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The Coronavirus Conspiracies
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The Covid-19 outbreak has nothing to do with 5G in any way. If it was we would expect to see a correlation with 5G deployment, as well as density of 5G masts and we don't.
For example, Iran had no 5G in 2020 [1] but had over 300,000 cases [2].
In France they had no 5G in March [3] but had thousands of cases [4].
Switzerland has a huge 5G infrastructure, yet only 35,000 cases in August [2].
If 5G was related to covid cases we wouldn't see Iran have many cases at all, and Switzerland would have very many. The opposite is true, because they're unrelated.
In fact, a study claiming 5G can be inducted via skin cells has been retracted [6] for being a total embarrassment, and an unscientific paper dubbed the worst paper of 2020 [7].
References:
[1] - http://french.presstv.com/Detail/2020/02/13/618603/Iran-5G-internet-network-minister-announcement
[2] - https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
[3] - https://www.rcrwireless.com/20200318/5g/france-postpones-5g-spectrum-auction-covid-19-outbreak
[4] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/1103418/coronavirus-france-confirmed-cases-total/
[5] - https://www.speedtest.net/ookla-5g-map
[6] - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32668870/
[7] - https://scienceintegritydigest.com/2020/07/23/worst-paper-of-2020-5g-and-coronavirus-induction/
The virus exists and has been been sequenced over and over. The genetic sequence was studied European Journal of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases [1], and again in the American Society of Microbiology [2].
The National Institute of Infectious Disease has photographed the virus under an electron microscope [3], the full gallery of which is public [4].
The virus has been studied in patients and labratory confirmed through testing [5].
Our world in data has been tracking confirmed cases from information gathered by the European CDC who checked 500 sources daily [6]. The virus has also been found in patients during the autopsy [7].
Additionally, Sars-Cov-2 genome sequences have been analysed for months both by Sanger COVID–19 Genomic Surveillance [8], and NextStrain which dates back to late 2019 and documents thousands of sequenced genomes by lineage. [9]
This virus has been found, studied, sequenced thousands of times across different lineages, photographed, and confirmed in patients through labratory testing, and tracked by an institution checking hundreds of global sources daily. This virus 100% exists.
References:
[1] - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7180649/
[2] - https://mra.asm.org/content/9/11/e00169-20
[3] - https://www.niaid.nih.gov/news-events/novel-coronavirus-sarscov2-images
[4] - https://www.flickr.com/photos/niaid/albums/72157712914621487
[5] - https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30183-5/fulltext
[6] - https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-19-total-confirmed-cases-vs-total-tests-conducted
[7] - https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2768914
[8] - https://covid19.sanger.ac.uk/lineages/raw?date=2021-02-27&area=overview
The virus is spread through respiratory droplets when you speak, talk, cough, and sneeze [1]. It has been shown in the Journal of Fluid Mechanics that coughs and sneezes can stay buoyant in the air for up to 10 minutes in turbulent clouds [2].
In the Royal Society Publishing they studied the air current that you exhale through coughing with and without masks and found that masks reduce the range of respiratory droplets [3]. In the Canadian journal of ophthalmology they found the same thing [4], as did a study in the journal AIP [5].
A study from Frontiers in Medicine found that textile cloth masks when double-layered were as effective as medical masks and suppressed droplet expulsion by as much as 97.2%, and single layer cloth masks were also effective [6].
A study from the journal Nature tested viral shedding with and without a face mask and found that shed viral particles were reduced when wearing a mask [7].
A meta-analysis from the journal Travel Medicine and Infectious Disease analysed 21 mask studies and found that face masks significantly reduced the spread of respiratory viruses in both healthcare workers and the general public, and reduced the risk of infection [8].
A common study people like to reference from the British Medical Journal in support of masks not working [9] actually saw a response from the lead author C Raina MacIntyre explaining that the control arm also wore surgical masks, cloth masks weren’t washed often or cycled, and if the choice is cloth mask or no mask, you should choose cloth mask. [10] This study also looked at filtration to protect the wearer. The reason to wear a mask is to limit transmission which is called source control, not so much to protect the wearer.
In the New England journal of medicine, Monice Gandhi writes about how masks may reduce viral inoculum to make infections less severe, which could result in more asymptomatic cases and help us reach herd immunity [11]. She talks about it at length in this video [12].
A study from Clinical Infectious Disease found surgical masks greatly reduce transmission in animal models [13].
The body of evidence showing that masks prevent infected individuals spreading the virus (source control) is significant. There is a good reason to prescribe to the viral inoculum hypothesis, and the nuance here is that studies which seem to point at masks not preventing inward infection, don't study infection severity. Additionally, inward infection is not source control - they’re not the same thing.
References:
[1] - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877705815028519
[2] - https://math.mit.edu/~bush/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Sneezing-JFM.pdf
[3] - https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsif.2009.0295.focus
[5] - https://aip.scitation.org/doi/full/10.1063/5.0016018
[6] - https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmed.2020.00260/full
[7] - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0843-2
[8] - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1477893920302301?via%3Dihub
[9] - https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/4/e006577
[10] - https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/4/e006577.responses
[11] - https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2026913
[12] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8N5oduX1KQ
[13] - https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/71/16/2139/5848814
The WHO [1] , FDA [2], and NIH [3] have all halted Hydroxychloraquine trials as they didn't look promising enough to continue.
A study which claims that the drug has a significant impact [5] has been described by the International Society of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy as not up to standard and the journal editor had no role in the papers peer-review [5].
Another study which seems to have implied a reduced risk in mortality using the drug has now been retracted [6] A study of 1376 patients has shown the drug to have no significant effect [7].
Another study in pre-print has found no utility in the drug [8]. And here's a report on 1542 patients saying the same thing [9]. Here's another randmoised trial on hundreds of people that found the same thing [10].
It's also been found that the drug can prolong heartbeats (QT Intervals) [11].
As for the word floating around about how Zinc will suddenly make this a miracle cure, all I can find on that are two studies which haven't even finished yet [12] [13], two are pre-print and haven't gone through peer-review [14] [15], and one is a heavily criticised study [16]. The biggest criticisms I found are [17], [18], and [19].
This doctor said this, or this doctor claims that, or Trump says this, or people think that this works isn't how science works. Science is the collective body of all good evidence; It isn't the sum of all papers as some are better than others. You need experts to evaluate the evidence otherwise you can cherry-pick whatever you like and the concept of fact has no meaning.
Those experts are institutions like the WHO, FDA, and NIH who have all halted trials on the drug. It doesn't work as expected, Zinc hasn't been shown at all to make it effective, and unless that does happen we have to say that it doesn't.
References:
[1] - https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/04-07-2020-who-discontinues-hydroxychloroquine-and-lopinavir-ritonavir-treatment-arms-for-covid-19
[3] - https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/nih-halts-clinical-trial-hydroxychloroquine
[4] - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0924857920300996
[5] - https://www.isac.world/news-and-publications/official-isac-statement
[6] - https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.05.20088757v2
[7] - https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa2012410
[8] - https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.15.20151852v1#disqus_thread
[9] - https://www.recoverytrial.net/files/hcq-recovery-statement-050620-final-002.pdf
[10] - https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-4207
[11] - https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2765631
[12] - https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/study/NCT04370782
[13] - https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04326725?cond=COVID&draw=2
[14] - https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.02.20080036v1
[15] - https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/202007.0025/v1
[16] - https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30534-8/fulltext#
[17] - https://www.fun-with-facts.com/copy-of-covid19-5g
[18] - https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30600-7/fulltext
[19] - https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30599-3/fulltext
Considering that the air we breathe is mostly Nitrogen and Oxygen [1], we can look at the size of those atoms and see the size difference.
-Oxygen is 152 pictometers [2]
-Nitrogen is 155 pictometers [3]
-Sars-Cov-2 has been observed to range between 60 and 140 nanometers [4]
-CO2 is 334 pictometers [5]
Next we need to know how large the pores are on face masks. The low end size of a mask pore is roughly 80 micrometers.
To put this into perspective:
Nitrogen atoms: 516,129x smaller than a low end mask pore
Oxygen atoms: 526,315x smaller than a low end mask pore
Carbon Dioxide molecule: 239,520x smaller than a low end mask pore
Sars-Cov-2: 1,333x smaller than a low end mask pore
As a note that if people claiming masks can't stop a virus yet clock oxygen and co2 drastically, then they're making absolutely no sense.
Nurses are wearing N95 masks for their shifts for so long that they're sustaining physical injuries from the tight fit and rubbing against the skin [7] [8].
What makes masks harder to breathe in than normal is a combination of humidity, temperature, perceived humidity and perceived temperature, as well as other factors [9].
"Therefore, it can be concluded that N95 and surgical facemasks can induce significantly different temperatures and humidity in the microclimates of facemasks, which have profound influences on heart rate and thermal stress and subjective perception of discomfort."
A small amount of co2 can get trapped behind the mask when you breathe out, and over time your blood oxygen saturation very slowly decreases. Here's the thing, though. Surgeons performing surgery in surgical masks for up to 4 hours had no more than a 2% reduction of oxygen saturation and heart rate increased no more than 10 bpm [10]. Even after 4 hours of surgery in a surgical mask, all surgeon's oxygen saturations were within the healthy range [11].
If nurses can wear tight fitting N95 masks all shift for days on end, and surgeons can very safely perform operations lasting up to 4 hours with no problem, then you can wear a mask for 30 minutes when you go shopping.
People are saying that wearing a mask is living in fear and it doesn't do anything. The sad irony is these claims come from unscientific perspectives which ironically, are driven by fear of wearing a mask.
If you have medical exemption from wearing a mask then don't force yourself, but if you have no medical reason to avoid wearing one, then put on a mask because you could be saving someone's life.
References:
[1] - https://www.space.com/17683-earth-atmosphere.html
[2] - https://www.worldofmolecules.com/elements/oxygen.htm
[3] - https://www.worldofmolecules.com/elements/nitrogen.htm
[4] - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7224694/
[5] - https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/molecular-diameter
[8] - https://mobilitymgmt.com/articles/2020/04/15/npiap-mask-position-paper.aspx
[9] - https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00420-004-0584-4
[10] - scielo.isciii.es/pdf/neuro/v19n2/3.pdf
[11] - incenter.medical.philips.com/doclib/enc/fetch/586262/586457/Understanding_Pulse_Oximetry.pdf%3Fnodeid%3D586458%26vernum%3D2
I haven't seen any compelling arguments supporting the virus being a man-made weapon, or even being man-made. The evidence so far suggests the opposite.
A study of the virus has asserted that considering the characteristics of the virus and how similar it is to sars-cov-1, it's not likely man-made [1].
This paper is authored by
Kristian Andersen who is Director of Infectious Disease Genomics at Scripps Research.
Andrew Rambaut from the University of Edinburgh who's specialism is in the evolution of emerging human viral pathogens
W. Ian Lipkin who is a professor of Neurology and Pathology and Cell Biology at the Mailman school of public health.
Professor Edward Holmes of the University of Sydney who "is known for his work on the evolution and emergence of infectious diseases, particularly the mechanisms by which RNA viruses jump species boundaries to emerge in humans and other animals".
Robert F. Garry of Tulane University, who's research includes molecular mechanisms of viral pathogenesis.
Arguments I've seen consist of claiming that a virus can't jump between species, but it absolutely can. The CDC have said this about the 1918 flu pandemic [2]:
"The 1918 influenza pandemic was the most severe pandemic in recent history. It was caused by an H1N1 virus with genes of avian origin."
Avian means birds. Human and pig flu viruses originated in birds. From the American Journal for Microbiology [5]:
"The influenza viruses currently circulating in humans and pigs in North America originated by transmission of all genes from the avian reservoir prior to the 1918 Spanish influenza pandemic"
"There is evidence that most new human pandemic strains and variants have originated in southern China."
Pigs can be infected by human flu, as well as bird flu [3]. On the subject of a 1957 flu outbreak was an influenza-A virus which originates in birds [4].
Long story short, viruses can, are, and have jumped between species. The virus after being studied by specialised scientists has been found unlikely to be man-made. In my eyes, this evidence outweighs any and all speculation to the contrary.
References:
[1] - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0820-9
[2] - https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/1918-pandemic-h1n1.html
[3] - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2720273/
[4] - https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0140-6736(97)11212-0
[5] - https://mmbr.asm.org/content/56/1/152.long
The infection fatality rate (IFR) is a measured estimate of the total number of cases vs deaths [1]. It is a way to measure the true impact of infection vs case-fatality rate which is only reported infections vs deaths.
A popular page shared to show a very low IFR is the CDC planning scenarios page [2]. The IFR statistics here are marked with †, which shows on the page that the source for this data is a systematic review and meta-analysis from the European Journal of Epidemiology [3], which says the middle-aged and elderly need to be protected, and that the IFR can range from 0.001% for children, to up to 25% for the elderly. The study says for example, that England has a median IFR of 1.5%.
A study from the journal Nature found that England’s median IFR is 1.4% [4], and the WHO notes that the global IFR is estimated between 0.5 and 1.0% [5].
It’s also not just about fatality. The European CDC notes that 32% of reported cases on average require hospitalisation, and 2.4% on average need to go to the ICU [6].
A study from the British Medical Journal shows ICU admission, high-flow oxygen intake, and invasive ventilation by age [7].
The Economist has a live tracker of various countries by excess deaths, and it shows that more deaths are happening compared to normal in the period of spiked infection [8].
Surface-level general statistics like “99.98% death rate” aren’t helpful, as they ignore and and all variables, nuance, confounders, and caveats. The IFR varies by age, comorbidities, and country. Flat death rates also ignore all hospitalisations and ICU admissions, hospitals being stressed, and long-lasting infection damage (long covid) [9].
References
[2] - https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scenarios.html
[3] - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7721859/
[4] - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2918-0
[5] - https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/estimating-mortality-from-covid-19
[7] - https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m1985
[8] - https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker
[9] - https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/long-term-effects-of-coronavirus-long-covid/