I'm appalled at claims I've seen in various supposedly COVID-realist circles that the virus has apparently "evolved to become milder" despite the fact that there is no evidence for this. None whatsoever.

The reasons why fewer people appear to be dying from the virus are:

• No one can die twice (vulnerable populations have already been culled by fascist governments worldwide who used the virus to save money on long-term care)
• No one tests anymore (medical care providers have effectively stopped testing altogether)
• Vaccines (which do significantly reduce the chances of dying even though they don't significantly reduce the odds of becoming infected or developing Long COVID)
• Deaths are being misattributed (50-year-olds dying of heart attacks? NotCOVID™! Healthy and fit seniors experiencing swift decline after a bout with COVID, only to die shortly after? It's just old age!)

#CovidIsNotOver #CovidIsNotMild #WearARespirator

I came across this tool in which you can calculate your risk of going to the hospital or developing long(er) term symptoms due to your next Covid infection. It's not perfect (there are a couple of risk increasing illnesses missing in the list) but interesting nonetheless:

https://corical.immunisationcoalition.org.au/longcovid

#Covid #LongCovid

Here are the first test images of the Sun’s Corona taken by the ESA Proba-3 mission.

The images (one in visible light, the other in light emitted by iron atoms w/o half their electrons) were taken by the twin Proba-3 spacecraft, flying 150 m apart to create artificial total solar eclipses using the 1.4 m disc on the Occulter spacecraft.

Still in commissioning phase, Proba-3 requires ground control for precision flying.

Next: Autonomous flying and 6 hour eclipses!

https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Space_Engineering_Technology/Proba-3/Proba-3_s_first_artificial_solar_eclipse
1/n

Australians *really* like Japan. Copies of Lone Wolf & Cub for all.

https://poll.lowyinstitute.org/report/2025/global-powers-and-world-leaders/#trust-in-global-powers

via @stilgherrian @Su_G

#auspol #japan

This is quite eye-opening to me anyways... temperatures averaged over land areas so far this year are statistically tied for the warmest on record!

Data from https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/land-based-station/noaa-global-temp

Breaking:

US Senator Alex Padilla, California, stands up at a press conference in LA, identifies himself, and ASKS A QUESTION of Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, whereupon multiple armed agents immediately grab him, throw him to the ground, handcuff him, and drag him away.

Welcome to the Trump dictatorship.

The situation can be seen here: https://youtu.be/ebsHov1ytVE?si=oeL02YcbbkwCLbXI

This is the 100 year anniversary of humans having an idea of what the heck the sun and all the stars actually are. If you had asked a leading astronomer in 1925 what the sun was, they would say that it's basically the same as Earth, but very hot.

In Cecilia Payne's doctoral thesis she was the first to say, from spectral data, that the sun was overwhelmingly made of hydrogen and helium.

It was later described as "the most brilliant PhD thesis ever written in astronomy".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecilia_Payne-Gaposchkin