Not a Vaccine!

The 9th Circuit Court has ruled that the "COVID vaccine" is not a vaccine.  A vaccine is something that prevents the spread of a disease, which this did not do.  In fact, it was admitted that it was merely a treatment to lessen the severity of symptoms.  Yeah, tell me something I didn't already know.  Okay, the "vaccine" was given legal protection from lawsuits as a vaccine, not a treatment.  Though there is judicial history approving forced vaccination for the benefit of all, there is no such history requiring a certain treatment for one's own benefit.  Ergo, the legal protections against lawsuits has just collapsed.  At least, until the Supreme Court weighs in on the question.  Pfizer, Moderna, J&J, et al. may be in serious legal jeopardy if this ruling holds.

In any case, the next 'pandemic' will not see the populace quite so willing to follow the 'experts' recommendations.  In a recent podcast (EconTalk), Vinay Prasad - UC San Francisco Epidemiologist - explained how the overhyping of the mRNA 'vaccines' has negatively impacted faith in medical professionals to the degree that vaccination rates in general have fallen.  The mishandling of Covid has sown distrust that will take many years to undo.  This is the boy who cried pandemic and now no one will believe when the real pandemic arrives unless bodies start piling up in the streets.

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Abraham Lincoln

I Agree with Jimmy Dore?

Though I rarely find myself agreeing with Jimmy Dore, he makes a great point here:

We should not be surprised that the government that infected black men with syphilis and then didn't treat them to see what happened (Tuskegee Syphilis Study) would also experiment on its citizens with an untried 'vaccine' to protect them from an illness that was mostly harmless to anyone under the age of 60.

Distrust of the government is why we were supposed to have a limited government.  The government long ago broke free of those limits and has become, in many ways, tyrannical.  Where is the American version of Javier Milei?  Our government is desperately in need of pruning with a chainsaw.

"The Pandemic is over"

Tonight, President Biden declared the pandemic over.  Normalcy may now resume in those jurisdictions that haven't already done so.  The curve is flat enough, the spread is slow-ish, and Dr. Fauci submitted his 4-month notice.  Overall, it was poorly handled.  Thanks to our advanced communication technology, we were able to do treat this pandemic in a way that would never have been contemplated.  The continuing advance of technology and likely rise in robots will allow even more stringent lockdowns in the future.  Life has risks.  Those who are at threat should 'voluntarily' self-isolate.  People should be free to weigh the odds.  If I had been in my 20s, I would have been frustrated that a disease likely to be mild and non-fatal had put my life on hold.  One of the annoying things from this pandemic is the new definition of vaccine.  I get a flu shot most years, not a flu vaccine.  However, vaccine sounds so much better and gives the impression of immunity.  Really, we've been doing Polio vaccines for decades and there have been virtually no cases.  Covid vaccine and multiple boosters didn't prevent infections, though reportedly reduced the severity.  Yeah, that's what the flu shot does.  This redefinition of terms is how the CDC has sown distrust.  Once lost, trust is very hard to restore.

Let's not do this again.

Drink Bleach

It has been a year since the 'drink bleach' story swept the country.  Did President Trump really suggest that drinking bleach would be a treatment for Covid-19?  Let's check it out.

During a briefing on April 23, 2020 that included William Bryan of DHS, Trump said the following:

"A question that probably some of you are thinking of if you’re totally into that world, which I find to be very interesting. So, supposedly we hit the body with a tremendous, whether it’s ultraviolet or just very powerful light, and I think you said that hasn’t been checked, but you’re going to test it. And then I said supposing you brought the light inside the body, which you can do either through the skin or in some other way. (To Bryan) And I think you said you’re going to test that, too. Sounds interesting, right?"

"And then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in one minute. And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning, because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it’d be interesting to check that, so that you’re going to have to use medical doctors with, but it sounds interesting to me. So, we’ll see, but the whole concept of the light, the way it kills it in one minute. That’s pretty powerful."

From this, the press latched onto the words disinfectant and injection.  It was a short step from their to drinking bleach.  Then again, injecting light sounds pretty wild too.  Is that a thing?

Yes, it is a thing.  Check out Healight for more details.  Given the opportunity between informing the public about a potential treatment for Covid-19 or making President Trump look like a moron, what did the press choose?  Is it any wonder he called them "Fake News."

Vaccine Passport

Can we implement that at the border first?  If undocumented immigrants are allowed to cross the border into the United States without a vaccine passport, I don't see any reason an American citizen should be held to a higher standard.  Citizenship should have some privileges.

Lockdowns Have Gone Too Far

Here is an interesting report out of Pennsylvania.  If two thirds of the cases are at nursing homes and the average age of someone who dies of Covid-19 is 79, why is everyone locked down?  Yes, have the elderly stay home but younger people, especially under 40, should be allowed out.  The shutdown was sold as a way to flatten the curve.  The curve is flattened.  The risk of overwhelming the system has been averted.  Let people go back to work.  Sure, we can wear masks and social distance but if isolation hasn't burned out the virus yet, it isn't a worthwhile tactic.  Maybe in New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts, where the majority of cases and deaths have occurred, should stick with the lockdown but not the whole country.  This starts to smack of petty tyrants who get high on locking up their citizens.

Speaking of petty tyrants, consider the Texas judge who sentenced a woman to jail because she didn't admit to being 'selfish.'  We're releasing prisoners for fear of the spread in jails and prisons but putting a woman in jail for not accepting court-ordered bankruptcy.  Nice.

Virus Discriminates by Governor's Party?

Does Covid-19 impact Democrat-run states more harshly than Republican-run states?  I heard that comment and thought it weird.  However, it's easy to check.  Let's look at the latest numbers.

Of the 10 states with the highest death tolls, 8 have Democratic governors.  Massachusetts and Florida are the exceptions.  Of the 10 states with the lowest death tolls, 7 have Republican governors.  Interesting but hardly conclusive.  More rural states tend to vote Republican while more urban states tend to vote Democrat.  Contagious diseases are harder on urban centers.

26 states have Republican governors and 24 have a Democrat.  Of note, 178 million people live in the Democrat states while only 150 million live in Republican states.  Of the 1.2 million people infected with Covid-19, 72% live in Democrat states.  80% of the deaths have been in Democrat states.  Correcting for population differences, 1 in 3,112 citizens of Democratic states have died while only 1 in 10,200 citizens in Republican states have died.  Odds of death are tripled in Democratic states.

Is this just a reflection of urban vs. rural populations or does it show that one party is better at handling such crises?

Different Approaches Valid

Ten states account for 42% of the US population but 73% of the Covid infections and 81% of the Covid deaths.  What is it about these states that it hit so much harder than the rest of the country?  If you look only at New York, the state has 6% of the US population but 30% of the infections and 41% of the deaths.  One out of every 68 New Yorkers has been infected and 1 out of 877 has died.  The situation is dire.  However, should the strategy to protect against a worsening of the pandemic in New York also be used in Nebraska?  In Nebraska, only 1 out of every 708 is infected and 1 in 36,500 has died.  What of Hawaii?  1 in 2,344 infected and 1 in 101,000 dead.  Our news media is based in New York and thus the situation there is driving the story.  There should be 50 different strategies, each customized to the situation in that state.

States	Cases	Deaths	Lethality	Population	% of Infections	% of Deaths
NY	288,045	22,179	7.7%	19,453,561	30.0%	40.7%
NJ	109,038	5,938	5.4%	8,882,190	11.3%	10.9%
MA	54,938	2,899	5.3%	6,949,503	5.7%	5.3%
IL	43,903	1,933	4.4%	12,671,821	4.6%	3.5%
CA	42,934	1,694	3.9%	39,512,223	4.5%	3.1%
PA	41,165	1,669	4.1%	12,801,989	4.3%	3.1%
MI	37,778	3,315	8.8%	9,986,857	3.9%	6.1%
FL	31,528	1,073	3.4%	21,477,737	3.3%	2.0%
LA	26,773	1,729	6.5%	4,648,794	2.8%	3.2%
CT	25,269	1,924	7.6%	3,565,287	2.6%	3.5%

These are the numbers to date.  The Lethality is based only on those who have been tested as infected.  Recent studies indicate that the number of infections may be vastly larger than thought, dramatically reducing the lethality, likely below 1%.  Still, a lot of people are dead and this is a crisis in these states and extended lockdowns may be the needed remedy.  But Nebraska, Hawaii, and many other states are entirely justified in taking a different course.

  

Flatten the Curve

Some states, notably Georgia, are reopening their economies.  Many are critical of this.  However, the whole point of the lockdown was to flatten the curve, not wait out the virus.  In many states, the hospital and ventilator capacity is far from full usage.  When the number of infected who need hospitalization exceed the capacity, the death rate goes way up.  For example, Italy and New York City.  There is a balance to be struck.  We have enough data to know that the death rate for those under 40 is extremely low.  The news has reported the teen in France who died and the 20 something in New York but these are the exceptions not the rule.  According to antibody testing, the vast majority - possibly 50 to 80 times the reported infected - of infected people didn't need any medical intervention.  Older people should stay in lockdown but younger people should get back to work.  The vast majority of them - 99.9% - who do contract the disease will be fine and contribute to the goal of herd immunity.

However, for those opposed, it is great that only some states are opening up.  This provides a perfect test case without threatening everyone.  If Georgia doesn't suffer a massive uptick in critical cases in 3 to 4 weeks time, then Governor Kemp will be vindicated.  If the states finds its hospital capacity pushed beyond the limit and deaths skyrocket, then his critics will have all that stronger a case.  Let federalism work and the people of Georgia can benefit or suffer for their elective choice.

More Infected than We Thought?

In California, there has been testing for Covid-19 antibodies.  Officially, California has 27,689 infections as of April 16.  That represents 0.07% of the state's population.  However, antibodies have been found in 2.5 to 4.2% of those tested.  This could indicate that the infection has been far more widespread and the lethality is much, much lower.  Suppose that 2.5% of Californians contracted Covid-19; That would be 988,000 people.  Of that group, only 27,700 felt sick enough to get tested and show positive; that's around 3%, much lower than the proposed 20% that were going to end up in the hospital.  Lower even than the 5% that would be on ventilators.   952 people have died so far in California, which is a 0.1% fatality rate, about as lethal as the flu.

Clearly, the death tolls show this is not just a bad flu season.  Maybe this is more contagious than thought.  It may be just as deadly as the flu but twice as many people get it.  As in my last post, we need to discover the denominator of this disease.  We need to find out who has antibodies and set them free.

Plot Twist

Last week, an entire homeless shelter was tested for Covid-19.  Of the 397 tested, 146 were positive.  Now for the plot twist: none of them had symptoms.  37% infection rate and only 1 needed treatment.  According to the official numbers, only 0.5% of Massachusetts residents have been infected and it has been lethal for 3.9% of those infected.  But this could turn that story on its head.  What if 10% have been infected but most showed no signs.  In Massachusetts, that would be 700,000 infections with 1,245 deaths.  That would drop the lethality rate to 0.2%, about twice as bad as the flu but is it national lockdown bad?  We are so focused on the size of the numerator without knowing the denominator.  We are in desperate need for randomized testing to determine the denominator.

As of April 16, 665,000 Americans have tested positive and 34,613 have died.  That's a 5% fatality rate.  What if 6 million have been infected?  That would make it fatal in less than 1% of cases.  That we don't know and that the homeless shelter numbers came as such a surprise is reason for concern.

Awesome if True!

A treatment trial in New York has shown to be 100% effective against COVID-19.  If this is indeed the case, let's ramp up the manufacture of this drug cocktail and throw open the doors!  Getting a bit stir crazy.

Med Cram

Want some positive news about COVID-19?  Check out MedCram on YouTube.  There are daily episodes that detail what is known or hypothesized about the latest Coronavirus.  The discussions go deep but are made amazingly clear.  Who would guess you can follow a discussion of microbiology and how a virus breaks into cells and convert them into virus factories?  If the doom and gloom is getting you down, this is a site to show that medical professionals are on the case.