Don’t weep for Sweden; it is now one of least infected countries

I heard CDC Director Robert Redfield surmise a couple of days ago that we could have another (different) novel viral pandemic hit us this year or next year. That would layer another untreatable virus on top of Covid. What a racket for big pharma.

This winter, people will panic when someone gets a head cold or the flu. A fairly high number of people never called in sick with cold or flu symptoms, but now the populous is paranoid if someone coughs. People will be peer-pressured to go home this year (which is not a bad thing). Should be a low incidence season from cold/flu/Covid. That's all the more reason to open up and trust the public.

 

Let's start with the Preamble.

And of course the 10th amendment

Care to tell me where the constitution prohibits a state from enacting health, clothing and such laws?

Oh and the next time you go to Walmart try going in butt naked and see how that works out for your nobody call tell you what to wear. After they kick you out head down to a school or police station and see if they agree with you.

 

You likely are not aware of the idea of powers granted to the government by the people. Those powers are specific. That is, government has only certain, enumerated powers. Any laws passed must be in accordance with the powers granted.

Government usurping powers not granted by the people is tyranny.

Those who advocate government usurping power might easily be called traitors, as usurpation of power might also be called treason.

 

In a better world, I agree. However, I fear that factors in the U.S. and elsewhere are creating conditions that will only make most diseases more lethal. I think this may be the case because I don't think we've treated the root of of the problem. I suppose that in one sense, one could say that the root is stress- stress to our bodies due to the toxic loads that are put upon them from toxins in the air, food and water we consume, as well as the stress we get from jobs that frequently features long work hours as well as "casual" work that frequently works out to being on call 24/7 and if they feel that you aren't "responsive" enough, out you go, time to get someone else who will tow the line. Reports of companies like Amazon tell the tale:
https://www.theguardian.com/technol...amazon-warehouses-as-number-of-incidents-rise

Meat packing plants are particularly stressful, and the correlation between Covid and these plants is hard to ignore:
https://www.wired.com/story/why-meatpacking-plants-have-become-covid-19-hot-spots/

 

I think we may be losing focus a bit- put simply, I think we can all agree that regardless of what the laws say or are interpreted to say, we all want to live in a world where people are healthier, not sicker. I think the bottom line is figuring out how best to go about that. I think that Sweden's approach is better, but I fully acknowledge that there are other questions to be asked. There is no denying that whatever good things Sweden did, it's Covid death rate was one of the highest in the world. Conversely, there is also no denying that despite its lockdowns, the U.K. and the U.S. have fared even worse. Trying to understand why this is and what the best long term solutions are is more important to me than figuring out whether a federal government has the power to do x or y thing. I'm not trying to downplay that line of argument, but I do hope that we can focus more on what the best approach is in this thread rather than whether x or y government has the authority to do x or y thing.

 

It's not hard to see what's actually going on in China. It electronically leaks like a sieve.

Not in Aus, Canada and NZ.

I don't have per capita cases/deaths by sovereign unit at my fingertips for Europe. If you do, please share

 

Thank you for a most reasonable and civil post.

There is an open letter from Belgian doctors about this, and I started a thread about it. It's long, but very well reasoned.

Those doctors cite points from the Hippocratic Oath, including its famous "First, do no harm". They point out the harm done by governmental reaction to the virus.

Call me cynical as hell and you would be right, but the population density of humans on this planet cannot be sustained. More, and stating the obvious, death is the natural conclusion of life. Strong emphasis on how many people die can be depressing for some.

I have tried to engage several posters on the topic of quality of life for those of us still living, but most will not engage.

Should our policy focus on quality of life for those remaining? Is that an important consideration, or must we forever muddle in the numbers of humans who have passed on?

Are the deaths of those from covid somehow more significant or meaningful than the deaths of those from wildfires? Auto accidents? Victims of US drone attacks at weddings?

The number of dead blasted all over the media is no different than the body counts the government used to justify our military aggression against the people of Vietnam.

Are we distracted by our handlers?

 

USA.

Paranoid conspiwacy theowies are not what we call reasoning.

 

Believing every word uttered by known liars is not reasoning either.

 

I'd be interested in seeing this open letter you speak of. And I definitely agree that these lockdowns are doing more harm than good, suggesting that the virus is the main problem instead of people's general state of health.

 

Government mandates or lack thereof do play a role in this discussion.

Sweden's constitution does not allow them to mandate lock downs so all behavioral adjustments were voluntary. Swedish citizens and their government have a very high level of trust, perhaps in part due to the fact that Sweden imposes very little upon their people and treats them like adults. Japan's government is also restricted from issuing government mandates, and they have done very well, despite having the highest percentage of elderly of any country in the world.

The U.S. and the U.K. are politically divided, with the right demanding less governmental intrusiveness and more freedom (more like Sweden). The left wants more government authority, including mandatory compliance measures, in a nanny-state government which treats citizens like irresponsible children. We (the U.S. and the U.K.) would likely have had more compliance with "requests" from the government, but the mandates have caused half the country to rebel against governmental use-of-force.

We can agree that we all want to live in a world where people are healthier. But the issue is largely political at this point. Do we want "healthy people" enforced with a boot on the neck, or do we want to trust the people to be the thinking, reasoning adults they are, at least when their freedoms are not threatened by government? People being forced against their will before any science was conclusive has arguable led to irrational, untrustworthy and rebellious behavior.

Much of the solution is involved in having trustworthy institutions (e.g. government, the WHO, and big pharma). That trust is shattered and the more any of these institutions try to force compliance without that trust, the more people will rebel.

 

That explains more than you intended, just not what you meant..

 

http://www.politicalforum.com/index.php?threads/open-letter-from-belgian-doctors.578517/

 

I find Japan fascinating.

A Doc went there once to study how Japan's Docs got such high levels of compliance. When he asked a physician there how he did it, the guy just looked at him blankly.

Conformity is a way of life there.

 

Thanks

 

No one could have known. The evidence was that Italy and Spain's hospitals were overwhelmed. Italy was literally saying at one point that they were just sedating people over 65 and leaving them to die. The staff were literally crying over this and traumatised.

It could just as easily have ended up that it killed a far higher percentage. Had it and had Governments not erred on the way of caution, they would be bankrupt with the number of relatives making claims. Again, how Sweden chose to deal with it by telling Drs to give their patients the death drink and by that avoiding their hospitals being overwhelmed should also be taken into consideration. Do people prefer that in an emergency when the outcome is unknown that Governments decide to euthanase the people who are vulnerable in order to keep their hospitals working? That isa very dangerous precident. I listened to a Dr talking about being asked to do this at the time. They advised they had another case and the age etc of patient and if over 65 were told to give them a happy goodbye. He was deeply upset about this which is why he contacted others to get the message out though it did not seem to be widely available. Could get it for you though.

Apart from making sure hospitals did not become overwhelmed the other reason for lockdown was to give countries the opportunity to develop new ways of addressing it, medicines and what not and because that has happened is why the death rate is now falling. Had we not had the lockdown more people would have died.

In South Korea, I think it was there, where they all wore masks, this came at the flue season and everyone wearing masks coincided with not only stopping covid19 from spreading but also resulted in South Korea having hardly any flue cases this year. Masks work.

Is this where you American's believe you can all do what you want and to hell with everyone else? Your belief in your right to do what you want as far as I can see is still dependent on the right of others to do what they want. If your right to do what you want interferes with anothers then there is a problem and in this the majority of people wanted to be cautious. We did not know what the result could be. We went on the best known advice and we managed to find ways to cut the deaths. Hindsight is a great thing. I do not know about the US but in the UK lockdowns were lawful. I do not think even in the US you have the right to go against the law.

We still though do not know what percentage of people who got covid 19 are going to find themselves with long lasting impairment of the quality of life but last I heard the number was believed to be 30%. That is though 30% of known cases but not necessarily the worst sufferers.

 

I find it rather ironic that, generally being left wing, I am siding more with the right wing on this particular issue. But while the right wing tends to focus on the fact that governments are issuing mandates and getting most of the blame, I think few people are looking at the corporations who are pulling their strings. I am all for a government that provides all of its citizens free health care, but it's not just a matter of having free health care, it's a matter of it being -quality- health care, and for that to happen, people have to do a major revamp of the entire medical-pharmaceutical industrial complex.

As to the issue of government mandates, I think it's best to try to avoid the issue of whether such a situation could ever be good (not something I have an answer for) and focus more on whether it is good in this particular situation. I definitely don't think it is here.

 

I'd definitely be interested in seeing some evidence for this so called death drink. I did a quick internet search and found nothing of the sort.

 

I read about it. Here's one excerpt and link:



https://patientsrightsaction.org/did-covid-19-open-the-door-to-euthanasia-in-sweden/


Hard to say if the patients perhaps agreed to essentially be "put down" or did not agree. Media articles make it sound as if the Swedish patients did not request something like a "do not resuscitate" action, but how do we know?


Who knows how many countries numbers were impacted by some form of euthanasia by legal request?

"Assisted dying is legal Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and more recently Germany. Other countries such as Austria, Finland, and Norway allow passive euthanasia under strict circumstances. Passive euthanasia is when a patient suffers from an incurable disease and decides not to apply life-prolonging treatments, such as artificial nutrition or hydration. Some countries like Spain and Portugal allow for withdrawing life-sustaining treatment in the person's best interests, but the official practices of euthanasia (passive or active) and assisted dying remain illegal. France is another example of how fragmented the legislation is across the EU. All forms of euthanasia and assisted dying are illegal in the country but since 2016 terminally ill patients have the right to ‘continuous deep sedation’ until death."

https://www.euronews.com/2019/09/25/where-in-europe-is-assisted-dying-legal-

That article doesn't mention Sweden, but this next link (from 2007) does mention "continuous deep sedation" until death practiced in Sweden (and Belgium, Denmark, Switzerland) as a common course in end of life decision making.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2465676/

 

It isn't called death drink. I couldn't remember the name. It is what people are given under Pallative Care so that the drift into death in a relaxed happy way. I will go and see if I can find it on you tube.

 

In elderly homes, in principle, only palliative care has been prescribed, which means that you get morphine, midazolam and haldol to prevent being nauseated and vomited by morphine.

 

Ok I am trying to find the videos I saw at the time. Here is a newspaper article on it

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/deadly-covid-discrimination-against-the-elderly-in-sweden/

 

I generally prefer articles over newspapers anyway, so thanks. Anyway, there is no mention of a 'death drink', but what is mentioned is pretty sad. However, it also mentions that similar things happened in New York State and also mentions other U.S. states doing similar things, without mentioning names. I know that here in my province of Ontario (Canada has provinces, not States), they decided on a scheme that just so happened to boost the Covid 19 death rate. They had their rationales to be sure, but I can't help but wonder whether the stated rationale(s) were the real ones. Quite an interesting read, feel free to take a look:
Were conditions for high death rates at Care Homes created on purpose? | Off Guardian

 

Yeah, that definitely doesn't sound good. Perhaps this is part of the reason that Sweden initially had such a high death rate. But while I definitely think their policy here was bad, that doesn't mean that their no lockdown policy was bad as well.

 

They regularly "put people to sleep" here after the point of Hospice Care or when patients are entered into nursing homes with a diagnosis of six months to live. Medicare money runs out at 6 months, which is magically how long many of our seniors (who are dependent on government "free healthcare") live. When they don't die within the "6 month diagnosis", they seem to pass right afterward. No one talks about it though.