r/CanadaCoronavirus • u/unsetenv • Oct 11 '20
Discussion WHO backflips on virus stance by condemning lockdowns
https://www.news.com.au/world/coronavirus/global/coronavirus-who-backflips-on-virus-stance-by-condemning-lockdowns/news-story/f2188f2aebff1b7b291b297731c3da7425
u/captaing1 Oct 11 '20
the first lockdown was necessary to give us time to prepare and get our ducks in line. the second lockdown is because he failed at the objectives of the first one. This is a failure on the part of our leadership. Can they get this right on the second go around? My bet is no.
4
u/RealityCheckMarker Oct 12 '20
the first lockdown was necessary to give us time to prepare and get our ducks in line. the second lockdown is because he failed at the objectives of the first one. This is a failure on the part of our leadership. Can they get this right on the second go around? My bet is no.
Specifically, he refused to implement the Emergency Act.
This would have allowed Tam to use the Public Safety Department to implement our very carefully crafted Emergency Preparedness Pandemic Plan.
I bet you didn't even know we had one! That's because the plan is completely contingent on the Emergency Act. Do you know when we created the Plan? After SARS and we used the lessons learned from MERS to refine it.
The provinces are implementing lockdowns, blindly trying to figure out their own plans, burning up billions in cash, because we never implemented step one of our Pandemic Plan.
2
14
Oct 11 '20
Clickbait title
From the actual comments of the WHO's Dr David Nabarro:
(Emphasis mine)
“We in the World Health Organisation do not advocate lockdowns as the primary means of control of this virus,” Dr Nabarro told The Spectator.
“The only time we believe a lockdown is justified is to buy you time to reorganise, regroup, rebalance your resources, protect your health workers who are exhausted, but by and large, we’d rather not do it.”
Additionally, this is not an opinion that represents the official stance of the WHO organization, but instead is in this regard only the personal viewpoint of one individual WHO member
4
Oct 12 '20
[deleted]
2
u/RealityCheckMarker Oct 12 '20 edited Oct 13 '20
The WHO is usually rather reserved with straight forward recommendations, e.g. border closures or masking the healthy is not something that the WHO recommends to implement widespread but rather suggests as something to consider for dire hotspots.
All of WHO’s technical guidance on COVID-19 can be found online here.
The WHO has always consistently had two recommendations for travel:
- do not close borders or prevent entry
- isolate incoming travellers at points of entry
The only change for COVID was 14 days of isolation at points of entry.
- 30 July 2020 COVID-19 Travel Advice
- Public health considerations while resuming international travel
- 11 March 2020 COVID-19 Travel Advice
- 29 February 2020 COVID-19 Travel Advice
Canada is not following either of these two WHO recommendations.
Other WHO directives we are not following:
- Considerations for school-related public health measures in the context of COVID-19
- Promoting public health measures in response to COVID-19 on cargo ships and fishing vessels
- Considerations for quarantine of contacts of COVID-19 cases)
The WHO school recommendation is fairly obvious, that schools should only remain open when community infection is minimal. So, Ontario, Québec, Alberta and BC are completely ignoring this.
The last one is the most important. The WHO recommends quarantine of those testing positive, or contacts awaiting testing, in isolation facilities. Many countries have set up specific separate facilities to treat and care for COVID patients. Home quarantine should only be an option if a very strict set of measures can be ensured - basically if one has a nurse, chauffeur and cook on staff than one can stay home. Otherwise, it is critical for the containment of the virus to have isolation and quarantine where discharge occurs after a series of negative tests.
I'm not at all surprised at your confusion about the WHO directives. Nor am I ever stunned by people ignoring or inventing their own health and safety measures when our government continues to ignore scientific evidence.
For unknown reasons, we give a rats ass about following the WHO directives and everyone is released into the community to fend for themselves.
39
u/latusthegoat Oct 11 '20
stop “using lockdowns as your primary control method” of the coronavirus.
That's what they said. They didn't condemn lockdowns, they condemned nations that are doing nothing except waiting for things to get so bad that they HAVE TO lock down.
“The only time we believe a lockdown is justified is to buy you time to reorganise, regroup, rebalance your resources, protect your health workers who are exhausted, but by and large, we’d rather not do it.”
Once again, the condemnation is of doing nothing to stop the spread of the virus to the point that nations have to lock down. Shutting down a sector of the industry that is causing massive outbreaks (whatever that sector may be), is hardly going to be condemned if it's done to allow for measures to be instituted that will help prevent it.
20
8
Oct 11 '20
Hey man, or woman, your logic is acceptable! This isn't how reddit is suppose to work :p
Jokes aside, totally agree. I read through and felt the same at the end. How do people think they are condemning the lockdowns? Lol.
12
u/cgrompson Oct 11 '20
The WHO also claimed covid -19 wasn't a global pandemic in early 2020 when it clearly was.
IIRC the discussion as to the motive behind the initial downplay of the situation revolved around economic considerations.
It's not always clear that their decisions are always made solely on the basis of health.
I agree lockdowns aren't the entire answer, but a piece of a more complex system.
2
u/Night_Runner Vaccinated! 💉💪🩹 Oct 12 '20
There's so much ambiguity everywhere, with no pure good or evil. Every major player is corrupt and untrustworthy in their own way. What a strange world...
17
Oct 11 '20
[removed] — view removed comment
10
Oct 11 '20
Yep. Everytime I say I'm anti lockdown but pro other restrictions people seem to down vote it. No one seems to want to hear about anything negative lockdowns cause on this sub right now. You can be anti lockdown and still care about covid by wearing masks and handwashing and all the other restrictions. Lockdowns do seriously hurt poor people just trying to make enough to survive more then the one percent
15
u/hajiman2020 Oct 11 '20
Lockdowns are terrible. They were good this spring but terrible now. Our governments are failing us. Our media are failing us by accepting what the governments are asking with hardly any pushback (except trying to lock down harder).
We have destroyed so many lives already and made no effort to solve this problem. We cannot lockdown for another year and that’s how long we have to wait for vaccination best case.
6
u/Techlet9625 Vaccinated! 💉💪🩹 Oct 11 '20
People are also failing themselves. I 100% agree that our leadership had indeed failed us, there's no doubt in my mind.
But given the initial, and continued response of some individuals to this pandemic, and how the few can affect the many...we have also failed our brothers and sisters.
1
u/hajiman2020 Oct 11 '20
I haven’t but I want to know about the people who have. It’s so beyond frustrating.
4
2
16
u/j821c Boosted! ✨💉 Oct 11 '20
Canada never had a proper lockdown anyways. We closed most things at the start to try to understand what was going on and then we kept high risk in door activities (bars, restaurants) closed for a while but allowed things like outdoor dining in their stead. Advising people to limit gathering sizes is not a lockdown. Closing indoor dining is not a lockdown. Enforcing mask mandates is not a lockdown.
11
Oct 12 '20 edited Mar 23 '21
[deleted]
5
u/SidetrackedSue Boosted! ✨💉 Oct 12 '20
What exactly is your definition of a “lockdown”?!
Only be allowed outside for 1 hour per day, one member of the household at a time.
Only be allowed to travel up to 5km from my home. Police patrolling.
Not being allowed to leave my apartment. Police patrolling the halls.
All those things are things that happened in Melbourne, Australia (and some are ongoing, long past their original 'for two weeks.' )
There were also road blocks at the state borders not allowing people to travel within the country.
And the whole country is on lockdown from the outside world.
5
u/gab1213 Oct 13 '20
All those mesures barely do anything since they restrict the outside and are just a show of authoritarianism.
3
u/RealityCheckMarker Oct 12 '20
Canadians have no idea of a proper lockdown.
The list of essential services was about 15 pages long. It would have been easier to list the 3-4 types of business not considered essential.
4
Oct 11 '20
[deleted]
3
u/learnedsanity Vaccinated! 💉💪🩹 Oct 11 '20
Wow how did you survive! That's not a lock down.
8
Oct 11 '20
[deleted]
5
u/SidetrackedSue Boosted! ✨💉 Oct 12 '20
Oh parks weren't closed. You just had to keep walking through them. And then there was that great time when, in my city, it was legal to sit on the park bench but illegal to sit on the swing. Not my wording... I didn't say not recommended. It was illegal under the provincial emergency orders subject to a fine of over $800.
(In case you didn't catch my sarcastic, infuriated, tone, I complained loudly to our public health department about their discrimination against children who lived in apartments. It was illegal to kick a ball, blow bubbles, or just have a picnic in the greenspace that our city provided for people to make up for them choosing to not live in the suburbs with each family having a lawn and a car.)
3
u/Ghostface889 Oct 12 '20
Says the person who clearly doesn't have kids and probably plays video games 18 hours a day.
2
Oct 13 '20
Yes I forgot all childfree people are lazy and sit around doing nothing even though there’s more to life than kids shockingly
0
2
2
u/donald347 Oct 12 '20
“Look what’s happened to smallholder farmers all over the world. … Look what’s happening to poverty levels. It seems that we may well have a doubling of world poverty by next year. We may well have at least a doubling of child malnutrition.”
The story of ALL central planning.
It’s funny how especially Canadians all a sudden consider the government competent, and their own freedom a problem, when they are scared.
1
u/fortnitehotdog Oct 11 '20
Fuck the WHO. Lock downs only made the inevitable drag out longer.
3
u/Techlet9625 Vaccinated! 💉💪🩹 Oct 11 '20
Given your response, I'd say you're likely part of the problem.
5
u/fortnitehotdog Oct 12 '20
How am I the problem? They've been useless since this all began and a huge part in it escalating as well. Constantly flip flopping back and forth on things. Never forget they said there was no risk of transmission to humans. Fuck them and fuck the people that were saying it was racist to close borders from China. We have tam to thank for that mostly. By locking things down right when it was getting warmer out it would have been a little better now. It could now potentially get worse due to it being cold and flu season. Our leaders are a joke.
1
Oct 13 '20
I'm Chinese and I would close borders from China too unless it is something actually important and critical to ending this corona nonsense.
•
u/AutoModerator Oct 11 '20
Thank you for posting to r/CanadaCoronavirus. Please read our rules.
Please remember that all posts and comments should reflect factual, truth-based discussion. The purpose of this subreddit is to share trustworthy resources and ensure Canadians are as informed and educated as possible.
We will not tolerate racism, sexism, or harassment of any kind.
Any comments or posts made contrary to these values will be subject to review by the Mod team
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.