Monkeypox - How the World Health Organization has Taken Political Correctness to the Extreme

Despite the fact that the monkeypox narrative never really took hold of the world and created fear among the sheeple like the COVID-19, the World Health Organization has not been content to let "sleeping monkeys lie".

 

Here is a recent news release from WHO:

 

It would appear that the monkeys that WHO officials talked to about the issue made it very clear that they found the use of the word "monkey" in monkeypox highly offensive.

 

Here are some quotes from the news release:

 

"Following a series of consultations with global experts, WHO will begin using a new preferred term “mpox” as a synonym for monkeypox. Both names will be used simultaneously for one year while “monkeypox” is phased out.

 

When the outbreak of monkeypox expanded earlier this year, racist and stigmatizing language online, in other settings and in some communities was observed and reported to WHO. In several meetings, public and private, a number of individuals and countries raised concerns and asked WHO to propose a way forward to change the name."

 

Given that the news release states that "a number of individuals and countries" raised concerns about the use of the monkeypox label, it would be interesting to know exactly how many individuals and countries actually raised the issue.  One, ten, one hundred, one thousand?  We'll never know.

 

Considerations for changing the name of the disease that shall no longer be referred to as monkeypox included rationale, scientific appropriateness, the extent of current usage, pronounceability, usability in different languages, the absence of geographical and zoological references and the ease of retrieval of historical scientific information.  According to WHO, assigning new names to existing diseases is "exceptional" and generally takes several years, however, in this case the process was accelerated but we are told not to worry because the process of renaming the disease followed standard procedures.

 

Following the consultations which included experts from both the medical and scientific communities and classification and statistics advisory committees from government authorities of 45 nations, WHO's Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Gheybreyesus recommends the following:

 

1.) Adoption of the new synonym mpox in English for the disease. 

2.) Mpox will become a preferred term, replacing monkeypox, after a transition period of one year. This serves to mitigate the concerns raised by experts about confusion caused by a name change in the midst of a global outbreak. It also gives time to complete the ICD update process and to update WHO publications.  

3.) The synonym mpox will be included in the ICD-10 online in the coming days. It will be a part of the official 2023 release of ICD-11, which is the current global standard for health data, clinical documentation and statistical aggregation. 

4.) The term “monkeypox” will remain a searchable term in ICD, to match historic information.

One has to wonder how many million dollars were spent on this exercise given that WHO is supported by the taxes that we remit to our governments, not forgetting that at least some of the cost fell on the shoulders of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as shown here:

 

This begs the question - how do chickens feel about the term "chickenpox"?  Perhaps WHO should now prioritize the renaming of this disease which has, for decades, stigmatized those wonderful barnyard animals that have provided the world with breasts, wings and eggs since time immemorial.  How about German measles?  Haven't the German people suffered enough prejudice after their ill-advised invasion of Europe and slaughter of the untermenschen living among them?

I think that the World Health Organization has its work cut out for it.

Where Canadian Tax Dollars Are Spent - Public Opinion Research

I have noticed that when politicians are confronted with bad polling numbers that they always use the "I don't believe in polls" or "We don't govern using polling numbers" excuse for ignoring what the electorate is trying to tell them.  Apparently, as in most cases, politicians say one thing and actually practice another when it comes to public opinions.

In researching the vast database found on various Canadian government websites, I stumbled on this report on the Public Works and Government Services Canada website.  The report outlines the federal government's spending on contracted public opinion research completed on behalf of various government departments by Public Works.  The report is published to "ensure that public opinion research activities are well co-ordinated, transparent and provide value for money to taxpayers.".

The report states the following:

"Public opinion research (POR) is a valuable source of information used by the Government of Canada to incorporate a citizen focus in the development, implementation and evaluation of policies, programs and services. These studies provide useful insight into the awareness, views, and current needs of Canadians as they apply to important issues such as children’s health and safety, job creation, economic growth, food safety, supporting veterans and elder abuse. POR uses reliable, impartial and systematic methods to collect opinions of a wide range of Canadians or those that could be most affected by particular Government of Canada programs, policies and activities. Real-time feedback can also be obtained with POR, which can benefit Canadians in times of emergency or rapidly evolving crises. Information gathered is used to better understand the needs and expectations of Canadians, and gives them a way to participate in the ongoing discussion between themselves and their government."

Right.

In 2011-2012, a total of 100 projects were conducted.  Here is a list of the projects and the total amount spent on each:

1.) Serving Canadians Better - $2,683,961

2.) Taking into Account Canadians' Needs - $2,061,329

3.) Informing Canadians - $1,768,534

That's a total of $6,513,824 of your tax dollars spent to find out what you think.

The one that I had to chuckle about was the "Serving Canadians Better" category.  Public opinion research was used to understand how people viewed government policies, programs and services and how satisfied they were with the services provided.  It provides the government with key areas that require improvement or change that will provide taxpayers with a higher level of satisfaction when dealing with government.  Research into this aspect of Canadian opinions took up 41 percent of all tax dollars spent on public opinion research as a whole.  Here's a hint for the feds; government "services" generally suck.  I guess "service improvements" are why I can no longer talk to a live person at my local Canada Revenue Agency office.

The other category that was "interesting" was the public opinion research into "Informing Canadians".  Apparently, the government "has a duty to explain its policies and decisions to Canadians".  This category includes advertising pre-testing; if the government is going to spend more than $400,000 on an advertising campaign, the ads must be pre-tested.   As well, post-advertising campaign evaluations are required when the government buys more than $1 million worth of media time.  I guess that's why we are stuck spending tens of millions on those stupid and very tired looking four year old Economic Action Plan commercials and signage!

Here is a look at how much Canadian taxpayers have spent on public opinion research over the past four fiscal years:

Here's a list of which government departments spent the money:

Here's a list of which contractors were hired by the Harper government to survey public opinion and have benefitted from Canadian taxpayers' involuntary largesse:

What I find rather interesting is that the Harper government spends money on polling public opinion when it has quite clearly shown that, in many cases, it really doesn't care what the majority of Canadians want.

More Taxpayer-Funded Propaganda from Ottawa

Depending on where you live in Canada and your political leanings, the Harper government's proposed changes to the Employment Insurance system have either received positive or negative reviews, particularly after it was revealed that some recipients could expect the dreaded "random knock at the door" by one of Service Canada's EI inspectors.  You may remember that this news came to light just as it was revealed that three of Canada's eminent Senators were being investigated for their spending ways.

In light of all of the bad press that the Harper Conservatives have received on their exuberant pursuit of EI fraudsters and those who "abuse" the system, the government is sparing no expense.  To that end, at least some Canadians, myself included, recently received this bit of taxpayer-funded propaganda in the mail:

The form letter was enclosed in both English and French and is intended to reassure Canadians that despite the recent changes to the EI system, nothing has really changed so don't worry your pretty little head.

This brings to mind the untold millions that have been spent on the now, very tired Economic Action Plan signage and advertising campaign that has been in effect since 2009 which cost Canadian taxpayers $21 million in fiscal 2011 - 2012 alone on top of the $53.2 million spent in 2009 - 2010.  I'm particularly fond of the most recent iteration of the television ads where the government seems to take credit for exploiting Canada's natural resource wealth:

In the online version, the ad has been viewed a whopping 31,933 times!  Time and effort well spent, don't you think?

As an aside, just in case you wondered who was responsible for Canada's current economic health, here is a screen capture from the Economic Action Plan that quite clearly shows where the credit is due:

Should you for some reason have lost count, on the first page alone, there are 13 references to the "Harper Government".

Looking back at the original subject of this posting, the government's own records show that, out of the estimated $17.5 billion in EI payments made by Ottawa last year, only $128 million was labelled as "fraudulent claims", or 0.73 percent of the total paid out.  Canada's next-to-useless Senate spends nearly that much in any given year!

While I'm not minimizing the problems with the current EI system, I am disappointed to once again find out that my tax dollars are being used to promote the Harper government's agenda.  I guess the government's spending on those nonsensical partisan ten percenters has been curtailed so they have to find another creative way to waste our money.