Friday, May 15, 2020

VOTE!

Click to enlarge.
Former US President Barack Obama is, these days, a man of few words. But the few he utters are elegantly concise.
In the face of ongoing abuse by The Donald - the “Obamagate” conspiracy theory (that alleges Obama led attempts in 2016 to sabotage Trump’s incoming administration) and Trump’s efforts to distract from criticism of his blundering coronavirus response - Obama Tweeted one word: VOTE!
(Someone please mention to White House senior adviser, son-in-law, and general-fix-it-guy Jared Kushner that neither he nor his boss can postpone the election,  not even in an emergency.  Despite Jared’s lack of familiarity with life's disappointments - or the US Constitution - shouldn’t someone mention that pesky third branch of government, the US Congress, not the prez – nor Jared –  has the power to pass a statute changing the date of the election, yet not even Congress has the power to cancel it altogether?)
***
The gift of free webinars on topics of concern during the coronavirus pandemic have helped ease the effects of lockdown.
Thanks to Daily Maverick and their sponsors for their generosity in making these available.
Seeding the Great Divide” addresses agriculture and agri-business in South Africa, Africa in general, and the possible effects of the pandemic.
Hosted by Daily Maverick’s Richard Poplak the webinar features Wandile Sihlobo, chief economist of the Agricultural Business Chamber of South Africa, and author, Finding Common Ground: Land, Equity and Agriculture.
Takeaways:
  • Food insecurity is dire in the African continent – and will grow in the coming months due to the pandemic and climate change. This may mean migrations of hungry people in many African countries.
  • South Africa is still exporting crops, but food insecurity is real for too many South Africans.
  • South Africa desperately needs a land audit to determine who owns what, and where is the land the government owns and how to benefit from it.
  • Worldwide, post Covid-19, there may be structural shifts in labor markets with more automation in agriculture. Over time, this will mean fewer people/migrants required to work.
  • Brief discussion on Expropriation without Compensation (EWC) and why Wandile does not support it.
View the growing list of Daily Maverick titles and benefit from these webinars.

Mail & Guardian also offers free webinars, most recently, “Alcohol, tobacco and substance use during COVID19."
The South African government is unique in banning the sale of alcohol and tobacco during lockdown and, essentially, forcing withdrawal on its people. This webinar unpacks the implications and effects on mental health of the banning tobacco and alcohol.
Hosted by SADAG’s Cassey Chambers, with psychiatrist Hemant Nowbath and clinical psychologist Neil Amoore.

Whackjob* no more?

“Just last month,” Brian Lee Hitchens, a former Covid-19 skeptic, said:
“I didn’t think the crisis was real. I thought it was maybe the government trying something, and it was kind of like they threw it out there to kinda distract us.”
“I’d get up in the morning and pray and trust in God for his protection, and I’d just leave it at that. There were all these masks and gloves. I thought it looks like a hysteria,” he added.
In posts on his Facebook page in early April, he had claimed, “I do not fear this virus because I know that my God is bigger than this Virus will ever be.”
Then, Hitchens and his wife contracted the virus. They were hospitalized with serious infections.
Now, he’s urging people to take coronavirus seriously. “I don’t want to see anybody go through what I went through…This wasn’t some scare tactic that anybody was using. It wasn’t some made-up thing. This is a real virus that you’ve got to take serious.” 
*Whackjob: term coined by Steve Schmidt of The Lincoln Project to denote virulent Trump supporters who’ve given up common sense in favor of Trumpism.

News blues…

The politics of food parcels in Cape Town.
Food parcels are not a sustainable, comprehensive or systemic fix, but are governed by a logic of charity. When the state distributes a small number of food parcels through its ward councillors, it mimics this logic of charity: Whether they want to or not, distributors are forced to choose those they deem to be “deserving”.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Another warm autumn/fall day, another lawn mowed, grass clippings composted, and pond edging trimmed. Four healthy goldfish spied, swimming in the pond.
One happy gardener.


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See photos Spying on Garden Creatures     
Watch Videos of Garden Creatures







Thursday, May 14, 2020

Digital death clock

Day 50! Let the humor  begin...
Ragging on Eric Trump, known in the US as the “least smart Trump” is like, well, bobbing for fish in a pot – so to speak.
Trying for an epic put-down of “truly evil people” @EricTrump Tweeted: “The chips are starting to crumble!”
Fellow Tweeters responded with a flurry of mixed clichés:
  • No use crying over pissed milk
  • You know what they say, the bigger they are, the more the eggs in the basket flock together
  • How the turns have tabled!
  • The tiger is now truly out of the barn!
  • Down is away and up is far-fetched!,
  • Time to shit or get out of the kitchen
  • It’s collapsing like a house of cookies
  • The cats out of the cradle
  • Looks like the domino's on the other foot.
One wag Tweeter pointed out, “Eric speaks fluent Donald!”

Talking Trump

Digital Death Clock
in Times Square, NY
Click to enlarge.
‘Trump Death Clock’ In Times Square Is Grim Reminder Of Preventable Virus Deaths.
The “Trump Death Clock”  is a digital billboard in New York City’s Times Square that highlights President Donald Trump’s early inaction on coronavirus.
On Wednesday, May 13 it ticked over to an estimated 50,000 deaths that, according to two leading epidemiologists, could have been avoided had social distancing measures been implemented earlier.

News blues…

Around the world:
Philippines. More than 50 million people in the Philippines are locked down due to Covid-19, with 11,876 confirmed cases. Simultaneously, more than 200,000 people are facing Typhoon Vongfong with winds of at least 115 mph - an intensity equivalent of a category 3 hurricane - forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands.
Russia is hailing its medical workers as heroes …
But as the country becomes one of the global hot spots of the pandemic, those workers are suffering astonishing levels of infection and death in their ranks.
Thousands have been infected, and more than 180 doctors, nurses, paramedics and other medical workers have died.
Like their colleagues in much of the rest of the world, many of those doctors and nurses are suffering from a shortage of protective gear and equipment. But Russian health workers are also at the mercy of a convoluted, unforgiving bureaucracy that increasingly appears outmatched by the pandemic.
Bangladesh…[where] tented Rohingya encampments spread across landslide-prone hills are already susceptible to disaster and disease.
Diphtheria, all but eradicated in most of the world, has raced through them. Marauding elephants have trampled children to death. A fire recently destroyed hundreds of shelters.
The first cases of the coronavirus in crowded refugee camps for Rohingya Muslims in Bangladesh were confirmed on Thursday, raising fears about how quickly disease can spread through one of the world’s most overcrowded and vulnerable communities…. where around 1 million refugees have taken shelter after fleeing decades of persecution in neighboring Myanmar.
A community leader in the camps said that up to 1,900 people who had contact with the pair have been identified and may undergo some form of quarantine.
Epidemiologists fear the virus could spread like wildfire through such camps around the world, teeming with millions of people fleeing war, persecution and famine. It has turned up in camps in Syria, South Sudan and Greece’s Aegean Islands.
Yemen. It was just two weeks ago that war-ravaged Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country, reported its first cluster of coronavirus cases.
Since then infections appear to have exploded, realizing the worst fears of aid groups.
Save the Children, the global charity, reported Thursday that at least 385 people had died over the past week with Covid 19-like symptoms in the city of Aden, where the first cluster — five cases — surfaced at the end of April.
Several hospitals in Aden have closed, and some medical workers have refused to work because of a lack of protective equipment. The two main public hospitals are providing only emergency services, and are not admitting patients.
Mumbai, India.
India’s ‘Maximum City’ Engulfed by Coronavirus. Photo essay.
Overflowing hospitals. Exhausted cops. Desperate slums. Images from Mumbai as the coronavirus upends the metropolis.

After President Ramaphosa’s lockdown update  EFF MP Mbuyiseni Ndlozi weighed in saying, “US President Donald Trump's Covid-19 addresses are good compared with how President Cyril Ramaphosa conducts his.”  This, because Trump “allows” reporters to “interrogate him” – nothing said about the lies Trump visits upon the American public and his abuse of reporters.
Economic Freedom Fighters – EFF – founded in 2013 by expelled former ANC Youth League President Julius Malema, and his allies, describes the party’s ideology as “far-left Pan-Africanist.”
“Far-left,” indeed. If political ideologies formed a circle, EFF is so far left that they’re overlapping far right. Of course, they love Trump. As Eric Trump might say, “they’re chicks of a feather.”
See post Day 6 – Tuesday April 1 for more.

(more) Whackjobery …

Another chapter in the ongoing saga of poopaganda, poopagandists, and poopagandism.*
  • Get Ready for a Vaccine Information War. Social media is already filling up with misinformation about a Covid-19 vaccine, months or years before one even exists. A concerned citizen (non-poopadandist) mulls the success of the anti-vaccine poopagandists mindset and raises awareness about what could be at stake.
  • Conspiracy theorists, far-right extremists around the world seize on the pandemic.  Civil rights advocates have warned for months that the coronavirus could aid recruiting for the most extreme white-supremacist and neo-Nazi groups. People seizing on the pandemic range from white supremacists and anti-vaxxers in the U.S. to fascist and anti-refugee groups across Europe, according to a POLITICO review of thousands social media posts and interviews with misinformation experts tracking their online activities.
*poopaganda – a quasi-genteel term for virulent bull-s**t “truthiness” masquerading as self-empowering info; poopagandist – one who perpetuates poopaganda and then complains that social media is trying to silence contrary views and/or conservative voices.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Another sunny, warm autumn/fall day.
Mowed 1.5 of 5 lawns – piece of cake! Mowing is smooth since I overcame the struggles encountered the first weeks of lockdown. Smooth, expect for the occasional wheel falling off the mower. The mower was new when first I began mowing and, during my first foray, the front left wheel fell off. Since then, all four wheels have fallen off, one at a time. Today, the front left wheel fell off again. If a wheel falls off tomorrow when I tackle lawns 3 through 5, I'll know there's a wheel-conspiracy....
Wheels notwithstanding, mowing, weeding and prepping the garden for winter is a pleasure. Full body exercise – bending, pulling, clipping, crawling – allows the mind to range and enquire.

Ongoing area of enquiry: what’s up with the U.S. Embassy’s confusing Updates on Special Repatriation Flights?
Last week I mentioned Qatar Airlines had arranged several flights from SA airports to Doha. That upon arrival in Doha, travelers would seek flights heading to the US and find their own way home. SAA had offered a flight to Dulles, Washington D.C.
Soon after, I received another email from the Embassy stating all flights had been cancelled.

Another confusing email arrived today:
Event:  The South African Ministry of Health confirmed 12,074 cases of COVID-19 within its borders.
May 16 Qatar Airways and May 17 SAA Flights
The airlines have notified us that these flights have been sold out. The airlines are working directly with customers on ticketing for the flights. These special repatriation flights are organized by the respective airlines and are not U.S. government-coordinated flights, and the U.S. Mission did not compile or prioritize the passenger lists but did work with the airlines to clear the passenger lists. If you have a ticket booked on one of these flights and have specific questions about baggage allowance, cost, or anything specific to the flight, please contact the airline directly. Otherwise, please wait until we have coordinated with the Government of South Africa and the airline to complete the passenger list clearance process after which we will create and distribute travel letters for confirmed passengers. You do not need to email us to request a travel letter; they will be distributed as soon as possible once the passenger list is finalized.
We continue to work with airlines for repatriation opportunities for our citizen community and we hope to be able to announce upcoming opportunities in the coming days. We want you to know that we've heard your questions and concerns as the lockdown was extended and future commercial flights continue to be canceled.  We understand there is a lot of uncertainty during this time and we are doing everything we can to seek clarity and pass on the latest information we have.
We will continue to follow every lead and pursue every option for repatriating U.S. citizens to the United States.
Hmmm, each time I receive an email from the Embassy, my lack of confidence in repatriation flights grows ….


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See photos Spying on Garden Creatures     
Watch Videos of Garden Creaturesatures






“Hugging, kissing, a thing of the past!”

Ramaphosa eases lockdown to level 3 – for parts of the country - as of end of May!
While some suggest the president “was vague and uncertain”,  my standards aren’t as high. After all, compare the US president’s demeanor … and that of the guy who was president prior to Ramaphosa.
The current president’s update was, for me, a pleasure to see and hear.  Finally, a president who is presidential! And humane. And who admits failures – and apologizes for them.
Too bad he said, “hugging and kissing is a thing of the past.”
If the opportunity presented, I would hug and kiss him for the difficult challenge he's attempting to confront!

Water, water, not everywhere

Lack of access to safe or reliable water is reality for 1 in 3 South Africans, about 20 million people. Photo essay presents views of life for too many South Africans.

Imagine a dwelling for a family of, say, five South Africans with no running water and no indoor plumbing in a locked down township, informal settlement, or rural area.
Need water to drink, cook, bath, and wash hands to stay free of Covid-19?
Carry a container to the nearest communal water faucet (compromising social distancing), fill the container, carry it back to the house. (FYI: 1-gallon of water weighs 3.6 pounds; 1-liter weighs 1 kilogram.)
Need to pee or poop? 
Walk to the nearest communal long-drop (ditto on compromising social distancing), walk back to your locked down house, and wash your hands using the household’s precious water.

© Elitsha 
Click to enlarge

South Africa’s water supply was the topic of Daily Maverick’s webinar, “Water Wars: Access to water in post-Covid South Africa.
Hosted by Mark Heywood with Xhanti Payi - economist and head of research at Nascence Advisory and Research - and Simon Gear – a leading South African climatologists and a national authority on global warming and green issues.

Takeaways:
South Africa faces overlapping crises: climate change (last year, Cape Town and the Cape metro area - population close to 5 million – run out of water); health and social welfare, and, now, Covid-19 co-morbid with virulent TB and the highest HIV rate in the world (7.7 million people in South Africa live with HIV).

Just do it!
Decades of corruption and the mismanagement of public funds has weakened the Department of Water and Sanitation’s ability to deliver access to safe and reliable water.
Minister Lindiwe Sisulu denies that access to water is an issue in South Africa, but her team has been forced to draw up emergency plans to deliver water to those most in need during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is time to make safe, running water an everyday reality for everyone, always.
Amnesty International urges signing their petition to encourage Minister Lindiwe Sisulu.

News blues…

Is the coronavirus mutating and becoming more contagious?  A recent study claims a new dominant strain of the virus could spread faster than the original. (Could does not mean will.)

Day 19, April 19, I predicted it wouldn’t be long before Covid-19 presented the perfect reason to release Trump protégés and current inmates from jail. Three weeks later:


No one should be exposed to Covid-19. But…will these felons report back to prison after the pandemic?
Enquiring minds want to know….

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Yesterday’s intruder sent me on a search of crime statistics since lockdown. Initially, there was a drop in crime:
Attempted murder cases dropped from 1300 to 443, rape cases fell from 2908 to 371, assault GBV cases decrease from 11 876 to 1758 and aggravated robberies fell from 6654 to 2022.
Carjacking crimes decreased 80.9 percent, robbery at non-residential premises decreased 65.5 percent, robbery at residents’ premises decreased by 53.8 percent. 
Then, alas,
The first week of level 4 restrictions has seen vehicle recovery activities more than double compared to the lockdown extension figures, representing a six-fold increase from the first week of lockdown to figures that are now only 35 percent lower than pre-lockdown averages. Vehicle crime activities are set to rise even further, back to the same levels or even higher as South Africans return to work and criminals resume their operations. 
On the other hand, neighborhood monkey incursions continue unabated.
Like troops of baboons, monkey troops post sentries to ensure youngsters are safe. Today, by mid-morning, the sentries had declared the zone safe and the troop, youngsters and all, had infiltrated the ‘hood.
My so-so video skills captured monkey antics, including an active three-legged monkey.


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See photos Spying on Garden Creatures     
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Wednesday, May 13, 2020

Whither lockdown?

(c) The Week
Click to enlarge
My experience of lockdown is benign inconvenience and self-enforced psycho-emotional pause; can’t swim or walk, 14,000 miles separating me from my immediate family and houseboat home, can’t book a return flight, and little to no one-on-one intellectual stimulation. In other words, except for feeling constrained, my situation is comparatively cushy.
Within a 25-mile radius of my location, people have it far worse.
Some South Africas advocate:
A “smart lockdown …targeted to protect the elderly and those with health conditions that put them at higher risk…focused on geographical areas or hotspots where the virus is uncontained. [And] stop the police and soldiers from abusing, assaulting and even killing citizens who break the lockdown laws. (It is striking to see their new-found enthusiasm for checking vehicles and stopping people from shopping or working – an enthusiasm that lacked when it came to serious criminal offences prior to the lockdown.)
Other South Africans “warn that we should not allow our freedoms to be removed during the national lockdown.
“We must ensure that the economic rules are rational and I think that a lot of the decisions that have been taken don’t pass the test of rationality, what you can buy, what you can’t buy, doesn’t work… the general appeal for reasonable conduct that extends to the police and army. Also, the idea that you can only exercise for three hours a day … none of this passes the test of rationality … we need voices to speak to the National Command Council and ask …that rationality be the order of the day [with] the objective … to prevent the spread of the infection and illness.”
Confusion reigns as health experts, politicians, and economist offer differing views. 
In the United States yesterday, Dr Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and White House health advisor quarantined for the next two weeks, addressed US Congress from his home. He's
worried some states are prematurely reopening businesses and may have ‘little spikes’ in coronavirus cases that erupt into full-blown outbreaks.
Fauci’s comments come as the virus continues to spread across the United States, infecting more than 1.3 million people and killing at least 80,684 as of Tuesday morning … health officials say the true number of cases and deaths is likely much higher as some people infected with the virus go undetected.
My cushy position allows me to follow the advice that best protects peoples’ health and prospects for health, safety and survival. For people really under the gun, it's a tougher call.

South Africa now has the highest rates of confirmed infections on the continent:
Of the 11,350 cases detected so far, 97 percent have occurred in four of the nine provinces, with Cape Town and the surrounding Western Cape province accounting for 54 percent.
The numbers may be skewed by varying testing and screening approaches and capability.
The government is still reviewing its virus response… “There are very different stages that different parts of the country are in,” Health Minister Zweli Mkhize said in a televised address. “There are areas that have shown no new patients, no new cases, and therefore we have to approach the issues and levels very differently.”
Latest numbers weigh in
Worldwide confirmed cases: 4,262,055 Deaths: 291,965
South Africa confirmed cases: 11,350 Deaths: 206
US confirmed cases: 1,369,685 Deaths: 82,375
Sweden: confirmed cases: 27,275 Deaths: 3,315
Russia confirmed cases: 232,245 Deaths: 2,116
Russia’s numbers have risen dramatically and, currently, are second only to the US.
Sweden refused to institute a lockdown or stay-at-home.
Sweden's controversial plan to deal with the coronavirus allows most people to go outside, visits bars, restaurants, and shops, and keep life relatively normal as long as they try to stay distant from each other.
Not everyone in Sweden is happy with the approach. But even as deaths rise, the majority seems satisfied.
A poll this week showed that just 11 percent of people in the country said they did not trust state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell, who is leading the strategy.
As you mull your thoughts on easing lockdown, keep in mind:
As governments around the world plan to loosen restrictions imposed to contain the coronavirus pandemic, some countries have reported a resurgence in cases — prompting fears that a new wave of infections is imminent.
… several Asian countries including China and South Korea where the coronavirus first hit, have experienced an uptick in cases after restrictions were eased. In some instances, authorities have had to reimpose measures that restrict interactions between people to once again fight the virus spread.
Public health experts — including those at the World Health Organization — have for weeks warned authorities against lifting containment measures too early, which could cause a rebound in new coronavirus cases. Meanwhile, investors and analysts said another round of lockdowns would exacerbate the damage already inflicted on the global economy.

Whackjobery unchained – cont’d…

Online poopaganda* and poopagandists* - including those of the Make America Great Again (MAGA) persuasion – “are finding out what happens when political speech collides with misinformation rules during a global pandemic” : you get shut down.
*poopaganda – a quasi-genteel term (thanks, Andy) for virulent bull-s**t “truthiness” masquerading as self-empowering info.
*poopagandist – one who perpetuates poopaganda and then complains that social media is trying to silence all conservative voices.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

An intruder yesterday afternoon entered at least three neighborhood gardens. Our garden was the last and as he ran, six neighborhood women yelling at him, he shouted, “People are chasing me, they want to kill me.”
I saw no one pursuing him.
Did he mean we six ferocious ladies?
Three of my mother’s dogs barked from the safety of the upper verandah. Deaf Scruffy slept through the incident. Two senior mutts pricked up their ears but elected to remain on the bed.
The gate at the back of the garden is looped with razor wire that offered no obstacle. The intruder scaled it and disappeared into the brush.
After calling the security company - “someone,” I was told, “was on the way” – I checked the fence. The razor wire was intact with no torn fabric or bloody flesh on the barbs.
No one from the security ever arrived.
Life under lockdown resumed.
For now.

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See photos Spying on Garden Creatures     
Watch Videos of Garden Creatures





Tuesday, May 12, 2020

Going viral

Within hours of British comedian Matt Lucas spoofing PM Boris Johnson’s recent public address, Lucas had 2.8 million views and 141,000+ likes on Twitter. One viewer stated, "This is actually clearer than what Johnson said."
To date, Boris Johnson’s address has garnered 49,000+ views and jokes about Lucas' message being easier to understand.
Hmmm, Johnson's fidgeting body language, rhetoric, and presentation didn’t quite nail what he attempted to emulate: “We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.”

Whackjobery unchained…

Beware these discredited online vehicles of poopaganda* :
  • The 26-minute “documentary,” Plandemic: The Hidden Agenda Behind Covid-19 circulating online (not linking to it) “promotes a number of dangerous falsehoods, including that wearing a mask can make people sick” and that the novel coronavirus was purposefully created in a laboratory.
  • Anything produced by American whackajob Alex Jones, and most recently, “BREAKING! President Trump Sidelines Fauci/Birx…”
*poopaganda – newly minted , quasi-genteel term (thanks, Andy) for virulent bull-s**t  “truthiness” masquerading as self-empowering info.

Whither lockdown?
The SA government has admitted to holding back information from the public on the Covid-19 pandemic, saying it is doing so to avoid panic.
What? Adults must be protected from the truth rather than be encouraged to face it and still act  responsibily? Patriarchy in action!

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Another brief trip into the village today revealed people still jammed together in long lines waiting to access ATMs. This because of too-slow deliveries of the government-promised supplementary child-benefit payments. Anxious recipients must travel back-and-forth from home into town to check bank balances.
Addendum to yesterday’s post re official monthly child allowance:
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa recently announced a significant package of social and economic measures to address the fallout from the country’s COVID-19 lockdown. The package includes a R50 billion increase to the value of existing social grants, a new grant and delivery of food parcels to poor households. All will last for six months.

The supplementation of the grants raises the child social grant (paid to the caregivers of around 12.5 million children) to R740 per child in May 2020. From June to October 2020, child social grants will be decreased to their original amount (R440 per month) and caregivers will receive an additional R500 per month.
A payment increase per caregiver means that instead of a household with three children receiving an additional R1500 per month, they will only get an additional R500 – the same amount as a family with one child. This has been condemned by civil society groups and researchers who called for grant increases per child.
All other grants will be augmented by R250 per month for six months with a special COVID-19 Social Relief of Distress grant of R350 per month for those who are not covered by other grants or the Unemployment Insurance Fund.
The COVID-19 lockdown has clarified the gaps and insufficiencies in South Africa’s social welfare system. The initial package of relief measures was aimed at supporting households by expanding the Unemployment Insurance Fund, but as economists have shown, about 45 percent of workers are not eligible for the fund.
Informal sector workers also do not qualify for Unemployment Insurance Fund, and only one in five receives income support through the child support grant. The shortfalls leave at least 8 million people without any form of direct income support.
The grant increases, alongside the new COVID-19 grant, will provide a necessary salve to poor households especially as direct food aid is weighed down by lethargic bureaucracies and accusations of corruption. (Read more.)
Question: Social grant increases may help keep millions from starvation but what happens when the immediate Covid-19 crisis abates?

Autumn/fall

Feeling the news blues?
The autumn/fall garden offers an antidote.
Swamp cypress leaves turning golden red.
Click to enlarge.
Leonotis Leonurus, aka  "lion's ear" and "wild dagga"
Click to enlarge

Autumn/fall succulent in flower
Click to enlarge

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See photos Spying on Garden Creatures     
Watch Videos of Garden Creatures






Monday, May 11, 2020

Damned if you do, damned if you don’t

As grumbling against lockdown gears up, the SA government admits to holding back information from the public on the Covid-19 pandemic, saying it is doing so to avoid panic.

Moreover, the ban on alcohol sales during the lockdown was meant to prevent drunken fights, reduce domestic violence, stop drunk driving, and eliminate weekend binge-drinking so prevalent across South Africa.
The ban was based up WHO data:
  • Avoid alcohol or keep drinking to a minimum as alcohol weakens the immune system.
  • Alcohol can cause acute respiratory distress.
  • Drinking reduces a person’s ability to cope with infectious diseases
  • Drinking also increases the risk of domestic violence and child abuse.
The ban on cigarettes was based on similar data.
Instead, these bans have created an underground market of rampant deals. In Pietermaritzburg, KZN,
“it’s not only dodgy characters indulging in the goods offered. Those supporting it are normally law-abiding citizens and many professional people. A Weekend Witness investigation conducted this week, revealed a “dial-a-fix” network on social media with door-to-door cigarette and alcohol deliveries.
It took four minutes and 28 seconds for news reporter to find cigarettes

A must see webinar

For no holds barred presentation of a handful of issues behind the “end lockdown” grumbling, I recommend Daily Maverick’s recent webinar, “The Inside Track: A Special Covid-19 Discussion.”  Hosted by DM’s Mark Heywood with Prof Shabir Madhi, M.B.B.C.H. (Wits), FCPaeds(SA), Ph.D., Professor of Vaccinology at the University of the Witwatersrand. Prof Mahdi is also co-founder and co-Director of the African Leadership Initiative for Vaccinology Expertise (ALIVE). More on Shabir Mahdi.

Biggest take away? South Africans must take personal responsibility to socially distance, wear masks, sanitize, sanitize, sanitize…
That’s great advice for anyone, not just South Africans. The implementation?
Well, we’d all live on a different Earth IF taking personal responsibility was easy.

I disagree with some points Prof Mahdi makes. (I was one vote of 22 percent webinar audience – 1,700+ - informally polled who thought Lockdown should continue.) Nevertheless, he’s clearly not a “political animal” and does not parse or hide his truth to avoid potential political fallout.
He states:
  • Continuing lockdown will not stop the wave of community transmissions from hitting South Africa
  • Continuing lockdown will prolong the collateral damage
  • Current strategy causes more harm as people with other illnesses – TB, for example, the country’s biggest killer - battle to access basic medical tests. There has been a 50 percent reduction in tests for TB and diagnosis has been delayed.
  • Current government response is “setting us up for greater mortality from non-Covid related illnesses”
  • Hospitals are starting to see cases of malnutrition
  • Children’s futures are being placed in jeopardy by keeping the schools closed (Data suggests healthy children (18 and under) with no other underlying health issues, run little risk of infection.)
  • The country’s chances to fight the spread of community transmission has been damaged by imposing lockdown before South Africa was ready to do mass testing.
  • Results of tests take up to two weeks to be released. This allows the number of contacts that must be traced to skyrocket and creates impossible workloads for health workers.
South Africans should be proud of the quality of the country’s expertise and the straight talk from some of its experts. Prof Mahdi is about as straight talking as they come.

For an example of politics, political animals, and political-speak in action: “The Four Men Responsible For America’s COVID-19 Test Disaster

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Another brief trip into the village today… and, still, people jammed together in lines waiting to access ATMs. Apparently, the government-promised supplementary child-benefit payments are slow in coming. This means anxious parents traveling back-and-forth into town to check bank balances.
For the duration of lockdown, the official monthly allowance per child has increased ZAR500 (US$27), from the usual ZAR400 (US$22). Only the funds aren’t quickly being dispersed into accounts.
Housing, feeding, clothing, educating a child on the equivalent of US$50 per month – while lockdown last.
Imagine having to return to US$22/month at the end of lockdown.

Word-on-the-street reports a confirmed Covid-19 infection in a health care worker from a local hospital.

Read Week 1  | Week 2 Week 3 | Week 4  |  Week 5   | Week 6   |   Week 7

See photos Spying on Garden Creatures     








Sunday, May 10, 2020

Mother’s Day under pandemic

Click to enlarge.
To mothers on Mother’s Day:

News blues…

Last thing last night, I checked Johns Hopkins site for latest numbers of confirmed Covid-19 cases. Sobering.
I expected by morning a number on or under 4 million. It’s worse: 4,025,175 - 32.5 percent of which are in the US.
Testing is the US’s latest political hot potato with Trump’s press spokesperson saying, “It’s ‘Nonsensical’ to Think Everyone Should Get a Coronavirus Test”.
Members of the Trump administration, meanwhile, are regularly tested. Two members have been confirmed with the infection and three are quarantined.
Numbers of confirmed cases in South Africa are rising too: 9,420 today, an increase of 525 overnight.
***
Former president Barack Obama, on a phone call with the Obama Alumni Association said:
“This election … coming … is so important because what we’re …battling is not just a particular individual or a political party… we’re fighting … long term trends … being selfish, being tribal, being divided and seeing others as an enemy. That has become a stronger impulse in American life… we’re seeing that internationally as well.”
“It’s part of the reason why the response to this global crisis has been so anemic and spotty. It would have been bad even with the best of governments. It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mind-set — of ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘to heck with everybody else’ - is operationalized in our government.”
Mr. Obama has adopted a public posture of muted disapproval of his successor during his post-presidency, although he has spoken out at moments calculated to have high impact. In the weeks before the 2018 midterm elections, Mr. Obama decried “crazy stuff” happening at the Justice Department under Mr. Trump and warned that “our democracy is at stake.”
He has told friends he is deeply concerned that Mr. Trump, despite his recent stumbles, will be able to successfully leverage the bully pulpit of the presidency….
On a lighter note, enjoy photo essays:

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Click to enlarge.
After weeding the garden yesterday afternoon, I sat on the grass and relaxed in the warm autumn sun.
Scruffy – the half blind, fully deaf, pee-on-furniture-prone dog – sat with me.
Embraced by grass, trees, water, insects, birds, it is possible (though not easy) to clear one’s mind of worries, to enjoy being alive, despite lockdown to feel intimately part of the world.
Awareness heightens clarity, too.
In my world, acting fruitfully on decisions means getting things done, moving forward, making progress.
In my mother’s world these days, decisions are talking points, not plans of action. Fruitless planning, not implementation, is her end point. To date, every agreed upon plan to ensure her health and safety, and that of this household, has been jettisoned.
Do I have the required fortitude?

Click to enlarge.

I’ll take this dragonfly as a good omen.
My camera was inside the house when it settled on a twig. Expecting it gone when I rushed for the camera, there it was, still posing.

Thank you, dragonfly.





Read Week 1  | Week 2 Week 3 | Week 4  |  Week 5   | Week 6   |   Week 7

See photos Spying on Garden Creatures