James Webb Space Telescope launches! No site visit. 26th December 2021

Yesterday was Christmas day, overcast and decidedly manky. Definitely no site visit, regardless of the lousy light conditions.  Today, it is currently pouring with rain; adding to the deluge yesterday, and over night.  Any miniscule thoughts of a possibly site visit today have been soundly abandoned; spurred on by thoughts that Inert et al haven't done very much over the past week.

I have no idea if this lack of activity was, in part, due to the Omicron variant of SARS-2 i.e. Covid-19. Possibly. I doubt much will happen this coming week. I may pay a site visit next Saturday or Sunday. Depends on the weather. Therefore, I wish you all a happy new year.

But spare a thought for the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish. Their loony leaders have imposed unnecessary restrictions due to the perceived threat of SARS-2 omicron variant. The loony leaders are in the thrall of the even loonier, so-called experts.

As both a graduate and postgraduate of Imperial college, and as someone who worked in the world of data science and analytics in my career, I know only too well the limitations, fallibility and outright dodginess of data models. The ultimate examples being: weather forecast, election polling forecasts and financial market forecasting. I have been saying this for over 18 months.

I  was appalled that both the LSTHM and Imperial college teams gave the omicron variant the same lethality as the delta variant, in their models. Despite all the reports coming out of South Africa, which pointed to the opposite. They modellers and so-called experts also ignored the cardinal rule of viruses: a virus has two evolutionary choices - get more lethal and less infectious or get less lethal and more infections.

In presenting best and worst case scenarios, the modellers and so-called experts ignored a fundamental psyche of human nature; we focus on the worst case scenario. It was appalling, and unprofessional for both the LSTHM to publish the results of their  model before it was peer reviewed - talking about 75,000 deaths due to omicron variant, and for Prof Whitty to reference this figure. Seriously! He obviously forgot about having to apologies about  the 4000 daily deaths per day forecast he quoted mid way through 2020. 

Right from day one, reports from South Africa said that omicron variant was way less lethal than delta and that the vaccine offered protection from serious symptoms. This would largely ignored by the so-called experts. Though who did notice it and said restrictions were unnecessary - causing more damage than good, were drowned out by the high priests of lockdown.

When their was growing acceptance that omicron variant was less lethal and that SA hospitals weren't overwhelmed, with mass admissions and deaths, the so-called experts move the goal posts, saying that the UK's demographic was different and that they (the experts) did not know how events would pan out in this country.

Hold the phone. These are experts. They should know or at the very least have a very good insight based on over a hundred years of viral research and experience. They can't take the stance of 'could', 'might', 'maybe', etc, etc, etc and then opt for the default suggestion of lockdown.

Well, until next year. Good luck to you all.