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Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

japantimes.co.jp

251–260 of 291 posts

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of COVID discussions remind me of the history of Beri-Beri in Japan. Recommend everyone to read up on that one. Clinical purists who deny any validity to field data have cost many lifes going back longer than you think.

Hi, can you recommend me a good book on that?

Good rundown: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/rice-disease-mystery-e...

"Takaki became navy surgeon general in 1885, yet other doctors attacked his theories and questioned his results. The sad result was that while the navy ate barley, the army ate only rice. According to Bay, the use of barley smacked of discredited traditional Japanese medicine to many Western-trained doctors. Plus, recruits were enticed into the army by promises of as much white rice as they could eat."

27 thousand deaths and a decree by the emperor later, and army doctors finally yielded to the evidence.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, can you recommend me a good book on that?

Good rundown: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/rice-disease-mystery-e... "Takaki became navy surgeon general in 1885, yet other doctors attacked his theories and questioned his results. The sad result was that while the navy ate barley, the army ate only rice. According to Bay, the use of barley smacked of discredited traditional Japanese medicine to many Western-trained doctors. Plus, recruits were enticed into…

Thank you!

This is actually not-too-dissimilar to the story of scurvy in European navies in a more distant time. It took a lot of lives and most attempts to alleviate it were based on the totally false theory of humors.

Doctors can be very resistant to change of paradigma. I wonder what is our scurvy or beri-beri; given how fat and diabetic the developed world has grown, maybe nutrition.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#253
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 8 hours That seems weird, to be kind. Source?

Appears to be unreliable info. Anyway, this not my point. My point is ADE, which make vaccination a terrible disaster. ADE is known to happen in some diseases , including SARS-1.

[deleted]

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Taiwan.. I’m grateful to be living here during Covid. Taiwanese people aren’t obedient. You should see how they drive. They wear masks without flaking out about it as slavery or being against their will or whatever nonsense you guys are on about back home in the west. Taiwanese people are couch potatoes and extremely reserved. They don’t really want to meet new people or hang out with strangers. Also the go…

> Taiwanese people aren’t obedient. You should see how they drive. ... > They wear masks without flaking out about it as slavery or being against their will or whatever nonsense you guys are on about back home in the west. The 2nd part is what the GP was talking about with regards to 'obedience'. In some western countries like the US and UK, even the simple request for individuals to wear a mask is seen by some as an…

> UK and US has also fostered a culture where everyone's voice is deemed equal, even the idiots

I've thought about this a lot as the pandemic and reaction unfolded. My feeling is that it's a little more nuanced.

From my perspective, it goes like this: (a) politics co-opts science, and (some) scientists become political (for career reasons), (b) political news media puts narrative-supporting "experts" on a pedestal (to reinforce their credibility), (c) people are told they lack the intelligence / knowledge / ability to ever be an expert, (d) people feel internal, unrealized shame at their ignorance, (e) people attempt to cover that shame by posing as experts for their peers, in fact just parroting whatever sound-bites they heard without critical thought, (f) rational debate drastically decreases, as critical thinking skills and underlying understanding have atrophied.

The net result: removal of critical thinking in the public, increased partisanship and anger, and a decreased ability of the public to dismiss crackpots posing as experts.

Recommended response: learn about the actual underlying issues, then (gently, remember (d)!) turn conversations to apolitical explorations of the underlying issues and truths.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just insane how incompetent European and American governments have been in this pandemic compared to East-Asian countries. We are lucky to have some functional private institutions that bailed us out -- kept the countries running and developed a highly effective vaccine super fast.

Moderna has received a lot of government funding despite not ever making a profit as a private institution.

https://www.axios.com/moderna-barda-coronavirus-funding-disc...

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sigh, this old canard again. Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore are all doing fine without "locking people into their homes" and they're not islands. (Ok, Singapore technically is an island but it's connected to Malaysia by the world's busiest border crossing; and Thailand's grappling with a new outbreak now but it seems to be improving.)

Maybe there's a genetic component to this virus? Which is "verboten" to be discussed and analysed because of various reasons ("race is a social construct" and all that), but at some point one has to take this into consideration too. All due respect to Laos, but I don't see it as having the needed expert infrastructure in order to keep this virus under control as well as they have. Similar discussion for Thailand.

It's less likely there's a genetic component to infection rates (though possible!) than a population-immunological one.

It's been experimentally verified that various pre-pandemic coronavirus antibodies are reactive against SARS-CoV-2.

It's a fact that different world populations have to deal with different endemic disease profiles.

Consequently, different populations have different pre-infection susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2. [0]

[0] https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)32310-9/ful...

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And then there are places like Taiwan that have kept themselves COVID free and report a grand total of 7 deaths on 22M inhabitants, without any lockdown needed and thus experiencing minimal economic impact. And yet no Western country seems to want to learn from that.

Why Taiwan? China has had even fewer deaths per capita and much larger much more connected population.

> Why Taiwan? China has had even fewer deaths per capita and much larger much more connected population.

China’s death rate is roughly _ten_ times that if Taiwan:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_death_rate...

And that’s if you even believe China’s official statistics.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sigh, this old canard again. Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore are all doing fine without "locking people into their homes" and they're not islands. (Ok, Singapore technically is an island but it's connected to Malaysia by the world's busiest border crossing; and Thailand's grappling with a new outbreak now but it seems to be improving.)

Maybe there's a genetic component to this virus? Which is "verboten" to be discussed and analysed because of various reasons ("race is a social construct" and all that), but at some point one has to take this into consideration too. All due respect to Laos, but I don't see it as having the needed expert infrastructure in order to keep this virus under control as well as they have. Similar discussion for Thailand.

it's perfectly acceptable to talk scientifically about the difference in races (really, people with shared population history) by genetics and their responses to disease. THe people who are saying "race is social construct" are by and large not the actual scientists making discoveries in this area. REad the NYTimes science section for a few months and you'll see they commonly discuss the difference in medical treatment research and how we could improve health care by being more aware of it.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#259
post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moderna has received a lot of government funding despite not ever making a profit as a private institution.

https://www.axios.com/moderna-barda-coronavirus-funding-disc...

Moderna has received many grants from the government even before their Covid play.

Re: Mutated Covid-19 strain confirmed in Japan as case tally hits record high

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Taiwan.. I’m grateful to be living here during Covid. Taiwanese people aren’t obedient. You should see how they drive. They wear masks without flaking out about it as slavery or being against their will or whatever nonsense you guys are on about back home in the west. Taiwanese people are couch potatoes and extremely reserved. They don’t really want to meet new people or hang out with strangers. Also the go…

> Taiwanese people aren’t obedient. You should see how they drive. ... > They wear masks without flaking out about it as slavery or being against their will or whatever nonsense you guys are on about back home in the west. The 2nd part is what the GP was talking about with regards to 'obedience'. In some western countries like the US and UK, even the simple request for individuals to wear a mask is seen by some as an…

Nah, Taiwanese people view the masks as protection against germs and pollution. I understand the context of suggesting they are obedient but I still disagree with that. Chalking it up to obedience in a way takes agency from them- they choose to wear masks because they know that they work and the government is enforcing their use as well. They don’t wear them because they are merely told to. It’s plain to everyone here that America is handling the virus poorly because most Americans are miseducated or retarded and refuse to take simple precautions because they are uncomfortable or inconvenient. Also there are severe leadership issues in America and no healthcare. It’s the perfect storm of fucking up. Taiwanese people have zero interest in modelling any policies in place in America. Most people here think the country is fundamentally broken.
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