All Hail ‘Teh Test’

Aaand – ‘Our MSM’ are at it again. It’s sickening. Suddenly everybody in the MSM loves BoJo while at the same time, in the same online issues, the various reporters and authors pontificate about who will succeed him (the ‘line’ is now Dominic Raab 1st, Rishi Sunak 2nd, Gove – nah, and he’s self-isolating anyway), while already starting their campaign against Raab.

Here’s an example of the strategy Our MSM use, in one variation or another. Note that again the hacks assume the role of inquisitors. Are they all suffering from a ‘Jeremy Paxman complex’, believing that insisting on an answer while trying to show the politician up as hapless dolt is the way to promote their careers?

“The Foreign Secretary, who is to deputise for Boris Johnson in key meetings, refused to confirm whether a decision on easing the restrictions would be taken on Easter Monday, in line with Mr Johnson’s timetable, instead saying “we’re not at that stage yet”. Mr Raab was asked repeatedly whether he had the power to make decisions in Mr Johnson’s absence as confusion grew over the constitutional position. He said only that he had taken clear instructions from the Prime Minister and that the Cabinet was aware of the plan for tackling coronavirus.” (link)

‘He refused!’ Omigawd! That wasn’t sufficient to assuage their blood lust. Displaying their own importance by mentioning ‘sources’ – always unnamed – their attacks are now firmly aimed at Mr Raab:

“However, Mr Raab has not spoken directly to Mr Johnson since Saturday and there is not understood to be an agreed lockdown exit strategy, with differing views among senior ministers. Cabinet sources said that major decisions would still be taken by Mr Johnson as long as he remained able to express his wishes.” (link)

I can’t decide what I find more despicable – the continuing MSM attacks on government, be it in the person of Johnson, be it now in the person of Raab, or the jockeying, behind the scenes, of ‘senior ministers’ for position, ‘just in case’ a successor is needed. They must’ve forgotten the warning about not distributing the pelt of the bear before he’s been killed.

It is quite extraordinary that even the rise in case and death numbers are no longer topping the headlines. Again, tests are ‘important’, with Germany and Italy once more being used as ‘why-oh-why’ sticks to clobber the government.

As for those tests … Italy, according to The Times, is now planning to use antibody tests to check for immunity. The plucky Italian regions are trying to do it themselves. You really have to gulp when you read this:

“The government is “within hours” of selecting the kit it wants to use for nationwide testing, but is being more “prudent” than the regional governors who have jumped first, said Walter Ricciardi, a member of the World Health Organisation’s executive board who is advising Italy. “We are studying this carefully so we don’t pick a set-up which gives false results,” he said.” (link, paywalled)

I would hope that the regional governors aren’t buying their test kits from China! And I assume that Italy doesn’t have an entity like ‘our PHE’. There’s this astounding article in The Times, claiming that ‘ministers will issue a rallying cry’ to biotech industries:

“Biotech companies will be asked to work together to produce a finger-prick testing kit accurate enough to be sent to millions of homes in an echo of the effort by manufacturing companies to build more ventilators. […] The Times revealed this week that none of the products ordered and evaluated by the government had proven good enough to use in mass testing.” (link, paywalled)

The Times wasn’t the ‘Great Revealer’, it was the PHE ‘test czar’ John Newton who said that. While praising ‘industry’ The Times doesn’t mention the many complaints by Biotech company leaders that PHE, while giving lip service, wasn’t  and isn’t collaborating with them – as if PHE mustn’t be criticised.

In contrast, the DT reports that PHE is still not co-operating. See this:

“Public Health England is hampering the development of accurate antibody tests by refusing to share vital blood samples from Covid-19 patients, private laboratories have claimed. The tests, which have been heralded as a potential “game changer” by the Prime Minister, are used to confirm whether an individual has previously had a coronavirus infection and may now be immune.” (link)

We remember that kits and supplements were bought from China to accelerate this useful test and found to have been totally useless. But yay for “Our Watchdog MSM” who bullied Johnson into ‘doing something’ even if it was a waste of time and money! Next:

“Private laboratories have claimed that Public Health England (PHE) has not responded to multiple requests asking for blood samples from Covid-19 patients […]. According to leaked correspondence shown to The Telegraph, John Bell, a professor from Oxford University who is advising the Government about antibody tests, is among those who has not received assistance from official sources. “We could not get them from PHE either,” he wrote in an email on Monday. “We are collecting ours one convalescent patient at a time.” (link)

Oh the urgency! Moreover, that lab isn’t alone – see this next:

“Rutherford Health has purchased 1,000 antibody tests for $10 (£7) per unit from South Korea, which has been widely praised for its approach to testing during the pandemic, in order to test staff working with vulnerable cancer patients. […] To validate the quality of the South Korean antibody tests, which are due to arrive on Thursday, the cancer centre is working with Medical Diagnosis, an independent laboratory in North London. […] The chief executive of Medical Diagnosis said they need just 50 samples from positive coronavirus patients and 50 from those who tested negative to confirm whether these antibody assays are accurate. However, the lab claims that Ministers and officials at PHE and the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) have repeatedly ignored phone calls and letters asking for these 100 blood samples.” (link)

Why are PHE and DHSC getting away with this obstruction? Why are “Our MSM” not up in arms? You might wonder why they preferred to bash Johnson rather than attack the real culprits. Next, from the horse’s mouth, the ‘explanation’ for why collaboration won’t be happening any time soon:

“PHE said that they only have a “very small number” of positive blood samples containing  coronavirus antibodies, so had not been able to share them with private companies. […] Dr Yvonne Doyle, Medical Director at PHE [said]: “PHE has only a very small number of positive blood samples. It takes time for an immune response to develop; for most people infected in the UK, this will have been in the past six weeks and so their blood is only now reaching maturity to be used in this capacity. A blood bank will be developed that companies can use to validate their technology,” she added.” (link)

Six weeks in, with tens of thousands of tests done, and PHE ‘hasn’t got enough samples’? Blimey! Not being a medic I won’t presume to question this extraordinary remark by Dr Doyle, I’ll just point out that Biotech firms who’re now being appealed to and were offering help and expertise, must wait for a PHE blood bank yet to be set up, after six weeks! No urgency there – and no urgency to get the Lockdown lifted. PHE, “Our NHS” and ‘Our MSM’ are perfectly happy with this.

And finally, an example of a typical ‘gotcha’ moment. Note well that PHE isn’t mentioned at all but Germany is – and that it’s all our government’s fault:

“Chris Whitty […] made the first official acknowledgement yesterday that Britain’s inability to increase the scale of the antigen test, which identifies people showing symptoms, had cost lives. Asked why deaths were rising more slowly in Germany than in other European countries, he told a Downing Street press conference: “We all know that Germany got ahead in terms of its ability to do testing for the virus. There’s a lot to learn from that and we’ve been trying to learn the lessons.” (link, paywalled)

It’s not ‘Britain’s inability’, you eejits – it’s the PHE, the top down “Our NHS” way of doing things that ‘cost lives’! And let me point out here, yet again, that Germany has a different system of defining who died with or indeed of that virus. In a revealing report in ‘Die Welt’ (link for speakers of Hun) a renowned, top pathologist said that in Hamburg not one (!) person died ‘of’ the virus. In all cases the virus was only the last straw, on top of the severe medical preconditions. Thus not one death was attributed to COVID-19 – and thus none was added to the German statistics. Compare and contrast to our ‘system’ …

If ‘Our MSM’ and the combined anti-Johnson forces were really so keen on ‘saving lives’ they should have questioned and criticised ‘Our Sacred Cow’ by now. They didn’t, they don’t, they won’t. That puts their crocodile tears over BoJo in perspective: they’ve bullied and pushed him into this ditch and will go on stomping on anyone in government who is trying to get us out. It’s sickening.

As for us plebs – we’ll have to stay in, trying to disregard the MSM stuff which keeps raising our blood pressure. Let’s keep washing our hands anyway even if we don’t meet anybody, let’s again send our best wishes to BoJo, and

KBO!