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The Coronavirus Pandemic Will Forever Alter the World Order
The U.S. must protect its citizens from disease while starting the urgent work of planning for a new epoch.
By Henry A. Kissinger
April 3, 2020 6:30 pm ET
TEXT
1,252
The USNS Comfort hospital ship travels under the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in New York, March 30.
PHOTO: DIMITRIOS KAMBOURIS/GETTY IMAGES
The surreal atmosphere of the Covid-19 pandemic calls to mind how I felt as a young man in the 84th Infantry Division during the Battle of the Bulge. Now, as in late 1944, there is a sense of inchoate danger, aimed not at any particular person, but striking randomly and with devastation. But there is an important difference between that faraway time and ours. American endurance then was fortified by an ultimate national purpose. Now, in a divided country, efficient and farsighted government is necessary to overcome obstacles unprecedented in magnitude and global scope. Sustaining the public trust is crucial to social solidarity, to the relation of societies with each other, and to international peace and stability.
Nations cohere and flourish on the belief that their institutions can foresee calamity, arrest its impact and restore stability. When the Covid-19 pandemic is over, many countries’ institutions will be perceived as having failed. Whether this judgment is objectively fair is irrelevant. The reality is the world will never be the same after the coronavirus. To argue now about the past only makes it harder to do what has to be done.
The coronavirus has struck with unprecedented scale and ferocity. Its spread is exponential: U.S. cases are doubling every fifth day. At this writing, there is no cure. Medical supplies are insufficient to cope with the widening waves of cases. Intensive-care units are on the verge, and beyond, of being overwhelmed. Testing is inadequate to the task of identifying the extent of infection, much less reversing its spread. A successful vaccine could be 12 to 18 months away.
The U.S. administration has done a solid job in avoiding immediate catastrophe. The ultimate test will be whether the virus’s spread can be arrested and then reversed in a manner and at a scale that maintains public confidence in Americans’ ability to govern themselves. The crisis effort, however vast and necessary, must not crowd out the urgent task of launching a parallel enterprise for the transition to the post-coronavirus order.
Leaders are dealing with the crisis on a largely national basis, but the virus’s society-dissolving effects do not recognize borders. While the assault on human health will—hopefully—be temporary, the political and economic upheaval it has unleashed could last for generations. No country, not even the U.S., can in a purely national effort overcome the virus. Addressing the necessities of the moment must ultimately be coupled with a global collaborative vision and program. If we cannot do both in tandem, we will face the worst of each.
Drawing lessons from the development of the Marshall Plan and the Manhattan Project, the U.S. is obliged to undertake a major effort in three domains. First, shore up global resilience to infectious disease. Triumphs of medical science like the polio vaccine and the eradication of smallpox, or the emerging statistical-technical marvel of medical diagnosis through artificial intelligence, have lulled us into a dangerous complacency. We need to develop new techniques and technologies for infection control and commensurate vaccines across large populations. Cities, states and regions must consistently prepare to protect their people from pandemics through stockpiling, cooperative planning and exploration at the frontiers of science.
Second, strive to heal the wounds to the world economy. Global leaders have learned important lessons from the 2008 financial crisis. The current economic crisis is more complex: The contraction unleashed by the coronavirus is, in its speed and global scale, unlike anything ever known in history. And necessary public-health measures such as social distancing and closing schools and businesses are contributing to the economic pain. Programs should also seek to ameliorate the effects of impending chaos on the world’s most vulnerable populations.
Third, safeguard the principles of the liberal world order. The founding legend of modern government is a walled city protected by powerful rulers, sometimes despotic, other times benevolent, yet always strong enough to protect the people from an external enemy. Enlightenment thinkers reframed this concept, arguing that the purpose of the legitimate state is to provide for the fundamental needs of the people: security, order, economic well-being, and justice. Individuals cannot secure these things on their own. The pandemic has prompted an anachronism, a revival of the walled city in an age when prosperity depends on global trade and movement of people.
The world’s democracies need to defend and sustain their Enlightenment values. A global retreat from balancing power with legitimacy will cause the social contract to disintegrate both domestically and internationally. Yet this millennial issue of legitimacy and power cannot be settled simultaneously with the effort to overcome the Covid-19 plague. Restraint is necessary on all sides—in both domestic politics and international diplomacy. Priorities must be established.
We went on from the Battle of the Bulge into a world of growing prosperity and enhanced human dignity. Now, we live an epochal period. The historic challenge for leaders is to manage the crisis while building the future. Failure could set the world on fire.
Mr. Kissinger served as secretary of state and national security adviser in the Nixon and Ford administrations.
by Joe Hillshoist » Mon Apr 06, 2020 4:34 am
by 8bitagent » Mon Apr 06, 2020 5:24 am
by identity » Mon Apr 06, 2020 6:10 am
by identity » Mon Apr 06, 2020 6:23 am
The prefix ‘nano’ refers to the dramatically small size of the items studied. It takes 25,400,000 nanometers to make an inch. The size of the smallest particle recognizable by the naked eye is 100,000 nanometers. Therefore nano-pathogens are dramatically small, though the damage they cause to the lungs is inversely proportional to their size.
The size of a nano-pathogen is between 5 and 200 nanometers. Considering that a virus is considered large at 250 nanometers, nano-pathogens and viruses (corona or otherwise), have the same order of magnitude. For expedience I will signal the questions put to Dt. Montanari by three dashes.
— Where did the virus originate?
All the news we have had so far is varied, fragmentary, and unverifiable. First it seemed it was born in China, then not in China (see previous article “Science and Fiction” – where virologist Dr. Wodarg claimed that some coronaviruses, belonging or related to the current entity called ‘the’ coronavirus, were already discovered in Georgia, USA in 2015).
Some said they come from bats, some that they were created in a laboratory to exterminate people in mass. Someone may know but they are very few. As for the bats, we may as well add the unicorn and we have completed the picture.
The fact that ‘this’ coronavirus is considered new, is anything but exceptional. There are very many coronaviruses. The common cold is often due to a coronavirus. They are viruses that by themselves cannot cause death, and very often are totally innocuous. This new strain is very infective, which means that it can more easily enter into people.
However, in the overwhelming majority of people it remains innocuous and without showing clinical indication of symptoms. But it hits, as an illness, old people, especially old people who take medicines used to treat other pulmonary diseases, or who have other pathologies.
Healthy people suffer absolutely no damage from this virus(es), which is probably ubiquitous and can be found everywhere in the billions, like billions of other viruses. Therefore I am convinced that, if we sought the virus in the 60-million Italians, we would find it at least in 30 million and probably more. As I said, this virus is found everywhere and it stays there without absolutely causing any harm, just like the enormous number of other viruses, present but harmless.
Mortality from the virus is very low and probably non-existent. But an illness with the virus is another matter. Yesterday evening (about Mar 23, my note) we heard a primary doctor in a hospital saying that the virus is the same as an illness. This gentleman should go back to school, but not to university, a bit further back, to elementary school. It is a statement that makes no logical sense.
To die of an illness means that the illness is the cause of death. For example, a myocardial infarction is a cause of death. If someone is run over by a train, the ensuing trauma is the cause of death. If he who is run over by a train happens also to have a cold, the cold is not the cause of death. He casually happened to have a cold.
I am convinced that if all deaths were checked – about 650,000 people die in Italy physiologically every year – you would find more than half having the coronavirus, probably many more than half. For they are old people who have this coronavirus in their body. The omnipresence of the coronavirus type and other coronaviruses is a fact, not a hypothesis.
— I see here the latest numbers from the official press service , indicating that Italy surpassed China in number of deaths during a single day, 475, of which 319 in Lombardy. Therefore I am asking you, Dr. Montanari, if you still use the adjective ‘harmless’ referring to the virus.
No, the virus is not harmless. It affects the lungs, just as there are viruses that affect the guts, hence diarrhea, the stomach, hence vomiting, the nervous system, hence headaches etc.
It means that, in certain cases, especially the old, they need respiratory care. If you examine the age of the dead they are on average eighty-year old. A respirator is common equipment in a hospital. I have spent more than 40 years in hospital operating rooms, and it is absolutely standard equipment.
That we do not have them or have too few (in Italy) is due to our having, through the last 10 years, destroyed our health system. We have closed entire hospital departments, as well as many smaller hospitals.
The purchasing system is bad, and all that is needed in a hospital costs double than in other countries – because the purchasing system is corrupted at the capillary level. (My note: the very governor of the region of Lombardy was recently condemned to six years in jail for a monstrous appropriation of funds (in the hundreds of millions) destined to health care)
We are facing an emergency – if we can thus call it – because we are not prepared, due to the 10-year long process of dismantling the system. And when I hear it said that the Italian health system is the best in the world my arms fall, and maybe not just the arms.
— But how do you explain the images of coffins carried away by military trucks from hospitals in the city of Bergamo. Would you still maintain that the cause of the death was not the coronavirus?
Look, and I am quoting the National Institute of Health, the actual deaths attributed or certified as having been caused by the corona virus were 3 (this was a few days ago when the numbers reported were already in the hundred). And when I hear Mario Giordano (a well-known journalist) say that we should not divulge this news, I wonder what kind of journalism we have in Italy (and maybe in the world). I’m not talking about the parish newspaper, I’m talking about a journalist of great notoriousness, who says something contrary to the very ethics of journalism… this man is advocating disinformation. It is a shame.
— If this virus mutates quickly does it mean that maybe the Italian virus is not the same as the Chinese?
It is not maybe, for sure it’s not the same as the German virus isolated in Germany, nor it is the same as the Chinese. It is the nature of viruses – they look for stability, for a state to be in in for a while. To achieve this the virus mutates at great speed. Tomorrow it will no longer be what it is today, and so on. But (the coronavirus) is not the only virus behaving this way. We host a huge number of viruses in our body. Many of them are also indispensable for our life. They are not even beings as such – they are a kind of chemical chains. The current type (Coronavirus) is particular for its relationship to RNA and DNA but let’s not go into this. There are many with similar structural characteristics. They mutate very quickly – therefore when attempting to look for a remedy for this or that virus you run after something that runs faster than us.
— But how about the images from hospitals showing people with respirators. Is your explanation that the phenomenon is not due to the severity of the virus but to the cuts to health care?
We are not prepared for a disease that affects the lungs. For our politicians have destroyed our health system. You know very well, as a journalist, how easy it is to manipulate text and images to create a message.
There are definitely people with respirators who definitely need it – and they must be helped by it. But all these coffins are part of the 650,000 deaths we have every year in Italy – there is no increase in mortality. And if you go to any hospital, you see coffins coming out every day. Many years ago I turned down a job in childhood oncology, precisely because I could not stand the spectacle of the white coffins that passed by me constantly. We are talking about nothing and, as I said, you know that it is possible to manipulate images and context to achieve the impression you wish to convey. (follow examples of unforgettable momentous events then quickly forgotten)
Here we are talking of 3 people’s death attributable to Coronavirus. If the number does not please the media that is another matter, but the facts are what they are – and that number, as I said, comes out from the National Institute for Health.
— But then the pneumonia caused by the covid-19 is different from the pneumonia we have known so far?
It is an interstitial pneumonia, it is a viral pneumonia, but there have been these types of viruses in Italy for several months. We never talk about it, but already, for example, in October, that is about 5-6 months ago, there were patients with atypical pneumonia – pneumonia not normally seen and about which we knew nothing. The source was unknown, it was impossible to counteract the virus pharmacologically, and we had to wait for those sick people to heal themselves. They healed by themselves, because, contrary to what some try to make you believe, we have immune defenses that are very much stronger than the vast majority of drugs.
We have on our skin various bacteria, fungi and viruses that are there to contrast and counteract pathogen bacteria and fungi, meaning carriers of illness. In fact when we wear gloves to combat the coronavirus, we are not helping because we do not allow our bacteria, fungi and viruses present on the skin to interact with the pathogenic ones. Then with gloves-covered hands we touch our clothes, we touch the money handed by the cashiers from the stores still open – the same gloves on which the viruses came to rest. Hence those gloves are distinctly worse than non-gloves. We are dealing with imbeciles, ignorant of the elementary principles of biology.
— Therefore it is as if we couldn’t build antibodies in this way …
We don’t build antibodies to this virus – we already have immune defenses, from rhinos to elephants to goldfish, we all have the capacity to heal ourselves. If you have a headache, and I give you some enamel to apply to your nails, it was not the enamel that cured the headache. It was just that next day the body eliminated the headache – and this happens at large.
My old professor of physiology used to say that an untreated flu lasts 7 days, a treated flu lasts one week. This means that we presumptuously interfere with nature without realizing what we are doing so.
As for the masks… they are useless. There are millions, billions of viruses for every square meter of the earth, on the sidewalk and so on. It’s an illusion following from the (imagined) idea that viruses are as big as sewer rats. A notion that perhaps arose from the words of Ms. Lorenzin when, as Minister of Health, she said that viruses crawl and jump around (as if they were animals).
Viruses exist in enormous quantities and can enter in enormous quantities inside the cells, which are a few thousands of a millimeter wide. Wearing a mask compares with raising a gate to prevent mosquitoes from entering your house.
— But if the disease is not so serious why every day more and more restrictive measures are placed on us? How do the authorities of the institutions justify their behavior?
The major issue at stake is, or are, the vaccines. The regime that now encompasses the world will force the world to vaccinate – that is to vaccinate with and against a virus that does not give immunity, as this (the coronavirus) is the case.
If 50 years ago, at my exam of pharmacology, I had told my examining professor – who was one of the most knowledgeable pharmacologists of the time – something like that, I would have been thrown out of the door. For only an incompetent can imagine a vaccine against a virus that does not give immunity and has no chance of being effective. We are talking about a virus that mutates at very fast speed and we cannot possibly run after it (its mutations).
It’s a virus somehow similar to the cold virus, whose family it belongs to. You can’t vaccinate against the common cold because the common cold does not give immunity. In the course of a life, a person can have a cold 200 times, and at no time that cold will give immunity (against the next). It is a colossal fraud. We are close to 8 billion people forced to be vaccinated and it will be an unimaginably enormous business.
— But then, if the most immediate defence consists in keeping the lungs efficient how does a smoker deal with the issue?
Badly. We all have bronchi. They are tubes that become thinner and thinner (as they approach the lungs). They convey air to the 600 million small bags, called pulmonary alveoli, in which oxygen and carbon dioxide are exchanged.
Along the bronchial tubes all healthy people have a thin, but indispensable layer of mucus, which envelopes and blocks dust, viruses and bacteria. Furthermore healthy people have, in the bronchi, what are called vibratile cilia – they are a kind of whips whipping out of the lungs these dust, viruses, bacteria and fungi.
The smoker has a layer of mucus that is relatively enormously thicker. The vibratile cilia not only cannot throw out what has been enveloped by the mucus – which in the smoker becomes catarrh – but they become paralyzed. What happens then is that the invaders slip down, slip into the pulmonary alveoli and do not come out anymore. Consequently the smoker gets viruses, bacteria, fungi in much greater number than a non-smoker does.
— On the subject of swabs (to verify the presence of the coronavirus), I would like to know from you what do you think of the governor of Veneto (Mr. Zaia) who said that we will take swabs from everybody.
The governor is clearly incompetent and doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Besides, for the analysis of the swabs special equipment is needed. The analysis cannot be done in the kitchen – both equipment and expertise are required. And then there is a further problem. The results, in more than 80% of the cases are false positive. Therefore there is a real risk of telling a person that he is ‘positive’ when he is not.
But there is more. Most of those who are actually positive have no symptoms – as is the case with the vast majority of viruses that exist in this world. Therefore, should we isolate and turn perfectly healthy people into sick people?
This is very serious, because – and this has been known for many decades – depressed people have lower defenses against pathologies and get sick more often. You take from these people the possibility to go out in the sun – without which the body cannot properly metabolize vitamin D, which is essential to protect our immune system.
So we stay at home in a bad mood, we cannot metabolize vitamin D and we get sick more easily. All these ideas, taken by perfectly incompetent people, are deleterious and worsen the situation.
People should be told to stay outside in the sun, to walk, to move around, to try staying healthy and eat healthily. Not to stay indoor, in the dark and without sun. These incompetents don’t realize the harm they do or maybe they realize it, I don’t know.
— This seems a vicious circle. But, compared to the SARS (epidemic) what are the differences?
(The coronavirus) is one of the many lung viruses (like SARS), causing an atypical pneumonia. They are cousins, almost brothers. And SARS did not cause disasters.
There have been other similar pathologies, the swine flu, the avian flu… In the case of the avian flu Italy bought 27-million vaccine doses of which we disposed 26-million and 700-thousand. We paid all that money for vaccines that we threw in the sewers. We have no money for respirators but money to buy a vaccine.
We are ruled by the incompetent and I do not wish to talk about corruption, though I am tempted to. It’s like commander Schettino to the umpteenth power [Schettino was the commander of the Cruise Liner “Costa Concordia” that ran aground near an island close to Tuscany in 2012. He wanted to blow the ship’s horn to wish a Happy Birthday to a friend in the island, while showing off for his Moldavian girlfriend, a personal friend as well as unregistered passenger on board – 32 people died, the cost of the damage was in the billions range).
— There are those who claim that the coronavirus is seasonal. Could you give a prediction on when this emergency will end …
I cannot say whether it is seasonal or not. Like almost all viruses it can be affected by temperature. It is certain that nature is wiser than our statesmen and many doctors. Besides, it is not corrupt.
Nature knows well that when we get sick , the body raises the temperature because, from the point of view of fighting the illness, the higher the temperature, the more efficient is the illness-fighting system – meaning that the temperature improves the efficiency of our immune system and decreases the vital capacity of bacteria and fungi – assuming that the viruses have a life.
But what do the doctors do? They gives the patient Tachypyrine – which takes away that defense connected with higher temperature. The doctor prescribes Tachypyrine when his patient has a 37.8 C (100.04 F) temperature. It compares to a besieged city throwing down the walls to let more air in. It is pure folly.
As for the coronavirus, it happens that in the summer the temperature rises and it is possible that this virus reduces its vital capacity. Vital capacity is a wrong expression, but let’s say so for simplicity.
It is possible that in the summer the virus presence drops. Even so, the matter is not that relevant. Every year we have 20,000 deaths from influenza but no one talks about it. Furthermore we have 49000 deaths per year due to infections contracted in the hospital. The data is official. 49000 people, (130-140 people per day) die because they are admitted into a hospital, say, for an appendicitis and then they die of pneumonia. No one is talking about it but we have many more deaths from these infections than we have had from a coronavirus, even since the beginning of this farce. We are facing something beyond absurd, which at least invites suspicion.
— Therefore, in summary, one cannot die of covid-19 unless the patient has previous pathologies.
Listen. If I throw you from the tenth floor and you had a cold or flu or had arthritis, I cannot say that you died of arthritis, flu or cold – you died because I threw you from the tenth floor. Go and see the data from the Higher Institute of health – you find that those who died from coronavirus are all people who have cancer, who have a very strong diabetes, who are obese who are old. Eighty-year-olds, as is the average death-norm in Italy, and 80 years also remains the death-norm associated with coronavirus, because they are all people who die of other diseases.
— How about the latest news about the death of a 32-year-old young man (from coronavirus)?
I cannot blame them but I did not understand. How sure are we that he died of coronavirus and not ‘with’ coronavirus? This patient had several health problems, some caused by an infection contracted in Cuba 2 years ago. Is this not meaningful in your opinion?
Surely you cannot think that if one is infected with coronavirus then he should heal from cancer or from whatever other disease. If someone has cancer, or a heart condition, and also accidentally the coronavirus, what does it mean? We are really facing a colossal scam.
— Do you agree, however, that it is good that the most affected, the most weak should stay at home?
No, it’s good for them to go out, to sunbathe, to stay outside, to stroll, to stay healthy, because if they remain locked in the house, they are more likely to die. Do you want to speed-up the death of the elderly? Should we keep them out of the air, out of the sun? They must walk, they must stay in the sun, they must exercise. In summary, they must do all that has always been said (as good for health) and that today is denied to them for interests that are abhorrent.
— Let’s move on to England and Boris Johnson, as the last question. He wanted to rely on ‘’Herd Immunity’ but then he retracted…
His reasoning resembles his hair. We are facing pure madness . Firstly, herd immunity is a brilliant invention and fantasy created by the pharmaceutical industry. Only an imbecile can believe that there exists such a monstrosity as herd immunity, which simply doesn’t.
If you wish, we can make another show where I’ll explain why (herd immunity) is a scam. But even if it existed, how does herd immunity exist for a disease that does not give you immunity? It is as if you were saying that herd immunity exists for colds. We’re really in front of a character (Boris Johnson) who speaks because he has a tongue. He is dangerous and should be stopped.
— He cannot because he is at the head of the of Great Britain. We have touched on the most important points. Have we left anything out?
There is one point we did not touch – the economic, which is not part of my competence. We are now blocking the world and, as for Italy, the economy was already at a low point. What do they (we) do? They freeze all activities but keep the stock exchange open. The stocks reach low bottom. What does it mean? The ultra billionaire can easily purchase companies that are now worth pennies.
When eventually it will be decided that the (coronavirus) farce is ended – and nothing will end because this virus will continue undaunted to do what it’s doing now (or its evolving strains will do), the ultra-billionaires will own everything. The rich (a degree below the billionaires) will have bought, say, 3-4 restaurants and/or 10 stores that had to close. In summary, all who were rich will be infinitely richer, But we will also have a flood-tide of people who will always be poorer. This will be another consequence of this fake epidemic, perhaps, who knows, created on purpose.
— I would like to close with your comment on the possible correlation between pollution and the development of the virus…
We have talked and studied this for many years. When there are dusts, micro and nano particles, the viruses – all almost infinitely small –stick to the nano-particles, which then become the vehicles for the viruses, as well as for dioxins, furans (another toxic compound), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and an infinite number of other substances.
All this is widely known – but now some pundits say so as if it were a novelty. We have been saying this for 20 years.
by Heaven Swan » Mon Apr 06, 2020 7:28 am
by Heaven Swan » Mon Apr 06, 2020 8:12 am
by Grizzly » Mon Apr 06, 2020 11:18 am
by Belligerent Savant » Mon Apr 06, 2020 11:59 am
Belligerent Savant » Sat Apr 04, 2020 11:05 pm wrote:.Belligerent Savant » Sat Apr 04, 2020 11:05 pm wrote:.
https://off-guardian.org/2020/04/04/did ... ock-downs/
Did Bill Gates Just Reveal the Reason Behind the Lock-Downs?
[snip]
...at 34:14, Gates talked about how he sees things rolling out from there.Eventually what we’ll have to have is certificates of who’s a recovered person, who’s a vaccinated person […] Because you don’t want people moving around the world where you’ll have some countries that won’t have it under control, sadly. You don’t want to completely block off the ability for people to go there and come back and move around. So eventually there will be this digital immunity proof that will help facilitate the global reopening up.”
billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman tweeted about his "optimism" and the need for"...Hydroxychloriquine and antibiotics appear to help. There is increasing evidence that the asymptomatic infection rate could be as much as 50X higher than expected.
If this is true, the severity and death rate could be much lower than anticipated, and we could be closer to herd immunity than projected. Highly accurate antibody tests are scaling production and distribution which will definitively answer this question hopefully soon.
One could imagine a world in the next few months where everyone is tested and all but the immune-compromised go back to a socially distanced but more normal life.
We wear bracelets or carry a phone certificate which indicate our status, and track infections where they emerge..."
The rollout of immunity certificates across the world will likely be government-issued to first responders and citizens who have developed resistance to COVID-19.
People who have contracted the virus and have recovered, normally develop antibodies to fight the virus, could be their golden ticket to escape regions that have strict social distancing measures and or lockdowns.
Just imagine, immunity certificates granted by governments to people who have recovered or have developed resistance to the virus could be considered special passports that will allow them to freely travel across states, countries, and or the world — while everyone else remains hunkered down in their homes or doomsday bunkers.
Some of the first talks of this has originated in the UK. The government could roll out immunity passports to Britons who have already contracted and recovered from the virus so they can reenter the economy, reported The New York Times.
"(An immunity certificate) is an important thing that we will be doing and are looking at but it's too early in the science of the immunity that comes from having had the disease," health minister Matt Hancock said at a Downing Street press conference."It's too early in that science to be able to put clarity around that. I wish that we could but the reason that we can't is because the science isn't yet advanced enough," Hancock said.
UK Health Secretary: "We are looking at an immunity certificate. How people who have had the disease, have got the antibodies, and therefore have immunity, can show that, and so get back... as much as possible to normal life." pic.twitter.com/SVLV8U2YwG
Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spokesman said Britain was completing due diligence in how feasible immunity passports would be.
Hancock said a blood test was in development that could test whether people already had the virus or had the antibodies that would make them resistant to the infection.
In Germany, researchers are preparing a study that would see if people already immune to the virus could reenter the workforce and be granted immunity passports.
In Italy, the conservative president of the northeastern Veneto region has proposed an immunity passport for people who possess antibodies that show they are resistant to the virus.
The former prime minister, Matteo Renzi, has called it a "Covid Pass" for the uninfected who can return to their normal lives.
Immunity passports and "intermittent lockdowns" could become a reality in the months, quarters, or at least in the next several years – as the virus could be sticking around a lot longer than many have anticipated.
Talk of these special passports surfaced in American politics last week when House Democratic Caucus Chairman Mike Stewart called on Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee to implement an "Immunity Certificate" for first responders and healthcare professionals.
Stewart said first-responders who have the antibodies and are immune to the virus should be shifted onto the frontlines."We need to get the resources in place to test all of our healthcare workers so we know which ones can work without fear of COVID-19 and which ones need maximum protection against the VIRUS," Stewart said.
by Grizzly » Mon Apr 06, 2020 2:07 pm
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Hedge funder Bill Ackman: I made $2.6 billion off coronavirus market crash
By Stephen Gandel
March 27, 2020 / 6:32 PM / MoneyWatch
At a time when most Americans are stuck at home avoiding the coronavirus, billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman has had problems containing himself.
This week it was a poorly timed humble brag: Ackman said in a letter published on his website he made $2.6 billion in less than a month by betting that the outbreak would cause a market crash. He invested $27 million on March 3 in securities that would soar if investors got worried companies would struggle paying back their debt. And that's what happened, he said. On Monday, Ackman cashed out for an amazing 9,500% return in less than one month.
Ackman attracted attention last week with an outburst during an appearance on CNBC in which he offered an especially dire warning about virus's impact. He predicted that shares of $16 billion hotel giant Hilton were falling to zero. He said dozens of major U.S. companies acquired by private equity giants like Blackstone and KKR through massive amounts of debt were headed for bankruptcy, threatening tens of thousands of jobs. He also warned that if the economy wasn't shut down at once, millions of Americans would die.
Coronavirus: The Race To Respond ›
"Hell is coming," Ackman told the business news channel's viewers.
It was not a measured assessment. Many on Twitter blamed Ackman for adding to the downturn in the market, which dropped 6% on the Wednesday he appeared last week, including a big drop as he was speaking on air.
Fellow hedge fund manager Bill Novogratz tweeted, "Please get Ackman off CNBC before people start jumping off bridges."
Please get Ackman off CNBC before people start jumping off bridges. @CNBC
— Michael Novogratz (@novogratz) March 18, 2020
Within hours, Ackman began issuing apologies. He called executives at Blackstone to apologize for saying that private equity-backed companies were going bankrupt, according to people familiar with the conversation. And he released a statement on Twitter that he had been misunderstood. He said he was really saying buy stocks, not sell. Ackman also said his "short" bets had largely been sold off by the time he went on TV, so profiting from stoking more fear could not have been his purpose.
What's more, Ackman noted that two days after his CNBC appearance calling for an economic shutdown, both San Francisco and New York state officially issued their stay-in-place orders.
Some investors have been confused by remarks. To clarify, I am confident the president will do the right thing in temporarily shutting down the country and closing the borders. If that happens, we can win the war against the virus and the markets and the economy will soar.
— Bill Ackman (@BillAckman) March 18, 2020
Perhaps biggest Ackman's biggest PR problem is that he seems to be winning big at a time millions of Americans are flailing. His hedge fund is only up slightly for the year, just 0.2%, but that's a very big deal in hedge fund land, where returns are generally measured against the rest of the market. The S&P 500, with Friday's drop, is now down 21% for the year. Ackman's ability to avoid major losses will likely to attract more clients for his hedge fund and make him money for years to come.
Given how emotional Ackman was on CNBC — he teared up about the health of his father — and the fact that the U.S. faces a major health and economic crisis, it is unlikely he had profits on his mind during his CNBC rant. But news of his massive windfall could make him a target of criticism, just as Goldman Sachs was in the wake of its financial crisis profits in 2009.
Prominent venture capital investor Chamath Palihapitiya said on CNBC last week that it was irresponsible behavior by hedge funds, not banks, that was currently fueling the financial panic and wild swings in the markets.
Banks, in large part because of regulations that followed the financial crisis, have been forced to carry less debt and more cash than during the run up to the 2008. They seem to be weathering the current crisis, at least so far — many have announced they will hold off on company layoffs and focus on helping distressed borrowers.
Hedge funds, on the other hand, have been adding loads of debt to eke out small additional gains in markets like corporate bonds and even U.S. Treasuries, Palihapitiya said.
Now the unwinding of those leveraged hedge fund bets is causing wild swings in areas that have traditionally thought to be relatively safe, which is heightening the sense of panic in financial markets, Palihapitiya said.
"We are going to need some new regulations on hedge funds in the future," he told CNBC.
First published on March 27, 2020 / 6:32 PM
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