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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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I'm not disputing any of this. I'm not agreeing with it either. But I was there at the time so I repeat: not a trace of panic ever reached the outside world. Nor, if I know anything about how Whitehall runs, was there any on the inside. Or any other variety of 'irrationality'. The machine is simply not capable of it.
That's at the heart of the problem.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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| Mick Harper wrote: | The machine is simply not capable of it.
That's at the heart of the problem. |
Your use of the word "machine" is very revealing. And may be the root of your problem.
It clearly is NOT a machine. It is a group of human individuals, each with their own beliefs and motives, with different personalities and styles of communication.
The ability to act and respond in a crisis also comes down to how individual behave and respond.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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'Fraid I don't agree. Occasionally, very occasionally, there is a minister or a permanent secretary or some other apparatchik who is able to make his mark (I don't know of any hers) but otherwise it is just a sausage factory. A dysfunctional sausage factory.
How else do you explain how people selected for their rarified intellectual powers are capable, collectively, of producing such shambles? They should, at the very least, be able to recognise they are not suited for the job.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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We should, at the very least, be able to sack them.
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Brian Ambrose
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| How else do you explain how people selected for their rarified intellectual powers are capable |
Hahahaha, good one!
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | How else do you explain how people selected for their rarified intellectual powers are capable, collectively, of producing such shambles? They should, at the very least, be able to recognise they are not suited for the job. |
How many politicians can you recall that ever said they were not suited for the job?
Or:
You may be alluding to the paradox that the kind of people most attracted to being a politician are often the kind of people least suited to running a large complex organisation or country.
Or
In Yes Minister style, the politicians are ornamental figure heads, and the real job of running the country happens elsewhere.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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I refer my honourable colleagues....
COBR (COBRA)
COBR’s purpose is high-level co-ordination and decision making in the event of major or catastrophic emergencies. |
What does COBR do?
| COBR’s purpose is high-level co-ordination and decision making in the event of major or catastrophic emergencies, including natural disasters, terrorist attacks and major industrial accidents or disruption. |
Who sits on COBR?
| The composition of any COBR meeting will depend on the situation being discussed. It will be a mixture of officials and agency personnel, alongside ministers, from relevant departments and agencies. The meetings are often chaired by the most senior minister in the room, and the prime minister if he or she is attending, but not always. |
Covid anyone?
| The prime minister, Boris Johnson, did not attend the first five Covid-related COBR meetings in January and February 2020. While Johnson was ill with Covid in late March/early April 2020, then foreign secretary Dominic Raab chaired COBR in his place. Michael Gove, then minister for the Cabinet Office and chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, also on occasion chaired COBR meetings, mostly during the second wave of Covid-19 which started in September 2021 | |
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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Wiley's view is that most folks, having not previously been involved in a WHO declared pandemic, were most probably sitting in virtual meetings, a bit unsure, so opted to act in accordance with "In dubio pro salus".
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| Borry wrote: | How else do you explain how people selected for their rarified intellectual powers are capable, collectively, of producing such shambles? They should, at the very least, be able to recognise they are not suited for the job.
How many politicians can you recall that ever said they were not suited for the job? |
There is a decisive difference between politicians and mandarins. Politicians are, to a very great extent, suited for their job. They have direct feedback loops in the form of selection committees and elections that ensure this. Mandarins have no such mechanism. They are selected by exams set by themselves, they are internally promoted by one another, and they are not removable.
| You may be alluding to the paradox that the kind of people most attracted to being a politician are often the kind of people least suited to running a large complex organisation or country. |
That is why they don't. They have civil servants to do it.
| Or, in Yes Minister style, the politicians are ornamental figure heads, and the real job of running the country happens elsewhere. |
No, politicians really do 'run' the country in the sense of guiding it in broad directions.
| Wiley wrote: | | Wiley's view is that most folks, having not previously been involved in a WHO declared pandemic, were most probably sitting in virtual meetings, a bit unsure, so opted to act in accordance with "In dubio pro salus". |
I was a bit unsure myself but after looking it up, I agree.
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Brian Ambrose
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I had never been on a march before. The issue was the imminent sacking of nurses who refused the mandatory mRNA jabs. Thousands of us started from BBC Broadcasting House, down Regent Street and down to Trafalgar Square, had a rest while some speeches were made, then down to Parliament Square. We were there to support the nurses and to make a point about choice in medical care - at that time there were many who would like to have made the jabs mandatory for everybody. I am pretty sure some of them would have been keen to set up concentration camps to isolate us.
I don’t know if that march made any difference. It was close but in the end the government caved in and freedom prevailed (other professions were not so lucky) - not because of us, not on principle, but because it would have been the loss of too many nurses. Still, I did expect an impact in the media but no, there was no mention of the march by the BBC (despite it being started on its doorstep). If I hadn’t found a tiny bit of it on the second page of a Sunday paper, I would’ve thought I’d imagined it.
A recording was played (often) on Richie’s radio show of a caller on LBC is an example of the infection of madness in the country at that time. He was so outraged by those who refused the jab that he said they should not be allowed a hospital bed in case he might get Covid.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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It is an important principle--the freedom to jab or not to jab--but do you think there were any people on that march who were in favour of the jab? If not, we will have to assume it wasn't really about freedom but anti-vaxxers exploiting (quite properly) a nifty opportunity.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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One of the medical principals involved was Informed Consent.
At the time, it was clear (to those that bothered to read the then-existing guidance) that Informed Consent definitely applied to experimental drugs.
As the vaccine had no medical application history to speak of, and the clinical trials were rushed and minimal, with ambiguous results, it clearly still was an experimental drug.
And yet - if we looks now at the current GMC guidelines - what do we find?
| Shared decision making and consent are fundamental to good medical practice. This guidance explains that the exchange of information between medical professionals and patient is essential to good decision making. Serious harm can result if patients are not listened to, or if they are not given the information they need - and time and support to understand it - so they can make informed decisions about their care. |
Sounds good so far?
| Obtaining a patient’s consent needn’t always be a formal, time-consuming process. While some interventions require a patient’s signature on a form, for most healthcare decisions you can rely on a patient’s verbal consent, as long as you are satisfied they’ve had the opportunity to consider any relevant information (see paragraph 10) and decided to go ahead. |
Written or verbal consent, but still consent.
| Although a patient can give consent verbally (or non-verbally) you should make sure this is recorded in their notes. |
Either way, consent is still required, and the patient can say no.
However, even for such routine procedures you should:
explain what you’re going to do and why
make clear the patient can say no, and stop immediately if they do | |
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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In which case I don't understand what right anyone had to sack nurses who refused an mRNA jab. It couldn't have been in their contracts of employment--it didn't exist--and while 'reasonable demands' to be innoculated might be legitimate because of the nature of their job, taking part in an experiment surely would not be.
Perhaps Lord Chief Justice Ambrose could set out the legal position.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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But (there's always a but)..
| There may be circumstances in which you decide not to share all relevant information with a patient straight away. If you delay sharing information necessary for making a decision, you should let the patient know there’s more to discuss and make sure arrangements are made to share the information as soon as it’s appropriate to do so. |
The doctor knowing whether the vaccine is "safe and effective" might be one such case. Was the vaccine "safe and effective"? Nobody could know for sure, there was no history to prove it one way or another. We were just told the vaccine was "safe and effective". But where did the promise come from? Honest, promise, cross-my-heart.
Then there's the murky grey area of when Informed Consent is not required.
| In an emergency, decisions may have to be made quickly so there’ll be less time to apply this guidance in detail, but the principles remain the same. |
When and where exactly (and in writing) did the Covid vaccine become an exception?
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Brian Ambrose
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | In which case I don't understand what right anyone had to sack nurses who refused an mRNA jab. It couldn't have been in their contracts of employment--it didn't exist |
Correct. And not just nurses. Care home carers were sacked, many in professions of workers were told the jab was mandatory. You don’t need to understand it, they just did it.
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