The pressing, overriding, number-one, get-on-with-it!!! priority must, surely, be to vaccinate the elderly. Instead, Hong Kong officials roll out the red carpet for a delegation of traditional Chinese medicine experts…
Traditional Chinese medicine will be very effective in reducing severe illness and deaths,” [CE Carrie] Lam said.
…”Elderly patients in Hong Kong have more severe illnesses and a higher death rate,” [Mainland TCM expert Xiaolin] Tong said.
“Chinese medicine has its advantages, especially in treating elderly patients with chronic diseases, because it not only targets the coronavirus but also helps treat their other illnesses.”
Full-blown adulatory press release here. More breathless praise for ceaseless Mainland anti-epidemic supplies.
You will soon be getting your very own anti-epidemic service bags with free boxes of quack voodoo placebos with mystery herbal ingredients that might damage your liver. Check out the logistics and manpower. (Can we grind up the TMC pills as fertilizer for potted plants? Hate throwing stuff away.)
More official messaging reflecting government priorities: the latest (in fact, first) Safe Community Newsletter from the Inter-Departmental Counter-Terrorism Unit. The oh-so Civil Service graphic design is itself borderline aesthetic terror.
A few more links, for ambience…
Professor Philip Cowley on how Hong Kong’s zero-Covid mania backfired…
Hong Kong ran out of coffins as well as smugness.
Bloomberg op-ed on the end of ‘antifragile’ Hong Kong…
…the administration’s public statements have tended to emphasize the city’s inability to cope and dependency on help from mainland China.
(An interesting point: unless you’re past your mid-40s or so, you have no memory of a time when Hong Kong had leaders who displayed pride and confidence in the city.)
HKFP on people stranded overseas giving up hope (loosely defined) of returning to Hong Kong anytime soon.
It occurs to me that the ONLY thing I have any memory of Carrie Lam saying about those who are living outside of Hong Kong is her comment that those who left with BNO status would surely come to regret it and in time realise how well off the city was going to be, now that it was in mainland hands and free of all the death and carnage caused by the rioters.
I find it depressingly ironic that more people have died after this comment, and after two years of “peace and stability” while banners on busses and in subways read that your neighbor is probably planning on bombing you into oblivion with a homemade concoction of TCM, linseed oil, fish poop and coffee grounds.
The gun-toting “terrorist” in the government’s leaflet looks like one of the golliwogs I am old enough to have played with as a child before they became politically incorrect. Back during the protests of 2019, I remember the police proudly announcing every few weeks that they had busted a terror cell and seized bomb-making materials. Did any of those cases ever come to court with solid evidence presented, or were they, as many of us suspected, composed of fairy dust?
Ok, it’s that time of the year for the ANNUAL TCM ABBREVIATION COMPETITION:
My humble attempt:
TCM = That Crap Medicine
Any other attempts?
Did y’all see the new HKgov’s “How to identify a suspicious person” leaflet regarding, err, suspicious persons?
These are some of the tell tale signs: Carrying weapons, wearing a hat, mask, gloves, carrying bulky objects around the waist, loitering, looking nervous, showing unusual interest in security matters, expression threat of violence and conducting reconnaissance.
Couple of days ago I bumped into yet another swarm of those extra-chromosome chaps of the PTU and what do you know? They checked all the boxes.
Should I call 999?
The Bloomberg Op-Ed’s quote from the Koala during the ’98 financial crisis was also depressing, especially once you edit it to fit today’s political realities:
“The most crucial factor now is our own confidence. Undeniably, Hong Kong faces many problems. But we must not sell ourselves short nor lose confidence. Rather, we should recognise that
Hong Kong still enjoys a position which is the envy of many. Our society is free, fair and stable; and we steadfastly uphold the rule of law… Above all,Hong Kong people remain resourceful, hardworking, forward-looking and dynamic. I firmly believe that as long as we retain our self-confidence and remain resilient, we will be able to turn crises into opportunities and together overcome the adversities that we now face (in our new host countries).”Which reminds: veteran arselicker Nonceferatu audibly lacked any confidence in his “everything will be alright now patriots are in charge with the NSL and the foreigners will be back soon” bullshit he was so desperately trying to peddle on ‘Straight Talk’ last night.
Perhaps he was all too aware that it was a particularly hard sell on a show whose previous host quit after the NSL and left Hong Kong for good.
What’s with this “shortage of caskets” for burials we keep reading about?
https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/3172320/missing-coffins-hong-kongs-covid-19-deaths-leave
Ignoring the Veblen NT burials with their my grave is bigger than yours cock measuring BS, , surely, if you are going to get cremated why not just have something made out of cardboard, say? Your family can save money or dontate to charity in your memory. Funeral agents are just grief-scammers.
Ah TCM…
I guess we are getting Omicron because our bodies are too heaty?
If only we had fed our old people bitter melon soup.
TCM = Traditional Chinese Masturbation
Or Tossing off with Chinese characteristics as it is better known as.
Totally Chinese Manure
“giving up hope (loosely defined) of returning to Hong Kong anytime soon”???!!
I have a morbid terror of returning to HK anytime soon!
PROPOSAL Legco May 2021
6. The Director of Architectural Services, with the support of the
Secretary for Food and Health, proposes to upgrade the following projects to
Category A –
– at an estimated cost of $8,620.0 million in MOD prices for the development of CMH in Tseung Kwan O; and
(b) 1MZ at an estimated cost of $2,005.0 million in MOD prices for the establishment of GCMTI in Tseung Kwan O.
As these projects never meet budget one can factor in additional billions.
This is why TCM is being, literally, stuffed down our throats,
Estimated annual expenditure $1B +++
An SCMP editorial today puts its weight behind TCM and how it’s doled out to local Covid patients. I know the paper has long been a lost cause, but the way in which the rag’s senior hacks have lost their grip is utterly bizarre.
“Instead, Hong Kong officials roll out the red carpet for a delegation of traditional Chinese medicine experts…”
I thought the Chicoms were ALL about science & technology dominating every problem that might come up? I guess the rhinos, pangolins and deer are REALLY fucked now. (and I suppose Russian troops are breathing a sigh of relief that Xhit Jumping isn’t sending TCM practitioners to deal with their battlefield wounds)
When you have shit for brains muppets like Yonden Lhatoo and Tammy Tam at the the top of SCMP, it doesn’t surprise me at all that they lost their grip. These fucking chumps weren’t promoted for their brains, and the best part is I think they’re really insecure about it especially that clown Yonden.
Against all the odds it seems there’s still a voice of sanity in Hong Kong public life. Even more surprising, it turns out to be a High Court judge!
https://legalref.judiciary.hk/lrs/common/ju/ju_frame.jsp?DIS=143255&currpage=T&fbclid=IwAR0LMpGLhEmmH2B_UOqZWv1VT6fF8uwswAb3wtkXcwET6lPl_N4MRk4PClE
Some of these zingers are worthy of Hemlock himself…
https://legalref.judiciary.hk/lrs/common/ju/ju_frame.jsp?DIS=143255&currpage=T
Russell Coleman judgment just handed down re Covid
2. There may well be room for people to say that a number of decisions and announcements made by the HKSAR Government relating to the Covid-19 pandemic have seemed to be: lacking in logic or common sense; riddled with inconsistencies; short on empathy and human understanding; detached from local personal and business realities; focused on distractions, hence being reactive to what seems urgent at the expense being proactive to what is important; blind to the need for a coherent longer-term strategy and contingency planning and the clear public communication of it; and sometimes even apparently contrary to the very ‘science’ which is invoked to justify them.
20. It is also well known that the HKSAR has pursued a policy to combat the pandemic which is in line with the policy pursued in Mainland China, but one increasingly out of step with most other countries and regions. That policy has been called the “zero Covid” policy, later shifted to or renamed as the “dynamic zero Covid” policy – though it did not inspire confidence that the person in charge of implementing the shift in policy could not give a clear description of it, also showing that a nice slogan is not a substitute for an actual strategy.
25. In any event, the Government had implemented a territory-wide vaccination programme from late February 2021. Notwithstanding that, the vaccination rate achieved was not satisfactory. In part, this might ironically have been the result of the HKSAR’s relative success in keeping numbers of infections and deaths very low, and – albeit with some restrictions on social activity – permitting a relatively normal daily life for most residents. Perhaps a focus on elimination in the present without an announced strategy for the future did not help. Perhaps poor communication giving rise to ‘mixed messaging’ also did not help. Perhaps a false sense of security then contributed to the failure to achieve the public health priority of vaccinating from the most vulnerable down.
Hello folks,
TCM = Tiresome Clueless Malarkey
That said, I’ve always found those Po Chai pills to be just the ticket after a surfeit of pai guat.
I humbly submit Tricks, Charletanism and Mummery although perhaps I was thinking of Curry’s behaviour more than medicine
How the rest of the world ever managed to get functioning vaccines without the glorious motherland’s 5000 year history of making soup from bitter herbs and bones is a question that I would probably get locked up for asking if I lived there. But if it was really effective shouldn’t the mainland avoid the need for so many lockdowns? Wouldn’t it be something that could be exported for big bucks to the rest of the world?
Ah well, I sure woke up full of the aul questions today.
@mifka
Re.25
In addition:
HKG govt had used up in 2019 all the good will & trust ~70% of the population had in our glorious overpaid officials; with no other way to speak up or protest without fear of arrest or worse the population in part went to the only thing they could do – refusal.
@Mifka – @Judge Russ
Well, His Honour Judge Coleman will be up for the Ta Kung Pao roasting before long. Cue the commiepaparazzi….
Totally Crap ‘Medication’
As a shout out to the reason why TCM is still relentlessly pimped by the CCP even though they know it’s garbage:
“Traditional Cynical Maoism”
TCM= Tuttu Caca Mambo
What does it stand for？ I don’t know.
Why do I call it that way? I don’t know.
And if I do know, does it make any difference???
Or was it Taca Cambo Muttu？
I keep forgetting things these days.
Darn….
TCM: Tiger Cocks Mostly