Using a report which seems to be more about the lack of transparency of the UK Government and SAGE, the Herald‘s Caroline Wilson uses it as an excuse to re-run fake news on the Scottish Government’s handling of the pandemic:
That the re-opening of schools has resulted in a steady growth of cases is a lie. Other than in one school, the small increases (20 or so out of 800 000 pupils and staff returning) have been due to community transmission of people who also happen to be teachers or pupils at a school. Professor Sridhar has summed up the situation after two weeks as ‘overwhelmingly positive‘ and called these incidents ‘bumps.’ Berlin with only 3.5 million citizens compared to Scotland’s 5.4 million has had cases in 41 schools.
Large scale research by the ONS and MHA which has homes in Scotland, has definitively shown that the spread of the virus in care homes was due to the use of agency staff and the failure to offer sick pay to affected staff. There is, I repeat for the umpteenth tine, no evidence at all, from anywhere, that prioritising the NHS caused any deaths in care homes.
How can a government prioritise a state-owned NHS over a care home system largely privately-owned?
As for ‘investing in (unused) health care facilities‘, this is a foul-smelling dig worthy only of the Scottish Conservatives. On expert advice the Louisa Jordan was set up to save lives should the pandemic get out of control. Does Wilson, a mere hack, feel better equipped to have made a different decision? Imagine what might have happened?
Even the ‘unused‘ jibe is inaccurate. The LJ has been used for orthopaedic outpatient consultations, will be used for staff training, teaching and examinations due to the clinical facilities and the space available to maintain physical distancing and, of course, the winter approaches. What do you think Wilson? You’re the big expert? Close it?
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
What we are looking at so frequently in Scottish journalism is stupidity. I copy and paste the opening paragraph of a talk given by Angela Phillips who teaches and is a professor of journalism. There is much in her talk, link below, that can be said and should be said, and I hope will be said, about the vast stupidity of journalists in Scottish Unionism. Remember Angela Phillips and what she says.
https://philosophynow.org/issues/131/Against_Stupidity_in_the_Media
“Stupidity is not about intelligence, or education. Rather, a stupid action or statement usually follows an untested assumption. It is stupid to leave your house without your keys because you didn’t check that they were where you thought they ought to be. And our assumptions too often come from a broad understanding of the world that we have stopped bothering to reconsider, because, ‘Hey, we’ve always thought that, so it must be true’. Broadcasting a conclusion based on an untested assumption simply compounds the error. It is stupid.”
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So are Scottish journalists more stupid than journalists from other parts of the UK.?
Are they being stupid on purpose?
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What does Lord Foulkes say?
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John.You ask as to what Lord Foulkes says
Answer
Nothing of importance
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Glad you asked John. . . . . In fact it was the Old Lordy himself who asked if Scottish Journalists are as stupid as they appear.
We’re all non the wiser.
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As media discussion intensifies south of the Border at the prospect of another ‘Williamson disaster’ when English schools return next week there was a plethora of ‘scare stories/comments around the ‘Scottish experience’ on the TV last night on Wark’s Newsight and ‘Press reviews’ all distorting the reality of the situation which is utterly disgraceful and merely adds to the uncertainties and concerns of parents.
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I read on Sunday that the Nightingale hospitals in other parts of the UK are being closed down. Personally, I’m happy to keep the Glasgow hospital open. Right now, the NHS and PHS are overwhelmed with kids needing Covid-19 tests. Any teacher will tell you August/September are a nightmare in schools with the cold virus flying all over the place. This year, schools are sending kids home if they have a cough or a runny nose, telling parents they need to be tested for the virus – and all the kids in a family need to be tested too. The LJ would be a handy testing hub for most of Glasgow. There are 790,000 children of school age. If even 10%-20% of them get sent home with the cold and need to have tests, the NHS is going to be run ragged. Not to mention the delay there will be as families wait for test results.
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The nightingale hospitals in England being closed, when they should be doing the opposite. The Britnat media in Scotland are a disgrace. The ‘uncomfortable truth’ is that the Britnat media seem to be the only ones panicking, in the hope that people will believe their dangerous lies. Also, Wilson says that ‘HEALTH ECONOMISTS’ say that ‘governments should be more transparent’. Firstly, ‘health economists’? Secondly, Nicola Sturgeon FM, was accused of controlling the airwaves, her party political broadcasts posing as daily briefings pretending to keep the er, public informed and arming them with up to date info and advice, ie, being ultra ‘transparent’. How very dare she!
Oh wait, not transparent enough for Caroline Wilson though! Lying journo’s have a heck of a lot to answer for.
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Oh dear me
If the scribblers of The Herald insist upon being Purveyors of such drivel
Then we are going to run out of straight
Jackets and space in Secure mental health
Units are we not
Someone please alert the procurement people please particularly so as this madness is highly contagious for most in the MSM
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Last night on CH4 news Jon Snow got a bit more than he bargained for when he interviewed Jason Leitch, NHS Scotland Clinical director.
https://www.channel4.com/news/face-coverings-may-be-part-of-armoury-in-schools-prof-jason-leitch-scotlands-national-clinical-director
The previous evening Prof Sridhar was interviewed on CH4 news.
https://www.channel4.com/news/we-should-not-underestimate-the-challenge-of-getting-kids-back-to-school-chair-of-global-public-health-at-the-university-of-edinburgh-prof-devi-sridhar
Credit where credit is due to Ch4 news at least they do give air time to Profs Leitch and Sridhar which is more than can be said for the BBC and Reporting Scotland
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And we all know why ABC and the others
Excluding CH 4
Do not interview them
Tis solely in the interests of deliberate imbalancing the truth
Oh sorry sorry sorry
Thought ABC always strove for balance
I am about to reinstate my licence payments
As i no longer a seeker of truth
I only desire to be mislead and informed by my undoubted superiors and Imperial
Masters
I am far too stupid to understand in any way which Sridhar & Leitch speak as their language is far to complex to understand
Despite I having a 1st class honours degree in Genetics
No doubt my superiors are well aware of that pairs shortcomings
I would rather my monies went towards
Nazis,clowns,morons,liars,cheats,tax dodgers,environmental wreckers,brexiteers,vagabonds,people who delight in putting the boot in,part time linesmen who want to govern,retired bacteriologists with axes to grind
And this list is indeed not exhaustive
But it is of the highest importance that ABC employ interviewers of the highest calibres who will aggressively attack any interviewee who are not of all the latter’s ilk and that is the only way for fair and proper balance
Hail Hail Hail
The last purveyors of coital bovine scatology The soon to be the late ABC
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