You’ve probably never heard of Dr. David Nabarro, which is probably very upsetting to him, considering that he has devoted his life to scaring the shit out of you.
In 2005, the good doctor, “one of the most senior public health experts at the World Health Organization”, was leading the crusade against bird flu:
“The consequences in terms of human life when the pandemic does start are going to be extraordinary and very damaging,” he said.
He told the BBC that the “range of deaths could be anything between five and 150 million”.
In fact, the WHO insisted at the time that an outbreak was “imminent” and that the “best case scenario” would be 7.4 million deaths globally.
In reality, the “pandemic” killed less than 150 people between 2003 and 2005. Nabarro’s terrifying prophesy was only off by a factor of one million.
The faux health crisis still had devastating consequences, of course. Thanks to Nabarro and his esteemed colleagues, nations across Asia carried out a mass culling of poultry to “flatten the curve,” so to speak. Millions of chickens were slaughtered as a sacrifice to the WHO. It was a bird holocaust.
Chickens might not seem so important to you and me, but they’re a life-and-death matter for poor farmers in Vietnam. Guess what happened to them, and their entire country?
Dr. Nabarro took part in many other triumphs of fear. He served as the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy on Ebola, a position he used to push for coordinated international action in 2015:
For responses to have their greatest chance of success, they must be strategic, strong and speedy, they must be based on pre-arranged roles and responsibilities and they must use already-established systems
Just as a reminder: Barack Obama declared Ebola a “threat to global security.” To date, the disease has killed two Americans.
Fast-forward to 2020. What’s Nabarro up to these days? Oh, you know. The usual:
Nabarro is now one of six “coronavirus envoys” tasked with “providing strategic advice and high-level political advocacy and engagement in different parts of the world.” The WHO has enlisted him to coordinate “the global response to the epidemic.”
It’s a big responsibility. He’s been very busy explaining to media outlets why lockdowns are necessary and will save tens of millions of lives. Here’s what he told India’s NDTV, amid apprehension over Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s decision to lock up 1.3 billion people:
There is pain associated with a lockdown implemented again but the government must do whatever is good to contain the virus. Speed is very important
He stressed that this was not the time for “accountability.” There’s simply not enough time! The world must take immediate action:
When history will be written, we will be judged on the basis of how fast we reacted to contain this pandemic. There will come a time where we will assess in great detail how did it all start and fix accountability. Now is not the time. I would also like to tell all the world leaders the same thing. This is a time where all of us should rise above blame and help fight this invisible enemy
Yes, “the invisible enemy.” As invisible as bird flu, though?
Edward Slavsquat is an American in self-exile in Russia who sometimes writes things on the internet