Amazon refuses to sell book on Covid-19 and lockdowns

That kind of viewpoint allows the media to peddle lies 24/7 and never be held accountable for them. Not that it'd stop them anyway, mainstream media is built upon lies (whether outright fabrications or lying by omission).

Studies are not facts. They are a mechanism by which decisions can be guided. That's why on all major issues there are hundreds of peer-reviewed studies on either side saying opposite things.

And it's not like academia is immune to this. Selection bias? Claims of causation? I bet half of the researchers on this list could have their work criticized in a similar manner.

>"marijuana makes young black people mentally ill and violent."

Interesting framing of his quoted passage. He doesn't say it makes "black people" mentally ill and violent, he says it makes all people mentally ill and violent. Whether or not that's true (I don't believe it is), that's a bad faith interpretation of his argument.

Who decided this is over and in the past tense? That's what troubling me, personally. I feel there's a point at which people are going to look down and realize we've run off a cliff into midair. We may not be in danger of having the hospitals overrun, so it could be ok, but it makes me nervous. If reopening goes well in the US and western Europe, what about the countries where the epidemic is spreading now at an ever increasing rate?

Daily new cases have been trending up for roughly a month, and daily new deaths have been declining, but may be turning a corner right now.

Do you have a source on that?

It's not about countering falsehoods, it's about giving people the tools to think critically and not be duped by falsehoods in the first place.

I wonder if Amazon would have reversed their original decision on more detailed review, without the publicity you speak of. Are we sure that the blog post or this discourse are the causes that effected the book being offered for sale in the end?

I would have read the blog post and HN comments with less skepticism if there was evidence that Amazon had continued to refuse to sell the book after multiple submissions and signs of human / managerial interaction in the process on their part.

I'm a true believer in the drug's seventy year safety record when given as a prophylactic for malaria prevention millions of times and over the counter in many places.

> The argument becomes more difficult the more widely used and essential a platform is.

The solution is to not let any one platform get that big and essential as a matter of policy.

For free speech to actually be positive, I'm starting to think it's actually pretty important for that speech to be subjected to some kind of peer review process before it's broadcast widely. We used to have that when broadcasting was more limited and expensive, but by destroying those limits, social media also weakened the peer review.

People are more comfortable with smaller actors making editorial decisions, we need those kinds of decisions, so we need to keep the actors smaller.

Trust Amazon moderators will do the right thing, of course!

I'm sure Amazon can build a massive team of highly educated unbiased technocrats to carefully parse through the tens of millions of content being added to their services any one day.

There's no way this could fail.

[4] https://www.amazon.com/Worlds-Collion-Immanuel-Velikovsky/dp...

"STOP BUYING MASKS" is not "Masks don't work," especially given the rest of the context of the statement where he's saying they're important to protect high-exposure roles healthcare providers. Which means he's also saying they work.

"They are not effective in preventing the general public" might be reasonably interpreted as "masks don't work", but given that he's clearly saying they work in the same breath, it's a better bet that he means something else.

* There is no scientific evidence they are effective in reducing the risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission

* Their use may result in those wearing the masks to relax other distancing efforts because they have a sense of protection

* We need to preserve the supply of surgical masks for at-risk healthcare workers.

Repeated many times while they were stockpiling them for themselves to resell at 10x the cost to hospitals.

which masks? for what reasons?

> It is not true that people are flattening that into "masks don't work"...Here's an example:

This is an example... of how the advice got flattened. Quoting from that first link:

"Surgical masks likely have some utility as source control (meaning the wearer limits virus dispersal to another person)" "Respirators, though, are the only option that can ensure protection for frontline workers dealing with COVID-19 cases, once all of the strategies for optimizing respirator supply have been implemented."

See anything familiar from my earlier comment in there? Surgical masks are not personally protective, but they reduce transmission. Respirators are protective, but should not be general public resort.

The second article? It's talking about a global shortage, so it's clear which kind of masks they're recommending people not wear. Same with the last article... which also has a later section talking about how masks slow transmission and can be effective.

So... yeah. People were absolutely flattening the advice. And apparently some still are.

If you want, you can transform that into a communications argument, but like I said above, that reinforces the position that curation is an important part of the process.

"We do not recommend requiring the general public who do not have symptoms of COVID-19-like illness to routinely wear cloth or surgical masks because:

"There is no scientific evidence they are effective in reducing the risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission

"Their use may result in those wearing the masks to relax other distancing efforts because they have a sense of protection

"We need to preserve the supply of surgical masks for at-risk healthcare workers.

"Sweeping mask recommendations—as many have proposed—will not reduce SARS-CoV-2 transmission, as evidenced by the widespread practice of wearing such masks in Hubei province, China, before and during its mass COVID-19 transmission experience earlier this year. Our review of relevant studies indicates that cloth masks will be ineffective at preventing SARS-CoV-2 transmission, whether worn as source control or as PPE.

"Surgical masks likely have some utility as source control (meaning the wearer limits virus dispersal to another person) from a symptomatic patient in a healthcare setting to stop the spread of large cough particles and limit the lateral dispersion of cough particles. They may also have very limited utility as source control or PPE in households."

Note the word in the first sentence: "requiring".

The article then goes on to describe filter fit and efficiency.

"These studies demonstrate that cloth or homemade masks will have very low filter efficiency (2% to 38%). Medical masks are made from a wide range of materials, and studies have found a wide range of filter efficiency (2% to 98%), with most exhibiting 30% to 50% efficiency.6-12"

"In sum, given the paucity of information about their performance as source control in real-world settings, along with the extremely low efficiency of cloth masks as filters and their poor fit, there is no evidence to support their use by the public or healthcare workers to control the emission of particles from the wearer."

As well as surgical masks...

"There is no evidence that surgical masks worn by healthcare workers are effective at limiting the emission of small particles or in preventing contamination of wounds during surgery.

"There is moderate evidence that surgical masks worn by patients in healthcare settings can lower the emission of large particles generated during coughing and limited evidence that small particle emission may also be reduced."

And N95 respirators...

"In summary, N95 FFRs on patients will not be effective and may not be appropriate, particularly if they have respiratory illness or other underlying health conditions. Given the current extreme shortages of respirators needed in healthcare, we do not recommend the use of N95 FFRs in public or household settings."

And in conclusion:

"While this is not an exhaustive review of masks and respirators as source control and PPE, we made our best effort to locate and review the most relevant studies of laboratory and real-world performance to inform our recommendations. Results from laboratory studies of filter and fit performance inform and support the findings in real-world settings.

"Cloth masks are ineffective as source control and PPE, surgical masks have some role to play in preventing emissions from infected patients, and respirators are the best choice for protecting healthcare and other frontline workers, but not recommended for source control. These recommendations apply to pandemic and non-pandemic situations.

"Leaving aside the fact that they are ineffective, telling the public to wear cloth or surgical masks could be interpreted by some to mean that people are safe to stop isolating at home. It's too late now for anything but stopping as much person-to-person interaction as possible.

"Masks may confuse that message and give people a false sense of security. If masks had been the solution in Asia, shouldn't they have stopped the pandemic before it spread elsewhere?"

All of this is backed up with a goodly stack of references. Which part do you consider dead wrong, and based on what?

  These organizations were dead wrong, and it had severe consequences for the spread of infection. 

Lot's of things are tried with a novel virus, and only some of them work. The only things so far that seem to be clearly working are distancing regulations and effective contract trace, the latter being very difficult to implement.

The reason why was because he declared there existed something called "bacteria", invisible to the eye, which was infecting patients and killing them.

He was ridiculed (#fakenews!), stripped of his professional degrees, LOCKED IN AN INSANE ASYLUM and eventually, beaten to death by guards.

Well, turned out, ole Semmelweiss was onto something. Who knew?

Amazon is a private company and they can sell what they want. That seems to bother you, because of a de facto monopoly they hold, but that is beside the point. Why do you think it is an author’s right to have any third party sell their book?