Steve Bull's Blog, page 38
May 10, 2024
Medicine shortages in England ‘beyond critical’, pharmacists warn
Survey has revealed challenges faced by pharmacists and risk of harm to patients as key drugs are unavailable
‘We’re firefighting in the background’: the pharmacists coping with record drug shortagesDrug shortages in England are now at such critical levels that patients are at risk of immediate harm and even death, pharmacists have warned.
The situation is so serious that pharmacists increasingly have to issue “owings” to patients – telling someone that only part of their prescription can be dispensed and asking them to come back for the rest of it later, once the pharmacist has sourced the remainder.
Hundreds of different drugs have become hard or impossible to obtain, according to Community Pharmacy England (CPE), which published the report. Widespread and often long-lasting shortages posed “immediate risks to patient health and wellbeing” and caused distress, it said.
“The medicine supply challenges being faced by community pharmacies and their patients are beyond critical,” said Janet Morrison, CPE’s chief executive. “Patients with a wide range of clinical and therapeutic needs are being affected on a daily basis and this is going far beyond inconvenience, leading to frustration, anxiety and affecting their health.
“For some patients not having access to the medicines they need could lead to very serious consequences, even leaving them needing to visit A&E. Medicines shortages are leading to delays in patients being able to access certain critical or potentially life-saving medicines in a timely manner.”
Recent months have seen key medicines for the treatment of type 2 diabetes, ADHD and epilepsy becoming unavailable. Last year saw shortages of HRT, adrenalines and antibiotics.
James Davies, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s director for England, said: “Medicines shortages are disrupting treatment for some patients and destabilising their health.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
UK farmers consider quitting after extreme wet weather and low profits
Farmers ‘on the brink’ after record rains, phasing out of EU subsidies and price volatility
British farmers are considering walking away from their farms as the recent record run of wet weather has left the sector “on the brink”, rural bodies have warned.
The Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) and the Soil Association raised concerns over the perilous situations facing many in their industry, with profits being squeezed and extreme weather driven by the climate crisis putting financial and mental strain on farm owners.
Helen Browning, the chief executive of the Soil Association, said: “A lot of farmers are really considering their options, and thinking about walking away from their farms, as they could make far more money doing something else.”
Browning, who runs a livestock and arable farm in Wiltshire, added: “If you were economically rational, you wouldn’t farm.”
The trade bodies’ comments came during a briefing on Thursday run by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) thinktank ahead of the second annual Farm to Fork summit being hosted by Rishi Sunak at No 10 next week.
The summit is expected to discuss the UK’s future food security against the backdrop of extreme wet weather that has affected four in five farms in the past 12 months.
The UK has been hit by 11 named storms since September, and experienced the wettest 18-month period since records began in 1836.
Tom Clarke, a board member at the AHDB, said the biggest effect on farms this year had been the poor weather, with many farms planting fewer crops, or no crops at all, due to fields being flooded. “It’s been a hell of a year, I think farmers across the UK are really on the brink, not only mentally, but financially and ecologically as well.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Three Russian grain regions declare emergency over cold weather, frost damage
Israel shuts down Al Jazeera operations in the country
The ban comes at a time when Israel prepares to invade Rafah despite serious concerns of the disastrous humanitarian crisis such an invasion would create for the over a million Palestinians trapped there
Al Jazeera studio in Doha, Qatar. Photo: Wikimedia commons
Two days after the world commemorated Press Freedom day, Israel ordered the Al Jazeera media network to be shut down, calling it a “threat to national security” on Sunday, May 5.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet unanimously voted to shut down Al Jazeera’s operations almost a month after the Israeli parliament had passed legislation which had given the government the right to shut down any foreign media channel in the country in the name of protecting national security.
Israel had earlier accused Al Jazeera of colluding with Hamas and had also claimed it participated in the October 7 attacks. The Qatar-based media network had denied the allegations calling them false and disgraceful. It had also said that it will hold the Israeli government responsible if any harm comes to its staff in the country following the incitement.
The Netanyahu government also seized all equipment used by the channel to broadcast news in the raids conducted on its office in the occupied East Jerusalem. Shlomo Karhi, Israel’s minister of communication, shared a video of the raid conducted at Al Jazeera’s office on his X page.
Al Jazeera claimed that the local cable operator took the channel off air in the evening.
Al Jazeera issued a statement calling the order of shutting it down a “criminal act” which “violates human rights and basic right to access of information.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Proof of Censorship is…Censored
The Proof of Censorship is…CensoredIt’s not been a good week for the Censorship Industrial Complex.
The machine has been built and put into action over nearly a decade but largely in secret. Its way of doing business has been via surreptitious contacts with media and tech companies, intelligence carve-outs in “fact-checking” organizations, payoffs, and various other clever strategies, all directed toward boosting some sources of information and suppressing others. The goal has always been to advance regime narratives and curate the public mind.
And yet, based on its operations and insofar as we can tell, it had every intention of remaining secret. This is for a reason. A systematic effort by government to bully private sector companies into a particular narrative while suppressing dissent contradicts American law and tradition. It also violates human rights as understood since the Enlightenment. It was a consensus, until very recently, that free speech was essential to the functioning of the good society.
Four years ago, many of us suspected censorship was going on, that the throttling and banning was not merely a mistake or the result of zealous employees stepping out of line. Three years ago, the proof started to arrive. Two years ago, it became a flood. With the Twitter files from a year ago, we had all the proof we needed that the censorship was systematic, directed, and highly effective. But even then, we only knew a fraction of it.
Thanks to discovery from court cases, FOIA requests, whistleblowers, Congressional inquiries thanks to the very narrow Republican control, and some industrial upheavals such as what happened at Twitter, we are overwhelmed with tens of thousands of pages all pointing to the same reality.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Biden Wants EVs so Badly That He Will Quadruple Tariffs on Them
Astute readers will immediately notice the title of this post makes no sense. It’s not supposed to. But it is exactly what President Biden is doing.
Biden to Quadruple Tariffs on Chinese EVs
Counter to the idea that quick EV adoption is needed to save the planet from a climate disaster, please note Biden to Quadruple Tariffs on Chinese EVs
The Biden administration is preparing to raise tariffs on clean-energy goods from China in the coming days, with the levy on Chinese electric vehicles set to roughly quadruple, according to people familiar with the matter.
Higher tariffs, which Biden administration officials are preparing to announce on Tuesday, will also hit critical minerals, solar goods and batteries sourced from China, according to the people. The decision comes at the end of a yearslong review of tariffs imposed by former President Donald Trump on roughly $300 billion in goods from China.
Officials are particularly focused on electric vehicles, and they are expected to raise the tariff rate to roughly 100% from 25%, according to the people. An additional 2.5% duty applies to all automobiles imported into the U.S. The existing 25% tariff on Chinese electric vehicles has so far effectively barred those models, often cheaper than Western-made cars, from the U.S. market. Biden administration officials, automakers and some lawmakers worry that wouldn’t be enough given the scale of Chinese manufacturing.
Conflicting Goals
We need EVs so badly that we also need a 100% tariff to stop them. That makes no sense but it is the precise message.
Stated differently, we don’t want EVs unless people are willing to pay 100% more for them. And this is despite the claim that the world as we know it will end in 12 years if we don’t act on them.
World Will End in 12 Years
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Russia Launches Surprise Offensive In Kharkiv, Aims To Extend Border 10km Deep Into Ukraine
Following several more cross-border attacks from Ukraine, including direct drone hits on Russian oil facilities over the past 48 hours, Russian forces have launched a surprise ground offensive which seeks to break through front lines in the northeastern Kharkiv border region on Friday.
“Russia launched a new wave of counteroffensive actions… Ukraine met them there with our troops, brigades, and artillery,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed of the new action in a briefing. “Now there is a fierce battle underway.”
Via ReutersCivilians have also been witnessed fleeing border areas in droves as heavy fighting ensues. Already Moscow forces have penetrated at least 1 kilometer deep in what’s being described as an effort to create a larger ‘buffer zone’ in order to help prevent Ukrainian attacks from reaching Russian territory.
Ukraine’s defense ministry said that the new offensive began at 5am local time with armored vehicles leading the charge of infantry troops in this major effort to effectively push the border itself deeper into Ukraine territory.
Kharkiv region on fire amid a major surprise Russian offensive:
But Ukraine defense officials have claimed, “As of now, these attacks have been repulsed; battles of varying intensity continue.”
The AFP has written, “If Moscow’s advances are confirmed, it would represent the Russian military’s largest land operation in the region since sending thousands of troops across the border in February 2022.”
Below: the center of Vovchansk after heavy fighting…
Heavy shelling is also taking place, especially in the vicinity of Vovchansk, which is a border town of a few thousand people but which had a pre-war population of 17,000. According to further unfolding details:
Kharkiv region’s governor said the length of the border and the settlements in it were a “grey zone” and confirmed active fighting taking place.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
FDA Preparing for Possible Bird Flu Spread Among Humans: Commissioner
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is preparing for a scenario in which the highly pathogenic avian influenza starts spreading among humans, the agency’s commissioner said on May 8.
“This virus, like all viruses, is mutating. We need to continue to prepare for the possibility that it might jump to humans,” Dr. Robert Califf, the commissioner, told senators during a hearing in Washington.
The influenza, also known as the bird flu or H5N1, has recently started spreading among cattle and other species. One person in Texas has had a confirmed case this year.
So far, genetic sequencing and other data indicate that influenza poses little risk to people, and there are no signs that the flu is transmitting from person-to-person, according to U.S. officials. But they are working on getting treatments, tests, and vaccines ready in case that changes.
“We’ve been busy getting prepared for if the virus does mutate in a way that jumps into humans on a larger level,” Dr. Califf told the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee.
The patient in Texas primarily experienced one symptom: inflamed eyes. Neither the patient nor many of the cows that have been infected have suffered respiratory symptoms. H5N1 commonly infects the respiratory tracts of birds.
“The real worry is that it will jump to the human lungs, where, when that has happened in other parts of the world for brief outbreaks, the mortality rates have been 25 percent,” Dr. Califf said. The worry is based in part on how viruses typically mutate, such as in the case of COVID-19.
From 2003 to April 1, 2024, 889 cases of H5N1 have been confirmed across the globe, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Of the patients, 52 percent have died.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Ukraine War “Spins Out of Control”: Putin Is “Letting It Get Too Late:” to Turn Aside from Nuclear Armageddon
The Russian government including President Putin now publicly acknowledges that Western provocations are increasing in scope and seriousness and are spinning the Ukrainian conflict out of control.
The Russian government has stated that the American F-16 aircraft supplied to Ukraine by the idiotic governments of Denmark, Netherlands, Norway, and Belgium will “be treated as nuclear-capable weapons.”
Dmitry Medvedev, former President of Russia and currently deputy director of the Russian Security Council has declared the West’s leaders to be “infantile morons” whose ignorant arrogance is leading to their destruction.
Alarmed by the increasing likelihood of NATO and US soldiers deployed to Ukraine and by the British Foreign Secretary’s statement that there are no prohibitions on Ukraine’s use of the UK-provided long range missiles to strike deep into Russian territory, President Putin has ordered the Russian Ministry of Defense to conduct exercises to guarantee Russia’s ability to rapidly deploy battlefield nuclear weapons.
Medvedev stated that while the moronic French president speaks of “strategic ambiguity,” for Russia there is no ambiguity. Russia’s “response will not be in Ukraine. There will be no hiding on Capitol Hill, in the Elysee Palace or at 10 Downing Street.”
These developments confirm that I was correct that Putin’s never-ending conflict would permit ever increasing Western interventions until the situation spins out of control. As Putin has never enforced any of his many red lines that the West has crossed in Ukraine, the West no longer regards Russian warnings as meaningful. The warnings are welcomed and used as propaganda to further rouse Western populations to “the Russian threat.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
May 9, 2024
NATO’s Entry Into the Ukraine War?
The war in Ukraine would have meant a return to the Cold War between Russia and the USA and a return to the Doctrine of Containment, the foundations of which were laid out by George F. Kennan in his essay “The sources of Soviet behavior”, published in the journal Foreign Affairs in 1947 and whose main ideas are summarized in the quote “Soviet power is impervious to the logic of reason but very sensitive to the logic of force”.
This would include the entry of Finland and Sweden into NATO military structures and the increase of military forces with four new battalions deployed on the European border with Russia and the Russian response to the installation of missiles in Belarus Iskander-M equipped with multi-purpose warheads as well as S-40 anti-aircraft missiles following the dynamics of the Cold War (action-reaction).
For their part, Russia would have installed in Kaliningrad the Iskander M missiles equipped with multi-purpose warheads as well as S-400 anti-aircraft missiles and in the event of NATO closing the exit of the Soviet enclave of Kaliningrad to the Baltic Sea, could be reissued the Kennedy-Khrushchev Missile Crisis (October, 1962) which would have as its epicenter Kaliningrad.
NATO’s Entry Into the Ukraine War?
With the US immersed in the electoral campaign for the November presidential elections, France, Poland and the United Kingdom would be the trident chosen by the globalists to implode the Ukrainian front next summer and provoke the subsequent entry of NATO into open conflict with Russia of a re-elected Putin until 2030.
Poland seeks to become a local player in the Eastern European hornet’s nest and extend its influence to the Ukrainian area by claiming its right to incorporate the Ukrainian region of Lviv on the Polish map, which was occupied by Poland from 1918 to 1939.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
