You are probably wondering why we used the subtitle “Using the placebo arm data - you never had it so good” for the previous post in the series.

Share Trust the Evidence

That’s because, in the chaos and headless chicken running around activity that engulfed the world during 2020 and 2021, we have not seen any credible data on the number of genuine cases of SARS-CoV-2, real active human cases capable of transmitting the infection. Vague definitions, misuse, and misreporting of polymerase chain reaction and antibody tests raised a media and miasma cloud of impenetrable nonsense. People who stood to gain in any way possible took advantage of the situation. You know the rest.

The Pfizer trial C4591001 gave us an inflated but possibly most accurate incidence estimate. Waving our wand, we accepted the estimate in our previous post, ignoring the problems present even in the placebo arm data. We got 130 cases per 100,000 “at risk” (which, in the panic, meant just about anyone).

Old geezers may remember the rule of when to start getting worried about the level of influenza-like illness/acute respiratory infections: 400/100,000. Arbitrary, back of a fag packet, yes, but based on observations from primary care.

So now we circle back to post 22 of the antiviral series:

In this post, we asked: What is precisely meant by the term “pandemic”?

The reason for asking such a question is now strikingly simple: every time WHO presses the button, the world is plunged into the arms of the pandemic industry.

The answers are, as you can expect, not linear. As Tom pointed out to the Council of Europe in 2010, the definition of pandemic has changed many times to suit what was going on or what the WHO thought was happening on the ground. Before 4 May 2009, the definition of a pandemic (which was used as synonymous with influenza pandemic) was:

“An influenza pandemic occurs when a new influenza virus appears against which the human population has no immunity, resulting in epidemics worldwide with enormous numbers of deaths and illness. With the increase in global transport, as well as urbanisation and overcrowded conditions, epidemics due to the new influenza virus are likely to quickly take hold around the world.”   

This was rapidly changed into “A disease epidemic occurs when there are more cases of that disease than normal. A pandemic is a worldwide epidemic of a disease. An influenza pandemic may occur when a new influenza virus appears against which the human population has no immunity……………. Pandemics can be either mild or severe in the illness and death they cause, and the severity of a pandemic can change over the course of that pandemic” because the previous definition (which had stood for decades) had been written in “error”.

Further definitions followed all a bit different from each other, but the thing to notice was that WHO’s Gregory Hartl justified the mistake by writing the “wrong” definition had been written with avian influenza in mind (talk about circling back, hey?)

If you are interested in the complete list of WHO contortions and flip-flops, just read our antivirals post. Our colleague Peter Doshi (reference below) sheds light on the contortions, and it looks as if no one can still agree on what a pandemic is. 

Least of all, those working on pandemic treaties

For what it’s worth, this is how Encyclopedia Britannica defines it:

“pandemic, outbreak of infectious disease that occurs over a wide geographical area and that is of high prevalence, generally affecting a significant proportion of the world’s population, usually over the course of several months. Pandemics arise from epidemics, which are outbreaks of disease confined to one part of the world, such as a single country. Pandemics, especially those involving influenza, sometimes occur in waves, so that a post pandemic phase, marked by decreased disease activity, may be followed by another period of high disease prevalence.”

Note the omnipresent obsession with influenza. Also, note that Rhinovirus (and many other agents) circulation fits the definition.

All this means that a pandemic is when Dr Tedros says it’s a pandemic.

Two puzzled old geezers wrote this post.

Readings

Doshi P. The elusive definition of pandemic influenza. Bull World Health Organ. 2011 Jul 1;89(7):532-8.

We need a universally endorsed definition of a pandemic for the Pandemic Accord to be effective. BMJ. 2023 Aug 23;382:1946.