en 
In reading through the WDA’s publication, I checked out the article’s second footnote, regarding spread of respiratory disease by asymptomatic carriers. They cited an article on CNN in claiming that only symptomatic people spread respiratory infections. Not being a doctor, I Googled this. In less than a minute I found that asymptomatic carriers can and have spread influenza and tuberculosis. One study estimates that 25% of the world’s people are asymptomatic carriers of TB.It’s one reason some countries still vaccinate against it.
Asymptomatic carriers also spread other diseases, such as HIV, typhus and cholera. Asymptomatic spread of disease is serious business. If footnote number 2 is so wrong, why read any further into the article?
The article then attacked the COVID spread model from Prof Neal Ferguson. They claim that his estimate of half a million COVID deaths in the UK was a gross exaggeration, by at least a factor of 10. But, there have been over 120,000 COVID deaths in the UK, despite the lockdowns, mask mandates and vaccines. So Ferguson is now off by only a factor of four and we are still counting the dead. Readers can project for themselves what the death count would look like without the public health interventions that were put into place.
And to speak about exaggerated claims, Prof Cahill warned in December of 2020 that giving COVID vaccines to the elderly would lead to “ “most of the elderly, most of those people will have serious adverse events or will die in the next few months.” How could an “expert” be so wrong?
It can be difficult to decide who to trust on important health matters. I find it easy though to dismiss Martin, Prof Cahill and the WDA and will look elsewhere for health information.
Larry Chisesi, Praia da Luz
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I am sure that no-one disagrees that Covid (correctly coronavirus-D) is a nasty virus which can in some cases be fatal. It is however only the latest mutation of Influenza (also a coronavirus) which mutates from one year to the next, sometimes severe and sometimes mild. What is interesting is that whilst mortality figures for Covid have been relentlessly forced upon us, the fact that the mortality figures from Influenza have been zero has been kept very quiet ! The only relevant figure is a comparison of the number of mortalities from coronvirus in 2020/1 to previous years. This will show that this period is not the worst in history, particularly bearing in mind increased populations.
Why therefore the governmental inspired 'panic attacks' ? Do the manufacturers of vaccines, masks, repirators, test kits etc. have friends in high places ? Where have all these 'experts' have come from ? Coronvirus is not a killer, it is the resultant pneumococcal consequences which kill . Why therefore not concentrate on this and inoculate elderly and vulnerable people with the pneumonia vaccine and let the world carry on as normal ? I fear that for economic reasons these are questions to which we shall never get an answer !!
By Roy Carpenter from Algarve on 03 Sep 2021, 21:47
It really is a constant battle trying to make the conspiracy theorists who get their news from Facebook and other unregulated junk media that people are dying everyday because they don't get vaccinated or wear the mask. Why did people die during lockdown? Not because it didn't work as it saved many lives of those who lived by the rules but many resented them, didn't heed the warnings and died.
The selfish people that claim their "freedoms" are being taken away and they don't want to put the serum in their bodies were really much better off as children when the government insisted on vaccines and they were too young to rebel. In the US today 640,000 deaths from Covid and it really is much more because in states like Florida (Ron DeSantis Autocratic Governor who doesn't want kids to wear masks in school with 212,000 child Covid cases already) and Gov. Abbott of
Texas; they don't report the real death toll. If a person dies of Covid related Pneumonia they have been told by the governors not to count it as Covid. Not many die of Pneumonia in Fl. & Texas, way too hot. The point is WE HAVE BEEN WARNED so do your very best to keep up the good fight by encouraging others to get the vaccine; here's why. We have been told for months that if at least 70% of each country's population doesn't get the correct amount of doses, eventually the Covid would mutate (that's what viruses do) into a VACCINE RESISTANT variant. TODAY, the CDC (US) voiced their concern that the variant WHO, originating in Columbia in January, is now in the US and is looking likely that this is VACCINE EVASIVE which means we'll be in lockdown for, well, who knows. Has anyone taken notice of sooo many fires and floods in Europe/US; all phrophesised. Vaccinate!
By Wes B. from USA on 04 Sep 2021, 04:12
I applaud what you're trying to do here but I feel like having an article with this headline only encourages the nutty conspiracy theories. It gives some weight to that which is clearly unmoored from reality because it's in the newspaper. Arguing with people who have no grip on reality seems fruitless.
By Susan Lahey from Porto on 04 Sep 2021, 08:47
I understand that people maybe hesitant to get a vaccine, especially when people pay attention to “news” they read and do not go there own investigation on various websites to help them draw a sensible conclusion. I for one don’t like government’s that remove our freedoms. However in this case, I always ask the same question “what’s the alternative to lockdowns and masks?” The lockdowns have been hard from a financial and psychological point of view but the alternative would be worse. The one part I can’t understand when people start touting this “freedom” stuff is without the lockdowns and the masks the hospitals would have collapsed, the virus (whether you think it’s just flu or not) would have been rampant and many people would have died. The lockdowns prevented this, the mask wearing helps others as well as yourselves and also provides a perception of safety which in itself is valuable. So, don’t want a vaccine, fine, that’s your choice, but with freedom of choice comes responsibility. Masks should be mandatory, I don’t accept any argument about wearing masks being an infringement of freedom, it’s your civil duty to you and others. Don’t want to be tested or have your children tested, then there is no argument to justify this and the children should be removed from the school system or perhaps the government should look at whether you he parents are fit to be parents. Covid kills, it might not kill that person but you could pass it someone else, people need to get over themselves and look at the greater good of humanity.
By The606 from Lisbon on 04 Sep 2021, 10:38