@MichaelYeadon3 : https://t.co/f7o0xui9Iz I don’t know how many hav…

https://t.co/f7o0xui9Iz I don’t know how many have read what is quite a short declaration? Essentially, it states that the restrictions on everyday life, while for many (like me, for example) are irksome at worst, are hugely disproportionate to the claimed public health benefits.

Great Barrington Declaration and Petition
https://gbdeclaration.org
As infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists we have grave concerns about the damaging physical and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies, and recommend an approach we call Focused Protection

For others, impacts are substantial. Failures of businesses small & large are unavoidable despite Govt assistance & poverty is an inevitable consequence. The interruption to normal social lives represent, for some, the severing of crucial contacts without which their lives are...

...lonely & without meaning. But the effects of the restrictions are most evident on people’s health. The NHS is harder to access than before, resulting in missed maternity reviews, lowered rates of childhood vaccinations & checks on development milestones in babies. The has...

...been a catastrophic fall in the rates of routine screening for diseases which, if detected early, have a high chance of good outcomes, like tests for cancers. GPs normally urgently refer a small fraction of their patients for investigation of worrisome signs & symptoms. This..

...everyday, lifesaving practise is reduced alarmingly. There is no question that a large number of people have already suffered & died avoidable deaths as a direct effect of ‘measures’ who’s stated intent is to preserve life. Many children & young adults at schools and...

...universities are being deprived of important educational opportunities which will be permanently lost. These young people will bear the scars of the unfocused measures for the rest of their lives. Depression & anxiety across the country has greatly increased and is going in...

...only one direction. Who among us can say the price being paid in livelihoods, suffering & deaths of tens of thousands of our fellow citizens is a price worth paying? The ghastly irony is anyway clear. These measures aren’t even effective in preventing transmission of...

...respiratory viruses. We can already see the increases in seasonal viral illnesses, from colds to ‘flu. Speaking of ‘flu, the Declaration asks us to do no more than we do, as individuals & as a society, in relation to risks from ‘flu. Despite ‘flu vaccines, and care in...

...relation to elderly or unwell relatives & friends, we’re generally mindful not to spread illness when we are symptomatic. Most are mature enough to recognise that ‘flu fatalities are a consequence of shared existence and in many cases is the final illness is the old & infirm.

The vast majority of deaths from covid19 are in the elderly. Median age of those perishing of or with this virus is over 80. The risk of imminent demise of those of advanced years is well understood & even successfully avoided in the case of covid19 for some people, others of...

...the many endemic or seasonal viruses will instead be that final illness. Importantly, we are now appreciating that the magnitude of the threat to life & health of covid19 is, mercifully, not close to the levels we initially thought, from way back in the early spring. It has...

...always been the case that estimates of the lethality of new infectious disease outbreaks are greater during the event than calculated in the cold light of day. This is mostly because we greatly underestimate the numbers of people who’ve been infected yet had mild or no...

...symptoms. It is already clear that, far from being an unusually virulent & lethal virus, improving estimates of the morbidity & mortality associated with covid19 show it to be rather ordinary. I’m confident that in retrospect, we will see covid19, from a medical perspective,

...as akin to seasonal influenza, killing around 1 in 1000 people it infects. In matters affecting the whole population, it’s important to be dispassionate. The general public doesn’t routinely need to know that every year, just under 1% of us won’t make our next birthday.

Viewed against that, which represents around 620,000 deaths annually, the approximately 0.06% who have died from or with covid19 is, as you can see, from an actuarial perspective, not even a leading cause of death. So here we are, engaged in a battle to prevent the spread of a..

...single, not particularly remarkable respiratory virus, using methods that simply don’t work, while seemingly willing to accept, as a price worth paying, the indirect & avoidable deaths of tens of thousands of our families, friends & neighbours. On top of this, the impacts on..

...the economy of the measures have had & will continue to wreak devastation on the lives of millions of the most vulnerable people. I have never accepted this ‘lethal calculus’, and I don’t believe you should either. That said, I’m not defeatist at all about how better to...

...handle the threats that covid19 represents. We’re so much more able to save more lives of those made deeply ill by it than we were in spring. We know now only rarely to ventilate, for this is not a disease of airways obstruction but of impaired gas exchange, so we offer...

...oxygen masks. Often this alone both relieves extreme distress but is sufficient for the patient to bridge a few days & move onto a path of healing. We’re now alert to clotting disorders, so carefully monitor parameters of coagulation & where needed, we’ve a medicine chest...

...of anti-coagulants ancient & modern on which to rely. And we also now know that overwhelming inflammation can be part of the course of disease in some, and know how to safely use powerful anti-inflammatory corticosteroids (most familiar you us through their beneficial...

...effects on asthma). We don’t yet have a vaccine, that much is true. But do note, a vaccine isn’t going to be a panacea. I think it’s most important to recognise that in the very old & already unwell, vaccines are often simply not very effective. You require a well-

...functioning immune system in order to benefit from a vaccine. I do think we’ve lost our way completely on all this. Many people may think the measures imposed on us will at least end triumphantly as medical science vanquishes this virus. I don’t wish to be overly negative...

...but we don’t even know if vaccines will much reduce the death rate from covid19. It may surprise you to learn that this endpoint, deaths, is not something even being studied in clinical trials. The main objective is to understand the durability of an immune response to the..

...vaccines in development. I believe there may be some “challenge studies” yet to be conducted. So we actually don’t even know for such to what extent vaccines will reduce illness, either. Now, I do expect they will reduce the severity of illness in some. I’m open-minded to...

...the possibility it will only have a marginal impact on deaths. It’s also the case that only a minority of population have any need whatsoever for a vaccine against covid19. That’s because most of us are not made ill by it & most who are, do not require hospitalisation. In...

...this regard, it’s very like ‘flu. We offer ‘flu vaccination to people over 60, some others who are more vulnerable as a consequence of an ongoing illness & to some children (‘flu can kill children, though it is an extremely rare event). Others talk of ‘long Covid’. While...

...of course we must remain vigilant to prolonged consequences of a severe illness from this virus, it’s important that you know that this syndrome is not at all new. The way it’s discussed, you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s a new observation. It also occurs after other viral..

...illnesses, including ‘flu. The data are yet young, but good reviews have appeared & so far, there’s no sign that ‘long’ occurs more often or with greater severity after covid19 than after ‘flu. Turning to the immune system, it’s vital to appreciate some important points.

Firstly, ‘flu mutates at a high rate & so despite perhaps having ‘flu last year does not, sadly, mean you can’t get it this year. The vaccines that are made available are the best guess of the likely dominant strain by the time it reaches us. The effectiveness of ‘flu vaccines...

...is quite limited & in some years, almost nothing at all. But we don’t restrict society for months on end. If we were to chase around the country, testing the population for the presence of partial genetic sequences of ‘flu, we’d be shocked. A very large number of people...

...will be infected by ‘flu from now until spring 2021. But few will be made very ill by it and some - we’ve no idea how many - people will die from it. Given that there isn’t any meaningful immunity in the population to each new strain of ‘flu, we know that each winter, it...

...will tear through society. By contrast, in the case of covid19, it’s been notable for its relative stability. Those who’ve followed me understand the next part. In essence, though this virus is novel, the coronaviridae family is not. Around 30% of us were already protected...

...from the virus because of previous exposure to one or more of its cousins. That good news is inexplicably not communicated to the public. It should be, because it tells us something really important that is poo-poo’d by proponents of restrictive measures & of vaccines. The...

...important something is that, once infected & survived, the person carries robust & long-lived immunity to the virus. The best reading of the science is what I’ve just written. You can always argue about levels of proof, but I argue that the level of confidence in this...

...statement is higher than the level of confidence that a particular drug will work for your depression or your hypertension. A good chance, but not a certainty on an individual level. I emphasise the weight of evidence that’s build up over the last 9 months or so definitely...

...favours the acquisition of immunity via surviving the virus (which 99.94% do). Now consider the extent of prior immunity. Add to it around 5% of the population that is young children, for they do not participate meaningfully in transmission. If we add to this the fraction...

...of the population who’ve been infected & are now immune, well, I believe we’re very close to the so-called herd immunity (HI) threshold. It’s important to appreciate what HI is & is not. On the latter, it does not mean no one can catch the virus. That would require 100%...

...population immunity. What it does mean, however, is that there are too few people to support a large & growing outbreak across the country. If we in U.K. are close to HI, what would we see? We’d see far fewer cases & deaths in the areas known to have been hit the hardest in...

...spring. Consider London. In spring it was the epicentre of an intense outbreak. Many hundreds were dying daily in hospitals in the wider London area. Now it isn’t. What else? Well, such outbreaks as occur would be much more likely to expand selectively in areas which had...

...fewer casualties in spring. It’s not a surprise to me that the deaths now are disproportionately in the NE, MW & parts of the midlands. But there’s something else you’d expect to see if we were close to the HIT. It’s that the apparent rate of transmission will be markedly...

...lower than in spring. We in U.K. don’t have as much data on the deaths aspect (which is great) but if you look for a moment at ‘cases’ not just in U.K. but cases & deaths in France & Spain as well. As soon as you see this, you cannot ‘unsee’ it. If you want to check this...

...for yourself, go to OWID covid19, select one of these countries, select cases & importantly, select ‘log’ depictions. It’s unmistakable. The slope of the log transformed data is almost a straight line, but it’s gradient today is roughly 20% of what it was during the rapid...

...phase in March & April. It may be argued that the lower slope is a sign of how effective our measures are being. I disagree, for two main reasons. Firstly, there’s no evidence of reduction in transmission of other respiratory viruses like ‘flu & of course common colds. So...

...that’s not what’s made the slope much flatter. The other reason is that the slopes are reduced in every country, despite there being measures of differing timing & severity. No, Occam’s Razor tells us that the simplest explanation not only fits the data, but it requires no...

...unlikely coincidence of other events. The clearly lower slope of the plots now vs spring not only tells us that we’re in the vicinity of the HIT, but it also tells us that this is going to self-limiting, just as it was in spring. Ferguson was wrong in March & he and SAGE...

...are wrong now. He’s overestimated by over 10-fold. Easily done, but I hear nothing but arrogance from him. He’s sticking to his predictions, even though they’re impossible now to be correct. So this brings me back to the beginning, the Great Barrington Declaration. The...

...highly qualified authors are much more qualified than anyone currently advising our Govt. They also don’t have any ulterior notices. If anything, they’ve put themselves in harms way by speaking out so strongly. I know who I believe, in addition to what I read, hear & reason...

...out for myself, and it’s not Prof Ferguson, who’s PhD is in theoretical physics & has no qualifications in any biologically related field. It’s not Prof Whitty or Sir Patrick, both of whom have financial interests in pushing the case for vaccines, as does Ferguson. Did you...

...know that he sits on the managing board of the global vaccine prediction unit at Imperial, an entity financed by the Gates Foundation, around $11M? I’m sure there’s no conflict there. So to conclude, the science clearly indicates that the way to end this awful & self-...

...inflicted suffering is to do no more than we are currently doing in relation to ‘flu. There isn’t a practical or moral distinction which renders ‘flu transmission to be accepted by not covid19. The evidence anyway shows that, unsurprisingly, we’re not much able to inhibit...

...the transmission of other respiratory viruses. It would be possible to prevent transmission but it would require everyone not already immune to remain in house arrest for many weeks. Half measures don’t do enough to warrant the pain, social, psychological, economic &

...mortality involved. And it’s also simply not necessary. The outbreaks we’re seeing are the dying embers of a huge event which began in early spring. Restricting people’s activities paradoxically is increasing the pain as well as deaths. It’s illogical, ineffective & in my...

...mind, it’s downright diabolical in the original sense. Those standing behind the extended if not deepened restrictions are not your friends. They stand to make money & accrete to themselves awesome powers over our lives. The persistence of using a known to be fatally flawed...

...PCR swab test is in my view criminal. It’s not a mistake. They know exactly what the effect of ever increasing ‘cases’ are each day: its to keep you frightened & to render you receptive to vaccination which most of us definitely do not need. Beyond money, which I don’t...

...think is motive enough for the prolonged lethal fraud being perpetrated upon us, I offer no motive. First, I’ve a distaste for conspiracy theories. I still don’t think Govts which could make a piece of bread with jam on it without dropping it, face down, on your carpet, are...

...incapable of a global level plot lasting months. Next, it’s not for me, a mere scientist to dig for underlying motives. That’s for the police. In closing, please also note that OFCOM brought into force extreme restrictions on all media on the very day lockdown was begun in...

...March. While I’m unimpressed by TV, most radio & newspapers, I do recognise that they’re operating under clear & present danger of being censured or even shut down if they do other than maintain Govts line & that of their advisors. So what to do? First, if having read this,

...you now see the Great Barrington Declaration as an outbreak of common sense, you might chose to add your name to it. At present it is the ONLY means you have to express dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs & direction of travel. What else? How about you write...

...to your MP? You can find their official email addresses on the Parliament website. Do add your address & phone number. Most have a policy of simply destroying inbound messages not including that info. Those of you who are willing to cross swords with broadcasting anchors...

...might consider phoning in to talk shows. Please do share this screed (use @threadreaderApp unroll command) with family, friends & work colleagues. Please note I am not asking you to endorse this opinion. But we’ve no competing narrative to Govts line. That’s obviously an...

...extremely dangerous position to be in. So please retweet & ask recipients to retweet with the same courteous request. Let’s help millions of people decide for themselves what they think. What else? Here, I can speak only for myself. This might be the most important decision...

...you’ll ever make. I ask myself, if our Govt organises, as it is so far, to enable massed vaccination of the entire population, know that this is wholly unnecessary. Worse than that, no one can yet know whether there are serious side effects, however rare, that only emerge...

...months or even a year after dosing. Given only 0.06% of the population has died from Covid & I expect less than another 0.01% might, with very much greater numbers dying from flu in the coming months, it would be truly extraordinary if the severe event rate was as low as...

...0.06%. And you don’t want only equivalence on severe side effects, surely? You’d want it 10x or 100x lower than the disease for it to make any sense from a medical ethics standpoint. No one knows if this very high hurdle will be cleared. The ongoing studies are neither...

...large enough not long enough to exclude the possibility that serious side effects could occur at similar rates to the disease itself. So if the situation of being offered vaccination, what will you decide? If you’re young & fit, you’d be taking on a risk you don’t need to,

...as you’ll get no benefit, but whatever they are, you’ll take on the burden of potential side effects. What is there isn’t a formal legal mandate to accept vaccination but instead you are coerced into it. This might take the form that you may not travel or enter enclosed...

...public spaces if you choose to decline. Both mandatory or coerced vaccination is illegal under international laws we in U.K. helped to write. In the wake of awful medical experiments on humans in WW2, codes of medical ethics were drawn up & widely adhered to. Those most...

...notable of them is that “no one should be required to accept a medical intervention to which they have not freely given their informed consent”. That’s the test, for me, in reply to my own question. There simply is not a public health crisis not any evidence one is even...

...plausible. Even then, explanation & encouragement, not illegal forcing, would be the way forward. So I’m not going gently into that good night. I won’t be accepting a vaccine I do not need. I am concerned about the motives of those driving this. You must decide for yourself.

But be assured, this is the critical turning point in our history. If the authorities succeed to getting almost everyone, including our children, perhaps aged 12y and over, to accept this vaccine, our lives will change forever. I don’t mean in relation to side effects. I mean..

...by the inevitable introduction of cloud-based electronic ‘passes’ which would henceforth be absolutely required, initially to cross borders but, in due course, there are no limits to what could be done in relation to access control through such passes. Once established,

...such passes & systems will never be stood down, but instead added to. Now, I hope none of this comes to pass. But there’s linkage between what you do in relation to the Great Barrington Declaration, here immunity & ultimately vaccination. I’m well aware this multi tweet...

...might be a contender for an award (perhaps for daftness by its author!?). But I commend it to you so that at least you have one, fairly comprehensive & alternative narrative. Thank you those who’ve read this far! Please think a lot in the coming days. Please retweet. Dr Mike

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