This is an archived version of one of Gigi Foster’s email missives. Some links may no longer be current.
Dear all,
On this ANZAC Day long weekend, I hope you are feeling solidarity not only with freedom fighters of the past but with the increasing numbers of people in Australia and the world today who are coming to understand the folly of lockdowns as a response to Covid-19. Notwithstanding the recent snap lockdown in Western Australia, with other Australian states promptly restricting free border crossings of travellers from WA, the recent protests in London and many of the resources and information below show the slow turn of the tide. I continue to hope that we will be free to live and travel unencumbered by blanket restrictions in the name of Covid by the end of this year or early 2022.
As usual, below/attached is a collection of curated links and reports that you may find of interest.
The most careful cost-benefit analysis of lockdowns for Australia that I have yet seen is attached (“The Costs and Benefits of a Covid Lockdown-6”), penned by Martin T. Lally of New Zealand, who comes to the firm conclusion that the Covid lockdowns were not worth it. Douglas Allen has also produced the attached “Lockdown Report”, concluding that lockdowns may go down in history as one of Canada’s greatest peacetime policy disasters.
On the legal front, disturbingly, Serene Teffaha – a solicitor I have mentioned in previous missives who has been working on class-action lawsuits for those negatively affected by lockdowns – has had her license revoked. She responds here: https://youtu.be/q5g3OvamOik
However, staying with legal matters, there is also the following heartening news:
The following page also featuring Dr Reiner Fuellmich contains, if you scroll down, some useful argumentation against lockdowns:
A Facebook group of Australian lawyers:
https://www.facebook.com/Concerned-Lawyers-Network-110748590838926/
Some useful information, evidence, and analyses by those on the North American continent:
https://www.liftthelockdown.ca/
And staying on that continent, the transcript of a speech by a kindred spirit in the US:
A couple of heartening pieces from the Wall Street Journal:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/an-american-epidemic-of-covid-mania-11618871457
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-lockdowns-werent-worth-it-11615485413
The American Institute for Economic Research and its writers continue to publish sensible and useful stuff on Covid lockdowns:
The Spectator as well has published some quality pieces during this period – a recent one is here, by Ramesh Thakur:
https://www.spectator.com.au/2021/04/lockdowns-are-the-opiate-of-champagne-socialists/
Pieter den Heten passes along information about the group he created to help advocate for Australians stranded overseas during the Covid period, called the Stranded Aussies Action Network (https://strandedaussies.com/). Some key extracts of SAAN’s mission statement:
The Stranded Aussies Action Network (SAAN) is an initiative that formed in January 2021 when the Australian government halved its international arrivals caps.
SAAN’s objective is to make the critical facts and figures widely known and to provide tools to help all of those impacted to advocate for themselves and their loved ones.
SAAN’s founders – the authors of the strandedaussies.com website and resources – are volunteers, currently in different parts of the world, who have been impacted by Australia’s travel ban. They understand the experience of being locked out of their home country.
SAAN is an informal network that is not politically partisan. It is not affiliated with any other group or initiative other than removethecap.com. Its founders are not involved in any proposed legal actions or rescue flights. SAAN requires no membership and it will not collect or store names or personal information. It will not collect money.
SAAN’s objective is to empower those impacted by the travel ban. It provides the informal means for all of those affected to form a unified force that can compel political leaders to act.
From the academy:
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/4/1376/htm
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2021.625778/full
Some recent media appearances of mine:
https://www.abc.net.au/qanda/2021-25-03/13260458
Some turning of the corner in the mainstream Australian press (though I also note that Adam Creighton, who has been one of the staunchest advocates in Australian journalism of abandoning the lockdown approach, has recently moved to the US, taking up a new post as the Washington DC correspondent for The Australian):
Some inspiration from the music world:
Somehow I’ve neglected to include a link to this group in my prior missives, but it is long overdue:
Finally, as the raison d’etre of this mailing list is to help provide solidarity and support for those (mainly in Australia) who believe that lockdowns are the wrong response to Covid, I have resisted including significant amounts of information in these Voices Against Lockdowns missives about related but separate issues such as the vaccines, vaccine passports, testing, masking, anti-Covid prophylaxis, and other interventions being implemented or discussed in the public space. Many of those on this list regularly forward me links about these related topics. While I do not wish to devote much space to them, in case you are interested, here are a few illustrative examples:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPbxOeYAC7s
http://www.jorgprobst.com/en/another-court-acknowledges-limitations-of-pcr-testing/
https://covid19criticalcare.com/
Sense will prevail, eventually. Until we see a cessation of blanket restrictions on normal human activities – including interstate and international travel – in the name of Covid in Australia, I will keep periodically sending these missives. Just let me know at any point if you’d like me to take you off my list. Thank you again to those who have sent me information since my last missive, helping me to compile the resources above.
In solidarity,
gigi
