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…which will begin testing people and issuing "immunity certificates" to those who have antibodies for the new coronavirus.
Interesting article and thanks for posting. But, note the modality: the article repeatedly says "could." Germans "could" be tested like this, which "could" give them a certificate like that, which "could" be used as so, etc. etc. Nothing has landed in Germany, especially not the future for the US, a country with a very different ideology and culture of personal autonomy, whose legal structure fragments along fifty different state lines, etc.
What Jonathan said. I think Germans are far away from this measure. First we follow the Austrians in mandatory face masks (you cannot enter grocery markets without them) and then I expect enforced curfews. The resources necessary for immunity certificates are just not there. Think of the forgery that his could spawn!
On a sidenote, I think it is time everyone starts boycotting Chinese products and openly call out the CCP propaganda where we can. No doubt, our own governments reacted poorly, but the way the CCP has been able to buy its way into institutions like the WHO to aoid a PR disaster is terrifying (Just watch the interview with Mr Aylward!). But exactly such a PR disaster would have helped the rest of the world to be more cautious of any positive spin coming out of Wuhan.
Not only are the official numbers coming from China total bogus, one reason why Italy and Southern Germany are hit so hard is due to the strong economic ties with China (lots of Chinese nationals in Bavaria and the affected Italian regions). Had the CCP acted correctly, closed the borders and put safety before profit, the incompetence of our own elected officials would not have been so costly.
I appreciate their are reasons for skepticsm about the Chinese numbers (as there are for the U.S., Italian and other country's numbers), but what grounds are there for saying they are "totally bogus"? Where is the evidence? And please do not cite the anecdotes about cremations now circulating. I am genuinely curious whether there has been a credible expose of underreporting by the Chinese.
True, I cannot come up with "hard" evidence and I rely on anecdotes such as the one about urns and cremations and the one about missing cell phones.
I think the only way to know is via our own intelligence agencies. For example, pretty much everyone suspected that Erdogan organized the recent flooding of the Greek border with migrants, just no media outlet could confirm it. A couple of days ago, Der Spiegel relied on sources of the BND (BND=Bundesnachrichtendienst= German foreign intelligence) to confirm these suspicions.
Why I am convinced that China is lying? Because the deck is stacked against them in such a situation: Overcrowding, lack of infrastructure and human capital. They did their "best" by resorting to measures only authoritarian regimes can resort to. However, things like social distancing and self-isolation rely on a sense for the common good of the community and from all I have heard and read, again only anecdotes even if first hand ones, despite the nationalism of many Chinese, there is no real sense of community outside that of family.
More directly, Wuhan has 11 million inhabitants, most likely massive air pollution and Chinese people tend to smoke a lot more compared to Westeners. Only 3200 deaths for a highly-infectious lung disease in such an area? Faulty test kits sent to Spain and the Czech Republic suggest that their testing is not up to par as well, in fact much worse than what we employ at the moment. And we know for a fact that the CCP first ignored warnings from physicians in the Hubei region, making South Korea and Singapore the only countries to not waste time.
So, no expose I can cite, but weighing the actions taken against the inaction and the track record of the CCP and their reliance on good economic data, I really think that I am justified in calling their numbers "totally bogus", even if I cannot come up with definitive data and "positive" evidence and for my beliefs.
Justified though no evidence can be cited. What do we gain by having this unsupported rubbish published?
https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/wuhan-deaths-03272020182846.html
Feigl-Ding cites this in his latest twitter thread. Never heard of this source, nor can I tell whether Feigl-Ding fell prey to anti-Chinese propaganda. Philippe Lemoine will probably have something to say about this very soon as he already has criticised the numbers regarding urns and cremations as evidence for a higher death toll.
As a response to Professor Matthen: I do not claim that I know what the numbers in Wuhan should really be, I just think that skepticism about the numbers is justified, not only because of differing ways of counting or delays/errors in testing.
How much do you trust US intelligence reports?
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