Sunday, April 19, 2020

COVID-19: How Big Pharma and Big Philanthropy Consume the World, by MICHAEL BARKER

For a month I argued with the climate change deniers and I learnt an incredible amount about the subject. I lost interest in the climate change deniers when I realised they were sockpuppets who knew that climate change science was right, but they just loved being contrarians.

Now it seems I'm at war with the anti-vaxxers, covid-19 conspiracy theorists, who say it's nothing, and the Bill Gates conspiracy theorists. Many of these people are on the left, like Whitney Webb, who has done a couple of YouTube videos spreading conspiracy theories about Bill Gates. She said how he wanted to use vaccines to depopulate the world, so I tweeted correcting her and also left comments on YouTube.


Bill Gates said that vaccines could help reduce population growth, not the population. There is no welfare in the third world, so people rely on their children to look after them in old age. Because many children may die due to diseases, lots of people will have big families as a safeguard. What Bill Gates was saying is that as vaccines save lives, people may opt for smaller families instead.

Population growth is said to be very high in Africa, and Bill Gates has spoken of his concern that they might outstrip their food supply, which could lead to problems for the rest of the world. He doesn't say what, but immigration could be one, plus wars could that could spill out into the rest of the world.

I agree with Bill Gates about this worry, and I'm certain he's genuinely trying to help people with his vaccination programme, but this doesn't mean I approve of his neoliberalism which he tries to influence third world countries with. Below is an excellent article criticising neoliberalism and some of Bill Gates' pro-corporate policies, which are not in the interest of people in the third world.

In one of her latest articles, McGoey highlights how the Gates Foundation has “aggressively pursued vaccination campaigns at the expense of initiatives championed by health experts in poor nations, who often call for universal healthcare strengthening, rather than what’s called ‘vertical’ disease targeting (campaigns focused on eradicating single diseases).” Although she acknowledges that not everything his foundation does is bad, and that Gates and other elites have stepped in improve diagnostic testing for coronavirus, McGoey correctly concludes that “billionaires won’t save us”. This is because billionaire philanthropists like Bill Gates are the very same people who created and profited from the problems that led us to the current impasse, where global health systems are in crisis, and where 26 billionaires’ control as much as the 3.8 billion people who make up the poorest half of the planet’s population.

Counterpunch 

COVID-19: How Big Pharma and Big Philanthropy Consume the World, by MICHAEL BARKER

17 comments:

Peter Pan said...

The United Nations estimated last year 25,000 people still die of hunger daily. That means more than 9.1 million people die of hunger every year.

Does Bill Gates have a vaccine for that?
Why aren't these deaths being reported by the mainstream media?

Kaivey said...

Good point!

Kaivey said...

I don't think Bill Gates talks about depopulation,but like me, he probably thinks the world would be better off with less people, done naturally, of course, by people choosing to have less children.

That figure of 9.1M dying of starvation is shocking. There should be a massive campaign to stop it. I might tweet Bill Gates and ask him. I don't suppose he would see it.

Matt Franko said...

We throw away half of our food....

Matt Franko said...

“ There should be a massive campaign to stop it. ”

There is...

Kaivey said...

That's terrible.

Greg said...

Yeah Peter ..... no one EVER talks about food insecurity or is working to end it.

Cmon man! I know you have to know better than that

Peter Pan said...

It's not on the news cycle, it's not a priority, and it will continue.

Greg said...

I see something every day on our news where someone is addressing the food insecurity which has been created as result of these lockdowns. Yes I wish the effort would continue in earnest after we reopen, and there are people who have made this their cause long before covid, but I am not optimistic

Problem I see it is that we have deferred to charitable spirit when we have the capacity to guarantee everyone enough food without relying on food banks, church groups or philanthropists. Everyone should have access to food and healthcare whether any other citizen cares about them or not. It’s like we require people to be a certain type of poor or unfortunate so as to appeal to our sense of pity. If they aren’t the right type of unfortunate they can be dismissed cuz we dont feel their pain. I think we want to have misfortune so we have a way for many of us to feel better about our fortune by “helping” someone

Matt Franko said...

Christendom operates largely to do good works... charity, etc...

It’s a slippery slope towards self justification thru these works...

Then Christ died for nothing...

Greg said...

Christendom operates largely as social engineering, and in America it’s been largely elevated to where it is by corporate forces. See “One Nation Under God” by Kevin Kruse


Most churches spend very small portion of their budgets on good works for people outside their circle. Their largest expenses especially for big churches in wealthy communities is on building, maintenance, salaries of staff, in house events for members and children’s programs

True good works as you are probably referring to, is down the list

Greg said...

Besides Matt, there are plenty of other needs that can be met besides food and healthcare insecurity. There will still be people displaced by natural disasters, women needing shelter from abusive spouse (children too) and myriad of other good works to be done. Food should not be issue, nor basic healthcare

Matt Franko said...

The church has no authority to be correcting for those types of human misfortune either...

Matt Franko said...

“Christendom operates largely as social engineering”

No.... Christendom is 99.9% Platonist trained... similar to Econ discipline and to not as great extent biology...

Matt Franko said...

https://www.wfp.org/overview


"Assisting 86.7 million people in around 83 countries each year, the World Food Programme (WFP) is the leading humanitarian organization saving lives and changing lives, delivering food assistance in emergencies and working with communities to improve nutrition and build resilience.

As the international community has committed to end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition by 2030, one in nine people worldwide still do not have enough to eat. Food and food-related assistance lie at the heart of the struggle to break the cycle of hunger and poverty.

On any given day, WFP has 5,600 trucks, 20 ships and 92 planes on the move, delivering food and other assistance to those in most need. Every year, we distribute more than 15 billion rations at an estimated average cost per ration of US$ 0.31. These numbers lie at the roots of WFP’s unparalleled reputation as an emergency responder, one that gets the job done quickly at scale in the most difficult environments.

WFP’s efforts focus on emergency assistance, relief and rehabilitation, development aid and special operations. Two-thirds of our work is in conflict-affected countries where people are three times more likely to be undernourished than those living in countries without conflict. "


this aint the only one....

Peter Pan said...

Make it $30 per ration, and perhaps it would become a priority among profit-seekers.

The situation is unacceptable now and will be unacceptable in 2030, at which point the goalposts will be moved. This issue isn't high profile, so it is left to humanitarian organizations.

Matt Franko said...

“$30 per ration”

Hey hamburger and fries at Trump Washington lobby restaurant only $24....