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Any and all updates regarding the COVID-19 will need a source provided. Please do your part in helping us to keep this thread maintainable and under control.
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Added a disclaimer on page 662. Many need to post better. |
On December 03 2021 16:16 Acrofales wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 13:11 Mohdoo wrote:
Great example why there shouldn't be non-essential international travel. The entire idea that we still have tourists flying around so they can look at stuff is mind boggling. The SA travel ban was justified and smart. The travel ban should have been expanded to the entire planet other than essential travel, with global mandatory 2 week quarantine+testing. Define essential please. Let me give some examples and you can say yes/no so we can get some idea. Is an epidemiologist travelling to South Africa to study omicron essential? Is an aspiring epidemiologist travelling to Germany to start a residency in a hospital there essential? Is a university student studying medicine travelling from France to Norway for a 6-month exchange program (Erasmus) essential? Replace medical student with fine arts student in the situation above. Is a nurse from Kenya travelling to the US for a new job essential? Is an IT specialist from Bangalore travelling to the US for a new job essential? Is a Mexican bricklayer travelling to the US for a temp job on a construction site essential? Is a Mexican farm worker travelling to the US for a temp job harvesting tomatoes essential? Is a business trip to secure the supply line for Pfizer's vaccine essential? Is a business trip to secure the supply line for Apple essential? Is a business trip to oversee construction of a new hotel in Southern Spain essential? Is a blue collar laborer going to spend a few days in a hotel in Southern Spain essential?
Pretty sure he mentioned "tourists" and "looking at stuff" ...
You can add to that, that everything working related that can be done remotely, should be done remotely.
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On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia.  Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi.
Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity.
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On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity.
You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made.
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On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made.
That's definitely fair. I'm not up-to-date on the information surrounding whether or not it's man-made, per se, which is why I focused only on the clearly racially-charged language. There are clearly plenty of problems here, though.
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On December 03 2021 21:11 Harris1st wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 16:16 Acrofales wrote:On December 03 2021 13:11 Mohdoo wrote:
Great example why there shouldn't be non-essential international travel. The entire idea that we still have tourists flying around so they can look at stuff is mind boggling. The SA travel ban was justified and smart. The travel ban should have been expanded to the entire planet other than essential travel, with global mandatory 2 week quarantine+testing. Define essential please. Let me give some examples and you can say yes/no so we can get some idea. Is an epidemiologist travelling to South Africa to study omicron essential? Is an aspiring epidemiologist travelling to Germany to start a residency in a hospital there essential? Is a university student studying medicine travelling from France to Norway for a 6-month exchange program (Erasmus) essential? Replace medical student with fine arts student in the situation above. Is a nurse from Kenya travelling to the US for a new job essential? Is an IT specialist from Bangalore travelling to the US for a new job essential? Is a Mexican bricklayer travelling to the US for a temp job on a construction site essential? Is a Mexican farm worker travelling to the US for a temp job harvesting tomatoes essential? Is a business trip to secure the supply line for Pfizer's vaccine essential? Is a business trip to secure the supply line for Apple essential? Is a business trip to oversee construction of a new hotel in Southern Spain essential? Is a blue collar laborer going to spend a few days in a hotel in Southern Spain essential? Pretty sure he mentioned "tourists" and "looking at stuff" ... You can add to that, that everything working related that can be done remotely, should be done remotely.
My examples weren't chosen at random. Either take the time to answer them and we can discuss why it doesn't make sense to ban "non-essential" travel based on your actual answers (assuming you support Mohdoo's PoV that non-essential travel should be banned for the foreseeable future), or just ignore them. Making fuzzy assertions doesn't help.
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On December 03 2021 23:20 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. That's definitely fair. I'm not up-to-date on the information surrounding whether or not it's man-made, per se, which is why I focused only on the clearly racially-charged language. There are clearly plenty of problems here, though.
The Information on it being man made or not has never changed. You were right to focus on the theory of it being man made is racialy-charged and is sustained by rampant raicsm and/or xenophobia on the right.
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Northern Ireland27464 Posts
On December 03 2021 09:23 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 08:53 WombaT wrote:On December 03 2021 07:28 BlackJack wrote:On December 03 2021 04:35 Lmui wrote:On December 02 2021 21:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 21:45 WombaT wrote:On December 01 2021 14:43 BlackJack wrote:
A tense situation in Australia is playing out where 3 individuals escaped from a COVID quarantine camp. The police have set up a perimeter with checkpoints. They are checking car trunks, car registrations, and searching buses coming in and out of the area. Very scary stuff. Scary or sensible? Actually quarantining and testing seems the best halfway house between outright restricting travel and enabling unrestricted spread across borders. I don’t get why you keep trying to bring up the Trump/Biden respective travel bans over and over. It’s a great broken clock example but I’m unsure what wider point can be taken from it. We haven’t even touched on all the ‘China flu’ rhetoric that was super helpful at the time. If an administration is absolutely haphazard over a pandemic response, but stumbles upon a sensible thing that just so happens to align with their general political rhetoric, it’s not a certain thing but likely that the political capital is guiding it rather than any sound, evidence-informed pandemic mitigation strategy. Likewise one could have plot European travel restrictions more accurately using a table of countries Trump likes and dislikes than their Covid numbers, at times anyway. This is Trump in total isolation. Biden’s lot well, they don’t come up here a huge amount. I’m assuming because they’re not doing an absolutely shit or amazing job in either direction. If we are to compare the wisdom of these travel bans, it would have to be through the lens of what was known in the relevant times, and what else they did in pandemic policy terms. I don’t (think) anyone in here is arguing that a Chinese travel ban was actually a bad idea at that time, I may be wrong on this. I was just asking Lmui to elaborate on his statement that there is more data and reasoning to back up Biden's Africa travel restrictions than Trump's China travel restrictions in early 2020. We have less data - we don't even know where this variant originated or how virulent it is. We also have less reasoning - COVID is already widespread everywhere. There was 1000x more reason to have travel bans in early 2020 before COVID was widespread, before we had PPE, before we had treatment protocols, before we had testing infrastructure, do I need to go on? Anyone without a political axe to grind should agree that restricting travel from China in early 2020 makes a ton more sense than Biden's travel restrictions on Africa. The fact that the opposite is being stated here just demonstrates my earlier point that both sides have politicized the virus and made it a partisan issue. Mostly based on this:
The U.S. government first issued a “Level 4: Do Not Travel” advisory on travel to the Hubei province where the city of Wuhan is. You might recall that Wuhan is the original epicenter of the coronavirus.
A nationwide travel ban from China took effect on January 31, 2020, with a few confirmed cases in the United States. This ban was only for non-U.S. citizens who had been in China within the last 14 days and were not the immediate family member of U.S. citizens or/and permanent residents.
There was barely any information on Covid at this point other than it being a transmissible disease with flu-like symptoms. There wasn't any serious effort to test for it, or anything up until March 2020 IIRC when shit hit the fan. There wasn't any data to say what the infection rate was from travellers in Wuhan/China. In comparison, most countries have very good ideas about the infection rate of people traveling from the African continent, given that tests are required to fly, and testing is also done at the destination in most cases. In comparison, around 10% of passengers from S.A. (In a fairly large sample) were positive. Trump's ban was far more gut-feel than the current bans. Trump's ban came after China itself locked down Wuhan and coincided with the CDC/WHO declaring COVID a public health emergency. Are you arguing that Trump should have let COVID spread a little more so we knew more about it before he issued any travel restrictions? Seems like an unusual take. If Trump were still President and issued a knee-jerk travel ban on Africa due to this omnicron variant he would be getting 10x the criticism as Biden. So for the people that post things like "Why is this a partisan issue. Why can't we all just come together to fight the virus." There's your answer. No, nobody is arguing that, you don’t seem to be responding to the actual arguments people have put forward. Multiple times, by multiple posters. You’ve not actually responded to critiques of your own postulations in this domain, you just ignore them and reiterate your own initial point. Please stop doing that, it’s annoying. And your general posting on this topic is good, and I like what you bring to to the general topic outside of this point you seem hellbent on making. Fair, strike that sentence. The reason I am hellbent on making the point is that people are hellbent on using whatever kind of mental gymnastics to deny this obvious double standard. Biden's travel restrictions were done against the advisement of the WHO, it was done before we even knew much of anything about this variant in terms of infectiousness, virulence, etc. it was done before we even knew where it originated. etc. It was 10x more knee-jerk than Trump's travel ban. As soon as people give up on the delusion that it was done judiciously and with better data and reason then I will stop posting the opposite.
If Trump had said, some version of ‘there’s a disturbing virus in China, we are enacting this measure and working with the Chinese and the international community to learn more and preparing on how to counter it’, then yes there is a huge double standard on show.
Contextually it’s worth noting that in the nascent series of the pandemic travel bans were seen as much more extreme measures than they are now. In the world of semi-regular lockdowns this no longer is seen as quite so extreme.
I’m sure it differs in other corners of the internet, I don’t recall Biden being widely praised for this specific measure in here, one I think could be seen as overly knee jerk.
We are essentially comparing that instance when a broken clock told the correct time with the occasion the functional clock ran out of batteries for a period and saying they’re equivalent and it’s a double standard to assess them otherwise.
I’m sure there are plenty exhibiting all sorts of double standards, I’m personally just looking at decisions in isolation and in context of the rest of what individuals did.
If Trump was a generic GOP President, perhaps we would see more evidence of rampant double standards. All I’ve seen is Trump’s actions being judged by his record and rhetoric, and god knows he ceded benefit of the doubt a long time ago.
What Jimmy linked was quite instructive to me in jogging the memory.
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On December 03 2021 23:29 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 23:20 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. That's definitely fair. I'm not up-to-date on the information surrounding whether or not it's man-made, per se, which is why I focused only on the clearly racially-charged language. There are clearly plenty of problems here, though. The Information on it being man made or not has never changed. You were right to focus on the theory of it being man made is racialy-charged and is sustained by rampant raicsm and/or xenophobia on the right.
I misspoke, when I said man-made (in the sense of being engineered) I meant to say that it could have been leaked from a lab, not necessarily as a biological weapon but possibly mutated in a lab. The idea that it would somehow be "rampant racism" to speculate about whether the virus was a bioweapon is preposterous though. China is a closed dictatorship that seems to have a biowarfare program (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_biological_weapons_program) and they refuse the international community access to the virus lab in Wuhan to investigate the question.
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Northern Ireland27464 Posts
On December 03 2021 23:21 Acrofales wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 21:11 Harris1st wrote:On December 03 2021 16:16 Acrofales wrote:On December 03 2021 13:11 Mohdoo wrote:
Great example why there shouldn't be non-essential international travel. The entire idea that we still have tourists flying around so they can look at stuff is mind boggling. The SA travel ban was justified and smart. The travel ban should have been expanded to the entire planet other than essential travel, with global mandatory 2 week quarantine+testing. Define essential please. Let me give some examples and you can say yes/no so we can get some idea. Is an epidemiologist travelling to South Africa to study omicron essential? Is an aspiring epidemiologist travelling to Germany to start a residency in a hospital there essential? Is a university student studying medicine travelling from France to Norway for a 6-month exchange program (Erasmus) essential? Replace medical student with fine arts student in the situation above. Is a nurse from Kenya travelling to the US for a new job essential? Is an IT specialist from Bangalore travelling to the US for a new job essential? Is a Mexican bricklayer travelling to the US for a temp job on a construction site essential? Is a Mexican farm worker travelling to the US for a temp job harvesting tomatoes essential? Is a business trip to secure the supply line for Pfizer's vaccine essential? Is a business trip to secure the supply line for Apple essential? Is a business trip to oversee construction of a new hotel in Southern Spain essential? Is a blue collar laborer going to spend a few days in a hotel in Southern Spain essential? Pretty sure he mentioned "tourists" and "looking at stuff" ... You can add to that, that everything working related that can be done remotely, should be done remotely. My examples weren't chosen at random. Either take the time to answer them and we can discuss why it doesn't make sense to ban "non-essential" travel based on your actual answers (assuming you support Mohdoo's PoV that non-essential travel should be banned for the foreseeable future), or just ignore them. Making fuzzy assertions doesn't help.
Travel to Mohdoo IslandTM should definitely be classed as essential.
It’s a mess over here at least, there aren’t really stringent restrictions to start with and what ones there are are easily flouted.
Banning travel in perpetuity is a rather untenable proposition, equally a cycle of lockdowns into people gallivanting all over the globe into potential more lockdowns doesn’t seem terribly sensible either
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On December 03 2021 23:43 Elroi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 23:29 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 23:20 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. That's definitely fair. I'm not up-to-date on the information surrounding whether or not it's man-made, per se, which is why I focused only on the clearly racially-charged language. There are clearly plenty of problems here, though. The Information on it being man made or not has never changed. You were right to focus on the theory of it being man made is racialy-charged and is sustained by rampant raicsm and/or xenophobia on the right. I misspoke, when I said man-made (in the sense of being engineered) I meant to say that it could have been leaked from a lab, not necessarily as a biological weapon but possibly mutated in a lab. The idea that it would somehow be "rampant racism" to speculate about whether the virus was a bioweapon is preposterous though. China is a closed dictatorship that seems to have a biowarfare program (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_biological_weapons_program) and they refuse the international community access to the virus lab in Wuhan to investigate the question.
China didn't invent Bioweapons, the west knows bioweapons very well and they can tell the difference very easily between a man made bio weapon and a naturally occurring virus. It is just rampant speculation, wholly ignoring basic science and the scientists who made this their lives all around the world, that is racially charged to blame china and Chinese people for creating and distributing a plauge on the world.
Its a theory that holds no water at all. There are tons of nations with grudges against china that would broadcast 24/7 the evidence that it was man made if there was any of it to exist at all.
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Northern Ireland27464 Posts
On December 03 2021 23:43 Elroi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 23:29 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 23:20 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. That's definitely fair. I'm not up-to-date on the information surrounding whether or not it's man-made, per se, which is why I focused only on the clearly racially-charged language. There are clearly plenty of problems here, though. The Information on it being man made or not has never changed. You were right to focus on the theory of it being man made is racialy-charged and is sustained by rampant raicsm and/or xenophobia on the right. I misspoke, when I said man-made (in the sense of being engineered) I meant to say that it could have been leaked from a lab, not necessarily as a biological weapon but possibly mutated in a lab. The idea that it would somehow be "rampant racism" to speculate about whether the virus was a bioweapon is preposterous though. China is a closed dictatorship that seems to have a biowarfare program (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_biological_weapons_program) and they refuse the international community access to the virus lab in Wuhan to investigate the question.
Is one speculating because they’re scared of the Chinese Commies and want dirt to affirm that, or neutrally speculating?
The former actively want these theories to be correct so that it can justify and further feed their anti-Chinese sentiments, sentiments I assume being higher in the US with China being the coming man and threatening their collective ego.
Not all speculation is tinged with xenophobia, racism or plain old fear, but a lot of it is, that I’ve seen anyway. From ‘why do those crazy Chinese eat bats, this is their fault’ thru to ‘the Chinese are developing bio-weapons to kill us’
A pure hypothetical of course, you’d have considerably less speculation on the Western internet if the virus had originated in the States or the U.K., IMO
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Chinese media has speculated that the virus was actually leaked by a united states lab and then brought to china by us soldiers. If it had any traction it would have been spread everywhere and given credibility by euro sources.
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On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made.
This is one of those technically correct, but meaningless separations. If humans leaked a naturally occurring virus and started a pandemic then is that really any better? The difference between intentional bio warfare that starts a pandemic and incompetence that starts a pandemic are meaningless to the average person.
You're only deciding if China is malicious or negligent. Either way China needs some reforms so it doesn't happen again.
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Norway28911 Posts
I think malicious or negligent is a pretty damn big difference when we're talking about starting a pandemic tbh.
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On December 04 2021 00:47 Liquid`Drone wrote:
I think malicious or negligent is a pretty damn big difference when we're talking about starting a pandemic tbh.
I should have been more specific on this. Politically when you're talking warfare or sanctions yes. In terms of response for dealing with the pandemic itself I don't think there is.
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On December 04 2021 00:43 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. This is one of those technically correct, but meaningless separations. If humans leaked a naturally occurring virus and started a pandemic then is that really any better? The difference between intentional bio warfare that starts a pandemic and incompetence that starts a pandemic are meaningless to the average person. You're only deciding if China is malicious or negligent. Either way China needs some reforms so it doesn't happen again.
This is handwaving to excuse racism and xenophobia by the people who put these assertions into the public. The difference between china intending to release a plague onto the world and if China accidentally let a plague onto the world is very meaningful separation of the reaction. Instead the right gets to dance with one of them for cover but insinuate the other with their audience.
The differences might not be meaningful to the average white person on the street but it has clearly meant a large difference to the average asian American on the street. There is a very clear very large increase in anti-asian violence that has been caused by these malicious actions by right wing media to insituate china, and by extension any asian looking person, caused this pandemic.
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On December 04 2021 01:01 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2021 00:43 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. This is one of those technically correct, but meaningless separations. If humans leaked a naturally occurring virus and started a pandemic then is that really any better? The difference between intentional bio warfare that starts a pandemic and incompetence that starts a pandemic are meaningless to the average person. You're only deciding if China is malicious or negligent. Either way China needs some reforms so it doesn't happen again. This is handwaving to excuse racism and xenophobia by the people who put these assertions into the public. The difference between china intending to release a plague onto the world and if China accidentally let a plague onto the world is very meaningful separation of the reaction. Instead the right gets to dance with one of them for cover but insinuate the other with their audience.
No one is hand waving to excuse racism. I don't trust the government or corporations to police speech they disagree with. Around this time last year anyone who suggested the naturally occurring lab leak theory was labeled and banned from places of discussion like the coronavirus subreddit or facebook. Now we think that this is the best explanation possible and requires further investigation.
source
Trump and many Republicans advocated for the lab leak theory and maybe falsely implied that it was malicious to saber rattle for their cause. The response from media and people to completely shut down any discussion on it was an overreaction.
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Northern Ireland27464 Posts
On December 04 2021 04:35 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2021 01:01 Sermokala wrote:On December 04 2021 00:43 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. This is one of those technically correct, but meaningless separations. If humans leaked a naturally occurring virus and started a pandemic then is that really any better? The difference between intentional bio warfare that starts a pandemic and incompetence that starts a pandemic are meaningless to the average person. You're only deciding if China is malicious or negligent. Either way China needs some reforms so it doesn't happen again. This is handwaving to excuse racism and xenophobia by the people who put these assertions into the public. The difference between china intending to release a plague onto the world and if China accidentally let a plague onto the world is very meaningful separation of the reaction. Instead the right gets to dance with one of them for cover but insinuate the other with their audience. No one is hand waving to excuse racism. I don't trust the government or corporations to police speech they disagree with. Around this time last year anyone who suggested the naturally occurring lab leak theory was labeled and banned from places of discussion like the coronavirus subreddit or facebook. Now we think that this is the best explanation possible and requires further investigation. sourceTrump and many Republicans advocated for the lab leak theory and maybe falsely implied that it was malicious to saber rattle for their cause. The response from media and people to completely shut down any discussion on it was an overreaction.
Were they? Was discussion of this actually suppressed?
If it was well I sure fuck saw a ton of it. Perhaps I am wrong but it smacks very much of people moaning about ‘you can’t talk about x because of sensitive millennials’, while talking about the thing quite freely.
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On December 04 2021 04:35 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:Show nested quote +On December 04 2021 01:01 Sermokala wrote:On December 04 2021 00:43 Blitzkrieg0 wrote:On December 03 2021 23:13 Sermokala wrote:On December 03 2021 21:46 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On December 03 2021 18:21 Elroi wrote:On December 01 2021 20:28 YumYumGranola wrote:On December 01 2021 18:35 BlackJack wrote:On December 01 2021 15:30 Lmui wrote:On December 01 2021 15:00 BlackJack wrote:https://www.npr.org/2021/11/30/1060025081/omicron-variant-netherlands-europe-south-africaThe omnicron variant was in Europe a week before it was sequenced by scientists in South Africa. So Joe Biden said we should lead the way with science and not xenophobia the day after Trump announced a travel ban on China where the COVID originated. Now President Biden has implemented a knee-jerk travel ban on African countries due to a variant that we don't even know where it originated. Science, not xenophobia. Well, when a flight from South Africa has ~10% of the people on a flight infected, you'd be tempted to ban flights too. 61/600 is a pretty high number considering sequencing said they caught it prior to boarding the flight. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-59451103There's quite a bit more data and reasoning backing up the ban this time in comparison to the initial ban on China due to the wider availability of reliable testing. Can you expand on that? Why do you think there is more data and reasoning to ban travel from parts of Africa than from China in early 2020? It's not a secret that China was ground zero for the virus. You don't need any testing to know that. Also I'm pretty sure the travel restrictions went into place before that flight even landed and the passengers were tested at the airport so you can't use it as justification for the travel restrictions. I think the main thing that separates the response now from the response back in 2020 is the context of everything surrounding it. Travel restrictions are a delaying tactic. The main criticism of trump at the time is that he was treating it like a solution, and neglecting to do or undermining the efforts of his experts to put into place the systems we actually needed. I think the reason why the China travel ban was seen as xenophobic and the present situation is not is the same as the reason why the virus wasn't called the Wuhan virus, why you'd get banned from twitter for speculating about it being man-made (plausible theory, it turns out), and why the present mutation isn't called Xi. Agreed. The racist speculation wasn't just that it was mistakenly made in a lab, but that it was purposely being processed as a bioweapon and that we should not only hate Chinese people, but all Chinese-Americans and all Asian-Americans too. There is a reasonable way to wonder about the origins of coronavirus, but the remarks made by Trump and Republican leadership and Fox News anchors did not (and still don't) reflect any sort of good-faith curiosity. You can't gloss over the part that you bolded about it being a plausible theory that its man made. Its not a plausible theory the science is very clear that its not man made. It may have been leaked accidentally from a lab where it was being studied but very explicitly is not man made. This is one of those technically correct, but meaningless separations. If humans leaked a naturally occurring virus and started a pandemic then is that really any better? The difference between intentional bio warfare that starts a pandemic and incompetence that starts a pandemic are meaningless to the average person. You're only deciding if China is malicious or negligent. Either way China needs some reforms so it doesn't happen again. This is handwaving to excuse racism and xenophobia by the people who put these assertions into the public. The difference between china intending to release a plague onto the world and if China accidentally let a plague onto the world is very meaningful separation of the reaction. Instead the right gets to dance with one of them for cover but insinuate the other with their audience. No one is hand waving to excuse racism. I don't trust the government or corporations to police speech they disagree with. Around this time last year anyone who suggested the naturally occurring lab leak theory was labeled and banned from places of discussion like the coronavirus subreddit or facebook. Now we think that this is the best explanation possible and requires further investigation. sourceTrump and many Republicans advocated for the lab leak theory and maybe falsely implied that it was malicious to saber rattle for their cause. The response from media and people to completely shut down any discussion on it was an overreaction.
Where do you get this idea that it's the best explanation possible? Every month there are new papers claiming none or the other is the best explanation. Here is a rather fair assessment (it starts discussing a recent paper, but soon starts talking about the greater picture):
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/11/18/coronavirus-origins-wuhan-market-animals-science-journal/
In short: we don't know, we may never know, and China avoiding the investigation isn't helping, but most of the evidence points to a natural cause, despite doubts.
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EPT
