Coronavirus
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I am being constantly surprised at just how well society can mobilise itself world-wide to deal with a potential threat.
This coronavirus outbreak shows what an effective campaign can be put into action when needed and the numbers are not even relatively significant. The mere change in seasons incapacitate and kill more people.
As indicated already by Marcos many pre-existing diseases do not rate the same sort of urgency, often because the cause of those illnesses are systemic to capitalism – poverty and overcrowding.
As ALB has pointed out in his post every district around the world could have a hospital up and working with an airport bringing in the necessary staff and medical supplies, all in a matter of a few weeks – yet under capitalism it takes years and requires financing from PFI so to line the pockets of business.
We see humanitarian responses every time there is a natural disaster. But under capitalism, what we also witness is the first priority is restoring “law and order” and protecting private property. Who can forget that the initial aid and assistance on the scene in New Orleans was the National Guard declaring people to be looters (particularly if you were non-white) for taking food and bottled water from the supermarkets
It seems from this that the coronavirus was actually patented way back in 2003/4. I am not quire sure what to make of this. Does this mean the virus was simply identified or developed under lab conditions? If the latter then the implications are (potentially) alarming
Thoughts?
Also this
https://www.ccn.com/israeli-analyst-one-coronavirus-conspiracy-theory-less-crazy-than-you-think/
But the above seems to be dismissed as conspiracy theory according to this
https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-51271037
Coronavirus are a group of viruses, given the name because of the shape (‘corona’ means crown). There is no such thing as “the” coronavirus, the word refers to a group.
It is more hysteria than anything else, that group of the virus has existed for a long time. Dengue is more dangerous and thousands of peoples are infected in Latin America and the Caribbean
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/01/coronavirus-weaponised-way-to-be-openly-racist
“…Coronavirus has spread to at least 16 countries including Japan, Thailand, Australia, France, the US and the UK. Hostility and racism directed by some people towards east Asians seems to be spreading faster still….”
In the days before political correctness this sort of thing used to be called “Asian flu” but it wasn’t a joke:
10 days of building.
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-51352535
The Shanghai Composite index fell nearly 9% before recovering slightly, while commodity prices also slumped. Manufacturing, materials, and consumer goods companies are among the hardest hit. China’s travel and tourism sectors have already taken a hit over an unusually quiet Spring Festival break, while cinemas were forced to close to try to contain the virus. Meanwhile, numerous factories have suspended production while companies have instructed employees to work from home
Foxconn, Toyota, Starbucks, McDonald’s and Volkswagen are just a few of the corporate giants to have paused operations or shuttered outlets across China.But every cloud has a silver lining – the good news – healthcare shares soar.
The capitalist crisis is always blamed in different factors instead of the internal logic of the operation of capitalism. China despite its large industrial and commodities production they already had an economic slow down before the emerge of the virus. Pharmaceuticals are expecting to make huge profits
A contributor to the Socialist Standard has drawn attention to what the Indian government is recommending to deal with this:
As the article says:
“If it weren’t for the Dalai Lama recently telling his followers to chant a mantra as protection, India’s purported tips to fend off the coronavirus might be the least effective advice offered yet. Now, the two will have to battle for that top spot”
At least the Chinese government isn’t relying on “traditional Chinese medicine” which they have been known to promote in general. They are not so stupid when things are serious.
The economic effects
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/05/coronavirus-global-economy
The Indian government like all the capitalists around the world, they do not want to invest money and resources on the needs of the peoples, they are too busy trying to compete for the military hegemony around the world and to compete with others superpowers , they are spending billions of dollars in modern weapons and atomic bombs but pennies for the poor peoples
I didn’t think they were going to be so stupid but apparently the Chinese authorities are promoting the unproven quack remedies of “Traditional Chinese Medicine” (Mumbo jumbo inherited from the pre-scientific past of medicine when virus were unknown) as a way to combat this new variety of the coronavirus;
They are using it as a complement to scientific medicine which of course will allow them to claim that any improvement is due at least in part to TCM whereas it will be due entirely to scientific medicine.
No wonder other countries want to get their citizens out of China. If I was there I would want to too.
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