Paris Olympics proved ignoring Covid is not a winner

 Today's article in the Indo: https://www.independent.ie/opinion/comment/tess-finch-lees-it-hasnt-gone-away-you-know-paris-olympics-proved-ignoring-covid-is-not-a-winner/a1177172379.html

Huge thanks to my lovely, principled editor Tom Coogan 😇

Absolutely gutted that my original opening was cut though: ""Olympic dreams shattered", "Covid causing havoc", "Everyone's dropping like flies". Just some of the headlines from the 2024 “post Covid” Olympics” where the word “post” won linguistic gymnastics gold and reality (along with several athletes) collapsed at the first hurdle: Covid denialism". 

Extracts👇

"Five years into this pandemic, the evidence of harm is now irrefutable. Yet most people are unaware, for example, of the Lancet study published in June indicating brain abnormalities in survivors of Covid two years later and that “people recovering continue to experience cognitive, psychiatric, neurological symptoms and brain functional alterations”. Numerous studies have found that even “mild” SARS2 infections can cause or accelerate neurological degeneration. This has wide-ranging implications.

In May, pathologist Dr Margot Bolster reported that Covid-induced brain fog was likely a significant factor in a multi-car crash in Cork killing two in 2022. The driver, who veered onto the wrong side of the road, tested positive for Covid in the morgue. “There were all sorts of brain symptoms with it… it affected all organs of the body,” Dr Bolster said.

Last week, the WHO issued yet another warning: “Your health is precious. Protect yourself and loved ones from Covid: stay at home if sick. Test, get boosted, ventilate, mask around others.”

Again, this information was not shared. Instead, our governments are pathologising, and increasingly criminalising, those of us using proven tools to protect ourselves and our loved ones. As though being scientifically literate is an act of disobedience, punishable by state-sponsored stigma and ostracisation": 

"The Paris Olympics proved that pretending the pandemic is over only serves to prolong it, that everyone, including elite athletes, are vulnerable and that we can’t hand-wash our way out of an airborne pandemic.

We urgently need clean indoor air and sterilising vaccines. Until then, FFP3 masks are the most effective tool we’ve got to protect our precious health".