COVID-19 Pandemic
2020
Timeline of significant global, Australian and SA data points in the initial response and first year of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Navigate the timeline pages:
1800s | 1900-1945 | 1946-1979 | 1980-1999 | 2000-2015 | 2016-2018 | 2019 | You Are Here | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025
Quick links to months of 2020:
Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sept | Oct | Nov | DecGive the page a couple of moments to load…it is long. Some of the links may not work due to the length! Best viewed on a large screen.
Spike protein becomes the target protein for novel vaccines
Scientific Consensus: Lancet letter used to “debunk” lab-leak theory
On February 19, 2020 a letter was published in The Lancet by 27 expert scientists to debunk “rumours and misinformation” about potential lab leak origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. This consensus was used as “evidence” for suppressing debate on whether the virus could have escaped the Wuhan lab; demonstrating the power of “scientific consensus” coupled with the media influence to rule a narrative. [1]
They stated: “we stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin”
They claimed no competing interests! Though 2021, it was revealed that 26 of the 27 scientists have links to Wuhan scientists including Professor John Mackenzie from Australia, who also served on WHO Emergency Committee. [2, 3]
Emails gained under FOI request shows planning by Peter Daszak of EcoHealth Alliance in who should sign the letter! [4]
In June 2021 we learn:
- Peter Daszak who heads EcoHealth Alliance who funds Wuhan Institute of Virology and is a WHO investigator clearly has competing interests.
- Daszak thanked Fauci in an email for dismissing the lab-leak theory
- Peter Palese does a 180 turn in opinion.
- Jeremy Farrar, of the Wellcome Trust and on the CEPI executive and SAC is very conflicted, and focused on evolutionary origin as per 13 Feb 2020 email from Fauci.
- Drosten wrote controversial PCR paper.
- The Lancet editor refuses to comment.
Watch @3min >>
Determining the Incubation Period
WHO worked with an international network of statisticians and mathematical modellers to estimate key epidemiological parameters of COVID-19, such as the incubation period (the time between infection and onset of symptoms).
- Preliminary estimates of median incubation period are 5-6 days (ranging from 0-14 days).
- By March 6, 2020, the WHO settled on incubation period of up to 14 days [2].
With the new concept of asymptomatic spread, an incubation period gives cause to isolate a PCR positive test case for the WHO declared maximum duration of 14 days. Meaning it could be 14 days before the onset of symptoms! That person may never produce symptoms! Historically a disease meant “dis-ease”, not well, having a symptom.
From 2020 anyone off the street can get diagnosed with COVID-19 disease if they return a positive PCR test, the lab runs the cycles of amplification up to 40 cycles (or 45) , which as Kary Mullis cautioned, you’re sure to find “something” its that good!
First Italian COVID-19 patient registered in Lombardy
February 20, 2020: the first Italian patient affected by COVID-19 is registered in Lombardy, a region in northern Italy. [1]
China report asymptomatic spread of SARS-CoV-2
On February 21, 2020 Chinese scientists publish letter to JAMA Network “presuming” that they have evidence that the SARS-CoV-2 virus is spread from asymptomatic carriers after a “20-year-old woman from Wuhan passed it to five of her family members but never got physically sick herself”. [1]
Reports of nursing home residents (the highest risk group) test positive for the virus, presumed infectious, but don’t show any symptoms.
Italy first Western country to go into lockdown
On February 21, 2020 Italy, was the first Western country to lock down. “Over 50,000 people have been asked to stay at home in the areas concerned, while all public activities such as carnival celebrations, church masses and sporting events have been banned for up to a week.”[1]
It is unclear why regional health chief Giulio Gallera decided to lock down, as the WHO had not released their report yet [2]
WHO: China “demonstrated” lockdowns worked and saved lives
On February 24, 2020, Dr Bruce Aylward (Team Leader), who had just concluded a WHO-China Joint Mission on COVID-19, told the world at WHO press briefing that the lockdown in China worked… [1]
What China has demonstrated is, you have to do this. If you do it, you can save lives and prevent thousands of cases of what is a very difficult disease.
Starting Febraury 16, 2020 the “mission has visited Beijing, Guangdong, Sichuan and Wuhan of Hubei province successively and completed all the tasks as planned”
Chinese military scientist files for COVID vaccine patent, then dies!
According to documents obtained by The Australian’s Sharri Markson (4 June 2021), Chinese military scientist Zhou Yusen, who specialised in coronavirus research and was funded by US NIH( separate to EcoHealth alliance funding), filed for COVID vaccine patent in February 2020. He mysteriously died May 2020, just 3 month later. [1, 2]
Filing a patent in this time frame, Flinders University researcher Nikolai Petrovsky noted was a “remarkable achievement“, raising questions as to when the genetic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 was first known.
Chief Medical Officer warns a pandemic is likely
Australia’s Chief Medical Officer, Professor Brendan Murphy, told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald there was “a strong possibility of a pandemic” which had “increased in recent days” and has not been contained.” At this point “There is still no sign the virus is spreading in Australia.”
- it is now clear the virus can readily spread through coughing and sneezing.
- “This is a proper respiratory virus, with all the bells and whistles,” Professor Mackey of UQ said
- The WHO has yet to declare COVID-19 a pandemic – “a disease that spreads across the globe”
- The WHO’s declaration of a pandemic is “no longer a designation triggering a formal response“!!!
- A sudden eruption of cases in Italy has forced them to lockdown
- The virus is spreading undetected, probably by people who are infected but not showing symptoms.
- Australian hospitals preparing for “the surge in patients a pandemic would cause”
- Age care expected to be worst hit
- Coronavirus poses a very small risk to healthy people aged under 60″ like the common cold
French Virologist Shares Chloroquine Treatment.
French Biologist and Infectious Diseases Specialist – Dr Didier Raoult MD said reposition old drug molecules with known toxic profiles to see if they could be used to treat the new coronavirus. Cloroquine brings spectacular improvement in trials. [Translation][1]
Didier said “From all respiratory infections [SARS-CoV-2 is] probably the easiest to treat. There’s really no need to rush to produce a vaccine”.
Chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine are listed as WHO Essential Medicines.
Australia’s Pandemic Emergency Response Plan enacted
The Australian Prime Minister activated the government’s health emergency response plan, or‘pandemic blueprint, to an “impending coronavirus pandemic, foreshadowing fever clinics, fast-tracked vaccines and severe pressure on hospitals, blood banks, medical supplies and mortuaries”. [1, 2, 3]
President Trump names VP Mike Pence to coordinate the Coronavirus response
At a White House news conference on February 26, 2020, President Trump announced that Vice President Mike Pence would coordinate the government’s response to the public health threat and lead the Coronavirus Taskforce, he wanted governors and members of Congress to have a single point-person to communicate with [1, 2]
At the news conference Dr. Anne Schuchat, the principal deputy director of the C.D.C., warned Americans that there would be more infections, there is currently 60, though “the trajectory of what we’re looking at over the weeks and months ahead is very uncertain.”
Pence selected Dr. Deborah L. Birx, the director of the United States effort to combat H.I.V. and AIDS, to serve as the Coronavirus Response Coordinator for the White House. Mr. Trump said that “Mike is going to be in charge, and Mike will report back to me.” Meanwhile, Alex M. Azar II, the health and human services secretary, remains the chairman of the government’s coronavirus task force.
The appointment of a taskforce was “to coordinate the alphabet soup of federal health and security agencies that have roles to play in protecting the country.”
Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, told associates that the White House had instructed him not to say anything else without clearance.
The announcement also came on a day when the CDC reported a person infected, with no known risk factors, who did not appear to have traveled to countries hard hit by the virus or been exposed to a known coronavirus patient. “That raised the prospect that the virus was spreading through unknown means.” At this point the CDC limited testing for the virus to people who have traveled in China or have come into contact with someone who has, where as other countries are testing more broadly. [3]
US could have 1.9 million requiring ICU – not enough ventilators
From a February 26, 2020 , “leaked’ slides from Dr. James Lawler presentation to the American Hospitals Association, revealed his model projected that 96 million Americans could become infected cases, of which 4.8 million could result in hospital admissions and 1.9 million of those “could require a stay in a hospital’s intensive care unit (ICU), and approximately half of them would need a ventilator“. The “slide says hospitals should prepare for an impact to the system that’s 10 times greater than a severe flu season.”
But in the same presentation Lawler showed clearly that the death rate in China was significantly higher in 80+ years than other age brackets and pre-existing conditions were associated with death. [3]
Also in February 2020 the Center for Health Security at Johns Hopkins released a February report [no archive for Feb] which estimated the United States “has about 160,000 ventilators ready for use in hospitals, with another 8,900 held in a national reserve”, enough for day-today operational capabilities but not for a severe pandemic. A shortage of skilled respiratory therapists is also noted. [2]
On March 13, 2020 the World Health Organisation released [2, 3] their updated interim guidance for “Clinical management of severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) when COVID-19 disease is suspected”, which recommended “mechanical ventilators as an early intervention” based on China’s experience. [1] And thus begins the ventilator panic.
Daszak: COVID-19 is “Disease X”
On February 27, 2020, Peter Daszak wrote an Opinion in New York Time stating COVID-19 is Disease X which they’ve been telling us was coming and that CEPI was preparing for with fast, new vaccine platforms.
Peter Daszak heads up EcoHealth Alliance and funded coronavirus research at the Wuhan labs, the very labs he helped investigate as potential origin of SARS-CoV-2.
But this pandemic “will challenge us in new ways, as people try to evade quarantines, and misinformation campaigns and conspiracy theorists ply their trade in open democracies.” More to the point he states “the really big picture: Pandemics are on the rise, and we need to contain the process that drives them, not just the individual diseases.” “Plagues are not only part of our culture; they are caused by it.”
“These spillovers are increasing exponentially” he stats, [that is the “Eco” and “Health” connection] because “our ecological footprint brings us closer to wildlife in remote areas and the wildlife trade brings these animals into urban centers” aka the wet market in China!
Dr Fauci: Calm one day, prepare for pandemic restrictions the next
On February 26, 2020 Dr Anthony Fauci wrote to CBS News that Americans should not yield to fear.
On February 27, 2020, next day, he wrote “be prepared to mitigate an outbreak in this country by measures that include social distancing, teleworking, temporary closure of schools, etc.” [1]
February 27th was also the day the media narrative in the U.S. shifted, with the New York Times leading the way with its first alarmist piece, by Peter Daszak of the EcoHealth Alliance, and also an alarmist podcast with science and health reporter Donald G. McNeil Jr., which quoted directly from China a 2% mortality rate for the virus. It is also the day Deborah Birx was hired as the Coronavirus Task Force Coordinator.” [2]
Caution warranted for coronavirus vaccines for humans – the animals died!
On February 27, 2020, independent media, The Highwire, alerted [@1:11:30] the public to the potential dangers of a SARS vaccine, base on a 2012 SARS vaccine study in mice. Coronovirus vaccines appear to cause “Pathogenic Priming”, a Disease Enhancement otherwise referred to as Antibody Dependent Enhancement (ADE). What resulted in the animal studies was upon re-infection the mice experienced a cytokine storm followed by death. [1, 2, 3]
The paper concluded “Caution in proceeding to application of a SARS-CoV vaccine in humans is indicated.”
- The same effect has been shown in chickens.
- In addition vasculitis or blood clots were identified in the coronavirus vaccine study in animals.
On March 5, 2020, Dr Peter Hotez warned the US government of “the unique potential safety problems of coronavirus vaccines”, such as with RSV vaccines in the 1960’s where “paradoxical immune enhancement phenomenon” can occur with respiratory virus vaccines, and “we don’t entirely understand the basis of it”! They were confronted with the same “immune pathology” problem with coronavirus vaccine tests done on laboratory animals. The FDA are aware of the problem, these types of vaccines can’t be rushed because of the long-term safety implications. [@1:26:30]
Yet Operation Warp Speed was officially announced 2 months later, .
Bill Gates: COVID-19 the “once-in-a-century pathogen we’ve been worried about”
On February 28, 2020, only eleven days after NIAID director Dr Fauci stated the risk is miniscule from this coronavirus, Bill Gates (who invests donates heavily to global health) warns in the NEJM perspective that:
In the past week, Covid-19 has started behaving a lot like the once-in-a-century pathogen we’ve been worried about. I hope it’s not that bad, but we should assume it will be until we know otherwise.
We need to save lives now while also improving the way we respond to outbreaks in general.
Gates provides “two reasons that Covid-19 is such a threat”:
- “First, it can kill healthy adults in addition to elderly people with existing health problems”, with a current “case fatality risk around 1%” it is more severe that seasonal influenza (0.6%)
- “Second, Covid-19 is transmitted quite efficiently. The average infected person spreads the disease to two or three others — an exponential rate of increase. There is also strong evidence that it can be transmitted by people who are just mildly ill or even presymptomatic.” MERS and SARS was spread “only by symptomatic people.”
“National, state, and local governments and public health agencies can take steps over the next few weeks to slow the virus’s spread.“
As well he called upon developed countries to help less wealthy nations prepare, as they have “health systems that are too weak to support a potential outbreak.”
“The world also needs to accelerate work on treatments and vaccines for COVID-19“
It seems his 2018 plans can now justify acceleration, government investment, and an instant market for a huge return on investment.
First confirmed US death from COVID-19
Washington state, USA, confirms first US death from novel coronavirus, a man in his 50’s with co-morbidities, no evidence he got the infection through travel.
Washington state had high influenza-like-illness week 51 & 52 of 2019 as reported by the CDC,
32.9 million doses of HCQ donated for Australians
In early March, The Palmer Foundation acquired 32,900,000 doses of the off-patent and cheap drug hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), which was then donated to the Australian Government to be placed on the National Medical Stockpile so it may be made available free to all Australians.
The Palmer Foundation is tracking HCQ data points with their own timeline.
In April 2020, Canada’s pharma company Apotex donated 2 million doses to the Canadian Public Health Agency.
Clive Palmer interview WATCH
First Australian to die from COVID-19
On March 1, 2020 , a 78-year-old man, from Perth was the first Australian reported to “die from COVID-19”. He was a passenger on board the Diamond Princess cruise ship that was forced to quarantine in the Japanese port of Yokohama. “The Diamond Princess cruise ship had around 3,700 people on board, with 10 passengers confirmed to be infected with coronavirus.”
Australia’s deputy chief medical officer Paul Kelly told ABC radio that “over 80% of the people that get this infection, it’s relatively mild.”
At this point “87,508 people worldwide had been infected, and 2990 had died of COVID-19.
President Trump meets with Big Pharma to discuss expedited medical countermeasures
On March 2, 2020, President Trump met with pharmaceutical executives at the White House “to discuss how the federal government can accelerate the development of vaccines and therapeutic treatments for the coronavirus.” Several members of The White House Coronavirus Task Force led by Vice President Mike Pence were also in attendance.
HHS Secretary Alex Azar stated
We’re here working with the pharmaceutical company leaders on three key issues: how do we speed vaccines, how do we speed therapeutics, and what are the supply chain challenges that we may be facing for pharmaceutical products here in the United States.
President Trump said:
…we’re working very hard to expedite the longer process of developing a vaccine…It’s likely that therapies will be available before a vaccine is actually ready, and we’ll seek to bring all effective treatments to market as soon as possible.
Since the start of the outbreak, my administration has taken the most aggressive action in history to protect our citizens, including closing our borders very early — a lot earlier than people wanted us to do.
So those are unheard of speeds…we have to be very safe.
Trump spoke about bringing drug manufacturing back to America…”which started about a year ago.”
VP Mike Pence addressed Dr. Deborah Birx as “one of the leading experts in infectious diseases in the world.” Dr Birx take away from the meeting …”there’s technology that can be used as an immediate bridge“, therapeutics and monoclonals. “while we work on the vaccines.”
Birx also said: “I think just to assure the American people that we have tried using our innovators to actually screen all of the current drugs for potential activity against this virus would be key.”
At this meeting Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel, told Trump they were already formulating Phase II vaccine, and that the “phase two would take a few months before going to phase three.”
“And one thing I want to add, we keep talking about “for America,” but really, we’re looking at — for a cure for the whole world because this is a world cure, not just for the United States. We want to take care of the United States. But whatever we do is going to inure to the benefit of the world.” said President Trump
The pharmaceutical heads and government health agency representatives sold President Trump on the potential for Warp Speed vaccines:
I came into the room not expecting to hear quite what I’ve heard, but a lot of work has already been done.
Germany RKI upgrade COVID-19 risk, without evidence
(In Retrospect from Freedom of Information (FOIA-like) documents). On March 2, 2020 Germany’s Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the equivalent to CDC, started to buckle under pressure from outside forces and without any evidence upgraded the COVID-19 risk from ‘low to moderate‘ to ‘moderate‘, despite its own labs having tested 140 samples for SARS-CoV-2 and ALL tests coming back negative. #RKIFiles
On March 2, 2020 German Health Minister Jens Sphan appeared before cameras flanked by Professors, including Christian Drosten, to talk-up the Corona threat! Further on March 3rd and 6th, collectively 293 more samples came back negative for the virus, but German politicians kept speaking up a non-existent threat. [1, 2]
Then following the March 16, 2020 release of the Imperial College’s (flawed) modelling, plus carrot of funding, the RKI protocol was altered on the basis of a (redacted) outside force. Then on March 17, 2020, RKI’s head Prof Lothar Wieler announced the risk assessment level has been “high”. “The upgrade of the risk assessment was… the legal foundation of all coronavirus measures.”
On March 22, 2020 Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel announced Germany must lockdown, with 2 person rule, justified on the basis that coronavirus is spreading “further with worrying speed”, and no vaccine is currently available.
But the actual increase in virus distribution, in relation to the number of PCR tests, was only one percentage point just before the lockdown – from 6% to 7% of people returning a positive, this “was the so-called “exponential growth” of the epidemic” that justified the lockdown, which the RKI knew would be devastating.
Effectively the whole world acted like Germany, and around the same time!
800 scientists write warning letter to the White House
800 scientists and medical professionals with expertise in medicine, public health, law, and human rights, and in previous pandemic responses, write an open letter to the White House warning against lockdowns, closures, and travel restrictions. It was sponsored by Yale University. [1]
“The letter warned that the crackdowns, shutdowns, travel restrictions, sweeping closures, and work restrictions could be counterproductive and not produce the results people hope for”…serious health scholars were not on board with many of the draconian command-and-control measures” that followed.
Fauci believed forced separation of people would stop the virus
Retrospective: Dr Fauci’s emails obtained under FOIA, reveals on March 2, 2020 he was in communication with a Washington Post reporter, and he believed the point of social distancing is to suppress the disease so that it goes away, to “force” the R0 [R-naught] below 1. Fauci even says that with enough forced human separation “the epidemic will gradually decline and stop on its own without a vaccine.”
The plan to lockdown was already in place, and in his email communication there is no mention of preserving hospital capacity; that line was yet to be invented to justify lockdowns!
The big flaw here is that the R-Naught [R0] in principle reveals what a virus “is doing” but it does not “cause the virus to behave in a certain way”. It is not possible to simply reduce the infection rate through a theory that viruses only spread in crowds (irrespective of immunity), yet that is what was used in the months following to justify shutdowns, lockdowns, and small business closures.
New York’s Gov. Cuomo issues EO prohibiting off-label use of HCQ
Governor Cuomo of New York in an unprecedented and unscientific move, on March 3, 2020 issues an executive order (EO) prohibiting the off-label use of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) to treat COVID-19, a seemingly direct attack on Dr Zelenko.
WHO claims COVID-19 fatality rate is 3.4% globally
On March 3, 2020, the WHO Director General Tedros, claimed in a press conference that the fatality rate for COVID-19 (3.4%) is higher than that of the common flu, “because no one has immunity”, on the back of the China Report. [1, 2] This figure could be calculated from February 25, 2020 WHO COVID-19 situation report with 80,239 confirmed cases globally and a total of 2,700 deaths, this amounts to 3.36% case fatality rate.
WHO fatality rate was based on faulty assumptions, and have simply assumed a “new” virus has no cross-immunity from previous coronavirus infections. Natural infection confers broad spectrum immunity. China concealed the true extent of the virus outbreak, thus the IFR was off by a “factor of 10” [3, 4]
Importantly, “WHO does not distinguish between people who died with the Covid-19 virus, rather than because of it.”
On March 26, 2020 US Dr Anthony Fauci et al published paper claiming the “[o]n the basis of a case definition requiring a diagnosis of pneumonia, the currently reported case fatality rate is approximately 2%”. They also state that if “one assumes that the number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic cases is several times as high as the number of reported cases, the case fatality rate may be considerably less than 1%. This suggests that the overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a case fatality rate of approximately 0.1%).
President Trump has a “hunch” the WHO’s 3.4% number is “false number“, based on who he was speaking with. [5, 7] Dr Jay Bhattacharya published on April 11, 2020 the infection fatality rate (IFR) in the US was “0.12-0.2%“. Trump’s statedment that it is likely “a fraction of one percent” proved to be correct. [6] The high estimated fatality rate was the figure that helped justify lockdowns.
CDC provides unprecedented new death certificate guidelines for COVID-19
On March 4, 2020 the CDC changed how to fill in a death certificate for COVID-19. Typically a death certificate is filled in with the underlying cause of death on the bottom line in part 1, and this is what is reported to the Federal Registry of Disease.
This is not the case for COVID-19!
“COVID-19 should be reported on the death certificate for all decedents where the disease caused or is ASSUMED to have caused or contributed to death.” [emphasis added].
Any markings of uncertaintly on the death certificates with words like suspected-, probably-, maybe- COVID-19, the US system would automatically default to COVID-19 as designated by ICD-10 codes.
US $8.6 billion spending bill to “quickly produce a vaccine”
On March 6, 2020 President Trump signed into law the first of 3 emergency spending laws to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic: H.R. 6074 (116th): Coronavirus Preparedness and Response Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2020. The legislation provided $8.3 billion in emergency funding for federal agencies to respond to the coronavirus outbreak. With funding”to remain available until September 30, 2024″ [Just before the next US Presidential election!] [1]
The “sweeping spending bill” is to pump “billions of dollars into prevention efforts and research to quickly produce a vaccine for the deadly disease”, to which only eleven Americans have died by this date.
$6.2 billion was allocated to Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) primarily for vaccine development and public health funding and $1.6 billion designated for the international response such as USAID. [4]
Spending allocated to agencies that fall under HHS:
- $3.4 billion to Public Health and Social Services Emergency Fund (PHSSEF), of which $2 billion to BARDA for research and development of vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics
- $1.9 billion to CDC
- $836 million to NIAID for research on therapies, vaccines, diagnostics
- $61 million to FDA for the development and review of vaccines, therapeutics, medical devices and countermeasures.
PLEASE READ all three March 2020 stimulus spending laws – HERE
Timeline pages:
1800s | 1900-1945 | 1946-1979 | 1980-1999 | 2000-2015 | 2016-2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025