I am far from alone in being horrified by the Telegraph article and headline, summarised in the Tweet:
The reality is that 108 children have died of Covid. Not six. It's just that the other 102 had conditions like asthma, or eczema. And so, apparently, they do not count.
Prof Alice Roberts summarised what must have been the thoughts of many:
That is exactly what it feels like.
Do we really now live in a country where there are the ‘pure', who are fit and healthy, who are valued and whose perpetuation is to be encouraged, and ‘the others', to whom we are indifferent?
It is but a short step from The Telegraph's article to something very sinister indeed.
And it's right to call out fascism where it is seen.
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‘Do we really now live in a country where there are the ‘pure’, who are fit and healthy, who are valued and whose perpetuation is to be encouraged, and ‘the others’, to whom we are indifferent?’
The answer is, YES, and we have done for a good number of years. The difference now is that with Johnson in power and the particular brand of Tory government/party we now have (and the right wing more generally), its perfectly ok to voice those sentiments.
On the one hand this is very sinister I agree.
But OTOH, it just smacks of Covid denial doesn’t it in the first instance? That’s is what springs to my mind first.
It’s a means of saying that Covid is not that deadly really and it’s the fault of the people who died from it because they were weak in some way.
It’s trying to make Covid less of threat and stall any real action to stop it spreading – and that’s what really makes me angry.
Then of course, such thinking starts to lead some down the path of eugenics and ‘racial hygiene’ theories.
Either way it’s very disappointing that some of us are still no better than we were in 1930s/40s in terms of our thinking. Lessons have not been learnt.
Or were they, and it’s just the case of the wrong lessons?
The Telegraph by the way are being totally irresponsible and should be censured. I wish I had the time and the money.
This is similar to the claim (in the Sun and MailOnLine) last December that Covid rarely killed healthy under 60’s. The numbers quoted then were ‘only 388 healthy under 60’s’ out of a total of 1,591.
An article in the Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/dec/29/covid-theory-dangerous-health) listed some of the ‘pre-existing’ conditions as:
Having had treatment for a mental health condition, having autism or other learning difficulties, asthma, chronic kidney disease, chronic neurological disorders, chronic lung disease, dementia, diabetes, rheumatological disorders (types of arthritis and other joint conditions), and ischaemic heart disease (angina and heart attacks). I think that covers nearly everyone I know!
The article also made the point that 4.5 million of the UK population have asthma and 15 million have chronic health conditions.
I think I don’t qualify
But almost everyone I know does
“Only” six healthy children died. So that is ok. We won’t mention the hundred others, who no doubt had it coming.
To put this in context, in 2019, in England and Wales, there were 2,390 deaths of infants aged under 1 year, and 907 deaths of children aged from 1 to 15 years. Those were the lowest figures in almost 40 years, since records began in 1980.
It is a rather good thing that children rarely suffer severe health outcomes from catching COVID, because the government’s inaction is letting tens of thousands of them catch it every week. (How many will have long COVID symptoms a year or more later? Hundreds, thousands?)
Latest figures from https://www.travellingtabby.com/uk-coronavirus-tracker/
Up to 9s – over 22,000 new cases this week
Those aged 10-19 – approaching 40,000 this week
With another bulge for the 30s and 40s – i.e. their parents.
Deaths so far this week? 12 aged under 40. 80 in their 40s or 50s. And over 700 aged 60 or older.
In the UK, COVID has killed approaching 1 in 20 people aged over 90 (4.87%), 1 in 50 people in the 80s (1.98%), and 1 in 160 people in their 70s (0.6%). No doubt they had it coming too.
Bizarre to think that mental health issues and Autism are treated as giving you a higher risk of death from COVID
John Boxall – it may be “bizarre” in the sense of being unable to define a physiological causality. But statistically it certainly is the case that those with mental health difficulties or learning disorders are significantly more likely to suffer from all forms of physical illness, and have a shorter lifespan. It is not a surprise that Covid is similar.
The explanation may not be physiological, it may be a matter of those individuals having greater barriers to accessing healthcare, and not being taken as seriously when they do.
Well said