Branch Covidian Advent Calendar, 12 Dec. 2023

When Austria Experiences 'Twice as Many Cases as Last Year'

Fear! Panic! Do…what exactly?

Thankfully, ‘the experts™’ are there for us, via Österreich, 11 Dec. 2023. Translation and emphases mine.

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Corona: Now Twice as Many Cases as Last Year

Via Österreich, 11 Dec. 2023 [source]

Alarming figures are once again available from the headquarters of the Austrian Health Insurance Fund. There are currently 303,212 Austrians on sick leave.

Of these, 41,690 have a coronavirus infection. That's almost twice as many (+90% to be precise) more than exactly one year ago! [oh, look, they lied in the headline]

States Report Record Numbers

In the past few days, one federal state after another has reported new record figures. After Tyrol and Vienna, Upper Austria has now also reported that the number of infections is higher than ever before. This is shown by current wastewater analyses. Sick leave is not only a burden on hospitals, but also on many companies.

[about the wastewater surveillance: it commenced on 17 Jan. 2022, and when they tell you such things as ‘numbers have never been higher’ but omit that little factoid, you know it’s propaganda]

‘Leave Out Parties’

Health Minister Johannes Rauch (Green Party) has still only issued a recommendation to wear a mask, e.g., in hospitals, nursing homes or doctors' surgeries. ‘We are in the middle of a corona wave. The national wastewater monitoring clearly shows this’, says Rauch. His counterpart from Germany, Karl Lauterbach (SPD), is clearer. He believes that people should wear masks again, work from home, and avoid parties, especially now, in the run-up to Christmas.

This is How Important Measures Are

Austrian Health Insurance Fund Head Physician Andreas Krauter on the situation: ‘The number of people contracting the real flu and Covid also continues to rise. Compared to the past, it is not only flu-like infections and influenza typical of the cold and damp season, but also Covid as a constant viral pathogen that is causing additional sick leave [what about seasonality of, say, respiratory illnesses? It doesn’t matter, but I suspect Dr. Krauter knows it’s a thing]. It is therefore all the more important to implement sensible measures, including wearing a mask when in crowds, disinfecting hands, keeping your distance, and regularly ventilating rooms. And, of course, vaccination against influenza and Covid, which at least prevents severe cases and secondary illnesses.’

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Bottom Lines

If you thought the past four years were, above all, a massive exercise in stupidity, behold the mega-moron Dr. Krauter: for him and his ilk, ‘sensible measures’ would incl., well, everything that has been tried and found wanting in the past four years, specifically ‘wearing a mask when in crowds, disinfecting hands, keeping your distance, and regularly ventilating rooms. And, of course, vaccination’.

Moving on to sick leave notions, well, here we learn that these stupid biopolitical, pseudoscience-peddling ‘experts™’ are, in fact, oblivious to whatever costs their schemes impose. And here we’re talking ‘only’ cost in money terms.

Background here for the following paragraph can be found here:

Branch Covidian Advent Calendar, 5 Dec. 2023

Facts, having long since ceased to matter, are of no use. Here’s a useful ‘statistic’, courtesy of a short piece that appeared in Heute on 9 Dec. 2023 (my emphasis):

The Austrian Health Insurance Fund (ÖGK) had almost 300,000 insured persons registered as sick at the end of November, last week [the first week in December] it was already 322,077. 82,000 people are affected in Vienna alone.

Isn’t it curious that three days ago we learned that in the second week of December 2023 there were ‘already 322,077’ people on sick leave, while three bloody days later, as per the above piece, ‘currently 303,212 Austrians on sick leave’. These numbers come from the same bloody institution that Dr. Krauter is chief physician of.

‘Twice as many cases as last year’ is, well, a wonderful example of massaged numbers, to say the least.

Oh, whatever the costs, right? Around 300,000 people on sick leave means approx. 10% of the workforce is not, well, at work right now. The costs, as per that second piece (in Heute) is about half a billion euros per week. Spare change, I’d propose, and I’m sure these costs would skyrocket if we actually did what chief physician Krauter demanded, ‘sensible mandates’.

Afterthoughts: Frédéric Bastiat (1801-50) on Socialism

Socialism, like the ancient ideas from which it springs, confuses the distinction between government and society. As a result of this, every time we object to a thing being done by government, the socialists conclude that we object to its being done at all. We disapprove of state education. Then the socialists say that we are opposed to any education. We object to a state religion. Then the socialists say that we want no religion at all. We object to a state-enforced equality. Then they say that we are against equality. And so on, and so on. It is as if the socialists were to accuse us of not wanting persons to eat because we do not want the state to raise grain. I do not dispute their right to invent social combinations, to advertise them, to advocate them, and to try them upon themselves, at their own expense and risk. But I do dispute their right to impose these plans upon us by law—by force—and to compel us to pay for them with our taxes. [source]