tap/fridge door/steering wheel/shopping cart, they will leave the droplets there. The droplets are relatively sticky and can survive for up to 3 days and some surfaces and only approximately 3 hours on others. If you then touch that surface AND transfer the droplets to your eyes, nose or mouth you can also get infected. So, don’t touch your face and you are most likely fine.

3. An infected person doesn’t show symptoms for up to 14 days, but can pass on the virus already. So we should be vigilant with regards to all people, not just obviously ill people. You will not get sick just by being in the same room with someone who is infected.

Adhere to this protocol:

◦ Don’t touch your face

◦ Wash hands surgeon style for at least 30 seconds after potential exposure to surfaces that others may have touched. You may think you know how to wash your hands, but you should STILL watch a video and get it right.

◦ Social distancing will decrease the risk of getting infected. Cancel unnecessary meetings, but confidently go to necessary engagements and then use the protocol above.

◦ Carry a large handkerchief at all times, even when you are not sick. Cough into it or at least cough into your elbow. Do not cough without covering your mouth.

◦ Wipe your phone down (at same time as washing hands)

◦ Wipe fridge door, taps, light switches, remote controls, keyboards etc

◦ Use a paper towel to open the door on the way out of a public toilet.

◦ Washing your hands with soap and water is sufficient. Anti-bacterial soap is NOT required. Hand sanitizer is NOT as efficient as soap, but can be used when no soap and water is available. Make sure that the hand sanitizer has 60+% of alcohol in it.

◦ Remember you have an immune system too. Even if the droplets manage to reach you, the virus still has to get past your immune system. So keep that healthy! Look after yourself and don’t run yourself down.

◦ Take care of your emotional self – fear, worry and anxiety wear you down

◦ If you do feel sick, immediately self-isolate, get tested and take directions from your health care provider.

Corona Virus, Covid-19, Dublin, Events, Health System, Society, Taoiseach Chrstian Drosten, containment, Corona Virus, delay, explainer, social distancing, Taoiseach