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South Africa Blasts ‘Knee-Jerk And Draconian’ Global Reaction To New Variant — Cases So Far Are ‘Extremely Mild’

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The South African Minister of Health said on Friday that the country is being “punished for transparency” in quickly reporting the new variant.

South Africa’s Health Minister, Joe Phaahla called travel restrictions imposed by the United States, the United Kingdom, and other countries “knee-jerk and draconian” after reports of a handful of cases of the Omicron (which should really be called the “Xi”) variant of the coronavirus.

South Africa has angrily condemned travel restrictions imposed by countries including Britain as “knee-jerk and draconian” as it scrambled to assess the potential for the new Covid-19 variant to unleash a deadly fourth wave.

In a heated press conference on Friday, the health minister, Joe Phaahla, said his country had acted transparently by alerting the world to the B.1.1.529 variant, which was detected by its scientists earlier this week…

…“The reaction of countries to impose travel bans are completely against the norms and standards as guided by the World Health Organization,” said Phaahla. “The same countries that are enacting this kind of knee-jerk, draconian reaction are battling their own waves.”

Source: The Guardian

South African News 24 reported that Phaahla also said that the reaction is “unjustified” and his ire was mostly aimed at the United Kingdom and European nations that were considering travel bans as Southern Africa prepares for the beginning of its summer tourism season.

“We want to assure South Africans and people elsewhere in the world that some of the reaction has actually been unjustified,” [Phaahla] added.

“I am referring to especially the reaction of countries in Europe, the UK and a number of others. I’m told that a number of European Commission countries are also contemplating similar reaction.”

But it’s likely no longer limited to criticism of Europe.

Phaahla’s statements were made on the same day that Joe Biden, an old, white man, imposed a xenophobic travel ban that targets eight predominantly black countries in southern Africa thereby reinforcing the white supremacy that has been in place in America since its founding in 1619. (Did I do the Corporate Media spin properly? Because, man, that made me feel icky!)

ClashDaily covered the hypocrisy of Biden imposing a travel ban after denouncing them as racist while he was running for President in 2020 here:

Biden BANS Travel From 8 AFRICAN Countries Due To ‘Variant Of Concern’ — Is That Racist?

Not to be outdone, New York’s new Governor, Kathy Hochul decided to take proactive measures by declaring a state of emergency with an executive order before a single case of Xi’s Omicron variant has been detected in the Empire state.

As part of the preemptive strike against Xi’s Omicron, the order will postpone elective surgeries… because that’s a brilliant idea and won’t pose a risk to public health.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed an executive order Friday to postpone elective hospital surgeries — something that hasn’t been done since the worst of the initial coronavirus outbreak last year.

Hochul said she made the move to deal with staffing shortages and boost bed capacity amid an anticipated “spike” in new cases and the emergence of the new Omicron variant in South Africa. The strain is named after a letter of the Greek alphabet…

…The edict curbing non-essential surgeries will kick in for hospitals with a limited capacity — defined as at or below 10 percent of available staffed bed capacity.

The new protocols will take effect on Friday, Dec. 3, and will be re-evaluated based on the latest COVID-19 data on Jan. 15.

Source: New York Post

New York is already seeing cases rise again as is consistent with other seasonal illnesses like the cold and flu.

The state is also seeing a shortage of healthcare workers due to heavy-handed vaccine mandates that don’t allow for religious exemptions or natural immunity from recovery.

The thing is… according to The Guardian, the situation on the ground in South Africa with Xi’s Omicron variant isn’t showing death and mayhem or hellfire and brimstone that large swaths of the Corporate Media are shrieking hysterically about — they’re seeing “extremely mild” cases of the coronavirus.

…Dr Angelique Coetzee, chair of the South African Medical Association and a practising GP based in Pretoria, said it was “premature” to make predictions of a health crisis.

“It’s all speculation at this stage. It may be it’s highly transmissible, but so far the cases we are seeing are extremely mild,” she said. “Maybe two weeks from now I will have a different opinion, but this is what we are seeing. So are we seriously worried? No. We are concerned and we watch what’s happening. But for now we’re saying, ‘OK: there’s a whole hype out there. [We’re] not sure why.’
Source: The Guardian(Emphasis Added)

Well, for anyone paying attention, it’s pretty clear why there’s so much hype — it’s to create panic for likes and clicks for the Corporate Media and give more power to politicians to control your life.

After all, it’s not like you can have life return to normal.

Don’t think that this is going away anytime soon. There are 24 letters in the Greek alphabet, Omicron is the 15th. But there’s already a plan by the World Health Organization to use the names of constellations for variants once they run out of Greek letters.

So, get ready for the Andromeda Strain — you know it’s coming.

Some people have been saying for a long, long time that there were going to be variants of this virus and that perhaps it should be a wise course of action to find a way to treat SARS-CoV-2 infections as best we can, protect the most vulnerable to the best of our ability, and recognize natural immunity… but those people were called “conspiracy theorists” and Google AdSense threatened to pull ads unless certain “disinformation” articles with that thrust were memory-holed. After stupidly complying with the Censorious Google Overlords, ads were pulled anyway.

Well, it looks like some people were right and Google was suppressing valid analysis.

Meanwhile, we can all watch how travel bans suddenly become perfectly reasonable and not at all racist or xenophobic now that they’re being implemented by the Biden-Harris administration.

We live in strange, strange times.

K. Walker

ClashDaily's Associate Editor since August 2016. Self-described political junkie, anti-Third Wave Feminist, and a nightmare to the 'intersectional' crowd. Mrs. Walker has taken a stand against 'white privilege' education in public schools. She's also an amateur Playwright, former Drama teacher, and staunch defender of the Oxford comma. Follow her humble musings on Twitter: @TheMrsKnowItAll and on Gettr @KarenWalker

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