Covid in Austria: Summer Lunacy Edition--Régime Mulls Ending Quarantine Obligations, which Triggers Covid Hawks

Highlights incl. distressed 'experts' calling for more surveillance, verbal insults by government officials, and the curious divergence of no-mandates Norway vs. Covidistan gives away the game

So, it’s been a while since I last wrote about this topic, which is mainly due to a few other more interesting topics (to me, that is, and hopefully also to you). Also, there’s the summer heat wave going on that is causing a lot of distress right now, which it didn’t kinda do last year around. Strange days, so to speak.

In addition, in all matters Covid, Austria was quite in limbo in the past couple of weeks: on the one hand, it would seem that the Covid Hawks aren’t going away anytime soon, with a bunch of ‘usual suspects’ calling for more non-pharmaceutical interventions as well as—you’ve probably guessed it—more injections, despite their lack of efficacy. So far, not much change, even though some people, in particular those in the Hawkish Vanguard, are getting more and more itchy as we’re stuck in the middle of what Vienna State officials called ‘an (unusual) summer wave’ (in a since-amended version of a ‘news’ item, courtesy of the Wayback Machine).

Bottom Line: it is expected that no-one needs to self-isolate in Covidistan anymore, as numerous media outlets are reporting in advance of the Committee of Public Safety’s meeting tomorrow, 27 July. Of course, the Covid Hawks are viscerally opposed, ranging from Vienna State Governor (Mayor) Michael Ludwig who called this ‘a step in the wrong direction’ to more base comments voiced by Vienna State HHS Secretary Hacker who, citing ‘recent recommendations to the contrary by the WHO’, bursted out last week:

This is so unprofessional, I feel like throwing up [Das ist so unprofessionell, dass es mir schon jetzt zum Hals raushängt].

As embarrassing as this sounds, this entire shitshow followed on the heels of Johannes Rauch, currently serving (ahem) as Minister of Health, who floated an end to the quarantine impositions last week on 21 July, as reported by Der Standard and various other media outlets. Somehow a draft executive order (Verordnungsentwurf) had been ‘leaked’, which caused the Covid Hawks to go bonkers on Twitter, which in turn made Mr. Rauch backpedal as fast as he could:

Nothing has been decided yet. We’re looking at a number of options. Yes, since 1 July there is the opportunity to regulate, via executive order [Verordnungsermächtigung], to substitute the quarantine imposition with social limitations [Verkehrsbeschränkung]…

Now, I’m the last one to express sympathy with public officials like Mr. Rauch, but even I feel (almost) sorry for him: what he’s actually saying is—no more quarantine, if you test positive, wear a FFP2 mask, and, if you’re sick, you don’t need to go to work.

Speaking of tests—with the full summer insanity on display, as Der Standard explains (ahem)—that these social limitations (FFP2 mask obligation) shall be ‘valid from the moment one tests positive’, but that leaked draft decree maintains that it would be ‘irrelevant’ if you test positive via lateral flow rapid test or a lab-confirmed PCR test, but the use of a lateral flow test must be followed by a PCR test. These limitations shall be carried out for at ten days, but there’s the possibility of ‘testing oneself out’ of them after five days (the PCR test required for doing so may still be ‘positive’, but if your CT exceeds 30, you’re off scot-free).

All of these notions are patently absurd: The most egregious facts are overlooked, and while I’ve been doing these apples to oranges comparisons earlier this year, the most striking images are perhaps these:

Trick Question: which country abolished all mandates in mid-February 2022? (Here’s a hint: it’s not Austria)

What the heck is going on here?

Notice any difference? I’d bet quite a bit of money on the ending of Covid mandates in mid-February in Norway (and its generally much more lenient ‘recommendations’, as opposed to the coercive methods employed by the Covidistan régime), but then again, what do I know?

The most dreadful consequence of these developments is, of course, that ‘the experts’ will have a much harder job now. As reported by ORF Vienna on 24 July, these policy changes will render poor Nikolas Popper’s work much harder. The self-styled ‘complexity scientist’ and Covidistan’s premier modellist (see, e.g., a fawning profile in weekly magazine News [sic] from as recent as 3 February 2022) is one of the chief proponents of Covid hawkery, yet he too sighed publicly (as that ORF Online piece writes)

If the quarantine imposition is ended, then even less people would get tested, Popper feared: ‘Then I’m even more lost in the data. Therefore, a monitoring system consisting of four pillars is decisive: hospitals, tests, wastewater monitoring, and genome sequencing must be carried out so that I will continue to be able to figure things out.’

Is it too early (late) to ponder these levels of arrogance and cognitive dissonance?

If you care to find out more about the non-decisions taken yesterday, here’s a summary, courtesy of state broadcaster ORF. It’s a testament of indecision, mainly because the concerned parties—the federal government, its ‘expert advisory panel’ (GECKO), and the state governors couldn’t agree on anything, that is, except to disagree, hence nothing was done. The next regular meeting of the Committee of Public Safety (ahem, federal government) is scheduled for tomorrow.

Stay tuned for much more insanity.

Stay strong and fight these bastards.