Some fact-checkers like to challenge themselves. But others like easier work. For them, there’s fact-checking Alan Jones. In an article in Murdoch newspapers this week, Jones takes aim at Gladys Berejiklian over lockdowns and COVID restrictions. Besides forgetting to mention that the two Yankee doctors he quotes are whacko conspiracy theorists and anti-vaxxers, he gets basic facts WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!
Of course, Alan Jones always opposed COVID restrictions. In March 2020, he ridiculed the response to the pandemic as ‘hysteria and alarmism.’ Despite that, he himself moved into self-isolation at his multi-million dollar rural retreat.
In this week’s article, Jones pillories the information provided to Australians by our political leaders.
“To prosecute your case, under the guise of leadership, in a brazen and know-all manner, denying the public information to which they are entitled is an abuse of the democratic process and dangerous to good health practice.”
In a subsequent rant, he doubled down, scolding inaccurate, dishonest, and unscientific pronouncements.
So who would Alan Jones have us believe?
Fact-checking Alan Jones: Dr Russell Braylock
Jones writes that our ‘discredited leaders’ might note the comments of Dr Russell Braylock. He mentions that the American is a neurosurgeon but fails to share that Blaylock hasn’t had a licence to practice since 2006.
Blaylock promotes views politer people than ourselves might term ‘inconsistent with scientific consensus’. The doctor waxes hysteric on chemtrails, describes vaccination as ‘medical genocide’, and claims the Soviet Union engineered the US drug problem.
He’s front and centre in health scare beat-ups on the dangers of everything from dental amalgam and MSG to fluoride and aluminium cookware.
Jones seized on the former neurosurgeon’s disparagement of mask-wearing.
“By wearing a mask, the exhaled viruses will not be able to escape and will concentrate in the nasal passages, enter the olfactory nerves and travel into the brain.”
WTF! Obviously, this writer is no brain surgeon. But you don’t need to be very clever to work out that a person exhaling the virus is already infected.
Fact-checking Alan Jones: Dr John/James Meehan
Jones also mentions someone he calls Dr John Meehan.
“Dr John Meehan, of Global Research, an organisation comprised of the heads of science from around the world dedicated to promoting the sharing of data and best practice.”
Sounds impressive.
Jones quotes Meehan as saying, “All over the world … bacterial pneumonias are on the rise … why might that be? Because untrained members of the public are wearing medical masks, repeatedly … in a non-sterile fashion … they are becoming contaminated. They are pulling them off their car seat, off the rear-view mirror, out of their pocket, from their countertop and they are reapplying a mask that should be worn fresh and sterile every single time.”
Meehan is not ‘of’ Global Research, the organisation does not comprise heads of science, and Meehan’s name is not John.
A website called Global Research attributes the words Alan Jones cites to Dr James Meehan. That man runs a wellness centre in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Global research quoted Meehan from a press conference he participated in announcing legal action against the city’s mask mandate.
Global Research is the website of ‘The Centre for Research on Globalization’. The centre describes itself as an independent research and media organization, not as Jones says ‘heads of science from around the world’.
In fact, Global Research is just an outlet for conspiracy theories and misinformation. If you want to learn how 9/11 was a false flag operation and fill your head with Holocaust denial or read up on the Illuminati, Global Research is the site for you.
Back to normal
Alan Jones decries Australian lockdowns and lauds some US states as ‘open for months’ or ‘back to normal’. He also says, “Britain has opened up but had nearly 30,000 new cases last Friday.”
But that ignores that in Australia less than 8% of the total population are so far fully vaccinated. The US and UK are far ahead with 47% and 50% respectively of their populations fully vaccinated.
And as to judging the response of our leaders to the pandemic compared to the response in the US and UK?
Australia’s death rate per million people during the pandemic stands at 35.69. By comparison, in the US and UK, over 1800 people per million of the population lost their lives.
I know where I’d rather be.
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I want a rocket trip to Mars after all this quite honestly!