#india covid-19 deaths

[worldinyourpalm]

भारत ने लगातार दूसरे दिन 24 घंटे में 1,800 से अधिक नए कोविड मामले दर्ज किए | India records more than 1,800 new COVID instances in a day for the second straight day;

केंद्रीय स्वास्थ्य मंत्रालय के सोमवार को अपडेट किए गए आंकड़ों के अनुसार

पिछले 24 घंटों में दर्ज किए गए 1,805 नए कोविड मामलों के साथ, सक्रिय मामलों की संख्या 10,000 के आंकड़े को पार कर गई है, जो संक्रमणों में निरंतर वृद्धि का संकेत है।

भारत ने लगातार दूसरे दिन 1,800 से अधिक नए कोविद मामले दर्ज किए, सक्रिय केसलोएड 10,000 से अधिक हो गए। 5,30,837 पर कुल मृत्यु के साथ छह और कोविद से संबंधित मौतें हुई हैं।

भारत में कोरोनोवायरस संक्रमण में वृद्धि जारी

केंद्रीय स्वास्थ्य सचिव राजेश भूषण आज राज्यों के स्वास्थ्य सचिवों और वरिष्ठ अधिकारियों के साथ कोविड-19 की तैयारियों की समीक्षा करने के लिए बैठक करेंगे, क्योंकि भारत में कोरोनोवायरस संक्रमण में वृद्धि जारी है। समीक्षा बैठक में सभी जिलों में स्वास्थ्य सुविधाओं पर अगले महीने नियोजित राष्ट्रव्यापी मॉक-ड्रिल का विवरण सूचित किया जाएगा।

केंद्रीय स्वास्थ्य मंत्रालय और भारतीय चिकित्सा अनुसंधान परिषद द्वारा जारी एक संयुक्त सलाह के अनुसार, सार्वजनिक और निजी दोनों स्वास्थ्य सुविधाओं से दवाओं, अस्पताल के बिस्तर, चिकित्सा उपकरण और चिकित्सा ऑक्सीजन की उपलब्धता का जायजा लेने के उद्देश्य से अभ्यास में भाग लेने की उम्मीद है। आईसीएमआर).......

[newscast1]

China slams 'distorted' reports on Covid response, eases further curbs

China slams ‘distorted’ reports on Covid response, eases further curbs

China will resume issuing passports for tourism in another big step away from anti-Covid controls, that isolated the country for almost three years, as it further eases curbs amid a massive spike in infection. A health worker waits for people to take swab samples to test for the Covid-19 coronavirus inside of a compound in the Jing’an district in Shanghai. (Photo: AFP) By India Today Web Desk:…

[covid-safer-hotties]

Nasal COVID-19 vaccine halts transmission - Published July 31, 2024

Study in hamsters indicates vaccines targeting nose, mouth may be key to controlling spread of respiratory infections

A nasal COVID-19 vaccine blocks transmission of the virus, according to an animal study by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The findings suggest that vaccines delivered directly to the nose or mouth could play a critical role in containing the spread of respiratory infections.

The lightning-fast development of COVID-19 vaccines just months after the virus appeared was a triumph of modern science and saved millions of lives. But for all the good they did in reducing illnesses and deaths, the shots were unable to end the pandemic because of one notable weakness: They couldn’t stop the spread of the virus.

A new study by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis indicates that next-generation vaccines that target the virus’s points of entry — the nose and mouth — may be able to do what traditional shots cannot: contain the spread of respiratory infections and prevent transmission. Using a nasal COVID-19 vaccine based on Washington University technology, approved for use in India and licensed to Ocugen for further development in the U.S., the researchers showed that vaccinated hamsters that developed infections did not pass the virus on to others, breaking the cycle of transmission. In contrast, an approved COVID-19 vaccine that is injected failed to prevent the spread of the virus.

The findings, published July 31 in Science Advances, provide further evidence that so-called mucosal vaccines sprayed into the nose or dropped into the mouth may be the key to controlling respiratory infections such as influenza and COVID-19 that continue to circulate and cause significant illness and death.

“To prevent transmission, you need to keep the amount of virus in the upper airways low,” said senior author Jacco Boon, PhD, a professor of medicine, of molecular microbiology and of pathology & immunology. “The less virus that is there to begin with, the less likely you are to infect someone else if you cough or sneeze or even just breathe on them. This study shows that mucosal vaccines are superior to injected vaccines in terms of limiting viral replication in the upper airways and preventing spread to the next individual. In an epidemic or pandemic situation, this is the kind of vaccine you’re going to want.”

Developing vaccines that can control virus levels in the nose has proven challenging. Viruses such as influenza virus, SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19) and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) multiply rapidly in the nose and spread from person to person within a few days of initial exposure. Traditional injectable vaccines generate immune responses that can take a week to build to full strength and are much less potent in the nose than in the bloodstream, leaving the nose relatively unprotected against a fast-multiplying, fast-spreading virus.

In principle, a vaccine sprayed or dropped directly into the nose or mouth could limit viral reproduction and thereby reduce transmission by eliciting an immune response right where it’s needed most. But gathering evidence that mucosal vaccines actually do reduce transmission has proven tricky. Animal models of transmission are not well-established, and tracking person-to-person transmission is fiendishly complicated, given the number and variety of encounters a typical person has on any given day.

For this study, Boon and colleagues developed and validated a model for community transmission using hamsters and then used it to assess the effect of mucosal vaccination on the spread of SARS-CoV-2. (Unlike mice, hamsters are naturally susceptible to infection with SARS-CoV-2, making them the ideal laboratory animals for a transmission study.)

The researchers immunized groups of hamsters with laboratory versions of approved COVID-19 vaccines: the nasal iNCOVACC used in India or the injected Pfizer vaccine. For comparison, some hamsters were not immunized. After giving the vaccinated hamsters a few weeks for their immune responses to fully mature, the researchers infected other hamsters with SARS-CoV-2 and then placed the immunized hamsters with the infected hamsters for eight hours. This first step of the experiment mimics the experience of vaccinated people who are exposed to a person with COVID-19.

After spending eight hours rubbing shoulders with infected hamsters, most of the vaccinated animals became infected. Virus was found in the noses and lungs of 12 of 14 (86%) hamsters that had received the nasal vaccine, and 15 of 16 (94%) hamsters that had received the injected vaccine. Importantly, while most animals in both groups were infected, they weren’t infected to the same degree. Hamsters that had been nasally immunized had virus levels in the airways 100 to 100,000 times lower than those that had received the shot or had not been vaccinated. The study did not assess the animals’ health, but previous studies have shown that both vaccines reduce the likelihood of severe illness and death from COVID-19.

The second step of the experiment yielded even more striking results. The researchers took vaccinated hamsters that subsequently developed infections and placed them with healthy vaccinated and unvaccinated hamsters for eight hours to model transmission of virus from a vaccinated person to others.

None of the hamsters that were exposed to nasally vaccinated hamsters became infected, regardless of whether the recipient hamster had been vaccinated or not. In contrast, roughly half of the hamsters that were exposed to hamsters vaccinated by injection became infected — again, regardless of the recipient’s immunization status. In other words, vaccination through the nose — but not by injection — broke the cycle of transmission.

These data, Boon said, could be important as the world prepares for the possibility that avian influenza, currently causing an outbreak in dairy cows, might adapt to humans and trigger a flu epidemic. An injectable vaccine for avian influenza already exists, and a team of researchers at Washington University is working toward a nasal vaccine for avian influenza. That team includes Boon and co-author Michael S. Diamond, MD, PhD, the Herbert S. Gasser Professor of Medicine and one of the inventors of the nasal vaccine technology used in this paper.

“Mucosal vaccines are the future of vaccines for respiratory infections,” Boon said. “Historically, developing such vaccines has been challenging. There’s still so much we don’t know about the kind of immune response we need and how to elicit it. I think we’re going to see a lot of very exciting research in the next few years that could lead to big improvements in vaccines for respiratory infections.”

Study linked in the first link!

[timetravellingkitty]

revisiting the second wave of covid 19 in india reminded me how much I hate the usa those bitches were hoarding vaccines and patenting them while in india we had bodies floating down rivers, lack of oxygen tanks, not enough hospital beds. our government only didn't care because why would modi of all people give a fuck but I love how the united shithole of america manages to make everything worse. I don't think I'll ever be able to convey the totality of the death toll. so many of us were dying left right and centre. my own grandfather almost died in a crowded hospital, which was one of many that were running short of oxygen tanks yankees had enough vaccines to give to their citizens twice over but we're the sensitive ones girl fuck you and your america

[darkmaga-retard]

Anyone who has followed my work since 2020 knows about Denis Rancourt (read his Substack here) and our numerous conversations about COVID-19 and climate change.

But especially COVID-19.

Or rather, COVID-1984 (to borrow from Hrvoje Morić).

I recommend listening to his conversation about all-cause mortality data across several countries, showing no evidence of a pandemic, and his conversation about vaccine-related deaths in the Southern Hemisphere. (Plot twist: the jab was neither safe nor effective.)

The following conversation, however, is the crème de la crème. Denis and his colleagues have published their most extensive paper to date, analysing all-cause mortality across 125 countries throughout the entire alleged COVID-19 pandemic.

We already know the conclusion (that there was no pandemic), but the scientific journey is the fascinating part.

The duration of the ‘pandemic’—2020 to 2023—is based on the declaration made by the WHO. (Speaking of the WHO, make sure to listen to my conversation with WHO insider Astrid Stuckelberger.)

The massive paper

The paper in question, Spatiotemporal variation of excess all-cause mortality in the world (125 countries) during the Covid period 2020-2023 regarding socio economic factors and public-health and medical interventions, is over 500 pages and has a really long title.

They analysed all-cause mortality data from 125 countries, covering about 35% of the global population.

What they found is an excess mortality rate of 0.392% during 2020-2022, compared to 0.97% during the 1918 Spanish Flu. (As an aside, I strongly recommend my podcast with Michael Bryant about the Spanish flu scam.)

India, not included in this study, had an excess death rate of 0.26% in 2021 alone.

The paper projected 30.9 million excess deaths globally from 2020-2022, with 16.9 million deaths related to the rollout to the jab.

Denis noted that the large variations in mortality rates were inconsistent with a viral outbreak. Clustering, which is not typical of viral behaviour, was apparently observed. Put another way, if a so-called virus spreads through a population, there shouldn’t be pockets of sick—or dead—people.

Now what?

What was the cause of excess mortality, in that case?

* The jab: Repeated injections, including booster shots.

* Stress: Lockdowns and significant socio-economic changes.

* Medical interventions: Ventilators, certain drugs and denial of various treatments.

“We conclude that nothing special would have occurred in terms of mortality had a pandemic not been declared and had the declaration not been acted upon.”

- Denis Rancourt

Talking points

Denis covered what was in the paper and touched on the geopolitical link between the COVID™ era, wars, climate change and

[beguines]

All indicators suggest that a project of ethnic cleansing is well underway in India. Minorities are being squeezed under a rubric of an all-consuming Hindu majoritarian project backed by giant oligarchs and corporations that threaten to tear apart a fragile country that has never been a nation. In the ethnocracy, no one is safe. Not journalists. Not Muslims. Not Christians. Not activists. Not even Hindus are safe if they do not conform to the fascist agenda. The assault on dignity has empowered none besides giant corporations and has turned citizens into a morass of disenfranchised subjects. The state is now firmly in the hands of a fiction called the nation.

In Kashmir, the Indian government's abrogation of the special constitutional clauses that provided certain protections over land and employment was an articulation of the expansionist project, or Akhand Bharat. The consequences have been catastrophic for Kashmiris. But Western democratic states have neither the political inclination nor the moral authority to hold Modi accountable. Delhi knows this. Meanwhile, Muslim majority countries, especially those in the Gulf, have in India an infinite resource of cheap human labor needed to build their luxury cities, a customer of energy, and now a geo-political ally. The fragile protections granted by the facade of the global capital economy has gifted Indian foreign policy a certain arrogance. India's unemployment rate is soaring. The economy has shown growth but only because of the soaring number of new billionaires. The government, meanwhile, has yet to come clean over the shocking number of Covid-19 deaths. None of these developments have gone unnoticed.

Azad Essa, Hostile Homelands: The New Alliance Between India and Israel

[lesbiansandgayssupporttheminers]

whenever you have time and energy, please let us hear more of your thoughts on violence under capitalism

Oh, I have the time and the energy, I just didn't want to make the previous ask/answer excessively long!

I think another basic point about both anarchism and communism is that there is violence inherent in capitalism. Capitalism requires the exploitation of the workers by the bosses in order to make profit.

If we take this on a global scale, I think we're all aware of the concept of "sweat shops" in the general, but often we don't consider how unsafe these places are to work. These are factories with no, or very limited regulation- we hear about factory collapses in Bangladesh, where people die in their hundreds. We don't hear about the individuals who are injured or killed every day globally due to unsafe working practices.

Even in the UK, a country that has reasonably good health and safety legislation (of course, legislation is not always followed), in 2018-2019, 147 workers were killed by "accidents at work", as well as 92 members of the public. That's more than 4 people each week. In 2020-21, bearing in mind there were mass lockdowns and many industries stopped working for a period of time, 123 workers, and 80 members of the public were killed. (figures from HSE). These figures do not include deaths from covid-19.

In fact, part of the reason I started this blog during the coronavirus pandemic was because I was aware people were being put in dangerous situations, and covid was being spread more widely because capitalism and profit were being prioritised above people's lives.

The way we are forced to work is killing many people, and injuring huge numbers. In 2021-22, about 150,000 people in the UK sustained an injury at work which meant they were absent for more than 7 days (so potentially quite a serious injury).

Injuries can be caused by unsafe working practices or environments, but equally things like rushing because you are under pressure can lead to a trip or a fall, or people trying to carry things that are too heavy or awkward on their own, and sustaining an injury. The nature of capitalism is that time is money, so we are encourage to work fast, to work when tired, and this can cause people to get hurt.

So that's a little bit about the violence inherent in "work", but what about the violence inherent in the system?

Capitalism kills people- capitalism has always killed people. The nature of the system is that some of us have money and access to all the things we need (food, housing, medication and so on) and some of us don't. People die, or are injured or get ill all the time due to homelessness, even in so-called developed countries. People die due to lack of food, even when there might be food available. People die due to lack of medicine all the time, even in countries where this ought to be freely available, because they cannot afford it.

Whenever people criticise communism, they like to bring up the famine under Stalin. I'm not going to launch into a defense of Stalin, but when we criticise capitalism, we should therefore look at famines caused by it, or contributed to by it. Historically, the potato famine in Ireland, or the Bengal Famine in India (when it was under British rule) are just two examples. We can also look at the ongoing famine in Yemen, and increasing problems in Sudan and the surrounding area.

Many people consider these famines to be solely due to natural causes, "acts of god" if you will. But that's not the case.

If we look at the potato famine, sometimes called an Drochshaol in Gaelic, solely because that's the one I'm most familiar with, we can see that it was caused largely by a capitalist, colonialist system, and the impacts of it were made far more extreme due to capitalism.

People will tell you the potato famine was caused by the potato blight, but it's not as simple as that. There was potato blight across Europe, in the 1840s, leading to about 100,000 deaths across the whole of Europe. In Ireland, more than 1 million people died, and many more emigrated, causing a 20-25% fall in the total population.

Part of the reason for this was the reliance on a single crop. This wasn't a situation chosen by the Irish people. Instead, English landlordism pushed the poorest Irish people into a situation where they had very little land, and the only crop that could sustain them on their land was the potato. Meanwhile, much of the agricultural land was used to grow wheat or other grains, or farm meat, which was solely used for the profit of the landlords.

Arguably the greatest tragedy of the Irish famine was that there was plenty of food in Ireland. It was just all being exported, so that people could make money. And during the famine, people continued to do this, and continued to make money, even whilst people were literally starving in the streets.

And during all of this, the English landlords continued to charge rent. Even before the famine, many families in Ireland could not fully afford their rents, and were supported through relatives working abroad (usually seasonal work in Britain). During the famine, there were a huge number of evictions.

I recently watched a BBC TV show about evictions (because English landlords haven't changed at all) and one of the tenants facing eviction said something along the lines of "eviction is a really violent act"- which I believe is true. And it is even more violent in a situation where your family is starving and everyone around you is starving.

Anyway, my point is that the landlords were able to evict their tenants, in order to make more money, causing even more deaths. And all of this is was fuelled by a capitalist, colonialist system.

And in the last 170 or so years, we can see that on a surface level, things have improved somewhat in some countries. But equally, in England, we still live in a country where someone can evict you for no reason and make you street homeless if *you* can't find another house in time- yes, in some circumstances, "the council" will help house people, but the housing offered is often inadequate or limited for families- and it often doesn't exist for young, single people- so they end up sofa surfing or sleeping on the streets.

In the USA, people still die or end up in extremely difficult situations because they can't afford the medical treatment they need.

I'm sure anyone who lives in a capitalist country can point to some key injustice which leads to death or serious ill health, and is driven solely by profit and the property owning class. This is the violence inherent in the system, and it kills far more people than interpersonal violence ever could.

Again, this has become very long, and there's still more in it that I want to explore, so do keep sending me asks on these themes if you are interested.

[krishna-sangini]

My Journey to Keshav

My journey to Keshav began when I was probably 2 or 3 years old. The tales that my grandpa and my great-granny told me; of Krishna's baal leelas, the cheer haran, His raas leela, His journey to Mathura, the slaying of Kansa, and then becoming the protector of uncountable people... All these tales I marvelled at as a toddler have the credit of hooking me onto my Keshav for the very first time.

This was just the start... Of a beautiful journey that would ultimately become my destination.

The toddler me grew up into a kid. That’s when the cartoon ‘Krishna Balram’ came onto the scene. And yeah, that show is 100% credited with making me fall head-over-heels for the sibling pair. I mean, y’all would be lying if you said you didn’t absolutely fall in love with Krishna and Balram after watching that show! Like, come on! Those two boys are simply sweethearts! Then came the ‘Little Krishna’ movie series. Ouffffff! My heart was completely occupied by the Makhan Chor by then. 

But then I entered teenage! The best phase of human life. You know, the phase everyone goes through where Westernization is considered cool and spirituality is considered ‘boring’ and ‘conservative’. Yeeeah… I fell into that ditch too. I pushed Kanha into the backseat. I got absorbed in the world of being ‘cool’ by shunning my religion and putting on the mask of atheism.

(This is not a dig at people who are genuinely atheists. Y'all are free to have your own opinions,  and I respect yours even if mine are different.) 

During those 5-6 years, I forgot all about my absolute bestie. The one who had stayed with me through every nightmare and sunshine. Needless to say, my life was a torment those years. Serious shitty family issues and my then school can be credited for that.

But again, once you’re into Krishna, he'll always find a way to bring you back if you go astray. That’s exactly what my Keshav did to me.

2020 saw the advent of the COVID-19 virus in India, and a long and tiring lockdown followed. Just as people were beginning to get frustrated to death, the good old Mahabharat and Ramayana started airing again. That was the turning point for me. Seeing Nitish Bhardwaj’s excellent portrayal of my Keshav, I was hit with the nostalgic memories of my childhood that I shared with Kanha. It was then that the thought struck me, “If a human can look so freaking beautiful, how much more radiant and divine must Kanha have looked in real life!”

And that was it. I called for Keshav after so long. He was waiting for me, perhaps. Waiting for me to call Him with all my heart, without my pride’s obstruction. I did, and He responded right away. A couple of days later was when I had that magnificent dream where my Keshav showed me a glimpse of Himself for the very first.

(I have posted about that dream here too; the link is in my pinned post. If you’re curious, you can check it out! Also, please share your Krishna story too!)

And since then, there has been no coming back.

I am now compensating for those 5 years by falling in love with my Keshav harder with each passing day. Not that I mind it. Because I absolutely love it. Now that I look back, it had been Him all along. All those times I sat crying alone in my room cuz of the mess our family was in, Keshav was there right by my side, caressing me gently. I was just too haughty to realize it. Had it not been for Him, the wicket of my life would already have toppled years ago.

Sooo, this is my journey to my Keshav. The journey that still continues; it will continue till we meet finally on the ultimate day… This journey has mended me in so many ways. It has shown me a whole new side of myself. It has helped me realize myself better. And best of all, it has made me feel my Keshav more and made me love Him much more. And I’m so so glad that I had people in my life who led me to the beginning of this journey. For this too, I thank our Manmohan.

Sooo, yeah. That’s it. How has your journey to Krishna been so far? Feel free to share!

Radhe Radhe, sakhis and sakhas! Kanha will stop by in your dream tonight~ (Yeah, he told me so himself!)

[mariacallous]

This month the World Trade Organization threw in the towel on COVID-19. Medicines like Paxlovid have been plentiful in the U.S. and Europe, but because of insufficient supplies and high prices, hardly anyone in Africa, Asia, and Latin America has had access. After more than three years of debate, the WTO declared on Feb. 13 that it was unable to reach agreement on waiving global patent rules for COVID-19 treatment to ease the way for expanded production.

Those confused about why the WTO is even still debating COVID-19 nearly a year after the public health emergency was declared over by the World Health Organization can be forgiven. Not only is this slow speed not what the world needs in a pandemic, it is also not how the World Trade Organization is supposed to work, and begs questions on WTO’s relevance in a multi-crisis world. It also makes clear that responsibility for the global governance of pandemic-related technology and intellectual property cannot remain with the WTO.

As negotiations have reconvened this week in Geneva over a new Pandemic Treaty, the question of which organizations should manage the response is a live question. Some negotiators are pushing for a role for the world’s health ministers and the World Health Organization on intellectual property, but the U.S. negotiator and others say these questions should stay with the WTO. The WTO’s failure, though, make this an increasingly untenable position: If the WTO cannot act in a pandemic to remove patents barriers and promote sharing of technology so the world can produce enough medicines and vaccines, then the WHO must be empowered to do so.

When the World Trade Organization was created in 1995, it marked a fundamental change to international trade law. Where the international system it replaced had primarily dealt with flow of goods across borders, WTO rules expanded the definition of “trade” to include the intangible—including patents on pharmaceuticals. All members were required to enforce 20-year monopolies over making new medicines. As the late scholar Susan Sell described it, this was a remarkable act of “forum shifting.” Before that, patents (effectively government-granted monopolies) were not part of “free” trade. Into the 1970s, many rich countries such as Italy and Japan did not allow patents on medicines, and many developing countries like India, Brazil, and Mexico had continued to exclude medicines from patent monopolies into the 1990s. But they were convinced to expand intellectual property in the new WTO agreement with a promise of “technology transfer” and a requirement that wealthy countries incentivize their companies to share with least-developed countries. This has not gone as promised.

The first effective medicines in the AIDS pandemic arrived just as the WTO came into being. It quickly became clear this debate about globally enforceable intellectual property was life-or-death as patents proved a major barrier to access. Twelve million Africans died between 1997 and 2007 with AIDS medicines too expensive and pharmaceutical companies blocking affordable generic versions. Eventually manufacturers in India, Brazil, South Africa, and elsewhere overcame barriers and made the drugs at a 99 percent lower cost. Today 30 million people are on treatment and cutting-edge medicines costs less than $50 per year.

Did drug companies voluntarily relent? Unfortunately, no. Dozens of low- and middle-income country governments issued “compulsory licenses” forcing drug companies to allow local producers to make HIV medicines. Activists pressured companies to drop their price and share their technology. The WTO eventually agreed on the “Doha Declaration” clarifying WTO rules allowing countries “flexibilities” to make affordable medicines and special consideration during emergencies. It took over a decade, but eventually the Medicines Patent Pool was created to facilitate voluntary sharing of technology—though companies only joined because compulsory alternatives left them little choice.

When the pandemic hit, these structures to transfer technology were all available, but world leaders decided to only use the voluntary elements—an approach that failed spectacularly. Scientists delivered vaccines in record time. Highly effective mRNA vaccines were developed in under a year and treatments followed. Paxlovid proved among the most effective—a long-standing HIV drug combined with a new drug similar to HIV antiretrovirals. Costa Rica and the WHO proposed a mechanism to pool technology and patents even before medicines were developed and approved. Over 100 different drug and vaccine manufacturers around the world were prepared to make them, several even showing they could reverse engineer mRNA vaccines. But no drug company agreed to share its technology, and none of the governments where companies were based compelled them to.

With neither a relaxation of WTO rules nor enough voluntary sharing to enable factories in Africa, Asia, and Latin America to expand supply, global leaders backed a set of voluntary efforts for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). COVAX, the international effort to procure and equitably distribute vaccines, tried to secure vaccines from companies like Pfizer and Moderna. Predictably, however, COVAX quickly discovered high-income countries were locking up global supplies by using economic and political power to secure preferential access from companies. By the end of the first year, less than 1 percent of all vaccines had gone to low-income countries. Medicines fared no better. One analysis showed need for Paxlovid exceeded supply in LMICs by 8 million doses—leaving 90 percent without access. The lowest reported price was $250—200 percent of the average per capita spending on all health in lower middle-income countries.

These shortages had consequences. Analyses show as many as 27 million lives lost to the pandemic, many of which were preventable. Beyond the direct effect, dangerous coronavirus variants swept the world from contexts of high transmission and low vaccinated immunity. The pandemic has been longer and more damaging because of an artificially limited global supply of countermeasures.

Throughout this time the WTO was locked in debate. South Africa and India proposed a temporary waiver of WTO rules on all COVID-19 products during the pandemic. Pharmaceutical industry lobbyists cast this as a dangerous idea, launching a campaign against it claiming “voiding patents” would undermine innovation for pandemic products. In reality, a waiver does not take away IP rights. It simply suspends global rules temporarily, giving policymaking authority back to national governments to decide whether to enforce patents on pandemic-products during the pandemic without threat of WTO-linked sanctions. A waiver alone would not have solved the pandemic supply problem, which also required shared know-how and expanded manufacturing. But it would have removed threats of lawsuits for companies making financial and infrastructure investments in production lines and threat of sanctions from powerful states for governments allowing local production.

The WTO is supposed to be able to use mechanisms like waivers to respond to crises in a matter of weeks, not years. The Marrakesh Agreement explicitly includes a provision on waivers, stating the General Council must act within 90 days on a waiver request, assuming consensus, but falling back to a vote of three-fourths of members. Every year multiple WTO waivers are granted on issues from pharmaceuticals to diamonds to preferential trade for neighbors. But since 2020, the WTO’s efforts to pass a waiver in the middle of a world-changing event hit institutional and ideological roadblocks. Even as heads of state weighed in and wide swaths of the global economy depended on stopping the coronavirus, the institutional structure encouraged gridlock. Despite seemingly supportive law, the WTO’s structures encourage narrow interest-group politics, excluding actors with a broader public interest and economic agenda.

Narrowly-focused intellectual property negotiators framed the COVID-19 issue in ways that insulated negotiators, focused on footnotes and eligibility instead of stopping the pandemic, and gave an effective veto to trade negotiators from a few states with strong pharmaceutical lobbies. By the time the 12th WTO Ministerial Conference rolled around in June 2022, a simple pandemic-long waiver proposed two years earlier had morphed into a complicated mechanism that several developing countries declared unworkable. It only covered vaccines, pushing treatments to further negotiations. Eight months of more negotiations yielded no further progress, leading to the WTO’s declaration of no agreement last week.

It is time for a new forum shift. Negotiations over a new Pandemic Treaty are intensifying as negotiators hope for a May conclusion. The draft agreement includes a commitment to waive intellectual property during a pandemic and to use WTO flexibilities to produce pandemic-fighting products. These are the minimum steps to make the whole world safer. President Joe Biden already supported a patent waiver during the pandemic and is using these flexibilities at home, including “march-in” rights to limit patent monopolies on high-priced drugs in the U.S. The U.S. negotiator’s opposition suggests misaligned foreign policy.

But the agreement should go further. Given the WTO’s repeated failure, the new agreement should shift authority to waive patent rules to the World Health Assembly. And it should include a binding agreement to share publicly funded technologies for global production. States delegated authority to the WTO, which has proved a barrier rather than an asset in pandemics. Taking it back is just good governance.

[reasonsforhope]

India was able to save more than 3.4 million lives by undertaking a nationwide Covid-19 vaccination campaign at an unprecedented scale, according to a Stanford University report.

The campaign also yielded a positive economic impact by preventing a loss of $18.3 billion, the working paper by Stanford University and Institute for Competitiveness titled 'Healing the Economy: Estimating the Economic Impact on India's Vaccination and Related Issues' released by Union health minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Friday suggested.

According to the Stanford report, the direct and total impact of vaccination varied from about $ 1.03 billion to $ 2.58 billion if minimum wages are considered within the age distribution category.

“The same, however, varied from about $3.49 billion to $ 8.7 billion if GDP per person employed (constant) is considered. The cumulative lifetime earnings of the lives saved through vaccination (in the working age group) rolled up to $ 21.5 billion. Moreover, since vaccination also saved the lives of the elderly, this indirectly helped prevent the health infrastructure from getting overwhelmed and thereby allowing for a more judicious use of the existing health infrastructure,” the report suggested.

Mandaviya said much before Covid-19 was declared a public health emergency by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in January 2020, processes and structures to focus dedicatedly on various facets of the pandemic management were put in place...

The Stanford working paper refers to a Lancet modelling study which estimated that in India around 3.4 million deaths were prevented by vaccination in the year 2021, an estimate based on officially reported deaths in India.

The paper also highlighted the impact of the lockdown and referred to the health ministry’s statistical analysis that the Covid-19 tally could have reached about two lakh (0.2 million) without lockdown by April 11, 2020.

Due to lockdown measures, the actual cases only went up to about 7,500 by April 11, 2020, making a case for the lockdown stronger."

-via Times of India, 2/25/23

[ferventrabbit]

Ao3 Fics

Hello hello! I thought I'd pin a post of my works on Ao3 :-). Here are the pairings I write:

Hannibal: Hannibal/Will Good Omens: Aziraphale/Crowley Interview with the Vampire: Lestat/Louis Our Flag Means Death: Ed/Stede Red White and Royal Blue: Alex/Henry Young Royals: Simon/Wilhelm

Fic Key

🤝 Collaborations

Series

🐭 Hannibal: Disney for Cannibals

🏡 Our Flag Means Death: Tales from a Seaside Inn

Completed longer works (>5k)

Hannibal

🐭 Tale as Old As Time (M): "I would consider very carefully before moving any further, Will," says Hannibal. Will can feel the mirth dancing in time with Molly's pulse. "What am I considering?" A great perhaps," he says. If he could learn to love another, the spell would be broken. But who could ever learn to love a beast? (24.7k)

Our Flag Means Death

🤝 Ariadne with art by @babykittenteach (E): While out thrifting for furniture and decorations for the inn, Ed comes across a painting that leads him on a journey of self-discovery and self-acceptance. (17.3k)

Down to Fall (E): Stede decides he wants to expand their repertoire, so to speak. Like all things worth having, it's worth working for. (5.9K)

High Point (T): Documentary videographer Ed Teach retired at the top of his game five years ago. An odd request from documentary producer Stede Bonnet has lured him back into the field to join a film crew in the mountains of India. Ed and Stede are looking for a snow leopard, but end up finding something unexpected along the way. (9.6k)

🏡 Old Friends (T): The crew of the Revenge pay the innkeepers a visit. (6.7k)

One Day You'll Awaken (T): A sea witch gives Edward Teach a gift - Blackbeard, a shadow, a sentinel - to keep him safe and strong. Her condition? He must keep Blackbeard close, or she will make sure he sleeps soundly forever. Stede Bonnet threatens to ruin her plans. (32.6k)

Red White and Royal Blue

Once in a Century (E): After the kiss everything goes to utter and complete shit. OR COVID-19 interferes with best laid plans. (23.7k)

Completed one-shots (<5k)

Hannibal

A Terror Quiet Calm (E): Will makes up his mind during Mizumono, when things could have ended differently. A Mizumono fix-it. (1.2k)

Conversion (T): The woodsman notices a presence in the wilderness. A giver of gifts. (2.5k)

Hot Stuff, or The night Hannibal realized he was well and truly whipped (T): Hannibal wakes up to find Will is missing. His search leads to some surprising discoveries. (2.1k)

Into the Dark (G): "In the dark Will looked like a shadow. Hannibal felt the soft sound of Will’s breathing on his skin, tasted it in his throat." Prepare for super creepy times! (1.3k)

Raindrop Prelude (T): Will and Hannibal, on a boat, feeling feels. (1K)

🐭 Poor Unfortunate Soul (M): Will would sell his soul to be rid of the nightmares that plague him. Or, at least, his voice. (4.9k)

Surge (E): "He remembers that look in the kitchen, tries to place it. He’d seen flashes of it in Baltimore: the night of Clark Ingram’s arrest and maybe even the first time they met, glimpsed from the corner of Will’s eye. Then in Italy, seated together at the feet of spring. He doesn’t think about the cliff – can’t, or else his lungs tighten and he feels like he can’t breathe, like he might be dying." (2.3k)

The Tide (M): Based on this prompt: I can’t shake this idea: Hannibal and Will being intimate for the first time and being utterly overwhelmed by it. (1.5k)

🐭 Trust in Me (G): Will is lost in the jungle. He finds refuge in a familiar place. (2.1k)

Until (M): Will is desperate for an end. Hannibal will fight him every step of the way. (1.8k)

Interview with the Vampire

Room for One More (E): Baby Vampire's First Night In. or: Louis is feeling some type of way about sleeping in a coffin, but after some finagling he and Lestat finally get it right. (2.3k)

Good Omens

Hush (M): Aziraphale has returned from heaven, but there are things still left unsaid. Crowley has finally had enough. (2.1k).

Our Flag Means Death

Anchor (E): Ed assures Stede that their first time was not a mistake, which Stede desperately needs (AND DESERVES) to hear. (1.7k)

Captain's Quarters (G): Ed and Stede platonically share a bed and feel feelings, like pirates do. (2.3k)

Daylight (E): Ed doesn't know what to do with himself when Stede comes back, until he does. (2.1k)

🏡 Filled (E): Stede thinks about what it would be like if he could carry Ed’s child, which leads where all roads lead during Bottom Stede Week. (3.6k)

🏡 Filled Out (E): Ed tries to figure out how he feels about his body post-piracy. A post-season 2 inn fic. (1.6k)

The Finer Points (G): Stede expands his fancy pants curriculum to include a simple waltz. (1.9k)

🏡 First Night (E): Truly just an entire fic of Ed and Stede making out in this shitty house. A post-season 2 inn fic. (2.1k)

Five Kisses (E): A chronicle of five important kisses on the good ship Blackbonnet. (2.3k)

🤝 Forever's Gonna Start Tonight with @shieldmaidenofmithrilhall (G): As the total solar eclipse approaches, two strangers meet at the top of a mountain, one with a telescope and one with a picnic basket full of eclipse treats. (5k)

Holdover (E): A PWP in which Stede wears a nightie for one reason and one reason only. (3.5k)

I Feel Pretty (E): Stede engaging in body worship of Ed, his preferred occupation. (1.4k)

Interlude (E): A PWP missing scene from 2x08 because BOYFRIENDS. (1.7k)

Leather and Silk (E): A PWP based on the “leather and silk” bts we received from Samba 🙏. (1.6k)

Midnight on the Revenge (G): Literally just a smol fic about Stede holding Ed until he falls asleep because I need that, okay? (1k)

🤝 Milkmaid with @dracothelizard (E): Stede remembers the little song he and Ed sang at the floating market, and Ed decides it’s as good a day as any to show Stede the true meaning of “all things milk.” (4.6k)

🤝 Perfectly Ordinary Tuesday with @petrichorca (M): Dave just wanted a place to sleep for the night, but he gets a lot more than he bargained for when the owners of a seaside inn make him an unwitting participant in their wedding. Will he make it through the ceremony unscathed? And what’s that seagull doing here? (4.9k)

Reset (E): Ed notices Stede looking at him more than usual, leaving them both a bit hot and bothered. He proposes a failsafe plan to give them both a reset. What could go wrong? Set sometime between 2x05 and 2x06. (5k)

🤝 Row Your Boat with @petrichorca (T): A missing scene following the events of season 2, episode 4, “Fun and Games.” Ed’s agreed to come back to the Revenge with Stede for the night, but they’ve got two dinghies to row back to the ship—will the distance between them linger? (3.3k)

Skintight (E): Ed wears a set of lingerie that he's kept in the back of his closet before now. Stede does what anyone would do after seeing Ed in lingerie, bless him. (3.7k)

🏡 Soft Open (T): Ed and Stede start sprucing up their inn and welcome Mary and Doug for a soft open. (3.3k)

Storm (G): Stede helps Ed through his grief in the season 2 finale. (1k)

Taking it Slow (E): As requested, Stede takes it slow. (2k)

That Ship Has Sailed (E): My interpretation of what happened after Calypso's birthday. (2.1k)

The Lube That Fell to Earth (E): A fic in honor of the Astroglide lube-along, in which Ed and Stede are in receipt of a gift from outer space. (4.1k)

🏡 Threshold (T): Ed and Stede take turns carrying each other over the threshold of the inn. Eventually, they cross it together. (2.6k)

🏡 Tucked In (E): Discussion of first times and new discoveries under the Wee John blanket. A post-season 2 inn fic. (2.7k)

Wanted (T): The fuckery after their inevitable discovery at the inn, and what it means for Ed. Written for the #13DaysofCrimesmas! (2.7k)

Wide Awake (M): Five times Stede wakes Ed up, and one time Ed returns the favor. Set throughout seasons 1 and 2. (2.2k)

Works for Spiders, Works for Men (G): Stede rescues Ed from a formidable eight-legged foe. (575)

Young Royals

After the Credits (M): I needed the cameras to keep rolling after their first kiss...OR The dramatic make-out session that may or may not change everything. (2.1k)

After the Curtains (M): As per my last fic, I need these scenes to keep going! This takes place after Wilhelm shuts the curtains in episode 5. (1.2k)

Works in progress

Good Omens

The Second Coming and Other Heavenly Tales (T): Aziraphale is the new Supreme Archangel of Heaven, and he's made a huge mistake. As Aziraphale navigates a tricky heavenly web, Crowley tries to find a way forward - is there one? - while being periodically interrupted by wishful Bentley songs and transmissions from Alpha Centurai. Can the ineffable duo save Earth from "Plan C?" Will the ducks in St. James' park ever get the good bread again? Join my headcanon for season 3 to find out! (16.5k, 15/20)

[richincolor]

Jessica’s 2022 Favorites

It's been a fantastic year for YA, but now that the year is wrapping up, all of us at Rich in Color will be picking our favorites of the year. Of course, that's always difficult -- they're all so good! -- and this year is no exception. At the very top of my list of YA reads for 2022 are two YA novels and one YA graphic memoir, all of which I consider must-reads. Check them out:

A Magic Steeped in Poison (The Book of Tea #1) by Judy I. Lin

For Ning, the only thing worse than losing her mother is knowing that it's her own fault. She was the one who unknowingly brewed the poison tea that killed her—the poison tea that now threatens to also take her sister, Shu.

When Ning hears of a competition to find the kingdom's greatest shennong-shi—masters of the ancient and magical art of tea-making—she travels to the imperial city to compete. The winner will receive a favor from the princess, which may be Ning's only chance to save her sister's life.

But between the backstabbing competitors, bloody court politics, and a mysterious (and handsome) boy with a shocking secret, Ning might actually be the one in more danger.

Messy Roots: A Graphic Memoir of a Wuhanese-American by Laura Gao

After spending her early years in Wuhan, China, riding water buffalos and devouring stinky tofu, Laura immigrates to Texas, where her hometown is as foreign as Mars--at least until 2020, when COVID-19 makes Wuhan a household name. In Messy Roots, Laura illustrates her coming-of-age as the girl who simply wants to make the basketball team, escape Chinese school, and figure out why girls make her heart flutter.

Insightful, original, and hilarious, toggling seamlessly between past and present, China and America, Gao's debut is a tour de force of graphic storytelling.

What Souls Are Made Of by Tasha Suri

As the abandoned son of a Lascar—a sailor from India—Heathcliff has spent most of his young life maligned as an “outsider.” Now he’s been flung into an alien life in the Yorkshire moors, where he clings to his birth father’s language even though it makes the children of the house call him an animal, and the maids claim he speaks gibberish.

Catherine is the younger child of the estate’s owner, a daughter with light skin and brown curls and a mother that nobody talks about. Her father is grooming her for a place in proper society, and that’s all that matters. Catherine knows she must mold herself into someone pretty and good and marriageable, even though it might destroy her spirit. As they occasionally flee into the moors to escape judgment and share the half-remembered language of their unknown kin, Catherine and Heathcliff come to find solace in each other. Deep down in their souls, they can feel they are the same.

But when Catherine’s father dies and the household’s treatment of Heathcliff only grows more cruel, their relationship becomes strained and threatens to unravel. For how can they ever be together, when loving each other—and indeed, loving themselves—is as good as throwing themselves into poverty and death?

[covid-safer-hotties]

Why Biden’s premature COVID ending could help it surge - Published Sept 23, 2022

Two years out from the publication of this article, and we can really see how true these warnings were. Why does the mainstream media and DNC refuse to do anything about forever covid?

This week, President Biden said what millions of Americans have been hoping to hear since the spring of 2020: “The pandemic is over.”

I understand the impulse to close the book and move on. But I am deeply concerned that this declaration is not only premature but also dangerous.

The SARS-CoV-2 virus has shown us, again and again, the danger of hubris. Think of the lethal impact of the omicron virus last winter, just when we were so grateful that the delta wave had ebbed. Think of the deadly surges this summer, just when we were planning our long-delayed vacations. This is a virus that has humbled us too often. We must approach it with humility.

This declaration has many damaging effects: As others have noted, it will now be even harder to persuade Americans to get the new bivalent boosters. It’ll be tougher to persuade Congress to fund essential COVID responses. And it will be nearly impossible for local officials to impose new indoor mask requirements should another surge arrive.

To be sure, Biden did acknowledge in his “60 Minutes” interview that “we still have a problem with COVID” and added that “we’re still doing a lot of work on it.” But he sandwiched that message between two flat declarations that the pandemic is over. Those are the soundbites that have reverberated most loudly, and they are decidedly unhelpful.

Dr. Tom Frieden, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has spoken often about how the U.S. has lurched from a cycle of panic to neglect when it comes to public health. Many of us in the field had hoped that the COVID-19 pandemic would break that cycle — a sliver of silver lining amid all the grief.

We had hoped that policymakers and voters alike would understand how essential it is to upgrade our data infrastructure, stockpile essential medicine and equipment, invest in preventive care for vulnerable populations, restructure our emergency response agencies and support an infusion of public health workers at the local and state levels. Surely, COVID would be the spur needed to finally bump U.S. spending on public health to more than 3 cents on the health care dollar.

By declaring the pandemic over when we are still very much in the thick of the fight, President Biden is undercutting that message.

Let’s look at where we are right now. The U.S. is still reporting close to 60,000 cases and 400 deaths each day. Millions are struggling with long COVID; by some estimates, this often debilitating condition is keeping 4 million adults out of work. Those at work may have less flexibility: Major companies are ending work-from-home policies and Starbucks announced this week that it will no longer give employees paid time off to isolate or get vaccinated. Biden’s remarks will only accelerate that trend.

Meanwhile, only 67 percent of Americans are vaccinated and only half of them have been boosted. While many of the remaining have some immunity from infection, the death toll makes clear that large swaths of the population remain highly vulnerable. And of course, new variants continue to emerge; right now, all eyes are on BA.2.75.2, a mutation of the omicron variant that is notably better at evading antibodies acquired from vaccination or prior infection and is spreading rapidly in India.

Declaring the pandemic over at this stage is tantamount to accepting all this misery as background noise.

And if we accept the status quo as background noise — rather than the urgent and immediate threat it represents — it’s nearly impossible to make the case that we need to do more as a society to protect the vulnerable, respond to surges, or prepare for future crises.

The Biden administration has made significant strides on COVID. It made tests, vaccines and treatments widely available across the country, which improved outcomes and saved lives. The vast majority of Americans feel we’re in a better place than at this time last year and many have returned, at least in large part, to normal activities.

It is an appropriate moment for our leaders to turn the page away from our wartime footing and begin a sober discussion about the next steps: the risks that remain, the importance of responding quickly to local surges, the value of supporting the Global South in building their own vaccine infrastructure — and the critical need to rebuild the battered and woefully outdated public health infrastructure in the U.S.

It is not the moment to declare victory.

John M. Barry, author of “The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History” has a stark warning from history. He writes that the world had largely moved on from the 1918 influenza pandemic when a fourth wave struck in 1920. By then, the U.S. had plenty of natural immunity from prior infection. Still, the virus spread ruthlessly. Public officials failed to respond. They, like the public, wanted the pandemic to be over — so the virus rolled on unchecked. In some cities, the death toll in 1920 exceeded the toll of the huge second wave.

We should not make the same mistake now. With humility as our watchword, we can move to the next chapter without closing the book. That is the way forward.

Michelle A. Williams is dean of the faculty of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

[darkmaga-retard]

https://www.globalresearch.ca/un-forced-admit-gates-funded-vaccine-causing-polio-outbreak-africa/5723137

UN Forced to Admit Gates-funded Vaccine Is Causing Polio Outbreak in Africa

By 21st Century Wire

Global Research, September 05, 2024

21st Century Wire 4 September 2020

The United Nations has been forced to admit that a major international vaccine initiative is actually causing a deadly outbreak of the very disease it was supposed to wipe-out.

While international organisations like the World Health Organization (WHO) will regularly boast about ‘eradicating polio’ with vaccines—the opposite seems to be the case, with vaccines causing the deaths of scores of young people living in Africa.

Health officials have now admitted that their plan to stop ‘wild’ polio is backfiring, as scores children are being paralyzed by a deadly strain of the pathogen derived from a live vaccine – causing a virulent wave of polio to spread.

This latest pharma-induced pandemic started out in the African countries of Chad and Sudan, with the culprit identified as vaccine-derived polio virus type 2.

Officials now fear this new dangerous strain could soon ‘jump continents,’ causing further deadly outbreaks around the world.

Shocking as it sounds, this Big Pharma debacle is not new. After spending some $16 billion over 30 years to eradicate polio, international health bodies have ‘accidentally’ reintroduced the disease to in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and also Iran, as the central Asia region was hit by a virulent strain of polio spawned by the a pharmaceutical vaccine. Also, in 2019, the government of Ethiopia ordered the destruction of 57,000 vials of type 2 oral polio vaccine (mOPV2) following a similar outbreak of vaccine-induced polio.

The same incident has happened in India as well.

It’s important to note that the oral polio vaccine is being pushed by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI), a consortium which is supported and funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

All of this should be cause for concern, especially with western governments and transnational pharmaceutical giants all rushing to roll-out their new Gates-funded experimental coronavirus vaccine for the global population.

Currently, the first experimental COVID-19 vaccine is being tested on the African populationthrough GAVI Vaccine Alliance, another organization funded by the Gates Foundation. A large round of human trials is taking place in South Africa, run by the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg—another Gates-funded institution.

[tomorrowusa]

Even before Putin started his unprovoked war of aggression, Russia was not experiencing great population stability. But as many as 208,370 Russians have died and more have been wounded in the war. Additionally, hundreds of thousands more have fled the country since early 2022.

The Economist writes (archived)...

A DEMOGRAPHIC TRAGEDY is unfolding in Russia. Over the past three years the country has lost around 2m more people than it would ordinarily have done, as a result of war, disease and exodus. The life expectancy of Russian males aged 15 fell by almost five years, to the same level as in Haiti. The number of Russians born in April 2022 was no higher than it had been in the months of Hitler’s occupation. And because so many men of fighting age are dead or in exile, women now outnumber men by at least 10m.

It only gets worse.

According to Alexei Raksha, an independent demographer who used to work for the state statistics service, if you look just at peacetime years, the number of births registered in April 2022 was the lowest since the 18th century.

Putin has been trying to emulate Peter the Great. The only way he’s managed to do so is in lowering the number of births in Russia to what it was in Peter’s time.

Putin’s pandemic response was terrible. 

All this began before the war and reflects Russia’s appalling covid pandemic. The official death toll from the disease was 388,091, which would be relatively low; but The Economist estimates total excess deaths in 2020-23 at between 1.2m and 1.6m. That would be comparable to the number in China and the United States, which have much larger populations. Russia may have had the largest covid death toll in the world after India, and the highest mortality rate of all, with 850-1,100 deaths per 100,000 people.

Anybody who observed the way Putin handled COVID-19 could not have been surprised by his failure in Ukraine.

The bottom line...

The demographic doom loop has not, it appears, diminished Mr Putin’s craving for conquest. But it is rapidly making Russia a smaller, worse-educated and poorer country, from which young people flee and where men die in their 60s. The invasion has been a human catastrophe—and not only for Ukrainians.

You know, this “demographic doom loop“ may be one of the reasons Russia is abducting children in Ukraine and bringing them to Russia.

Ukraine war: The mothers going to get their children back from Russia

After the war, Ukraine will rebuild and will prosper. Ukrainians are among the most innovative, resourceful, and energetic people on the planet. The country has remained standing because of the strength of its people.

After the war, Russia will still be Russia – a kleptocracy run by oligarchs who keep the bulk of the declining population poor and ignorant. 

The difference between Russia and Ukraine will increasingly resemble the difference between North Korea and South Korea.

[liberaleffects]

Yet another TRUMP TOTAL FAIL. In the USA OVER A MILLION PEOPLE, SO FAR, HAVE DIED from COVID, far and away the highest number in THE WORLD. India with about 3X the US population and severe poverty has had the second highest with 528,905 deaths so far, a little over half the number in the US.