Listen to South African scientists on omicron

“You have to empower people by telling them what’s going on, but I have a feeling that some British scientists didn’t want to use the word ‘light’, they just want to use the word ‘severe’.”

His suspicions appear to be borne out by the language used by the SPI-MO modeling committee, which said on December 7: “Currently, there is no strong evidence that omicron infections are more or less severe than delta infections. “

Sage also avoided the use of the word “mild,” noting on Dec. 16 that “it is still too early to reliably assess the severity of the disease caused by omicron compared to previous variants. Preliminary analysis from South Africa suggests that this wave may be less severe than previous waves, a comparison of […]cases within this wave suggest less difference between the variants.

“Some severity estimates should start to be available in about a week […] even if there were to be a modest reduction in severity from the delta, a very high number of infections would still put significant pressure on hospitals. “

Laura Dodsworth, author of A State of Fear: How the UK Government Weaponized Fear during the Covid-19 Pandemic, says the “language manipulation” was entirely deliberate.

“The omission of the word ‘light’ is no accident,” she said. “The problem for the government is that once you start using fear as a tactic, there is nowhere to go, so you have to keep using it and you have to keep citing the worst case scenarios. .

“But every time you do it, the tactic becomes less effective because people are getting wise. Once you see the smoke and the mirrors, you can’t ignore them anymore.

Modeling released by SPI-MO on December 15 suggested a “high-level scenario” of infections, peaking between 600,000 and 2 million per day with current Plan B restrictions between late December and January, with up to 6 million. 000 deaths per day, peaking between mid-January and mid-March.

In fact, infections currently average around 180,000 per day and may have already peaked in parts of the country, with deaths averaging just over 150 per day.

Even when new data confirmed what South African scientists had said, Sage was dismissive, noting in his December 20 minutes: “The number of infections and hospitalizations in Gauteng [a province in South Africa] seems to be going down. The reasons for this are unclear and it cannot be assumed that this will continue. “

MP Mark Harper, chairman of the anti-lockdown group Covid Recovery, said ministers were once again guilty of blithely following expert advice rather than questioning advisers and looking at the photo in the turn.

“The whole history of the pandemic shows that ministers need to ask better questions,” he said, “to challenge advice and really understand what they are being told so they can compare it to all the other factors that they must take into account. in the best interest of the country.

The darkest predictions for the omicron wave now seem certain to have been far from the truth. The problem for the government is that if a more dangerous and resistant variant of the vaccine presents itself, it could prove difficult to persuade an increasingly cynical public to do as it is told.