David Craig, on July 10th, 2020(Friday/weekend blog)
Why don’t the mainstream media mention the 1996/7 Wuhan flu?
There are many strange things about media reporting of the current 2019/20 Chinese Covid-19 flu.
One is the apparent desperation of the mainstream media and all the supposed ‘scientists’ they interview to insist that the current flu is “zoonotic” – that it naturally developed in animals (bats?) and then spread to humans courtesy of the Wuhan ‘wet market’. Anyone suggesting that the current Covid-19 plague was accidentally released from one of two virus research institutes in the Chinese city of Wuhan due to carelessness and poor hygiene by the dirty, corrupt, lying, disease-ridden Chinese is dismissed as a tin-foil-hat-wearing, mentally-unhinged conspiracy theorist.
But here’s an article from a US newspaper in 1996:
And here’s a link to some scientific stuff about the 1996/7 Wuhan flu outbreak
https://www.fludb.org/brc/fluStrainDetails.spg?strainName=A/Wuhan/359/95(H3N2)&decorator=influenza
Dirty, careless, corrupt, disease-ridden Chinese?
We know there are two research institutes in Wuhan – the bio-safety level-2 Wuhan Centre for Disease Control and the bio-safety level-4 Wuhan Institute of Virology.
We know that the bio-safety level-4 Wuhan Institute of Virology was built with French help in a deal approved by Michel Barnier (currently the EU Brexit negotiator) when he was the French foreign minister. At the time, the project was given the go-ahead despite strong opposition from French diplomatic and security advisers, who argued that the Chinese reputation for poor bio-security could lead to a catastrophic leak.
We know that the website of the bio-safety level-4 Wuhan Institute of Virology that a Dr Peng Zhou was conducting research into how viruses like Ebola and Coronavirus could be carried by bats without the bats becoming ill:
“Taking bats as the research object, I will answer the molecular mechanism that can coexist with Ebola and SARS- associated coronavirus for a long time without causing disease, and its relationship with flight and longevity.”
We know that the US was helping fund research at the bio-safety level-4 Wuhan Institute of Virology and that this funding was stopped in 2014 over fears of a leak from the Institute:
We know that US diplomats visited the bio-safety level-4 Wuhan Institute of Virology in 2018 and were so worried by what they saw that they sent cables back to Washington warning of poor hygiene practices and of a potential leak from the Institute:
And we know that the corrupt Chinese Communist Party tried to hide the existence of the Wuhan Covid-19 plague by censoring any mention of it, arresting any doctors who tried to sound the alarm and putting pressure on the utterly corrupt and discredited World Health Organisation to downplay the virus giving the Chinese time to spread it around the world before anyone realised what was happening.
As for the Wuhan Centre for Disease Control – they produced a short documentary film in 2019 boasting about how they had managed to collect over 2,000 different viruses from bats to study in their research. In this film we see the researcher handling bat viruses without proper protective equipment.
What a coincidence! (not)
Here’s the inimitable Tony Heller discussing the extraordinary ‘coincidence’ of two deadly flu epidemics both starting in the city of Wuhan which just happened to be the centre for Chinese research into viruses:
Category: 
Is there anything we can believe that comes out of the scientific community? The media takes any theory and turns it into a fact. The governments seem to have no ability to question the advice they receive before acting on it and never consider the impact of their policies in other areas.
I have yet to see any evidence to support the wearing of masks and research that is available, some going back years, says they are not effective against viruses. I now keep hearing the mantra that masks are not to prorated the wearer but to protect others, which defies common sense, implying that they only stop viruses when breathing out. It also seems that the way viruses are transmitted is not even certain after years of study, especially the way in which they behave in the air.
Tony Heller has another recent video “Making climate change illegal” which contains an extract from General Eisenhower’s farewell address. He says about research “ Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of
scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university,
historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a
revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a
government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.” I put this another way – science has been corrupted by government funding and taken over by activists. Nothing demonstrates this more than climate science. In other areas there is no incentive to find a solution, only to present problems since this keeps the money flowing and expansion of jobs. Prof Ferguson is an example of this.
Standing by our town’s war memorial waiting for a taxi the other day, for the first time I actually read through the names of those who died. Obviously many more names from WW1 than WW2. Got me to thinking. We, or those in power, have shut down the whole world’s economy which will result in untold suffering and misery worldwide because of a pandemic that so far has killed considerably less in the whole wide world than this county alone lost on the battlefields in WW1. 556,895 for Covid so far compared to up to 887,000 of our brightest and best in 14-18. Ours a missing and irreplaceable gene pool of leadership in all fields, the loss obvious viewing the shower that governs us these days. They were clearly a far more stoical generation back then because as if having to face the future with the loss of so many vital workers in such a short time, along came Spanish flu which by 1919 had killed another 228,000 Britons – compared to our current 44,735 victims from Covid. And the Spanish flu, (unlike Covid which kills off the old with underlining health problems anyway) aimed at killing the young and fittest of our society. Did the 1918 generation lockdown? Not a bit of it, coal was dug, ships were built, factories produced goods and if the staff were not all dead, pubs, entertainment and most schools all carried on as if everything was normal. And unbelievably, they still rolled up their sleeves and were ready for a second round in a conflict that for all they knew, could have cost us another 800,000 a mere 21 years later in 39. So what happened? How did the character, spirit and moral fibre of a nation change in a mere one or two generations?
Well done David.
An excellent informative article, well researched.
Universities have become a joke, with even the Russell Group now allocating places not on the basis of academic achievement at age 18, but on ethnicity and so-called “disadvantage”. There is ever more emphasis on “soft” subjects such as social sciences, and the provision of “safe spaces” where the precious little melting snowflakes can flee for shelter should they suspect that their infantile notions of life and the universe risk challenge. When I was young, you went University in order to extend your knowledge by academic study and broaden your mind by contentious debate. As for the hard sciences, which it is still possible to study to a high level at some universities, it must be apparent to all serious researchers that even if they may privately disagree with much of the accepted propaganda now being fed the public, it is more than their careers are worth publicly to voice their doubts, even when they can be supported by evidence. As for Covid-19, it is, without doubt, a more serious illness for many people than is normal ‘flu. Although there were pre-existing morbidities in some who have been very ill or died, others were previously fit and healthy. It is it’s random nature which distinguishes it from previous recent ‘flu outbreaks and which makes it frightening. Having said that, the vast majority who have it suffer no more than a mild chill, while some as we know remain asymptomatic. While the Government seems to be obsessed with “Covid-19” to the exclusion of all economic or other health considerations, and continues to ramp up fear to the point of hysteria in some people, the economy is in terminal decline and cancer patients and those awaiting orthopaedic surgery for the relief of chronic joint pain are quietly dying or suffering unbearable pain because their treatment or surgery has been postponed indefinitely. As a population, we can either remain in permanent semi-lockdown, watching the economy gasp its last, while we wait for an effective vaccine to become universally available, or we can be big, grown up people, acknowledge that there are some nasty big bugs out there which may get us or may not, and get back to our previous lives without delay. After all, it wasn’t too bad a life for most, was it? Seriously, I suppose that for most people in the Western world, all our politicians, scientists and doctors included, this is the very first time they have ever been confronted by an infectious illness for which there is no known cure. Previous generations accepted such as a normal part of life, as they watched friends and family dying of smallpox, diphtheria, measles and tuberculosis, or become permanently disabled through polio. Have we in the developed world, as a population, become incapable of facing up to and confronting with courage what we cannot change?
Excellent comment, William Boreham. You have said, and more effectively, much of what I was trying to say. I posted my comment, almost completed last evening, before I’d refreshed the page so hadn’t seen your response. My parents sometimes spoke of WW1, having both been children at the time but old enough to remember a great deal. My mother recalled a neighbour, a married woman with, as my mother said, “Four fine sons”. First the husband went to the Somme and was killed. Then, successively, during the four years of the War, all four sons reached adulthood, joined up, and were killed. With the death of each son, the telegram announcing the death was pasted in a window overlooking the street, as was the custom. It was a mark not only of tragedy but of pride. Then came the ‘flu pandemic, which my parents remembered well. Life, as you say, carried on. People worked. They had to. No furlough then. No Social Security. No NHS providing free health care. You worked or you and your family starved. Of course, most of today’s younger generations know practically nothing of any of this, since they are taught little or no history at school.
Some of the comments above show the struggle we have trying to navigate through conflicting information. Einstein was extremely confident about the accuracy of his work, but he was not so arrogant to believe that it should be widely accepted until there was evidence to prove the theory. Last year marked 100 years since measurements were made during an eclipse to prove that gravity bends light but there was little mention of this in the media. Now we are bombarded with theories about Covid-19 with little/no evidence to back them up and world leaders pick what they want to implement their crazy policies. It is no better than basing policies on superstition.
There is reference to the Spanish flu above which killed more young people than elderly. Only recently did I see an explanation from Prof Gupta, an epidemiologist from Oxford University. She claimed the reason for this was that there had been no flu in Europe for 30 years and so the younger generation had not developed any immunity. It makes sense, but is it true? Why does the government and media not establish whether it is true – because they prefer to spread fear when they are not certain what to do about Covid19. More importantly perhaps is why do scientists not cooperate and tell us the uncertainty associated with the different theories – because they all want to get as much government funding as possible to pursue their own theories and the longer they spin it out the more funding they get. Nobody seems to have any idea whether we will have immunity if we get Covid19 and there is even discussion saying that lockdown may have reduced our immunity to other diseases.
Prof Gupta also believed that the death rate would not increase if lockdown was lifted and she is not the only one. The government seems to be tossing coins to determine the “science” they will follow.
I also understand that no autopsies have been carried out on those said to have died with Covid19. Some reports claim that no antibodies associated with Covid19 have been found. Why is it that nobody seems to have died from seasonal flu this year when the average number of associated deaths is about 17,000? Why is it that we get all the grim details of Covid19 deaths but never hear anything about people dying from seasonal flu. I imagine that death from seasonal flu is very similar and unpleasant.
We are not hearing much about a vaccine, not surprisingly since for a novel virus the effectiveness of a vaccine can only be tested when the virus is about. The seasonal flu vaccine is said to be between 30-50% effective because the “experts” don’t know which strains will appear. They don’t know if the coronavirus will mutate and I understand that no vaccine has ever been successfully developed for any known coronavirus. Talk of a cure seems a distant dream. The smallpox vaccine was not a cure, the disease was eliminated by an intense effort to identify the cases. The vaccine helps reduce the infection developing and so it was eliminated. There is no cure for HIV but it can also be controlled.
It seems to me that we will have to exist with Covid-19 and return to normal life if we want to avoid being hit with a complete collapse of the economy. We have yet to find out just how bad it will be and Boris and his merry men don’t have a clue, and they will pay no consequences for their failed policies.
A. Thorpe: “Einstein was extremely confident about the accuracy of his work, but he was not so arrogant to believe that it should be widely accepted until there was evidence to prove the theory. Last year marked 100 years since measurements were made during an eclipse to prove that gravity bends light but there was little mention of this in the media.”
But the dingbat BBC made out in a news bulletin on both TV and radio – that a girl aged 13 – was a mathematician, who, with the help of her father, helped win World War II.
Obviously an attempt to give ‘meat’ to its female empowerment agenda. This time in a STEM subject – mathematics.
Her father was Frederick William Hill, a mathematician and aircraft weapons’ expert during both World wars. He created ‘calculating machines’, which were rudimentary computers, and the two of them entered the data into them that proved that 8 guns were needed on the Spitfire fighters to make them as effective a killing machine as possible. The Spitfires were then fitted with 8 guns.
They did that on the kitchen table of their London home.
The person who enters data into a computing machine is a data-entry clerk, not a mathematician. A girl aged 13 in those days would have been in her first year of high school – at least three years away from matriculating. In any case, she went on to become a doctor, not a mathematician.
Hazel Hill – 13-year-old mathematician who helped win WWII (UK) – BBC News – 10th July 2020 –