Guest Post by Michael Snyder
The coronavirus outbreak that is raging all over China right now has been making headlines on a daily basis all over the globe, and rightly so. At this point we don’t know if it will ultimately become a horrifying global pandemic that will affect tens of millions of people, but what we do know is that the virus spreads very easily and the number of cases has been rising at an exponential rate. Meanwhile, three other plagues have also been marching across Asia, and most people in the western world don’t even realize that this is happening. What I am about to share with you in this article is quite chilling, and the months ahead will be very dark if these plagues continue to spread.
Long before we ever heard of this new coronavirus, African Swine Fever was devastating pork farms from one end of China to the other. There is no vaccine for “pig ebola”, there is no cure, and once it hits a farm the only thing that can be done is to kill every single pig so that it won’t spread anywhere else. But even though draconian measures have been implemented, it has just kept spreading, and at this point “about two-thirds of China’s swine herd has been lost”…
Video of people fighting over pork at Chinese meat counters will likely become more common as the fallout from the African swine fever outbreak in China progresses.
Brett Stuart, president of the market research and analysis firm Global AgriTrends, estimates that about two-thirds of China’s swine herd has been lost to the disease and contrary to official government reports of recovery, more pigs are dying every day as ASF continues to spread.
Prior to this crisis, approximately half of all the pigs in the entire world lived in China, and they would usually slaughter about 700 million a year. But now pork production has absolutely plummeted, and this is driving pork prices in China through the roof…
In China itself, pork prices are at an all-time high at just under $300 per hundredweight and the country outbids Japan, which is usually the top bidder. Food inflation is soaring and some Chinese people have been unable to buy pork in six months.
Unfortunately, this insidious disease has also been devastating farms in many other nations all over the planet. In particular, Cambodia, North Korea, South Korea, Vietnam and the Philippines have been hit particularly hard.
It has been estimated that one out of every four pigs in the entire world has already died, and this crisis is far from over.
Fortunately, African Swine Fever does not affect humans, but this new coronavirus seems perfectly suited to be transmitted from person to person. Johns Hopkins has put up a map that is continually updated, and according to the latest official numbers there are now 14,637 cases and the death toll has risen to 305. But by the time you read this article those numbers are likely to be even higher.
Of course many are extremely skeptical that the official numbers coming out of China are accurate, and this is something that I have written about repeatedly. There have been multiple reports that indicate that China has been falsely categorizing the deaths of many of the victims to keep the death toll down, and it is also suspicious that so many corpses are being taken “directly to the crematorium”…
Radio Free Asia (RFA) has tweeted a disturbing video on its Twitter account on Saturday morning detailing how those who died of coronavirus in Wuhan, the outbreak area in China, were loaded up on a bus and taken “directly to the crematorium.”
RFA said (in a translated tweet): “[Latest Situation of Wuhan Fifth Hospital] Some Wuhan citizens entered Wuhan Fifth Hospital on February 1st and found many patients who died of pneumonia. The corpses were packed directly to the crematorium. Paramedics are busy rescuing the dying patient.”
RFA’s video is in line with our report from Friday that said those who died of the deadly virus were hauled off to a crematorium in Wuhan by Chinese authorities.
At this point we don’t know how bad this outbreak will ultimately become, but we do know that the very first death outside of China has now been confirmed…
The Philippine Department of Health said a 44-year-old Chinese man from Wuhan was admitted on Jan. 25 after experiencing a fever, cough, and sore throat. He developed severe pneumonia, and in his last few days, “the patient was stable and showed signs of improvement, however, the condition of the patient deteriorated within his last 24 hours resulting in his demise.”
The man’s 38-year-old female companion, also from Wuhan, also tested positive for the virus and remains in hospital isolation in Manila.
Meanwhile, there has been a very alarming resurgence of the H5N1 bird flu in China.
According to the Daily Mail, more than 17,000 chickens have been culled in an effort to keep this new outbreak from spreading further…
China has reportedly seen an outbreak of a ‘highly pathogenic’ strain of H5N1 bird flu which has already killed 4,500 chickens.
The outbreak was initially reported at a farm in Shaoyang city in the southern province of Hunan, south of the epicentre of the Coronavirus in Wuhan.
According to the Reuters report, Chinese authorities have already culled 17,828 poultry in the wake of the outbreak.
Unlike African Swine Fever, humans can become infected by the H5N1 bird flu.
And according to the World Health Organization, the mortality rate for human cases is approximately 60 percent.
So let us hope that this current outbreak remains limited to chickens.
Alarmingly, the H5N1 bird flu has also popped up at a facility in India…
Authorities in an eastern Indian state will start culling chickens and destroying eggs from Tuesday to contain a bird flu virus of the H5N1 strain, a government statement said on Monday.
The samples collected from a poultry breeding and research farm of a veterinary college in Odisha state tested positive, the statement said.
We haven’t heard much about the H5N1 bird flu in recent years, but this is an extremely deadly disease, and so we will want to monitor these developments very carefully.
On top of everything else, the H1N1 swine flu is starting to spread once again. In fact, more than 100,000 people in Taiwan “sought medical treatment for flu-like symptoms at hospitals across the country over the past week” and there have been 13 confirmed deaths…
At a time when the world is panicking over a 2019-nCoV coronavirus outbreak, the H1N1 flu virus is actually posing a greater threat in Taiwan, claiming 13 lives in the country in just one week, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).
At a weekly meeting Friday, CDC Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥) said 116,705 people sought medical treatment for flu-like symptoms at hospitals across the country over the past week, including 61 more confirmed flu cases.
Not too long ago, the H1N1 swine flu caused mass panic all over the globe, and I personally knew someone that was killed by it.
So the truth is that all of these outbreaks are very concerning.
And never before have we seen so many alarming outbreaks occur simultaneously. Could it be possible that we have entered a period of time when mass pandemics are going to become “the new normal”?
Hopefully none of these current outbreaks will end up killing millions of people all over the globe.
But we have been warned for a long time about how vulnerable we are, and the experts assure us that it is just a matter of time before a mass pandemic brings death to every corner of the planet.
About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. This article may contain opinions on political matters, but it is not intended to promote the candidacy of any particular political candidate. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.
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There are just too many damned people. Maybe this is Nature’s enema.
When the situation gets desperate enough, and the bus is waiting for a full load, the temptation to hurry along a nearly dead patient becomes acceptable. That is a slippery road, that once crossed, leads to “helping along” more and more patients, some that may have survived, in the interest of expediency, saving space, and “they would have died” anyway.
Feed lots and mechanized animal husbandry should be outlawed as their practices are inhumane and encourage the spread and incubation of new strains of pathogens.
I’m an omnivore as are most people. However, I would prefer that animals are raised in reasonable conditions for their benefit and mine. The food chain with humans at the top is what it is and eschewing meat isn’t going to happen any time soon. That lab grown crap is just going to produce diseases we may not have discovered yet. The phony processed vegetable faux meat is no better. It’s not nice to fool mother nature!
Corporate profits and competition produce low priced low quality food for way too many people on this planet. Half the current population is still too many, especially when viewing the projected population curves going forward. The excess people are overrunning the first world with the full blessing of the respective shit for brains gov’ts.
The corporate and gov’t ‘growth’ mantra is the root cause of all this and it was created and spurred on by the invention of fiat currency by the worlds ass hat bankers and their gov’t enablers. We have to get rid of these people to survive.
SAO,
A very underappreciated comment.
+1
Lots of problems get solved with billions of people being deaded.
Perhaps this is karma for burning dogs alive, boiling dogs alive, skinning animals alive? The Chinese for the most part are a cruel and rapacious lot, when you get a group that will wipe out entire species for money perhaps it is best if they aren’t allowed to continue and grow? Their loyalty is to family and money….
I respect the innate intelligence of the Chinese people. I loathe their cultural practices, especially their diet. I dealt with many of them when I was building thousands of custom PC’s as servers and high end workstations and I don’t like their business practices or business attitude either. They are not to be trusted, especially when they deal with non Chinese people.
But, there are 1.4 Billion of them and they’re not going to disappear any time soon. They have one of the oldest cultures on the planet with a strong work ethic as is evidenced by their rapid development in recent decades. Like it or not, their gov’t structure is damned efficient. Will their economy fail? Yes it will and will take the rest of the world’s economies down due to interconnections if some other black swan elsewhere doesn’t beat them too it. As everyone probably knows, their economy is built on debt even worst than all other developed economies.
They are a force to be reckoned with and I suspect will, by sheer numbers and determination, overtake all other countries economically if not now than after the global reset.
In the case of the US, the legal system and crony capitalism is hindering development to an unprecedented degree. The Fed Gov is strangling the US with bullshit regulations, laws, costs and now social horseshit like LGBTWLMNOP nonsense, cancel culture, political comedies, and a host of other issues that needn’t exist if there were grownups in charge.
Harsh. You know they lead the world in IQ. Americans are fat, lazy, and expect the government to manage their feelings and stimulation. Their loyalty is to government stimulation. We should mind our business better, and solutions are obvious. But the use of ivory, etc., sucks. Loyalty to family. How can I condemn that? Or money? Shit’s a lot easier when you have affluence. I think we can not lump everyone together for punishment. Hail the organic process. We decide very little.
Too much we and buy in to the idea of globalism. I’d like my enemies to die. I’d like my friends to live. We have systemic problems, and China is not the problem. Look at the fucks you see every day. That’s the problem. What I’m saying is that government regulation is the problem not the solution. I want an organic political process. The rest will take care of itself. We have no patriarchy and therefore no culture. Bureaucracy is nothing to salvage. The world will be just fine, whatever the population does. Managing world population is like managing the weather. There will be times of harsher natural selection. We should aspire to win. Thinking beyond that is fantasy. Organic process can be stalled and bent, but it’s not going away. The only thing to manage for us is fighting better because it’s been so long and the need is coming for us.
The Chinese stock market sold off 9% when it opened after their holiday. US investors will do the same as soon as they get wind of the possibility that China just rung the bell at the US top.
Interest rates inverted twice. I don’t think its coronabowna that will tank the US economy. We got fundamental problems, people, as your handle makes clear enough. There’s really nothing else to fix at this point. We are just waiting for when, aren’t we?
The ‘when’ I’ve been waiting for has been 15 years so far, but it’s within sight now, I believe. With the funny money Fed injecting economic heroin continuously into the dying corpse of the economy, it’s a sure sign the patient is near death.
Maybe the Chinese economy will crater, maybe the EU will unravel, maybe ‘global warming’ will trash growing seasons to cause food shortages or actual famine as the Grand Solar Minimum kicks in, maybe …, but something is going to light the fuse on this sucker and blow the US and probably the world’s economy up. Yeah, it’s just a matter of time.
Dave Collum (Cornell) is watching the recovered versus died ratio and is concerned that they’re almost 50/50. The numbers are moving so fast, they’re hard to analyze. And of course, they’re all suspect. Of the 16,758 purportedly confirmed cases, if only 2,148 are “serious”, then ~14,5xx aren’t serious. Those should start showing up in the “recovered” category. Meanwhile, the disease captures more victims. If there’s a longer period before they’re declared “recovered” that would give hope that it doesn’t have a 50% kill ratio.
Thailand reports 19 cases, with 11 recovered, the remainder still being treated and no deaths yet.
Thank God they extended to 14 days the mandatory quarantine of the ~ 200 Americans extracted from Wuhan. We’ll see whether any test positive. Hopefully antivirals will prove effective- as in Washington State. Meanwhile the race for a vaccine is on.
I stopped reading when I saw the author was Michael Snyder.
Don’t hurt me. In trying to amuse myself at a superbowl party. ?
Michael has to feed 4 websites on a daily basis with fear porn. It’s gotten quite old.
I’m pulling for the Pirates over the Celtics.
After this missive I get it.
Scratch the General Tso’s Chicken, and absolutely no Mu Shu Pork for this boy. How about the Shrimp in Lobster Sauce, that’s still safe right?
On the other hand, when any fucking moron starts up about open borders, illegal aliens and unlimited immigration, it is the perfect setup to ask them how they feel about people infected with Novel Corona Virus coming in from China, and other places, along with swine flu and every other sort of communicable killer disease in with them.
Then, when they will certainly agree to checking people coming into the country under those circumstances, for the perfect riposte that shatters their fuktard imbecile Lib world view, let them know that that is precisely the reason for border controls in the first place: public health.
On second thought some Szechuan Pork, Sweet and Sour Chicken and a side order of pork fried rice sounds good; all washed down with a frosty Tsingtao.
But how to chow down with this N-100 mask on is the question.
Tsingtao is actually pretty tasty beer.
Dr. Judy Stone (via Forbes Mag.)
“The decision to impose a severe travel ban and mandatory quarantines in response to the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) flies in the face of public health recommendations, including those from the recent Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security’s “Event 201” pandemic preparedness exercise.
Instead, it appears to be a response to xenophobia from the right wing, as Megan Thielkin noted in Stat.
Information about 2019-nCoV is rapidly changing as public health officials and scientists work feverishly to understand it and curtail its spread. “
Run away!!!
Fuck…Fuck….Fuck….
We have not heard from Llpoh lately. I suspect he is prepping for a long isolation.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/one-number-could-reveal-chinese-coronavirus-cover
The sickest bit of food poisoning I ever got was from eating a street vendor hot dog…
How is this bad for me or the U.S. economy? I’ve had the thought that an onerous trade attack by Trump could bring down the communist government. This post suggests the timing for squeezing could not be better. The big sources of H-1B workers are China and India. We know how US companies outsource to China. China is spearheading high-tech control over the population to include a political score used to ration resources and freedom with party bias. I think I’d be happy to see regime change there. I don’t see a down side to this. Globalism increases the scale of things. Big deal. People die. Flu kills more. I could not finish the OP. Seriously.
Get sick and survive, you are inoculated. That’s the way it works. We got indoor plumbing, food in refrigerators. I know if you’re rather old it’s much more risky, but then there’s much less vitality to lose. This is WHO propaganda to create a global health tax or some shit. Fear conditioning. You could die in a car accident tomorrow, at the hands of a vibrant. I come here to live better. Can you believe it? Don’t answer that.
…seems entirely plausible that the Chinese realized the swine flu was going to cause mass chaos due to starvation and a drastic shortage of food for the 1.3 Billion. To thin out the herd, the WuFlu was “accidentally” released. A 10% mortality rate due to inadequate medical facilities could be expected, but that was 100 million less people to feed and would put a stop to any uprisings a food shortage may have induced.
Way to many people and no way to feed them without resorting to intensive farming and animal husbandry. The crowded cities with their low levels of hygiene will go first. Beijing, Shanghai, Delhi are just a few examples.
Send some of that sh!t to the middle east.
The article left out the plague of armyworm that is seriously affecting grain production in at least 15 provinces in China so far.
China…infecting the world for centuries.