Kate. I'm not into interracial, even if Harry thinks it's cool.
Huh? You start a forum thread asking who Lush's most successful Amazon Kindle author is, and don't even address that question yourself? Instead just reeling off a plot synopsis of your own story? If a cheap self-marketing trick like this works I'll be fucking astounded.
The latest official word on the effectiveness of face masks is that they provide only marginal protection, but are nevertheless worthwhile and should be worn dutifully.
The narrative has changed. A few weeks ago, a top scientific adviser stated that trying to stop COVID-19 with a mask is like trying to use a whale net to catch plankton, and that wearing them hampers the immune system, making it more likely that you'll get it from other contact sources.
Did the scientific community, in the space of just a few weeks, discover something new about the nature of a piece of cloth that nobody had noticed before?
Boris Johnson ordered the mandatory wearing of face masks in England so as not to be outdone by Nicola Sturgeon, who had just imposed the new measure in Scotland. He asked the right question of the right scientists to get the right answer at the right time, for political one-upmanship.
Ditto, the lockdown to begin with. No government wanted to be seen as the odd one out who didn't protect their citizenry, because they knew the media would savage them out of office. So they trashed the economy (again) for political safety. It's all bullshit, and you're being sold a pup.
COVID-19 is real; the reaction to it is entirely out of proportion, and is nothing but politicking and media hysteria. Yes, it's important to 'flatten the curve' and save lives. But not at such a massive expense. Around 50% of the excess deaths have been caused by the lockdown itself, due to people with other ailments not receiving medical treatment or feeling obliged not to burden the health services with other serious medical problems. As journalist Peter Hitchens, who writes for the Mail on Sunday, said, never before have we quarantined the healthy. Quarantining the sick would have been the correct course.
When the whole thing is over, Sweden will be the smoking gun. Of the handful of countries that did not lock down, Sweden has fared the worst, but are still pretty much in the middle of the overall order in terms of outcome, and have done significantly better than the UK, per capita. The virus will run its course regardless of whatever measures are imposed. These measures only delay it, the final disposition will be the same.
To get some context, the Spanish flu of 1918 killed around 50 million people. And let's not forget that the world population then was a lot lower than now. COVID-19 has caused around 700,000 globally. People will say that with this pandemic the outcome would have been worse without lockdowns, whereas in fact the UK (lockdown) and Sweden (no lockdown) have compared very similarly with one another between COVID-19 and the Spanish Flu where lockdown wasn't even a factor. Of the countries that did not lock down, the average deaths-per-capita has been one third of that of the countries that did lock down.
100 years have passed since the Spanish flu. That's a century of scientific advancement. Yet with COVID-19 they resort not to advanced science but to something so crass and primitive as locking people in their houses.
What you're experiencing is politicking fuelled by prurient media sensationalism.
But never mind. Put your maskies on. Cavort about and pull faces at one another in this new height of fetishistic fashion. Be your governments' little pet performing seals.