not neolithic Britain yet then?

[wingstoo]

Hmmm, your maths is a bit out.

-Taking the average death toll from the 2 WWII bombs as 110,000 (going on your figures) per bomb
-Assuming a modern nuclear war will use modern nuclear warheads rather than 60 year old atom bombs which will give an approx 160 KTon yield as opposed to Nagasaki's 20 - 22KTon yield
-Bearing in mind an actual war will involve the targeting of approx 30 - 40 targets in the UK alone...........

Then your looking at a (simplistic but fair) death toll of approx. 3.8 million or just over half the UK population.

Assuming any war will involve attacks on more than one country, and taking into account collateral deaths through radiation exposure, lack of resources etc. then I'd say yes - saying swine flu could be more deadly than nuclear war is scare mongering.



Seriously - more people have dies in the past year through allergic reactions to prescription drugs than have dies from swine flu - where's the ibuprofen vaccine? okenest:

And of course you have not quite grasped what I said, we have not had any deaths from Nuclear war since 1945, in fact we have not had a nuclear war at all, so if there was just one death from swine flu it is one more than from a nuclear war.

You are looking at the results if there had been or was a nuclear war, we have not had one, so you are basing your outlook on if and buts, rather than the facts of no nuclear war, no casualties.

 

[Toddy]

We teach our schoolchildren to, " look for the agenda behind the propaganda"

Sometimes I think we adults need to learn that lesson too

The one factor that none of you, or as far as I'm aware, a single newspaper has made mention of, is that all this scaremongering about this latest flu has in fact changed people's behaviour sufficiently that *normal* flu deaths this year are greatly reduced.
Now that's worth paying attention to.
How do we keep that effect without all the hype

cheers,
Toddy

 

[wanderingblade]

You are looking at the results if there had been or was a nuclear war, we have not had one, so you are basing your outlook on if and buts, rather than the facts of no nuclear war, no casualties.

As there has never been a nuclear war what other way of looking at it is there?

I based my outlook on potential casualties of a modern day nuclear war as opposed to a nasty case of the sniffles AKA swine flu.

Kind of thought that any article that ran with the header "How swine flu could be a bigger threat to humanity than nuclear warfare" might be refering to the consequences of swine flu as opposed to a nuclear war.

If they were making a comparison to an event that would not / could not happen then why not run with the headline "Swine flu may kill more people than an invasion from Mars"

Of course, any article that opens with this headline only to close with "Nothing, short of perhaps nuclear war, has such potential to kill so many" kind of makes a mockery of the whole premise.

Daft, daft, daft.

 

[wingstoo]

The problem when Swine flu started was that no one knew where it was going, no one really knew that it wouldn't have gone the way of the 1918 pandemic, and that had a death toll of something estimated between 50 and 100 million, so, with the increase in population since then and projecting those figures forward it "might" have doubled or trebled that figure?

So 150 to 300 million projected deaths.

But it didn't and as Toddy has pointed out the result of scaring the Carp out of people has had a positive result.

 

[TallMikeM]

We teach our schoolchildren to, " look for the agenda behind the propaganda"

Sometimes I think we adults need to learn that lesson too

The one factor that none of you, or as far as I'm aware, a single newspaper has made mention of, is that all this scaremongering about this latest flu has in fact changed people's behaviour sufficiently that *normal* flu deaths this year are greatly reduced.
Now that's worth paying attention to.
How do we keep that effect without all the hype

cheers,
Toddy

and are you saying that's a direct and intended effect of the swine flu scaremongering?

 

[caliban]

We teach our schoolchildren to, " look for the agenda behind the propaganda

In other words, "follow the money", and using this priciple the original story doesn't sound at all far fetched. To dismiss the original story because it originates from the Daily Mail is an example of the genetic fallacy. Drug companies conduct all sorts of medical experiments and in the process discover that certain combinations of chemicals have various interesting results, for which they retrospectively seek medical applications. An example would be the American phenomenon of "strep throat", for which they take various patent remedies. People of our parents generation sometimes got a "sore throat" for which they either shut up and got on with it, or in a worst case scenario they sucked a boiled sweetie, in an extreme case you might gargle salt water and lemon. Salt water lemon and boiled sweets don't make money for Glaxo Klein Incorporated of course, so let's call it "strep throat" and get the pennies rolling in. Problem, reaction, solution, as David Icke would say.

 

[John Fenna]

Sore throat?
Best remedy is gargling with Whisky!
Tastes better than salt water or patent antiseptics, is equally antiseptic and - remember not to spit it out - makes you feel better, even if it does not cure you!
You might even get to like having a sore throat .....
The only patent medicines I take as first choice are pain killers (pethadine has no equal for treating Renal Colic, Migralieve for migraine) for the rest I tend to go for herbal stuff..
Beer is a class A diuretic, liquorice a great laxative, gin treats the symptoms of the runs etc etc etc
And no multi-national drug barons get rich off my illness
Cullpeper rules the sickroom!

 

[BushEd]

i promise this is not made up, show's how little actual testing drug companies do. i've heard flu vaccines are also highly carcinogenic...

anyway, this is the weirdest thing i've ever seen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5ZWhELqnlA

 

[Toddy]

and are you saying that's a direct and intended effect of the swine flu scaremongering?

Yes, but unintended I think, but basically because people actually practiced basic hygiene.

Don't sneeze all over everyone; if you aren't well, isolate yourself; wash your hands; don't spit; dispose of used tissues properly; ....... actually makes a difference, not just your Mum nagging at you to be 'polite'

cheers,
M

 

[HillBill]

i promise this is not made up, show's how little actual testing drug companies do. i've heard flu vaccines are also highly carcinogenic...

anyway, this is the weirdest thing i've ever seen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5ZWhELqnlA

Thats awful, worst thing is the governments made prosecution of the drug companies impossible.

They should be liable for it.

 

[caliban]

John Fenna's post made me think of some of the older patent remedies that do actually work. There used to be an old remedy for hacks and chapped skin called "Snowfire", Olbas Oil is the business, I seem to remember menthol crystals worked quite well and my mum used something called "tooth tincture for toothache. Anyone have any others up their sleeves?

 

[Toddy]

Tea tree for athlete's foot, honey and almond oil (see Locum76) for lipsyl for cracked or weather sore lips. Magsulph (or sugar) poltices for festering skelfs. Oil of cloves for toothache until you can get to a dentist.
Grated onion covered in brown muscovado sugar, leave to sit in a jar overnight and a spoonful of the juice that develops is good for a sore throat or a cough.

cheers,
Toddy

 

[TallMikeM]

Yes, but unintended I think, but basically because people actually practiced basic hygiene.

Don't sneeze all over everyone; if you aren't well, isolate yourself; wash your hands; don't spit; dispose of used tissues properly; ....... actually makes a difference, not just your Mum nagging at you to be 'polite'

cheers,
M

I'll agree with the unintended bit. Guess I'm struggling to see where the hidden agenda is.

 

[TallMikeM]

John Fenna's post made me think of some of the older patent remedies that do actually work. There used to be an old remedy for hacks and chapped skin called "Snowfire", Olbas Oil is the business, I seem to remember menthol crystals worked quite well and my mum used something called "tooth tincture for toothache. Anyone have any others up their sleeves?

my missus once cured a tooth abscess using bicarb of soda and salt. Oddly enuff, a guy I was working with was being treated by the dentist for the same condition. His lasted weeks, in the end I told him what my missus had done, he tried it and his abscess went in a week as well.

 

[John Fenna]

Alcahol for athletes foot! (but not whisky or gin this time!)
I used to suffer badly with this - especially on exped - but a chiropodist friend of my fathers told me not to waste my money on Mycil type treatments but use surgical spirit or (when on exped using Trangias) meths.
I used a bit of cotton wool dipped in the spirit to wipe down (almost dry-dip and squeeze the cotton wool out) the prone areas - "body folds" and tween toes - every morning and night.
The used cotton wool could even be used as tinder.....
Cheap and VERY effective!
Not that I think that T-Tree does not work (I am a trained Aromatherapist) it is just that spirit is cheaper!

 

[Bushwhacker]

When we had cuts as kids, mother used to tell us to go swim in the sea.

 

[Toddy]

I'll agree with the unintended bit. Guess I'm struggling to see where the hidden agenda is.

Promote the scare tactics and we all fall into line with unnecessary (I've lost control of the n's c's and s's somewhere with that one ) vaccinations, result= profits for drug manufacturers.
Instead of playing up panic, it would have been more logical to play it down........like wartime broadcasting )

cheers,
M

 

[Toadflax]

........like wartime broadcasting )

cheers,
M

Those halcyon days, when the press may have told lies, like how Dunkirk was a victory for us, but at least they were positive lies and had a good purpose.


(grumpy old) Geoff

 

[John Fenna]

I had the same advice from a Hospital in Cornwall 30 years ago when I messed up my feet a bit....but then I saw all the raw sewage and gave it a miss!

 

[TallMikeM]

Promote the scare tactics and we all fall into line with unnecessary (I've lost control of the n's c's and s's somewhere with that one ) vaccinations, result= profits for drug manufacturers.
Instead of playing up panic, it would have been more logical to play it down........like wartime broadcasting )

cheers,
M

I thought we mostly had spotted that agenda, that the scare tactics were all to get us to buy their products. You mentioned a hidden agenda we hadn't got...
EDIT: tho at least this scaremongering has had a positive effect, as you mentioned normal flu deaths are down.