Opinion by Kip Hansen — 15 May 2021
If there was ever a surer example of the perversion of the Power of Experts than the Covid Mask Mania, I am unaware of it. I doubt that there is a single self-aware person in the world that does not know what the Covid Mask Mania means, even most of those who have been stanch supporters and promoters of The Mask are aware that it is, in fact, a product of a world-wide Mass Hysteria that grew out of the unknowns surrounding the outbreak of a novel coronavirus in Wuhan, China in late 2019.
Those of you who still have the ability to remember the recent past, despite endless propaganda aimed at making you forget, the original CDC Guidance on Face Masks for Covid-19 was this:
Wear a facemask if you are sick
If you are sick: You should wear a facemask when you are around other people (e.g., sharing a room or vehicle) and before you enter a healthcare provider’s office. If you are not able to wear a facemask (for example, because it causes trouble breathing), then you should do your best to cover your coughs and sneezes, and people who are caring for you should wear a facemask if they enter your room. Learn what to do if you are sick.
If you are NOT sick: You do not need to wear a facemask unless you are caring for someone who is sick (and they are not able to wear a facemask). Facemasks may be in short supply and they should be saved for caregivers.
[ source CDC website dated 28 March 2020 via WayBack Machine ]
The Famous Fauci, back when he was just Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and not yet a global media star – let me be clear, we are talking about when Dr. Anthony Fauci was the nation’s leading expert on infectious diseases of all kinds – he said the following in a televised interview on March 8, 2020:
[ Quoting the opinion checking website, FactCheck.org which found that history requires a revision in order to comply with “latest guidelines” in its current coverage here. ]
Here’s what Fauci told Dr. Jon LaPook, chief medical correspondent for CBS News, in the clip circulating on social media:
LaPook, March 8: There’s a lot of confusion among people, and misinformation, surrounding face masks. Can you discuss that?
Fauci: The masks are important for someone who’s infected to prevent them from infecting someone else… Right now in the United States, people should not be walking around with masks.
LaPook: You’re sure of it? Because people are listening really closely to this.
Fauci: …There’s no reason to be walking around with a mask. When you’re in the middle of an outbreak, wearing a mask might make people feel a little bit better and it might even block a droplet, but it’s not providing the perfect protection that people think that it is. And, often, there are unintended consequences — people keep fiddling with the mask and they keep touching their face.
LaPook: And can you get some schmutz, sort of staying inside there?
Fauci: Of course, of course. But, when you think masks, you should think of health care providers needing them and people who are ill. The people who, when you look at the films of foreign countries and you see 85% of the people wearing masks — that’s fine, that’s fine. I’m not against it. If you want to do it, that’s fine.
LaPook: But it can lead to a shortage of masks?
Fauci: Exactly, that’s the point. It could lead to a shortage of masks for the people who really need it.”
Other than adding a link to the definition of schmutz – I have not highlighted any of Faucci’s statement. I don’t need to catch Fauci out in anything because Fauci was absolutely scientifically correct in everything he said. In this, he totally depended on the existing science on the prevention of the transmission of coronavirus illnesses. And the science on the topic has not changed – if anything, it has been reinforced over and over throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.
Yet, FactOpinionCheck.org decided that Fauci, the USA’s leading expert on Infectious Diseases and their transmission, was not expert enough – so they check his knowledge against the opinion of the Director of the CDC? No….against the opinion of Dr. Dean Winslow, a well-known infectious disease physician at Stanford (University) Health Care who told FactOpinionCheck.org:
“In early March, so few patients had been tested that public health officials didn’t yet know that people could spread the virus without showing symptoms, said Winslow.
“That was just not known at that point.”
There was no new science that suddenly made masks effective for the general public but something maybe about Covid-19.
And what does that science really say? “…there’s little scientific evidence that the various face coverings we call ‘masks’ do much if anything to stop the spread of the coronavirus.” [ source ] There are just too many peer-reviewed, high-powered, definitive studies and meta-analyses to list here. The Big List of such studies is in the book: “The Price of Panic. . . .” by Jay W. Richards, Douglas Axe, and William Briggs.
It is, of course, as in all things that deal with the political interference in things that should depend on strict empirical science, worse than that.
In April 2020, the Famous Fauci said
“So, we want to make sure that this issue of having a broader community approach towards putting on a facial covering doesn’t, in fact, get in the way of the primary purpose of masks.
[ which was, he had just explained: “masks that are most appropriately used and necessary for the front-line health care workers, who do need it for the clear and present danger that they find themselves in when they are taking care of people who are actually sick with coronavirus disease.” ]
And in that regard, that’s why what we’re talking about are things that may not necessarily need to be a classical mask, but could be some sort of facial covering.
You know, we’re pretty good in making things in a way that spontaneously becomes effective just because of your own creativity.”
[ source – PBS interview here. ]
Once the CDC changed it’s tune on masks, demanding that The Mask be worn at all times under almost all circumstances, the rhetoric ramped up not only demanding that everyone everywhere wear masks, but accusing those who fail or refuse to wear masks of “killing their grandmothers” (Andrew Cuomo – Governor of New York – a charge he repeats in the present about those who don’t get vaccinated).
In a mass-hysteria-type reaction, everyone who could find a public megaphone jumped on the bandwagon, making wilder and wilder public statements about the deadly-serious importance of wearing masks:
“Everyone should wear a mask,” Blumberg said. “People who say ‘I don’t believe masks work’ are ignoring scientific evidence. It’s not a belief system. It’s like saying, ‘I don’t believe in gravity.’
“People who don’t wear a mask increase the risk of transmission to everyone, not just the people they come into contact with,” he said. “It’s all the people those people will have contact with. You’re being an irresponsible member of the community if you’re not wearing a mask.” [ source ]
Wearing a mask became a virtue signaling bellweather: “I’m a good person, a patriot, a saint….” Because I wear a mask, even in my own home or when alone in my car.
And now?
In an unexpected change if heart (must have been as there has been no new science or breakthrough understanding), the CDC has said:
Vaccinated Americans May Go Without Masks in Most Places, Federal Officials Say
Fully vaccinated people do not have to wear masks or maintain social distance indoors or outdoors, with some exceptions, the C.D.C. advised. [ source ]
Directly from the CDC:
“Update that fully vaccinated people no longer need to wear a mask or physically distance in any setting, except where required by federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial laws, rules, and regulations, including local business and workplace guidance
Update that fully vaccinated people can refrain from testing following a known exposure unless they are residents or employees of a correctional or detention facility or a homeless shelter”
[ source: CDC here 13 May 2021 ]
End BQ
What does this mean for the real world?
Up to 13 May 2021, US News and World Report list the following U.S. states as having NO Mask Mandate previous-to-CDC-announcement:
Alabama | Alaska | Arizona | Arkansas | Florida | Georgia | Idaho | Indiana | Iowa | Kansas | Louisiana | Minnesota | Mississippi | Missouri | Montana | Nebraska | New Hampshire | North Dakota | Oklahoma | South Carolina | South Dakota | Tennessee | Texas | Utah | Wisconsin | Wyoming | Northern Mariana Islands (an unincorporated territory and commonwealth of the U.S.)
That’s 26 out of 50 states with no mandate before the new CDC guidelines.
So far today:
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear says the state’s mask mandate will end June 11, 2021. On that date, the Bluegrass State will also return to 100% capacity at venues and events. [ source ]
Minnesota — Following New CDC Guidance, Governor Walz Announces End to Statewide Face Covering Requirement — Minnesota will align with CDC guidance and recommend unvaccinated Minnesotans continue to wear face coverings indoors [ source ]
North Carolina has removed its indoor mask mandate for most settings and lifted all mass gathering and social distancing limits. This step forward is effective immediately and follows yesterday’s guidance from the CDC. [ source ]
Rhode Island — paraphrasing “fully vaccinated people, as of this coming Tuesday, will no longer need to wear masks or social distance”. [ source ]
Michigan – paraphrasing “everyone who is two weeks out from their second vaccine dose can go without a mask”. [ source ]
Oregon – “Starting today, Oregon will be following this guidance, which only applies to fully-vaccinated individuals. That means Oregonians who are fully-vaccinated no longer need to wear masks or social distance in most public spaces.” [ source ]
Florida — “Floridians should not be penalized for rejecting the overreach of local authorities through unnecessary mask mandates,” [Governor] DeSantis wrote on Twitter Thursday about his decision to pardon the Carnevales. [ who had been arrested for failing to require masks and social distancing at their business, a gym.]” “The governor confirmed his intentions to pardon people at a press conference Thursday in Ormond Beach, Florida, saying he would “remit” the remaining outstanding fines that have been issued against people at the state’s next clemency meeting.” [ source ]
Connecticut — Masks Not Required Indoors For Fully Vaccinated People in Connecticut Starting May 19: Governor [ source ]
Illinois – “Gov. J.B. Pritzker says that he will revise executive orders to sync up with new CDC guidelines on mask wearing by vaccinated individuals in indoor and outdoor spaces.” [ source ]
Nevada – “On May 3, Gov. Steve Sisolak signed an emergency directive updating mask and face covering requirements for the state to align with the CDC’s recommendations, including any subsequent guidance. As a result, the new guidance from the federal agency became effective immediately, according to a news release from the state.” [ source ]
Pennsylvania – “In short, the Health Department says it is following the CDC’s lead. That means Pennsylvanians who are fully vaccinated no longer have to wear masks outdoors or indoors except in certain situations.“ [ source ]
Washington – “Masks off: Fully vaccinated people can shed masks in Washington, [Washington Governor] Inslee announces following new CDC rules” [ source ]
New York – “Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today announced that New York State will adopt the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s new guidance on mask use for fully vaccinated people. The guidelines state that fully vaccinated people, defined as two or more weeks after receiving the second dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine or the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine, no longer need to wear masks outdoors, except in certain crowded settings and venues.” [ source ]
Virginia – “Governor Ralph Northam today lifted Virginia’s universal indoor mask mandate to align with new guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Governor Northam also announced that Virginia will ease all distancing and capacity restrictions on Friday, May 28, two weeks earlier than planned. The updates to Virginia’s mask policy …. will become effective at midnight tonight along with previously announced changes to mitigation measures.” [ source ]
Colorado – “Coloradans who are fully vaccinated are no longer required to wear masks, and people who aren’t vaccinated are only required to wear them in limited settings, Gov. Jared Polis said Friday.” [ source ]
Delaware – “Governor John Carney on Friday announced that – effective May 21 – the State of Delaware will lift its requirement that Delawareans and visitors must wear face coverings anytime they are indoors with others outside their household. Delawareans should instead follow masking guidance issued on Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for all indoor and outdoor activities.” [ source ]
West Virginia – “West Virginia Governor Jim Justice announced that he is signing an executive order to modify the face covering requirement during a press conference on Friday. The governor says West Virginia will immediately begin following the updated CDC guidance for those who are fully vaccinated. The facial covering requirement will still apply to those who have not been vaccinated until June 20.” [ source ]
The Governors of the states (in the United States) are announcing allegiance to the CDC so quickly that I literally cannot keep up with adding them in above as I write this column.
How long do you think the other governors, who have not yet fallen into line with the new (and very welcome) diktat from the CDC, can delay? Does anyone think that citizens of one state seeing freedom restored in the neighboring state will not demand the same freedom?
I think that reasonable people will realize that the mask mandate was unnecessary from the beginning — especially as The Science from The Epidemiologists has been telling them all to expect to have to wear masks for at least another six months, a year longer, two years, or maybe forever. In a poll conducted by the NY Times that was completed just 4 days ago, 81% of professional epidemiologists expected mask mandates to continue for at least 1 more year. 52% expected masking to last for more than a year. The minimum expected was “a few more months”. Up until yesterday, Epidemiologists represented The Science….no longer, they have been kicked to the curb.
In my opinion, this new CDC Guideline breaks the back of the oppressive Covid-19 Panic Power Grab by presidents, governors, city councils and mayors who have reveled in their free pass to rule by executive order under emergency powers without oversight by elected law makers.
There will be no going back, I don’t think the people will stand for it, at least not in the United States.
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Note: A few typos and other editing errors have been corrected on my first review of “as published”. — kh
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Author’s Comment:
In the spirit of full disclosure, I have never worn a mask unless absolutely required by a “no mask, no service” rule at a place of business. Despite signs requiring masks, I have never worn a mask at a gas pump.
I have been appalled at the sight of nuclear family groups walking in the woods, hundreds of feet from the nearest non-family members, wearing masks. I have had the same reaction seeing married couples bicycling on rail trails in the bright Spring sunshine, wearing masks.
The Power of Experts, abused, for the sake of fame. The intentional ignorance of the truths of medical science, gained over the last fifty years but abandoned by today’s self-serving “experts” in the throes of a Mass Hysteria who have gone-along-to-get-along, bandwagoning and cheerleading whatever the current Covid Hysteria message from WHO and the CDC and unknown/unnamed political forces have demanded.
It is entirely possible that the CDC has issued the “vaccination will free you from mandates” guideline as a tool to increase vaccinations (not a bad thing) and/or as a political tool to improve the sitting President’s miserable approval ratings.
Address comments to “Kip . . .” if speaking to me.
Thanks for reading.
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80% of C-19 CASES are UNDER 65 years old.
80% of C-19 DEATHS are OVER 65 years old.
30% of C-19 deaths were over 85 years old, only 2% of the population.
30% of C-19 deaths were in nursing homes, hospice or residence.
During the 2020/2021 scam-demic there were 568,053 Covid-19 “involved” deaths.
There were 3,916,033 deaths from other causes!!!!!
C-19 was 12.7% of ALL the 4,484,086 deaths from all causes.
Rather sorry excuse for a wide-spread, highly contagious, lethal scam-demic
Per CDC data tables.
Mother Nature and her buddy Grim Reaper were simply using C-19 to cull the herd of the too many, too old, too sick, too crammed together in contagious badly run (BLUE) eldercare facilities.
The lying, fact free, fake news MSM left wing coup de’tat propaganda machine rebranded an ordinary flu as a pseudo-pandemic to stampede the sheeple into deposing Trump.
Seeing the results of this SCAM-demic think how easy it would be to line everyone up at cattle cars for one-way trips to xyklon showers.
The US press is the poster child for why despots kick shit-stirring “journalists” out of helicopters into the Atlantic.
The US, Brazil, India, Mexico and the UK are accountable for HALF of the global C-19 deaths.
Including the next five: Italy, Russia, France, Germany and Spain and these top ten are accountable for 65% of the global C-19 deaths.
That takes some kind of special talent – or crappy health care.
Japan has counted a mere 11,064 C-19 deaths. What do they know the rest of the world does not?
WHO data
Stop sugar coating it, Nick. Tell us what you really think.
There has long been discussion in biological areas, probably those especially with medical early education, about the possible skewing of the demographic curve with antibiotics, surgeries, even vitamins, etc. As a susceptible, as also since birth to something, I recall hearing this long ago once in a while in such areas. That model prediction, with rough edges, was correct to some degree. Teaching genetics with predictive abilities has always been very difficult.
The medics that dealt with this in person all along were the most trustworthy when push came to shove.
Nearly 80% of cases, at least in America, were of people who were overweight, “healthy at any weight”, “fat is beautiful” a is a comorbidity past, present, and progressive. The conditional infection rate heavily weights (no pun intended) the population at risk. And, yes, Planned Parent/hood is one of the few venues and practices with excess year-over-year deaths. Denying and stigmatizing early therapeutic treatments (e.g. HCQ, Ivermectin) exacerbated sustainable viability. So, overweight, vascular disease, and metabolic dysfunction are first-order forcings of disease progression. A perfect dysfunctional convergence.
Roger ==> Try Googling the question, there may be answers for you there.
G00gle? You will get G00gle’s answer, not the truth or facts.
Doug ==> An in-depth serious web search guided by good critical thinking skills and a knowledge of how to find stuff and what to do with it once found can be very successful.
In an earlier time and place, I developed search functions for various [huge] web sites — it is an art as much as a science.
Roger ==> Web search engines are tools — those that know how to use them appropriately can be quite successful.
The cr*p that Google offers users in the first few pages of general searches is mostly mis- and dis-information – I totally agree.
Steering engines. Best bet: signal diversity.
An imposter has been posting comments in my name; please ignore all snarky comments in this thread.
Roger ==> I have asked the Moderator to look into it. It may take sometime — the Mods are volunteers and such work is not easy.
No, they don’t.
Let’s be real: India has almost 1.4 billion people. Their covid death rate per 1 million population is very very low. I’ve noticed Our Illustrious Media do not choose to mention this, nor what the excess death rate is. What I do see on tv is people in a very hot, very poor country sick with respiratory disease, with minimal health care and zero air conditioning. And still the covid deaths/million are a fraction of the US or Germany or UK.
India’s population is over 4 times that of the US. The number of cases and deaths there are large, but the rates are far lower the the the peak US, and the daily case and death graphs seems to indicate peaking.
The following will be my opinion only. I have nothing but antidotal evidence of back it up.
I believe there are two causes to their low covid rates.
Greg, If there’s anything to your last point, my family is pretty safe 🙂
Roger ==> Did you read the studies? They were testing to see if it would save very sick people. That’s was never the claim for HCQ.
You really need to pull your head out of where ever it is you store it! The ONLY studies that showed HCQ to be ineffective were the ones that did not USE it correctly! If you said that ivermectin is much more effective you would have scored partial points; as it is you are once again shut out!
The meta analysis of HCQ shows that studies from North America are 3.7 times more likely to publish negative results than the rest of the world, yet in spite of the incorrect regimen being used by many in the US, HCQ still comes out as 65% effective! Ivermectin is 80-85% effective! Imagine how it would come out if they used the correct protocol like Fauxi opined about almost ten years ago!
Please explain the differences in fatality rates between people in Africa and Americans of African descent! Are the health care systems in the US inferior to those in many African nations? Once again you come off as a proto-Nazi; with murderous and totalitarian intent plastered across your consciousness!
it appears that a hell of a lot of black americans are obese and unfit
same as whitey and others just more so?
The only studies that claim negative outcomes were carried out with small populations in late stage disease progression, with toxic doses of HCQ. HCQ works in two modes as documented in two reports posted in this thread.
They don’t, and disease progression in disparate states can be attributed to delayed and novel treatments with increased risk and mortality. Also, their misplaced faith in expert testimony of mask ability to mitigate viral infection.
If india administrated hydroxchloroquine and it worked this would prove trump was right ,the political left will never allow this to happen, politics over lives.
Boris Johnson is a right wing politician in the UK, what they appear to be is often not the case, if you don’t believe the effects of Hq have been suppressed your being very naive.
You are wrong, the science shows it works, the “science” applying it to late shows it doesn’t work, that’s fraudulent science you refer to
The effects of HCQ have not been suppressed. The science shows it does not work.
Wrong! The people you’re arguing with have ALL read studies that contradict your erroneous beliefs. Rarely does any treatment show positive benefits when wrongly used. HCQ is a mitigation, not a cure.
BoJo right-wing? Don’t make me laugh. He’s about as right wing as Corbyn. all his advisors are basically socialists and his girl friend is a devout XR nutter who is always interfering and we currently find ourselves looking forward to a future without affordable heating or transport thanks to this muppet.
What they appear to be is often not the case” , can you not read andy ,
Oh Please B Clarke, Blundering Boris Johnson/Corbyn is no more ‘right wing’ than ‘my’ Pope is a catholic.
Are you dense what part of “what they appear to be is often not the case” I surgest you read the whole comment and the context.
Libertarian?
Liartarian.
“COULDN’T care less” is the correct expression, not “could” care less.
Rory ==> Well, he “could care less” . . . but yes, a often mis-used expression.
I use both. Seems to mean the same with common usage.
One is correct; the other is not.
Donna ==> Yes — that’s it, but the latest thing is that there is No right and No wrong — no correct and no not-correct.
2 states in india are going full tilt with ivermectin
so the results should be interesting a HUGE pop study to shut the naysayers up shortly
Thanks Oz
First results from Goa are already in: https://twitter.com/PierreKory/status/1393576205807493122
Read that, than you know
Dr Dhananjay Bakhle, a physician treating COVID patients but also leading medical research for a pharmaceutical company, has agreed to respond to our questions regarding the recent crisis in India. In March, we published the article “The Mystery Behind India’s Success in Flattening the Curve,” which he co-authored. While infections and mortality remained low, per capita, in the first wave, the recent rapid increase in cases and mortality has taken the country by surprise. In this interview, Dr Bakhle helps us understanding what is going on, and why some states appear to fare much better than others. He also offers practical suggestions / recommendations. (Note: the interview was done in writing, through email exchanges on April 23-29; some edits were done for readability purposes).
KG ==> For readers: “The people from the slums who got hit by the first wave were treated in the govt and municipal dispensaries, and got ydroxychloroquine and zinc regimen. This helped keeping the death rate very low.”
80% is close to the percentage of Americans deemed overweight.
Making the COVID-19 preferentially affecting overweight people claim meaningless.
ATheoK ==> The “obesity rate” is determined by the Skinny Police. . . . .and is not real in any pragmatic sense.
Ahh this Paul Krugman clap trap.
People are really, really effing fat. WAY too many. The average weight has increased 50-75 pounds in the last 50 years.
It’s as simple to demonstrate this- watch any movie made before 1990…
Even worse, the average male cannot do a push up anymore.
Vitamin D is fat soluble therefor those who are overweight are usually deficient in vitamin D. A large portion of covid victims are deficient in vitamin D. People with darker skins who live in higher latitudes are deficient in Vitamin D, People with darker skins who live in higher latitudes make up a higher proportion of covid victims.
‘People’ who cover themselves from head to toe in shrouds are also deficient in Vitamin D
Nick:
You’re forgetting China, with a mere 4,634 deaths, or 3 per million population — way better than Japan.
The WHO data is only as good as the competence and integrity of the national agencies reporting it.
If you believe the data, in Europe among countries with > 10M population, Germany is clearly doing the best job. The worst job in that category goes to Belgium, home of all the Eurocrats empowered to tell the rest of Europe how to run everything from agriculture to health care. Not exactly a ringing endorsement.
Germans have always been a better at documenting everything. They likely have done a much better both clinical job and clerical job of delineating and documenting those who died of COVID and those who died with COVID. Then there are those who died and were never tested or their COVID PCR test yielded as false negative (due to mishandling, bad primers, etc)
In statistical terms, the Germans are very good at avoiding Type 1 statistical errors, that is labeling someone died of COVID who if fact died of something else.
In signal detection theory, it doesn’t matter whether you are a radar engineer wanting to detect true radar targets from noise in the signal returns, or you’re a statistical health professional trying to determine those who died of COVID, those who died with COVID, and those deaths were completely missed where COVID may have been involved but not detected by a either a bad PCR test or no test done at all. Pushing detection thresholds in one direction or the other affects the number of false negatives or false positives as a trade-off.
This Nature study is particularly impressive from a Berlin hospital.
Table 1 is of particular interest in how detailed they have documented the 26 studied deceased patients from COVID. Of the 26, only 1, had no clear underlying prior co-morbidity.
See this table:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-82862-5/tables/1
(consider patient #12 in the table, had there not been a pandemic no one would have been surpirsed at this individual expiring due to pulmonary embolism.)
Whilst ARDS/viral pneumonia was causative in many of these patients, it is also unknown how many non-COVID deaths.
The bottom line is the German hospitals have been very good at documenting COVID death prior co-morbidities.
Joel ==> In the US, the federal government paid the hospitals a cash amount for every Covid death at the hospital . . . . meant to offset the hospitals costs but may have skewed reporting.
“may have skewed reporting” – only if human beings or other living organisms (all of which respond to incentives) were involved.
The explanation for the low mortality rate in China is: most of what they say is a lie. The Japanese are merely reporting real Covid deaths, and not conflating them with all other respiratory tract infections.
Masks are utterly ineffective against covid … as Fauci explained in the beginning. “Crowd packers” wearing white gloves to overload commuter trains isn’t how Westerners would describe either social distancing or “social courtesy”.
Roger ==> Can you explain that, please?
Covering one’s face shows respect for fellow citizens?
I spent six months in Nagano in 1998 — and I witnessed a few people wore surgical masks — but none of my Japanese colleagues did and none would have thought it a sign of “respect” but rather showing an exaggerated concern about air pollution and/or germaphobia.
Roger ==> Very informative article, but you focus on a single small aspect of the issue and leave out the important history, philosophy and other more prominent reasons for mask wearing: air pollution and fear of transmitting or catching diseases.
Roger ==> Come on — you know full well that there are far too many variables to try to single out “masks” as an explanation for differences between Covid statistics of nations.
Roger Taguchi(s) ==> Until the imposter issue is sorted, I will nmot be responding to any comments from you two.
An imposter has posted this.
MODERATOR ==> “Roger Taguchi” is complaining of imposter posts….anyway to verify and nuke the imposter?
Not only that ,replies to Roger taguchi earlier yesterday are now somehow transformed into replies to me!
When I lived in Korea in the early 1970s, many Koreans wore masks in the winter when working outdoors. It did two things–kept their faces warm, and kept them from breathing the pollution due to the charcoal stoves common only used for home heating and cooking. Most people who wore masks were men–and they did most of the outside work. Rarely saw anyone masked up inside.
An imposter has posted this.
An imposter has posted this.
Well, mother nature and a few test-tubes.
I believe that the Japanese wore masks to hide their bad teeth.
It won’t be Zyklon-B™ showers. It’ll be Climate mitigation internment camps to lower the carbon footprint of the unwashed masses.
The Green Guard camp operators won’t need cyanide gas, they’ll just slowly starve the internees. Any woman upon found pregnant will be given an abortifacient, forced fed if necessary. Camp doctors will perform forced sterilizations of men and women, and children will be “offered” therapies (hormones, surgeries) for addressing their programmed sexual aphasia, turning boys to girls and girls to boys and thus ensuring future sterility.George Orwell got it only partially correct.
I understand you’re being somewhat hyperbolic … but only slightly. These people are serious about depopulating the planet artificially … at the only time in history when it was completely unnecessary. It is well understood that as the poorest people get access to plentiful, low cost heating and light, better diets and living conditions, birthrates drop like a stone. Overpopulation simply isn’t a thing in the 21st century.
“These people are serious about depopulating the planet artificially ” agreed its the only thing that makes sense. Taking into account ,environmental measures , farming measures,power production measures,,and this that I posted yesterday. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-57120354
1984 was a draft. The reality is more severe. We have contact tracing in Tasmania. No covid cases here at the moment. All small shops, restaurants, places of worship and assorted other venues require registration from customers. Funny thing is that supermarkets don’t require it. I refuse to accept dictators. I don’t have the app on my phone so I have to register in a book. My name is G. Clooney, E Musk etc. with a fake landline number.
An imposter has posted this, not me (Roger Taguchi).
COVID-19 caused influenza illnesses and death rates to plummet to record lows.
COVID-19 caused pneumonia diagnosis and especially death counts to record lows.
Gunshot deaths became COVID-19 deaths.
Even a skydiver whose parachutes failed to open was classified as a COVID-19 death.
All it took was to pay more money to hospitals and states for COVID-19 illnesses and deaths than for any other kind of illness or death.
That and a lot of political pressure.
ATheoK ==> It’s not so much that they were paying hospitals for Covid deaths — they were really paying for the extra csts from care to Medicare and Uninsured Covid patients — but it is possibly true that in-house doctors and medical examiners were “more inclined” to include the ICD code for Covid on Death Certificates when there was ANY possibility that Covid “contributed” or “was involved in any way” with the death.
I know of someone who had C19, who one morning dodged at high speed around a line of cars at a stoplight, crashed, and died. Cause of death: Covid-19.
Unfortunately, there are far too many people who do not think critically nor research the scam and fall for the propaganda spouted by main stream media out lets like the BBC, ABC, CBC, SBS etc etc. You cannot tell these people anything to the contrary, they have fallen for the scam 100%, hook, line and sinker.
And yet accurate “excess death” numbers are very hard to find.
Hard to find for a reason.
In the UK, Public Health England (PHE) produces many statistics related to health. As people are tending to live longer, the death rate has generally been slowly declining. The overall death rate for 2020 was similar to that ten years earlier. We did not have lockdowns and curfews ten years ago when the death rate was similar, or even twenty years ago when the death rate was significantly worse.
The european data for excess deaths is at https://www.euromomo.eu/
Or just creative counting.
The complete COV-19 fearmongering was a fraud, not, that it does exist, not that it’s dangerous for certain people, but with more sure instinct from the WHOside, or in Germany the RKI, we would have less victims in persons, economics, and what ever.
So many people lying, spreading false informations, looking for personal advantages it got as bad as it is.
The masks are peanuts compared to the rest.
Now they try to telling us, the s called third wave is broken among athers, from vaccination, foregetting, most vaccinated people are these over 70 and often in care houses, not just known to be spreader of COV-19.
Remember when it was xenophobic to call it the China or Wuhan virus?
Now we have, South African, UK and Brazilian variants.
Not to forget the Indian,… but do we really have ?
Also we have faulty tests, giving false positives.
On a recent repatriation flight from India to Australia, half the passengers were refused entry because of positive tests. They were all asymptomatic, and had most likely been pretty careful in the previous 2 weeks because they knew they needed negative tests.
Several of those passengers had tests performed privately afterwards, and they came back negative.
The company performing the original tests had been thrown under the bus, but I’m convinced that the huge infection waves are not genuine.
OK Believe me when I say I was vaccinated.
Sid ==> And that’s why the new CDC Guidleines Break the Back of the Mask Madness — as one of the governors said — (paraphrasing) it’s impossible to tell who has been vaccinated….”
People… persons who are not inocculated… rather, not vaccinated, could wear a star, perhaps a yellow star, a clear indicator of privilege, and systemic risk.
Apologies for me double posting! Didn’t see yours! Mea culpa!
I’ suggest an armband with a yellow syringe, called Fauci’s syringe.
Van Doren ==> Maybe we should start a poll for the favored lapel sign for th vaccinated –or maybe, alternately, for the UNvaccinated.
The latter won’t work due to removal problems. Either at vaccination or self…
How about a star on the belly?
Virginia issues a CDC vaccination card with your name, the vaccine you got, and the dates. Mine shows two Pfizer doses, the last on March 21.
During my career, I attended hundreds of conferences, mostly as a speaker or panelist, and I have a huge collection of name tents and, especially, badge holders. I laminated my vaccine card, and am going to put it in one of those badge holders for tomorrow’s grocery shopping outing. My wife ran errands today at stores in Fairfax County (very blue) and Prince William County (still red). Predictably, the Fairfax County stores still insisted on customers wearing masks, while in the stores in Prince William County, almost no one did. Since our grocery run is in Fairfax County, it will be interesting to see what happens…
Michael ==> An interesting approach. Maybe we can try pinning big blue cloth “V”s to out chests . . . . .
Really, I think that just setting the example of abandoning masks will be most effective.
Kip ==> While I carried my vaccination card today, I never had to pull it out. The three places we shopped today were all in Fairfax County, and it was interesting. Almost all of the customers in each store wore masks, except us – and no one gave us a dirty look, or even seemed to notice, except for the few who were also maskless. We traded mutual smiles with the latter, something I missed terribly. One such mother remarked to her daughter as we passed “I see they got the memo.”
We had chance conversations with a few masked people, and every one of them was completely unaware of the fact that the Governor had lifted all mask restrictions “for the fully vaccinated” (an unenforceable condition). Two of the three stores (one being Costco) have officially dumped the mask requirement. Costco did away with all of their external and internal mask signage. The grocery store (Wegman’s) had removed its big sandwich board sign at the entrance. I didn’t see a single person without a mask in there (and it was crowded), but no one batted an eye at the fact that we weren’t wearing them. Only the checkout girl even mentioned it, asking me very politely if I would like someone to bring me a mask. I shook my head, and replied “I’ve been fully vaccinated since March.” She said “That’s great! Me too.” And the rest of our interaction was normal.
My wife and I discussed the whole phenomenon, and she concluded that once the word gets around, there will be an induction period followed by a rapid drop in mask-wearing. Her theory is that people will realize that maskless people are implicitly advertising the fact that they are vaccinated. And since being vaccinated is the new virtue, and, OMG, there is an overt signal of it, everyone will rush to unmask so that no one thinks they are the evil unvaccinated.
I think there’s some truth to that. However, I think you’re right in that more people hate the damn things than anything else, and just haven’t “gotten the memo.”
Michael ==> Yes, I quite agree. My wife and I attended Church today, maskless even though the rules have not caught up with the new CDC guidelines. And you are quite right about “for the fully vaccinated” (an unenforceable condition). “”
The last time someone in Vermont asked me to put on a mask I just told them I had an exception and that was that. Go HIPPA!
A relative of mine in New Hampshire made an official looking badge for herself which read “Exempt”. This was last year, and it worked for a very long time.
Michael ==> Clever — who would question an official looking Badge?
I noticed similar: NC Gov. lifted mask mandate and all other restrictions on Friday, with a lot of news coverage, but over the weekend you couldn’t tell from all the places with signs still up and people still with masks. It’s almost like people still want them. But nobody said anything, just like with you.
Kip,
The “V” would become the new “Scarlet Letter”
Well, obviously the unvaccinated could be forced to wear armbands. With , say, a colored star?
Elle ==> No worries, Elle. Thanks for reading and commenting.
Yes, any attempted enforcement of “masks for the unvaccinated” will be interesting.
( Traditionally medical history is private)
And if the jabs work, how is an
“unvaccinated” a threat to a vaccinated?
And what about an unvaccinated person with antibodies and T cell resistance. They have zero need if an experimental vaccine. They likely have far longer resistance to a wider variety of virus versions.
David A ==> You know that it is unpatriotic to confuse the public with logic or facts!
I identify as being vaccinated….
dodgy ==> “vaccination status” is just a social construct….
Wrong as usual.
Roger ==> This comment thread is HUMOR
Roger never received any of those genes. This is a real benefit when socializing within his “bubble”, since no one with his sociopolitical bias is allowed to use humour.
I’m going to steal that. 🙂
Me, too.
I’m part of the control group, dodgy geezer.
an “ex” is a has-been. a “spurt” is a drip under pressure.
Kip, I have never believed in the mask BS, I don’t wear one unless required to by a business that I need to frequent. I’m 73 well into the early death zone, but hysteria has never been my thing. It appears that in this age there are lies, damned lies and Faucets.
The double masking fad didn’t last very long did it?
McNeill ==> “…and Faucets.” LOL
72 y.o. Healthy as a horse (remember the idiom, before memes). Faux FauXi
Faucies not faucets
He could be headed down the drain, along with Gates. For some reason, their walls of protection have been falling.
Except for some at the end of their lives and/or already seriously unhealthy, or for those who have become unfortunate victims of a criminally inept medical system, covid is essentially faucisymptomatic (play on paucisymptomatic), i.e., big scare, nothing there.
The Dread Covid Theatre of the last 14 months has been a real revelation.
All the masks are off.
Indeed,the mass hysteria and incoherence of our experts has show us Government at its finest.
Clueless.
Useless.
And (Power Mad) dangerous.
The fear of a possible pandemic let all the masks slip.
Faced with a projected medical emergency our “helpers” and oath sworn defenders of civil liberty,freedom and human rights..Tossed these civic institutions into the garbage.
Rather than expand medical abilities,hiring more people and creating temporary facilities,most of our “helpers” opted to imprison the healthy in their own homes..To “save the Healthcare system”.
Prior to March 2020 most of the past year would have been dismissed as crazy talk and conspiracy theory.
Now we know better.
Government is the enemy.
That Wuhan Flu otherwise known as Covid-19 has been a wet squib,when rated as a pandemic grade virus,however the hysteria about it,emulating from all levels of government has done us all massive harm.
The cure is worse than the illness.
So yeah,the masks are off.
Only a dreamer can “unsee” what we have just observed.
The state has become the enemy by ever increasing its reach and depth and replacing competence with bureaucracy.
No evidence exist that face Masks stops transmission.
Sunsettommy ==> Well, very little evidence of very little effect, even in hospital operating theaters.
But at least a surgeon doesn’t touch the mask all the time and even worse, reuse them.
I have been a painter most of my life and know just how useless the majority of masks are and that is with dust you can see.
I wore masks and respirators as a condition of employment, and was trained and qualified annually on their maintainence, replacement, donning and doffing.
Going into an empty radioactive water holding tank I would have to wear double waterproof-Anti-C over Anti-c and an air fed breathing apparatus. Four hours to dress and four hours to undress.
Doug ==> Better you than me — my worst was as a volunteer fireman and a Scott pack — climbing a three-story ladder and going in through a window backwards so as to test the strength of the floor n]before putting my weight on it. That and having a concrete block wall collapse behind me in a burning motel.
Surgeons’ masks are to prevent snotting and drooling into the open field.
Doug ==> and to keep the surgeon from inhaling spurting body fluids.
What does a surgeon do with a really urgent fart in the middle of a surgery?
(No, this is not a joke. I really want to know how many airborne germs attend the hydrogen sulfide gas — or is the weave of the Fruit-of-the-Loom sufficient to hold them back?)
N95 tightie-whities?
Can you provide 2 or 3 peer review articles that “clearly” reinforce your statement? At least that masks do not work in slowing down transmission? The same extents to Kip. Just curious…
J N ==> Start with this list:
Jacobs, J. L. et al. (2009) “Use of surgical face masks to reduce the incidence of the common cold among health care workers in Japan: A randomized controlled trial,” American Journal of Infection Control, Volume 37, Issue 5, 417 – 419. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19216002
N95-masked health-care workers (HCW) were significantly more likely to experience headaches. Face mask use in HCW was not demonstrated to provide benefit in terms of cold symptoms or getting colds.
Cowling, B. et al. (2010) “Face masks to prevent transmission of influenza virus: A systematic review,” Epidemiology and Infection, 138(4), 449-456. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/epidemiology-and-infection/article/face-masks-to-prevent-transmission-of-influenza-virus-a-systematic- review/64D368496EBDE0AFCC6639CCC9D8BC05
None of the studies reviewed showed a benefit from wearing a mask, in either HCW or community members in households (H). See summary Tables 1 and 2 therein.
bin-Reza et al. (2012) “The use of masks and respirators to prevent transmission of influenza: a systematic review of the scientific evidence,” Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses 6(4), 257–267. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/j.1750-2659.2011.00307.x
“There were 17 eligible studies. … None of the studies established a conclusive relationship between mask/respirator use and protection against influenza infection.”
Smith, J.D. et al. (2016) “Effectiveness of N95 respirators versus surgical masks in protecting health care workers from acute respiratory infection: a systematic review and meta-analysis,” CMAJ Mar 2016 https://www.cmaj.ca/content/188/8/567
“We identified six clinical studies … . In the meta-analysis of the clinical studies, we found no significant difference between N95 respirators and surgical masks in associated risk of (a) laboratory-confirmed respiratory infection, (b) influenza-like illness, or (c) reported work-place absenteeism.”
Offeddu, V. et al. (2017) “Effectiveness of Masks and Respirators Against Respiratory Infections in Healthcare Workers: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis,” Clinical Infectious Diseases, Volume 65, Issue 11, 1 December 2017, Pages 1934–1942, https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747
“Self-reported assessment of clinical outcomes was prone to bias. Evidence of a protective effect of masks or respirators against verified respiratory infection (VRI) was not statistically significant”; as per Fig. 2c therein:
Radonovich, L.J. et al. (2019) “N95 Respirators vs Medical Masks for Preventing Influenza Among Health Care Personnel: A Randomized Clinical Trial,” JAMA. 2019; 322(9): 824–833. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2749214
“Among 2862 randomized participants, 2371 completed the study and accounted for 5180 HCW-seasons. … Among outpatient health care personnel, N95 respirators vs medical masks as worn by participants in this trial resulted in no significant difference in the incidence of laboratory-confirmed influenza.”
Long, Y. et al. (2020) “Effectiveness of N95 respirators versus surgical masks against influenza: A systematic review and meta-analysis,” J Evid Based Med. 2020; 1- 9. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/jebm.12381
“A total of six RCTs involving 9,171 participants were included. There were no statistically significant differences in preventing laboratory-confirmed influenza, laboratory-confirmed respiratory viral infections, laboratory-confirmed respiratory infection, and influenza-like illness using N95 respirators and surgical masks. Meta-analysis indicated a protective effect of N95 respirators against laboratory-confirmed bacterial colonization (RR = 0.58, 95% CI 0.43-0.78). The use of N95 respirators compared with surgical masks is not associated with a lower risk of laboratory-confirmed influenza.”
I can add dozens more — and more recent — but that should keep you busy.
Some of your links are pre-Covid 19 and are related with Influenza (12 of them). Can you provide a couple specifically about Covid 19 (not influenza), after the outbreak (not from 2009 and 2012 for instance), that clearly prove that masks are not effective? A couple at least. That should keep you busy for a while at least. As you might know, a Pandemic such as this one provided a huge amount of new science with an increased concern because Covid 19 became a pandemic and Influenza was not, at least in recent decades. In the link you provided below “LINK for that is here.” in an answer to TonyG, we find, in the same publisher, lots of articles that say the contrary, for instance “https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/10/20-0948_article” (I could provide a lot more). If we do a quick search we also find thousands of articles that prove the contrary, like this one found in a few seconds “https://www.pnas.org/content/118/4/e2014564118” and thousands more are available if you care to find them. Another quick list here “https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/media/674/open” (just googling). You will find good and bad articles, of course, but that is also extensible to the ones that state that masks are not effective. Do you really want to go through a path that is similar to the climate alarmists that are constantly denying the evidence that they might be wrong?
You really think Covid is so different from influenza that all previous science is thrown out?
“lots of articles that say the contrary”, perhaps, but how many RCTs? The article Kip linked did an analysis of several RCTs to reach its conclusion. Computer modeling with assumptions about fundamentals like transmission rate are not proof of anything.
Also, you asked “Can you provide 2 or 3 peer review articles that “clearly” reinforce your statement?”. Did Kip answer your question?
The mask is a physical item to lessen the escape of the particles The size of the viruses before C-19 are the same size as the C-19 viruses. The cracks around the nose and other places where it is easy for the viruses to escape are also the same before and present. So what difference does a study before or during C-19 have to do with anything? They have studied the same thing.
J N ==> You question belies an understanding of the question. The SARS-C0V-19 virus is just another in a long line of coronaviruses– it is not some magical new thing. All the coronaviruses — which include the common cold and others — have the similar size and transmission methods.
There is not a lot of definitive Covid-19 specific studies testing with masks … there is some but it has been rushed and there have been no findings that differ from studies on all other similar viruses.
Give it some time and they may do real rigorous studies — but the real-time data available from masking-mandate areas and no-masking-mandate areas show no significant differences.
Now that the CDC has changed its stance on the issue, more non-confirmatory studies (studies showing masks are ineffective) will be published to support their new position.
As with all controversies, there will be some evidence on each side — depending mostly on the pre-existing biases of the researchers or the current general bias of the entire field (ref: Ianodidis).
Many of the references I provided are meta-analyses combining the results of many studies.
Look for them and you will see that masks simply are not particularly effective for the general public – if at all — for a whole host of reasons.
that’s part of the problem…. the entire mask effectiveness question shifted due to covid… not because masks work to prevent covid spread, they don’t (if they did, we wouldn’t have so many infected people)… but because science and the medical establishment has been corrupted by woke politics…
i guess we were a bunch of dunces regarding virology and epidemiology prior to covid… we were complete idiots, knew nothing, and had no idea how to perform scientific experiments… I call bull feces on that… it’s all been politicized.
we have the control group… it’s called sweeden… if I was to put covid 19 case/deaths curves for all european countries and the USA, I guarantee you will not be able to point out which country had no mask mandates or lockdowns… MASKS DON’T WORK
I think there is only one RCT (Danish) that specifically studied the efficacy of masks preventing covid virus transmission, and it found essentially the same as the influenza RCTs: no significant affect. There are no RCTs that show otherwise for influenza or covid. Not going with the best science, which RCTs are considered to be, is denialism.
icisil ==> If you have a title or a link — I’d appreciate it.
The study itself is in the first link
https://swprs.org/danish-mask-study-no-benefit/
icisil ==> Ah, thanks.
In case you didn’t see it, there is a link to a very good compilation of mask studies in that link.
‘
https://swprs.org/face-masks-evidence/
And, regarding masks, we should keep in mind that about 99 percent of people do not wear N95 or higher masks, or anything close.
Just about everyone wears a cheap poures cotton covering, and there habits of use are horrendously ineffective, many multiple uses, left lying around in a purse or pocket, found a week later, etc…
icisil ==> Thanks for the good link.
I don’t think it matters whether it is a cold virus, influenza or COVID-19. Face coverings are useless. Despite, the suggestion that N-95 respirators be worn in a HC setting, there effectiveness has been demonstrated to be poor. Likely, many reasons for that, namely they are not “tight” fitting. Besides when you are talking nanometers in size vs a N-95 that is most effective at best at .3 microns
The facial coverings or mask wearing mandated by officials was a farce. No science behind it at all. If there were science increasing air exchanges in enclosed spaces would have made more sense. Dilution ventilation reducing the concentration would have been more reasonable. Moreover, once the risk factors were identified, those people could have been protected which PH is geared to: applying limited resources to were the greatest risks exist.
Lastly, old age coupled with more than one co-morbidity only increases a negative outcome. The wake-up call is this: Americans have a weight/obesity problem along with other metabolic dysfunction. You cannot have your cake and eat it to.
George ==> Also, American Baby Boomers are hitting the age where everything begins to break down — our life expectancy at birth. This includes me.
Kip,
I am in the same boat (age 62) with the exception I have kept myself physically fit, eat well, maintain my body weight and have no serious health issues other than a low thyroid. If I recall correctly, 40% of Americans are obese. That really comes as no surprise to me. With that comes diabetes, high blood pressure and increased cardiac and stroke risk. I am likely preaching to the choir, but somethings are within our control if we choose to act according to your self-interests. Hence, I have elected not to wear a mask unless pressed to do and no gene therapy injection. For me the risks out weight the benefit and especially when there are therapeutics available that have been demonstrated to be effective.
George ==> The “obesity epidemic” is a very complicated and not well understood at this time.
This is my fave: https://www.dropbox.com/s/8haf4xzx01icjn0/jama_73_5_002.pdf?dl=0
Johnny ==> Thanks for that link — very interesting.
Read the replies, they’ve managed to convince some people to stay masked forever
https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1393298782658387968
TonyG ==> Most of the follow-on is Ding writing an OpEd using models — none of which are likely to be correct — none of the previous Covid models have been.
It is blindingly obvious that the CDC did not use a “consensus of epidemiologists” to formulate the new guideline.
Kip => Ding has been pretty consistently wrong, yet (as is so typical) is still seen by many as some sort of “expert” with credibility.
But I was talking about all the people responding to him, saying they’ll keep wearing masks:
“I’m fully vaccinated and will continue to wear my mask indefinitely.”
“I have no plan of stopping wearing my mask. I will be for a long time.”
“Fully vaccinated, plan to keep masking indefinitely. ”
etc.
It’s sad.
TonyG ==> I suppose there are those who have had their mental health so damaged by the incessant barrage of fear-mongering that they now suffer from a diagnosable mental/emotional disorder.
Like Trump Derangement Syndrome — I suspect there is a Covid Madness Syndrome.
I won;t speculate on the causes of either of them.
It really is sad. Here healthy vaccinated 70+ y/o’s are fully masked working outdoors making new docks for the boat club. They back up hastily if approached by an unmasked person (me). The level of fear is still palpable. The BC gubmint is promoting this. I say, if I still have to ‘social distance’ and wear a mask in all public spaces, why do I need the vaccination.
Then there’s Hawaii, where governor David Ige has kept the “public setting” mask mandate in place, ignoring the latest CDC guideline. Hawaii has gone beyond the nanny state into ninny state territory. Different counties (islands) within the state enforce different and ever-changing Covid-19 regulations. Hawaii’s “safe traveler” program is an embarrassment, or would be if bureaucrats were capable of being
embarrassed.
In Hawaii County (big island), you must wear a mask in “public settings”, whether vaccinated or not, and must sanitize your hands when entering any business or other public building.
Hawaii has one of the highest adult vaccination rates – over 50%, but apparently “herd immunity” is a moving target.
So in addition to ignoring the research showing cloth masks are of insignificant value is preventing virus transmission, Hawaii is ignoring the guidance that vaccinated people don’t need any kind of mask.
Alan ==> Yes, Gov. Ige says : “At this point in time with the majority of our community not vaccinated, and we are not able to determine whether someone is vaccinated or not, we will continue to maintain the mask mandate here in the state of Hawaii. The challenge is it’s impossible to determine who’s vaccinated and who’s not vaccinated.”
How long do you think he can keep that up? Hawaii depends on tourism for its wealth.
Hawaii lacks the natural resources to maintain an industrial civilization: no iron, no coal, no oil. Everything they need must be imported over 2,000+ miles of ocean and they have limited ways to pay for that. Tourism is a major source of the state’s income and provides a large part of the total employment base.
The impact of the COVID shutdown can be seen here:
[ emphasis added; the average (not seasonally adjusted) unemployment rate for 2020 was 15.1 percent ]
The mask regulations for restaurants lead to farcical kabuki theater — you must wear a mask to enter and walk 40 feet to be seated at your table, at which point you can take off your mask and see up to six people at the tables around you without masks. The servers must remain masked all the time, which makes for more comedy when they try to recite the specials and have to repeat selections because it’s hard to understand what they’re saying through the masks. It’s even more fun when speaking (masked) to the hostesses (also masked) through a plexiglass barrier.
I put up with it because the food is really good and I feel genuinely sorry for the workers who have lost jobs or had hours severely curtailed. Visiting Hawaii is expensive, but so is living there. Not being able to work is a major hardship.
When I’m required to wear a mask, I wear this one, which you can order here.
Kip,
So what Ige is saying is either the vaccine DOESN’T work, and you must continue to mask; or the vaccine makes you infectious, so you must continue to mask up!
Am I missing something here; besides more deaths reported from the “vaccines” than ALL other real vaccines for the last 20 years!
AB ==> Not sure what Ige is thinking — he may just be an extremely over-cautious man? He just likes the power? He doesn’t trust the Feds?
Community immunity is a conditional mitigation strategy that reduces viable transmission paths, but does not preclude infections and even exponential bursts.
I am having trouble deciding…are you FOR or AGAINST wearing masks? (<- Yes, sarcasm)
I really see this entire experience in a whole different light. I think the early guidelines were based on the belief that a mask on the face of an untrained person had no ability to reduce infection. This belief was later turned on it’s head as data from different countries with different policies started rolling in. Mask wearing, if enough participated, does reduce the rate of infection. So does social distancing, washing hands, and yes…even common sense.
I did/do not like wearing a mask, but there are situations were PUBLIC HEALTH out ways what I like or dislike. If this disease had been Ebola with horrifying pictures of death surrounding it, I think more people would have understood or at least been cooperative. You have a right to your beliefs and practices as long as those are not putting the public at risk. Someone has to decide and we have allowed this power to be invested in state and federal officials. Just as you can drive a car without a license, you can go into a store without a mask – but there are consequences (unless of course you are in this country illegally in which case you are just let go).
So, I choose to wear a mask in order to slow down the infection rate. I choose to stay away from people for the same reason. I have better causes to spend my time on then an obvious Public Health policy based on the best evidence available.
Robert of Texas ==> I think you would be hard pressed to find rigorous studies that found that mask wearing reduces transmission of coronaviruses in general or Covid-10 specifically.
I suggest a deep read on the effectiveness of masks in general.
There is a lot of mis-information floating around about masks — but the hard science on mask wearing, even by surgeons in operating rooms, is weak at best — non-existent at worst.
If it makes you feel better personally, then wear a mask — but unless you are actually physically ill with Covid-19 you will not be “slow[ing] down the infection rate”.
As always, you are entitled to your opinion, but it doesn’t change medical science.
“I suggest a deep read on the effectiveness of masks in general.”
A good starting point would be Infectious Disease Journal, May 2020 “Nonpharmaceutical Measures for Pandemic Influenza in Nonhealthcare Settings”
The LINK for that is here.
Or this one :
https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/329439/WHO-WHE-IHM-GIP-2019.1-eng.pdf?ua=1
p.100 :
“Ten RCTs were included in meta-analysis, and there was no evidence that face masks are effective in reducing transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza. “
Petit_Barde ==> Thanks, added to my list.
Thank you for that, Kip. It’s a great relief and a breath of fresh air to read an article that is completely free of the BS, virtue signalling and hysteria we’ve endured for the past year. I hope this latest CDC ‘encyclical’ will set the new standard and lift the panic.
Rory ==> So far it has prompted Governor after Governor (but not all) to drop mask mandates.
It has also infuriated “The Epidemiologists” who have apparently been ignored and discounted, “dissed” as they say in hip-hop lingo. Epidemologists apparently no longer “make the rules”.
And all the studies you have referenced show they NEVER should have made ANY rules.
So many usa states saying full vax no mask ,I call that state black mail , we still have to wear masks in the UK, although some mask less trials at open venues have gone ahead. They are muttering about increasing / keeping as is lockdown restrictions because of the Indian variant.
And the Welsh government are trying universal income. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-57120354
A very dangerous step by these socialists
B Clarke ==> Well, yes — it’s the carrot (as opposed to the stick). “Get Vaccinated and you’ll have your basic human rights restored.”
The tricky part is, of course, that on the streets of amwrica, there is no way to tell who is “fully vaccinated” and who isn’t. They haven’t [yet] started requiring the unvaccinated to wear Yellow Stars pinned to their coats.
Hello kip in the UK you can have a piece of paper to say you have had the vax( easily copied no doubt ) or use the NHS app, and a dedicated app as well.
B Clarke ==> Oh, we have CDC proof of vaccination cards here too — mine is somewhere . . . I think.
But I can not conceive of any state that will have the police asking people to show their cards — not even in today’s “police-state climate”.
I thin the new CDC Guidelines put an end to all of that nonsense.
Hawaii has started to use those cards to permit inter-island travel without quarantine, and is talking about also allowing them for travel from the mainland. But the news reports so far say you must register your trip at the state “safe travels” site and upload an image of your vax card before each trip. This is the same treatment they currently enforce for negative screening tests.
The ninny state portal is here. 1984 came a few years late.
Inoculated, treated (e.g. therapeutic, nutritional), or otherwise not a safe sanctuary, that mitigates viral viability and contagion. A large minority, probably a majority, have preexisting (e.g. crossreactive) immunity, which seems to be keyed on the protein encapsulating the genetic material. Likely from previous exposure to another virus in this class.
Don’t forget about the untold lives that were saved by the one-way isles at the grocery stores. (src)
Patrick ==> Well,I think the “In Door” and “Exit Door” policies at grocery stores did improve general health — but only by requiring people to take 50 or 100 extra steps to do their grocery shopping.
In my area, NO ONE followed the one way signs in grocery stores — that’s just not how people here shop (though it makes more sense!).
Every Wallyworld I went to while traveling over 10,000 miles on the road over the last year CLOSED one of their 2 entry/exit door sets so that everyone had to come in and out the same side of the store. Always the “Grocery” side, not the “Pharmacy” side, and of course there were no open garden centers. Thus they made sure everyone had to come close to each other.
They did so so that they could track the number of customers in the store with ONE person.
Our brilliant NV governor even closed all the smoke shops and liquor stores so that EVERYBODY with those vices had to go to the crowded big box stores to get their fixes. He did not close the pot stores though. He also closed he schools, but not the daycare centers.
Drake ==> Well, NY was better — liquor stores were deemed essential — libraries and churches were closed, of course — who needs books or religion?
And the capriciousness of all those closures and other requirements, what was ok vs. what was not, makes it very clear (to me at least) that “science” had nothing to do with it.
Intuitive or cargo cult science.
Postoperative wound infections and surgical face masks: a controlled study
Effectiveness of Adding a Mask Recommendation to Other Public Health Measures to Prevent SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Danish Mask Wearers
Physical interventions to interrupt or reduce the spread of respiratory viruses
Flip a coin at best. Increase infections at worst. There is no source control. And that doesn’t cover the petri dish effect, the collateral damage of social distancing, and ingestion of alien particles (e.g. fibers) with reused, recycled masks.
n.n ==> Great links — and, yes, medical science does not support mask wearing for the general public to prevent the spread of infuenza-like illnesses, including Covid-19.
Politics and science both operate on narratives. (In science, the narratives are called theories.) The difference is that in honest sciences, theories are tested by researchers in their fields. If they can’t be validated, they are corrected or sometimes even replaced.
In politics, the testing comes not from those who are committed to the narrative, but by their opponents. Those narratives don’t get deliberately tested. They don’t get corrected. When the evidence against them is so obvious to the general public that it is not worth the effort to defend them, their proponents move on to something else without ever acknowledging they were wrong.
Anything that claims to be science but doesn’t go through a process of testing and correction isn’t a science. It’s politics.
Ralph ==> The best reqding on this is John P.A. Ioannidis — https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-as-the-coronavirus-pandemic-takes-hold-we-are-making-decisions-without-reliable-data/ — and many many others.
The mask, CRT, racism, police incompetence, no voter fraud, Russian collusion, wealth gap, worst drought/rainfall/cold/heat/hurricanes/tornadoes/earthquakes/tsunamis/ad infinitum, are all products of media hype. Blaming it on the need to sell news is a red herring. The media has been bought to produce propaganda.
markl ==> Much of the propaganda is being produced by “True Believers” in their White Hat causes — with their own sense of virtue giving them permission to exaggerate and even “stretch the truth” to forward The Cause (whatever it is).
The UK Government, in the shape of Public Health England, is now the single largest purchaser of advertising, having pushed Proctor & Gamble into second place. Given that traditional media is feeling the financial pinch, as people move to online sources, they are not going to “Bite the hand that feeds”…
Very few public figures have emerged from the ‘pandemic’ with their reputations intact. Cuomo and nursing homes. Fauci and masks. CDC guidance and the ‘died with versus of’ bodycount controversy. WHO and China. Emergent Biosystems and a ruined 15 million doses of Janssen vaccine. UK epidemiological models.
Vast swaths of official expert incompetence have been revealed.
Hopefully some good will come after all the damage. Fix the over reliance on China for PPE. Don’t leave emergency stockpiles empty. Quarantine the sick, not the healthy. Simple common sense stuff, sadly lacking in hindsight.
Rud ==> We can only hope and speak up wherever we can.
americasfrontlinedoctors.org
covid19criticalcare.com
gbdeclaration.org
Who ever advised Trump of early treatment, to stand down from national mandates, but not, unfortunately, intubation, and others who responded rationally and carefully to mitigate viral spread, disease progression, and collateral damage.
Don’t forget Gates, his weird virus proclamations, past relationship with Epstein, travel to Pedo Island, all of which probably contributed to divorce.
Rud:
My question in all this is: for how many years has the US had a full-time professionally-staffed federal agency whose most significant charter was to prevent or minimize epidemics of communicable diseases? It’s got to be 100 years or more, right (since Panama Canal and yellow fever).
Yet when Covid-19 became a crises what did we hear? — not enough PPE, ventilators, sanitation chemicals, right? Daily briefings from White House task force on rounding up and delivering more of all this stuff.
You’d think after 100 years someone would be tasked to run some simple calculations periodically to estimate just how much of all that stuff we should stockpile, where to keep it, and have supply contracts in place to order more. There’s not excuse for this to become a crisis.
After all, what would we think if Biden ordered a military action somewhere and the response was “we don’t have enough ammunition or fuel, and we don’t know how/where to get more”? Sympathy would be lacking all around.
IMHO, this crisis indicates a major failure of US public health agencies: they clearly were not prepared to carry out the responsibilities they were established for in the first place.
Alan ==> Unlike the UK, the US does nt really have a Public Health agency that has the job of “to prevent or minimize epidemics of communicable diseases”
The CDC is pledged to:
“As the nation’s health protection agency, CDC saves lives and protects people from health threats. To accomplish our mission, CDC conducts critical science and provides health information that protects our nation against expensive and dangerous health threats, and responds when these arise.”
They are a science and data agency — not an action agency. That is why they don’t have CDC sponsored and paid-for vaccination sites all across America. CDC did not develop the vaccines. CDC idenified the threat — Covid-19 — and studied it — but did not FIGHT it.
Kip – the UK had such an agency, but its main thrust at the time the pandemic occurred was on diversity, there was no mention in its recent strategic plan summary of epidemics or pandemics.
I suggest a main cause of the problems (lying by governments and scientists) is that the public health officials and agencies dealing with the pandemic are the very same people responsible for their country’s lack of preparedness. Their first and last instincts have been to cover their arses, not to solve the problem.
kiwi ==> I sailed the seas with a lots of Kiwis. In my experience, all mad as hatters. Fun guys though. . . .
National health bodies don’t seem yo have learned much from past pandemics . . . .
Kip,
The Obama/Biden administration did not restock the masks depleted by previous viral outbreaks. Below one of MANY links.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/04/05/usa-today-true-no-indication-obama-admin-replenished-mask-supply/
Alan, just saw your comment. Panama Canal was a special case.
My understanding based on having been on the EUA front lines as a private company CEO during the 2010 Swine flu pandemic (my regulatory guy died of it in June, which did not make things easier for me) is that front line ‘actionable’ public health responses are supposed to be primarily at the state level, not federal. In fact, that general notion is even ingrained several places in the Constitution. States run elections. States run school systems. States run health care. Admittedly, there has been federal mission creep, some appropriate (FDA based on interstate commerce) and some not (S1 is unconstitutional on three grounds).
This is why there have been so many different state responses. DeSantis opened up Florida but protected nursing homes; Cuomo closed NY but deliberately infected nursing homes via his readmission EO.
Rud ==> Generally, there is very little public understanding of the implications of our Federal Republic form of government.
Thus we saw calls for the Feds to “Save Us!” and blamed the President for not having a federal public health service like the UK.
Flu virus is so much bigger it doesn’t pass the mask ? 😀
Roger ==> Dubious — mostlyI understand that it is that no one had been actually been testing the sick people for influenza over the last year — only for Covid.
Yes, the ratio of CV to Flu tests this past season was over 500 to 1, and when in doubt the diagnosis went to the disease with accompanying bonus. Who would have thought?
Roger ==> Well, we’ll have to dig in a bit to the national data on flu surveillance.
We do know that there have been very few cases of influenza for the 2020-2021 flu season.
Nothing, the person is ‘”healed” 😀
Kip:
The Covid-19 lockdown fraud is deeper and more sinister – a Great Reset power play:
The following credible paper states that USA deaths attributed to Covid-19 were 16 times higher than actual. Covid-19 was a false crisis.
I published a similar comment many months ago in November 2020, by comparing the per capita death rate attributed to COVID-19 in Alberta, versus the reported per capita death rate in the United States, which was about 10 times higher.
Covid death statistics in the USA are false and fraudulent – not ~500,000 Covid deaths, but 30,000 to 50,000 – similar to a typical flu year in the USA.
Furthermore, in my recent paper, excerpted below, note that there is no “death bump” to mid-2020 in either Alberta or Canada – that is, no significant increase in total deaths from all causes over the trend of the previous seven years.
That means there was no significant deadly Covid-19 “epidemic” in Alberta or Canada to mid-2020, and no justification for the panic, the lockdowns of the workforce and students, and the destruction of our economy – just as I correctly published more than one year ago, on 21&22 March 2020:
21March2020 – Allan MacRae
LET’S CONSIDER AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACH: Isolate people over sixty-five and those with poor immune systems and return to business-as-usual for people under sixty-five. This will allow “herd immunity” to develop much sooner and older people will thus be more protected AND THE ECONOMY WON’T CRASH.
22March2020 – Allan MacRae
This full-lockdown scenario is especially hurting service sector businesses and their minimum-wage employees – young people are telling me they are “financially under the bus”. The young are being destroyed to protect us over-65’s. A far better solution is to get them back to work and let us oldies keep our distance, and get “herd immunity” established ASAP – in months not years. Then we will all be safe again.…
All we really needed to do was over-protect the very elderly and infirm – the high-risk population – which we failed to adequately do. What a debacle!
_______________________
FAULTY COVID DEATH NUMBERS EXPLAINED
The American Thinker, April 9, 2021
By Dennis McGowan
For many of us who have had ties to the scientific standards and procedures connected to recording fatalities there has been a serious sense of doubt about the numbers of Covid 19 deaths reported by the media, courtesy of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The numbers have appeared to be somewhere between marginally overstated and grossly exaggerated. Finally, these instincts have been supported by a peer-reviewed scientific paper.
On October 12 of last year, a 25-page paper in Science, Public Health Policy and The Law was released that explained, in detail, the foundational reason for the publicly announced fatality numbers and the mechanism by which they were derived. This paper, authored by ten members of the scientific community is titled “Covid-19 Data Collection, Comorbidity & Federal Law: A Historical Perspective.” At the heart of the issue is the CDC and its methods for collecting and reporting the data, a model which was changed radically in the face of the current crisis.
In 2003, the CDC authored and released guidance documents used by the forensic community titled Medical Examiners’ and Coroners’ Handbook on Death Registration and Fetal Death Reporting along with “Physicians’ Handbook on Medical Certification of Death.” These have been the standard for the certification of fatalities, nationwide, for seventeen years. However, in March of 2020 things changed.
The National Center for Health Statistics released Covid-19 Alert No. 2 which changed the way deaths with connections to Covid 19 were reported and tabulated. The revealing line in the alert is in the last paragraph: “Covid-19 should be reported on the death certificates for all decedents where the disease caused or is assumed to have caused or contributed to death.” [emphasis added] This changed the parameters for the inclusion of deaths from Covid, raising the numbers substantially.
A table in the October study titled “Comparison of Total Covid-19 Fatalities Based Upon Different Reporting Guidelines” demonstrated that deaths through August 23rd of 2020 were higher by over 16 times as compared to the traditional definition. If the reporting of these deaths followed the CDC guidebook from 2003, the number of Covid deaths would have been 9,684. However, utilizing this new reporting and classification method that exclusively applied to Covid-19, the number of deaths is 161,392.
file:///C:\Users\Owner\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\01\clip_image001.gifThe paper delves into a variety of other topics, some legal and some statistical, that are all intrinsically functions of the change in death reporting parameters initiated by the March 2020 alert. However, for so many of us who have had nagging doubts about the actual numbers, knowing that the calculus for recording these deaths had been replaced is reassuring. Having spent a year looking at Covid fatality numbers and assuming that the true count was more likely half or a third of what was being reported, this new report is both satisfying and startling. None of us would have guessed that the actual disparity would be that the number of Covid deaths, according to this study, is a bit less than 6% of the numbers reported by the media.
________________________________
NO “DEATH BUMP” MEANS NO REAL DEADLY COVID-19 PANDEMIC.
My recent paper:
In 2020 there were NO excess deaths in Alberta or Canada – no total death bump means no deadly pandemic.
Average age of Covid-19 deaths in Alberta was 82 – four years longer than average life expectancy of 78.
WHERE IS THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC? WHY THE FULL LOCKDOWN?
ANNUAL TOTAL DEATHS IN ALBERTA AND CANADA SHOW NOTHING UNUSUAL TO 30June2020
by Allan MacRae, B.A.Sc., M.Eng., April 3, 2021
From the total deaths plotted for Alberta and Canada, there were NO significant excess total deaths to 30June2020, and so there was NO justification for the incredibly costly Covid-19 lockdown, which is estimated to have caused 10 to 100 times more current and future harm than the Covid-19 illness.
The important question is why the lockdowns were ever enacted, and why the tried-and-tested Alberta Emergency Management Plan was tossed out and a young medical officer given the impossible task of managing the alleged pandemic – that in the first half of 2020 was a hugely exaggerated, false crisis.
In addition to needlessly destroying the economy, the impacts of the lockdown continue to cause harm:
– Hospitals were emptied for ~2 months to make room for a “tsunami of Covid-19 cases” THAT NEVER HAPPENED;
– Cancer tests, surgeries and other needed medical procedures were delayed and backlogged;
– Deaths from opioid overdoses more than doubled, resulting in an increase of tens of thousands of years-of-life-lost;
– Societal problems including substance abuse, family violence, poverty, and mental illness all increased;
– The education system was disrupted and the harm to students will continue for years.
There is ample evidence that lockdowns and masking had little impact on Covid-19 mortality. Sweden and South Dakota that did not lock down had similar or better mortality outcomes to those that did.
In fact, the lockdowns encouraged the longevity of the Covid-19 illness and the development of more deadly variants. Most flu’s die out in the summer season, but lockdowns and masking allowed Covid-19 to survive through the summer. The Covid-19 problems since 30June2020 with renewed contagion and more dangerous variants were enhanced by the lockdowns – the lockdowns were a total debacle.
Furthermore, the incessant testing and reporting of positive PCR tests as “cases” is harmful nonsense, needlessly creating fear and bad policy. A “case” exists NOT from a positive test, which is often asymptomatic, but from a real illness that requires treatment.
I correctly concluded that the Covid-19 lockdowns were a huge error in early March 2020, and published that conclusion on 21&22March2020. All we needed to do, which I published at that time, was over-protect the very elderly and infirm (which we failed to do) and get everyone else back to work and school. The data shows that the lockdowns were not justified and were hugely harmful.
Alberta and Canada are now in a far worse situation than if we had done nothing – no lockdowns, no masking, etc. How do we get out of the needless mess our governments have created? First, stop reacting in panic to overblown test results and other scary propaganda. Adults should take 4000IU of Vitamin D3 daily. Cease all lockdowns, masking and distancing measures now. Get everyone back to work and school.
Let’s walk out into the sunshine and get back to enjoying our lives.
A correlation. Given the demonstrated (i.e. controlled trials) ineffectiveness of masks to mitigate airborne transmission, it’s more likely that SARS-CoV-2 masks the expression and inhibits the viability of competing viruses. Washing hands, sanitizing surfaces, and mindful nutrition were probable contributors.
Dear Roger,
I’ve heard a number of medical doctors and epidemiologists express just exactly that, but you are so much more believable with your snits and tantrums!
By the way, if you want to hear them you’ll have to do the research yourself; I don’t do favors for rude children! Maybe your mommy can help!
An imposter has been posting crap under my name, using my email address which the moderator should confirm before posting any further Comments.
“Everyone should wear a mask,” Blumberg said.
Blumberg, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at UC Davis Children’s Hospital.
My first reaction was Michael Bloomberg and his famous quote on farming.
Steve Case ==> well – – – don;t keep us in suspense! What was his famous farming quote?
“I could teach anybody … to be a farmer. … You dig a hole, you put a seed in, you put dirt on top, add water, up comes the corn.” Michael Bloomberg 2016
So don’t keep me in suspense, did you actually mean Michael Bloomberg or Dr. Blumberg of Children’s Hospital UC Davis.
Steve ==> Took me a bit to catch up to you jumping from one to the other.
It was you who mentioned the quote — I had no idea that either of them had an interesting quite about farming…..
Whatever it is, it will be hard pressed to beat Biden’s quote on unemployed coal miners learning to code Java.
I see Democrats have decided to keep their masks on, so they don’t get mistaken for Republicans. 😉
Clown World.
At least they are more photogenic that way.
Much like the swastika armband of 1930s Germany; continued face diaper wearing indicates abject obedience to one’s overlords, and agreement with their objective of a one-party totalitarian state!
Don’t forget that the CDC admitted that the death count in the United States is inaccurate and inflated. They didn’t use those exact words, but you can read the report here.
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7014e2.htm
Did the negative news report that truth? No, of course not. Everything about this virus has been a lie. The politicians succeeded with COVID-19 what they could not succeed with climate change. And when you read some of the things they say, you can be quite confident that these politicians will find something else to scare people into submission. It may be another virus, because it worked once quite successfully.
Wade => The CDC is covering its tracks in that report. It is excusing including “died with Covid” along with “died of Covid”.
I wrote Cause of Death as a result.
The Federal government was rewarding hospitals with $$$ payments for each “Cocid-19” death. Read through the comments on the Cause of Death essay for the links.
First, healthcare in the United States is a business. Whether that is a good thing or a bad thing is beyond the scope of this website. What that means is that hospitals are also businesses. And businesses want to make money.
USA today showed that hospitals make more money off every COVID-19 death. Link
The CDC once said :
Archive link
To translate the CDC guidance — ‘You can count someone as COVID-19 death and nobody will check to see if you are telling the truth.’
Imagine if you had a business where you can make more money if you checked a boxed and nobody would every verify you were telling the truth and, in fact, the people whose job it was to pay you encouraged you to check that box. How many people would be honest and not check that box? That is what has happened with COVID-19.
In fact, the CDC recently said:
Link
This does not mean that 95% of official COVID-19 deaths are people who died with the disease and not because of it. What it does mean is that the vast majority of official COVID-19 deaths are not really COVID-19 deaths and that the vast majority of people who die with it are in very poor health. I personally know someone, Mr. R.S., whose cousin died when his parachute didn’t open while skydiving. The local hospital did an autopsy, found COVID-19 antibodies, and called his death a COVID-19 death. The official death count is so badly tainted that it will be impossible to know who really did die from the disease.
This virus has been nothing but lies. Even the New York Times admits China was lying and spreading propaganda about the virus to make it appear worse. Link
And also remember that nobody spends more money on political lobbying than drug companies. Link. How many lives could have been saved if hospitals were allowed to give off-patent and dirt-cheap hydroxchloroquine, zinc, and an antibiotic? Instead, we get bureaucrats who manipulate data to make an expensive, on-patent drug look better than it really is. Link. The only other industry that has paid more fines to the US government than drug companies has been banking companies. Link.
Politicians wanted power. Politicians wanted someone they could not blackmail because he had no political baggage out of the White House. China also wanted this person gone because 4 more years of him would kill their economy. And the media, which most blindly worship the democrat party, also wanted this person gone. The media also pleasures themselves over bad news. And you had greedy drug companies drooling over a large payday. It all came together to give us a COVID-19. A real disease with an overinflated seriousness.
I have been called a conspiracy theorist for quoting published scientific study after study proving masks don’t work. (I’m up to 19 studies right now.) I’ve been called a Trump supporter (p.s. I’m not.) for quoting the reports on the CDC’s website that the media does not report on. What I’ve not heard is “your verifiable proof from reputable sources has changed my mind.”
Roger ==> I am beginning to think you are just trolling here . . . .
The extra payments are from:
“The CARES Act calls for a 20%, rather than a 15%, increase in reimbursement when a hospital cares for a patient with COVID-19; the increase does not apply “every time,” but only to Medicare recipients and the uninsured.”
To qualify for the extra 20% the hospital only needs to see that the ICD code for Covid appears anywhere on the death certificate.
You can read the CARES Act in the Congressional Record.
Whether this changed the death cert coding is unknown at this time.
Just because you are a conspiracy theorist doesn’t mean that there isn’t a conspiracy.
Also: Just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t all out to get you.
Roger ==> You have to do your own homework. The link to that information is in the comments — your browser has a search function for all the words on any page displayed. Use it and find the link. Windows has a Ctrl-F function as well.
As a never masker, I saw this (as a data scientist) back in late February 2020 as a McGuffin. Going forward, it was amazing to see so many redefinitions of terms and conditions such where data became unusable because it kept changing definitions and methods of collection and curation.
Cases, prior to 2020 were defined as infections requiring hospitalization, rather than just infections being a number of symptoms with a confirming diagnosis. For the tens of millions of “cases” of SARS where the first letter means “Severe”, for most people on a continuum of severity were grouped towards “having an off day” – Cuomo’s nursing home victims non-withstanding.
I’m old enough to have survived a number of “pandemics” that were more severe than this Wuhan Death Miasma, without the theater and the power grabs. We just buried the dead, healed the sick and led our lives otherwise as normal.
I think it is funny that during Eisenhower’s Admin, he too had his version of Operation Warp Speed, and instead of cranking out an mRNA concoction that isn’t a true vaccine, they developed in just a few months a true vaccine and within a few months after that had delivered many millions of doses. This all happened without massive media propaganda campaigns, trillions of minted fiat, SWAT team assaults, lock-downs, threats and deployment of the militarized Karenstaffel.
During the Obama Regime, a few months in to the 2009 H1N1, they stopped testing under the excuse “we know its an epidemic, it is pointless to keep testing” where the Regime considered testing the equivalent of dipping a toe in a body of water to test if it is cold – once confirmed, implement policy accordingly. The extent of the Emergency Declaration was to ask employers to send sick employees home and allow them to return once cleared by a physician. This should have been common sense to everyone so there was no real costs and the requests were reasonable, mainly because the requests were not backed up by the barrel of a gun.
But the corporate media decided to try terrifying people because the transmission levels weren’t as high as they would like, so radio quacks like “Dr” Dean Edell were making claims that the virus will evolve and mutate to be more deadly and contagious, then had the audacity to add “Since Christians don’t believe in evolution, they should be denied a vaccine”. This marked a transition in the culture where dealing with an epidemic became ideological and political.
Since the direction of medical policy has been ‘Lebensunwertes Leben‘ it has been abundantly clear while our cultural elites have universally adopted a Malthusian policy bias, they have also adopted quite fully the abandonment of considering any costs for a given policy. That is the most horrifying aspect of the Wuhan Death Miasma, every social and cultural pathology has been subsidized, encouraged and practically codified in to law in the wake of this virus. If it costs trillions of fiat, a pile of suicides, drug deaths and widespread mental illness, then so what – WE HAVE POWER.
The “Mask Mandate” has always been a projection of POWER to humiliate people and force them to accept foolishness and even bully people into believing 2 + 2 = 5
“In my opinion, this new CDC Guideline breaks the back of the oppressive Covid-19 Panic Power Grab by presidents, governors, city councils and mayors who have reveled in their free pass to rule by executive order under emergency powers without oversight by elected law makers.”
Kip: isn’t everyone in this list an Elected Lawmaker? Aren’t they providing oversight above healthcare people?
-/-
Isn’t this pandemic a perfect example of the message that WUWT writers and readers have been claiming:
=> “the science is always changing”?
Lorne ==> Which list is that? List of Governors? Governors are NOT NOT NOT lawmakers. Governors are elected and in most cases head the Executive Branches of their state governments. Legislatures make laws — those elected to be legislators (representatives and senators in most states) are charged with making the laws for their states.
The idea that “The science is always changing” is an almost right idea. science is our species cumulative knowledge about the world around us and how and why it does what it does. Solid science — such as the laws of mathematics and Newtonian Physics — are sometimes slightly modified when there is a new understanding brought to light.
However, while DNA vaccines are a new idea, how viruses are transmitted and under what circumstances is not. Whether masks are effective at preventing the transmission of viral diseases has been subject to exhaustive careful double-blinded studies for many years and that science has not changed over the last decade and is unlikely to change very much in the future.
There are a lot of good links provided by other readers here that lead to original medical studies done on the issue. The findings are very consistent and show that medical face masks are of no or very little use for the general public outside of the sick room.
Not sure the <b>CDC Guidelines</b> have had much to do with science.
PMHinSC ==> I wouldn’t have accused them of such. In fact, I specifically point out that CDC did not follow the Consensus of Epidemiologists. I suspect the whole thing is political.
Went to the market this morning (Sat. 5/15) in Colorado. A number of folks were shopping without
masksrandom bits of face cloth. Wearing mymaskrandom bit of face cloth I felt foolish and will join their rebellion henceforth.tommy ==> That’s my boy!
The mask, for many, has become the modern-day equivalent to Linus’ security blanket. They refuse to give it up. I’d burn mine (which is just one of those freebie cheap masks -months old), except stores like Rite Aid still require it, and some towns (not ours) still mandate them. I hate masks. We’re having a get-together here tomorrow. Two mandates – must be fully vaccinated, and NO MASKS allowed.
Bruce ==> I’m not sure substituting one’s own mandates for those of the State is a “plus”.
Our house, our rules.
Bruce ==> I wasn’t entirely joking…..but mostly.
The local public pool is requiring people to wear two swimsuits this summer.
Scissor ==> With the latest styles for girls, doubling the area covered by the suits might be a good idea — unless you are a teen-aged boy, in which case you might appreciate the current sizes.
I still appreciate the current swimsuit sizes. I may be old but I am not blind.
Drake ==> Keep them eyes open and peeled!
That was the attitude during Jim Crow when businesses would only serve whites. Doesn’t apply when it violates civil rights.
Inoculated or vaccinated? Perhaps immune, or merely virus free.
That said, check for symptoms at the door. Be wary of fecal transmission around the commode. Close the door. Wash your hands. Ventilate to minimize the greenhouse effect.
Fauci was telling the truth the first time when he called masks window dressing. None of his statements later on supporting the dictates once it became a political weapon – the equivilant of a cross waved at a vampire – negated that, nor contradicted the truth of that statement.
My guess is the Biden administration wants have a big Biden Recovery Summer celebration this summer with a big 4th of July blowout and cross-country “victory” tour. The narrative will be Biden saved the day and America is in full economic and covid recovery.
The masks are part of the old narrative and have to go so the new narrative of Recovery Summer Thanks to Biden can be implemented.
Kevin ==> A bit cynical of the motivations behind the CDC decision?
The poor Biden Administration has had a rough week with a worsening economy and the misery index coming back to life, so getting rid of masks was one way of trying to get the people distracted by this “new shiny object.”
noaaprogrammer ==> A viable theory
Kip,
Thanks for the article and a chance to clear the air of the miasma of the Fauxi virus hysteria!
It seems pretty clear that the entire mask mania was an attempt by our dear leaders to instill obedience and fear into as many of the sheep as possible! It was also an opportunity to put new voting regulations into effect to make voter fraud easier to perpetrate and conceal!
Have you considered doing a retrospective on the therapeutics like ivermectin and HCQ? The meta analysis of ivermectin I found stated that over one and a half million deaths could have been prevented with proper use; and then there’s HCQ and the nursing home deaths!
2020 could still be an opportunity to learn the real shortcomings and faults of our government agencies, but it can’t happen until we fully look at what went wrong!
AB ==> HCQ/Zinc/Antibiotic treatment to prevent serious Covid-19 outcomes has not been seriously studied to the best of my knowledge. . WHO and others only wanted to test it to see if it would save lives of those already seriously ill enough to require hospitalization or ICU.
WHO/CDC/EU only wanted a Magic Bullet treatment that would cure the very very ill.
Not in randomized clinical trials, but there is an observable, reproducible consistency and signal diversity across populations, venues, nations, and geographies. Also, observation in vitro. Ironically, good enough evidence to discern cause and effect of prospective climate change, but not as evidence for an inexpensive, low-risk, available early treatment.
New insights on the antiviral effects of chloroquine against coronavirus: what to expect for COVID-19?
Zn2+ Inhibits Coronavirus and Arterivirus RNA Polymerase Activity In Vitro and Zinc Ionophores Block the Replication of These Viruses in Cell Culture
No not a magical elixir, only a complement to normal system function, but a credible part of a risk management protocol.
n.n ==> Oh, yes, I agree that HCQetc was a victim of anti-Trump madness (and in France, victim of a similar political situation).
There have been positive studies, but they are generally ignored — less so now that Trump is no longer US President.
See: https://bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12879-021-05773-w
Kip,
Meta analysis of 55 different studies of ivermectin come up with 79% effective in early use and 85% in prophylaxis! There are several other off-use drugs that showed promise but it seems that government control and corporate profits are more important than tens of thousands of lives being lost unnecessarily!
The next shoe to drop will be the experimental injections. According to the US VAERS, in only 5 months there have been more reported post-vaccine deaths (4434) than for all vaccines combined during the past 20 years. I think it was the swine flu vaccine that was pulled off the market after only 50 or so deaths. Not a good idea IMO to turn the human body into a factory that produces a protein implicated in blood clotting.