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It’s inhuman that we’ve been left at the mercy of Sage’s garbage Covid models

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Michael Ejercito

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Apr 8, 2021, 8:39:36 AM4/8/21
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It’s inhuman that we’ve been left at the mercy of Sage’s garbage Covid
models
Ministers and scientists are trying to cover their backs, ignoring the
fact that social interaction is not a luxury
JONATHAN SUMPTION
7 April 2021 • 9:30pm
Jonathan Sumption
The modellers have been at it again. The modelling committee of Sage
(which goes by the unlovely name of SPI-M-O) has produced a report
projecting the consequences of ending restrictions in accordance with
the Government’s Covid Roadmap. The projection which has attracted the
most attention, and was surely designed to, is that on “pessimistic but
plausible” assumptions there will be a third wave in the summer if the
restrictions are eased, leading to hospitalisations as bad as at the
January peak.
Does that seem odd? It should. The January peak reflected the situation
before vaccinations took effect. So we are being told that it is
“plausible” to think that the vaccines may make little difference to
hospitalisations.
When Imperial College produced its modelling report last March, which
pushed the Government into the first lockdown, they pointed out that
unless restrictions were kept in place until there was a vaccine,
infections and associated hospitalisations and deaths would simply surge
again once the restrictions were lifted.
The goalposts are now being shifted. We are being told that the
restrictions may have to be kept in place even though there are now
highly effective vaccines. Hospitalisations and deaths are at rock
bottom. Almost all of the more vulnerable groups have been vaccinated.
Even accounting for the MHRA’s changed advice regarding the AstraZeneca
vaccine, a high proportion of the rest will have been inoculated by
June. If the vaccine is not an exit route, then what is? The logic of
the modellers’ more extreme projections is that the restrictions may
have to stay in place indefinitely.
It is time to be honest about documents of this kind. As aids to
policymaking and public understanding, they are at best useless and at
worst extremely misleading. The problem is that they are not evidence.
They are just painting by numbers. A model will produce any result you
care to name, depending on the assumptions fed into it.
SPI-M-O’s report is based on models from three different institutions:
Imperial College, Warwick University, and the London School of Hygiene
and Tropical Medicine. All three models assume no dangerous new variant.
The critical assumption in all of them is about the efficacy of the two
vaccines currently in use. The modellers assume a reduction in
hospitalisations after two doses of the Astra Zeneca vaccine varying
from 80-90 per cent (Warwick) to 70-80 per cent (Imperial).
These are wide ranges. The higher figure in the range is the modellers’
“central” projection. The lower figure is the “pessimistic but
plausible” projection. Neither has any greater validity than the other.
It depends on what you feel like.
Peak hospital occupancy in January was about 34,000. Hospital occupancy
in August as projected by SPI-M-O could be anywhere between 4,000 and
30,000 depending on which of the three modellers you choose, and whether
you choose the “central” or the “pessimistic but plausible” option. Only
at the outer extreme of pessimism does the projection come anywhere near
the January peak.
But the real eye-opener is the comparison between the modellers’
assumptions about vaccine efficacy and the real world. We do not need to
make assumptions about the efficacy of the vaccines. We have the results
of the clinical trials. In the latest US trials of the AstraZeneca
vaccine, involving 32,000 people, the reduction in the number of cases
serious enough to require hospitalisation was not 70-90 per cent, as
assumed by the modellers, but 100 per cent. The modellers’ assumptions
about the Pfizer vaccine are closer to the clinical trials, but they are
still notably more pessimistic. This makes a critical difference. If the
modellers had taken their assumptions from the real world, the projected
hospitalisations would have been far better than even the most
optimistic projection.
Why are the assumptions of the three modellers so different from each
other? And why are they all so different from the empirical results? On
the face of it, these assumptions are arbitrary, and the results based
on them no better. Garbage in – garbage out. What is missing from all
this number-crunching is an injection of judgment or common sense. The
public is entitled to ask what is going on.
What seems to be going on is that every one is covering their backs.
Ministers want to pass the buck to the scientists. They want to be able
to say “What a triumph for our policies” if things turn out fine; and
“We followed the science” if they turn out badly. The scientists don’t
like being made to carry the can for what is basically a political
judgment. They want to be able to say “These were only scenarios, not
predictions” if things turn out fine; and “We told you so” if they turn
out badly. Each group is trying to manipulate the other. Balanced
assessments based on actual evidence are sadly missing.
There are more important things at stake than the reputation of
ministers or their advisers. Human beings are social animals.
Interaction with other people is not a luxury. It is a basic human need.
It is also the foundation of our mental health, our social organisation,
our leisure activities and our economy.
There is a breed of public health officials who are indifferent to these
things. They have never reflected, at any rate in public, on what makes
life worth living. As far as they are concerned, human beings are just
instruments of government health policy. They will be lining up to tell
us that it is dangerous to return to normal life because we cannot be
absolutely sure that normal life will be risk-free. They will quote the
gloomier speculations of modellers as evidence of what “might” happen if
the Government stops treating us like caged animals or inert specimens
in some ghastly sociological laboratory.
The Government must now make up its mind whether the vaccines are
effective in reducing hospitalisations and deaths, or not. If they are
effective, then the restrictions on our lives are unnecessary and should
be lifted. If they are not effective, then they should still be lifted,
because in that case we are going to have to live with periodic surges
of Covid-19, for the only alternative is to prolong the current assault
on our humanity indefinitely.
Related Topics
UK coronavirus lockdown, Vaccines
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HeartDoc Andrew

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Apr 8, 2021, 11:41:41 AM4/8/21
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The only healthy way to stop the pandemic in the UK, and other
places is by rapidly ( http://bit.ly/RapidTestCOVID-19 ) finding
out at any given moment, including even while on-line, who among us
are unwittingly contagious (i.e pre-symptomatic or asymptomatic) in
order to http://bit.ly/ConvinceItForward (John 15:12) for them to call
their doctor and self-quarantine per their doctor in hopes of stopping
this pandemic. Thus, hoping for the best while preparing for the
worst-case scenario of the "UK variant mutations" **and** others like
the Brazilian, Californian, South African & "cluster-5 mink mutations"
(read more via Google) rendering current vaccines ineffective.

Indeed, I am wonderfully hungry ( http://bit.ly/RapidTestCOVID-19 )
and hope you, Michael, also have a healthy appetite too.

So how are you ?








...because we mindfully choose to openly care with our heart,

HeartDoc Andrew <><
--
Andrew B. Chung, MD/PhD
Cardiologist with an http://bit.ly/EternalMedicalLicense
2016 & upwards non-partisan candidate for U.S. President:
http://bit.ly/WonderfullyHungryPresident
and author of the 2PD-OMER Approach:
http://bit.ly/HeartDocAndrewCare
which is the only **healthy** cure for the U.S. healthcare crisis

Michael Ejercito

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Apr 9, 2021, 9:29:49 AM4/9/21
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I am wonderfully hungry!


Michael

HeartDoc Andrew

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Apr 9, 2021, 9:48:30 AM4/9/21
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MichaelE wrote:
> I am wonderfully hungry!



While wonderfully hungry in the Holy Spirit, Who causes (Deuteronomy
8:3) us to hunger, I note that you, Michael, not only don't have
COVID-19 but are rapture (Luke 17:37) ready and pray (2 Chronicles
7:14) that our Everlasting (Isaiah 9:6) Father in Heaven continues to
give us "much more" (Luke 11:13) Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23) so
that we'd have much more of His Help to always say/write that we're
"wonderfully hungry" in **all** ways including especially caring to
http://bit.ly/ConvinceItForward (John 15:12 as shown by
http://bit.ly/RapidTestCOVID-19 ) with all glory (
http://bit.ly/Psalm117_ ) to GOD (aka HaShem, Elohim, Abba, DEO), in
the name (John 16:23) of LORD Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Amen.

Laus DEO !

Be hungrier, which really is wonderfully healthier especially for
diabetics and other heart disease patients:

http://bit.ly/HeartDocAndrewToutsHunger (Luke 6:21a) with all glory to
GOD, Who causes us to hunger (Deuteronomy 8:3) when He blesses us
right now (Luke 6:21a) thereby removing the http://bit.ly/HeartVAT
from around the heart

...because we mindfully choose to openly care with our heart,

HeartDoc Andrew <><

Freedom for Gaza

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Apr 9, 2021, 11:36:00 AM4/9/21
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On Fri, 9 Apr 2021 06:30:12 -0700, NOT Michael Ejercito
<MEje...@HotMail.com> wrote:
AGAIN, gook?

Peeler

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Apr 9, 2021, 11:58:53 AM4/9/21
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On Fri, 09 Apr 2021 16:35:56 +0100, clinically insane, pedophilic, serbian
bitch Razovic, the resident psychopath of sci and scj and Usenet's famous
sexual cripple, making an ass of herself as "Freedom for Gaza", farted
again:

>>>
>>
>> I am wonderfully hungry!
>
> AGAIN, gook?

AGAIN being an asshole, psychopath? <BG>

--
Pedophilic dreckserb Razovic arguing in favour of pedophilia, again:
"Isn't it time that paedophiles were admitted to the LGBTQ rainbow?"
MID: <Y8LUE.513827$DQ1.1...@usenetxs.com>

NO, it isn't, you filthy old pedo swine!

Michael Ejercito

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Apr 11, 2021, 12:41:11 PM4/11/21
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Mangina, try being wonderfully hungry.

Then you can be rapture ready!


Michael

HeartDoc Andrew

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Apr 11, 2021, 1:24:14 PM4/11/21
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