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I want to deal with a little bit of nonsense the Irish anti-lockdown conspiracy theorists are spreading, pertaining to this document, which is a recent report on the epidemiology of Covid-19 in Ireland
https://www.hpsc.ie/a-z/respiratory/coronavirus/novelcoronavirus/casesinireland/epidemiologyofcovid-19inireland/COVID-19_Daily_epidemiology_report_(NPHET)_04092020_website.pdf?fbclid=IwAR3UtFI6pOgC3yncDmskB6R-KFGCjvudykihEpaN-OXExAIqXacVO0NCAAw
https://www.hpsc.ie/a-z/respiratory/coronavirus/novelcoronavirus/casesinireland/epidemiologyofcovid-19inireland/COVID-19_Daily_epidemiology_report_(NPHET)_04092020_website.pdf?fbclid=IwAR3UtFI6pOgC3yncDmskB6R-KFGCjvudykihEpaN-OXExAIqXacVO0NCAAw
Ben Gilroy, head of Yellow Vests Ireland and member of the Irish Freedom Party, focuses on one number in page 11 of the report. In this figure they focus on the number of deaths with underlying clinical conditions (1,677) out of the total of 1,777.
Before I go further, I encourage you to go to Ben's social media, in particular his FB page, to view his recent postings about this if you feel like I've misrepresented them.
So they believe the pandemic is fake, a scam, and they want it and the safety regulations put in place scrapped, usually pointing to the collapsing economy and the effects of that as another reason to do so.
They also want some form of "Justice for the Elderly". This is in reference to the deaths of elderly people in Irish care homes from Covid-19 during the pandemic. There are also a mess of other demands, but these are the ones I'd like to focus on here.
The narrative they're building with this figure is that the state and the media are attempting to bury the "truth" of the pandemic, by manipulating numbers, and that really only about 100 people have died from Covid alone, everyone else had conditions and would've died anyways
So, as we can see from the figure ourselves, the majority of deaths are from those with underlying clinical conditions, and also the median age of deaths is 84, and the mean is 82.
Out of interest, I did some further research and also found this article from The Lancet: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(20)30264-3/fulltext#seccestitle160
This article produces estimates for the number of people with conditions that put them at increased risk from Covid-19.
This article produces estimates for the number of people with conditions that put them at increased risk from Covid-19.
From Figure 3 of the article we can see that they estimate the percentage of those with conditions that increase risk from Covid-19 in Ireland at about 25-26% (this excludes those at risk simply by being old)
You can also see from the article, and through basic common sense, that this percentage increases as you go to older age groups, with the global estimate reaching 66% by 70.
What I'm saying is that Ben Gilroy and his gang can't say that they care for people if they're willing to risk the lives of a quarter of the population who have underlying conditions, or the at least 12% of Ireland where age alone may be a risk (12% being the proportion over 65).
You can't stand on the streets chanting "Justice for the Elderly", while making demands with the implication that you're happy to endanger the lives of said elderly for the sake of the economy.
So, to use a catchphrase of this lot, "Do your own research" you yellow-vested eejits
So, to use a catchphrase of this lot, "Do your own research" you yellow-vested eejits
