We were told to feel afraid of something we cannot see, that most of us have never before had to think about and don’t understand. In 1968 when the Hong Kong Influenza pandemic was in full swing, there were few conglomerates able to profit from it. Efforts were made to follow public health evidence and freedoms were not stripped from society under the guise of virus control. It’s perfectly possible that people employed to think about and understand viruses might use their knowledge against those with less knowledge, which happens to be most of the world, for reasons which are not benevolent. Medical professionals often have very limited understanding of infectious disease dynamics beyond which treatment to prescribe for a specific individual. Politicians even less so.
With an invisible threat to fear, global groupthink established quickly courtesy of a single message throughout our media outlets. Stay at home, test-test-test, protect your airways with cloth and microplastic, report your every move to centralised authorities, wait for the phamarceutical industry to rescue us. Pressure to conform is profound. It also topples reasonably easily in the face of appropriate information, as Nick Hudson of Panda describes in this sixteen minute interview in which he talks about the half hour presentation he delivered last month, about the actual data and evidence relating to this pandemic. The presentation was being viewed at a rate of 12,000 per hour when YouTube removed it from their site. One of the most informative and well articulated public health presentations you can hear about Covid-19, following basic evidence, it is still available to view at Panda’s homepage.
It is okay to hear another viewpoint. If that viewpoint is nonsense, then you will know and can dismiss it. To insist on only one single consensus narrative that we all must follow, leads us into dark days. Our children deserve better.
History has shown repeatedly that humans are capable of and not infrequently motivated by self interest and/or malevolence. 1930s Europe and 1970s Cambodia were full of people convinced that there was no need to believe “the conspiracists” as their leaders were only concerned with protecting their people. As with numerous other examples, it didn’t pan out so well.
Panda, and the multitude of other public health expertise groups who have formed in the past year (HART, Americas Frontline Doctors, Covid Medical Network, Concerned Ontario Doctors, Covid Plan B are a few examples), offer alternatives to the idea that human freedom is a murderous virus super spreader event. Surrender of human freedom and democracy are ineffective at virus control. Viruses don’t follow human rules or recognise human boundaries. Decades of established public health evidence are for some reason being largely ignored in favour of a harmful political response.
Our civilsation is under threat. We have a choice.
Be pushed of the cliff. Or push back.
~ Nick Hudson
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