New Research Casts Doubt Coronavirus Epidemic Started At Wuhan Food Market

Although practically all of the western media reports from the city of Wuhan have claimed that the city's hospitals have been completely overwhelmed by cases of pneumonia as more cases of the Wuhan coronavirus are confirmed, the South China Morning Post reports that a team of researchers at Wuhan’s Jinyintan hospital have retraced the movements of the first individual who was diagnosed with the virus, and determined that he had no links to a shady seafood market selling live snakes and bats for human consumption.

Amazingly, SCMP caveated its report by claiming that other patients among the earliest cases had "continuous exposure to the market," which was shut down on Jan. 1 by Wuhan authorities over fears that its trade in wild animals was linked to the viral outbreak. Authorities have since banned the selling of live animals at markets.

The researchers, seven of whom work at Wuhan’s Jinyintan hospital, designated for patients with the illness, revealed on Friday in The Lancet medical journal that symptoms of the new disease were first reported on December 1 – much earlier than the Wuhan government’s initial announcement on December 31 of 27 cases of the pneumonia-like infection.

According to the report, the first patient had no exposure to the Huanan seafood market which was shut down on January 1 over fears – later confirmed – that the new virus was linked to its trade in wild animals. The researchers added that none of the patient’s family had developed fever or any respiratory symptoms. There was also no epidemiological link between the first patient and the later cases, they found.

The researchers analysed data from 41 patients with confirmed infections who had showed an onset of symptoms up to January 2. Six of those patients died, putting the fatality rate of the group at 15 per cent. The researchers noted that clinical presentations of the patients greatly resembled severe acute respiratory syndrome.

The first patient to die from the new coronavirus had continuous exposure to the market before he was admitted to hospital with a seven-day history of fever, cough and breathing difficulties, according to their report.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/no-bat-soup-new-research-casts-doubt-links-shady-seafood-market

FLASHBACK: Adam Schiff Flew with Russian Ambassador Kislyak to Aspen Forum

Adam Schiff continued to push smears and lies on Saturday about Russia collusion in the 2016 election.

Of course, none of that is true. Not one word of it.

The Mueller attorneys dug into every single detail of President Trump’s campaign and found ZERO evidence of Russia collusion.

However, the same could not be said for Adam Schiff.

Now is a good time to remind Americans that it was Adam Schiff who was palling around with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.

Adam Schiff flew to the Aspen Security Forum with the Russian ambassador in 2016.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/01/flashback-adam-schiff-flew-with-russian-ambassador-kislyak-to-aspen-forum/

Rick Scott: Pelosi Held Articles ‘to Help Joe Biden’ – ‘No Different’ than 2016

During the Fox News Channel’s Senate impeachment trial coverage on Saturday, Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) stated that he has concluded that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) delayed transmitting the House’s articles of impeachment to the Senate to keep 2020 Democratic presidential candidates Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) “off the campaign trail” and assist 2020 Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden.

Scott said, “I think I’ve come to a conclusion why Nancy Pelosi held that thing — held the articles of impeachment for 33 days. This whole thing is to help Joe Biden. I mean, all of this is to keep Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren off the campaign trail and help Joe Biden. I think this is all — this is no different than what happened to Sanders back in 2016.”

https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020/01/25/rick-scott-pelosi-held-articles-to-help-joe-biden-no-different-than-2016/

China virus death toll rises to 56, with nearly 2,000 infected nationwide & more cases confirmed abroad

The death toll from 2019-nCoV coronavirus outbreak in China has reached 56, with hundreds of new infections detected nationwide, despite all containment efforts. A handful of news cases have also been reported outside China.

Thirteen more people died in Hubei province, where nearly 130 people have reportedly been in serious or critical condition as of Sunday morning. In addition to over 1,000 known and confirmed cases being treated in the epicenter of the outbreak, some 7,000 people there remain under increased medical supervision due to their potentially dangerous “close contacts.”

Meanwhile, the number of those who had beaten the virus and were discharged from hospitals has increased to at least 85 people, according to authorities.

China is facing a “grave situation” as the new coronavirus is “accelerating its spread,” President Xi warned earlier. He added, however, that given the immense efforts to contain the outbreak, China “will definitely be able to win the battle.”

Around 450 Chinese military medics, many with experience in combating SARS or Ebola, were deployed in the region to help the overworked and exhausted hospital staff, who had been on around-the-clock shifts in recent weeks. Local authorities, in the meantime, are rushing to construct a new 1,000-bed facility specifically to treat victims of the deadly virus.

Chinese authorities have also imposed strict travel restrictions on the outbreak epicenter of Wuhan, as well as nearly 20 cities in Hubei Province, with nearly 50 million people virtually quarantined and additional limitations imposed on intercity bus routes starting Sunday. Medical staff have been tasked with checking travelers’ temperatures for any signs of fever – the most apparent symptom of coronavirus, which is followed by a dry cough and leads to shortness of breath.

https://www.rt.com/news/479199-hubei-coronavirus-death-toll/

Adam Schiff’s Very Scary Warmongering Speech

All the usual suspects are praising Adam Schiff’s marathon two-and-a-half-hour Senate speech on Wednesday to the skies. Neocon columnist Jennifer Rubin calls it "a grand slam" in the Washington Post. Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin describes it as "dazzling" on CNN. New York Times columnist Gail Collins says it was "a great job" and that Schiff is "a rock star" for pulling it off.

But in fact it was the opposite – a fear-mongering, sword-rattling harangue that will not only raise tensions with Russia for no good reason, but sends a chilling message to dissidents at home that if they deviate from Russiagate orthodoxy by one iota, they’ll be driven from the fold.

What is that orthodoxy? It’s that Russia invaded poor innocent Ukraine in 2014, that it interfered in the US presidential election in 2016 in order to hurt Hillary Clinton and propel Donald Trump into the White House, and that it’s now trying to smear Joe Biden merely because he had allowed his son to take a high-paying job with a notorious Ukrainian oligarch at a time when he was supposedly heading up the Ukrainian anti-corruption effort.

As Schiff put it with regard to Donald Trump’s famous July 25 phone call urging Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to look into Biden’s activities:

"This investigation was related to a debunked conspiracy theory alleging that Ukraine not Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election. This narrative propagated by the Russian intelligence services contends that Ukraine sought to help Hillary Clinton and harm then-candidate Trump…. This tale is also patently false and, remarkably, it is precisely the inverse of what the US intelligence community’s unanimous assessment was that Russia interfered in the 2016 election in sweeping and systemic fashion in order to hurt Hillary Clinton and help Donald Trump."

So even though the Financial Times reported during the 2016 election campaign that the threat of a Trump victory was spurring "Kiev’s wider political leadership to do something they have never attempted before: intervene, however indirectly, in a US election," articles like that are now down the memory hole because Schiff says they’re Russian propaganda that US intelligence agencies have determined to be false.

https://original.antiwar.com/daniel_lazare/2020/01/23/adam-schiffs-very-scary-warmongering-speech/

French and Dutch Police Bust Network Smuggling 10,000 Kurds into the UK

French and Dutch authorities have arrested 23 people in connection with a people-smuggling network that is said to have helped around 10,000 Kurds illegally enter the UK.

Eurojust, the European unit for judicial cooperation, announced the arrests earlier this week in a statement saying: “In a joint action by the French and Dutch authorities, coordinated by Eurojust, 23 people were arrested on suspicion of large-scale migrant smuggling.”

Thirteen of the 23 individuals arrested were apprehended in the French city of Le Mans on Tuesday and another four were previously arrested in the Netherlands near the Hague, Ouest France reports.

Investigators also carried out searches of five separate residences used by the network and say the smugglers charged as much as 7,000 euros per migrant and may have profited to the tune of 70 million euros in total.

The investigation into the network began in August 2018, with French authorities citing suspicious activity from individuals driving cars with Dutch license plates on a fairly regular basis.

Migrant activity in the English Channel has surged over the last year with 2,358 migrants picked up by British or French authorities in 2019, up 400 per cent from the previous year.

David Wood, former immigration enforcement at the Home Office, commented on the surge in attempted crossings earlier this month, saying: “The more Border Force cutters there are in the Channel the more attractive it is for those setting sail in small boats. They know they will be picked up and taken to the UK. For them, that is mission accomplished.”

Despite measures taken by French and Belgian authorities to increase their surveillance of the coastal areas by deploying drones, the number of migrants attempting to cross the channel remains high with 49 migrants being brought ashore in the UK on Boxing Day 2019 alone.

UK Home Secretary Priti Patel has vowed to cut deportation wait times as a measure to combat the rise in new arrivals, with a Home Office spokesman saying: “When there is an incentive, people will find ways to get here, whether it is in lorries, small boats or any other means. If they know they are going to be promptly returned they will stop coming.”

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/01/25/french-dutch-police-bust-network-smuggling-10k-kurds-uk/