Delusional hubris from the one-man Ministry of Truth
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Introduction
We would like to caveat this piece by underscoring that HART does not subscribe to many of the basic assumptions being promulgated by the Covid Inquiry. We disagree heartily on assumed lethality of covid, assumed novelty, their understanding of transmission and their assumptions about the success of the ‘vaccines’ to name a few. But given the Overton window in which we are being forced to reside, there are nonetheless severe discrepancies showing up in the testimonies of the key characters of The Science™ 2020 Edition.
This piece is based on an initial email received by HART from a reader (Chris Valle) who had done some digging into the inquiry transcripts with some additions and edits from HART.
Background
In 2013, Christopher Whitty, Neil Ferguson and Jeremy Farrar co-authored a paper, published in Nature titled “Infectious disease: Tough choices to reduce Ebola transmission.” This paper discussed the UK government’s response to the Ebola epidemic in Western Africa, particularly in Sierra Leone. The paper proposed strategies like “we plan to help to build and support community isolation centres where people can voluntarily come to be isolated if they suspect that they have the disease”.
Their respective positions in influential organisations in global health and infectious diseases suggest that these three characters likely intersected in various research and policy discussions. Jeremy Farrar’s role as Director of the Wellcome Trust, Chris Whitty’s position as Chief Scientific Adviser for the Department for International Development (DFID) from 2009 to 2015, and Neil Ferguson’s role as the director of the UK Medical Research Council’s centre for outbreak analysis and modelling at Imperial College London, would have positioned them at the forefront of global and UK health policy and research initiatives, particularly in response to infectious diseases like Ebola.
One big happy family of old chums, ready to jump out of the gates in 2020 to impose complete tyranny on an entirely unsuspecting population.
This trio of Old Boy Oxonians set about defining The Science™ during the pandemic:
- Ferguson supplied the mathematical modelling;
- Farrar drummed up support for prevailing narrative: “On 19 February 2020, Farrar, along with 26 other scientists, published as a co-author of the Statement in support of the scientists, public health professionals, and medical professionals of China combatting COVID-19, which declared “We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin.”;
- Whitty was the ‘front-man’, privately convincing politicians and publicly delivering the narrative.
In the light of the above, Christopher Whitty’s responses to the Covid enquiry appear to follow the line famously developed by Anthony “I AM the science” Fauci.
Front and centre in Whitty’s Covid Inquiry testimony is the The Great Barrington Declaration (GBD), which is a very short and clear document. Here are a few extracts and notes to provide context for Mr. Whitty’s confused responses to the enquiry:
- “As infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists we have grave concerns about the damaging physical and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies, and recommend an approach we call Focused Protection“; Among others, the GBD was signed by 14 individuals with specific expertise in epidemiology i.e. the study and analysis of the distribution, patterns and determinants of health and disease conditions in a defined population;
- The context GBD provides for their definition of herd immunity: “As immunity builds in the population, the risk of infection to all – including the vulnerable – falls. We know that all populations will eventually reach herd immunity – i.e. the point at which the rate of new infections is stable – and that this can be assisted by (but is not dependent upon) a vaccine. Our goal should therefore be to minimise mortality and social harm until we reach herd immunity.“
Examining Whitty’s Responses
Now on to the muddled (to be charitable) thinking expressed in Whitty’s ‘evidence’.
Whitty’s quotes are taken from the recording of the UK Covid-19 Inquiry – Module 2 Hearing AM – 22 November 2023. They appear in italics with shaded background with our commentary on his testimony expressed as bullet points. Full transcript in PDF form is also available.
11:49…my only contribution on this really up to the point of about the 20th of March was to say to people this (herd immunity) is very complicated please don’t talk about it not because I wanted to hide it but because I thought that a very uninformed discussion was forming that was not helping policy making …. well my view was it (herd immunity) was a clearly ridiculous goal of policy and a very dangerous one.”
- Technically herd immunity is complex but not complicated. It is actually breath-takingly simple as a strategy.
- “Don’t talk about it” is not an acceptable position during a so-called public health crisis, unless one is living in a dictatorship. ‘Talking about it’, ideally with a breadth of resident experts (such as those of the GBD) was exactly what should have been taking place before opting for the most draconian public health policy in recorded history. Was he in fact deliberately steering things towards lockdown on orders from on high, as was happening in lockstep all over the world? Occam’s Razor may apply here.
- “Not because I wanted to hide it”. Typically said by people who are trying to hide something.
- “Not helping policy making” possible translation: ‘runs counter to the official narrative I have been instructed to push’.
12:39… well my my view was it (herd immunity) was a clearly ridiculous goal of policy and a very dangerous one
16:59… I always thought it [unclear whether he’s referring to shielding or herd immunity] it was wholly impractical for multiple reasons to try and achieve that
- These comments show clearly that Whitty had already unilaterally decided (or been told) what he was going to do, dismissing alternatives out of hand.
17:55… so the idea you could somehow provide this barrier struck me as wholly impractical for those reasons as well, so I just thought you know the various attempts on this were theoretically perfectly, uh, you you could debate them but they were clearly not going to work and they were clearly going to lead significant loss of life so my in my view so that was why I was extremely cautious of them
- Again he asserts that these ideas could be debated but not on his watch, as “they were clearly not going to work”. When the suggestion is to ruin the intricate lives of every man, woman and child in this country by locking them in their homes for an undetermined amount of time, perhaps you might want to be a little more circumspect? Perhaps discussions with other experts would be prudent?
20:12… yes I thought it [The Great Barrington Declaration] was flawed at multiple levels I thought it made an assumption of full immunity that would be lifelong which they didn’t state but was an assumption which I thought was extremely unclear and indeed proved to be incorrect
- This is the pivotal moment in Whitty’s evidence giving, where he exposes his flawed thinking on multiple levels:
- he says he “thought it made an assumption of full immunity that would be lifelong”, which it categorically does not;
- he catches himself and then has to admit that “which they (GBD signatories) didn’t state”, exposing that it was in fact his own flawed assumption;
- He then has to admit that his own unscientific thinking processes led him into a confused mental state where he says “which I thought was extremely unclear and indeed proved to be incorrect”: So he thought that the thing that he had imagined was incorrect. Gotcha.
20:55… so the idea that this [shielding] was a sensible proposition struck me as as a zero actually
- More evidence that there was only one view, and that was his view. Seems he might be a graduate of the Jacinda Ardern ‘single source of truth’ school.
21:40… I mean there’s no doubt that rightly, the modellers and others were looking at this in their models to work out what would happen over time, as people got infected. That’s a perfectly appropriate thing to do. It was not to do with threshold of herd immunity, this has to do with the gradual accretion of population immunity whenever there’s going to be transmission.
- Saying the word ‘rightly’ doesn’t make it true. There has never once been anything ‘right’ about Neil Ferguson’s modelling. He is famous for absurd predictions that never come true. Most computer modelling is a paid-for service to drive a particular agenda and desired outome.
- He is essentially pointing out exactly the point made by GBD about increased population immunity over time, whatever you do or don’t do.
22:04… that was simply a calculation question, they were using it in that sense, and my view is herd immunity is the wrong term to use for that, because it has for most people’s understanding it means the herd immunity threshold after vaccination, which is exactly how I think it was interpreted by others.
- Mr Whitty believes that most people’s understanding of herd immunity refers to threshold after vaccination but that’s still compatible with GBD extract 3 above. Again, the assumptions and wrong-think here are breath-taking. Firstly, vaccination cannot really provide herd immunity, and particularly in this case (if he had bothered to read anything of the novel injectables’ design) as they were never tested to see if they reduced transmission!
22:20… so I think that debate was a perfectly proper intellectual exercise, that modellers in particular were undertaking, and I don’t think there’s any reason to doubt that.
- Well that’s reassuring. Whitty, 4 years on, when proved completely wrong on all counts, doesn’t think that there is any reason to doubt his utterly flawed logic. Moving on!
22:32… then I think there were some people who ran with this but I thought in a rather confused way in trying to explain what would happen over time as waves of infection went through. My view was that wasn’t a helpful conversation which is what I was trying to say to people.
- Ran with what specifically? how were they confusing themselves? what specifically wasn’t helpful
22:48… and then there undoubtedly were some people who were seriously thinking, without having thought it through, I don’t think if they thought it through I don’t think they would have thought
- Here is a rather confused account of Whitty trying to explain how he actually engages in ‘mind reading’
22:56… but I do think there were some people who were genuinely think thinking well you know this will go through and then it’ll be passing and it’ll be fine in a short period those are different areas
- More mind-reading & assumptions not based in any reality.
23:07… in general my view is debating science in public is exactly the right thing to do
- Again, that’s reassuring, even if it’s only “in general”, but not then. Definitely not then when you were going to take every single person’s basic freedoms away for months at a time.
23:12… this is an area where I think it got extremely confused, and I don’t think helped the debate because it was not based in my view on a proper understanding of the issues concerned
- Note: Debate is only right if it’s based on Mr Whitty’s understanding of the issues concerned
23:57… well first it’s quite rare that I actually say of a group of distinguished other academics I utterly disagree with what you’re saying this is one of those few occasions I think they were just wrong
- Well there you have it – distinguished academics or not, Whitty was right and they were wrong. End of.
24:07… straightforwardly the the second thing is that if this (GBD) had been posited as we know the vaccines just around the corner we’ve got we’ve seen some vaccines that work we this we’ve got six months you could make the argument
- One wonders whether he actually read the GBD, at least up to extract 3 above, because he clearly hasn’t processed it. Very common in individuals with severe left-brain domination (see McGilchrist “The Matter with Things”). Unless of course he knows the GDB was correct and was just following orders from on high.
24:23… but in that case why not wait to do it with the vaccine anyway because you’ve got a way of achieving herd immunity safely relatively, relatively to infection – big caveat, a vaccine would achieve this without having to go through any of these processes
- “why not wait” – because waiting would put people at risk, undermining the GBD goal (extract 3. above) which was “..to minimize mortality and social harm until we reach herd immunity”
- Whitty seems to believe that the hassle of going through the processes suggested in the GBD was ‘worse’ than the potential mortality and social harm incurred while waiting for a vaccine when locking down every healthy man woman and child. This is clearly a man with no knowledge of the huge body of work linking healthy social functioning to human health. A quick reminder that the average age of death from covid was greater than the average age of death nationally.
24:36… but that wasn’t actually what they were suggesting
- indeed they were not suggesting that waiting for a vaccine was the only option
24:41… they were suggesting this in a sense absent of a vaccine
- Yes. The measures they were suggesting were practical steps that did not depend on a vaccine becoming available
24:44… they weren’t suggesting you had to wait for a vaccine as part of their their their approach
- He’s really getting it now! The GBD stated: “this [stabilising the rate of infections] can be assisted by (but is not dependent upon) a vaccine”. Correct then, correct now.
24:51… so I just thought it had a very large number of of problems with it
- What problems specifically? It might be worth elucidating, given the gargantuan levels of collateral damage that a population-wide lockdown were going to cause. A small child could have predicted the ensuing chaos.
24:56… I thought it was one of the few areas where I thought it was sensible to knock it really hard out of the Court
- And there you have it. Chris Whitty thinks (doesn’t know, doesn’t have any evidence) it should be dismissed out of hand
25:03… rather than say this is an interesting point let’s debate it
- Confirming that although he claims that in general debating science is good, he’s not prepared to engage with anyone who disagrees with him;
- He was not willing to listen to alternative opinions and suggestions. End of conversation!
Conclusion
What stratospheric levels of arrogance does Whitty possess to have trampled over his eminent colleagues’ opinons to push through the most extreme and harmful public health measures ever conceived? It is breathtaking to watch the mental gymnastics in this so-called independent inquiry (we prefer ‘public-funded whitewashing’) to suggest that the only problem with their response was not doing it sooner and harder! We should be very afraid of these people. They would be happy to ‘go again’ at the drop of a hat.
Doubling down is a well known psychological tactic when your internal narrative starts to crumble.
This was a paradigm example of it.
