Free speech should be what is contagious

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Our present social system comes in various guises.  Many countries have some form of dictatorship, others have freer systems with less restriction on free speech.


  In China, if you vote, you vote for the regime. Any kind of dissent or disaffection, you’re in trouble. So when Dr Li Wenliang (a doctor in Wuhan, in central China) decided some of his patients were showing symptoms reminiscent of the Sars epidemic of 2003, and warned others to take extra care, the police moved in.


 They told him about the nasty things which happen to people who “make false comments” and “disturb the social order”, and he had to promise to shut up.


  For some strange reason this vigorous police action didn’t kill off the virus, or stop the disease spreading.  More people fell ill with flu-like symptoms, including Dr Li, who died. 


 At the Lunar New Year, thousands of Chinese (or even millions – China is a big country) travel to celebrate the holiday with relatives.  All of this continued, and when the Chinese authorities finally had to agree that something was wrong, the virus had spread all over China, and to other countries. Now in China and elsewhere, there is an economic slowdown, and stock exchanges all over the world report sharp falls in the price of shares.


      In other words, if China had what is usually called democracy, so doctors were less likely to be told to “shut up or else”, it is likely that mass travel across the country could have been restricted much earlier, and probably coronavirus nipped in the bud.  If these crisis measures had been taken promptly, it would have been much better for the world’s share owners, and might have saved them from the losses which coronavirus is now imposing. This could explain why in some countries the people in power agree that there are benefits in free speech.



Alwyn Edgar

Raise wages, cut hours, double the work-load

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Target increased their minimum wage then rolled out a “modernization plan” in 2019 to increase efficiency that cut workers’ hours and doubled their workload.  Target reported record share prices at the end of 2019.



Adam Ryan, 31, has worked at Target in Christiansburg, Virginia, for three years. He works additional jobs whenever he’s able to, but is regularly scheduled only 20 hours per week at Target, despite having open availability.



“I have to live with my family because I can’t afford rent on my own. I don’t have health insurance. I’ve had a rotting tooth in my mouth for years that I haven’t been able to receive treatment. I’ve applied for Medicaid in Virginia and every time I’m told I make too much money, and Target has told me I don’t qualify for their benefits because I don’t get enough hours,” said Ryan, who is also an organizer with Target Workers Unite, an independent initiative of Target workers.
Some 54% of workers surveyed report management telling them not to discuss wages with other workers and 41.6% of workers report workers have been reprimanded by management for discussing workplace issues in the store or on social media.
In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Bonnie Furlong has worked as a cashier at Target for about seven years, but still makes what starting workers make, $13 an hour.



“The last time they raised it, they cut our hours, so I’m basically making less than I was before they raised it to $13 an hour,” said Furlong. Her hours were reduced from 32 to 38 hours per week to around 20 hours per week. “If I wasn’t getting social security, which isn’t very much either, I wouldn’t be able to work there because I couldn’t afford it.”
In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Bonnie Furlong has worked as a cashier at Target for about seven years, but still makes what starting workers make, $13 an hour.



“The last time they raised it, they cut our hours, so I’m basically making less than I was before they raised it to $13 an hour,” said Furlong. Her hours were reduced from 32 to 38 hours per week to around 20 hours per week. “If I wasn’t getting social security, which isn’t very much either, I wouldn’t be able to work there because I couldn’t afford it.”
A Target employee in Florida for six years also reported drastic cuts to their schedule.



“This year I am losing my health benefits in March because of cut hours and I recently found out I am pregnant so I’m stressed out about it all. I am given eight hours of work to do in a four-and-a-half-hour shift and expected to get it all done,” they said. “I went from 40 hours a week to 15 hours in January 2020.”



In Houston, Texas, a Target employee told the Guardian the modernization plan has significantly increased workloads that aren’t feasible to complete in the time they’re scheduled.



“I can’t get anything done in 12 hours. I can’t pay rent either. They’re trying to minimize the workforce but maximize what gets done, and it’s causing issues,” they said. “I have two jobs to make ends meet on top of college. I don’t really do anything other than work any more, but they keep us dangling on a string.”

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/feb/27/target-cuts-hours-leaves-workers-struggling

Profits before Coronavirus

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Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar—a former pharmaceutical executive—repeatedly refused during House testimony to guarantee that any coronavirus vaccine or treatment developed with taxpayer money will be affordable for all in the U.S., not just the rich.



During testimony before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Azar was pressed multiple times to vow that vaccines and treatments for the coronavirus will be priced fairly and made affordable for all U.S. households.




“We would want to ensure that we’d work to make it affordable,” Azar told Rep. Jan Schakowsky, “but we can’t control that price because we need the private sector to invest.”


Schakowsky tweeted following the hearing that she gave Azar “THREE chances to assure us that any coronavirus vaccines or treatments developed with U.S. taxpayer dollars will be affordable and accessible to everyone and he flat out refused to do so.”


“He’s giving Big Pharma a blank check to monopolize them instead,” added Schakowsky.


Progressive advocacy group Social Security Works said that “this is what happens when you put a Big Pharma CEO who doubled the price of insulin in charge of regulating Big Pharma,” referring to Azar’s tenure at Eli Lilly. “Pharma and their friends in the Trump admin don’t care how many people die,” the group wrote, “as long as they get to make a profit.”


https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/02/27/outrage-hhs-chief-azar-refuses-vow-coronavirus-vaccine-will-be-affordable-all-not

Migrant Misery = Torture

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The trauma Donald Trump’s administration caused to young children and parents separated at the US-Mexico border constitutes torture, according to the group Physicians for Human Rights (PHR). 



Most met the criteria for at least one mental health condition, including post-traumatic stress disorder, major depressive disorder or generalized anxiety disorder “consistent with, and likely linked to, the trauma of family separation”, according to the report. Not only did the brutal family separation policy create trauma, it was intensified by the families’ previous exposure to violence on their journey to the US and in their home countries of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.

The report co-author Dr Ranit Mishori, senior medical adviser at PHR, told the Guardian, “It is beyond shocking that this could happen in the United States, by Americans, at the instruction and direct intention of US government officials.”



 Dr Stuart Lustig, a California-based psychiatrist and long-time volunteer said: “Part of the work is simply building trust in humanity again.”

London Public meeting (29/2)

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“What should socialists do now: Socialist principles and policy”



Saturday 29 February, 2.00 p.m.



Venue: Friends Meeting House, 

20 Nigel Playfair Rd (off King St, at Town Hall), 

London W6 9JF 

(nearest tubes: Hammersmith or Ravenscourt Park)

Divide and Rule in India

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Hindu-Muslim confrontations have begun to occur with sickening regularity in parts of India where the two communities co-exist. Unrest across India began in December with the passing of a law that makes non-Muslims from some neighbouring nations eligible for fast-tracked citizenship – a move many Muslims say is discriminatory and marks a break from India’s secular traditions. Persecuted religious minorities including from Hindu, Sikh, or Christian communities are eligible for citizenship, but those from Islam do not enjoy all the same advantages. 



Modi has pursued a Hindu-first agenda that has emboldened his followers, who account for about 80 percent of the population, and left India’s 180 million Muslims reeling. In August, it stripped Kashmir, India’s only Muslim-majority state, of its special status, a move which Modi defended as a way of integrating the region with the rest of the country. In November, the Supreme Court handed Hindu groups control of a contested site in the city of Ayodhya that paves the way for a temple to be built on a site where a mosque once stood. 



 From being Hindu versus Muslim, they have become Hindu versus Christian, Hindu versus Sikh, upper-caste Hindu versus lower-caste Hindu. It is just about everyone against everybody. The root cause of spreading endemic violence is economic: religious linguistic and ethnic differences provide the excuse and motivation to indulge in it. There is not enough jobs available. There are always economic and social divisions within society to be exploited by those more rich and powerful, particularly when the existing order is threatened. Religious perceptions in any class-divided society are not neutral, but a tool in the hands of the dominant class in its struggle to maintain its control over economic surplus. Religious and all manner of spurious ideological theories are contrived by the ruling class or its representatives in the intellectual community and church organisations to keep the downtrodden perpetually entrapped in the vicious circle of exploitation.



To create a good slave you must first kill his pride, his self-respect, his notion of himself as an ordinary equal human being. The slave’s body is needed – the man’s for labour, the woman’s for labour and abuse; but to control the body the inner spark which ignites anger must be crushed. There are many weapons in the arsenal, both psychological and physical  but the chief one is dramatically simple: hunger. Oppress by destitution. Keep a people on the permanent edge of want. And the last stage of hunger – despair. There is no hope left. 


The real trick is to destroy the confidence of a people: make them believe the caricatures you have created about them. The strength of the hoax lies, of course, in the fact that it is constructed on a malicious distortion of reality to give it a facade of believability. 



UK Inequality

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The gap between the best and worst paid people in Britain is greater than previously thought, according to revised government figures for income inequality levels across the country. The new figures dispel arguments made by the Conservatives that the gap between rich and poor – on official measurements of income inequality – has narrowed since the party entered power in 2010. Surveys do not always fully capture the incomes of the richest families, particularly those among the top 1%.



The   Office for National Statistics said the UK’s Gini coefficient – the most common international measurement of inequality which uses a score of 0-100%, whereby 100% would indicate one person controlling everything – should have been 34.5% in the financial year ending in 2018, rather than 32.5% as official records show.



It said the score would have been around 1.9 percentage points higher on average in the years between 2002 and 2018 if the latest revisions had been taken into account. Britain has one of the highest Gini scores for income inequality in the western world, after the divide between rich and poor ballooned in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It has remained relatively unchanged with a score in the mid-30s since the early 1990s.
According to the fresh analysis, income inequality rose sharply in the years up to the financial crisis, fell during the economic collapse, and has been broadly flat since.



It said the average income of the top 10% rose by 28.5% between 2001-02 and 2007-08. As the banking collapse damaged the earnings of the highest paid, incomes for the group which is likely to include bankers and highly paid professionals fell by 20.8% by the end of 2012-13. Before the revisions, official figures had shown little change over the period.

https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2020/feb/25/uk-income-inequality-greater-than-previously-thought-says-ons

Coronavirus exposes the divide between China’s rich and poor

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The coronavirus crisis has come to clearly demonstrate the impact of these inequalities on public health and access to services. Experts warn low- and middle-income Chinese will suffer the most as the epidemic continues.



“Income disparity certainly makes a lot of difference in crisis-stricken China, and Hubei in particular,” Kent Deng, a professor of economic history at the London School of Economics and Political Science, told DW.



The cost of food, medicines and supplies have peaked since the outbreak, but “those with a deep pocket will be able to maintain their lifestyle regardless,” Deng said, adding that lower and middle classes “will become impoverished this time next year” once their savings have dried up.



According to the economist, China’s “well-to-do class” counts for around 50 million in a total population of 1.4 billion. “The vast majority living hand to mouth cannot possibly afford the outbreak of the new virus,” he warned.
Professor Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute in London, said that the “rich in Wuhan enjoy much better conditions with the lockdown in place.”



For those who can afford it, there is home delivery available of meals, groceries, and certain medicines in quarantined cities like Wuhan. Delivery drivers wearing face masks deliver anything imaginable to people’s homes — from face masks to margaritas. Alongside doctors and nurses, delivery workers have also been hailed as “heroes” by many in China for their hard work. They are also praised for risking their own health to keep the virus from spreading by helping others stay at home.



However, food delivery drivers or small shop workers cannot stop working because they lack savings or social support. Many delivery drivers are also stigmatized as potential carriers of the coronavirus. White-collar professionals can afford to stay home and often have sufficient savings that allow them to halt work for a period of time. Many white-collar jobs can also be done remotely.



“Many workers are employed informally, which makes it impossible to receive social security protection such as unemployment insurance … it’s difficult for them to be out of work and they are more vulnerable to catching the virus,” said Christina Maags, a lecturer in Chinese politics at London’s SOAS China Institute.



She added that China’s underdeveloped welfare state exacerbates inequalities as low-income workers are not protected by a social safety net.



According to Fei Yan, an associate professor at Beijing’s Tsinghua University, lower-income Chinese living in cities are also vulnerable to overcrowding and lack of healthcare options. For example, in smaller houses and apartments, it is more difficult to separate sick and healthy family members. 
“Social status is highly relevant to health, as well as access to information and network support,” said Yan, adding that it is important for China to establish a more comprehensive social welfare system to serve the country’s “underprivileged social groups.”
Travel has also become a right of the rich in China. Since the outbreak, travel restrictions have been imposed that will keep the average person from moving. But those who know the right people can sometimes still get around.
“When people have received approval to travel abroad, or were able to buy plane tickets, this is commonly not only the result of being able to pay, but also of knowing the right people,” said Maags, adding that China’s wealthy were more likely to have political connections which “enable them to circumvent restrictions others face, especially during a health crisis.”
Personalized networks of power in China are known as “Guanxi,” and in China money and connections go hand in hand.
“Cases in which high-income people have managed to escape abroad demonstrate the pervasiveness of corruption in China, where your ‘guanxi’ networks are equally as important as the money you have,” said Maags.



Life Expectancy Declines

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Life expectancy among women living in the poorest communities in England has declined since 2011, says a report warning of growing health inequalities by Prof Sir Michael Marmot, one of the country’s leading experts on health inequalities. It comes 10 years after he first published data on the growing gap between rich and poor, and between north and south, in England. 
Overall, life expectancy growth has stalled over the past decade – for the first time in 100 years. This report is concerned with England, but in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland the damage to health and wellbeing is similarly unprecedented. Prof Marmot said, “If health has stopped improving, that means society has stopped improving.”



 Real cuts to people’s incomes are damaging the nation’s health for the long term. Benefit cuts that push single mothers into poorly-paid, part-time jobs – in which they have to juggle families and work– may take their toll. Not only are lifespans stalling, but people are living for more years in poor health. Austerity has taken its toll over the last 10 years in all of these areas, says Marmot in a foreword to the report. “From rising child poverty and the closure of children’s centres, to declines in education funding, an increase in precarious work and zero hours contracts, to a housing affordability crisis and a rise in homelessness, to people with insufficient money to lead a healthy life and resorting to food banks in large numbers, to ignored communities with poor conditions and little reason for hope…Austerity will cast a long shadow over the lives of the children born and growing up under its effects.”
The largest decreases were seen in the most deprived areas of north-east England, while the biggest increases were in the richest parts of London. Similar trends can be seen right across the UK.
The report highlights:

stalling life expectancy for men and women in England since 2010 the more deprived the area, the shorter the life expectancy among women in the poorest 10% of areas, life expectancy fell between 2010-12 and 2016-18 people in poorer areas spend more of their lives in ill health than those in affluent areas the amount of time people spend in poor health has gone up across England since 2010 cuts in funding in deprived areas and areas outside London were larger and affected those areas more

The report, from the Institute of Health Equity, maintains the widening health inequalities and deteriorating health which have marked the last decade cannot just be put down to very cold winters, flu, or problems with the NHS or social care. Instead, it points the finger at “social and economic conditions, many of which have shown increased inequalities”.
Prof Marmot said similar trends can be seen right across the UK, where the slow-down in life expectancy is more obvious than in most European and other high-income countries, apart from the US. The government must tackle health inequalities “as a matter of urgency” and bring the level of deprived areas in the north up to the level of good health enjoyed by people living in London and the south, the report says. “You talk to local authority after local authority around the country, and they say, ‘We can’t do any more.’ We are closing youth centres, we’re closing Sure Start children’s centres and we are closing libraries, and parks and recreation centres. We can scarcely do what we have to do to fulfil our statutory duty,” said Marmot.



 The president of the Royal College of Physicians, Prof Andrew Goddard, said the review painted “a stark picture”.




Food Insecurity in Venezuela

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One of every three people in Venezuela is struggling to put enough food on the table to meet minimum nutrition requirements.



A total of 9.3 million people – roughly a third of the population – are moderately or severely food insecure, said the study, which was conducted at the invitation of the Venezuelan government. Food insecurity is defined as an individual being unable to meet basic dietary needs.



The study describes food insecurity as a nationwide concern but even in more prosperous regions one in five people are estimated to be food insecure.

74% of families have adopted “food-related coping strategies”, such as reducing the variety and quality of food they eat. Sixty percent of households reported cutting portion sizes in meals, 33% said they had accepted food as payment for work and 20% reported selling family assets to cover basic needs.



The issue appears to be one that is less about the availability of food and more about the difficulty in obtaining it. Seven in 10 reported that food could always be found but said it is difficult to purchase because of high prices. Thirty-seven percent reported they had lost their job or business as a result of Venezuela’s severe economic contraction.



The survey also looked at interruptions in access to electricity and water, finding that four in 10 households experience daily power cuts. Four in 10 also reported recurrent interruptions in water service, further complicating daily life.









Noting that the survey was carried out between July and September, Carolina Fernández, a Venezuelan rights advocate, said she believed the situation had deteriorated even more. While it was once possible for many families to survive off remittances sent by relatives abroad, she said, that has become more difficult as much of the economy is dollarized and prices rise.



Fernández said food insecurity is likely to have an enduring impact on a generation of young Venezuelans going hungry during formative years.



“We’re talking about children who are going to have long-term problems because they’re not eating adequately,” she said.

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