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[Oct 06, 2020] 'False' positive Covid-19 tests saw non-contagious people counted as fresh infections triggered 2nd wave alarm Belgian media -- RT World News

Oct 06, 2020 | www.rt.com

'False' positive Covid-19 tests saw non-contagious people counted as fresh infections & triggered 2nd wave alarm – Belgian media 5 Oct, 2020 15:36 / Updated 2 hours ago Get short URL 'False' positive Covid-19 tests saw non-contagious people counted as fresh infections & triggered 2nd wave alarm – Belgian media FILE PHOTO © Global Look Press / Frank Hoermann / SVEN SIMON 66 Follow RT on RT Over a half of coronavirus infections revealed this summer by one of Belgium's biggest labs were old and no longer contagious, but were still reported as new cases, local media discovered.

Belgian daily newspaper Het Laatste Nieuws examined the tests carried out by AZ Delta, one of the largest labs in the country, and made a stunning discovery. Almost half of all positive cases reported throughout June, July and August were actually people with an old infection.

The problem, it turns out, lies in the PCR Covid-19 tests. The paper reports that scientific data reveals virus particles can be detected up to 83 days after the actual infection. This led to instances where people were no longer contagious, but were still registered as positive cases. According to HLN, all of these people had to be quarantined.

Belgian experts sounded the alarm in mid-July, when coronavirus numbers spiked after a relief in June, and even insisted that the second wave had already begun for the country.

"We may have had to deal with old infections largely in the summer months," the lab's clinical biologist Frederik Van Hoecke told the paper.

ALSO ON RT.COM Paris to shutter bars for 2 weeks as French capital placed on Covid-19 high alert

The revelation comes as countries look to reintroduce restrictions to curb the spread of the virus.

If you like this story, share it with a friend!

[Oct 03, 2020] Following PCR-confirmation of the President's diagnosis, as a precautionary measure he received a single 8 gram dose of Regeneron's polyclonal antibody cocktail

Oct 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

vk , Oct 2 2020 23:09 utc | 145

It's confirmed: Trump won't be treated with hydroxycloroquine:

Physician to the President: Health Update on President Donald J. Trump, Oct. 2, 2020

"Following PCR-confirmation of the President's diagnosis, as a precautionary measure he received a single 8 gram dose of Regeneron's polyclonal antibody cocktail . He completed the infusion without incident. In addition to the polyclonal antibodies, the President has been taking zinc, vitamin D, famotidine, melatonin and a daily aspirin."

When the cookie crumbled, no hydroxycloroquine was taken - even in a case of of initial phase of the disease. It is below even a single aspirin in the COVID-19's treatment food chain (which is being ministered, among other supplements, just to keep Trump's body strong while the main drug takes effect, as is normal to old patients).

On the bright side, at least we know the name of the real deal: Regeneron.

[Oct 02, 2020] Covid-19 triggered wave of 'fraud and quackery' in medical research, leading ethicist warns -- RT World News

Notable quotes:
"... Given what's at stake, Bramstedt proposes an overhaul of the submissions process to make it more efficient, while also introducing mandatory ethics and integrity training for researchers. ..."
"... "Research has the potential to enter the public domain and be used by many stakeholders, including governments and policy makers, so the data must be robust," she concludes. ..."
Oct 02, 2020 | www.rt.com

A leading ethicist is sounding the alarm over a flood of potentially substandard pandemic research which may endanger lives through ill-informed public policy, while damaging medical and scientific practice itself in the process.

There has been a surge of almost 4,000 recently-published papers related to Covid-19, many of which have been of questionable quality, according to Professor Katrina Bramstedt from Bond University, Queensland, who is also secretary general at the Luxembourg Agency for Research Integrity.

Bramstedt recently published her own study examining the poor quality of Covid-19 research, which forms the basis of her recent criticisms.

Amid the rush to print the latest updates and 'breakthroughs' in Covid-19 research, there has been a slew of retracted research papers, following an unprecedented number of submissions to pre-print servers, which carry out fewer quality assurance and due diligence checks than established medical journals.

"No research team is exempt from the pressures and speed at which COVID-19 research is occurring. And this can increase the risk of honest error as well as deliberate misconduct," Bramstedt says.

The rapid spread of the pandemic and the growing public thirst for information forced researchers into overdrive looking for treatments, vaccines, and cures potentially endangering patients, medical practitioners, and potentially government policy.

As of July 31, 2020, 19 published articles and 14 preprints about Covid-19 have been retracted, withdrawn or been seriously called into question with regards to the quality of their data. Over 57 percent of these papers come from Asia, over half of which came from China.

There were concerns reported over falsified data, issues with methodology, irregularities in interpretation of data, and conclusions among a multitude of other issues.

I've lost all trust in medical research – the financial muscle of Big Pharma has been busy distorting science during the pandemic

Even the paragons of medical research best practice, the Lancet and New England Journal of Medicine, were forced to retract two preprints and two research papers due to the presence of unverified data shared by all four.

"Patient harm that is significant, permanent and irreversible could result from using faulty research results from preprints as well as published papers," she adds.

Bramstedt highlights the time and resource constraints under which researchers, their supervisors, as well as publishers and their editors are operating under as a major factor in the plethora of poor quality research.

Add to the mix the fact that many peer reviewers work on a voluntary basis with competing demands on their time, especially as they face uncertainty through the pandemic, and issues with quality control are largely inevitable.

At the same time, convening cross-disciplinary meetings of leading immunologists, microbiologists, and lung disease specialists on a consistent basis to share, review, and discuss research during such trying times is increasingly difficult.

Given what's at stake, Bramstedt proposes an overhaul of the submissions process to make it more efficient, while also introducing mandatory ethics and integrity training for researchers.

"Research has the potential to enter the public domain and be used by many stakeholders, including governments and policy makers, so the data must be robust," she concludes.

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Trends: Covid-19 coronavirus news


Smythe_Mogg 8 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 08:10 AM

Medical research has for long been diluted in quality by inherently inconsequential studies, incompetently designed and/or executed studies, and pressure to value quantity over quality. Mediocrity and worse abounds among researchers. Thus, Bramstedt's findings are all too plausible.
Tango 8 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 08:42 AM
Unfortunately this "ethicist" doesn't focus on the quackery that has come from the leading government experts and researchers including Ferguson, Drosten, Zambon, Fauci, Holmes, Rambaut, Burioni and all the rest.
Hanonymouse Tango 1 hour ago 2 Oct, 2020 03:21 PM
Yeah epidemiology used to be about tracking a disease, not a form of government... If only these constant lockdowns and re-openings weren't destroying people's lives then I would find it funny that politicians think they can chase statistics that lag by 2+ weeks and have it mean anything. But it IS destroying people's lives. Those businesses and jobs are not coming back once this mess is over.
diessa 8 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 07:58 AM
wave of fraud and quackery in medical research re convid, actually sums it up!
Timkun 3 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 01:09 PM
Research is an expensive endeavour. Management typically doesn't like it, because there is usually no profit. At the university level, many "experts" are ego driven, find it hard to admit that their theory may be wrong. IMO from years working in research, I find that because so much money is on the line, today, research is less of an exact science. The reason; more money and recognition for being first.
Count_Cash 8 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 08:21 AM
Demand has a habit of overwhelming any system. Of course Covid-19 has spurred increased research - it should have. So the system has broken and needs a few changes to make it more efficient..... However, when there is a huge financial benefit in driving the demand, you may well find that no matter what you do, a way will be found around it. That is the bigger issue!
Gerald Comeau Count_Cash 7 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 09:16 AM
Demand? This has little to do with demand? It seems to me greed and opportunism on the part of scientists aspiring career advancement is more in line, with what is going on, than demand.
eyeofmice 7 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 09:21 AM
check out a real doctors Dr. Andrew Kaufman and Dr. Vernon Coleman who are exposing this hoax and are being censored.
Logicthought 7 hours ago 2 Oct, 2020 09:39 AM
Medical Research has brought the Medical Profession into disrepute ...

[Sep 28, 2020] No wonder Pompey and his friend Jeffries won't give up on Syria! No wonder

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Virtually every aspect of the Syrian opposition was cultivated and marketed by Western government-backed public relations firms, from their political narratives to their branding, from what they said to where they said it. ..."
Sep 28, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

"Western government-funded intelligence cutouts trained Syrian opposition leaders, planted stories in media outlets from BBC to Al Jazeera, and ran a cadre of journalists. A trove of leaked documents exposes the propaganda network."

"Leaked documents show how UK government contractors developed an advanced infrastructure of propaganda to stimulate support in the West for Syria's political and armed opposition.

Virtually every aspect of the Syrian opposition was cultivated and marketed by Western government-backed public relations firms, from their political narratives to their branding, from what they said to where they said it.

The leaked files reveal how Western intelligence cutouts played the media like a fiddle, carefully crafting English- and Arabic-language media coverage of the war on Syria to churn out a constant stream of pro-opposition coverage.

US and European contractors trained and advised Syrian opposition leaders at all levels, from young media activists to the heads of the parallel government-in-exile . These firms also organized interviews for Syrian opposition leaders on mainstream outlets such as BBC and the UK's Channel 4.

More than half of the stringers used by Al Jazeera in Syria were trained in a joint US-UK government program called Basma, which produced hundreds of Syrian opposition media activists.

Western government PR firms not only influenced the way the media covered Syria, but as the leaked documents reveal, they produced their own propagandistic pseudo-news for broadcast on major TV networks in the Middle East, including BBC Arabic, Al Jazeera, Al Arabiya, and Orient TV .

These UK-funded firms functioned as full-time PR flacks for the extremist-dominated Syrian armed opposition. One contractor, called InCoStrat, said it was in constant contact with a network of more than 1,600 international journalists and "influencers," and used them to push pro-opposition talking points.

Another Western government contractor, ARK, crafted a strategy to "re-brand" Syria's Salafi-jihadist armed opposition by "softening its image ." ARK boasted that it provided opposition propaganda that "aired almost every day on" major Arabic-language TV networks."

"The Western contractor ARK was a central force in launching the White Helmets operation.

The leaked documents show ARK ran the Twitter and Facebook pages of Syria Civil Defense, known more commonly as the White Helmets.

ARK took credit for developing "an internationally-focused communications campaign designed to raise global awareness of the (White Helmets) teams and their life saving work."

ARK also facilitated communications between the White Helmets and The Syria Campaign , a PR firm run out of London and New York that helped popularize the White Helmets in the United States.

It was apparently "following subsequent discussions with ARK and the teams" that The Syria Campaign "selected civil defence to front its campaign to keep Syria in the news," the firm wrote in a report for the UK Foreign Office." thegreyzone

--------------

Using really basic intelligence analytic tools; Occam's Razor, Walks like a duck, Smileyesque back azimuth's, etc. it has been clear that the UK government has been deeply involved in sponsoring and influencing the Syrian/ jihadi opposition in that miserable country. The wide spread British Old Boys network of aspirants to the tradition of imperial manipulation has been visible just below the surface if you had eyes to look and a brain to think.

A lot of the money for this folly came right out of USAID.

pl

https://thegrayzone.com/2020/09/23/syria-leaks-uk-contractors-opposition-media/


ISL , 27 September 2020 at 04:03 PM

Dear Colonel agreed.

I object to the line in the article that they "played the media like a fiddle" - as it implies the mainstream media is a victim as opposed to willing accomplice.

The American public very strongly told Obama they didn't want another invasion and war in the middle east (red lines or not) so rather ineffective propaganda.

Moreover, I suspect that given the US public inattention to overseas events that do not involve much US blood (in places they can not find on a map). Today's mess would be where more or less the same if the entire IO had never happened - though maybe with less cynicism of US/UK gov'ts and media.

OTH, it is curious how well the British Old Boys network (and US) aligns with Israeli interests (and runs counter to US or British interests). Maybe grayzone will investigate that (impressive) IO campaign. I think a small country in the middle east played US and UK elites like a fiddle.

The Twisted Genius , 27 September 2020 at 04:48 PM

I've only given this article a cursory reading so far and it is clear that the Brits are going balls to the wall on the PSYOPS/perception management front. This campaign flows naturally from the strong material support for the Syrian "moderate rebels" provided by the US, the Brits and probably others for years. We may still be blowing up IS jihadis, but we're also supporting our own brand of jihadis around Al-Tanf, giving free hand to Erdogan's jihadis along the Turkish-Syrian border and doing our best to stymie R+6 efforts to crush the remaining jihadis and unite Syria.

The article focuses on the contractors role in PSYOP. I'm not sure if it mentions the British government's role in this. The GCHQ's Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) probably manages most of those contractors. The British Army also has the 77th Brigade. This brigade's slogan is: "behavioural change is our unique selling point". Gordon MacMillan, a reserve officer with the 77th Brigade, is now Twitter's head of editorial operations for the Middle East.
The 77th was formed in 2015 and subsumed the 15th Psychological Operations Group which was headed by Steve Tathan, who went on to head the defence division of SCL, the now defunct parent of Cambridge Analytica. I'm sure the 77th is capable of managing some of those contractors, as well. I wouldn't be surprised if quite a few of contractors were also reservists in the 77th.

I bet we're not letting the Brits have all the fun. The CIA Special Activities Center (formerly SAD) includes the Political Action Group for PSYOP, economic warfare and cyberwarfare. That dovetails nicely with what CENTCOM is doing in Syria. I knew some of those guys a while back. I remember scaring them with some of my own anarchist hacker rantings when I was penetrating those hackers.

Our Army has fours PSYOP groups brigade-sized), two active and 2 reserve. I would think they have advanced their methodology since I took the course at Bragg. For a few years, they were called military information support operations (MISO) groups rather than PSYOP groups. They have since reverted to their PSYOP name although their activities are referred to as MISO. I don't know what the difference is.

Babak makkinejad , 27 September 2020 at 05:10 PM

ISL

No, no, no.

There is no such small country as you describe in the Near East.

There is an self-disciplined proxy force masquerading as a state which is mostly funded by the United States to further the religious policies of the WASP Culture Continent.

It is no accident that in this context, the names of US and UK occur often in the same sentences; one declared a crusade to wrestle control of Plastine from Muslims, and the otber one carried out that crusade and escalated it.

That is also the reason that US cannot end the war over Palestine or leave Islamdom

(Oil, Geostrategic considerations, arms sales, Realpolitik are just pseudo-rationications to obscure the real war.)

Diana Croissant , 28 September 2020 at 07:45 AM

Where is Candide (aka Voltaire) when we need him?

BABAK MAKKINEJAD , 28 September 2020 at 09:14 AM

Ishmael Zechariah

How WASP-dom has arrived in this crusade is not, in my opinion, as significant as that it has been waging it for more than a hundred years.

fakebot , 28 September 2020 at 10:43 AM

"WASP Culture" is into golfing, not crusading. Erik Prince and the religious fundamentalists, maybe, but they don't drive US policy.

Russia and/or Chinese dominion over Eurasia cannot be permitted. Their means to achieve that would be less ethical, not that the US or UK have been prince among men and salts of the earth, as noted in the article.

The US has tried in vain to win over hearts and minds. It has been a mostly noble effort to bring countries like Iraq and Afghanistan into the 21st century, but it was always more of a losing game. The problem lies too much in Islam and tribal rivalries.

[Sep 28, 2020] Truth be told: political operatives own and run our MSM. This is why the press is called the 'Fourth Estate'

Highly recommended!
Aug 21, 2020 | www.unz.com
Ragno says: August 21, 2020 at 4:16 pm GMT 800 Words ⇑ @mark green

Truth be told: political operatives own and run our MSM. This is why the press is called the 'Fourth Estate'.

They are more correctly described as a Fifth Column , one far more open and sworn to destroy our country and its foundational citizens – and taxpayers – as any that ever operated during World War II. You would think this would be of vital interest to people who loudly declare themselves to be "Nazi-punchers", but who time and again show themselves to be merely low-level street terrorists informed and inspired by Mao's Red Guard and the irredeemable thugs of the African National Congress.

One wonders what's preventing them from mimicking the Red Terror waged by the leftists of Spain, when the battle for "freedom" involved the disinterment of the graves of Catholic clergy to better pose the corpses in blasphemous positions. Imagine how depraved those Mostly Peaceful protesters had to have been for even a leftist-supporting site such as Wikipedia to baldly state

The violence consisted of the killing of tens of thousands of people (including 6,832 Roman Catholic priests, the vast majority in the summer of 1936 in the wake of the military coup), attacks on the Spanish nobility, industrialists, and conservative politicians, as well as the desecration and burning of monasteries and churches.

Directly in the crosshairs this time are small and medium-sized owner-operated businesses – the true backbone of American freedom and prosperity – who have largely been sacrificed in exchange for the knock-kneed offerings of Danegeld from our giant conglomerates, all of whom have prospered immensely from the suffering and privation brought on by the Democratic lockdown of society – and the total shutdown of our economy.

Think! – have you read a single article charting how the government war on small business directly enriched Amazon.com and world's richest autocrat, Jeff Bezos? . who then funnels his windfall into a newspaper that blatantly pimps for the Democratic Party, which translates into a vast payday for the DNC, not least from its newly-approved partnership with the shadowy and many-tentacled Soros-surrogate group, BLM?

The result is what you'd expect when a fringe group operates with the full cooperation and partnership of major industry and both political parties (don't confuse Trump with a standard-issue Republican, please – he may have terrible flaws, but that isn't one of them) – 10% of the population holding the other 90% in a chokehold with only one set of rules: no arrest and prosecution for Bolshevik violence and terror ..but the zero-tolerance heavy hand of corrupt Leviathan coming down hard against any and all citizens who fight back or, eventually – inevitably – who even struggle against their restraints.

Short of the sudden arrival of celestial horsemen to punish the guilty and reward the set-upon, it has become clear that the only answer is the one that the Powers That Be claim to be dead set against: racial separatism. (Particularly when we consider that all that will be necessary to turn America into Hell on earth will be the adoption of Ibram Kendi's First Law, sometimes known as equality of outcome :

To fix the original sin of racism, Americans should pass an anti-racist amendment to the U.S. Constitution that enshrines two guiding anti-racist principals: Racial inequity is evidence of racist policy and the different racial groups are equals.

Could any "amendment" be more terrifyingly totalitarian than this?)

White and black separation would, instead, accomplish two goals, both more important than Kendi's quick fix: we would learn soon enough about actual equality of outcomes (which is why no Communist, black or white, wants anything to do with the creation of one more failed basket-case black state), and much more importantly, white families can sleep secure in their beds at night, without worrying about Apache raids at midnight, egged on and recorded for "posterity" by that Fourth Estate/Fifth Column referred to up top. Because the fact of the matter is that, even should some combination of government and law-enforcement halt the burning and looting of America – as things stand now, none of the worst malefactors will ever see the inside of a prison cell .which means any ceasefire will only be temporary, to be violently ripped asunder the moment they sense white Americans have at last lowered their guard once more. And living in perpetual paranoid readiness for violent uprisings and mindless destruction is no way to live at all.

Trump has it half right, a border wall is the answer: only it needs to run lengthwise , between the Southern and Northern borders. If we don't use the next four years to plan out such a separation, fretting over our children's children will be a fruitless exercise – those who aren't murdered will be captured and 'go native' .and in case you haven't looked at a globe lately, there's no place left to run.

Majority of One , says: August 21, 2020 at 4:33 pm GMT

@Miro23

As a recovering journalist, I can point out that even on a rinkydink rag in a small city, where I got fired for being a real journalist back in the early '70's; he who owns the presses and distribution networks calls the tune. It's a matter of working-class (no matter how middle-class your income or social-status) versus the ownership class. The latter wins every time.

[Sep 25, 2020] Blood type may affect COVID-19 outcomes, study shows - TMC News

Sep 25, 2020 | www.tmc.edu

Blood type may affect COVID-19 outcomes, study shows 3 MINUTE READ

Blood type may play a key role in determining who contracts COVID-19 and how severe the illness becomes, according to a recent report published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM).

Researchers studied 1,610 COVID-19 positive patients with respiratory failure.

"Our genetic data confirm that blood group O is associated with a risk of acquiring Covid-19 that was lower than that in non-O blood groups, whereas blood group A was associated with a higher risk than non-A blood groups," researchers concluded.

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Looking for the latest on the CORONAVIRUS? Read our daily updates HERE .
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Study participants were spread throughout seven hospitals in the Italian and Spanish epicenters of the pandemic and each were defined as having "severe" respiratory disease; those patients were compared to approximately 2,000 healthy individuals.

Based on the early data and despite the relatively small sample size, the study corroborates other reports, including one from Wuhan, China, where the SARS-CoV-2 virus outbreak originated.

Yet inherent limitations of the NEJM study mean it's too soon to definitively link blood type to COVID-19 outcomes.

"I do believe there is likely a connection, and the question is: What does this word 'outcome' mean?" said Ang Li, M.D., an assistant professor of hematology and oncology at Baylor College of Medicine . "The cases are not a study of all COVID patients versus all non-COVID patients, and it's not a study of all severe COVID patients versus all non-severe COVID patients. It's comparing the severe COVID patients versus everyone else without COVID. So, it's hard to know if it's an increased susceptibility to infection or a severity question."

Still, Li said, the data suggests that a connection may exist. If it holds, he said, the conclusion would follow results from a 2005 study published in JAMA (the Journal of the American Medical Association) examining SARS-CoV-1 -- the "original" SARS virus that created an outbreak in 2003. That study also found an association between ABO blood groups and disease susceptibility, with individuals with Type O less susceptible to that virus, as well.

Scientists do not know exactly why blood type could influence a person's susceptibility to these viruses, but authors of the NEJM paper suggest that variations in biologic mechanisms in ABO blood groups may play a role, specifically in their immune response.

"We have different antibody profiles based on our ABO blood type," Li said. "Also, there are some theories about how some of these ABO genes, based on the protein they're encoding, might affect some of the receptors where the virus binds and can alter how someone becomes more or less susceptible to the virus."

A person's blood type is determined by the presence or absence of specific antigens -- A and B -- which are molecules on red blood cells that trigger an immune response. A person with Type A blood has the A antigen on red cells and a B antibody on their plasma; a person with Type B has the B antigen on red cells and A antibodies on their plasma. Individuals with Type AB have both A and B antigens on their red cells, but neither on their plasma, and those with Type O have neither A nor B antigens on their red cells, but both antibodies are present on their plasma.

One theory is that because the immune systems of people with Type O blood already have antibodies for both A and B, their bodies are more equipped to identify foreign proteins -- including those on the surface of viruses.

"There are potentially some changes in the immunogenicity in the human host based on the ABO typing," Li said.

Some of the conditions observed in COVID-19 patients -- including blood clots, strokes and thromboembolisms -- may also vary in severity based on blood type, adding another possible explanation, Li added.

"In the ABO blood group, there is evidence that there is increased susceptibility in Type A versus Type O for increased risk for venous thromboembolism, such as pulmonary embolism and deep vein thrombosis," Li said. "That has been confirmed in multiple different studies."

In addition to finding a potential link between blood type and COVID-19 severity, authors of the NEJM paper detected a cluster of six genes with potential relation to COVID-19 severity, as well. The authors reiterated that further study was necessary for both connections, writing that the "pragmatic aspects leading to the feasibility of this massive undertaking in a very short period of time during the extreme clinical circumstances of the pandemic imposed limitations that will be important to explore in follow-up studies."

[Sep 25, 2020] Coronavirus- People with blood type O at less risk from Covid-19, research shows - The Independent - The Independent

Sep 25, 2020 | independent.co.uk

People with blood type O appear to have a greater form of protection against coronavirus compared to those with other blood types, early data produced by a US genomics firm suggests.

More than 750,000 individuals have so far participated in an ongoing study conducted by 23andMe, the California-based company best known for direct-to-consumer genetic testing, which is examining the genetic make-up of SARS-CoV-2.

The preliminary data, which has not been peer-reviewed, shows that people with type O blood were on average 14 per cent less likely than other blood types to get Covid-19 and 19 per cent less likely to be hospitalised, after accounting for age, sex, ethnicity and co-morbidities.

These findings reflect similar results from other studies that have shown people with type O blood seem to report fewer incidents of infection and severe illness.

Among respondents to the 23andMe survey, the proportion of respondents reporting a positive test for Covid-19 was highest among those with the AB blood type.

Read more How to help the elderly and vulnerable during the coronavirus How to help the elderly and vulnerable during the coronavirus How to feel less anxious about the coronavirus How to feel less anxious about the coronavirus How to be productive when working from home during coronavirus How to be productive when working from home during coronavirus Which countries around the world has coronavirus spread to? Which countries around the world has coronavirus spread to? The dirty truth about washing your hands The dirty truth about washing your hands The company is still recruiting for its study, and is currently seeking 10,000 participants who have been diagnosed and hospitalised with Covid-19.

In March, researchers at the Zhongnan Hospital at Wuhan University examined blood group patterns of 2,173 people who had been diagnosed with the disease and found patients with blood type A had a "significantly higher" rate of infection.

Lead researcher Wang Xinghuan said people with blood type A may need "particularly strengthened personal protection" to keep their chances of infection lower, and infected patients with that specific blood type may need "more vigilant surveillance and aggressive treatment".

✕ More recently, Italian and Spanish scientists noted that the gene region which codes for blood type is associated with elevated levels of key immune molecules.

In their study, which was published earlier this month, DNA samples were extracted from 1,980 patients in hotspot sites such as Milan and Barcelona who were hospitalised for respiratory failure. Their analysis showed a higher risk for A-positive individuals and a protective element among blood type O.

Research conducted into the 2002 SARS epidemic supports the O blood type protection theory for the two coronaviruses.

Scientists at a Hong Kong hospital analysed an infected patient who came into contact with 45 healthcare workers. Of 18 people with type blood O, eight became infected (44 per cent), compared to the other 27 people having other blood types, of whom 23 contracted the virus (85 per cent, or almost twice as much).

Blood type can influence blood clotting – one of the pathologies seen among seriously ill Covid-19 patients. People with type O blood have lower levels of proteins that promote blood clotting.

[Sep 25, 2020] Relationship between the ABO Blood Group and the COVID-19 Susceptibility

Sep 25, 2020 | nlm.nih.gov

To explore any relationship between the ABO blood group and the COVID-19 susceptibility, we compared ABO blood group distributions in 2,173 COVID-19 patients with local control populations, and found that blood group A was associated with an increased risk of infection, whereas group O was associated with a decreased risk.

[Sep 25, 2020] The effects of blood group types on the risk of COVID-19 infection and its clinical outcome - PubMed

Sep 25, 2020 | nlm.nih.gov

Results: The most frequently detected blood group was blood group A (57%) amongst the COVID-19 patients. This was followed by the blood group O (24.8%). The blood group types did not affect the clinical outcomes. Blood group A was statistically significantly more frequent among those infected with COVID-19 compared to controls (57% vs 38%, p <0.001; OR: 2.1). On the other hand, the frequency of blood group O was significantly lower in the COVID-19 patients, compared to the control group (24.8% vs 37.2%, p: 0.001; OR: 1.8).

Conclusions: The results of the present study suggest that while the blood group A might have a role in increased susceptibility to the COVID-19 infection, the blood group O might be somewhat protective. However, once infected, blood group type does not seem to influence clinical outcome.

[Sep 24, 2020] What to know before getting a COVID-19 antibody test by Keith Zubrow

Jun 28, 2020 | www.cbsnews.com

In March, as the United States faced a shortage of COVID-19 diagnostic tests to determine who was currently infected with the virus, the Food and Drug Administration began allowing antibody tests into the country without FDA review or formal clearance.

A COVID-19 molecular diagnostic test, sometimes referred to as a virology test, is often conducted through a nasal or throat swab. It is designed to detect if you presently have the COVID-19 virus.

A COVID-19 antibody test, or serology test, usually involves a blood sample and determines the presence of antibodies, which may signal that you previously had the viral infection.

"The two different types of tests give us complementary information about the pandemic," said Dr. Alex Marson, an infectious disease specialist and the director of the Gladstone UCSF Institute for Genomic Immunology. "The one tells us about who's actively infected. The other tells us who has been infected."

Dr. Marson and Dr. Patrick Hsu, an assistant professor of bioengineering at the University of California, Berkeley both told 60 Minutes it is presently unknown if a positive antibody test means protection from future infection.

"We do not know if a positive antibody test means that you have protective immunity," said Dr. Hsu. "It will certainly mean that in some cases, but how much, and for how long, and how many times? We do not yet know. People should not assume that, if you have a positive antibody test that you're immune, [that] you don't need to wear a mask, and [that] you don't need to socially distance."

A small sample size study from China published on June 18 in Nature Medicine found antibodies could fade in as soon as two to three months after the time of infection.

Both Dr. Marson and Dr. Hsu were interviewed by 60 Minutes correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi as part of a three-month investigation into the accuracy of antibody tests available in the U.S. The physicians assembled a team of scientists to study the accuracy of COVID-19 antibody tests in early March.

The accuracy of antibody tests are measured by their sensitivity and specificity. The sensitivity refers to a test's ability to determine if someone has COVID-19 antibodies present in his or her body. The specificity refers to a test's ability to distinguish who does not have COVID-19 antibodies.

In the early months of the pandemic, hundreds of companies from around the world were selling antibody tests in the U.S. with varying levels of accuracy.

In May, the FDA amended its policy and began requiring developers of antibody tests to apply for emergency authorization and submit data to prove their tests work. The FBI warns the policy change has not stopped scammers from trying to infiltrate the U.S. market with fraudulent or inferior quality tests.

The FDA also teamed with the other government agencies including the National Institutes of Health to track the accuracy of some antibody tests and on June 18 published performance results for 21 of them.

The FDA's list includes both rapid serology tests that are often processed on-location and tests that require blood samples be sent to a laboratory.

ARRAY / AP

"I will say that the best tests, especially tests where blood samples are being sent off to labs, seem to have responsible test performance characteristics," Dr. Marson told Alfonsi. "Does that mean that they're perfect? No"

The FDA says the prevalence of COVID-19 in a specific area and amongst different groups of people will factor into the likelihood of false positive or false negative results.

"I think when you ever get a positive test, it's important to undergo confirmatory testing, whether with a different antibody test, or an independent test that looks for a different viral antigen, or a different antibody isotype," Dr. Hsu told 60 Minutes. "This will be a way that we can guard against false positives. The statistical likelihood that you would test false positive twice is generally quite unlikely if you use independent tests."

Getting multiple independent tests might be more difficult than it sounds.

Quest Diagnostics and LabCorp are two of the largest laboratory testing providers in the U.S. They have collectively processed more than 3.5 million COVID-19 serology tests.

Quest told 60 Minutes it presently offers antibody tests manufactured by Abbott Laboratories, EUROIMMUN AG, and Ortho Clinical Diagnostics. LabCorp said it currently uses serology tests made by Abbott and Roche.

Both lab companies told 60 Minutes they do not allow patients to choose which antibody test is used ahead of a sample being processed.

Quest said the testing platform used to process a sample depends on a lab's volume and capacity. The company said it can run 200,000 serology tests per day and has conducted 2.1 million since April.

LabCorp said it began serology testing on a limited basis in March and now has the ability to run 300,000 samples a day. It does not disclose the daily volume of antibody testing, but told 60 Minutes it has processed approximately 1.4 million tests so far.

As of June 27, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported more than 32 million tests have been processed in the U.S. with a positivity rate of 9%. The CDC declined to tell 60 Minutes the specific sources of its aggregated data. A spokesperson told 60 Minutes the 32 million tests include both viral and antibody test results. The CDC also says not all test results are reported to them.

A Government Accountability Office report released on June 25, 2020 says the watchdog agency found that the CDC has made mistakes in its collection of data about COVID-19 testing. It says the CDC was gathering data about testing that combined antibody tests with diagnostic tests in their overall testing numbers, a practice that has been criticized by scientists as mixing apples and oranges.

The CDC made an effort to correct this practice and advise states to separate virology and serology test results, but the overall testing numbers from prior to June may still be inaccurate. Given the problems with accuracy of some antibody tests, it is also unclear whether all antibody positives should be considered true positives.

The video above was produced by Keith Zubrow and Sarah Shafer Prediger. It was edited by Sarah Shafer Prediger.

[Sep 24, 2020] COVID-19 antibodies may last for at least 4 months, Icelandic study suggests by Akshay Syal

Sep 24, 2020 | www.nbcnews.com

Sept. 1, 2020

People may have antibodies for at least four months after they get COVID-19, a study published Tuesday in the New England Journal of Medicine suggests.

The study pulled from a massive dataset from Iceland, looking for the presence of antibodies in more than 30,000 blood samples. The samples came from three groups of people: those with confirmed COVID-19 cases, those who had been exposed to the virus but weren't necessarily infected, and those who had no known exposure.

The researchers focused on a small subset of 487 people who had had more than one antibody test, which allowed researchers to see whether antibody levels remained stable or faded over time. In this group, the researchers found, antibody levels increased in the first two months after diagnosis and remained stable for the next two months.

Stefánsson said the study detected antibodies in a significant number of people who had been asymptomatic and were never tested for COVID-19.

Not everyone developed antibodies after infection, the authors wrote, suggesting that some people might have weaker immune responses to the virus. It's possible, however, that those people had false positive diagnostic tests and were never sick in the first place.

The researchers noted several other interesting trends. Antibody levels were higher in older patients and in those with more severe disease. Women also had lower antibody levels compared to men, and smokers had lower antibody levels than nonsmokers.

"What they're seeing here is that they're inducing a pretty strong immune response," said Jason Kindrachuk, an assistant professor of medical microbiology & infectious diseases at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg.

But while the data suggest that antibody levels remain stable for at least four months, questions remain.

"What we don't know is really the million-dollar question: How do these antibodies reflect immunity against this virus and inhibition of this virus," said Kindrachuk, who wasn't involved with the research. "Just because you see antibodies being produced, it doesn't tell you that those antibodies are going to act specifically against the virus."

In other words, it's unclear whether the antibodies will protect people from being reinfected.

Confirmed cases of people being reinfected with the coronavirus are exceedingly rare. Last week, it was reported that four people were reinfected, the only such instances out of more than 25 million cases worldwide.

In August, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention changed its quarantine guidelines, saying people with confirmed COVID-19 didn't need to be tested again for three months if they didn't develop any symptoms.

The study isn't the first to show that antibodies can stick around for some time after infection.

The data in the new study are in line with those in a July preprint article showing that antibody levels were stable for at least three months in patients who had recovered from the virus in New York City, said Elitza Theel, director of the infectious diseases serology laboratory at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.

[Sep 24, 2020] If the PCR Test Is Unreliable - Why Are Health Officials Demanding the Public Be Tested-

Sep 24, 2020 | www.blacklistednews.com

SOURCE: DERRICK BROZE, THE LAST AMERICAN VAGABOND

S EVIDENCE MOUNTS THAT THE "GOLD STANDARD" TEST FOR DETECTING COVID-19 IS UNRELIABLE, WHY ARE HEALTH OFFICIALS AROUND THE WORLD CALLING FOR MORE TESTS?

In the months since the COVID-19 panic began health authorities around the world have told the public to "get tested" to help track the spread of SARS-CoV-2. However, as fear and hysteria subside, the scientific community and public at large are calling into question the efficacy of the test used to determine a patients status. This article is a brief examination of the evidence that the PCR test is unreliable and should not be used as a determinant for the number of COVID-19 cases or as a factor in political decisions.

HOUSTON HEALTH AUTHORITY HAS CONCERNS ABOUT PCR TEST

On August 31, I attended a press conference in Houston to ask the Mayor and Houston Health Authority about reports regarding problems with the Texas Department of State Health Services' numbers on COVID-19 cases. TLAV has previously reported on these concerns with the COVID-19 case numbers in Texas. I also had a chance to ask Houston Health Authority Dr. David Persse about concerns around the test used to detect COVID-19.

The most common test is a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) lab test. This incredibly sensitive technique was developed by Berkeley scientist Kary Mullis, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1993. The test is designed to detect the presence of a virus by amplifying the virus' genetic material so it can be detected by scientists. The test is viewed as the gold standard, however, it is not without problems.

The PCR test uses chemicals to amplify the virus's genetic material and then each sample goes through a number of cycles until a virus is recovered. This "cycle threshold" has become a key component in the debate around the efficacy of the PCR test.

Dr. Persse says that when the labs report numbers of COVID-19 cases to the City of Houston they only offer a binary option of "yes" for positive or "no" for negative. "But, in reality, it comes in what is called cycle-thresholds. It's an inverse relationship, so the higher the number the less virus there was in the initial sample," Persse explained. "Some labs will report out to 40 cycle-thresholds, and if they get a positive at 40 – which means there is a tiny, tiny, tiny amount of virus there – that gets reported to us as positive and we don't know any different."

Persse noted that the key question is, at what value is someone considered still infectious?

"Because if you test me and I have a tiny amount of virus, does that mean I am contagious? that I am still infectious to someone else? If you are shedding a little bit of virus are you just starting? or are you on the downside?," Dr. Persse asked in the lobby of Houston City Hall. He believes the answer is for the scientific community to set a national standard for cycle-threshold.

Unfortunately, a national standard would not solve the problems expressed by Dr. Persse and others.

UK PARLIAMENT AND SCIENTISTS HAVE CONCERNS ABOUT PCR TEST

In the first weeks of September a number of important revelations regarding the PCR test have come to light. First, new research from the University of Oxford's Center for Evidence-Based Medicine and the University of the West of England found that the PCR test poses the potential for false positives when testing for COVID-19. Professor Carl Heneghan, one of the authors of the study, Viral cultures for COVID-19 infectivity assessment – a systematic review , said there was a risk that an increase in testing in the UK will lead to an increase in the risk of "sample contamination" and thus an increase in COVID-19 cases.

The team reviewed evidence from 25 studies where virus specimens had positive PCR tests. The researchers state that the "genetic photocopying" technique scientists use to magnify the sample of genetic material collected is so sensitive it could be picking up fragments of dead virus from previous infections. The researchers reach a similar conclusion as Dr. David Persse, namely that, "A binary Yes/No approach to the interpretation RT-PCR unvalidated against viral culture will result in false positives with segregation of large numbers of people who are no longer infectious and hence not a threat to public health."

Heneghan, who is also the the editor of BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine, told the BBC that the binary approach is a problem and tests should have a cut-off point so small amounts of virus do not lead to a positive result. This is because of the cycle threshold mentioned by Dr. Persse. A person who is shedding an active virus and someone who has leftover infection could both receive the same positive test result. He also stated that the test could be detecting old virus which would explain the rise in cases in the UK. Heneghan also stated that setting a standard for the cycle threshold would eliminate the quarantining and contact tracing of people who are healthy and help the public better understand the true nature of COVID-19.

The UK's leading health agency, Public Health England, released an update on the testing methods used to detect COVID-19 and appeared to agree with Professor Heneghan regarding the concerns on the cycle threshold. On September 9, PHE released an update which concluded, "all laboratories should determine the threshold for a positive result at the limit of detection."

This is not the first time Heneghan's work has directly impacted the UK's COVID-19 policies. In July, UK health secretary Matt Hancock called for an "urgent review" of the daily COVID-19 death numbers produced by Public Health England after it was revealed the stats included people who died from other causes. The Guardian reported:

"The oddity was revealed in a paper by Yoon K Loke and Carl Heneghan of the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine at Oxford University, called " Why no one can ever recover from Covid-19 in England – a statistical anomaly ".

Their analysis suggests PHE cross-checks the latest notifications of deaths against a database of positive test results – so that anyone who has ever tested positive is recorded in the COVID-19 death statistics.

A Department of Health and Social Care source said: 'You could have been tested positive in February, have no symptoms, then hit by a bus in July and you'd be recorded as a COVID death.'"

Only days after Hancock called for the review of PHE data, the UK government put an immediate halt to its daily update of death numbers from COVID-19.

On September 8, Heneghan tweeted out another study on the limitations of the PCR test. The study, "SARS-CoV-2 Testing: The Limit of Detection Matters" , examines the limit of detection (LoD) for RNA. The researchers note similar problems with the PCR test and the cycle threshold, concluding, "the ultimate lesson from these studies bears repetition: LoD matters and directly impacts efforts to identify, control, and contain outbreaks during this pandemic."

Heneghan also recently told the BMJ , "one issue in trying to interpret numbers of detected cases is that there is no set definition of a case. At the moment it seems that a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) positive result is the only criterion required for a case to be recognised."

"In any other disease we would have a clearly defined specification that would usually involve signs, symptoms, and a test result," Heneghan explained. "We are moving into a biotech world where the norms of clinical reasoning are going out of the window. A PCR test does not equal covid-19; it should not, but in some definitions it does."

Heneghan says he is concerned that as soon as there is the appearance of an outbreak there is panic and over-reacting. "This is a huge problem because politicians are operating in a non-evidence-based way when it comes to non-drug interventions," he stated.

THE EVIDENCE FOR FALSE POSITIVES IS OVERWHELMING

A recent report from NPR outlines the dangers of false positives with the PCR tests. Andrew Cohen, director of the Center for Research on Aquatic Bioinvasions, was hired by the state of California to study an invasion of non-native mussels. The researchers took water samples and used a PCR test to search for genetic material from the mussels. After the tests came back overwhelmingly positive, Cohen grew suspicious.

"I began to realize that many of these -- if not all of these -- were false positives, especially when they started being reported in waters that had chemistry that would not allow the mussels to reproduce and establish themselves," he told NPR. NPR notes that, depending on the lab, there was a 2 to 8 percent false positive rate.

Once COVID-19 was declared a pandemic, Cohen said he began asking if the reports of people with absolutely no symptoms and positive PCR test results could be false positives. "I began wondering whether these asymptomatic carriers weren't in large part or in whole part the human counterparts of those false-positive results of quagga and zebra mussels in all those water bodies across the West," he said.

Cohen emphasized the importance of researchers taking potential false positive PCR results seriously. "As near as we can tell, the medical establishment and public health authorities and researchers appear to be assuming that the false-positive rate in in the PCR based test is zero, or at least so low that we can ignore it."

Cohen is correct that the scientific authorities need to take false positives seriously, especially when a person can be sent to isolate or quarantine for weeks due to a positive test result. Even the U.S. FDA's own fact sheet on testing acknowledges the dangers posed by false positives:

"The CDC 2019-nCoV Real-Time RT-PCR Diagnostic Panel has been designed to minimize the likelihood of false positive test results. However, in the event of a false positive result, risks to patients could include the following: a recommendation for isolation of the patient, monitoring of household or other close contacts for symptoms, patient isolation that might limit contact with family or friends and may increase contact with other potentially COVID-19 patients, limits in the ability to work, the delayed diagnosis and treatment for the true infection causing the symptoms, unnecessary prescription of a treatment or therapy, or other unintended adverse effects."

A CDC fact sheet also acknowledges the possibility of false positives with the PCR test.

Professor Heneghan believes the confusion around COVID-19 has come as a result of a shift away from "evidence-based medicine." In a recent opinion piece published at The Spectator , Heneghan and Tom Jefferson, a senior associate tutor and honorary research fellow at the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, University of Oxford, wrote that patients have become a "prisoner of a system labelling him or her as 'positive' when we are not sure what that label means." The two scientists offer this conclusion and warning:

Governments are producing a series of contradictory and confusing policies which have a brief shelf life as the next crisis emerges. It is increasingly clear the evidence is often ignored. Keeping up to date is a full time occupation, and the advances of the last 30 years have at best been put on hold.

The duties of a good doctor include working in partnership with patients to inform them about what they want or need in a way they can understand, and respecting their rights to reach decisions with you about their treatment and care. Questions need to be asked as to how this will occur if you don't see your doctor, particularly if all you have to do is queue in at a drive in to get your answer.

And ultimately what is a 'good test'? We think it's the test which helps your doctor narrow the uncertainty around the origins and management of your problem.

RELATED ARTICLES: Tuesday, September 8, 2020 - "Dead" Virus Cells Frequently Trigger "False Positives" In Most Common COVID Test, New Study Finds

In the past, our reports raising questions about the accuracy of COVID-19 tests have been met with accusations of 'fearmongering' and spreading 'misinformation'.

Wednesday, June 10, 2020 - REPORT: Over 95% of UK "Covid19" deaths had "pre-existing condition"

Over 95% of "COVID Deaths" recorded in England and Wales had potentially serious comorbidities, according to statistics released by NHS England. RELATED ARTICLES: Tuesday, September 8, 2020 - "Dead" Virus Cells Frequently Trigger "False Positives" In Most Common COVID Test, New Study Finds

In the past, our reports raising questions about the accuracy of COVID-19 tests have been met with accusations of 'fearmongering' and spreading 'misinformation'.

[Sep 24, 2020] Covid-19- Do many people have pre-existing immunity

Sep 24, 2020 | www.bmj.com

17 September 2020

  1. Peter Doshi , associate editor
Author affiliations
  1. [email protected]

It seemed a truth universally acknowledged that the human population had no pre-existing immunity to SARS-CoV-2, but is that actually the case? Peter Doshi explores the emerging research on immunological responses

Even in local areas that have experienced some of the greatest rises in excess deaths during the covid-19 pandemic, serological surveys since the peak indicate that at most only around a fifth of people have antibodies to SARS-CoV-2: 23% in New York, 18% in London, 11% in Madrid. 1 2 3 Among the general population the numbers are substantially lower, with many national surveys reporting in single digits.

With public health responses around the world predicated on the assumption that the virus entered the human population with no pre-existing immunity before the pandemic, 4 serosurvey data are leading many to conclude that the virus has, as Mike Ryan, WHO's head of emergencies, put it, "a long way to burn."

Yet a stream of studies that have documented SARS-CoV-2 reactive T cells in people without exposure to the virus are raising questions about just how new the pandemic virus really is, with many implications.

Not so novel coronavirus?

At least six studies have reported T cell reactivity against SARS-CoV-2 in 20% to 50% of people with no known exposure to the virus. 5 6 7 8 9 10

In a study of donor blood specimens obtained in the US between 2015 and 2018, 50% displayed various forms of T cell reactivity to SARS-CoV-2. 5 11 A similar study that used specimens from the Netherlands reported T cell reactivity in two of 10 people who had not been exposed to the virus. 7

In Germany reactive T cells were detected in a third of SARS-CoV-2 seronegative healthy donors (23 of 68). In Singapore a team analysed specimens taken from people with no contact or personal history of SARS or covid-19; 12 of 26 specimens taken before July 2019 showed reactivity to SARS-CoV-2, as did seven of 11 from people who were seronegative against the virus. 8 Reactivity was also discovered in the UK and Sweden. 6 9 10

Though these studies are small and do not yet provide precise estimates of pre-existing immunological responses to SARS-CoV-2, they are hard to dismiss, with several being published in Cell and Nature . Alessandro Sette, an immunologist from La Jolla Institute for Immunology in California and an author of several of the studies ( box 1 ), told The BMJ , "At this point there are a number of studies that are seeing this reactivity in different continents, different labs. As a scientist you know that is a hallmark of something that has a very strong footing."

Box 1 Swine flu déjà vu

In late 2009, months after the World Health Organization declared the H1N1 "swine flu" virus to be a global pandemic, Alessandro Sette was part of a team working to explain why the so called "novel" virus did not seem to be causing more severe infections than seasonal flu. 12

Their answer was pre-existing immunological responses in the adult population: B cells and, in particular, T cells, which "are known to blunt disease severity." 12 Other studies came to the same conclusion: people with pre-existing reactive T cells had less severe H1N1 disease. 13 14 In addition, a study carried out during the 2009 outbreak by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that 33% of people over 60 years old had cross reactive antibodies to the 2009 H1N1 virus, leading the CDC to conclude that "some degree of pre-existing immunity" to the new H1N1 strains existed, especially among adults over age 60. 15

The data forced a change in views at WHO and CDC, from an assumption before 2009 that most people "will have no immunity to the pandemic virus" 16 to one that acknowledged that "the vulnerability of a population to a pandemic virus is related in part to the level of pre-existing immunity to the virus." 17 But by 2020 it seems that lesson had been forgotten.

RETURN TO TEXT

Researchers are also confident that they have made solid inroads into ascertaining the origins of the immune responses. "Our hypothesis, of course, was that it's so called 'common cold' coronaviruses, because they're closely related," said Daniela Weiskopf, senior author of a paper in Science that confirmed this hypothesis. 18 "We have really shown that this is a true immune memory and it is derived in part from common cold viruses." Separately, researchers in Singapore came to similar conclusions about the role of common cold coronaviruses but noted that some of the T cell reactivity may also come from other unknown coronaviruses, even of animal origin. 8

Taken together, this growing body of research documenting pre-existing immunological responses to SARS-CoV-2 may force pandemic planners to revisit some of their foundational assumptions about how to measure population susceptibility and monitor the extent of epidemic spread. Population immunity: underestimated?

Seroprevalence surveys measuring antibodies have been the preferred method for gauging the proportion of people in a given population who have been infected by SARS-CoV-2 (and have some degree of immunity to it), with estimates of herd immunity thresholds providing a sense of where we are in this pandemic. Whether we overcome it through naturally derived immunity or vaccination, the sense is that it won't be over until we reach a level of herd immunity.

The fact that only a minority of people, even in the hardest hit areas, display antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 has led most planners to assume the pandemic is far from over. In New York City, where just over a fifth of people surveyed had antibodies, the health department concluded that "as this remains below herd immunity thresholds, monitoring, testing, and contact tracing remain essential public health strategies." 19 "Whatever that number is, we're nowhere near close to it," said WHO's Ryan in late July, referring to the herd immunity threshold ( box 2 ).

Box 2 Calculating the herd immunity threshold

In theory, outbreaks of contagious disease follow a certain trajectory. In a population that lacks immunity new infections grow rapidly. At some point an inflection in this growth should occur, and the incidence will begin to fall.

The 1970s gave rise to a theory that defined this inflection point as the herd immunity threshold (HIT) and offered a straightforward formula for estimating its size: HIT=1−1/R 0 (where R 0 is the disease's basic reproduction number, or the average number of secondary cases generated by an infectious individual among susceptible people). This simple calculation has guided -- and continues to guide -- many vaccination campaigns, often used to define target levels of vaccination. 20

The formula rests on two assumptions: that, in a given population, immunity is distributed evenly and members mix at random. While vaccines may be deliverable in a near random fashion, from the earliest days questions were raised about the random mixing assumption. Apart from certain small closed populations such as "orphanages, boarding schools, or companies of military recruits," Fox and colleagues wrote in 1971, 21 truly random mixing is the exception, not the rule. "We could hardly assume even a small town to be a single homogeneously mixing unit. Each individual is normally in close contact with only a small number of individuals, perhaps of the order of 10-50."

Nearly 50 years later, Gabriela Gomes, an infectious disease modeller at the University of Strathclyde, is reviving concerns that the theory's basic assumptions do not hold. Not only do people not mix randomly, infections (and subsequent immunity) do not happen randomly either, her team says. "More susceptible and more connected individuals have a higher propensity to be infected and thus are likely to become immune earlier. Due to this selective immunization by natural infection, heterogeneous populations require less infections to cross their herd immunity threshold," they wrote. 22 While most experts have taken the R 0 for SARS-CoV-2 (generally estimated to be between 2 and 3) and concluded that at least 50% of people need to be immune before herd immunity is reached, Gomes and colleagues calculate the threshold at 10% to 20%. 22 23

Ulrich Keil, professor emeritus of epidemiology from the University of Münster in Germany, says the notion of randomly distributed immunity is a "very naive assumption" that ignores the large disparities in health in populations and "also ignores completely that social conditions might be more important than the virus itself." He added, "Tuberculosis here is the best example. We all know that the immune system is very much dependent on the living conditions of a person, and this depends very much on education and social conditions."

Another group led by Sunetra Gupta at the University of Oxford has arrived at similar conclusions of lower herd immunity thresholds by considering the issue of pre-existing immunity in the population. When a population has people with pre-existing immunity, as the T cell studies may be indicating is the case, the herd immunity threshold based on an R 0 of 2.5 can be reduced from 60% of a population getting infected right down to 10%, depending on the quantity and distribution of pre-existing immunity among people, Gupta's group calculated. 24

RETURN TO TEXT

But memory T cells are known for their ability to affect the clinical severity and susceptibility to future infection, 25 and the T cell studies documenting pre-existing reactivity to SARS-CoV-2 in 20-50% of people suggest that antibodies are not the full story.

"Maybe we were a little naive to take measurements such as serology testing to look at how many people were infected with the virus," the Karolinska Institute immunologist Marcus Buggert told The BMJ . "Maybe there is more immunity out there."

The research offers a powerful reminder that very little in immunology is cut and dried. Physiological responses may have fewer sharp distinctions than in the popular imagination: exposure does not necessarily lead to infection, infection does not necessarily lead to disease, and disease does not necessarily produce detectable antibodies. And within the body, the roles of various immune system components are complex and interconnected. B cells produce antibodies, but B cells are regulated by T cells, and while T cells and antibodies both respond to viruses in the body, T cells do so on infected cells, whereas antibodies help prevent cells from being infected. An unexpected twist of the curve

Buggert's home country has been at the forefront of the herd immunity debate, with Sweden's light touch strategy against the virus resulting in much scrutiny and scepticism. 26 The epidemic in Sweden does seem to be declining, Buggert said in August. "We have much fewer cases right now. We have around 50 people hospitalised with covid-19 in a city of two million people." At the peak of the epidemic there were thousands of cases. Something must have happened, said Buggert, particularly considering that social distancing was "always poorly followed, and it's only become worse."

Understanding this "something" is a core question for Sunetra Gupta, an Oxford University epidemiologist who developed a way to calculate herd immunity thresholds that incorporates a variable for pre-existing innate resistance and cross protection. 24 Her group argues that herd immunity thresholds "may be greatly reduced if a fraction of the population is unable to transmit the virus."

"The conventional wisdom is that lockdown occurred as the epidemic curve was rising," Gupta explained. "So once you remove lockdown that curve should continue to rise." But that is not happening in places like New York, London, and Stockholm. The question is why.

"If it were the case that in London the disease hadn't disseminated too widely, and only 15% have experienced the virus [as serology tests indicate] . . . under those circumstances, if you lift lockdown, you should see an immediate and commensurate increase in cases, as we have observed in many other settings," Gupta told The BMJ , "But that hasn't happened. That is just a fact. The question is why."

Possible answers are many, she says. One is that social distancing is in place, and people are keeping the spread down. Another possibility is that a lot of people are immune because of T cell responses or something else. "Whatever it is," Gupta added, "if there is a significant fraction of the population that is not permissive to the infection, then that all makes sense, given how infectious SARS-CoV-2 is."

Buggert's study in Sweden seems to support this position. Investigating close family members of patients with confirmed covid-19, he found T cell responses in those who were seronegative or asymptomatic. 10 While around 60% of family members produced antibodies, 90% had T cell responses. (Other studies have reported similar results. 27 ) "So many people got infected and didn't create antibodies," concludes Buggert. Deeper discussion

T cell studies have received scant media attention, in contrast to research on antibodies, which seem to dominate the news (probably, says Buggert, because antibodies are easier, faster, and cheaper to study than T cells). Two recent studies reported that naturally acquired antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 begin to wane after just 2-3 months, fuelling speculation in the lay press about repeat infections. 28 29 30

But T cell studies allow for a substantially different, more optimistic, interpretation. In the Singapore study, for example, SARS-CoV-1 reactive T cells were found in SARS patients 17 years after infection. "Our findings also raise the possibility that long lasting T cells generated after infection with related viruses may be able to protect against, or modify the pathology caused by, infection with SARS-CoV-2," 8 the investigators wrote.

T cell studies may also help shed light on other mysteries of covid-19, such as why children have been surprisingly spared the brunt of the pandemic, why it affects people differently, and the high rate of asymptomatic infections in children and young adults.

The immunologists I spoke to agreed that T cells could be a key factor that explains why places like New York, London, and Stockholm seem to have experienced a wave of infections and no subsequent resurgence. This would be because protective levels of immunity, not measurable through serology alone but instead the result of a combination of pre-existing and newly formed immune responses, could now exist in the population, preventing an epidemic rise in new infections.

But they were all quick to note that this is speculation. Formally, the clinical implications of the pre-existing T cell reactivity remain an open question. "People say you don't have proof, and they're right," says Buggert, adding that the historical blood donor specimens in his study were all anonymised, precluding longitudinal follow-up.

There is the notion that perhaps T cell responses are detrimental and predispose to more severe disease. "I don't see that as a likely possibility," Sette said, while emphasising that we still need to acknowledge the possibility. "It's also possible that this absolutely makes no difference. The cross reactivity is too small or weak to affect the virus. The other outcome is that this does make a difference, that it makes you respond better."

Weiskopf added, "Right now, I think everything is a possibility; we just don't know. The reason we're optimistic is we have seen with other viruses where [the T cell response] actually helps you." One example is swine flu, where research has shown that people with pre-existing reactive T cells had clinically milder disease ( box 1 ). 12 13 14

Weiskopf and Sette maintain that compelling evidence could come through a properly designed prospective study that follows a cohort of people who were enrolled before exposure to SARS-CoV-2, comparing the clinical course of those with and without pre-existing T cell responses.

Understanding the protective value of pre-existing SARS-CoV-2 T cell reactivity "is identical to the situation on vaccines," said Antonio Bertoletti, professor of infectious disease at Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore. "Through vaccination we aim to stimulate antibodies and T cell production, and we hope that such induction of immunity will protect but we need a phase III clinical study to really demonstrate the effect."

German investigators came to the same conclusion, arguing that their T cell findings represented a "decisive rationale to initiate worldwide prospective studies" mapping pre-existing reactivity to clinical outcomes. 31 Other groups have called for the same thing. 6

"At the start of the pandemic, a key mantra was that we needed the game changer of antibody data to understand who had been infected and how many were protected," two immunologists from Imperial College London wrote in a mid-July commentary in Science Immunology . "As we have learned more about this challenging infection, it is time to admit that we really need the T cell data too." 32

Theoretically, the placebo arm of a covid-19 vaccine trial could provide a straightforward way to carry out such a study, by comparing the clinical outcomes of people with versus those without pre-existing T cell reactivity to SARS-CoV-2. A review by The BMJ of all primary and secondary outcome measures being studied in the two large ongoing, placebo controlled phase III trials, however, suggests that no such analysis is being done. 33 34

Could pre-existing immunity be more protective than future vaccines? Without studying the question, we won't know.

[Sep 23, 2020] Your Coronavirus Test Is Positive. Maybe It Shouldn t Be by Apoorva Mandavilli

Any test with a cycle threshold above 35 is too sensitive, agreed Juliet Morrison, a virologist at the University of California, Riverside. "I'm shocked that people would think that 40 could represent a positive," she said.
In Massachusetts, from 85 to 90 percent of people who tested positive in July with a cycle threshold of 40 would have been deemed negative if the threshold were 30 cycles, Dr. Mina said. "I would say that none of those people should be contact-traced, not one," he said.
Notable quotes:
"... PCR tests still have a role, he and other experts said. For example, their sensitivity is an asset when identifying newly infected people to enroll in clinical trials of drugs. ..."
Aug 29, 2020 | www.nytimes.com

Updated Sept. 17, 2020

The usual diagnostic tests may simply be too sensitive and too slow to contain the spread of the virus.

Tests authorized by the F.D.A. provide only a yes-no answer to infection, and will identify as positive patients with low amounts of virus in their bodies. Credit... Johnny Milano for The New York Times

Some of the nation's leading public health experts are raising a new concern in the endless debate over coronavirus testing in the United States: The standard tests are diagnosing huge numbers of people who may be carrying relatively insignificant amounts of the virus.

Most of these people are not likely to be contagious, and identifying them may contribute to bottlenecks that prevent those who are contagious from being found in time. But researchers say the solution is not to test less, or to skip testing people without symptoms, as recently suggested by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention .

Instead, new data underscore the need for more widespread use of rapid tests , even if they are less sensitive.

"The decision not to test asymptomatic people is just really backward," said Dr. Michael Mina, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, referring to the C.D.C. recommendation.

"In fact, we should be ramping up testing of all different people," he said, "but we have to do it through whole different mechanisms."

In what may be a step in this direction, the Trump administration announced on Thursday that it would purchase 150 million rapid tests.

The most widely used diagnostic test for the new coronavirus, called a PCR test, provides a simple yes-no answer to the question of whether a patient is infected.

But similar PCR tests for other viruses do offer some sense of how contagious an infected patient may be: The results may include a rough estimate of the amount of virus in the patient's body.

"We've been using one type of data for everything, and that is just plus or minus -- that's all," Dr. Mina said. "We're using that for clinical diagnostics, for public health, for policy decision-making."

But yes-no isn't good enough, he added. It's the amount of virus that should dictate the infected patient's next steps. "It's really irresponsible, I think, to forgo the recognition that this is a quantitative issue," Dr. Mina said.

The PCR test amplifies genetic matter from the virus in cycles; the fewer cycles required, the greater the amount of virus, or viral load, in the sample. The greater the viral load, the more likely the patient is to be contagious.

This number of amplification cycles needed to find the virus, called the cycle threshold, is never included in the results sent to doctors and coronavirus patients, although it could tell them how infectious the patients are.

In three sets of testing data that include cycle thresholds, compiled by officials in Massachusetts, New York and Nevada, up to 90 percent of people testing positive carried barely any virus, a review by The Times found.

On Thursday, the United States recorded 45,604 new coronavirus cases, according to a database maintained by The Times. If the rates of contagiousness in Massachusetts and New York were to apply nationwide, then perhaps only 4,500 of those people may actually need to isolate and submit to contact tracing.

One solution would be to adjust the cycle threshold used now to decide that a patient is infected. Most tests set the limit at 40, a few at 37. This means that you are positive for the coronavirus if the test process required up to 40 cycles, or 37, to detect the virus.

Tests with thresholds so high may detect not just live virus but also genetic fragments, leftovers from infection that pose no particular risk -- akin to finding a hair in a room long after a person has left, Dr. Mina said.

Any test with a cycle threshold above 35 is too sensitive, agreed Juliet Morrison, a virologist at the University of California, Riverside. "I'm shocked that people would think that 40 could represent a positive," she said.

A more reasonable cutoff would be 30 to 35, she added. Dr. Mina said he would set the figure at 30, or even less. Those changes would mean the amount of genetic material in a patient's sample would have to be 100-fold to 1,000-fold that of the current standard for the test to return a positive result -- at least, one worth acting on.

Image
"It's just kind of mind-blowing to me that people are not recording the C.T. values from all these tests, that they're just returning a positive or a negative," one virologist said. Credit... Erin Schaff/The New York Times

The Food and Drug Administration said in an emailed statement that it does not specify the cycle threshold ranges used to determine who is positive, and that " commercial manufacturers and laboratories set their own."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it is examining the use of cycle threshold measures "for policy decisions." The agency said it would need to collaborate with the F.D.A. and with device manufacturers to ensure the measures "can be used properly and with assurance that we know what they mean."

The C.D.C.'s own calculations suggest that it is extremely difficult to detect any live virus in a sample above a threshold of 33 cycles . Officials at some state labs said the C.D.C. had not asked them to note threshold values or to share them with contact-tracing organizations.

For example, North Carolina's state lab uses the Thermo Fisher coronavirus test, which automatically classifies results based on a cutoff of 37 cycles. A spokeswoman for the lab said testers did not have access to the precise numbers.

This amounts to an enormous missed opportunity to learn more about the disease, some experts said.

"It's just kind of mind-blowing to me that people are not recording the C.T. values from all these tests -- that they're just returning a positive or a negative," said Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University in New York.

"It would be useful information to know if somebody's positive, whether they have a high viral load or a low viral load," she added.

Officials at the Wadsworth Center, New York's state lab, have access to C.T. values from tests they have processed, and analyzed their numbers at The Times's request. In July, the lab identified 872 positive tests, based on a threshold of 40 cycles.

With a cutoff of 35, about 43 percent of those tests would no longer qualify as positive. About 63 percent would no longer be judged positive if the cycles were limited to 30.

In Massachusetts, from 85 to 90 percent of people who tested positive in July with a cycle threshold of 40 would have been deemed negative if the threshold were 30 cycles, Dr. Mina said. "I would say that none of those people should be contact-traced, not one," he said.

Other experts informed of these numbers were stunned.

"I'm really shocked that it could be that high -- the proportion of people with high C.T. value results," said Dr. Ashish Jha, director of the Harvard Global Health Institute. "Boy, does it really change the way we need to be thinking about testing."

Dr. Jha said he had thought of the PCR test as a problem because it cannot scale to the volume, frequency or speed of tests needed. "But what I am realizing is that a really substantial part of the problem is that we're not even testing the people who we need to be testing," he said.

The number of people with positive results who aren't infectious is particularly concerning, said Scott Becker, executive director of the Association of Public Health Laboratories. "That worries me a lot, just because it's so high," he said, adding that the organization intended to meet with Dr. Mina to discuss the issue.

The F.D.A. noted that people may have a low viral load when they are newly infected. A test with less sensitivity would miss these infections.

But that problem is easily solved, Dr. Mina said: "Test them again, six hours later or 15 hours later or whatever," he said. A rapid test would find these patients quickly, even if it were less sensitive, because their viral loads would quickly rise.

PCR tests still have a role, he and other experts said. For example, their sensitivity is an asset when identifying newly infected people to enroll in clinical trials of drugs.

But with 20 percent or more of people testing positive for the virus in some parts of the country, Dr. Mina and other researchers are questioning the use of PCR tests as a frontline diagnostic tool.

People infected with the virus are most infectious from a day or two before symptoms appear till about five days after. But at the current testing rates, "you're not going to be doing it frequently enough to have any chance of really capturing somebody in that window," Dr. Mina added.

Highly sensitive PCR tests seemed like the best option for tracking the coronavirus at the start of the pandemic. But for the outbreaks raging now, he said, what's needed are coronavirus tests that are fast, cheap and abundant enough to frequently test everyone who needs it -- even if the tests are less sensitive.

"It might not catch every last one of the transmitting people, but it sure will catch the most transmissible people, including the superspreaders," Dr. Mina said. "That alone would drive epidemics practically to zero."

An earlier version of this article, using information provided by a laboratory spokesman, misstated the number of positive coronavirus tests in July processed by Wadsworth Center, New York's state lab. It was 872 tests, not 794. Based on that error, the article also misstated the number of tests that would no longer qualify as positive with a C.T. value of 35 cycles. It is about 43 percent of the tests, not about half of them. Similarly, the article misstated the number of tests that would no longer qualify as positive if cycles were limited to 30. It is about 63 percent of the tests, not about 70 percent.


Apoorva Mandavilli is a reporter for The Times, focusing on science and global health. She is the 2019 winner of the Victor Cohn Prize for Excellence in Medical Science Reporting. @ apoorva_nyc A version of this article appears in print on Aug. 30, 2020 , Section A, Page 6 of the New York edition with the headline: You're Positive. But Are You Contagious? Tests May Be Too Sensitive, Experts Say . Order Reprints | Today's Paper | Subscribe

[Sep 23, 2020] DNA Amplification Through Polymerase Chain Reaction

Sep 23, 2020 | www.thoughtco.com

By Theresa Phillips Updated October 25, 2019

PCR stands for polymerase chain reaction , a molecular biology technique for amplifying segments of DNA, by generating multiple copies using DNA polymerase enzymes under controlled conditions. As little as a single copy of a DNA segment or gene can be cloned into millions of copies, allowing detection using dyes and other visualization techniques.

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Developed in 1983, the process of PCR has made it possible to perform DNA sequencing and identify the order of nucleotides in individual genes. The method uses thermal cycling or the repeated heating and cooling of the reaction for DNA melting and replication. As PCR continues, the "new" DNA is used as a template for replication and a chain reaction ensues, exponentially amplifying the DNA template.

https://d956b974574e4d9df2e942a9641c69dc.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-37/html/container.html

PCR techniques are applied in many areas of biotechnology including protein engineering , cloning, forensics (DNA fingerprinting), paternity testing, the diagnosis of hereditary and/or infectious diseases, and for the analysis of environmental samples.

In forensics, in particular, PCR is especially useful because it amplifies even the smallest amount of DNA evidence. PCR can also be used to analyze DNA that is thousands of years old, and these techniques have been used to identify everything from an 800,000-year-old mammoth to mummies from around the world.

PCR Procedure Initialization

This step is necessary only for DNA polymerases that require hot-start PCR. The reaction is heated to between 94 and 96 °C and held for 1-9 minutes.

Denaturation

If the procedure does not require initialization, denaturation is the first step. The reaction is heated to 94-98 °C for 20-30 seconds. The DNA template's hydrogen bonds are disrupted and single-stranded DNA molecules are created.

Annealing

The reaction temperature is lower to between 50 and 65 °C and held for 20-40 seconds. The primers anneal to the single-stranded DNA template. The temperature is extremely important during this step. If it's too hot, the primer might not bind. If it's too cold, the primer might bind imperfectly. A good bond is formed when the primer sequence closely matches the template sequence.

Extension/Elongation

The temperature during this step varies depending upon the type of polymerase. The DNA polymerase synthesizes a completely new DNA strand.

Final Elongation

This step is performed at 70-74 °C for 5-15 minutes after the final PCR cycle.

Final Hold

This step is optional. The temperature is kept at 4-15 °C and strops the reaction.

Three Stages of the PCR Procedure Exponential Amplification

During every cycle, product (the specific piece of DNA that is being replicated) is doubled.

Leveling-off Stage

As the DNA polymerase loses activity and consumes reagents, the reaction slows.

Plateau

 No more product accumulates.

[Sep 20, 2020] NYT First Reinforces, Then Silently Debunks Its False Claims About Russia's Covid-19 Vaccine

Vaccine against coronaviruses is a very tricky business as the virus tend to mutate with time. Still it looks like Russian found some nw avenue to tackle this problem which might be more efficient then alternatives.
Notable quotes:
"... Science Magazine ..."
"... Science Magazine ..."
Sep 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Western reporters to not like to correct their own false reporting. They rather reinforce it as much as possible. Only when overwhelmed by the facts will they silently admit that they were wrong in the first place. Here is a prime example of how that's done.

In mid-August we exposed how 'western' media lied about the approval for phase-3 testing of the Russian Sputnik vaccine against Covid-19. They said that Russia claimed the vaccine was ready to go population wide. That never was the case.

'Western' Media Falsely Claim That Russia's Covid-19 Vaccine Is Ready To Go

Russia has not approved a vaccine against Covid-19 and it is not skipping large-scale clinical trials. The Russia regulator gave a preliminary approval for a vaccine candidate to start the large-scale clinical trial. [...]

Science Magazine is one of the few media who got it right : ...

One of the false reports we pointed out was by the New York Times Moscow correspondent Andrew E. Kramer:

Russia Approves Coronavirus Vaccine Before Completing Tests

Russia has become the first country in the world to approve a vaccine for the coronavirus, President Vladimir V. Putin announced on Tuesday, though global health authorities say the vaccine has yet to complete critical, late-stage clinical trials to determine its safety and effectiveness.
...
By skipping large-scale clinical trials, the Russian dash for a vaccine has raised widespread concern that it is circumventing vital steps -- and potentially endangering people -- in order to score global propaganda points.

Russia had, as we and Science Magazine reported, never the intent to skip large-scale clinical trials. Kramer made that up.

In new report today Kramer reinforces his previous false and disproven claims to lament about an alleged slow distribution of the Sputnik vaccine in Russia:

Russia Is Slow to Administer Virus Vaccine Despite Kremlin's Approval

More than a month after becoming the first country to approve a coronavirus vaccine, Russia has yet to administer it to a large population outside a clinical trial, health officials and outside experts say.

The approval, which came with much fanfare, occurred before Russia had tested the vaccine in late-stage trials for possible side effects and for its disease-fighting ability. It was seen as a political gesture by President Vladimir V. Putin to assert victory in the global race for a vaccine.

It is not clear whether the slow start to the vaccination campaign is a result of limited production capacity or second thoughts about inoculating the population with an unproven product.

The Times author reinforces his own lie that Russia had declared its vaccine ready for population wide application. It had never done that. The official registration of the vaccine by the relevant authorities was only a necessary precondition to start the large scale phase-3 testing of the vaccine. There never was a Russian intent to distribute the vaccine to a large population without phase-3 testing.

In the bottom third of his long piece Kramer comes near to admitting that. There he describes that the Sputnik phase-3 testing is now ongoing. That contradicts all of his previous reporting on the issues though he himself never says that. But even now he is getting the details wrong:

The trial in Russia began on Sept. 9, and Russian officials have said they expect early results before the end of the year, though the Gamaleya Institute, the scientific body that developed the vaccine, has scheduled the trial to continue until May.

That timeline is similar to the testing schedules announced by the three pharmaceutical companies testing potential vaccines in the United States, AstraZeneca, Moderna and Pfizer.
...
The Russian late-stage, or Phase 3, clinical trial is being carried out entirely in Moscow, where 30,000 people will receive the vaccine and 10,000 will get a placebo.

Yevgenia Zubova, a spokeswoman for the Moscow city health department, said in an interview that the vaccine was available only to trial participants.

Those last two paragraphs, which completely debunk Kramer's original reporting, should have been at the very top of the piece. They are buried down in paragraph 23 and 24 of a 29 paragraphs story that starts out with an epic repeat of the previously made false claims.

Kramer is wrong to say that the testing is limited to Moscow. As explained on the Sputnik Vaccine website :

Post-registration clinical trials involving more than 40,000 people in Russia will be launched in a week starting from August, 24. A number of countries, such as UAE, Saudi Arabia, Philippines and possibly India or Brazil will join the clinical trials of Sputnik V locally. [...] Mass production of the vaccine is expected to start in September 2020.

That testing of Sputnik V will also happen outside of Moscow has been confirmed by recent reports :

Russia's sovereign wealth fund will supply 100 million doses of its potential coronavirus vaccine to Indian drug company Dr Reddy's Laboratories, the fund said on Wednesday, as Moscow speeds up plans to distribute its shot abroad.
...
Dr Reddy's, one of India's top pharmaceutical companies, will carry out Phase III clinical trials of Sputnik-V in India, RDIF said.

It is not Russia that is fudging the testing of its vaccine. It is the Trump administration that is planning to do so out of political reasons:

Eric Topol @EricTopol - 18:10 UTC · Sep 19, 2020

We have the protocols. Now we know how there will very likely be an Emergency Use Approval (EUA) for a vaccine prior to November 3. The company and political motivations are fully aligned.

The criteria for an EUA is that it "may be effective" https://fda.gov/regulatory-inf ...
...
16. If there was any doubt about @HHSgov @SecAzar's plan to make sure there is an EUA for a vaccine before Nov 3 (see 10. above), then you can read this by @BySheilaKaplan In 'Power Grab,' Health Secretary Azar Asserts Authority Over F.D.A.

In contrast to the U.S. the Russian testing of its Sputnik vaccine will be -as usual- of high integrity and will strictly follow the protocols such trials are supposed to follow. In paragraph 29, the very last one in today's NYT story, the author at last admits as much :

[W]hen medicines are tested, Russia has an exceptionally good track record on managing clinical trials , according to a database of U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspections of clinical trials around the world. The F.D.A. found a lower percentage of trials with problems in Russia than in any other European country or the United States.

If I get the chance to chose a vaccine for myself I will rather take the one which was developed by a highly qualified state financed research institution and approved in Russia than one developed by some profit oriented pharmaceutic conglomerate that is in cahoots with a politicized regulator under the Trump administration.

Posted by b on September 20, 2020 at 12:12 UTC | Permalink


foolisholdman , Sep 20 2020 12:21 utc | 1

Very interestng clarification of well-muddied waters! Thank you for that b.
vk , Sep 20 2020 12:53 utc | 2
If I get the chance to chose a vaccine for myself I will rather take the one which was developed by a highly qualified state financed research institution and approved in Russia than one developed by some profit oriented pharmaceutic conglomerate that is in cahoots with a politicized regulator under the Trump administration.

To top it off, Gamaleya's vaccine simply has the better science behind it. It uses two human adenoviruses, in opposition to the single chimpanzee adenovirus used by the AstraZeneca one (the Chinese one also uses only one adenovirus, but I don't remember if it is human or chimpanzee).

No other laboratory in the world is using Gamaleya's technology - which it already dominates. Two American laboratories (Moderna and one more that I forgot the name) are testing the untried and dangerous mRNA technology. It is very unlikely those two mRNA vaccines will ever come out to the public; those two labs probably just cashed in their USD 2 billion checks they received from the USG.

This gives force to my original hypothesis: the Anglo-Saxon laboratories are exploiting exotic technologies for their vaccines because they want something the can patent, thus charging astronomical prices to the national governments and thus emerge from this pandemic even richer.

--//--

Speaking of AstraZeneca (Oxford), it released its blueprints yesterday after "public pressure":

A Phase III Randomized, Double-blind, Placebo-controlled Multicenter Study in Adults to Determine the Safety, Efficacy, and Immunogenicity of AZD1222, a Non-replicating ChAdOx1 Vector Vaccine, for the Prevention of COVID-19

The USG is, behind the scenes (I already posted the link here in the open thread), extremely worried about this vaccine.

AstraZeneca will try to get what it can get, but the fact is it's game over for them. The thing here is that the Gamaleya alternative is better and if the USA (where the vaccine makers will really make money) wants to get political, it will simply opt for one of the many American vaccines that will come out - ready or not, satisfactory or not - next year. As a British vaccine, AstraZeneca-Oxford will, at best, have to do with the British market, which is very tiny for a big pharmaceutical company.

It is better if they just cancel the trials and abandon production.

jo6pac , Sep 20 2020 13:07 utc | 3
If I had money I'd fly to Russia for their vaccine. They made theirs for the people and in Amerika we make it for profits and protect the makes from lawsuits.

Thanks b and vk

Clueless Joe , Sep 20 2020 13:19 utc | 4
To be frank, at this point, ironically, it's Big Pharma's own self-interest that might help us to counter Trump's lunacy. There are enough anti-vaxxers around for them not to want a screwed up vaccine and a big scandal that would only comfort the vaxxers and sow mistrust among the population. They need people to assume vaccines are well done and mostly harmless if they want to keep making profit with them. Trump is only interested in a victory in the next few weeks, Pharma business is interested in making profits for the next decades.
That's quite a damning indictment of our Western system, but then 2020 is a milestone, the threshold beyond which it won't be possible to consider the Western liberal capitalistic system as the superior one, if not the best one possible - quite the opposite.
Tuyzentfloot , Sep 20 2020 13:22 utc | 5
The Kramer reporting is highly unusual. Normally the important information should be in the third paragraph from the end and now it's in the sixth and seventh last.

Anyway, while I agree that this vaccine should be treated as an entirely legitimate effort I want to add:
- phase 1/2 testing did appear a too lightweight and the article on it in the Lancet has been criticized by russian scientists ( https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2020/09/08/leading-scientists-question-highly-improbable-russian-vaccine-results-published-in-lancet-a71384).
- one family of vaccines can be more controversial and experimental than another and the judgement of the testers can take this in account when considering shortcuts.
- One should distinguish what the makers of the vaccine claim with the political (exaggerated) statements from Putin about it .
- The statements on testing on the Sputnikvaccine have changed over time. In the beginning it said 2000 people in Russia and it listed 4 more countries(UAE, KSA, Brazil,Mexico). That was insufficient. Several of these countries have been omitted since, and others have been added. One can say that the intent to do decent testing was always there but the confirmed planning was not.
- rollout to large population was impossible anyway at an early stage because the production capacity was limited.

pnyx , Sep 20 2020 14:02 utc | 6
Kramer is not wrong, he simply lies. In the Relotius media this is standard practice when covering politically sensitive topics, combined with omissions.
Of course, many well-researched and truthful articles are published in the nyt, faz, nzz etc. That is exactly what makes these media so refined and what they base their claim to be quality media on. One lies and distort as little and as targeted as possible.
Steve , Sep 20 2020 14:05 utc | 7
The Europena and Australian vassals of the USA would not be given a choice to choose the more authetic option of the vaccine. But Israel would probably opt for the Russian version without consequence. It's over for the West!
morongobill , Sep 20 2020 14:10 utc | 8
Get your covid 19 news here folks!
Kramer vs Kramer , Sep 20 2020 14:15 utc | 9
Kramer appears to have the right kind of nose. It is all that matters
vk , Sep 20 2020 14:22 utc | 10
@ Posted by: Tuyzentfloot | Sep 20 2020 13:22 utc | 5

Nobody is saying the Gamaleya vaccine will be the second coming of the polio vaccine. Whichever COVID-19 vaccine comes out will inevitably be imperfect (in relation to the already tested and tried vaccines everybody takes nowadays).

Your worries are all legitimate. Indeed, Gamaleya publicly admitted phases 1 and 2 of its trials has small samples of subjects.

However, you also have to take into account that the science is solid (two human adenoviruses, a tested and tried technology) and that Gamaleya is the center of excellence in adenovirus vaccine technology. That's why - and not because it is Russian - we can trust Gamaleya's vaccine is, given the circumstances (pandemic), reliable. The fact Gamaleya already dominated the adenovirus technology also explains why it was the first laboratory to come out with a solution - it simply used a tested and tried method it already dominated, while the other pharmaceuticals are basically having to relearn how to develop a vaccine and/or are adventuring in uncharted territory because they want something they can patent.

So yes, we can search and find defects in Gamaleya's trials - but the strongest argument in its favor is not the trials, it's the solid science and technology behind it.

Jackrabbit , Sep 20 2020 14:34 utc | 11
What will the astro-turfed libertarian mob say about vaccines?

My guess: they will support them vociferously.

Because freedumb. And Big Pharma $$$ in their pockets.

!!

Anne , Sep 20 2020 14:54 utc | 12
Vk and the wabbit - right on. And Thanks to you, B, for this clear and straightforwardly informative piece (as usual).

Is it any surprise that the NYT uses the usual propaganda format of truth (when it accords with the ruling elites perspective) and lies (when "reporting on" what is happening in those "bad hat" countries)? And might I add that NPR and the BBC World Service do exactly the same thing, boosting the US-UK-NATO worldview (which equals the western corporate-captitalist-imperialist, oh so exceptional, ruling elites world position) while denigrating Russia, China, Iran (and now Lukashenko - indeed the Beeb refuses to pronounce his name properly, always reducing it to the feminine form, and believe me, as born and raised Brit, that's deliberate) via lies, lies and more lies. And via those weasely words: "likely," "Highly likely" and so on and on ....

All that this latest vaccine competition (western) will produce is more anti-vaxxers. And this time round, sensibly so.

JohnH , Sep 20 2020 14:57 utc | 13
Tuyzefot (5): it is common for the NYT to lead with propaganda and bury the facts at the end of the article.

I noticed it decades ago in articles covering Palestine. I learned to skip whatever was printed on the front page and immediately jump to the final five paragraphs found deep within the paper. I guess they print the facts at all there only as a bizarre way of covering their asses in a feeble attempt at integrity.

vk , Sep 20 2020 15:22 utc | 14
Just saw this, should've posted here earlier. Highly recommend reading in full:

Kirill Dmitriev: Questions on Sputnik V Vaccine Answered, Critics need to Look for Plank in Own Eyes

Highlights:

The vaccine uses a unique two-vector human adenovirus technology which no-one else in the world currently has for COVID-19.

[...]

On the surface the Sputnik V trial with 76 participants seems smaller in size compared to 1,077 people that, for example, AstraZeneca had in its Phase 1-2 studies. However, the design of the Sputnik V trial was much more efficient and based on better assumptions.

[...]

The post-registration studies involving more than 40,000 people started in Russia on August 26, before AstraZeneca has started its Phase 3 trial in the U.S. with 30,000 participants. Clinical trials in Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Philippines, India and Brazil will begin this month. The preliminary results of the Phase 3 trial will be published in October-November 2020.

[...]

Q.: Why has the Sputnik V vaccine already become eligible for emergency use registration?

Because of the very positive results of the Phase 1-2 trials and because the human adenoviral vector-based delivery platform has been proven the safest vaccine delivery platform over decades including through 75 international scientific publications and in more than 250 clinical trials.

[...]

Some other companies are using human adenoviral vector-based platforms for their COVID-19 vaccines. For example, Johnson & Johnson uses only Ad26 vector and China's CanSino only Ad5 while Sputnik V uses both of these vectors. The work of Johnson & Johnson and CanSino not only validates the Russian approach but also shows Sputnik V's advantage as studies have demonstrated that two different vectors produce better results than one.

[...]

The monkey adenovirus and mRNA vaccines have never been used and approved before and their research is lagging the proven human adenoviral vector-based platform by at least 20 years. However, their developers have already secured supply contracts worth billions of dollars from Western governments and may potentially apply for fast-track registration -- while receiving full indemnity at the same time.

At the end of the Q&A, Dmitriev counters his Western colleagues:

Question 1: Are there any long-term studies of mRNA and monkey adenovirus vector-based technologies for carcinogenic effects and impact on fertility? (Hint: there are none)

Question 2: Could their absence be the reason why some of the leading pharmaceutical firms making COVID-19 vaccines based on these technologies pushed the countries buying their vaccines for full indemnification from lawsuits if something goes wrong?

Question 3: Why is Western media not reporting a lack of long term studies for mRNA and monkey adenoviral vector-based vaccines?

Those are good questions. Very good questions.


Mark Thomason , Sep 20 2020 15:42 utc | 15
The constant Russia bashing is a disconnect from the truth and the real world.

It is annoying to wade through.

Far more important, it is crippling for a nation if its leadership actually does disconnect from reality and believe its own fantasy.

Disconnect from reality, belief in convenient fantasy, is exactly how the Democrats went from losing with Hillary to running again with Hillary II, the same donors and advisers and influence peddlers pushing the same right wing triangulation by the Democratic Party.

Maybe they can squeak out a win this time. It should not be close.

Far more important, there are things that need doing, things that would win like health care for all, that they simply won't offer or run on. We are not going to get from them what we need, we know that, and that is why they again have a squeaker election even against a joke like Trump.

Patrick Armstrong , Sep 20 2020 15:54 utc | 16
Perfect example of the free and unfettered press at work. What do you mean we're just a propaganda rag? See, right down at the bottom, the bit you didn't bother to read down to, right next to the denture ad, we told the truth. So there! Balanced and accurate reporting!
Kooshy , Sep 20 2020 16:21 utc | 17
Here in US we are getting 737maxed again this time with FDA
Kooshy , Sep 20 2020 16:28 utc | 18
Trump's "national security" state has managed to kill 200000 by him the autocrat in chief to come out and tell the truth as he admitted so to Woodward. This fucking American national security phobia is costing American lives more than all past 70 years of national security wars.
aquadraht , Sep 20 2020 18:14 utc | 19
The sick transatlantic mindset is exposed here:

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/08/31/china-covid-19-vaccine-first-401636

Nice to read the comment on Global Times:
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1199658.shtml

Tuyzentfloot , Sep 20 2020 19:34 utc | 20
@JohnH 13 , it was hm, a joke. There is indeed rule of thumb that you have to look fore the third to last paragraph. I upgraded it into something of a law, which is then violated in this case.
Tuyzentfloot , Sep 20 2020 20:10 utc | 21
@vk 10, I wouldn't call it my worries, just that I think B. posted a version which was too simple and rosy. In the meantime I saw your post 14 which I roughly expected but hadn't read about yet.
Jen , Sep 20 2020 20:17 utc | 22
Andrew Kramer's reporting on the Sputnik V vaccine is deliberately written to discredit the Russians and anything and everything they do, which includes the way they conduct scientific and medical research (because it's govt-funded, not funded by global pharmaceutical corporations) and the way they run their healthcare system (not privatised).

First, Kramer says the Kremlin approved the vaccine: this is to set up Moscow and Putin in particular as rash, so that the supposed "roll-out" of the vaccine can be (secondly) portrayed as inefficient.

Kramer knows he is lying which is why his piece is long (he knows most NYT readers are time-poor and want the celebrity news and baseball results) and the most important information is squeezed into the last two paragraphs of his article.

Jen , Sep 20 2020 20:24 utc | 23
Tuyzentfloot @ 5:

I tried linking to that Moscow Times article at your link and either I hit a dead end or the newspaper removed the article, which does not surprise me since that newspaper is as credible as The New York Times. It used to be given away f o r free in Moscow but I believe it now exists only as an online paper.

Tuyzentfloot , Sep 20 2020 20:32 utc | 24
@Jen, you have to remove the last two characters ').' because I omitted a space. The article in the moscow times is ok and not too alarming. It is also not discrediting the lancet article. Just raising concerns.

[Sep 17, 2020] Dr. Quack- CDC's Redfield Claims Masks -- Guaranteed To Protect Against COVID

Sep 17, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Dr. Quack? CDC's Redfield Claims Masks "Guaranteed To Protect Against COVID" by Tyler Durden Thu, 09/17/2020 - 14:09 Twitter Facebook Reddit Email Print

Authored by Jordan Schachtel via The Mass Illusion,

In February, Redfield said healthy people should *not* wear masks.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1306270050261831683&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fmedical%2Fdr-quack-cdcs-redfield-claims-masks-guaranteed-protect-against-covid&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=219d021%3A1598982042171&width=550px

Testifying before the Senate Appropriations Committee Wednesday morning, CDC Director Robert Redfield entered further into quack doctor territory, claiming that wearing a mask protects the wearer against the novel coronavirus, even more so than a high-efficacy vaccine.

"These facemasks are the important, powerful public health tool we have," Redfield said, while touching both sides of his mask and unconsciously contaminating it with his hands. "I might even go so far as to say that this facemask is more guaranteed to protect me against COVID than when I take a COVID vaccine," he added.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-1&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1306274937456529415&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fmedical%2Fdr-quack-cdcs-redfield-claims-masks-guaranteed-protect-against-covid&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=219d021%3A1598982042171&width=550px

This appears to be another "scientific" evolution on masks from the "public health expert" class. At first, we were advised not to wear masks. Then, the "my mask protects you. Your mask protects me" mantra became the widely disseminated narrative. Now, masks apparently have the incredible power of protecting the mask wearer from the virus.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-2&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1306265374367850497&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fmedical%2Fdr-quack-cdcs-redfield-claims-masks-guaranteed-protect-against-covid&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=219d021%3A1598982042171&width=550px

me title=

In February, Redfield said the exact opposite about masks.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-3&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1306290933596553217&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fmedical%2Fdr-quack-cdcs-redfield-claims-masks-guaranteed-protect-against-covid&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=219d021%3A1598982042171&width=550px

In the February hearing, Redfield told Americans not to buy medical-grade masks , saying there's "no role for these masks in the community."

There remains zero evidence that cloth masks or the earloop masks displayed by Redfield helps to slow the spread of COVID-19 or protect the wearer from infection. No country in the world has proven a link in slowing or stopping the spread due to mask wearing mandates, which are in effect in countless nations.

Given the lack of demonstrated evidence supporting it, mask-wearing has become a cult-like religious movement in the United States , one that relies on complete subservience to total mysticism. Members of the mask movement frequently target Americans who engage in non-compliance, likening these individuals to evil, plague-carrying menaces. Redfield's testimony will only add fuel to the mask mania that is sowing discord in America.

In his testimony, Redfield added that a COVID vaccine probably won't be available to the general public until at least the second or third quarter of 2021.

"If you're asking me when is it going to be generally available to the American public, so we can begin to take advantage of vaccine to get back to our regular life, I think we're probably looking at third, late second quarter, third quarter 2021," he testified, adding that first responders may have access to the vaccine before the end of the year.

Like many institutional bureaucracies in the federal government, the CDC has become plagued with corruption and "woke" politics. A whistleblower recently revealed that the CDC was forcing its staff to undergo "critical race theory" training.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-4&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1305619445520318465&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fmedical%2Fdr-quack-cdcs-redfield-claims-masks-guaranteed-protect-against-covid&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=219d021%3A1598982042171&width=550px NEVER MISS THE NEWS THAT MATTERS MOST

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Under Redfield's leadership, the CDC dropped the ball on preparing Americans for the U.S. coronavirus outbreak, as shown through internal emails displaying the bureaucracy as an organizational mess.

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[Sep 06, 2020] Inactive fragments on virus RNA trigger false positives in most common COVID test due to way too many cycles of amplification which amplifies noise along with the signal and efffectly turns noise (inactive fragments on RNA) into signal, new study finds

Highly recommended!
From comments: "Article is poorly written by someone who does not know medical science. There are no viral "cells" so the headline is a put off right away. The comment about "sensitivity" is misplaced as PCR tests are too sensitive: ergo false positives. I believe "specificity" is the word the author was searching for. If a test lumps true positives with false positives, then it lacks specificity."
Sep 05, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

In the past, our reports raising questions about the accuracy of COVID-19 tests have been met with accusations of 'fearmongering' and spreading 'misinformation'.

But not today.

That's because new research from the University of Oxford's Center for Evidence-Based Medicine and the University of the West of England has found that the swab-based technique used for most COVID-19 testing is at risk of returning "false positives" since copies of the virus's RNA detected by the tests might simply be dead, inactive material from a weeks-old infection. Although patients infected with COVID-19 are typically only infectious for a week or less, tests can be triggered by virus genetic material left over from a weeks-old infection.

The team's research involved analyzing 25 studies on the widely used polymerase chain reaction test. PCR tests use material collected with a swab - the most common type of test around the world, and especially in the US - then utilize a "genetic photocopying" technique that allows scientists to magnify the small sample of genetic material collected, which they can then analyze for signs of viral RNA.

What the researchers here have effectively found is that these PCR tests just aren't sensitive enough to distinguish if the viral material is active and infectious, or dead and inert.

For those who desire a more comprehensive understanding of how these tests work, the chart below can be helpful.

Professor Carl Heneghan, one of the authors of the study, said there was a risk that a surge in testing across the UK was increasing the risk of this sample contamination occurring and it may explain why the number of Covid-19 cases is rising but the number of deaths is static.

"Evidence is mounting that a good proportion of 'new' mild cases and people re-testing positives after quarantine or discharge from hospital are not infectious, but are simply clearing harmless virus particles which their immune system has efficiently dealt with," he told the Spectator.

Professor Heneghan added that international scrutiny might be required to avoid "the dangers of isolating non-infectious people or whole communities." ZKnight 14 minutes ago

Fake science. How about purify the virus first and establish a gold standard for testing first. No, of course not because the CDC has a patent for Covid-19 and nobody is allowed to try find it to see if it exists. play_arrow LogicFusion 27 minutes ago

Everybody is a Covid-19 / Coronavirus expert now!

Read about the failed coin dealer and convicted felon's performance. It's hilarious!

Martin Armstrong becomes Covid-19 Coronavirus Expert overnight play_arrow ducksinarow 59 minutes ago

Covid -19 has been so politicized that I don't believe a word of any publication for or against testing, existence of the Virus, or anything that provokes testing or issues opinions about locking down communities. Just like the riots, Covid news is just plain boring. play_arrow ominous 3 hours ago

Link to spectator.co.uk goes to home page, not this story.

Where is the original story posted? play_arrow play_arrow ominous 3 hours ago (Edited)

Perhaps this

https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/infectious-positive-pcr-test-result-covid-19/ y_arrow 1 Rabbi Blitzstein 38 minutes ago

"Give me control of a nation's money, and I care not who makes the laws" - Mayer Amschel Rothschild. play_arrow play_arrow tangent 4 hours ago remove link

People who recommend a vaccine for an entirely cured virus should lose their license to practice medicine. 99.9% cure rate applying to people who take it before being hospitalized is one of the biggest success stories in the history of medicine for HCQ. Not only that, but there are multiple other likely cures that simply have not been studied well. You'd think people would appreciate the fact that the common cold has been cured, but instead they just whine that big pharma isn't getting those bucko bucks.

I honestly expected a ticker tape parade like in the movies when that first cure study came out. But instead they took a massive **** on the study and on the doctor... ****ty world we live in. ay_arrow Pair Of Dimes Shift 2 hours ago

An exec (55+) at my company is gung ho about the vaccine.

Unfortunately, I just had to give him a "wait and see" response although I know vaccines for coronaviruses are impossible. play_arrow 2 play_arrow ThanksIwillHaveAnother 4 hours ago (Edited)

Viruses are not full cells. They are DNA/RNA wrapped with a protein the clings to a cell then the cell imports the DNA/RNA to start making its proteins. So what is inactive? If that person sneezes on another person depending on immune system status that other person could get a bad infection. y_arrow 4 CrabbyR 3 hours ago

viruses utilizes CELL structures and host DNA to replicate dna or rna according to the viruses genetic code, the protein jacket is the final product to

disguise the virus from detection and to bind on another cell after the compromised cell RUPTURES, there's more to it but if it cannot copy itself effectively it can become nonviable and unable to infect another cell. It replicates DNA inside a host cell, It is not a complete organism and cannot replicate unless it can inject its DNA into a host cell. Antibodies cling to viruses and destroy this ability to bind to a target cell. A non viable virus has a damaged coat or DNA RNA that has to many Dimers (damage or code breaks) Bacteria is more in line with what you think a virus is y_arrow onewayticket2 4 hours ago (Edited) remove link

they lost me when they changed the definition of "death" to include "presumed, untested" cases (while bI@#$% ing at me that we needed to "follow the science")....and even got busted for the laughable motorcycle accident being classified as a covid death and the Labs that were sending in 100% positive results. (until they were caught) play_arrow OutaTime43 4 hours ago remove link

The test detects RNA. Not necessarily viable virus. Also, it will detect RNA presence in an individual who may already have antibodies and may be immune. We are bombarded daily by viruses of which we already have immunity. play_arrow sun tzu 10 hours ago

Shocking news that the South Koreans already discovered and published back in May. Western big pharma driven medicine is garbage 😂😂😂

https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/05/wha-passes-pandemic-probe-resolution-korea-clarifies-reinfection-reports

play_arrow Roger Casement 10 hours ago

WTF!!!!

World Bank exporting COVID-19 Testing Kits in 2018??????

https: // wits.worldbank.org/trade/comtrade/en/country/ALL/year/2018/tradeflow/Exports/partner/WLD/nomen/h5/product/300215 play_arrow 7 play_arrow sun tzu 10 hours ago

Interesting play_arrow play_arrow Jack Mehoff 1 more time 9 hours ago

Business as usual play_arrow play_arrow Argon1 7 hours ago

Preparation for agenda 2021 in 2017. play_arrow 1 play_arrow CrabbyR 4 hours ago

WOW.......ties a few strands from other sources together into a real ugly picture play_arrow play_arrow Welsh Bard 10 hours ago

The professor who won the Nobel prize for work in this field, said that the way this test is being operated with over forty cycles, means that any results are entirely meaningless.

In Britain, having spent over £15 billion setting up PCR testing systems and a shaky test and trace apparatus on top of that, it appears that 90% of positive results now appear to be false. This is compounded by the fact that when a hot spot develops, more testing is done to show a rapid increase in more false positive results, meaning further new lockdowns and even more testing to prove yet more false positive results ad infinitum.

Now whether this is by design or ineptitude, people must decide for themselves but the outcome is utter chaos.

For those countries who have not followed the Swedish model especially countries like Australia and New Zealand who have set up complete isolation, now face a future perpetually cut off from the rest of the world.

Okay, new techniques will and are coming along to treat the disease like HCQ when used correctly maybe as a prophylactic and a vaccine that will need to be constantly upgraded like the Flu vaccine, means that the whole world has painted itself into a corner unless drastic revision is now made to the whole sorry mess.

In the meantime, we will now be stuck with digital currency and the introduction of ID Health Cards that will limit people in how they travel where they work and access to a whole heap of things like government services.

Welcome to the new world order! play_arrow 1 KuriousKat 11 hours ago (Edited) remove link

Don't tell the Shameless Aussie gov that after arresting hundreds for simply voicing doubt on need to lockdown entire city...Next time it will be thousands and not a damn thing they can do to stop it..These people are trickling us the truth how worthless the tests are when pretty much everyone knows. play_arrow espirit 12 hours ago remove link

Lessee.

WHO

Imperial College

John Hopkins

CDC

Line all those peeps up against the wall, and the first one to rat gets to live.

I'll provide my own ammo... ay_arrow Sick Monkey 6 hours ago

Not everyone working in these agencies are dishonest but like you and I we have to work and eat.

Most of them are trapped in this mess with bills to pay threatened by NDA.


play_arrow 1 Urban Roman 12 hours ago

Not particularly new news. Been talked about since April at least -- it's an RNA virus, it has its own polymerase, and it leaves lots of RNA fragments in its wake.

The Corona family of viruses make 5 or 6 strands with partial copies of their RNA molecule. negative copies are made first, and then copied again into positive copies. Finally the one big RNA is made with the entire genome on it.

So about a dozen RNA molecules are made for each finished virus particle that is produced. And finally, a variety of different primers are used for the PCR tests, some are matched to the small partial RNA copies and others are matched to various features on the large whole-virus RNA. They can give different results for the same sample.

So, someone who registers on a PCR test has probably been exposed to the virus, but the test gives no clue as to whether it is an active infection, or the person is contagious, or they are just coming down with it, or they got over it six months ago. play_arrow 4 play_arrow 1

10 play_arrow gordo 12 hours ago remove link

Sweden, no masks, no lock downs, ALL SCHOOLS OPEN, herd immunity, no second wave.

Still think your masks and lock downs are working muppets?


1 play_arrow The 3rd Dimentia 13 hours ago

https://youtu.be/sjYvitCeMPc SARS-CoV2 and the Rise of Medical Technocracy. Lee Merritt, M.D. play_arrow 3 play_arrow hugin-o-munin 13 hours ago

I'm glad to see that many are starting to counter the official narrative.

We've been asleep for too long and allowed these agendas to fester to the point we're at now where a college dropout software salesman and a former 3rd world communist terrorist (neither of whom have any medical degree) are dictating to the world how everyone needs to get a DNA altering vaccine and a medical ID. It's completely nuts and bonkers yet more or less the entire planet's governments follow in 'lockstep' with ever more draconian laws and regulations incarcerating people in their own homes, making them wear masks causing oxygen deprivation and shutting down the entire world economy.


lay_arrow Warthog777 , 13 hours ago

Article is poorly written by someone who does not know medical science. There are no viral "cells" so the headline is a put off right away. The comment about "sensitivity" is misplaced as PCR tests are too sensitive: ergo false positives. I believe "specificity" is the word the author was searching for. If a test lumps true positives with false positives, then it lacks specificity.

Cabreado , 13 hours ago

"accusations of 'fearmongering' and spreading 'misinformation'.
But not today."

Well, much of the world has known for months now about the testing lies...

and I'd be remiss to not remind the Tylers that they indeed played a role in the fear mongering along the way; quite intently so.

Crush the cube , 13 hours ago

https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Flavio_Bell_Covid_24?id=SxrxDwAAQBAJ

Busted, published 2018, what a scam.

Digital-Anarchy , 14 hours ago

Anyone who would use the term "virus cells", has no clue what they're talking about and should be completely disregarded. Viruses are not cells. PCR tests are searching for something your body produces in response to a virus as well. They are not produced specifically for a singular virus either. The entire concept of PCR testing is garbage. This **** was a scam from the get-go.

hugin-o-munin , 13 hours ago

Yes it is evident now that this entire pandemic is false and political. The goal seems to be to vaccinate entire populations and the question people need to ask is - why? what for? Aside from the obvious economic motives there are some more sinister plans that most people will have a hard time accepting but these need to be looked at. Several years ago there were a group of doctors and researchers that died of suspicious suicides who were collaborating and studying vaccines and the link to autism.

The effort was led by Dr.Jeffrey Bradstreet who was researching the natural substance GcMAF and how this could boost the immune system. What he discovered was that many vaccines had a compound/substance called Nagalase in them that is unnatural and has a detrimental effect on the immune system and function of GcMAF (which is produced by our own bodies) and has no business at all being in vaccines. Just before he was able to blow the whistle on this he also died of a suspicious 'suicide' and today most of the clinics and research groups working on GcMAF have been destroyed and ruined. Draw your own conclusions.

snblitz , 14 hours ago

Dr. Kary Mullis invented the PCR test. He said it was ineffective for this purpose.

Though he was addressing its use in a prior virus hoax unleashed upon the world.

I bet you didn't know this scam has been used before.

That is why I was able to call out the scam right from the start. The second I saw them using the PCR again, I knew it was from the same playbook.

snblitz , 14 hours ago

So many lies.

Viruses are not alive. They have no metabolic functions. They cannot move.

Don't believe me? Get a degree is virology or microbiology or just a read a book on the subject. Or capture a wuhan-virus yourself and watch it under a microscope. It won't move. It won't consume anything. It will just sit there inert.

The problem is that you are being lied to at a scale you cannot imagine.

I know, off to the fema re-education camp for me for spreading false information about the wuhan-virus.

Though I am not the one spreading fear and hysteria.

aldousd , 13 hours ago

There article is confused, but the work of the doctor is not. Viruses use your cells to reproduce. When your immune system targets the virus it actually kills your own cell which has become host to the virus. The virus particles and markers, and the DNA of the virus can be detected in these dead cells, but dead cells cannot serve as a factory for more viruses. So it's effectively a dead virus infected cell. Not a dead virus cell.

So while the transcription of the idea here was done by an idiot, it's not an idiotic idea. The tests cannot tell if the virus came in a living cell that is actively producing more viruses or a dead host cell that has been assassinated by your immune system. That's what they're talking about here.

mstyle , 11 hours ago

what about the chromosome 8 stuff that has been mentioned lately?

(since you appear to be rather intelligent)

hugin-o-munin , 11 hours ago

Thanks. Well the chromosome 8 discovery in the PCR test specifications/details is strange and worrying because it makes you wonder why it's part of this at all. Some believe it's to get more false positive results while others believe it is what the mRNA vaccines are intended to target and if that's right then it's really sinister. What exactly is the plan? To make all of us get Downs Syndrome? I don't know but judging by all their other lies and schemes it wouldn't surprise me.

IRC162 , 14 hours ago

Fuggin progressives and their pandemic political prop. But really this reaction is the same as their reaction to 'racial injustice'. They focus on feelings before the facts are known in order to achieve their end, and then do their best to bury/ignore the facts when they are gathered later.

94% COVID deaths with multiple comorbidities.

10 unarmed blacks killed by police in 2019 (6 were in self-defense).

adr , 15 hours ago

Why didn't you mention that nearly all labs are running 35-40 cycles which guarantees a positive test, simply from noise.

The inventor of the test said if you don't find anything after 15 cycles, it probably isn't there. After 20 cycles the noise starts to be greater than any real information. By 30, the test is mostly noise. More than 35, the test is completely worthless.

Of course I've been saying this for five months, but most people didn't listen. After the NYT article came out, people I know started saying, "How did you know?"

I said, "Because I have critical thinking skills. Why didn't you believe me? Name a time I've steered you wrong."

Antiduck , 14 hours ago

333 labs in florida had 100% positivity. (stupid word.)

ZenStick , 12 hours ago

Exactly correct.
Nobody will touch this line of reasoning in public or on media.
Bastages.

Identify as Ferengi , 15 hours ago

See above, Born2Bwired.

The PCR test is not useful for what they are using it for apparently. This has been known since the beginning. Here is quote regarding AIDS:

"Kary Mullis, who won the Nobel Prize in Science for inventing the PCR, is thoroughly convinced that HIV is not the cause of "AIDS". With regard to the viral load tests, which attempt to use PCR for counting viruses, Mullis has stated: "Quantitative PCR is an oxymoron." PCR is intended to identify substances qualitatively, but by its very nature is unsuited for estimating numbers. Although there is a common misimpression that the viral load tests actually count the number of viruses in the blood, these tests cannot detect free, infectious viruses at all; they can only detect proteins that are believed, in some cases wrongly, to be unique to HIV. The tests can detect genetic sequences of viruses, but not viruses themselves.

What PCR does is to select a genetic sequence and then amplify it enormously. It can accomplish the equivalent of finding a needle in a haystack; it can amplify that needle into a haystack. Like an electronically amplified antenna, PCR greatly amplifies the signal, but it also greatly amplifies the noise. Since the amplification is exponential, the slightest error in measurement, the slightest contamination, can result in errors of many orders of magnitude."

http://www.virusmyth.org/aids/hiv/jlprotease.htm

naro , 15 hours ago

NYTimes article last week suggested that only 10% of Covid positive PCR tests are clinically significant and infectious.

[Sep 06, 2020] Wrote a memoir of a incubation patient. The coronavirus Hospital staff are pressured to hook you up to the tubes...

Neoliberal medicine puts stents in people hearts just for money. Why neoliberal medicine should behave differently in case of COVID-19
Sep 06, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

naro , 15 hours ago

It is important to note that detecting viral material by PCR does not indicate that the virus is fully intact and infectious, i.e. able to cause infection in other people. The isolation of infectious virus from positive individuals requires virus culture methods. These methods can only be conducted in laboratories with specialist containment facilities and are time consuming and complex.

PCR is 90% false positive as far as detection of live infectious virus. IT IS A FRAUD

I Write Code , 15 hours ago

The "PCR" tests are only testing for fragments anyhow, if they did a full sequence it would be much more reliable - but much more slow and expensive, too.

NumbNuts , 15 hours ago

These test kits?

COVID-19 Test kits (300215) exports by country in 2018
https://wits.worldbank.org/trade/comtrade/en/country/ALL/year/2018/tradeflow/Exports/partner/WLD/nomen/h5/product/300215

4Celts , 14 hours ago

I saw this on RFB an hour ago . He showed how a link on this page had been scrubbed already .

adr , 15 hours ago

Why didn't you mention that nearly all labs are running 35-40 cycles which guarantees a positive test, simply from noise.

The inventor of the test said if you don't find anything after 15 cycles, it probably isn't there. After 20 cycles the noise starts to be greater than any real information. By 30, the test is mostly noise. More than 35, the test is completely worthless.

Of course I've been saying this for five months, but most people didn't listen. After the NYT article came out, people I know started saying, "How did you know?"

I said, "Because I have critical thinking skills. Why didn't you believe me? Name a time I've steered you wrong."

Spiritual Anunnaki , 15 hours ago

Wrote a memoir of a incubation patient. The coronavirus Hospital staff are pressured to hook you up to the tubes...

adr , 15 hours ago

If you walked into a hospital coughing, they gave you paralytics and hooked you up to a vent. Something that is only supposed to be done if you are in imminent danger of death.

The problem with paralytics, is that your body believes it is dead, and your blood starts to coagulate. It wasn't Covid that caused the problems, it was the drugs the doctors were forcing down patient's throats.

They should be held criminally libel, but thanks to the emergency declaration, they are immune to prosecution.

flim_flam_man , 11 hours ago

They wanted them intubated for two reasons: nurses didn't want to deal with patients on bipaps and other respiratory support in a conscious patient as that increases THEIR risk of infection. AND the hospitals collected $38K/intubated patient from the fed...significantly more than a garden variety mildly sick patient.

This went on mainly in hospitals in crappy areas that largely serve the "socioeconomically challenged" segment of the population, which then solves the mystery as to why blacks and hispanics have been disproportionately affected by covid.

[Aug 27, 2020] Trump's Executive Orders Will Make Prescription Drugs More Affordable -

Aug 27, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

esident Trump recently introduced four executive orders aimed at reducing drug prices for all Americans. Affordability in health care is consistently a leading issue on the minds of the people, and the price of prescription drugs is a key component of that. Every president, regardless of party, wants to make medication more affordable. But more times than not, they fail to make much of a difference. President Trump's orders, however, should.

Insulin, a drug that has been in existence for nearly a century, continues to be cost prohibitive for many diabetics. We've all seen story after story of people having to choose between groceries and lifesaving drugs -- even at a time when the Affordable Care Act is the law of the land. Over the last 10 years, the price of Humalog, a commonly prescribed insulin, has increased from $75 to $250, with no changes to formula, packaging, or designs.

https://lockerdome.com/lad/13045197114175078?pubid=ld-dfp-ad-13045197114175078-0&pubo=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theamericanconservative.com&rid=www.theamericanconservative.com&width=838

Over the same time frame, the list prices established by pharmaceutical companies have skyrocketed, although their profits have remained relatively flat . The middlemen and insurers, however, have seen record growth and rampant consolidation due to the large rebates they command from the manufacturers that benefit from being on the insurers' drug lists. This is a broken system; it sounds like a business model straight out of The Godfather movies.

The next EO, the International Pricing Index (also known as the "most favored nation" order), seeks to compel pharmaceutical manufacturers to charge the U.S. no more than the lowest price available among economically advanced countries for Medicare Part B drugs. Clearly, this is rate-setting and not a sustainable solution, but the order is the only one that comes with a trigger mechanism. President Trump has given Big Pharma until noon August 24 to negotiate a substantive plan to lower the cost of drugs for the American people.

If the manufacturers are unsuccessful in producing a viable plan, it will pull the trigger that initiates most favored nation status. This tactic has given the president necessary leverage to push for a deal that makes sense.

The importation order achieves the same end, but it will ultimately be up to the states to implement, should they wish to import drugs from nations with which they negotiate. Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida has been a long-time proponent of this policy and has been leading the charge for his state.

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Another order that focuses on bringing down the cost of insulin and epinephrine was issued within the network of clinics known as Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHC). Patients that are seen in these clinics will now be able to take advantage of newly extended purchasing discounts that will allow them to get these life-saving drugs for pennies on the dollar.

The fourth and perhaps most substantive order makes rebates for Medicare patients available at the pharmacy. Insurers and other middlemen have often kept these rebates and counted them as revenue rather than passing them on to patients. This order makes Medicare patients the beneficiaries of these rebates, which will result in much greater affordability for our seniors who are often on fixed incomes.

Are the orders perfect? Perhaps not. But the absence of leadership from Congress to get this done has resulted in needed action from President Trump. The physicians and patients who attended the signing applauded this effort and encouraged the administration to press on to make health care even more affordable. We are all patients, and efforts like this are opportunities for us to unite in our effort to fix our broken health care system.

David Balat is the policy director of the Right on Healthcare initiative at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.

Victor_the_thinker 9 hours ago

I work for a Pharma company. I haven't heard anyone concerned about these EOs. If they were actually going to impact pricing, I would have heard the concern as I deal directly with upper level management.

Victor_the_thinker Victor_the_thinker 9 hours ago

Also, insulin and epinephrine are made by only a handful of companies. There are a ton more drugs around than these generic drugs. It's the on patent drugs which drive the extreme cost of healthcare. Focusing on genetics isn't remotely where the big dollars are for the industry. Yea, there is gouging going in for insulin, it's certainly not the biggest thing going on right now in pricing.

[Aug 24, 2020] Angry Bear " Some of the Gilead Remdesivir Results from Recent Studies

Aug 24, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

Some of the Gilead Remdesivir Results from Recent Studies

run75441 | August 24, 2020 9:00 pm

HEALTHCARE HOT TOPICS POLITICS Effect of Remdesivir vs Standard Care on Clinical Status at 11 Days in Patients With Moderate COVID-19 A Randomized Clinical Trial , JAMA, Christoph D. Spinner, MD ; Robert L. Gottlieb, MD, PhD ; Gerard J. Criner, MD, August 21, 2020

This is a freebie so you should be able to get into this article and pickup on additional detail. Those who were treated early on had a better result from remdesivir than those who were treated later after contracting Covid. This was already know,.

Results: Among 596 patients who were randomized, 584 began the study and received remdesivir or continued standard care (median age, 57 [interquartile range, 46-66] years; 227 [39%] women; 56% had cardiovascular disease, 42% hypertension, and 40% diabetes), and 533 (91%) completed the trial. Median length of treatment was 5 days for patients in the 5-day remdesivir group and 6 days for patients in the 10-day remdesivir group.

On day 11, patients in the 5-day remdesivir group had statistically significantly higher odds of a better clinical status distribution than those receiving standard care (odds ratio, 1.65; 95% CI, 1.09-2.48; P  = .02).

The clinical status distribution on day 11 between the 10-day remdesivir and standard care groups was not significantly different ( P  = .18 by Wilcoxon rank sum test). By day 28, 9 patients had died: 2 (1%) in the 5-day remdesivir group, 3 (2%) in the 10-day remdesivir group, and 4 (2%) in the standard care group. Nausea (10% vs 3%), hypokalemia (6% vs 2%), and headache (5% vs 3%) were more frequent among remdesivir-treated patients compared with standard care.

Some Limitations: This study has several limitations. First, the original protocol was written when COVID-19 cases were largely confined to Asia and the clinical understanding of disease was limited to case series. This led to a change in the primary end point on the first day of study enrollment as it became clear that hospital discharge rates varied greatly across regions and the ordinal scale had become standard for interventional COVID-19 studies. Second, the study used an open-label design, which potentially led to biases in patient care and reporting of data. Third, because of the urgent circumstances in which the study was conducted, virologic outcomes such as effect of remdesivir on SARS-CoV-2 viral load were not assessed. Fourth, other laboratory parameters that may have aided in identifying additional predictors of outcomes were not routinely collected. Fifth, the ordinal scale used to evaluate outcomes was not ideal for detecting differences in patients with moderate COVID-19, especially for a clinical situation in which discharge decisions may be driven by factors other than clinical improvement.

Conclusions: Among patients with moderate COVID-19, those randomized to a 10-day course of remdesivir did not have a statistically significant difference in clinical status compared with standard care at 11 days after initiation of treatment. Patients randomized to a 5-day course of remdesivir had a statistically significant difference in clinical status compared with standard care, but the difference was of uncertain clinical importance.

[Aug 24, 2020] Anthropologist Wade Davis on how COVID-19 signals the end of the American era

Aug 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Oui , Aug 24 2020 13:43 utc | 95

The Unraveling of America
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/covid-19-end-of-american-era-wade-davis-1038206/

Anthropologist Wade Davis on how COVID-19 signals the end of the American era

Food for thought ... 😉. Well written ...

Odious as he may be, Trump is less the cause of America's decline than a product of its descent. As they stare into the mirror and perceive only the myth of their exceptionalism, Americans remain almost bizarrely incapable of seeing what has actually become of their country.

[Aug 22, 2020] Viruses, Plagues, and History- Past, Present and Future- Oldstone M.D., Michael B. A.- 9780195327311- Amazon.com- Books

Aug 22, 2020 | www.amazon.com

>


Johnny Beans

Very informative

5.0 out of 5 stars Very informative Reviewed in the United States on April 18, 2020 Verified Purchase Update: I'm just about done reading this book. Here's a quotation:

P 278. "When scientific research interferes with politics, economics, or culture, science is most often the loser. Thus, governments and businesses control health care for personal gains or concepts and disregard or avoid factual knowledge and events." Sound familiar? This was written ten years ago. I understand that the last thing many people want is more virus talk, but this book is very informative and may effect many of your actions. It also provides a long view on identifying and treating viruses. For example, I didn't know that it took over forty years for an effective polio vaccine. Same thing for measles.

[Aug 21, 2020] If You're Reading This, You Might Be A Conspiracy Theorist

Highly recommended!
Science now is a highly politicized science and that's a huge problem. Ask USSR scientists about possible consequences. Is Kapitsa noted long ago in his obitiary on Ernest Rutherford death as soon as science become rich it lost its freedom. "
"The year that Rutherford died (1938) there disappeared forever the happy days of free scientific work which gave us such delight in our youth. Science has lost her freedom. Science has become a productive force. She has become rich but she has become enslaved and part of her is veiled in secrecy. I do not know whether Rutherford would continue to joke and laugh as he used to.
Lysenkoism in Stalins's USSR was the first robin of this process. Now it became commonplace. That's why we see so many pseudo-scientists -- politicians who pretend to be scientists like Fauci. and so much corruption like among Professors of economics (all those neoclassical economic scoundrels)
Aug 20, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by John Steppling via Off-Guardian.org,

"...a permanent modern scenario: apocalypse looms and it doesn't occur."

- Susan Sontag, AIDs and its Metaphors

"I should not misuse this opportunity to give you a lecture about, say, logic. I call this a misuse, for to explain a scientific matter to you it would need a course of lectures and not an hour's paper. Another alternative would have been to give you what's called a popular scientific lecture, that is a lecture intended to make you believe that you understand a thing which actually you don't understand, and to gratify what I believe to be one of the lowest desires of modern people, namely the superficial curiosity about the latest discoveries of science. I rejected these alternatives."

- Ludwig Wittgenstein, A Lecture on Ethics

If you're reading this, then you've probably been called a conspiracy theorist. Also you've been derided and shamed for questioning the "science" of the Covid debacle.

The idea of science is now a badly corrupted idea. In a nation, today, (the USA) which in educational terms ranks 25th globally in science skills and reading, and well below that in math; all one hears is a clarion call to science. In reading skills the US placed below Malta, Portugal, and right about the same as Kazakhstan.

But in a nation that no longer reads, and *can* no longer read, it is not surprising that knowledge is absorbed via the new hieroglyphics of gifs (interestingly the creator of gifs wanted it pronounced with a soft g the more to sound like a peanut butter brand) and memes.

So-called 'response memes' are the new version of conversation, and most register and communicate (sic) confusion. As beer ad marketers know, the state of your brain after consuming a six pack is pretty much the standard target ideal for advertising. And it relays a message that six pack confusion is actually a good and perhaps even sexy state in which to find oneself.

Education is for those with money, those who can afford the proper foundational skills to get into Harvard, MIT, Cal Tech and the Stanford. For everyone else science is Star Trek.

But I digress. The point is that most Americans imagine that they revere science, and they ridicule anyone they think of as unscientific. But they think of it in cult terms, really. Its a religion of sorts. The only people who don't are those 'real' religious zealots, Dominionist and Charismatic Christians (like Mike Pompeo, Mike Pence, Rick Perry, Betsy DeVos et al) who hold positions of enormous power in the US government under the least scientific president in history.

The Christian right doesn't like any science, ANY science. But for most of that target demographic (the educated mostly white 30%), the cry is to "trust the science" even the great Greta says to "trust the science".

https://lockerdome.com/lad/13084989113709670?pubid=ld-dfp-ad-13084989113709670-0&pubo=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com&rid=www.zerohedge.com&width=890

The problem is, science is not neutral, its as politicized as media and news and the pronouncements of celebrities.

In May 2020, The Lancet published an article revisiting the 1957 and 1968 Influenza pandemics.

The 1957 outbreak was not caused by a coronavirus -- the first human coronavirus would not be discovered until 1965 -- but by an influenza virus. However, in 1957, no one could be sure that the virus that had been isolated in Hong Kong was a new pandemic strain or simply a descendant of the previous 1918–19 pandemic influenza virus.

The result was that as the UK's weekly death count mounted, peaking at about 600 in the week ending Oct 17, 1957, there were few hysterical tabloid newspaper headlines and no calls for social distancing. Instead, the news cycle was dominated by the Soviet Union's launch of Sputnik and the aftermath of the fire at the Windscale nuclear reactor in the UK.

By the time this influenza pandemic -- known colloquially at the time as "Asian flu" -- had concluded the following April, an estimated 20 000 people in the UK and 80 000 citizens in the USA were dead. Worldwide, the pandemic, sparked by a new H2N2 influenza subtype, would result in more than 1 million deaths.

To date, Covid 19 has not reached the million death marker in the US, and yet we are seeing the most draconian lockdowns in modern history, the total suspension of democratic process and a level of hysteria (especially in the U.S. and UK) unprecedented. I wrote about some aspects of this on my blog here , mostly touching on the cultural effects

Allow me to quote The Lancet again.

The subsequent 1968 influenza pandemic -- or "Hong Kong flu" or "Mao flu" as some western tabloids dubbed it -- would have an even more dramatic impact, killing more than 30 000 individuals in the UK and 100 000 people in the USA, with half the deaths among individuals younger than 65 years -- the reverse of COVID-19 deaths in the current pandemic.

Yet, while at the height of the outbreak in December, 1968, The New York Times described the pandemic as "one of the worst in the nation's history", there were few school closures and businesses, for the most, continued to operate as normal.

I remember the 68 Hong Kong flu. I was in my last year of high school. The summer after was Woodstock, the 'summer of love'. Not a lot of social distancing going on. But we are past numbers and statistics having any real meaning. The Covid narrative is now in the realm of allegory.

The media perspective is utterly predictable. Liberal outlets that have the inside track to government are seen to be reinforcing the mainstream story (VOX, Slate, Huff Post, The Guardian and Washington Post). In a recent VOX article the message was only a sociopath would NOT wear a mask and that the 'science' was unanimous.

Of course its no such thing. But the message of sites like VOX, or Daily Beast, or Wa Po or the truly reprehensible Guardian, are always going to be to hammer away 'on message'. The same is true for what passes for moderate news organs like the NY Times, ABC News, The Hill, and BBC. There has been virtually no dissenting opinions expressed in these rags.

All these news outlets are given clear messages by the spin doctors in government, by the White House, and by contacts within the State Department and Pentagon. And by the advertising firms employed by the state (such as Ruder Finn).

"Ad agencies are not in the business of doing science."

- Dr. Arnold S. Relman (Madison Ave. Has Growing Role In the Business of Drug Research, NY Times 2002)

The WHO, the CDC, and most every other NGO or government agency of any size hires advertising firms. The WHO, which is tied to the United Nations, is a reasonably sinister organization, actually.

Just picking up a random publication from the WHO, on what they call 'the tobacco epidemic' and you find on page 33 the following chapter heading "Objective: Effective surveillance, monitoring and evaluation systems in place to monitor tobacco use."

Reading further and all this is really saying is that the populace of any country is best put under surveillance. It's for their own good, you see.

But back to the science. Here is a small trip down memory lane

Institutions of medicine, global and national possess no more integrity than your average NGO (Amnesty International, Médecins Sans Frontières, Oxfam et al). And that means not very much.

To understand the nature of institutional corruption one must understand Imperialism. The institutions of Imperialist nations are going to further Imperialist ideology. (see Antonio Gramsci, ideological hegemony). The US is not in the business of helping Americans .

Modern monopoly forms better reflect that scientific knowledge, and its advanced application to production, are concentrated, ultimately, not in physical objects but in human beings and human interaction with those objects. It is monopoly of the labour power of the most highly educated workers, by both imperialist states and Multi National Corporations, that forms the ultimate and most stable base of imperialist reproduction.

– Sam King (Lenin's theory of imperialism: a defence of its relevance in the 21st century, MLR)

The idea of super-exploitation needs to be conceptually generalised at the necessary level of abstraction and incorporated in the theory of imperialism. Super-exploitation is a specific condition within the capitalist mode of production [ ] the hidden common essence defining imperialism.

he working class of the oppressed nations/Third World/Global South is systematically paid below the value of labour power of the working class of the oppressor nations/First World/Global North. This is not because the Southern working class produces less value, but because it is more oppressed and more exploited.

– Andy Higginbottom (Structure and Essence in Capital 1, quoted by John Smith Imperialism in the Twenty-First Century)

The US jobless rate just hit 2.1 million. Officially. Making the total something over forty million. Its much higher in reality. Nobody has work. There is no work and we are at the start of a period of massive evictions, foreclosures, and delinquencies - and the homeless population will soon reach Biblical proportions (in some cities, such as Los Angeles, its already Biblical). Will be simply of a magnitude never before seen.

Hence the authoritarian policing of lockdowns in, for example, New Zealand, suggests something like a practice run. The ruling class in western nations knows full well this is coming. And one wonders if it's not, in fact, a part of the plan (oh here is where someone says conspiracy theory probably Louis Proyect).

Yes it's a fucking conspiracy theory. It is a theory based on evidence, however.

Why are the US and UK and a host of other countries deliberately ensuring a massive depression? Because they care about your health? They are worried we all might catch the flu? Has the US ever demonstrated a concern with your health and well being before?

Remember how many discretionary tax dollars go to health care and how much to defense. Conspiracies do occur. The denial of that fact seems to be a hallmark of the pseudo or false left. Does the suspension of democratic process not cause this soft left any problems at all? Look at Sweden, at Belarus no lockdown and no problem.

It should be noted that there are a great many terrific doctors in the US. Dedicated and brilliant, often. But they are not the system. The system is run for profit.

With about three-fourths of Americans under lockdown, the unintended consequences will be vast. There has been a notable decrease in the number of heart attack and stroke patients arriving at hospitals, presumably because they are afraid of catching the coronavirus or of not finding a hospital bed.

As the economy spirals downward, we can also expect an increase in mental health crises, domestic violence and suicides. While lockdown supporters say that to have a functioning economy, we must have good public health, the reverse is also true: To have good public health, we must have a functioning economy.

– Alex Berezow PhD (Geopolitical Futures, 2020)

Alfred Willener wrote an interesting book in 1970, analysing May 68 in France. He analyses the answers students gave to various questionnaires they responded to. The section regarding science is worth quoting.

'The scandalous fact is that, for all the means that science has put at our disposal, most people live not much better than in the Middle Ages'. The system benefits from science in the following way: through the atom bomb, through 'the power of statistical research', through computers, through the chemical industry being 'in the hands of the state', through space research.

'In the end, you realize', concludes one reasonably logical reply, 'that technological progress, which makes economic growth possible, does not satisfy the fundamental needs of man and is used above all to maintain and strengthen the system'.

Lastly, I should like to quote one quite unexpected reply, which forms the extreme point of pessimism: ' Everyone is oppressed by science.'

– Alfred Willener (The Action-Image of Society on Cultural Politicization)

I doubt seriously one would get such responses today in any European or North American country. The contemporary indoctrination regards science is acute. And the media abounds in junk science. Click bait science. And this is where most people have their opinions formed for them.

There is a paper put out by one of the founders of the World Economic Forum, Klaus Schwab, called The Great Reset. The conclusion of the book reads

...at a global level, if viewed in terms of the global population affected, the corona crisis is (so far) one of the least deadly pandemics the world has experienced over the last 2000 years."

In other words, a mortality of .06% is simply not commensurate with the extreme measures the governments of the world (the West in particular) are taking.

There is no question, none, that those measures, the lockdown, the masks, the distancing, and the attending *diseases of despair*, will kill more people by a factor of ten than the virus itself.

This is not even to begin discussing the psychological harm done, in particular to children. And not just harm to children, but severe harm to the most vulnerable .

What is being internalized by children is three fold. One, there is something inherently sick and contagious about ME. Two, everyone MIGHT be a threat to my health. And three, obey authority, because you don't want to end up like those smelly homeless people were are trying to hard to avoid.

Children take things personally. They tend to blame themselves. Even in the comparative sanity of Norway, where I reside, children are increasingly anxious about the world. How could they not be? All this for a health risk of .06%.

But it is more than just the decimation of the economy in the US and UK. It is a dismantling of the culture. One in three museums closed because of Covid will not re-open. Ever. Where does all that art go?

Just a guess but probably very wealthy collectors will gobble it up at wholesale prices.

The predictable outcome of these lockdowns, certainly in the US, is a guaranteed minimum income. Very minimum. Restrictions on travel, all freedom of movement in fact, will not soon return to normal. Various forms of surveillance and tracking, as well as health certifications, are the goal of the state.

Also, if this pandemic succeeded so well, with so little resistance, why not have another? And there is another aspect to the SWAT mask police, and that is that western society is becoming alarmingly hypochondriacal. Children are kept out of school for runny noses. If all kids with snotty noses were kept out of class, nobody would get an education.

There is a dire future of two or three generations now developing and maturing with very weak immune systems. So that if a natural mutation takes place one day, from a Corona virus or any other, a genuinely serious pandemic could kill tens of millions.

It is not a speculation that there are people who prosper and even benefit during an economic crisis -- as smaller business owners struggle, large corporations and banks benefit from huge government subsidies, giving them more power to buy failing small businesses, for example. And it is a fact that many of those people have enormous economic power to shape the policies that can benefit themselves.

It is not a speculation that they would appreciate having strict measures of control against the people by limiting their freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom to travel, or by installing means of surveillance, check points and official certifications for activities that might give freedom to the people beyond the capitalist framework.

It is not a speculation that they would benefit from moving our social interactions to the digital realm, which can commodify our activities as marketable data for the advertising industry, insurance industry and any other moneyed social institutions Including education, political institution, legal institution, and financial institution.

Such matters should be seen within the context of the western history being shaped by unelected capitalists with their enormous networks of social institutions.

– Hiroyuki Hamada (Wrong Kind of Green, April 2020)

The collapse of retail is accelerating. This is emerging as a monopolization of retail. Few shops will remain, in fact, except luxury stores in select gated areas. The rest will be online and probably rudimentary. The culture and the economy are being strip-mined and recreated for a select clientele. The collapse of the economy means the collapse of the bottom 90% or so.

The very richest men and corporations on the planet are making huge profits.

And yet, there are precious few voices of dissent to the master narrative in the US. In Norway, the lockdown was about five weeks. But its a sparsely populated country and one hardly noticed it save for the kids being home and not in school. But schools reopened and the Prime Minister actually made a speech apologizing, in effect, for an *unnecessary* lockdown. She had been frightened.

But now, with a mild uptick in positive cases the country is considering stricter limitations on travel. Why?

There is no uptick in deaths, only in positive test results. The fact remains the virus attacks the aged and the already sick. But this is very telling, I think. The Norwegian government doesn't want to be seen as disobedient. They don't want to not follow the grand plan provided by western agencies and experts. Even if they seemingly don't really believe it.

(The saddest aspect is the voice of Dr. Mads Gilbert, a known advocate for Palestinian rights, who has weighed in on the side of fear. Why? I have no idea. But it is worth noting his predictions from March 2020 were staggeringly wrong.)

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But clearly the groupthink pressure is powerful and small nations do not want to be singled out for bucking the *science* . There are economic coercions threatened, tacitly, as well. The pressure to conform is huge and it takes a Herculean effort -- both individually and as a nation, to resist. And *experts* seem to have a hard time admitting they were wrong.

The science has been consistently wrong from day one.

As I say, this is now allegory. Or fable. There is nothing reasonable or rational in the lockdown measures of the US and UK and NZ. Or anywhere. And this is not even to touch upon the criminality of the Gates Foundation and Bill Gates buying public influence and visibility. Not trained in any medical discipline, Gates has somehow made himself one of the faces of the pandemic.

And to deconstruct Gates' language is to find a disturbing quality of authoritarian hubris. Gates utters declarations as if he were God speaking to his flock. All from a man who has done little save steal from his partners and exploit the poor of India and Africa. One of the most striking aspects of this whole last few months has been the enormous and coordinated effort the Gates machine has put into rehabilitating his image.

If you google "Crimes of the Gates Foundation" for example, you will get ten different fact-checkers officially denying any crimes and another half dozen articles ridiculing those who question Gates motives, his profit from vaccines, or even his alignment with eugenicists (depopulation adherents)– all are derided as, yes, conspiracy theorists.

If you dare to question the rushing of an untested vaccine you are called an anti-vaxxer.

My children are vaccinated. I just don't like the idea of a hurried untested vaccine produced for a virus that needs no vaccine. And one promoted by a creepy millionaire.

But clearly the Gates charm offensive is in overdrive. The pastel cardigan is everywhere. And yet, his favorable rating in recent surveys is around 56%. That is actually not very high given the amount of self-promotion involved. It's better than Mark Zuckerberg and Joe Biden, though. Gates is not likeable. No amount of spin can change that.

The final factor to note is the Trump effect. Many liberals would literally rather see dead in the street if it meant discrediting Trump. It is no longer quite a zero sum game, though. But overall the hatred of Trump is now at a religious level, too.

And behold, the opposition is Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. If you want a window in the black heart of Biden, watch and/or listen to his testimony around the Waco inferno. The inherent sadism and lack of humanity is glaringly apparent.

As for Kamala Harris:

As a San Francisco social worker, I sat on the school district committee that met with families of chronically truant students. Once, when we asked a student why he didn't go to school, he said there was too much police tape and shootings at his school bus stop.

Harris, as CA Attorney General, was putting parents/caregivers in jail if their child was chronically truant. Also as Attorney General, she denied a DNA test to Kevin Cooper, a very likely innocent man who came within hours of execution in 2004.

– Riva Enteen (Counterpunch Aug. 2020)

These are the servants of capital.

The left should be emphasising the economic aspect of lockdown because it is the working class who are the principal victims of lockdown."

- Phil Shannon (Lockdown Skeptics, June 2020)

A Downing street tweet today:

We're putting tougher measures in place to target serious breaches of coronavirus restrictions. Fines for not wearing a face-covering will double for repeat offences, up to £3,200."

This is a class-based assault. The wealthy will not be fined for not wearing a face-covering on their private beaches, or dinner parties at the yacht club.

[Aug 19, 2020] Russia's Ministry of Health names three drugs that can treat new Chinese coronavirus

This is from Jan 2020, but still interesting
Jan 30, 2020 | www.rt.com

While experts across the world search for a vaccine to tackle the dangerous new infection, Russian health bosses have identified a trio of existing medicines to combat 2019-nCoV in adults.

The new coronavirus can be fought with ribavirin, lopinavir/ritonavir and interferon beta-1b, they believe. These drugs are typically used to treat hepatitis C, HIV and multiple sclerosis respectively.

The Ministry of Health advisory not only offers recommendations, but also describes how the treatments work and in what quantities they should be prescribed. The guidelines are intended for doctors in hospitals throughout the country.

... ... ...

One of the drugs recommended, ribavirin, was used in the treatment of the 2003 Chinese SARS outbreak, which infected over 8,000 people and killed 774 across 17 different countries. The new coronavirus has shown a sizeable genetic similarity with SARS, with one sequence comparison showing a match of 79.5%.

The ministry also instructs that, in order to prevent and reduce the severity of symptoms, medication should be consumed within two days of contact with an infected person. Their prevention recommendations also include sanitary and hygiene rules, such as handwashing and wearing protective masks.

[Aug 13, 2020] America's Obesity Epidemic Threatens Effectiveness of Any COVID Vaccine

Aug 13, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Sarah Varney via Kaiser Health News,

As scientists race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine, experts say obesity could prove an impediment -- a sobering prospect for a nation in which nearly half of all adults are obese.

For a world crippled by the coronavirus, salvation hinges on a vaccine.

But in the United States, where at least 4.6 million people have been infected and nearly 155,000 have died, the promise of that vaccine is hampered by a vexing epidemic that long preceded COVID-19: obesity.

Scientists know that vaccines engineered to protect the public from influenza, hepatitis B, tetanus and rabies can be less effective in obese adults than in the general population, leaving them more vulnerable to infection and illness. There is little reason to believe, obesity researchers say, that COVID-19 vaccines will be any different.

"Will we have a COVID vaccine next year tailored to the obese? No way," said Raz Shaikh, an associate professor of nutrition at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

"Will it still work in the obese? Our prediction is no."

More than 107 million American adults are obese, and their ability to return safely to work, care for their families and resume daily life could be curtailed if the coronavirus vaccine delivers weak immunity for them.

In March, still early in the global pandemic, a little-noticed study from China found that heavier Chinese patients afflicted with COVID-19 were more likely to die than leaner ones, suggesting a perilous future awaited the U.S., whose population is among the heaviest in the world.

And then that future arrived.

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As intensive care units in New York, New Jersey and elsewhere filled with patients, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that obese people with a body mass index of 40 or more -- known as morbid obesity or about 100 pounds overweight -- were among the groups at highest risk of becoming severely ill with COVID-19. About 9% of American adults are in that category.

As weeks passed and a clearer picture of who was being hospitalized came into focus, federal health officials expanded their warning to include people with a body mass index of 30 or more. That vastly expanded the ranks of those considered vulnerable to the most severe cases of infection, to 42.4% of American adults.

Obesity has long been known to be a significant risk factor for death from cardiovascular disease and cancer. But scientists in the emerging field of immunometabolism are finding obesity also interferes with the body's immune response, putting obese people at greater risk of infection from pathogens such as influenza and the novel coronavirus. In the case of influenza, obesity has emerged as a factor making it more difficult to vaccinate adults against infection. The question is whether that will hold true for COVID-19.

A healthy immune system turns inflammation on and off as needed, calling on white blood cells and sending out proteins to fight infection. Vaccines harness that inflammatory response. But blood tests show that obese people and people with related metabolic risk factors such as high blood pressure and elevated blood sugar levels experience a state of chronic mild inflammation ; the inflammation turns on and stays on.

Adipose tissue -- or fat -- in the belly, the liver and other organs is not inert; it contains specialized cells that send out molecules, like the hormone leptin, that scientists suspect induces this chronic state of inflammation. While the exact biological mechanisms are still being investigated, chronic inflammation seems to interfere with the immune response to vaccines, possibly subjecting obese people to preventable illnesses even after vaccination.

An effective vaccine fuels a controlled burn inside the body, searing into cellular memory a mock invasion that never truly happened.

Evidence that obese people have a blunted response to common vaccines was first observed in 1985 when obese hospital employees who received the hepatitis B vaccine showed a significant decline in protection 11 months later that was not observed in non-obese employees. The finding was replicated in a follow-up study that used longer needles to ensure the vaccine was injected into muscle and not fat.

Researchers found similar problems with the hepatitis A vaccine, and other studies have found significant declines in the antibody protection induced by tetanus and rabies vaccines in obese people.

"Obesity is a serious global problem, and the suboptimal vaccine-induced immune responses observed in the obese population cannot be ignored," pleaded researchers from the Mayo Clinic's Vaccine Research Group in a 2015 study published in the journal Vaccine.

Vaccines also are known to be less effective in older adults, which is why those 65 and older receive a supercharged annual influenza vaccine that contains far more flu virus antigens to help juice up their immune response.

By contrast, the diminished protection of the obese population -- both adults and children -- has been largely ignored.

"I'm not entirely sure why vaccine efficacy in this population hasn't been more well reported," said Catherine Andersen, an assistant professor of biology at Fairfield University who studies obesity and metabolic diseases. "It's a missed opportunity for greater public health intervention."

In 2017, scientists at UNC-Chapel Hill provided a critical clue about the limitations of the influenza vaccine. In a paper published in the International Journal of Obesity , they showed for the first time that vaccinated obese adults were twice as likely as adults of a healthy weight to develop influenza or flu-like illness.

Curiously, they found that adults with obesity did produce a protective level of antibodies to the influenza vaccine, but they still responded poorly.

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"That was the mystery," said Chad Petit, an influenza virologist at the University of Alabama.

One hypothesis, Petit said, is that obesity may trigger a metabolic dysregulation of T cells, white blood cells critical to the immune response.

"It's not insurmountable," said Petit, who is researching COVID-19 in obese patients. "We can design better vaccines that might overcome this discrepancy."

Historically, people with high BMIs often have been excluded from drug trials because they frequently have related chronic conditions that might mask the results. The clinical trials underway to test the safety and efficacy of a coronavirus vaccine do not have a BMI exclusion and will include people with obesity, said Dr. Larry Corey, of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, who is overseeing the phase 3 trials sponsored by the National Institutes of Health.

Although trial coordinators are not specifically focused on obesity as a potential complication, Corey said, participants' BMI will be documented and results evaluated.

Dr. Timothy Garvey, an endocrinologist and director of diabetes research at the University of Alabama, was among those who stressed that, despite the lingering questions, it is still safer for obese people to get vaccinated than not.

"The influenza vaccine still works in patients with obesity, but just not as well," Garvey said. "We still want them to get vaccinated."

[Aug 12, 2020] New Study Finds Potential Reason Why COVID-19 Occurs Less In Children

Aug 12, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

This new study detailed in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) on May 20, discovered that the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), which grows in abundance as the individual grows, might be the reason that less than two percent of all individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 - the virus that causes the COVID-19 disease - are children.

Researchers had suspected that COVID-19 susceptibility could be linked to the amount of gene expression of ACE2 seen in the nasal cavity, given that the enzyme acts as a receptor to allow the SARS-CoV-2 virus to pass into the body.

To investigate this potential link, researchers looked for a relationship between the two - the level of gene expression of ACE2 in the nose and COVID-19 infection - by taking nasal swabs from 305 people involved in an asthma study . Researchers hypothesized that the lower the levels of enzyme gene expression, the less likely it is a person will be infected by COVID-19.

Researchers said they chose to swab the nose because it is one of the first access points for SARS-CoV-2 to infect an individual.

Samples were taken from both asthmatic (49.8 percent) and non-asthmatic patients. The 305 people involved in the study were between four to 60 years of age.

Researchers said they found a clear association between ACE2 expression and age - opening up a possible explanation as to why most children, who tend to have lower levels of enzyme expression, are less susceptible to COVID-19.

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Supinda Bunyavanich, professor of Genetics and Genomic Sciences and Paediatrics at Mount Sinai, said in a press release that the study found "that there are low levels of ACE2 expression in the nasal passages of younger children, and this ACE2 level increases with age into adulthood.

"This might explain why children have been largely spared in the pandemic," Bunyavanich said.

[Aug 03, 2020] Red Flags Soar As Big Pharma Will Be Exempt From COVID-19 Vaccine Liability Claims -

Aug 03, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Last week we warned readers to be cautious about new COVID-19 vaccines, highlighting how key parts of the clinical trials are being skipped as big pharma will not be held accountable for adverse side effects for administering the experimental drugs.

A senior executive from AstraZeneca, Britain's second-largest drugmaker, told Reuters that his company was just granted protection from all legal action if the company's vaccine led to damaging side effects.

...

For more color on leading vaccines in development that produce "severe" side effects, read our latest piece titled "Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine Induced Adverse Reactions In "More Than Half" Of Trial Participants."

Maybe these rushed vaccines are more for optics, get consumers back into airplanes, hotels, resorts, and malls.

The major red flag is how governments are allowing big pharma to rush experimental vaccines, with no legal recourse if something goes terribly wrong.

[Aug 03, 2020] Next big COVID-19 treatment may be manufactured antibodies

Aug 03, 2020 | www.msn.com

As the world awaits a COVID-19 vaccine, the next big advance in battling the pandemic could come from a class of biotech therapies widely used against cancer and other disorders - antibodies designed specifically to attack this new virus.

[Aug 02, 2020] Red Flags Soar As Big Pharma Will Be Exempt From COVID-19 Vaccine Liability Claims

Aug 02, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Last week we warned readers to be cautious about new COVID-19 vaccines, highlighting how key parts of the clinical trials are being skipped as big pharma will not be held accountable for adverse side effects for administering the experimental drugs.

A senior executive from AstraZeneca, Britain's second-largest drugmaker, told Reuters that his company was just granted protection from all legal action if the company's vaccine led to damaging side effects.

[Aug 02, 2020] Obese People Are Twice As Likely To Die From Covid

Notable quotes:
"... And while being overweight does not seem to increase people's chances of contracting COVID-19 according to the study, it can affect the respiratory system, and potentially immune function as well. ..."
Aug 02, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Just in case Americans - the most obese nation in the world - needed another reason to lose some weight, here it is.

In what is emerging as a perfidious Catch 22, at a time when the US population is rapidly gaining weight due to mandatory work from home regulation (hence the Covid 19 pounds ) as described here and here , while a surge in domestic alcohol consumption is only making the matters worse...

... Public Health England has published a paper titled " Excess Weight and COVID-19 Insights from new evidence ", indicating that the risks of hospitalization, intensive care treatment and death increase progressively with increasing body mass index (BMI) above the healthy weight range even after adjustment for potential confounding factors, including demographic and socioeconomic factors. In other words, the fatter one is, the higher the risk that person may die from covid.

Some more details: according to the Public Health England paper, the hazard ratios of ICU admission patients who are overweight (BMI ≥25-29.9), obese (BMI ≥30-34.9) or severely obese (BMI ≥35) are 1.64, 2.59 and 4.35, respectively see figure below) relative to patients with a BMI of ≥20-24.9.

And while being overweight does not seem to increase people's chances of contracting COVID-19 according to the study, it can affect the respiratory system, and potentially immune function as well.

And since no crisis will ever be put to waste by a nanny state which after the covid pandemic will control virtually every aspect of our lives, the British government plans to initiate an anti-obesity campaign including strict rules on how junk food is advertised and sold in the UK.

[Aug 02, 2020] The Coronavirus Recovery Handbook: 19 Rehab Exercises for Mild to Severe Cases of COVID-19

Aug 02, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , Aug 1 2020 10:46 utc | 89

This book is likely required reading for those who have suffered from COVID-19. It's only 76 pages, but only costs $1.99 for the Kindle edition. I downloaded a copy from the Internet and will tuck it away for when I'm unlucky (assuming I would live long enough to try them.)

The Coronavirus Recovery Handbook: 19 Rehab Exercises for Mild to Severe Cases of COVID-19 - Dr. Liu Xiaodan and Dr. Shan Chunlei and their colleagues at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center and Lei Shenshan Hospital in Wuhan.

[Aug 01, 2020] Russia preparing mass vaccination against coronavirus for October

Aug 01, 2020 | www.msn.com

Russia's health minister is preparing a mass vaccination campaign against the novel coronavirus for October, local news agencies reported on Saturday, after a vaccine completed clinical trials.

Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said the Gamaleya Institute, a state research facility in Moscow, had completed clinical trials of the vaccine and paperwork is being prepared to register it, Interfax news agency reported.

He said doctors and teachers would be the first to be vaccinated.

[Aug 01, 2020] Length of interaction with tan infected person matter

Highly recommended!
Aug 01, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

monty42 , 2 hours ago

" We know that wearing a mask outside health care facilities offers little, if any, protection from infection. Public health authorities define a significant exposure to Covid-19 as face-to-face contact within 6 feet with a patient with symptomatic Covid-19 that is sustained for at least a few minutes (and some say more than 10 minutes or even 30 minutes). The chance of catching Covid-19 from a passing interaction in a public space is therefore minimal. In many cases, the desire for widespread masking is a reflexive reaction to anxiety over the pandemic."

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2006372

Revisionist claims now- " In truth, the intent of our article was to push for more masking, not less." "

[Jul 27, 2020] The problem of false positives from Covid-19 tests means UK is inflating its numbers – and taking wrong decisions by Rob Lyons

Jul 27, 2020 | www.rt.com

The problem of false positives from Covid-19 tests means UK is inflating its numbers – and taking wrong decisions Rob Lyons

Rob Lyons is a UK journalist specialising in science, environmental and health issues. He is the author of ' Panic on a Plate: How Society Developed an Eating Disorder'.

A sign is seen at a drive-through coronavirus disease (COVID-19) testing facility in Hyde Park, following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease, London, Britain, June 11, 2020

When seven staff at a Scottish football club tested positive for coronavirus, alarm bells went off. But really alarming was when six of those results turned out to be wrong. Such inaccurate tests are exaggerating the problem.

Last weekend, at very short notice, the UK reintroduced quarantine measures for people arriving from Spain. For those already in Spain, or for whom it was too late to postpone their trip, the decision is very inconvenient. For those who can't work at home when they return, it may mean missing out on wages for the two weeks they will have to spend in isolation when they get back. But what if the apparent rise in cases has been exaggerated by seemingly small flaws with testing?

The potential for problems was illustrated by Scottish football team St Mirren last week. The club, based in Paisley, a town just west of Glasgow, reported seven positive test results for Covid-19 among its staff. Alarm bells went off about what this might mean for the new Scottish football season. But this "cluster" was a mirage. When the seven people were re-tested using a more accurate method, just one of them was found to be Covid-positive.

In Spain, half of the reported cases have been in people who had no symptoms. We know that many people who test positive never suffer any symptoms. But what if many of these people don't have Covid-19 at all?

READ MORE International airline body slams UK's 'unilaterally decided blanket quarantine' on travellers from Spain

If that sounds implausible, it's important to know that tests are not perfect. There are currently two kinds of tests to see if you have the disease. One kind, the molecular real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test, looks for genetic material from the virus. This kind seems to be very accurate, but it's expensive and time-consuming. The other kind, the antigen test, detects specific proteins on the surface of the virus. This is quicker, easier and cheaper, but it's much less accurate. In developed countries, RT-PCR testing is the norm, but poorer countries may have to make do with antigen testing.

The difficulty at the moment is that there are relatively few cases of Covid-19 in the community, but more and more testing is being done. So even if the RT-PCR test has a high "specificity" – that is, a tiny fraction of test results are false positives – the number could actually be quite significant. For example, let's say that 99.9 percent of the time, a test correctly identifies someone without the disease as negative. Just 0.1 percent of tests produce false positives.

Recently, in the UK, it was estimated that 0.04 percent of people had the virus outside of care homes and hospitals. So, if we tested 10,000 people, we should find four cases of Covid-19, on average. Of the 9,996 other people tested, in this hypothetical example, 0.1 percent who don't have the virus would also test positive – that's 9.996 – in other words, 10 people. So, even if the test is very accurate indeed, we could easily end up with four positive tests from people who really do have the virus and 10 false positives from people who don't.

For any particular individual, the chances of the test being a false positive is small. But when we look at the big picture, we could easily be fooled into thinking that there are many more cases than there really are. Indeed, with a test accuracy of 99.9 percent, if you tested a million people, none of whom actually had the disease, you would produce 1,000 positive results. And for tests with less accuracy – as with St Mirren FC – the situation could be even worse.

The UK government has now performed nearly 11 million tests. Could there be 11,000 "cases" that are simply a mistake ? In turn, that means governments and other authorities might be introducing additional restrictions on people's lives that are actually unnecessary.

The problem of false positives is much less significant when the disease really is in wide circulation. It doesn't change the picture much for the period from mid-March through to the start of June. (In any event, in the UK at least, there was very little testing capacity thanks to the jaw-dropping incompetence of bodies like Public Health England.)

Let's look at the latest figures. On Sunday, July 26, for example, 142,954 tests were processed. Of these, 747 were found to be positive. If 0.1 percent of tests are false positives, we would expect 142 of those 747 positives to be false. If the test turns out to be slightly less accurate – perhaps 'only' 99.5 percent accurate (which still seems very good), then 710, almost all the reported positives, could be false.

We should also bear in mind, when trying to assess the overall situation, that there will be some false negatives. There will also be people who don't show symptoms who do have the virus and never get tested. But this understanding shows that we do need to be careful about reading too much into every small blip in the number of cases. We should be particularly sceptical about imposing new restrictions like mandatory quarantine. And if we rely solely on these tests, we could have the crazy situation where Covid-19 apparently never disappears, even when nobody has got it.

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[Jul 27, 2020] How and when to wear masks

I remember signs on businesses that said "No shirts, no shoes: no service". I don't recall morons screaming at underpaid clerks about their constitutional right not to wear a shirt or shoes.
Population density has at least something to do with it. Big cities are the hardest hit, as would be expected. The US death rate per capita is below that of Belgium, the UK, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Peru (which is surprising), Chile (another surprise), and France.
Jul 27, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

John Michener20 hours ago

I fail to see your problem with masks. My grandfather wore a gas mask on the front during World War 1. I wear a mask, indeed a N99 mask, when sawing concrete or doing fine wood sanding. When I was in the chemical process industry, some stations had Oxygen rebreathers to deal with the hazards in case of accidents.

Medical staff have always worn respirators around patients with airborne diseases, as have researchers handling such agents. Covid-19, Tuberculosis, and late stage plague are all airborne. Wearing a mask when in a situation when you are potentially exposed is common sense.

So wearing my N99 mask when I go shopping is a trivial additional step. I actually wear nitrile gloves as well - I had them for dealing with paints and solvents.

Now I have had to give up eating out and going to my professional society meetings. I am not happy about that, but I am not willfully stupid. I am approaching 70...

[Jul 27, 2020] One element of being a proper person is having some regard for the wellbeing of other people.

Jul 27, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

d_hochberg Bradley Perry6 hours ago

One element of being a proper person is having some regard for the wellbeing of other people.

stephen pickard Bradley Perry5 hours ago

To me : A proper person dresses properly for the occasion. A proper person has high regard for both himself and others. A proper person does not smoke in a no smoking zone. A proper person places his child in a child restraint seat while riding in a car. And on and on with other safety festures that we accept.You get my point.

What I would have you do is to do the three things that I mentioned.

Social distance. Good hygiene protocol. And yes wear a mask. A rhetorical question. Would you permit a surgeon and every other person in an operating room go about the surgery masklessess?

SatirevFlesti Bradley Perry10 hours ago

Real science and evidence won't convince the Coronadoom kool-aid drinkers. Masks are all about signalling one's virtue and submission to arbitrary rules and to be seen as "doing something". That the virus has an IFR in the range of flu and that mask are ineffective in stopping spread of viruses doesn't matter to them. They want to force everyone to abdicate human dignity and act in the same paranoid, abject manner as they do. It's all political and has been form the beginning.

njoseph18 SatirevFlesti8 hours ago

So if masks are ineffective, are you comfortable having your surgery team not wear masks and breathe all over you while you're cut open? If not, why not, since masks are ineffective?

I work in a hospital. The people who say Covid is just flu both don't understand how bad Covid is and also don't understand how deadly the flu can be.

A third thing they don't understand is that cloth or surgical masks are about preventing asymptomatic transmission, which is a real thing. I've seen people die from Covid that they caught from someone who was "perfectly healthy."

It is such a simple, small thing to do, and has nothing to do with virtue signalling and everything to do with not killing other people because you're carrying a virus and don't know it. Some of the most Trump supporting people I've ever met work in this hospital and wear masks everywhere they go to protect others, because they understand what Covid is. C'mon people, if other countries can get this right without all the hand-wringing, so
can we.

Gswag99 njoseph188 hours ago • edited

weak straw man emotive argument with no basis in reason or education whatsoever.

njoseph18 Gswag997 hours ago

Umm, actually I am a frontline non clinical hospital worker. I guess you're a bot but if my reasoning is emotive can you kindly share the peer reviewed data upon which you base your perspective?

stephen pickard Gswag995 hours ago

It is a good counter point. One I made above using the same anology. Relevant anologies are powerful antidotes to careless thinking like yours.

Curious SatirevFlesti4 hours ago

I didn't realize Fisher Price ran a medical school

[Jul 25, 2020] Corporate Insiders Pocket $1 Billion in Rush for Coronavirus Vaccine

Jul 25, 2020 | www.msn.com

Corporate Insiders Pocket $1 Billion in Rush for Coronavirus Vaccine David Gelles and Jesse Drucker 11 hrs ago


Opinion: There is more to picking a place to retire than low taxes -- avoid these 5 Reserving a 2021 Ford Bronco? Get Ready To Wait 18 Months to Take Delivery The New York Times logo Corporate Insiders Pocket $1 Billion in Rush for Coronavirus Vaccine

On June 26, a small South San Francisco company called Vaxart made a surprise announcement: A coronavirus vaccine it was working on had been selected by the U.S. government to be part of Operation Warp Speed, the flagship federal initiative to quickly develop drugs to combat Covid-19.

a close up of a cell phone screen with text: Selling Vaxart stock made more than $197 million in profit for Armistice Capital, a hedge fund that owned two-thirds of the company's shares. © Rafael Henrique/Getty Images Selling Vaxart stock made more than $197 million in profit for Armistice Capital, a hedge fund that owned two-thirds of the company's shares.

Vaxart's shares soared. Company insiders, who weeks earlier had received stock options worth a few million dollars, saw the value of those awards increase sixfold. And a hedge fund that partly controlled the company walked away with more than $200 million in instant profits.

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The race is on to develop a coronavirus vaccine, and some companies and investors are betting that the winners stand to earn vast profits from selling hundreds of millions -- or even billions -- of doses to a desperate public.

Across the pharmaceutical and medical industries, senior executives and board members are capitalizing on that dynamic.

They are making millions of dollars after announcing positive developments, including support from the government, in their efforts to fight Covid-19. After such announcements, insiders from at least 11 companies -- most of them smaller firms whose fortunes often hinge on the success or failure of a single drug -- have sold shares worth well over $1 billion since March, according to figures compiled for The New York Times by Equilar, a data provider.

A trial of a potential coronavirus vaccine announced by Moderna in January. Since then, Moderna insiders have sold shares totaling about $248 million. © Ted S. Warren/Associated Press A trial of a potential coronavirus vaccine announced by Moderna in January. Since then, Moderna insiders have sold shares totaling about $248 million.

In some cases, company insiders are profiting from regularly scheduled compensation or automatic stock trades. But in other situations, senior officials appear to be pouncing on opportunities to cash out while their stock prices are sky high. And some companies have awarded stock options to executives shortly before market-moving announcements about their vaccine progress.

a man smiling for the camera: Andrei Floroiu, the chief executive of Vaxart, received stock options worth about $4.3 million in June. A month later, they were worth more than $28 million. © Will Ragozzino/Patrick McMullan Andrei Floroiu, the chief executive of Vaxart, received stock options worth about $4.3 million in June. A month later, they were worth more than $28 million.

The sudden windfalls highlight the powerful financial incentives for company officials to generate positive headlines in the race for coronavirus vaccines and treatments , even if the drugs might never pan out.

Some companies are attracting government scrutiny for potentially using their associations with Operation Warp Speed as marketing ploys.

For example, the headline on Vaxart's news release declared: "Vaxart's Covid-19 Vaccine Selected for the U.S. Government's Operation Warp Speed." But the reality is more complex.

Vaxart's vaccine candidate was included in a trial on primates that a federal agency was organizing in conjunction with Operation Warp Speed. But Vaxart is not among the companies selected to receive significant financial support from Warp Speed to produce hundreds of millions of vaccine doses.

"The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has entered into funding agreements with certain vaccine manufacturers, and we are negotiating with others. Neither is the case with Vaxart," said Michael R. Caputo, the department's assistant secretary for public affairs. "Vaxart's vaccine candidate was selected to participate in preliminary U.S. government studies to determine potential areas for possible Operation Warp Speed partnership and support. At this time, those studies are ongoing, and no determinations have been made."

Some officials at the Department of Health and Human Services have grown concerned about whether companies including Vaxart are trying to inflate their stock prices by exaggerating their roles in Warp Speed, a senior Trump administration official said. The department has relayed those concerns to the Securities and Exchange Commission, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

It isn't clear if the commission is looking into the matter. An S.E.C. spokeswoman declined to comment.

"Vaxart abides by good corporate governance guidelines and policies and makes decisions in accordance with the best interests of the company and its shareholders," Vaxart's chief executive, Andrei Floroiu, said in a statement on Friday. Referring to Operation Warp Speed, he added, "We believe that Vaxart's Covid-19 vaccine is the most exciting one in O.W.S. because it is the only oral vaccine (a pill) in O.W.S."

Well-timed stock transactions are generally legal. But investors and corporate governance experts say they can create the appearance that executives are profiting from inside information, and could erode public confidence in the pharmaceutical industry when the world is looking to these companies to cure Covid-19.

"It is inappropriate for drug company executives to cash in on a crisis," said Ben Wakana, executive director of Patients for Affordable Drugs, a nonprofit advocacy group. "Every day, Americans wake up and make sacrifices during this pandemic. Drug companies see this as a payday."

Executives at a long list of companies have reaped seven- or eight-figure profits thanks to their work on coronavirus vaccines and treatments.

Shares of Regeneron, a biotech company in Tarrytown, N.Y., have climbed nearly 80 percent since early February, when it announced a collaboration with the Department of Health and Human Services to develop a Covid-19 treatment. Since then, the company's top executives and board members have sold nearly $700 million in stock. The chief executive, Leonard Schleifer, sold $178 million of shares on a single day in May.

Alexandra Bowie, a spokeswoman for Regeneron, said most of those sales had been scheduled in advance through programs that automatically sell executives' shares if the stock hits a certain price.

Moderna, a 10-year-old vaccine developer based in Cambridge, Mass., that has never brought a product to market, announced in late January that it was working on a coronavirus vaccine. It has issued a stream of news releases hailing its vaccine progress, and its stock has more than tripled, giving the company a market value of almost $30 billion.

Moderna insiders have sold about $248 million of shares since that January announcement, most of it after the company was selected in April to receive federal funding to support its vaccine efforts.

While some of those sales were scheduled in advance, others were more spur of the moment. Flagship Ventures, an investment fund run by the company's founder and chairman, Noubar Afeyan, sold more than $68 million worth of Moderna shares on May 21. Those transactions were not scheduled in advance, according to securities filings.

Executives and board members at Luminex, Quidel and Emergent BioSolutions have sold shares worth a combined $85 million after announcing they were working on vaccines, treatments or testing solutions.

At other companies, executives and board members received large grants of stock options shortly before the companies announced good news that lifted the value of those options.

Novavax, a drugmaker in Gaithersburg, Md., began working on a vaccine early this year. This spring, the company reported promising preliminary test results and a $1.6 billion deal with the Trump administration.

In April, with its shares below $24, Novavax issued a batch of new stock awards to all its employees "in acknowledgment of the extraordinary work of our employees to implement a new vaccine program." Four senior executives, including the chief executive, Stanley Erck, received stock options that were worth less than $20 million at the time.

Since then, Novavax's stock has rocketed to more than $130 a share. At least on paper, the four executives' stock options are worth more than $100 million.

So long as the company hits a milestone with its vaccine testing, which it is expected to achieve soon, the executives will be able to use the options to buy discounted Novavax shares as early as next year, regardless of whether the company develops a successful vaccine.

Silvia Taylor, a Novavax spokeswoman, said the stock awards were designed "to incentivize and retain our employees during this critical time." She added that "there is no guarantee they will retain their value."

Two other drugmakers, Translate Bio and Inovio, awarded large batches of stock options to executives and board members shortly before they announced progress on their coronavirus vaccines, sending shares higher. Representatives of the companies said the options were regularly scheduled annual grants.

Vaxart, though, is where the most money was made the fastest.

At the start of the year, its shares were around 35 cents. Then in late January, Vaxart began working on an orally administered coronavirus vaccine, and its shares started rising.

Vaxart's largest shareholder was a New York hedge fund, Armistice Capital, which last year acquired nearly two-thirds of the company's shares. Two Armistice executives, including the hedge fund's founder, Steven Boyd, joined Vaxart's board of directors. The hedge fund also purchased rights, known as warrants, to buy 21 million more Vaxart shares at some point in the future for as little as 30 cents each.

Vaxart has never brought a vaccine to market. It has just 15 employees. But throughout the spring, Vaxart announced positive preliminary data for its vaccine, along with a partnership with a company that could manufacture it. By late April, with investors sensing the potential for big profits, the company's shares had reached $3.66 -- a tenfold increase from January.

On June 8, Vaxart changed the terms of its warrants agreement with Armistice, making it easier for the hedge fund to rapidly acquire the 21 million shares, rather than having to buy and sell in smaller batches.

One week later, Vaxart announced that its chief executive was stepping down, though he would remain chairman. The new C.E.O., Mr. Floroiu, had previously worked with Mr. Boyd, Armistice's founder, at the hedge fund and the consulting firm McKinsey.

On June 25, Vaxart announced that it had signed a letter of intent with another company that might help it mass-produce a coronavirus vaccine. Vaxart's shares nearly doubled that day.

The next day, Vaxart issued its news release saying it had been selected for Operation Warp Speed. Its shares instantly doubled again, at one pointing hitting $14, their highest level in years.

"We are very pleased to be one of the few companies selected by Operation Warp Speed, and that ours is the only oral vaccine being evaluated," Mr. Floroiu said.

Armistice took advantage of the stock's exponential increase -- at that point up more than 3,600 percent since January. On June 26, a Friday, and the next Monday, the hedge fund exercised its warrants to buy nearly 21 million Vaxart shares for either 30 cents or $1.10 a share -- purchases it would not have been able to make as quickly had its agreement with Vaxart not been modified weeks earlier.

Armistice then immediately sold the shares at prices from $6.58 to $12.89 a share, according to securities filings. The hedge fund's profits were immense: more than $197 million.

"It looks like the warrants may have been reconfigured at a time when they knew good news was coming," said Robert Daines, a professor at Stanford Law School who is an expert on corporate governance. "That's a valuable change, made right as the company's stock price was about to rise."

At the same time, the hedge fund also unloaded some of the Vaxart shares it had previously bought, notching tens of millions of dollars in additional profits.

By the end of that Monday, June 29, Armistice had sold almost all of its Vaxart shares.

Mr. Boyd and Armistice declined to comment.

Mr. Floroiu said the change to the Armistice agreement "was in the best interests of Vaxart and its stockholders" and helped it raise money to work on the Covid-19 vaccine.

He and other Vaxart board members also were positioned for big personal profits. When he became chief executive in mid-June, Mr. Floroiu received stock options that were worth about $4.3 million. A month later, those options were worth more than $28 million.

Normally when companies issue stock options to executives, the options can't be exercised for months or years. Because of the unusual terms and the run-up in Vaxart's stock price, most of Mr. Floroiu's can be cashed in now.

Vaxart's board members also received large grants of stock options, giving them the right to buy shares in the company at prices well below where the stock is now trading. The higher the shares fly, the bigger the profits.

"Vaxart is disrupting the vaccine world," Mr. Floroiu boasted during a virtual investor conference on Thursday. He added that his impression was that "it's OK to make a profit from Covid vaccines, as long as you're not profiteering."

Noah Weiland contributed reporting.

Continue Reading

[Jul 24, 2020] Cold Wars Profit by Craig Murray

Jul 24, 2020 | consortiumnews.com

Consortiumnews Volume 26, Number 206 – Friday, July 24, 2020

AFGHANISTAN , COMMENTARY , FOREIGN POLICY , HISTORY , HUMAN RIGHTS , MEDIA , PROPAGANDA , RUSSIA , RUSSIAGATE , UKRAINE , UNITED KINGDON , UNTIL THIS DAY--HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE NEWS Cold Wars & Profit July 21, 2020 Save

Craig Murray lambasts a Russophobic media that celebrates a supposed cyber attack on UK vaccine research, ignores collapse of key evidence of a "hack" and dabbles in dubious memorabilia.

The Guardian's headquarters in London. (Bryantbob, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

By Craig Murray
CraigMurray.org.uk

... ... ...

Attack on UK Vaccine Research

Andrew Marr, center, in 2014. ( Financial Times , Flickr)

A whole slew of these were rehearsed by Andrew Marr on his flagship BBC1 morning show. The latest is the accusation that Russia is responsible for a cyber attack on Covid-19 vaccination research. This is another totally evidence-free accusation. But it misses the point anyway.

The alleged cyber attack, if it happened, was a hack not an attack -- the allegation is that there was an effort to obtain the results of research, not to disrupt research. It is appalling that the U.K. is trying to keep its research results secret rather than share them freely with the world scientific community.

As I have reported before , the U.K. and the USA have been preventing the WHO from implementing a common research and common vaccine solution for Covid-19, insisting instead on a profit driven approach to benefit the big pharmaceutical companies (and disadvantage the global poor).

What makes the accusation that Russia tried to hack the research even more dubious is the fact that Russia had just bought the very research specified. You don't steal things you already own.

Evidence of CIA Hacks

If anybody had indeed hacked the research, we all know it is impossible to trace with certainty the whereabouts of hackers. My VPNs [virtual private networks] are habitually set to India, Australia or South Africa depending on where I am trying to watch the cricket, dodging broadcasting restrictions.

More pertinently, WikiLeaks' Vault 7 release of CIA material showed the specific programs for the CIA in how to leave clues to make a leak look like it came from Russia. This irrefutable evidence that the CIA do computer hacks with apparent Russian "fingerprints" deliberately left, like little bits of Cyrillic script, is an absolutely classic example of a fact that everybody working in the mainstream media knows to be true, but which they all contrive never to mention.

Thus when last week's "Russian hacking" story was briefed by the security services -- that former Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn deployed secret documents on U.K./U.S. trade talks which had been posted on Reddit, after being stolen by an evil Russian who left his name of Grigor in his Reddit handle -- there was no questioning in the media of this narrative. Instead, we had another round of McCarthyite witch-hunt aimed at the rather tired looking Corbyn.

Personally, if the Russians had been responsible for revealing that the Tories are prepared to open up the NHS "market" to big American companies, including ending or raising caps on pharmaceutical prices, I should be very grateful to the Russians for telling us. Just as the world would owe the Russians a favor if it were indeed them who leaked evidence of just how systematically the DNC rigged the 2016 primaries against Bernie Sanders.

But as it happens, it was not the Russians. The latter case was a leak by a disgusted insider, and I very much suspect the NHS U.S. trade deal link was also from a disgusted insider.

When governments do appalling things, very often somebody manages to blow the whistle.

On the core subject here: By necessity, a pandemic requires a cooperative international response. Only one country has refused to do so: The US. In their supreme arrogance, our ruling class lost track the fact that the US needs the rest of the world, not the other way way around.

[Jul 24, 2020] Study identifies six different types of COVID-19

Jul 24, 2020 | www.msn.com

We Find the Best $500 Cars to Field in the 24 Hours of Lemons Race Series Sources: Trump erupted over Esper's flag ban

Study identifies six different "types" of COVID-19

A new study of COVID-19 , based on data from a symptom tracker app, determined that there are six distinct "types" of the disease involving different clusters of symptoms. The discovery could potentially open new possibilities for how doctors can better treat individual patients and predict what level of hospital care they would need.

Researchers from King's College London studied data from approximately 1,600 U.K. and U.S. patients who regularly logged their symptoms in the COVID Symptom Tracker App in March and April.

Typically, doctors will look for key symptoms such as cough, fever and loss of the sense of smell to detect COVID-19. The study, which has not been peer-reviewed, says the six different "types" of COVID-19 can vary by severity and come with their own set of symptoms.

"I think it's very, very interesting," Dr. Bob Lahita, who is not affiliated with the study, told CBSN anchors Vladimir Duthiers and Anne-Marie Green. "Among the patients I see, those who recovered, many of them present different ways: some people with fever and some without fever, and some with nausea and vomiting, some people with diarrhea , etc."

The six clusters of symptoms outlined in the study are:

  1. Flu-like with no fever: Headache, loss of smell, muscle pains, cough, sore throat, chest pain, no fever.
  2. Flu-like with fever: Headache, loss of smell, cough, sore throat, hoarseness, fever, loss of appetite.
  3. Gastrointestinal: Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, diarrhea, sore throat, chest pain, no cough.
  4. Severe level one, fatigue: Headache, loss of smell, cough, fever, hoarseness, chest pain, fatigue.
  5. Severe level two, confusion: Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, cough, fever, hoarseness, sore throat, chest pain, fatigue, confusion, muscle pain.
  6. Severe level three, abdominal and respiratory: Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, cough, fever, hoarseness, sore throat, chest pain, fatigue, confusion, muscle pain, shortness of breath, diarrhea, abdominal pain.

The first level, "flu-like with no fever," is associated with headaches, loss of smell, muscle pains, cough, sore throat and chest pain. Patients at this level have a 1.5% chance of needing breathing support such as oxygen or a ventilator.

The second type, "flu-like with fever," includes symptoms like loss of appetite, headache, loss of smell, cough, sore throat, hoarseness and fever. Researchers say about 4.4% of patients at this level needed breathing support.

Patients with the third type, simply described as "gastrointestinal," do not have a cough as part of their illness. Instead, they experience headache, diarrhea, loss of smell, loss of appetite, sore throat and chest pain, and about 3.3% needed breathing support.

Lahita referred to the following three clusters of COVID-19 as the "really severe types."

In type four, or "severe level one," patients experience fatigue along with headache, loss of smell, cough, fever, hoarseness and chest pain. Patients at this level needed breathing support at a rate of 8.6%.

Type five, "severe level two," includes the symptoms of type four along with loss of appetite, sore throat and muscle pain, and is mainly distinguished by confusion .

"That means you don't know where you are or where you live, whether you are in or out of the hospital, who your relatives are," Lahita explained. "That is very scary." Almost 10% of patients at that level need breathing support.

The most severe type of COVID-19 is referred to as "severe level three, abdominal and respiratory," and has all the above symptoms along with abdominal pain, shortness of breath and diarrhea. Nearly 20% of these patients need breathing support.

"Those are the severe level threes who wind up on a ventilator, and then it is touch-and-go as to whether they survive the infection entirely," Lahita said.

The U.K. researchers also found that only 16% of patients with type one COVID-19 required hospitalization, compared with nearly half of the patients with type six.

Patients in the severe clusters also tended to be older or with pre-existing conditions and weakened immune systems, compared to those in the first three.

Scientists hope the discovery, once further studied, could help predict what types of care patients with COVID-19 might need, and give doctors the ability to predict which patients would fall into which category.

"I'm very happy that these six types have been identified and can give us an idea of a prognosis going forward for patients who are afflicted with this virus," Lahita said.

[Jul 23, 2020] COVID-19/nCOV/SARS-2 immunity comes from T-cell and B-cell activity

Jul 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Jul 23 2020 15:30 utc | 8

More talk about T-cells and B-cells (per Volchkov)
Australia T-cell and B-cell research
To recap: Volchkov, a Russian geneticist/medical researcher, was quoted in a John Helmer article that he believes the true COVID-19/nCOV/SARS-2 immunity comes from T-cell and B-cell activity. His view is based upon multiple European studies employing a very expensive T-cell/B-cell test called ELISPOT - and is that the actual nCOV infection rate is likely far higher than spot PCR or antibody tests can ever detect. In particular, if 20% of people tested by PCR or antibody tests show exposure, the likely actual exposure rate is 3 times higher (60% vs. 20%).
This has huge ramifications if true: it means places with high nCOV death rates have likely already achieved herd immunity levels.
One thing is true: death rates in every single nation and region with a high nCOV death/million count have fallen dramatically.
People are still dying, but they are dying at a far lower CFR/IFR rate.
IF, and I mean *IF*, this is true, this means the lockdown strategies actually did very little to "contain" the outbreak.
This is why looking at the historical behavior in different US states is so important.
California locked down early, but the nCOV mortality rates (both absolute and relative) have basically been flat from April until now.

[Jul 21, 2020] Scientists report that airborne coronavirus is probably infectious

Notable quotes:
"... This boosts the hypothesis that normal speaking and breathing, not just coughing and sneezing, are responsible for spreading COVID-19 -- and that infectious doses of the virus can travel distances far greater than the six feet (two meters) urged by social distancing guidelines. ..."
"... The paper was posted to the medrxiv.org website, where most cutting-edge research during the pandemic has first been made public. ..."
"... The team managed to collect microdroplets as small as one micron in diameter. They then placed these samples into a culture to make them grow, finding that three of the 18 samples tested were able to replicate. For Santarpia, this represents proof that microdroplets, which also travel much greater distances than big droplets, are capable of infecting people. "It is replicated in cell culture and therefore infectious," he said. ..."
Jul 21, 2020 | www.msn.com

Scientists have known for several months the new coronavirus can become suspended in microdroplets expelled by patients when they speak and breathe, but until now there was no proof that these tiny particles are infectious.

A new study by scientists at the University of Nebraska that was uploaded to a medical preprint site this week has shown for the first time that SARS-CoV-2 taken from microdroplets, defined as under five microns, can replicate in lab conditions.

This boosts the hypothesis that normal speaking and breathing, not just coughing and sneezing, are responsible for spreading COVID-19 -- and that infectious doses of the virus can travel distances far greater than the six feet (two meters) urged by social distancing guidelines.

The results are still considered preliminary and have not yet appeared in a peer-reviewed journal, which would lend more credibility to the methods devised by the scientists.

The paper was posted to the medrxiv.org website, where most cutting-edge research during the pandemic has first been made public.

The same team wrote a paper in March showing that the virus remains airborne in the rooms of hospitalized COVID-19 patients, and this study will soon be published in a journal, according to the lead author.

"It is actually fairly difficult" to collect the samples, Joshua Santarpia, an associate professor at the University of Nebraska Medical Center told AFP.

The team used a device the size of a cell phone for the purpose, but "the concentrations are typically very low, your chances of recovering material are small."

The scientists took air samples from five rooms of bedridden patients, at a height of about a foot (30 centimeters) over the foot of their beds.

The patients were talking, which produces microdroplets that become suspended in the air for several hours in what is referred to as an "aerosol," and some were coughing.

The team managed to collect microdroplets as small as one micron in diameter. They then placed these samples into a culture to make them grow, finding that three of the 18 samples tested were able to replicate. For Santarpia, this represents proof that microdroplets, which also travel much greater distances than big droplets, are capable of infecting people. "It is replicated in cell culture and therefore infectious," he said.

Why we wear masks

The potential for microdroplet transmission of the coronavirus was at one stage thought to be improbable by health authorities across the world. Later, scientists began to change their mind and acknowledge it may be a possibility, which is the rationale for universal masking.

The World Health Organization was among the last to shift its position, doing so on July 7.

"I feel like the debate has become more political than scientific," said Santarpia. "I think most scientists that work on infectious diseases agree that there's likely an airborne component, though we may quibble over how large."

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Linsey Marr, a professor at Virginia Tech who is a leading expert on aerial transmission of viruses and wasn't involved in the study, said it was rare to obtain measurements of the amount of virus present in air.

"Based on what we know about other diseases and what we know so far about SARS-CoV-2, I think we can assume that if the virus is 'infectious in aerosols,' then we can become infected by breathing them in," she told AFP.

[Jul 20, 2020] Russian Elite Received 'Experimental' COVID-19 Vaccine As Early As April -

Jul 20, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Russian Elite Received 'Experimental' COVID-19 Vaccine As Early As April by Tyler Durden Mon, 07/20/2020 - 07:22 Twitter Facebook Reddit Email Print

Last week, we shared news of what Russia's scientific community had touted as a major breakthrough in the development of a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2: A vaccine trial at Moscow's Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University had yielded the first successful human trials. The American business press slavishly parrots every Moderna press release as the company regurgitates its Phase 1 trial results, despite the fact that the politically-connected biotech company's stage 3 clinical trials won't begin until later this month. Meanwhile, its CEO Stephane Bancel and other executives have cashed in on their Moderna shares, prompting SEC chief Jay Clayton to sheepishly caution against credibility-destroying insider selling.

Despite all of this, we didn't hear a peep out of the western press about the Sechenov trial's accomplishments . However, a few days later, with anxieties about Russia-backed electoral interference intensifying and 'national polls' hinting at a Biden landslide, the British press reported on a new 'policy paper' accusing those pesky Ruskies of trying to steal British research involving COVID-19 vaccines. Intel shared by Canada and the US purportedly supported this conclusion, though Russia has vehemently denied the accusations.

But that's not all: Around the same time, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab accused Russia of trying to meddle in the UK's December election (which returned the Tories to power and ended the reign of opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn).

Were these reports about Russia's vaccine-trial successes merely a smokescreen? The British might see it that way, but on Monday, US-based Bloomberg News published an interesting report claiming that certain Russian VIPs had been administered experimental doses of a vaccine prototype as early as April. Reportedly developed by Moscow's Gamaleya Institute and financed by the state-run Russian Direct Investment Fund, this Russian vaccine candidate is a so-called "viral vector vaccine" based on human adenovirus - a common cold virus fused with the spike protein of SARS CoV-2 to stimulate a human immune response.

It's similar to a vaccine being developed by China's CanSino Biologics, according to Bloomberg.

Scores of members of Russia's business and political elite have been given early access to an experimental vaccine against Covid-19, according to people familiar with the effort, as the country races to be among the first to develop an inoculation.

Top executives at companies including aluminum giant United Co. Rusal, as well as billionaire tycoons and government officials began getting shots developed by the state-run Gamaleya Institute in Moscow as early as April, the people said. They declined to be identified as the information isn't public.

The Gamaleya vaccine, financed by the state-run Russian Direct Investment Fund and backed by the military, last week completed a phase 1 trial involving Russian military personnel. The institute hasn't published results for the study, which involved about 40 people, but has begun the next stage of trials with a larger group.

Gamaleya's press office couldn't be reached by phone Sunday. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov didn't respond to a text message asking whether President Vladimir Putin or others in his administration have had the shots. A government spokesman couldn't immediately comment.

Wait... so the Russians hacked the British vaccine research, traveled back in time, then decided to test their vaccine prototype on some of the most powerful people in Russia's (highly unequal) society? Well, they had to first travel to the future to steal the time-travel technology from the Americans (bear with us...we're still piecing it all together).

The program under which members of Russia's business and political elite have been given the chance to volunteer for doses of the experimental vaccine is legal but kept under wraps to avoid a crush of potential participants, according to a researcher familiar with the effort. He said several hundred people have been involved. Bloomberg confirmed dozens who have had the shots but none would allow their names to be published.

It's not clear how participants are selected and they aren't part of the official studies, though they are monitored and their results logged by the institute. Patients usually get the shots - two are needed to produce an immune response Gamaleya says will last for about two years - at a Moscow clinic connected to the institute. Participants aren't charged a fee and sign releases that they know the risks involved.

Dmitriev of the RDIF said he and his family had taken the shots and noted that a significant number of other volunteers have also been given the opportunity. He declined to provide further details. The Gamaleya Institute said it vaccinated its director, as well as the team working on the trial, when it started. In May, state-controlled Sberbank recruited volunteers among employees to test the institute's vaccine.

O ne top executive who had the vaccine said he experienced no side effects. He said he decided to risk taking the experimental shots in order to be able to live a normal life and have business meetings as usual. Other participants have reported fever and muscle aches after getting the shots.

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Is it so hard to believe that Russia had enough faith in its vaccine prototype that it would allow certain individuals the choice of receiving an early dose? After all, EU governments are already buying up millions of doses of Moderna's still-largely-untested vaccine candidate.

Similarly, is it possible that Russian spies were simply monitoring the competition?

Who knows? When it comes to the shadowy world of espionage, the public rarely hears the full story. Russia's outbreak has slowed in recent weeks as it has been overtaken by India, which now counts more than 1 million confirmed cases. Meanwhile Russia has confirmed more than 750,000 cases of Covid-19, the fourth-largest total in the world.

[Jul 20, 2020] Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 Vaccine Trials Show -No Adverse Effects- -

Jul 20, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

pdate (0935ET): A coronavirus vaccine candidate developed by Oxford and AstraZeneca has shown promise in an early trial which found it to be safe for human consumption while reliably producing antibodies that are effective at stopping the virus.

In what looked like a coordinated one-two punch, one of the top researchers leading the Oxford-Astrazeneca trials said in an interview published Monday morning that the research was making "good progress". Minutes later, the Lancet published the first Phase 1/2 trial results, which showed that the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine caused "robust immune responses" and was "tolerated" by all study subjects.

That interview was published Monday morning in the US, just minutes before the Lancet released the results of a Phase 1/2 study of the Oxford-AZ vaccine, the most highly anticipated COVID-19 news of the day.

There are currently more than 137 vaccine candidates undergoing preclinical development, and 23 in early clinical development, according to WHO. Of these, candidates from Moderna and the Oxford-AstraZeneca partnership are two of the most closely followed prototypes. Governments have already started ordering the vaccine from Moderna, even though approval is still months, perhaps years, away.

According to the Lancet, research has shown that vaccine candidates from Cansino and Astra-Oxford trial have been making good progress, and while they couldn't say much conclusively, the Astra-Oxford trial showed no worrisome "adverse effects".

The Phase 1/2 trial, one of the first human studies of the vaccine, showed an appropriate "immune response". Patients who received 2 doses instead of one saw a stronger response. All patients who received the vaccine generated the desired immune response.

Oxford's candidate "showed an acceptable safety profile, and homologous boosting increased antibody responses. These results "support large scale evaluation of this candidate vaccine in an ongoing phase 3 program." The Oxford-AZ study included 1,077 participants spread across 5 test sites in and around the UK.

By comparison, Moderna has released press releases touting findings from studies with fewer than 100 patients. The fact that 8 patients developed neutralizing antibodies in a study that involved dozens of additional subjects was apparently news enough for Moderna, which released a market-pumping press release on those findings a few weeks back.

Though to be sure, not everybody was impressed.

In the study, researchers measured the number of antibodies, and the strength of the immune response, after administering single doses and double doses of the vaccine to various groups of study subjects, and compared those results with a control group who received another vaccine. Pain and swelling caused by the injection were easily treated with paracetemol.

There were no serious adverse events related to ChAdOx1 nCoV-19. In the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 group, spike-specific T-cell responses peaked on day 14 (median 856 spot-forming cells per million peripheral blood mononuclear cells, IQR 493–1802; n=43). Anti-spike IgG responses rose by day 28 (median 157 ELISA units [EU], 96–317; n=127), and were boosted following a second dose (639 EU, 360–792; n=10). Neutralising antibody responses against SARS-CoV-2 were detected in 32 (91%) of 35 participants after a single dose when measured in MNA80 and in 35 (100%) participants when measured in PRNT50. After a booster dose, all participants had neutralising activity (nine of nine in MNA80 at day 42 and ten of ten in Marburg VN on day 56). Neutralising antibody responses correlated strongly with antibody levels measured by ELISA (R²=0·67 by Marburg VN; p<0·001).

The result: The vaccine candidate has been deemed safe enough to move on to 'Phase 3', which would involve large-scale human trials.

ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 showed an acceptable safety profile, and homologous boosting increased antibody responses. These results, together with the induction of both humoral and cellular immune responses, support largescale evaluation of this candidate vaccine in an ongoing phase 3 programme.

Read the full Lancet paper below:

[Jul 20, 2020] Trust in US famacuticals eloparates: the Big Pharma mafia and its political apparatchiks in the West promote expensive patented drugs like Remdesivir, as opposed to inexpensive alternatives, as well as the Holy Grail for Big Pharma - a highly profitable vaccine

Jul 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Blue Dotterel , Jul 20 2020 9:13 utc | 96

Here is an alternative, if familiar take on Masks from OffGuardian: https://off-guardian.org/2020/07/18/media-mask-mania-or-covid19-groupthink/

He correctly points out the confusion created by certain "experts":

"For anyone who has forgotten, Fauci told 60 Minutes that:

[t]here'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 better and it might even block a droplet, but it's not providing the perfect protection that people think it is. And often there are unintended consequences – people keep fiddling with the mask and they keep touching their face."

That was how things stood when the epidemic was new and all stops were out. And now?"

The author of the article also notes that the mask doesn't prevent you from being infected, but of course the point is that it reduces the probability of being infected.

But he does make an astute point:

"Recently I had the poor judgment to turn on National Public Radio for about an hour, under the impression that I was going to learn something about the day's news.
...
No – for a solid hour, I heard the following: that COVID19 – in reality, at most, a moderately serious flu virus – is the worst medical threat the United States has ever faced.
...
But the real theme of the hour was masks, masks, masks: how to make them, how to wear them, their different types, who doesn't seem to have enough of them, and why muffling our faces (even though no such thing was ever demanded of us during dozens of past viral outbreaks) is absolutely, positively good for us all."

Needless to say the author did not approve of us "muzzling" ourselves, but the MSM, like commenters here, and perhaps b do seem obsessed with the mask.

IMO, the mask is an important component in preventing more people from becoming infected, but does not prevent all people from being infected. So, what about the people who do become infected? its too late for the mask to help them. How do we mitigate the effects of the disease?

For the Big Pharma mafia and its political apparatchiks in the West, its expensive patented drugs like Remdesivir, as opposed to inexpensive out of patent chloroquine, among others, as well as the Holy Grail for Big Pharma - a highly profitable vaccine, yet to come. A list of drugs mostly based on CDC sourcing. The CDC, like the WHO being seriously compromised by its conections to Big Pharma:
https://www.drugs.com/condition/covid-19.html

Unfortunately, politcally motivated scientific fraud as published in the retracted Lancet article, among others, prevents us from having an intelligent discussion of this even on Moon of Allabama.

A final area for discussion, as important or more important than the above, is how to approach impending "lockdowns" of the economies in the future. A potential greater tragedy than the virus itself may be the destruction wrought on the unemployed and small businesses that has already occurred, but promises to continue should a second wave of the virus appaer this fall.

Admittedly, such discussions seem hopeless. We can individually control whether we wear a mask or not, but how do we mitigate the effects of those who have already contracted the disease, and those whose livelihood is threatened or destroyed by the "lockdowns" in response to the disease?

I would like to see these last two areas more seriously investigated on Moon of Alabama.

[Jul 18, 2020] COVID-19- What Does Being Positive Really Mean- What Are We Really Detecting- - Fort Russ

Jul 18, 2020 | fort-russ.com

By Dr. Sherri Tenpenny – May 21, 2020an osteopathic medical doctor, board-certified in three specialties. She is the founder of Tenpenny Integrative Medical Center, a medical clinic located near Cleveland, Ohio. Her company, Courses4Mastery.com provides online education and training regarding all aspects of vaccines and vaccination.

_____________________________

In 1965, scientists identified the first human coronavirus; it was associated with the common cold. The Coronavirus family, named for their crown-like appearance, currently includes 36 viruses. Within that group, there are 4 common viruses that have been causing infection in humans for more than sixty years. In addition, three pandemic coronaviruses that can infect humans: SARS, MERS, and now, SARS-CoV-2.

As the news of deaths in China, South Korea, Italy, and Iran began to saturate every form of media 24/7, we became familiar with a new term: COVID-19. To be clear, the name of the newly identified coronavirus is SARS-CoV-2, short for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2. This virus is associated with fever, cough, chest pain, and shortness of breath, the complex of symptoms that form the diagnosis of COVID-19.

The Trump administration declared a public health emergency on January 31, 2020, then on February 2 placed a ban on the entry of most travelers who had recently been in China. On February 4, Alex Azar, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a declaration of public health emergency and activated the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act, otherwise known as the PREP Act. This nefarious legislation provides complete protection of manufacturers from liability for all products, technologies, biologics, or any vaccine developed as a medical countermeasure against COVID-19. For those nervously waiting for the vaccine to become available, be sure to understand the PREP Act before rushing to the get in line.

Calls for testing – to see if a person is or isn't infected – began soon after the emergency was declared, but performing those tests was initially slow due to an inadequate number of test kits. As the kits became available, those developed by the CDC had a defect: The reagents reacted to the negative control sample , making the test inaccurate and the kits unusable.

In various countries, thousands of test kits purchased from China were found to be contaminated with the SARS-CoV-2 viruses. No one really knows how that happened, but theories spread like wildfire. Could the test kit infect the person being tested? Or, did it mean the test would return a false-positive result, driving up the numbers of those said to be infected so those in power could implement stronger lockdowns and accelerate the hockey-stick unemployment rates? Neither of those questions has been adequately answered.

Mandatory Testing of what?

Authorities claim that testing is important for public health officials to assess if their mitigation efforts – "shelter in place" and "social distancing" and "wearing a mask" – are making a difference to "flatten the curve." Officials also claim that testing is necessary to know how many persons are infected within a community and to understand the nature of how coronaviruses spread.

Are these reasons sufficient to give up our health freedom and our personal rights, being tested and shamed in public?

Despite the challenges with test kits, testing began. By the end of March 2020, more than 1 million people had been tested across the US. By May 9, the number tested had grown to over 8.7M. Testing methods include a swab of the nasal passages or by inserting a long, uncomfortable swab through the nose to scrape the back of the throat. Specimens have also been obtained bronchoalveolar lavage, from sputum , and from stool specimens.

The call for mandatory testing has been gathering steam and becoming ever more onerous. In Washington state, Governor Inslee has declared:

Individuals that refuse to cooperate with contact tracers and/or refuse testing, those individuals will not be allowed to leave their homes to purchase basic necessities such as groceries and/or prescriptions. Those persons will need to make arrangements through friends, family, or state provided 'family support' personnel .

But what do the results really mean?

Who Should Be Tested

On May 8, 2020, the CDC has listed specific priorities for when testing should be done. As of May 16, more than 11-million samples have been collected and more than 3700 specimens have not yet been evaluated.

High Priority

Priority

Read that last priority again: That means virtually everyone can be required to get a test.

Is that a violation of your personal rights? And, if you submit to testing, what does a "positive test" actually mean?

Types of Testing: RT-PCR

PCR, short for polymerase chain reaction , is a highly specific laboratory technique. The key to understanding PCR testing is that PCR can identify an individual specific virus within a viral family.

Has COVID-19 Testing Made the Problem Worse? Confusion Regarding "The True Health Impacts"

However, a PCR test can only be used to identify DNA viruses; the SARS-CoV2 virus is an RNA virus. Therefore, multiple steps must be taken to "magnify" the amount of genetic material in the specimen. Researchers used a method called RT-PCR, reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction, to specifically identify the SARS-CoV-2 virus. It's a complicated process. To read more about it, go here and here.

If a nasal or a blood sample contains a tiny snip of RNA from the SARS-CoV-2 virus, RT-PCR can identify it, leading to a high probability that the person has been exposed to the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

However – and this is important – a positive RT-PCR test result does not necessarily indicate a full virus is present. The virus must be fully intact to be transmitted and cause illness.

RT-PCR Testing: The Importance of Timing

Even if a person has had all the symptoms associated with a coronavirus infection or has been closely exposed to persons who have been diagnosed with COVID-19, the probability of a RT-PCR test being positive decreases with the number of days past the onset of symptoms.

According to a study done by Paul Wikramaratna and others:

In other words, the longer the time frame between the onset of symptoms and the time a person is tested, the more likely the test will be negative.

Repeat testing of persons who have a negative test may (eventually) confirm the presence of viral RNA, but this is impractical. Additionally, repeated testing of the same person can lead to even more confusing results: The test may go from negative, to positive, then back to negative again as the immune system clears out the coronavirus infection and moves to recovery.

And what makes this testing even more confusing is that the FDA admits that "The detection of viral RNA by RT-PCR does not necessarily equate with an infectious virus."

Let's break that down:

You've had all the symptoms of COVID19, but your RT-PCR test for SARS-CoV-2 is negative.

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So, what does a "positive" test actually mean? And that's the problem:

No one knows for sure.

Another Type of Testing: Antibodies

According to the nonprofit Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics (FIND) , more than 200 serologic blood tests, to test for antibodies, are either now available or in development.

There are two primary types of antibodies that are assessed for nearly any type of infection: IgM and IgG. While several new testing devices are being touted as a home test, they are not the same as a home pregnancy test or a glucometer to you're your blood sugar. The blood spot or saliva specimen can be collected at home, must it must then be sent to a laboratory for analysis. It can take a few days – or longer – to get the results. With so many tests in the pipeline, the ability to test at home will be changing over time.

The first antibody to rise is IgM. It rises quickly after the onset of the infection and is usually a sign of an acute, or current, infection. The IgM levels diminish quickly as the infection resolves. The FDA admits they do not know how long the IgM remains present for SARS-CoV-2 as the infection is being cleared.

The interpretation of an IgG antibody is more difficult. This antibody is an indicator of a past infection. The test is often not specific enough to determine if the past infection was caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus or one of the four common coronaviruses that cause influenza-like illness.

The FDA says:

Because serology testing can yield a negative test result even if the patient is actively infected (e.g., the body has not yet developed in response to the virus) or maybe falsely positive (e.g., if the antibody indicates a past infection by a different coronavirus), this type of testing should not be used to diagnose an acute or active COVID-19 infection.

Similarly, the CDC says the following regarding antibody testing:

What? Wait!

If the FDA does not know if an IgG antibody to SARS-CoV-2 after recovering from the infection is protective against a future infection, then they certainly don't know if an antibody caused by a vaccine will prevent infection either.

Doesn't this completely eliminate the theory that antibodies afford protection and antibodies from vaccines are necessary to keep you from getting sick?

Mandatory Testing – New Job Creation

Illinois U.S. Rep. Bobby L. Rush introduced the H.R. 6666 TRACE Act on May 1. On his website, Rush said ,

Until we have a vaccine to defeat this dreaded disease, contact tracing in order to understand the full breadth and depth of the spread of this virus is the only way we will be able to get out from under this.

H.R.6666 would authorize the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), acting through the Director of the CDC to award grants to eligible entities to conduct diagnostic testing and then to trace and monitor the contacts of infected individuals. The contact tracers would be authorized to test people in their homes and as necessary, quarantine people in place.

Where do they intend to do this testing? Besides mobile units to test people in their homes, the bill identifies eight specific locations where the testing and contract tracing could occur: schools, health clinics, universities, churches, and "any other type of entity" the secretary of HHS wants to use.

The bill would allocate $100 billion in 2020 "and such sums as may be necessary for fiscal year 2021 and any subsequent fiscal year during which the emergency period continues."

But what are they looking for?

The virus is rapidly mutating, which is rather typical of RNA viruses. In a study published in April 2020, researchers have discovered that the novel coronavirus has mutated into at least 30 different genetic variations. If your RT-PCR test is positive, does this identify exposure to the pandemic virus or exposure to one of the genetic variations? The same can be said about the vaccines under development: With each mutation, is the vaccine more likely to be all risk and no benefit when it reaches the market?

What You Can Do

Across the nation, police are being told to not apprehend criminals but instead, to arrest parents at playgrounds, to arrest lone surfers on public beaches, to fine ministers and congregation members sitting in their cars listening to a service on the radio, and to restrict movement by creating one-way sidewalks.

People have had enough. They are beginning to see the huge scam that has been perpetrated on the entire world over a viral infection with a global death rate of 1.4% (meaning, 1.4% of people infected with SARS-CoV-2 have a fatal outcome, while 98.6% recover). This is far fewer deaths than a severe flu season.

We're already starting to see the thrust to take our power back:

While they shut us down and held us hostage in our homes, they changed our society, our lives, our world.

It's time for Americans to resist with non-violent civil disobedience. Be brave. Be bold. Put on the full armor of God, as found in Ephesians 6:10-20 in the Bible, to stand against the world rulers of this present darkness. With God on our side, all things are possible.

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[Jul 18, 2020] Lee Camp- The Life-Saving COVID-19 Drugs You've Never Heard Of (and Why)

Jul 18, 2020 | www.mintpressnews.com

he American profit-based healthcare system impacts us in more ways than just our gargantuan bill at the excretion end of an emergency room visit. Right now, our lovable idiotic inhumane healthcare system is acting as a hurdle to the manufacture and procurement of the right drugs to treat Covid-19.

One of the drugs currently trumpeted as our savior is Remdesivir . Despite sounding like the name of a Hobbit in Middle Earth, some reports from the corporate media make it sound like the drug will thrust us face-first into a fresh world of happiness -- water parks and restaurants and random no-holds-barred make-outs with strangers. A world where when someone sneezes, we don't dive under our desk with an adult diaper strapped on our face as a makeshift mask.

There's only one problem. The big pharma company that owns Remdesivir, Gilead, has already made clear their plans to profiteer from this pandemic. As The LA Times put it

Drugmaker Gillead says it's doing you a favor by setting the price for its pending COVID-19 treatment, Remdesivir, at more than $2,000 for government agencies and over $3,000 for private insurers."

How does the CEO of Gilead, Daniel O'Day, justify this disgusting price point? He claims they're under-pricing Remdesivir. He said , "In normal circumstances, we would price a medicine according to the value it provides. Earlier hospital discharge would result in hospital savings of approximately $12,000 per patient."

Public Outcry Follows Gilead Decision to Charge $3000 for COVID Drug that Costs Pennies to Produce Gilead announced that a five-day course of its drug Remdesivir -- used to fight COVID-19 -- will cost $3,120 despite costing pennies to produce.

MintPress News | Alan Macleod | Jul 1

The value it provides?? So, if a doctor saves someone's life with heart surgery, then that guy owes the doctor the entire worth of the rest of his life? Millions of dollars? Maybe he should become the surgeon's butler or wet nurse.

Saying something should cost even close to the value it provides ranks up there as one of the stupidest arguments ever spoken. (Second only to when the people at Mountain Dew argued that human beings would love a Doritos-flavored soft drink named "Dewitos.") So, for a dude taking Viagra who can now get it up, he owes the makers of Viagra – what? – sex with his wife? Or does he just owe them 300 orgasms? Or perhaps he owes them the child he's able to produce while taking the pills. ("Dear Cialis Folks, I'm emailing to ask for a mailing address to send you my 2-year-old, Robbie. Fair is fair. I want to give you the value of your goods. Just be careful – he bites a lot. And he's already totally racist. Not sure how he picked that up so young.")

But there's another catch to Gilead's price-gouging shenanigans. They didn't create Remdesivir. We did. You and me.

Public Citizen revealed that Gilead raked in over $70 million from taxpayers. Plus, federal scientists ran the team that found out Remdesivir also worked against Coronaviruses. And, " The National Institutes of Health ran the trial that led to Remdesivir's emergency use authorization, and public funding is supporting clinical trials around the world today."

You and I paid for the creation and research behind Remdesivir. There is absolutely no reason we should fill the pockets of Gilead's preposterously rich CEO and its board. Most countries realize this. Most countries don't behave this way. Most countries have some tiny modicum of respect for the lives of their citizens. America is not most countries.

Back to the LA Times , "Nearly all other developed countries limit how much pharmaceutical companies can charge for prescription meds. The U.S. doesn't operate like that. We allow drug companies to charge as much as they please "

Perhaps prescription meds that cost the same as landing a man on Mars (in a pair of Jimmy Choo heels) are the reason 42 percent of new cancer patients have their entire life savings wiped out within two years. The average amount drained from a patient is nearly $100,000, and the entire medical costs for U.S. cancer patients per year is $80 billion . Why ever change a system that piles such bulbous mountains of cash in the vaults of those running the show?

Apparently most other national governments don't want to ruin the lives of every cancer survivor. As to why not, one can only guess.

But this story gets crazier. Not only is Remdesivir way over-priced, we're not even sure it does much. Some studies show it achieves almost nothing. Meanwhile, according to the Intercept

[A]nother Covid-19 treatment has quietly been shown to be more effective. A three-drug regimen offered a greater reduction in the time it took patients to recover than Remdesivir did. People who took the combination of interferon beta-1b, lopinavir-ritonavir, and ribavirin got better in seven days as opposed to 12 days for those who didn't take it."

However, I have yet to hear of a mad rush to hoard those drugs. Why is that? Probably because those drugs don't have colossal marketing campaigns that would make Coca-Cola blush. In fact there appears to be no marketing campaign whatsoever for the more effective drugs. To figure out why that is, one simply must follow the money.

New Research Shows Anti-Coronavirus Drugs Could Be Produced for Pennies A new study shows that several drugs that have shown promise in fighting the coronavirus could be produced cheaply and in en masse.

MintPress News | Alan Macleod | Apr 10

[E]ach of the three drugs in the new combination is generic, or no longer under patent, which means that no company stands to profit significantly from its use."

Must cut-throat late-stage capitalism always be so predictable?

Only the ridiculously profitable drugs are worth hyping. Only the money makers deserve 80,000 commercials telling every consumer to irrationally demand them. The cheap drugs that simply – save lives – those are garbage. What's the point of saving a life if you can't make a bundle from it? I've always said, "A life saved without extracting a shitload of money from it, is a life lost."

I don't know that this last part needs saying, but I'm going to do it anyway. When a society has a system built on profit, run by sociopaths, based on the manipulation of lizard-brain impulses, then it will always end up in a race to the bottom. With unfettered capitalism we inevitably find ourselves with the worst drugs, priced at the highest amounts, hoarded by those who need them the least.

Unless we're talking about recreational illegal drugs. Those are cheaper than ever.

If you feel this column is important, please share it.

Feature photo | A lab technician works at the Eva Pharma facility in Cairo, Egypt, July 12, 2020, where Remdesivir is being produced. Nariman El-Mofty | AP

Lee Camp is the host of the hit comedy news show "Redacted Tonight." His new book "Bullet Points and Punch Lines" is available at LeeCampBook.com and his standup comedy special can be streamed for free at LeeCampAmerican.com .

This article was published with special permission from the author. It originally appeared at Consortium News .

Stories published in our Daily Digests section are chosen based on the interest of our readers. They are republished from a number of sources, and are not produced by MintPress News. The views expressed in these articles are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect MintPress News editorial policy.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect MintPress News editorial policy.


[Jul 15, 2020] These Are the Drugs and Vaccines That Might End the Coronavirus Pandemic

Jul 15, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

Vaccines Vaccines give broad parts of the population some level of immunity and are considered crucial to ending the pandemic. They also take longer to develop, in part because they must be proven to be extremely safe since they're given to healthy people. While some researchers say a vaccine could be ready by the end of the year, others say it could take far longer.
COMPANY Oxford University, AstraZeneca Plc NAME ChAdOx1 nCov-19 PROGRESS Phase 3

The vaccine is made from a harmless virus that's been altered to produce the surface spike protein from SARS-CoV-2.

LATEST NEWS With human trials underway, the U.S. government has pledged as much as $1.2 billion, and the company plans to produce as many as 30 million doses available in the U.K. by September. Other groups are moving to line up access elsewhere. COMPANY Moderna Inc. NAME mRNA-1273 RECENTLY UPDATED Phase 2

Moderna's mRNA-1273 uses messenger RNA to prompt the body to make a key protein from the virus, creating an immune response.

LATEST NEWS Moderna's vaccine produced antibodies to the coronavirus in all patients tested in an initial safety trial. The company expects a phase 3 trial to begin July 27. COMPANY CanSino Biologics Inc. NAME Ad5-nCoV PROGRESS Phase 2

CanSino's vaccine was developed alongside China's military and is genetically engineered with a replication-defective mutant virus.

LATEST NEWS CanSino's vaccine has received a special authorization to be used by China's military after a study showed it generated an immune response. President Xi Jinping says the country will make any vaccine available as a global public good. COMPANY BioNTech SE, Pfizer Inc. NAME multiple candidates PROGRESS Phase 2

BioNTech's BNT162 is another messenger RNA vaccine platform that the German company is developing with Pfizer. In China, BioNTech is co-developing vaccines with Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group.

LATEST NEWS One of the companies' vaccine candidates has shown promising antibody responses. Further testing in up to 30,000 people may start as early as July. COMPANY Sinovac Biotech Ltd NAME No name yet PROGRESS Phase 3

The vaccine uses inactivated virus, which can help the body develop antibodies to the pathogen without risking infection.

LATEST NEWS Sinovac has begun human trials in China. The company says its vaccine candidate can neutralize different strains of the virus. COMPANY China National Biotec Group Co., Beijing Institute of Biological Products NAME No name yet PROGRESS Phase 3

The vaccine uses inactivated virus, which can help the body develop antibodies to the pathogen without risking infection.

LATEST NEWS With phase 2 trials complete, a vaccine could be available as soon as the end of this year, according to an official report in May. COMPANY Novavax Inc. NAME NVX-CoV2373 RECENTLY UPDATED Phase 2

Novavax's vaccine is meant to create antibodies that block a protein "spike" that the virus uses to infect its host.

LATEST NEWS Novavax has received $1.6 billion from the U.S. government as it prepares for a final-stage study as early as this fall. COMPANY Johnson & Johnson NAME No name yet PROGRESS Preclinical

J&J is working on an unnamed adenovirus-based vaccine as well as two backups.

LATEST NEWS J&J accelerated plans for human studies and aims to make up to 1 billion doses by the end of 2021 . J&J has said its vaccine could be ready for emergency use by January, and it has received $456 million from the U.S. COMPANY Sanofi, GlaxoSmithKline Plc NAME No name yet PROGRESS Preclinical

Sanofi is working on a vaccine using technology already employed in one of its flu vaccines, which could speed development and production.

LATEST NEWS France's Sanofi has partnered with the U.K.'s Glaxo on a project backed by U.S. funding. The companies plan to start human trials in the second half of this year. Sanofi is also developing an mRNA vaccine with Translate Bio. COMPANY Inovio Pharmaceuticals Inc. NAME INO-4800 RECENTLY UPDATED Phase 1

Inovio's experimental vaccine uses DNA to activate a patient's immune system.

LATEST NEWS Inovio says an early trial showed positive immune responses but investors complained about a lack of detail. COMPANY Merck & Co. NAME No names yet PROGRESS Preclinical

Merck's two vaccine candidates employ exisiting technology behind its Ebola virus shot and a measles virus vector platform discovered by the Pasteur Institute, respectively.

LATEST NEWS Merck has partnered with AIDS researchers to develop a vaccine using technology already employed in its Ebola virus shot. The company has also agreed to buy biotech Themis, gaining a vaccine candidate that uses an existing measles virus vector platform. COMPANY Imperial College London NAME No name yet PROGRESS Phase 1

When injected, the RNA vaccine candidate delivers genetic instructions to muscle cells to make the "spike" protein on the surface of the coronavirus.

LATEST NEWS Researchers have received U.K. funding and have begun human trials.

[Jul 14, 2020] C has it correct. Everything besides death rates is meaningless. Unfortunately, the deaths need to be genuine Covid deaths not just any death.

Jul 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Bull Gator , Jul 14 2020 5:11 utc | 73

I am a Biomedical Scientist with expertise in this area. Made antibodies and PCR tests for a living for 35 years, I did other stuff to but I did make some World Class Antibodies and other discoveries. My gut feeling is that all of these tests are tremendously flawed and not reliable in any way to make any kind of decision for either the patient or society. It is almost impossible to create a truly specific test and and it would take a considerable amount of time and effort to get one that could be performed on large numbers of samples. At least a year or more even with a Herculean effort. So the bottom line is it is all Bull Shit at best. Garbage in Garbage out is what you have. Would you base anything in your life on information that you know is inaccurate? You would have to be intoxicated, greedy or needing sex badly to go to that place. The Scum of humanity has pushed a large number of people to that state. I think the outcome is going to be very unpleasant for many.

[Jul 11, 2020] Right to Repair Advocates Accuse Medical Device Manufacturers of Profiteering - Slashdot

Jul 11, 2020 | news.slashdot.org

A new Motherboard article interviews William, a ventilator refurbisher who's repaired at least 70 broken ventilators that he's bought on eBay and from other secondhand websites, then sold to U.S. hospitals and governments to help handle a spike in COVID-19 patients.

He's part of a grey-market supply chain that's "essentially identical to one used by farmers to repair John Deere tractors without the company's authorization and has emerged because of the same need to fix a device without a manufacturer's permission ..." The issue is that, like so many other electronics, medical equipment, including ventilators, increasingly has software that prevents "unauthorized" people from repairing or refurbishing broken devices, and Medtronic will not help him fix them... Faced with a global pandemic, hospitals, biomedical technicians, right to repair activists, and refurbishers like William say that medical device manufacturers are profiteering by putting up artificial barriers to repair that drive up the cost of medical care in the United States and puts patient lives in danger. They describe difficulty getting parts and software, delays in getting service from "authorized" technicians, and a general sense of frustration as few manufacturers appear ready to loosen their repair restrictions during the COVID-19 crisis.

For the past decade, medical device manufacturers have refused to sell replacement parts and software to hospitals and repair professionals unless they pay thousands of dollars annually to become "authorized" to work on machines. The medical device industry has lobbied against legislation that would make it easier to repair their machines, refused to release repair manuals , and used copyright law to threaten those who have made repair manuals available to the public. The technicians who are unable to gain access to repair parts, manuals, and software are not random people who are deciding on a whim to try to fix complex medical equipment that is going to be used on sick patients. Hospitals and trained professionals are regularly unable to fix the equipment that they own unless they pay for expensive service contracts or annual trainings from manufacturers.

While hospitals deal with a resurgent coronavirus that is overtaxing intensive care units across the country, their biomedical technicians are wasting time on the phone and in Kafkaesque email exchanges with medical device manufacturers, pleading for spare parts, passwords to unlock diagnostic modes, or ventilator repair manuals.
The article notes that newer medical devices even have "more advanced anti-repair technologies built into them. Newer ventilators connect to proprietary servers owned by manufacturers to verify that the person accessing it is authorized by the company to do so."

[Jul 11, 2020] The Great Covid-19 Deception and What You Need to Know to Survive by Gary Heavin

Jul 11, 2020 | www.unz.com
The Great Covid-19 Deception and What You Need to Know to Survive GARY HEAVIN JULY 10, 2020 1,600 WORDS 74 COMMENTS REPLY Tweet Reddit Share Share Email Print More RSS

I've been speaking with my friends who include medical doctors and other highly educated people about the treatments that they would seek if they were diagnosed with Covid 19. Most of them had no idea what course of treatment they or their families might seek. This conundrum is in part due to the massive volume of information that is being thrown at us. Much of this information is deliberately deceptive. I am writing this article to cut through the deception so that you and your physician can make informed decisions if and when the time comes.

This article has two purposes. First, it's imperative that you understand the great deceit that Big Pharma, their minions at the FDA, CDC, NIH, the WHO, the MSM, and officials in high government positions are perpetrating on you, your family, and likely your doctor.

The second purpose is to assure that you are armed with the necessary information to insure that you receive the best treatment options from your health care provider. Knowledge is power.

Allow me to repeat, you need to know you are being duped and you need a plan for you and your family if you become infected with Covid 19. So let's get to it. Let me begin by stating that I'm not a medical doctor and I m not offering medical advice. I do have a bachelors of science degree in health, nutrition, and counseling. I've written two NY Times bestselling books on women's health and fitness and I have been awarded an honorary doctorate degree. However, you will need to determine your treatment options with your personal physician.

The Great Deception

When it comes to safe, effective and affordable therapies for Covid 19, Big Pharma and its agents, i.e. Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx and many others, appear to have an agenda to lie to you and your physician.

The most obvious example is their ongoing effort to ridicule the treatment option of hydroxychloroquine, Azithromycin, and Zinc. We've all watched the harsh criticism that President Trump received when he promoted this protocol for Covid 19.

So, hydroxychloroquine has been around for almost 70 years as a treatment for malaria, lupus, and rheumatoid arthritis. The WHO has designated it as a safe and effective medication akin to taking an aspirin. A survey of 6,000 medical doctors affirmed it as their treatment of choice for Covid 19.

The treatment works like this. hydroxychloroquine is an ionophore, which means it can transport material through the cellular wall. Zinc is a mineral that stops the replication of the Covid 19 virus within the cell. hydroxychloroquine transports Zinc into the cell so that it can stop the replication of the virus. The Z-pak antibiotic is given to prevent opportunistic bacterial infections like pneumonia that can occur while your immune system is engaged in fighting your viral infection. The key to its effectiveness is to start this treatment at the early onset of Covid 19 so that it has time to work.

How much effort has Big Pharma put into subverting this treatment regimen? In addition to denouncing its effectiveness, from Dr. Fauci and company, constant MSM hit pieces, the censoring of medical doctor's articles and videos from the internet, there has also been a number of "studies" done that were literally sabotaged from the onset.

The VA hospital system reported in March that they had given hydroxychloroquine to a number of patients. Following their release of information, the MSM ran the story with the headlines, "VA hospital found that hydoxychloroquine doesn't work and increases the fatality rate of Covid 19." However, if you actually read the study (see link ) you will find that only the sickest of the cohorts were given the drug. They got the drug only after they were so far along that it would not have a chance to work and they were not given zinc. None of these details made the MSM articles.

Another example of the Great Deception came from the British medical journal, The Lancet. The Lancet reported that a meta study showed that hydroxychloroquine was ineffective. As a result of this published study, France, Italy and other European countries immediately prohibited the use of this treatment option. Within a few weeks, it was found that the study was so badly designed and that the results were literally fabricated . The Lancet was forced to make a retraction of the "study." Of course in the meantime the MSM ran the original Lancet story and mislead millions of people and their physicians.

So what could possibly be the motive behind Big Pharma's Great Deception. Well there's three answers, money, money and money. That brings up the treatment option that Big Pharma is promoting, Remdesivir. This lovely experimental drug, costs above $3,000 per regimen, must be given intravenously in a hospital (five days stay around 15 grand) and evidence shows it doesn't really work .

The other treatment option is the promised Covid 19 vaccine that they allege is forthcoming. The NHS in Great Britain has committed to purchase a vaccine for the entire population of Great Britain. That's a commitment of 80,000,000 doses at an agreed price of around $600 for each vaccination. That's about $50,000,000,000. (50 Billion) That's a lot of incentive to mislead people. This week, a US pharmaceutical company received $1.6 billion dollars towards their efforts to make this vaccine which in the opinion of many experts, won't work on a coronavirus and will be untested and experimental.

How does Big Pharma have so much control over the dissemination of this information or should I say propaganda? Well, the same answer pops up again, money. Big Pharma gave $2 billion dollars during the last election cycle to US politicians. Big AG, the military/security complex and big oil each gave only a paltry $1.0 billion dollars to buy the votes of our political leadership.

The MSM counts Big Pharma's advertising revenue at up to 80 percent of their income. The internet's "masters of the universe" also kowtow to Big Pharma's influence and advertising dollars by censoring anyone who tries to tell the American people the truth about Covid 19. It certainly appears that anyone who is complicit in this Great Deception, a deception that is designed to kill and terrify enough people to ultimately beg for an experimental vaccine, well, these people would be accessories to murder.

What You Need to Know to Survive

Now, for some good news. There are several therapies that are being offered that appear to be safe, effective and affordable. However, these therapies must be utilized early in the disease progression.

Budesonide

Japan, Taiwan and other Asian countries have maintained a much lower fatality rate with Covid 19 then we have here in America, in spite of the fact they live in densely populated communities. Many people believe that it is due to their preferred method of treatment. They use a steroid medication that is inhaled in a mist through a home use nebulizer. I'm familiar with this since my 2 year old granddaughter needed this treatment with a similar drug for an upper respiratory issue that she had recently. That speaks to the safety and the commonality of this treatment. Watch the link of a Texas doctor who shares his patient's experiences with this therapy method using the drug Budesonide and a course of antibiotics.

Ivermectin

Another treatment option that appears to be safe and effective is the use of the antiparasitic drug Ivermectin with the antibiotic Doxycycline. Just one Ivermectin pill and then the course of antibiotics for ten days resulted in a 100 percent cure rate for Covid 19 patients according to the attached study. Ivermectin has been widely used on the continent of Africa for many years as an anti-parasitic and is believed to be a primary reason that Covid 19 has not severely impacted the African population.

Hydroxychloroquine & Zinc

As we've seen above, this therapeutic regimen should be considered simply due to the efforts to prevent you from knowing the truth about it . As Shakespeare wrote, "Doth thou protest too much?"

The challenge with this therapeutic is both finding a doctor who will prescribe it and finding a pharmacy that will sell it. This should be between you and your doctor. Not the governors of certain states. Considering that 20 percent of all drugs are prescribed "off label", meaning that they are prescribed for a use other than intended, you and your doctor should have the liberty and the responsibility to make this health care decision.

There are several other therapies that appear to be safe, effective and affordable. You may want to research Chlorine Dioxide, intravenous ozone, high dose intravenous vitamin C and another, glutathione which are popular treatments in the homeopathic communities.

As for me and my family, we are going to make informed and responsible decisions regarding our health care. I hope the information I've given to you today along with the links for further information will help you, your family and your doctor make the best decisions as well.

Gary Heavin and his wife Diane are the founders of Curves, the world's largest fitness franchise. Gary is the author of two NY Times bestselling books, Curves and Curves on the go. Gary co-wrote and starred in the movie Amerigeddon. Gary is a pro-life libertarian and serves on the advisory board of Dr. Ron Paul's Institute for Peace and Prosperity. Gary and his wife are philanthropists who feed 10,000 children a day in Haiti and operate an orphanage outside the slums of Mumbai. Most importantly, they are bible believing Christians.


Anon [694] Disclaimer , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:42 am GMT

Excellent article. Early treatment is definitely key. The French doctor who recommended hydroxychloroquine way back in Feb. said that it needs to be given early, by the time they go on ventilator it's no longer effective. I read in Zerohedge last week that in TX, doctors said they simply give patients who come into the emergency room a steroid shot and send them home with antibiotics. Usually they are already feeling much better after the steroid shot. Even those who are hospitalized are now only staying 3-5 days.

I find it incredulous that on their website, CDC is still telling people to stay home if they are sick, that "many people" get over it themselves without treatment, and to *not* go to the doctor's until we are having difficulty breathing. By then it is too late! Doctors have said that the main difference btwn Covid patients and flu patients is, with a flu patient, when their lungs are 10% fluid, they are already having difficulty breathing, but for some reason for Covid19, the patient does not have difficulty breathing until the lungs are 50 to 60% fluid, which is why it's too late by the time they sought treatment.

This article discusses the low fatality rate in HK(0.4%) and Singapore(<0.1%), the doctors there attributed it to early treatment using a different cocktail of drugs: interferon beta-1b, which was developed to treat multiple sclerosis; ribavirin, which is used in the treatment of hepatitis C; and lopinavir-ritonavir, also known by its brand name, Kaletra. But again, early treatment is key.
https://www.msn.com/en-sg/news/singapore/how-hong-kong-singapore-kept-coronavirus-death-rates-low/ar-BB14CLbM

CDC is an absolute fail. I'm beginning to believe they want more people to die so Trump would lose the election. They need to change their advice on their website before more lives are senselessly lost. Pence as the Covid Tzar is also totally failing on his job by not calling him out.

I'm also beginning to believe those who claim hydroxychloroquine doesn't work simply want to keep it for themselves and their cronies to take as preventive drug. Trump has been on it and he hasn't gotten sick, even though he's been exposed to lots of people. Something tells me many of our congress critters and the effing Jews are already loaded up on it.

Anonymous [426] Disclaimer , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:50 am GMT

I can't wait for November 4th when COVID-19 ends for good and all the masks and social distancing bullshit ends. Thankfully this C-19 psyops will last just 8 months and not the 2+ years the Russian collusion BS was drawn out to. Though sadly with the former it has further eviscerated working/middle-class America. I'm guessing that was part of the plan as well.

Quinsat , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:24 am GMT

The great Covid deception is it hasn't fulfilled Koch's postulates.

Smokey , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:51 am GMT

I believe Mr. Heavin more than I believe the government, and the CDC in particular.

But that could also apply to a Numerologist vs the gov't, so there's that.

I don't believe Jeffrey Epstein died a natural death any more than I believe the mainstream media is the least bit impartial. They used to try. They tried to keep the news and the Op-Ed pages separate. But that was then and this is now

This is getting fun!

So, I used to believe that cops were always the good guys, and that federal judges were above politics. Oh, and they would never lie, or take a bribe. And I believed that priests would never, ever molest a boy, or even girl (did I get that backward?), or even use bad words around them. And I believed Scoutmasters took Boy Scouts up into the mountains for the fresh air and Indian lore OK, this is starting to sound ridiculous.

Except, now I'm not sure what to believe any more.

Can anyone tell me ?

Chris in Cackalacky , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:57 am GMT
@Kirt

No offense but do you know how many people claim to have had Covid before Covid was cool? I don't know anyone who has tested positive but I know 25 people who claim they had or have it. In the past three years there have been severe influenzas making the rounds, there is no denying that. And why should routine flu and colds take a holiday just because our criminal elites tell us there is a special disease we need to watch out for? My point is we are so deceived that nobody knows up from down anymore. But at least we know one thing for sure -- hostile elites are working to deceive us.

Achilles Wannabe , says: July 11, 2020 at 6:33 am GMT

My doctor suffers from a delusion common to her profession. She thinks she is a "Medical Scientist". Actually she is a retailer for pharmaceuticals and medical technologies. She is a sales person in a capitalist industry And should she have any questions about her real role in a health care field which is really a substance and med tech pushing industry, her colleagues – fellow sales people – will remind her of her professional obligations by threatening her board certification to insure her near absolute conformity to market standards.

But there is no getting her to understand her real role in the medical industry. She believes her own hype or the hype created about her profession back in the 1950s when a few genuinely useful drugs and technologies were discovered which then afforded the money making corporate establishment the opportunity to take a humane craft and, thru the "science" of Epidemiology -Medical speak for lying with statistics – turn professional Medicine into probably the largest boondoggle in history. Consider the flag ship for usurious medicine – cholesterol lowering statin drugs.

But why don't I get rid of my essentially brain dead doctor, go to to someone else? Practically speaking, there is no one else. There are doctors who understand all this and write books about it but they are so rare as to be useless when real sickness like bacterial infections for which there are useful technologies like antibiotics actually occur. The most useful thing these real scientific doctors have to say is "Don't see your doctor" unless you have a real emergency – like an old fashion visceral type sickness – as opposed to some epidemiologically hyped condition like, again, "high cholesterol" as the "cause" of heart disease.

But now we have a genuine epidemic that is killing and injuring people and Medical Science is lying to us about possible treatments. Even a Medical skeptic like myself could not have predicted this level of base greed by our Medical pharmaceutical establishment This is tantamount to MURDER. And we have no government -whether it be run by Democrats or Republicans- who will take action. They are all on the Med Pharm tit and/or deluded by "Medical Science" as well. Until we learn to help ourselves and overthrow this system, God help us

Valka , says: July 11, 2020 at 6:48 am GMT

$50 billion just for Britain America doesn't stand a chance.

TheTrumanShow , says: July 11, 2020 at 6:58 am GMT

Thanks, Gary.

I've been reading everything counter-&-alternative to the deception I could find since it first appeared, but had never thought to investigate therapies until reading your article. Fortuitously, for me (in Thailand), Hydroxychloroquine is being used therapeutically and may even be available OTC.

However, Big Medicine & Big Pharma are already here and steadily making inroads into health care and medicine.

Gleimhart Mantooso , says: July 11, 2020 at 7:10 am GMT

Whatever happened to that vaccine that some Israeli Genius Doctors claimed would be ready in a few weeks, which was months ago now? What a shock that that never materialized.

Trygve Blodøks , says: July 11, 2020 at 7:38 am GMT

You should also look into coodial silver water. I got rid of an hpv infection using it. No side effects.

Herald , says: July 11, 2020 at 9:14 am GMT

The author doesn't mention Vitamin D, which is rather strange.

skrik , says: July 11, 2020 at 9:29 am GMT

@Gary Heavin

The Great Covid-19 Deception and

Click-baitish, much? Well, you got me in, but you seem to have a good 'treatment' argument, and 'good luck,' both by avoiding Covid-19 in the 1st place and finding a 'collaborative+pursuasive' Dr in the 2nd = worst case, should you or one of yours gets 'hit.' [Perish the thought.]

But IMHO, the Great est Covid-19 Deception is the negligent way most 'Western' governments have *not* taken Covid-19 properly seriously, starting of course with US = Trump and UK = Johnson then perhaps SE 'led' by so-called expert Tegnell next in a looong list of apparent delinquents.

Again IMHO, when Wuhan realised that they were under a bio-warfare-like attack [possibly when they 1st saw the PRRA inclusion in the decoded genome], they reacted like cut snakes and proceeded with the speed of fear-stricken Gazelles in a very largely successful attempt to *suppress* the virus. But, of course, they are communists, eh? So-called 'democratic' [in-name-only governments, many largely bolshie 'wo/men in the street'] think differently [even to their own detriment; they just can't help themselves.]

With the possible exception of NZ = Ardern, most 'Western' governments went for 'mitigation' = 'flattening the curve,' if they took any action at all, see BR = Bolsonaro "has accused the media of "fear-mongering"" and IIRC said something like "What can I do?"

Here is an article, 1st found by me in March on MoA :

"Coronavirus: The Hammer and the Dance"
https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-the-hammer-and-the-dance-be9337092b56

MoA blurb: 'Here is his latest in which he argues not only to "flatten the curve" but to eradicate the virus.'

For my last IMHO, all 'Western' leaders who have acted with less than full effort = incompetently meaning ineffectively on behalf of their 'own people' should be prosecuted for their negligence. rgds

GeeBee , says: July 11, 2020 at 9:34 am GMT

A good article all around, except that the population of the UK is nowhere near eighty million. The latest figure I can find gives 66 million. Also, your attempt to invoke the Bard ('As Shakespeare wrote, "Doth thou protest too much?"') is lamentably botched. Try 'Methinks the lady doth protest too much'. (Hamlet's mother Gertrude says it of what she regards as overacting in a play that Hamlet has arranged for his mother and her husband, the usurper Claudius, to watch).

Justvisiting , says: July 11, 2020 at 10:37 am GMT

It is a great idea to have a candid discussion with your doctor/nurse on the issue of big pharma's economic power and how it creates conflicts of interest in the medical profession.

Many doctors/nurses already knew it and will quickly agree, many more "get it" after you explain it to them.

If your doctor is so brainwashed by "experts" that they think you are an "anti-science kook", time to get a new doctor!

gotmituns , says: July 11, 2020 at 10:40 am GMT
@Kirt

Bingo – it's all a total bunch of malarkey. All the BS isn't aimed at people our age (I'm 76), it's aimed at the milennials and younger. It is shaping them for the "Brave New World" that they will live.

Simon Tugmutton , says: July 11, 2020 at 10:48 am GMT

First let me say that the virus has never been satisfactorily isolated and does not meet Koch's postulates, which leads some people to speculate that it does not exist at all. The symptoms are so various as to be nonsensical; whatever the virus may be, last winter, that led to all the hospitalizations is open to question. Certainly the fear-porn spewed out 24/7 by the corporate media led to high levels of anxiety among the credulous and many of these no doubt presented as Covid-19 patients even though they were in fact suffering from the flu or a bad cold. Once in the hands of the quacks, nosocomial infections and intubation really made them sick – or dead.

As for protection against any respiratory illness, vitamin D is essential and I am surprised the author fails to understand this. 4000 IU per day maximum.

All that aside, Covid-19 a gigantic psyop designed to usher in a world government. It was even rehearsed in 2019 and all the wrinkles worked out beforehand.

[MORE]
Mark G. , says: July 11, 2020 at 10:56 am GMT

If you can't get hydroxychloroquine there is some evidence that the natural substance quercetin found in apples and onions can act as an ionophore that transports zinc into the cell. Instead of the z-pak, a natural antibiotic like oregano or cinnamon oil might suffice. These items quercetin, zinc and oregano and cinnamon oil are all available down at the local health food store. There is more evidence for the hydroxychloroquine, zinc, z-pak combination so those would be the preferred combination if you can get them but these natural substances might help if you can't get them and might act as a preventative to keep from getting the virus if you use them regularly.

I have found only a few studies that support the use of these natural substances but you need to understand that since these aren't drugs they can't be patented so there isn't the same financial incentive to prove their effectiveness as there would be with drugs that can be patented and then sold exclusively by one company.

UncommonGround , says: July 11, 2020 at 10:59 am GMT

Whether hydoxy/chloroquine works or not is something that will be clear only after there are studies that allow to take a final conclusion. The question has been discussed critically by the press, by medical doctors, by people. Of course, everybody knows that it's possible that no vaccination will function or be available (we can hear this everyday on television). Contrary to what the author says, a phamaceutical firm was happy that the medicament could be possibly used when the question came up and some people were optimistic about it. The web site of a German television wrote in may that it was still conceivable that hydoxychloroquine could work in the very early stages of the disease (after first negative results). This was only speculation.

The author mentions a talk with some friends of him and some information that he has. But there have been a few studies, good or bad, with chloroquine with negative results. The study of the Lancet was taken back because the data that they used was apparently not trustworthy. This shows how difficult it is to have good and conclusive results in a short time. We can say the same about the evidence used by the author. It doesn't mean very much. We still have to see what happens and until now we don't know. There are efforts to find ways to treat better the disease. In German, I read yesterday:

https://www.swr.de/swraktuell/baden-wuerttemberg/mannheim/heidelberg-neue-corona-behandlungsmethode-100.html

chuckywiz , says: July 11, 2020 at 11:15 am GMT

The media never talks about those who recovered from Corona virus like BOJO, the prime minister of UK or others. What treatment the recovered patients received, how it helped them and other information. We hear only the scary stuff.
Dr. Fauci and associates could never develop his promised HIV vaccine. I read somewhere that he had been on the same job for the last 37 years. Go figure.

"DR" Bill Gate of MS is an expert of globalized vaccination and his articles on the subject have been published in several Medical Journals.
New Economy. Question More.

Linux_tyro , says: July 11, 2020 at 11:31 am GMT

I was diagnosed with an upper respiratory infection in April. Was given a Z-pack for 5 days, an inhaler, Albuterol Sulfate that I am going to refill and a pill for cough, Benzonatate 200mg. They tested me for Flu, Pneumonia, Strep and Covid. All test came back negative.

Now I have a sinus infection and was prescribed another Z-pack with Prednisone 250mg twice a day for five days.

I've been feeling under the weather for months now.

Oh! Now I remember my question. How much zinc daily should we be taking?

Emslander , says: July 11, 2020 at 11:39 am GMT

So, now we know who the enemy is. When can we start arresting and executing them?

I've had a condition common to old men for a long time. I went to some MD from the Far East who started immediately talking about cutting me up. I went to a second doctor, a young American, and told him I guess I needed to be sliced and diced. He said, "Not so fast" and recommended the regular use of two substances I could get at the vitamin store. I did so and the matter improved to the point that I felt effectively cured.

Last week, I went back to him. He works at a large establishment that includes my regular MD. I started telling him about how miraculous and enlightened his advice was. He quickly shut me up and started talking about operations and antibiotics. He wouldn't even listen when I told him that his earlier advice had worked. My presumption is that the financial people got to him. I'd guess that they do a regular review of medical care by each physician to see how they can better monetize their practice. Anyway, his changed tone was remarkable enough that it had to be something like money that was involved.

mark tapley , says: July 11, 2020 at 11:47 am GMT

Covid 19 is just another in a long line of fake or hyped up illnesses. Remember H1N1, H5n1, SARS1, Swine flu, Bird flu, Zika and others. AIDS was another fake disease (read Dr. Peter Duesberg on this). The same type of hoax is being perpetrated with the current Corona "epidemic."

Notice it supposedly began in Wuhan China. This city of 11 million has the worlds worst air pollution. 350,000 people per year die of pneumonia in China. There are lots of people there that can be tagged as Covid 19 victims. Also quickly touted as a hot spot by our Jew controlled MSM was deaths in Italy. Official autopsies revealed over 99% of victims had pre existing illness, most of them had multiple ones at an avg. age go 69.5. Latter the age went up but I can't remember the exact figure. Remember CDC criminal Debra Brix said "we have told the hospitals to tag everything possible as Covid 19."

Remember the fake tents set up all over and the hospital ship that looked like a relic of WW1. The MSM kept talking about overflowing hospitals. Several people took videos of near vacant hospitals at this time including Brian Ruhe's exposure of Vancouver's practically empty hospital. Whenever you see the media jump all over something with all the official spokesmen and there is no alternative opinion allowed, you known it is a gov. false flag. All of a sudden climate change is no longer the critical topic of the day. I guess Greta Thunberg got the covid.

The covid 19 has never been identified by the standard scientific method of the Koch's postulates because they can't. If you have a fake virus you must have a fake test. That is the PCR test that gives ap. 200 false positives, does not determine one Corona (cold from another) and is not quantitative is a fake test. The numbers given by the CDC (holds 50 vaccine related patents) that is really an adjunct of big Pharma are a crock of baloney. Most of these figures are generated from old people in the nursing homes that are given a "visual" conformation as having covid. Note that Fauci said in February that the masks did more harm than good. Hospitals get paid big money for labeling patients as Covid victims and many times doctors just write it on the report.

The Zionists have hit a home run with this medical hoax and they will never give it up unless the cucks start using their brain a little bit and figure some things out. The next move will be manditory dangerous vaccines for all the cattle. There is big money to be made in the vaccine scam. To get the truth on vaccines read Dissolving Illusions by Dr. Suzanne Humphries and books by Forrest Maready.

The Covid scam has been planned for many years, this was an opportune time to spring it as a cover for the central banks theft of trillions more while bankrupting the workers and small businesses. The Jews at Blak Rock are big investors in masks and will now be scooping up failed businesses everywhere just like in 08.

Emslander , says: July 11, 2020 at 11:47 am GMT
@Smokey

Except, now I'm not sure what to believe any more.

Can anyone tell me ?

My uncle told me a story a long time ago about a man who had his young son climb a tree in the back yard. He let him get pretty high and then said, "Jump Johnny, Jump!" Johnny said, "If I jump, I'll get hurt." The Dad said, "No, I'll catch you." Johnny jumped and the Dad did nothing. The boy hit the ground and was crying, though not permanently injured.

He said to his Dad, "Father, you promised to catch me."

"Let that be a lesson," the Dad said. "Don't trust NOBODY."

Brás Cubas , says: July 11, 2020 at 12:03 pm GMT

Gary is a pro-life libertarian

Well, seeing as libertarians are against government action to stop abortions, I suppose all that a libertarian who opposes abortion is allowed to do is acting against it in their private life; seeing as that is exactly what the pro-choice option means, you see that Gary's position is rigorously meaningless: he is pro-life and pro-choice at the same time.

That is a really grand deception, regardless of any other claimed by this article, and all I need to know about it.

Giancarlo M. Kumquat , says: July 11, 2020 at 12:17 pm GMT

Stop feeding those Haitians!

St-Germain , says: July 11, 2020 at 12:24 pm GMT

Thanks for your article.

I also prefer plain facts to eloquent fiction (MSM). Your article has obvious practical value for the public. It's a keeper. I also hope it circulates widely as an effective antidote to virulant MSM viruses.

BTW, my first act following retirement from four decades of professional news writing was to cancel all newspaper and magazine subscriptions. There is no utility in paying to be misinformed.

It never ceases to amaze me that so many people who have never set foot in a news room now regurgitate MSM propaganda as though it came down from Mt. Sinai. MSM journalism has now run the gamut from the duty to reveal what is true, even if it hurts, to the need to say what sounds nice, even if the reporter himself doesn't believe it. That's the definition of PR.

anonymous [400] Disclaimer , says: July 11, 2020 at 12:29 pm GMT

When this wears thin they'll discover another killer virus and there'll be another go-round. They started off saying the lockdowns were just for a brief time and then when they got their foot in the door it was extended. Now government herding people around by diktat is a permanent feature of American society. They'll never let it go. There's already been some report of some other mysterious killer virus coming out of Kazakhstan so get ready. This is the largest transfer of wealth scheme ever, the assets of the bankrupted scooped up by the big companies.

An Easterner , says: July 11, 2020 at 12:38 pm GMT

'Most importantly, they are Bible believing Christians.'

That for me, as a Muslim, is the best guarantee that the person writing this article will have written all in good faith because he or she is answerable to God.

Overall, the article was very informative and pertinent to the situation we face today.

macilrae , says: July 11, 2020 at 12:47 pm GMT

The article cites imperfect studies in which hydroxychloroquine was found to be an ineffective therapeutic for COVID19 – imperfect because the treatment was generally started too late in the progression of the disease. The author postulates that, if treatment were begun earlier, mortality would be drastically reduced but, unfortunately, there is no study to support this and the majority of people suffering the symptoms of early-onset COVID19 will recover spontaneously anyway.

Singapore, with its superb bureaucratic infrastructure, has reported over 45,000 infections but only 26 deaths – that is 4 deaths per million population. South Korea reports 13,000+ deaths and 287 deaths (6 per million population) and Japan 20,000 cases and 981 deaths (10 per million) compare this to the USA with 364 deaths per million or the UK with 718.

I have yet to see a convincing explanation of these shocking differences and, when asked recently, a British government spokesman said that it is "too early" to start drawing international comparisons – "too early" for whom you might ask? Evidently not for those who have succumbed – by now a huge effort should have been put forth to account for the disparity – even if the explanation is demographic as is being largely claimed. I assume that national pride has stood in the way of seeking answers by sending study teams to these countries.

The article recounts a number of inexpensive treatments that might work and points to "Big Pharma" as the major reason these are not being systematically studied – that may well be an impediment in the USA particularly – so gathering of data from East Asia, where that influence is far less and where dramatic positive results are seen, is all the more urgent.

Meanwhile my family will wear masks and hunker down because we have no particular plan to implement if one of us catches this bug.

Butch , says: July 11, 2020 at 1:01 pm GMT

Here is a clue, stop doing ALL the things they tell you to do because its all designed to make you sicker. Eat real food, so many people just don't get it, its garbage in and garbage out. Curves have always been flattened by the healthy freely moving about [oops, stay home], health from being outside, in the sun, and amongst nature is vital [oops stay inside], eating good REAL food is how you have a good immune system [oops, dont want that we need sick people for the pharma devils, therefore we'll allow FAST [shit] FOOD to be readily available [no contact of course [OMG can you actually believe this crap?] Wear a mask because the covid devil lurks everywhere [oops, retard the flow of healthy oxygen into your body, breath back in your own exhalations of CO2 and bacteria so you can increase your odds of getting sick, you just cant make this twisted stuff up!!!] Social distance, thats the best one? We should be wanting to be social for many many reasons, the least of which is because we ARE social animals, but the best way to flatten any curve is, as previously stated, assimilate it [as humans have with all viruses] to develop herd immunity [something that you CANNOT get with a toxic vaccination], like Sweden and Japan. STOP watching MSM and social platforms removing truth. Actually STOP watching TV, its all designed to make you think a certain way.

Off The Reservation , says: July 11, 2020 at 1:06 pm GMT

The biggest problem with this article is that it does not address the fundamental basis of the fraud that is CV19.

The Chinese supposedly identified a new coronavirus and named it SARS-CoV-2.

Then, the WHO made a vague list of symptoms and created a syndrome called COVID19.

There is no proven connection whatsoever between the supposedly identified virus and the syndrome.

Billing codes were created that allow the assumed or tested diagnosis of CV19.

To make matters worse, a test was created which only tests for "markers" of coronavirus and has never been proven to connect to the above viruses or the above syndrome. Thus testing positive or negative really has no meaning as proven by the disconnect between symptoms and diagnosis.

Then, the government incentivized and instructed the use of the above billing codes and created the commonly known situation of people dying "with" the syndrome even though they died of other causes.

Add to that the manipulation of the case count, etc. Then, you have New York and New Jersey basically murdering people with treatment. Loved ones banned from visiting homes – for reasons they might bring the virus in – while "positive" sick patients are brought in. Reconcile that.

I am not saying a few people aren't sick, but there is no way to deal with something while these language tricks are going on.

The virus, the syndrome, and the tests, and the count of cases have no scientific connection to each other. What is it you are talking about being treated for? The flu?

CW2isComing , says: July 11, 2020 at 1:14 pm GMT
@Gleimhart Mantooso

Yes, where IS that Wonder of Modern Medicine anyway? We were breathlessly told of its soon-to-be release; I even thought that it was peculiar that the Israelis were so serendipitously working on just the right strain of coronavirus as to be in the forefront of vaccine development.

Miracles happen.

Except when they don't. And, to summarize here, there has NEVER been a stable/effective vaccine for the coronavirus family of viruses. NEVER.

As in, NEVER.

Adûnâi , says: Website July 11, 2020 at 1:22 pm GMT
@skrik bio-warfare-like attack [possibly when they 1st saw the PRRA inclusion in the decoded genome], they reacted like cut snakes and proceeded with the speed of fear-stricken Gazelles in a very largely successful attempt to *suppress* the virus. But, of course, they are communists, eh?"

Finally some sense in the sea of conspiratards. It is fascinating to observe the insanity of White nations – they will cling to their clearly delusional beliefs to the end, even when an alternative is presenting itself this whole time.

Wearing a mask apparently turns you into a slave. Believing in the existence of the virus makes you a shill. Pure anarchism, just without the bombs.

The comment #19 by UncommonGround is decent as well.

anon [327] Disclaimer , says: July 11, 2020 at 1:25 pm GMT

Best cure for C-19: Put Dr. Fauxci and Dr. Birx , ilk,
on a SpaceX ship bound for Mars.

Doesn't need to be a big ship.
Use sardine packing method.

CW2isComing , says: July 11, 2020 at 1:35 pm GMT
@Mark G. As well (and mentioned in some of the above comments) there are many studies indicating that adequate levels of Vitamin D may be protective. Best source: sunlight; then fresh fish, then supplements.

The entire point of this article is "self-rescue." It is clear to me that the "official" recommendation is to "stay home, don't come to your doctor's office/E.R. until you get shortness of breath, etc." so as to not "overload the hospital system."

The latter advice will get you killed if you are elderly and/or have certain co-morbidities. Treat yourself early on, be proactive towards you health; oh, also, maybe stop shoving Cheetos down your neck, take a walk, lose some weight?

anon [624] Disclaimer , says: July 11, 2020 at 1:48 pm GMT
@skrik

Moon of Alabama is a controlled website that censors dissenting commenters. The Covid-19 has completely blown the cover of that site and Mr. 'b'. Do not push that site. This unz.com site does not censor comments. Get back to us when Mr. 'b' (or is that German Intelligence?) decides to play his role properly again.

Gary Heavin , says: July 11, 2020 at 1:58 pm GMT
@Herald

Hi Herald,
The reason I didn't mention vitamin D3 is that I classify it under prevention rather than therapeutics.
I take 2,000 iu daily, 2,000 mg of vitamin C, 30 mg of zinc and 200 mg of magnesium to help prevent illness.

Twodees Partain , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:04 pm GMT
@Quinsat ch's postulates.

That's the main point of information needed if "need to know" is at the top of the list on how to survive. A person "diagnosed with covid19" should know that the existence of this "novel coronavirus" has not been established in any way that is based in actual science.

Such a diagnosis subjects the purportedly infected person to treatments that would be, at best, useless. Diagnosis is the starting point for a political assault conducted by means of "contact tracing" prescribed by an Israeli intelligence operation, and can't possibly include any effective medical treatment.

No medical treatment exists that can cure infection with an imaginary virus.

Gary Heavin , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:06 pm GMT
@GeeBee

Thank you for your corrections. When I found out that Ron was going to post my article on this website I was very excited due to the quality of its readership. People like you.

Really No Shit , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:08 pm GMT

A chinaman told me that lots of chopsuey with exotic wild animals worked for his country, whereas a wetback told me lots of beans and rice with hot sauce was the key to their success. Here in my neighboring neighborhood, the Borough Park, I hear that bubbies are offering up matzo ball soup with a scrawny chicken thrown in and the Bensonhurst Fredos are insisting that had the Italian government not abandoned the age old custom of over eating pasta fagioli, none of those paisans needlessly would have died. So, who do you believe?

Gary Heavin , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:10 pm GMT
@Linux_tyro

25 mg of zinc daily is what I take

Agent76 , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:19 pm GMT

July 9, 2020 CDC May Officially Downgrade COVID From An 'Epidemic'

The coronavirus mortality rate in the United States has dropped so low that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may soon stop calling the virus an "epidemic."

https://principia-scientific.org/cdc-may-officially-downgrade-covid-from-an-epidemic/

Twodees Partain , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:32 pm GMT
@Emslander

"the regular use of two substances I could get at the vitamin store."

What two substances?

Alfred , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:39 pm GMT
@Anon

I'm beginning to believe they want more people to die so Trump would lose the election.

I am surprised it is taking people so much time to work that one out.

The media don't want you to see this chart. That is why I won't stop shouting CASES

Anonymousse , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:53 pm GMT

I had symptomatic corona. It was a day and a half of mild fever and fatigue. Basically like the flu but not nearly as bad. Everyone else I've known that had symptomatic corona (already a small minority of those who actually got infected woth corona) experienced the same or even less.

If you're just about to die from something else anyway, yeah maybe such a mild disease can give you that last little push. At that point you need to be thinking about saying confession and your relationship to eternity not some magic drug extending your life another few months

It's just the flu bro.

Desert Fox , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:54 pm GMT

Coronavirus is one of the biggest scams, frauds, psyops, mass hypnosis, in history, see these sites for the truth about the coronavirus scam, henrymakow.com , thetruthseeker.co.uk, chuckbaldwinlive.com , thedollarvigilante.com .

Alfred , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:55 pm GMT
@Gleimhart Mantooso aled that they had designed a vaccine and tested it on hamsters. They wrote that a single dose "was able to protect hamsters against SARS-CoV-2."

Their best shots: Israeli efforts to invent a coronavirus vaccine, explained (Times of Israel)

You can be absolutely certain that the clowns above removed their masks as soon as they were off-camera.

Trinity , says: July 11, 2020 at 2:58 pm GMT

The (((CoronaRona?))) Well, put it this way, the same people pushing the (((CoronaRona))) story or the same people who told you that Germans gassed 6 gatrillion Jews in the "holocaust." You might have a better chance at seeing Santa Claus than dying from the (((CoronaRona.)))

During the riots, the weasel, Fauci and that female doctor whats her name, were nowhere to be seen, and now they have returned and the (((CoronaRona))) is being looped 24/7. My guess is that all these (((medical experts))) will recommend another lock-down until the election. IF Biden wins, which given the corruption out there, is highly likely whether we are in lock-down or not, the (((CoronaRona))) will fade away into the night. IF Trump is somehow is reelected, well the (((Antifa-BLM))) types will be having another meltdown that the (((media))) will cover 24/7, and the (((CoronaRona))) will be back page news again.

I'm (((CoronaRona))) and I approve this message.

Che Guava , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:13 pm GMT

This reply is both to Kirt and Garry Heavin.

For Kirt, yes, I think I already had it too, seven or eight weeks from NYE last year to mid-Feb. of this. As I have said several times, the area near my workplace was usually full of Chinese tourists.

I had a cough, extreme lethargy on many days, a slight fever. Water frnm my nose, always the case for me in winter, but no sneezing. I must raise the idea with my regular doc., since I saw him at least three times over that time.

As for our author, Heavin's article, he is clearly offering better ideas for treatments than big pharma, but who really needs treatment?

Those who have a persistent cold-like syndrome?

Anyome identified through the polymerase chain reaction tests, which prove nothing.

Just ignore it and it will go away seems by far the wisest course.

schrub , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:29 pm GMT

On an entirely different topic:

WARNING: FOR THOSE WHO USE NORD VPN for their VPN service

If you select NORDVPN's "CYBERSEC" option to "block ads and malicious websites" , you will no longer be able to get on sites like unz.com or many other right wing sites (like Mike Rivero's site: whatreallyhappened.com for instance).

NORDVPN's CYBERSEC will, however, allow you on all the left wing sites pushed by the ADL. This means that NORDVPN'S CYBERSEC option is probably using the ADL's filtering criteria.

I questioned NORDVPN about this "selectivity" and never received a reply.

This also means that your NORDVPN software could well be spying on you and recording your keystrokes if you try to access to certain unapproved sites EVEN IF if the CYBERSEC option hasn't chosen.

NORDVPN is now, curiously enough, based in Panama, a country which the US government has been shown in the past to have considerable influence over when the need arises. (Ask Manuel Noriega for examples)

Spread the word.

It might be time choose a different VPN sofware if you are now using NORDVPN. Anybody have any good suggestions?

Zarathustra , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:33 pm GMT

I believe!
I believe in CNN.
I believe that half of population of USA will die of Corona virus.
The other half because Corona virus infecting toe nails will become zombies.
Also their brains are now eaten out by Corona virus.
All US population will be replaced by natives from Africa.
First herd of Negroes are already swimming halfway in Atlantic toward America.

Well?
Its not really funny.
But than CNN is never funny.

CW2isComing , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:35 pm GMT
@Twodees Partain

@Emslander

Yes, why are you being cryptic here–on this site–where a free exchange of information is desirable?

Herald , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:38 pm GMT
@Alfred

Cases now mean positive tests and of course, no really knows what that means, other than that more useless tests have been carried out. As the graph clearly indicates these so called "cases" have little to do with deaths. Nor do they have anything to do with hospitalisations.

We are clearly in the midst of an almighty scam, which is much much bigger than simply getting rid of Trump.

Emslander , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:41 pm GMT
@Twodees Partain

Extract of cranberries and D-Mannos. Together they are very good. I presume that they can't cure serious problems, but they work pretty well.

I'm not a doctor and I don't even work on TV.

Alfred , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:50 pm GMT
@UncommonGround ut a thorough check.

A report in The Guardian also found that the key employees of Surgisphere included a science fiction writer and an adult movie star.

The HCQ study mess: How 3 Indian researchers put reputation of Lancet, NEJM at stake

How 3 'smart' Indian names have ruined 200-year reputation of most respected medical journals

https://www.youtube.com/embed/-6WnSiCPYyQ?feature=oembed

Zarathustra , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:55 pm GMT

But putting all attempted jokes aside and talking a little bit more seriously, CNN did become certified criminal enterprise now.

Gary Heavin , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:56 pm GMT

To Bras my pro-life libertarian position does not become "meaningless" as if my prolife and libertarianism negate each other as you suggest. It's quite simple. Libertarianism demands we not harm other persons. An unborn baby is a person.
To Che I certainly agree with you that Covid 19 has been hyped, politicized, misrepresented, etc..
If I come down with a severe upper respiratory event that is heading toward pneumonia-like symptoms, I've lost my sense of taste and smell I'm going to talk with my Doctor and try one of the therapies I've written about. I hope you do the same.

Thomas Milton , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:57 pm GMT

"What you need to know" .is that this crisis has been spun from whole cloth.

Montefrío , says: July 11, 2020 at 3:58 pm GMT
@gotmituns e before the year is out. My bucolic life has been given a shake and I'm scrambling to best position our family (we live on the same property) financially and economically when BNW arrives with a vengeance. I wish to leave my grandchildren (my son, a water well driller, is prospering, happily, but still ) wholly owned property and the houses thereon plus one. I believe the BNW will have a distinctly local air to it in rural or semi-rural communities: little travel, local employment save for telecommuters, detachment from social media, different educational strategies and opportunities, etc. If you share this belief, get cracking and pretend that the reset has already arrived and act accordingly.
schrub , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:00 pm GMT

AS an answer to my own question about a new secure VPN service, I just came upon this. Anybody have any experience with this outfit?

https://protonvpn.com/about

I now wouldn't trust any VPN whatsoever service that wasn't entirely "open source". Protonvpn claims to be "open source". (On the other hand, NORDVPN isn't open source).

https://protonvpn.com/blog/open-source/

Definition of very important term "open source" for those are unfamiliar with it:
https://opensource.org/osd

If a software isn't "open source" it could potentially be spying on you. Choosing a VPN service using "open source" software should be the PRIMARY and most critical consideration when choosing a VPN service.

Non "open source" VPN software is open to outside manipulation and possible government infiltration.

Wally , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:02 pm GMT
@Gleimhart Mantooso

asked:
"Whatever happened to that vaccine that some Israeli Genius Doctors claimed would be ready in a few weeks, which was months ago now?"

– The same thing that happened to the 'Israeli Geniuses' laughable, but "historic", attempt to put a spacecraft on the moon.

Israel's Beresheet spacecraft crashes during historic moon landing attempt : https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/how-watch-israel-s-beresheet-spacecraft-attempt-moon-landing-ncna993436

Alfred , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:04 pm GMT
@Emslander

It suits her personality as she is a quite orderly and methodical person. However, it means that she is incapable of critical thinking. All doctors in Australia are invited to free seminars and meals at expensive restaurants – paid for by pharmaceutical companies.

Sadly, she did not listen to my opinion about vaccines for our two girls. In the State of Victoria, they give a mandatory HPV vaccine. However, HPV is only a problem for those who are promiscuous. Furthermore, this vaccine is essentially an unknown. It is highly-expensive at some US$300 – paid for by the tax-payers. I suspect the vaccine altered the personality of one of our daughters. It is uncanny.

Astuteobservor II , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:05 pm GMT

It seems the only way to convince retards is to kill them or let them see dead bodies everywhere.

It is like the old saying in IT.

Everything is working, wtf does the company need you for.

Everything is falling apart, wtf does the company need you for.

On covid.

Lockdowns and quarantine is working, wtf, covid is Nothing, flu is worst.

Death count is now twice the number of the worst flu year, the lockdowns and quarantine are the causes, not covid.

Lincoln was right, just need to make sure the 80% retards gets fooled, the other 20% doesn't matter as their voices would be drown out by the retards.

If this covid virus is as deadly as it needs to convince the retards, nukes would have flown. I wonder how many retards understands why that is.

Zarathustra , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:13 pm GMT
@Gary Heavin

Slightly increase the daily intake of butter you moron, and you will not need to worry anymore.

Montefrío , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:21 pm GMT
@macilrae

I neither wear a mask nor hunker down and I'm a "double-vulnerable" (nearly 74 and mildly diabetic). A close lady friend is the village pharmacist and when on duty wears the mask under mild duress; neither of us wears it when alone with each other. Unless you're in a densely populated area, better to go out and get at least half an hour of sun daily, fortify yourself and family, keep the faith and don't succumb to manufactured fear, sez I.

Sparkon , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:35 pm GMT
@macilrae ak links here in the USA, sad to say. During my most recent trip to the market, I saw perhaps 7-10% of shoppers with their masks pulled down so it was covering the mouth, but not the nose. For the most part, these non-complying shoppers were the fat, ugly, slovenly, and stupid looking types one would try to avoid anyway, so the pulled-down mask is a good signal to give these types a very wide berth.

Recall that the world's experience with COVID-19 amounts to just six or seven months. Nobody knows what this virus may do in the future, but odds are it will mutate, like all viruses.

Psst: If it's just the flu, bro, why is it still spreading in the summer?

Vandal , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:41 pm GMT
@chuckywiz

The regiment I've seen published is as follows

Hydroxychloroquine 200mg twice a day for 5 days

ZPAK 500mg once a day for 5 days

Zinc Sulfate 220mg daily

Pragma , says: July 11, 2020 at 4:47 pm GMT

Mr. Heaven:

I found your figures regarding the vaccine cost and quantity remarkable, to say the least.

After some research, I could find no reference of a commitment by the UK government to purchase 80 million doses at $600 each.

I did find, however, reference to the Oxford/AstraZeneca potential vaccine AZD1222 which is estimated to cost around 2.5 euros or about $2.80 US. This appears to be the direction that the EU is going, but it is unclear if the UK will be part of it.

Could you please forward a link or reference for the source of your figures?

Gary Heavin , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:16 pm GMT
@Pragma

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8123691/With-estimated-477-injection-potentially-billions-coronavirus-jab.html
As you can imagine, this article has been lambasted by big pharmaceutical interests.

Thim , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:19 pm GMT
@macilrae

Your family will wear masks, because you are slaves. Absolutely no one claims wearing a mask will prevent you from catching a flu or cold (Corona virus).

Bardon Kaldian , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:20 pm GMT

So, it's all a giant conspiracy Interesting: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/10/health/coronavirus-entire-body-effects-columbia/index.html

How coronavirus affects the entire body

TheTruthSeeker , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:30 pm GMT

Pavia, a cure that works, challenges media silence: "Plasma kills the virus"

"Plasma kills the coronavirus." The therapy developed by the Immuno-hematology Institute of Saint Matthew in Pavia is encouraging. In this exclusive interview with The Daily Compass given at the end of his experimentation, director Cesare Perotti reveals the positive results: "The treatment works; at the moment no one has died; the USA has asked for the protocols." But nobody is talking about it: "There are other interests opposing us, but we will address these after the scientific publication." This is how the shared treatment works, by "using" volunteers who have recovered to help heal those who are sick.

Reference and continuation:

https://newdailycompass.com/en/pavia-a-cure-that-works-challenges-media-silence-plasma-kills-the-virus

Rubicon , says: July 11, 2020 at 5:53 pm GMT
@Achilles Wannabe

What Achilles Wannabe writes is ABSOLUTELY CORRECT.

If I have to, the ONLY way to purchase HDC is via my Canadian brothers. Naturally, I would need an American doctor's prescription, but push comes to shove, I absolutely refuse going to ANY American "medical doctor" to treat me.

Hopefully, the Canadian prescription stores would be able to fill that prescription. If not, oh well.
Living in this dying nation is death-defying.

[Jul 10, 2020] Vitamin D deficit potencially increases the probablity to catch COVID-19

Jul 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

jean , Jul 10 2020 17:59 utc | 105

There is a racial difference in that blacks and people of color are vitamin D deficient, as are the elderly.

Vitamin D linked to low virus death rate, study finds
New COVID-19 research finds relationship in data from 20 European countries

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/05/200507131012.htm


dbk , Jul 10 2020 18:05 utc | 107

For commenters who've remarked on the incidences of (a) obesity, (b) diabetes and (c) high blood pressure - other cardiovascular ailments (not sure anyone referred to [c] but it's on most lists), these are all ultimately rooted in poverty / stress.

For commenters who remarked on the "Southern" diet and McDonald's food, many urban neighborhoods and poor rural counties are food deserts, period. The urban elite in the South (Black and white alike) have diets that resemble those of residents of Manhattan.

For the commenter who remarked on the absence of a national health care program in the U.S. - yes, this is a major contributing factor but it's further complicated by other intersecting forms of injustice which contribute to the heightened risk for Blacks who contract the virus.

The premise of the OP is correct in my view, and the post correctly concludes the Identity Politics is being used (by both sides) to mask the real disease.

karlof1 , Jul 10 2020 18:34 utc | 108

I must applaud b for finally bringing in the Class War into his COVID-19 analysis. What you are genetically isn't the main factor; rather, it's your socio-economic-- CLASS --status that matters most regarding your potential exposure to the disease. Activists within the Outlaw US Empire have pointed to that fact going back to March, and it's certainly a big factor fueling the ongoing protests.

[Jul 10, 2020] AR Comes to the Fight Against Covid-19

Jul 10, 2020 | www.afr.com

Australian Financial Review
John Davidson
July 6, 2020

Researchers at La Trobe University in Australia have developed an augmented reality (AR) visualization of the effects of Covid-19 on the lungs, in an effort to aid diagnosis and treatment. The researchers converted two-dimensional (2D) computed tomography (CT) scans of Covid-damaged lungs into three-dimensional (3D) images. Microsoft's HoloLens 2 headset lets researchers view those images, superimposed into the space in front of their eyes. Said La Trobe's Henry Duh, "If you only see a 2D scan, without HoloLens, you need to do more mental rotations and reconstructions in order to figure out what it looks like in the body." The researchers hope to use machine learning to analyze original CT scans and identify areas of the lungs damaged by the disease.

Full Article
*May Require Paid Registration

[Jul 10, 2020] LancetGate- -Scientific Corona Lies- Big Pharma Corruption - Hydroxychloroquine Versus Remdesivir -

Jul 10, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

LancetGate: "Scientific Corona Lies" & Big Pharma Corruption - Hydroxychloroquine Versus Remdesivir by Tyler Durden Fri, 07/10/2020 - 19:05 Twitter Facebook Reddit Email Print

Authored by Prof Michel Chossudovsky via GlobalResearch.ca,

Introduction

There is an ongoing battle to suppress Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), a cheap and effective drug for the treatment of Covid-19. The campaign against HCQ is carried out through slanderous political statements, media smears, not to mention an authoritative peer reviewed "evaluation" published on May 22nd by The Lancet, which was based on fake figures and test trials.

The study was allegedly based on data analysis of 96,032 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 between Dec 20, 2019, and April 14, 2020 from 671 hospitals Worldwide. The database had been fabricated. The objective was to kill the Hydroxychloroquine ( HCQ) cure on behalf of Big Pharma.

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Harvard And MIT Sue

Meatpacking Workers Are In Danger

Trump Not Happy With CDC School Guidelines

The Unreported Cases

The CDC Single Test

Censor In Chief? VP Pence To Control Coronavirus Info

The Yeezy Loan

Cruise Ships Might Be a Safer Way to Vacation During COVID-19, Health Expert Claims

While The Lancet article was retracted, the media casually blamed "a tiny US based company" named Surgisphere whose employees included "a sci-fi writer and an adult content model" for spreading "flawed data" (Guardian) . This Chicago based outfit was accused of having misled both the WHO and national governments, inciting them to ban HCQ. None of those trial tests actually took place.

While the blame was placed on Surgisphere, the unspoken truth (which neither the scientific community nor the media have acknowledged) is that the study was coordinated by Harvard professor Mandeep Mehra under the auspices of Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) which is a partner of the Harvard Medical School.

When the scam was revealed , Dr. Mandeep Mehra who holds the Harvey Distinguished Chair of Medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital apologized:

I have always performed my research in accordance with the highest ethical and professional guidelines. However, we can never forget the responsibility we have as researchers to scrupulously ensure that we rely on data sources that adhere to our high standards.

It is now clear to me that in my hope to contribute this research during a time of great need, I did not do enough to ensure that the data source was appropriate for this use. For that, and for all the disruptions – both directly and indirectly – I am truly sorry. (emphasis added)

Mandeep R. Mehra, MD, MSC ( official statement on BWH website)

But that "truly sorry" note was just the tip of the iceberg. Why?

https://lockerdome.com/lad/13084989113709670?pubid=ld-dfp-ad-13084989113709670-0&pubo=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com&rid=www.zerohedge.com&width=890

Studies on Gilead Science's Remdesivir and Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) Were Conducted Simultaneously by Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH)

While The Lancet report (May 22, 2020) coordinated by Dr. Mandeep Mehra was intended "to kill" the legitimacy of HCQ as a cure of Covid-19, another important (related) study was being carried out (concurrently) at BWH pertaining to Remdesivir on behalf of Gilead Sciences Inc. Dr. Francisco Marty, a specialist in Infectious Disease and Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School was entrusted with coordination of the clinical trial tests of the antiviral medication Remdesivir under Brigham's contract with Gilead Sciences Inc :

Brigham and Women's Hospital began enrolling patients in two clinical trials for Gilead's antiviral medication remdesivir. The Brigham is one of multiple clinical trial sites for a Gilead-initiated study of the drug in 600 participants with moderate coronavirus disease (COVID-19) and a Gilead-initiated study of 400 participants with severe COVID-19.

If the results are promising, this could lead to FDA approval, and if they aren't, it gives us critical information in the fight against COVID-19 and allows us to move on to other therapies."

While Dr. Mandeep Mehra was not directly involved in the Gilead Remdesevir BWH study under the supervision of his colleague Dr. Francisco Marty, he nonetheless had contacts with Gilead Sciences Inc: "He participated in a conference sponsored by Gilead in early April 2020 as part of the Covid-19 debate" (France Soir, May 23, 2020)

What was the intent of his (failed) study? To undermine the legitimacy of Hydroxychloroquine?

According to France Soir, in a report published after The Lancet Retraction:

The often evasive answers produced by Dr Mandeep R. Mehra , professor at Harvard Medical School, did not produce confidence, fueling doubt instead about the integrity of this retrospective study and its results . (France Soir, June 5, 2020)

Was Dr. Mandeep Mehra in conflict of interest? (That is a matter for BWH and the Harvard Medical School to decide upon).

Who are the Main Actors?

Dr. Anthony Fauci, advisor to Donald Trump, portrayed as "America's top infectious disease expert" has played a key role in smearing the HCQ cure which had been approved years earlier by the CDC as well as providing legitimacy to Gilead's Remdesivir.

Dr. Fauci has been the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since the Reagan administration. He is known to act as a mouthpiece for Big Pharma.

Dr. Fauci launched Remdesivir in late June (see details below). According to Fauci, Remdesevir is the "corona wonder drug" developed by Gilead Science Inc. It's a $1.6 billion dollar bonanza.

Gilead Sciences Inc: History

Gilead Sciences Inc is a Multibillion dollar bio-pharmaceutical company which is now involved in developing and marketing Remdesivir. Gilead has a long history. It has the backing of major investment conglomerates including the Vanguard Group and Capital Research & Management Co, among others. It has developed ties with the US Government.

In 1999 Gilead Sciences Inc, developed Tamiflu (used as a treatment of seasonal influenza and bird flu). At the time, Gilead Sciences Inc was headed by Donald Rumsfeld (1997-2001), who later joined the George W. Bush administration as Secretary of Defense (2001-2006). Rumsfeld was responsible for coordinating the illegal and criminal wars on Afghanistan (2001) and Iraq (2003).

Rumsfeld maintained his links to Gilead Sciences Inc throughout his tenure as Secretary of Defense (2001-2006). According to CNN Money (2005) : "The prospect of a bird flu outbreak was very good news for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld [who still owned Gilead stocks] and other politically connected investors in Gilead Sciences".

Anthony Fauci has been in charge of the NIAID since 1984, using his position as "a go between" the US government and Big Pharma. During Rumsfeld's tenure as Secretary of Defense, the budget allocated to bio-terrorism increased substantially, involving contracts with Big Pharma including Gilead Sciences Inc. Anthony Fauci considered that the money allocated to bio-terrorism in early 2002 would:

"accelerate our understanding of the biology and pathogenesis of microbes that can be used in attacks, and the biology of the microbes' hosts -- human beings and their immune systems. One result should be more effective vaccines with less toxicity." (WPo report)

In 2008, Dr. Anthony Fauci was granted the Presidential Medal of Freedom by president George W. Bush "for his determined and aggressive efforts to help others live longer and healthier lives."

The 2020 Gilead Sciences Inc Remdesivir Project

We will be focussing on key documents (and events)

Chronology

February 21: Initial Release pertaining to NIH-NIAID Remdesivir placebo test trial

April 10 : The Gilead Sciences Inc study published in the NEJM on the "Compassionate Use of Remdesivir"

April 29 : NIH Release: Study on Remdesivir (Report published on May 22 in NEJM)

May 22, The BWH-Harvard Study on Hydroxychloroquine coordinated by Dr. Mandeep Mehra published in The Lancet

May 22 , Remdesivir for the Treatment of Covid-19 -- Preliminary Report (NEJM)

June 5: The (fake) Lancet Report (May 22) on HCQ is Retracted.

June 29 , Fauci announcement. The $1.6 Billion Remdevisir HHS Agreement with Gilead Sciences Inc

April 10: The Gilead Sciences Inc. study published in the NEJM on the "Compassionate Use of Remdesivir"

A Gilead sponsored report was published in New England Journal of Medicine in an article entitled "Compassionate Use of Remdesivir for Patients with Severe Covid-19" . It was co-authored by an impressive list of 56 distinguished medical doctors and scientists, many of whom were recipients of consulting fees from Gilead Sciences Inc.

Gilead Sciences Inc. funded the study which included several staff members as co-authors.

The testing included a total of 61 patients [who] received at least one dose of remdesivir on or before March 7, 2020; 8 of these patients were excluded because of missing postbaseline information (7 patients) and an erroneous remdesivir start date (1 patient) Of the 53 remaining patients included in this analysis, 40 (75%) received the full 10-day course of remdesivir, 10 (19%) received 5 to 9 days of treatment, and 3 (6%) fewer than 5 days of treatment.

The NEJM article states that "Gilead Sciences Inc began accepting requests from clinicians for compassionate use of remdesivir on January 25, 2020". From whom, From Where? According to the WHO (January 30, 2020) there were 82 cases in 18 countries outside China of which 5 were in the US, 5 in France and 3 in Canada.

Several prominent physicians and scientists have cast doubt on the Compassionate Use of Remdesivir study conducted by Gilead, focussing on the small size of the trial. Ironically, the number of patients in the test is less that the number of co-authors: "53 patients" versus "56 co-authors"

Below we provide excerpts of scientific statements on the Gilead NEJM project ( Science Media Centre emphasis added) published immediately following the release of the NEJM article:

" 'Compassionate use' is better described as using an unlicensed therapy to treat a patient because there are no other treatments available . Research based on this kind of use should be treated with extreme caution because there is no control group or randomisation, which are some of the hallmarks of good practice in clinical trials. Prof Duncan Richard , Clinical Therapeutics, University of Oxford.

"It is critical not to over-interpret this study. Most importantly, it is impossible to know the outcome for this relatively small group of patients had they not received remdesivir. Dr Stephen Griffin , Associate Professor, School of Medicine, University of Leeds.

"The research is interesting but doesn't prove anything at this point: the data are from a small and uncontrolled study. Simon Maxwell, Professor of Clinical Pharmacology and Prescribing, University of Edinburgh.

"The data from this paper are almost uninterpretable. It is very surprising, perhaps even unethical, that the New England Journal of Medicine has published it. It would be more appropriate to publish the data on the website of the pharmaceutical company that has sponsored and written up the study. At least Gilead have been clear that this has not been done in the way that a high quality scientific paper would be written. Prof Stephen Evans, Professor of Pharmacoepidemiology, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

"It's very hard to draw useful conclusions from uncontrolled studies like this particularly with a new disease where we really don't know what to expect and with wide variations in outcomes between places and over time. One really has to question the ethics of failing to do randomisation – this study really represents more than anything else, a missed opportunity." Prof Adam Finn, Professor of Paediatrics, University of Bristol.

To review the complete document of Science Media Centre pertaining to expert assessments click here

April 29: The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Study on Remdevisir.

On April 29th following the publication of the Gilead Sciences Inc Study in the NEJM on April 10, a press release of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on Remdevisir was released. The full document was published on May 22, by the NEJM under the title:

Remdesivir for the Treatment of Covid-19 -- Preliminary Report (NEJM)

The study had been initiated on February 21, 2020. The title of the April 29 Press Release was:

"Peer-reviewed data shows remdesivir for COVID-19 improves time to recovery"

It's a government sponsored report which includes preliminary data from a randomized trial involving 1063 hospitalized patients. The results of the trial labelled Adaptive COVID-19 Treatment Trial (ACTT) are preliminary, conducted under the helm of Dr. Fauci's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) :

An independent data and safety monitoring board (DSMB) overseeing the trial met on April 27 to review data and shared their interim analysis with the study team. Based upon their review of the data, they noted that remdesivir was better than placebo from the perspective of the primary endpoint, time to recovery, a metric often used in influenza trials. Recovery in this study was defined as being well enough for hospital discharge or returning to normal activity level.

Preliminary results indicate that patients who received remdesivir had a 31% faster time to recovery than those who received placebo (p<0.001). Specifically, the median time to recovery was 11 days for patients treated with remdesivir compared with 15 days for those who received placebo. Results also suggested a survival benefit, with a mortality rate of 8.0% for the group receiving remdesivir versus 11.6% for the placebo group (p=0.059). (emphasis added)

In the NIH's earlier February 21, 2020 report (released at the outset of the study), the methodology was described as follows:

A randomized, controlled clinical trial to evaluate the safety and efficacy of the investigational antiviral remdesivir in hospitalized adults diagnosed with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Numbers. Where? When?

The February 21 repor t confirmed that the first trial participant was "an American who was repatriated after being quarantined on the Diamond Princess cruise ship" that docked in Yokohama (Japanese Territorial Waters). "Thirteen people repatriated by the U.S. State Department from the Diamond Princess cruise ship" were selected as patients for the placebo trial test. Ironically, at the outset of the study, 58.7% of the "confirmed cases" Worldwide (542 cases out of 924) (outside China), were on the Diamond Cruise Princess from which the initial trial placebo patients were selected.

Where and When: The trial test in the 68 selected sites? That came at a later date because on February 19th (WHO data), the US had recorded only 15 positive cases (see Table Below).

"A total of 68 sites ultimately joined the study -- 47 in the United States and 21 in countries in Europe and Asia." (emphasis added)

In the final May 22 NEJM report entitled Remdesivir for the Treatment of Covid-19 -- Preliminary Report :

There were 60 trial sites and 13 subsites in the United States (45 sites), Denmark (8), the United Kingdom (5), Greece (4), Germany (3), Korea (2), Mexico (2), Spain (2), Japan (1), and Singapore (1). Eligible patients were randomly assigned in a 1:1 ratio to receive either remdesivir or placebo. Randomization was stratified by study site and disease severity at enrollment

The Washington Post applauded Anthony Fauci's announcement (April 29):

"The preliminary results, disclosed at the White House by Anthony S. Fauci, fall short of the magic bullet or cure But with no approved treatments for Covid-19, [Lie] Fauci said, it will become the standard of care for hospitalized patients The data shows that remdisivir has a clear-cut, significant, positive effect in diminishing the time to recovery," Fauci said.

The government's first rigorous clinical trial of the experimental drug remdesivir as a coronavirus treatment delivered mixed results to the medical community Wednesday -- but rallied stock markets and raised hopes that an early weapon to help some patients was at hand.

The preliminary results, disclosed at the White House by Anthony Fauci, chief of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which led the placebo-controlled trial found that the drug accelerated the recovery of hospitalized patients but had only a marginal benefit in the rate of death.

Fauci's remarks boosted speculation that the Food and Drug Administration would seek emergency use authorization that would permit doctors to prescribe the drug.

In addition to clinical trials, remdesivir has been given to more than 1,000 patients under compassionate use. [also refers to the Gilead study published on April 10 in the NEJM]

The study, involving [more than] 1,000 patients at 68 sites in the United States and around the world (??) , offers the first evidence (??) from a large (??), randomized (??) clinical study of remdesivir's effectiveness against COVID-19.

The NIH placebo test study provided "preliminary results". While the placebo trial test was "randomized", the overall selection of patients at the 68 sites was not fully randomized. See the full report.

May 22: The Fake Lancet Report on Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ)

It is worth noting that the full report of the NIH-NIAID) entitled Remdesivir for the Treatment of Covid-19 -- Preliminary Report was released on May 22, 2020 in the NEJM, on the same day as the controversial Lancet report on Hydroxychloroquine.

Immediately folllowing its publication, the media went into high gear, smearing the HCQ cure, while applauding the NIH-NIASD report released on the same day.

Remdesivir, the only drug cleared to treat Covid-19, sped the recovery time of patients with the disease, "It's a very safe and effective drug," said Eric Topol, founder and director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute. "We now have a definite first efficacious drug for Covid-19, which is a major step forward and will be built upon with other drugs, [and drug] combinations."

When the Lancet HCQ article by Bingham-Harvard was retracted on June 5, it was too late, it received minimal media coverage. Despite the Retraction, the HCQ cure "had been killed".

June 29: Fauci Greenlight. The $1.6 Billion Remdesivir Contract with Gilead Sciences Inc

Dr. Anthony Fauci granted the "Greenlight" to Gilead Sciences Inc. on June 29, 2020.

The semi-official US government NIH-NIAID sponsored report (May 22) entitled Remdesivir for the Treatment of Covid-19 -- Preliminary Report (NEJM) was used to justify a major agreement with Gilead Sciences Inc.

The Report was largely funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci and the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

On June 29, based on the findings of the NIH-NIAID Report published in the NEJM, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced on behalf of the Trump Adminstration an agreement to secure large supplies of the remdesivir drug from Gilead Sciences Inc. for the treatment of Covid-19 in America's private hospitals and clinics.

The earlier Gilead study based on scanty test results published in the NEJM (April 10), of 53 cases (and 56 co-authors) was not highlighted. The results of this study had been questioned by several prominent physicians and scientists.

Who will be able to afford Remdisivir? 500,000 doses of Remdesivir are envisaged at $3,200 per patient, namely $1.6 billion (see the s tudy by Elizabeth Woodworth )

The Drug was also approved for marketing in the European Union. under the brandname Veklury.

If this contract is implemented as planned, it represents for Gilead Science Inc. and the recipient US private hospitals and clinics a colossal amount of money.

[error in above title according to HHS: $3200]

According to The Trump Administration's HHS Secretary Alex Azar (June 29, 2020):

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"To the extent possible, we want to ensure that a ny American patient who needs remdesivir can get it . [at $3200] The Trump Administration is doing everything in our power to learn more about life-saving therapeutics for COVID-19 and secure access to these options for the American people."

Remdesivir for Covid-19: $1.6 Billion for a "Modestly Beneficial" Drug?

Remdesivir versus Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ)

Careful timing:

The Lancet study (published on May 22) was intended to undermine the legitimacy of Hydroxychloroquine as an effective cure to Covid-19, with a view to sustaining the $1.6 billion agreement between the HHS and Gilead Sciences Inc. on June 29th. The legitmacy of this agreement rested on the May 22 NIH-NIAID study in the NEJM which was considered "preliminary".

What Dr. Fauci failed to acknowledge is that Chloroquine had been "studied" and tested fifteen years ago by the CDC as a drug to be used against coronavirus infections. And that Hydroxychloroquine has been used recently in the treatment of Covid-19 in several countries.

According to the Virology Journal (2005) " Chloroquine is a potent inhibitor of SARS coronavirus infection and spread". It was used in the SARS-1 outbreak in 2002. It had the endorsement of the CDC.

HCQ is not only effective, it is "inexpensive" when compared to Remdesivir, at an estimated "$3120 for a US Patient with private insurance".

Below are excerpts of an interview of Harvard's Professor Mehra (who undertook the May 22 Lancet study) with France Soir published immediately following the publication of the Lancet report (prior to its Retraction).

Dr. Mandeep Mehra: In our study, it is fairly obvious that the lack of benefit and the risk of toxicity observed for hydroxychloroquine are fairly reliable. [referring to the May 22 Lancet study]

France Soir: Do you have the data for Remdesivir?

MM: Yes, we have the data, but the number of patients is too small for us to be able to conclude in one way or another.

FS: As you know, in France, there is a pros and cons battle over hydroxychloroquine which has turned into a public health issue even involving the financial lobbying of pharmaceutical companies. Why not measure the effect of one against the other to put an end to all speculation?

MM: In fact, there is no rational basis for testing Remdesivir versus hydroxychloroquine. On the one hand, Remdesivir has shown that there is no risk of mortality and that there is a reduction in recovery time. On the other hand, for hydroxychloroquine it is the opposite: it has never been shown any advantage and most studies are small or inconclusive In addition, our study shows that there are harmful effects.

It would therefore be difficult and probably unethical to compare a drug with demonstrated harmfulness to a drug with at least a glimmer of hope.

FS: You said that there is no basis for testing or comparing Remdesivir with hydroxychloroquine, do you think you have done everything to conclude that hydroxychloroquine is dangerous?

MM: Exactly.

All we are saying is that once you have been infected (5 to 7 days after) to the point of having to be hospitalized with a severe viral load, the use of hydroxychloroquine and its derivative is not effective.

The damage from the virus is already there and the situation is beyond repair. With this treatment [HCQ] it can generate more complications

FS Mandeep Mehra declared that he had no conflict of interest with the laboratories and that this study was financed from the endowment funds of the professor's chair.

He participated in a conference sponsored by Gilead in early April 2020 as part of the Covid-19 debate.

- France Soir, translated by the author, emphasis added, May 23, 2020)

In Annex, see the followup article by France Soir published after the scam surrounding the data base of Dr. Mehra's Lancet report was revealed.

Concluding Remarks

Lies and Corruption to the nth Degree involving Dr. Anthony Fauci, "The Boston Connection" and Gilead Sciences Inc.

The Gilead Sciences Inc. Remdesivir study (50+ authors) was published in the New England Journal of Medicine (April 10, 2020).

It was followed by the NIH-NIAID Remdesivir for the Treatment of Covid-19 -- Preliminary Report on May 22, 2020 in the NEJM. And on that same day, May 22, the "fake report" on Hydroxychloroquine by BWH-Harvard Dr. Mehra was published by The Lancet.

Harvard Medical School and the BWH bear responsibility for having hosted and financed the fake Lancet report on HCQ coordinated by Dr. Mandeep Mehra.

Is there conflict of interest? BWH was simultaneously involved in a study on Remdesivir in contract with Gilead Sciences, Inc.

While the Lancet report coordinated by Harvard's Dr. Mehra was retracted, it nonetheless served the interests of Gilead Sciences Inc.

It is important that an independent scientific and medical assessment be undertaken, respectively of the Gilead Sciences Inc New England Journal of Medicine (NEMJ) peer reviewed study (April 10, 2020) as well as the NIH-NIAID study also published in the NEJM (May 22, 2020).

* * *

ANNEX

Retraction by France Soir

The fraud concerning the Lancet Report was revealed in early June. France Soir in a subsequent article (June 5, 2020) points to the Boston Connection: La connexion de Boston , namely the insiduous relationship between Gilead Sciences Inc and Professor Mehra, Harvard Medical School as well as the two related Boston based hospitals involved.

(excerpts here, to access the complete text click here translation from French by France Soir, emphasis in the original article)

The often evasive answers produced by Dr Mandeep R. Mehra, a physician specializing in cardiovascular surgery and professor at Harvard Medical School, did not produce confidence, fueling doubt instead about the integrity of this retrospective study and its results.

However, the reported information that Dr. Mehra had attended a conference sponsored by Gilead – producer of remdesivir, a drug in direct competition with hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) – early in April called for further investigation

It is important to keep in mind that Dr. Mandeep Mehra has a practice at the Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) in Boston.

That study relied on the shared medical records of 8,910 patients in 169 hospitals around the world, also by Surgisphere.

Funding for the study was "Supported by the William Harvey Chair in Cardiovascular Medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital. The development and maintenance of the collaborative surgical outcomes database was funded by Surgisphere."

The study published on May 22 sought to evaluate the efficacy or otherwise of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, alone or in combination with a macrolide antibiotic.

It is therefore noteworthy that within 3 weeks, 2 large observational retrospective studies on large populations – 96,032 and 8,910 patients – spread around the world were published in two different journals by Dr. Mehra, Dr. Desai and other co-authors using the database of Surgisphere, Dr. Desai's company.

These two practising physicians and surgeons seem to have an exceptional working capacity associated with the gift of ubiquity.

The date of May 22 is also noteworthy because on the very same day, the date of the publication in The Lancet of the highly accusatory study against HCQ, another study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine concerning the results of a clinical trial of remdesivir.

In the conclusion of this randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, "remdesivir was superior to placebo in shortening the time to recovery in adults hospitalized with Covid-19 and evidence of lower respiratory tract infection."

Concretely: on the same day, May 22nd, one study demeaned HCQ in one journal while another claimed evidence of attenuation on some patients through remdesivir in another journal.

It should be noted that one of the main co-authors, Elizabeth "Libby"* Hohmann, represents one of the participating hospitals, the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, also affiliated with Harvard Medical School, as is the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, where Dr. Mandeep Mehra practices.

Coincidence, probably.

Upon further investigation, we discovered that the first 3 major clinical trials on Gilead's remdesivir were conducted by these two hospitals:

"While COVID-19 continues to circle the globe with scientists following on its trail, Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) are leading the search for effective treatment.

"Both hospitals are conducting clinical trials of remdesivir."

MGH has joined what the National Institute of Health (NIH) describe as the first clinical trial in the United States of an experimental treatment for COVID-19, sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of NIH . MGH is currently the only hospital in New England to participate in this trial, according to a list of sites shared by the hospital.

" It's a gigantic undertaking, with patients registered in some 50 sites across the country, getting better .

"The NIH trial, which can be adapted to evaluate other treatments, aims to determine whether the drug relieves the respiratory problems and other symptoms of COVID-19, helping patients leave hospital earlier.**

As a reminder, the NIAID/NIH is led by Antony Fauci, a staunch opponent of HCQ.

Coincidence, probably.

" At the Brigham, two additional trials initiated by Gilead , the drug developer, will determine whether it alleviates symptoms in patients with moderate to severe illness over five- and ten-days courses. These trials will also be randomized, but not placebo controlled, and will include 1,000 patients at sites worldwide. Those patients, noted Francisco Marty, MD, Brigham physician and study co-investigator, will likely be recruited at an unsettlingly rapid clip."

As a result, the first major clinical trials on remdesivir launched on March 20, whose results are highly important for Gilead, are being led by the MGH and BWH in Boston, precisely where Dr. Mehra, the main author of the May 22nd HCQ trial, is practising.

Small world! Coincidence, again, probably.

Dr. Marty at BWH expected to have results two months later. Indeed, in recent days, several US media outlets have reported Gilead's announcements of positive results from the remdesivir clinical trials in Boston.:

"Encouraging results from a new study published Wednesday on remdesivir for the treatment of patients with COVID-19.**

Brigham and Dr. Francisco Marty worked on this study, and he says the results show that there is no major difference between treating a patient with a five-day versus a 10-day regimen.

"Gilead Announces Results of Phase 3 Remdesivir Trial in Patients with Moderate COVID-19

– One study shows that the 5-day treatment of remdesivir resulted in significantly greater clinical improvement compared to treatment with the standard of care alone

– The data come on top of the body of evidence from previous studies demonstrating the benefits of remdesivir in hospitalized patients with IDVOC-19

"We now have three randomized controlled trials demonstrating that remdesivir improved clinical outcomes by several different measures," Gilead plans to submit the complete data for publication in a peer-reviewed journal in the coming weeks .

These results announced by Gilead a few days after the May 22 publication of the study in the Lancet demolishing HCQ, a study whose main author is Dr. Mehra, are probably again a coincidence.

So many coincidences adds up to coincidences? Really ?


[Jul 09, 2020] Vitamin D may be a good defense against the coronavirus, according to several new reports. Here's what you need to know-

Jul 09, 2020 | www.msn.com

While there's still no evidence that vitamin D can cure or prevent the coronavirus, three major health organizations in the UK are advising people to ensure they get enough vitamin D, from the sun or supplements, to be on the safe side.

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The Scientific Advisory Commission on Nutrition , the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence , and the Royal Society all published reports last month detailing what we know (and don't) about the coronavirus and vitamin D, concluding that we need more research to fully understand the connection.

In the meantime, however, these organizations advise a stronger emphasis on meeting the current recommended vitamin D intake, not only as a precaution against coronavirus, but for general health too.

Vitamin D is important for health, and might even stave off some illnesses

Vitamin D is an essential nutrient for health, including the immune system.

Normally, humans can produce vitamin D naturally through direct exposure to sunlight -- we also get vitamin D in certain foods, like eggs, fatty fish, and beef liver. In total, the UK recommends people get 10 micrograms of vitamin D per day; the US recommendation is slightly higher, 15 micrograms for most people, and 20 micrograms for those over 70.

Spending too much time indoors, whether in the colder winter months or in quarantine, can potentially put you at risk of a vitamin D deficiency. Not enough of the nutrient is directly linked to muscle, tooth, and bone health issues, according to the recent Royal Society report.

That could be a problem when it comes to illness -- there's some evidence that a lack of vitamin D is linked to infections, particularly in the respiratory tract, according to the Scientific Advisory Commission on Nutrition report.

But there's no evidence showing a direct cause link between vitamin D and better coronavirus outcomes

However, while COVID-19 (the disease caused by the novel coronavirus) does attack the respiratory system, there's no evidence vitamin D can cure or prevent the illness.

Several previous studies have made a link between coronavirus outcomes and vitamin D deficiency -- however, that research has included other variables that could explain the number and severity of COVID-19 cases, and the research is far from showing a causal link.

But at least one study has also shown no apparent link between vitamin D and coronavirus outcomes, leading s ome researchers to remain skeptical about the possible connection .

Previous research has cautioned consumers about exaggerated claims about vitamin D and the coronavirus, particularly with regard to supplements or extremely high doses through an IV: too much vitamin D can can cause a toxic buildup of calcium and lead to kidney issues, according to the Mayo Clinic .

As such, there's still much more research to be done on the implications of vitamin D for different coronavirus outcomes.

Charles Bangham, professor of immunology at Imperial College London and co-author of the Royal Society paper, told the Financial Times that Vitamin D deficiency could in part explain why people with darker skin tones have been hardest-hit by the coronavirus. Black and brown people have more melanin that blocks UV rays from the sun, so naturally-producing the nutrient from sunlight takes longer for people with darker skin.

... ... ...

Read more:

Huge doses of vitamin D will not cure or protect you from the coronavirus, a new report says

Copper will not protect you from the coronavirus, despite its germ-killing properties, a microbiologist says

Race is not the reason Black Americans have a higher risk of dying from the coronavirus. It's racism.

Read the original article on Insider

[Jul 08, 2020] Copper will not protect you from coronavirus despite killing germs - Insider

Jul 08, 2020 | www.insider.com

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As the US begins to tentatively return to business, despite the novel coronavirus still lurking among the population, any potential protection has become a hot commodity.

Copper metal, used in products such as door handles and key rings, is being touted as one such solution, advertised as killing the virus on contact.

But before you click "buy" on those Instagram ads for copper patches billed as "natural hygienic germ stoppers," it's important to distinguish between what copper is and isn't capable of doing against the virus.

It may help against germs in some instances, but it's not a panacea for prevention, since the coronavirus can still live on copper surfaces for hours. And it's certainly no substitute for other precautions, according to Dr. Miryam Wahrman, biology professor at William Paterson University and author of " The Hand Book: Surviving in a Germ-Filled World ."

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"From what we're dealing with now, I don't think there's a lot of evidence to support the usefulness of copper in terms of reducing infections," Wahrman told Insider.

"Germ-killing" ads include everything from copper discs and stickers to cell phone cases, bracelets and socks

There is a huge variety of copper products sold as "prevention tools," but they fall into four general categories.

There are wearables, such as face masks, but also tee-shirts laced with copper, and jewelry, which vendors claim "self-sanitize" if they come into contact with contagious particles.

Then there are "sanitizers," which are bars or discs made of or coated in copper. These are designed to be rubbed on your hands or other objects in order to sanitize them.

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Touch-tools, the third category, can vary widely, but picture something that looks like bottle opener or key. You might use these to open doors, push buttons, or even tap on touchscreens instead of directly interesting with those potentially germy surfaces.

Finally, there are copper-coated versions of everyday items you touch frequently, such as cellphone cases and door handles. The advantage of these over their ordinary counterparts is that germs (including coronavirus) can't survive as long on copper as on surfaces like plastic and other types of metal.

Copper can kill bacteria, but it's less effective against viruses

It's true that research has shown copper has antimicrobial properties -- it can kill germs on contact in several ways, including by damaging the cell membranes, but is most effective against bacteria, Wahrman explained.

"Copper is good as an antimicrobial against certain types of bacteria but when it comes to viruses, that's a whole different ballgame because viruses are not living cells," she said.

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An April 2020 study in the New England Journal of Medicine found copper is inhospitable for the novel coronavirus as well, as the virus has a much shorter lifespan on copper than on other surfaces such cloth, plastic, or even other metals.

That's important for environments where a lot of potential viral and bacterial particles are present, such as hospitals. A 2016 study found that using copper components in hospitals could help prevent patients from contracting other infections while hospitalized. According to the study, copper surfaces reduced the infection rate of patients by 58% (from 8.1% to 3.4%), and reduced the viral load on surfaces by 83%.

However, the study found the coronavirus can still survive as long as 4 hours on copper, and it could take as long as 45 minutes for copper to reduce even a substantial amount of the virus on a surface .

copper sink
The soap, not the metal on the sink, is what really helps prevent viral contamination.
Maryna Andriichenko/Getty Images
Most copper products do nothing more than lull you into a false sense of security, experts say

Touch-tools, which you can use to open doors, push buttons or otherwise interact with high-touch surfaces, might help by creating a barrier between contagions and your hand, but only if you keep the tool clean, too. If you're not careful to do that, this protective touch tool could simply be lulling you into feeling you're protected, when you're not.

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"The positive thing is, you're touching fewer surfaces," Wahrman said. "But then you're going to come into contact with the part that's been touching surfaces when you put it back in your purse or your pocket. It's going to give you a false sense of confidence and won't occur to you that you've actually transferred germs to yourself and your home."

As an antimicrobial surface, copper could potentially still slow the spread of infection. But experts say it's highly unlikely that, even in that unlikely scenario, it wouldn't instantly kill coronavirus germs.

"The suggestion that you can rub these items on your hands and that's going to keep you healthy, that's not scientifically supported, especially for viruses," Wahrman said.

And face masks containing copper might be even less helpful, since in order for it to be effective, the copper needs to come into direct contact with the virus. Copper-infused cloth would only work if the virus penetrates the fabric, defeating the purpose of the mask in the first place.

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"The face mask is a great barrier. They have a tight fiber so that they do block a lot of the viral particles and blocking them is key," Wahrman said. "If the viral passes through the mask, it's not going to interact with the metal anyway, so it's not going to make a difference."

For that direct contact to occur, items would need to be fully coated in copper across the entire surface. Even then, however, the virus wouldn't be eliminated instantly. There's an additional complication, too, with cleaning copper-coated objects, since typical cleaning products could interfere with the chemical properties of the metal that make it effective against viruses in the first place, according to research.

Copper might help on surfaces over time, but it can't prevent droplets direct from another person

None of these uses of copper address the most common form of contagious for the novel coronavirus, which is airborne infectious directly from person to person.

"The big problem with the coronavirus is that it travels in droplets from one person to another who inhales it and that's how most of the infections are happening. So there's no real way to get copper involved," Wahrman said.

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So, while copper could have some promising applications, particularly in high-risk settings such as hospitals, it's not a cure-all for the average person, and it can't replace traditional disinfectants, hand sanitizer, or good old fashioned soap and water, according to Wahrman.

"The original advice that's tried and true is wash your hands with soap and water or use alcohol based hand sanitizer, and you've really reduced the risk and reduced the germ load," she said.

Wearing a mask, washing your hands frequently, and maintaining social distancing are still your best bet against slowing the spread of the virus, per the CDC's advice .

[Jul 07, 2020] Approximately one in every 12 individuals, or 500 million people worldwide, is living with chronic viral hepatitis

Jul 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

somebody , Jul 6 2020 20:48 utc | 118

Posted by: Tuyzentfloot | Jul 5 2020 20:23 utc | 41

More math .

Perhaps the scariest numbers in microbiology relate to pathogenic microorganisms. Worldwide, 16 million people die from infectious disease every year, and many of these deaths are preventable. Approximately one in every 12 individuals, or 500 million people worldwide, is living with chronic viral hepatitis, and the estimated number of new chlamydial infections per year is approximately 50 million, more than the population of South Korea. The bacterium Clostridium botulinum produces a toxin so potent that 3 grams would be enough to kill the population of the United Kingdom and 400 grams would kill everyone on the planet.

In total, there are ∼1,400 known species of human pathogens (including viruses, bacteria, fungi, protozoa and helminths), and although this may seem like a large number, human pathogens account for much less than 1% of the total number of microbial species on the planet. On this point, ignoring questions about what actually constitutes a species, estimates for the total number of microbial species vary wildly, from as low as 120,000 to tens of millions and higher. Part of the reason for this large range is that we have only sequenced 1 × 10−22% of the total DNA on Earth (although the Earth Microbiome Project should improve this dramatically to 1 × 10−20% in the next 3 years). This means that the fraction of microbial diversity that we have sampled to date is effectively zero, a nice abstract entity to end on.

Have you ever wondered how Sarv-Cov-2 made it to discovery? Or how humans have managed to survive up to now?

[Jul 07, 2020] Why closed spaces are them main avenue of COVID-19 propagation

Jul 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Tuyzentfloot , Jul 5 2020 20:23 utc | 41

Airborne ballpark math: we breathe about 500 l/h when sitting down and up to 10 times that when exercising. When someone is ill and pushing 500 l/h of breath into a room with a halftime of say 4 hours then after about that time this person maintains roughly 2 cubic meters of breath in that room. For a room of 100 cubic meter that would be 2% of the air. So during a workday you'd be breathing the breath of that other person at a dilution of the order of 1%. Air conditioning recycles the air (maybe not completely I don't know the ratio) so it is not ventilation where the air is replaced. Maybe airco can pick off a large part of the particles. But that is the idea, assuming various losses and a large room you would still breathing someone elses breath diluted by a factor thousand.
I haven't found data on it but I suspect half time in cool air is considerately longer.
What talking and shouting then does is increase the amount of virus material in the air but there will be a huge increase at short distance and an unknown increase at large distance.
With this reasoning the question is not whether the virus can travel through air but how easy it is. Long halflife in air increases the chance.
High threshold of number of virus particles to have an effective transmission would decrease the chance. So I would start by measuring the amount of material we can push into the air in small droplets. How much variation is there.

So meat processing: cold air and to save energy ventilation is not good. Air is recycled a lot. People doing physical labour a whole day, not sitting. Sounds tricky independently of the hygiene question of dealing with industrially forcegrown animals

tucenz , Jul 5 2020 20:29 utc | 42

Tuyzentfloot | Jul 5 2020 20:23 utc | 40

You may need to put some gallons, pounds and feet in that post for the benefit "exceptional" nation readers.

[Jul 05, 2020] The main benefit of herd immunity is that it will allow the country to function again. And that would be good for everyone, healthy and sickly alike.

Jul 05, 2020 | www.unz.com

john cronk says: July 2, 2020 at 5:18 pm GMT 500 Words

There is no exit strategy for this haphazard insanity. Once this over-reaction to a fairly innocuous infectious agent was accepted as being necessary, there's no way to ever declare reversion to normalcy.

In my opinion, rather than endlessly focussing on this not particularly interesting virus, coming up with creative signboards and banners restricting movement, wrecking people's livelihoods and painting crosses on the pavement where one must stand, we should have been onto a more obvious problem by now. What if this HAD been a deadly pathogen? Why aren't we prepared to quickly open special quarantine/treatment centers, disconnected from regular hospitals? And what are we going to do about it?

This little rehearsal showed how unprepared we are should a real existential threat arise.
But no, we must instead continue to waste our time, money and effort in playacting that this is a real biological crisis, and creating an actual breakdown in our way of life. We must continue to double down, because if we take ever more extreme action about corona, that will prove that the idiocy we've demonstrated thus far was necessary ..right?

[Hide MORE]
Given the way corona virus is being handled, one would think we don't realize that people die quite regularly, especially when they're in bad condition. Now, we're practically demanding that nobody should die from catching a microbe – that we should stay home and hold our breath until everyone is guaranteed to survive. Since when have we ever believed that? Is that how we built civilization? The civilization that we're now destroying?

There's little reason for insulin-sensitive people – with healthy immune status and without metabolic disease – to stay home, wear a mask or 'social distance' themselves. Since they won't be getting seriously ill, their staying home wouldn't help 'flatten the curve' of sick people overburdening the healthcare system (as usual, to the expense of all of us). On the contrary, active healthy people can contribute something to the economy.

The main benefit of herd immunity is that it will allow the country to function again. And that would be good for everyone, healthy and sickly alike. The metabolically/immunologically compromised will be vulnerable to catching the corona virus from anyone who's contracted it and is temporarily contagious, no matter whether the carrier's general health is good or poor. And that's the same fix that people with poor immune function are in, always and everywhere. The answer for protecting these most vulnerable people from COVID – which is only one of the many dangers to their health that they face – can be one of two things; the best one being that they start eating right. And/or, we can build as much equipment and medical facilities, where they're most needed, as they may require. Either of these solutions is much more viable, less disruptive and less expensive than what we're doing now. And with either solution, healthier people would no longer be punished for possessing normal human vitality.

While governments, health agencies and scientists take steps to upgrade the availability of care facilities, equipment and treatments, individuals should follow this
CORONA VIRUS PROTOCOL
Part A (Everyone)
Begin a therapeutic diet to quickly upgrade and regulate the immune system. This consists of, wholly or mostly:
Home cooked meat, oily fish, eggs (especially yolks), animal fat, bone broth, collagen or gelatin, and liver, and the elimination of corn, soy, canola, safflower, sunflower, grapeseed and rice bran oils as well as flours, sugar and prepared foods.

Part B (those most at risk for COVID complications- individuals with high BMI or chronic health issues, or taking prescription medications, etc.)
While following the part A protocol, take reasonable precautions to limit your exposure to possible infection from others, such as limiting time or wearing a mask when in close contact with other people.

AaronInMVD , says: Website July 2, 2020 at 6:16 pm GMT

@john cronk with this knowledge is talk about it. Lots of talk, little action. The only active pieces on the board are hopping around and trying to do a cultural revolution and proceeding with an absolute poverty of energy.

This might be the most sedentary collapse ever. The world is taking a hard turn towards a prolonged dark age and for the lack of reaction it seems people are just going with the flow. Welcome to the future. A little bit of 1984, a heavy dose of Idiocracy, and a whole bunch of pudgy kids trying to live out their Harry Potter headcanon.

Nevermind all the attention given to "Black Lives" while Black voices (Lest we forget the 'Shaun King is transracial' scandal of not long ago) are shut out of the conversation Nonsense reigns!

[Jul 03, 2020] Hydroxychloroquine lowers COVID-19 death rate, Henry Ford Health study finds - Detroit News

Notable quotes:
"... The study analyzed 2,541 patients hospitalized among the system's six hospitals between March 10 and May 2 and found 13% of those treated with hydroxychloroquine died while 26% of those who did not receive the drug died. ..."
"... Among all patients in the study, there was an overall in-hospital mortality rate of 18%, and many who died had underlying conditions that put them at greater risk, according to Henry Ford Health System. Globally, the mortality rate for hospitalized patients is between 10% and 30%, and it's 58% among those in the intensive care unit or on a ventilator." Detroit News ..."
"... A long "take down" of Fauci: https://www.unz.com/audio/kbarrett_ken-mccarthy-tony-fauci-is-corrupt-to-the-core/ ..."
"... This is not Fauci's first rodeo. He's been pumping hysteria for 36 years. He always gets it wrong. He was wrong about swine flu. He was wrong about bird flu. He was wrong about Zika. He was wrong about Ebola. He wildly exaggerated AIDS. And he always is wrong in the favor of pharmaceutical companies. And he's always wrong in favor of 'we've got to develop a vaccine now. We have to throw out all the rules. ..."
"... Observational studies are never the equivalent of double-blind randomized studies; but there can still provide important and fare more readily obtained early information about these connections and conditions. ..."
"... This stuff is hard. There are lots of variations in patient populations and treatment protocols. We have to consider doses, concomitant meds (such as azithromycin), patient status at time of treatment, age, and, comorbidities. ..."
"... the recently halted NIH trial was randomized, double-blinded; this was in a hospital setting. The prophylactic trial reported at the beginning of June in NEJM (author Boulware) was also randomized, double-blinded; this was in a prophylactic setting. ..."
Jul 03, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

"A Henry Ford Health System study shows the controversial anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine helps lower the death rate of COVID-19 patients, the Detroit-based health system said Thursday.

Officials with the Michigan health system said the study found the drug "significantly" decreased the death rate of patients involved in the analysis.

The study analyzed 2,541 patients hospitalized among the system's six hospitals between March 10 and May 2 and found 13% of those treated with hydroxychloroquine died while 26% of those who did not receive the drug died.

Among all patients in the study, there was an overall in-hospital mortality rate of 18%, and many who died had underlying conditions that put them at greater risk, according to Henry Ford Health System. Globally, the mortality rate for hospitalized patients is between 10% and 30%, and it's 58% among those in the intensive care unit or on a ventilator." Detroit News

-----------------

No comment needed. pl

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/07/02/michigan-henry-ford-health-study-finds-hydroxychloroquine-lowers-covid-19-death-rate/5365090002/


Fred , 03 July 2020 at 11:38 AM

I agree, no comment is needed. Some charges for medical malpractice and malfeasance certainly are.

John Credulous , 03 July 2020 at 01:06 PM

Fred,

There will be no accountability: The b-stards have set the standards.

A long "take down" of Fauci: https://www.unz.com/audio/kbarrett_ken-mccarthy-tony-fauci-is-corrupt-to-the-core/

BillWade` , 03 July 2020 at 01:09 PM

Damn it, it's too cheap!

Deap , 03 July 2020 at 01:54 PM

Uncharted research: areas where anti-malarial drugs are sold widely over the counter - in malaria prone parts of the world - eg: Central America, SEA and Pacific Islands. How do their covid rates relate to these specific localities (not just generalized country numbers), where ongoing prophylactic sales of OTC anti-malaria drugs are most prevalent?

Why does the CDC travel and tourism website info still recommend taking anti-malarial drugs, when the other hand of our deep state bureaucrats are screaming these drugs will kill you?

Observational studies are never the equivalent of double-blind randomized studies; but there can still provide important and fare more readily obtained early information about these connections and conditions.

jonst , 03 July 2020 at 01:56 PM

No comment/s needed perhaps. But deliciously anticipated. Here, from the Committee, and especially from the MSM. Even if only silence. Because "silence is really violence" in this case.

John Credulous , 03 July 2020 at 02:17 PM

FWIW, Jimmie Moglia's erudition is formidable, and as a stylist, not too distracting:

https://www.yourdailyshakespeare.com/2020/04/11/the-coronavirus-and-galileo/
As for me I am reminded of the advice that Timon of Athens gave to two robbers who came to see him, "Trust not the physician, for his antidotes are poison, and he slays more than you rob."

https://www.yourdailyshakespeare.com/2020/06/08/the-world-upside-down/
And here is an example, a reported 'case-study'. A prince of Persia had melancholia and suffered from the delusion of being a cow. He would moo like a cow, crying "Kill me so that a good stew may be made of my flesh," and would never eat anything. Avicenna was persuaded to treat the case and sent a message to the patient, asking him to be happy as the butcher was coming to slaughter him. The sick man rejoiced. When Avicenna approached the prince with a knife in his hand, he asked, "Where is the cow so I may kill it."

The patient then mooed like a cow to indicate where he was. He was then laid on the ground for slaughter. When Avicenna approached the patient pretending to slaughter him, he said, "The cow is too lean and not ready to be killed. He must be fed properly and I will kill it when it becomes healthy and fat. The patient was then offered food, which he ate eagerly and gradually gained strength, got rid of his delusion, and was completely cured.

How relevant may be the Avicennian case study to the current dynamics of the pandemic I will leave it to my possible and patient readers to decide.

Ulenspiegel , 03 July 2020 at 02:20 PM

"No comment needed."


What was the difference between the Michigan study and the others, which found no positive ecffect?

How do you explain the low mortality of the control group in the Michigan study?

egl , 03 July 2020 at 02:31 PM

"Limitations to our analysis include the retrospective, non-randomized, non-blinded study design."

turcopolier , 03 July 2020 at 02:51 PM

ulenspiegel

Dr. Marc Siegel a medical correspondent for Foxnews told T. Carlson weeks ago that an emergency treatment of this drug saved the life of his 96 year old father who was at the point of death, cured him overnight in fact.

Babak makkinejad , 03 July 2020 at 03:27 PM

Utenspiegel

It is a fact that cancer drugs are not uniformly effective in all patients.

The causes must be sought in the genotypes of the patients.

The differential response as well as effectiveness are not reasons to discard a therapy.

In further news on COVID-19 Treatments I have 2 items to report:

First one:

The 3-drug mixture of Azittomycin, Naproxen, and prednisolone (oral or injectable) have been used successfully for reduction of the inflammation of respiratory system.

3 systematic trials have been undertaken and results were conclusive in expediting faster recovery.

Second one:

Clinical trials in Iran (in Masih Daneshvari hospital) – indicated 100% cure of COVID-19 in 20 patients using a combination of ReciGen and Cultera (sic?) which is an AIDS drug.

A second group of patients – 152 – had a reduction in mortality of 20% as compared to those who were only receiving Cultera (sic.?)


https://www.cinnagen.com/Product.aspx?t=2&l=1&Id=66&f=3

The results are supposed to be published in the Journal of Immunopharmacotherapy.

The dosage was: 5 times day, 12 million units.

No side effects were reported.

egl , 03 July 2020 at 03:57 PM

ulenspiegel:

This stuff is hard. There are lots of variations in patient populations and treatment protocols. We have to consider doses, concomitant meds (such as azithromycin), patient status at time of treatment, age, and, comorbidities.

A big difference: the Ford study was not randomized, not double-blinded. They used a statistical technique to try to make the groups comparable on factors believed to be relevant, but this is after fact. (It's a nice technique, I've used it myself, but it doesn't magically solve all of the difficulties of retrospective analysis.)

In contrast, the recently halted NIH trial was randomized, double-blinded; this was in a hospital setting. The prophylactic trial reported at the beginning of June in NEJM (author Boulware) was also randomized, double-blinded; this was in a prophylactic setting.

Seward , 03 July 2020 at 06:00 PM

Hydroxychloroquine is the active ingredient in the tonic portion of gin and tonics, which I've been drinking for prophylactic purposes since the pandemic began.

[Jul 03, 2020] The current reserach suggests that while the G614 variant may be more infectious, it is not more pathogenic.

Jul 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Mina , Jul 3 2020 12:57 utc | 134

"The current work suggests that while the G614 variant may be more infectious, it is not more pathogenic. There is a hope that as SARS-CoV-2 infection spreads, the virus might become less pathogenic,"

i.e. that if schools had been left open, it would have spread and became less pathogenic earlier.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/02/health/coronavirus-mutation-spread-study/index.html

[Jul 02, 2020] Public Outcry Follows Gilead Decision to Charge $3000 for COVID Drug that Costs Pennies to Produce

Notable quotes:
"... Journal of Virus Eradication ..."
"... Alan MacLeod is a Staff Writer for MintPress News. After completing his PhD in 2017 he published two books: Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting and Propaganda in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent . He has also contributed to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting , The Guardian , Salon , The Grayzone , Jacobin Magazine , Common Dreams the American Herald Tribune and The Canary . ..."
Jul 02, 2020 | www.mintpressnews.com

alifornia-based pharmaceutical giant Gilead Sciences has announced that a five-day course of its antiviral drug Remdesivir -- shown in tests to effectively fight COVID-19 -- will cost $3,120 to Americans with health insurance and $2,340 to those on Medicaid. Yet research published in April calculated that the drug could be produced at a profit for as little as $0.93 per day.

The study, led by Dr. Andrew Hill from the Department of Translational Medicine, University of Liverpool, U.K., and published in the Journal of Virus Eradication , found that a five-day course of lifesaving Remdesivir could be mass-produced for less than the cost of a Subway sandwich. So cheap is the drug that the saline solution and the syringe needed to administer it would be more costly. MintPress spoke with Dr. Hill, who was dismayed by the company's announcement.

We are in a health emergency. We can't have a situation right now where people are unable to access medicine because the prices are too high. Remdesivir is a drug that has had its development costs paid for, in large part, by independent donors like governments and ministries of health in China, the WHO, and the U.S. government. So why should a company be making money in the middle of a pandemic by selling a drug which has largely been developed independently of them?" he said.

https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=AlanRMacLeod&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-1&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1278229120711716865&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mintpressnews.com%2Fpublic-outcry-gilead-charges-3000-covid-19-drug-cost-pennies%2F269110%2F&siteScreenName=MintPressNews&theme=light&widgetsVersion=9066bb2%3A1593540614199&width=500px

News of the decision led to an explosion of public anger. "As Gilead charges $3,120 for its COVID drug, Remdesivir, remember that the drug was developed with a $70,000,000 grant from the federal government paid for by American taxpayers. Once again, Big Pharma is set to profit on the people's dime," wrote former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich. "This isn't healthcare. It's extortion," appeared to be the overwhelming sentiment on social media.

Gilead itself, however, seemed not to share this sentiment. Indeed, its press release on the subject positioned its decision as a selfless and magnanimous gesture of corporate philanthropy. "We approached this with the aim of helping as many patients as possible, as quickly as possible and in the most responsible way," said its CEO, Daniel O'Day, adding that, "under normal circumstances" the company would have charged the public $12,000 per patient.

"A new low"

Remdesivir is an intravenous antiviral drug that has been used to fight other coronaviruses like SARS and MERS and has shown some effectiveness against Ebola. Although far from a miracle treatment, studies have concluded that it aids recovery, reducing the average hospital visit for COVID-19 patients from 15 days to 11 days when compared to a placebo. Like with everything coronavirus-related, there is no absolute scientific consensus. In late April, the WHO accidentally leaked a Chinese study that suggested Remdesivir may not be as effective as Gilead claims it to be. Nevertheless, the Trump administration has now bought up the entire world's stock of the drug, effectively confiscating it and shutting out every other country from the medicine.

"I've been working in medicine for 32 years and I have never seen anything like it. I've never seen a country be that brazen. We have to work together. This could be a taste of the future. They've tried to also do this with advanced orders of vaccines. Imagine if we had a 100 percent effective vaccine and it only went to Americans," Dr. Hill told MintPress .

At the moment people don't quite understand the gravity of the decision that the American government has made. This is a worldwide epidemic and we have got to remember that the clinical trials of Remdesivir were not just conducted in the United States; they were conducted around European and Chinese centers. Patients put themselves at risk to take part in an experimental drug trial, and the gratitude we get as other countries after our people were involved in these studies is to be shut out of the future supply of the drug?! It is simply ethically unacceptable. I think there are serious questions to be answered. This is a new low ground, unfortunately," he added.

https://twitter.com/leahmcelrath/status/1277821241496408071

Gilead has been under considerable public scrutiny of late. The company, which announced profits of $5.4 billion last year, has increased its value by $15 billion since the pandemic began. In December, MintPress reported that it was being sued, accused of deliberately holding back a lifesaving HIV drug to extend the profitability of their previous, inferior one. With shades of the Remdesivir announcement, the drug is sold in Australia for $8 per month, but the company charges Americans around $2,000 for the same dosage. "Gilead has a long history of profiteering," said Dr. Hill. "Its CEO is a billionaire and has been accused of tax avoidance; by keeping their intellectual property in Ireland they avoided $10 billion in taxes in 2016 and they sell drugs for between 100 and 1,000 times the cost of production. And nobody is stopping them. I think this is a taste of things to come if we don't have better controls on the pharmaceutical industry's excesses."

As of Wednesday morning, there have been 2.73 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States, the six worst days for the virus in terms of infections all occurring in the previous week.

Feature photo | A lab tech displays a package of the Remdesivir at the Eva Pharma Facility in Cairo, Egypt June 29, 2020. Amr Abdallah | Reuters

Alan MacLeod is a Staff Writer for MintPress News. After completing his PhD in 2017 he published two books: Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting and Propaganda in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent . He has also contributed to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting , The Guardian , Salon , The Grayzone , Jacobin Magazine , Common Dreams the American Herald Tribune and The Canary .

[Jul 02, 2020] Would you like brain damage with your fries? America's favorite cooking oil causes neurological changes, says animal study by Peter Andrews

Notable quotes:
"... Considering the evidence, the authors believe that soybean oil could increase the risk of Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, and autism. However, there is no concrete proof yet that soybean oil causes these conditions, since this research was conducted on male mice only. But mice are used as a model organism for human health for a reason, as a mammal species they have similar tissues and genetics to us, and it is reasonable to provisionally project some of the authors' health warnings onto humans. ..."
"... There is a genetically engineered form of soybean oil that has a lower linoleic acid (LA) content, and this form is healthier for the heart. The authors also fed mice this form to see whether the results would be any better, but the low-LA form had a similarly detrimental effect on the mice's brains. ..."
Jan 24, 2020 | www.rt.com

New research has shown that despite being marketed as a healthy alternative, soybean oil, America's most popular oil, causes neurological changes in the brains of mice, and may contribute to autism and dementia in humans. Extracted from the seeds of soybeans and used in everything from fast food to animal feed and even baby formula, soybean oil is easily the most widely consumed oil in the US, ubiquitous in the national cuisine.

It's in McDonald's fries, Pizza Hut crust, and the "healthy" 9-grain bread used for your Subway sandwich.

A research team from University of California, Riverside has been studying the impact of soybean oil for several years. They previously found that it induces diabetes and obesity in mice, hardly surprising given that vegetable oils are high in saturated and unsaturated fatty acids. By now, most people know that eating too much fried food is bad for your ticker.

Also on rt.com If new gene-edited cooking oil is a scientific marvel just say so - but don't secretly feed it to us

But what is really shocking about their latest findings is the effect soybean oil seems to have on the brain.

From Alzheimer's to autism

The study is published in Endocrinology, a scientific journal, and it shows that when soybean oil is fed to mice it has major impact on their hypothalamus, an area of the brain crucial for regulating mood and behaviour.

Also on rt.com What are toxic 'forever chemicals' & should Americans be worried there are more of them in the water supply than we thought?

More worryingly, it even affected over 100 of the mice's genes, including one for controlling oxytocin, the love and bonding hormone. Soybean-fed mice showed lower levels of oxytocin in the hypothalamus. Other genes affected had to do with metabolic and hormone pathways, including the insulin pathway, synonymous with diabetes. There was also upregulation of genes associated with anxiety, depression, and schizophrenia.

Considering the evidence, the authors believe that soybean oil could increase the risk of Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, and autism. However, there is no concrete proof yet that soybean oil causes these conditions, since this research was conducted on male mice only. But mice are used as a model organism for human health for a reason, as a mammal species they have similar tissues and genetics to us, and it is reasonable to provisionally project some of the authors' health warnings onto humans.

Lead author Poonamjot Deol said: "If there's one message I want people to take away, it's this: reduce consumption of soybean oil."

Is the GM version better?

There is a genetically engineered form of soybean oil that has a lower linoleic acid (LA) content, and this form is healthier for the heart. The authors also fed mice this form to see whether the results would be any better, but the low-LA form had a similarly detrimental effect on the mice's brains.

Also on rt.com Canada launches major class-action lawsuit against Monsanto's Roundup & owner Bayer

It is produced from what are called Roundup Ready soybeans, designed for use with the signature product of bought-out agrochemical firm Monsanto, which is embroiled in a controversy of its own.

Peter Andrews is an Irish science journalist and writer, based in London. He has a background in the life sciences, and graduated from the University of Glasgow with a degree in Genetics.

[Jun 29, 2020] Gilead Will Charge More Than $3,000 For A Course Of COVID-19 Drug Remdesivir

Highly recommended!
Corrupt Fauci, stupid customers. IT the same neoliberal story of profiteering as a virtue all over again.
The government bought by Big Pharma, and Big Pharma out or control with questionable drugs and methods are two side of the same coin
Jun 29, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

On Monday, Gilead disclosed its pricing plan for Gilead as it prepares to begin charging for the drug at the beginning of next month (several international governments have already placed orders). Given the high demand, thanks in part due to the breathless media coverage despite the drug's still-questionable study data, Gilead apparently feels justified in charging $3,120 for a patient getting the shorter, more common, treatment course, and $5,720 for the longer course for more seriously ill patients. These are the prices for patients with commercial insurance in the US, according to Gilead's official pricing plan.

As per usual, the price charged to those on government plans will be lower, and hospitals will also receive a slight discount. Additionally, the US is the only developed country where Gilead will charge two prices, according to Gilead CEO Daniel O'Day. In much of Europe and Canada, governments negotiate drug prices directly with drugmakers (in the US, laws dictate that drug makers must "discount" their drugs for Medicare and Medicaid plans).

But according to O'Day, the drug is priced "far below the value it brings" to the health-care system.

However, we'd argue that this actually isn't true. Remdesivir was developed by Gilead to treat Ebola, but the drug was never approved by the FDA for this use, which caused Gilead to shelve the drug until COVID-19 presented another opportunity. Even before the first study had finished, the company was already pushing propaganda about the promising nature of the drug. Meanwhile, the CDC, WHO and other organizations were raising doubts about the effectiveness of steroid medications.

Months later, the only study on the steroid dexomethasone, a cheap steroid that costs less than $50 for a 100-dose regimen, has shown that dexomethasone is the only drug so far that has proven effective at lowering COVID-19 related mortality. Remdesivir, despite the fact that it has been tested in several high quality trials, has not.

So, why is the American government in partnership with Gilead still pushing this questionable, and staggeringly expensive, medication on the public?

[Jun 28, 2020] New COVID19 treatment protocol specifically targets the cytokine storm and they use heparin for the blood clots

Jun 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , Jun 28 2020 14:08 utc | 3

"My hunch is that by now doctors have learned much more about the disease's progression (cytokine storm, blood clotting) and how to manage it."

I believe the UK is where the dexamethasone Study was done. Possibly more doctors are using it. The Front-Line COVID-19 Critical Care Working Group have been pushing corticosteroids as the main treatment in their MATH+ Protocol, and they believe the UK study provides evidence that they are on the right track. Their Protocol specifically targets the cytokine storm and they use heparin for the blood clots. Now if they can only get a full-fledged trial going. Unfortunately their Web site doesn't provide much info about how much traction they're getting promoting their Protocol.

The 1918 SF article proves that morons are morons no matter how many years have passed. I'm sure there were such during the Black Plague. I sincerely hope the coronavirus mutates before the second wave and starts killing all the younger people just to see their reaction when they have to bear the brunt. Can't wait for all the "it's just the flu" BS from these morons to dry up.

[Jun 28, 2020] European study links genes, blood type with risk of severe coronavirus infection

Notable quotes:
"... "Our genetic data confirm that blood group O is associated with a risk of acquiring Covid-19 that was lower than that in non-O blood groups, whereas blood group A was associated with a higher risk than non-A blood groups," the researchers wrote in their report. They found people with Type A blood had a 45% higher risk of becoming infected than people with other blood types, and people with Type O blood were just 65% as likely to become infected as people with other blood types. ..."
Jun 28, 2020 | www.blogger.com
Anonymous Fred C. Dobbs said...
European study links genes, blood type with risk of severe coronavirus infection

(CNN - June 18) A team of European scientists say they have found two genetic variations that may show who is more likely to get very sick and die from coronavirus, and they say they have also found a link to blood type.

Their findings, published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine, point to a possible explanation for why some people get so seriously ill with the virus, while most barely show any symptoms at all.

(NEJM: Genomewide Association Study of Severe Covid-19 with Respiratory Failure )

They found people with Type A blood have a higher risk of catching coronavirus and of developing severe symptoms, while people with Type O blood have a lower risk.

"Our genetic data confirm that blood group O is associated with a risk of acquiring Covid-19 that was lower than that in non-O blood groups, whereas blood group A was associated with a higher risk than non-A blood groups," the researchers wrote in their report. They found people with Type A blood had a 45% higher risk of becoming infected than people with other blood types, and people with Type O blood were just 65% as likely to become infected as people with other blood types. ...

June 27, 2020 at 9:41 AM

[Jun 28, 2020] Genomewide Association Study of Severe Covid-19 with Respiratory Failure

Jun 17, 2020 | www.blogger.com
Anonymous said...
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2020283

June 17, 2020

Genomewide Association Study of Severe Covid-19 with Respiratory Failure
By David Ellinghaus, Ph.D., Frauke Degenhardt, M.Sc., Luis Bujanda, M.D., Ph.D., Maria Buti, M.D., Ph.D., Agustín Albillos, M.D., Ph.D., Pietro Invernizzi, M.D., Ph.D., Javier Fernández, M.D., Ph.D., Daniele Prati, M.D., Guido Baselli, Ph.D., Rosanna Asselta, Ph.D., Marit M. Grimsrud, M.D., Chiara Milani, Ph.D., et al. for The Severe Covid-19 GWAS Group
Abstract

BACKGROUND

There is considerable variation in disease behavior among patients infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19). Genomewide association analysis may allow for the identification of potential genetic factors involved in the development of Covid-19....

[Jun 28, 2020] Coronavirus Causes Weaponized 'Tentacles' To Sprout From Infected Cells, Directly Inject Virus Into New Ones

Jun 28, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Coronavirus Causes Weaponized 'Tentacles' To Sprout From Infected Cells, Directly Inject Virus Into New Ones


by Tyler Durden Fri, 06/26/2020 - 19:25 The virus behind COVID-19 causes infected cells to sprout 'tentacles' which allow the virus to attack several nearby cells at once - poking holes which allow the disease to easily transfer inside.

This nightmare fuel was discovered by researchers led by the University of California, San Francisco.

" There are long strings that poke holes in other cells and the virus passes through the tube from cell to cell ," said UCSF's Director of the Quantitative Biosciences Institute, Professor Nevan Krogan. " Our hypothesis is that these speed up infection. "

The images taken by scientists at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) laboratory in the US and University of Freiburg in Germany will be published in the medical journal Cell on Saturday.

Most viruses do not cause infected cells to grow these tentacles . Even those that do, such as smallpox, do not have as many or the same type of branching as Sars-Cov-2, the virus behind Covid-19. - FT

According to the report, the silver lining is that the tentacle discovery may pave the way for a number of drugs to work against the disease - most of which were previously being used to treat cancer.

"It totally makes sense there's an overlap in anticancer drugs and an antiviral effect," said Prof. Krogan, who added that cancers, HIV and SARS-CoV-2 are all searching for the "Achilles heel of the cell."

Potential drugs include silmitasertib, made by Taiwan-based Senhwa Biosciences - which is working with the NIH on trials in the US. The drug works by inhibiting the CK2 enzyme which is used to build the tubes.

The drug is one of five which were found to be more effective against the virus than Gilead's remdesivir , including FDA-approved Xospata (aka gilteritinib) made by Japan-based Astellas Pharma, Eli Lily's FDA-approved abemaciclib (Verzenio) and ralimetinib, and dasatinib, made by Bristol-Meyers Squibb.

Remember, the official narrative is that the virus - which specializes in infecting humans and packs ultra-rare 'infection tentacles' - did not emerge from a Chinese biolab located at 'ground zero' for the pandemic, where scientists had previously come under international scrutiny for conducting 'gain of function' experiments in which chimeric coronaviruses were genetically engineered for the sole purpose of infecting humans.

But we digress.

play_arrow Shemp 4 Victory , 1 hour ago

Remember, the official narrative is that the virus - which specializes in infecting humans and packs ultra-rare 'infection tentacles' - did not emerge from a Chinese biolab located at 'ground zero' for the pandemic, where scientists had previously come under international scrutiny for conducting 'gain of function' experiments in which chimeric coronaviruses were genetically engineered for the sole purpose of infecting humans.

Well, the funny thing is that, despite all the hand-wringing histrionics of the Falun Gong/Epoch Times cultists, the story of a "weaponized CCP virus" is still just a clickbait fairy tale. The fact remains that there is zero evidence that the virus emerged from a Chinese biolab. Zero. Nada. Null. The empty set.

But hey, US citizen society is articulated around monetization of conflicts (among other things) and cannot do without it. This is how the US has killed the possibility of debate.

Debate as a means of investigating truth requires to accept facts. In US citizenism, admittance of facts is counter-balanced by denial of facts. Which one is better to monetize?

When it comes to US citizens, it is always good to balance admittance with denial, trying to figure out which one is the most profitable. US citizens always weigh whether it is more profitable to deny or admit facts, and they usually choose profits over truth.

It is no critical thinking here, it is no education. It is US citizenism. If it is profitable to deny facts, well, US citizens deny. And will keep denying until it is no longer profitable.

You can apply this to all fields touched by US citizens. It never misses, because US citizens nature is eternal.

Truth, justice, freedom: US motto.

JGResearch , 1 hour ago

It was made in Japan., and the U.K.

Japan's Demon Of BioWar Kawaoka Inserted HIV Force Multipliers Inside The Wuhan Virus - No governments will ever state this truth. It would lead to war and even the Chinese do want that. They want business back to normal. The Chinese are not so concern about some workers and elders who are on the public welfare.

It is still a Bio-engineered virus, but it is from Veterinary labs that are not being watched like Bio 4 labs, from second generation of Unit 731. Who knows bat and fish better than anyone else, it is the Veterinary labs. Imperial Japanese have a long history with China. For the most part, Suzuki's military-dominated cabinet favored continuing the war. For the Japanese, surrender was unthinkable -- Japan had never been successfully invaded or lost a war in its history, plus they were hit with two Atomic weapons. You think they forgot about at that?

The dark side of microbiology finds its haven inside the dozens of veterinary schools outside the authority of the WHO, CDC, NIH and equivalent professional supervisory bodies and reporting-review systems.

Exhibit A: To summarize, a decade ago at his lab in Wisconsin with generous funding from Japanese state institutions, Kawaoka was developing an "unstoppable flu", secretly derived from an illegal exhumation of the Arctic frozen corpse of an Alaskan native who died in the 1918-19 influenza pandemic, which killed up to 80 million worldwide. We learned of Kawaoka's reckless violations of science ethics from Robert Finnegan, former editor of the Jakarta Post, who was tracking the theft of MERS and other virus samples from NAMRU-2 (U.S. Navy Research Unit) by a senior local lab technician who personally smuggled the dangerous materials to U Wisconsin.

Exhibit B is a 2011 research paper by Y. Kawaoka and two colleagues at his animal virology lab at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, titled "HIV reverse-binding protein is essential for influenza A virus replication and promotes genome-trafficking in late-stage infection". Published in the Journal of Virology, September 2011, it's an admission of guilt for preparing the emergence of the Wuhan contagion.

JGResearch , 1 hour ago

The original plan: The dilution of toxicity indicates the objective as being mild symptoms diagnosed as a case of food poisoning. On a massive scale, a food poisoning scandal would lead to the shut down of fisheries and aquaculture in a huge blow to national food security.

However, what's so amazing about the Wuhan coronavirus was its regeneration after being clipped of virulence-causing genes that intensify the pain of symptoms in its victims. nCov2019 somehow reconstructed alternative sequences to replace the lopped-off gene sequence. The Japanese ignore the morphogenetic fields of the virus.

Therein lies the rub. Prophetically, Kawaoka foresaw HIV acting in unexpected ways in constructing new flu virions and their components, which likely explains how and why the at-first relatively mild version bio-engineered Wuhan coronavirus was self-altered in its third or fourth generation with highly lethal proteins, a spontaneous Gain of Function, which transformed 2019-nCov into a raging killer.

This is exactly what occurred in early January when the Chinese government banned fishing and consumption of fish along the entire 6,300 km (3,900 miles) length of the Yangtze River.

JGResearch , 1 hour ago

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3044376/china-bans-fishing-depleted-yangtze-river-10-years-protect

https://jvi.asm.org/content/85/18/9588

https://jvi.asm.org/content/85/18

DefendYourBase , 1 hour ago

JUST DA FLU!

warsev , 2 hours ago

I've read any number of articles from "experts" in the field who claim that this thing is "engineered". The "experts" get very little play outside of a small echo chamber. I want to know when anyone with any political clout will start shouting about it more broadly. Doesn't seem likely.

Cthonic , 1 hour ago

accredited virologists are kept in line

http://tapnewswire.com/2016/02/list-of-over-100-dead-microbiologists/

Cthonic , 1 hour ago

have another 100 hits

https://time.com/3003840/malaysia-airlines-ukraine-crash-top-aids-researchers-killed-aids2014-mh17/

DFCtomm , 2 hours ago

I caught an episode of peak prosperity on youtube the other day and they were talking about supercells and multiple nuclei. This makes sense. This virus behaves more like a colonizing bacteria.

4Celts , 2 hours ago

What I was most disgusted by the " Task Force " presser today, was that the orchestrators have noticed all of the pushback on the statistics showing the small demographic that was most effected by this " virus . So , they put the maggot Fauci out there to say the " young " who are asymptomatic were the cause of the " second wave " , and they should really curb their youthful bravado and instead be very mindful that " they " could spread this to the immunodeficient , both the elderly and the child with cancer. A totally spineless, and despicable tact.

FrankDrakman , 2 hours ago

In Ontario, 1.3 million have been tested for the virus. Outside of nursing homes, only 960 have died.

Can you divide 960 by 1.3 million, "boob"? Let me help you.. 130,000 is 10%, 13,000 is 1%, and 1,300 is 0.1%

960 is .078%. In other words, you have 99.92% chance of surviving this bug. Wow, 'far more deadly than originally thought', indeed.

[Jun 28, 2020] Diabetes is linked to a higher risk of death from the new coronavirus

Jun 28, 2020 | www.blogger.com
ilsm said...
Anonymous,

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00502-w

"11 May -- High risk of COVID-19 death for minority ethnic groups is a troubling mystery:"

"People who are not white face a substantially higher risk of dying from COVID-19 than do white people -- and pre-existing health conditions and socioeconomic factors explain only a small part of the higher risk."

"In the most sweeping study of its kind, Ben Goldacre at the University of Oxford, UK, and his colleagues examined the medical records of more than 17 million residents of England (E. Williamson et al. Preprint at medRxiv http://doi.org/dt9z; 2020). The analysis, which has not yet been peer reviewed, showed that medical conditions such as diabetes are linked to a higher risk of death from the new coronavirus."

"But the prevalence of such conditions in people who belong to minority ethnic groups plays only a small part in the heightened risk, as does the prevalence of social disadvantages such as low income. The researchers say that there is an urgent need for better measures to protect people in minority ethnic groups from the disease."

This is from Nature daily Covid 19 update. Which is good reading and covers vaccines, and anti body treatments which may be used by Autumn. See ELI Lilly and Regenron debvelopments.

June 26, 2020 at 2:51 PM

Anonymous Anonymous said...
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/us/corona-virus-latinos.html

June 26, 2020

Many Latinos Couldn't Stay Home. Now Virus Cases Are Soaring in the Community.
Rates of coronavirus infection among Latinos have risen rapidly across the United States.
By Shawn Hubler, Thomas Fuller, Anjali Singhvi and Juliette Love

June 26, 2020 at 1:48 PM

[Jun 28, 2020] Nobel Prize winner Dr Michael Levitt postulated that the virus burns out when it has infected 15-20% of the population

Jun 28, 2020 | www.blogger.com
Anonymous ilsm said...
JBR,

Thanks for your forbearances, misguided as you may be.

You do not answer questions, you do not like. Okay, with me. You could attempt to revise my conclusions on your lack of openness to countering evidence.

For Fred, from my son's latest input. Fred is an RPI alum, within a years or two, with me:

"Stockholm is the best population to test Covid theory whereby it was hit hard early and did not have lockdowns.
Nobel Prize winner Dr Michael Levitt postulated that the virus burns out when it has infected 15-20% of the population.
According to this, he's right...What does this mean for the US?
If you look at the rest of Sweden, you see a bumpier curve because different counties get hit at later times

The same will probably happen in states which were not hit hard during the first wave"

The tweet thread goes on to list the states that have not yet reached the 20% threshold, which is many, though if these states only need to reach 15-20% to exit the first wave, then most of them are at least halfway there."

https://twitter.com/gummibear737/status/1275118332887392256?fbclid=IwAR3udQL8UNl8o05RTmtpOmlxDyVb57NptU9WqwhAzUXe9J1WfKE1FF4PYnY

Why the US is in for rocky road with or without "second wave".

Concluding any of oit due to Trump is a stretch.

June 26, 2020 at 8:57 AM

[Jun 23, 2020] Stanford Prof Median Infection Fatality Rate Of COVID-19 For Those Under-70 Is Just 0.04%

Jun 23, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Stanford Prof: Median Infection Fatality Rate Of COVID-19 For Those Under-70 Is Just 0.04% by Tyler Durden Mon, 06/22/2020 - 22:50 Authored by Daniel Payne via JustTheNews.com,

A scientist known for his contrarian takes to dire COVID-19 predictions has released a paper claiming that antibody evidence suggests the median coronavirus infection fatality rate for those under 70 is just 0.04%.

The estimate throws into sharp relief the lopsided mortality figures for the disease, which has claimed an inordinate number of elderly people across the planet while leaving younger individuals mostly unscathed.

John Ioannidis, a professor of epidemiology and population health at Stanford University, argues in a paper published earlier this month that COVID-19 "seroprevalence studies," which measure infection rates using the presence of antibodies in blood samples, "typically show a much lower fatality than initially speculated in the earlier days of the pandemic."

"It should be appreciated," he writes in the paper, "that [the fatality rate] is not a fixed physical constant and it can vary substantially across locations, depending on the population structure, the case-mix of infected and deceased individuals and other, local factors. "

In the paper, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, Ioannidis surveyed 23 different seroprevalence studies and found that "among people <70 years old, infection fatality rates ranged from ... 0.00-0.23% with median of 0.04%."

The median fatality rate of all cases, he writes, is 0.26%, significantly lower than some earlier estimates that suggested rates as high as over 3%.

In the paper, Ioannidis acknowledges that "while COVID-19 is a formidable threat," the apparently low fatality rate compared to earlier estimates "is a welcome piece of evidence."

"Decision-makers can use measures that will try to avert having the virus infect people and settings who are at high risk of severe outcomes," he writes.

"These measures may be possible to be far more precise and tailored to specific high- risk individuals and settings than blind lockdown of the entire society."

[Jun 22, 2020] With the lack of humanely adequate, publicly mandated sick leave in the USA it's easy to see how infectious diseases can get out of control.

Notable quotes:
"... The Elite are gambling that a lid can be placed on the unrest by police/mercenaries, surveillance, and propaganda until a for-profit treatment or vaccine becomes available. That the hundreds of thousands of Americans, Britons or Swedes are dying is of no matter to the top 10% in these nations. ..."
"... The Western Establishment is also in full blown denial. The Empire has fallen. North and South America are sick continents that will have to be quarantined from the coronavirus free nations for the foreseeable future ..."
Jun 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

robjira , Jun 19 2020 18:52 utc | 14

I think Thierry Meyssan says it best here . The economic portion alone of the US reaction to the latest thing we're all supposed to be freaking-out over should be sufficient to cast doubt on the entire narrative. I make no claim to being the sharpest blade in the drawer, but frankly something stinks about all this.

As to mask wearing, well I had to continue showing up to work (a grocery co-op) when everything hit the fan, and mask wearing in all sections has been required.

It's true that US culture doesn't encourage regard for others in ordinary times, hence the infrequent use of masks by those who are ill even when there isn't a pandemic in town (hence my suspicion that this SARS2, or whatever has already been going around and resulted in me being infected by those who'd continue showing up for work while still sniffling and coughing, without masks ).

Couple this with the lack of humanely adequate, publicly mandated sick leave and it's easy to see how diseases can get out of control.

So yes, I agree that mask wearing by those who are experiencing symptoms , is every bit as conducive to common health (and courtesy) as covering ones mouth when sneezing or coughing, along with frequent hand washing. Making mask wearing an overarching requirement might be pushing things, imo. I guess my reasoning behind this is the tendency to social ostracism that can result from making such societal wide requirements (full disclosure; I wear the mask when required, too). In short, yes by all means wear an effing mask if you're feeling sick, or if the allergies are particularly bad; you don't want to get anyone else sick, and it's the nice thing to do. But do not give in to panic every time someone sneezes, or your local flu season comes calling.

Most would agree that the US has been overtaken by cynical "political correctness (witness the recent laughable displays of 'solidarity' from legislators and capitalists)." There's a great line in the Tao De Jing ; "when there is an overabundance of morality, hypocrites abound." This recent trend toward hyper-morality is being exploited once again by authorities to keep the population at large divided against itself, same as "left" vs. "right" or "black" vs. "white" have been so exploited. It is this sort of division that keeps the usual scumbags happily in power over everyone else, and the future of our collective civilization can't take it much longer.
Once again, humble thanks to you b. for being here and doing what you do, and thanks for letting me blab on. Peace and health, barflies.

VietnamVet , Jun 19 2020 23:05 utc | 42

The only way to fight the coronavirus pandemic is with a functional national government implementing public health measures of universal testing, contact tracing and isolation of the infected. Where corporate neoliberalism is in control, the USA, UK and Sweden, a conscious decision was made not to give power back to the national governments to tax, regulate and use these old fashion methods to defeat the virus. These nations are following their amoral aristocratic ideology and are allowing their citizens to die in order to keep the rich in the money.

The Elite are gambling that a lid can be placed on the unrest by police/mercenaries, surveillance, and propaganda until a for-profit treatment or vaccine becomes available. That the hundreds of thousands of Americans, Britons or Swedes are dying is of no matter to the top 10% in these nations.

The Western Establishment is also in full blown denial. The Empire has fallen. North and South America are sick continents that will have to be quarantined from the coronavirus free nations for the foreseeable future .

[Jun 22, 2020] Protesters douse French health ministry with red paint

Jun 22, 2020 | news.yahoo.com

PARIS (Reuters) - French protesters on Saturday doused the country's health ministry with red paint, to symbolize the blood of those who died from COVID-19 and to demonstrate against poor working conditions for public sector healthcare workers.

"For years, health workers have been alerting us to the fact they don't have enough resources with regards to staff, beds and equipment to be able to allow us to look after people decently," Aurelie Trouve, a spokeswoman for the 'Attac' activist group which was behind the protest, told Reuters.

They also placed a giant, medal-shaped banner dubbed 'Medal of Contempt' on the steps of the French health ministry, to highlight what they said was the government's failure to listen to the concerns of healthcare workers.

President Emmanuel Macron's government has decided to pay a 1,500 euros ($1,676) bonus to public sector healthcare workers, in recognition of their role during the coronavirus outbreak.

Yet many in the sector feel the government should do more for them, and violence broke out this week at another protest held by healthcare workers in Paris.

[Jun 20, 2020] Everything You Need to Know About Herd Immunity

Jun 20, 2020 | elemental.medium.com


It's the ultimate goal, but attaining it can be difficult (and deadly)

The bigger problem with achieving herd immunity through infections is that it defeats the purpose of reaching herd immunity at all.

"The whole point is to minimize death and morbidity, but even if there is a high rate of asymptomatic or mild disease, you're still going to have millions of deaths," Rasmussen says. "What good is herd immunity if millions of people have to die to get there?"

Remember that threshold of 60% to 80% to bring about herd immunity to Covid-19? There's a reason for it being a range.

Jenkins says, "60% is often bandied around as the level you need to drive the reproductive number below one, but it still takes time for transmission to go down." But adds, "the final size of people who might be infected before you see no more transmission would be higher, more like 80 or 85%."

Researchers call this "overshoot," where "an epidemic doesn't magically stop when you reach herd immunity," as University of Washington biology professor Carl Bergstrom, PhD, described it on Twitter. "You reach herd immunity not when the epidemic is nearly over, but rather *precisely* at the epidemic peak," he explained.

Murray offers this analogy: "I think of it like a train. It's going along slowly, then it's getting up to speed, and then you pull the brake -- but it's not going to stop immediately. It's got to slow down."

With a current U.S. population of around 330 million people, a 60% infection rate is about 198 million people. Using the low estimate of a 0.5% death rate, nearly a million people will die (for context, as of May 13, the official death toll was just over 80,000). If the fatality rate is closer to 3%, nearly 6 million will die.

And that's just when the brake is pulled, when infections start to taper down. Reaching 80% means 1.3 to 7.9 million dead Americans -- with no guarantee transmission will stop.

Of course, if you're Trump (or me, for that matter), you don't give a shit how many people die as long as it isn't you.

Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | Jun 20 2020 0:52 utc | 70

[Jun 18, 2020] Most Coronavirus Tests Cost About $100. Why Did One Cost $2,315? U.S. health care prices are unregulated, opaque and unpredictable

Notable quotes:
"... "We've seen a small number of laboratories that are charging egregious prices for Covid-19 tests," said Angie Meoli, a senior vice president at Aetna, one of the insurers required to cover testing costs. ..."
"... The second outcome is huge price variation, as each doctor's office and hospital sets its own charges for care. One 2012 study found that hospitals in California charge between $1,529 and $182,955 for uncomplicated appendectomies. ..."
"... "It's not unheard-of that one hospital can charge 100 times the price of another for the same thing," said Dr. Renee Hsia, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco, and an author of the appendectomy study. "There is no other market I can think of where that happens except health care." ..."
"... But American patients will eventually bear the costs of these expensive tests in the form of higher insurance premiums. In some cases, they are paying for additional tests, for flu and other respiratory diseases, that doctors tack onto coronavirus orders. Those charges are not exempt from co-payments and can fall into a patient's deductible. ..."
"... Those kinds of bills could make patients wary of seeking care or testing in the future, which could enable the further spread of coronavirus. In an April poll, the Kaiser Family Foundation found that most Americans were worried they wouldn't be able to afford coronavirus testing or treatment if they needed it . ..."
Jun 18, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

anne ,

June 16, 2020 11:05 am

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/16/upshot/coronavirus-test-cost-varies-widely.html

June 16, 2020

Most Coronavirus Tests Cost About $100. Why Did One Cost $2,315?
U.S. health care prices are unregulated, opaque and unpredictable. When Congress required insurers to cover Covid-19 testing, a few providers decided to take advantage.
By Sarah Kliff

In a one-story brick building in suburban Dallas, between a dentist office and a family medicine clinic, is a medical laboratory that has run some of the most expensive coronavirus tests in America.

Insurers have paid Gibson Diagnostic Labs as much as $2,315 for individual coronavirus tests. In a couple of cases, the price rose as high as $6,946 when the lab said it mistakenly charged patients three times the base rate.

The company has no special or different technology from, say, major diagnostic labs that charge $100. It is one of a small number of medical labs, hospitals and emergency rooms taking advantage of the way Congress has designed compensation for coronavirus tests and treatment.

"We've seen a small number of laboratories that are charging egregious prices for Covid-19 tests," said Angie Meoli, a senior vice president at Aetna, one of the insurers required to cover testing costs.

How can a simple coronavirus test cost $100 in one lab and 2,200 percent more in another? It comes back to a fundamental fact about the American health care system: The government does not regulate health care prices.

This tends to have two major outcomes that health policy experts have seen before, and are seeing again with coronavirus testing.

The first is high prices over all. Most medical care in the United States costs double or triple what it would in a peer country. An appendectomy, for example, costs $3,050 in Britain and $6,710 in New Zealand, two countries that regulate health prices. In the United States, the average price is $13,020.

The second outcome is huge price variation, as each doctor's office and hospital sets its own charges for care. One 2012 study found that hospitals in California charge between $1,529 and $182,955 for uncomplicated appendectomies.

"It's not unheard-of that one hospital can charge 100 times the price of another for the same thing," said Dr. Renee Hsia, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco, and an author of the appendectomy study. "There is no other market I can think of where that happens except health care."

There is little evidence that higher prices correlate with better care. What's different about the more expensive providers is that they've set higher prices for their services.

Patients are, in the short run, somewhat protected from big coronavirus testing bills. The federal government set aside $1 billion to pick up the tab for uninsured Americans who get tested. For the insured, federal laws require that health plans cover the full costs of coronavirus testing without applying a deductible or co-payment.

But American patients will eventually bear the costs of these expensive tests in the form of higher insurance premiums. In some cases, they are paying for additional tests, for flu and other respiratory diseases, that doctors tack onto coronavirus orders. Those charges are not exempt from co-payments and can fall into a patient's deductible.

Those kinds of bills could make patients wary of seeking care or testing in the future, which could enable the further spread of coronavirus. In an April poll, the Kaiser Family Foundation found that most Americans were worried they wouldn't be able to afford coronavirus testing or treatment if they needed it .

[Jun 17, 2020] Polio vaccine may be useful to prep the body for COVID19.

Jun 17, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Caliman , Jun 17 2020 17:28 utc | 9

Perhaps one of the well-read people here can help me find some sources. I've been puzzled by something before and it got exacerbated by the news recently that the Polio vaccine may be useful to prep the body, as it were, for COVID19.

What I'd be puzzled by is the following: we know there are four commonly circulating human coronaviruses that register as "colds" in the population, sometimes nasty but generally not dangerous, and that large %ages of us have gotten them over the years and will continue to. While these four viruses are not identical to COVID19, they are quite similar. And it seemed like there were some reports that people who had recently been sick with these more common coronaviruses had some immunity to COVID19.

Has this been investigated further? Would it not make sense, if true, that the "quick vaccine" we have been looking for could be purposeful infection by one of these common human coronaviruses? Would this not be like using the cowpox as a way to make ourselves more resistant to smallpox, which used to be done until the actual smallpox vaccine was discovered?

Anyway, anybody read anything along these lines?


hopehely , Jun 17 2020 17:47 utc | 10

@Caliman | Jun 17 2020 17:28 utc | 9
Anyway, anybody read anything along these lines?

Yes, we read it here a month ago.
albagen , Jun 17 2020 17:56 utc | 11
Well Caliman, why do you bother thinking about Covid19? It's just the flu, on tap. When they need, they open the tap. When it suits them, they close the tap. It's Covid19 on, Covid19 off. Sometimes it trickles or drips. We all will die some day.

In other words: "behave, or else we bring back the restrictions", but if the flow of money stops, we will lift them, just so that you work to produce something and keep us happy.

My suggestion: live your life to the fullest, enjoy nature and family, as if there is no covid19, no government, no bullshit. You won't regret it.

And don't forget to give feedback here, if you follow my advice.

;)

[Jun 16, 2020] Hope for patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia

Jun 16, 2020 | www.msn.com

Trial results announced on Tuesday showed dexamethasone, which is used to reduce inflammation in other diseases such as arthritis, reduced death rates by around a third among the most severely ill of COVID-19 patients admitted to hospital.

[Jun 16, 2020] Coronavirus- Dexamethasone proves first life-saving drug by Michelle Roberts

"This is an extremely welcome result," said Peter Horby of Oxford, one of the study leaders. "The survival benefit is clear and large in those patients who are sick enough to require oxygen treatment, so dexamethasone should now become standard of care in these patients. Dexamethasone is inexpensive, on the shelf, and can be used immediately to save lives worldwide."
Lead researcher, Prof. Martin Landray, says that hospital patients should now be given the steroid without delay, but that people shouldn't try to hoard it for private use. According to the study, Dexamethasone does not appear to help milder cases - those who don't need help breathing.
The drug has been used to treat a wide range of conditions, including asthma and rheumatoid arthritis.
Notable quotes:
"... Chief investigator Prof Peter Horby said: "This is the only drug so far that has been shown to reduce mortality - and it reduces it significantly. It's a major breakthrough." ..."
Jun 16, 2020 | www.bbc.com

By Michelle Roberts Health editor, BBC News online

A cheap and widely available drug can help save the lives of patients seriously ill with coronavirus.

The low-dose steroid treatment dexamethasone is a major breakthrough in the fight against the deadly virus, UK experts say.

The drug is part of the world's biggest trial testing existing treatments to see if they also work for coronavirus.

It cut the risk of death by a third for patients on ventilators. For those on oxygen, it cut deaths by a fifth.

Had the drug had been used to treat patients in the UK from the start of the pandemic, up to 5,000 lives could have been saved, researchers say.

And it could be of huge benefit in poorer countries with high numbers of Covid-19 patients.

About 19 out of 20 patients with coronavirus recover without being admitted to hospital. Of those who are admitted to hospital, most also recover, but some may need oxygen or mechanical ventilation. These are the high-risk patients whom dexamethasone appears to help.

The drug is already used to reduce inflammation in a range of other conditions, and it appears that it helps stop some of the damage that can happen when the body's immune system goes into overdrive as it tries to fight off coronavirus.

The body's over-reaction is called a cytokine storm and it can be deadly.

In the trial, led by a team from Oxford University, around 2,000 hospital patients were given dexamethasone and were compared with more than 4,000 who did not receive the drug.

For patients on ventilators, it cut the risk of death from 40% to 28%. For patients needing oxygen, it cut the risk of death from 25% to 20%.

Chief investigator Prof Peter Horby said: "This is the only drug so far that has been shown to reduce mortality - and it reduces it significantly. It's a major breakthrough."

Lead researcher Prof Martin Landray says the findings suggest that for every eight patients treated on ventilators, you could save one life.

For those patients treated with oxygen, you save one life for approximately every 20-25 treated with the drug.

"There is a clear, clear benefit. The treatment is up to 10 days of dexamethasone and it costs about £5 per patient. So essentially it costs £35 to save a life. This is a drug that is globally available."

Prof Landray said, when appropriate, hospital patients should now be given it without delay, but people should not go out and buy it to take at home.

Dexamethasone does not appear to help people with milder symptoms of coronavirus - those who don't need help with their breathing.

The Recovery Trial has been running since March. It included the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine which has subsequently been ditched amid concerns that it increases fatalities and heart problems.

Eric Feigl-Ding @DrEricDing Replying to @DrEricDing

5) And again, Dexamethasone is cheap, available from any pharmacy, and easily obtainable anywhere in the world. This is EXACTLY what we need, instead of a $1000 drug like remdesivir that is just marginally effective for shortening illness but not yet fully proven for mortality.

[Jun 16, 2020] Another topic doctors talk about privately are the well-known "bad doctors" who keep getting free passes mistake after mistake, and often sit on hospital quality review committees.

Jun 16, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Deap , 15 June 2020 at 11:49 AM

Walrus, another topic doctors talk about privately are the well-known "bad doctors" who keep getting free passes mistake after mistake, and often sit on hospital quality review committees.

As well as talking among themselves about the large numbers of iatrogenic deaths, caused by the medical community itself, which have long exceeded the numbers of "corona" deaths, ginned up covid numbers or not.

Be well and thrive.

[Jun 15, 2020] These San Francisco doctors flew to New York to fight the coronavirus -- and they have a warning for us

Jun 15, 2020 | www.cnbc.com


"I've worked in a lot of settings," said Dr. Michael Peters, a pulmonary critical care doctor, was assigned to a hospital in Queens overwhelmed with Covid-19 cases. "These patients were very sick, and they had a disease that we didn't know how to take care of yet."

All of the UCSF doctors said they saw patients in their forties and fifties, who didn't meet the "typical" profile for Covid-19 because they were otherwise healthy. In the Queens hospital, where Peters worked, many of the patients were Black or Hispanic. Data shows that the virus has hit racial and ethnic minorities worse, and studies are underway to better understand why.

[Jun 13, 2020] We Don't Need No Stinking Vaccine For COVID-19

Jun 13, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Jeff Harris via The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity, A Glaring Omission

With the 24/7 media circus coverage of Covid-19 I find it particularly interesting that there is an obvious glaring omission of some extremely important facts relative to dealing with a virus, especially one that is allegedly so virulent like this one. Yes, I read all about the critical need to shelter in place, stay inside away from other people, wash your hands constantly, avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth, wear your face mask and by all means observe social distancing if you MUST venture outside for food!

Then it's repeated ad infinitum that the ONLY hope we have of ever returning to a semblance of normalcy is to have a vaccine to protect us! Then to add some drama to this narrative the media highlights their death-o-meter scoreboard with the implied threat that you'll be next IF you don't obey the rules as dictated by the "experts".

But what is assiduously avoided at all cost is any reference to our most potent defense against any virus; our body's natural immune system. Try as I might I couldn't find anything about this first line of defense on the World Health Organizations (WHO) website or Centers for Disease Control (CDC) website. It's as if it doesn't exist and is completely irrelevant.

If these organizations were genuinely concerned about the health of citizens they would obviously discuss the vital role a healthy immune system plays in protecting us from illnesses. But since they don't its obvious some other motive is at work, at least to me, and I strongly suspect to other critical thinkers as well.

We now know from the science and data that over 90% of the people exposed to Covid-19 have no symptoms at all or at worst a mild cold. The flu vaccines we have are only effective 30% to 60% of the time and the bugs change regularly so a vaccine that worked OK last year may barely work at all this year. Let's learn some more about our body's immune system.

Virus protection without a vaccine

There is an enlightening article on Web MD titled: "How to use Your Immune System to Stay Healthy". That's a pretty straight forward title now isn't it? Early on Bruce Polsky, MD, interim chairman department of medicine and chief division of infectious disease at St. Lukes-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York City says:

"We are endowed with a great immune system that has been designed evolutionarily to keep us healthy."

The article goes on. . .

"The immune system is your body's natural defense system. It's an intricate network of cells, tissues and organs that band together to defend your body against invaders. Those invaders can include bacteria, viruses, parasites, even fungus, all with the potential to make us sick. They are everywhere-in our homes, offices and backyards. . . "

The truth is no amount of social distancing, hand washing or face mask wearing is going to eliminate our exposure to these various bugs. That's why we were created with this amazing first line of natural defense.

Here's more from Web MD . . .

"The immune system can recognize millions of different antigens. And it can produce what it needs to eradicate nearly all of them. When it's working properly, this elaborate defense system can keep health problems ranging from cancer to the common cold at bay. . . "

Wow! That's pretty amazing stuff isn't it! According to Web MD a properly functioning immune system can "keep health problems ranging from cancer to the common cold at bay." So why isn't this "science" being included in all the other health recommendations we're being bombarded with daily? It seems to me that any "expert" worth their salt would be talking about the importance of a healthy immune system to stay healthy.

But there's more . . .

The Web MD article noted that failure to eat a healthy diet, sitting around not exercising, not getting enough sleep and chronic stress can all lead to a compromised immune system. To quote Dr. Polsky again:

". . . Lifestyle aspects are very, very important."

So if our lifestyle is very, very important to staying healthy as the good doctor says ask yourself this question? Based on the Web M.D. article virtually all the results of the lockdown serve to weaken our immune systems. The stress of unemployment, constant harping about infections and rising death rates, lack of exercise and now a crack in our food distribution system all are known to weaken the human immune system.

I also find it quite interesting that large groups of people can shop at Walmart, Home Depot or other big box stores but they can't attend their local church even if it's a "drive through" service?

Web M.D. says:

"Research shows that people with close friendships and strong support systems tend to be healthier than those who lack such supports."

During times of crisis people need encouragement and their faith built up more than ever before. Mandating people huddle in fear in their homes with constant media reports of infections and death bombarding them continually is there any wonder peoples immune systems are under severe stress?

[Jun 13, 2020] CDC Reiterates Mask Recommendations as Virus Continues to Spread - Bloomberg

Admitting their own blunder: Better late then never
Jun 13, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

Masks "are strongly encouraged in settings where individuals might raise their voice," the CDC guidance said.

The agency also recommended limiting attendance to allow for distancing.

[Jun 12, 2020] PE-Owned Hospitals Paid Owners Millions and Got Low Care Ratings by Lauren Coleman-Lochner and Jeremy Hill

Private equity is essential a mafia style business: they aid to blled thier victim dry.
Notable quotes:
"... By the end of 2018, available cash was so tight that Prospect got a $41 million infusion from Leonard Green and members of its management, according to Moody's. The ratings firm downgraded Prospect deeper into junk last year at B3, citing "shareholder-friendly policies" and the higher leverage resulting from the $457 million dividend. ..."
"... Meanwhile, care quality ratings for seven of the 10 Prospect hospitals evaluated by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, have declined since 2016, according to HMP Metrics, a health-care facility analytics service. CMS ranks facilities from 1 to 5 stars, with 5 being the best. ..."
"... Most Prospect hospitals sit at the bottom rungs of quality assessments, according to the agency's hospital comparison database. Nine have a two-star rating or below, placing them in the lowest 30% of rated hospitals, according to CMS data. Just one Prospect-owned hospital -- Roger Williams Medical Center in Rhode Island -- earned a three-star rating. ..."
"... "Private equity owners, seeking high returns, may be even more willing to cut costs in crucial ways than even other for-profit health care companies," she said in an interview. ..."
Jun 12, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

[Jun 12, 2020] Russia registers new Covid-19 drug to keep complications caused by virus 'under control'

Jun 07, 2020 | www.rt.com

Russian developers have registered a new drug that may help alleviate the harshest complications caused by Covid-19, including lung failure. It's hoped the treatment can buy time before a vaccine is found. Levilimab is the second medication to receive state approval through a fast-track mechanism, implemented to give doctors more options to tackle the virus, which has already infected more than 459,000 and killed 5,725 in Russia, according to official statistics.

"I think we'll be able to keep Covid-19 complications under control and minimize the harshest problems it causes," Dmitry Morozov, general director of Biocad, the biopharmaceutical company behind the drug, wrote on Facebook. By reducing the Covid-19 mortality rate, Levilimab will allow Russia to "buy time" before the vaccine against the coronavirus is made, and "the vaccine is surely coming soon," he added.

The drug is aimed at curbing the so-called 'cytokine storm,' a common complication from Covid-19 when the sick person's immune system overreacts to the virus and the excessive inflammation leads to fatal outcome.

"The mechanism [used in Levilimab] is known to researchers around the globe. But all the rest was done in Russia, by our company, from scratch. There's an original patented molecule," Morozov told RT.

Levilimab's highlight is that it can be administered not only to patients already in a serious condition, but used as a prophylactic to "prevent the 'cytokine storm' from occurring and allowing the patient to avoid intensive care and lung ventilation," he pointed out.

The drug, which will go into the market under the brand ILSIRA, is administered hypodermically unlike its foreign counterparts, which get into the system through the intravenous route. "One shot and you don't go into the emergency room. There are two syringes in a package. Their injected simultaneously or with some interval. And in a week the person is discharged from hospital," Morozov said.

Levilimab has proven itself as effective as its foreign counterparts and increased the speed of recovery for patients, Ekaterina Trifonova, who heads the infectious ward at the Central Clinical Hospital in Moscow, where the drug underwent clinical testing, told RT. During the first two weeks of trials, out of 45 Covid-19 patients who got the drug, ten were discharged, including a 92-year-old-man, while the rest remained in satisfactory condition, she added.

[Jun 11, 2020] WHO now says asymptomatic spread of coronavirus is 'very rare'

Jun 11, 2020 | video.foxnews.com

WHO now says asymptomatic spread of coronavirus is 'very rare'

Jun. 09, 2020 - 4:06 - World Health Organization changes its tune on asymptomatic patients spreading COVID-19; reaction from Fox News medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel.

[Jun 11, 2020] Does asymptomatic spread exists or this is artifact of modeling and tests false positives?

Jun 11, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , Jun 11 2020 0:18 utc | 48

Coronavirus confusion reigns as World Health Organisation scrambles advice about masks and asymptomatic spread

Although numerous studies have suggested people can spread the virus before they show symptoms, the WHO has largely dismissed those as anecdotal or pointed out that they were based on modelling.

Babak Javid, an infectious diseases doctor at Cambridge University Hospital, says many scientists are persuaded by the studies published so far and think WHO should publish the data it is citing to explain why it believes transmission of the disease in people without symptoms is "rare".

"If you're going to make a really important statement like that, it would be good to back it up," Javid said. "I think WHO is an important organisation, but they've made a lot of statements that have been misleading."

[Jun 11, 2020] WHO official backtracks after claiming asymptomatic spread of coronavirus is 'very rare'

Jun 10, 2020 | video.foxnews.com

Reaction and analysis from Fox News medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel.

[Jun 10, 2020] Coronavirus vaccine developers are chasing outbreaks before they disappear Washpost - Sic Semper Tyrannis

Jun 10, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

"Coronavirus vaccine developers are chasing outbreaks before they disappear" Washpost

"The top teams rushing to develop coronavirus vaccines are alerting governments, health officials and shareholders that they may have a big problem : The outbreaks in their countries may be getting too small to quickly determine whether vaccines work

A leader of the Oxford University group, one of the furthest ahead with human trials, admits the reality is paradoxical, even "bizarre," but said the declining numbers of new infections this summer could be one of the big hurdles vaccine developers face in the global race to beat down the virus.

Even as new cases are growing worldwide, transmission rates are falling in Britain, China and many of the hardest-hit regions in the United States -- the three countries that have experimental vaccines ready to move into large-scale human testing in June, July and August." Washpost

---------------

Well, pilgrims it would seem that the Post staff does not see the irony in their own writing, or perhaps they do. There have been scattered evidences of rationality there lately. Even as Democrat governors and mayors across the country drag their feet on the re-opening of the American economy, infection rates are falling. In the Faucibirxist view of things everything depends on vaccine development (or herd immunity post holocaust). But, alas there just aren't enough new, vibrant infections to make development of the vaccines convenient. What will happen to the flow of government money to these projects if this phenomenon becomes general knowledge. Someone at the Post should be disciplined for this indiscretion. pl

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/coronavirus-vaccine-trials-astrazeneca-moderna/2020/06/09/48f28fea-a414-11ea-898e-b21b9a83f792_story.html


Fred , 10 June 2020 at 09:34 AM

"What will happen to the flow of government money to these projects if this phenomenon becomes general knowledge."

Well Fauci is almost 80 so I think he's set for life. I hear the left wants lots of redevelopment funds and jobs programs, with the attendant opportunities for graft that comes with them, for thier cities which we are all assured had neither rioting nor looting.

Jim , 10 June 2020 at 11:50 AM
Thank you Col. Lang for all the posts on novel coronavirus.

For shining light on this, this utter failure by the medical community and their various and sundry enablers in government and in business.

On these liars and charlatans and killers and criminals.

The video below is about an hour long. It is a nurse, who worked in NYC hospital, the alleged epi center of epi centers.

She basically says, without saying directly, but points to the fact that doctors were murdering patients there, it seems.

She paints a picture of doctors not as scientists but as zealots, as neo neanderthals, as craven monsters, who care not about life, the elderly, the sick, the least among us.

As Nurse Ratchets

Towards the end of video, she recounts her last day at this hospital, discussing a patient she had nursed for many days, and who was doing fine, making progress, . . . and how she was removed from his bed on direct orders, sent to the ER where she was not assigned, and 20 minutes later, the man she was caring for is dead.

These sorts of stories abound; this rage is not going away anytime soon. This is the rage, and what caused it, that our "lords and masters" who censor us and tell us black is white, and want to destroy our country. . . this is the rage they don't want to see expressed and exposed. Will they get their way?

http://edwardcurtin.com/the-undercover-epicenter-nurse-watch-weep-and-rage/


-30-

Laura Wilson , 10 June 2020 at 01:04 PM
Well...they can always test their vaccines in the USA. We seem not to be faring as well and can help out. (I believe this is a glass half-full moment.)
Walter Lang , 10 June 2020 at 01:27 PM
Laura Wilson

Still hysteric. if you are not over 65 and not in compromised health the disease is rarely fatal.

optimax , 10 June 2020 at 01:32 PM
Trump needs to stop the $600 a week federal bonus to the unemployed. My neighbor told me about how his daughter-in-law worked one day a week as a barmaid before the virus shut the bar down and made a little over a hundred a week. Oregon unemployment pays her 150 a week and with the added 600 she now makes over 7 times what she did working. How many protesters and rioters are just as flush getting paid to party in the street? Most i'd say. That makes these government funded protests a powerful voice and recruitment tool for the Democratic Party.

Ending the federal subsidy to the unemployed would reduce, if not stop, the demonstrations and mau-mauing of the country.

Fred , 10 June 2020 at 03:17 PM
optimax,

Absolutely. There were howls of protests before Minneapolis when Georgia, Florida and Texas started tellling people that if they recieved a recall to work notice from an employer and refused to go they would be considered a voluntary quit and no longer eligable for unemployment insurance payments. They'll howl again when they figure out this is all taxable income.

LA Sox Fan , 10 June 2020 at 03:21 PM
Take everything the WaPo claims with a grain of salt. There is no real worry over lower covid infections. What made Covid decrease was the lockdowns. Remove the lockdowns and covid infection rates will climb, as we are seeing in the already reopened states.

Then when fall rolls around, and people are stuck indoors again, rates will skyrocket. There will be plenty of test subjects for a vaccine.

rho , 10 June 2020 at 09:29 PM
With the spread rate of the coronavirus, any outbreak of the infection will peter out once the total immunity rate of the population approaches 65-70 percent.

In Bergamo (Italy), 57 percent a population sample have tested positive for coronavirus antibodies, which means that they must have had the infection before and are now most likely immune.

If you are a Karen, then don't listen to me, but take it from the German government's very own propaganda outlet, Deutsche Welle:

"Out of nearly 10,000 Bergamo residents who had their blood tested between April 23 and June 3, 57% had antibodies, indicating they had come into contact with the virus and developed an immune response.

Health authorities said the sample size was 'sufficiently broad' to be a reliable indicator of the presence of SARS-CoV-2 among Bergamo province's population."

https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-tests-show-half-of-people-in-italys-bergamo-have-antibodies/a-53739727

Nobody in Bergamo will need a coronavirus vaccine once its development is finished - whenever that may happen, if at all.

[Jun 10, 2020] Yale has published research that shows HCH + AZ has 50-fold benefits and insignificant risks

Highly recommended!
Jun 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

BM , Jun 10 2020 18:11 utc | 5

Yale has published research that shows HCH + AZ has 50-fold benefits and insignificant risks

Using Hydroxychloroquine and Other Drugs to Fight Pandemic

Early Outpatient Treatment of Symptomatic, High-Risk Covid-19 Patients that Should be
Ramped-Up Immediately as Key to the Pandemic Crisis

In the author's words:

COVID-19 is really two different diseases. In the first few days, it is like a very bad cold. In some people, it then morphs into pneumonia which can be life-threatening. What I found is that treatments for the cold don't work well for the pneumonia, and vice versa. Most of the published studies have looked at treatments for the cold but used for the pneumonia. I just looked at how well the treatments for the cold worked for the cold. There are five studies done this way, four of hydroxychloroquine plus azithromycin and one with hydroxychloroquine plus doxycycline, and they all show that treating the cold part of COVID-19 -- the early part -- works very well.

The article completely decimates the arguments against using HCQ + AZ or HCQ + doxycycline, specifically in early outpatient use.

uncle tungsten , Jun 10 2020 22:29 utc | 41

BM #5

re Yale HCQ study.

The article completely decimates the arguments against using HCQ + AZ or HCQ + doxycycline, specifically in early outpatient use.

It is good to see real science being applied rather than voodoo shilling for big pharma.

Still waiting for the editor resignations at Lancet and NEJM on their publication of the hoax science article.

Let me be very clear about pharmaceuticles: the interaction of two dissimilar substances can be extraordinary beneficial. My personal example is from a Specialist Pharmacologist that treated a bone disease in my thumb arising from mechanical injury. He explained thus:

The bone problem has three quite separate stages of treatment.

At the first week common antibiotic remedies are vital and effective. I was too late for that.

If that stage is missed then a common and potent antibiotic combined with a substance commonly used to treat gout is vital. The combination of the two flattens the peak of the antibiotic such that it is sustained in the bloodstream for 24 hours until the next dose of the two. A fourteen day process as I recall. It was totally successful.

If that second stage is missed then late intervention is extensive use of antibiotics and the gout remedy over months as the bone decomposition bacteria have spread throughout ones metabolism and lodge randomly to wreak havoc. This treatment regime is punishing on the body and digestive tract and many people cannot endure it.

This Specialist was a high street operator in nice office NOT a pharmacy.

So lets not be jumping to hasty dismissals of what may or may not 'work' and when. Humans vary, diets vary and propensities are highly variable. It is the responsibility of scientists to be honest and act in the best interests of humanity. Clearly the study published in the Lancet and NEJM was fake science and those journals fell for it because of either inadequate editorial investigation of the paper, confirmation bias, inadequate consideration of human consequences.

The WHO stands condemned for being suckered by fake news, confirmation bias, malign financial manipulation or perhaps inadequate investigation of the authors and claims of the paper.

[Jun 10, 2020] Officials say most Americans not at risk of coronavirus CIDRAP

Was it complete incompetence , or what ?
Jan 28, 2020 | cidrap.umn.edu

The top US public health officials today said the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak that began in Wuhan, China, is not a threat to the average American citizen.

"Americans should know this is a potentially very serious public health threat, but Americans should not worry for their own safety," said Alex Azar, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

Azar was joined by Robert Redfield, MD, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Nancy Messonnier, MD, director of CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Disease, and Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health.

Azar began and ended the press conference by imploring the Chinese government to accept the US's offer to send experts from the CDC to aid in the response efforts.

"We are urging China, more cooperation and transparency are the most effective options you can take for an effective response," Azar said. Azar said the United States first offered assistance on Jan 6, and most recently reiterated the offer yesterday.

During the press conference, Azar was alerted to the news that China had agreed to allow a team of international experts led by the World Health Organization to come to China to work on the virus, which he welcomed.

No ongoing spread among US cases

All officials at the press conference offered assurances about the US response to the five confirmed 2019-nCoV cases identified in Washington state, Illinois, Arizona, and California. So far, none of the cases have resulted in secondary transmission, they said, and all patients have cooperated with the CDC in gathering as much information as possible about the illness.

"We have no evidence of human-to-human transmission in the United States," said Messonnier. "All the cases have been directly transmitted from China."

Redfield said the CDC decided to increase surveillance efforts in US airports. Now 20 -- up from 5 -- of the nation's largest and busiest airports will practice enhanced screening of passengers traveling from China. Late yesterday the CDC also issued a level 3 travel advisory, suggesting US citizens avoid all nonessential travel to anywhere in China.

Redfield and Messonnier said an important part of the enhanced screening will be educating passengers to look for possible symptoms of 2019-nCoV, as patients may be asymptomatic at the time of travel. The experts urged both travelers and their physicians to take precautions if an upper respiratory illness and fever follow a recent trip to China.

Throughout the press conference, the officials referenced past experience in Asia with coronavirus diseases SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome), and avian flu, suggesting the US has the tools to help combat the new coronavirus outbreak.

Symptomatic transmission as likely driver

Fauci explained that China was currently using both the antiviral remdesivir and the antiretroviral drug Kaletra (lopinavir and ritonavir) on a compassionate basis on some nCoV patients. Both treatments, used against Ebola and HIV, respectively, are unproven against the novel coronavirus.

Fauci said monoclonal antibody–based therapies will be the next step in developing a possible treatment for the virus, as will a phase 1 clinical trial of a potential vaccine.

He also addressed concerns about whether the virus could be easily spread by asymptomatic carriers. "The driver of respiratory outbreaks is symptomatic people, not asymptomatic carriers," said Fauci.

FDA launches nCoV site

In related news, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced yesterday it was taking key actions to develop nCoV countermeasures.

The FDA also launched a landing page, or website, for 2019-nCoV information.

"We are committed to keeping the American people informed as we prepare and respond to emerging public health threats, including the novel coronavirus," said FDA Deputy Commissioner of Policy, Legislation, and International Affairs Anna Abram, in a press release. "The agency is committed to ensuring safe and effective medical countermeasures are available as quickly as possible to protect public health."

The FDA said the first step will be developing diagnostic tests that will quickly identify the coronavirus. Such tests would likely be able to benefit from the FDA's Emergency Use Authorization pathway, and developers are urged to follow the links and guidelines provided by the FDA.

See also:

Jan 28 WHO news release

Jan 27 FDA press release

FDA 2019-nCoV website

[Jun 08, 2020] Doctors were allowed to consider PCR results as a factor, cautioned not to rely on them. In current situation PCR results became the definition of COVID

Jun 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

oldhippie , Jun 7 2020 23:59 utc | 45

PavewayIV @ 36

Try doing a search on Kary Mullis, creator of the PCR process. He died last year so we can only go by past statements. He always stated that PCR was completely inappropriate and meaningless for diagnostics or for any other clinical purpose.

CDC guidance on PCR until earlier this year was that doctors do diagnosis, not laboratories. Doctors were allowed to consider PCR results as a factor, cautioned not to rely on them. In current situation PCR results are the definition of COVID.

If the test is allowed to run too many cycles any sample will test positive.

And it is never entirely certain how many cycles have elapsed, clock does not tell exactly what the RNA is up to.

[Jun 06, 2020] A fraction of infected people trigger the bulk of new cases, one reason the pandemic is far from over

Jun 06, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , Jun 6 2020 5:01 utc | 101

The Science of Superspreaders
A fraction of infected people trigger the bulk of new cases, one reason the pandemic is far from over

Meanwhile, the protests happening in this convulsed nation, with people often shoulder to shoulder, set the stage for new chains of infections. Any shouting, along with sneezing and coughing (perhaps in reaction to pepper spray) will spread the virus especially easily. "All things considered, there's little doubt that these protests will translate into increased risk of transmission for Covid-19," Maimuna Majumder, an epidemiologist at Boston Children's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, tells The Atlantic.

Putting an exact number on the impact of superspreaders is nearly impossible, since not all cases are ever traced back to any original source. The going best estimate is that 20% of infected people are responsible for 80% of onward infections, says William Hanage, associate professor of epidemiology at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Some evidence suggests as few as 10% of people trigger 80% of ongoing infections, Hanage told reporters in a recent teleconference.

Three separate studies have suggested the 20/80 ratio. A study of Hong Kong cases reached that conclusion and also found that 70% of people who contracted Covid-19 didn't spread it at all.

[Jun 05, 2020] Rush to trash hydroxychloroquine was based on faulty Surgisphere data exposes fundamental flaws in profit-based medical science

Jun 05, 2020 | www.rt.com

The latest data this disprove its efficiency in treating COVID-19, as it turned out, came from a tiny US healthcare analytics firm called Surgisphere, and calling it faulty would be excessively charitable. This is clearly a hired guns hit.

Not only is Surgisphere a company lacking in medical expertise – its employees included an "adult" entertainer and a science-fiction writer – but its CEO Sapan Desai co-authored two of the damning studies that used the firm's data to smear hydroxychloroquine, already thoroughly demonized in the media thanks to its promotion by US President Donald Trump, as a killer. All data is sourced to a proprietary database supposedly containing a veritable ocean of real-time, detailed patient information yet curiously absent from existing medical literature.

The Surgisphere-tainted study appeared to show increased risk of in-hospital deaths and heart problems with no disease-fighting benefits, confirming the suspicions of medical-industry naysayers already inclined to hate the off-patent drug due to the lack of profit potential and Trump's incessant boosterism. Italy, France, and Germany rushed to ban hydroxychloroquine, citing "an increased risk for adverse reactions with little or no benefit."

[Jun 04, 2020] I think the illusion the CDC. was the "world's premier health agency" comes from the fact that the USA has, by far, the largest and most powerful pharmaceutical sector in the world

CDC consist of overpaid idiots. On 20 January, the first confirmed case in South Korea was identified as a 35-year-old Chinese woman. The first South Korean national to be infected occurred three days later was a 55-year-old man who worked in Wuhan and returned for a checkup with flu symptoms. The two infection reports were publicly released on 24 January. [1] At this point team of CDC researchers should already be in South Korea. But nothing was done.
Jun 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
vk , Jun 3 2020 22:43 utc | 55
The C.D.C. waited 'its entire existence for this moment'. What went wrong?

Propaganda never stops:

The technology was old, the data poor, the bureaucracy slow, the guidance confusing, the administration not in agreement. The coronavirus shook the world's premier health agency , creating a loss of confidence and hampering the U.S. response to the crisis

"World's premier health agency"?

I think the illusion the C.D.C. was the "world's premier health agency" comes from the fact that the USA has, by far, the largest and most powerful pharmaceutical sector in the world (which Americans call "Big Pharma"). If you have the biggest pharma, you will have the most sheer volume of human trials and new drug patents. This, by osmosis, puts your country's C.D.C. at the forefront of most drug regulation - which the rest of the world's C.D.C.s will simply copy and paste for obvious reasons (i.e. they won't do the same work twice). That doesn't mean your C.D.C. is "the premier". For instance, it could simply be the most corrupt, the C.D.C. which is at the right place, the right time. An example for this is the USA's airplane equivalent to the C.D.C., which sold itself off to Boeing, resulting in the 737 MAX fiasco.

[Jun 03, 2020] Games with health accounts large corporations play

Jun 03, 2020 | features.propublica.org

Jeff , Thursday, March 22, 2018 2:05 PM

In early 2013 I was given a 3 PBC rating for my 2012 performance, the main reason cited by my manager being that my team lead thought I "seemed distracted". Five months later I was included in a "resource action", and was gone by July. I was 20 months shy of 55. Younger coworkers were retained. That was about two years after the product I worked on for over a decade was off-shored.

Through a fluke of someone from the old, disbanded team remembering me, I was rehired two years later - ironically in a customer support position for the very product I helped develop.

While I appreciated my years of service, previous salary, and previous benefits being reinstated, a couple years into it I realized I just wasn't cut out for the demands of the job - especially the significant 24x7 pager duty. Last June I received email describing a "Transition to Retirement" plan I was eligible for, took it, and my last day will be June 30. I still dislike the job, but that plan reclassified me as part time, thus ending pager duty for me. The job still sucks, but at least I no longer have to despair over numerous week long 24x7 stints throughout the year.

A significant disappointment occurred a couple weeks ago. I was discussing healthcare options with another person leaving the company who hadn't been resource-actioned as I had, and learned the hard way I lost over $30,000 in some sort of future medical benefit account the company had established and funded at some point. I'm not sure I was ever even aware of it. That would have funded several years of healthcare insurance during the 8 years until I'm eligible for Medicare. I wouldn't be surprised if their not having to give me that had something to do with my seeming "distracted" to them. <rolls eyes="">

What's really painful is the history of that former account can still be viewed at Fidelity, where it associates my departure date in 2013 with my having "forfeited" that money. Um, no. I did not forfeit that money, nor would I have. I had absolutely no choice in the matter. I find the use of the word 'forfeited' to describe what happened as both disingenuous and offensive. That said, I don't know whether's that's IBM's or Fidelity's terminology, though.

[Jun 02, 2020] Unnatural end of social distancing: Where do this week's riots leave 'social distancing'?

Jun 02, 2020 | www.rt.com

We were told for months we'd never gather in public again 'because Covid-19.'

...Media, politicians and celebrities who spent the past three months lecturing Americans about the importance of staying home and keeping at least six feet away from all other humans lest they catch or spread the deadly coronavirus have suddenly pivoted on a dime – seemingly as one – to cheering on those Americans defying their advice to pour into the streets and join nationwide protests...

[Jun 02, 2020] Neoliberalism and relationships of care: and Neoliberalism... just doesn't care

Notable quotes:
"... "individualism ignores or misvalues the role of care" ..."
Jun 02, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Dr. Durian M.D. , 2 years ago

Super happy to see you bring up care ethics and how the existence of relationships of care undermine the individualist focus of (neo)liberalism. Have you done a video on care ethics?

If so I'll be watching it shortly. I wish you'd gone even farther and looked at the importance of un-paid or underpaid care labour in the foundation of capitalism, but I suppose that's tangential.

KuraIthys , 3 months ago div c

lass="comment-renderer-text-content expanded"> Neoliberalism is pretty much what caused me to have to leave the UK when they simply made it too difficult to survive as someone with a disability. I can consider myself unreasonably lucky in holding dual citizenship, and in the other country I have citizenship of not (yet) resorting to quite the same level of sadistic behaviour... But it certainly wasn't something that was reassuring... And I feel sorry for all the people in similar circumstances who had to somehow find a way to cope with it anyway...

42billybob , 2 years ago

"They assume that free markets mean competition. And competition means that quality is kept high, prices are kept low, and it drives innovation, distributes resources efficiently to the people that want them the most." That's... not specifically a neoliberal thing. That's capitalism in general. But OK... I'm inclined to mostly agree with this stated premise (might pick some different semantics but eh... close enough). You're going to tell me why I shouldn't. So let's see what you've got:

"Have free markets resulted in a lot of competition everywhere? Or have some markets become dominated by a very small number of companies?" Yep... oligarchies happen. Ever notice that it tends to be in the most heavily regulated markets? Big companies with fat profit margins can survive regulations, small businesses and startups can't. The more you free the market, the easier it is for literally anyone with money, charisma, and/or a brilliant idea to spring up and carve off a big piece of the big guy's market share with a better product/service/resource for everyone.

"Are resources as efficiently distributed as they could be?" Never. There's always room for improvement. But if we're to compare against existing examples capitalism does it faster, cheaper & overall better than the alternatives.

"Do they always go to the people who want them the most?" They go to people able and willing to provide something of value in exchange. There's a lot of overlap between the two groups. But no. Some people don't get the resources they want because wanting something doesn't automatically mean you get it. Although even in a ruthless capitalist society of individualism people actually do still give a shit about their fellow man. Private charities are still perfectly functional capitalist entities (for profit or otherwise).

"Is the innovation that is happening always useful?" No. People chase bad ideas all the time. But generally, people quickly lose interest and stop supporting bad ideas (or run out of money). At least in a capitalist setting bad ideas can die on their own merit of providing nothing in exchange for what you give them. Instead of being propped up by tax dollars people don't want to spend on a completely unsustainable pet project of some ego-centric politician and the slight majority he's convinced is not a bad enough reason to kick him out of office.

"Is it allowed to benefit all of human kind when it is?" Who decides what is and isn't beneficial to all of human kind? Or are you simply referring to the fact that when someone creates something useful and new, it isn't immediately somehow provided to everyone who may want it?

I can't help but notice there was weasel wording in every single one of these questions. As presented, you have to answer "no" to all of them because the question requires absolute total success in all cases in order to answer "yes" to any of them.

"individualism ignores systemic privilege" Yea... so what? In what way does someone else being rich, good looking, charismatic, smart or skilled negatively affect you? Especially someone you never interact with? What it does not ignore is systemic discrimination. Stuff that actually negatively affects people in a quantifiable way.

"individualism ignores or misvalues the role of care" Individuals still care about people. They still have friends and family. The only difference is that they are encouraged to take it upon themselves to see to the well being of themselves and the people they care about. Sure, you can be a shithead who burns every social bridge but you end up fucking yourself when hard times fall upon you. An individualist still has vested personal interest in maintaining good relationships with those around them for this very reason. Even when their motives are completely selfish. As individuals we are encouraged to make these connections ourselves as opposed to expecting some authority to forcibly extract our needs from strangers. Individuals care about other people, collectivists care about the idea of other people.

[Jun 02, 2020] Nobel Prize Winner Lockdowns Are A Huge Mistake by Michael Levitt

Jun 01, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
Authored by Edward Peter Stringham via The American Institute for Economic research,

Michael Levitt is Professor of computer science and structural biology at Stanford Medical School and winner of the 2013 Nobel Prize in chemistry.

He has been a close observer of the pandemic and the response from the outset through its movement to Europe, the U.K., and the U.S.. Last month, speaking to the Unherd podcast and youtube channel, he offered some compelling thoughts and observers, and a striking conclusion.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/bl-sZdfLcEk

Below is a transcript of the parts I found most relevant.

Q: So you noticed that the curve was less of an exponential curve than we might have feared, in those early days?

A: In some ways there was never any exponential growth from the minute I looked at it, there were never any two days that had exactly the same growth rate -- and they were getting slow of course you could have non exponential growth where every single day they're getting more than exponential -- but the growth was always sub-exponential. So that's the first step.

Q: [In the UK] we talk endlessly about the R-rate -- the reproduction rate -- and apparently that began very high, maybe as high as 3, and [we've now] got it down below 1 in the UK. Intuitively, if there's a high reproduction rate, you should see that exponential curve just going up and up.

A: Well no, wait, okay. The R-0, which is very popular, is in some ways a faulty number. Let me explain why. The rate of growth doesn't depend on R-0. It depends on R-0 and the time you are infectious. So if you are twice as long infectious and have half the R-0 you'll get exactly the same growth rate. This is sort of intuitive, but it's not explained, and therefore it seems to me that I would say at the present time R-0 became important because of a lot of movies -- it was very popular -- talked about R-0.

Epidemiologists talk about R-0 but, looking at all the mathematics, you have to specify the time infectious at the same time to have any meaning. The other problem is that R-0 decreases -- we don't know why R-0 decreases. It could be social distancing, it could be prior immunity, it could be hidden cases.

Q: You've been observing the shapes of these curves and how the R-0 number tends to come down and the curve tends to flatten in some kind of natural way regardless of intervention. Is that what you are observing?

A: We don't know. I think the big test is going to be Sweden. Sweden is practicing a level of social distancing that is keeping children in schools, keeping people at work. They are obviously having more deaths in countries like Israel or Austria that are practicing very very strict social distancing but I think it is not a crazy policy. The reason I felt that social distancing was unimportant is practicing very very strict social distancing, but I think it is not a crazy policy.

The reason I felt that social distancing was unimportant is that I had two examples in China to start with and then we had the additional examples. The first one was South Korea (yeah), and Iran, and Italy. The beginning of all the epidemics showing a slowing down, and it was very hard for me to believe that those three countries could practice social-distancing as well as China. China was amazing, especially outside Hubei, in that they had no additional outbreaks. People left Hubei, they were very carefully tracked, had to wear face masks all the time, had to take their temperatures all the time, and there were no further outbreaks.

So this did not happen in either in South Korea or in Italy or in Iran. Now, two months later something else suggests that social distancing might not be important, and that is that the total number of deaths we're seeing in New York City, in parts of England, in parts of France, in northern Italy -- all seem to stop at about the same direction of the population so are they all practicing equally good social distancing? I don't think so.

The problem I think is outbreaks occurring in different regions. I think social distancing that stops people moving from London to Manchester is probably a really good idea. My feeling is that in London, and in New York City, all the people who got infected, all got infected before anybody noticed. There's no way that the infection grew so quickly in New York City without the infection spreading very quickly. So one of the key things is to stop people, who know that they're sick, from infecting the others. Here again, China has three very, very important advantages that are not high-tech that don't involve security tracking of telephones.

What they involve is, number one, the tradition in China for years, of wearing a face mask when you're sick. As soon as the coronavirus started everybody wore a face mask. It doesn't have to be a hygienic face mask it just has to be a face covering to stop you spraying saliva, micro droplets of saliva on somebody you talk to. The second thing in China is that because they were so scared of the SARS epidemic in most airports, stations where you pay tolls et cetera, there are thermometers. Infrared thermometers that that measure your temperature. So having your temperature measured at every single store entrance -- either with a handheld thermometer or with something mounted on the wall -- is something completely standard in China. And the third thing is that almost all payments in China are made not using a credit card, so in some senses it is very much easier there to practice social distancing. Of course, in addition they know where people are.

Q: What's your view of the lockdown policy that so many European countries and states in America have introduced?

A: I think it is a huge mistake. I think we need smart lockdowns. If we were to do this again, we would probably insist on face masks, hand sanitizers, and some kind of payment that did not involve touching right from the very beginning. This would slow down new outbreaks and I think that for example they found as I understand, that children, even if they're infected, never infect adults, so why do we not have children at school? Why do we not have people working? England, France, Italy, Sweden, Belgium, Holland, are all reaching levels of saturation that are going to be very, very close to herd immunity -- So that's a good thing. I think the policy of herd immunity is the right policy. I think Britain was on exactly the right track -- before they were fed wrong numbers and they made a huge mistake.

I see the standout winners as Germany and Sweden. They didn't practice too much lock down, they got enough people sick to get some herd immunity. The standout losers are countries like Austria, Australia, Israel that actually had very very strict lockdowns but didn't have many cases. So they have damaged their economies, caused massive social damage, damaged the educational year of their children, but not obtained any herd immunity.

I think in many ways the European countries are fine. They didn't need to have lockdown but they have all reached a high enough level of infection not to have to worry about further future attacks of coronavirus. The United States seems to be heading that way, they're certainly that way in New York City but they still have a long way to go

Q: What you're saying is that, you believe success -- as we are currently measuring it which is as few cases as possible and as small a spread of the virus as possible -- is actually failure?

A: I think if you really control your epidemic, for example, California, it's now had lockdowns for six weeks, and wants another four weeks, they have so far less than a hundred deaths, that means they don't have more (let's say a hundred thousand) in people, that is not enough to give them significant herd immunity. They didn't need to do all that lock down.

The lockdown is particularly hurtful in countries that don't have good social infrastructure, countries like the United States and Israel . Many, many people have been really really hurt -- especially young people. You know I think that everybody panicked -- they were fed incorrect numbers by epidemiologists and you know this I think led to led to a situation.

There is no doubt in my mind that when we come to look back on this, the damage done by lockdowns will exceed any saving of lives by a huge factor. One very easy way to see this is, and again I am getting into a sensitive territory here, but economists have a very simple way of looking at death. They don't count people. They come to the conclusion that if you're 20 and you die that's a greater loss than if you're 85 and you die. It's a hard issue, but in some ways are we valuing the potential future life of the 20 year old? Are we valuing the loss of more senior persons by what's called daily disability-adjusted life years. Basically if somebody is in their 80s, has Alzheimer's disease, and then dies from pneumonia (perhaps due to corona) that is less of a loss than if a 15 year old is riding his motorcycle bike and gets run over. This is an important way of looking at death.

It's also you know, right now, the number of excess deaths is around 130,000 up to yesterday, [May 1st]. This is for all of Europe, for a population of around 330 million people. So an excess of 100,000 for this whole year, is actually not that much. In some of the worst flu epidemics we get to those kinds of numbers -- sometimes it's a bit more, sometimes a little bit less.

Now, I'm not saying flu is like coronavirus, I'm just simply saying that the burden of death of flu is like coronavirus. Especially when we correct for the fact that people who die from coronavirus are older on average than people who died from flu . Flu kills young people, it kills two or three times more people under 65 than does coronavirus. If we put those facts into the situation we find that the burden of death from coronavirus and Phillip Shaw will, in Europe, where we have good numbers in less than that of a very flu.

Another factor which has not been considered are all the cancer patients who aren't being treated, or all the heart cardiology patients who aren't being treated. I've got estimates of tens of thousands of people who are basically going to be dying because of lack of that treatment -- and generally again the age group who die of cancer are younger than the age group who die of coronavirus.

There's one very easy way to sort of summarize coronavirus. I put an article in the medium by the pretty famous British statistician Sir David Spiegelhalter of Cambridge [University] and he had said that the numbers coming from Ferguson suggested that we had to lose about one year of people. It turns out that I immediately wrote an article in the same medium and replied to him, saying that in fact the answer was actually one month, not one year. So basically my feeling is, and it's being supported by the numbers, is that the amount of excess death you need to reach saturation, I'm not going to call it herd immunity, where the virus by itself stops, is on the order of four weeks of excess. Now to give you some idea in the European area where there is good monitoring, by a website called EuroMoMo , run out of Denmark, which covers about 300 million people. Every week in Europe in that area there's around 50,000 natural deaths. So in four weeks there will be about 200,000 extra deaths in that year -- and it looks like coronavirus in Europe where it's no doubt that it's the most severely hit area in the world -- we'll probably reach around 200,000 or 4 weeks worth.

Q: So what happens if what you're saying is there's a sort of statistical observation which is around four weeks of excess death and then the pandemic seems to peter out, or begin to flatten out. What does that mean policy-wise for these European countries then?

A: If we could protect the old people perfectly, then the death rates would be very, very low. So for example in Europe there were about 140,000 excess deaths in the last nine weeks. The number of those excess deaths who are younger than 65 is about 10%. So basically 13,000 of 130,000 deaths are actually under 65 years old and if we had simply been able to protect elderly people then the death rate would have been much much less . But the key thing is to have as much infection for as little possible death and also do whatever you can to keep the hospitals full but not overflowing. It's a difficult calculation and the trouble is that in Sweden there's no political concerns.

The trouble is is that in Israel and I know as well in the United States, everything is political and therefore nobody could say something like this. They would say, " Ah, but you are not valuing death -- the thing that should have been done is for the media to stress to people that everyday somebody dies. These people are essentially in the same age band, and they die from Corona and other comorbidities, other diseases.

I've become a huge fan of Twitter. I'd never used twitter before and for me Twitter is the best discussion forum I had seen since I was a student at the Cambridge Laboratory of Natural Biology. Which is a 26 Nobel Prize winning lab. The best lab in the world. The Twitter discussion is phenomenal and I'm getting documents from Italy showing that many of the Covid deaths were either dead before they were tested or else they had up to three other conditions. There is nothing wrong with this, people die for all sorts of reasons, but the news should be stressing this and maybe they should be counting it as a 0.1 Covid death.

Countries seem to be racing to have as many Covid deaths as they could, and this is a huge mistake. In the flu season no one cares about these people. I mean, the total number of Covid deaths in Europe will be very similar to a severe flu season, and you know, this is serious. Flu is a serious disease. Maybe we should just shut down the economy during the flu season. I mean people should have been made to understand it. Unfortunately I think in Britain they started out wanting to go for herd immunity without too much lockdown, there was then a scary paper -- which is likely to be retracted -- which influenced Italy as well where basically it was claimed they were -- [Interviewer interrupts]

Q: I know you had some specific queries about Neil Ferguson's paper; we had him on the show last week . So, what did you think he got wrong in those models and predictions?

A: His work was on modelling, and around the 10th of February he had his first paper (that I saw) and in there he was getting a case fatality ratio of around 15%, whereas all my observations were saying that it was around three or four percent. So I was suspicious: I looked at the paper very carefully and in a footnote to a table it said "assuming exponential growth for six days at fifteen percent a day." Now, I had looked at China, and never, ever seen exponential growth that wasn't decaying rapidly so I was suspicious. My numbers were 10% of the numbers that Ferguson had obtained. I pointed this out, in a reply in the medium -- which was out there, it's clear nobody has ever seen it but it's there, and I didn't hide it it just didn't get any likes and this said that it was much more like one month than one year and have an exchange with Spiegelhalta and Ferguson, where I tried to show my case.

But all I was doing was just simple proportionality using exactly the same profile of -- different ages have different death rates, so there's a profile saying that people over 80 have a certain fraction of the disk [deaths] people between 17 and 80 have a different fraction -- just using that data and simply saying we want the number of deaths that occurred on the Diamond Princess to be the same number that we found which was 7 or 8. If you do that, and then you apply that proportionality to Britain and the USA, you find that for Britain the half a million drops to about 50,000 and in the United States the two million drops to 200,000. Essentially a year dropping to a month.

Q: And so the the argument that is made here is that whether you believe the infection fatality rate is point three percent or whether you believe it's point eight percent there is still a big chunk of the population, the majority population who hasn't had been exposed to the disease or hasn't had it and therefore if we just let it rip there will be many many tens possibly even further hundreds according to Professor Ferguson of thousands of deaths and that's why it's politically totally not an option to be at do anything other than follow this ultra cautious approach.What do you say to that?

A: The World Health Organization, and epidemiologists in general, can only go wrong if they give [politicians] a number smaller. If I said it's going to be 1 billion deaths from coronavirus and it's, "oh, you guys have done what I've said and there's only gonna be a hundred thousands," that is considered good policy. They overestimated bird flu by a factor of a hundred, or ten thousand in The Guardian . The Guardian wrote about this. Ebola was overestimated by a factor of 100 I think. They see their role as scaring people into doing something. I can understand that and there's something to be said for it. I f you could practice lock down with zero economic costs, and zero social costs -- let's do it. But the trouble is that those costs are huge, we're gonna have fatalities from hospitals being closed down, additional children in trauma, businesses damaged -- maybe less so in the UK because of the compensation policy -- but certainly massive economic damage in the USA and in Israel, and in other countries. So you need to balance both of these things.

That is what I don't think is responsible. I n my work if I say a number is too small and I'm wrong or a number is too big and I'm wrong, both of those errors are the same. If I'm 10 percent too high or 10 percent too low that is okay. It seems that being a factor of a thousand too high is perfectly okay in epidemiology, but being a factor of three too low, is too low.

Q: I'm trying to think about what this means for the UK and for these countries that are trying to work out what to do next.Is your view then having looked at the numbers that if we had not implemented lockdown we would have seen a fall off anyway is that a fair summary?

A: We could have had smart lockdown. Sweden, for example, doesn't allow gatherings of more than 50 people. I think a football game would be a really bad idea right now, because people shout and therefore spray saliva on everyone around them, and they could infect a lot of people. But you know Sweden is doing fine, their deaths again are very localized to nursing homes, like they are in England -- it's the same profile.

I think that you know again it's Sweden so all the evidence suggests that. So my contradiction is the following: Britain, if they had done nothing would have had reported deaths. Now remember there's a difference of reported death, my numbers are all reported. This would have four weeks of additional reported death when the numbers actually came in from what were the real axis death. My guess is they would be less than that so it would not have been double. It wasn't in the month but maybe one and three quarters or so on. So that is my feeling -- we're seeing this in Europe we will know the answer in three or four weeks time. We will know for all of Europe exactly what the excess death of coronavirus was, right now it's a hundred and thirty seven thousand.

Q: Do you find when you've been making these points -- in the media that you received a lot of backlash? Do you think there's a lot of political pressure, as an academic and as an academic you know they're one of your colleagues in Stanford dr. Ioannidis has also put out studies that seem to become skeptical and has received a lot of political blowback.

A: I went on CNN once when he was CNN Vicky Anderson out of London. I appeared on Fox News a couple of times basically said this is all just common sense because I appeared on Fox News CNN wouldn't have me anymore. So basically I have had very clear of things. I had one article in the Los Angeles Times which did great but since I was not saying things that were too extreme none of the East Coast newspapers wanted me, they quoted me, but they wouldn't have me. What's disconcerting is, a few of my academic colleagues -- even relatives -- were very upset with me. Because in my earlier writing I published a report, the medium report from the 22nd of March but on the 13th or 14th of March I distributed a 19 page report,and three academics got very upset with me. I think they were totally panicked, and they felt that if anyone thought this was true they wouldn't lock down as tightly as they should, I'm in fact friends with all the people again, there are no hard feelings.

Q: Let me leave you with one final question: what's your prognosis, what do you think is now gonna happen with this what happens next?

A: There will be a reckoning. Maybe countries will start to see that they need governments that are not necessarily great in rhetoric, but actually thinking and doing. I often go back and think about what Socrates said 2,400 years ago: use your common sense instead of listening to the rhetoric of leaders. We have become very influenced by [rhetoric] that. I think this is another foul-up on the part of the baby boomers.

I am a real baby-boomer, I was born in 1947, and I think we've really screwed up. We cause pollution, we allowed the world's population to increase three-fold, we've caused the problems of global warming, we've left your generation with a real mess in order to save a really small number of very old people. If I was a young person now, I would say, "now you guys are gonna pay for this."

We have my family whatsapp and very early on I said this is a virus being designed to get rid of the baby boomers. You know I don't know, I think my wife thinks this is going to be a take it to the streets thing,and we're gonna have the young people on the street saying you guys have really screwed up it's time to go. And I always joke with her, saying well at least I've made lots of friends among the young people, I'll be okay.

But quite frankly you know I've had a great life, and I must say this to all the young faces in front of me. I have a grandson who's 17. I'd much rather have young people live for a very long time. That said I do have a mother who's a hundred and five years old living in London with my brother, she's in lockdown and I talk to her by whatsapp every single day on FaceTime, and she's fine. She still uses her phone and so on so you know these differences but

You guys should get out there and do something don't accept this anymore we screwed up too much

[Jun 01, 2020] Drug Wars How Big Pharma Raises Prices and Keeps Generics off the Market

Jun 01, 2020 | www.amazon.com

David Wineberg , Reviewed in the United States on June 26, 2017

...when first we practice to deceive

A measure of just how perverse US pharmaceutical markets have become is the "reverse payment" in which the original manufacturer sues the maker of the new generic version for patent infringement, then settles by paying the generic maker to go away for several months before launching its version. If that is intriguing instead of revolting, Drug Wars is for you.

Feldman and Frondorf have researched all the Food and Drug Administration's generics files going back to the turn of the century, and found a treasure trove of manipulation, waste and greed that prove why we need an FDA in the first place. That the FDA is being crippled by all these shenanigans is criminal. To the tune of billions of dollars a year.

The name of the game is delay. Every month of delay can mean tens of millions of dollars from consumers and insurers overpaying. A year's delay can easily mean a billion dollars' profit. The frightening total is that 45% of Pharma revenues worldwide come from American patients. Because no other country lets them get away with this.

Some of the tactics Big Pharma uses:

Big Pharma fills the courts with frivolous suits, loads down the FDA with nonsenses complaints (demanding tests that are already required, for example) and applications, and stalls. A finding that a drug might be dangerous may not be filed for years – until a generic appears on the scene. Bogus applications that slow down generic approvals are routinely rejected – but they serve the purpose by taking up valuable time, at taxpayer and patient expense. While Drug Wars has a worthy conclusion packed with sensible recommendations, it is clear Congress will not act on them, and that lifesaving drugs should not be left to the "free" market.

David Wineberg

Rebecca L. Elson , Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2017
Drug Wars

This article originally appeared on The Magical Buffet's website on 06/28/2017.

When you read that I'm about to discuss a book called "Drug Wars" your mind probably goes straight to America's "war" on illegal drugs, but you would be mistaken. There is a war involving prescription drugs going on right now that many of us had no idea existed. It's one where pharmaceutical companies always win and the public always loses.

A long time ago, before the mid-80's (I can't believe I called that a long time ago!) people realized that very few generic drugs were coming onto the market. Wait, let me back up for those of you who aren't constantly on meds like myself. So in the fashion world designer label Louis Vuitton sells its "Saint Michel" purse for $1,700. It's a bag, it holds stuff. You can also find on your better handbag websites what are subtly referred to as "knock off" versions for a couple hundred dollars. It's also a bag. It also holds stuff. That's essentially prescription drugs and their generic versions, except in this case the FDA makes sure that the bags are made of the same primary material. A prescription drug can be hundreds of dollars, but a generic drug is nearly identical at a fraction of the price. With the state of health insurance then, and now, there is an interest in generics for public consumption.

Thus in 1984 The Drug Price Competition and Patent Term Restoration Act, often called the Hatch-Waxman Act, went into effect to stimulate a generic drug market. The Hatch-Waxman Act is a great idea. It attempts to strike a balance between capitalism and the common good. When a pharmaceutical company goes to market with a new chemical that company is given 5 years of exclusivity. It also streamlined the process for companies looking to bring a generic version to the market. Thus the originator gets 5 years of market dominance to recoup research costs, etc. while providing the eventual competition of a generic to make things easier on the consumer's pocketbook and encourage pharmaceutical companies to get back to the drawing board to innovate and bring another new drug to market that again gets 5 years of competition free existence. Pretty elegant, right?

What no one saw coming, but let's face it, those in the know probably did, was that pharmaceutical companies found ways to extend their periods of exclusivity, which of course makes things harder on us sickos of America. The use of lawsuits to stall generics going to market is common, and not surprising once you're reading "Drug Wars". What was shocking was the collusion between the manufacturers of the original drug and the companies making the generics. When these companies are in litigation they can fight it out, or settle. Oddly the settlement involves the manufacturer of the original drug paying obscene sums of money to the generic, and the generic agreeing to hold off going to market for several more years. There many ways safe and effect generic drugs are delayed from becoming available, and "Drug Wars" does an amazing job highlighting them. The authors, Robin Feldman and Even Frondorf, also make recommendations on how to fix these issues.

If you're into intricate bureaucracies, healthcare in America, and a few laugh out loud absurdities then you need to read "Drug Wars: How Big Pharma Raises Prices and Keeps Generics Off the Market" by Robin Feldman and Even Frondorf.

[Jun 01, 2020] Drugs, Money, and Secret Handshakes The Unstoppable Growth of Prescription Drug Prices

Jun 01, 2020 | www.amazon.com

In the warped world of prescription drug pricing, generic drugs can cost more than branded ones, old drugs can be relaunched at astronomical prices, and low-cost options are shut out of the market. In Drugs, Money and Secret Handshakes, Robin Feldman shines a light into the dark corners of the pharmaceutical industry to expose a web of shadowy deals in which higher-priced drugs receive favorable treatment and patients are channeled toward the most expensive medicines. At the center of this web are the highly secretive middle players who establish coverage levels for patients and negotiate with drug companies. By offering lucrative payments to these middle players (as well as to doctors and hospitals), drug companies ensure that inexpensive drugs never gain traction. This system of perverse incentives has delivered the kind of exorbitant drug prices - and profits - that everyone loves except for those who pay the bills.

[May 31, 2020] Russian Health Ministry Approves First Domestic Drug for COVID-19

May 31, 2020 | sputniknews.com

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The Russian Health Ministry has approved the first domestic drug, called Avifavir, for treating coronavirus patients, according to a new entry to the national drug registry. The medicine was developed by the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), a sovereign wealth fund, and ChemRar, a Russian pharmaceutical investment and R&D group.

"Avifavir is not only the first antiviral drug registered against coronavirus in Russia, but it is also perhaps the most promising anti-COVID-19 drug in the world. It was developed and tested in clinical trials in Russia in an unprecedentedly short period of time enabling Avifavir to become the first registered drug based on Favipiravir in the world", CEO of the RDIF Kirill Dmitriev said.

The final stage of Avifavir clinical trials involving 330 patients, approved by the national Health Ministry earlier in the month, is ongoing.

Previously, the new drug underwent several clinical trials at I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Lomonosov Moscow State University, and other medical and academic institutions.

Avifavir, is the first Russian direct antiviral drug that has proven effective in clinical trials. The drug has been used in Japan since 2014 against severe forms of influenza.

In April, the Russian Direct Investment Fund launched a project to diagnose and detect pneumonia , including that caused by the SARS-COV-2 coronavirus.

ChemRar Group includes R&D service and investment companies in the field of innovative pharmaceuticals for the development and commercialization of innovative medicines, diagnostics, preventive care, and new treatments of life-threatening diseases in Russia and abroad.

The latest data by the Russian Health Ministry shows that more than 396,000 cases of the coronavirus and 4,555 fatalities related to the disease have been confirmed in the country.

[May 30, 2020] Paul Craig Roberts Questions The Campaign Against HCQ

May 29, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,

The Covid-19 pandemic has brought out many disturbing features of our society. Misinformation, or perhaps more accurately, disinformation, abounds in the service of agendas ranging from those who interpret the virus as a useful ploy for the construction of a police state, to Big Pharma and its allies who are moving us toward mass vaccinations, to the narcissistic views of those who would sacrifice the elderly and ill rather than to be inconvenienced by being denied access to bars and beaches. Every aspect of the pandemic, including Trump's own use of HCQ, is being used against the President of the United States.

At a time when accurate information is essential, the waters are instead muddied by disinformation in the service of political, ideological, and profit agendas. The irresponsibility of those putting their self-interests first is extraordinary. It indicates that the social bond between people that made America a country has been dissolved by greed, multiculturalism, and Identity Politics. America has become a country without a common interest. It is a narcissistic state.

This article is limited to the campaign against HCQ. HCQ -- hydroxychloroquine -- has been in use for 65 years for the prevention or treatment of malaria, lupus, and rheumatoid arthritis. It is officially labeled a safe drug. Many doctors treating Covid patients have found and reported HCQ, when used early enough together with zinc and the antibiotic azithromycin to be an effective and safe treatment.

I have reported and made available many of the reports of HCQ's efficacy and safety. See for example:

Despite 65 years of safe use, HCQ is alleged to be dangerous and to cause heart attacks. Its use is officially approved only for "adolescent and adult patients hospitalized with COVID-19." Generally, by the time a patient is hospitalized the virus has progressed to a later stage in which treatment is less successful. Studies of HCQ's effectiveness, such as the VA one and apparently the more recent one reported in The Lancet, are limited to later stage hospitalized patients and seem to exclude the essential zinc component of the HCQ treatment. In other words, the studies seem to be designed to exclude from official approval the treatment that doctors have found most effective. It is not easy for a layperson to know what the studies actually say as the media report the studies in an anti-Trump manner. For the media, what is most important is criticism of Trump, not the effectiveness of a treatment.

In contrast, the untested investigational antiviral drug, Remdesivir, which has no record of safe use and is extraordinarily expensive compared to HCQ, has been given the same clearence for use. The media is not interested in the effectiveness and safety, or lack of, of this new and untested drug. Trump isn't taking it, and it is a potential profit-maker for Big Pharma. If Remdesivir fails, the failure will be used to dispose of the hope for cures and to focus on vaccination.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that HCQ/zinc is being sidelined in order to clear the way for a profitable vaccine and a vaccination mandate.

But the vaccines are not panning out.

The Moderna vax touted by Bill Gates and Dr. Fauci caused severe illnesses in one-fifth of the test recipients.

The other fast-tracked vaccine developed by the Oxford Vaccine Group proved ineffective. The vaccine produced insufficient antibodies to prevent Covid-19 infection.

...

A few years ago the British medical journal, The Lancet , published a paper touting the safety of HCQ. But this was before HCQ with zinc was found effective if used earlier enough against Covid-19. Covid-19 turned HCQ's effectiveness into a big problem for Big Pharma's big profits.

The solution was another study by medical professionals some of whom have ties to Big Pharma and none of whom, apparently, are involved in the treatment of Covid patients. The study lumps together people in different stages of the disease and undergoing different treatments. It touts its large sample, but many of the patients in the sample received treatment too late after the virus had reached their heart and other vital organs. Most likely the people who died from heart failure died as a result of the virus, not from HCQ.

To be effective treatment has to stop the virus early. Waiting until the patient must be hospitalized has given the virus too much of a head start. Every doctor, and there are many, who reports success with the HCQ treatment stresses early treatment. President Trump used a two-week treatment with HCQ as a prophylactic as he was constantly coming into contact with people who tested positive for the virus. Many medical professionals who are treating Covid patients also use HCQ as a prophylactic.

The Lancet study was a rush job as it was essential for Big Pharma to prevent the spread of the HCQ treatment and awareness of its safety and effectiveness. The study's authors completed the data collection around the middle of April and the study was published on May 22. As soon as it appeared, it was used to close down the World Health Organization's clinical trial of hydoxychloroquine in coronavirus patients citing safety concerns. Most likely, the trial was aborted in order to prevent an official agency from finding out that HCQ worked.

The media, of course, used the suspended trial to cast more doubt on Trump's judgment for recommending and using the treatment, the implication being that Trump had put himself at more risk from a heart attack than from the virus itself.

The Daily Mail , which is often somewhat skeptical of official reports, even misreported French virologist Didier Raoult's report ) of his success with treating 1,061 patients with HCQ/AZ as consisting of o nly a small sample of 30 patients . A small sample is considered to be inconclusive. Thus 1,061 people became 30.

The Lancet study claims a high mortality from HCQ treatment, reporting a death rate ranging from 5.1% to 13.8%. In response to a journalist when asked about this claim, Didier Raoult said that he and has colleagues have followed 4,000 of their patients so far. They have had 36 deaths and none from heart problems for a death rate of 0.009%. According to The Lancet study, he should have between 204 and 552 patients dead from heart problems. He has zero. Raoult had more than 10,000 cardiograms analysed by rythmologists (a special kind of cardiologist) searching for any sign of heart problems.

NIH's Dr. Fauci denies that Raoult's hard evidence is evidence. On May 27 Fauci said, without showing shame of his ignorance or his lie, that there's no evidence that shows the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine is effective at treating COVID-19.

Perhaps what Fauci means is that no study undertaken by NIH or another Big Pharma friendly official body has been done and that only such studies constitute evidence.

When hard evidence such as Raoult's is suppressed and misreported while "studies" doctored to produce a predetermined conclusion that serves Big Pharma profits are rushed into publication, we know that money has pushed ethics out of medical research. A number of concerned people have been telling us this for some time. We are past due to listen to them.

Private medicine is profit driven, which makes it susceptible to fraud. In long ago days fraud was restrained by the moral character of doctors and the respect for truth of researchers. These restraints, never perfect, have eroded as greed turned everything, integrity itself, into a commodity that is bought and sold.

The intent is to bury HCQ as a low cost effective treatment and to put in its place a high cost alternative whether effective or not, and to supplement this enhancement of profits with mass vaccination which might do us more harm than the virus itself. Big Pharma could care less. The only value it knows is profit.

This intent has garnered the support of the French, Belgium and Italian governments . Using The Lancet study and WHO's termination of its HCQ trial as the excuse, the French government revoked its decree authorizing HCQ treatment. Belgium's health ministry issued a warning against the use of HCQ except in registered clinical trials. Italy's health agency wants HCQ's use banned outside of clinical trials and suspended authorization to use HCQ as a Covid-19 treatment.

Does this mean that Raoult and his team who by treating Covid patients with HCQ have achieved the remarkable low death rate of 0.009% are prohibited from using the proven cure to save lives? Will Raoult and his team be imprisoned if they continue to save lives? What about the people who will die from the three government's prevention of a safe and effective treatment? Will France, Belgium, and Italy accept responsibility for these lost lives?

I can't avoid wondering if the revolving door between Big Pharma and the NIH and CDC which corrupts US public health decisions also operates in France, Belgium and Italy. Are European health officials elevating themselves by climbing over the dead bodies of their victims?

[May 30, 2020] Democrats are fueling a corporate counter-revolution against progressives by David Sirota

Notable quotes:
"... corporate health insurance has far higher administrative costs than single-payer programs like Medicare , and even the much-vaunted Affordable Care Act allows insurers to siphon up to 20% of customers' premiums to corporate profits rather than actual medical care. ..."
"... That's probably why insurance companies have been lobbying for it . They know that such a program would boost their short-term profits, and they know that once such a program is in place, it would be politically difficult to get it repealed and replaced by progressives' far better Medicare for All program. In other words: Democrats' Cobra plan may secure insurance companies' profit-skimming position between Americans and their healthcare providers for decades to come. ..."
May 26, 2020 | www.theguardian.com

Democrats in Washington are not just passively failing to mount an opposition to Trump. They are actively helping Republicans. 'This corporate counterrevolution is easiest to see in Democrats' enthusiastic support for Republicans' legislative response to the coronavirus crisis.'

These are bleak days for America's progressive movement. The Democratic primary process handed the party's nomination to the candidate with the most conservative record. Corporate-friendly politicians like the New York governor, Andrew Cuomo, are using the pandemic to brandish their images and install billionaires to run things . Progressive lawmakers in Congress are being steamrolled, even by their own party's leadership . And a recession is battering the state and local budgets that fund progressive priorities like education and the social safety net.

Perhaps this is a temporary stall-out – a fleeting moment of retreat in a two-steps-forward-one-step-back trajectory. After all, polls continue to show that from workers' rights to universal healthcare , a majority of Americans support a progressive policy agenda.

The problem, though, is that Democrats in Washington are not just passively failing to mount a strong opposition to Donald Trump – they are actively helping Republicans try to fortify the obstacles to long-term progressive change well after this emergency subsides.

This corporate counter-revolution is easiest to see in Democrats' enthusiastic support for Republicans' legislative response to the coronavirus crisis. Democrats' entire 2018 electoral campaign told America that the opposition party needed to win back Congress in order to block Trump's regressive agenda. And yet, when the Republicans proposed a bill to let Trump's appointees dole out government cash to their corporate allies with no strings attached , this same opposition party mustered not a single recorded vote against the package. Not one.

Thanks to that, Trump appointees and the Federal Reserve can now hand out $4tn to politically connected corporations as they lay waste to our economy and steamroll progressive reforms. Private equity firms and fossil fuel companies get new tax breaks as they buy elections and try to lock in permanent climate change.

These bailouts were part of a larger legislative package that included good things like expanded unemployment benefits – and so you could argue that Democrats simply had to swallow a bitter pill and vote yes. Except, they subsequently proposed their own standalone legislation that would further strengthen the corporate opponents of progressive reform.

For example, there is the Democrats' push to alter the so-called paycheck protection program (PPP). Those loans were designed to help employees of mom-and-pop enterprises throughout the country. House Democrats' new stimulus legislation would open up the small business lending program to what they call "small nonprofits", but their language was crafted to provide the forgivable loans to industry trade associations. Those lobby groups represent the planet's biggest corporations – and their political action committees have delivered more than $191m of campaign cash to lawmakers in the last two decades.

Democrats have pitched their legislation as a "message" bill that declares their values – and in this case, they are reassuring Washington power-players that money meant for workers at neighborhood restaurants, local shops and other mom-and-pop concerns can be raided by the front groups representing giant drug companies, health insurers and Wall Street firms. If the legislation passes, it would not merely be an epic tale of greed – the new funding stream for corporate lobbying groups would bolster the very forces that make sure federal policy disempowers workers, maximizes private profit and generally protects the ruling class.

The tragedy is we're already moving in that wrong direction, and chances to change the dynamic don't come around often

It's an even worse story on healthcare. As 43 million Americans face the prospect of losing private health insurance, Democrats had a huge opportunity. After Trump himself suggested he wanted the government to pay healthcare providers directly for treating uninsured Covid-19 patients, they could have called his bluff and passed existing legislation to expand a Medicare program that provides actual medical care. Instead, House Democrats passed a bill to support lightly regulated private insurance marketplaces and to subsidize existing private insurance plans through a Rube Goldberg machine known as Cobra – and they passed this giveaway just after receiving an infusion of campaign cash collected by insurance lobbyists.

Taken together, these initiatives would route yet more public money through a corporate insurance bureaucracy in hopes that medical care eventually trickles down to Americans who desperately need it. Such a system is totally inadequate during a pandemic: it doesn't guarantee healthcare – it only only guarantees insurance coverage, which is so often denied or restricted when a medical claim is actually filed. Moreover, corporate health insurance has far higher administrative costs than single-payer programs like Medicare , and even the much-vaunted Affordable Care Act allows insurers to siphon up to 20% of customers' premiums to corporate profits rather than actual medical care.

But then, Democrats' Cobra plan is not merely a financial bailout for insurers – it is also a political bailout when the industry needs it most. At a time when popular support for Medicare for All is surging – when even a Republican president feels the need to make rhetorical (if empty) gestures toward the concept of government-funded healthcare – the Cobra plan would use public money to firm up the private health insurance industry's dominance over the healthcare system, just in time to short circuit a Medicare expansion.

That's probably why insurance companies have been lobbying for it . They know that such a program would boost their short-term profits, and they know that once such a program is in place, it would be politically difficult to get it repealed and replaced by progressives' far better Medicare for All program. In other words: Democrats' Cobra plan may secure insurance companies' profit-skimming position between Americans and their healthcare providers for decades to come.

If you get the sense that the fix is in and this is all deliberate, you're not wrong. Many of the self-styled progressive advocacy groups in Washington that posture as #resistance leaders turned a blind eye to the bill's problems and endorsed the legislation shortly after it was introduced, undercutting progressive lawmakers off the bat.

Making matters worse was the theater on the House floor. During the debate over the Democratic bill, nine progressive lawmakers made a public show of voting against the procedural measure to advance the bill, along with a tiny group of moderates. When it came to the real vote on actually passing the bill, a larger group of moderates ended up voting against it, but only one progressive lawmaker, Representative Pramila Jayapal, voted no . Had the progressives and moderates combined forces on either of the votes, they would have forced the bill back to the drawing board. Instead, their shenanigans ultimately helped secure the legislation's passage.

Taken together, the spectacle was more confirmation that whatever resistance exists in the nation's capital, it is so often performance art, rather than anything real.

"Outside groups and House lawmakers need to work together to build a populist bloc – probably inclusive of moderate Democrats and perhaps even an occasional Republican – who will stand united to force votes to ensure that our economy does right by ordinary people," said David Segal of Demand Progress, pointing to news of a potential Democratic coalition to buck the party's leadership and support a plan to float businesses' payrolls through the crisis. "We must make sure that America does not go in the wrong direction and become even more inequitable because we let unemployment soar, compel cities and states to implement austerity, force small businesses to shutter and let large corporations backstopped by the Fed roll them up."

The tragedy is that we're already moving in that wrong direction, and chances to change the political dynamic do not come around often. As Barack Obama's former chief of staff Rahm Emanuel (now an investment banker and TV talking head) said more than a decade ago during the financial crisis: "Never allow a good crisis to go to waste – it's an opportunity to do the things you once thought were impossible."

Billionaires and corporations are clearly following that advice, aiming to use the pandemic to grow their wealth and political power in previously unfathomable ways. It would be better if the opposition party put up a real fight – or at least refused to be complicit in postponing progress for yet another generation.

David Sirota is a Guardian US columnist and Jacobin editor at large who served as Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign speechwriter. He also publishes Too Much Information newsletter.

[May 29, 2020] Chris Whitty - the UK's Chief Medical Officer - says that, to most people, the coronavirus is entirely harmless.

May 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Roberto , May 28 2020 20:12 utc | 10

2 or 8 meters away from everybody? it doesn't matter.

Please go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adj8MCsZKlg

In this clip from the Downing Street Corona Briefing on May 11th, Chris Whitty - the UK's Chief Medical Officer - says that, to most people, the coronavirus is entirely harmless.

Most people will never get it.
Most of the people who get it won't ever experience symptoms.
Most of the people who experience symptoms won't need medical care.
Most of the people who need medical care won't be need emergency or critical care.
And even the tiny percentage of people who need who DO need critical care will survive, regardless of risk factors or medical history.

[May 29, 2020] 'Thousands' Of Dutch COVID-19 Survivors Likely Have Permanent Lung Damage According To Top Pulmonologist

May 29, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

COVID-19 may be far less deadly than originally projected - and asymptomatic cases may be even more common than first suspected, but for those who have caught it and come down with symptoms, the disease can result in lasting symptoms, including shortness of breath, lethargy, recurrent fevers, headaches, itchiness and other mystery problems that aren't going away .

To that end, a top pulmonologist in the Netherlands says that thousands of Dutch residents who have recovered from COVID-19 may be left with permanent lung damage , resulting in decreased lung capacity and difficulty absorbing oxygen.

A computer tomography (CT) X-ray scan shows the signature "ground glass" tissue due to COVID-19 infection,
which is caused by fluid in the lungs. Weifang Kong and Prachi P. Agarwal

According to Leon van den Toorn, Chairman of the Dutch Association of Physicians for Pulmonary Disease and Tuberculosis NVALT, people are underestimating the consequences of the coronavirus .

"In severe cases, a kind of scar formation occurs, we call this lung fibrosis. The lungs shrink and the lung tissue becomes stiffer, making it harder to get enough oxygen," Van den Toorn told Dutch newspaper AD (via the NL Times ), adding that "there may be thousands of people in the Netherlands who suffered permanent injury to the lungs from corona."

Of the 1,200 Covid-19 patients who so far recovered after admission to intensive care, "almost 100 percent went home with residual damage", he said to AD. And about half of the 6 thousand people who were hospitalized, but did not need intensive care, will have symptoms for years to come.

So far 45,500 people in the Netherlands tested positive for the coronavirus. Many did not get sick enough to need hospital care. In this group, Van den Toorn expects that permanent problems will be less serious, but still possible. - NL Times

Van den Toorn says that patients experiencing lung issues should immediately see a pulmonologist, as "there may be a low oxygen level in the blood, which is harmful to the body."

"People with a history of corona infection should be monitored closely to see if recovery is complete," he added.

Drilling down on lung issues, let's flash back to March , when a New Orleans respiratory therapist dealing with coronavirus patients told ProPublica that coronavirus patients suffering from acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) are extremely difficult to oxygenate .

Authored by Lizzie Presser via ProPublica

"Normally, ARDS is something that happens over time as the lungs get more and more inflamed. But with this virus, it seems like it happens overnight . When you're healthy, your lung is made up of little balloons. Like a tree is made out of a bunch of little leaves, the lung is made of little air sacs that are called the alveoli. When you breathe in, all of those little air sacs inflate, and they have capillaries in the walls, little blood vessels. The oxygen gets from the air in the lung into the blood so it can be carried around the body.

​ A screenshot of chest radiographs of a man suspected to have COVID-19. (Obtained by ProPublica via the Radiological Society of North America, cited in the paper "Severe Acute Respiratory Disease in a Huanan Seafood Market Worker: Images of an Early Casualty" by Lijuan Qian, Jie Yu and Heshui Shi.)

"Typically with ARDS, the lungs become inflamed. It's like inflammation anywhere: If you have a burn on your arm, the skin around it turns red from additional blood flow. The body is sending it additional nutrients to heal. The problem is, when that happens in your lungs, fluid and extra blood starts going to the lungs. Viruses can injure cells in the walls of the alveoli, so the fluid leaks into the alveoli. A telltale sign of ARDS in an X-ray is what's called 'ground glass opacity,' like an old-fashioned ground glass privacy window in a shower. And lungs look that way because fluid is white on an X-ray, so the lung looks like white ground glass, or sometimes pure white, because the lung is filled with so much fluid, displacing where the air would normally be. "

...

"It first struck me how different it was when I saw my first coronavirus patient go bad. I was like, Holy shit, this is not the flu . Watching this relatively young guy, gasping for air, pink frothy secretions coming out of his tube and out of his mouth . The ventilator should have been doing the work of breathing but he was still gasping for air, moving his mouth, moving his body, struggling. We had to restrain him. With all the coronavirus patients, we've had to restrain them. They really hyperventilate, really struggle to breathe . When you're in that mindstate of struggling to breathe and delirious with fever, you don't know when someone is trying to help you, so you'll try to rip the breathing tube out because you feel it is choking you, but you are drowning . ay_arrow 3 play_arrow


Bananamerican , 5 hours ago

Oxygen toxicity, caused by excessive or inappropriate supplemental oxygen, can cause severe damage to the lungs and other organ systems. High concentrations of oxygen, over a long period of time, can increase free radical formation, leading to damaged membranes, proteins, and cell structures in the lungs. It can cause a spectrum of lung injuries ranging from mild tracheobronchitis to diffuse alveolar damage.

smacker , 4 hours ago

I think you're right about ventilators being the wrong treatment. According to some doctors the patients needed oxygen not ventilation.

I spotted here in Brazil, patients were being placed inside plastic oxygen tents neatly fitted over the top half of their beds. So their breathing remained natural.

Battlefield USA , 6 hours ago

Co-existence of coronavirus with bacterial pathogen a major cause of fatalities

Battlefield USA , 6 hours ago

Did you know that the regular run-of-the-mill pneumonia causes lung damage and a host of other problems.

You would know that if you read up on it at the CDC and NIH website.

But just keep being an ignorant brainwashed dumb-***.

Getitright2016 , 7 hours ago

As soon as symptoms appear, a person should be treated. Waiting for shortness of breath is too late. Damage has been done. Early treatment, blood thinners, HCQ with zinc and Antibiotics Zpac to prevent pneumonia.

INeverForget , 7 hours ago

**** THAT "Z-PACK".

Harnar , 7 hours ago

Z-pack gave my mother in law afib (Atrial fibrillation). Although the doctor said it was just coincidence that 3 days after starting Z-pack she was in the hospital with chest pains and needed to be on beta blockers for the rest of her life....

Unfortunately she isn't always good about remembering her pills and died a couple years later due to a brain aneurysms (which can occur if you come off beta blockers too fast or forget to take them for a few days after taking them regularly for a year)

OutaTime43 , 8 hours ago

Lung injuries happen with Pneumonia. When your cells are killed by the virus, then they are replaced with fibroid tissue (scar tissue) just like any other injury. This is of course a problem with Lungs as it reduces vital capacity. If you smoke or have other lung diseases, then it affects you more. When you're young with healthy lungs, then the damage isn't enough to affect you.

I've had CT scans of my lungs and they can still see the damage caused to my lungs from pneumonia at age 5.

charlie_don't_surf , 8 hours ago

Details??? When they don't give details be suspicious. Were these very old patients with already damaged lungs? Are these former ventilator patients and their lungs were damaged by the ventilator? Were these patients with particular genetic weaknesses or predispositions regarding lung tissue? Until there are exact details of patient demographic, pre existing disease, and the nature of their treatment take with a grain of salt.

MX_DOGG , 8 hours ago

Approximately 22.4% of adults in the Netherlands smoked in 2018. This includes 16.0% daily smokers and 6.4% occasional (non-daily) smokers . Of people in the Netherlands who reported smoking , 71.6% smoked every day

charlie_don't_surf , 8 hours ago

the smart people tell you that extensive data collection shows that 50's and under have an extremely low risk, the vast majority of deaths are extremely old, in nursing homes and the smart also will tell that the death rate was jacked up by Cuomo and some other NE dem state guvs ordering infected patients be put in the nursing homes to increase infections and deaths and the smart people will also tell you that destroying the economy will definitely greatly increase injuries, illnesses and premature death...brah...that's what smart people will tell ignorant stiffs like you but it's like talking to a tree stump...brah.

charlie_don't_surf , 8 hours ago

that's probably damage from over expansion from ventilators or just inflammation can cause capillary breakage...capillaries are weak and break easily when stressed and then of course they clot...because they clotted is normal and not a "clotting disease"...I would bet similar happens when people get a bad pneumonia...lungs bleed from tuberculosis too...probably any significant infectious process in lungs will cause bleeding...I had bleeding from strep throat when I was in college.

John C Durham , 9 hours ago

This happens where ever one doesn't get an anti-viral drug from his doctor at his office in the first day or so. The Viral attack comes and goes in about 7 days.

An anti-viral drug does no good after that and giving anti-viral drugs to a hospital patient when the viral attack is long past, just loads them up with more toxins. This has been known since Hydroxychloroquine was given against SARS years ago. It worked great there early on and many doctors starting using it again for the current big panic.

It does nothing later as demonstrated in a recent study that is being used as firepower against that drug instead of against any doctor prescribing it for late treatment in the hospital.

Hydroxychloroquine should be in everyone's medicine cabinet, available over the counter, to be used against flu, colds and any virus starting on the first day. It's safer than an aspirin and much safer than Tylenol and I bet you have had either or both in your cabinet before without triggering WWIII.

She Love Me Long Time , 9 hours ago

Just like politics, the herd has separated into two sides.

Is it really so difficult to see that both sides are wrong?

Yes, there is a virus. No, it won't kill us all. It's more deadly than the flu but it's not the ******* plague. However, this could be the equivalent of an airborne HIV-type of infection that results in chronic long-term health issues and a weakened immune system. If that's true, wearing an N95 mask when you're at the grocery store, even if it makes you look like a sissy, is the smart thing to do.

Just my 2 cents

Drachma , 9 hours ago

The important test would be to determine how many of the worst affected were regular vaccine recipients, especially the flu vaccine, which has been linked to the phenomenon of viral interference, There are at least two proposed related mechanisms of action contributing to an enhancement of disease with subsequent respiratory viral infections, especially coronavirus, after vaccination with influenza vaccine. On the one hand there is an inflammation and scarring of the interstitial membrane of the lungs, subsequent to influenza inoculation, which lessens oxygen transfer to the blood. On the other hand there is an overreaction by the immune system at the time of the secondary infection with coronavirus, as the cross-reactivity from influenza group antibodies, in this case, acts to over-stimulate the immune system, leading to excessive tissue damage and compounding the disease symptoms.

Vaccines, by their very nature, are contaminated with RNA and DNA from latent and dormant viruses from different species cell lines. Since one of the most ubiquitous viruses in the mammalian cell lines is coronavirus, and many different mammalian as well as avian cell lines are used to produce vaccines, chances are that most people with a government-scheduled vaccine history are already infected with coronavirus. Ponder that subject for a while.

Cardinal Fang , 9 hours ago

I'm no radiologist but those 3 CT scans are of different people so it is not a progression.

It appears they are from Chinese study.

So you can throw that data out the window.

Fiscal Reality , 9 hours ago

Democrat Governors LOVE to kill geezers in nursing homes. Facts matter Cuomo, Murphy,Waltz, Wolf and Witmer.

While Fauxi, Birx, the MSM, Soros, the WHO, the CDC and the DNC/CCP scream SOCIAL DISTANCING AND WEAR YOUR MASK, Dem governors build a big body count by pushing COVID infected patients back into nUrsing homes. MONEY MATTERS MORE THAN LIVES.

bunnyswanson , 9 hours ago

Medical error causing death and the controversy around how ...

healthydebate.ca › 2019/08 › topic › medical-error-cau...

Aug 1, 2019 - In May 2016, the British Medical Journal (BMJ) published an article with the headline: Medical error -- the third leading cause of death in the U.S. The article estimated that as many as 250,000 deaths per year in the United States were caused by medical error.

PrivetHedge , 9 hours ago

gasping for air, pink frothy secretions

That is a lung damaging cytokine storm that can be moderated with vitamin D and C, vitamins our government is staying remarkably quiet about. In a politics free medical system no patient would be allowed to get to that stage.

There are simple cures to these diseases:

  1. Stop Fort Detrick etc. from making them
  2. Use interferon 1, hydroxychloroquine, zinc and antibiotics to cure people before they are permanently damaged.
  3. Allow people to get sunshine and fresh air, and instead of banning useful medicines; ban junk food, GMO and the various other harmful things our government permits in our air and water.
Uncle Frank , 5 hours ago

Why? We didn't buy it the first time.

Don't lose sight of an important fact, one of the few verifiable ones in the piece -

His title - 'Chairman of the Dutch Association of Physicians for Pulmonary Disease and Tuberculosis'.

Ya think he might be motivated to go for grants by hyperbolizing the situation? I do. I'm not saying that some people aren't dying, just that pneumonia isn't ever a walk in the park, and it kills 100's of thousands every year. Try some perspective, and grow a pair. You might need to lose 100 lbs too, I can't tell from here.

JSG , 9 hours ago

Let's see the demographics of these folks. It's an incomplete story without that. My bet: it's people over 70 with pre-existing conditions so this is not remotely surprising. Their immune systems aren't as strong. Their pre-existing conditions likely already causes a lot of this damage (e.g. COPD does exactly this!)

PrivetHedge , 9 hours ago

(as directed by CCP military to the lab people)

The evidence says the CCP were the targets, not the makers.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-world-leader-bio-weapons-research-production-use-against-mankind
https://www.nature.com/news/engineered-bat-virus-stirs-debate-over-risky-research-1.18787
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/higher-form-of-killing-robert-harris/1100618277
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/09/people-are-still-dying-from-mysterious-vaping-illness-as-outbreak-slows.html

smacker , 8 hours ago

Those who claim that China knowingly released this virus in China and elsewhere in Asia to attack America(!) conveniently ignore the vaping disease which was actually a severe respiratory infection.

Then there were multiple deaths in nursing homes by similar infections. All this happened months before CovID-19 came along.

Roacheforque , 10 hours ago

The question is ... is COVID 19 alone CAUSING this reaction, or is it TRIGGERING an immune system response from "something else"?

https://roacheforque.blogspot.com/2020/05/the-case-for-mikovits.html

mrjinx007 , 10 hours ago

"It first struck me how different it was when I saw my first coronavirus patient go bad. I was like, Holy ****, this is not the flu . Watching this relatively young guy, gasping for air, pink frothy secretions coming out of his tube and out of his mouth . The ventilator should have been doing the work of breathing but he was still gasping for air, moving his mouth, moving his body, struggling. We had to restrain him. With all the coronavirus patients, we've had to restrain them. They really hyperventilate, really struggle to breathe . When you're in that mindstate of struggling to breathe and delirious with fever, you don't know when someone is trying to help you, so you'll try to rip the breathing tube out because you feel it is choking you, but you are drowning .

Caused by ventilator.

[May 29, 2020] France bans use of hydroxychloroquine as coronavirus treatment

May 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 28 2020 10:11 utc | 69

France bans use of hydroxychloroquine as coronavirus treatment
The country's public health agency advised against use outside of clinical trials.
https://tinyurl.com/ybm266qn

WHO pauses study of hydroxychloroquine in global trial
The study has enrolled 3,500 patients in at least 17 countries since March.
https://tinyurl.com/ya8b4yuw

US coronavirus death toll tops 100K as Trump pushes to reopen
The tragic milestone revives debate over the handling of the pandemic.
https://tinyurl.com/ybpzormy


A day before the U.S. reached the 100,000-death mark, Trump once again blamed China for not stopping the virus before it spread across the globe, and touted his decision in January to restrict travel from China to the U.S.

"For all of the political hacks out there, if I hadn't done my job well, & early, we would have lost 1 1/2 to 2 Million People, as opposed to the 100,000 plus that looks like will be the number," he tweeted on Tuesday.

Yes, folks, *Trump* is claiming *credit* for saving 1-2 million lives! You can't make this shit up!

Mina , May 28 2020 11:47 utc | 74

Good to know, with regards to what the WHO is doing: "It is not the case that HCQ has been removed from the trial. The WHO has paused that arm of the trial to allow for a review of the interim data to see if they are seeing the same impacts on mortality as have been seen in some other studies."
https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2020/05/26/last-post-on-hydroxychloroquine-perhaps/#comment-1345645

[May 29, 2020] Introducing the Care Smart watch for seniors

Notable quotes:
"... Helpful functions, like a timer, stopwatch, volume and ringtone controls allow the wearer to customize their watch to their lifestyle. Care Smart helps seniors stay effortlessly connected with loved ones with easy-to-use functions and simplified calling and texting. ..."
May 29, 2020 | www.verizon.com

With one-button emergency contact calling and more to help keep seniors safe.

Care Smart watch is an easy-to-use smartwatch designed for seniors. With features like streamlined calling and texting, text-to-speech, reminder settings, and one-button emergency contact calling, 1 this device helps seniors stay connected and puts family members' minds at ease.

Using the Care Smart app 2 caregivers can add up to 10 trusted contacts 3 as well as manage useful things like medication reminders and location alerts.

A large easy-to-read display, simple navigation and pre-set text replies make Care Smart a trusted, everyday companion that seniors and caregivers can rely on. Stay connected with your loved ones with the Care Smart watch and Verizon, America's most awarded network. See Less

Simple to stay in touch.

Care Smart comes with a number of pre-loaded messages making it easier than ever for seniors to respond to text messages. An easy-to-read screen displays the date and time and streamlined 3-touch navigation for accessing contacts, placing calls or sending texts makes this smartwatch a snap to use.

Helpful functions, like a timer, stopwatch, volume and ringtone controls allow the wearer to customize their watch to their lifestyle. Care Smart helps seniors stay effortlessly connected with loved ones with easy-to-use functions and simplified calling and texting.

Only connect with those you trust. With the Care Smart app caregivers can set up to 10 trusted contacts in the senior's watch for calling or texting. And only those predesignated contacts can call or text the wearer, eliminating the worry of fraudulent callers getting in touch with seniors. 3

[May 28, 2020] U.S. Declares a Vaccine War on the World

Notable quotes:
"... The failure of the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) against COVID-19, with nearly four times the annual budget of the WHO, is visible to the world. The CDC failed to provide a successful test for SARS-CoV-2 in the critical months of February and March , while ignoring the WHO's successful test kits that were distributed to 120 countries. ..."
"... Trump has yet to hold his administration and the CDC responsible for this criminal bungling. This, more than any other failure , is the reason that the U.S. numbers for COVID-19 are now more than 1.5 million and about a third of all global infections. Contrast this with China, the first to face an unknown epidemic, stopping it at 82,000 infections, and the amazing results that countries such as Vietnam and South Korea have produced. ..."
"... Taiwan was the first to inform the WHO of human-to-human transmissions in December, but was completely ignored. ..."
"... "Just how evil does this situation become? Is the general leadership of the American political economy trying to be evil just for the fun of it?" ..."
"... And at what point does the general indifference to this state of affairs that still, incredibly, obtains, turn over into mass outrage and condemnation? Skrelli, Bayer, and all the rest are frelling evil. Extortion writ large, with easily preventable death and suffering. ..."
"... As you note it's about profits. One of the disturbing condemnations of the now fading American Century, which most USians remain contentedly oblivious to is that during their watch as global hegemon, the US, in what can be seen, in the best light, as bad faith, worked to undermine the democratic functionality of international cooperative organizations like the WHO, the UN, etc. ..."
"... The intention of granting copyrights and patents was noble, to provide a limited monopoly on an invention or literary work for a limited period. IP has been distorted and twisted, extended to insane time limits to protect works that for any common sense thinkers have already become public domain (see, e.g. the Happy Birthday song, Mickey Mouse or re-formulation of a drug that's gone out of patent). Software should have had its own IP regime but that ship has sailed (thanks Bill G.). ..."
May 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Donald Trump launched a new vaccine war in May, but not against the virus. It was against the world. The United States and the UK were the only two holdouts in the World Health Assembly from the declaration that vaccines and medicines for COVID-19 should be available as public goods , and not under exclusive patent rights. The United States explicitly disassociated itself from the patent pool call, talking instead of "the critical role that intellectual property plays" -- in other words, patents for vaccines and medicines. Having badly botched his COVID-19 response, Trump is trying to redeem his electoral fortunes in the November elections this year by promising an early vaccine. The 2020 version of Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan is shaping up to be, essentially, " vaccines for us" -- but the rest of the world will have to queue up and pay what big pharma asks, as they will hold the patents.

In contrast, all other countries agreed with the Costa Rican proposal in the World Health Assembly that there should be a patent pool for all COVID-19 vaccines and medicines. President Xi said that Chinese vaccines would be available as a public good , a view also shared by European Union leaders . Among the 10 candidate vaccines in Phase 1 and 2 of clinical trials, the Chinese have five, the United States has three, and the UK and Germany have one each.

Trump has given an ultimatum to the World Health Organization (WHO) with a permanent withdrawal of funds if it does not mend its ways in 30 days. In sharp contrast, in the World Health Assembly (the highest decision-making body of the WHO), almost all countries, including close allies of the United States, rallied behind the WHO. The failure of the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) against COVID-19, with nearly four times the annual budget of the WHO, is visible to the world. The CDC failed to provide a successful test for SARS-CoV-2 in the critical months of February and March , while ignoring the WHO's successful test kits that were distributed to 120 countries.

Trump has yet to hold his administration and the CDC responsible for this criminal bungling. This, more than any other failure , is the reason that the U.S. numbers for COVID-19 are now more than 1.5 million and about a third of all global infections. Contrast this with China, the first to face an unknown epidemic, stopping it at 82,000 infections, and the amazing results that countries such as Vietnam and South Korea have produced.

One issue is now looming large over the COVID-19 pandemic. If we do not address the intellectual property rights issue in this pandemic, we are likely to see a repeat of the AIDS tragedy . People died for 10 years (1994-2004) as patented AIDS medicine was priced at $10,000 to $15,000 for a year's supply, far beyond their reach. Finally, patent laws in India allowed people to get AIDS medicine at less than a dollar a day , or $350 for a year's supply. Today, 80 percent of the world's AIDS medicine comes from India. For big pharma, profits trumped lives, and they will continue to do so, COVID or no COVID, unless we change the world.

Most countries have compulsory licensing provisions that will allow them to break patents in case of epidemics or health emergencies. Even the WTO, after a bitter fight, accepted in its Doha Declaration (2001) that countries, in a health emergency, have the right to allow any company to manufacture a patented drug without the patent holder's permission, and even import it from other countries.

Why is it, then, that countries are unable to break patents, even if there are provisions in their laws and in the TRIPS Agreement? The answer is their fear of U.S. sanctions against them. Every year, the U.S. Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) issues a Special 301 Report that it has used to threaten trade sanctions against any country that tries to compulsorily license any patented product. India figures prominently in this report year after year, for daring to issue a compulsory license in 2012 to Natco for nexavar, a cancer drug Bayer was selling for more than $65,000 a year . Marijn Dekkers, the CEO of Bayer, was quoted widely that this was "theft," and "We did not develop this medicine for Indians We developed it for Western patients who can afford it."

This leaves unanswered how many people even in the affluent West can afford a $65,000 bill for an illness. But there is no question that a bill of this magnitude is a death sentence for anybody but the super-rich in countries like India. Though a number of other drugs were under also consideration for compulsory licensing at that time, India has not exercised this provision again after receiving U.S. threats.

It is the fear that countries can break patents using their compulsory licensing powers that led to proposals for patent pooling. The argument was that since many of these diseases do not affect rich countries, big pharma should either let go of their patents to such patent pools, or philanthropic capital should fund the development of new drugs for this pool. Facing the pandemic of COVID-19, it is this idea of patent pooling that emerged in the recent World Health Assembly , WHA-73. All countries supported this proposal, barring the United States and its loyal camp follower, the UK . The United States also entered its disagreement on the final WHA resolution, being the lone objector to patent pooling of COVID-19 medicines and vaccines, noting "the critical role that intellectual property plays in incentivizing the development of new and improved health products."

While patent pooling is welcome if no other measure is available, it also makes it appear as if countries have no other recourse apart from the charity of big capital. What this hides, as charity always does, is that people and countries have legitimate rights even under TRIPS to break patents under conditions of an epidemic or a health emergency.

The United States, which screams murder if a compulsory license is issued by any country, has no such compunction when its own interests are threatened. During the anthrax scare in 2001, the U.S. Secretary of Health issued a threat to Bayer under "eminent domain for patents" for licensing the anthrax-treatment drug ciprofloxacin to other manufacturers. Bayer folded, and agreed to supply the quantity at a price that the U.S. government had set. And without a whimper. Yes, this is the same Bayer that considers India as a "thief" for issuing a compulsory license!

The vaccination for COVID-19 might need to be repeated each year, as we still do not know the duration of its protection. It is unlikely that a vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 will provide a lifetime immunity like the smallpox vaccine. Unlike AIDS, where the patient numbers were smaller and were unfortunately stigmatized in different ways, COVID-19 is a visible threat for everyone. Any attempt to hold people and governments to ransom on COVID-19 vaccines or medicines could see the collapse of the entire patent edifice of TRIPS that big pharma backed by the United States and major EU countries have built. That is why the more clever in the capitalist world have moved toward a voluntary patent pool for potential COVID-19 medicines and vaccines. A voluntary patent pool means that companies or institutions holding patents on medicines -- such as remdesivir -- or vaccines would voluntarily hand them over to such a pool. The terms and conditions of such a handover, meaning at concessional rates, or for only for certain regions, are still not clear -- leading to criticism that a voluntary patent pool is not a substitute for declaring that all such medicines and vaccines should be declared global public goods during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Unlike clever capital, Trump's response to the COVID-19 vaccine is to thuggishly bully his way through. He believes that with the unlimited money that the United States is now willing to put into the vaccine efforts, it will either beat everybody else to the winning post, or buy the company that is successful . If this strategy succeeds, he can then use "his" COVID-19 vaccine as a new instrument of global power. It is the United States that will then decide which countries get the vaccine (and for how much), and which ones don't.

Trump does not believe in a rule-based global order , even if the rules are biased in favor of the rich. He is walking out of various arms control agreements and has crippled the WTO . He believes that the United States, as the biggest economy and the most powerful military power , should have the untrammeled right to dictate to all countries. Threats of bombing and invasions can be combined with illegal unilateral sanctions ; and the latest weapon in his imaginary arsenal is withholding vaccines.

Trump's little problem is that the days of the United States being a sole global hegemon passed decades ago. The United States has shown itself as a fumbling giant and its epidemic response shambolic . It has been unable to provide virus tests to its people in time, and failed to stop the epidemic through containment/mitigation measures, which a number of other countries have done.

China and the EU have already agreed that any vaccine developed by them will be regarded as a public good. Even without that, once a medicine or a vaccine is known to be successful, any country with a reasonable scientific infrastructure can replicate the medicine or the vaccine, and manufacture it locally. India in particular has one of the largest generic drug and vaccine manufacturing capacities in the world. What prevents India, or any country for that matter, from manufacturing COVID-19 vaccines or drugs once they are developed -- only the empty threat of a failed hegemon on breaking patents?


Noel Nospamington , May 28, 2020 at 4:19 am

Clearly the Trump and Johnson administrations are completely wrong in not supporting that all COVID vaccines and medications be declared as public goods. This is an unprecedented global threat requiring unprecedented global response.

But as a Canadian I have to reluctantly admit, there are legimate reasons to oppose the WHO. Trump like a broken clock can be correct twice a day, even if he is wrong the other 1438 times a day.

The worst offence is that the WHO (World Health Organisation) is suppose to represent the world, and yet it deliberately excludes Taiwan, which it a known part of the world with 24 million people.

Taiwan was the first to inform the WHO of human-to-human transmissions in December, but was completely ignored. And Taiwan has best handled its response to the pandemic.

Personally I think that all countries should stop supporting the WHO until it restores Taiwan's observer status it previous had until 2016. The only other reasonable option would be to create an alternative health organisation to the WHO which does not exclude any part of the world.

The WHO also has other failings, including corruption, exorbitant travel expenses, and an unqualified president beholden to the CCP. But these failings pale in comparison to Taiwan's exclusion, and hopefully the other failings can be fixed within the organisation.

Amfortas the hippie , May 28, 2020 at 7:49 am

"Just how evil does this situation become? Is the general leadership of the American political economy trying to be evil just for the fun of it?"

And at what point does the general indifference to this state of affairs that still, incredibly, obtains, turn over into mass outrage and condemnation?
Skrelli, Bayer, and all the rest are frelling evil. Extortion writ large, with easily preventable death and suffering.

it did NOT begin with trump.It's been there for most of my life. What will it take for ordinary people to get mad enough about it all to do something about it?

Even in this article, the unspoken assumption is that our hands are somehow tied that these corps have agency far beyond anyone else's but those corps can be seized, and exist only at the pleasure of governments in the places they pretend to exist in.

They are a human creation an Egregore, set tottering about as if it were willful and alive but even Lefties treat them as untouchable godlike entities "oh, well lets appeal to "Benevolent Capital, instead "

"Behold, I show you the last man. 'What is love? What is creation? What is longing? What is a star?' thus asks the last man, and blinks. The earth has become small, and on it hops the last man, who makes everything small. His race is as ineradicable as the flea; the last man lives longest. 'We have invented happiness,'say the last men, and they blink. They have left the regions where it was hard to live, for one needs warmth. One still loves one's neighbor and rubs against him, for one needs warmth

One still works, for work is a form of entertainment. But one is careful lest the entertainment be too harrowing. One no longer becomes poor or rich: both require too much exertion. Who still wants to rule? Who obey? Both require too much exertion.

No shepherd and one herd! Everybody wants the same, everybody is the same: whoever feels different goes voluntarily into a madhouse. 'Formerly, all the world was mad,' say the most refined, and they blink

One has one's little pleasure for the day and one's little pleasure for the night: but one has a regard for health. 'We have invented happiness,' say the last men, and they blink.""

-Zarathustra

mpalomar , May 28, 2020 at 8:50 am

As you note it's about profits. One of the disturbing condemnations of the now fading American Century, which most USians remain contentedly oblivious to is that during their watch as global hegemon, the US, in what can be seen, in the best light, as bad faith, worked to undermine the democratic functionality of international cooperative organizations like the WHO, the UN, etc.

Thus when emergencies arise such as international diplomatic crisis or pandemics, it is found these organisations have been rendered untrustworthy, corrupted and unreliable; unsuited to purpose. American exceptionalism?

VietnamVet , May 28, 2020 at 5:55 am

It is clear now that the USA will not fund a national public health system to fight the coronavirus epidemic. The only conclusion is the reason is to allow Pharmaceutical Corporations to make huge profits by marketing patented drugs and vaccines to treat the illness; if and when, they become available sometime in the future.

Due to incompetence, lack of money and bad messengering; the economic reopening of the USA could kill close to a million Americans. To Republicans and Libertarians, this is of no concern. Democrats may acknowledge the deaths but say they are unavoidable.

For the Elite keeping their wealth is more important than spending a portion to prevent the huge costs in lives and treasure that will come once the Wuhan Coronavirus is established across North America like the related common cold.

Alternate Delegate , May 28, 2020 at 6:32 am

This is a teachable moment on the immorality of all "intellectual property". I am pleased to see that so many countries – other than the US and the UK – can get together on the common decency of allowing everyone to live, and set that above the "justice" of paying off intellectual property assignees. But these countries still have some ways to go in understanding that this applies to all information. That the creation of information can never be a living – in contrast to a living based on the creation of essential goods and services, about which we are learning so much right now! – and that information can never be owned.

They do not yet fully comprehend that all claims to own and extract rent from information are in fact crimes against humanity.

But they will. A teachable, as I said, moment.

Bugs Bunny , May 28, 2020 at 7:05 am

The intention of granting copyrights and patents was noble, to provide a limited monopoly on an invention or literary work for a limited period. IP has been distorted and twisted, extended to insane time limits to protect works that for any common sense thinkers have already become public domain (see, e.g. the Happy Birthday song, Mickey Mouse or re-formulation of a drug that's gone out of patent). Software should have had its own IP regime but that ship has sailed (thanks Bill G.).

Either a giant reform is due or people will ignore the law and infringe the IP. Chinese companies do it with impunity. Maybe they're right to do so.

John Wright , May 28, 2020 at 9:59 am

It appears that the USA has some real competition in the intellectual property game.

Per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Intellectual_Property_Indicators

Patent applications for the top 20 offices, 2018
Rank Country Patent applications
1 China 1,542,002
2 U.S. 597,141
3 Japan 313,567
4 South Korea 209,992

If one sums up USA patent applications vs Asia (China, Japan, SK), it is USA 597K vs Asia 2066K.

So Asia is putting in patent applications, vs the USA, at a 3.46 multiple vs the USA.

It will be interesting to see if the USA attitude about the sanctity of intellectual property changes when important key patents are held by the rest of the world.

timbers , May 28, 2020 at 8:33 am

Teachable moments. This could get really interesting if China or a non US & associated puppets develops an effect Covid treatment first.

I will dream of something like this: China develops vaccine, offers it free to US on condition it reduce it's Dept of War & Aggression by 80% and honor all existing and recently existing arms control agreement, and withdraws it's Naval forces though out the world and confines them to the North Atlantic and California coast.

ProNewerDeal , May 28, 2020 at 8:55 am

I wonder if a geopolitically powerful nation/bloc of nations such as China/India/etc might announce that they disregard pharma IP, & announce that they will adhere to the economist Dr Dean Baker-type policy of open source pharma R&D/recipe publication, any private manufacturer may manufacture & sell the resultant pharma SKU. I am referring to any type of pharma or medical device (such as ventilators), not just a COVID-19 vaccine. I would guesstimate that the "soft power" & goodwill generated by such a policy would be extremely beneficial to those nation(s). Furthermore, the US if it tried to retaliate via sanctions or other threats would get a corresponding additional decrease in soft power.

Raj , May 28, 2020 at 9:37 am

To be honest, in some instances Indian govt practices on pharma are quite bad. It is extremely hard in some instances to recoup investments at prices they ask for.

[May 28, 2020] Is aerosol tranmission of the SARC-NCOV-2 virus possible?

May 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 28 2020 23:24 utc | 32

As for aerosols over droplets, I've been reading about that for the last month. I thought it was common knowledge. It's the obvious explanation for why some people get it and others don't. Fomites - the virus particles on surfaces - are supposedly responsible for only ten percent of transmission. The question was always to what *degree* aerosols were the transmission method over droplets. Quite a few articles I read debated that point, with evidence mounting that aerosols might have equal or more effect than droplets, at least as secondary transmission. Obviously if someone sneezes or coughs in your face at close range, droplets are the primary transmission. But there are tons of reports - and even video demonstrations on Youtube - of how far aerosols can be dispelled by breathing, talking, yelling, singing and coughs and sneezes. Aerosols can be spread up to 25 feet or more and hover in the air for up to 45 minutes, if not longer, depending on air temperature, humidity and air movement. Droplets can turn into aerosols depending on the same factors.

I started early on washing my hands religiously because due to the fact that I do not interact with hardly anyone in my building or elsewhere except during my supply runs, fomites would be the most likely way I could catch the virus. I have to use a common toilet - so touching the door and toilet lid would be my main risk. That's why I bought a thousand food service plastic gloves which I wear when using the john or going outside the building. When I return, I remove them by the recommended method, then wash my hands.

Initially I didn't have any masks because the depletion of the supply had already occurred. Now I have nineteen masks, 14 of which I use and rotate whenever going to the john or outside the building. I wear it when going to the john because I read recently that flushing a toilet aerosolizes fecal matter - and any virus particles - present in the water. In other words, you get a faceful of virus every time you flush a toilet. So close the lid before flushing. When I return, I wash my hands, remove the mask, then apply hand sanitizer or wash my hands again - which is the recommended procedure.

I now have an adequate supply of masks, hand sanitizer and disinfectant spray (with some more of the latter coming), so I think I'm in a good position to reduce my risk. But of course, as with the rest of life, it's still a crapshoot.

It will be a worse crapshoot as these idiots start crowding places I have to go to for supplies. I use convenience stores a lot and they tend to be crowded because they are very small. I also visit the Target store, but they initially had the crowding under control - because you had to wait in line to get in, which took twenty minutes or more. Now with the easing of restrictions, they have eliminated the door check, so the store is a bit more crowded, but not too much. People might still be wary, as has been suggested by some articles and polls. It's a big store, so ventilation and air movement might be better than a smaller space.

likbez , May 28, 2020 at 23:40

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@Richard Steven Hack | May 28 2020 23:24 utc | 32

The question was always to what *degree* aerosols were the transmission method over droplets

They are not mutually excusive. Aerosol transmission can theoretically occur when a droplet that contains virus particles dry out and they start chaotically move via Brownian motion of air molecules.

Looks like the virus does not die instantly in this case. After all it looks like it survives in dry state on surfaces for a day or two in the absence of sun radiation (depending on the surface -- longest on steel surfaces, shortest on copper)

[May 28, 2020] https://tinyurl.com/y9mudhmf

May 28, 2020 | tinyurl.com

Recommends blood thinners in the same manner that the Front-Line COVID-19 Critical Care Working Group does...


There is another treatment that hasn't received as much coverage possibly because it isn't one individual drug. It's a broad category of blood thinners called anticoagulants. A recent pre-proof study of over 2500 patients from the Journal of the American College of Cardiology showed that anticoagulation can decrease the mortality of critically ill patients with the coronavirus from a frightening 63% to a somewhat less daunting 29%.

Medical providers, including myself, often use prophylactic doses of blood thinners such as heparin or enoxaparin to prevent blood clots in hospitalized patients particularly in those with additional risk factors for blood clots, but now these medications are being administered to hospitalized patients who have no risk factors for clots other than having COVID-19.

Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | May 28 2020 10:22 utc | 70

[May 28, 2020] Leading UK Epidemiologist -- Pubs, Nightclubs, Restaurants Could Reopen Without Serious Risk

Just who is going to pay for all of this?!?!
Notable quotes:
"... A prominent Oxford epidemiologist has reportedly called for a more rapid exit from Britain's lockdown, saying the coronavirus pandemic is "on its way out" of Britain after infecting as much as half the population. ..."
May 28, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Trevor Marshallsea via The Belfast Telegraph,

A prominent Oxford epidemiologist has reportedly called for a more rapid exit from Britain's lockdown, saying the coronavirus pandemic is "on its way out" of Britain after infecting as much as half the population.

Professor Sunetra Gupta says there would be a "strong possibility" that pubs, nightclubs and restaurants in Britain could reopen without serious risk from Covid-19.

The professor of theoretical epidemiology at the University of Oxford said the UK had most likely erred on the side of over-reaction in its handling of the crisis, suggesting imposing the lockdown itself was one such misstep.

Prof Gupta told unherd.com the Government had brought in the lockdown based on the worst-case scenario modelling of the Imperial College London.

In March, Imperial College's workings suggested Covid-19 had a deaths-to-cases ratio of as high as 1.4%, reducing to 0.66% when allowing for undiagnosed cases.

Prof Gupta's Oxford team produced a rival model, also in March, speculating as much as 50% of Britain's population may have already been infected, and suggesting an infection fatality rate as low as 0.1%, which she says would be far lower now.

Asked for her updated ratio, Prof Gupta said the epidemic had "largely come and is on its way out in this country" and that the rate would be "definitely less than one in 1000 and probably closer to one in 10,000", or between 0.1% and 0.01%.

Prof Gupta said the Government's defence of the lockdown was that it was based on a plausible, "or at least a possible", worst case scenario.

"The question is, should we act on a possible worst case scenario, given the costs of lockdown?

"It seems to me that given that the costs of lockdown are mounting, that case is becoming more and more fragile," she said.

Prof Gupta called for a "more rapid exits from lockdown" based on factors such as "who is dying and what is happening to the death rates".

She said it was feasible Britain could have fared better with the Covid-19 crisis by doing "nothing at all" or at least by concentrating on protecting the people most vulnerable to the disease.

"Remaining in a state of lockdown is extremely dangerous from the point of view of the vulnerability of the entire population to new pathogens," she said.

"Effectively we used to live in a state approximating lockdown 100 years ago, and that was what created the conditions for the Spanish Flu to come in and kill 50m people."

Whilst accepting it hard to prove on current evidence, Prof Gupta said there was a "strong possibility" the UK could return to normal without great risk. Panic Mode , 42 minutes ago

If you are being furlough and hoping you will getting your job back, Good ******* luck. I will put my money 80% furlough people won't get their jobs back. This is your government doing, those ******* politicians.

The government have surely flattened the curve - THE ECONOMY.

AG17 , 43 minutes ago

Finally we are approaching end of Feardemic...

The Shodge , 41 minutes ago

You wish. Better get ready for The Second Wave of Government Terror

Louhnatique , 43 minutes ago

You can tell by these experts' point of view who's paying their bills. None are independent.

Panic Mode , 52 minutes ago

Yeah, I can't wait for the restaurants to open and see how much fears government have injected to the consumers, totally destroy their industries. For those who have completely lost their career, livelihood and their kids future, this is on government, those ******* politicians.

Thanks to the government listening to crook like Neil ******* Ferguson.

Canoe Driver , 53 minutes ago

5,000 government douchebags are now feverishly looking for a different expert.

They have to know already that there are not many 80-year old chain smokers at the local pub. The continued lockdowns are mostly because they can't be seen to admit it was all a mistake and a horrible overreaction. Oh, and because they are the ones obsessed with defeating Trump. Sucks to lose a family business so Gavin Newsom, et al., can try to win a pissing war with Republicans. But that is what it's come to.

funkyfreddy , 1 hour ago

I guess she thought south Korean clubs could reopen safely until that one guy infected numerous people at multiple clubs in one night causing them all to be shut again?

[May 28, 2020] Interesting comments/reviews on the article which has supposedly debunked HCQ

May 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Mina , May 28 2020 8:35 utc | 64

Interesting comments/reviews on the article which has supposedly debunked HCQ. (But see Somebody's links at the Nicotine-patch thread for the danger it presents in certain genetic groups)
https://pubpeer.com/publications/71DA593B9943638F1ADE6F80696914

[May 27, 2020] The CDC Slashed The COVID-19 Fatality Rate To A Fraction Of Earlier Estimate Used To Justify Lockdowns

May 27, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

Governments throughout the world and across the US justified extreme, draconian, undemocratic, and unconstitutional (in most US states) "lockdown" and stay-at-home orders on the grounds that the COVID-19 virus was exceptionally fatal.

In March, the World Health Organization (WHO) was claiming that the fatality rate was a very high 3.4 percent .

Yet as time went on, it became increasingly clear that such high estimates were essentially meaningless because researchers had no idea how many people were actually infected with the disease. Tests were largely being conducted on those with symptoms serious enough to end up in emergency rooms or doctor's offices.

By late April, many researchers were publishing new studies showing that the number of people with the disease was actually much higher than was previously thought. Thus, it became clear that the percentage of people with the disease who died from it suddenly became much smaller.

Now, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has released new estimates suggesting that the real fatality rate is around 0.26 percent.

Specifically, the report concludes that the "symptomatic case fatality ratio" is 0.4 percent. But that's just symptomatic cases. In the same report, the CDC also claims that 35 percent of all cases are asymptomatic.

Or, as the Washington Post reported this week:

The agency offered a "current best estimate" of 0.4 percent. The agency also gave a best estimate that 35 percent of people infected never develop symptoms. Those numbers when put together would produce an infection fatality rate of 0.26, which is lower than many of the estimates produced by scientists and modelers to date."

Of course, not all scientists have been wrong on this. Back in March, Stanford scientist John Ioannidis was much, much closer to the CDC's estimate than the WHO. The Wall Street Journal noted in April :

In a March article for Stat News, Dr. Ioannidis argued that Covid-19 is far less deadly than modelers were assuming. He considered the experience of the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which was quarantined Feb. 4 in Japan. Nine of 700 infected passengers and crew died. Based on the demographics of the ship's population, Dr. Ioannidis estimated that the U.S. fatality rate could be as low as 0.025% to 0.625% and put the upper bound at 0.05% to 1% -- comparable to that of seasonal flu.

Not that this will settle the matter.

Proponents of destroying human rights and the rule of law in order to carry out lockdowns will continue to insist that "we didn't know" what the fatality rate was back in March. The lack of evidence, however, didn't stop proponents of lockdowns from implementing policies that destroyed the ability of families to earn a living, and which also created social conditions that caused child abuse and suicides to spike.

But for more sane people, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Those who have claimed that lockdowns are "the only option" had virtually no evidence at all to support their position. Indeed, such extreme over-the-top measures such as the general lockdowns required an extreme level of high-quality, nearly irrefutable evidence that lockdowns would work and were necessary in the face of a disease with an extremely high fatality rate. But the only "data" the prolockdown people could offer was speculation and hyperbolic predictions of bodies piling up in the streets.

But that became politically unimportant.

The people who wanted lockdowns had gained the obeisance of powerful people in government institutions and in the media . So actual data, science, or respect for human rights suddenly became meaningless. All that mattered was getting those lockdowns. So the lockdown crowd destroyed the lives of millions in the developed world -- and more than a hundred million in the developing world -- to satisfy the hunches of a tiny handful of politicians and technocrats.

[May 27, 2020] The general election scenario that Democrats are dreading

Notable quotes:
"... "Consumption and hiring started to tick up "in gross terms, not in net terms," Furman said, describing the phenomenon as a "partial rebound." The bounce back "can be very very fast, because people go back to their original job, they get called back from furlough, you put the lights back on in your business. Given how many people were furloughed and how many businesses were closed you can get a big jump out of that. ..."
"... IMO Trump now realizes that he was snookered by the medical equivalent of the Holy Office. Our Auto da Fe has been impressive and nearly fatal but not quite. Trump's statement that he will never shut the economy down again indicates to me that the "scales have fallen" from his eyes. ..."
"... One thing to note are all the diffusion indexes will show large upticks, because of the base effects. U6 will likely be more stubborn. ..."
May 27, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

"... he believes, the way to think about the current economic drop-off, at least in the first two phases, is more like what happens to a thriving economy during and after a natural disaster: a quick and steep decline in economic activity followed by a quick and steep rebound.

The Covid-19 recession started with a sudden shuttering of many businesses, a nationwide decline in consumption, and massive increase in unemployment. But starting around April 15, when economic reopening started to spread but the overall numbers still looked grim, Furman noticed some data that pointed to the kind of recovery that economists often see after a hurricane or industry-wide catastrophe like the Gulf of Mexico oil spill." politico

******

"Consumption and hiring started to tick up "in gross terms, not in net terms," Furman said, describing the phenomenon as a "partial rebound." The bounce back "can be very very fast, because people go back to their original job, they get called back from furlough, you put the lights back on in your business. Given how many people were furloughed and how many businesses were closed you can get a big jump out of that. It will look like a V."" politico

--------------

Well, pilgrims, there you have it. If Politico thinks so, it must be so. Do I think the Democratic Party grandees are deliberately suppressing the economy as long as they can and bitching and whining as the GOP tries to crank up the machine? Yes, I do. Is that criminal? Should it be criminal? IMO it should be but to prevent the disintegration of the Great Republic, we must not treat it as such.

IMO Trump now realizes that he was snookered by the medical equivalent of the Holy Office. Our Auto da Fe has been impressive and nearly fatal but not quite. Trump's statement that he will never shut the economy down again indicates to me that the "scales have fallen" from his eyes.

Are his attempts too little and too late? That could be. Or, maybe not.

The brawny beast that is America is gathering itself up, and looking once again at what CAN BE, not at what is forbidden us by the Globalist nitwits who would destroy us and make us into building blocks for their utopia. pl

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/26/2020-election-democrats-281470

What I don't understand is how prolonging the lockdown of reliably blue states like my own WA furthers the Democrat election strategy -- assuming it is what you suggest.

It seems to me that when people in those states feel the totalitarian pinch on their own livelihood, they might be more inclined to vote against the party that's doing it to them, tipping the state into the purple or even red column.

Same goes for the battleground states. Seems like a surefire way to throw the election, not win it.

Can someone explain how this is supposed to work?!?


Jack , 26 May 2020 at 01:10 PM

Sir,

One thing to note are all the diffusion indexes will show large upticks, because of the base effects. U6 will likely be more stubborn.

The best comparisons will be unit volumes relative to prior to lockdown. For example, number of flights or gas consumption prior to and after lockdown ends.

One indicator that I track is used car prices. It is starting a nice uptick particularly for full size trucks. With all the incentives and financing options I would bet we'll see growth in even new truck volumes .

On the flip side, IMO, the increased debt and the trillions that the Fed printed up for Wall St will constrain growth in the medium term.

walrus , 26 May 2020 at 01:52 PM
Col. Lang,

With respect, I don't agree with your view of what has happened from an economic and medical sense although I agree with your view of the political machinations of the democrats.

I said when all this started that the economy would bounce back quickly. I still believe it will. I also believe that the lockdown was necessary, but now it is thought possible to open up because the medical system and logistics have now caught up with the pandemic. The lockdowns bought us time.

Fauci, Birx and Co. were talking of easing up three weeks ago at one of President Trumps press conferences, I watched most of them live. I don't see the medicos as malevolent globalists or anything other than public health officials doing their jobs under great pressure and public scrutiny. I don't think they have drunk any of the numerous glasses of kool aid that were proffered. They appear to me to have stuck stubbornly to the science.

We too are easing lockdown rules - allegedly in "a controlled and measured manner" but that is actually BS. Everyone is sick of being cooped up and can't wait. We too have one State leader - a leftist "democrat" that is dragging their feet in Queensland for political reasons, our equivalent of Florida. Their borders are currently closed - when they reopen there will be an absolute avalanche of tourists heading North, us included, to get some warm weather, that will provide a huge economic spike.

Let's hope we can get vaccines moving PDQ.

LondonBob , 26 May 2020 at 02:25 PM
Problem is things were frothy before covid, financial markets were well overextended, the deficit was out of control, oil won't come back anytime soon. In many ways Trump is a lucky general, gets to blame the slowdown on the virus and any faltering in the recovery on Dem governors.
Eric Newhill , 26 May 2020 at 03:10 PM
Here is a link to a poll that suggests the globalists have screwed up again (see bottom 1/3 of the link). A large % of Americans polled say they will now avoid products made in China and would be willing to pay more for the same product if it's made in the USA. They also think that trade restrictions and tariffs are a good idea. Basically, they like the Trumpian model. China Joe and his boy Hunter are going to be perceived as being on the wrong side of this issue by Trump.

https://fticommunications.com/covid-19/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/FTI-Shifting-Expectations-II-Topline-Results.pdf

turcopolier , 26 May 2020 at 03:21 PM
walrus

you are right. We do not agree. IMO the country wide shutdown was never necessary. What was needed was a strategy of protection for the vulnerable. The rest could have taken care of themselves with anti-flu like treatment while therapies and vaccines were developed.

turcopolier , 26 May 2020 at 03:23 PM
Corkyagain

Yes. In their contempt for those they think "deplorable, they f----d up.

turcopolier , 26 May 2020 at 03:26 PM
LondonBob

The Democrats deserve it and BTW I don't agree with any of the negatives you state with regard to the pre-COVID state of things. You just don't like Trump. Neither do I

turcopolier , 26 May 2020 at 03:32 PM
LondonBob

Lucky is better than skillful. But I disagree about trump. He is a lot more than just lucky.

AK , 26 May 2020 at 03:45 PM
CorkyAgain,

It is the strategy (poorly conceived) of people whose ideology blinds them to extant reality, and who think they can mold that reality to their whims through sheer fervency of their belief in their moral superiority to other, "lesser types." I can't think of a single historical example where such a strategy has worked out, but there you have it. Then again, according to them, history also fits into that concept of "malleable reality" as they see it. They are the makers of history in their own estimation, rather than part of and subject to it. This is why the Left has never been able to grapple with, and is often outright hostile to, the notion of unforeseen consequences.

BillWade , 26 May 2020 at 03:56 PM
This past weekend our hotel parking lots were pretty full, this is normally a slow time in SW Florida. It's likely restaurants will be allowed 100% capacity seating with bars opening this coming Monday.

Reasonable people who want a real economy in the USA should all be voting for President Trump. If he wins, and I think he will, we're going to have a real boom as smart EU money moves into USA equities, particularly the NASDAQ.

Vegetius , 26 May 2020 at 04:49 PM
Trump is the Charlie Brown of American political history.

How many more footballs will he make a go at before (and after) November?

Fred , 26 May 2020 at 05:37 PM
LondonBob,

" blame the slowdown on the virus "
Not gonna happen. He's going to blame the Democrats who issued all those EO declaring who was essential and who was "seperate but equal". He'll blame China, rightfully so, for spreading this as far and wide in the West as possible; he'll blame the academics and professional "resistance" within and without the government for their incompetence and intransigence.

Corky,

"Seems like a surefire way to throw the election, not win it."
it doesn't matter who votes, it only matters now who counts them. Thus the statewide mailings of ballots to maximize ballot harvesting. At the very least lots of local elections will get stolen, probably a congressional one too, even if WA doesn't go for Trump in November.

Terence Gore , 27 May 2020 at 09:20 AM
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3086177/coronavirus-uses-same-strategy-hiv-dodge-immune-response-chinese

"Both viruses remove marker molecules on the surface of an infected cell that are used by the immune system to identify invaders, the researchers said in a non-peer reviewed paper posted on preprint website bioRxiv.org on Sunday. They warned that this commonality could mean Sars-CoV-2, the clinical name for the virus, could be around for some time, like HIV...that the coronavirus was showing "some characteristics of viruses causing chronic infection"."

J , 27 May 2020 at 10:52 AM
It appears that an Intelligence report that's come out regarding the CCP and their virus by French Intelligence (DGSE) isn't getting the traction it deserves.

Eleven years, , 'eleven years' BEFORE the EU signed off on the PRC/CCP Wuhan lab construction, French DGSE warned that the PRC/CCP's lab was a construction leak and bio-weapon making facility disaster waiting to happen.

Why was nobody listening at the time? Where were the FIVE EYES in all of this, were they ignoring French Intelligence's warning, what? Where was the CIA in this? They're supposed to be the 'external' watchdog, right? It was the Tenet/Goss handover time frame, 2004. But surely the DGSE warnings had to have been 'flagged' by Langley for a closer scrutiny, right? What was DIA's read on this at the time?

..."French diplomatic and security advisers, who argued that the Chinese reputation for poor bio-security could lead to a catastrophic leak.

They also warned that Paris could lose control of the project, and even suggested that Beijing could harness the technology to make biowarfare weapons."...

Another interesting cavet in the article relates to P4 labs everywhere (including U.S. facilities)..... "A source told the newspaper: 'What you have to understand is that a P4 [high-level bio-security] laboratory is like a nuclear reprocessing plant. It's a bacteriological atomic bomb."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8351113/Wuhan-virus-lab-signed-Michel-Barnier-2004-despite-French-intelligence-warnings.html

Barbara Ann , 27 May 2020 at 03:15 PM
An interesting development yesterday: Twitter have flagged a couple of Trump's tweets on mail-in ballots as "Misleading". A link at the bottom of each tweet says "Get the facts about mail-in ballots" and directs you to a piece written by Twitter on the subject quoting CNN & WaPo as having contrary views to the President - hardly news in itself.

Are we seeing the beginning of another insurance policy, in case the economy recovers? It appears to put Trump in a bind, as shutting down or sanctioning Twitter as a whole would not only deny Trump his (until yesterday) unfiltered comms channel to his base, but also invite cries of censorship by the MSM. If he does nothing, what is to stop Twitter 'correcting' more of this messages? In a later tweet Trump directly accused Twitter of "..interfering in the 2020 Presidential Election". It will be very interesting to see how this develops. Here is the first of the offending tweets:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1265255835124539392

CK , 27 May 2020 at 03:38 PM
@Barbara
If Israel, Mexico, Great Britain, China, Ukraine, Canada, et.al can interfere in American elections, and the USA can interfere in the elections of any nation it wishes, why should the Masters and Commanders of the internet be forbidden the same hobby?
Have you never watched Network?
https://americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/moviespeechnetwork4.html
Same as it ever was.

[May 27, 2020] Kids Smart Watch Waterproof, GPS-LBS Tracker SOS Call Smartwatch Phone for Kids 3-12 Year Old Boys Girls with Two-W

May 27, 2020 | www.amazon.com

✿【Keep Kids Safe】: When in distress, Kids can press the SOS key for 3 seconds to circularly call families' numbers for help. You can set up to 3 SOS numbers. Great help for kids in emergency situation. The kids tracker smart watch equipped with positioning function. When kids are outdoor, Parents can track children's real-time location through the "Setracker 2" app. But when Kids are indoor or at poor gps signal place, there will be some deviation in positioning.

[May 26, 2020] Any "nationwide" statistics for the virus without exclusion of the NY metropolitan area for the USA is big fat lie. At least it is clear that it distorts the picture for the rest of the country.

May 26, 2020 | angrybearblog.com
  1. likbez , May 26, 2020 7:48 pm

    How does that affect this specifically? What we see is that the US has a slower decline in cases than these other nations.

    My point is the form of the curve in the USA was partially distorted by the NY metropolitan areas with its huge and very specific problems and demographics. This area accounts for around 40% of cases.

    Death per million normalize the number of death for the population of the whole county and that's it.

    But my pint is that the USA is not homogeneous country and will never be.

    In this sense any "nationwide" statistics for the virus without exclusion of the NY metropolitan area for the USA is big fat lie. At least it is clear that it distorts the picture for the rest of the country.

    We have core inflation which exclude food and energy, why we can't have death without NY metropolitan area?

    Another important point that the number of death as a statistics is another one big and fat lie. Or at least is very suspect. I would like to stress that only the difference between number of death for the particular period and average for several previous years has scientific value. Not the absolute number.

    And what is interesting that for March 2020 COVID-19 epidemic was a lives saver. Such an interesting paradox.

    There are essentially two outcomes of COVID-19 -- one in this pneumonia does not develop, and the second in which virus pneumonia develops.

    The only way to die from the virus is to die from virus pneumonia or complications (including organs failures due to the lack of oxygen).

    Everything else (including gunshot wounds 😉 belongs to "with COVID-19" category and in the USA constitutes probably 80% of reported COVID-19 deaths. In other words, most of deaths reported are very sick people with significant percentage already of the death bed.

    For people at the end of their life scan coronavirus is often the last straw that break the camel back, so to speak. Cutting this lifespan for several months or a couple of years at best.

    And there is nothing special for this role of coronavirus. Flu acts exactly the same way: pneumonia as a flu complication is one of the most common ways for the old sick people to meet the creator.

    Unfortunately we know very little about conditions in which pneumonia develops (there are probably some generic markers in play as well as sex and a couple of other metrics ) other that the main victims are obese (often morbidly obese), diabetics (which in the USA is almost synonym with obesity) and hypertonics (those are intersecting categories).

    Chances for everybody else to get this (very dangerous indeed) virus pneumonia are approx. 100-1000 times less.

[May 26, 2020] Death normalized to population zise (aka death per million)

May 26, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

S , May 26 2020 18:23 utc | 75

Britain has had the second highest number of deaths from Covid-19 so far, 36.875 according to the current count.

Relative to population, it is currently only the fifth:

   #  Country         Deaths /
                      million
                      people

   1  San Marino         1,251
   2  Belgium              808
   3  Andorra              658
   4  Spain                570
   5  United Kingdom       557
   6  Italy                546
   7  France               424
   8  Sweden               390
   9  Netherlands          335
  10  Ireland              326
  11  United States        298
      ...
      Russia                25
      ...
      China                  3

[May 26, 2020] America needs a permanent solution for paid sick leave - nj.com

May 26, 2020 | www.nj.com

America needs a permanent solution for paid sick leave Posted May 25, 11:26 AM

sick days op-ed

A recent survey in 2019 found that 53% of hourly service sector workers at 91 large American companies lack access to paid sick leave. Sick workers can spread disease to other workers and customers and disrupt the firm's ability to provide services. So why exactly do employers still resist providing paid sick leave?

By Star-Ledger Guest Columnist

By Soumitra S. Bhuyan and David K. Wyant

With the federal government's enactment of an emergency paid sick leave law to help slow COVID-19, the pandemic has put a spotlight on what should be a major policy concern in America.

The Trump Administration passed the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) to extend sick-leave benefits to workers. Still, millions of Americans working in the fast-food industry and retail sector among others have no protections under the new law.

Under the FFCRA, American private employers with fewer than 500 employees receive full tax credit reimbursement for the cost of employee sick leave related to COVID-19. This allows employers to continue paying these workers and avoids forcing workers to choose between their paychecks and staying home to help contain the virus. A recent survey in 2019 found that 53% of hourly service sector workers at 91 large American companies lack access to paid sick leave.

Many of the major national fast-food chains, grocery stores, retail, hospitality, delivery service providers have more than 500 employees. For example, 78% of workers surveyed in McDonald's have no paid sick leave. In response to COVID-19, McDonald's is now offering 14 days of sick leave for employees at corporate-own stores, however, 95% of the McDonald's locations are owned by an independent franchise. Many of these franchises have more than 500 employees.

Similarly, Walmart enacted special sick leave policies for COVID-19. However, the workers are only eligible for paid sick leave if they get diagnosed with COVID-19 or formally placed into quarantine by a government agency or by Walmart. With the significant delays in testing and guidelines for voluntary quarantine, many of these workers may still show up, even if they may feel sick, to avoid losing wages or losing their jobs.

The United States needs a more permanent solution. Before the enactment of FFCRA, Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) introduced a new emergency paid sick leave bill in the House and Senate that would mandate seven days of paid sick leave to all workers, plus an additional 14 days during a public health emergency such as COVID-19.

So why do employers resist providing paid sick leave without a legal requirement? Although most economists prefer solving problems through market-oriented policies, many also recognize that markets can be inefficient when a firm's self-interested behavior is harmful.

Paying sick leave represents an additional cost that makes it more difficult for a company to keep its prices competitive. A firm's management might recognize a risk that sick workers could spread disease and disrupt the firm's ability to provide services. But, that firm might still choose not to pay for sick leave and bear the risk of a catastrophic event. However, if all firms must provide sick leave, the competitive disadvantage on any one firm is not as great, and the law serves to level the playing field.

For example, when employers choose not to provide paid sick leave, there are external effects on anyone who contracts the disease because a sick worker did not stay home. These could include coworkers, customers, and individuals exposed during the sick worker's commute, not to mention secondary exposures as those exposed transmit the disease to others. These external effects are borne both by individuals and by their employers.

Economists often suggest that public policies, such as new laws, are appropriate to remove or "internalize" these external effects. In this case, a law requiring employers to provide sick leave would reduce the adverse effects that occur to individuals and other firms throughout society.

In addition to potential cost savings in the workplace, paid sick leave will likely generate savings in health care costs. One study published in the journal Vaccine found that paid sick leave is associated with a 30% greater likelihood of being vaccinated against influenza. Allowing employees with flu to stay home can reduce the spread of workplace influenza infections by 25.3% for leave of "1 flu day" and 39.2% for leave of "2 flu days."

Another study published in the American Journal of Emergency Medicine found that among U.S. private sector working adults, the availability of paid sick leave is associated with fewer costly emergency department visits.

Since Laurie Garrett's book The Coming Plague in 1994, it has been clear that emerging infectious diseases will be a significant and recurring threat to the United States. We are the only country in the developed world without a federal regulation for paid sick leave. Given this threat, efforts to protect our country through effective responses should consider the importance of paid sick leave, especially for low-income workers.

Soumitra S. Bhuyan, PhD, MPH, is an Assistant Professor of Health Administration at Edward J. Bloustien School of Planning and Public Policy and a faculty associate at Rutgers Urban & Civics Informatics Lab at Rutgers University. Dr. Bhuyan is also an Associate Editor at BMJ Global Health.

David K. Wyant, PhD is an Assistant Professor of Management, The Jack C. Massey College of Business, Belmont University, Nashville Tennessee.

Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com .

The Star-Ledger/NJ.com encourages submissions of opinion . Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion . Follow us on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and on Facebook at NJ.com Opinion . Get the latest news updates right in your inbox. Subscribe to NJ.com's newsletters .

[May 26, 2020] Tracki 2020 Model Mini Real time GPS Tracker. Full USA Worldwide Coverage. For Vehicles, Car, Kids. Magnetic Hidd

Notable quotes:
"... $19.95 or as low as $9.95 for long term plans. ..."
May 26, 2020 | www.amazon.com

Garrets Daddio , Reviewed in the United States on September 18, 2019

Much better products available around the same price

I wanted to like this and I will start out with the only positive I can think about this product. It's small and easy to hide.

Originally I was going to give this three stars but the negatives added up and then they updated the app and made things much worse. You can view history and set alarms on both the phone app and the web interface. However each interface has different abilities with some options on one but not the other. The maps looked similar until the phone app updated. The mess of lines when tracking history became even more unbearable as it lost the function of telling you the direction of travel on the phone app. You can export a log file but it has no real support for viewing on google earth, you loose all track lines and are stuck with random dot points. Pulling up history often limits you to pulling up a full days worth of tracking. So it's not easy to single out a hour or two of when you knew a particular event happened or perhaps the time a particular person was driving unless you want to download the file and alter it using third party software..

Battery life was bad. If you are actually tracking a moving object it takes more power. I did stretch it out to 2.5 days once or twice but many days I had to charge it everyday. To overcome this I was going to hard wire it into the vehicle... until they updated the app. Also note that being discrete in removing and installing it so often to charge the tracker is difficult to do. Also hard wiring it in defeats the purpose of having a small device. I even tried the low power setting turning the device off for 15 minutes then on for 5 to take a reading but it did not help much. Instructions for doing that are pretty much non existent but you can make these changes on the web interface but not the app. The app was slightly better at giving you more options for past history as long as it was in the past 24 hours. But no matter what way you checked history after a day went past you only could view full days at a time.

At it's best this tracker can update once a minute. This is actually the slowest setting for other trackers, some update every 3 to 5 seconds. What this means is that often the track will not follow roads. I also used other trackers that easily lasted 2 full weeks vs 1 day this unit often gave me. At one minute intervals it was possible to see many stops when other people got into the car. But reducing the intervals in attempt to save battery life lost the ability to see people pull over to pick somebody up. It also makes it impossible to determine what roads were actually used. It does not track data like miles driven like others do.

In terms of functionally I had better luck with free apps on an old cell phone. Oops I dropped my phone in the car again? Silly me. The "magnetic mount" is actually a magnet attached to velcro and made no sense to me. The app lost functionality after they updated it. It also changed to a very plain looking map by default that actually makes it difficult to figure out the location. You can change the view to something more viewable but it always changes itself back to the default view I dislike.

Update 10/17/2019

As mentioned before originally I was going to give this a three star review but ended up giving it one star for all the things I already mentioned. So how did we get to this point? I am actually giving it five stars at this point.

A representative reached out to me. He was very professional and actually appreciated my negative input. But more importantly I was under the impression that they strive to make the product better. I waited to update this review though, perhaps a little too long. I wanted to see the actions and improvements first. But yeah, customer service and attention to detail really impressed me.

So what about those improvements that I am talking about? Both the web interface and the Android app received updates. The battery saving function is now available on all formats and it was simplified to set up. History can now be looked up without the cluttered mess of looking at a full day. The map now retains your preferred method of viewing it, the arrows are back indicating direction of travel. I added another photo so you can see for yourself the difference between the old app map and the new one that indicates direction of travel. The app is also less cluttered looking but at the same time gives you more available information. I no longer have to switch from the app to pc to get all features as everything is more uniform. I was told they would attempt to add even more features and I believe they will.

The unit itself is currently selling below the competitors. It accurate. The monthly fee is also below most competitors. Battery life is still somewhat of a disappointment to me. But it normally falls between what they claim. For me usually two days as this point but at times it surprises me with a third day. I can't take a star off for this as it is in a normal variance and as advertised. However the thing with this device is that you can choose what you want. A small device that is very lightweight for a kid to carry in a backpack or...... Get the optional battery pack/water proof holder with magnetic mount. The choice is up to you. I have not used the the extended battery pack yet but it's charging now as I write this. Although it does add size to the small tracker it does not make it any larger than the competitors in other waterproof cases. I will perhaps update after I get familiar with how well the case/extended battery works. For now though this company has completely turned my opinion around with great customer service

victoria , Reviewed in the United States on August 23, 2019
Great product highly recommended ❗️

I purchased the Tracki with suspicion of my husband's activity and thanks for the Tracki I was correct, it was a great device and works amazing, I highly recommend it ❗️

rcashley , Reviewed in the United States on January 3, 2020
Works perfect.

I have been using this tracking device for approx. one month now, and I will say it does a very good job.

For the first week I used it with the original battery. Even though the instructions say not to put it in the trunk or the engine bay, I tried it anyway, first in the engine bay (placed high on the inside of the fender) and then the next day in the trunk (high on the inside of the fender). The tracker did a good job in both places and the accuracy was very good. The battery life with the original small battery was pretty good, it took about two days to go down to 50%. I had the settings on 1 minute (the most frequent currently available). The vehicle wasn't in constant motion all day, so keep in mind, if it was, and reporting every minute, it would consume more battery, so you could always change to a less frequent time (5, 10, 15, 30, 45, 60, 120). The history of where the tracker has been is being recorded based on these reporting times. You can look up past history many ways (the last few hours or a date range). This info. can be downloaded if needed. I ordered the waterproof case with the larger battery and have been using that for the last three weeks. The battery life with it is a huge improvement (it took two weeks to go down to 50%), and I used it in the trunk and engine bay also with no negative issues. I have talked with Customer Service a few times to report my thoughts, and I will say, they are as good as anyone could hope. I have tracked my device with an iPhone/iPad and on a PC using various browsers. I will say that if you use an iPhone/iPad, and you want to see "live tracking", there are a couple of apps that you can use. The newer Tracki app still has a few bugs they are working out (as far as seeing live tracking), but there is another app called Trackimo, and it doesn't have all the "bells and whistles" of the new app, but "live tracking" works well on it. Keep in mind the history of the device is being recorded (no matter what app or device you use to check it), so you can always check it out from any computer with a browser. There are many applications someone could use this device for, and the tracker is so small, you could put it anywhere.

rcashley , Reviewed in Canada on November 26, 2019
Works perfect.

I wanted to follow my son when he takes the bus. I also wanted an alert for when the bus quits the school using the area alert system, but the bus's route is so short that the alert is not reaching me soon enough, so I have to go to the Tracki website and ping the device repetitively until I see the bus moving. That way I know when I have to leave work and get to my son on time.

The fact that the tracker is not as fast as I would have expected and the higher monthly fee than some other 2G tracking device I've found made it loose one star.

[May 26, 2020] PRIMETRACKING Personal GPS Tracker - Mini, Portable, Track in Real Time - 4G LTE - with SOS Button

Might be illegal to use without consent
May 26, 2020 | www.amazon.com

by PRIMETRACKING 4.4 out of 5 stars 1,178 ratings | 637 answered questions


Price: $49.97 & FREE Shipping . Details & FREE Returns Return this item for free
  • Free returns are available for the shipping address you chose. You can return the item for any reason in new and unused condition and get a full refund: no shipping charges
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How to return the item?
  1. Go to your orders and start the return
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Cesar Hawn , Reviewed in the United States on January 30, 2019

set up the geofence!

I'm always working late so my mom with an alzheimer's disease is left at home. Sometimes she went outside, and buy food and things. One time, I got home like almost 12 midnight and my mom isn't at home! I found her sitting at the bus station around 3 am. Thank you so much for this tracker as I can now monitor my mother's location!!

Tina A. , Reviewed in the United States on June 25, 2019
I've used a much better service

This tracker works fine but the reporting is not very good. I used to have this same type of tracker that I purchased from Americaloc but I misplaced it so I thought I would try this one because the device looked the same but was much cheaper. You get what you pay for! The reporting features was so much better with the Americaloc GL300W! Reporting is great and very precise!

Janet Lord , Reviewed in the United States on February 1, 2019
Excellent product all in all.

This is the second tracking device I purchased and this product by far is the most accurate and reliable. Battery lasted for 10 days which is good because my other tracker only lasts 4-5 days. Subscription is also very cheap compared to its uses and the option to cancel it any time.

DotScott1 Top Contributor: Cycling , Reviewed in the United States on May 15, 2019
Comparing this PrimeTracking GPS Tracker to SpyTec GPS Tracker...

I've been using GPS trackers to track my (quite expensive) electric bike - just in case it gets stolen plus to see my routes after I'm done riding. I built it into my bike to where it's powered by the main bike battery. You can also power it with your car battery with a DC-DC converter - 12v-to-5v - or just take apart any usb car charger and wire it yourself. I think that's really the cheapest way because those things only cost like $1-$2 at auto shops (all it needs is a 5v input). I have another, very similar name-brand tracker (SpyTec) that I can compare this one too so I'll list out the good differences and the bad differences (Pros and Cons) below but before you see the cons, I should mention that I still think this GPS tracker is the way to go:

Pros:
---- Cheaper in the long run: The device is the same price as the SpyTec GPS tracker BUT... the service is cheaper (for "faster" updates). SpyTec is $25/month updating location every 60 seconds. This one is $20/month (with a 6-month payment deal) for 10 second updates.
---- Seems well-built. Battery ran for well over a week before I decided to recharge (was down to around 30%).
---- Device appears to be water-tight, just like my other tracker - which is great :)
---- This one has a (usable) app! SpyTec does not.
---- Can export travel logs to

Cons:
---- About 150% larger than the SpyTec GPS tracker. This could be due to a larger battery or just different electronics. Though it has the same battery life as the SpyTec.
---- Appears to only work in the US and Canada, where the SpyTec tracker works worldwide (as long as you call them and let them know you're traveling).
---- Not nearly as much info on the site. The SpyTec gives start/stop info for every GPS update. This one just shows a solid line. Website is not as user-friendly.
---- No text updates, only emails. This just means when the vehicle goes over the speed limit OR leaves a geofenced area, it will send an email instead of a text. I do miss getting texts from my SpyTec GPS but I'm willing to sacrifice that for the lower monthly fee of this one.
---- Limited notifications. This one only has geofencing and speed alerts where SpyTec has Geofencing, speed, ignition on, ignition off, tow alert (I LOVE THIS ONE, I wish PrimeTracking had this alert), function key and low battery alert.
---- Shows speed in mph but distance in km. Can't find a way to switch distance to miles. Not a huge con but I wish I could change it.
---- Less tracking options than SpyTec.

NOTE: By default, the device is set to only update every 60 seconds. In order to switch it to 10-second updates, you have to either contact support and have them do it for you or do it yourself by following these instructions:

"To access the Upload interval setting; Visit PrimeTracking.Net > Click more under your tracker to the left > Click Upload Interval > to set the 10 second interval enter 10 into each of the four boxes and click save > if the tracker is online and the settings is saved, you will get a notification that says "Command saved" otherwise you will get one that says "please make device online first"."

Overall though, I think this GPS tracker is ALMOST 5 stars. It's almost there. If they added a few features to their site (like tow alerts, the ability to pick an update point to see information [instead of having to click "play" and then "pause" at the point you want to see] and text alerts), I'd say 5 stars all the way. It just needs some work on the website/tracking side of things. If their site gets updated with a more user-friendly UI and some additional options, I'll come back and give it 5 stars. Other than those things though, this GPS unit really does work quite well. And at a great subscription price. Good for tracking a stolen car, your kids or a significant other that you suspect of cheating.

BTW: You can see more info on their website: MyPrimeTracking.com and actually track your device on their other site: PrimeTracking.net

Hope this is helpful!

[May 26, 2020] Spytec GL300 GPS Tracker for Vehicle, Car, Truck, RV, Equipment, Mini Hidden Tracking Device for Kids and Seniors

Spying without consent is illegal in most jurisdictions.
May 26, 2020 | www.amazon.com

MysticCurse , Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2017

Worked Perfectly.

Verified my (now ex) girlfriend was cheating. Sucks but it's better than never knowing the truth. The tracker was incredibly easy to set up. Charge lasted longer than what other reviews stated (mine is still 55% after just over a week). The best feature by far is the Geofence; I would get text alerts whenever my ex arrived or left the dude's apartment complex. I placed the tracker under her vehicle using the Spy Tec M2 Waterproof Weatherproof Magnetic Case for STI GL300 / GX350 Real-Time GPS Trackers which I also recommend.

Since the job is done, I submitted a form on their website to cancel the service. If they continue to charge my card (as other reviews warned of) I'll be sure to change this review to a one-star.

UPDATE: They confirmed my cancellation request within 24 hours. Locating the cancellation form was as easy as typing "spytec gps cancellation" in my search bar. I would 10/10 recommend this product to anyone suspecting of infidelity.

DickDastardly , Reviewed in the United States on August 30, 2017
Caught Cheating Wife and Boytoy

Used this to track my ex-wife. Suspected her of cheating and sure enough caught her visiting her boytoy during the day when I was at work. I'm divorced now and can laugh about it, but at the time watching the Spytech screen and seeing her every move was traumatic, but I had to know

[May 26, 2020] The fact that this being a great social experiment has been lost on those decrying the lockdown. We are still unpacking the effects of it, but I will repeat that the gov't has essentially blown its wad for all to see.

May 26, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

NemesisCalling , May 25 2020 17:35 utc | 95

@91 lizard

I love it, man. Your post/writing/poems.

But don't you think you are being a wee bit devil-may-care with your hotdoggin'? Lol.

...

Russ is also a fantastic writer but whereas his post above and his prior during the pandemic have focused on the brutality of the lockdown, I'm afraid he has missed the boat on its net-positive effects, although he has rightly noted that being a bachelor during this time is a far different experience than a family man (the same goes for apartment dwellers vs. homeowners):

- As the breadwinner, I have never been home as much as I have with the fam. I'm exploring fatherhood, long hair and a patchy and itchy beard, and enjoying myself more than anyone should during the lockdown.

- I have seen more use at public parks, tennis courts, dog walking, family-outing than ever before. They say that street foot-traffic is down but I beg to differ. Perhaps consumerism and strip-mall venturing is way down, but f*** that vacuous endeavor I say anyhow.

- People are cooking again. Fast food has more or less been relegated to treat-status where it rightfully belongs

- More time at home allows the family to see the benefits of parenting at home and how NOT to rely on public school raising your child in absentia. Our public school system desperately needs a wake-up call. It needs to end the trend of politically-charged mission-statements and remove itself back to second-fiddle status when it comes to raising our children.

- The fact that this being a great social experiment has been lost on those decrying the lockdown. We are still unpacking the effects of it, but I will repeat that the gov't has essentially blown its wad for all to see. Future generations will be able to judge this event more accurately, but there are those now who are more politically active than they have ever been and so will be more fully enraged during the NEXT encroachment on our liberties. And do you think that the gov't will be able to repeat this lockdown in the near future with the same acquiescence from the people? I think not. Indeed, a powder keg has been borne out of this and it is propelling us out of our collective consumer-driven apathy. And the fact that those decrying this event have failed to understand how disrupting the course of this spirit-trough we have all been dwelling in the past decades could actually be a boon for consciousness, I'm afraid says more about them and their need of the status-quo than anything else. FFS, how long do you think the gov't can enforce such a policy? How long before it goes to far and creates a reaction that reinvigorates the sleeping masses? My argument is that it is getting closer every day and that their goal during this event will backfire spectacularly on them in the near future.

- As the lockdown peters out, and liberty to frequent parks, forests, and the right to disperse camp is restored, one wonders what the point of barring us from such activities for just under three months was for other than piss people off? These activities would never stand a snowballs chance to be removed permanently, so one can only wonder why? All it did was further cast a spotlight on their idiocy and further reinforces my point above that, in effect, they blew their wad.

- Small businesses have suffered. Money is printing so fast to go out of style in the near future. Oh well, if your margins were that thin so as not to weather a couple months hiatus/sabbatical, where the gov't has been alleviating the burden of such a time, then you should probably rethink your business venture and decide whether it is 1) needful, 2)worthwhile, 3)non-superfluous. We need to eliminate the novel enterprises of a late-capitalist society where hard work is shunned and luxury is all. Toughening up and becoming lean-and-mean is not necessarily a bad idea, especially when it comes to the powder-puff society that we find ourselves in.


[May 26, 2020] COVID Politics Insider Closers vs. Outsider Openers

May 26, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Now with the coronavirus, we see a similar misplay between earnest elites and raucous masses. When the severity of the crisis became apparent to all in early March -- some alarmist statistical models were predicting millions of deaths–it seemed obvious and necessary for federal and state officials to follow the advice of the earnest elites and to order lockdowns; as for the raucous masses, they were initially too bowled over by the apparent menace to raise much of a protest. After all, nobody wanted to be outdoors during a zombie apocalypse.

Of course, in the absence of zombies, or of people dropping dead in the streets, anti-lockdown protests soon erupted; in this country, somebody is always protesting something. At first the protesters seemed to be little more than surviving Tea Partiers, flecked with neo-Confederates -- a perception that the media was only too happy to reinforce -- and yet over the past few weeks, it's become clear that the reopen movement is broader than just the anti, the angry, and the Trumpy.

Indeed, as this author noted last week, blue-state politicians, including incumbent Democrats, are now in favor of reopening, albeit in a sometimes inconsistent and arbitrary fashion. In fact, some recognized members of the earnest healthcare policy elite have gone so far as to write in The New York Times , "As circumstances have evolved, so has my thinking" -- that is, time to open up.

Yet in the meantime, populists -- aided by Republican researchers -- are tallying up incidents of blue-state condescension and hypocrisy, as the woke and the wealthy have imposed one set of rules on the proles, even as they themselves live by another set of rules.

For instance, there were the orders about closing down churches, but not liquor stores . And there was the governor's wife who ignored her husband's lockdown order and flew by private jet to her equestrian farm in another state. And there was the state public health chief who pulled her mother out of a nursing home even while ordering such homes to accept Covid-19 patients. (That official was the first transgender person to hold such a post, so she gets extra points for wokeness, if not for fairness.)

Indeed, the comedian Ruth Buzzi -- best known for her appearances on the Laugh-In TV show in the late 60s and early 70s -- tweeted about some of the many weirdnesses of the current situation: "Marijuana is legal and haircuts are against the law. It took half a century but Hippies finally won."

In the meantime, many people -- including Elon Musk , who defies ideological categorization, and including as well African American partiers in Florida, not likely to be Republicans -- are simply ignoring the remaining restrictions. The hard-pressed police, betwixt and between the rulers and the ruled, can't arrest them all.

It's in this environment that The Washington Examiner took note of a Gallup poll showing that a whopping 63 percent of Americans support reopening, if new cases of the virus are declining. To be sure, that's a big "if," and yet for the time being, it doesn't seem coincidental that Gallup also finds that the approval rating of President Trump -- who has mostly supported reopening and who has always been contemptuous of those earnest elites -- has edged into positive territory.

.... ... ...

[May 26, 2020] CDC Confirms Remarkably Low Death Rate - Media Chooses To Ignore COVID-19 Realities -

May 26, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

For the first time, the CDC has attempted to offer a real estimate of the overall death rate for COVID-19, and under its most likely scenario, the number is 0.26%.

Officials estimate a 0.4% fatality rate among those who are symptomatic and project a 35% rate of asymptomatic cases among those infected, which drops the overall infection fatality rate (IFR) to just 0.26% - almost exactly where Stanford researchers pegged it a month ago.

We destroyed our entire country and suspended democracy all for a lie, and these people perpetrated the unscientific degree of panic. Will they ever admit the grave consequences of their error?

sybaris , 3 minutes ago remove link

I believe the CDC has lied from the start, and will continue to lie for one goal in mind, making certain enough people fall ill to make any vaccine regiment they cook up mandatory (because of the sudden realization of bad numbers) do not trust a word these people say, they are proven liars. Sars 1 circa 2003 had a cfr of 15%, sars-cov-2 is a variant of the first one, in a year the true cfr will actually be known, sure as hell won't be known now with this limited data set, and that is why this seemingly good news is extremely deceptive......

FinkPloyd, 52 minutes ago

Caveats:

§ Estimates only include onset dates between March 1, 2020 – March 31, 2020 to ensure cases have had sufficient time to observe the outcome (hospital admission or death).

¶ Estimates only include hospital admission dates between March 1, 2020 – March 31, 2020 to ensure cases have had sufficient time to observe the outcome (hospital discharge or death).

** Estimates only include death dates between March 1, 2020 – March 31, 2020 to ensure sufficient time for reporting.

This Scenario represents a current best estimate about viral transmission and disease severity in the United States, with the same caveat: that the parameter values will change as more data become available.

Are not predictions of the expected effects of COVID-19.

Flynt2142ahh, 1 hour ago (Edited)

Weak dumb decaden society ... where to start - Intellectually lazy media and public plus weak analysis skills across board coupled with a culture that likes a quick fix and fast takes - you get snow-pocalypses that turn into light dustings with school closures that you and I know are total BS... and now you get fake pandemics. In a society that needs to ask if you are glutten free or are you non binary... or for some strange reason these upright walking sapiens need to "save" a billion year old planet from what I am not entirely sure of - cuz the math of those models is crap too -whoops said the quiet part out loud.. (last i checked it was not climate that blew up the world trade back on 9/11 ) ... losing faith in humanity here... and those in the media carrying water for the chicoms & W.H.O need to relocate to the China and enjoy their version of freedom and liberty..

TruthDetector, 1 hour ago (Edited)

“ We destroyed our entire country and suspended democracy all for a lie, and these people perpetrated the unscientific degree of panic ( for this plannedemic ).

Will they ever admit the grave consequences of their error?”

I’ve got a dollar that says the only substantive thing we’ll ever hear from the Fake Stream Media (FSM) is...

...🦗🎶🦗Crickets🦗🎶🦗...

Any one willing to wager $1 against my prediction?

Patmos, 1 hour ago remove link

So basically it should have been what’s been known since very early on:

Isolate the elderly and the infirm, maybe recommend masks as part of that protection plan especially if you’re going to be around that vulnerable subset, so that if you got it you don’t give it to them.

Instead we got:

Be very afraid, because the Bill Gates funded WHO said so, and oh yeah also take this vaccine which helps pad Bill Gates’ coffers.

[May 26, 2020] The Healing Power of Proper Breathing

Really questionable ides. But may in context of COVID-19 they make some sense.
May 26, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
BM , May 25 2020 11:26 utc | 77
The Healing Power of Proper Breathing."
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-healing-power-of-proper-breathing-11590098696
And he explains how to breathe the correct way, which includes breathing through the nose.
Posted by: Pundita | May 24 2020 16:09 utc | 6

Firstly I couldn't access the article, but someone saved it on archive.is here:

http://archive.is/NVWOo

The article is extremely limited, but as far as it goes it is correct: short breathing is extremely bad for the health, makes us uncomfortable, irritable, stressed, illogical, dulls our thoughts and so many other handicaps. Deep long breathing (actually doesn't really matter if it is fast or slow, the importance is that it is deep, using the full capacity of the lungs) has all the benefits of exactly the opposite of short breathing - far better health, we feel better, more relaxed, more concentrated, our minds are more powerful, more logical, more energetic, we have more positive thougts, more helpful thoughts, more comfortable thougts, and so many other benefits.

Short breathing is unnatural. 2000 years ago deep breathing would be the norm, short breathing would be exceptional. Today in this world far divorced from nature the unhealthy short breath has become the norm instead of the exception, making us irritable, stressed, uncomfortable and unhealthy, and clouding our vision.

Actually 5 seconds per breath is still a pretty short breath; 20 seconds per in-breath and 20 seconds per out-breath gives much better results if you develop it.

I can recommend a far far far better source here, a book by the distinguished Thai monk Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, Mindfulness with breathing, Unveiling the secrets of life: a manual for serious beginners

It can also be ordered from Wisdom Publications.

Understanding the breathing is the greatest secret of life.

[May 25, 2020] Two postulates of the establishment's propaganda on coronavirus

Outdoor maskism has zero to do with science, everything to do with irrational panic at best, and most of all top-down totalitarian control-seeking
Living in the Empire isn't quite as bad as being a victim of the Empire, but it's getting close.
May 25, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Russ , May 25 2020 5:44 utc | 66

v> Thus in this case the propaganda has been largely monolithic:

1. Stay indoors. Don't breathe the air.

2. If you must venture into the hostile outdoors*, wear a mask**. Especially now that the air is the cleanest it's been our whole live s, do all you can to avoid breathing it.

"Covid-19 has forced modern medicine to broaden its outlook and look for new solutions, even in the wisdom of the past."

Indeed, it's clear where the establishment's propaganda has found wisdom.

Thus in this case the propaganda has been largely monolithic:

1. Stay indoors. Don't breathe the air.

2. If you must venture into the hostile outdoors*, wear a mask**. Especially now that the air is the cleanest it's been our whole live s, do all you can to avoid breathing it.

"Covid-19 has forced modern medicine to broaden its outlook and look for new solutions, even in the wisdom of the past."

Indeed, it's clear where the establishment's propaganda has found wisdom. /div

[May 25, 2020] Should I be ashamed of this gathering? I'm sure some will think yes, yes I am being an asshole. But I'm going to take the risk of doing what social herd animals need to do in order to maintain my mental health.

May 25, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

lizard , May 25 2020 16:35 utc | 92

Thank you Russ @66. I always appreciate your comments.

I'm going to repost something I wrote this morning about how one can be a skeptic but not be an asshole about it:

Did you know it is possible to be skeptical about the pandemic but not be an asshole about it?

I'll use myself as an example.

I wear a mask when I'm in commercial spaces, even when it's not required. I understand and respect how irrationally fearful people are, and I also understand how the mask has been turned into a politically divisive symbol of freedom vs. tyranny. I'm not going to waste energy on opposing mask-wearing when the real threat is a mandatory vaccine program cooked up by sociopaths and administered by the military.

I don't bring my little germ-sponges–aka, children–into stores with me when I'm shopping. My oldest, half-jokingly, said he wants to go into Target for his birthday as his birthday gift. Not to buy anything, just to be in a store.

I'm not rushing into bars and restaurants and cram-packed swimming pools in the Ozarks now that things are reopening. I stay at home, play with Legos, and drink box wine like a good adult male with kids and no social life.

Since there is a reopening going on, and a subsequent media effort to highlight the most obnoxious visual examples of violating our NEW NORMAL social distancing requirements, let me offer a personal example of what reopening looks like for me.

Yesterday I hosted a social gathering. My friend came over with his two girls, and another friend came over with his partner. The kids played and laughed over a fart gun. We ate hotdogs and had a fire. It was great.

We talked about the risk of our gathering in our backyard to eat hotdogs and to let the kids play. I think we understand the risk as best we can, considering how dubious much of the information has been, and how flawed the models were.

Should I be ashamed of this gathering? Am I being an asshole by hanging out with a few friends who have social lives that are about as exciting as mine?

I'm sure some will think yes, yes I am being an asshole. And that's fine. But until the freedom to hang out with other people is completely removed, I'm going to take the risk of doing what social herd animals need to do in order to maintain my mental health.

[May 25, 2020] BIG PHARMA steered public money away from pandemic research and into PROFIT-MAKING projects for years watchdog -- RT World New

Notable quotes:
"... EU money intended for underfunded public-benefit research such as preparing for a pandemic has been diverted by the pharmaceutical industry into areas where it can make more money, according to a scathing new report. ..."
"... The target of the criticism is the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), a public-private partnership that was equally funded, between 2008 and 2020, by the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) lobbying group and the European Commission to the tune of 5.3 billion euros (US$5.8 billion). The money is supposed to go to areas of "unmet medical or social need," ..."
"... "We were outraged to find evidence that the pharmaceutical industry lobby EFPIA not only did not consider funding biopreparedness (ie, being ready for epidemics such as the one caused by the new coronavirus, COVID-19) but opposed it being included in IMI's work when the possibility was raised by the European Commission in 2017, ..."
"... "The research proposed by the EC in the biopreparedness topic was small in scope," ..."
"... "IMI's projects have contributed, directly or indirectly, to better prepare the research community for the current crisis, the Ebola+ programme or the ZAPI project." ..."
"... "belated interventions when an epidemic is already underway," ..."
"... Think your friends would be interested? Share this story! ..."
May 25, 2020 | www.rt.com
EU money intended for underfunded public-benefit research such as preparing for a pandemic has been diverted by the pharmaceutical industry into areas where it can make more money, according to a scathing new report. Officials in Brussels wanted to co-fund research that would have ensured the European Union (EU) was better prepared for a pandemic akin to the one we are experiencing today. But their partners, the big pharmaceutical companies, rejected the proposal, ensuring that taxpayer money would go instead into studies with more potential for commercial application. In short big-pharma lobbyists were allowed to steer billions of euros of public funds as they saw fit, a damning new report claims.

The target of the criticism is the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), a public-private partnership that was equally funded, between 2008 and 2020, by the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) lobbying group and the European Commission to the tune of 5.3 billion euros (US$5.8 billion). The money is supposed to go to areas of "unmet medical or social need," but, in practice, corporate priorities dominate the decision-making, according to the non-governmental organization Corporate Observatory Europe (COE).

"We were outraged to find evidence that the pharmaceutical industry lobby EFPIA not only did not consider funding biopreparedness (ie, being ready for epidemics such as the one caused by the new coronavirus, COVID-19) but opposed it being included in IMI's work when the possibility was raised by the European Commission in 2017, " a new COE report said.

Also on rt.com Head of EU's top science body quits after Covid-19 response plans get bogged down by Brussels bureaucracy

The rejected proposal would have directed money into refining computer simulations and the analysis of animal testing models, potentially speeding up regulatory approval of vaccines, according to the Guardian. But a spokeswoman for the IMI called the report "misleading".

"The research proposed by the EC in the biopreparedness topic was small in scope," she said. "IMI's projects have contributed, directly or indirectly, to better prepare the research community for the current crisis, the Ebola+ programme or the ZAPI project."

ZAPI, or the Zoonotic Anticipation and Preparedness Initiative, was launched in 2015 with a budget of 20 million euros (US$21.8 million) after the Ebola epidemic a year prior. The COE report said it exemplifies a pattern of "belated interventions when an epidemic is already underway," much like this year's emergency funding of coronavirus research.

Also on rt.com Hotly-touted Oxford coronavirus VACCINE trial has only 50 percent chance of success, project leader warns

The think tank questioned whether EU public money was well applied through IMI. Much of it went into research into cancer, Alzheimer's disease and diabetes – areas that are potentially profitable and thus are given close attention by private business. But epidemic preparedness, HIV/AIDS, and poverty-related and neglected tropical diseases have been overlooked by the initiative, the report said.

Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!

[May 24, 2020] It all points to social economic status and povert: one argument against shutting down economies so drastically

May 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Blue Dotterel , May 24 2020 16:29 utc | 8

"It all points to social economic status and poverty," Gray Molina said.

This is probably true. It was one argument against shutting down economies so drastically. This is less of a problem in the wealthier countries for the moment, but in a second or third wave, you will probably see more deaths among the below 60s due to increasing poverty caused by poorly managed lockdowns this time around.

[May 24, 2020] 'How Could the CDC Make That Mistake?' The government's disease-fighting agency is conflating viral and antibody tests, compromising a few crucial metrics that governors depend on to reopen their economies. Pennsylvania, Georgia, Texas, and other states are doing the same.

Notable quotes:
"... "According to CDC, the disease of obesity affects about 78 million Americans 1 and the ASMBS estimates about 24 million have severe or morbid obesity." ..."
May 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 24 2020 23:54 utc | 46

And the government botching of this crisis continues...

'How Could the CDC Make That Mistake?' The government's disease-fighting agency is conflating viral and antibody tests, compromising a few crucial metrics that governors depend on to reopen their economies. Pennsylvania, Georgia, Texas, and other states are doing the same.
https://tinyurl.com/y92ea59f

And overseas as well...

'Politicised nature' of lockdown debate delays Imperial report
https://tinyurl.com/y7csboom

And of course, the effect of that...

Nearly half of US states haven't contained their coronavirus outbreaks, a new study finds
https://tinyurl.com/yc72pd8t

And no, Sweden is not doing better...

Just 7.3% of Stockholm had Covid-19 antibodies by end of April, study shows
Official findings add to concerns about Sweden's laissez-faire strategy towards the pandemic
https://tinyurl.com/yahnmb3a

Finally, a large scale study on HCQ - 86,000 patients, with 15,000 receiving HCQ...

Trump drug hydroxychloroquine raises death risk in Covid patients, study says
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-52779309

The color of coronavirus:
COVID-19 deaths by race and ethnicity in the U.S.
https://www.apmresearchlab.org/covid/deaths-by-race

Blacks are *twice* as likely to get it as whites and Latinos. American Indians are *five times* more likely to get it. They conclude the best indicator is poverty.

From The Lancet, a study of New York patients... Epidemiology, clinical course, and outcomes of critically ill adults with COVID-19 in New York City: a prospective cohort study https://tinyurl.com/yblmszsx

Between March 2 and April 1, 2020, 1150 adults were admitted to both hospitals with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19, of which 257 (22%) were critically ill.

The median age of patients was 62 years (IQR 51–72), 171 (67%) were men. 212 (82%) patients had at least one chronic illness, the most common of which were hypertension (162 [63%]) and diabetes (92 [36%]).

119 (46%) patients had obesity.

As of April 28, 2020, 101 (39%) patients had died and 94 (37%) remained hospitalised.

203 (79%) patients received invasive mechanical ventilation for a median of 18 days (IQR 9–28), 170 (66%) of 257 patients received vasopressors and 79 (31%) received renal replacement therapy.

The median time to in-hospital deterioration was 3 days (IQR 1–6).

In the multivariable Cox model, older age (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR] 1·31 [1·09–1·57] per 10-year increase), chronic cardiac disease (aHR 1·76 [1·08–2·86]), chronic pulmonary disease (aHR 2·94 [1·48–5·84]), higher concentrations of interleukin-6 (aHR 1·11 [95%CI 1·02–1·20] per decile increase), and higher concentrations of D-dimer (aHR 1·10 [1·01–1·19] per decile increase) were independently associated with in-hospital mortality.

Note: 36% had diabetes; 46% were fat. Like I've said before, "diabetes" is a code word for "fat." And how many people in the US are fat and thus at risk? "According to CDC, the disease of obesity affects about 78 million Americans 1 and the ASMBS estimates about 24 million have severe or morbid obesity."

So much for "let's just isolate the elderly"...so we can attend our baseball games this summer and stuff ourselves with crap food...

[May 24, 2020] Private Equity Is Ruining Health Care, Covid Is Making It Worse: Investors have been buying up doctor s offices, cutting costs, and, critics say, putting pressure on physicians by Heather Perlberg

Highly recommended!
So not only ambulance service was destroyed by private equity, they now added other specialties. I wonder is those criminals who insert unnecessary stents in patients are connected to private equity.
Images removed
Notable quotes:
"... "You can't serve two masters. You can't serve patients and investors" ..."
"... Morganroth's defense of pandemic Botox might seem odd, but it made perfect sense within the logic of the U.S. health-care system, which has seen Wall Street investors invade its every corner, engineering medical practices and hospitals to maximize profits as if they were little different from grocery stores. At the center of this story are private equity firms, which saw the explosive growth of health-care spending and have been buying up physician staffing companies, surgery centers, and everything else in sight. ..."
"... But some doctors say that the private equity playbook, which involves buying companies, drastically cutting costs, and then selling for a profit -- the goal is generally to make an annualized return of 20% to 30% within three to five years -- creates problems that are unique to health care. "I know private equity does this in other industries, but in medicine you're dealing with people's health and their lives," says Michael Rains, a doctor who worked at U.S. Dermatology Partners , a big private equity-backed chain. "You can't serve two masters. You can't serve patients and investors." ..."
"... Yet over the past decade, lawyers devised a structure that allows investors to buy a medical practice without technically owning it: the MSO, or management service organization. Today, when an investment firm buys a doctor's office, what it's actually buying are the office's "nonclinical" assets. In theory, physicians control all medical decisions and agree to pay a management fee to a newly created company, which handles administrative tasks such as billing and marketing. ..."
"... Businessweek ..."
"... When individual doctors sell, they generally receive $2 million to $7 million each, with 30% to 40% of that paid in equity in the group. After the acquisition, doctors get a lower salary and are asked to help recruit other doctors to sell their practices or to join as employees. ..."
"... Patients, for the most part, are in the dark. Unlike when your mortgage changes hands, you usually aren't notified when a big investment firm buys your doctor. Sometimes the sign on the door bearing the physician's name stays put, and subtle changes in operations or unfamiliar fees may be the only clues that anything has happened. ..."
"... At Advanced Dermatology & Cosmetic Surgery , the largest private equity-backed group in the field, with more than 150 locations across the U.S., that sense of discomfort came shortly after Audax Group bought a controlling stake in what was then a much smaller chain in 2011. The new management team introduced a scorecard that rewarded offices with cash if they met daily and monthly financial goals, according to a lawsuit filed in 2013 against the company by one of its dermatologists. The doctor alleged that the bonus program encouraged staff to do as many procedures as possible, rather than strictly addressing patients' medical needs. ..."
"... Most dermatologists use outside labs and pathologists, but private equity-owned groups buy up existing labs and hire their own pathologists. Then doctors are encouraged to refer patients within the group and send biopsy slides to the company-owned labs, keeping the entire chain of revenue in-house. ..."
"... Now comes the cost-cutting. This is supposed to be the hallmark of private equity, and, done right, it can work to the benefit of doctors and patients. But there are pitfalls unique to medicine, where aggressive cuts can lead to problems, some of them merely inconvenient and some potentially dangerous. ..."
"... A doctor at Advanced Dermatology says that waiting for corporate approvals means his office is routinely left without enough gauze, antiseptic solution, and toilet paper. Even before the great toilet paper shortage of 2020, he would travel with a few rolls in the trunk of his car, to spare patients when an office inevitably ran out. The company declined to comment. ..."
"... One paradox of the Covid-19 pandemic has been that even as the virus has focused the entire country on health care, it's been a financial disaster for the industry. And so, while emergency room doctors and nurses care for the sick -- comforting those who would otherwise die alone, and in some cases dying themselves -- private equity-backed staffing companies and hospitals have been cutting pay for ER doctors. These hospitals, like the big medical practices, make a large portion of their money from elective procedures and have been forced into wrenching compromises. ..."
"... For investors with capital, on the other hand, the economic fallout from the virus is a huge opportunity. Stay-at-home orders have left small practices more financially strained than they've ever been. That will likely accelerate sales to private equity firms, according to Marc Cabrera, an investment banker focused on health-care deals at Oppenheimer & Co. Independent doctors or groups that previously rebuffed offers from deep-pocketed backers "will reconsider their options," he says. ..."
"... Many doctors may ultimately come to regret cashing out, but it's hard to get out once you're in. As part of an acquisition, the private equity groups typically require doctors to sign yearslong contracts, with noncompete clauses that prevent them from working in the surrounding area. ..."
May 20, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

Not long after Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, ordered the state's 40 million residents to stay home to stop the spread of the new coronavirus, Dr. Greg Morganroth called his team of doctors and said their dermatology group was staying open.

Morganroth is chief executive officer of the California Skin Institute , which he founded in 2007 as a single office in Mountain View. He's since expanded to more than 40 locations using a financing strategy that's become exceedingly common in American health care: private equity. In this case, he took out a loan from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. that could eventually convert to an equity stake. CSI is now the largest dermatology chain in California.

But the Covid-19 pandemic put Morganroth in a precarious position. Most medical procedures were characterized as nonessential by government officials and practitioners. Doctors were closing offices, and patients were staying away to limit their potential exposure to the virus.

CSI took a different approach. Morganroth explained his thinking on April 2 in a Zoom call with more than 170 dermatologists from around the country organized by the Cosmetic Surgery Forum, an industry conference. Contrary to what they might have heard, Morganroth told them, they should consider staying open during the pandemic. "Many of us are over-interpreting guidelines," he said.

For a moment there was an awkward silence. Doctors had thought they were signing up for advice on how to apply for government money that would help them meet payroll while they were shut down; they hadn't expected to be told not to shut down at all. Morganroth continued: "We are going to be in a two-year war, and we need to make strategic plans for our businesses that enable us to survive and to rebound."

Back at CSI, the company's front-office staff was working the phones, calling patients in some of the worst-hit areas and reminding them to show up for their appointments, even for cosmetic procedures such as Botox injections to treat wrinkles. During the videoconference, Morganroth argued that offering Botox in a pandemic wasn't so different from a grocery store allowing customers to buy candy alongside staples.

"If I had a food supply company and had to stay open, and I had meat, bread, and milk, would I stop making lime and strawberry licorice?" Morganroth asked. "I would make everything and go forward."

From a public-health point of view, some of the doctors believed, this was questionable. Common reasons for visiting a dermatologist's office -- skin screenings, mole removals, acne consultations -- aren't particularly time sensitive. Serious matters, such as suspected cancers and dangerous rashes, can be handled, at least initially, with telemedicine consultations . Then doctors can weigh the risks for their patients and determine who needs to come in. In a statement, CSI says that it followed local and state laws for staying open, while providing "necessary care" for patients, and that it had not required doctors to come to work.

"You can't serve two masters. You can't serve patients and investors"

Morganroth's defense of pandemic Botox might seem odd, but it made perfect sense within the logic of the U.S. health-care system, which has seen Wall Street investors invade its every corner, engineering medical practices and hospitals to maximize profits as if they were little different from grocery stores. At the center of this story are private equity firms, which saw the explosive growth of health-care spending and have been buying up physician staffing companies, surgery centers, and everything else in sight.

Over the past five years, the firms have invested more than $10 billion in medical practices, with a special focus on dermatology, which is seen as a hot industry because of the aging population. Baby boomers suffer from high rates of two potentially lucrative conditions: skin cancer and vanity. Some estimates suggest that private equity already owns more than 10% of the U.S dermatology market. And firms have started to expand into other specialties, including women's health, urology, and gastroenterology.

There's nothing inherently wrong with any of this. But some doctors say that the private equity playbook, which involves buying companies, drastically cutting costs, and then selling for a profit -- the goal is generally to make an annualized return of 20% to 30% within three to five years -- creates problems that are unique to health care. "I know private equity does this in other industries, but in medicine you're dealing with people's health and their lives," says Michael Rains, a doctor who worked at U.S. Dermatology Partners , a big private equity-backed chain. "You can't serve two masters. You can't serve patients and investors."

Investment firms, and the practices they fund, say these concerns are overblown. They point out that they're giving doctors a financial shelter from the rapidly changing medical environment, a particularly attractive prospect now, and that money from private equity firms has expanded care to more patients. But they've also made it next to impossible to track the industry's impact or reach. Firms rarely announce their investments and routinely subject doctors to nondisclosure agreements that make it difficult for them to speak publicly. Bloomberg Businessweek spoke to dozens of doctors at 10 large private equity-backed dermatology groups. Those interviews, along with information obtained from other employees, investors, lawyers, court filings, and company records, reveal how the firms operate, and why they sometimes fail patients.

The process is never exactly the same, but there are familiar patterns, which tend to play out in five steps.

Step 1: Marriage

The strange thing about private equity money in medicine is that for-profit investors have long been prevented from buying doctor's offices. Corporate ownership goes against a doctrine set by the American Medical Association , the main trade group for doctors in the U.S., and is prohibited by law in many states, including Texas and New Jersey. For most of the past 100 years, if you wanted to make money on a medical practice, you needed to have a medical license.

Yet over the past decade, lawyers devised a structure that allows investors to buy a medical practice without technically owning it: the MSO, or management service organization. Today, when an investment firm buys a doctor's office, what it's actually buying are the office's "nonclinical" assets. In theory, physicians control all medical decisions and agree to pay a management fee to a newly created company, which handles administrative tasks such as billing and marketing.

In practice, though, investors expect some influence over medical decision-making, which, after all, is connected to profits. "When we partner with you, it's a marriage," said Matt Jameson, a managing director at BlueMountain Capital, a $17 billion firm that recently invested in a women's health company, while speaking at a conference in New York in September. "We have to believe it. You have to believe it. It's not going to be something where clinical is completely not touched." (When contacted by Businessweek , Jameson asked to clarify his comments. "Doctors and other qualified healthcare professionals at the providers we've invested in make medical decisions," he said in a statement.)

The typical buyout starts with the acquisition of a big, popular practice, often with multiple doctors and several locations, for as much as $100 million. (Investors typically pay between 9 and 12 times annual profit.) This practice functions as an anchor, like a name-brand department store at a shopping mall, attracting patients and doctors to the new group as it expands. Then comes the roll-up: The private equity firm purchases smaller offices and solo practices, giving the group a regional presence.

As part of the new structure, investors deal with paperwork and save money by buying medical supplies in bulk. Crucially they also negotiate higher insurance reimbursement rates. One dermatologist who sold her practice to the California Skin Institute says she was surprised to find out the bigger group's payouts from insurers were $25 to $125 more per visit.

When individual doctors sell, they generally receive $2 million to $7 million each, with 30% to 40% of that paid in equity in the group. After the acquisition, doctors get a lower salary and are asked to help recruit other doctors to sell their practices or to join as employees.

At first, doctors are generally thrilled by all of this. They have financial security and can focus on treating patients without the stress of running a business. Patients, for the most part, are in the dark. Unlike when your mortgage changes hands, you usually aren't notified when a big investment firm buys your doctor. Sometimes the sign on the door bearing the physician's name stays put, and subtle changes in operations or unfamiliar fees may be the only clues that anything has happened.

Step 2: Growth

The promise of more patients is a big draw for doctors. By sharing marketing costs and adding locations, the new companies can advertise more and attract customers. Private equity-owned practices have been diligent users of social media, announcing newly added doctors and posting coupons on Twitter and Instagram. But these practices can be aggressive in ways that make some doctors uncomfortable.

At Advanced Dermatology & Cosmetic Surgery , the largest private equity-backed group in the field, with more than 150 locations across the U.S., that sense of discomfort came shortly after Audax Group bought a controlling stake in what was then a much smaller chain in 2011. The new management team introduced a scorecard that rewarded offices with cash if they met daily and monthly financial goals, according to a lawsuit filed in 2013 against the company by one of its dermatologists. The doctor alleged that the bonus program encouraged staff to do as many procedures as possible, rather than strictly addressing patients' medical needs.

In some of the company's Florida offices, the doctor alleged, medical assistants responded to the bonus structure by ticking extra boxes on exam reports, stating that doctors checked many more areas of the body than they actually had. That led to higher patient bills, defrauding the government under its Medicare program, according to the lawsuit. The federal government declined to join the case, and it was dismissed about a year after it was filed. Advanced and Audax declined to comment.

One-Stop Skin Care

By buying up labs and adding specialists, private equity-owned dermatology groups get paid at every step of a patient's treatment.

Data: Estimated Medicare reimbursement rates for the Miami area, Sensus Healthcare sales presentation

Private equity-backed practices also try to increase revenue by adding more-lucrative procedures, according to doctors interviewed by Businessweek . In dermatology, this means more cosmetics, laser treatments, radiation, and especially Mohs surgeries -- a specialized skin cancer procedure that removes growths from delicate areas like the face and neck one layer at a time, to limit scarring. The surgery involves expensive equipment and specialized doctors, so some large medical groups keep costs down by assembling traveling Mohs teams, who fly in from other states. Others create mobile labs in vans that set up in clinics' parking lots.

Most dermatologists use outside labs and pathologists, but private equity-owned groups buy up existing labs and hire their own pathologists. Then doctors are encouraged to refer patients within the group and send biopsy slides to the company-owned labs, keeping the entire chain of revenue in-house. This takes advantage of a regulatory quirk that has made dermatology, and a handful of other specialties, attractive to private equity. Under the 1989 Stark Law, doctors aren't allowed to make patient referrals for their own financial gain. An exception was made for some fields because it's more convenient for patients, explains Dr. Sailesh Konda, a Mohs surgeon and professor at the University of Florida. "But that can be abused."

Step 3: Synergy

Now comes the cost-cutting. This is supposed to be the hallmark of private equity, and, done right, it can work to the benefit of doctors and patients. But there are pitfalls unique to medicine, where aggressive cuts can lead to problems, some of them merely inconvenient and some potentially dangerous.

A doctor at Advanced Dermatology says that waiting for corporate approvals means his office is routinely left without enough gauze, antiseptic solution, and toilet paper. Even before the great toilet paper shortage of 2020, he would travel with a few rolls in the trunk of his car, to spare patients when an office inevitably ran out. The company declined to comment.

At the country's second-biggest skin-care group, U.S. Dermatology Partners , a former doctor says a regional manager switched to a cheaper brand of needles and sutures without consulting the medical staff. The quality was so poor, she says, they would often break off in her patients' bodies. Mortified, she'd have to dig them out and start over. She complained to managers but couldn't get better supplies, she says. Paul Singh, U.S. Dermatology's CEO, says the company uses a "reputable, global vendor for medical supplies." "While our group may have standardized purchasing processes, individual providers have the autonomy to procure specific supplies that they need for a particular patient situation or patient population," he says in a statement.

Doctors who join a private equity-backed group generally sign contracts that state they'll never have to compromise their medical judgment, but some say that management began to intervene there, too. Dermatologists at most of the companies say they were pushed to see as many as twice the number of patients a day, which made them feel rushed and unable to provide the same quality of care. Others were forced to discuss their cases with managers or medical directors, who asked the doctors to explain why they weren't sending more patients for surgery. Multiple practices also encouraged doctors to send home Mohs surgery patients with open wounds and have them come back the next day for stitches -- or to have a different doctor do the closure the same day -- because that would allow the practice to collect more from insurers.

That's if doctors are performing the procedures at all. At Advanced Dermatology, several doctors say they were asked to claim that physician assistants, or PAs, were under their supervision when they weren't seeing patients in the same building, or even the same town. Because PAs are paid less than dermatologists, this allowed the company to keep costs low while growing the business. In a statement, Eric Hunt, Advanced's general counsel and chief compliance officer says that having PAs on staff enables the company to "provide access to quality dermatological care to more patients."

Step 4. Rolling Up the Roll-Up

Advanced Dermatology was sold in 2016 by Audax to Harvest Partners LP , following a pattern that's typical in the industry. At some point, after costs have been cut and profits maximized, most private equity-owned medical groups will be sold, often to another private equity firm, which will then try to somehow make the company even more profitable.

Having reduced most of the obvious costs, Advanced Dermatology began skimping on more important supplies, including Hylenex, according to doctors and other employees. The drug is an expensive reversal agent used when cosmetic fillers, which are supposed to make skin look plumper, go wrong. Not having enough is dangerous: Patients who get an injection that inadvertently blocks a blood vessel can be left with dead sections of skin or even go blind if they don't get enough Hylenex in a matter of hours. The company says that it stocks Hylenex in every office that performs cosmetic procedures, and that it "has no records of any provider being denied an order for this medication."

Advanced Dermatology also started giving even more authority to PAs, according to doctors and staff. Without enough oversight some were missing deadly skin cancers, they say. Others were doing too many biopsies and cutting out much larger areas of skin than necessary, leaving patients with big scars. Doctors who complained about the bad behavior say they saw PAs moved to other locations rather than fired or given more supervision. Hunt, the company's lawyer, says that all PAs get six months of training and are supervised by experienced doctors.

The staff coined a new medical diagnosis, "pre- pre- pre-cancer"

Advanced Dermatology also put more pressure on doctors to send biopsies to in-house labs. The move made sense financially, but some of the doctors didn't trust the lab. One of its two pathologists in Delray Beach, Fla., Steven Glanz, had a history of misdiagnosing benign tumors, which led patients to undergo surgeries that were later found to be unnecessary, according to doctors who worked with him. Dermatologists who warned that Glanz was a danger to patients say that their complaints to Dr. Matt Leavitt, the group's founder and CEO, were ignored. More procedures, doctors knew, brought in more money.

Glanz, who had been with the practice since its early days, was known to read slides under a microscope with a pistol on his desk. After he was arrested with a handgun, a folding knife, and a vial of methamphetamine crystals, he was fired and Florida's state medical board fined him $10,000, requiring him to complete a five-hour course on ethics before he could resume practicing. But his former colleagues were unsettled; they knew Glanz's signature was on years of reports that determined treatment for patients. Some slides were reevaluated, and pathologists noticed mistakes. Managers told some doctors and their staff that patients, even those who'd been misdiagnosed and had unnecessary procedures, were not to be told. Glanz pleaded guilty to stalking and a firearms violation and was sentenced to probation. When a reporter called his office and identified herself, the receptionist hung up. Further attempts to reach Glanz were unsuccessful. Advanced's Hunt says that he was "formally released from employment three years ago," but did not comment further.

Of course, some doctors pushed ethical boundaries long before private equity came into the picture. But critics of the industry, including doctors and investors, say management teams put in place by private equity firms tend to look the other way as long as a medical practice is profitable. Of the dermatologists with the highest biopsy rates in the country (between 4 and 11 per patient, per year), almost 25% were affiliated with private equity-backed groups, according to Dr. Joseph Francis, a Mohs surgeon and data researcher at the University of Florida.

Medical providers may have also been blurring ethical lines at U.S. Dermatology Partners, which was until recently on its second private equity owner, Abry Partners LLC . At four of the company's offices in Texas, a doctor and his PAs were doing more biopsies than necessary, according to employees. These employees say the staff routinely called patients with benign lichenoid keratosis, small brownish blotches that usually go away on their own, and told them the growths should be removed. Under instruction from the doctor, the staff coined a new medical diagnosis, "pre- pre- pre-cancer," and then talked patients into coming in for removal, employees say. Singh, the U.S. Dermatology CEO, says that the company trusts doctors to make the right decisions and that it monitors them through routine audits.

Step 5: Sell-Off

In some cases the cost-cutting either becomes impossible or leads to compromises in care too obvious to ignore. In 2016 a DermOne LLC office in Irving, Texas, had been using a faulty autoclave machine to sterilize surgical equipment -- the state and county health departments identified 137 patients that needed to get tested for blood-borne diseases such as HIV and hepatitis. By 2018, DermOne's backer, Westwind Investors, wanted out.

Westwind had been one of the earliest firms to build a big dermatology business -- with practices in five states -- but others had grown larger. After the debacle in Irving, the Nevada-based firm sold DermOne's medical records and patient lists, as well as some of its offices, to other groups. It dissolved the remaining offices, leaving some patients abruptly without care. Westwind did not respond to repeated requests for comment. Two other private equity-backed groups, TruDerm and Select Dermatology LLC, have also gone out of business in the past two years.

The surviving chains have been saddled with large piles of debt they're now struggling to repay. In January, U.S. Dermatology Partners defaulted on a $377 million loan, meaning the private equity backer, Abry Partners, had to hand over the keys to its lenders, Golub Capital , Carlyle Group , and Ares Management , which will now oversee a chain with almost 100 locations, receiving 1 million visits from patients a year. Abry did not respond to requests for comment .

For the medical groups that make it, the game plan is to eventually sell to the largest players, such as KKR , Blackstone Group , and Apollo Global Management . Pioneering investors, including Audax, are now buying practices in other fields -- a concerning development to critics who note that the areas that are currently attracting investment, such as urology, generally involve more invasive procedures. Should doctors performing vasectomies be thinking about the dollar-rate returns for KKR -- or any private investor?

"It's ultimately going to backfire," says Dr. Jane Grant-Kels, a veteran dermatologist and professor at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. "There's a limit to how much money you can make when you're sticking knives into human skin for profit."

One paradox of the Covid-19 pandemic has been that even as the virus has focused the entire country on health care, it's been a financial disaster for the industry. And so, while emergency room doctors and nurses care for the sick -- comforting those who would otherwise die alone, and in some cases dying themselves -- private equity-backed staffing companies and hospitals have been cutting pay for ER doctors. These hospitals, like the big medical practices, make a large portion of their money from elective procedures and have been forced into wrenching compromises.

For investors with capital, on the other hand, the economic fallout from the virus is a huge opportunity. Stay-at-home orders have left small practices more financially strained than they've ever been. That will likely accelerate sales to private equity firms, according to Marc Cabrera, an investment banker focused on health-care deals at Oppenheimer & Co. Independent doctors or groups that previously rebuffed offers from deep-pocketed backers "will reconsider their options," he says.

Many doctors may ultimately come to regret cashing out, but it's hard to get out once you're in. As part of an acquisition, the private equity groups typically require doctors to sign yearslong contracts, with noncompete clauses that prevent them from working in the surrounding area.

As governors throughout the nation ease restrictions on businesses, Advanced Dermatology is opening its most profitable offices first. The company received an undisclosed sum under the Cares Act, as part of the government relief package intended for health-care workers. Hunt, Advanced's chief compliance officer, told employees in an email earlier this month that the money would be used for protective gear, such as masks, and to replace "millions of dollars" in lost revenue.

The group had closed most of its offices since the stay-at-home orders were issued in March, cutting pay for doctors and furloughing staff. With cities and states beginning to consider reopening, doctors and PAs say they've been told they should be prepared for a full schedule. Hunt says the company is following the appropriate safety measures, but employees fear it will be nearly impossible to keep patients apart in waiting rooms. Opening in a reduced capacity, they understand, is not an option.

Read more: Private Equity Ate Finance, and Now It's Taking Over the World

[May 24, 2020] Lung volume as an important factor in coronavirus progrnnsys

May 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jen , May 24 2020 23:13 utc | 41

I think lung volume is indirect indicator of how well trained the person is. Coach potatoes have low lung volume. Most sportsmen -- a high or even very high.

From WSJ article "The Healing Power of Proper Breathing" https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-healing-power-of-proper-breathing-11590098696

In the 1980s, researchers with the Framingham Study, a 70-year research program focused on heart disease, gathered two decades of data from 5,200 subjects, crunched the numbers and discovered that the greatest indicator of life span wasn't genetics, diet or the amount of daily exercise, as many had suspected. It was lung capacity. Larger lungs equaled longer lives. Because big lungs allow us to get more air in with fewer breaths. They save the body from a lot of unnecessary wear and tear.

Also a sedentary way of life with not enough movement during the day, especially during childhood and adolescence, along with poor sitting and standing postures can encourage shallow breathing instead of breathing with the whole body.

[May 24, 2020] It's the biggest question in the world right now: is Covid-19 a deadly disease that only a small fraction of our populations have so far been exposed to? Or is it a much milder pandemic that a large percentage of people have already encountered and is already on its way out?

May 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

Swedish Family , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 8:39 pm GMT

New UnHerd interview up , this time with Sunetra Gupta, professor of theoretical epidemiology at Oxford. From their summary:

It's the biggest question in the world right now: is Covid-19 a deadly disease that only a small fraction of our populations have so far been exposed to? Or is it a much milder pandemic that a large percentage of people have already encountered and is already on its way out?

If Professor Neil Ferguson of Imperial College is the figurehead for the first opinion, then Sunetra Gupta, Professor of Theoretical Epidemiology at the University of Oxford, is the representative of the second. Her group at Oxford produced a rival model to Ferguson's back in March which speculated that as much as 50% of the population may already have been infected and the true Infection Fatality Rate may be as low as 0.1%.

Since then, we have seen various antibody studies around the world indicating a disappointingly small percentage of seroprevalence -- the percentage of the population has the anti-Covid-19 antibody. It was starting to seem like Ferguson's view was the one closer to the truth.

But, in her first major interview since the Oxford study was published in March, Professor Gupta is only more convinced that her original opinion was correct.

As she sees it, the antibody studies, although useful, do not indicate the true level of exposure or level of immunity. First, many of the antibody tests are "extremely unreliable" and rely on hard-to-achieve representative groups. But more important, many people who have been exposed to the virus will have other kinds of immunity that don't show up on antibody tests -- either for genetic reasons or the result of pre-existing immunities to related coronaviruses such as the common cold.

The implications of this are profound – it means that when we hear results from antibody tests (such as a forthcoming official UK Government study) the percentage who test positive for antibodies is not necessarily equal to the percentage who have immunity or resistance to the virus. The true number could be much higher.

Observing the very similar patterns of the epidemic across countries around the world has convinced Professor Gupta that it is this hidden immunity, more than lockdowns or government interventions, that offers the best explanation of the Covid-19 progression:

"In almost every context we've seen the epidemic grow, turn around and die away -- almost like clockwork. Different countries have had different lockdown policies, and yet what we've observed is almost a uniform pattern of behaviour which is highly consistent with the SIR model. To me that suggests that much of the driving force here was due to the build-up of immunity. I think that's a more parsimonious explanation than one which requires in every country for lockdown (or various degrees of lockdown, including no lockdown) to have had the same effect."

Asked what her updated estimate for the Infection Fatality Rate is, Professor Gupta says, "I think that the epidemic has largely come and is on its way out in this country so I think it would be definitely less than 1 in 1000 and probably closer to 1 in 10,000." That would be somewhere between 0.1% and 0.01%.

[ ]

https://www.youtube.com/embed/DKh6kJ-RSMI?feature=oembed

If she is right, antibody tests are a poor measure of the true virus spread, and the declining death rate Sweden and many other countries have seen this past month is from immunity -- not measures -- lowering the effective reproduction number. Time will tell.

[May 24, 2020] Coronafacts IFR 1%, Spread Low by Anatoly Karlin

May 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

Beckow , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 11:24 am GMT

To summarise: corona infects less than 5-10% of people, more under ideal virus circumstances in cold, dumpy ski resorts or in NY-London tenements. Among infected it kills about 1%, almost all over 65, with those over 80 having a 10-20% chance of dying.

And they shut down the world, because ' corona '. This is a policy of 'do anything to protect the old' even if it means enslaving the young, a gerontocracy that would be unthinkable in the past.

It is dawning on even the most fanatical corona fans that the data won't change. Now we hear about a 'second wave' – why only one more? Or that the restrictions stopped a disaster – one of those 'what if' historical speculations. But the best one lately is that ' we didn't know anything, nobody knew '.

Right, who knew? One can justify anything by embracing ignorance: "I know nothing, but you must do what I say." This is one is better than WMDs, lier loans, or Putin personally flipping votes in Michigan in 2016 West is really growing intellectually. I can't wait for the next one

sudden death , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 11:50 am GMT

To summarise: corona infects less than 5-10% of people, more under ideal virus circumstances in cold, dumpy ski resorts or in NY-London tenements

That is in 2-3 months since initial infections and it was enough to completely overwhelm organized healthcare in some places and strain very hard in most places, then all those loathed protective measures kick in and the spread slows because of it. If there were no such any measures taken anywhere in the world growth would become explosively exponential very soon and those 5% would increase tenfold.

Ludwig , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 1:34 pm GMT
Thanks for a great list of resources! Incidentally ongoing studies from the COVID-19 stricken USS Roosevelt – a closed ecosystem like the Diamond Princess but with relatively young, fit crew members – should be interesting. ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2020/04/23/roosevelt-coronavirus-epidemiology )

A couple of thoughts (and apologize if they may be in some of the links you mentioned):

While it's good to know what the "average" IFR is, IMO it's as important from a policy point of view to know what the conditions in which it varies and how much (based on current treatment options) it can vary by. Speaking purely statistically, a mean of 1% with a 95% CI of 0.9-1.1% is significantly different from one of 1% with a 95% CI of 0.01% to 2%.

Here are some factors that we already know significantly impact hospitalizations/mortality:

Inherent Factors:
– Age (easily the biggest known variable for impacting IFR, likely correlated with immune system response)
– Gender (men more susceptible than women (around 30% more?)
– Co-morbidity (correlates with pre-existing damage to tissues throughout the body and sensitivity of receptors/immune response)
– Prior coronavirus history (??? One paper claims that recent infection with coronavirus that causes the common cold may offer cross-reactive antibodies to SARS-Cov-2 https://www.lji.org/news-events/news/post/first-detailed-analysis-of-immune-response-to-sars-cov-2-bodes-well-for-covid-19-vaccine-development/ )
– Blood groups (??? Contradictory/not fully vetted data claiming for example those with ABO antigen type A more susceptible to infection progressing than type O, B, AB)

External Factors
– Early detection and treatment before severe symptoms
– Medical care availability
– Tailored treatment cocktails (evolving but reports that each country/region gaining experience on identifying optimal treatment regimens depending on patient)
– Optimal use of ventilators (reports that though low blood oxygen is first presented, automatic intubating may often make things worse)
– Lethality/Infectiousness of different strains (?? Non-peer reviewed studies claim for example at least three major strains that differ in infectiousness/severity which are found dominant in different regions.

There may be more (eg BCG vaccine (a theory I don't buy for reasons too long to go into here); past use of nicotine etc; ethnic genotypes etc).

But the point is, based on even current, rapidly evolving knowledge, IFR varies widely based on known/speculative factors, which should inform response policy from severity/types of lockdowns/social restrictions to medical responses in addition to efforts to prevent infection in the first place.

A123 , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 1:36 pm GMT
@AP The interesting & important thing to note is that fatalities are heavily tied to the related factors of pre-existing conditions and advanced age. For example:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1107913/number-of-coronavirus-deaths-in-sweden-by-age-groups/

With CQ/AZ/ZN available everywhere, the bulk of the economy could reopen immediately with or without masks. Given that psychology is important, odds are mask wearing will make the restart more effective. However, masks provide partial protection at most.

Znzn , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 3:03 pm GMT
Let us talk about this again, basically, how much of international travel is really necessary, the cheap labor travel? White pedos vacationing in Thailand? A lot of mass tourism just leads to places like Queenstown, Kyoto, and Venice being trashed, driving the locals out, and losing their local culture, and 95 percent of business travel are really junkets that can be replaced by videoconferencing.
Znzn , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 3:05 pm GMT
@james wilson Given that the current crap state of Western culture is that responsibility of SJW millennials and zoomer maybe it is they that should be sacrificed? How much will the world lose anyway? The world was much better off before they came here. They are the ones who are responsible for things going off the deep end the past decade or so. Look at how much better Star Trek the next generation was compared to the crap now by JJ Abrams.
utu , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 3:18 pm GMT
I liked very much the paper by the Berkeley physicists: Modi, Chirag, Vanessa Boehm, Simone Ferraro, George Stein, and Uros Seljak. Epidemiologists and all kinds of statisticians could learn from them how to write transparently. One of the reason there are so many papers written poorly is that the authors often have to obfuscate as they do not really understand what they are doing. People can be taught how to use statistical software packages like SAS, SPSS, R w/o really understanding the underlying mathematical routines.

[May 24, 2020] Preliminary Estimate of Excess Mortality During the COVID-19 Outbreak -- New York City, March 11 May 2, 2020 MMWR

May 24, 2020 | www.cdc.gov

During March 11–May 2, 2020, a total of 32,107 deaths were reported to DOHMH; of these deaths, 24,172 (95% confidence interval = 22,980–25,364) were found to be in excess of the seasonal expected baseline. Included in the 24,172 deaths were 13,831 (57%) laboratory-confirmed COVID-19–associated deaths and 5,048 (21%) probable COVID-19–associated deaths, leaving 5,293 (22%) excess deaths that were not identified as either laboratory-confirmed or probable COVID-19–associated deaths ( Figure ).

[May 23, 2020] The more you know Over a third of Americans apprehensive about Covid-19 vaccine, citing rushed development trust issues -- RT

May 23, 2020 | www.rt.com

The more you know? Over a third of Americans apprehensive about Covid-19 vaccine, citing rushed development & trust issues 21 May, 2020 21:37 Get short URL The more you know? Over a third of Americans apprehensive about Covid-19 vaccine, citing rushed development & trust issues © Global Look Press / Fotostand / K. Schmitt Follow RT on RT As the Trump administration pushes for Covid-19 vaccine development on an ever-shrinking timetable and companies report lackluster early trials, 35 percent of Americans are less than thrilled about getting the shot. Operation Warp Speed, the Trump administration's unprecedented drive to create and roll out a vaccine for the coronavirus pandemic by the end of the year, may be doing more harm than good, at least where Americans' trust is concerned. Between the shockingly abbreviated timetable and the lack of long-term safety testing, almost one in four Americans (24 percent) said they were not interested in the shot, according to a Reuters poll published Thursday. An additional 11 percent were unsure about it.

Also on rt.com Study Trump cited in his latest attack on WHO does NOT EXIST, says editor-in-chief of prestigious medical journal

Compounding the distrust is the polarizing figure of President Donald Trump himself, who proudly announced the shortened timetable for vaccine development last week. Thirty-six percent of those polled by Reuters said they would be less likely to take a potential Covid-19 vaccine if it came recommended by Trump, while just 14 percent thought the president's seal of approval was a positive.

Trump's narrative flip-flops haven't helped his credibility on the vaccine front. From his early reassurances that the virus would vanish in weeks, to his public conflicts with his own health advisers over locking down and reopening the country, it's not hard to see why Americans are hesitant to fall in line behind him on this. But the problem isn't necessarily political. Nearly half of those uninterested in taking the vaccine said the speed of its development worried them, while over 40 percent said the vaccine would be riskier than actually contracting Covid-19 itself.

Read more Trump's WARP SPEED vaccine czar oversaw an infamously BOTCHED vaccination. Wonder why a THIRD of Americans want to dodge this one? Trump's WARP SPEED vaccine czar oversaw an infamously BOTCHED vaccination. Wonder why a THIRD of Americans want to dodge this one?

However, even 29 percent of those who said they were " not very interested " in the vaccine allowed they'd be willing to change their mind if the shot was approved by the Food and Drug Administration. The full approval process for vaccines usually takes over a decade, and even the most optimistic experts – including Dr. Anthony Fauci, who has become the public face of the US' Covid-19 policy – believe a shot won't be ready for another year to 18 months. Rushing a vaccine to market in the middle of a pandemic means sacrificing comprehensive safety checks for efficiency – a tradeoff that can be disastrous, as in the case of the 2009 swine flu shot Pandemrix, which caused permanent brain damage in over 1,000 British patients.

The parallels between Covid-19 and that epidemic are ominous – wildly inflated death predictions had spooked the UK government into approving Pandemrix without sufficient safety data – and it surely won't help Americans' trust in this vaccine that Trump's " vaccine czar " Moncef Slaoui ran GlaxoSmithKline's vaccine division during the swine flu debacle. Nor has it been especially heartening to discover Slaoui's extensive investments in not just Glaxo but many other drug companies working on potential vaccines.

Slaoui earned $3 million on Monday alone from Moderna, which is still considered the leading candidate in the vaccine race, even though the drug company has never brought a vaccine to market. After hyping up what were essentially meaningless preliminary results, Moderna's stock shot up 25 percent, bringing his holdings to over $10 million. He pledged to donate those earnings to " cancer research " after demands for him to divest reached a fever pitch. A vaccine produced at Oxford University hasn't fared much better, with all six rhesus monkeys who received the shot becoming infected anyway – despite a preliminary report that tried to spin the failure as representing " some " success.

Also on rt.com Define 'distribute'! Trump mobilizing MILITARY to deliver Covid-19 vaccine 'assuming we get it,' sparks conspiracy frenzy

Threats of mandatory vaccination have unsurprisingly not helped to soothe Americans' worries over a potentially unsafe vaccine. Fauci and other health officials have repeatedly warned the public that there will be no return to " normal " without a vaccine, even as lockdown restrictions are slowly lifted – a statement some have interpreted as a threat that the unvaccinated will be barred from crowded public places or travel. Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz went further, declaring the government has " police power " to mandate Americans take a vaccine and claiming such power is " not debatable " constitutionally. And other experts downplayed the very real concerns voiced by poll respondents in favor of blaming the " very aggressive anti-vaccine movement ."

All this is bad news for the health experts Reuters cites, who say 70 percent of Americans would have to be immune in order to achieve " herd immunity " and stop the virus from spreading through the US, where upwards of 90,000 people have died since the pandemic began.

[May 23, 2020] Hydroxychloroquine After Action Report

May 23, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

Robert Waldmann | May 23, 2020 10:52 am

Healthcare Hot Topics I was a vehement advocate of prescribing hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) off label while waiting for the results of clinical trials. I wasn't all that much embarrassed to agree with Donald Trump for once. Now I feel obliged to note that my guess was totally wrong. I thought that the (uncertain) expected benefits were greater than the (relatively well known) costs.

The cost is that HCQ affects the heart beat prolonging the QT period (from when the atrium begins to contract to when the ventrical repolarizes and is read to go again). This can cause arrhythmia especially in people who already have heart problems. I understood that one might argue that all people with Covid 19 have heart problems but didn't consider that argument decisive (I probably should have).

The positive expected value of the uncertain benefits was based on strong in vitro evidence that HCQ blocks SARS Cov2 infection of human cells in culture. (this is a publication in the world's top general science journal).

Already in early May, there was evidence that any effect of HCQ on the rate of elimination of the virus must be small. In this controlled trial conducted in China , the null of no effect is not rejected. Much more importantly, the point estimates of the effects over time are all almost exactly zero. I considered the matter settled (although the painfully disappointed authors tried to argue for HCQ and that their study was not conclusive).

There are now four large retrospective studies all of which suggest no benefit from HCQ and two of which suggest it causes increased risk of death. I am going to discuss the two studies most recently reported.

One is a very large study (fairly big data goes to the hospital) published yesterday in The Lancet. In this study patients who received HCQ had a significantly higher death rate with a hazard of dying 1.335 times as high. The estimate comes from a proportional hazard model with a non parametric baseline probability and takes into account many risk factors including crucially initial disease severity. It is also important that only patients who were treated within 48 hours of diagnosis were considered.

I am, of course, dismayed by this result. I am also puzzled, because it is quite different from the result obtained in a smaller retrospective study published in JAMA

I think the practical lessons are that it seems unwise to give Covid 19 patients HCQ. Also maybe Robert Waldmann should be more humble. After the jump, I will discuss the two studies in some detail and propose an explanation of the difference in results.

[May 22, 2020] Global report: don't count on vaccine, US scientist warns, as cases pass 5m

May 22, 2020 | www.theguardian.com

A top US scientist has said that people should not count on a Covid-19 vaccine being developed any time soon...

William Haseltine, the groundbreaking cancer, HIV/AIDS and human genome projects researcher, has said the best approach to the pandemic is to manage the disease through careful tracing of infections and strict isolation measures whenever it starts spreading. He said that while a vaccine could be developed, "I wouldn't count on it", and urged people to wear masks, wash hands, clean surfaces and keep a distance.

[May 22, 2020] Washington State conned out of a likely 'hundreds of millions of dollars' by Nigerian scammers

If Nigerian hackers can steal that much money, Israel, Chinese, and Russian, intel agencies probably are in the most Fed information systems doing what they want ;-)
Notable quotes:
"... officials in Washington State may have lost "hundreds of millions of dollars" to fraudsters filing bogus unemployment claim ..."
May 22, 2020 | www.rt.com
officials in Washington State may have lost "hundreds of millions of dollars" to fraudsters filing bogus unemployment claim s – all the way from Nigeria.

[May 22, 2020] Washington officials admit to counting GUNSHOT DEATHS in Covid-19 tally, say virus death toll likely underreported despite lapses

Yes, gunshot wounds are clearly the ffect of the new coronavirus.
May 22, 2020 | www.rt.com

Health officials in Washington state said they are reassessing their Covid-19 fatality data, warning of underreported deaths.

Even after noting that five people who died of gunshot wounds were inexplicably included in the figures.

[May 22, 2020] The Remdesivir Study Is Finally Out Drug Only Helped Those On Oxygen, Finds Mortality Too High For Standalone Treatment Zero

May 22, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Remember when the market soared on several days in April on the Facui-touted Remdesivir study which, according to StatNews and various other unofficial sources of rumors, was a smashing success only for the optimism to fizzle as many questions emerged , and as the Gilead drug quietly faded from the public's consciousness and was replaced by various coronavirus vaccine candidates such as those made by the greatly hyped Moderna ( whose insiders just can't stop selling company stock ).

Meanwhile, those who were waiting for the official version of Remdesivir's effectiveness had to do so until 6pm on a Friday before a long holiday, and for good reason...

Friday 6 pm. Fking ridiculous. https://t.co/6Ze38BfVgN

-- Adam Feuerstein (@adamfeuerstein) May 22, 2020

... According to a pivotal study published in the New England Journal of Medicine late on Friday, Remdesivir, which was authorized to treat Covid-19 in a group of 1063 adults and children (split into two groups, one receiving placebo instead of remdesivir) who need i) supplemental oxygen, ii) a ventilator or iii) extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), only significantly helped those on supplemental oxygen.

Meanwhile, and explaining the 6pm release on a Friday, the study also found no marked benefit from remdesivir for those who were healthier and didn't need oxygen or those who were sicker, requiring a ventilator or a heart-lung bypass machine.

The NEJM, almost apologetically, stated that "the lack of benefit seen in the other groups might have stemmed from a smaller number of patients in each group."

Still, as a result of the partial benefit for patients in the supplemental oxygen group, the study from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases was evaluated early and led to the authorization of remdesivir before the full trial was completed.

Our findings highlight the need to identify Covid-19 cases and start antiviral treatment before the pulmonary disease progresses to require mechanical ventilation.

Some more details on the study, which was a "rank test of the time to recovery with remdesivir as compared with placebo, with stratification by disease severity":

The primary outcome measure was the time to recovery, defined as the first day, during the 28 days after enrollment, on which a patient satisfied categories 1, 2, or 3 on the eight-category ordinal scale. The categories are as follows:

  1. not hospitalized, no limitations of activities;
  2. not hospitalized, limitation of activities, home oxygen requirement, or both;
  3. hospitalized, not requiring supplemental oxygen and no longer requiring ongoing medical care (used if hospitalization was extended for infection-control reasons);
  4. hospitalized, not requiring supplemental oxygen but requiring ongoing medical care (Covid-19–related or other medical conditions);
  5. 5, hospitalized, requiring any supplemental oxygen;
  6. hospitalized, requiring noninvasive ventilation or use of high-flow oxygen devices;
  7. hospitalized, receiving invasive mechanical ventilation or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO); and
  8. death.

The results are summarized below, highlighting the only group that showed a statistically significant improvement in outcomes as a result of taking the drug vs placebo.

A visual representation of the outcomes is below; it shows that whereas there was a modest benefit only to patients who were receiving oxygen, the results were statistically insignificant vs placebo for patients not receiving oxygen, while in a surprising twist patients on high-flow oxygen or mechanical ventilator/ECMO did modestly better in the placebo group than those taking remdesivir. Also, the overall results showed a very modest, but not statistically significant improvement in the remdesivir group vs placebo (box A).

Another disappointment: the study found that overall "mortality was numerically lower in the remdesivir group than in the placebo group, but the difference was not significant ", in other words the alleged "miracle drug" has largely the same effect as a placebo in terms of overall disease mortality.

The study authors also note that the "findings in our trial should be compared with those observed in a randomized trial from China in which 237 patients were enrolled (158 assigned to remdesivir and 79 to placebo).... That trial failed to complete full enrollment (owing to the end of the outbreak), had lower power than the present trial (owing to the smaller sample size and a 2:1 randomization), and was unable to demonstrate any statistically significant clinical benefits of remdesivir. "

Finally, the study found that while mortality was modestly lower for the remdesivir arm, it was not significantly so, at 7.1% at 14 days on drug versus 11.9% on placebo.

In conclusion, while the "preliminary findings support the use of remdesivir for patients who are hospitalized with Covid-19 and require supplemental oxygen therapy" the study goes on to warn that " given high mortality despite the use of remdesivir, it is clear that treatment with an antiviral drug alone is not likely to be sufficient."

The study's recommendation:

Future strategies should evaluate antiviral agents in combination with other therapeutic approaches or combinations of antiviral agents to continue to improve patient outcomes in Covid-19.

So a generally disappointing outcome, one which would lead to a drop in the market. Nonsense: think of all the spin, and why this is in fact great news for stocks: Remdesivir may be a dud as a "silver bullet" to curing covid, leading to statistically significant improvement in only a very limited subset of infected patients and "high mortality" for those taking it, but at least the algos will have a whole lot of other "miracle drugs" to levitate them as optimism that the next remdesivir is just around the corner. In short: rinse, rumor, and repeat... and then save the bad news for 6pm on a Friday.

Oh, and for those asking about the "official" reason why the NE Journal of Medicine waited until just the right time to make sure nobody reads the results, here it is:

I asked NEJM spox to explain the Friday 6 pm release of the remdesivir study. Her response is below. pic.twitter.com/WjNGyUv7sH

-- Adam Feuerstein (@adamfeuerstein) May 22, 2020

The full study is available here .

[May 22, 2020] End New York City's lockdown now! by David Marcus

May 22, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Terence Gore , 21 May 2020 at 12:13 PM

long interview Robert Kennedy Jr

as left as you can get

against the left support of big Pharma

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3164&v=QLi6ZrFp6vQ&feature=emb_logo

RFrancis , 21 May 2020 at 12:27 PM
The phrase "professional deformations" helped clarify a number of things for me! Thank you for your incisive words, Col. Lang.
CK , 21 May 2020 at 12:30 PM
But what about the snitches and the virtue signalers and the screamingly fearful faux celebrities, and how can you be so cruel to the currently essential who if we re-open have to return to being just another bunch of working stiffs. Have you not seen the vasty deep outpouring of love and affection we are currently piling on the Nurse Ratcheds and Dr. Evils of the world for their virtuous and self effacing tv commercials and the many glorious PSAs with paeans and "we're all in this together" sophistries from various health insurance companies and makers of very expensive symptom mollifiers?
I am sorry sir, but I must disagree. We must not only keep closed that which is currently closed, we must use the power of the IC and the various state and federal militaries and national guards to close down all the open and partially opened states and cities and towns and farms and counties and any other political subdivisions of this great nation until we are truly "all in this together".
Or
We could just open all of it, now.
If we did, we would be back to normal in about 60 days, some places would open with new management, some folks would enjoy continued unemployment until they were called back.
I, personally, expect that except for Ca and NY the country will be reopen about 90 days prior to the election.
Deap , 21 May 2020 at 12:38 PM
The liberal media and legislators applied the 100% solution to 1% of the population, if that much.

That was failed leadership; that was slavish "following orders". That was a loss of the maxim "trust, but verify" maxim. This powerful legacy of the Reagan era, must be put back at the forefront of any public decision process. Question authority needs repeating as well.

Our public education system failed us completely for too many decades. Teaching generations of Americans to be critical of America, is not teaching them critical thinking skills. We need to own up to that, from our local school boards on up.

These non-science , not thinking, hateful liberal media and politicians deserve the 100% solution - 100% voted out of office in 2020. Liberal media and legislators must get a new message. Voting and boycotting are the two primary tools we have. Some stunning upsets in primary races are already occurring. It will be morning in America again.

But may we never forget why so many were so willing to shoot ourselves in the foot. For what end purpose? Were we ever so collectively scared as a Nation in the past, that we were willing destroy ourselves as we witnessed happening these past few money - no nuance, no graduated response, no scalpel wiled with professional precision.

What happened to our true grit as Americans? How did we get into this devastatingly false dichotomy - total submission or we are all going to die.

Will there be a post mortem examination of the corpse of our once vibrant nation? This requires honest soul searching. I honestly don't think we have the tools to do this any longer. I hope I am wrong. In fact I would be greatly comforted to be proven wrong.

Will current national leadership rise to this challenge? Or has the Black Swan yet to arrive. Or do we start this soul-searching right here and right now, one by one. "Stronger together". Will the Karens stop demanding we go through their menopause danger years with them.

ancientarcher , 21 May 2020 at 02:02 PM
It is astonishing that no one is talking about the death profile from covid19 (or as it should have been named - the Wuhan coronavirus). Over there in the UK, the median age of death from covid is 83-84.

There has been a lot of talk about Children dying of covid. Only 2 (two) children under the age of 10 have died from covid since it started and they probably had other conditions. This is in a total population of 65million.

Fully 90% of the deaths from covid19 are in the ages of 65+ and that segment of the population doesn't, by and large, participate in production in the economy (of goods or services). While death is always sad and it will lead to grieving, we have to understand that people always die, especially the old and infirm. Anyways, no one is suggesting that they should be left to fend for themselves, the older people and those with conditions makes them high risk should be isolated.

The UK closed the massive Nightingale hospitals that were set up to handle thousands of patients. The one in London handled a total of 54 before shutting down. Clearly, we had over-provisioned for the outbreak (as we should) but very clearly we are past the worst.

Please OPEN UP THE ECONOMY. And do it NOW. The deaths being avoided are not worth keeping the economy shut down, not only in the UK but across the world.

People point towards the Spanish flu where most deaths happened in the 2nd wave. Well, most of those deaths would not have happened had antibiotics been invented then. The deaths were due to subsequent bacterial infections (usually pneumonia) after the virus weakened the immune system.

We need to start going back to normal and we need to do it now!

Fred , 21 May 2020 at 02:03 PM
Democrats - the Dream Killers. Meanwhile immigration is our strength, multi-national corporations may operate, private businesses may not - "for the common good" as Deborah Dingell, former GM lobbyist and now successor to John D's hold on power in Congress and the DNC, likes to repeat daily on her FB stream of concousness - along with exhortations to obedience.

"By prolonging the coronavirus shutdown long after its core mission was accomplished, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio have plunged tens of thousands of New Yorkers into poverty."

Poverty apparently doesn't kill anyone infected with this virus, but it sure is killing our freedoms and thanks to Cuomo and Whitmer it has killed thousands in nursing homes. The press is all praise for them, and tries to gin up stories about other governors, such as De Santis of Florida, or ignores them, as they are going with the story in Georgia.

Eric Newhill , 21 May 2020 at 02:05 PM
Sir,
I was a fence sitter/agnostic until the end of February or early March. Then there was enough data in to be able to understand that the elderly needed to be protected and the rest of should go about life as normal. When you first posted about panic, I wasn't seeing a panic as I would define it. Then a few days later lockdowns were announced. You had the jump on that one!

Just to summarize what I have been saying since the lockdown started, there are going to be more deaths (and many more years of life lost) from all of the people not able and/or too afraid to engage in regular healthcare services than there will be killed by the virus - and from the effects of economic destruction.

The Mayor of Ithaca, NY - not a conservative by any means - made an appeal to Cuomo to open the economy back up and to allow students to return to colleges. He says his college town (includes Cornell U) had the best economy in all of NY up to the lockdown (lowest unemployment, etc). Now he can't collect enough tax revenue to pay police and other public servants.

And that's what I don't get about this scheme to establish a new [socialist] normal. How do the socialists think they are going to generate revenues to pay for everything they want? It's almost as if they don't understand economics 101. Will they turn on their limousine faction and confiscate their wealth along with that of conservatives? Do they really imagine that no one is going to fight back (I mean with votes, pitchforks, guns...whatever)? For that matter, same goes for the non-scheming sincere useful science geek/idiots. They are supposed to be engineer types, but where are the sober calculations of costs and benefits? What are they thinking?

TedBuila , 21 May 2020 at 02:14 PM
Re:
A lot of people die every day of a variety of causes. This virus is a reaper that culls the population, eliminating the weak and the old. The great majority of healthy, productive people survive infection with little or no apparent effect.

The last or only time this brushed me was with polio in Detroit in the 50's. Following your "re-open the country, all of it" swimming pools and Belle Isle would never have been closed would have remained open in August and September to allow nature to thin-out Detroit's/the country's weakest.

That's your C19 call as I read it.

Keith Harbaugh , 21 May 2020 at 02:28 PM
On the damage the shutdowns and restrictions are causing,
this is a good account:

Doctors raise alarm about health effects of continued coronavirus shutdown: 'Mass casualty incident'

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/doctors-raise-alarm-about-health-effects-of-continued-coronavirus-shutdown

Laura Wilson , 21 May 2020 at 02:58 PM
Yeah, too bad about all those doctors and nurses dying. Easily replaced, I'm sure.

It's just math, folks. Epidemics are math...you can either go with the math or try to change the equation and the outcome of the math. I, personally, would rather try to change the equation.

turcopolier , 21 May 2020 at 03:40 PM
Laura Wilson

"The greater good ..." How many doctors and nurses really? How many? You should remember about me that I am accustomed to sacrificing people for the greater good. That is MY professional deformation.

turcopolier , 21 May 2020 at 03:44 PM
TedBuila

This plague actually kills few outside the legion of the old and infirm. Polio kills the youngest first. Yours is a false comparison.

turcopolier , 21 May 2020 at 03:50 PM
Eric Newhill

What were the Khmer Rouge thinking in the Year Zero when they systematically destroyed Cambodia and killed millions?

jerseycityjoan , 21 May 2020 at 04:07 PM
New York City is still getting hundreds of new cases and hospitalizations a day. How many people will want to go to crowded indoor places? If there is social distancing with lots of empty chairs and spaces, how many closed places could make any money if they opened?

There's been a lot of uncertainty and guesswork involved with this new virus and that will continue. We came through the first round with some hotspots but most places doing OK. I think we were right to shut down when we did and that we need to be careful in opening back up. I still trust Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx.

Certainly it's time to start relaxing restrictions in most places. But we need to remember that this is a new virus with many unknowns and that we are all vulnerable because there's no proven ttestment that works, cure or vaccine.

I have to say that this crisis has taken on a symbolic importance for some. It has not for me. I think this will lead to a lot more disagreement about what should be done in the future, particularly if we have addition waves. That makes me feel uneasy -- very uneasy. I am not assuming we're going to have a very effective vaccine within a year so we may be living with this threat for a long time.

Deap , 21 May 2020 at 04:09 PM
Eric, socialists in California have one standard answer when confronted with funding for their schemes: They'll find the money. .

End of all practical discussion. When asked for details, they will invariably add .. "you had money for the Vietnam war .... the military etc. Just use that money."

Only two decades of total socialism in this state has this done to our fiscal literacy. "Just tax the rich" gets anything passed. Cruel fact in this state, the rich - just the top 1% in this state pay 50% of all state revenues. Only a handful of people pay half the bills.

Should any of this top 1% leave, like Musk recently threatened, shock waves will reach the state's executive suite. But this threat will fall on deaf ears in the state's Democrat super-majority legislature.

Voters finally are catching on - they lost their livelihood due to government actions, but government employees never missed a paycheck. How this translates at the ballot box remains to be seen. Two Democrats getting recently tossed out is a good start, but is it a trend?

My own local city council yesterday just gave all SEIU employees a raise; while our entire economy, much of it dependent on tourism, has been totally trashed. This is what a Democrat one party state looks like.

turcopolier , 21 May 2020 at 04:19 PM
jerseycityjoan

Timid. Will you like living in a dying metro area?

blue peacock , 21 May 2020 at 04:28 PM
"How do the socialists think they are going to generate revenues to pay for everything they want?"

Eric,

Simple. Print money. As they've been doing since the GFC at scale. The added benefit is that the biggest beneficiary of socialism - the titan of capitalism - Wall St - will get the lion's share as they're getting now with the Wuhan virus lockdown. Average Joe peon should be thankful they got $1,200.

Powell on 60 Minutes says there's no limit to the Fed printing money. He like Bernanke loves to click Print on the keyboard. And no pesky Congressional authorization either. MOAR & MOAR!!

BillWade , 21 May 2020 at 04:47 PM
It's feeling pretty normal here in SW Florida now, rumor is Jun 1st the bars will open up and that makes it 100% normal. I know of at least 6 restaurants in Port Charlotte/Punta Gorda that will not re-open. We go through the restaurant closings every year anyway, "Season" ended early this year with the lock down. Memorial Day usually is when we get the closings. But, they will reopen with new owners who have recently retired and "have always wanted to own a restaurant" not understanding that the restaurant business is for the younger, just as life is.

I feel awful when I see the little old ladies driving alone in their cars with their masks on, victims of the MSM that are truly a national security threat.

Eric Newhill , 21 May 2020 at 05:06 PM
Sir,
The fact of the Khmer Rouge and the mentality behind it (at bottom, same as Mao, same as Stalin same others that brought death, destruction and misery to their societies) is another reason to get back to normal in this country - and accept any casualties that might result. This has become a war for the heart and soul of the country. Actually, it's a war for everything; even material prosperity. Whatever the casualties might be in the short run, they will be far less than the long run if we allow the Khmer Rouge to continue (which, of course, is one of your key points).

One of my objectives on social media has been to try to gain insight into the Khmer Rouge and young pioneer psychology. I can now recognize it when I see it; even when it tries to disguise itself, but I truly don't understand such people. IMO it is some kind of twisted spiritual illness that seeks dominance as it replaces God with themselves. That much I can see. I guess it has to do with the battle between good and evil. Evil always seeks to control and manipulate and disrespects the sanctity of each soul. It seeks to enslave and cut off from freedom and recognition of divinity around each of us and in each of us. Its sycophants are attracted to the sense of power; false as it may truly be.

At least that is the way I best understand it.

Barbara Ann , 21 May 2020 at 05:15 PM
jerseycityjoan

Our natural capacity for threat perception and assessment is warped by the media's need to generate headlines. The virus is a gift to them which they have enthusiastically embraced. Most of us have a vanishing small chance of it killing us off, yet this single risk dominates the public discourse to the exclusion of almost all else.

Social media is particularly insidious, the effects of which far too few are prepared to counter. The feedback loops of hysteria it generates must be assessed as a threat in their own right - to our ability to make sound judgments.

A destroyed economy is not a direct threat to any one individual's survival, but it's collapse is an inevitable consequence if the lockdowns are allowed to continue. In this case many will die and very many more will experience a great deal of misery. Sadly the headlines carrying these stories will only come after it is far too late.

Turn off the Tee Vee news, treat social media 'news' with great skepticism and read the opinions of people who see the bigger picture. You are in the right place for the last of these.

Bobo , 21 May 2020 at 05:51 PM
Open it up-It never should of closed. What we have done is to prolong the inevitable. You either get it or you don't but it is still here waiting for those cowering in their homes. Prudent actions and awareness of your situation will get one through most of life's events.
The next thing we will here is Oh Folks, get out there and enjoy the summer while you can as it's coming back in the fall. No schools, Sheltering in Place, minimize the essentials, where are those ships and tent hospitals, we need PPE, start the printing etc etc cause the vaccine ain't ready Folks.

It will all be fine, don't worry. Keep in mind it has only taken a 100,000 out 330,000,000 a very low ratio.

rho , 21 May 2020 at 06:39 PM
"How do the socialists think they are going to generate revenues to pay for everything they want?"

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/goldman-spots-huge-problem-fed

The US government will issue 3 trillion $ of new debt in this quarter alone. The banks will buy these bonds, then sell them back to the US Central Bank (that's called "quantitative easing", the quoted article talks about the expectation that the central bank will announce a new bond purchasing program soon because the current one is far too small to absorb all the new debt), and the cycle repeats.

That's not sustainable, but that's the only plan that exists. If the shutdown of the economy continues indefinitely, it will end in economic collapse by bankruptcy of the federal government, or hyperinflation, which is really just a different way to reach the same painful end point.

Same story here in Europe, just with the added complication that there are conflicts between the different national governments of the Eurozone when the European Central Bank does the very same thing.

Master Slacker , 21 May 2020 at 06:50 PM
You can open up the city when everyone starts to wear a mask . Covid-19 is proving to be an airborne killer... which simplifies things enormously. Consider it an instance of CBW. And of course the children's inflammatory syndrome is just collateral damage.
Laura Wilson , 21 May 2020 at 07:59 PM
Master Slacker--And now there is some evidence that the inflammatory syndrome is hitting teenagers and young adults, too.

turocpolier--The numbers aren't comprehensive (or even good) on the national toll of doctors and nurses and aides and CNAs, etc. in health care/hospitals. Too bad our government can't get everyone to report in a uniform manner!!!! (Not that any other administration has been successful with this either.) It certainly would be helpful in the middle of a novel pandemic to know if we were going to have enough front line responders to stay in the fight.

And I NEVER forget that you are a professional "sacrificer for the greater good." That is why I appreciate what you have to say...it is a worthy perspective and not one that I default to!

Fred , 21 May 2020 at 08:00 PM
Master slacker,

So "my body, my choice" is for abortion only now, because your fear is greater than my rights? "stay home, stay safe" negates my need to wear a gag in your presence. I reccomend Kevin Drum go out and drum up some antifa support for the socialist distancing policing. They ought to be well rested and ready for some agit-prop and agent provocateur actions by now.

"children's inflammatory syndrome" - is a miniscule risk to a minimal risk pool. It's like the CDC's mentioning legionaire's disease in their school opening guidlelines - meant to invoke fear. More civil servent "resistance". Trump should reform the civil service. Perhaps he should revoke EO 10988,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_10988
His initial order was upheld, I'm sure this one would be too.
https://www.politico.com/newsletters/morning-shift/2019/07/17/executive-orders-limiting-federal-employee-unions-reinstated-458951


[May 22, 2020] Mortality due to COVID-19 in the USA

May 22, 2020 | www.unz.com

TRM , says: Show Comment Next New Comment May 21, 2020 at 10:53 pm GMT

Connecticut and North Carolina are missing some weeks in 2020 (5 weeks & 3 weeks respectively). Pennsylvania is also negative but not missing any weeks. Interesting, I'll have to look into that.

The entire USA is about 4.5% higher than the 4 year average.

In some online discussions some were suggesting using "excess deaths" to see what effect the covid-19 disease is having and I thought that would be a reasonable approach as it gets past the deaths "with/from" issue.

State 2016-19-Av 2020 Diff
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -
Entire USA 915946 956410 40464

California 88731 91453 2722
Florida 65372 68427 3055
Georgia 26955 27649 694
Illinois 35539 38088 2549
Massachusetts 19074 21800 2726
Michigan 31957 35598 3640
New Jersey 24525 32600 8075
New York State 33187 39267 6079
New York City 17614 35524 17910
Pennsylvania 44275 37383 -6892

All the data is from this CDC page:
https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/fluview/mortality.html

The script and all related files are here if you want to kick the tires:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/fh9x5fngmfbeiiu/AAAH-OtOMqiY_R9qqG6YccCRa?dl=0

The script generates data for all 50 states plus DC and New York City (CDC treats it separately from New York State).

I follow the advice of Ken Thompson, "When in doubt use brute force". The script is nothing fancy and dumps to file a lot as that is how I like to debug.

I will be doing up a Powershell script for this as well so the Windows folks can run it natively if they don't have WSL2 or a Linux system around.

[May 22, 2020] Survey finds 87% of America's nurses forced to reuse protective equipment

www.smh.com.au

The vast majority of America's nurses say they have not been tested for Covid-19, are reusing personal protective equipment (PPE), or have exposed skin or clothing while caring for Covid-19 patients, a new survey has shown.

The nationally representative survey finds that "dangerous healthcare workplace conditions have become the norm" since Covid-19 spread widely in the US, said the union which conducted the survey. More than 100 nurses have died since the beginning of the pandemic .

"We've known for years we're behind," said Jean Ross, president of National Nurses United. "Not because we couldn't have what we needed – because we are the richest country on the planet – but because of greed, because of the profit system that doesn't really look out for the welfare of patients. Therefore it couldn't possibly look out for the welfare of workers." ...

The survey asked more than 23,000 nurses across all 50 states and Washington DC about their working conditions since the pandemic began. The survey represents the period between 15 April and 10 May, and was conducted by National Nurses United. It included both union and non-union nurses.

In it, surveyors found 84% of nurses had not been tested for Covid-19, 87% are forced to reuse personal protective equipment designed to be single-use, such as N95 masks and face shields, and 72% of nurses have exposed skin or clothing while treating coronavirus patients.

[May 21, 2020] Smokers are at a lower risk of contracting covid19 infections

May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

J Norwich , May 19 2020 5:43 utc | 108

Prior infection with other coronavirus strains appears to confer an enhanced immune response to covid19. Smokers are at a lower risk of contracting covid19 infections. Perhaps the two observations are related? Smokers generally have poorer lung health and may be more likely to acquire lung infections such as those caused by other varieties of coronavirus and to develop antibody protection. So maybe their vulnerability to such infections has proved an advantage in this case?

Hoarsewhisperer , May 19 2020 6:05 utc | 109

"Immune warriors known as T cells help us fight some viruses, but their importance for battling SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, has been unclear. Now, two studies reveal infected people harbor T cells that target the virus -- and may help them recover. Both studies also found some people never infected with SARS-CoV-2 have these cellular defenses, most likely because they were previously infected with other coronaviruses."

Thanks for drawing attention to this, b.

The T cell/Common Cold factor may help to explain why children are less likely to be infected by COVID-19 than adults. I can recall that when each of my own offspring went through that miserable, snotty-nosed toddler phase, there seemed to be no upside for them or their parents. In retrospect, maybe it was producing a hidden benefit?

[May 21, 2020] Is nikotin effective against COVID-19

May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

gm , May 19 2020 16:13 utc | 129

With respect to highly addictive nicotine, it is not hard to find any number of "healthful" justifications for continuing with the (disgusting, imho) smoking habit.

Why, there is already an extensive body of scientific "evidence" one can latch onto that nicotine is beneficial in Parkinson's disease:

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=smoking+parkinson%27s+disease&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart

And of course, one can also find numerous reports nicotine also helps schizophrenics to manage their symptoms:

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=smoking+schizophrenia+benefits&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart

But with regard to anecdotal/unverified [touch'e] claims of nicotine benefits in covid, one should not reflexively ignore the evidence to the contrary that conflict with one's pro-nicotine bias/belief system:}

"Smokers more likely to express ACE2 protein that SARS-COV-2 uses to enter human cells"
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-05-smokers-ace2-protein-sars-cov-human.html

and

"Tobacco smoking increases lung entry points for COVID-19 virus"
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-04-tobacco-lung-entry-covid-virus.html

"They looked at the expression of ACE2, the molecule in the respiratory tract that the COVID-19 virus uses to attach to and infect human cells. They also looked at the expression of FURIN and TMPRSS2, human enzymes known to facilitate COVID-19 virus infection.

The researchers report in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine a 25 percent increase in the expression of ACE2 in lung tissues from ever-smokers, people who have smoked at least 100 cigarettes during their lives, when compared with nonsmokers. Smoking also increased the presence of FURIN, but to a lower extent compared to ACE2 . TMRPSS2 expression in lungs was not associated with smoking. They also found that smoking remodeled the gene expression of cells in the lungs so that the ACE2 gene was more highly expressed in goblet cells, cells that secrete mucus in order to protect the mucous membranes in the lungs ."

But if you are totally bent on using a non-addictive feel-good drug that Israelis say may prevent/fight against the Corona-chan, try CANNABIS:

https://news.google.com/search?for=marijuana%20covid%20israel&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US%3Aen

[May 21, 2020] An MD wrote this op/ed dealing with the hypoxia caused by the coronavirus and provides evidence in support of Dr. Bush's video interview

May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

karlof1 , May 19 2020 20:56 utc | 137

An MD wrote this op/ed dealing with the hypoxia caused by the coronavirus and provides evidence in support of Dr. Bush's video interview that can be reached through the link @135 above.

Yes, the op/ed's a month old, but the dynamics of the virus haven't changed nor have the frequency of deaths within the Outlaw US Empire.

Based on the doctor's first hand testimony and other studies, the initial treatment approach advocated by Dr. Bush and its reasoning seem quite pragmatic and logical.

Comparison with Malaria yields almost no correlation aside from the malaria parasite's use of red blood cells as nurseries and lairs, which may explain why anti-malaria drugs used against COVID-19 in its initial stages have some positive results.

[May 21, 2020] Our FLCCC Working Group currently believes that, if hydroxychloroquine proves to have any benefit, it will most likely be in the earliest stage of infection, while the virus replicates and the patient is still at home, before breathing difficulties or low oxygen levels necessitate a trip to the hospital.

May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 19 2020 4:45 utc | 106

The Front-Line COVID-19 Critical Care Working Group (EVMS is part of that group) has this to say about HCQ:
Some have asked why our initial protocol included hydroxychloroquine, the anti-viral drug that was widely touted as a cure for the COVID-19 disease that is caused by the virus. Almost all ER and ICU physicians tried it before a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed it to have no effect on mortality in patients with severe cases of the disease. Our FLCCC Working Group currently believes that, if hydroxychloroquine proves to have any benefit, it will most likely be in the earliest stage of infection, while the virus replicates and the patient is still at home, before breathing difficulties or low oxygen levels necessitate a trip to the hospital.

A shortened version of their current treatment protocol (PDF):
https://tinyurl.com/y836kmpc

Dr. Kory Senate Testimony before the Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee Hearing (Vimeo video)
https://vimeo.com/415698366

Dr. Kory is Pierre Kory, M.D., M.P.A., Medical Director, Trauma & Life Support Center, Critical Care Service Chief, Associate Professor of Medicine Univ. of Wisconsin School of Medicine & Public Health - one of eight medical professionals on the FLCCC team.

Note: I do *not* explicitly endorse any of this. I am not a doctor, nor do I play one on MoA. But I find their arguments reasonable to the degree I can comprehend them.

Richard Steven Hack , May 19 2020 6:26 utc | 110

Just watched Dr. Kory's testimony before the Senate Committee I referenced above... Link again: https://vimeo.com/415698366

I recommend it to everyone. Again, I can't speak to the medicine, but I think you'll find him highly persuasive, if rather desperate to fit his arguments into the time allotted him (which he overran.)

At least we got a number for the patients treated with their complete MATH+ Protocol - merely 100 (at the time of his testimony.) That's not a high number that persuades me. But he also cites a number of other doctors around the country and in Italy who have tried corticosteroids and apparently they consider it a "game-changer" in treatment, in that it massively reduces the number of people needing to be put on ventilators. He emphasizes that the treatment is safe, physiologically sound, well-recognized as useful for the conditions caused by the virus for years, and although "off-label" for this disease it is not unusual to do "off-label" and that is supported by all the medical association ethical standards.

But he emphasizes that the treatment needs to be started as soon as respirator symptoms develop and he is concerned that too many people are avoiding going to the hospital until it's too late. This of course raises the question as to whether this is another treatment - like HCQ - that "only" works at early stages and therefore is not necessarily proven by trials, but is only supported by "observation" in the hospital.

Of course, the solution to that is run the bloody trial. Or at least use the treatment on a greater number of treatments and see how it washes out. He's concerned that they can't get the White House to listen - big surprise, there.

[May 21, 2020] Do Lockdowns Work Mounting Evidence Says No

May 21, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

The coerced economic "shutdowns" - enforced with fines, arrests, and revoked business licenses - are not the natural outgrowth of a pandemic. They are the result of policy decisions taken by politicians who have suspended constitutional institutions and legal recognition of basic human rights. These politicians have instead imposed a new form of central planning based on an unproven, theoretical set of ideas about police-enforced "social distancing."

Suspending the rule of law and civil rights will have enormous consequences in terms of human life counted in suicides, drug overdoses, and other grave health problems resulting from unemployment , denial of "elective" medical care , and social isolation.

None of that is being considered, however, since it is now fashionable to have governments determine whether or not people may open their businesses or leave their homes. So far, the strategy for dealing with the resulting economic collapse is no more sophisticated than record-breaking deficit spending , followed by debt monetization via money printing. In short, politicians, bureaucrats, and their supporters have insisted a single policy goal -- ending the spread of a disease -- be allowed to destroy all other values and considerations in society.

Has it even worked? Mounting evidence says no.

In The Lancet , Swedish infectious disease clinician (and World Health Organization (WHO) advisor) Johan Giesecke concluded:

It has become clear that a hard lockdown does not protect old and frail people living in care homes - a population the lockdown was designed to protect. Neither does it decrease mortality from COVID-19, which is evident when comparing the UK's experience with that of other European countries.

At best, lockdowns push cases into the future, they do not lower total deaths. Gieseck continues:

Measures to flatten the curve might have an effect, but a lockdown only pushes the severe cases into the future -- it will not prevent them. Admittedly, countries have managed to slow down spread so as not to overburden health-care systems, and, yes, effective drugs that save lives might soon be developed, but this pandemic is swift, and those drugs have to be developed, tested, and marketed quickly. Much hope is put in vaccines, but they will take time, and with the unclear protective immunological response to infection, it is not certain that vaccines will be very effective.

As a public policy measure, the lack of evidence that lockdowns work must be balanced with the fact that we have already observed that economic destruction is costly in terms of human life.

Yet in the public debate, lockdown enthusiasts insist that any deviation from the lockdown will result in total deaths far exceeding those places where there are lockdowns. So far, there is no evidence of this.

In a new study titled "Full Lockdown Policies in Western Europe Countries Have No Evident Impacts on the COVID-19 Epidemic," author Thomas Meunier writes , "total deaths numbers using pre-lockdown trends suggest that no lives were saved by this strategy, in comparison with pre-lockdown, less restrictive, social distancing policies." That is, the "full lockdown policies of France, Italy, Spain and United Kingdom haven't had the expected effects in the evolution of the COVID-19 epidemic." 1

The premise here is not that voluntary "social distancing" has no effect. Rather, the question is to whether "police-enforced home containment" works to limit the spread of disease. Meunier concludes it does not.

Meanwhile a study by polititical scientist Wilfred Reilly compared lockdown policies and COVID-19 fatalities among US states. Reilly writes:

The question the model set out to ask was whether lockdown states experience fewer Covid-19 cases and deaths than social-distancing states, adjusted for all of the above variables. The answer? No. The impact of state-response strategy on both my cases and deaths measures was utterly insignificant. The "p-value" for the variable representing strategy was 0.94 when it was regressed against the deaths metric, which means there is a 94 per cent chance that any relationship between the different measures and Covid-19 deaths was the result of pure random chance.

Overall, however, the fact that good-sized regions from Utah to Sweden to much of East Asia have avoided harsh lockdowns without being overrun by Covid-19 is notable.

Another study on lockdowns -- again, we're talking about forced business closures and stay-at-home orders here -- is this study by researcher Lyman Stone at the American Enterprise Institute. Stone notes that areas where lockdowns were imposed either had already experienced a downward trend in deaths before the lockdown could have possibly shown effects or showed the same trend as the year prior. In other words, lockdown advocates have been taking credit for trends that had already been observed before lockdowns were forced on the population.

Stone writes:

Here's the thing: there's no evidence of lockdowns working. If strict lockdowns actually saved lives, I would be all for them, even if they had large economic costs. But the scientific and medical case for strict lockdowns is paper-thin.

Experience increasingly suggests that a more targeted approach is better for those who actually want to limit the spread of disease among the most vulnerable. The overwhelming majority -- nearly 75 percent -- of deaths from COVID-19 occur in patients over sixty-five years of age. Of those, approximately 90 percent have other underlying conditions . Thus, limiting the spread of COVID-19 is most critical among those who are already engaged with the healthcare system and are elderly. In the US and Europe , more than half of COVID-19 deaths are occuring in nursing homes and similar institutions.

This is why Matt Ridley at The Spectator quite reasonably observes that testing, not lockdowns, appears to be the key factor in limiting deaths from COVID-19 . Those areas where testing is widespread have performed better:

Yet it is not obvious why testing would make a difference, especially to the death rate. Testing does not cure the disease. Germany's strange achievement of a consistently low case fatality rate seems baffling -- until you think through where most early cases were found: in hospitals. By doing a lot more testing, countries like Germany might have partly kept the virus from spreading within the healthcare system. Germany, Japan and Hong Kong had different and more effective protocols in place from day one to prevent the virus spreading within care homes and hospitals.

The horrible truth is that it now looks like in many of the early cases, the disease was probably caught in hospitals and doctors' surgeries. That is where the virus kept returning, in the lungs of sick people, and that is where the next person often caught it, including plenty of healthcare workers. Many of these may not have realised they had it, or thought they had a mild cold. They then gave it to yet more elderly patients who were in hospital for other reasons, some of whom were sent back to care homes when the National Health Service made space on the wards for the expected wave of coronavirus patients.

We could contrast this with the policies of Governor Andrew Cuomo in New York, who mandated that nursing homes accept new residents without testing . This method nearly ensures that the disease will spread quickly among those who are most likely to die from it.

Meanwhile, Governor Cuomo saw fit to impose police-enforced lockdowns on the entire population of New York, ensuring economic ruin and ruined health for many non-COVID patients who were then cut off from vital treatments. Yet, disturbingly, lockdown fetishists like Cuomo are hailed as wise statesmen who "acted decisively" to prevent the spread of disease.

But this is the sort of regime we now live under. In the minds of many, it is better to abolish human rights and consign millions to destitution in the name of pursuing trendy unproven policies. The prolockdown party has even turned basic fundamentals of policy debate upside down. As Stone notes:

At this point, the question I usually get is, "What's your evidence that lockdowns don't work?"

It's a strange question. Why should I have to prove that lockdowns don't work? The burden of proof is to show that they do work! If you're going to essentially cancel the civil liberties of the entire population for a few weeks, you should probably have evidence that the strategy will work. And there, lockdown advocates fail miserably, because they simply don't have evidence.

With economic output crashing worldwide and unemployment soaring to Great Depression levels, governments are already looking for a way out. Don't expect to hear any mea culpas from politicians, but we can already see how governments are quickly moving toward a voluntary social-distancing, nonlockdown strategy. This comes even after politicians and disease "experts" have been insisting that lockdowns must be imposed indefinitely until there's a vaccine .

The longer the lockdown-created economic destruction continues, the greater will be the threat of social unrest and even economic free fall. The political reality is thst the current situation cannot be sustained without threatening the regimes in power themselves. In an article for Foreign Policy titled " Sweden's Coronavirus Strategy Will Soon Be the World's ," authors Nils Karlson, Charlotta Stern, and Daniel B. Klein suggest that regimes will be forced to retreat to a Swedish model:

As the pain of national lockdowns grows intolerable and countries realize that managing -- rather than defeating -- the pandemic is the only realistic option, more and more of them will begin to open up. Smart social distancing to keep health-care systems from being overwhelmed, improved therapies for the afflicted, and better protections for at-risk groups can help reduce the human toll. But at the end of the day, increased -- and ultimately, herd -- immunity may be the only viable defense against the disease, so long as vulnerable groups are protected along the way. Whatever marks Sweden deserves for managing the pandemic, other nations are beginning to see that it is ahead of the curve.

[May 21, 2020] On the necessity and the duration of quarantine

May 21, 2020 | www.unz.com

likbez , says: Show Comment May 21, 2020 at 9:20 pm GMT

Hi The Kremlin Stooge,

Don't forget 'Covidiots'. The frontline-worker-lovin', government-narrative-believin' social-distance welcomin' simpletons are endlessly inventive when it comes to coining contemptuous nicknames for those who don't buy into their embrace of madness. I am happy to be able to say I thought the virus was bogus from the first, and said so to anyone who would listen.

That's too simplistic. You should agree that religious nuts who attend the church in large groups despite the risk can and should be called "Covidiots". Because they are. And the people who are trying to preserve their meager income generally should not.

Why religious nuts can't move to outdoors for the same purpose like first Chirstians did, is unclear to me ;-). Not sure about Orthodox Jews, which is pretty closed sect in any case so if they want to infect each other, be my guest.

The virus causes specific for it virus pneumonia which is no joke. People who recovered still have fibroses in this lungs of different degree. That's why people who were hospitalized with COVID-19 are ineligible to serve in US army. So for those unlucky who get virus pneumonia that's a crippling disease. You can't deny this.

For around 15-20% of people over 65 infected with COVID-19 it means the death sentence -- they will never recover and either die in hospital or soon after. Men over 65 are two third of those so for old men the risk can't be discounted.

So the question is what forms and length of quarantine was optimal, not whether it should or should not be enforced. I doubt that you want to argue that night clubs should remain open. Or that wearing masks in closed spaces is redundant (in open spaces they generally are redundant, unless you are standing in line, etc)

You also need some timeout to collect the vital information about the disease using first cases, enhance the protection of medical personnel, and access the level of actual risk to the population and the economy (the USA generally wasted it and Trump was inapt; so the effect of quarantine is more questionable for this particular country).

It was not that clear in March that the risk is generally low, although we can't deny that Fauci and Co were caught without pants (or, for some sinister reason were intended to be caught this way as if they waited until epidemic got to a certain point that masks something else )

That does not excuse incompetence of Trump administration and very strange behaviors of Fauci, who spent two months and then woke up and suddenly start crying Wolf, Wolf, but the USA is very mysterious country and in no way Canadians can understand it

[May 21, 2020] More than 80% of Americans support closing non-essential businesses. Support for limiting restaurants, closing schools, canceling sporting and entertainment events, and group gatherings exceeds 90%.

May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 19 2020 6:47 utc | 111

The Argument Against the Argument Against Facemasks
Resistance rooted in liberty clashes with the unalienable right of life
https://tinyurl.com/yctjydmx

Masks help stop the spread of coronavirus – the science is simple and I'm one of 100 experts urging governors to require public mask-wearing
https://tinyurl.com/yah8orzo

THE STATE OF THE NATION: A 50-STATE COVID-19 SURVEYUSA, April 2020
https://tinyurl.com/yaf58h27

Key takeaways:


More than 80% of Americans support closing non-essential businesses. Support for limiting restaurants, closing schools, canceling sporting and entertainment events, and group gatherings exceeds 90%. A total of 94% strongly or somewhat approve asking people to stay home and avoid gathering in groups; 92% support canceling major sports and entertainment events; 91% approve closing K-12 schools; 91% approve limiting restaurants to carry-out only; 83% approve closing businesses other than grocery stores and pharmacies. There are some partisan differences on these items -- Republicans are somewhat less supportive, but even among Republicans large majorities support all of these measures; and, as summarized below, support is largely consistent across every state.

A bipartisan consensus opposes a rapid "reopening" of the economy. Only 7% support immediate reopening of the economy, and the median respondent supports waiting four to six weeks. There is a bipartisan consensus on waiting (89% of Republicans as compared to 96% of Democrats opposed immediate re-opening), and Republicans support a somewhat faster re-opening of the economy than Democrats, where the median Republican supports waiting two to four weeks versus median Democrat six to eight weeks. As discussed below, even in those Republican-led states which are moving toward re-opening, few people support reopening immediately
Generally, Americans report adhering to social distancing, indicating that they had minimal social interactions with people outside of their households. That said, 56% reported encountering at least one person from outside of their home in the preceding 24 hours (and 7% reported encountering 10 or more persons); the survey did not contain information on the circumstances of those encounters (e.g., was it at grocery stores? were the individuals wearing masks?). Generally, there were not large differences with respect to age, gender, race, income, partisanship or education. An exception was that Asian Americans were substantially less likely to encounter other individuals, and more likely to avoid contact with other people. There were significant racial differences reported in wearing face masks outside of the home, with 51% of whites reporting following recommendations very closely, along with 62% of Hispanics, 64% of African Americans, and 68% of Asian Americans. There was also an age gradient in this regard, ranging from 50% face mask wearing for 18-24 year olds to 60% of those aged 65 or higher. There were also partisan differences: 51% of Republicans, compared to 64% for Democrats, reported wearing face masks outside the home.

I find the racial differences interesting, especially since in my observation fewer blacks are wearing masks. However, since I was specifically looking at blacks (due to the disproportionate number of blacks dying) in my walks, I may have under counted the number of whites not wearing masks. Also I suspect it varies between cities, states and more suburban or rural areas.

In any event, not enough people are wearing masks to re-open the economy - and we damn sure don't have enough testing, tracing and isolating capability and probably won't until September, according to one report I read.

A number of other interesting results. Check it out.

[May 21, 2020] The most recent CDC COVID-19 mortality data

May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Don Bacon , May 19 2020 18:05 utc | 134

From the most recent CDC COVID-19 mortality data report, Feb 1 to May 16:
> US deaths 62,515 [which are inflated, and yet comparable to annual flu deaths]
> US deaths from all causes – 97% of expected deaths. [i.e. no 'excess' deaths] . . here
> The media currently reports 90,694 deaths which they get from Johns Hopkins. That's an organization which ought to be examined. CDC data is not used by the media, but CDC doesn't have a great record either:
> CDC estimates that, from October 1, 2019, through March 28, 2020, there have been 24,000 – 63,000 flu deaths . . here
> For 2017-2018, the CDC first estimated 80,000 flu deaths, then later reduced the estimate (their word) to 61,000.
> In the news now: San Diego County California public health first reported 194 Covid deaths out of a population of 3.3 million. After autopsies and testing of tissue, health department reported only 6 of the 194 actually died of Covid.
> Meanwhile the lives of millions of people of all ages have been adversely affected.
> But hey, the banks have more money.

[May 21, 2020] New York Times continues to prop up the vaccine hype

May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

vk , May 21 2020 0:49 utc | 55

New York Times continues to prop up the vaccine hype:

Coronavirus Live Updates: Scientists See Progress in Path to Vaccine by Next Year

In addition to this Home Page highlight, there's an opinion piece as a side dish:

What to Expect When a Coronavirus Vaccine Finally Arrives

Buried a little bit more at the bottom, there's this borderline pseudoscientific, definitely reckless article:

Prototype Vaccine Protects Monkeys From Coronavirus

There is a statistical possibility a vaccine comes out next year. But his possibility is remote. The key here is that a vaccine must be tested to the exhaustion before being ok'd by any government for mass use. Any mistake can result in a number of deaths that will make this pandemic look like child's play. My opinion is that the NYT is feeding too much enthusiasm to its readers.

Circe , May 19 2020 12:05 utc | 119

The Moderna Vaccine the media is touting as a promising, miracle breakthrough that has only been tested on a limited group of 45 people, aged 18 to 55 has Grade 3 adverse effects in 100 and 250 microgram dosage.

So they're going to lower dosage to 50 micrograms and test it on the 56 to 70 and over 70 age groups. What about the group most Americans are in: the KFC, McDonald's, IHOP group?

[May 21, 2020] It is worth reminding of criticism of the untrustworthiness of modern medical science from the editors of some of the top medical journals

Notable quotes:
"... There are some who parrot Big Pharma vested interests in ridiculing and denigrating hydroxychloroquine, despite the very notable positive results several countries such as China, Russia, Iran and Turkey have had with it, while vainly spouting the benefits of smoking despite complete lack of quality research papers supporting it and abundant quality papers against. ..."
"... Research is not created equal. There is good research (some, not so much) and there is bad research (bundles of it), mostly funded by vested interests, who where necessary direct the desired results. In general, research from China and Russia arguably tends to be higher quality and more reliable because those countries place the emphasis on health for society, not on profits for the corporations. ..."
May 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

BM , May 20 2020 6:17 utc | 146

But with regard to anecdotal/unverified [touch'e] claims of nicotine benefits in covid, one should not reflexively ignore the evidence to the contrary that conflict with one's pro-nicotine bias/belief system:}
"Smokers more likely to express ACE2 protein that SARS-COV-2 uses to enter human cells"
"Tobacco smoking increases lung entry points for COVID-19 virus"
Posted by: gm | May 19 2020 16:13 utc | 129

Touché again gm!

It is indeed desperate grasping at straws to believe that smoking will protect against Covid-19 when far higher quality research clearly indicates increased risk from smoking that the disease will be more severe (the latter also being the more plausible result).

As I commented the last time B raised this issue, there is one genuine effect of a past history of smoking that statistically reduces risk of death from Covid-19 - namely smoking significantly reduces expected lifespan, and therefore reduces the risk of living long enough to reach the highest risk age groups for severe Covid-19. Alternatively expressed - smoking kills you off first before you get a chance to be killed by Covid, if that is what you want. Post-hoc nicotine patches at a late stage deny you even that advantage.

There are some who parrot Big Pharma vested interests in ridiculing and denigrating hydroxychloroquine, despite the very notable positive results several countries such as China, Russia, Iran and Turkey have had with it, while vainly spouting the benefits of smoking despite complete lack of quality research papers supporting it and abundant quality papers against.

At this point it is worth reminding of criticism of the untrustworthiness of modern medical science from the editors of some of the top medical journals:

Skeptical of medical science reports?

"It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as editor of The New England Journal of Medicine"
Angell M. Drug Companies & Doctors: A Story of Corruption. The New York Review of Books magazine.

More recently, Richard Horton, editor of The Lancet, wrote that "The case against science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn towards darkness"
Horton R. Offline: What is medicine's 5 sigma? www.thelancet.com.

The first of these two commentaries on clinical research publications appeared in 2009, the second in April of this year. These statements are being taken seriously, coming as they do from the experiences of editors of two of the world's most prestigious medical journals. The first article showed how the relationships between pharmaceutical companies and academic physicians at prestigious universities impacted certain drug-related publications and the marketing of prescription drugs. Potential conflicts of interest seemed to abound: millions of dollars in consulting and speaking fees to physicians who promoted specific drugs, public research dollars being used by a researcher to test a drug owned by a company in which the researcher held millions of dollars in shares, failure of university researchers to disclose income from drug companies, company subsidies to physician continuing education, publishing practice guidelines involving drugs in which the authors have a financial interest, using influential physicians to promote drugs for unapproved uses, bias in favor of a product coming from failure to publish negative results and repeated publication of positive results in different forms. The author, Marcia Angell, cited the case of a drug giant that had to agree to settle charges that it deliberately withheld evidence that its top-selling anti-depressant was ineffective and could be harmful to certain age groups. ...

Richard Horton's statement was part of his comments on a recent symposium on reliability and reproducibility of research in the biomedical sciences and addresses a broader area of concern. Some of the problems he identified are seen in the veterinary literature. They include inadequate number of subjects in the study, poor study design, and potential conflicts of interest. He notes that the quest for journal impact factor is fuelling competition for publication in a few high reputation journals. He warns that "our love of 'significance' pollutes the literature with many a statistical fairy-tale" ...

Research is not created equal. There is good research (some, not so much) and there is bad research (bundles of it), mostly funded by vested interests, who where necessary direct the desired results. In general, research from China and Russia arguably tends to be higher quality and more reliable because those countries place the emphasis on health for society, not on profits for the corporations.

@Flatulus @16 "sources"
Christian Drosten, chief virologist Charité Berlin in his podcast no 31. Available with transcript here.
Posted by: b | May 18 2020 16:42 utc | 32

B, have you looked into the Big Pharma vested interests of Drosten yet? I suggest you do so.

[May 20, 2020] Adding insult to injury Spike in Covid-19 robocalls fraud

Few things can be more annoying than answering the phone while you're in the middle of something -- and then being greeted by a recording. If you receive a robocall trying to sell you something (and you haven't given the caller your written permission), it's an illegal call. You should hang up. Then, file a complaint with the FTC and the National Do Not Call Registry.
May 20, 2020 | www.rt.com

From phony positive Covid-19 test results to deceptive offers of financial relief, robocalls have proliferated amid the pandemic, separating Americans from millions of precious dollars at a time when few can afford to lose money.

One particularly nasty scam sees the target receive a text or phone call warning them they've been exposed to the virus, tricking them into providing personal information while in a state of panic. Another cruel variant dangles the possibility of virus-related financial relief if they just give up their bank account details or wire the scammer a small " fee " – a tempting prospect at a time when half of American workers are unlikely to see a paycheck this month and upwards of 36 million have filed for unemployment since the pandemic began. Phony treatments – in which the target orders a miracle cure, only to never receive it – comprise some 22 percent of coronavirus-related robocalls, making them the most common pandemic scam.

Even those who haven't been personally scammed by a robocaller have experienced stress because of them, Provision found; 70 percent of millennials are concerned a parent or grandparent will be preyed upon by the automated scammers, who frequently impersonate government authorities like the Social Security Administration or the Internal Revenue Service in order to con their targets out of bank account information or other personal data. In fact, nearly two in five robocalls (39 percent) claim to be the SSA, with 38 percent impersonating the IRS and 33 percent pretending to be debt collectors.

The Covid-19 scams are apparently quite effective, robbing Americans of over $13.4 million of their hard-earned cash in the first three months of 2020 alone, according to the Federal Trade Commission. That number doesn't include scams that haven't been discovered by their victims, or those that go unreported to the FTC – meaning the real figure is likely much higher.

[May 20, 2020] Beware of fake contact tracers, N.J. officials warn

May 20, 2020 | www.nytimes.com

Beware of fake contact tracers, N.J. officials warn.

New Jersey officials warned residents on Wednesday to be wary of fraudsters identifying themselves as contact tracers in order to obtain financial information.

In recent weeks, as health departments have hired legitimate tracers to track the spread of the coronavirus, fake tracers have been sending people text messages looking for insurance information and bank account and social security numbers, said Judith Persichilli, the state health commissioner.

Real contact tracers do not ask for such things, the state said.

A legitimate tracer will call, identify themselves as part of a local health department, and explain to the person on the phone that they may have come into contact with someone who tested positive for the virus.

Scams around the virus, unemployment benefits and stimulus checks have proliferated nationwide , the authorities say.

Gov. Philip D. Murphy said "there is a special place in hell" for people who would scam others during the pandemic.

Mr. Murphy also reported the state's daily virus fatalities: 168, bringing the overall death toll to 10,747.

[May 20, 2020] Breakthrough South Korean Study Finds Recovered COVID Patients Who Test Positive Aren't Infectious

May 19, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
In what appears to be yet another strike against public officials like LA County's Barbara Ferrer - that is, Democrats and others who insist that lockdowns should continue perhaps until a vaccine has been discovered and that police should punish anyone who dares violate these orders - a study from the Korean Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has found that patients who test positive for COVID-19 after recovering from the illness appear to be shedding dead copies of the virus. That would suggest that these patients are not infectious, the scientists said, which helped dispel fears that some patients can remain infectious for months after being infected. While the study doesn't answer every question about the virus's longevity - such as patients who almost appear to have developed a "chronic" form of the illness because their symptoms have persisted for so long.

But still, the finding was greeted as a major relief, and, if anything, should encourage economies to reopen more quickly, as a potential trigger for reinfection that had panicked some experts appears to be a non-issue.

The research also undermines the reliability of 'antibody' tests like the ones NY Gov Andrew Cuomo insisted would be 'critical' for NY's reopening.

The results mean health authorities in South Korea will no longer consider people infectious after recovering from the illness. Research last month showed that so-called PCR tests for the coronavirus's nucleic acid can't distinguish between dead and viable virus particles, potentially giving the wrong impression that someone who tests positive for the virus remains infectious.

The research may also aid in the debate over antibody tests, which look for markers in the blood that indicate exposure to the novel coronavirus. Experts believe antibodies probably convey some level of protection against the virus, but they don't have any solid proof yet. Nor do they know how long any immunity may last.

A recent study in Singapore showed that recovered patients from severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, are found to have "significant levels of neutralizing antibodies" nine to 17 years after initial infection, according to researchers including Danielle E. Anderson of Duke-NUS Medical School.

Other scientists have found higher levels of IgM, an antibody that appears in response to exposure to an antigen, in children, according to an article published on medRxiv. That suggests younger populations have the potential to produce a more potent defense against Covid-19. The study has not been certified by peer review.

Bloomberg offers a succinct review of some of the research into the infectious qualities of the virus, and the efficacy of antibodies in keeping patients safe from reinfection. As BBG shows, studies of SARS, which is related to the virus that causes COVID-19, suggest that antibodies keep patients safe for years, undermining warnings about a possible second wave, or worries that the virus might become endemic, which were recently raised by the WHO.

The research may also aid in the debate over antibody tests, which look for markers in the blood that indicate exposure to the novel coronavirus. Experts believe antibodies probably convey some level of protection against the virus, but they don't have any solid proof yet.

Nor do they know how long any immunity may last.

A recent study in Singapore showed that recovered patients from severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, are found to have "significant levels of neutralizing antibodies" nine to 17 years after initial infection, according to researchers including Danielle E. Anderson of Duke-NUS Medical School.

Other scientists have found higher levels of IgM, an antibody that appears in response to exposure to an antigen, in children, according to an article published on medRxiv. That suggests younger populations have the potential to produce a more potent defense against Covid-19. The study has not been certified by peer review.

The study's findings are apparently convincing enough for South Korean health authorities to no longer require patients to be re-tested after they've recovered from COVID-19 and all symptoms have subsided.

As a result of the findings in the South Korea study, authorities said that under revised protocols, people should no longer be required to test negative for the virus before returning to work or school after they have recovered from their illness and completed their period of isolation.

"Under the new protocols, no additional tests are required for cases that have been discharged from isolation," the Korean CDC said in a report. The agency said it will now refer to "re-positive" cases as "PCR re-detected after discharge from isolation."

Some coronavirus patients have tested positive again for the virus up to 82 days after becoming infected. Almost all of the cases for which blood tests were taken had antibodies against the virus.

If nothing else, this study is just the latest reminder of how much we don't know about the virus.

[May 20, 2020] Here's a source of excellent n95 masks. They are 3m 8210 PLUS

May 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Alden , says: Show Comment May 10, 2020 at 2:53 pm GMT

@Al t from wood like cherry and walnut Unlike the medical masks with the 3 flapping edges, dust doesn't come in through the seal.

The medical masks are 6 inch long rectangles that are open at the bottom and 2 sides. According to the 2 Drs I saw , they're useless for preventing germs and viruses coming in.

The 3m 8210 PLUS n95 masks work to keep the finest softest dust out if you think you need a mask. And you can use them for days if you're not sanding and using dangerous materials.

The only reason I looked at was after I used a really strong toxic paint stripper all day long. The stripper was orange. I saw that the outside of the mask was orange from the fumes. But the inside was still white, no orange. So that mask prevented the fumes going through to my nose and mouth.

[May 20, 2020] Men's Blood Contains High Levels of Enzyme That Helps COVID-19 Infect Cells Study

May 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

vot tak , says: Show Comment May 12, 2020 at 12:22 am GMT

Men's Blood Contains High Levels of Enzyme That Helps COVID-19 Infect Cells – Study

https://sputniknews.com/science/202005111079275898-mens-blood-contains-high-levels-of-enzyme-that-helps-covid-19-infect-cells -- study/

"A new study published in the European Heart Journal on Monday has provided scientific evidence that men have higher concentrations of ACE2 in their blood than women. ACE2, which is found in organs such as the heart, kidney, intestines and others, is the receptor required for cellular entry of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

While the ACE2 receptor is normally helpful to the human body, as it stabilizes one's blood pressure and regulates blood vessel dilation, it is also the target of SARS-CoV-2's spike protein. Once the spike protein has attached itself to the receptor, the novel coronavirus is able to invade the human cell and infect an individual.

"When we found that one of the strongest biomarkers, ACE2, was much higher in men than in women, I realised that this had the potential to explain why men were more likely to die from COVID-19 than women," said Iziah Sama, a doctor at University Medical Center (UMC) Groningen who co-led the study.

Findings from the recent study further advanced scientists' presumption that the ACE2 is a key component to how COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the novel coronavirus, creeps to the lungs.

"ACE2 is a receptor on the surface of cells. It binds to the coronavirus and allows it to enter and infect healthy cells after it has been modified by another protein on the surface of the cell, called TMPRSS2," explained Dr. Adriaan Voors, a professor of cardiology at UMC Groningen who led the study. "High levels of ACE2 are present in the lungs and, therefore, it is thought to play a crucial role in the progression of lung disorders related to COVID-19."

The study, which relied on blood samples from several thousand participants, also found that heart failure patients prescribed drugs that target the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system, like angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors or angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs), did not have higher concentrations of ACE2 in their blood.

"ACE inhibitors and ARBs are widely prescribed to patients with congestive heart failure, diabetes or kidney disease," Reuters noted.

"Our findings do not support the discontinuation of these drugs in COVID-19 patients as has been suggested by earlier reports," explained Voors."

[May 20, 2020] If 20% recovered enough for herd immunity?

May 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Alfred , says: Show Comment May 9, 2020 at 3:29 pm GMT

@KA From April 12, 2009 to April 10, 2010, CDC estimated there were 60.8 million cases (range: 43.3-89.3 million), 274,304 hospitalizations (range: 195,086-402,719), and 12,469 deaths (range: 8868-18,306) in the United States due to the H1N1pdm09 virus

This is interesting.

The population of the USA in 2010 was 308 million. The number of infected was 60.8 million. That suggests that herd immunity was reached when 19.7% of the population was infected.

That magical number of 20% has been repeated by me in a number of comments here. I don't claim to have originated it.

[May 20, 2020] There are several papers on pubmed suggesting the use of doxycycline to treat COVID-19

May 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Harold Smith , says: Show Comment May 6, 2020 at 9:15 pm GMT

@Anon Speaking of antibiotics, there are several papers on pubmed suggesting the use of doxycycline to treat COVID-19 (and the ARB drug telmisartan is apparently another off-the-shelf treatment possibility).

In silico modeling shows that doxycycline might inhibit SARS-CoV-2 PLpro and 3CLpro; plus it has an anti-inflammatory effect. Doxy is highly bioavailable and crosses the blood brain barrier.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7102550/

Apparently some clinical trials with doxycycline for COVID-19 are in the works.

https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04371952

[May 19, 2020] Politics is altering clinical practice.

May 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

oldhippie , May 18 2020 18:15 utc | 48

Analysis begins with close reading.

The BMJ article in top post refers to mild and moderate cases. All cases are hospitalized cases. What exactly does it mean to hospitalize a mild case? Is that standard practice for covid? The article has some discussion on this point but it basically makes no sense. Patients excluded from study does not begin to include all those who would ordinarily be contraindicated for HCQ. Then dosages of 1200mg per day to start are flat twice what is recommended by Raoult. After 3 days dosage cut to 800mg, which is still high. Dosage continued for two to three weeks where others would end after ten days.

The Economist article from top post is so badly in need of basic copy editing it just makes no sense at all. Perhaps the publication has given up on editing since that interferes with the constant right wing propaganda onslaught. Currently owned by Rothschilds.

I could give some notes here on actual clinical practice as given to me by those treating patients but old friends and HIPPAA have a lot of conflicts. Suffice it to say that politics is altering clinical practice. Which reminds of the article above about Utah. Utah is a theocracy. A theocracy of cranks and cultists. No, that does not mix with science.

If this comment is not yet suitable for deletion some notes on the pandemic as seen from Cook County (Chicago). The current case count is up to 62,000, deaths nearing 3000. There is no panic in the streets. A heavy blanket of fear uncertainty and doubt covers the city, there is no panic. More than 1% of the population is supposedly positive but everyone is asking each other "Do you know anyone who is sick? Do you know anyone positive?" And most do not know a soul who is sick. Fatalities I know of are in NYC. Most lack even that sort of connection. One friend lives in zip 60639 where 2-1/2% of residents are positive and he hasn't heard a thing from neighbors. Supposedly there is a cluster of six deaths centered right around his house (neighborhood of single-family residences) and no one is talking about it

Finally I do personally know a case. Our mailman had it. Postal employees can be tested, most of us still can't. He was sick ten days. First retest at two weeks showed positive even though he felt fine.Second retest at three weeks was negative, immediately allowed to return to work. Wife and daughter also got sick, also recovered easily. No tests available for them so no stats. No medical treatment but stay home and rest. On his own he took high doses of Vitamin C plus some zinc, but he does that for any cold or flu. After discussing symptoms with him am fairly certain that my wife and I had it back in January but will never know for sure. An antibody test would be interesting and even helpful at this point, no expectation one will ever be offered.

[May 19, 2020] Does COVID-19 attack hemoglobin cells?

May 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

karlof1 , May 18 2020 22:57 utc | 85

What if the virus causing COVID-19 is first doing great injury to hemoglobin which then allows bacteriological infections to do their work? People are showing hypoxia, not all, just what become the worst cases. Those factors are part of an hypothesis developed by Dr. Zach Bush, a physician specializing in internal medicine, endocrinology and hospice care, that gets presented during this 1 hour 20 minute interview that covers more than just the COVID-19 issue. When finished, you'll have a completely different appreciation for the term Environmental Science.

[May 19, 2020] A team of doctors in Bangladesh claims success in treating patients with COVID-19 using doxycycline and ivermectin:

May 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jen , May 19 2020 2:59 utc | 104

A team of doctors in Bangladesh claims success in treating patients with COVID-19 using doxycycline and ivermectin:

Kamal Kant Kohli, "Doxycycline And Ivermectin Combo May Be New Effective Covid 19 Treatment"

Doxycycline is an anti-malarial drug that was patented in 1957, became commercial in 1967 and is now a generic drug. Ivermectin , used to treat parasitic infestations, is available in the US as a generic prescription drug. Both drugs do have side effects. It will be interesting to see if either drug gets much attention in the global press beyond the medical literature if the Bangladeshi doctors continue to have success in treating their patients.

Jim , May 19 2020 3:28 utc | 106

https://www.evms.edu/media/evms_public/departments/internal_medicine/Marik-Covid-Protocol-Summary.pdf

Eastern Virginia Medical school covid treament protocol
Pretty recent update (may 14th)

[May 18, 2020] Donald Trump says Americans won't stand for stay-at-home orders anymore

May 18, 2020 | www.washingtontimes.com

me name=

President Trump said Wednesday the coronavirus crisis is worse than the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and Americans won't allow it to go on any longer.

"I don't think people will stand for it," Mr. Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. "The country won't stand for it. It's not sustainable."

He said the pandemic "is worse than Pearl Harbor."

...Asked about soaring unemployment being a potential liability for him in an election year, the president replied, "Nobody's blaming me for that. I built the greatest economy and I'm going to rebuild it again. This was an artificially induced unemployment."

[May 16, 2020] FDA Halts Bill Gates-Backed COVID-19 Testing Program

Notable quotes:
"... SCAN is backed by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the University of Washington Medicine. The testing program was sending free test kits to participants' homes in the Seattle Metropolitan Area, with the goal of testing people in the region to get a sense of how the virus was spreading through the community. ..."
May 16, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

About a month after Bill Gates criticized President Trump's decision to suspend funding to the World Health Organization (WHO), the federal government has just halted a Seattle-based COVID-19 testing program backed by Gates.

What are the odds, right?

"Please discontinue patient testing and return of diagnostic results to patients until proper authorization is obtained," the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) wrote in a memo, addressed to the Seattle Coronavirus Assessment Network (SCAN), according to The New York Times .

SCAN posted an update on its website on Thursday (May 14) describing how the FDA had asked it to "pause" testing while it receives further guidance on new procedures for its COVID-19 test kits that collect samples at home.

The FDA "recently clarified its guidance for home-based, self-collected samples to test for COVID-19. We have been notified that a separate federal emergency use authorization (EUA) is required to return results for self-collected tests," the post read.

"The FDA has not raised any concerns regarding the safety and accuracy of SCAN's test, but we have been asked to pause testing until we receive that additional authorization."

An FDA spokesperson told The Times, the home collection test kits raised some concerns about "safety and accuracy that required the agency's review."

The issue in the Seattle case appears to be that the test results are being used not only by researchers for surveillance of the virus in the community but that the results are also being returned to patients to inform them.

The two kinds of testing — surveillance and diagnostic — fall under different F.D.A. standards. In a pure surveillance study, the researchers may keep the results just for themselves. But coronavirus testing has largely revolved around getting results returned to doctors who can share the results with patients.

"We had previously understood that SCAN was being conducted as a surveillance study," the spokesperson said.

SCAN is backed by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the University of Washington Medicine. The testing program was sending free test kits to participants' homes in the Seattle Metropolitan Area, with the goal of testing people in the region to get a sense of how the virus was spreading through the community.

[May 16, 2020] Side effect of untested vassine can be crippling

May 16, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

juliania , May 16 2020 13:41 utc | 88

As there have been some comments relating to the development of a vaccine against the virus, I made a search this morning relating to the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation's record in funding such developments. I tried to stay away from the articles that seemed to be inflammatory but did find this article dated today at indianexpress.com: "Can't penalise US NGO for violating drug trial norms" related to a previous drug trial involvement of the foundation. Here are the opening paragraphs:
The NDA government Friday told the Supreme Court that no specific penalties could be imposed on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation-funded Programme for Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH) for violating norms in conducting the vaccination trials on tribal girls in Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat.

Pointing out that the current legal regime had no provision of penalties, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has expressed its inability to proceed against the NGO PATH despite a parliamentary panel recommending strict actions.

The article would seem to advise caution in urging such trials on the part of the US government with respect to a vaccine for the covid virus, as they also have taken place in other countries, with unforseen complications for some of the participants. It is often the case that strong medicinal remedies are available to poor people on a trial basis. These days I'm remembering the John Le Carre novel, "The Constant Gardener". If my library were open I'd be rereading it.

The old saying 'haste makes waste' needs to be kept in mind.

Trailer Trash , May 16 2020 14:25 utc | 96

> I made a search this morning relating to the Bill and Melinda Gates
>Posted by: juliania | May 16 2020 13:41 utc | 88

Thank you for this. I've been wondering about the noise swirling around Gates and vaccine shenanigans and how much of it is true. I would not be surprised to learn that he really did harm many people with his PATH project.

It's well understood in the computer industry that Gates was an abusive bully to his employees while wrecking every company he crossed paths with, whether they were the competition or a partner. No reason to think it would be different with his new projects.

I'll take my chances with the evil virus before I'll take a dose of a Gates' vaccine.

[May 16, 2020] Any drugs out of patent will be discredited by big pharma lobbyists. It seems a number of drugs do have an impact on the covid-19 set of symptoms.

May 16, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , May 16 2020 11:18 utc | 73

Any drugs out of patent will be discredited by big pharma lobbyists. It seems a number of drugs do have an impact on the covid-19 set of symptoms.

At one point in time, I was diagnosed with 'chronic fatigue syndrome'. It is a bullshit diagnosis, basically the scrap heap for undiagnosed disease. I looked up research on the subject at the the time. There was a couple of interesting contrasts.

One research project simply took in a mob that had been diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome, and of course found nothing in various trials.

Another project took in a cohort with exactly the same symptoms, and found that a pathogen was indeed causing their problems.

A number of drugs on anecdotal evidence (and perhaps the observations of Chinese doctors unencombered by lobbyists are anecdotal) do help certain patients.
Each drug may not be a cure all for all people with COVID-19, but it seems these do help various patients depending on their symptoms and the way the virus is attacking them.

With that in mind, I would be keeping an eye on China rather than US big pharma.
Big pharma may well come up with a you beaut cure all, but in the mean time I would be looking at doctors unencombered by big pharma for something that will help.


BM , May 16 2020 13:59 utc | 91

WaPo: Drug promoted by Trump as coronavirus 'game changer' increasingly linked to deaths
Posted by: b | May 16 2020 9:39 utc | 61

b,
do you have any conception of the lobbying methods used by Big Pharma?
Do you have any conception of the financial clout they have available for protecting their interests?
Do you have any conceptions of the influence they have, of the revolving doors between Big Pharma, pharmaceutical regulatory bodies, medical schools and every single level of the medical industry?
Do you have any conception of the way pharmaceutical registration works, and of the corrupt and fraudulent practices used to obtain authorisation for drugs?

It is one gigantic spaghetti pot of corruption and deception. Boeing/FAA is miniscule and almost angelic by comparison (and far less deadly also).


Coincidentally I have direct first-hand experience of both sides of the activities of Big Pharma concerning one specific highly effective cancer drug that the world's biggest Pharma corporations have tried for the last 40 years to eradicate (finally almost successful by 2014, unfortunately). I have direct first-hand experience of the highest praise they share amongst their own top elites of the efficacy of that competitor's medicine against all known types of cancer. I also have close 2nd hand inside knowledge of their efforts to purchase the patents for that same medicine for vast sums of money. I also personally know the proprietor and developer of that same medicine, and have witnessed and experienced first hand some of the fraudulent and criminal methods Big Pharma have used non-stop for 40 years to try to force my friend out of business, together with the lies and deception they have used publicly falsely alleging its "danger" and "inefficacy", together even with using police to illegally force parents to stop using it for their seriously ill children who had already dramatically benefited from its use, and forcing doctors to stop using it for treatment. I also have extensive 2nd hand knowledge of their activities to that effect, and have good reason to believe they are true. I have also used that medicine myself, to great effect, and closely know a medical practice which has used it with considerable medical success, and of the coercion they also experienced not to use it.

The way the Western medical establishment has handled the question of the use of chloroquine and closely related drugs for Covid-19 is in every single respect and at every level 100% typical of Big Pharma disinformation projects .

The very fact that the US medical establishment approved use of hydroxychloroquine under specific conditions that ensure it is used exclusively at a very late stage after the virus has ceased to replicate guarantees that all or almost all major Western hydroxychloroquine trials will be negative - because it is a specific and known requirement of hydroxychloroquine therapy that the therapy is conducted early whilst the virus is stil replicating - later it is known to be useless. The approval of its use under such conditions is the specific result of Big Pharma influence . That is how they operate all the time.

Big Pharma is no more honest about either the safety or the efficacity of its products than are the White Helmets about their activities in Syria. Many of the most dangerous drugs sold by the biggest companies are approved on the basis of very small, improperly balanced trials, sometimes fraudulently conducted. Trials which give the wrong result are routinely hidden. Research on toxicity and dangerous side-effects are routinely inadequate, frequently fraudulent or knowingly misleading, and legal requirements for drug authorisations are frequently waived on the basis of influence campaigns. This is especially so for new chemotherapy drugs, which are intrinsically highly toxic and are normally used at very close to the fatal dose. There is no level playing field at all, quite the contrary.

Big Pharma do not profit from cures - they profit from selling very expensive drugs, and they are far more ruthless than the White Helmets in destroying any potential threat to their profits. There is no more effective threat to the World-View of Big Pharma - as I know from first hand experience - than effective cures, especially where they are cheap and unpatentable, or the patents are owned outside the cabal. Any such cure must be destroyed at all costs.

Several of the Big Pharma companies in recent years have been given multi-billion dollar fines for the fraud and subversion they have utilised in obtaining authorisation for drugs which are dangerous to the patient, and for their marketing of drugs known to be dangerous.

The patent for chloroquine and its derivatives has expired. It has been widely used for many years, its hazards and limitations are thoroughly documented, and it is in this respect - under proper supervision with respect to its known hazards and limitations and qualified by them - incomparably safer than any new and barely tested pharmaceutical drug or vaccine such as Remdesivir. It is cheaply produced around the world. Therefore, no full-scale well-controlled randomised clinical trial of hydroxychloroquine treatment for Covid-19 will ever be conducted in a major Western country. Big Pharma will ensure that.

BM , May 16 2020 16:24 utc | 112
One does have to wonder whether it is simply a matter that the difficulty in the US concerning early diagnosis is the real problem that makes use of the drug impractical here. Perhaps we just don't have the resources, teams of testers and physicians and nurses, for the accuracy and careful monitoring of patients in early stage infection required when using this drug.
Posted by: juliania | May 16 2020 15:17 utc | 103

I'm afraid it's not anything to do with early diagnosis, it is only about profit. As Blue Dotterel said, it is about profit, not curing patients. For Big Pharma the very last thing they want is for the patient to be cured - a dead patient is far more profitable. No wonder Gilead holds the more promising GS-441524 off the market, because they can make more profit from a more expensive useless drug that will be in patent for far longer.

Big Pharma expects to make many trillions of dollars profit per year on Covid-19, as they do on cancer. The more Covid cases, the more profits. The less effective the efforts to reduce infections, the more profits. The less availability of PPE, the more profits. The more chaotic and irrational the government policies, the more profit. Big Pharma profits at every step.

They will stop at nothing to block proper trials of hydroxychloroquine - including bribery, coercion, and sabotage, not just massive disinformation. They will spend billions just to block
proper trials, using myriad different methods of subterfuge and subversion. That is just small change compared to the profits they want and expect.

The entire philosophy of Western medicine is a dying patient - it is corrupt, it is dishonest, its entire foundations are fraudulent. There is an urgent need for a whole new paradigm for medicine that is based on maximising the health of society, not on maximising profit.

There is a story I heard on television several decades ago - I think it was true, but I am not certain - about an old Chinese tradition. Villagers would pay a regular monthly fee to the doctor, as long as they stay healthy. As soon as they fall sick they stop paying, and the doctor has to cure them (without charge). Only when they get better will they resume the normal regular payments. Think about it, what is the best interest of the doctor towards his patient? He has an investment in their good health. Now compare the Western system. What interest does the doctor have in the patient's health? If the patient is sick for 4 times as long and then dies, is the doctor richer or poorer? If the doctor gives drugs with side effects, which need more drugs against the side effects, will he be richer or poorer? If there are two drugs available, one cheap, one expensive, which one does the doctor prefer?

Think about it Juliana, the last time you went to a hospital, how much did it cost? How many useless medicines did the doctor give you, versus how many basic essential medicines?

Western medicine is a big scam. It is a business. The second biggest business in the world after war.

That is why I reject Western medicine. For 20 years I have used only non-Western medicine.

[May 16, 2020] WaPo: for a certain type of patients hydroxychloroquine promoted by Trump as coronavirus 'game changer' increasingly linked to deaths

May 16, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

b , May 16 2020 9:39 utc | 61

@fairleft

You want to continue to promote Trump's wonder medicine? Than leave this place and go elsewhere.

You are obviously not well informed about the issue anyway.

WaPo: Drug promoted by Trump as coronavirus 'game changer' increasingly linked to deaths

Clinical trials, academic research and scientific analysis indicate that the danger of the Trump-backed drug is a significantly increased risk of death for certain patients. Evidence showing the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine in treating covid-19 has been scant. Those two developments pushed the Food and Drug Administration to warn against the use of hydroxychloroquine outside of a hospital setting last month, just weeks after it approved an emergency use authorization for the drug.

Alarmed by a growing cache of data linking the anti-malaria drug to serious cardiac problems, some drug safety experts are now calling for even more forceful action by the government to discourage its use. Several have called for the FDA to revoke its emergency use authorization, given hydroxychloroquine's documented risks.

"They should say, 'We know there are harms, and until we know the benefits, let's hold off,' " said Joseph Ross, a professor of medicine and public health at Yale University, who added that the original authorization may have been warranted but new evidence has emerged about the drug's risks.

"I'm surprised it hasn't been revoked yet," said Luciana Borio, who served as director for medical and biodefense preparedness of the National Security Council and was acting chief scientist at the FDA.
...
Yogen Kanthi, assistant professor in the division of cardiovascular medicine at the University of Michigan, said that it has been clear that the combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin -- used to treat bacterial infections -- could lead to cardiac arrhythmias, which cause the heart to beat irregularly or too fast or slow. Many patients hospitalized for covid-19 had underlying cardiovascular disease that put them at higher risk for arrhythmias, "so it shouldn't be surprising we saw an increase in death," he said.
AD

"The question has been answered that if you have the infection and it's significant enough to be in the hospital, the drug doesn't seem to do anything for you," he said. "It may be the horse is out of the barn."

Many hospitals have stopped using the drug outside of clinical trials.

"We no longer are keeping large quantities and have returned most of it," said Nishaminy Kasbekar, director of pharmacy for the Penn Presbyterian Medical Center in Philadelphia. "I think they should revoke the EUA because clearly based on the data it is no longer considered a treatment for covid."
...
A study of Veterans Affairs patients hospitalized with the coronavirus found no benefit and higher death rates among those taking hydroxychloroquine, researchers said last month.

More than 27 percent of patients treated with hydroxychloroquine died, and 22 percent of those treated with the combination therapy died, compared with an 11.4 percent death rate in those not treated with the drugs, the study said.


fairleft , May 16 2020 13:13 utc | 82

Posted by: b | May 16 2020 9:39 utc | 61

This is what I thought, you've been damaged by Trump Derangent Syndrome (TDS), so you insult with a childish phrase like "Trump's wonder medicine." You actually erased a medical doctor's respectful and evidence-laden disagreement with your 'line'. In any case, I'm not participating in the childish Trump/antiTrump, pro-hydroxychloroquine/anti-hydroxychloroquine, pro-lockdown/anti-lockdown discourse. The evidence is split on all of these issues. You cite your evidence, those who disagree with you cite theirs. Believe it or not, neither side in the disagreement are demons.

I don't have a strong opinion on Hydroxychloroquine, but it's just that it had been widely and uncontroversially used in China from early on in the fight against Covid-19. Then, after Trump mentioned it positively, it became controversial. A classic TDS timeline doesn't mean anything factually, but it naturally raises a rational person's skepticism about the extremely negative claims suddenly appearing in places like the Washington Post and other classic TDS places. I'm not expert enough to weigh the evidence, and neither are you, b, but even a brief internet search shows China-produced scientific studies of Hydroxychloroquine showing positive results:

Efficacy of hydroxychloroquine in patients with COVID-19: results of a randomized clinical trial
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.22.20040758v3

"But for TTCR, the body temperature recovery time and the cough remission time were significantly shortened in the HCQ treatment group. Besides, a larger proportion of patients with improved pneumonia in the HCQ treatment group (80.6%, 25 of 31) compared with the control group (54.8%, 17 of 31)."

Chinese study finds hydroxychloroquine useful in controlling Covid mortality

"The mortality rate in the HCQ group stood at 18.8 percent against 43.5 percent in the non-HCQ group, the study noted.

"'Hydroxychloroquine treatment is significantly associated with a decreased mortality in critically-ill Covid-19 patients,' the researchers wrote. ...

"The Chinese researchers, however, also suggest that despite their findings, the randomized double-blind-control study was needed to provide stronger evidence."

So there is evidence on both sides, as contributors more expert than you or me have told you repeatedly. Non-experts don't know who's right, or if this disagreement will reach some nuanced "you're both partly right" conclusion. I will humbly continue to be open to both sides of the argument. Get well soon from TDS, b.

BM , May 16 2020 13:59 utc | 91
WaPo: Drug promoted by Trump as coronavirus 'game changer' increasingly linked to deaths
Posted by: b | May 16 2020 9:39 utc | 61

b,
do you have any conception of the lobbying methods used by Big Pharma?
Do you have any conception of the financial clout they have available for protecting their interests?
Do you have any conceptions of the influence they have, of the revolving doors between Big Pharma, pharmaceutical regulatory bodies, medical schools and every single level of the medical industry?
Do you have any conception of the way pharmaceutical registration works, and of the corrupt and fraudulent practices used to obtain authorisation for drugs?

It is one gigantic spaghetti pot of corruption and deception. Boeing/FAA is miniscule and almost angelic by comparison (and far less deadly also).


Coincidentally I have direct first-hand experience of both sides of the activities of Big Pharma concerning one specific highly effective cancer drug that the world's biggest Pharma corporations have tried for the last 40 years to eradicate (finally almost successful by 2014, unfortunately). I have direct first-hand experience of the highest praise they share amongst their own top elites of the efficacy of that competitor's medicine against all known types of cancer. I also have close 2nd hand inside knowledge of their efforts to purchase the patents for that same medicine for vast sums of money. I also personally know the proprietor and developer of that same medicine, and have witnessed and experienced first hand some of the fraudulent and criminal methods Big Pharma have used non-stop for 40 years to try to force my friend out of business, together with the lies and deception they have used publicly falsely alleging its "danger" and "inefficacy", together even with using police to illegally force parents to stop using it for their seriously ill children who had already dramatically benefited from its use, and forcing doctors to stop using it for treatment. I also have extensive 2nd hand knowledge of their activities to that effect, and have good reason to believe they are true. I have also used that medicine myself, to great effect, and closely know a medical practice which has used it with considerable medical success, and of the coercion they also experienced not to use it.

The way the Western medical establishment has handled the question of the use of chloroquine and closely related drugs for Covid-19 is in every single respect and at every level 100% typical of Big Pharma disinformation projects .

The very fact that the US medical establishment approved use of hydroxychloroquine under specific conditions that ensure it is used exclusively at a very late stage after the virus has ceased to replicate guarantees that all or almost all major Western hydroxychloroquine trials will be negative - because it is a specific and known requirement of hydroxychloroquine therapy that the therapy is conducted early whilst the virus is stil replicating - later it is known to be useless. The approval of its use under such conditions is the specific result of Big Pharma influence . That is how they operate all the time.

Big Pharma is no more honest about either the safety or the efficacity of its products than are the White Helmets about their activities in Syria. Many of the most dangerous drugs sold by the biggest companies are approved on the basis of very small, improperly balanced trials, sometimes fraudulently conducted. Trials which give the wrong result are routinely hidden. Research on toxicity and dangerous side-effects are routinely inadequate, frequently fraudulent or knowingly misleading, and legal requirements for drug authorisations are frequently waived on the basis of influence campaigns. This is especially so for new chemotherapy drugs, which are intrinsically highly toxic and are normally used at very close to the fatal dose. There is no level playing field at all, quite the contrary.

Big Pharma do not profit from cures - they profit from selling very expensive drugs, and they are far more ruthless than the White Helmets in destroying any potential threat to their profits. There is no more effective threat to the World-View of Big Pharma - as I know from first hand experience - than effective cures, especially where they are cheap and unpatentable, or the patents are owned outside the cabal. Any such cure must be destroyed at all costs.

Several of the Big Pharma companies in recent years have been given multi-billion dollar fines for the fraud and subversion they have utilised in obtaining authorisation for drugs which are dangerous to the patient, and for their marketing of drugs known to be dangerous.

The patent for chloroquine and its derivatives has expired. It has been widely used for many years, its hazards and limitations are thoroughly documented, and it is in this respect - under proper supervision with respect to its known hazards and limitations and qualified by them - incomparably safer than any new and barely tested pharmaceutical drug or vaccine such as Remdesivir. It is cheaply produced around the world. Therefore, no full-scale well-controlled randomised clinical trial of hydroxychloroquine treatment for Covid-19 will ever be conducted in a major Western country. Big Pharma will ensure that.

Blue Dotterel , May 16 2020 14:17 utc | 94
Turkey uses Chloroquine as well
"Koca explained that unlike the other countries, in Turkey doctors do not advise people with symptoms such as fever, store throat and coughing to take antipyretics and stay at home, but invite them to hospital and immediately start treatment by administering chloroquine to the people in suspicious cases without waiting for the results from the test results.

Another difference between the methods Turkey and other countries use is that in addition to chloroquine, an antibiotic, called azithromycin, is used in the early stages of the treatment, Koca noted."
https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkish-model-proves-effective-in-covid-19-treatment-154220

So one has to wonder

Blue Dotterel , May 16 2020 14:17 utc | 94
Turkey uses Chloroquine as well
"Koca explained that unlike the other countries, in Turkey doctors do not advise people with symptoms such as fever, store throat and coughing to take antipyretics and stay at home, but invite them to hospital and immediately start treatment by administering chloroquine to the people in suspicious cases without waiting for the results from the test results.

Another difference between the methods Turkey and other countries use is that in addition to chloroquine, an antibiotic, called azithromycin, is used in the early stages of the treatment, Koca noted."
https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkish-model-proves-effective-in-covid-19-treatment-154220

So one has to wonder

Hoarsewhisperer , May 16 2020 14:46 utc | 98
...
The very fact that the US medical establishment approved use of hydroxychloroquine under specific conditions that ensure it is used exclusively at a very late stage after the virus has ceased to replicate guarantees that all or almost all major Western hydroxychloroquine trials will be negative-
...
Posted by: BM | May 16 2020 13:59 utc | 91

I'm calling bullshit on that claim.
Whoever made it is an ignoramus with no knowledge, or understanding, of what Clinical Trials involve, how many variables have to be tested, nor why it takes so long for such trials to reach a 'safe' set of recommendations. If ever...

Trailer Trash , May 16 2020 15:36 utc | 105
>I'm calling bullshit on that claim.

Unfortunately the poster doesn't state what is wrong with the claim. Assertions that another poster is ignorant are not relevant. Neither are appeals to authority.

BM , May 16 2020 16:24 utc | 112
One does have to wonder whether it is simply a matter that the difficulty in the US concerning early diagnosis is the real problem that makes use of the drug impractical here. Perhaps we just don't have the resources, teams of testers and physicians and nurses, for the accuracy and careful monitoring of patients in early stage infection required when using this drug.
Posted by: juliania | May 16 2020 15:17 utc | 103

I'm afraid it's not anything to do with early diagnosis, it is only about profit. As Blue Dotterel said, it is about profit, not curing patients. For Big Pharma the very last thing they want is for the patient to be cured - a dead patient is far more profitable. No wonder Gilead holds the more promising GS-441524 off the market, because they can make more profit from a more expensive useless drug that will be in patent for far longer.

Big Pharma expects to make many trillions of dollars profit per year on Covid-19, as they do on cancer. The more Covid cases, the more profits. The less effective the efforts to reduce infections, the more profits. The less availability of PPE, the more profits. The more chaotic and irrational the government policies, the more profit. Big Pharma profits at every step.

They will stop at nothing to block proper trials of hydroxychloroquine - including bribery, coercion, and sabotage, not just massive disinformation. They will spend billions just to block
proper trials, using myriad different methods of subterfuge and subversion. That is just small change compared to the profits they want and expect.

The entire philosophy of Western medicine is a dying patient - it is corrupt, it is dishonest, its entire foundations are fraudulent. There is an urgent need for a whole new paradigm for medicine that is based on maximising the health of society, not on maximising profit.

There is a story I heard on television several decades ago - I think it was true, but I am not certain - about an old Chinese tradition. Villagers would pay a regular monthly fee to the doctor, as long as they stay healthy. As soon as they fall sick they stop paying, and the doctor has to cure them (without charge). Only when they get better will they resume the normal regular payments. Think about it, what is the best interest of the doctor towards his patient? He has an investment in their good health. Now compare the Western system. What interest does the doctor have in the patient's health? If the patient is sick for 4 times as long and then dies, is the doctor richer or poorer? If the doctor gives drugs with side effects, which need more drugs against the side effects, will he be richer or poorer? If there are two drugs available, one cheap, one expensive, which one does the doctor prefer?

Think about it Juliana, the last time you went to a hospital, how much did it cost? How many useless medicines did the doctor give you, versus how many basic essential medicines?

Western medicine is a big scam. It is a business. The second biggest business in the world after war.

That is why I reject Western medicine. For 20 years I have used only non-Western medicine.

[May 16, 2020] Remdesivir is a drug looking for a disease

May 16, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

abierno , May 15 2020 19:34 utc | 10

Deep thanks for the comment on Remdesivir. I've seen this appraisal in the medical community but not in any public commentary. It was developed to address Ebola and failed miserably. Tagged "a drug looking for a disease."

[May 15, 2020] The games cats play: a cat which went out of the house and met a cat already infected with Covid-19 comes back home and infects its own human servant

May 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

oldhippie , May 15 2020 22:32 utc | 27

The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM)has a correspondence about cats:

Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 in Domestic Cats

Cats can get infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus and do replicate it strongly in their respiratory system. But the cats do not get sick and show no symptoms. During the study three infected cats were each put into the same cage as a not-infected cat. They transmitted the disease to the previously non-infected ones. The researchers tested if the viruses the cats produce are still able to grow on human tissues. Unfortunately they are.

This means that a cat which went out of the house and met a cat who's owner has Covid-19 might come back home and infect its own human servant. Household cats may also play a role in the infection chain between household members. Any cat owner who goes into lockdown or is quarantined at home must also quarantine the cat. So far COVID lives in cats, Siberian tigers, bats, pangolins, raccoon dogs, ferrets. Only commonality here is they are all mammals. There have been a couple reports that it lives in dogs as well. If conclusions can be drawn from this it would seem to be a simple and indiscriminate virus. And we must mask our dogs, mask our cats, make them wear diapers if they go outside.

[May 15, 2020] French researchers High temperatures ineffective against coronavirus TheHill

May 15, 2020 | thehill.com

The novel coronavirus can survive in high temperatures, researchers said, casting doubt on suggestions that the threat will subside in the summer.

Researchers from the University of Aix-Marseille in France, led by Remi Charrel and Boris Pastorino, found that the virus survived in 140-degree Fahrenheit temperatures typically used to disinfect research labs, The Jerusalem Post reported .

It took 15 minutes of exposure to 197.6-degree temperatures to kill the virus, the newspaper noted, adding that the study had yet to be peer-reviewed.

Researchers did say the lower temperature should be sufficient to deactivate the virus in samples with smaller loads but added that the higher temperature was necessary for larger loads and concluded that disinfecting chemicals were a better option.

Earlier research has reached similar conclusions.

A National Academies of Sciences (NAS) panel told the White House in early April that previous research suggesting a connection between temperature and the virus's transmissibility was flawed. "There is some evidence to suggest that [the coronavirus] may transmit less efficiently in environments with higher ambient temperature and humidity; however, given the lack of host immunity globally, this reduction in transmission efficiency may not lead to a significant reduction in disease spread" without efforts such as social distancing, the NAS report stated, noting that SARS and MERS are not seasonal.

[May 15, 2020] Uncovering Why the COVID-19 Virus Is So Infectious and Efficiently Evades Immune Responses

May 15, 2020 | scitechdaily.com

SARS-CoV-2 , the virus that causes COVID-19 , is highly infectious. Curiously, in many patients, it triggers poor immune responses, which prolongs illness. This helps the virus spread widely, exacerbating the global pandemic. In a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , researchers at the University of Minnesota identified the biochemical mechanism that may explain how the virus infects people efficiently while evading their immune responses.

This study, led by Fang Li, a professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine, examined the mechanism by which SARS-CoV-2 enters cells. Specifically, the team of scientists investigated how the virus "unlocks" human cells using a surface spike protein as the "key." They made three important findings:

"Typically when a virus develops mechanisms to evade immune responses, it loses its potency to infect people," said Li. "However, SARS-CoV-2 maintains its infectivity using two mechanisms. First, during its limited exposure time, the tip of the viral key grabs a receptor protein on human cells quickly and firmly. Second, the pre-activation of the viral key allows the virus to more effectively infect human cells."

Li says that recognizing the evasiveness of SARS-CoV-2 is important for designing antibody drugs and vaccines. Antibody drugs would need to overpower the tip of the hidden viral key by latching onto it very quickly and tightly during its limited exposure time. Alternatively, drugs can target other parts of the viral key that are more exposed.

Li recommends that successful antiviral strategies will need to consider both the potency of the virus and its evasiveness.

Reference: "Cell entry mechanisms of SARS-CoV-2" by Jian Shang, Yushun Wan, Chuming Luo, Gang Ye, Qibin Geng, Ashley Auerbach and Fang Li, 6 May 2020, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2003138117

The study is coauthored by postdoctoral researchers Jian Shang, Yushun Wan, and Chuming Luo, graduate students Gang Ye and Qibin Geng, and junior scientist Ashley Auerbach. The National Institutes of Health funded the study.

[May 15, 2020] Dirty games of big pharma

Notable quotes:
"... I've seen this appraisal in the medical community but not in any public commentary. It was developed to address Ebola and failed miserably. Tagged "a drug looking for a disease." ..."
May 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Stonebird , May 15 2020 20:46 utc | 14

The remdesivir drug by the company Gilead gets hyped as a potential useful drug against the Covid-19 disease. This even after a serious study from China published in Lancet found it useless:

Remdesivir in adults with severe COVID-19: a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, multicentre trial

The result:

In this study of adult patients admitted to hospital for severe COVID-19, remdesivir was not associated with statistically significant clinical benefits.

A not completed Adaptive COVID-19 Treatment Trial (ACTT) by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases also found that remdesivir does not change the mortality of serious Covid-19 cases. But it found that the drug may lead to a faster recovery. That has led to run on the hard to produce drug and confusion about its distribution .

But the real scandal behind this is that Gilead has a second drug, GS-441524, that is more promising and much easier to produce. STAT published a strong call on Gilead to release it immediately:

Gilead should ditch remdesivir and focus on its simpler and safer ancestor

The authors have the suspicion that Gilead has an ignoble motive for holding back the better drug as its patent will run out sooner:

The attractive profile of GS-441524 from both manufacturing and clinical perspectives raises this question: Why hasn't Gilead opted to advance this compound to the clinic? We would be remiss for not mentioning patents, and thus profits. The first patent on GS-441524 was issued in 2009, while the first patent for remdesivir was issued in 2017.
...
Given GS-441524's optimal properties, we -- along with the millions of people awaiting an effective treatment for Covid-19 -- are left to wonder why Gilead isn't giving it the same attention it is giving remdesivir. The world can only hope it isn't for the sake of protecting its intellectual property.
Surely it is profit that Gilead is after? I have heard quoted that one dose of remdesivir is about $1'000 so a "full" cure (whatever that may be) is $30'000. The second drug is almost certainly much cheaper.

They may think about reducing the cost if they find it is being given to the cat.

abierno , May 15 2020 19:34 utc | 11

Deep thanks for the comment on Remdesivir. I've seen this appraisal in the medical community but not in any public commentary. It was developed to address Ebola and failed miserably. Tagged "a drug looking for a disease."

[May 15, 2020] I don't think we should coerce people to go back to work. But once people are given accurate information and this hysteria calms down, people will just go back to their lives as normal. No coercion will be needed.

May 15, 2020 | crookedtimber.org

Anthony T 05.11.20 at 11:53 am 1 ( 1 )

Hello Chris,

I certainly don't think that people should be coerced back to work if they don't want to, though I do think we need to end these lockdowns as soon as possible. What we need is more clear public messaging, from the government: making it clear to people that this disease isn't actually that dangerous and that unless they are in an at risk group they really have very little to be concerned about. Cards should be sent out with green, red, amber marking where people can fill it out with their BMI, their underlying health conditions, chronic diseases etc. and this will give them a picture for whether or not they and their household is actually at risk.

People are talking about this disease like its the black death; as though it threatens everyone and kills indiscriminately. This way of talking has created a completely unfounded mass hysteria in the population. We are talking about a disease which has a case fatality rate of 0.3% (according to the most detailed serological studies, such as the one carried out in Gangelt) so it's a little more deadly than the flu. Of course, it will be a significant killer for the next couple of years – but so is influenza, and nobody panics like this and announces crackers lockdowns during a bad flu season.

Part of the problem has been the medias failure to adequately contextualise the data they are presenting, so people just hear a large number of deaths and don't know what to make of that number. Reporters need to be more clear about the fact that 800,000 people die every year in the UK and that deviations of 5% on either side of this are not uncommon. We need to be reminded that at 43,000 the number of excess deaths in the UK is about the same as the number of excess deaths during the 2014/15 flu season – and still falls short of the number of excess deaths during the 2017/18 flu season (excess deaths then were around 50,000). That context allows people to make sense of the data they read about without panicking – how scared were you of going to work during the 17/18 flu season? Most people probably didn't even notice.

The other problem is that the government has completely failed to give a serious explanation for the lockdown to the public. They are spouting rubbish about "save lives" without actually explaining why the lockdown would "save lives". As a result the public have been given the wrong impression that just extending the lockdown on and on will save lives. This is nonsense. Eventually the lockdown will be lifted and then the same people who would have died before would die a bit later – so no lives would be saved apart from for a few months. There are two explanations that could have been given for why we were implementing the lockdown. Firstly, it could be to ensure that hospitals don't get overfilled as happened in Wuhan and Northern Italy. If that was the aim, then a short lockdown (or a local lockdown in London and some of the other cities with severe outbreaks) would have been sufficient. It has been clear for at least the last three weeks that the government has overestimated ICU needs, most hospitals around the country – including the Nightingale in London – are completely empty. There are no more concerns about shortages of ventilators as it is now clear they are not actually a good way to treat most cases. If there is another severe outbreak in another city in the UK we can always just announce a small local lockdown of that city. Secondly, it could be argued that lockdowns save lives because they give us time to build up a testing capactiy so we can trace down cases and stop really severe outbreaks from happening; but at 500,000 or so tests per week the UK is now testing a lot of people and has the capacity to test even more. Apart from that I can't really think of any other reason why a lockdown would "save lives".

So, no I don't think we should coerce people to go back to work. But once people are given accurate information and this hysteria calms down, people will just go back to their lives as normal. No coercion will be needed.

[May 14, 2020] About the distinction "of COVID-19" and "with COVID-19"

May 14, 2020 | crookedtimber.org

Hidari 05.06.20 at 4:22 pm 9 ( 9 )

@8

The distinction between 'with' and 'of' is self-evident bullshit, if you just think about HIV and how it acts and what it does.

You just need to think it through: how could you possibly tell the difference?

Lots of semi-educated, semi-smart people are drawing this tenuous distinction vis a vis Covid-19 that they would not dare to do with any other disease ('Oh no the real cause of his illness was Kaposi sarcoma. It just happened to be an unfortunate coincidence that the patient was HIV positive as well'.)

In any case, there was an actuary in a twitter thread I have now lost the addy for, who pointed out that actuaries make decisions about this 'distinction' all the time, it is literally their job. And the reality is that even for very old Covid-19 sufferers who die, they are still losing a non-trivial number of years in terms of their lifespan, maybe up to 8 or 9 years.

hix 05.06.20 at 5:20 pm ( 10 )
Just look at excess death rates – they are at least as bad as the covid numbers, there is no overcounting whatsoever going on in the UK. What is going on is very slow reporting of non hospital covid death.
Anarcissie 05.06.20 at 5:37 pm ( 11 )
@4 -- or more directly, https://existentialcomics.com/comic/259
Jim Harrison 05.06.20 at 5:51 pm ( 12 )
Just for the record, has the Department of Public Health ever taken the lead or even participated significantly in the establishment of a despotic regime? First they told us to eat more broccoli; and next thing you know, they're telling us we're going to be deloused.
Alex 05.06.20 at 11:17 pm ( 13 )
@Quentin The "dying with, not of" is pretty much moot given that all-cause mortality in England and Wales is twice normal. The Financial Times has a write up, but there's no way to explain that away as mislabeling existing deaths. There's a lot of people who live 50 years or more with high blood pressure or diabetes. They didn't just all die this month for no reason.
Moz in Oz 05.07.20 at 12:04 am ( 14 )

The UK is generous with its death figures

But it does not test all deaths and only counts those who had a positive test result. I've seen more complaints about likely undercounting than overcounting.

Vahid Friedrich 05.07.20 at 12:41 am ( 15 )
Here is a great example of the freedom to work. https://www.10tv.com/article/reopened-restaurant-told-workers-dont-wear-face-masks-or-dont-work-2020-may
Collin Street 05.07.20 at 2:13 am ( 16 )
The UK is generous with its death figures: it counts those who die with Coronavirus, not those who die of it. That's a nice but important distinction.

Not many car accidents in the respiratory ER, I thought.

The distinction between "with" and "of" matters very much for chronic conditions. A lot of cancers are extremely slow-growing, for example; a 90-yo with early stage prostate cancer is statistically likely to die of something fast-acting -- a car accident, a lung infection -- years before the prostate cancer becomes a problem. The thing-that-kills-you has to be faster-acting than the thing-that-will-kill-you-if-you-live-long-enough. But COVID-19 is an acute condition, actually pretty fast-acting: there's not a huge lot that kills you faster than a lung infection. Major trauma? Septicemia, dehydration? If you're working at a meatworks and you have COVID-19 and you get decapitated, that's "with not of", but that looks to me like we're talking about tiny numbers, and you've just claimed that that's an important distinction.

I don't think that that distinction is important. It's potentially non-zero, a source of error that might potentially be significant but on the face of it that potential is so small as to be ludicrous rather than important. You think otherwise, strongly enough to bother to write a comment: please, explain to me what lead you to think that. Show me I'm wrong.

hix 05.07.20 at 9:18 am ( 17 )
Regarding over/undercounting in general. There are just no standardiced rules for counting. Every nation, sometimes every region does it´s own thing, with a wild mix of aspects that under and overcount, or just delay reporting of some death. Overall overcounting (compared to excess death rates, there is no objective rule whom to count anyway) seems to be very rare, maybe Belgium?
Here is a nice graphic tool with weekly excess mortality data, they sure look particular ugly in the UK:
https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps#excess-mortality
bianca steele 05.07.20 at 1:36 pm ( 18 )
If the infection rate in big cities and institutions is as high as some studies have suggested (1/3 by some reports), counting "deaths by Covid-19" as "presumed deaths" + "positive tests at death" will obviously be inaccurate. There are other reasons to count asymptomatic infections.

If people like the form of argument "basically P, but it's more complicated than that, for reason A, and B, and I think that's enough reasons, may as well just assert that P," I guess I'm not going to stop them. Maybe they're right and I'm wrong. It's not like anyone's willing to pay me to do it my way.

Collin Street 05.07.20 at 2:40 pm ( 19 )
If the infection rate in big cities and institutions is as high as some studies have suggested (1/3 by some reports), counting "deaths by Covid-19" as "presumed deaths" + "positive tests at death" will obviously be inaccurate

I am forced to admit that I was approaching this problem with the perspective of the situation we have in australia, where the disease is still very rare.

[which is to say much of what I said and implied is wrong, for which I apologise.]

[May 14, 2020] What you *deliberately* have ignored and continue to ignore is the number of people who *are* at risk from re-opening the economy too soon.

May 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 14 2020 2:26 utc | 254

Posted by: fairleft | May 14 2020 0:35 utc | 253 So because you didn't read the word "healthy" in my description of the truth about Covid-19 (which I note you do not deny), you've stupidly decided I'm a troll.

No, you've been pushing this "only the elderly are at risk" *crap* since forever. *Of course* healthy people are at limited risk. That's been known since almost day one from China. As soon as the first statistics came out, we knew that *most* people don't die from it.

What you *deliberately* have ignored and continue to ignore is the number of people who *are* at risk from re-opening the economy too soon. I have cited the *millions* of people who are at risk several times in these threads. The numbers aren't hard to find. And every expert who has written about risk factors since the first statistics came out have pointed that out.

But it doesn't fit your agenda, so you ignore it.

"And I'm not writing about Amerikkka moron."

Nice try. You were referring to the Galbraith piece in the top post which is explicitly referring to the US. Moron.

Typical troll behavior. Deflect, deny, make counter accusations, continually re-assert the same positions no matter how many times they are debunked.

Why b hasn't kicked your ass to the curb is beyond me. Few people here are posting more nonsense than you - and you have even less actual evidence.

[May 14, 2020] Stephan Kohn (who was fired immediately of course) assesses the German reaction as "Fehlalarm" (false alarm), claims that the lockdown has charged/will charge many more deaths than the virus itself. It was a grotesque overreaction, not only in Germany, but in many other countries.

May 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

mk , May 13 2020 19:40 utc | 241

In Germany a huge scandal is growing. I'm surprised that this didn't emerge here yet (as far as I can see).

An official in the Ministry for Interior has blown the whistle. After trying to forward a study about the effect of the lockdown measures to his superiors, including Minister for Interior Horst Seehofer, and being ignored, he leaked the study to a non-mainstream online magazine. The study has reached the mainstream meanwhile.

Stephan Kohn (who was fired immediately of course) assesses the German reaction as "Fehlalarm" (false alarm), claims that the lockdown has charged/will charge many more deaths than the virus itself. It was a grotesque overreaction, not only in Germany, but in many other countries.

I will just take one point, which the majority here, AFAICS, has never taken into account: collateral damage. In Germany, in March/April 2020, 90% of important, in part life-saving operations have not been conducted because the beds were reserved for the expected giant Corona wave that didn't arrive. This means between 1,5 Million and 2,5 Million people are affected, and it is only a matter of statistics how many lives have been lost or shortened due to the delayed operations. Cohn estimates between 5000 and 125000 premature deaths which easily outweigh the 7000 Corona deaths.

And this is just one point.

Like so many virologists, he says Corona is not worse than a strong flu.

Here's the document:

https://ichbinanderermeinung.de/Dokument93.pdf

[May 14, 2020] The virus may mostly kill older people - but it's because of the co-morbidities which almost *half* of US adults suffer from it his most age groups

May 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 13 2020 9:14 utc | 216

Here's Who's Dying From Covid-19 in the United States
Data and new research reveal all age groups are at risk, from children to middle age and beyond
https://tinyurl.com/y8ch67qk
"We estimated that 45.4% of U.S. adults are at increased risk for complications from coronavirus disease because of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, respiratory disease, hypertension, or cancer," according to a new analysis from the CDC. Those at elevated risk include 19.8% of people age 18 to 29 and 80.7% for people over age 80.

As I've pointed out before, the virus may mostly kill older people - but it's because of the co-morbidities which almost *half* of US adults suffer from. More than 25 million Americans have asthma. This is 7.7 percent of adults and 8.4 percent of children. Currently, there are about 6.2 million children under the age of 18 with asthma. Granted, most of them probably never will get this virus - but those who do...


Separately, a new study of children with Covid-19 admitted to pediatric intensive care units in the United States and Canada concludes that while the overall severity of symptoms in the children was "far less than that documented in adults Covid-19 can result in a significant disease burden in children." According to the research, published in JAMA Pediatrics, 40 of the 48 children, ranging in age from four to 16, had underlying medical conditions. Two of them died, and three remain on ventilators. /BLOCKQUOTE> Assuming the three on ventilators die, that's five out of 48 - ten percent.

So much for the "we can let the old people die" meme. No one wants to claim a willingness to let kids die to re-open the economy.

[May 14, 2020] Interesting *opinion* piece supporting HCQ over remdesivir.

May 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 13 2020 6:29 utc | 213

Interesting *opinion* piece supporting HCQ over remdesivir. I take no position on this argument - unlike many here - except that as I've said before, we need a *good* set of studies on both (and every other treatment, which includes the EVMS treatment I discuss above) and then a decent review study to interpret the results for us laymen. Perhaps that's another case of "good luck with that" any time before, say, five or ten years from now...

A Tale of Two Drugs: Money vs. Medical Wisdom
https://tinyurl.com/yadpyktu


Richard Steven Hack , May 13 2020 6:39 utc | 214

Ah, the same doctor referenced above as author of the "A Tale of Two Drugs" has another *opinion* article on the same topic - HCQ. Again, I have no idea whether her statements are factual, although presumably her quoting the CDC on HCQ is accurate, which in itself is interesting if true.

Doctors and Patients Are Pawns in a Dangerous Political Brinkmanship
https://tinyurl.com/ycpxcjry


On duration of use: "CDC has no limits on the use of hydroxychloroquine for the prevention of malaria. When hydroxychloroquine is used at higher doses for many years, a rare eye condition called retinopathy has occurred. People who take hydroxychloroquine for more than five years should get regular eye exams."

NOTE: CDC guidelines for use in malaria do not even mention the "fatal heart arrhythmia" hyped in the fear-mongering articles in the media. Rheumatology guidelines for HCQ in lupus and rheumatoid arthritis (RA) do not require a baseline EKG to check heart rhythm, although doctors might order one before prescribing HCQ if needed for a patient with heart disease. SARS-CoV-2 itself, which can damage to the heart, may be responsible for some heart problems now blamed on HCQ.

Hausmeister , May 13 2020 13:35 utc | 223
@ b
Did you read what you linked here?
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2012410?query=featured_home

„Conclusions

In this observational study involving patients with Covid-19 who had been admitted to the hospital, hydroxychloroquine administration was not associated with either a greatly lowered or an increased risk of the composite end point of intubation or death. Randomized, controlled trials of hydroxychloroquine in patients with Covid-19 are needed. (Funded by the National Institutes of Health.)"

According to what we learnt in the meantime the use of HCQ at a quite late stadium of this illness is as meaningless as most likely the use of Remdisivir (another kind of pure antiviral medicament) would have been. The only thing what one can learn from this study isthat HCQ apparently did not damage people. So your sentence „...to be as false as the promotion of the useless but potentially dangerous Hydroxychloroquine as a therapy for Covid-19." is just nonsense.

[May 14, 2020] UCSF Health Hospital Epidemiology and Infection Prevention COVID-19 Global Clinical Knowledge Base

May 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , May 13 2020 6:13 utc | 212

People might find this resource useful...

UCSF Health Hospital Epidemiology and Infection Prevention COVID-19 Global Clinical Knowledge Base
https://tinyurl.com/y9qu3qs6


The goal of this site is to compile a comprehensive but curated directory of publicly-available practice guidelines, clinical protocols, and other resources related to COVID-19. We hope this resource will encourage clinicians and medical organizations to share knowledge and compare practices with peers.

Submitted resources are reviewed by a team of medical professionals for accuracy and relevance. We do not specifically endorse any resource posted on this site.

[May 13, 2020] Prager The Worldwide Lockdown May Be The Greatest Policy Mistake In History

Notable quotes:
"... The forcible prevention of Americans from doing anything except what politicians deem "essential" has led to the worst economy in American history since the Great Depression of the 1930s. It is panic and hysteria, not the coronavirus , that created this catastrophe. And the consequences in much of the world will be more horrible than in America. ..."
"... That would be enough to characterize the worldwide lockdown as a deathly error. But there is much more. If global GDP declines by 5%, another 147 million people could be plunged into extreme poverty, according to the International Food Policy Research Institute. ..."
"... Foreign Policy magazine reports that, according to the International Monetary Fund, the global economy will shrink by 3% in 2020, marking the biggest downturn since the Great Depression, and the U.S., the eurozone and Japan will contract by 5.9%, 7.5% and 5.2%, respectively. Meanwhile, across South Asia, as of a month ago, tens of millions were already "struggling to put food on the table." Again, all because of the lockdowns, not the virus. ..."
May 13, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Prager: The Worldwide Lockdown May Be The Greatest Policy Mistake In History by Tyler Durden Wed, 05/13/2020 - 13:15 Authored by Dennis Prager via PJMedia.com,

The idea that the worldwide lockdown of virtually every country other than Sweden may have been an enormous mistake strikes many - including world leaders; most scientists, especially health officials, doctors and epidemiologists; those who work in major news media; opinion writers in those media; and the hundreds of millions, if not billions, of people who put their faith in these people - as so preposterous as to be immoral.

Timothy Egan of The New York Times described Republicans who wish to enable their states to open up as "the party of death."

That's the way it is today on planet Earth, where deceit, cowardice and immaturity now dominate almost all societies because the elites are deceitful, cowardly and immature.

But for those open to reading thoughts they may differ with, here is the case for why the worldwide lockdown is not only a mistake but also, possibly, the worst mistake the world has ever made. And for those intellectually challenged by the English language and/or logic, "mistake" and "evil" are not synonyms. The lockdown is a mistake; the Holocaust, slavery, communism, fascism, etc., were evils. Massive mistakes are made by arrogant fools; massive evils are committed by evil people.

The forcible prevention of Americans from doing anything except what politicians deem "essential" has led to the worst economy in American history since the Great Depression of the 1930s. It is panic and hysteria, not the coronavirus , that created this catastrophe. And the consequences in much of the world will be more horrible than in America.

The United Nations World Food Programme, or the WFP, states that by the end of the year, more than 260 million people will face starvation -- double last year's figures. According to WFP director David Beasley on April 21:

"We could be looking at famine in about three dozen countries...

There is also a real danger that more people could potentially die from the economic impact of COVID-19 than from the virus itself " (italics added).

That would be enough to characterize the worldwide lockdown as a deathly error. But there is much more. If global GDP declines by 5%, another 147 million people could be plunged into extreme poverty, according to the International Food Policy Research Institute.

Foreign Policy magazine reports that, according to the International Monetary Fund, the global economy will shrink by 3% in 2020, marking the biggest downturn since the Great Depression, and the U.S., the eurozone and Japan will contract by 5.9%, 7.5% and 5.2%, respectively. Meanwhile, across South Asia, as of a month ago, tens of millions were already "struggling to put food on the table." Again, all because of the lockdowns, not the virus.

In one particularly incomprehensible act, the government of India, a poor country of 1.3 billion people, locked down its people. As Quartz India reported on April 22, "Coronavirus has killed only around 700 Indians a small number still compared to the 450,000 TB and 10,000-odd malaria deaths recorded every year."

One of the thousands of unpaid garment workers protesting the lockdown in Bangladesh understands the situation better than almost any health official in the world:

"We are starving. If we don't have food in our stomach, what's the use of observing this lockdown?"

But concern for that Bangladeshi worker among the world's elites seems nonexistent.

The lockdown is " possibly even more catastrophic (than the virus) in its outcome : the collapse of global food-supply systems and widespread human starvation" (italics added).

That was published in the left-wing The Nation, which, nevertheless, enthusiastically supports lockdowns. But the American left cares as much about the millions of non-Americans reduced to hunger and starvation because of the lockdown as it does about the people of upstate New York who have no incomes, despite the minuscule number of coronavirus deaths there. Or about the citizens of Oregon, whose governor has just announced the state will remain locked down until July 6. As of this writing, a total of 109 people have died of the coronavirus in Oregon.

An example of how disinterested the left is in worldwide suffering is made abundantly clear in a front-page "prayer" by a left-wing Christian in the current issue of The Nation: "May we who are merely inconvenienced remember those whose lives are at stake."

"Merely inconvenienced" is how the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, a Protestant minister and president of the North Carolina NAACP, describes the tens of millions of Americans rendered destitute, not to mention the hundreds of millions around the world rendered not only penniless but hungry. The truth is, like most of the elites, it is Barber who is "merely inconvenienced." Indeed, the American battle today is between the merely inconvenienced and the rest of America.

Michael Levitt, professor of structural biology at Stanford Medical School and winner of the 2013 Nobel Prize in chemistry, recently stated, "There is no doubt in my mind that when we come to look back on this, the damage done by lockdown will exceed any saving of lives by a huge factor."

To the left, anyone who questions the lockdown is driven by preference for money over lives. Typical of the left's moral shallowness is this headline on Salon this week:

"It's Time To Reject the Gods of Commerce: America Is a Society, Not an 'Economy,'" with the subhead reading, "America Is About People, Not Profit Margins."

And, of course, to smug editors and writers of The Atlantic, in article after repetitive article, the fault lies not with the lockdown but with President Donald Trump. The most popular article in The Atlantic this week is titled "The Rest of the World Is Laughing at Trump." The elites can afford to laugh at whatever they want. Meanwhile, the less fortunate -- that is, most people -- are crying.

[May 13, 2020] The Chilling Return of 'Papers Please'

May 13, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

The Chilling Return of 'Papers Please'

So-called immunity passports would bring back the worst civil liberties abuses of the past and result in a crime wave. Credit: M.Moira/Shutterstock

May 13, 2020

|

12:01 am

Bill Wirtz The coronavirus lockdown drags on, yet only a few fringe fanatics (and France, but I repeat myself) support continuing complete shutdowns of the world's economies. However, even those countries that have opted to end forced quarantines still present a range of worrying responses. One of these ongoing debates surrounds the so-called "Corona apps," with which authorities intend to track and trace the movements of their own citizens. In Poland, the government is mandating that those infected with COVID-19 install an app and use it to send a selfie on a regular basis. If they do not comply, they face a visit from the law enforcement.

The nightmarish infringements on civil liberties are set to continue with "immunity passports." The German Robert Koch Institute, along with other researchers and blood donation services, is working on a large-scale study to establish immunity in COVID-19 patients. Those found to have built immunity, either because they've already had the disease or through antibody testing, could be issued paperwork that exempts them from lockdown restrictions.

CNN's medical analyst Saju Mathew counts himself as convinced by the concept, and quotes a noted beacon of human freedom to back it up: "In China, for example, QR codes have been used to loosen restrictions in Wuhan, where the pandemic originated. People assessed to be healthy have been given a green QR code, indicating they can travel within the province."

From a law enforcement level, the existence of immunity passports would extend indefinitely the practice of questioning citizens without reasonable suspicion at any time. "Papers please" wouldn't be experienced only because one is crossing a border, but merely because one is outside. If you were worried about rogue police abusing power before, wait until stop and frisk becomes the norm all across the United States, at any time of the day.

In the United Kingdom, Professor Peter Openshaw, a member of the government's new and emerging respiratory virus threats advisory group, told The Guardian that "people granted the passports would have to be kept under close observation to ensure they were not becoming reinfected." In practice, this would amount to daily identification checkpoints and mandatory home visits. Any pretense of individual liberty and fundamental rights would go out the window.

But beyond that, on a more practical level, the measure would be inoperable. In a scientific brief published at the end of April , the World Health Organization (WHO) -- known to be warm on authoritarian measures such as those used by China -- preliminarily rejected the idea of these passports. Current antibody tests, the WHO warned, could confuse immunity with one of the six existing coronaviruses, four of which cause the common cold. The WHO also noted that such paperwork would give citizens the impression that they do not need to abide by social distancing guidelines, giving them a false sense of security. Professor Openshaw adds that immunity passports would incentivize people to try and deliberately catch coronavirus, which could end up overwhelming the health sector, exactly the scenario that the lockdowns are meant to prevent.

There's also a massive opportunity for crime under such a proposal. In 2015, 50 million travel documents were either lost or stolen. In 2014, the UK recorded a five-year high of counterfeit passport seizures. Fake passports fuel organized crime and have long been available on the black market. Immunity passports would be far more valuable, since they would grant not just the ability to go to other countries, but other basic freedoms of movement, going into shops or meeting friends. The idea that people would pay a pretty price for their freedom would be an understatement. In turn, the government could only react to such a flood of false documentation by becoming more authoritarian, casting us into yet another spiral of increasing state control.

There is no instance in which the systematic control of citizens has not ended in police abuse, or plain and simple authoritarianism. There is a genuine fear about the coronavirus. That said, we cannot allow such fear to rid us completely of our fundamental rights. States of emergency were and are designed to be temporary, and in that, to be short.

If the debate is over whether to radically overturn the Bill of Rights and human rights conventions, then let us have that debate. Let us talk about rewriting the rules, instead of just plain ignoring them.

Bill Wirtz comments on European politics and policy in English, French, and German. His work has appeared in Newsweek , the Washington Examiner , CityAM, Le Monde , Le Figaro , and Die Welt .

[May 13, 2020] 92% Of Cook County COVID-19 Victims Had Pre-Existing Condition

Notable quotes:
"... The medical examiner's database showed COVID-19 as the primary cause of death for 2,303 people. Of those, 2,112 were shown to have at least one underlying condition as a secondary cause of death. Those conditions, also known as comorbidities, included hypertension, diabetes, obesity and heart disease. There were no secondary causes reported for 191 deaths. ..."
"... For months, Illinois residents have lived in fear, a fear that has been exacerbated by a lack of transparency and open reporting from the state. ..."
May 13, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner via Wirepoints.org,

A Wirepoints analysis of COVID-19 deaths from the Cook County Medical Examiner's office reveals that 92 percent of victims from the virus had pre-existing medical conditions.

The medical examiner's database showed COVID-19 as the primary cause of death for 2,303 people. Of those, 2,112 were shown to have at least one underlying condition as a secondary cause of death. Those conditions, also known as comorbidities, included hypertension, diabetes, obesity and heart disease. There were no secondary causes reported for 191 deaths.

... ... ...

Hypertension affected 1,070 victims, or more than 46 percent of all deaths. Diabetes impacted 973 victims, or 42 percent of the total. Pulmonary disease was part of 397 deaths, or 17 percent. And 215 of those deaths, about 9 percent, were accompanied by obesity or morbid obesity.

Yet others had conditions including cancer and cardiovascular and kidney diseases. The numbers above add up to more than 100 percent because many victims had more than one pre-existing condition.

,,, ,,, ,,,

What’s stark about the Cook comorbidity data is just how few young adults die from COVID-19 in the absence of some pre-existing condition. Just 3 of the 15 deaths in the 20-29 age bracket had no comorbidities. Same goes for the 30-39 and 40-49 age brackets, where just 26 of the 132 deaths were accompanied with no underlying causes.

Even more, almost 50 percent of all Illinois deaths have been tied to long-term care facilities, the subject of an upcoming Wirepoints piece. That means nearly 1,600 deaths occurred outside the general public.

For months, Illinois residents have lived in fear, a fear that has been exacerbated by a lack of transparency and open reporting from the state.

[May 12, 2020] Deadly Medicines and Organized Crime

May 12, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , May 12 2020 23:01 utc | 186

Interesting book "Deadly Medicines and Organized Crime " published in 2013 by PETER C GØTZSCHE

He points out "Science philosopher Karl Popper in "The Open Society and Its Enemies" depicts the totalitarian, closed society as a rigidly ordered state in which freedom of expression and discussion of crucial issues are ruthlessly suppressed. Most of the time, when I have tried to publish unwelcome truths about the drug industry, I have been exposed to the journal's lawyers, and even after I have documented that everything I say is correct and have been said before by others, I have often experienced that important bits have been removed or that my paper was rejected for no other reason than fear of litigation. This is one of the reasons I decided to write this book, as I have discovered that I have much more freedom when I write books. Popper would have viewed the pharmaceutical industry as an enemy of the open society.

Rigorous science should put itself at risk of being falsified and this practice should be protected against those who try to impede scientific understanding, as when the industry intimidates those who discover harms of its drugs. Protecting the hypotheses by ad hoc modifications, such as undeclared changes to the measured outcomes or the analysis plan once the sponsor has seen the results, or by designing trials that make them immune to refutation, puts the hypotheses in the same category as pseudoscience.

In healthcare, the open democratic society has become an oligarchy of corporations whose interests serve the profit motive of the industry and shape public policy, including that of weakened regulatory agencies. Our governments have failed to regulate an industry, which has become more and more powerful and almighty, and failed to protect scientific objectivity and academic curiosity from commercial forces."

Thats about it in a nutshell. Too bad the good scientists are all muzzled. Only the politicized fraudsters get the good press.

[May 12, 2020] PHARMA: Greed, Lies, and the Poisoning of America

May 12, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

karlof1 , May 12 2020 16:01 utc | 125

Renegade Inc interview with Gerald Posner the author of PHARMA: Greed, Lies, and the Poisoning of America is lively, timely, revealing, and very informative! An excellent 25 minute investment of your time today. In the book which was written well before the COVID-19 breakout, Posner did address the issue of pandemic which this article reported on along with other aspects of PHARMA . And there's much more at his website.

[May 12, 2020] How coronavirus attacks the human body - The Washington Post

May 12, 2020 | www.washingtonpost.com

How coronavirus attacks the human body - The Washington Post It mostly spares the young. Until it doesn't: Last week, doctors warned of a rare inflammatory reaction with cardiac complications among children that may be connected to the virus. On Friday, New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo (D) announced 73 children had fallen severely ill in the state and a 5-year-old boy in New York City had become the first child to die of the syndrome. Two more children had succumbed as of Saturday.

That news has shaken many doctors, who felt they were finally grasping the full dimensions of the disease in adults. "We were all thinking this is a disease that kills old people, not kids," Reich said.

Mount Sinai has treated five children with the condition. Reich said each started with gastrointestinal symptoms, which turned into inflammatory complications that caused very low blood pressure and expanded their blood vessels. This led to heart failure in the case of the first child who died.

"The pattern of disease was different than anything else with covid," he said.

"We were all thinking this is a disease that kills old people, not kids," said David Reich, president of Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan. (Jeenah Moon/Reuters)

Of the millions, perhaps billions, of coronaviruses, six were previously known to infect humans.

Four cause colds that spread easily each winter, barely noticed. Another was responsible for the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome that killed 774 people in 2003. Yet another sparked the outbreak of Middle East respiratory syndrome in 2012, which kills 34 percent of the people who contract it. But few do.

SARS-CoV-2, the bad seed of the coronavirus family, is the seventh. It has managed to combine the infectiousness of its cold-causing cousins with some of the lethality of SARS and MERS. It can spread before people show symptoms of disease, making it difficult to control, especially without widespread and accurate testing. At the moment, social distancing is the only effective countermeasure .

It has infected 4 million people around the globe, killing more than 280,000, according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center. In the United States, 1.3 million have been infected and more than 78,000 have died.

Had SARS or MERS spread as widely as this virus, Rasmussen said, they might have shown the same capacity to attack beyond the lungs. But they were snuffed out quickly, leaving only a small sample of disease and death.

Paramedics bring home a woman with covid-19 who underwent an emergency C-section because she was gravely ill. After extensive care, including time on a ventilator, she was released from a hospital in Stamford, Conn., and she has a healthy newborn. (John Moore/Getty Images)

Trying to define a pathogen in the midst of an ever-spreading epidemic is fraught with difficulties. Experts say it will be years until it is understood how the disease damages organs and how medications, genetics, diets, lifestyles and distancing impact its course.

"This is a virus that literally did not exist in humans six months ago," said Geoffrey Barnes, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan who works in cardiovascular medicine. "We had to rapidly learn how this virus impacts the human body and identify ways to treat it literally in a time-scale of weeks. With many other diseases, we have had decades."

In the initial days of the outbreak, most efforts focused on the lungs. SARS-CoV-2 infects both the upper and lower respiratory tracts, eventually working its way deep into the lungs, filling tiny air sacs with cells and fluid that choke off the flow of oxygen.

But many scientists have come to believe that much of the disease's devastation comes from two intertwined causes.

The first is the harm the virus wreaks on blood vessels, leading to clots that can range from microscopic to sizable. Patients have suffered strokes and pulmonary emboli as clots break loose and travel to the brain and lungs. A study in the Lancet, a British medical journal, showed this may be because the virus directly targets the endothelial cells that line blood vessels.

The second is an exaggerated response from the body's own immune system, a storm of killer "cytokines" that attack the body's own cells along with the virus as it seeks to defend the body from an invader.

Research and therapies are focused on these phenomena. Blood thinners are being more widely used in some hospitals . A review of records for 2,733 patients, published Wednesday in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, indicates they may help the most seriously ill.

"Things change in science all the time. Theories are made and thrown out. Hypotheses are tweaked. It doesn't mean we don't know what we are doing. It means we are learning," said Deepak Bhatt, executive director of interventional cardiology at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

Inflammation of those endothelial cells lining blood vessels may help explain why the virus harms so many parts of the body, said Mandeep Mehra, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and one of the authors of the Lancet study on how covid-19 attacks blood vessels.

Subtitle Settings Font Font Size Font Edge Font Color Background The novel coronavirus is a master of disguise: Here's how it works Skip

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That means defeating covid-19 will require more than antiviral therapy, he said.

"What this virus does is it starts as a viral infection and becomes a more global disturbance to the immune system and blood vessels -- and what kills is exactly that," Mehra said. "Our hypothesis is that covid-19 begins as a respiratory virus and kills as a cardiovascular virus."

The thinking of kidney specialists has evolved along similar lines. Initially, they attributed widespread and severe kidney disease to the damage caused by ventilators and certain medications given to intensive-care patients, said Daniel Batlle, a professor of medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

Then they noticed damage to the waste-filtering kidney cells of patients even before they needed intensive care. And studies out of Wuhan found the pathogen in the kidneys themselves, leading to speculation the virus is harming the organ.

"There was nothing unique at first," Batlle said. But the new information "shows this is beyond the regular bread-and-butter acute kidney injury that we normally see."

Like other coronaviruses, SARS-Cov-2 infiltrates the body by attaching to a receptor, ACE2, found on some cells. But the makeup of the spikes that protrude from this virus is somewhat different, allowing the virus to bind more tightly. As a result, fewer virus particles are required to infect the host. This also may help explain why this virus is so much more infectious than SARS, Rasmussen said.

Other factors can't be ruled out in transmission, she said, including the amount of virus people shed and how strictly they observe social distancing rules.

Once inside a cell, the virus replicates, causing chaos. ACE2 receptors, which help regulate blood pressure, are plentiful in the lungs, kidneys and intestines -- organs hit hard by the pathogen in many patients. That also may be why high blood pressure has emerged as one of the most common preexisting conditions in people who become severely ill with covid-19.

A colorized scan of a cell (shown in red) infected with SARS-COV-2 virus particles (shown in yellow), isolated from a patient sample. (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases)

The receptors differ from person to person, leading to speculation that genetics may explain some of the variability in symptoms and how sick some people become.

Those cells "are almost everywhere, so it makes sense that the virus would cause damage throughout the body," said Mitchell Elkind, a professor of neurology at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons and president-elect of the American Heart Association.

Inflammation spurs clotting as white blood cells fight off infection. They interact with platelets and activate them in a way that increases the likelihood of clotting, Elkind said.

Such reactions have been seen in severe infections, such as sepsis. But for covid-19, he said, "we are seeing this in a large number of people in a very short time, so it really stands out."

"The virus can attack a lot of different parts of the body, and we don't understand why it causes some problems for some people, different problems for others -- and no problems at all for a large proportion," Elkind said.

Coughlin, in critical condition at a hospital in Connecticut, deteriorated quickly after she reached the emergency room. Her fever shot up to 105 and pneumonia developed in her lungs.

On Wednesday, she called her six daughters on FaceTime, telling them doctors advised she go on a ventilator.

"If something happens to me, and I don't make it, I'm at peace with it," she told them.

The conversation broke daughter Coleman's heart.

"I am deciding to help her go on a ventilator, and she may never come off," she said. "That could have been my last phone conversation with her."

Illustrations from iStock. Edited by Carol Eisenberg . Photo editing by Nick Kirkpatrick . Copy-edited by Jennifer Anderson and Thomas Floyd. Design and development by Tyler Remmel.

Read more:

Coronavirus destroys lungs. But doctors are finding its damage in kidneys, hearts and elsewhere.

Young and middle-aged people, barely sick with covid-19, are dying of strokes

Children are falling ill with perplexing inflammatory syndrome thought to be linked to covid-19

A mysterious blood-clotting complication is killing coronavirus patients

Frostbite' toes and other peculiar rashes may be signs of hidden coronavirus infection, especially in the young

[May 12, 2020] https://www.newsbiella.it/2020/04/28/leggi-notizia/argomenti/speciale-coronavirus-4/articolo/idrossiclorochina-vs-covid-19-una-terapia-considerata-efficace-ma-controversa-il-parere-dellinfet-4.html

May 12, 2020 | www.newsbiella.it

Posted by: cirsium | May 11 2020 23:44 utc | 43

[May 11, 2020] Do you need a personal oximeter to fight coronavirus? by By Jane Ridley

Vital for old people who live alone. Especially for those with hypertension
Apr 08, 2020 | nypost.com

ver since coronavirus survivor Andy Cohen told listeners of "Andy Cohen Live" March 30 that owning a pulse oximeter provided a source of relief for him, interest in the humble medical device has soared.

The small, handheld units, which normally attach to your finger or toe, monitor your oxygen-saturation level -- which, if that level dips below 90%, can be an indicator that you have COVID-19.

"Oximeters measure how efficient the lungs are at getting the blood filled with oxygen," Dr. Eric Cioe-Pena, director of global health at Northwell Health , tells The Post. "Most healthy people's reading of oxygen in the blood is 100%.

"We are seeing lower levels in coronavirus patients because the virus impedes their ability to oxygenate the blood. There is fluid, instead of air, in their lungs, and so, when the blood passes through those organs, it doesn't get oxygen."

The doctor, based in New Hyde Park, LI, adds that he has treated COVID-19 sufferers with blood-oxygen levels as low as 55% and even 27%.

Speaking on his radio show, Cohen, 51, said, "You could scare yourself and think: 'Oh my God, my lungs don't feel right,' but you could use this pulse oximeter and see, OK, actually, you're fine, you're within the range." CNN host Chris Cuomo, 49, who currently has the coronavirus , has also been testing his oxygen levels daily using an oximeter, according to his wife, Cristina, who shared an extensive update on Cuomo's health earlier this week.

No wonder people are scrambling to purchase their own oximeters, which can be found at pharmacies and online for anywhere from $20 to $50.

see also Andy Cohen reveals what it was like to have coronavirus His symptoms included a fever, tightness in his chest, a...

But Cioe-Pena maintains that healthy people don't need them. Not only that, a rush on the devices could cause problems at hospitals and other emergency facilities that require them, similar to the situation that played out over N95 masks and other gear for essential medical workers .

"The issue is supply and demand," explains Cioe-Pena, adding that the information given by an oximeter about oxygen is really "only good if you have the ability to supply supplementary oxygen, like you can in a hospital." He notes as well that folks with "underlying conditions such as diabetes, hypertension or chronic lung disease" might need to have access to oximeters more than the average healthy person with fears of contracting the coronavirus.

[May 10, 2020] Can pulse oximeters detect coronavirus How they work and more by Dale Smith

Notable quotes:
"... According to the Mayo Clinic, a normal pulse oximeter oxygen level reading is between 95% and 100% , and anything less than 90% is considered dangerously low, or hypoxic. Some doctors have reported COVID-19 patients entering the hospital with oxygen levels at 50% or below . ..."
May 08, 2020 | www.cnet.com

Some doctors are recommending these small, inexpensive devices to help monitor symptoms.

A pulse oximeter attaches to a finger and uses light to detect the level of oxygen in your blood.

As coronavirus testing efforts continue to ramp up and face masks are now a part of everyday life, a small diagnostic tool that clips to the tip of your finger is fast becoming a must-have gadget in the fight against the coronavirus . It's called a pulse oximeter, and it painlessly checks your blood oxygen level, which can be affected by lung diseases such as COVID-19.

The device was already starting to surge in popularity as word got around that people with the coronavirus frequently arrive at the hospital with abnormally low oxygen levels . After an op-ed piece in The New York Times recommended the use of pulse oximeters to detect a frightening condition called "silent hypoxia," sales of the devices skyrocketed . Many models are sold out or on lengthy backorder online. Same with brick-and-mortar drug stores, supermarkets and box stores.

[May 10, 2020] I wonder if the average age of our government was say 30, do you think they would have chosen to lock down the country? No.. Its because the average age of our government is more like 68.

Notable quotes:
"... "Our outcomes are similar to the state of Pennsylvania, where the median age of death from COVID-19 is 84 years old. ..."
"... "COVID-19 is a disease that ravages those with preexisting conditions – whether it be immunosenescence of aging or the social determinants of health. We can manage society in the presence of this pathogen if we focus on these preexisting conditions. ..."
May 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

jack lockwood , May 10 2020 9:36 utc | 52

This lock down stupidity needs to end now.

i wonder if the average age of our government was say 30, do you think they would have chosen to lock down the country? No.. Its because the average age of our government is more like 68.. We are sacrificing ourselves to protect the old, the least productive part of our society.
Im 33, i have had the virus, it was mild.i have had worse colds. Im running out of money! unlike pensioners who get there cash regardless i need to earn it. Furthermore the pension these people currently draw i will never see, we realise now that pensions as they were cannot be sustained, but yet they still have them. If they are like my grandparents they retired over 20 years ago.. 2/3 of my life, and have drawn private/public pensions since, they consume the vast majority of the NHS resources so they can stay alive another day and continue drawing pensions. The old people of my country also own the majority of the property, i rent my house of a couple in there 70s, i pay them over £1000 per month to live here. i cannot afford to buy.

When i do get a little bit of work at the moment i head out to find the roads and shops populated with fucking pensioners, all driving around in there stupid tall and narrow cars doing 40mph in a 60 oblivious to the world and economy that is around them paying them their pensions and protect them.

my attitude is simple.. if you dont want to catch it, dont go out.. no need to lockdown everybody, just the ones who fear this.. like you B. Its my right to live or die as i chose, not under the kosh of the fucking gray mafia.

ive already given up following the 'rules' fuck em all.


fairleft , May 10 2020 10:05 utc | 54

"Our outcomes are similar to the state of Pennsylvania, where the median age of death from COVID-19 is 84 years old. The few younger patients who died all had significant preexisting conditions. Very few children were infected and none died. Minorities in our communities fared equally as well as others, but we know that this is not the case nationally. In sum, this is a disease of the elderly, sick and poor. ...

"COVID-19 is a disease that ravages those with preexisting conditions – whether it be immunosenescence of aging or the social determinants of health. We can manage society in the presence of this pathogen if we focus on these preexisting conditions.

"What we cannot do, is extended social isolation. Humans are social beings, and we are already seeing the adverse mental health consequences of loneliness, and that is before the much greater effects of economic devastation take hold on the human condition."

- Dr. Steven Shapiro, University of Pennsylvania Medical Center chief medical and scientific officer

https://inside.upmc.com/shapiro-economy-roundtable/

Richard Steven Hack , May 10 2020 12:03 utc | 61
@Circe | May 10 2020 11:07 utc | 57

"people with proven underlying conditions not returning to work yet"

You mean the...

William Gruff , May 10 2020 12:21 utc | 62
Pretty easy to spot the tattoo-sleeved, cranial-pierced, hipster baristas with no productive skills in here as they are manically demanding that everyone else go to work. After all, they cannot go back to slinging idiot-proof pre-measured lattes until real working people are out and about, so they shriek for everyone else to go back to normal.

But isn't the current situation just a huge basket of opportunities for real bold entrepreneurs? If one is some hero type like the guy above who has "given up following the 'rules'" , then the marketplaces are theirs for the taking, what with all of the competition shut down. If one wants the capitalists' economy to be "re-opened" , then they need to be like the fabled entrepreneurs that worked for their wealth and take the initiative oneself instead of demanding that others do it for them.

Or are the whiners demanding that the economy be "re-opened" really just kids wishing their parents would go back to work because that is who actually pays the rent on their hipster apartments?

Something these individuals will have to confront is that things are never "going back to normal" . A new normal is being born, and it ain't very normal.

[May 10, 2020] Monoclonal antibodies Drug inspired by an old treatment could be 'next big thing for Covid-19' - CNN

May 10, 2020 | www.cnn.com

At least five US teams have cloned antibodies to Covid-19, paving the way for cutting-edge treatments that could be what one researcher calls "an immunity bridge" before a vaccine comes along. The treatment is monoclonal antibody therapy, and the antibodies come from people who have recovered from the novel coronavirus. Researchers then take the blood, select the most potent antibodies, and make them into a drug. One company, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, hopes to have a treatment available to patients as early as the end of the summer. "I think monoclonal antibody therapy has enormous promise as the next big thing for Covid-19," said Dr. Peter Hotez, a vaccine specialist at Baylor University School of Medicine who is not involved in the research. Monoclonal antibody therapy is a modern take on convalescent plasma, where someone who has recovered from coronavirus donates blood to someone who is currently ill. Read More Even if convalescent plasma is effective -- it's still being studied -- it has two shortcomings. First, one person can only give so much blood. Second, the donor might not have enough strong antibodies for the blood donation to be effective. To develop a monoclonal antibody treatment, researchers cull through thousands of antibodies to find the best ones, and then clone them potentially in unlimited amounts. Many other illnesses are treated with monoclonal antibodies, such as various forms of cancer, HIV, asthma, lupus, multiple sclerosis and various forms of cancer, but of course there's no guarantee it could work for Covid-19. What happens if a coronavirus vaccine is never developed? It has happened before <img alt="What happens if a coronavirus vaccine is never developed? It has happened before" src="//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200428210047-coronavirus-new-york-0320-large-169.jpg"> What happens if a coronavirus vaccine is never developed? It has happened before "One of the things about the search is it's a little bit like finding a needle in a haystack. We're all searching for the magical antibody that's a silver bullet," said Dr. James Crowe, who's leading the Covid-19 monoclonal antibody effort at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Regeneron is hoping to start clinical trials for an antibody treatment for coronavirus in humans as soon as next month, and if everything goes right, perhaps have a treatment ready for widespread distribution by the end of the summer. "We generated thousands of [antibodies] and then selected the most powerful and potent ones to grow up into an antibody cocktail," said company president Dr. George Yancopoulos. Like any treatment under development, it might not pan out. But if it does, it could treat coronavirus and possibly also prevent infection for a period of time. A vaccine would likely offer longer lasting immunity, but that would likely take longer to develop, with the earliest estimates set at January. "I think antibodies will be finished first, and will be the bridge toward longer immunity, which will be conferred by vaccines," said Crowe, director of the Vanderbilt Vaccine Center at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. 'A guided nuclear warhead' In mid-January, researchers at the Rockefeller University in New York City heard from the National Institutes of Health: Get to work because we hope to have coronavirus antibodies cloned by the spring. About two months later, Rockefeller researcher Jill Horowitz found herself handing out fliers outside a supermarket in New Rochelle, New York, inviting people who'd recovered from coronavirus to learn more about the Rockefeller study. They won the fight against coronavirus. Here&#39;s what life looks like on the other side <img alt="They won the fight against coronavirus. Here&amp;#39;s what life looks like on the other side" src="//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200416042613-03-coronavirus-recovery-large-169.jpg"> They won the fight against coronavirus. Here's what life looks like on the other side The city -- and in particular one synagogue -- had been hit hard by a coronavirus outbreak. "I'm Jewish, and I'm Orthodox, and I know people at Young Israel. I have friends in New Rochelle. Our kids went to school together, so I could go into the community and make my case," said Horowitz, executive director of strategic operations in the immunology laboratory at Rockefeller. In all, more than 100 people donated blood for the study, many of them from the New Rochelle community. Some of their stories will be told in an upcoming documentary, " Rebel Blood The Race to Cure Covid-19 ." The lead scientist in Rockefeller's monoclonal antibody effort compares it to battle, noting that convalescent plasma has been used for more than a century. "If you're thinking about a war, and you're fighting a war with a drug that came out of the early part of the 20thcentury, the monoclonal antibody is like a guided nuclear warhead in comparison," said Dr. Michel Nussenzweig, a professor at Rockefeller. Research by several US teams Several other US teams also say they've cloned antibodies, including Vanderbilt, Regeneron, Lilly Pharmaceuticals and Distributed Bio. Regeneron anticipates starting clinical trials next month and hopes to provide "hundreds of thousands of doses" to patients by the end of the summer, Yancopoulos said. The company already makes monoclonal antibodies for several illnesses, including cancer, arthritis and asthma. "We're using the same exact technology now to come up with a specific tailored approach against Covid-19," Yancopoulos said. Get CNN Health's weekly newsletter Sign up here to get The Results Are In with Dr. Sanjay Gupta every Tuesday from the CNN Health team. Other companies gave a longer timeline. For example, Crowe, the doctor at Vanderbilt, said he anticipates it will be around the first quarter of next year before his team might have a Covid monoclonal antibody treatment ready to distribute. He said it's a good sign that several teams are working on monoclonal antibodies. "I think the more groups we have working on it, all the better, and the more shots on goal we have for getting an effective prevention or treatment," he said.

CNN's Dr. Minali Nigam, Devon Sayers and Wes Bruer contributed to this report.

[May 09, 2020] Is Fauci corrupt? The story of Remdesevir approval suggest that YES.

Does Dr Fauci enjoy indirect financial ties to Gilead? Does he own the stock?
Notable quotes:
"... Basically, this was a negative trial. Of the 255 patients screened, 237 met the eligibility criteria, and 158 were assigned to the remdesivir group, with 79 assigned to placebo control. Unfortunately, remdesivir treatment was not associated with a shorter time to clinical improvement, and mortality was not different between the two groups. ..."
"... It does look very fishy to me. Endpoint or outcome switching, particularly late in a clinical trial is a huge red flag. ..."
"... There are also other reasons to question this trial, including how no confidence intervals were reported, that not even an abstract was published, just a press release with, as Heathers put it, "two results in four lines": ..."
"... I remain very suspicious that the NIH study was announced the same day that a negative study out of China of remdesivir was published. It just seems too convenient. Maybe I'm being overly suspicious. Maybe I'm too suspicious. Maybe I'm falling prey to conspiracy mongering. However, in the Trump era, when the Trump administration has politicized previously (mostly) apolitical government agencies as never before, it's hard not to wonder. ..."
"... He was unimpressed by remdesivir's modest benefit. "It was expected to be a whopping effect," Topol added. "It clearly does not have that." ..."
"... Indeed, given that the pre-test probability of remdesivir having a significant effect was low, meaning that this trial is probably just noise: ..."
"... But Gilead will make billions and billions of dollars ..."
"... Could Anthony Fauci explain why the investigators of the NIAID remdesivir trial did change the primary outcome during the course of the project (16th April)? Removing "death" from primary outcome is a surprising decision. ..."
"... The most common adverse effects in studies of remdesivir for COVID-19 include respiratory failure and blood biomarkers of organ impairment, including low albumin, low potassium, low count of red blood cells, low count of platelets that help with clotting, and yellow discoloration of the skin. Other reported side effects include gastrointestinal distress, elevated transaminase levels in the blood (liver enzymes), and infusion site reactions. ..."
"... So, if it does shorten duration, is it worth potential liver damage, respiratory failure and organ impairment? In other words is the cure potentially as bad as the disease. ..."
"... For yet another drug that was supposed to be a game changer, I am unimpressed by its results. The whole mechanism is wrong. A drug with this mechanism would need to be almost a prophylactic for it to be hugely effective. ..."
"... Fauci didn't seem to have any problem cautioning against unwarranted optimism for CQ/HCQ even while DJT was championing the stuff. What is different about this? . ..."
"... So, what did Fauci say about chloroquine? ""We've got to be careful that we don't make that majestic leap to assume that this is a knockout drug. We still need to do the kinds of studies that definitely prove whether any intervention is truly safe and effective," Fauci, who is also a member of the White House coronavirus task force, said during an interview on "Fox & Friends. . . "We don't operate on how you feel, we operate on what evidence and data is," Fauci said, adding that it was "not a very robust study" or "overwhelmingly strong."" (Concha, 2020 Apr 3) ..."
"... Now, what did he say about Remdesivir: "Speaking to reporters from the White House, Fauci said he was told data from the trial showed a "clear-cut positive effect in diminishing time to recover." Fauci said the median time of recovery for patients taking the drug was 11 days, compared with 15 days in the placebo group. He said the mortality benefit of remdesivir "has not yet reached statistical significance." ..."
"... Disappointingly, the lock down seems to have made a number of people irrational. Just a quick post to expound on my Fauci post for those who see the world as binary – ie: black or white. These people think you either support Fauci 100% or 0% and a single criticism of any Fauci statement means 0% support of Fauci. I do not happen to worship at the altar of Fauci or any scientist and recognize all are subject to errors – including myself. I view the world in a more nuanced manner than those with the black/white delusion. I find I can disagree with some things a person says or stands for and agree with some other things they say or do. ..."
"... I am of the opinion that Fauci made a mistake here. The evidence for Remdesiver is nowhere near good enough for it to become the standard of care. ..."
"... On the other hand, watching the White House performance from afar, I can see the administration is dysfunctional and is run by a narcissistic bully, who will publicly turn on anyone who disagrees with them. ..."
"... I believe that is the main thrust of this Orac article – that the evidence for Remdesiver efficacy is sorely lacking. ..."
May 09, 2020 | respectfulinsolence.com
Remdesivir: Gilead wins with unimpressive results announced by press release On Wednesday, Dr. Anthony Fauci announced positive results for the antiviral drug remdesivir treating COVID-19. They were unimpressive and, suspiciously, announced by press release rather than scientific paper. It's all very fishy, but one thing's for sure. Gilead Sciences will make boatloads of money. I've been writing a lot about the unjustified and premature hype over hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malarial drug with mild immunosuppressive activity that is also used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and other autoimmune diseases and how the drug probably doesn't work against COVID-19, despite its being hyped by President Trump and his sycophants, toadies, and lackeys on Fox News, Dr. Mehmet Oz , Dr. Phil , Dr. Didier Raoult , and a bevy of irresponsible fame seeking doctors who have no idea how to do a proper clinical study.

There are, however, other drugs being hyped out there, drugs that might actually have a better chance of turning out to be effective treatments for COVID-19. Chief among these is remdesivir, the experimental antiviral drug being tested by Gilead Sciences.

Remdesivir is an adenosine (a nucleotide) analog that inhibits viral RNA polymerases. It is incorporated into RNA made by the virus, causing the premature termination of the RNA molecule, thus interfering with viral replication. The drug was originally developed to treat Ebola and Marburg but was ultimately found to be ineffective against these viruses . Because it inhibits the replication of a number of RNA viruses, it was only natural that it would be considered as a possible treatment for COVID-19, and Gilead has been relentlessly promoting it as such as the company has been working to carry out clinical trials.

What prompted me to write about remdesivir were headlines like Dr. Anthony Fauci says Gilead's remdesivir will set a new 'standard of care' for coronavirus treatment that started popping up on Wednesday afternoon:

White House health advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said Wednesday that data from a coronavirus drug trial testing Gilead Sciences' antiviral drug remdesivir showed "quite good news" and sets a new standard of care for Covid-19 patients.

Speaking to reporters from the White House, Fauci said he was told data from the trial showed a "clear-cut positive effect in diminishing time to recover."

Fauci said the median time of recovery for patients taking the drug was 11 days, compared with 15 days in the placebo group. He said the mortality benefit of remdesivir "has not yet reached statistical significance."

The results suggested a survival benefit, with a mortality rate of 8% for the group receiving remdesivir versus 11.6% for the placebo group, according to a statement from the National Institutes of Health released later Wednesday.

"This will be the standard of care," Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, added. "When you know a drug works, you have to let people in the placebo group know so they can take it."

My skeptical antennae started twitching immediately, because on the same day a study from China was published in The Lancet that was far less impressive. In fact, it was a negative trial. What also got my skeptical antennae all aflutter twitching away was how the results of the remdesivir trial were announced. Normally, when a study is announced to the press, it's upon publication of the paper, and the press release is issued either the same day or the evening before publication. As of last night, as I wrote this, however, the actual paper reporting the results of the clinical trial had not yet been published. As I perused Twitter on Wednesday, I found even more reasons for skepticism.

So, before I get to the study touted by Dr. Fauci, let's review some history.

Remdesivir: The early days versus COVID-19 (like, you know, three weeks ago)

The first data published on remdesivir was a single-arm uncontrolled trial that somehow got published three weeks ago in The New England Journal of Medicine . This was peak COVID-19 publishing, when an uncontrolled case series of patients with severe COVID-19 treated with remdesivir under compassionate was published in a super high impact journal like NEJM and made headlines as a result. Be that as it may, the case series examined 61 patients with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection who had an oxygen saturation of 94% or less while they were breathing room air or who were receiving oxygen support. They received a 10-day course of remdesivir, consisting of 200 mg given intravenously on day 1, followed by 100 mg daily for the remaining 9 days of treatment. (Remdesivir is an intravenous drug.) The authors reported clinical improvement in 68% of evaluable patients:

Of the 61 patients who received at least one dose of remdesivir, data from 8 could not be analyzed (including 7 patients with no post-treatment data and 1 with a dosing error). Of the 53 patients whose data were analyzed, 22 were in the United States, 22 in Europe or Canada, and 9 in Japan. At baseline, 30 patients (57%) were receiving mechanical ventilation and 4 (8%) were receiving extracorporeal membrane oxygenation. During a median follow-up of 18 days, 36 patients (68%) had an improvement in oxygen-support class, including 17 of 30 patients (57%) receiving mechanical ventilation who were extubated. A total of 25 patients (47%) were discharged, and 7 patients (13%) died; mortality was 18% (6 of 34) among patients receiving invasive ventilation and 5% (1 of 19) among those not receiving invasive ventilation.

The case series also did not collect viral load data to confirm potential antiviral activity in humans or any association between declines in viral load and clinical improvement. Basically, when you get right down to it, this study was not really much better than Didier Raoult's crappy study of his hydroxychloroquine/azithromycin combination, but that didn't stop the authors from concluding that comparisons with contemporaneous cohorts "suggest that remdesivir may have clinical benefit in patients with severe Covid-19." In reality, like Raoult's trials, this trial said nothing about the efficacy of remdesivir against COVID-19 other than that the drug could be given to COVID-19 patients with a reasonable safety profile.

Less than week later, as related by Derek Lowe , came news that two clinical trials of remdesivir in China, one for severe disease and one for moderate disease had been suspended. (They still are.) Lowe noted that both trials had the notice: "The epidemic of COVID-19 has been controlled well at present, no eligible patients can be recruited." The apparent explanation was "the stringent inclusion criteria for the trials – apparently patients had to have no previous therapy with any other experimental agent to enroll, and that eliminates a lot of people." Around the same time, Adam Feuerstein and Matthew Herper published a story in STAT, Early peek at data on Gilead coronavirus drug suggests patients are responding to treatment :

The University of Chicago Medicine recruited 125 people with Covid-19 into Gilead's two Phase 3 clinical trials. Of those people, 113 had severe disease. All the patients have been treated with daily infusions of remdesivir.

"The best news is that most of our patients have already been discharged, which is great. We've only had two patients perish," said Kathleen Mullane, the University of Chicago infectious disease specialist overseeing the remdesivir studies for the hospital.

Her comments were made this week during a video discussion about the trial results with other University of Chicago faculty members. The discussion was recorded and STAT obtained a copy of the video.

Derek Lowe discussed this story in depth, and I largely agree with him that the leak of the video to STAT was a serious breach of clinical trial ethics and protocol. (I'm not alone in suspecting that it was almost certainly intentional to jack up Gilead's stock price, a result that was achieved.) Lowe also noted:

But now that it's out there, let's talk about what's in the leak. Gilead stock jumped like a spawning salmon in after-market trading on this, and one of the reasons was that that 113 of the 125 patients were classed as having "severe disease". People ran with the idea that these must have been people on ventilators who were walking out of the hospital, but that is not the case. As AndyBiotech pointed out on Twitter, all you had to do was read the trial's exclusion criteria : patients were not even admitted into the trial if they were on mechanical ventilation. Some will have moved on to ventilation during the trial, but we don't know how many (the trial protocol has these in a separate group).

Note also that this trial is open-label; both doctors and patients know who is getting what, and note the really key point: there is no control arm. This is one of the trials mentioned in this post on small-molecule therapies as being the most likely to read out first, but it's always been clear that the tradeoff for that speed is rigor. The observational paper that was published on remdesivir in the NEJM had no controls either, of course, and that made it hard to interpret. Scratch that, it made it impossible to interpret. It will likely be the same with this trial – the comparison is between a five-day course of remdesivir and a ten-day course, and the primary endpoint is the odds ratio for improvement between the two groups.

Again, these data, such as they are, are no more useful than Didier Raoult's data on hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin to treat COVID-19, but this brings us to the Chinese trial published in The Lancet on Wednesday.

The Chinese randomized clinical trial

The Chinese trial published two days ago is the first randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial of remdesivir to treat COVID-19, but it was also one of the studies halted. Eligible patients were adults admitted to the hospital with laboratory-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 whose symptoms had lasted less than 12 days before enrollment and who had an oxygen saturation on room air of 94% or less or a ratio of arterial oxygen partial pressure to fractional inspired oxygen of 300 mm Hg or less (another measure of hypoxia), and radiologically confirmed pneumonia.

Patients were randomly assigned in a 2:1 ratio to intravenous remdesivir at the same dose as the NIH trial touted by Dr. Fauci or the same volume of placebo infusions for 10 days and were permitted concomitant use of lopinavir–ritonavir, interferons, and corticosteroids. The primary endpoint was time to clinical improvement up to day 28, defined at the time from randomization to the point of a decline of two levels on a six-point ordinal scale of clinical status (from 1=discharged to 6=death) or discharged alive from hospital, whichever came first. An intention-to-treat analysis was carried out.

Basically, this was a negative trial. Of the 255 patients screened, 237 met the eligibility criteria, and 158 were assigned to the remdesivir group, with 79 assigned to placebo control. Unfortunately, remdesivir treatment was not associated with a shorter time to clinical improvement, and mortality was not different between the two groups. Subgroup analysis looking for hypotheses found that there was a trend towards a shorter duration of symptoms (not statistically significant) in patients treated with remdesivir who had had symptoms for less than ten days. Most disappointingly, there was no detectable difference in viral load between the remdesivir groups and the placebo controls. Again, basically this was a negative study with only the barest hint that remdesivir might -- I repeat, might -- work if administered earlier in the course of COVID-19. That's some pretty thin gruel.

Which brings us to the NIH trial of remdesivir touted by Anthony Fauci.

The NIH press release for its remdesivir trial.

The results of the NIH remdesivir trial can, unfortunately, only be gleaned from the press release and news stories so far:

For the first time, a major study suggests that an experimental drug works against the new coronavirus, and U.S. government officials said Wednesday that they would work to make it available to appropriate patients as quickly as possible.

In a study of 1,063 patients sick enough to be hospitalized, Gilead Sciences's remdesivir shortened the time to recovery by 31% -- 11 days on average versus 15 days for those just given usual care, officials said. The drug also might be reducing deaths, although that's not certain from the partial results revealed so far.

"What it has proven is that a drug can block this virus," the National Institutes of Health's Dr. Anthony Fauci said.

"This will be the standard of care," and any other potential treatments will now have to be tested against or in combination with remdesivir, he said.

Here is the press release , posted to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases website:

Hospitalized patients with advanced COVID-19 and lung involvement who received remdesivir recovered faster than similar patients who received placebo, according to a preliminary data analysis from a randomized, controlled trial involving 1063 patients, which began on February 21. The trial (known as the Adaptive COVID-19 Treatment Trial, or ACTT), sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, is the first clinical trial launched in the United States to evaluate an experimental treatment for COVID-19.

An independent data and safety monitoring board (DSMB) overseeing the trial met on April 27 to review data and shared their interim analysis with the study team. Based upon their review of the data, they noted that remdesivir was better than placebo from the perspective of the primary endpoint, time to recovery, a metric often used in influenza trials. Recovery in this study was defined as being well enough for hospital discharge or returning to normal activity level.

Preliminary results indicate that patients who received remdesivir had a 31% faster time to recovery than those who received placebo (p<0.001). Specifically, the median time to recovery was 11 days for patients treated with remdesivir compared with 15 days for those who received placebo. Results also suggested a survival benefit, with a mortality rate of 8.0% for the group receiving remdesivir versus 11.6% for the placebo group (p=0.059).

More detailed information about the trial results, including more comprehensive data, will be available in a forthcoming report. As part of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's commitment to expediting the development and availability of potential COVID-19 treatments, the agency has been engaged in sustained and ongoing discussions with Gilead Sciences regarding making remdesivir available to patients as quickly as possible, as appropriate. The trial closed to new enrollments on April 19. NIAID will also provide an update on the plans for the ACTT trial moving forward. This trial was an adaptive trial designed to incorporate additional investigative treatments.

As you can see, the difference in mortality was not statistically significantly different, although that could just be because of inadequate numbers. It's also very important to note the part about the adaptive trial design of this trial, which puts Dr. Fauci's comment about how remdesivir will become the "standard of care" going forward into the proper context. In this particular trial , multiple different drugs can be compared to placebo or standard of care. The idea is that, if a signal of efficacy is found with one drug, that drug becomes "standard of care" and the trial is adapted to study how adding other experimental drugs compares to the "standard of care." So what Dr. Fauci meant was that, based on the finding, going forward remdesivir will become the "standard of care" arm for the trial and the experimental arm will become remdesivir plus another experimental therapeutic. However, given that the FDA is on the verge of issuing an emergency use authorization for remdesivir to treat COVID-19, it looks as though remdesivir will become standard-of-care in general soon.

But back to the results. Derek Lowe observed:

it's worth noting that had there been "clear and substantial evidence of a treatment difference" during the trial that the DSMB was to have halted the study at that point. We can infer that nothing rose to that level, then: we have a difference, but not substantial enough to have ended the trial prematurely.

It's also worth noting some things posted on Twitter about the trial. For instance, Waller Gellad noted:

Since NIH remdesivir trial is in the news

was there an explanation about why the primary outcome (now positive) was changed last month to 'time until clinical recovery?' @matthewherper https://t.co/fCTc1EGI1d pic.twitter.com/W1hAACnO1r

-- Walid Gellad, MD MPH (@walidgellad) April 29, 2020

It's very odd that the primary endpoint was changed:

Thread that summarizes my concerns with Remdesivir press release (not science) as well.

Changing the endpoint midtrial this way is like hosting a race for one destination then declaring wherever you end up after running for an hour is the finish line. https://t.co/XMUXYW3njp

-- Mark Hoofnagle (@MarkHoofnagle) April 30, 2020

This long Twitter thread explains:

Here's Fauci talking about it. Give him a listen, sharpen your ears at about 0.30.

"The primary endpoint was the time to recovery, namely the ability to be discharged."

He's right, it was.

On April 16th. https://t.co/U6Cx3XSOJ6

-- 🏴James Heathers 🏴 (@jamesheathers) April 30, 2020

I'll summarize, so that you don't have to scroll through a Twitter thread if you don't want to. As James Heathers and Waller Gellad noted, the original primary outcome of the trial when it was registered on March 20. The original primary endpoint of the trial was an 8-point severity scale (death, on ventilator, hospitalized with oxygen, all the way down to discharged with no limits on activity) but was changed to time to recovery. There's still a similar scale for the secondary endpoints, but no numbers for that were reported. (Any bets on whether the results are negative?) This change was apparently made on or around April 16.

Gellad also notes:

last thing:
Here is the results table for the negative lancet trial of remdesivir. The highlighted results are what the primary outcome for the NIH trial was until 2 weeks ago. https://t.co/niQ65zgLF2

We need to see that outcome, in addition to time until recovery. pic.twitter.com/ptXGhPx13N

-- Walid Gellad, MD MPH (@walidgellad) April 30, 2020

It does look very fishy to me. Endpoint or outcome switching, particularly late in a clinical trial is a huge red flag. Don't get me wrong. There can be legitimate scientific reasons to switch primary endpoints of a trial. as James Heathers puts it:

Sometimes it becomes clear after you start that the registration is incomplete or wrong. Sometimes you have a better idea after you start. Sometimes your thinking changes.

Other times, you're trying to cherry-pick the results.

-- James Heathers 🏴 (@jamesheathers) April 30, 2020

There are also other reasons to question this trial, including how no confidence intervals were reported, that not even an abstract was published, just a press release with, as Heathers put it, "two results in four lines":

(2) the results in the press release. I call this 'two results, four sentences' – press releases describe the results in incredibly brief terms, usually the two most positive outcomes w the briefest explanation possible. He's me bitching about it earlier. https://t.co/FQlaAQaytG

-- James Heathers 🏴 (@jamesheathers) April 30, 2020

Basically, if you have two "good" results and twenty "bad" or uninterpretable results, what do you do? What are you going to tell people? The two "good" results, of course!

Gary Schwitzer has a nice summary of the negative reactions to the trial and how it was announced.

The bottom line

I remain very suspicious that the NIH study was announced the same day that a negative study out of China of remdesivir was published. It just seems too convenient. Maybe I'm being overly suspicious. Maybe I'm too suspicious. Maybe I'm falling prey to conspiracy mongering. However, in the Trump era, when the Trump administration has politicized previously (mostly) apolitical government agencies as never before, it's hard not to wonder.

Adding to my suspicion is the fact that the study was reported in a press release, rather than being published, which makes me wonder if the press release was written to counter the negative study from China that would certainly have tanked Gilead's stock prices. Yes, I know that the press release reported that this decis, apparently the announcement was decided upon after April 27 meeting of the data and safety monitoring board overseeing this trial, but the outcome switching so late in the trial makes me very suspicious. Yes, the explanation, which should have been in the press release, along with an acknowledgment that the primary outcome/endpoint had been changed, but wasn't is not unreasonable:

NIAID explains why endpoint of remdesivir trial was changed: pic.twitter.com/Zpl08nd4PL

-- Meg Tirrell (@megtirrell) April 30, 2020

Then there was this news report in which Fauci claimed that concerns about leaks fueled the announcement:

He expressed concern that leaks of partial information would lead to confusion. Since the White House was not planning a daily virus briefing, Fauci said he was invited to release the news at a news conference with Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards(D). "It was purely driven by ethical concerns," Fauci told Reuters in a telephone interview.

"I would love to wait to present it at a scientific meeting, but it's just not in the cards when you have a situation where the ethical concern about getting the drug to people on placebo dominates the conversation."

An independent data safety and monitoring board, which had looked at the preliminary results of the NIAID trial, determined it had met its primary goal of reducing hospital stays.

On Tuesday evening, that information was conveyed in a conference call to scientists studying the drug globally.

"There are literally dozens and dozens of investigators around the world," Fauci said. "People were starting to leak it." But he did not give details of where the unreported data was being shared.

I smell bullshit here. What probably really happened is that he was under enormous pressure to release the results. It was also unwise to discuss the results with so many scientists until the manuscript reporting the results of the trial had at least been submitted for publication. I agree with the scientists who had "expected it [the trial data] to be presented simultaneously in a detailed news release, a briefing at a medical meeting or in a scientific journal, allowing researchers to review the data." I also agree with Dr. Eric Topol, referring to the Chinese RCT and this one:

"That's the only thing I'll hang my hat on, and that was negative," said Dr. Eric Topol, director and founder of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in La Jolla, California.

He was unimpressed by remdesivir's modest benefit. "It was expected to be a whopping effect," Topol added. "It clearly does not have that."

Indeed, given that the pre-test probability of remdesivir having a significant effect was low, meaning that this trial is probably just noise:

Unfortunately, by the time you are symptomatic with a virus, you are usually already high/peak viral load. So, when you give an antiviral to someone who is already ill, the damage from the virus is largely done. It's there in big numbers and in the cells.

-- Mark Hoofnagle (@MarkHoofnagle) May 1, 2020

Indeed, I'm not only unimpressed with the modest benefit reported, I question whether there really was any benefit at all, particularly in light of the Chinese trial, which found zero difference in viral load in the remdesivir group.

The whole thing looks damned fishy, and we can't judge the study until it's actually published. Meanwhile, whatever the true reasons for releasing the study results this way, mission accomplished. The negative effect of the Chinese study on Gilead's stock price was successfully countered and remdesivir becomes a de facto standard of care for patients hospitalized with COVID-19. Worse, no further trials of remdesivir versus placebo will be possible, because it's been declared that remdesivir "works" against COVID-19 and is the new standard of care! As Mark Hoofnagle put it in a great Twitter thread, that echoes my thoughts:

By the end of the day, reports that FDA is going to emergently approve remdesivir for treatment of COVID.

Gilead gets what they want. No one will want to be in a control arm in further trials and they will argue all future trials must be noninferiority.

-- Mark Hoofnagle (@MarkHoofnagle) May 1, 2020

Absolute genius. You have to salute them. On the day a negative trial of their drug is reported, based on a press release they took over the news cycle, and with some midstream edits to their endpoints their now "positive" trial wins them FDA approval and a halted trial.

-- Mark Hoofnagle (@MarkHoofnagle) May 1, 2020

It's worse than that. If remdesivir is now the "standard of care" for hospitalized COVID-19 patients, it now becomes unethical to randomize them to a placebo group testing ANY new drug for COVID-19. Trials will now have to compare remdesivir alone to remdesivir plus experimental drug. We'll probably never know now for sure if remdesivir is truly effective against COVID-19.

But Gilead will make billions and billions of dollars.

Related The FDA's emergency use authorization of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19: Dangerous politics, not science

Yesterday, the FDA issued emergency use authorization for hydroxychloroqine and chloroquine to treat COVID-19. Politics, not science, is why.

By Orac Orac is the nom de blog of a humble surgeon/scientist who has an ego just big enough to delude himself that someone, somewhere might actually give a rodent's posterior about his copious verbal meanderings, but just barely small enough to admit to himself that few probably will. That surgeon is otherwise known as David Gorski ...

John Kane says: May 2, 2020 at 8:52 am

In long twitter exchange mainly led by James Heathers, has anyone noticed that there are a series of tweets by Didier Raoult ?

One tweet reads:

Could Anthony Fauci explain why the investigators of the NIAID remdesivir trial did change the primary outcome during the course of the project (16th April)? Removing "death" from primary outcome is a surprising decision.

In a quick search of the web I found the following two:

WHAT ARE SIDE EFFECTS OF REMDESIVIR (RDV)?

In the Ebola trial, researchers noted side effects of remdesivir (RDV) that included:

Typical antiviral drug side effects include:

Nausea
Vomiting

Found at: https://www.rxlist.com/consumer_remdesivir_rdv/drugs-condition.htm

Side effects

The most common adverse effects in studies of remdesivir for COVID-19 include respiratory failure and blood biomarkers of organ impairment, including low albumin, low potassium, low count of red blood cells, low count of platelets that help with clotting, and yellow discoloration of the skin. Other reported side effects include gastrointestinal distress, elevated transaminase levels in the blood (liver enzymes), and infusion site reactions.

Other possible side effects of remdesivir include:

Infusion‐related reactions. Infusion‐related reactions have been seen during a remdesivir infusion or around the time remdesivir was given.[8] Signs and symptoms of infusion‐related reactions may include: low blood pressure, nausea, vomiting, sweating, and shivering.

Increases in levels of liver enzymes, seen in abnormal liver blood tests. Increases in levels of liver enzymes have been seen in people who have received remdesivir, which may be a sign of inflammation or damage to cells in the liver.

Found at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remdesivir

So, if it does shorten duration, is it worth potential liver damage, respiratory failure and organ impairment? In other words is the cure potentially as bad as the disease.

And, as Orac and many commenters have made more than clear, one more example of Trump's government, ignoring science, and jumping to conclusions.

And once more I suggest reading the following:

Jeanne Lenzer and Shannon Brownlee (April 28, 2020). Pandemic Science Out of Control. Issues in Science and Technology. Available at: https://issues.org/pandemic-science-out-of-control/

Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: May 2, 2020 at 7:05 pm
ADDENDUM

I found the following: "Particular laboratory features have also been associated with worse outcomes (table 2). These include: Elevated liver enzymes"

Found at: https://www.uptodate.com/contents/coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19-epidemiology-virology-clinical-features-diagnosis-and-prevention?search=coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19- demiology-virology-clinical-features-diagnosis-and-prevention&source=search_result&selectedTitle=1~150&usage_type=default&display_rank=1

So, one of the side-effects has been associated with worse outcomes. Not exactly a ringing endorsement of Remdesivir.

Chris Preston says: May 2, 2020 at 6:52 pm
For yet another drug that was supposed to be a game changer, I am unimpressed by its results. The whole mechanism is wrong. A drug with this mechanism would need to be almost a prophylactic for it to be hugely effective.
Tim says: May 3, 2020 at 11:33 am

One thing they discovered is that the proteins involved have zinc atoms incorporated into their structure. This won't surprise any biochemists, as zinc-containing proteins are common. But there's been a steady flow of fringe treatments for the disease -- including some involving chloroquine derivatives -- in which zinc was a key component. We'll have to see whether that changes now that it's clear that zinc is needed to make copies of the virus (assuming that fact registers at all with the people prone to promoting fringe therapies).

https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/05/scientists-get-an-atomic-level-look-at-how-a-drug-blocks-the-coronavirus/

What is that saying about zinc? I've always heard that zinc was a good thing to have a high intracellular level of it to protect against viruses besides also being needed to make NO.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/05/nih-cuts-coronavirus-funding-amid-trump-comments-and-conspiracy-theories/

Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: May 4, 2020 at 1:11 pm
@ Reality

So: "Fauci just dropped down a level or two in my estimation of his commitment to rationality."

Let's look at the "Reality": "America needs a federal government that assertively promotes and helps to coordinate that, not one in which experts like Tony Fauci and Deborah Birx tiptoe around a president's tender ego."

I wouldn't want to be in Fauchi's shoes. If he openly criticizes Trump, he is out and staying in allows him to have some effect. Damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. So, he has to balance his "committment to rationality" to trying to modify/reduce the insanity of Trump. If he resigned or was fired, could he have more of an influence? Maybe, maybe not. I would not want to be in his shoes! ! ! Personally, I would probably resign and try to get our media to listen to me. Just standing next to Trump would turn my stomach.

So, maybe you should live up to your "name" and evaluate "reality" not an idealistic world.

Reality says: May 4, 2020 at 2:22 pm
So you wouldn't say what Fauci said and would quit, eh, Joel?
I wouldn't say what Fauci said about "standard of care" which is basically his endorsement of this.
I believe Orac wouldn't make that statement endorsing Remdesivir as the "standard of care".
I don't know of any self-respecting scientist who would make such a statement no matter what the pressure.
If I was pressured by DJT I would object but maybe agree to not make any statement pro or con about the subject – so as to keep my position and influence but if someone asked me to say something I thought was not true I would not do it and refuse.
.
Fauci didn't seem to have any problem cautioning against unwarranted optimism for CQ/HCQ even while DJT was championing the stuff. What is different about this?
.

That is the Reality of this Fauci statement.

A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: May 4, 2020 at 4:31 pm
@ Reality

You write: "Fauci didn't seem to have any problem cautioning against unwarranted optimism for CQ/HCQ even while DJT was championing the stuff. What is different about this?"

Yep; but the only studies promoting CQ/HCQ was a fraudulent one in France and an in vitro study.

What about Remdesivir? First it is a nucleic acid analogue designed to directly disrupt replication of the viral genome. Chloroquine/Hydroxychloroquine were not even remotely designed to target viruses, though they have a moderate dampening effect on immune reactions, so they work for autoimmune diseases (e.g., lupus, rheumatoid arthritis); but, as I wrote in a previous exchange, the immune response in an autoimmune disease compared to a cytokine storm is like comparing 20 mile per hour winds to a category 5 hurricane, 160 mph winds. In addition, chloroquine/hydroxychloroquine have a large number of mild side-effects and some really serious major ones.

So, what did Fauci say about chloroquine? ""We've got to be careful that we don't make that majestic leap to assume that this is a knockout drug. We still need to do the kinds of studies that definitely prove whether any intervention is truly safe and effective," Fauci, who is also a member of the White House coronavirus task force, said during an interview on "Fox & Friends. . . "We don't operate on how you feel, we operate on what evidence and data is," Fauci said, adding that it was "not a very robust study" or "overwhelmingly strong."" (Concha, 2020 Apr 3)

Now, what did he say about Remdesivir: "Speaking to reporters from the White House, Fauci said he was told data from the trial showed a "clear-cut positive effect in diminishing time to recover." Fauci said the median time of recovery for patients taking the drug was 11 days, compared with 15 days in the placebo group. He said the mortality benefit of remdesivir "has not yet reached statistical significance."

The results suggested a survival benefit, with a mortality rate of 8% for the group receiving remdesivir versus 11.6% for the placebo group, according to a statement from the National Institutes of Health released later Wednesday. "This will be the standard of care," Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, added. "When you know a drug works, you have to let people in the placebo group know so they can take it." "What it has proven is a drug can block this virus," he said. (Lovelace, 2020 Apr 29)

"The data shows that remdesivir has a clear-cut, significant, positive effect in diminishing the time to recovery," Fauci said at the White House on Wednesday. The data he referred to is from a large study of more than 1,000 patients from multiple sites around the world. Patients either received the drug, called remdesivir, or a placebo.

Dr. Michael Saag, associate dean for global health at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, said the results seemed promising. Antiviral drugs such as remdesivir tend to work earlier in the course of an illness, so "the thing that I think is important in this study is the patients had advanced disease," said Saag, who is not involved with any remdesivir trials. (NBC News (2020 Apr 29)

Hospitalized patients with advanced COVID-19 and lung involvement who received remdesivir recovered faster than similar patients who received placebo, according to a preliminary data analysis from a randomized, controlled trial involving 1063 patients, which began on February 21. The trial (known as the Adaptive COVID-19 Treatment Trial, or ACTT), sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, is the first clinical trial launched in the United States to evaluate an experimental treatment for COVID-19.

An independent data and safety monitoring board (DSMB) overseeing the trial met on April 27 to review data and shared their interim analysis with the study team. Based upon their review of the data, they noted that remdesivir was better than placebo from the perspective of the primary endpoint, time to recovery, a metric often used in influenza trials [my emphasis]. Recovery in this study was defined as being well enough for hospital discharge or returning to normal activity level. . .

Results also suggested a survival benefit, with a mortality rate of 8.0% for the group receiving remdesivir versus 11.6% for the placebo group (p=0.059). the group receiving remdesivir versus 11.6% for the placebo group (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (2020 Apr 29).

So, first I'd bet you don't understand how nucleic acid analogues work?
Second, though I tend not to rely on one study, this one was fairly large and the shortening of time to recovery was clinically significant, "defined as being well enough for hospital discharge or returning to normal activity level." And Dr. Michael Saag: "Antiviral drugs such as remdesivir tend to work earlier in the course of an illness, so "the thing that I think is important in this study is the patients had advanced disease,"

Standard of Care is more a legal definition than a clinical one. Basically it reduces risk of malpractice lawsuits.

While I probably would not have called it "standard of care", instead clearly stating that based on the recent trial, it is currently the best we have to offer or something to that effect.

So, Fauci didn't call it a cure, didn't claim it reduced mortality, though indications it did, and based on over 1,000 patients, found it reduced hospitalization and return to normal life by a clinically significant margin, the standard used for flu studies. Again, I would have been more cautious in my working; but your rank attack on a man who knows more about infectious diseases that you, I, and many others, a man who has dedicated his life to preventing and dealing with them is just plain sickening. Your black and white view of Fauci is how antivaccinationists and other adherers to unscience see the world. And an MPH probably means a couple of lower level epidemiology courses. So, the old saying: A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, coupled with a personality that prefers a dichotomous world is very very problematic.

Only time and further studies will tell if Remdesivir really does shorten recovery time and, perhaps, also lowers mortality. Right now, we have nothing else and I wouldn't jump on something because of this; but the over 1,000 patient study isn't nothing.

Just to be clear, Orac's critique is valid; but, as he says, by this time one becomes perhaps overly skeptical given Trump's insanity. How cautious should Fauci have been? People are becoming desperate. The risks from Remdesivir are extremely low, so currently, either use it or continue as is.

If there were significant risks and the one study had been one a much smaller group, the scales would be different. And, though Orac is right they changed the outcome points, as mentioned, shortening of recovery time is a criterion used for treatment of flu, so, though not, perhaps, the best end-point, it is certainly not the same as some studies using endpoints such as lowered cholesterol without looking at deaths. They did look at deaths and though not significant, in the right direction. By the way, do you even understand significance levels? Though only one study, p=0.059 isn't far from p=0.05.

References:

Reality says: May 5, 2020 at 10:58 am
Disappointingly, the lock down seems to have made a number of people irrational. Just a quick post to expound on my Fauci post for those who see the world as binary – ie: black or white. These people think you either support Fauci 100% or 0% and a single criticism of any Fauci statement means 0% support of Fauci. I do not happen to worship at the altar of Fauci or any scientist and recognize all are subject to errors – including myself. I view the world in a more nuanced manner than those with the black/white delusion. I find I can disagree with some things a person says or stands for and agree with some other things they say or do.

My criticism of Fauci in regard to his remdesivir endorsement does not mean I have 0% support for Fauci it means that with that statement and some others my positive view of him is now ~80% but not 100% and I will have to check up on what he is endorsing to make sure that I agree with it just like I do with any other scientist/person.

BTW – If some were to check my Disqus account history (Reality022) you would find posts strongly defending Fauci against the Loony Libertarians who seem to think he is the debil.
.
Now to a second point:

There appears to be a group of Fauci apologists who, to excuse Fauci's statement, say it is due to 'pressure from Trump/the administration'.
I do not subscribe to this excuse and think it is a horrible thing to say for 2 reasons:

1) There is absolutely no evidence that this statement was made under pressure. That idea is totally invented in the minds of the Fauci apologists in their attempt to exonerate Fauci.

2) It is a horrible thing to say about Fauci. I take him at his word. If he said it he meant it. The excuse actually means that Fauci's word is so untrustworthy that he can be pressured into being dishonest about his scientific opinions and only the apologists can tell us when he is lying or actually relating his honest view. The apologists are basically saying Fauci is dishonest.

I have much more respect for the man and believe he is honest but in this case merely wrong.
.
That is all I'm going to say about this subject as some people are going off the rails with their binary view of the world. (snicker)

A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: May 5, 2020 at 11:06 am

@ Reality

And you continue to miss the point that "Standard of Care" is mainly a legal term. Are you that dense? It is you who stated your opinion of Fauci sank, so your binary view of the world. Try reading my other comments, closely, maybe you will learn something; but I doubt it. "Reality", lacks reality testing. Reply

Preston says: May 5, 2020 at 8:18 pm

I tend to agree. I am of the opinion that Fauci made a mistake here. The evidence for Remdesiver is nowhere near good enough for it to become the standard of care. But then I am not the one having to make these decisions under difficult circumstances. I don't pretend to understand why Fauci might have made the comment, so don't see a lot of point in speculating about it.

On the other hand, watching the White House performance from afar, I can see the administration is dysfunctional and is run by a narcissistic bully, who will publicly turn on anyone who disagrees with them. I also see there are people within and around the White House who are happy to tell whatever lies they think Trump wants to hear, either through fear or hope for advancement. I understand why people would add 2 and 2 and come up with 5.

Reality says: May 5, 2020 at 9:28 pm
Chris Preston said, "I am of the opinion that Fauci made a mistake here. The evidence for Remdesiver is nowhere near good enough for it to become the standard of care."

I believe that is the main thrust of this Orac article – that the evidence for Remdesiver efficacy is sorely lacking.

Quoting Orac's article above: "In reality, like Raoult's trials, this trial said nothing about the efficacy of remdesivir against COVID-19 other than that the drug could be given to COVID-19 patients with a reasonable safety profile."
.
I agree with your 2nd paragraph and think that Fauci is not one of those administration toadies and is being honest and has merely made a mistake perhaps brought about through grasping-at-straws desperation as described in a current SBM article.

I, as well, do not know why Fauci made the statement but to me it is very disrespectful of the man to use as an excuse that he is dishonest enough to lie like a toady when pressured by Trump.

I think we are essentially in agreement about this matter.
Have fun.

Denice Walter says: May 5, 2020 at 10:05 pm
re dysfunctional administration.. narcissistic bully et al

It seems that the aforementioned will now " wind down" the Covid task force ( The Hill reports) but Drs Fauci and Birx will still be involved in some capacity.

AS though the battle is already won. Hah! CA and the NY area are reporting lower numbers of deaths and hospital admissions BUT whilst
other areas are increasing theirs.

Maybe the Orange One imagines that if we discuss Covid less, people will think it's gone, go back to work, buy stuff and the economy will flourish. Ignore it and it'll go away. Wishful thinking as usual.

Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: May 5, 2020 at 10:55 pm
@ Chris Preston

Apparently you lack understanding of English. As I explained even grandfathered in medical treatments with no hard scientific evidence are considered the standard of care, that is, if a doctor uses them he/she lessens risk of lawsuits. Standard of care doesn't mean a high level of scientific validity.

I guess I am wasting my time. Think of it this way, if allowed for compassionate use advised by ones doctor, then doctor may not be protected against lawsuits. Unfortunately, as something I read a long time ago, even in Colonial times Americans would rather sue than eat breakfast. Just one more sickness of American exceptionalism, so maybe, just maybe, all Fauci was doing was trying to reduce this risk.

Tim says: May 5, 2020 at 10:56 pm
No shit???

https://www.youtube.com/embed/KzRhcjOG1es?version=3&rel=1&fs=1&autohide=2&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&wmode=transparent

At least, he had the googles on; Wouldn't want him to get fibres in his eyes.,

Aarno Syvänen says: May 6, 2020 at 12:34 am
Not to mention that CDC closed the lab. So CDC is not part of great vaccine conspiracy, after all. Huge news, I would say. One could mention, too, that Johnson & Johnson get COVID vaccine contract. So Dorit Reiss' plots are not very effective, ater all. Reply
Natalie White says: May 6, 2020 at 10:30 am
Aarno, you made me curious about how much $$$$ and how many companies. A list of the Convid19, oops, I mean Covid19 cash! https://www.fool.com/investing/2020/04/07/here-are-all-the-companies-working-on-covid-19-vac.aspx
Natalie White says: May 9, 2020 at 10:20 am
@Aarno- Sometimes the CDC gets it right and sometimes, well .. sometimes you can't truss it. https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/04/cdcs-failed-coronavirus-tests-were-tainted-with-coronavirus-feds-confirm/

https://www.youtube.com/embed/am9BqZ6eA5c

Natalie White says: May 9, 2020 at 11:47 am
Aarno writes, "Not to mention that CDC closed the lab." Yes, sometimes they get it right. Then, they fail miserably like this https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/cdc-lab-contamination-delayed-coronavirus-testing-67438

Confidence meter less than zero.

Natalie White says: May 6, 2020 at 9:40 am
Hmm . Problems with the Wuhan Lab and those nasty bats back in 2018. Just another coincidence, I suppose. Weird. So many coincidences. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/04/14/state-department-cables-warned-safety-issues-wuhan-lab-studying-bat-coronaviruses/ Reply
Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: May 6, 2020 at 2:18 pm
@ Natalie White

You write: Hmm . Problems with the Wuhan Lab and those nasty bats back in 2018. Just another coincidence, I suppose. Weird. So many coincidences."

From a recent article in the Atlantic:

scientists have also identified about 500 other coronaviruses among China's many bat species. "There will be many more -- I think it's safe to say tens of thousands," says Peter Daszak of the EcoHealth Alliance, who has led that work. Laboratory experiments show that some of these new viruses could potentially infect humans. SARS-CoV-2 likely came from a bat, too.

It seems unlikely that a random bat virus should somehow jump into a susceptible human. But when you consider millions of people, in regular contact with millions of bats, which carry tens of thousands of new viruses, vanishingly improbable events become probable ones. In 2015, Daszak's team found that 3 percent of people from four Chinese villages that are close to bat caves had antibodies that indicated a previous encounter with SARS-like coronaviruses. "Bats fly out every night over their houses.

Some of them shelter from rain in caves, or collect guano for fertilizer," Daszak says. "If you extrapolate up to the rural population, across the region where the bats that carry these viruses live, you're talking 1 [million] to 7 million people a year exposed." Most of these infections likely go nowhere. It takes just one to trigger an epidemic.

Ed Yong (2020 Apr 29). Why the Coronavirus Is So Confusing. Available at: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/04/pandemic-confusing-uncertainty/610819/

Note. he links to peer-reviewed journal articles. So, as the second paragraph makes clear, antibodies to bat coronaviruses exist in the population, etc. Add this to the sequencing of the genome that shows just how close it is to the 2003 SARS corona virus and to bat coronaviruses and, as usual, your moronic "coincidences" just lacks any validity.

Note also that his article links to many other good ones.

As I've written before, nature is quite capable of creating really nasty microbes.

Natalie White says: May 6, 2020 at 10:17 am

Oh this guy needs a dishonorable mention, Harvard traitor, Charles Leiber. "has received more than $15,000,000 in grant funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Department of Defense (DOD)." Our tax dollars hard at work for this POS.

Dude is still collecting a paycheck. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/harvard-university-professor-and-two-chinese-nationals-charged-three-separate-china-related Reply

Aarno Syvänen says: May 6, 2020 at 11:00 am

This is our guy:
Charles M. Lieber
Semiconductor nanowires: A platform for nanoscience and nanotechnology
MRS Bulletin
Volume 36, Issue 12 (Laser micro- and nanofabrication of biomaterials)December 2011 , pp. 1052-1063
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1557/mrs.2011.26
So COVID 19 was not involved. One should indeed not serve two masters, DOD and a Chinese university Reply
Joel A. Harrison, PhD, MPH says: May 6, 2020 at 4:48 pm
@ Natalie White

You write: "Hmm . Problems with the Wuhan Lab and those nasty bats back in 2018. Just another coincidence, I suppose. Weird. So many coincidences."

From a recent article by Ed Yong (2020 Apr 29). "Why the Coronavirus Is So Confusing: A guide to making sense of a problem that is now too big for any one person to fully comprehend." The Atlantic. Available at: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/04/pandemic-confusing-uncertainty/610819/

Note that he links to a number of excellent articles, including the two that the following is based on:

"scientists have also identified about 500 other coronaviruses among China's many bat species. "There will be many more -- I think it's safe to say tens of thousands," says Peter Daszak of the EcoHealth Alliance, who has led that work. Laboratory experiments show that some of these new viruses could potentially infect humans. SARS-CoV-2 likely came from a bat, too.

It seems unlikely that a random bat virus should somehow jump into a susceptible human. But when you consider millions of people, in regular contact with millions of bats, which carry tens of thousands of new viruses, vanishingly improbable events become probable ones. In 2015, Daszak's team found that 3 percent of people from four Chinese villages that are close to bat caves had antibodies that indicated a previous encounter with SARS-like coronaviruses. "Bats fly out every night over their houses. Some of them shelter from rain in caves, or collect guano for fertilizer," Daszak says. "If you extrapolate up to the rural population, across the region where the bats that carry these viruses live, you're talking 1 [million] to 7 million people a year exposed." Most of these infections likely go nowhere. It takes just one to trigger an epidemic."

So, 3 percent of people had antibodies to bat corona viruses. As the above explains, it is quite probable that the current virus came from someone infected by a bat. Now, since sequencing of the current SARS-Cov-2 has found its genome quite close to the 2003 SARS virus and to several bat coronavirus genomes, goes against your sick need to blame the Chinese. A coincidence is not even close to any type of proof, except in the mind of a moron like you looking to place blame. And there is a great book on "coincidences": David J. Hand (2014). "The Improbability Principle: Why Coincidences, Miracles, and Rare Events Happen Every Day." Basically, what someone might think is a rare coincidence isn't.

And, the major blame for what is happening in the U.S. is a combination of Trump and overall American unappreciation for Public Health and, thus, pandemic preparedness. When it comes to cutting funding, first to go.

I realize that real research, logic, etc. have NO effect on moron's like you; but, hopefully, others monitoring this exchange are open-minded.

And as Aarno pointed out, you attacked someone who had nothing to do with COVID. He worked with the Wuhan Institute of Technology; yep, in Wuhan and that's it. It's a large city dimwit. More importantly, he has been charged, not found guilty. I realize that the old adage innocent until proven guilty doesn't apply to anyone you chose to attack. You just don't know when to stop. YOU ARE DESPICABLE! Reply

[May 07, 2020] A new strain has come Meet Spike D614G, the new improved coronavirus

May 07, 2020 | www.rt.com

Fears that the coronavirus would mutate into a more dangerous strain appear to have been borne out, as research has identified that a new, more contagious strain of SARS-CoV-2 has become the dominant form worldwide. The new strain, which has been dubbed 'Spike D614G' has been proliferating in Europe since at least mid-February, and spread to become the dominant form during the month of March. It is far more contagious than the original strain which emerged from Wuhan, for reasons as yet unknown.

Wherever it emerged it became dominant very quickly, and in some countries it became the only common strain within weeks. The paper notes that the rapid global spread of the coronavirus has provided it with "ample opportunity for natural selection to act upon rare but favorable mutations.'' Furthermore, if the virus does not wane away as the weather warms in summer there will be nothing to stop it mutating into more and more strains.

Warning call

The research , which was carried out by a joint American and British team led by Los Alamos National Laboratory, has been released ahead of peer review as 'an early warning' to other researchers. As it stands, scientists studying the coronavirus around the world may be analysing the genetic sequence of the older strain, and therefore it is crucial that they collaborate with this team to get the latest information. "We cannot afford to be blindsided as we move vaccines and antibodies into clinical testing," the lead author Dr Bette Korber, known for her work on HIV, said.

Because the paper has not yet been peer-reviewed, it has been published online on the server BioRxiv. However, the reputations of the scientists involved suggest that the findings are sound and must be taken with the utmost seriousness -- the report is 33 pages long, and short on laughs. "This is hard news,'' said Korber of the findings.

Also on rt.com Covid-19 mutations underestimated, Chinese scientists warn, as DEADLIEST strains grip Europe and US

The scientists' methodology involved running computer analysis of over 6,000 coronavirus DNA sequences collected from around the world. Although they remark that "observed diversity among pandemic SARS-CoV-2 sequences is low'' there were no fewer than 14 different mutations in the Spike protein sequences, just one of which is the strain that has everybody worried.

This is the strain with the D614G mutation, which is probably causing the increased contagiousness. The mutation affects the 'Spike proteins' on the outside of the virus, which allow the virus to invade human cells. For this reason, these spikes have until now been the main target of those trying to design vaccines or antiviral drugs to combat the virus. There are currently at least 62 vaccines in development, and most of these are focused on the Spike proteins.

Wasted efforts

Although there is not really any good news here, this may not be as bad as it sounds. There is at present no suggestion that Spike D614G is any more deadly than the original. The British team calculated that people were no more likely to be hospitalized by it, although they did seem to have higher viral loads (more of the virus in their body).

But even if Spike D614G is not meaningfully different from the old strain, it does not mean that nothing has changed. The problems introduced by multiple forms of a virus have everything to do with immunity and vaccination. If a person had contracted and been ill with one strain, that would still be no guarantee of immunity to another. Epidemiologists could be left every winter having to guess what the commonest strain of coronavirus will be, as they do with the flu.

Furthermore, the development of a vaccine relies on designing the antibodies to match perfectly to the specific 'Spikes' on the outside of the virus. If these are mutated, any potential vaccine might not be specific enough to target that strain. Receiving the vaccine would provide no guarantee of immunity. This possibility is especially worrying to the study's authors.

Also on rt.com Neither 'lab' nor 'wet market'? Covid-19 outbreak started months EARLIER and NOT in Wuhan, ongoing Cambridge study indicates

The authors have also been led to speculate that the wildly different outbreaks experienced in different regions could be down to different strains. Spike D614G hit Italy in early February, probably around the same time as the older strain hit there. Italy has been one of Europe's worst affected countries.

And in America, just a few days after the first cases were reported in New York, Spike D614G was the dominant form there. Contrasting New York City with the relatively mild outbreak on America's West Coast suggests that different strains could be at play. No matter what details transpire, it's clear that in a world with multiple strains of coronavirus, developing vaccines or treatments is only going to get harder.

[May 07, 2020] SARS-CoV-2 is so good at infecting the upper respiratory tract that there might even be a second receptor that the virus could use to launch its attack.

May 07, 2020 | www.unz.com

skrik , says: Show Comment May 6, 2020 at 8:52 am GMT

@Kratoklastes ory tract that there might even be a second receptor that the virus could use to launch its attack.

Even more troubling is the fact that SARS-COV-2 seems to make use of the enzyme furin from the host to cleave the viral spike protein. This is worrying, researchers say, because furin is abundant in the respiratory tract and found throughout the body.

It is used by other formidable viruses, including HIV, influenza, dengue and Ebola to enter cells. By contrast, the cleavage molecules used by SARS-CoV are much less common and not as effective

I do not think that Covid-19 is 'just a flu' and I think that the panic in Wuhan started in the next microsecond after they had decoded the [warlike!] spike. rgds

[May 07, 2020] Coronavirus Mutates Into Now-Dominant, More Contagious Form As Doctors Ponder 'East Coast vs. West Coast' Strains

May 07, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

A new study from Los Alamos National Laboratory has revealed a new, now-dominant strain of the coronavirus which appears to be more contagious , according to the authors. Meanwhile, doctors in the United States are wondering if the harder-hit East Coast is being hit with a different version of the virus than the West Coast.

Emerging in early February, the new strain migrated from Europe to the East Coast of the United States, where it became the dominant strain across the world beginning in mid-March. Wherever the new strain has appeared, it's quickly infected far more people than earlier strains which emerged from Wuhan, China. Within weeks it became the most prevalent strain in some nations.

... ... ...

Emerging in early February, the new strain migrated from Europe to the East Coast of the United States, where it became the dominant strain across the world beginning in mid-March. Wherever the new strain has appeared, it's quickly infected far more people than earlier strains which emerged from Wuhan, China. Within weeks it became the most prevalent strain in some nations.

In addition to spreading faster, it may make people vulnerable to a second infection after a first bout with the disease , the report warned.

The 33-page report was posted Thursday on BioRxiv, a website that researchers use to share their work before it is peer reviewed, an effort to speed up collaborations with scientists working on COVID-19 vaccines or treatments. That research has been largely based on the genetic sequence of earlier strains and might not be effective against the new one . - LA Times (via Yahoo)

According to the report, fourteen mutations have been identified in the spike proteins of SARS-CoV-2 , the protrusions on the exterior of the virus which make up its namesake 'corona.' The report was based on a computational analysis of more than 6,000 coronavirus samples from around the world, collected by the Germany-based Global Initiative for Sharing All Influenza Data.

Assisted by scientists at Duke University and the University of Sheffield in England, the Los Alamos team focused on a mutation called D614G, which controls changes in spike proteins.

"The story is worrying, as we see a mutated form of the virus very rapidly emerging, and over the month of March becoming the dominant pandemic form," said lead author Bette Korber, a Los Alamos computational biologist. "When viruses with this mutation enter a population, they rapidly begin to take over the local epidemic, thus they are more transmissible." The new strain first appeared in Italy, almost at the same time as the original Wuhan strain appeared, according to the report. By March 15, the mutated strain was dominant. The same was seen in New York, which was hit by the original virus around March 15, but was overwhelmed by the new strain within days.

The authors also warn that if the pandemic doesn't wind down during the summer as most viruses do, it could undergo further mutations right as the first medical treatments and vaccines - should the adhere to ambitious timelines we've been promised - begin to roll out.

" We cannot afford to be blindsided as we move vaccines and antibodies into clinical testing ," Korber added on Facebook. "Please be encouraged by knowing the global scientific community is on this, and we are cooperating with each other in ways I have never seen in my 30 years as a scientist."

David Montefiori , a Duke University scientist who worked on the report said it is the first to document a mutation in the coronavirus that appears to make it more infectious.

Although the researchers don't yet know the details about how the mutated spike behaves inside the body , it's clearly doing something that gives it an evolutionary advantage over its predecessor and is fueling its rapid spread. One scientist called it a "classic case of Darwinian evolution."

" D614G is increasing in frequency at an alarming rate , indicating a fitness advantage relative to the original Wuhan strain that enables more rapid spread," the study said.

Different strains, different effects?

As the Times notes, doctors in the United States have begun to question whether new strains of the virus could account for differences in how it affects different people , according to UC San Francisco professor Alan Wu, who runs the clinical chemistry and toxicology laboratories at SF General Hospital.

According to Wu, medical experts have speculated in recent weeks that at least two strains of coronavirus were circulating in the US - one prevalent on the East Coast and one on the West Coast.

"We are looking to identify the mutation," said Wu, who highlighted that his hospital has only had a few fatalities out of the hundreds of cases it's treated, which is "quite a different story than we are hearing from New York."

The Los Alamos study does not indicate that the new version of the virus is more lethal than the original. People infected with the mutated strain appear to have higher viral loads. But the study's authors from the University of Sheffield found that among a local sample of 447 patients, hospitalization rates were about the same for people infected with either virus version.

Even if the new strain is no more dangerous than the others, it could still complicate efforts to bring the pandemic under control . That would be an issue if the mutation makes the virus so different from earlier strains that people who have immunity to them would not be immune to the new version.

And if the mutation makes it back to those who have already had COVID-19, it would make "individuals susceptible to a second infection," according to the authors.

[May 07, 2020] The Puzzling Questions of the Coronavirus: A Doctor Addresses 6 Questions That Are Stumping Physicians

Notable quotes:
"... Originally published at The Conversation ..."
"... Editor's Note: As researchers try to find treatments and create a vaccine for COVID-19, doctors and others on the front lines continue to find perplexing symptoms. And the disease itself has unpredictable effects on various people. Dr. William Petri, a professor of medicine at the University of Virginia Medical School, answers questions about these confusing findings. ..."
"... Even before symptoms arise ..."
"... Differences in susceptibility to a virus is one of the main working hypotheses regarding the disease Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (a.k.a. myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), and systemic exertion intolerance disease (SEID). ..."
"... It is possible that the virus is spreading within crowded and substandard apartment complexes. One possible mechanism? Toilets, as an outbreak of SARs in 2003 demonstrated: https://www.cnn.com/2013/02/21/world/asia/sars-amoy-gardens/index.html ..."
"... In addition in poorly maintained buildings just going out in the hallways to put out your garbage, for example, might well expose a home bound residents to viruses lingering on common surfaces. ..."
"... The city of Hong Kong is even more crowded than New York, but last I checked its virus deaths and hospitalizations were much lower. ..."
"... This link has the slides Cuomo used plus more details: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/06/ny-gov-cuomo-says-its-shocking-most-new-coronavirus-hospitalizations-are-people-staying-home.html ..."
"... some aspect of their domiciles, such as plumbing or ventilation; or are they permitting non-household individuals to visit them. ..."
"... It would be interesting to see if there is a connection between the virus and apartments/co-living. ..."
"... Indians and Pakistani's in particular seem to have been hit very hard in the UK, and yet the same can't be said in their home countries. ..."
"... The drug, made by the US company Gilead Sciences, is an antiviral that was trialled in Ebola, but which failed to show benefits in Africa. ..."
"... Here is a study on an early transmission site in China, where incidents of infection seem to correlate to ventilated air flow in a restaurant: COVID-19 Outbreak Associated with Air Conditioning in Restaurant, Guangzhou, China, 2020 https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/7/20-0764_article ..."
"... Here is a not-yet-reviewed preprint of a study of two buses transporting attendees to and from an event in China. One bus (#2) had a suspected "index patient" (IP), the other didn't. https://twitter.com/zeynep/status/1255579524047220741 ..."
"... Interestingly, the conference itself produced few further cases, these were all traced to prolonged interactions with the IP. Generally with viruses, some critical mass of virions must accumulate in sufficient number to produce infection, and total net exposure may approximately correlate with severity. Untreated recirculated air bearing virus-laden droplets may lead to repeated exposure and increase concentration of virions in individuals. ..."
May 07, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Yves here. While a list of coronavirus "known unknowns" is useful, I imagine most readers would have focused on other questions, like "When will we know how much if any immunity you get from contracting the virus?" However, this article likely reflects issues that seem to be coming up in layperson discussions .which in turn reflects the informational nuggets that attract media attention.

Originally published at The Conversation

Editor's Note: As researchers try to find treatments and create a vaccine for COVID-19, doctors and others on the front lines continue to find perplexing symptoms. And the disease itself has unpredictable effects on various people. Dr. William Petri, a professor of medicine at the University of Virginia Medical School, answers questions about these confusing findings.

Some evidence suggests that patients experience low oxygen saturation days before they appear in the ER. If so, is there a way to treat patients earlier?

Even before symptoms arise, people infected with SARS-CoV-2 show damage to their lungs. This is likely why low oxygen saturation – that is, below-normal oxygen levels in their blood – occurs before the patient goes to the ER . Restoring those levels to normal is presumed, though not proven, to be beneficial; giving patients supplemental oxygen via a nasal cannula, a flexible tube that delivers oxygen, placed just inside the nostrils, will restore oxygen to normal levels unless disease worsens to the extent that mechanical ventilation is needed.

Young adults are having strokes with COVID-19. Does this suggest the illness is more of a vascular disease than a lung disease in that age group ?

COVID-19 can be a devastating disease to multiple organs and systems in the body, including the vascular and immune systems. A lung infection is the primary cause of disease and death. There are examples of the clotting system being activated and causing strokes, perhaps caused by an immune system responding abnormally to COVID-19 .

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently updated its official list of symptoms. Does this suggest anything unusual about COVID-19?

This new information is due to a greater number of infected individuals being studied . The update simply reflects a better understanding of the full spectrum of illness due to COVID-19, from asymptomatic to presymptomatic to severe and fatal infections.

How can so many people experience such mild symptoms and others quickly die from it?

One of the most fascinating aspects of these diseases is the huge difference that individuals experience with an infection. In our own research, we have found that many children in the U.S. infected with cryptosporidia have no symptoms, yet this parasite is a major killer of infants in the developing world. After an infection of SARS-CoV-2, the severity of the illness is likely due in part to how the patient's immune system responds; an overzealous immune response may cause death through what is called colloquially a " cytokine storm. ." We do not know yet if cytokine storms occur more in one group than another – for example, older versus younger.

The disease appears now to affect various other organs – heart and kidney, for example. What does this suggest?

What we know most clearly is that infection starts only in human cells with the ACE2 receptor – that is, in a cell that is capable of receiving the virus. That is present not only in the lungs, but in other cells as well, including those in the intestine and in the nasal mucosa, which lines the nasal cavity. When those cells are infected, the immune system is activated. A consequence is that both the heart and kidney are affected.

Why are some countries not experiencing as much COVID-19 as the U.S., Europe and China?

I think it's too early in the pandemic to know if certain countries or populations are relatively less susceptible. The younger overall age of a population could be a primary factor. Or perhaps the virus, so far at least, has not had time to spread more widely in these countries.


PlutoniumKun , May 7, 2020 at 10:12 am

I'd add that the FT has a very good free to read article on the 'unknowns' around the virus: From Blood Clots to 'Covid Toe', the Medical Mysteries of Coronavirus.

The Rev Kev , May 7, 2020 at 10:25 am

The thing about this virus is that it seems to be the Swiss Army knife of the virus world. Instead of a simple virus, as time goes along you find out that it has all sorts of weird and damaging effects in all sorts of places. And that just because you get it does not mean that the won't get the next strain.

We aren't even sure how to treat it and financial interest are clouding the search for a treatment. It is like we just can't get a handle on just what this virus really is or just what it does to the human body.

Synoia , May 7, 2020 at 11:41 am

The Eco-sphere strikes back? There are a lot of humans to infect, appears to the virus as a bountiful place to inhabit.

Lee , May 7, 2020 at 10:34 am

Differences in susceptibility to a virus is one of the main working hypotheses regarding the disease Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (a.k.a. myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), and systemic exertion intolerance disease (SEID).

The assumption is that the symptoms represent a relatively rare immune system over-reaction in a relatively small percentage of the population to a viruses that in the vast majority of persons is part of their normal viral load producing no symptoms.

Hana M , May 7, 2020 at 10:50 am

Yet another puzzling note on Coronavirus transmission. Sixty-six percent of coronavirus hospital admissions in New York in a recent study cited by Gov. Cuomo, were people who had been staying home. Most of the cases were elderly, and either retired or unemployed. The vast majority had other conditions. And African-Americans and Hispanics were disproportionately affected. My apologies for not linking to the original study–I'm still trying to track it down.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/lisettevoytko/2020/05/06/majority-of-new-coronavirus-cases-in-new-york-are-from-people-staying-at-home-not-traveling-or-working/#792178af1655

It is possible that the virus is spreading within crowded and substandard apartment complexes. One possible mechanism? Toilets, as an outbreak of SARs in 2003 demonstrated: https://www.cnn.com/2013/02/21/world/asia/sars-amoy-gardens/index.html

In addition in poorly maintained buildings just going out in the hallways to put out your garbage, for example, might well expose a home bound residents to viruses lingering on common surfaces.

Bob Hertz , May 7, 2020 at 10:54 am

The city of Hong Kong is even more crowded than New York, but last I checked its virus deaths and hospitalizations were much lower.

Hana M , May 7, 2020 at 4:26 pm

Hong Kong and New York are completely different on so many levels apart from population density. The differences are more instructive than the similarities. Hong Kong had a devastating experience with the SARs coronovirus epidemic in 2003 so they had a much clearer idea what they were dealing with; much of the early response (masks, increased social hygiene) was a bottom up response by people who had gone through it before.

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/coronavirus-sense-of-crisis-scars-from-sars-help-keep-cases-in-hong-kong-lower-than

The HK response to COVID-19 was also earlier, more targeted, both more draconian in some ways and much less so in others.

https://www.sfgate.com/science/article/How-Hong-Kong-kept-COVID-19-at-bay-15254007.php .

Still, the two apartment building outbreaks I've referenced in these threads both occurred in Hong Kong.

Hana M , May 7, 2020 at 10:58 am

This link has the slides Cuomo used plus more details: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/06/ny-gov-cuomo-says-its-shocking-most-new-coronavirus-hospitalizations-are-people-staying-home.html

Hana M , May 7, 2020 at 11:00 am

What a surprise! You're on your own, says Cuomo.

'"Much of this comes down to what you do to protect yourself. Everything is closed down, government has done everything it could, society has done everything it could. Now it's up to you," Cuomo said.'

IsabelPS , May 7, 2020 at 11:13 am

"How can so many people experience such mild symptoms and others quickly die from it?"

There seems to be another possibility, that SARS-CoV-2 can infect both the upper respiratory tract (like the coronavirus responsible for the common cold) and the lower respiratory tract, eventually causing pneumonia (like the SARS-CoV)

anon in so cal , May 7, 2020 at 12:38 pm

This is an alarming development, not least because anti lockdown GOP and Libertarian types have jumped on it to argue that the lockdowns are misguided. The news item raises many questions, such as, are the afflicted individuals getting the virus from groceries; some aspect of their domiciles, such as plumbing or ventilation; or are they permitting non-household individuals to visit them. Obviously, more detailed data are needed.

PlutoniumKun , May 7, 2020 at 11:02 am

It would be interesting to see if there is a connection between the virus and apartments/co-living.

The one thing for sure is that this virus is extremely contagious for those who are vulnerable. A colleague of mine cocooned himself with his two elderly parents in their detached suburban house at the very beginning of this, back in late February (he could see it coming). I know he was very cautious in order to protect them. But both his parents died from it over the last 2 weeks, and he is only just recovering from it. So far as I know, he has no idea how the infection got into the house.

Synoia , May 7, 2020 at 11:50 am

Is the address data for the death available? It would be interesting to look for correlation between Covid deaths and the ages of the apartment complex.

Hana M , May 7, 2020 at 12:53 pm

What a terrifying story! Really we are so far behind on the basic public health detective work and analysis that we need to do to beat this.

rtah100 , May 7, 2020 at 5:12 pm

We have been isolating since mid- March. All food delivered and disinfected, post heat-treated. Never eaten a healthier diet or taken more vitamins. Been out (beach and moor) just a handful of times, no contact, always hand sanitizer etc.

Nevertheless, still had three colds!

Viruses are damn infectious.

Also, pace the Kawasaki-like syndrome in children putatively linked to sars-cov-2, true Kawasaki syndrome has no known causal agent but it is believed to be infectious in origin because it is reliably linked to wind: when it blows from central Asia, cases spike in Japan and Hawaii.

Could Sars-cov-2 be hitching a ride on the wind / pollen and infecting people long distance?

Oso , May 7, 2020 at 12:20 pm

Hana M, good post and links

"It is possible that the virus is spreading within crowded and substandard apartment complexes. One possible mechanism? Toilets, as an outbreak of SARs in 2003 demonstrated"

brought to mind one of the possible causes among my community (field workers). porta pottys are badly maintained as well as in short supply. among the many hazards, also particle board living quarters where people sleep in shifts.

Oso , May 7, 2020 at 1:45 pm

you're welcome Hana M.
also, along similar lines a group of us here in oakland (with some city council buy in) are asking for a black new deal dealing with covid-19. demands are specific as well as linked to available funding. i'll share them if ur interested.

Oregoncharles , May 7, 2020 at 4:08 pm

We've been having groceries and other items delivered; one just arrived. This leads to a big disinfecting operation, focused on containers, sacks, etc. I even wash all the veggies before bringing them in. It's more trouble than doing the shopping was, but so far it's worked. We're healthy so far, salt over shoulder.

Fortunately there's minimal infection here, but it is present.

I'm just thinking if you DON'T disinfect the packaging and then your hands, you might well introduce the virus.

Ignacio , May 7, 2020 at 6:18 pm

Indeed, two weeks after a lockdown most hospitalizations must be originated in contagions inside houses or residential buildings where most direct or indirect contacts occur. This suggests that fomites-led contagions are important in Covid-19 transmission. During a lockdown, with very few getting in and out one should basically beware about touching things like doors, elevator buttons, or light switches rather than breathing contaminated air. In buildings with wealthy residents someone will be paid to keep all these surfaces clean once or twice a day but in less wealthy sites it has to be done by oneself.

cnchal , May 7, 2020 at 8:31 pm

> . . . Sixty-six percent of coronavirus hospital admissions in New York in a recent study cited by Gov. Cuomo, were people who had been staying home.

Anyone check if there is a stack of empty Amazon boxes in the corner? Every one of their warehouses has infected workers, and we all know how much people like to push the buy button and crack that whip.

Hana M , May 7, 2020 at 10:51 am

More on the toilet problem with technical notes and 'news you can use': https://waterandhealth.org/disinfect/preventing-infection/can-coronavirus-spread-through-defective-bathroom-sewage-pipes/

CuriosityConcern , May 7, 2020 at 10:58 am

I had a thought yesterday, and it probably has nothing to do with COVID19, but remember the vaping injuries to young people last year? What if those were early infections transmitted via infected vape devices or accessories? Points against this being true: didn't appear to be any spread among medical personnel treating the vape injury population.

Final verdict if I remember right was some form of vitamin e being in the vape liquid. Points in favor: I thought certain quarters were not satisfied with the vit e explanation. Just wild speculation on my part, but interesting idea, no?

Code Name D , May 7, 2020 at 3:37 pm

I remember hearing a roomer that smokers were more susceptible to covid. Not seen anything to support that though.

ShamanicFallout , May 7, 2020 at 4:12 pm

It is actually now appearing to be the opposite- smoking (and/or nicotine) is something of a prophylactic. There have been several links floating around here discussing this. Not sure how definite the conclusions though.

Also, I am untrained in any of this stuff, though have been following, but it seems that something that hits a small majority of people very hard, while so many seem to not even know they have it, says to me it's some specific genetic issue.

Hayek's Heelbiter , May 7, 2020 at 11:17 am

https://www.the-scientist.com/research-round-up/could-the-black-death-protect-against-hiv-54468

Strangely enough, one possible explanation of why ethnic minorities are more susceptible to Corona virus is the same reason that Northern Europeans seem to have greater resistance to HIV. Corona virus and HIV both are single-stranded RNA viruses. (And why remdesivir, effective against Ebola [a double-stranded RNA virus] is also showing effectiveness against Corona virus).

If you are alive today and have Northern European ancestry, they were quite likely survivors of the Black Death with a mutation that disables CCR-5 . It's Evolution 101.

Africa, Asia and the Americas were never exposed to the plague with the same virulence that Northern Europe was, and thus populations there did not develop the same level of of immunity that has lingered in people with Northern European ancestry.

As this is already a plausible theory for HIV, I have been unable to find the same research on Coronavirus as to whether people who are immune to it somehow have similarly disabled receptors on ACE-2.

Synoia , May 7, 2020 at 11:48 am

How could the two Black Death plagues, the 1347one and the 1665 affect your hypothesis?

I believe the 1347 plague was not brought to the west by sea, as it predates the Portuguese exploration of the sea route to the orient.

The Historian , May 7, 2020 at 12:03 pm

There are many good books on the Black Plague of 1347 and how it originated and spread. The most common theory is that it came with the Huns as they attacked shipping ports on the Black Sea which were connected to the overland shipping routes to China. Yes, Europe had trade with the Orient before the Portuguese rounded Africa. And then the ships in the Black Sea started bringing it west to ports in Italy and beyond.

For a simple yet historically accepted theory of the Black Plague, there is a well done course on Great Courses Plus, as well as a ton of written histories. Just search your favorite bookstore.

Harold , May 7, 2020 at 2:31 pm

By "Huns" do you mean Mongols? The disease is endemic to the grasslands of Mongolia and also the Western United States. Supposedly Genoese traders brought it to Constantinople from their ports in the Crimea, I thought.

The Historian , May 7, 2020 at 6:19 pm

Yes, it is probably more correct to call them Mongols because that is who they were fighting under, although some of the midieval historians that I have been reading called them Tartars and Huns, based on what tribes they belonged to. And Caffa, the city where the plague probably got its foothold, was both in Crimea and a port on the Black Sea. And yes, it did strike Constantinople first but since the topic was Europe proper, I just stated that ships brought it to Italy.

Hayek's Heelbiter , May 7, 2020 at 12:12 pm

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-mutant-genes-behind-the-black-death/

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/02/black-death-left-mark-human-genome

PlutoniumKun , May 7, 2020 at 1:01 pm

I'm not really convinced – for one thing I'd always understood that the Black Death did hit many other populations, they just weren't recorded so well (I can stand corrected by this, I don't know the latest research). It also doesn't explain why so far the home countries of those ethnicities that have been hit so hard in the west – East Asians, Iranians, SE Asians, have so far not been hit so hard by Covid. Indians and Pakistani's in particular seem to have been hit very hard in the UK, and yet the same can't be said in their home countries. This is why I suspect that a mix of socio economic (there is evidence that non-white healthcare workers are more likely to be put on the frontline), plus dietary/vitamin D related explanations may be stronger.

But its an interesting theory, nonetheless.

Synoia , May 7, 2020 at 1:28 pm

East Asians, Iranians, SE Asians, have so far not been hit so hard by Covid. Indians and Pakistani's in particular seem to have been hit very hard in the UK, and yet the same can't be said in their home countries.

Ambient Temperatures are very different, and there are some reports of less virulence in hotter climates.

PlutoniumKun , May 7, 2020 at 2:13 pm

Iran and a large chunk of Pakistan is actually quite cold in winter and early Spring. Tehran temperatures only went above a max of 20C in the last 2 weeks or so. Much of the temperature range of that region is not all that different from the inland cities of northern Italy and Spain.

HotFlash , May 7, 2020 at 4:53 pm

Indians and Pakistani's in particular seem to have been hit very hard in the UK, and yet the same can't be said in their home countries.

I wonder, are there differenced betw first or second generation immigrants? Age groups? Another factor that seems to correlate is vaccination for tuberculosis. The BCG vaccine (which is the only tuberculosis vaccine, although there are several strains and manufacturers of it) is mandatory in a number of countries, including India and Pakistan. Some countries never did it, and others have ended or limited their TB vaccination programs as cases of TB diminished.

There are lots of variables to work out -- lockdown, distancing, age of population, co-morbidities, yada yada. But just doing a deeper dive into Spain is interesting. Universal vaccination program started in 1965 for all newborns, no booster, and stopped in 1981, except for at-risk children. So that is a cohort of approx 49 to 55 year olds vaccinated. It would be interesting to see if the mortality rate was different in that group. Bonus! Basque region children are automatically considered 'at-risk' and have been vaccinated up to present! We have a control group! Would love to see data on that.

Here are the charts, people, go crazy. 91-divoc , this is deaths normalized for population, and the BCG World Atlas .

Bsoder , May 7, 2020 at 2:27 pm

Too bad Evolution 101 or 202 is not taught in red states, just not how god does things.

Science Officer Smirnoff , May 7, 2020 at 4:02 pm

Reply to Hayek's Heelbiter
May 7, 2020 at 11:17 am
On remdesivir:
The drug, made by the US company Gilead Sciences, is an antiviral that was trialled in Ebola, but which failed to show benefits in Africa. -- The Guardian Thu 23 Apr 2020 15.35 EDT
[emphasis added]

Hayek's Heelbiter , May 7, 2020 at 6:55 pm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remdesivir
Nevertheless (emphasis mine)

As an adenosine nucleotide triphosphate analog, the active metabolite of remdesivir interferes with the action of viral RNA-dependent RNA polymerase and evades proofreading by viral exoribonuclease its predominant effect (as in Ebola) is to induce an irreversible chain termination. Unlike with many other chain terminators, this is not mediated by preventing addition of the immediately subsequent nucleotide, but is instead delayed, occurring after five additional bases have been added to the growing RNA chain.[56] Hence remdesivir is classified as a delayed chain terminator.

[56] Tchesnokov EP, Feng JY, Porter DP, Götte M (April 2019). "Mechanism of Inhibition of Ebola Virus RNA-Dependent RNA Polymerase by Remdesivir". Viruses. 11 (4): 326. doi:10.3390/v11040326. PMC 6520719. PMID 30987343.

Carolinian , May 7, 2020 at 1:01 pm

A useful discussion of the models versus evidence schools of epidemiology. While the evidence school sounds a lot more like science, the models school currently has the upper hand given the emergency nature of the response. Are they "assuming a can opener?"

https://bostonreview.net/science-nature/jonathan-fuller-models-v-evidence

Cuibono , May 7, 2020 at 1:17 pm

My questions

  1. how important is asymptomatic transmission?
  2. what is the relative importance of different locales of transmission
  3. does prior SARS infection provide protection

Ignacio , May 7, 2020 at 6:50 pm

Your first two questions are unfortunately very difficult to address.

I think asymptomatic or nearly asymptomatic direct transmission is very important when there is not awareness of disease in the community. Then, there is fomites-led transmission which is even more elusive than asymptomatic direct transmission. So, when you detect someone with symptoms in a community if then everyone is tested it is almost certain some more will show positive. A couple of days later some many more will. So when first symptoms appear everyone must be isolated from each other, clean all surfaces, masks mandatory, and if the community includes some medical and other care full protection by and for the providers. Suddenly the community transforms into something resembling a military camp in wartime.

What i find most difficult is to decide what discipline to keep BEFORE the first case appears.

John k , May 7, 2020 at 2:03 pm

Everybody's different, flu only kills a very small fraction, granted elderly get shots. Maybe some differences are nutritional.

My thought is that there is a wide variety of vitamin d and zinc levels in those that get the virus, and that low levels worsen the outcome. And maybe nicotine also provides protection.

Diets low in red meat and oysters typically mean low zinc, plus local soils may be low, too I saw an indication North American soils are generally low. Poor people on cheap diets likely get little red meat. Hiding inside means low vit d, plus many seniors like me anyway seek shade to avoid harmful rays. And most living seniors stopped smoking, so no nicotine input.

I take vit d, plus zinc in a multi, have zinc lozenges on hand if I get symptoms, and if they worsen would add nicotine patch.

Bsoder , May 7, 2020 at 2:32 pm

American soils remain the richest in the world. Zinc would be a mineral and mined. There's no evidence based data to indicate for people in general zinc going to do anything. But if makes you happy sure why not. I'd ask my doc for a blood test on minerals and a vitamin panel. Then you'd know.

rd , May 7, 2020 at 7:31 pm

It is a function of regional geology. The northern US and Canada were largely glaciated and the soils are very recent (<100,000 years old) and so have not leached their nutrients and miinerals out. The rolling farmed plains of Western NY, OH, IL, KS, NE, etc. are glacial till plains or old glacial lakebeds. The Russian steppes are similar. Much of the major floodplains come from such soils and are rich as well (e.g. Mississippi).

Much of the South and California are old soils that are classified as "residual", basically bedrock weathered in place with a lot of leaching over hundreds of thousands or millions of years. These regions often have limited crops that can be grown or require a lot of fertilizer and maintenance. The same issues hold true for much ot the tropics (the reason why the Amazon rainforest has slash and burn agriculture to open up new areas that are temporarily rich.

Bob , May 7, 2020 at 2:39 pm

Regarding why are some countries not experiencing as much COVID-19 as the U.S., Europe and China, my personal non-scientifcally vetted opinion is that this this virus spreads indoors. Fresh air, ozone and UV radiation are all natural disinfectants. Outdoors, coughs and sneezes are dispersed via the wind.

This could also explain why the disease is concentrated in urban settings like NYC, present in warm weather locations like Singapore and implies it won't necessarily go away come the summer. On the other hand, the poorest citizens in the poorest countries spend a lot of time outdoors and don't seem to be as hard hit. Though this has been attributed to a lack of testing, their homes aren't hermetically sealed and climate controlled like those in the US, Europe or China which I believe leads to a lower infection rate. That being said, people who live in urban slums are certainly vulnerable.

Moshe Braner , May 7, 2020 at 3:59 pm

There is also the issue, recently somewhat in the news, of different genetic variants of the virus. I've heard the claim that that explains why NY has been hit harder than the US West Coast – that the variant in NY supposedly came from Italy, while the West Coast got it from China. Of course they also spend more time outdoors on the West Coast than in NY, especially in February.

WhoaMolly , May 7, 2020 at 3:40 pm

I wonder if air conditioning systems could be contributing to infections by recirculating the air inside buildings.

My reasoning:

rd , May 7, 2020 at 7:33 pm

Commercial real estate is probably going to have to increase their fresh air exchange and potentially install electrostatic filters if they don't have them. Without that, offices are likely to be unhealthy.

neo-realist , May 7, 2020 at 10:05 pm

Offices have been unhealthy, air wise, for years. We just cough, hack, adapt, deal.

dk , May 7, 2020 at 7:41 pm

The short answer is yes.

The term for the motile form of a virus is virion , one or more strands for RNA (of DNA but SARS-CoV-19 is RNA) enclosed in a fatty lipid capsule ("capsid"), usually with protruding receptors with which the virion can attach to and inject it RNA strand into a host cell. Coronaviruses have characteristically prominent "spikes," receptors that extend beyond the capsid surface.

Basically, virions are little blobs of fat. When exposed directly to air they quickly rancidify and the exposed RNA strand disintegrates. Riding air pollution particles is possible but unlikely, as many of these kinds of particles have surfaces antagonistic to the fatty capsid. However, exhaled particulate droplets suspended in air can pass through coarse filtration. HEPA filters are designed to trap such droplets, UV irradiation can "cook" them.

Here is a study on an early transmission site in China, where incidents of infection seem to correlate to ventilated air flow in a restaurant: COVID-19 Outbreak Associated with Air Conditioning in Restaurant, Guangzhou, China, 2020 https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/7/20-0764_article

The Figure 1 illustration helps to visualize this: https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/7/20-0764-f1

Here is a not-yet-reviewed preprint of a study of two buses transporting attendees to and from an event in China. One bus (#2) had a suspected "index patient" (IP), the other didn't. https://twitter.com/zeynep/status/1255579524047220741

From the article: "In both buses and conference rooms, central air-conditioners were in indoor re-circulation mode."

Interestingly, the conference itself produced few further cases, these were all traced to prolonged interactions with the IP. Generally with viruses, some critical mass of virions must accumulate in sufficient number to produce infection, and total net exposure may approximately correlate with severity. Untreated recirculated air bearing virus-laden droplets may lead to repeated exposure and increase concentration of virions in individuals.

[May 07, 2020] Why didn't we shutdown everything in 1968?

May 07, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

xxx Anonymous IX,

xxx 3 hours ago

You might be interested in this little tidbit, Quy. From the CDC . You do "trust" them, don't you?

Just one question for you. Why didn't we shutdown everything in 1968?

1968 Pandemic (H3N2 virus)

The 1968 pandemic was caused by an influenza A (H3N2) virus comprised of two genes from an avian influenza A virus, including a new H3 hemagglutinin, but also contained the N2 neuraminidase from the 1957 H2N2 virus. It was first noted in the United States in September 1968. The estimated number of deaths was 1 million worldwide and about 100,000 in the United States. Most excess deaths were in people 65 years and older. The H3N2 virus continues to circulate worldwide as a seasonal influenza A virus. Seasonal H3N2 viruses, which are associated with severe illness in older people, undergo regular antigenic drift .

"The estimated number of deaths was 1 million worldwide and about 100,000 in the United States."

[May 07, 2020] Locking down without specific actions to shield the vulnerable will yield no better results than no lockdown or the sweden approach

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Alaric , May 6 2020 21:13 utc | 20

Reading some of the other comments, I see many recognize the incredible specificity involved here in outcomes, treatment, etc. Lockdown is an indirect way to impact those variables but locking down without specific actions to shield the vulnerable will yield no better results than no lockdown or the sweden approach. A sweden approach that does protect those vulnerable is likely more effective than a lockdown that does not.

NYC has nursing homes that are 700 and more persons. Large nursing homes should be banned if we want to stop this sort of thing in the future. Residents of such facilities should be moved to smaller temporary housing. NY State allowed persons who tested positive for Covid to go back to nursing homes -- disaster. Employees of such facilities and visitors would ideally be tested. Employees of such facilities should not be taking the NYC subway to get to work as Subways are major transmission points. Nosocomial infections were a big part of the problem in NYC as well. We needed separate facilities for suspected covid patients. 88.1% of those on mechanical ventilation in NYC (according to a JAMA study) died. That's junk medicine and it was implemented in part out of fear of spreading and probably for financial gain....ick.

There are a lot of things that could and should be done but we don't talk about that because it doesn't fit the media narrative of fear, panic, fear, lockdown, lockdown, lockdown or bust.

The media has done us and the elderly a great disservice......again

[May 07, 2020] Post-Lockdown Insist on the Old Normal by Helen Andrews

May 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com
When the CIA wanted to circumvent possible Chinese bugging of its offices in Beijing in the 1980s, it came up with a voice protector or "hush phone," essentially two masks with tubes running between them. It worked, but no one would use it. George Shultz said he felt "ludicrous" wearing something that made him look "like Siamese-twin elephants joined at the trunk." Even during planning for Reagan's state visit in 1984 when secrecy was essential, staff in Beijing simply refused to use a device that made them sound like Donald Duck.

And good for them. There were logistical reasons to reject the hush phone, like the impossibility of more than two people talking to each other at a time, but there is also something creditable about whatever part of Secretary Shultz said: I am a grown man, and I have some dignity.

Everyone is wondering what life will look like at the end of the month. Lockdown bitter-enders insist that the return to normal will not be like flipping a light switch, to borrow Maryland governor Larry Hogan's expression. Instead, they say, we will need to spend an indefinite period in a twilight zone of half-freedom where lockdown orders have been lifted but aggressive safety measures remain -- a "new normal."

Based on descriptions of the new normal, I am not sure we should allow ourselves to get used to it. As eager as we are to get the lockdowns over with, we must not let desperation compel us to put up with things we shouldn't.

Ross Douthat thinks that long lines outside grocery stores of people waiting to come inside and shop "may become a permanent feature of the semi-normal landscape." That's absurd, and, like the hush phone, there are both good reasons and gut reasons why.

One-way aisles and occupancy caps don't do much to stop the spread of disease considering how little transmission takes place between shoppers who pass like ships in the night. Also, queuing down the block for groceries is just too grimly Soviet.

Social distancing measures should remain in place even after schools and businesses reopen, many say. But enforced by whom? Continuing to make cops responsible for enforcing a six-feet-apart rule will only lead to more viral videos like this week's from New York, which depicts the violent conclusion of what started as a social distancing stop.

The New York City Police Benevolent Association says officers shouldn't be enforcing "vague guidelines and mixed messages." It wants the mayor to "get cops out of the social distancing enforcement business altogether." The PBA is right. The alternative is for Americans to get accustomed to being hustled along by police for the crime of picnicking on the grass or reading a book on a park bench, which would be an ominous thing to start shrugging off.

Australia is making its new normal conditional upon citizens downloading a location-tracking app modeled on Singapore's. The prime minister insists the app is voluntary, but business groups like Restaurant and Catering Australia are already considering requiring diners and shoppers to download the app before being served.

The government says its goal is for 40 percent of the population to download the app, a target still more than halfway off after its first week in the app store. "Downloading the COVIDSafe app is the major obstacle now between us freeing up a lot of these restrictions in a cautious way," Prime Minister Scott Morrison said, not disguising the ultimatum.

The last time the Australian government requested emergency permission to track its citizens' phones was the metadata retention law of 2015. As with COVIDSafe, repeated assurances were made about privacy and civil liberties. Later it was revealed that users' metadata had been used by local city councils in order to track down litterbugs and other mundane offenders who had nothing to do with the law's original justification, counter-terrorism.

The United States is not Singapore, and there are certain restrictions on our liberty that we won't tolerate. A government location-tracking app should be one of them. Such excessive post-lockout safety measures are not needed to deal with a disease that is no longer in danger of overloading our hospital capacity. More importantly, Americans' gut aversion to being overpoliced is worth preserving. Ordinary aspects of pre-coronavirus life should not be sacrificed in order to give those still attached to the lockdowns a psychological on-ramp or a face-saving pretense that their doomsday forecasts were more accurate than they were.

Except for open plan offices. Ban those permanently, for the good of the nation's health.

[May 07, 2020] A Tale of Two Countries: Denmark and Sweden

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jen , May 7 2020 1:32 utc | 50

It is interesting if perhaps concerning that of all the comments on the Peter Turchin article "A Tale of Two Countries [Denmark and Sweden]" , the one comment B chose to zero in on and highlight for his post is one by Richard England who refers to the lockdown of fiat and the lockdown of fear but provides no link to any information (such as polls, questionnaires or surveys) that would support his argument of most Swedes complying with recommendations and regulations voluntarily out of fear.

Turchin started his comparison of the progress of COVID-19 in Denmark and Sweden expecting that the death rates in Denmark compared to those in Sweden would support his belief that a lockdown was necessary. He did not expect to see that by 1 May 2020, the trends in new cases, transmission rates and even death rates in Sweden were actually comparing well with equivalent data in Denmark.

One commenter on the Turchin article, Ernst Nilsson, says that 80% of COVID-19 deaths in Sweden were of people aged 70+ years and that Swedish authorities have acknowledged that people in aged care homes and similar facilities had not been well protected.

Karl Kling points out that in Sweden, aged care facilities are the responsibility of municipal governments that have been cutting labour costs in those places by using workers, many of them on hourly contracts and / or not being fluent Swedish speakers. It is likely then that these workers have been spreading the virus among the people they care for because they are working long hours to make ends meet, are being exposed themselves to the virus more than they would be if they were working regular hours on their shifts and were being paid adequately, and do not have a good understanding of what they should be doing to avoid being infected and spreading the disease in their own languages because Swedish authorities failed to communicate adequate information about COVID-19 to immigrant communities and foreign workers.

Other commenters point out that Sweden has a large immigrant population ( Wikipedia states that the immigrant population and their children make up at least 24% of the total population; incidentally this means comparisons between Sweden and other Nordic nations, where the immigrant population and their children are about 15%, of dubious worth) and sections of this population may be behaving differently in ways that exacerbate COVID-19 incidence and mortality. The Somali community in Sweden is known to be very hard-hit by COVID-19 due in large part to living in dense and crowded housing in impoverished communities where access to healthcare, other social services and information about the disease is poor.

That aged care facilities and immigrant communities have been badly affected by COVID-19 disease is not a consequence of not having a lockdown or shutdown but is rather a consequence of past Swedish policies in allowing nursing homes and similar institutions to be rundown or badly managed, and in neglecting other vulnerable groups by not giving them information about the disease in ways they can access. That immigrants are also working in aged care facilities helps to circulate the disease among vulnerable groups.

[May 07, 2020] Sweden is a valuable case but the only viable option

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Tuyzentfloot , May 7 2020 7:13 utc | 77

Sweden is a valuable case. I see three categories of measures which can be combined:
- top down centrally managed/enforced
- self organized
- negotiated
The first relies on central planning and as central planning goes, it can be powerful and at the same time crude and wasteful. The second resembles more the 'free market' approach , it has the advantage of 'on the terrain' adjustments which can be much smarter than in the centrally organized case but it does not necessarily work in the desired direction. Much depends on the feedback mechanisms which are available.

The third is where a group of people is willing to do their sacrifices for the greater good(or the lesser evil) but they should expect something in return from other groups of people because it shifts the balance of power.

An example of the difference between 1 and 2 is how masks were handled in Belgium vs Czechia. Czechia took the more trusting decentralized approach. Belgium followed the WHO and was more guided by fear that people would do it wrong, with the scarcity and all. But people perform better if you give them trust and responsibility. Also using masks is a learning process so now you see in Belgium it takes time to get it going.

The main flaws in thinking about Sweden is that it relied entirely on the second group, that this second group by itself should be able to fix it all, and that this second group did not hit the economy hard. But for the cinema owner it does not make a big difference if they have to close down because nobody is allowed to visit, or because there are only 2 people in the theater anyway. In the restaurant sector the self organizing approach will have softened the blow. I read visitors dropped to 1/3.

I think Sweden has used a variety of measures with a variety of results. They flattened the curve without lockdown. We can learn from them, or to put it differently, steal ideas from them.

r , May 7 2020 7:23 utc | 78

so maybe Japan's strategy was better than the others ... delayed "lockdown" with very low testing ratio per million resident (even after promising about 20000 tests per day last April, to this date J-lawmakers blame lack of manpower and preparation for not being able to reach that objective). we got low numbers ... and reported infections have been declining in Tokyo.

the "lockdown" is simply a request for people to follow 3密 (san mitsu). people have explained that Japan can force the people to lockdown. the government does not have the authority. most people followed the requests ... i don't know if it's because they respected the request of the gov't or just because of fear.

GW just finished, it is a yearly migration of people from the cities back to their home towns. or people trying to refresh, go on vacation/travel. i traveled from Kanagawa (where I live) to Tokyo and was surprised at how empty it was. the trains, train stations, the areas. locally in Kanagawa, the parks are full of people, under sun shades, kids playing around.

J-media highlighted 2 cases where asymptomatic person died in self isolation in Saitama, and has now modified the requirements for getting a PCR test. i myself would like to get an antibody test ... well waiting, that is.

waiting to be able to apply for the 10万円 (100000 thousand yen) being given by the government.

i am still waiting for my アベノマスク (Abenomask). distribution is delayed because the masks were soiled/moldy/dirty. a failed stunt which cost 466億円 (466 billion yen).

the best place to buy masks now is in Chinatown ... price is high ... but there is supply ... and there is demand. Sharp (TV/LED maker) is making masks, but has to raffle it off because of the demand.

Abe-extended the State of Emergency to enf-of-May ... but if they think everything is clear they can lift the SoE as early as May 15.

[May 07, 2020] Sheriffs in Arizona have announced that they will not arrest or fine people who violate the governor's virus diktats. Police always have discretion to charge or ignore any crime, but this is a direct challenge to the governor.

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

karlof1 , May 6 2020 0:29 utc | 41

I usually don't read The Atlantic , but I was shocked its staff writer George Packer wrote this : "We Are Living in a Failed State: The coronavirus didn't break America. It revealed what was already broken." It's a special preview of the June issue, so I don't know how long it'll be at the link. Yes, the title foretells the content!

Hoyeru , May 6 2020 0:31 utc | 42

PIF GADGET comics magazine(a famous French comics anthology magazine for children produced by the French communist party) predicted the corona virus epidemic back in one of its January 1979 issues, not sure which, because they came out weekly. It was in Doctor Justice series, about a doctor named Benjamin Justice who travels around the world helping poor nations. It even had a drawing of a corona virus. Interesting.

Back in the 1970s, growing in a communist country, we were repeatedly warned that Americans want to wage bio war against the communists countries using viruses and bacteria. We were told they will try to spread the bio weapons around. And here we are, 2020. Seems the communists KNEW.

Trailer Trash , May 6 2020 3:25 utc | 47
>We Are Living in a Failed State

Not yet. Uncle Sam still has a near-monopoly on violence. But civilians with 400 million guns (really, more guns than people) might have something to say about that in the near future. Meanwhile, sheriffs in Arizona have announced that they will not arrest or fine people who violate the governor's virus diktats. Police always have discretion to charge or ignore any crime, but this is a direct challenge to the governor.

If an individual directly challenges the police, over anything at all, they will be abruptly dealt with. Failure to Obey is the second worst crime, right next to killing a cop. So what can a governor do, call out the National Guard against the sheriffs? That would be a big deal. But he can't let a direct challenge to his authority go unanswered. That is unthinkable in a rigid hierarchy.

[May 07, 2020] Closing cinemas and bars is a bit inconvenient but can be done without much protest. We have little experience in taking such measures. The model builders do not know how much each of those restrictions will contribute to the lowering of the peak.

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

We have little experience in taking such measures. The model builders do not know how much each of those restrictions will contribute to the lowering of the peak. They have to estimate those parameters. Until this month it was not even clear if children could get infected or were infectious. Arguing for closing schools without knowing that is quite difficult.

Clinical epidemiologists, who mostly work on randomized trials which produce hard data, are often critical of the model builders. They dislike the many assumptions that go into modeling and demand more hard data. Stanford's professor John Ioannidis, who ran the Santa Clara antibody study , is one of them. He is somewhat right. All models are wrong, but some are useful. A recent Boston Review piece looks at the differences between the two tribes of epidemiologists. It finds that we need both.

When the politicians take measures they are only in part based on the predictions the modelers made. They also have to look at economic outcomes, at other security issues and they have to take public opinion into account. Quite strict measures were taken in many western countries. They worked well in some of them. Germany has hardly any 'excess death' from Covid-19. Other countries, like Britain, acted too late or not to a sufficient degree and had to pay the price for that.

As the epidemic now starts to recede a bit there is quite a lot of criticism of the lockdown in Germany. 'The models were wrong,' some people claim. 'The lockdown measures were unnecessary.' Then follow demands for the immediate lifting of most restrictions.

"There is no glory in prevention" is the frustrating aspects in the life of an epidemiologist. If they do their job too well everyone will bash them.

A month ago Max Abrams saw this development coming and commented :

A month ago Max Abrams saw this development coming and commented :
  1. Models make assumption of how much people will social distance.
  2. Based on this assumption model predicts virus cases.
  3. More social distancing is practiced than assumed.
  4. Model over-predicts virus cases.
  5. Idiots say models are wrong so we don't need social distance.

Others point to Sweden and claim that its decision to let the epidemic burn without much intervention was a much better way than to go for lockdowns. But the evidence for that isn't there . The numbers show a different picture:

Barry Ritholtz @ritholtz - 18:03 UTC · May 3, 2020

Sweden's Coronavirus death rate > its neighbors https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

Sweden
Total Cases: 22,317
Per /1m Pop: 2,210
Deaths: 2,679
Recovered: 1,005

Denmark
Cases: 9,523
/1m: 1,644
Deaths: 484
Recovered: 6,987

Norway
Cases: 7,809
/1m: 1,440
Deaths: 211
Recovered: 32

Sweden in fact had the very same problems with its medical systems that some other countries also had. It had to ration ICU beds by denying them to people above a certain age. Its economy was hit as bad as other ones :

The effect of virus-fighting efforts on the Swedish economy has been devastating. A very large number of small businesses have collapsed. All but essential industries closed down almost immediately and many face bankruptcy. People have been told to refrain from all non-essential travel. Virtually all air travel has been suspended. Unemployment figures are soaring. The opposition parties deem government counter-measures to be too little too late.
...
Contrary to impressions created in American media, Sweden's approach to handling the pandemic has not been "relaxed," but essentially the same as in other Western countries. This country of 10 million has been at least as preoccupied with the pandemic as other countries. Whether its approach has been as efficient remains to be seen. What may stand out as exceptional in the end is Sweden's glaring lack of preparedness for a pandemic, especially for protecting its elderly, and that the dead are disproportionately recent immigrants.

While Sweden may not have ordered everyone into a total lockdown the people have largely done that by themselves simply out fo fear.

As a comment by one Richard England here (May 6, 2020 at 3:40am) describes that effect:

There are two kinds of lock-down, lock-down by fiat and lock-down by fear (or for that matter, self-preservation). The importance of lock-down by fear explains why Sweden has not done as badly as would be expected. Both forms of lock-down are economically destructive. Lock-down by fiat is usually either too slow or too incomplete to be much different from lock-down by fear, and both are more than enough to knock over a weak economy. Fear dissipates, and the economic life resumes more quickly where the disease has been essentially eliminated.

The effect is also captured in this graph by the German equivalent to the CDC, the Robert Koch Institute. It shows the replication factor R of the epidemic in Germany and three points in time where official lockdown measures were taken.


bigger

The replication factor of the disease in Germany was already decreasing in mid March before the more severe measures were ordered. R was below 1 even before March 23 when the government ordered the lockdown.

The simple reason for that is the people heard the news and watched TV. The pictures and death numbers from Italy in late February were quite brutal. When herd animals sense that an epidemic is taken place within their herd they distance themselves from each other. Humans behave similarly. As in Sweden many people in Germany went into some kind of lockdown and practiced social distancing even before it was ordered.

Some now claim that the RKI graph shows that the measures were not necessary. They are wrong. The data was not known when the measures were taken. The first of the simulations shown in the graph was done on April 1. In late March the R seemed to go again above 1 which meant that the epidemic was again expanding. Only the lockdown measures taken on March 23 pressed R below 1 and led to a slow decrease of new daily cases.

Germany is now slowly coming out of its lockdown. The U.S. is doing this too but at a point of the epidemic where it is way too early. There are economic reasons to do so but the early lifting of lockdown measures will likely cost the U.S. many human lives.

Fear will help to overrule that overhasty political decision. The news will continue to report new mass outbreaks in this or that part of the country. The fear will therefore also continue and the people will keep distancing themselves from each other. How much that will help to slow down the epidemic is difficult to estimate.

There is now some evidence that the summer will bring some relief from the onslaught of bad news. A study with data from 166 countries and published in Science of The Total Environment finds :

A 1 °C increase in temperature was associated with a 3.08% (95% CI: 1.53%, 4.63%) reduction in daily new cases and a 1.19% (95% CI: 0.44%, 1.95%) reduction in daily new deaths, whereas a 1% increase in relative humidity was associated with a 0.85% (95% CI: 0.51%, 1.19%) reduction in daily new cases and a 0.51% (95% CI: 0.34%, 0.67%) reduction in daily new deaths. The results remained robust when different lag structures and the sensitivity analysis were used. These findings provide preliminary evidence that the COVID-19 pandemic may be partially suppressed with temperature and humidity increases. However, active measures must be taken to control the source of infection, block transmission and prevent further spread of COVID-19.

A hot and wet summer is likely to lower the number of new Covid-19 cases. But after the summer come fall and winter during which we are likely to see a new peak. The fear will be back, social distances will again be practiced and the economic damage will further increase.

We had the chance to do otherwise. China gave us time to take the right measures. It has, like Hong Kong, Vietnam, South Korea and New Zealand, practically eradicated the disease within its boarders. It now has an advantage that will be difficult to beat.

Posted by b on May 6, 2020 at 18:57 UTC | Permalink

Posted by b at 18:57 UTC , Comments (149)

Posted by b at 18:57 UTC | Comments (149) /div

[May 07, 2020] Government sponcored lockdown vs self-imposed lockdown driven by fear

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

bevin , May 6 2020 19:15 utc | 1

"The importance of lock-down by fear explains why Sweden has not done as badly as would be expected. Both forms of lock-down are economically destructive."

The difference being that where the government plans and controls the lockdown it can mitigate many of the economic consequences by, for example, ensuring that nobody runs out of money to buy essentials, subsidising prices in agriculture and buying surpluses arising from lower demand, and various other measures, including rationing, which will ensure that the 'lockdown' does not lead to the deaths of anything except marginal businesses.

Many and sincere thanks, b, for these thoughtful and prescient posts. Yours has been a rare voice of sanity and social responsibility in this pandemic. It is to be hoped that even those who disagree with your conclusions recognise the honest and agonising analysis behind them.


C , May 6 2020 20:14 utc | 9

Regarding the imposed versus fear lockdown: Spain had (has) an imposed lockdown, but from the first day the new PSOE/Podemos government announced unprecedente measures to prevent evictions, layoffs, and provide income support that would help working people, including the irregular "gig economy" types that usually fall through the cracks of many such efforts. Big diference from 2007_8. The battle is now with the EU. We Will see if the Dutch and Germán bankers Will pull their heads out of their collective asses, or take the while EU down.
Alaric , May 6 2020 20:27 utc | 10
One really needs to take a closer, deeper look at Sweden and most every place. The lockdown vs. not lockdown mentality is overly simplistic and inaccurate.

Sweden has a high level of obesity (21%) and 44% of Swedes are overweight. Norway is similar but Denmark has 9.5% obesity. Sweden has a larger immigrant (% pop) than Norway and probably than Denmark. Immigrant population in Sweden did not seem to listen to the measures sweden took. Nearly 50% (maybe more now)of the deceased in Sweden are from nursing homes and Sweden's nursing homes are on average bigger (200 plus persons) compared to those in Norway (about 45 people). The Swedes failed to take actions to protect those nursing homes until it was too late and 1/3 had infections. Its worth pointing out that immigrants are over represented among employees of said institutions too.

The over simplification is a tool lockdown advocates are using to ignore the basic reality. Deaths are ultimately about percent of vulnerable in the population (elderly mostly) and success in protecting them from the Virus. The virus yields asymptomatic to mild results in 95% of more of the population so its really all about the vulnerable population. If you want a meaningful chart, then you need to chart deaths vs over 65 population and vs persons with comorbidities.

NY/NJ shut down and still had a lot more deaths per capita than Sweden. NY/NJ failed in the same way Sweden failed. They did not protect the vulnerable.

Lurk , May 6 2020 20:31 utc | 11
When I was in Sweden last summer, I was perplexed how unhealthy many Swedes look. The picture in Denmark was completely different. Curiously, the Covid-19 incidence rates in Denmark, Norway and Sweden mostly mirror my (superficial and subjective) impression of the health of the citizens of these countries. Lots of obesity in Sweden, lots of cyclists in Denmark.

[May 07, 2020] Will the American Way of Life Become a Casualty of the Coronavirus

May 07, 2020 | nationalinterest.org

By April, the country had changed. A virus that had gained footing overseas had spread like wildfire in major cities, forcing bars and restaurants to shutter their doors. The long days at the office were gone. Economic stability had disappeared. At night, the news organizations displayed images of corpses wrapped in white bags being loaded into refrigerated trucks in the once-busy streets of New York City. They showed video footage of people in biohazard suits placing bodies into a mass grave on Hart Island . The gears in the clock were moving at a fast pace in high-density parts of the country: alive this month and dead the next. By May, those who resided outside of the coronavirus hot zones though, who didn't have to see the deadly virus's grim threats on a daily basis, yearned for their old ways of living.

[May 07, 2020] As of a few weeks ago in one NJ hospital Plaquenil (hydroxychloroquine) was the standard treatment, along with azithromycin and zinc which is the most common protocol.

May 07, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Valissa , 06 May 2020 at 06:03 PM

Eakens, thanks for the link to the Plandemic video! I was chatting with my sister today and she recommended it as well.

BTW, my sister is a nurse in NJ in a hospital about 60 mi south of NYC near the shore. Several wards in her hospital were converted to ICUs to handle the influx of covid patients, so I have been asking her what meds they are given. As of a few weeks ago Plaquenil (hydroxychloroquine) was the standard treatment, along with azithromycin and zinc which is the most common protocol. Most patients are getting this and to quote her directly: "It's standard treatment and saving lives daily." She is perplexed by the politicization. While she is a conservative, the great majority of her coworkers are not.

The other two standard treatments added more recently to their covid protocols are tocizulamab (IL-6) and plasma with antibodies.

Here is a recent article on the tocizulamb, which I had never heard of before my sister mentioned it.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/tocilizumab-drug-shows-coronavirus-treatment-promise-doctor-says/ar-BB13HNun

optimax , 06 May 2020 at 11:23 PM
Teachers want their students back in the classroom before they start thinking for themselves. (drum roll). The NYT published a letter from a middle school girl who says she learns better, faster and deeper, distance learning than in class. Teachers have to spend too much time dealing with disruptive knuckleheads. Teachers didn't put up with any crap when I went to school.

Doctors that use hydroxychloroquine as a covid treatment report up to a 90% success rate, and works best when given early. On the other hand, the ebola wonder drug shortens the hospital stay from 15 to 11 days. I don't understand Ain't So Bright's, and many of the "experts," dismissal of of what treating physicians report an effective treatment in favor of one that less effictive. I trust the observations of the doctors on the ground more than some office dweller reading numbers, the most important ones being those in his paycheck.

[May 07, 2020] 2020 US Pentagon study that found that the flu shot INCREASES the risks from coronavirus by 36%

May 07, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

xxx Anonymous IX, 4 hours ago

Do you believe the Pentagon? From their study published this year. From Children's Health Defense entitled "Pentagon Study: Flu Shot Raises Risk of Coronavirus by 36% (and Other Supporting Studies)."

In searching the literature, the only study we have been able to find assessing flu shots and coronavirus is a 2020 US Pentagon study that found that the flu shot INCREASES the risks from coronavirus by 36%. "Receiving influenza vaccination may increase the risk of other respiratory viruses, a phenomenon known as "virus interference 'vaccine derived' virus interference was significantly associated with coronavirus " Here are the findings:

2020 Pentagon study: Flu vaccines increase risk of coronavirus by 36%

Examining non-influenza viruses specifically, the odds of coronavirus in vaccinated individuals were significantly higher when compared to unvaccinated individuals with an odds ratio (association between an exposure and an outcome) of 1.36. In other words, the vaccinated were 36% more likely to get coronavirus.

[May 07, 2020] There is evidence that vitamin D is involved in our defense against respiratory tract infections

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Lurk , May 6 2020 20:46 utc | 14

From a rapid response to an article in the British Medical Journal:

https://www.bmj.com/content/368/bmj.m1101/rr-10

... ... ...

A risk factor that we want to highlight, however, is the low vitamin D levels...

There is evidence that vitamin D is involved in our defense against respiratory tract infections. According to a meta-analysis, vitamin D supplementation (daily-weekly dosage) prevents acute respiratory tract infections, especially in those with 25(OH)-D below 25 nmol/l (NNT = 4).[7]

In a randomised trial on individuals with frequent respiratory tract infections, treatment with cholecalciferol 4000 IE/day reduced the need for antibiotic treatment.[8] The mechanism is debated; however, modulation of the renin-angiotensin system has been implicated in animal studies of acute respiratory distress syndrome,[9] and angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 is a well-established receptor for the SARS-CoV virus.[10]

In order to cope with the covid-19 epidemic, preventive measures could be administration of vitamin D to high-risk populations... adults with low sun-exposure and/or individuals with risk factors for respiratory tract infections. Although it may not always be helpful, it is unlikely to be harmful.

24 March 2020
Susanne Bejerot
Professor, MD
Mats Humble, MD, PhD
Örebro University, School of Medical Sciences
Campus USÖ, SE-70182 Örebro, Sweden

[May 07, 2020] Scientists have detected an antibody that blocks the coronavirus from entering cells, providing a much-needed shield for severely ill patients

May 07, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

uncle tungsten , May 7 2020 10:08 utc | 93

Likklemore #38
Scientists have detected an antibody that blocks the coronavirus from entering cells, providing a much-needed shield for severely ill patients. While not a cure or vaccine, it is still a significant development.
"This is clearly a breakthrough that shows that we are on the right track for the development of a drug against Covid-19," said virologist Professor Luka Cicin-Sain.

"In repeated experiments, we were able to show that this result is sustainable." [.]

The antibodies are currently undergoing additional testing on cell cultures to whittle their number down to find the most effective at blocking the infection. [.]

a drug for treatment, a vaccine unlikely.

Thank you Likklemore, that is promising news. Methinks chasing the holy grail (more likely Golden Fleece) of vaccines has cost the world many lives and needless lockdown. You have to wonder what all that research was doing by NOT coming up with a remedial medicine years ago.

[May 07, 2020] Evidence mounts that outside is safer when it comes to COVID-19

Notable quotes:
"... Health experts say people are significantly less likely to get the coronavirus while outside, a fact that could add momentum to calls to reopen beaches and parks closed during the COVID-19 pandemic. ..."
"... The virus is harder to transmit outdoors because the droplets that spread it are more easily disturbed or dispersed outside in the elements than in a closed, confined, indoor setting. ..."
"... As people go outside for their daily exercise and pass by one another, experts offered reassurance that simply passing someone for a split second outdoors presents a low risk. "The virus can't magically teleport," said Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security. "It needs a cough or sneeze or something, singing, talking, spitting. ... It's not magnetism or something like that." ..."
May 07, 2020 | thehill.com

Health experts say people are significantly less likely to get the coronavirus while outside, a fact that could add momentum to calls to reopen beaches and parks closed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

... ... ...

Murray said that even outside on the beach, people who do not live together should stay six feet apart and that activities such as beach volleyball should be avoided because multiple people touching the same equipment can spread the virus.

That means playgrounds also are a danger, she said.

"While it's great to have parks and beaches, you probably don't want playground equipment open," Murray said.

The virus is harder to transmit outdoors because the droplets that spread it are more easily disturbed or dispersed outside in the elements than in a closed, confined, indoor setting.

"It definitely spreads more indoors than outdoors," said Roger Shapiro, a professor at Harvard University's T.H. Chan School of Public Health. "The virus droplets disperse so rapidly in the wind that they become a nonfactor if you're not really very close to someone outdoors -- let's say within six feet."

As people go outside for their daily exercise and pass by one another, experts offered reassurance that simply passing someone for a split second outdoors presents a low risk. "The virus can't magically teleport," said Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security. "It needs a cough or sneeze or something, singing, talking, spitting. ... It's not magnetism or something like that."

Adalja said some of the decisions around activities such as sitting closer than six feet away from a friend outside on the grass have to do with how much risk someone is personally willing to accept. "There's not some kind of black or white answer to all of this stuff," he said. "People are going to have to make a lot of decisions about what risk tolerance they have."

Indoor spaces such as barbershops are certainly higher risk, though. There are more shared surfaces that could transmit the virus, such as the barber's chair. Another danger, especially in the summer, is air conditioning, which can circulate the virus through the air.

Military not accepting new recruits who've recovered from COVID-19 Immigrant detainee with COVID-19 dies in ICE custody: ACLU

"If you're in an indoor space that has the air conditioning blasting ... that air conditioning might be blowing the droplets straight at you," said Murray, the Boston University professor. Even outdoors, Adalja said people should be mindful of keeping their distance and washing their hands. "You can go to the beach, you can go to the park, and it can be safe," he said. "It's just you have to be cognizant of the fact that the virus is there."

[May 06, 2020] The accuracy of existing tests used to detect COVID-19 is at 70%-80%

May 06, 2020 | thenewkremlinstooge.wordpress.com

[May 06, 2020] Russian virusolog about an interesting form of institutional idiotism: enforcing wearing of masks outside closed spaces

Notable quotes:
"... "Actually, wearing masks on the street is stupid. First, in the open air, it is absolutely useless, only makes it difficult for people with disabilities to breathe. But, of course, in public places, shops, probably, wearing a mask should be left. Secondly, if you do not provide the entire population with masks, it will end in the fact that a person will buy a single mask and wear it forever, which will cause much more harm to health," Zverev says. ..."
May 06, 2020 | vz.ru

The virologist also spoke about the possible introduction of a mandatory "mask regime" throughout Russia, which is written about by the media.

"Actually, wearing masks on the street is stupid. First, in the open air, it is absolutely useless, only makes it difficult for people with disabilities to breathe. But, of course, in public places, shops, probably, wearing a mask should be left. Secondly, if you do not provide the entire population with masks, it will end in the fact that a person will buy a single mask and wear it forever, which will cause much more harm to health," Zverev says.

He explains that after two hours of continuous wearing of the mask, it becomes wet, which turns it from a means of protection to a means of infection with viruses and bacteria. Zverev reminds that in addition to the coronavirus in the world, there are still a huge number of infections that can also cause severe harm to a person, so it is not necessary to resort to such measures yet.

Earlier, a mandatory "mask regime" was introduced in the Moscow region in order to prevent a new coronavirus. For going out on the street without this means of protection, citizens of the region face a fine of 4 thousand rubles.

[May 06, 2020] Halting the economy to guard against COVID-19 spread is a terrible idea, and it will already have horrific consequences

I can't imagine that the lockdown will last much longer then end of May. A month, perhaps, to enable governments to row back and gradually feed the change of planned course through the media.
May 06, 2020 | thenewkremlinstooge.wordpress.com

[May 06, 2020] USAF gives Boeing $882m to help cash flow and fix KC-46 boom camera

May 06, 2020 | thenewkremlinstooge.wordpress.com

et Al April 10, 2020 at 9:57 am

FlightGlobal.com: USAF gives Boeing $882m to help cash flow and fix KC-46 boom camera
https://www.flightglobal.com/fixed-wing/usaf-gives-boeing-882m-to-help-cash-flow-and-fix-kc-46-boom-camera/137713.article

As fallout from the coronavirus pandemic further pinches Boeing's cash flow – financials already hurt by the grounding of the 737 Max – the US Air Force (USAF) has decided to release $882 million in payments withheld from the company in order to help fix a troublesome problem with the
####

Over only a measly $1 billion?

I should try this. Give me money or I'll go bankrupt and you'll get nothing that works properly! What a great 'business model'.

Did Boing hold its breath until it went red?

[May 06, 2020] Chloroquine has strong antiviral effects on SARS-CoV infection of primate cells

May 06, 2020 | nlm.nih.gov

Virol J . 2005; 2: 69. Published online 2005 Aug 22. doi: 10.1186/1743-422X-2-69 Background

Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is caused by a newly discovered coronavirus (SARS-CoV). No effective prophylactic or post-exposure therapy is currently available. Results

We report, however, that chloroquine has strong antiviral effects on SARS-CoV infection of primate cells. These inhibitory effects are observed when the cells are treated with the drug either before or after exposure to the virus, suggesting both prophylactic and therapeutic advantage. In addition to the well-known functions of chloroquine such as elevations of endosomal pH, the drug appears to interfere with terminal glycosylation of the cellular receptor, angiotensin-converting enzyme 2. This may negatively influence the virus-receptor binding and abrogate the infection, with further ramifications by the elevation of vesicular pH, resulting in the inhibition of infection and spread of SARS CoV at clinically admissible concentrations. Conclusion

Chloroquine is effective in preventing the spread of SARS CoV in cell culture. Favorable inhibition of virus spread was observed when the cells were either treated with chloroquine prior to or after SARS CoV infection. In addition, the indirect immunofluorescence assay described herein represents a simple and rapid method for screening SARS-CoV antiviral compounds.

[May 05, 2020] There may be hope in an engineered antibody that targets the viral spike protein

May 05, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Krollchem , May 5 2020 0:05 utc | 89

Laguerre@11

"Every time the virus replicates, there is a danger of error in the copy, which renders it less effective for the most part, much as in human cells."

The issue is that the SARS-CoV-2 spike (S) protein that binds to ACE2 and CD147 receptors is what allows the virus to replicate more efficiently. In a given population of viral particles a less efficient particle would result in fewer replicates leading its mutation to be less prevalent in a population of the coronavirus.

Thus, I would expect the virus to retain its virulence over time which leads us back to Dr Talab's conclusion on how to stop the transmission of a virus that needs a host. A subset of the availability of a host is what happens if the host can also be a non-human such as the Chinese raccoon dog, ferrets or even pigs?

In discussing viral mutations it is important to also note that articles that claim to calculate viral mutation rates fail to understand that statistics is about populations, and not individuals. The mutation rates of a population are not well represented by the PCR test if the mutation is not frequent enough to be seen in the amplification process (38-39 times).

I would not bet against the persistence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus S-protein and thus its continued virulence given the probability of mutations and the loss of function by a less virulent strain.

There may be hope in an engineered antibody that targets the viral spike protein:
https://www.zerohedge.com/health/coronavirus-defeated-experimental-antibody-targets-spike-protein

As for a vaccine, I would not hold my breath and if partially successful might result in more deaths due the the vaccine of the cytokine storm that the virus itself.

[May 05, 2020] What does an anti-body test do?

May 05, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Deap , 04 May 2020 at 01:44 PM

What does an anti-body test do? I just had one last week and awaiting the results - was a cruise passenger and international air passenger during the month of January in a later suspected area. (not Asia).

Here is why I did the anti-body test: (Quest Labs - fee service, no RX- 99% accuracy - drawn blood vial test)

1. Helps substantiate dates and areas of transmission that may not yet be in the data pool.

2. Tracks the rates of asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic cases occurring among the "elderly", in order to see if there is an enhanced risk of not in this age group, if there are no underlying co-morbidities.

3. Adds demographic data specific for the travel industry.

4. Allows possible donation of anti-body serum for research and perhaps mitigation of those who are affected.

5. Personal peace of mind -been there and done that. Freedom to move about.

6. Provides baseline for duration of immunity; resilience of immunity or data showing re-infection can be possible.

Primarily it is for data gathering to help stop the hysteria. That was worth the time, money and blood donation for me. We will never know the true extent of this virus, its impacts, its initial modeling accuracy until we start plugging facts into the "expert" hypotheticals.

Taking one for the team is the way I see it. Will I now become a local Typhoid Mary and our house burned down if this data becomes known? Or will people stop walking out into the roadway in faux deference to my advanced age as I pass by, from our deliciously virtue signaling "progressive" population in blue state California.

turcopolier , 04 May 2020 at 01:47 PM
Deap

"Provides baseline for duration of immunity; resilience of immunity or data showing re-infection can be possible. Primarily it is for data gathering to help stop the hysteria." Yes

[May 05, 2020] Coronavirus profiteering: Anger grows as hedge fund makes STAGGERING 4,144 percent return

The super-rich always get to do pretty much whatever they want, and the ordinary workers get the pay and respect the super-rich think they deserve
May 05, 2020 | express.co.uk

HEDGE FUNDS have been accused of profiteering from the coronavirus pandemic, as they exploit the economic turmoil to make billions of pounds in quick profits.

By JOHN VARGA
PUBLISHED: 06:02, Fri, Apr 10, 2020 | UPDATED: 11:25, Fri, Apr 10, 2020

[May 05, 2020] Pandemic Profiteering How the Military Goes to the Head of the Covid-19 Bailout Line

May 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com
Yves here. Even though it should come as no surprise that Covid-19 is an opportunity for more-better military grifting, the conduct can't even be classified as brazen. It's now routinized plunder.

By Mandy Smithberger, the director of the Center for Defense Information at the Project On Government Oversight (POGO). Originally published at TomDispatch

At this moment of unprecedented crisis, you might think that those not overcome by the economic and mortal consequences of the coronavirus would be asking, "What can we do to help?" A few companies have indeed pivoted to making masks and ventilators for an overwhelmed medical establishment. Unfortunately, when it comes to the top officials of the Pentagon and the CEOs running a large part of the arms industry, examples abound of them asking what they can do to help themselves.

It's important to grasp just how staggeringly well the defense industry has done in these last nearly 19 years since 9/11. Its companies ( filled with ex-military and defense officials) have received trillions of dollars in government contracts, which they've largely used to feather their own nests. Data compiled by the New York Times showed that the chief executive officers of the top five military-industrial contractors received nearly $90 million in compensation in 2017. An investigation that same year by the Providence Journal discovered that, from 2005 to the first half of 2017, the top five defense contractors spent more than $114 billion repurchasing their own company stocks and so boosting their value at the expense of new investment.

To put this in perspective in the midst of a pandemic, the co-directors of the Costs of War Project at Brown University recently pointed out that allocations for the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Institutes of Health for 2020 amounted to less than 1% of what the U.S. government has spent on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan alone since 9/11. While just about every imaginable government agency and industry has been impacted by the still-spreading coronavirus, the role of the defense industry and the military in responding to it has, in truth, been limited indeed. The highly publicized use of military hospital ships in New York City and Los Angeles, for example, not only had relatively little impact on the crises in those cities but came to serve as a symbol of just how dysfunctional the military response has truly been.

Bailing Out the Military-Industrial Complex in the Covid-19 Moment

Demands to use the Defense Production Act to direct firms to produce equipment needed to combat Covid-19 have sputtered , provoking strong resistance from industries worried first and foremost about their own profits. Even conservative Washington Post columnist Max Boot, a longtime supporter of increased Pentagon spending, has recently recanted, noting how just such budget priorities have weakened the ability of the United States to keep Americans safe from the virus. "It never made any sense, as Trump's 2021 budget had initially proposed, to increase spending on nuclear weapons by $7 billion while cutting Centers for Disease Control and Prevention funding by $1.2 billion," he wrote . "Or to create an unnecessary Space Force out of the U.S. Air Force while eliminating the vitally important directorate of global health by folding it into another office within the National Security Council."

In fact, continuing to prioritize the U.S. military will only further weaken the country's public health system. As a start, simply to call up doctors and nurses in the military reserves, as even Secretary of Defense Mark Esper has pointed out , would hurt the broader civilian response to the pandemic. After all, in their civilian lives many of them now work at domestic hospitals and medical centers deluged by Covid-19 patients.

The present situation, however, hasn't stopped military-industrial complex requests for bailouts. The National Defense Industrial Association, a trade group for the arms industry, typically asked the Pentagon to speed up contracts and awards for $160 billion in unobligated Department of Defense funds to its companies, which will involve pushing money out the door without even the most modest level of due diligence.

Already under fire in the pre-pandemic moment for grotesque safety problems with its commercial jets, Boeing, the Pentagon's second biggest contractor, received $26.3 billion last year. Now, that company has asked for $60 billion in government support. And you undoubtedly won't be surprised to learn that Congress has already provided Boeing with some of that desired money in its recent bailout legislation. According to the Washington Post , $17 billion was carved out in that deal for companies "critical to maintaining national security" (with Boeing in particular in mind). When, however, it became clear that those funds wouldn't arrive as a complete blank check, the company started to have second thoughts. Now, some members of Congress are practically begging it to take the money.

And Boeing was far from alone. Even as the spreading coronavirus was spurring congressional conversations about what would become a $2 trillion relief package, 130 members of the House were already pleading for funds to purchase an additional 98 Lockheed Martin F-35 jet fighters, the most expensive weapons system in history, at the cost of another half-billion dollars, or the price of more than 90,000 ventilators.

Similarly, it should have been absurdly obvious that this wasn't the moment to boost already astronomical spending on nuclear weapons. Yet this year's defense budget request for such weaponry was 20% higher than last year's and 50% above funding levels when President Trump took office. The agency that builds nuclear weapons already had $8 billion left unspent from past years and the head of the National Nuclear Security Agency, responsible for the development of nuclear warheads, admitted to Representative Susan Davis (D-CA) that the agency was unlikely even to be able to spend all of the new increase.

Boosters of such weapons, however, remain undeterred by the Covid-19 pandemic. If anything, the crisis only seems to have provided a further excuse to accelerate the awarding of an estimated $85 billion to Northrop Grumman to build a new generation of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), considered the " broken leg " of America's nuclear triad. As William Hartung, the director of the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy, has pointed out , such ICBMs "are redundant because invulnerable submarine-launched ballistic missiles are sufficient for deterring other countries from attacking the United States. They are dangerous because they operate on hair-trigger alert, with launch decisions needing to be made in some cases within minutes. This increases the risk of an accidental nuclear war."

And as children's book author Dr. Seuss might have added , "But that is not all! Oh, no, that is not all." In fact, defense giant Raytheon is also getting its piece of the pie in the Covid-19 moment for a $20-$30 billion Long Range Standoff Weapon , a similarly redundant nuclear-armed missile. It tells you everything you need to know about funding priorities now that the company is, in fact, getting that money two years ahead of schedule.

In the midst of the spreading pandemic, the U.S. military's Indo-Pacific Command similarly saw an opportunity to use fear-mongering about China, a country officially in its area of responsibility, to gain additional funding. And so it is seeking $20 billion that previously hadn't gained approval even from the secretary of defense in the administration's fiscal year 2021 budget proposal. That money would go to dubious missile defense systems and a similarly dubious "Pacific Deterrence Initiative."

How Not to Deal With Covid-19

Along with those military-industrial bailouts came the fleecing of American taxpayers. While many Americans were anxiously awaiting their $1,200 payments from that congressional aid and relief package, the Department of Defense was expediting contract payments to the arms industry. Shay Assad, a former senior Pentagon official, accurately called it a "taxpayer rip-off" that industries with so many resources, not to speak of the ability to borrow money at incredibly low interest rates, were being so richly and quickly rewarded in tough times. Giving defense giants such funding at this moment was like giving a housing contractor 90% of upfront costs for renovations when it was unclear whether you could even afford your next mortgage payment.

Right now, the defense industry is having similar success in persuading the Pentagon that basic accountability should be tossed out the window. Even in normal times, it's a reasonably rare event for the federal government to withhold money from a giant weapons maker unless its performance is truly egregious. Boeing, however, continues to fit that bill perfectly with its endless program to build the KC-46 Pegasus tanker, basically a "flying gas station" meant to refuel other planes in mid-air.

As national security analyst Mark Thompson, my colleague at the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), has pointed out , even after years of development, that tanker has little hope of performing its mission in the near future. The seven cameras that its pilot relies on to guide the KC-46's fuel to other planes have so much glare and so many shadows that the possibility of disastrously scraping the stealth coating off F-22s and F-35s (both manufactured by Lockheed Martin) while refueling remains a constant danger. The Air Force has also become increasingly concerned that the tanker itself leaks fuel. In the pre-pandemic moment, such problems and associated ones led that service to decide to withhold $882 million from Boeing. Now, however, in response to the Covid-19 crisis, those funds are, believe it or not, being released .

Keep all of this behavior (and more) in mind when you hear people suggest that, in this public health emergency, the military should be put in charge . After all, you're talking about the very institution that has regularly mismanaged massive weapons programs like the $1.4 trillion F-35 jet fighter program, already the most expensive weapons system ever (with ongoing problems galore). Even when it comes to health care, the military has proved remarkably inept. For instance, attempts of the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense to integrate their health records were, infamously enough, abandoned after four years and $1 billion spent.

Having someone in uniform at the podium is, unfortunately, no guarantee of success. Indeed, a number of veterans have been quick to rebuke the idea of forefronting the military at this time. "Don't put the military in charge of anything that doesn't involve blowing stuff up, preventing stuff from being blown up, or showing up at a place as a message to others that we'll be there to blow stuff up with you if need be," one wrote .

"Here's a video from Camp Pendleton of unmasked Marines queued up for haircuts during the pandemic," tweeted another . "So how about 'no'?" That video of troops without masks or practicing social distancing even shocked Secretary of Defense Esper, who called for a military haircut halt, only to be contradicted by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, desperate to maintain regulation cuts in the pandemic moment. That inspired a mocking rebuke of "haircut heroes" on Twitter.

Unfortunately, as Covid-19 spread on the aircraft carrier the USS Theodore Roosevelt , that ship became emblematic of how ill-prepared the current Pentagon leadership proved to be in combatting the virus. Despite at least 100 cases being reported on board -- 955 crewmembers would, in the end, test positive for the disease and Chief Petty Officer Charles Robert Thacker Jr. would die of it -- senior Navy leaders were slow to respond. Instead, they kept those sailors at close quarters and in an untenable situation of increasing risk . When an emailed letter expressing the concerns of the ship's commander, Captain Brett Crozier, was leaked to the press he was quickly removed from command . But while his bosses may not have appreciated his efforts for his crew, his sailors did. He left the ship to a hero's farewell .

All of this is not to say that some parts of the U.S. military haven't tried to step up as Covid-19 spreads. The Pentagon has, for instance, awarded contracts to build "alternate care" facilities to help relieve pressure on hospitals. The Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences is allowing its doctors and nurses to join the military early. Several months into this crisis, the Pentagon has finally used the Defense Production Act to launch a process to produce $133 million worth of crucial N95 respirator masks and $415 million worth of N95 critical-care decontamination units. But these are modest acts in the midst of a pandemic and at a moment when bailouts, fraud, and delays suggest that the military-industrial complex hasn't proved capable of delivering effectively, even for its own troops.

Meanwhile, the Beltway bandits that make up that complex have spotted a remarkable opportunity to secure many of their hopes and dreams. Their success in putting their desires and their profits ahead of the true national security of Americans was already clear enough in the staggering pre-pandemic $1.2 trillion national security budget. (Meanwhile, of course, key federal medical structures were underfunded or disbanded in the Trump administration years, undermining the actual security of the country.) That kind of disproportionate spending helps explain why the richest nation on the planet has proven so incapable of providing even the necessary personal protective equipment for frontline healthcare workers, no less the testing needed to make this country safer.

The defense industry has asked for, and received, a lot in this time of soaring cases of disease and death . While there is undoubtedly a role for the giant weapons makers and for the Pentagon to play in this crisis, they have shown themselves to be anything but effective lead institutions in the response to this moment. It's time for the military-industrial complex to truly pay back an American public that has been beyond generous to it.

Isn't it finally time as well to reduce the "defense" budget and put more of our resources into the real national security crisis at hand?


JBird4049 , May 4, 2020 at 3:58 am

Please , before buying a ticket for the Orange Man Hate Train Express, do realize that the latest cuts of the scientific and medical areas of the federal government are only a very, very small portion of all the similar cuts since the 1980s; six presidents and two of them Democratic.

The federal government already only has a shadow of it former capabilities, aside from murdering people and countries that is. Part of that is because of the sheer inability to use what is left.

Congress itself is also in the same way as all the supporting research agencies and much, although not all, administrative staff for both Congress as a whole and the individual has Congresscritters has been similarly cut since the 1980s; the whole institution is rather like those ghost units that the United States military used to fool the Germans. Fake radio traffic, fake camps, fake vehicles (inflatable tanks!) fake noise, anything that the Wehrmacht might use to verify its information.

Actors, musicians, carpenters, anyone with artistic flare and skills were used including in mobile fake or propaganda units. IIRC, one or twice a unit of these unarmed artists accidentally got far too close to some Germans units and the American soldiers got really, desperately creative with their show. A veteran once interviewed said that they were well aware that they had inflated tanks while the other side had real tanks. They, like Congress today, faked out the opposition. However, they only had to do so for maybe 2-3 days while Congress has become gradually more of a show over the past forty years. It is too bad that we need a real one right now. Reality really has decided to assert itself.

rosemerry , May 4, 2020 at 4:12 am

As well as the fact that the USA tries its very best to make enemies yet really is not in existential danger from any other nation, its behavior towards its own people continues to demonstrate that 99% really have no importance and only the rich and the corporations matter.
The recent rumours (?) that Trump is to discard the only restraint on nuclear war between the USA and Russia, ie the START Treaty to expire in 2021 despite Russian willingness to renew it, adds to the evidence that "defense" in the USA means aggression and madness when viewed with a cool head. Andrei Martyanov's book "Losing Military Supremacy" gives strong indications that even the famed spending on "defense" is wasted and ineffective.

divadab , May 4, 2020 at 5:16 am

Is any aspect of the shiny imperial death star not corrupt?

Oh , May 4, 2020 at 9:24 am

I wish there was a way to cut the salary of all in Congress and all those in the administration.

JE , May 4, 2020 at 11:36 am

Cutting their govt provided salary ($174k) would have minimal impact as the average (median) net worth of congress is over $1 million and they are largely paid after service, based on their ability to "play ball", by the revolving door placing them in highly paid lobbyist, consultant, board member, influence peddler positions. Barring congress and other officials from participating in the revolving door would have a real impact and has been proposed by many, including Gary Hart as detailed here but since it will cut down the lucre, it has no chance.

Susan the other , May 4, 2020 at 10:49 am

I don't think it would/will be difficult to retool the military for domestic service. They are undoubtedly focused now on destruction, "blowing things up" and then blowing things up some more. But preservation is not beyond their thinking. Proof of this elusive quality is how successful they have been preserving the military. Theoretically, they answer to the political leaders. But the political leaders have been undermining their own position in the blind faith that "the market" can take care of everything. Funny how that mantra never translated into "Let the market take care of the military." And Congress has proven itself to be a blithering masochist. They control the purse and they have cut themselves to the bone. Abdicated all responsibility to and for a nation of 350 million people and let it all go to hell. I don't blame the military for the mess we are in.

[May 05, 2020] Price-Gougers Caught Hoarding One Million Face Masks In New York DoJ

Apr 29, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Isabel van Brugen via The Epoch Times,

Two men have been arrested for allegedly attempting to sell 1 million KN95 face masks in New York City at double or triple the original price, violating the Defense Production Act, the Department of Justice said on April 28.

The U.S. Attorney's Office said in a release Tuesday that the two individuals, 56-year-old Kent Bulloch and 64-year-old William Young, Sr., are being charged in a criminal complaint unsealed in a federal court in Brooklyn with conspiracy to violate the Defense Production Act.

The charges come after President Donald Trump on March 23 signed an executive order to prevent the price gouging and hoarding of "critical supplies" needed to combat the CCP virus outbreak.

"We have some people hoarding. We want to prevent price gouging and critical resources are going to be protected in every form," Trump said at a press conference last month.

The White House said that the president is authorized under the Defense Production Act to prohibit the hoarding of needed resources.

Between March and April this year, the pair sought out investors to sell the protective masks for at least double the purchase price, court filings state. They then attempted to conceal the markup on the masks by falsely claiming in an escrow agreement that profits on the resale of the masks would not exceed 10 percent. A federal law enforcement agent posed as a purported investor, the release states.

"As alleged, the defendants conspired to turn a huge profit from the urgent need for surgical masks in New York during the pandemic," stated U.S. Attorney Richard Donoghue said in a statement .

"When the attorney general said that those engaged in price gouging should expect a knock on the door, he meant it -- and when we knock with one hand, we usually have a warrant in the other."

Bulloch was arrested in California on Monday night and will appear in federal court via teleconference in San Francisco, while Young will appear via teleconference in Phoenix.

"This is precisely the type of price gouging for which Attorney General Barr created our nationwide task force," said Craig Carpenito, head of the Department of Justice's nationwide COVID-19 Hoarding and Price Gouging Task Force.

"The Department of Justice will not allow greedy profiteers to take advantage of the public during this health crisis."

Last month, Attorney General William Barr emphasized that individuals who stockpile essential supplies will not be the target of the presidential action, but those who hoard items to sell with hiked up prices are, and may be subject to investigation.

"If you have a big supply of toilet paper in your house, this is not something you have to worry about, but if you are sitting on a warehouse with surgical masks, you'll be hearing a knock on your door," he said.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) was granted the authority to determine which items are prohibited for sale in "unnecessary quantities" above the fair market value in light of the hoarding rules.

The measure aims to ensure that hospitals, first responders, and doctors have sufficient supplies of critical medical equipment, including personal protective equipment and sanitizing and disinfecting products.

"By limiting access to these critical resources, those who engage in hoarding and price gouging could put both our medical workers and the health of the American people at risk," the White House said last month. "All Americans must come together to help one another during this time and help combat the outbreak."

[May 05, 2020] Suspected Mask Profiteer Arrested for Coughing on FBI Agents

Apr 04, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

How about the Brooklyn Jew who was arrested for hoarding medical supplies and then acting like a terrorist, coughing on the FBI agents who were arresting him?

Suspected Mask Profiteer Arrested for Coughing on FBI Agents

Baruch Feldheim, 43, was charged with assaulting federal officers and lying to them about his accumulation and sale of medical supplies, the U.S. Attorney's office in New Jersey said Monday in a statement. He wasn't charged with profiteering.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-30/suspected-mask-profiteer-arrested-for-coughing-on-fbi-agents

I'm sure poor Baruch is just another victim of anti-Semitism, never mind that he had hoarded enough medical supplies to outfit a small hospital and was selling his stash at a 700% markup.

Maybe if Jews would stop acting like those anti-Semitic tropes and become part of the human race, they'd be viewed in a different light?

[May 04, 2020] Fauci and the damage to the USA economy

May 04, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

It's likely Fauci's incorrect simply because just as central planners routinely failed when it came to planning economic outcomes in the 20th century, so does that same central planning fail now. Fauci once again may be brilliant, but he's no match for a U.S. economy comprised of hundreds of millions of individuals making infinite informed decisions every second of every day.

The same applies to Bill Gates. Some believe that his undeniable genius as a businessman positions him to knowledgeably opine on how we the U.S. and the world can come back from the virus. Gates has observed that businesses would be troubled with or without the lockdowns, unemployment would be higher with or without them, so the plan should be to continue them until we're better situated in terms of a vaccine.

Is Gates right? It's once again difficult to know. For one, his analysis ignores the "unseen"; as in what would individuals and businesses have done had the response of politicians to the virus been something like "You're all adults. Be careful."

If so, it's not unreasonable to suggest that Fauci, Gates and other intelligent individuals would have strongly called for Americans to shelter-in-place, and tens of millions would have done just that. At the same time, Elon Musk and investors like Michael Burry might have responded in more intrepid fashion; calling for individuals and businesses to work around a virus of unknown lethality.

[May 03, 2020] GSK partnered with Bill Gates to produce the Covid-19 Vaccine. GSK has been found guilty for several criminal federal offenses, bribes and health violations, and paid Billions in lawsuits including for birth defects brain damage.

May 03, 2020 | twitter.com

Marina Solonos ‏ 8:18 PM - 2 May 2020

GSK partnered with Bill Gates to produce the Covid-19 Vaccine. GSK has been found guilty for several criminal federal offenses, bribes and health violations, and paid Billions in lawsuits including for birth defects & brain damage. https://www. drugwatch.com/manufacturers/ glaxosmithkline/ # BillGates # QAnon # q

https--childrenshealthdefense.org-wp-content-themes-chd-theme-chd-theme

Promising his share of $450 million of $1.2 billion to eradicate polio, Gates took control of India's National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (NTAGI), which mandated up to 50 doses (Table 1) of polio vaccines through overlapping immunization programs to children before the age of five. Indian doctors blame the Gates campaign for a devastating non-polio acute flaccid paralysis (NPAFP) epidemic that paralyzed 490,000 children beyond expected rates between 2000 and 2017. In 2017, the Indian government dialed back Gates' vaccine regimen and asked Gates and his vaccine policies to leave India. NPAFP rates dropped precipitously. ­

[May 03, 2020] The spike elements of SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus are mutating

May 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , May 2 2020 23:31 utc | 49

Yesterday a preprint of a collaborative study involving medical, genomic and virology researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico-US, University Of Sheffield-UK, Duke University in North Carolina-US, Sheffield Teaching Hospital-UK and the NHS-Foundation-UK, was released. No quacks there.

It shows that the Spike elements of SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus is mutating

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.29.069054v1.full.pdf+html

It uses real-time mutation tracking in the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, specifically on the Spike (S) protein because it mediates infection of human cells and is the target of most vaccine strategies and antibody-based therapeutics.

It monitored changes over the last two months from the early strains in Wuhan to the specific strains across the globe in conjunction with the GISAID data.

They focused on 14 specific sites on the virus and 2 Spike mutations were of particular interests: D614G and S943P.

It was found that D614G is increasing in frequency at an alarming rate, indicating a fitness advantage relative and enables more rapid spread. S943P is located in the fusion core region, and is of particular interest as it is concerned with spreading via recombination.

D614 is located on the surface of the spike protein protomer, where it can form contacts with the neighboring protomer. The mutation allows from a structurally perspective more easy 'binding' to human host cells through a variety of ways and from a immunological function, it disrupts antibody functions trying to attack it.

Hence the D614G mutation not only increases transmissibility, but also impacts severity of disease.

The S943P mutation however allows recombinant strategies for the virus to evolve.

The study of the other mutation sites L5F, L8V V367F, G476S, and V483A all indicate that he virus can easily and evolve depending and conditions, displaying characteristics that it is even far more potent than HIV. There were also many other sites of mutations that the study covered.

So thats not very encouraging and doesn't bode well. Not conclusive but just means this needs watching.

... ... ...

[May 03, 2020] Ignorant Italians majors do not understand that 99% of coronavirus infections happened in closed spaces.

As long as social distancing is maintained, there is no harm of people specing some time ourdoors. Excessive zeal here is countrproductive
May 03, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Angry Italian mayors rage at people ignoring coronavirus lockdown rules - YouTube


ppermint , 1 month ago

Well, walking your dog around the home for 5 minutes with no other people around, will not spread anything and will keep a better mental health. Italians have gone from total ignorance to total isolation - another extreme. Unfortunately, many people are undisciplined and careless, so there's no other choice. By the way, stop running: you may already have the virus, making any physical effort will only waste your body energy to fight the virus

spywhale , 1 month ago

Its not the people in the open countryside or walking in the streets or relaxing in the park spreading the virus its when people travel together in buses, trains or any crowded environment.

shaun grobbelaar , 2 weeks ago

Ah the open border Italian wussy is complaining about smokes. they stupid

forist1 , 2 weeks ago

The Camorra are scared of the Black Axe , Maybe if the mayors stopped turning a blind eye to the growing threat of criminal gangs on there streets instead of bullying there citizens Italy would be a safer place to live .

NotJerry Beans , 1 month ago

Poor government makes ignorant majors

Michael Lee , 1 month ago

"Sweet coronavirus-flavoured cream" that's a good one, Mayor.

Eagle 4 , 1 month ago

"What do you even need these haircuts for!?" 😂😂😂😂

Justin B , 1 month ago

They've censored all the funny bits. Like how the mayor with the glasses says the f word a lot and the one talking about hairdressing says the casket is closed, noones going to see your new haircut when yo dead' 😂

P.C. Π.Χ.Φ.Ω , 1 month ago

Love them all Mediterreneans-they have such passion and fire in them . Italians, Greeks, Spanish..LOL

Ma Sa , 1 month ago

I love the last part "why people suddenly become runners."

Sam H , 1 month ago

i love their dark humour. viva italia! what a tremendous loss of the country's elderly population, I love italian elderly, they have so much wisdom and charisma. what a loss.

Emah Edabus , 1 month ago

The best one from another clip was: if u have a party I'll send the police with flamethrowers. They're all passionate!

Tristan Lau , 1 month ago

If anyone in Italy violates the lockdown rules will be subjected to eating pineapple pizza, the streets will be empty.

Adriana Giuro-Walla , 1 month ago

"La bestialità totale!" 🤣 Grande Sindaco De Luca!

A BC , 1 month ago

I must admit, I feel so much better working from home than dragging myself to the office. And there is so much flexibility.

Pesi Belau , 4 weeks ago

The best one were the who made references to will smith and the one who threathen to send police with torch to break party out!!

[May 03, 2020] Brad Griffin is Not My Mommy and He Doesn't Get to Decide Whether or Not I Can Play Outside by Andrew Anglin

May 03, 2020 | www.unz.com

The decision of whether or not to embrace coronamania is not based on statistical analysis of the specific number of nursing home residents or obese black people that are likely to die. We are witnessing a mass hysteria. It is collective temporary insanity induced by the media. The gulf between skeptics and true believers is underlined by personal disposition; those who are inclined to prioritize personal responsibility, freedom and suspicion of authority are pushing back against the lockdown, while those who are prone to neuroticism, risk aversion, safety prioritization and trust in authority are embracing the hysteria. For most people, the data becomes simply a post-hoc rationalization for a position that was already determined by their psychological profile. Given the masculine/feminine dichotomy, it has also become a partisan political issue, which has poisoned any public debate over the merits of the various claims.

...As a healthy and athletic 35-year-old, I am not at risk for dying. According to the CDC's own numbers, I have less than a 1 in 1000 chance of dying, even if I get sick enough to go to the hospital. This is approximately the same risk I have of dying from drowning or burning to death in a fire. By CDC math, I am ten times more likely to die in a car crash than I am to die of the coronavirus. For me personally, the coronavirus falls squarely into the category of "acceptable risks." I believe that I had a right to make that choice. However, here I sit, locked in my house, because people like Brad Griffin lobbied for this insane experiment.

This government that Brad Griffin demands we hand over total control of our lives to has overseen the mass import and distribution of opioid drugs, which are now killing 70,000 people a year. This government refuses virtually any regulation of the food industry, which leads to the deaths of 650,000 people every year from heart disease. This government sent thousands of young Americans to die in Iraq and Afghanistan for the purpose of forwarding the regional goals of Israel, based on a series of hoaxes. It's very difficult for me to buy the idea that this government is particularly concerned about my health.

Ezekiel Emmanuel, a dual Democrat political operative and credentialed expert, has been a prime evangelist for this lockdown. He was at the forefront of changing the narrative from "prevent the hospitals from being overwhelmed" to "we must continue the lockdown until the virus is eradicated." He is currently serving as Joe Biden's chief advisor on medical issues. While developing Barack Obama's healthcare plan, Emmanuel was the core proponent of what became known as "death panels," a policy that would limit end of life care for the elderly in the name of prioritizing the greater good of society. And he is now concerned about old people dying of the flu?

Brad Griffin claimed in his gotcha manifesto that anyone who even dares ask questions about whether or not it is desirable to surrender all control of our lives to this government, all the way down to our ability to feed ourselves, is a "libertarian." I assert that even if you actually believed that this coronavirus is a Biblical plague, that the only possible solution to it is to lock everyone in their houses (while also letting them gather whenever they want at supermarkets), including healthy young people whose chance of experiencing complications from the virus is statistically nonexistent, and you were fine with sacrificing the entire economy, putting what will probably amount to at least 50% of the population out of work, destroying virtually all small businesses, creating a massive new homeless population that is going to number in the millions and vastly inflating the suicide and drug abuse rates – even then, it would be appropriate to ask if this government is going to take advantage of this situation.

Brad Griffin's position is that we all just need to shut up and do as we're told.

While claiming that there is no chance whatsoever that the government will exploit this situation, Brad Griffin also takes the position that this will not collapse the economy. He's the only person on the entire internet I've seen saying that. The fun part is, whereas we will never know if we would have had as easy of a time as Sweden if we did as they did and refused the lockdown, we are going to know very soon whether the government is going to agree to give us all of our Constitutional rights back and whether or not the economy has collapsed. You will all be able to come back here and see my position in contrast with Brad Griffin's position, and decide who was right and who was wrong.

I have no idea why Brad Griffin and the rest of the costumed neo-Nazi community is promoting a total surrender to the government in the name of safety. Some people might say, "the COINTELPRO chief should be fired, because this has gotten ridiculous."

I won't say that. I'll just say this: Brad Griffin, you are not my mommy. I already have a mommy. In fact, we all have mommies. We all love our mommies, but none of us are looking for a second mommy.

MB , says: Website Show Comment May 2, 2020 at 7:21 pm GMT

Dunno Andrew. This is not rocket science and we all doesn't have to be Werner Von Einsteins (sic) to figure it out. Because if nobody is an expert, but the experts, so what?

It's called jujitsu.
IOW are the so called experts self consistent and coherent?

Rather, the WHO/CDC organizations and the IMHE and Imperial College reports are bought and paid for hirelings of Bill Gates. The same who took how many times and versions before he got Windows right?
Fauci in 2000 was still calling AIDS a plague threatening the world and likewise the 2009 Swine Flu.
(That something that was transmitted by sticking something in your arm or up the poop chute was supposed to seriously threaten heterosexuals who weren't drug addicts passed expert peer review is par for the course.)

Likewise for anybody who has lived through the Asian, Hong Kong, Swine, Bird, Nile River, Zika, AIDS, Ebola, SARS, MERS etc. epidemics, some herd immunity has been developed regarding the Chicken Little/Boy Who Cried Wolf fairy tale

So at first it was 2-3 Million – even with mitigation i.e. cower in place/anti-social distancing etc. – then 100-200 k and now 60-80k which is a bad flu season. Hmmm.

Neither does "flattening the curve" reduce the overall numbers. It only spreads them out. So now the hospitals are empty/going broke.
And we're going to empty the jails so the criminals don't get sick there is room for all the people that don't wear masks.

But what I really want to know is if there really is a mask shortage, how come nobody has snitched on Antifa and the KKK. It would seem that this is the time for them to come into their own as the real heros of the debacle. (Nah, cops and robbers is only for kids.)

IOW give me liberty or six feet and a mask blindfold so we'll shut up/suck it up.

cheers,

The Emperor Has No Clothes/Long Live the Emperor.

[May 03, 2020] Lockdown Wars Debating Pandemic Measures in a Failed State

May 03, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

... ... ...

People and governments always invoke the safety and security of the majority when they are taking away rights for "our own good," just like the Patriot Act did. It's an old playbook...

There is science which should be informing decisions. But while claiming a small rally in Denver will cost lives, or Florida will kill people by opening its beaches, the same voices remain silent as NYC keeps its subway running 24/7. The public beach versus public transportation debate came as a new study showed that NYC's "multitentacled subway system was a major disseminator -- if not the principal transmission vehicle -- of coronavirus infection," seeding the virus throughout the city. Without a superspreader like the subway it can be contained locally. It is tragic when the virus rips through a nursing home or meatpacking plant (it is a virus after all, it will go viral), but all of those together barely touch a week's body count in New York. Shut down mass transport.

We can put most people back to work with limited risk; the protesters are right. The virus kills a very specific patient. About half the dead are over age 65. Less than one percent of deaths are under age 44. Almost 94 percent of the dead in any age group had serious underlying medical issues (about half had hypertension and/or were obese, a third had lung problems). The death toll in NY/NJ under total lockdown: over 27,000. Death toll in much more densely populated Tokyo with "smart" lockdown: 98.

About 22 percent of New Yorkers already have the virus antibody and thus expected immunity. One logical implication of this -- that large numbers already have or had the virus, and that it is harmless to them -- is simply ignored. Quarantine/social distancing should be for those most vulnerable so we can stop wrecking all of society with cruder measures. Hospitals should separate patients by age. No need to keep kids from school, especially if that means isolating them inside a multigenerational household. Let them wear soggy paper masks to class, even tin foil on their heads, if it makes things easier. Online classes are lame and America doesn't need a new generation dumber than the current one.

The New York-New Jersey area, with roughly half the dead for the entire nation, practices full-on social distancing while Georgia was one of the last states to implement a weaker stay-at-home policy. Yet as Georgia re-opens, the NY/NJ death count is over 27,000 . Georgia is 892. NYC alone continues adding around 500 bodies to the pile every day, even with its bowling alleys closed.

We judge risk versus gain for every other cause of death. We wear condoms. We watch our diets. Time to do the same for the virus. As for lockdowns, we may not even be judging them accurately. Some 22 states have had fewer than 100 deaths. Only 15 states had total deaths for the entire duration of the crisis higher than NYC's current 500 a day. The original goal of lockdowns, to buy time for the health care system (and most resources were never needed due to over-estimates of the viral impact), has passed. If the new goal is Virus Zero it will never come. If the real goal is to harm Trump we'll have to put up with this without serious discussion until November.

A Stanford doctor nails it: "Strictly protect the known vulnerable, self-isolate the mildly sick and open most workplaces with some prudent large-group precautions. This would allow the essential socializing to generate immunity among those with minimal risk of serious consequence, while saving lives, preventing overcrowding of hospitals, and limiting the enormous harms compounded by continued total isolation."

We are fretting and frittering away our national muscle watching TV about a bigamous tiger keeper. There are too many who want this isolation to continue indefinitely, a pathetic nation whose primary industries for its young people are camming and GoFundMe. Politics focuses on viral deaths, but the Reaper keeps a more accurate tally: deaths from despair, from hunger (two million new people became food insecure in NYC since the virus), financial losses (26 million Americans have filed for unemployment ), mental health issues, and abuse (domestic murders during the viral months in NYC outstripped the total from 2019). In some ultimate irony, parents are postponing standard childhood vaccinations for fear of bringing their kids to medical facilities.

It is the reaction to the pandemic that exhausts us, not the pandemic itself. So when someone claims it is Money vs. Life they miss the real answer: It's both. It should not be taboo to discuss this.

Peter Van Buren, a 24-year State Department veteran, is the author of We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People, Hooper's War: A Novel of WWII Japan , and Ghosts of Tom Joad: A Story of the #99 Percent .

[May 03, 2020] Contact tracing via app: a scam

May 03, 2020 | www.schneier.com

Bruce Schneier on contact tracing via app

This is a classic identification problem, and efficacy depends on two things: false positives and false negatives.

False positives: Any app will have a precise definition of a contact: let's say it's less than six feet for more than ten minutes. The false positive rate is the percentage of contacts that don't result in transmissions. This will be because of several reasons. One, the app's location and proximity systems -- based on GPS and Bluetooth -- just aren't accurate enough to capture every contact. Two, the app won't be aware of any extenuating circumstances, like walls or partitions. And three, not every contact results in transmission; the disease has some transmission rate that's less than 100% (and I don't know what that is).

False negatives: This is the rate the app fails to register a contact when an infection occurs. This also will be because of several reasons. One, errors in the app's location and proximity systems. Two, transmissions that occur from people who don't have the app (even Singapore didn't get above a 20% adoption rate for the app). And three, not every transmission is a result of that precisely defined contact -- the virus sometimes travels further.

Assume you take the app out grocery shopping with you and it subsequently alerts you of a contact. What should you do? It's not accurate enough for you to quarantine yourself for two weeks. And without ubiquitous, cheap, fast, and accurate testing, you can't confirm the app's diagnosis. So the alert is useless.

Similarly, assume you take the app out grocery shopping and it doesn't alert you of any contact. Are you in the clear? No, you're not. You actually have no idea if you've been infected.

The end result is an app that doesn't work. People will post their bad experiences on social media, and people will read those posts and realize that the app is not to be trusted. That loss of trust is even worse than having no app at all.

It has nothing to do with privacy concerns. The idea that contact tracing can be done with an app, and not human health professionals, is just plain dumb.

Posted by: c1ue | May 3 2020 17:03 utc | 37

[May 03, 2020] A Protest From France. The Great Danger of Ill-Conceived Lockdowns - Global ResearchGlobal Research - Centre for Research on Gl

May 03, 2020 | www.globalresearch.ca

A Protest From France. The Great Danger of Ill-Conceived Lockdowns By Jörg Guido Hülsmann Global Research, May 01, 2020 Mises Wire 30 April 2020 Region: Europe Theme: History , Police State & Civil Rights

After WWI, the distinguished British economist Edwin Cannan was asked, somewhat reproachfully, what he did during the terrible war years. He replied: "I protested." The present article is a similar protest against the current lockdown policies put into place in most countries of the Western world to confront the current coronavirus pandemic.

Here in France, where I live and work, President Macron announced on Thursday, March 12, that all schools and universities would be shut down on the following Monday. On that Monday, then, he appeared on TV again and announced that the entire population would be confined starting the very next day. The only exceptions would be "necessary" activities, especially medical services, energy production, security, and food production and distribution. This policy response was apparently coordinated with other European governments. Italy, Germany, and Spain have applied essentially the same measures.

I think that these policies are understandable and well intentioned. Like many other commentators, I also think that they are wrongheaded, harmful, and potentially disastrous. An old French proverb says that the way to hell is plastered with good intentions. Unfortunately, it seems as though the present policies are no exception.

My protest concerns the basic ideas that have motivated these policies. They were clearly enunciated by President Macron in his TV address of March 12. Here he made three claims that I found most intriguing.

The first one was that his government was going to apply drastic measures to "save lives" because the country was "at war" with the COVID-19 virus. He repeatedly used the phrase "we are at war" ( nous sommes en guerre ) throughout his talk.

Secondly, he insisted right at the very beginning that it was imperative to heed the advice of "the experts." Monsieur Macron literally said that we all should have to listen to and follow the advice of the people "who know" -- meaning who know the problem and who know how best to deal with it.

His third major point was that this emergency situation had revealed how important it was to enjoy a state-run system of public healthcare. How lucky are we to have such a system and to be able to rely on it, now, in the heat of the war against the virus! Unsurprisingly, the president insinuated that this system would be reinforced in the future.

Now, these are not the private ideas of Monsieur Macron. They are shared by all major governments in the EU and by many governments in other parts of the world. They are also shared by all major political parties here in France, as well as by President Macron's predecessors. Therefore, the purpose of the following remarks is not to criticise the president of this beautiful country, or his government, or any person in particular. The purpose is to criticise the ideas on which the current policy is based.

I do not have any epidemiological knowledge or expertise. But I do have some acquaintance with questions of social organisation, and I am also intimately familiar with scientific research and with the organisation of scientific research. My protest does not concern the medical assessment of the COVID-19 virus and its propagation. It concerns the public policies designed to confront this problem.

As far as I can see, these policies are based on one extraordinary claim and two fundamental errors. I will discuss them in turn.

An Extraordinary Claim

The extraordinary claim is that wartime measures such as confinement and shutdowns of commercial activity are justified by the objective of "saving lives" that are at risk because of the burgeoning coronavirus pandemic.

Over here in Europe, we have heard American presidents use such expressions since the 1960s, as in "the war on poverty" or the "war on drugs" or "the war on terrorism" or more recently "the war on climate change." Odd language of this sort seemed to be one of America's many eccentricities. It also did not escape our notice that none of these would-be wars have ever been won. Despite the great sums of money that the US government has spent to fight them, despite the new state institutions that were put in place, and despite the great and growing infringements on the economic and civil liberties of ordinary Americans, the problems themselves never went away. Quite the opposite; they were perpetuated and aggravated.

Most of the European governments have now joined ranks with the Americans and consider that they, too, are at war -- with a virus. It is therefore appropriate to insist that this is metaphorical language. A war is a military conflict designed to protect the state -- and thus of the very institution that is commonly held to guarantee the lives and liberties of the citizens -- against malicious attack from an outside power, usually another state. In a war, the very existence of the state is under attack. Clearly, this is not so in the present case.

Moreover, there can be no war with a virus, simply because a virus does not act . At most, therefore, the word "war" can be used here metaphorically. It then serves as a cover and justification of infringements of the very civil and economic liberties that the state is supposed to protect.

Now, in the traditional conception, the state is supposed to protect and promote the common good. Protecting the lives of the citizens might therefore, arguably, justify massive state interventions. But then the very first question should be: How many lives are at stake? Government epidemiologists, in their most dire estimates -- whose factual basis is still not solidly established -- have considered that about 10 percent of the infected persons might be in need of hospital care and that a large part of those would die. It was also already known by mid-March that this mortal threat in the great majority of cases concerned very old people, the average COVID-19 victim being around eighty years of age.

The claim that wartime measures, which threaten the economic livelihood of the great majority of the population and also the lives of the poorest and most fragile people of the world economy -- a point on which I will say more below -- are in order to save the lives of a few, most of whom are close to death anyway, is an extraordinary claim, to say the least.

Without going into any detail, let me just highlight that this contention squarely contradicts the abortion policies that Western governments have applied since the 1970s. There, the reasoning was exactly the other way around. The personal liberty and comfort of the women who wished to abort their children was given priority over the right to lives of these yet unborn children. According to World Health Organization (WHO) figures, each and every year, some 40–50 million babies are aborted worldwide. In 2018 alone, more than 224,000 babies have been aborted in France. However serious the current COVID-19 pandemic may yet become, it will remain a small fraction of these casualties. Not only have governments neglected to "save lives" when it comes to abortions. They have in point of fact condoned and funded the killing of human beings on a massive scale.

They still do so now. Here in France, all hospital services have been run down to free up capacity for the treatment of COVID-19 victims -- all except one. Abortion services run unabated and have recently been reinforced by the legal obligation for hospital staff to provide abortions (previously it was possible for individual doctors to refuse this out of personal conviction).

The pretention that drastic policies are justified in order to "save lives" also flies into face of past policy in other areas. In the past, too, it would have been possible to "save lives" by allocating a greater chunk of the government's budget to state-run hospitals, by further reducing speed limits on highways, by increasing foreign aid to countries on the brink of starvation, by outlawing smoking, etc. To be sure, I do not wish to make a case for such policies. My point is that it has never been the sole or highest goal of government policy to "save lives" or to extend them as much as possible. In fact, such a policy would be utterly absurd and impractical, as I will explain further below.

It is difficult to avoid the impression that the "war to save lives" is a farce. The truth seems to be that the COVID-19 crisis has been used to extend the powers of the state. The government obtains the power to control and paralyse all other human concerns in the name of prolonging the lives of a select few. Never has this principle been admitted in a free country. Few tyrannies have managed to extend their power this far.

The current beneficiaries of these new powers are the elder citizens and a few others. But make no mistake. It is likely that their destinies only serve as a pretext to justify the creation of new and unheard-of powers for the state. Once these new powers are firmly established, there is no reason why the elderly should remain especially dear to those in power. It must be feared that the very opposite will be the case.

Now, in order to avoid any misunderstanding, I do not claim that the present French government seeks to grab power over life-and-death decisions, or dictatorial powers to introduce socialism through the backdoor under the cover of COVID-19. In fact, I cannot imagine that Monsieur Macron and his government are driven by sinister motivations. I think they have the best of all intentions. But the point here is precisely that there is a difference between doing good and wishing to do good.

A Grave Error: Rule by Experts

So far, I have commented on a political issue. But there are also matters of fact. And this brings me to the two aforementioned errors.

The first fundamental error is to hold that is that the experts know and all the rest of us should trust them and do as they tell us.

The truth is that even the most brilliant academics and practitioners have in-depth knowledge only in a very narrow field; that they have no particular expertise when it comes to devising new practical solutions; and that their professional biases are likely to induce them into various errors when it comes to solving large-scale social problems such as the current pandemic. This is patent in my own discipline, economics, but not really different in other academic fields. Let me explain this in some more detail.

The kind of knowledge that can be acquired by scientific research is just a preliminary to action. Research gathers facts and yields partial knowledge of causal connections. Economics tells us, for example, that the size of the money stock is positively related to the level of unit prices. But this is not the whole picture. Other causes come into play as well. Real-world decision-making cannot just rely on facts and other bits of partial knowledge. It must weigh the influence of a multitude of circumstances, not all of which are well known, and not all of which are directly related to the problem at stake. It must come to balanced conclusions, sometimes under rapidly changing circumstances.

In this respect, the typical expert is no expert at all . How many laureates of the Nobel Prize in economics have earned any significant money by investing their savings? How many virologists or epidemiologists have established and operated a privately run clinic or laboratory? I would never trust a colleague who had the folly to volunteer to direct a central planning board. I do not trust an epidemiologist who has the temerity to parade as a COVID-19 czar. I do not believe a government that tells me that it somehow knows "the experts" who know best how to protect and run an entire country.

Furthermore, consider that scientific knowledge is, at best, a state of the art. The precious thing about science is not to be seen in the results, which are hardly ever final. What is crucial is the scientific process , which is a competitive process based on disagreements about the validity and relevance of different research hypotheses. This process is especially important when it comes to new problems -- such as a new virus which spreads in unheard-of ways and has unheard-of effects. It is precisely in such circumstances, when the stakes are high, that the impartial confrontation and competitive exploration of different points of view is of paramount importance. Research czars and central planners are here of no use at all. They are part of the problem, not part of the solution.

A government which bets the house on one horse and hands the management of a pandemic over to a single person or institution achieves, at best, only one thing: that all citizens receive the same treatment. But it thereby slows down the very process which leads to the discovery of the best treatments, and which makes these treatments rapidly available to the greatest number of patients.

It is also important to keep in mind that academics -- and this includes epidemiologists just as much as economists and lawyers -- are typically government employees and that this colours their approach to any practical problem. They are likely to think that serious problems, especially large-scale problems touching most or all citizens, should be solved by state intervention. Many of them are in fact incapable of imagining anything else.

This problem is reinforced through a nefarious selection bias . Indeed, those academics who opt for an administrative or political career, and who make it into the higher ranks of the civil service, cannot fail to be convinced that state action is suitable and necessary to solve the most important problems. Otherwise they would hardly have chosen such careers, and it would also be virtually out of the question that for them to end up in leadership positions. A good example among many others is the current WHO director Tedros Adhanom, who I understand is a former member of a communist [party in Ethiopia] organisation. The point is not that a WHO director should have no political opinions or that Dr. Adhanom is an evil or incompetent person. The point is that it is unsurprising that men like him occupy leadership positions in state-run organisations, and that the approach he envisions to deal with a pandemic is likely to be coloured by his personal political preconceptions, not only by medical information and good intentions.

Another Momentous Error: Neglect of Economics

Along with such selection bias comes a peculiar ignorance in regard to the functioning of complex social orders. This brings me to the second fundamental error that vitiates the COVID-19 policies. It consists in thinking that civil and economic liberties are some sort of a consumers' good -- maybe even a luxury good -- that can only be allowed and enjoyed in good times. When the going gets tough, the government needs to take over and all others should step back -- into confinement if necessary.

This error is typical for people who have spent too much time among politicians and in public administrations. The truth is that civil and economic liberty is the most powerful vehicle to confront virtually any problem. (The notable exception is that liberty does not help to consolidate political power.) And the reverse side of the same truth is that governments typically fail whenever they set out to solve social problems, even very ordinary problems. Think of state-run education or housing projects. I will return to this point further below.

Because of the mechanics of the political process, governments are liable to overreact to any problem that is big enough to make it into the news and to become an issue for voters. Governments will then typically zoom in on this one problem. In their perception, it becomes the most important of all problems that humanity has to solve. If such a government has no clue about economics, it is liable to propose one-plan technical solutions that completely neglect the social and political dimension of what it means to solve a problem. In the present case, the "experts" have blithely proposed to shut down the entire economy because this is what "works."

Now, I do not contest that shutdowns are effective in slowing down the transmission speed of a pandemic. I have no opinion at all on the most suitable way to deal with pandemics or other problems of virology or medicine. But as an economist I know the crucial importance of the fact that there is never ever only one single goal in human life. There is always a great and diverse array of objectives that each of us pursues. The practical problem for each person is to strike the right balance, most notably to act in the right temporal sequence. Translated to the level of the economy as a whole, the problem is to allocate the right amounts of time and material resources to the different objectives.

For most people, protecting their own lives and the lives of their families has a very high importance. But irrespective of how important this objective is, in practice it cannot be perfectly achieved. To protect my life, I need food. Thus, I need to work. Thus, I need to expose myself to all kinds of risks that are associated with leaving the safe space of my house and encountering nature and other humans. In short, human lives cannot be perfectly protected, even by those who are ready to subordinate everything else to doing so. It is a practical impossibility. When it comes to protecting lives, the only question is: How much am I willing to risk my life and the lives of those who depend on me? And it more than often turns out that by risking much one protects best. What holds true for the eternal life of one's soul also holds true for the mundane material life down here on earth: "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it" (Matt 16:25).

Now, most people do not actually cherish the preservation of their lives, or the extension of their life spans, as the single highest goals. Smokers, meat eaters, drinkers prefer a shorter, more joyful life, to a longer life of abstinence. Policemen, soldiers, and many citizens are more than often driven by the love of their country and by a love of justice. They would rather die than live under slavery or tyranny. Priests would risk their lives rather than forsake their commitment. A believer in Christ would rather risk death than apostasy. Sailors risk their own lives to provide for their families. Medical doctors and nurses are willing to risk their lives to help patients with infectious diseases. Rugby players and racecar drivers risk their lives not only for the glory of winning, but also for the excitement and satisfaction that comes with performing well under danger. Many young men and women gladly trade the excitement of dance for the risk of catching COVID-19.

All of these people, in one way or another, make material contributions to the livelihood of all others. Smokers and drinkers ultimately pay for their consumption, not with money (which serves them only as a tool for exchange with others), but with the goods and services that they themselves provide to others. If they could not indulge in their consumption, their motivation to help others would diminish or vanish altogether. If policemen, soldiers, sailors, and nurses did not have a relatively low risk-aversion, their services would be provided only at much higher cost, and possibly not at all.

The preferences and activities of all market participants are interdependent. In the market order, each one helps all others in pursuing their goals, even if these goals may ultimately contradict his own. The meat eater might be a mechanic who repairs the cars of vegetarians, or an accountant who does the bookkeeping for a vegetarian NGO. The soldier also protects pacifists. Among the pacifists may be farmers who grow the food consumed by soldiers, etc.

It is impossible to disentangle all of these connections, and it is not necessary. The point is that in a market economy the factors determining the production of any economic good are not just technical . Through exchange, through the division of labour, all production processes are interrelated. The effectiveness of doctors and nurses and their assistants does not only depend on the people who directly supply them with the materials that they need. Indirectly, it also depends on the activities of all other producers who do not have the slightest thing to do with medical services in hospitals. Even in an emergency situation, it is therefore necessary to respect the needs and priorities of these others. Locking them away, locking them down, far from facilitating the operation of hospitals, will eventually come to haunt the latter as well when supply chains wither and consumer staples start lacking.

Now one might contend that such consequences only obtain in the longer run and that a government confronted with an emergency situation needs to neglect long-run issues and focus on the short-run emergency. This sounds reasonable, which is why governments have appealed to arguments of this sort with great regularity in other areas, most notably to justify expansionary macroeconomic policies, which also trade off the present against the future.

But the reasoning is flawed in the present case. The root of the error is to consider the COVID-19 virus an immediate threat to human lives whereas the lockdown policies are not. But this is not the case. How many people have committed suicide because the lockdown measures have driven them to depression and insanity? How many did not receive life-saving treatments because hospital beds and staff were restricted to COVID-19 victims? How many have become victims at home because of the lockdown-induced aggression of their spouses? How many have lost their jobs, their companies, their wealth, and will be driven to suicide and aggression in the months to come? How many people in the poorest countries of the world economy are now driven to starvation because households and firms in the developed world have cut back demand for their products?

The inevitable conclusion is that, even in the short run, lockdown policies are costing the lives of many people who would not otherwise have died. In the short and in the long run, the current lockdown policy does not serve to "save lives," but to save the lives of some people at the expense of the lives of others .

Conclusion

The lockdown policies are understandable as a panic reaction of political leaders who want to do the right thing and who have to make decisions with incomplete information. But upon reflection -- and certainly in hindsight -- they are not good policy. The lockdowns of the past month have not been conducive to the common good. Although they have saved the lives of many people, they have also endangered -- and are still endangering -- the lives and livelihoods of many others. They have created a new and dangerous political precedent. They have reinforced the political regime uncertainty -- to use Robert Higgs's felicitous phrase -- that bears on the choices of individuals, families, communities, and firms in the years to come.

The right thing to do now is to abandon these policies swiftly and entirely. The citizens of free countries are able to protect themselves. They can act individually and collectively. They cannot act well when they are locked down. They will greet any honest and competent advice on what they can and should do, upon which they will proceed responsibly, whether alone or in coordination with others.

The greatest danger right now is in the perpetuation of the ill-conceived lockdowns , most notably under the pretext of "managing the transition" or other spurious justifications. Is it really necessary to walk through the endless list of management failures of government agents? Is it necessary to remind ourselves that people who have no skin in the game are irresponsible in the true sense of the word? These would-be managers should have stayed out of the picture from the very beginning. Instead, so far, they have managed to get everybody else out of the picture. If they are allowed to go on, they might very well turn the present calamity -- big as it is -- into a true disaster.

The historical precedent that comes to mind is the Great Depression of the 1930s. Then, too, the free world was confronted with a painful recession, when the implosion of the stock market bubble entailed a deflationary meltdown of the financialised economy, along with massive unemployment. This recession , dire as it was, could have remained short, as all the previous recessions in the US and elsewhere had been. Instead it was turned into a multiyear depression , thanks to folly of FDR and his government, who had the pretention of managing the recovery with government spending, nationalisations, and price controls.

It is not too late. It is never too late to recognise an honest error and correct a wrong course of action. Let us hope that President Macron, President Trump, and all other people of goodwill may rapidly come to their senses. COVID-19 Lockdown: A Global Human Experiment *

Note to readers: please click the share buttons above or below. Forward this article to your email lists. Crosspost on your blog site, internet forums. etc.

This article was originally published on LewRockwell.com.

Jörg Guido Hülsmann is senior fellow of the Mises Institute where he holds the 2018 Peterson-Luddy Chair and was director of research for Mises Fellows in residence 1999-2004. He is author of Mises: The Last Knight of Liberalism and The Ethics of Money Production . He teaches in France, at Université d'Angers. His full CV is here . The original source of this article is Mises Wire Copyright © Jörg Guido Hülsmann , Mises Wire , 2020

[May 03, 2020] Neoliberalized healthcare is organically unable to deal with epidemics like COVID-19 because it tuned to service of the top 10 to 20% of population

May 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

VietnamVet , May 2 2020 23:31 utc | 50

I want to thank b again for the best updates on current events on the internet.

The most astonishing thing is watching an Empire collapse with nobody in charge by self-immolation. China, Vietnam, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, New Zealand and Australia show that old fashion public health institutions by testing, tracing and isolation of the infected can defeat the Wuhan Coronavirus. The West cannot and will not do this. Testing and Tracking in the USA is a total SNAFU. Saving more lives would require the restoration of democracy and use of the Plutocrat's wealth to fight the pandemic. The Elite are quite unwilling to do this. The unprepared haphazard reopening of the economy will kill hundreds of thousands more Americans. If North America breaks apart into nuclear armed regional states, millions more will die. Together with Climate Change, Armageddon approaches. VP Mike Pence knows he has been selected to be uplifted. Besides stupidity, why else would he walk around Mayo Clinic without a face mask greeting COVID-19 patients and doctors?

[May 03, 2020] I think this remdesivir authorization was a genius move by the Trump administration

May be it is valuable as a placebo treatment... "Remdesivir (imho) has no effect whatsoever, positive or negative, so it will work as a placebo and a show of 'good treatment'. On the whole ppl are apt to judge that what is expensive (as opposed to dirt cheap and used by lesser folks) and can be touted as 'innovative' (hmm..) is well -classier!- therefore more effective!" An indirect result might be that less /very seriously affected/ patients are put on vents. (Intubated with breathing done outside the body.)
May 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
vk , May 2 2020 19:44 utc | 2
I think this remdesivir authorization was a genius move by the Trump administration. So genial even Dr. Fauci must have immediately understood the catch and endorsed it, as it is probable the drug must not have any grave collateral effects on the patients (as is the case with hydroxycloroquine).

First of all, remdesivir helps one of America's biggest pharmaceuticals (Gilead). Therefore, it will also help American capitalist reproduction.

Second, it will trigger a nationwide placebo effect thanks to widespread optimism and petit-bourgeois euphoria, thus lowering the death rates (though not the infection rates), and giving Trump an election boost in crucial areas (by the astroturf protests pattern, important swing states in the Midwest).

Third, by the time the efficacy of remdesivir is debunked, the Trump administration can simply state they acted with good will, with the "evidence" available at the time, and gently apologize. It is the perfect plausible deniability.

[May 03, 2020] prosperopharma.com

Martin Shkreli has been seeking a jail furlough since early April from his New Jersey (Fort Dix Federal) prison (ie., covid incubator/deathtrap), to do vital research on covid cures. https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/491536-shkreli-seeks-prison-release-to-conduct-research-for-coronavirus-cure
Maybe its working for him, but then again maybe not: As of last week He's been transferred out of the New Jersey prison, but is now being held in the NYC "Jeffery Epstein Memorial Euthanasia Facility" aka the Metropolitan Detention Center", (yikes!) awaiting relocation to a minimum security (?) Allenwood Federal prison in PA. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/24/pharma-bro-martin-shkreli-moved-from-prison-after-rule-breaking.html
May 03, 2020 | prosperopharma.com

M. Shkreli states: The industry response to COVID-19 is inadequate. All biopharmaceutical companies should be responding with all resources to combat this health emergency. Donations from these very valuable companies do not go far enough. The biopharmaceutical industry has a large braintrust of talent that is not working on this problem as companies have deprioritized or even abandoned infectious disease research. Medicinal chemists, structural biologists, enzymologists and assay development and research biology departments at EVERY pharmaceutical company should be put to work until COVID-19 is no more.

[May 03, 2020] Another day another hypothesis: SARS-COV-2 is not primarily a respiratory virus, it is mostly an epithelial virus.

May 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Lurk , May 2 2020 20:01 utc | 6

Recent developments and insights point out that SARS-COV-2 is not primarily a respiratory virus, it is mostly an epithelial virus. The lung surface is composed of epithelial cells, but so are many other organs in the body.

The virus binds to ACE2 receptors that are richly expressed in epithelial cells. ACE2 stands for the angiotensin II converting enzyme. By this binding action, it disables the function of this enzyme and therein lies the mechanism of the problems it causes in the body.

A cascade of reactions surrounding the angiotensin system results in the creation of, and acerbation of pre-existing oxidative stress at the cellular level. This is why the actual risk categories turn out not to be asthmatics and other pulmonary patients, but instead diabetics, hypertensics and people with coronary disease.

Many COVID-19 victims die not from ARDS, but from sudden heart attacks, strokes and renal failure, in many cases systemic blood clotting is found. The "ground glass" lung photos are in fact showing pervasive alveolar bleeding.

Check out the latest of many highly informative MedCram videos on the topic:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gzx8LH4Fjic

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[May 03, 2020] Analysis and viewpoint scenarios: COVID-19 prepare for the next 2 years

May 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Likklemore , May 1 2020 22:30 utc | 94

Analysis and viewpoint scenarios: COVID-19 prepare for the next 2 years

Part 1:"The Future of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Lessons from Pandemic Influenza" by CIDRAP, University Minnesota.

LINK

cited by Sputniknews.


[May 02, 2020] General lockdown strategies can reduce transmission and death counts in the short term. But this strategy cannot be considered successful until lockdowns are removed without the disease resurging.

May 02, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

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MacCheerful 3 days ago
The pessimistic models predicted millions of deaths if no measures were taken to slow the disease. In nearly every country measures were taken to slow the disease. But now conservatives complain that hey, no millions of deaths! So why was it necessary to go into confinement?
Sidney Caesar MacCheerful 3 days ago • edited
The people who cite the success of social distancing measures as the reason social distancing measures weren't necessary (or were too rigorous) seem to be using the same logic as certain anti-vaxxers who use the success of vaccinations to buttress their contention that vaccinations are unnecessary.
Jim Chilton Sidney Caesar 2 days ago
Anti-vaxxers calculate their own safety by using the knowledge that most people get vaccinated. That is the logic of their position.
Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 2 days ago • edited
Yes, it's likely that most of them are free-riders.

But there's a variety of misconceptions motivating anti-vaxxers, which is why I wrote "certain anti-vaxxers" instead of 'all anti-vaxxers'.

wicked_sprite MacCheerful 3 days ago
Those predictions were WITH social distancing. So the good news is the worst case is most definitely not the case.
Adriana Pena wicked_sprite 2 days ago
It is always safer to go with the worst projections. It is better to give out a sigh of relief when they do not come true than a scream of pain when they do.
Jim Chilton 3 days ago
Martin Kulldorff is a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. In his opinion, general lockdown strategies can reduce transmission and death counts in the short term. But this strategy cannot be considered successful until lockdowns are removed without the disease resurging. So the best policy is to go for herd immunity. The sooner that is achieved, the more lives will be saved in the long term.

Herd immunity arrives after a certain still unknown percentage of the population has acquired immunity. It will never be achieved unless most people who get the disease and survive, are immune to it afterwards.

MacCheerful Jim Chilton 3 days ago
1) We don't know whether getting Covid-19 gives you immunity.
2) Going full fledged for herd immunity quickly, i.e. 60-70% infection rate, means in the U.S. perhaps 1 million dead. One million dead over the course of a couple of months looks a lot worse for a society than one million dead over the course of a couple of years.
FND MacCheerful 3 days ago
"Going full fledged for herd immunity quickly, i.e. 60-70% infection rate, means in the U.S. perhaps 1 million dead."

You just proved the author's point.

Also, of course we don't know for 100% certain that having had the virus gives one immunity since its a brand new virus, but it would be a very rare virus indeed if that doesn't turn out to be the case. It is overwhelmingly expected, but we don't know for sure yet.

Sidney Caesar FND 3 days ago
"...we don't know for sure yet."
Which is why caution is indicated going forward.
I Don't Matter FND 3 days ago
" we don't know for 100% certain that having had the virus gives one immunity since its a brand new virus, but it would be a very rare virus indeed if that doesn't turn out to be the case."

Wish this were true. Alas. There's no immunity to common cold. And it's caused by corona viruses, among others. This is a truly nightmarish scenario: a common cold-like lack of acquired immunity combined with SARS-like disease.
We just don't know yet.

IanDakar FND 2 days ago
Very rare? The common cold doesn't give long term immunity. It's not rare. It depends on whether the body decides to hold on to the memory cells that cause immunity. Some diseases They hang around for decades, some for years, some just a few weeks.

And the cold is caused by coronaviruses: the same family COVID lives in. Also a lot of people who get this virus don't face heavy symptoms and there's some speculation (just speculation) that the easier it is for the body to handle a disease the less it cares to remember it.

So not only is it not rare it's also very much possible for this one.

We don't know. But unfounded statements like "it's very rare." Don't help the discussion.

FND IanDakar 2 days ago
Immunity is more than just "you don't get it again". Its also "if you get it again the symptoms are less" as with colds. Also, colds like all viruses, don't stay the same. They mutate. But with immunity from a previous form, the symptoms are less with the mutation.
JonF311 IanDakar 2 days ago
You generally don't get the same cold you had, at least not in any immediate time frame. There are a myriad different cold viruses out there and they mutate over time, so like the flu, any immunity is fairly short-lived.
IanDakar JonF311 2 days ago
It's about 4 weeks on average last I heard and that's of you get hit with the same stand. The flu is stronger with a few years but there's a mass of stands and mutations so it's hard to notice when you ignore one of them.

For example a particularly nasty h1n1 stain hit us in 2009. Most people didn't have an immunity but many older than 60 did. Seems They had been hit with a similar strand in the past and thus their bodies still remembered it.

This is also why some vaccines aren't given again after childhood as you basically don't forget it. Others need to be given again after so many years to be sure of immunity.

stephen pickard Jim Chilton 3 days ago
Tell me if I got this correct. Herd immunity can be achieved if there is rigorous testing immediately when a hot spot ocurrs. Plus a vaccine must be unavailable when it breaks out. In addition there must be sufficient data points that indicates if the virus is contained. None of which is present now.

And do not forget that in the hotspots now, the health care community is getting close to the breaking point. None of the models can account for the collapse of the health care infrastructure.

For those who advocate for reopening the economy, what does their model predict if there are no workers, no managers, no consumers and the like because they are part of the sick and dead. We just don't know. So it boils down to determing what level of destruction is bearable. Is anyone willing to trust our stable genius? God save us.

Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 3 days ago
Successful long-term herd immunity will only come with a vaccine.
Jim Chilton Sidney Caesar 3 days ago • edited
Before the theory of vaccination was understood or even the idea that microbes cause, or can cause, infectious disease in human beings, herd immunity had to be acquired by exposure. Had this not been the case, the human race would not have survived.
Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 2 days ago • edited
Right.
Like the herd immunity that prevented smallpox, polio, measles, mumps, rubella, diptheria, influenza, etc.
Naturally acquired herd immunity was not enough to prevent recurrent epidemics that we currently prevent with vaccinations (although anti-vaxxers are trying mightily to rectify that success).
Jim Chilton Sidney Caesar 2 days ago • edited
There is good reason to hope a vaccine will be produced for CORVID-19. However, that is not a certainty and it might be a year or two before it's safe to use throughout the population.

Since the economy can hardly be left in suspended animation until a vaccine is available, there will be a period during which the acquistion of herd immunity has to proceed by default.

IanDakar Jim Chilton 2 days ago
This is true but it resulted in a lot of death. This is why disease changed so much of our history. Entire communities and nations have been changed or fallen due to disease.

That was the world that relied on herd immunity. That's why medicine is deemed so precious as our entire current way of life is based on no longer relying on pure herd immunity.

Talking as if the old way at all worked just as fine as our modern age is a case of just enough knowledge to know the terms but not enough to know what it really means.

Jim Chilton IanDakar 2 days ago • edited
I know how much we owe to the advance of medical science and I am not suggesting a fatalistic response to this epidemic is desirable. But until a vaccine is produced for this particular virus and its mutations, we have no alternative but to accept the risk and carry on.

No one is seriously suggesting that the shutdowns must continue until a vaccine is produced, so draw the obvious conclusion.

Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 2 days ago
"...draw the obvious conclusion"
...which is to let the experts and their science lead.
Jim Chilton Sidney Caesar 2 days ago
Not necessarily. Continuation of the lockdown is a political decision.

If you advocate continuing the lockdown until a vaccine is available, you should say so.

Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 2 days ago • edited
"If you advocate continuing the lockdown until a vaccine is available, you should say so."
Please explain how you take that away from "...let the experts and their science lead"? We're in uncharted territory in which tens (possibly hundreds) of thousands of lives are at stake- the "political decision" to reopen should be based on the best advice of scientists.
Jim Chilton Sidney Caesar 2 days ago
The "obvious conclusion" which I referred to, had nothing to do with taking the advice of scientists. If we want to revive the economy, then sooner or later we have no option than to resume our social and economic actvities. Until a vaccine is produced, this entails risk; but human life is never as safe as we might wish to believe.
Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 2 days ago • edited
"If we want to revive the economy, then sooner or later we have no option than to resume our social and economic activities."
Of course, the rub in that profoundly obvious statement is the meaning of "sooner or later". I'm suggesting we defer to the best expert advice available. Should we infer that you would leave those decisions solely up to 'experts' like Brian Kemp (who first became aware of person-to-person transmission April 1)?
Jim Chilton Sidney Caesar 2 days ago
Sometimes it's necessary to state the obvious to people who hide their fuzzy position behind "expert advice".
Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 2 days ago • edited
How is it "fuzzy" to plainly state (several times) that we should let scientists lead?
Jim Chilton Sidney Caesar 2 days ago
It's the government's job to lead; that's what it was elected to do.

This predicament involves a choice between evils - not a simple choice between the crude economic materialism of politics and the science of saving lives. It's a choice between lives and lives. Your comments are made in bad faith.

Sidney Caesar Jim Chilton 2 days ago • edited
One of us is arguing in "bad faith", and it's not me. I've written- repeatedly- that we should be deferring to the best judgement of scientists to navigate reopening- whatever 'fuzziness' you infer from that is occurring somewhere between your eyes and your brain (which is also the source of the somewhat "fuzzy" and undefined "sooner or later" timeline, when you feel normal activity can be resumed- when is "sooner or later", exactly, and what are the criteria that would define "sooner" as opposed to "later"?
john Jim Chilton 2 days ago
The Koreans, the Chinese, the Taiwanese, the Australians and the New Zealanders all provide a counter example of how to deal with it. The path we are on isn't the only path.
Adriana Pena john 2 days ago
Do not forget Vietnam nor Cuba. Just because they are communist does not mean that they do not get some things right
Jim Chilton john 2 days ago
I agree; but we're being led up a path on which we shall have to retrace our steps.
IanDakar Jim Chilton 2 days ago
I'm not either. I'm actually standing with Trump, or whoever wrote his plan, on this one. Get a 2 week downturn in cases then open slowly wait for the spikes open more wait for spikes and so on. Keep buisiness from doing stupid things like making sick people work. That sort of thing.

I'd prefer longer as manycountries are waiting a month. But we seem to be able to handle barely what we have now and you have to balance the panicked with the impatient on this so 2 weeks may have to do. The goal is to make sure the public doesn't go crazy or the situation doesn't go nutty enough to require a new shutdown.

I'm ok for that. If you are ok with that then I'm not your enemy here.

I'm arguing against the folks who want to keep throwing out mass media lines like "cure worse than the disease." Or "it's the flu". I'm against the folks who see the flattening after this lockdown and somehow conclude that the lockdown did nothing. I'm against the folks like my Georgia governor that somehow thought that opening salons and theaters are to be opened no matter that we aren't even sure we peaked no matter how few people will even go there no matter that it kills the companies' governmental benefits for being locked down or that it forces people into risk as they can't take UI anymore no matter that it ignores Trump's own plan.

Also I'm just sick of the (find random country praised by media) they aren't mass dying so OF COURSE the virus means nothing LIBERATE THE PLANET, LET THE PEOPLE DIE LIKE NATURE INTENDED.

Jim Chilton IanDakar 2 days ago • edited
This virus is here to stay, and we must learn to live with it. In the coming months, until a vaccine is produced, there will be many hard choices between economic survival and risking lives.

Only a callous fool would argue that we should let the infection rip and "let the people die as nature intended."

IanDakar Jim Chilton 2 days ago
That's a claim I won't even put on Trump. I'm suspecting he's just trying to find the most popular position.

Governor Kemp though. I'm suspecting now. We're in the upper end as far as infections, the worst in testing and most of the flatten we might be in is due to counties and cities deciding for themselves to lock (my own started once the first case showed up. We're still pretty empty on infections here): a feature Kemp is now taking away as he unilaterally opens the state.

That I'm now seriously defending a Trump policy over my governor means something is going very very wrong.

Sidney Caesar IanDakar a day ago • edited
Trump's only concern throughout this debacle (that can virtually all be laid at the feet of his administration, given it's inactivity- with the exception of the travel 'sieve'- from January to March), as well as his entire presidency and life, is and has been Trump. It's not the most popular decision he's trying to find, he just wants to goose the stock market and economy enough to eke out another (unpopular) electoral college win- he doesn't give a damn about the lives of the people who may go back to work, or the loss of lives of people who may die unnecessarily because of imbeciles like Kemp forcing people back to work prematurely.
And while the Trumps and Kemps are at least honest enough to wear their sociopathy on their sleeves, you can find it by scratching just about any Republican.
By the way, as a Georgian you might find this article interesting:
https://www.theatlantic.com...
IanDakar Sidney Caesar a day ago
I couldn't read the article fully. It's like watching a close up of a massacare economically. Even ignoring the health costs it's a boneheaded move. And since Kemp has massive powers as a governor in an emergency he gets full reign to keep being a bonehead.

I understand why he's doing it. His economy is shattered when he is desperately in need to fund the promises that got him elected (not many Republicans would offer a 5k raise to all teachers but there you go). He's in a state constantly whispering of turning blue and he only won by slivers. And if he can't lock the state government or both Senate seats (the other retired due to health issues) when the whispers also say democrats are taking the Senate he's doomed. So he's pulling a Hail Mary.

I get it. So saying he's a callous man ready to kill for a buck is toxic nonsense.

But it's boneheaded.

I have to hopeI'm wrong and Kemp scores and probably saves the state for the Republicans one more election. Because I have to live in the horrible mess he'd have created if I'm right.

Save SK 3 days ago
Person has Heart attack taken to ER does and is called death by C-Virus
Immune system is CRITICAL -that is why older folks suffer more weakened immune functions. Fear weakens Immune function !!! Play Hide
Sidney Caesar Save SK 3 days ago
I work in an ER- despite what Alex Jones may have told you, when people die of a heart attack, we use the evidence (EKG changes, abnormal labs) to attribute their death to a heart attack.
On the other hand, it's highly likely that COVID19 deaths have been undercounted:
https://www.businessinsider...
M Orban 3 days ago
"Competing Pandemic Projections Driving You Mad?"
Not really. I just sit it out and see what happens.
Sidney Caesar 3 days ago
Great interview:
https://www.theguardian.com...
Shouvik Banerjee 2 days ago
I am deeply dubious that James Pinkerton truly believes in hard, empirical data over modeled probabilities. His disingenuous logic comes through in his celebration of Ionnadis who, in recent weeks, is best known for releasing a sloppy study and publishing an even sloppier WSJ op-ed. He has been criticized by statisticians around the world. Before he had sufficient empirical data, he went repeatedly on Fox News to shape conservative minds, advocating that the covid death rate was low and the costs of social distancing too high. There are statistical rules that define when data is sufficient and significant, increasing confidence in a projection. Ionnadis failed to do this in a big way, but is celebrated by Pinkerton as the White Knight of hard data.
Adriana Pena 2 days ago
Of course, the models vary widely. IT is new, there is new data coming every minute. So some models become obsolete very quick, and new models have to be made incorporating the new data.

But as a rule, it is better to go with the more pessimistic models. Because as it happens, there is no way that an optimist can be pleasantly surprised.

[May 02, 2020] In pandemic blame distribution Fauci and the CDC top should get mayor shares

May 02, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Antonym , May 1 2020 14:03 utc | 15

In pandemic blame distribution Fauci and the CDC top should get mayor shares.

In financial crash blame distribution the New York FED with its top 5 controller / bail-out receiver banks have big parts. It still holds the world's other Central Banks hostage through its reserves and trade in U$ dollars only meme.

In the intelligence area it is not very different: also that branch of the US Deep State failed.

A multipolar world is getting closer..

GeorgeV , May 1 2020 14:04 utc | 16

The jaw-dropping stupidity of the Trump administration regarding the COVID-19 pandemic is truly mind numbing. There is an old dictum that states that there is no such thing as 'military intelligence.' To that I add there is no such thing as 'intelligence' in Washington DC either, or the Trump White House for that matter. If you try to look for it, you will only find hacks, flacks, quacks and certifiable jerks. You would do better to waste your time and money looking for the Loch Ness Monster, Big Foot, or the Tooth Fairy. The prospect that Trump could get anther four years as president is depressing indeed. All that would be left is divine intervention, and I don't think that is any more likely than finding the aforementioned mythical creatures.

[May 02, 2020] Better late then never: T rump declares May 'Older Americans Month,' announces new measures as COVID-19 ravages nursing homes

Apr 30, 2020 | q13fox.com

In a Thursday address on "protecting America's seniors," President Donald Trump discussed new initiatives pertaining to COVID-19 and its impact on nursing homes and their residents. Prior to delivering his remarks on nursing homes, the president noted that he would sign a proclamation making May "Older Americans Month." ...Among the new initiatives were: Additional shipments of PPE to all Medicaid/Medicare nursing homes in the U.S; $81 million from the CARES act to increase inspections of nursing homes during the pandemic; Requiring nursing homes to inform residents and family members about new COVID-19 cases...

Compare with

Coronavirus patients admitted to Queens nursing home - with body bags | 23 April 2020 | The first coronavirus patients admitted to a Queens nursing home under a controversial state mandate arrived along with some grim accessories - a supply of body bags, The Post has learned. An executive at the facility - which was previously free of the deadly disease - said the bags were in the shipment of personal protective equipment received the same day the home was forced to begin treating two people discharged from hospitals with COVID-19. "My colleague noticed that one of the boxes was extremely heavy. Curious as to what could possibly be making that particular box so much heavier than the rest, he opened it," the exec told The Post Thursday. "The first two coronavirus patients were accompanied by five body bags." Within days, three of the bags were filled with the first of 30 residents who would die there after Gov. Andrew Cuomo's Health Department handed down its March 25 directive that bars nursing homes from refusing to admit "medically stable" coronavirus patients , the exec said. Like clockwork, the nursing home has received five body bags a week - every week - from city officials.

Governor's death sentences: Cuomo forced high-risk nursing homes to admit COVID-19 patients, spreading killer virus amongst the most vulnerable -- Some patients were transferred with body bags accompanying them . | 26 April 2020 | The New York State Department of Health made a deadly decision on March 25 when it forced nursing homes to take in people who held a positive diagnosis for coronavirus in certain cases. It was determined by the state of New York that these coronavirus patients were "medically stable," but in actuality, they were far from stable. They still carried the disease that could be easily passed to others in these crowded facilities. The New York Post reported that in one particularly morbid case, coronavirus patients were admitted to a nursing home in Queens with body bags accompanying them. ... Thirty residents would die from coronavirus-related in just days after the first COVID+ patients were admitted at one nursing home alone . "Cuomo has blood on his hands. He really does. There's no way to sugarcoat this," the health care executive said. "Why in the world would you be sending coronavirus patients to a nursing home, where the most vulnerable population to this disease resides?" they added. [ Cuomo wanted as many elderly people in his state to die as possible - to save New York money. Imagine if this was Trump's policy, he'd have already been executed - but Cuomo gets a pass.]

[May 02, 2020] Ohio State nurses file complaint over working conditions during pandemic

May 02, 2020 | www.dispatch.com

Nurses said working conditions have caused them to become infected with the coronavirus and to be quarantined away from work and their families. Union officials want administration to better protect them.

A union representing nurses at Ohio State University's Wexner Medical Center filed a formal complaint this week that alleges poor working conditions inside the hospital have caused 85 nurses to be infected with COVID-19 and many more exposed.

Rick Lucas, head of the Ohio State University Nurses Organization, filed the complaint Tuesday with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration

"Many have suffered serious illnesses and lost work time and may have also exposed or infected their families," Lucas wrote in the complaint.

In the filing, Lucas details 14 instances in which he says nurses were put in danger by medical emergencies handled without proper protection, and by decisions made by the administration. "Health care professionals are in imminent danger of infection and serious illness associated with SARS CoV-2 across the entire Medical Center," he wrote.

Dr. Andrew Thomas, the chief clinical officer for the medical center, said administrators had not received any complaints for OSHA. Thomas said the administration is doing all it can to support hospital staff.

"Nothing means more to us than the health and safety of our colleagues, our patients and their families," he said in an email.

Thomas said the hospital has taken numerous safety steps that follow recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"We continue to work tirelessly to purchase PPE and maximize usage of those we have," he said.

Among the allegations in the complaint:

[May 02, 2020] 'We're Getting Crumbs' COVID-19 Essential Worker Protests Rock US on May Day

May 02, 2020 | sputniknews.com

javascript:void(0)

held nearly 140 rallies in 13 states calling for the US government to provide more masks and other protective equipment, warehouse workers and grocery employees at Amazon, Whole Foods and Shipt walked off the job in New York's Staten Island, California's Bay Area and Los Angeles, Ohio and Kentucky. Such essential workers have stated that their employers have been slow to establish safety precautions and provide them with protective gear to safeguard them against the coronavirus.

https://widget.spreaker.com/player?episode_id=26527302&theme=light&playlist=false&playlist-continuous=true&playlist-loop=false&playlist-autoupdate=true&autoplay=false&live-autoplay=false&chapters-image=true&episode_image_position=right&hide-likes=false&hide-comments=false&hide-sharing=false&hide-logo=false&hide-download=true&hide-episode-description=false&hide-playlist-images=false&hide-playlist-descriptions=false&gdpr-consent=null&cover_image_url=https://d3wo5wojvuv7l.cloudfront.net/images.spreaker.com/original/a59b15ee9c65c3b2c6f944b30f3d12a1.jpg

"It [the labor movement] has returned, and as you mentioned, it does commemorate a time in US labor history. But ironically, it's been all but washed away from our current culture, and that's what we're trying to do at US Labor Against the War, is to really bring back this holiday, because this is our day This is the real Labor Day, and this pandemic has really made clear how absolutely essential workers are to our economy," Zahra told Loud & Clear host Brian Becker on Friday.

Similar protests calling for additional safety measures and protective equipment for workers took place across the world on Friday in countries like Greece, Italy, Spain and Austria.

May 1 is known as May Day or International Workers' Day and was originally suggested in 1889 by the Marxist International Socialist Congress and pushed by the American Federation of Labor, which was then demonstrating for an eight-hour work day. May 1 eventually became a national holiday to celebrate workers and the working classes in most countries around the world, but not in the United States.

In socialist countries such as China, Vietnam, the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and Cuba, May Day is a national holiday during which the country showcased its industrial accomplishments, including military hardware.

"Our economy is global. We are all globally connected, and workers have the same issues here in the US that they do in Iran and Venezuela and Cuba and China, Sweden, Syria, all around the world. We just want to live dignified lives, but the same handful of super rich billionaires are the ones really getting in the way of that. And they don't want us to understand our solidarity across countries, across borders, race, gender lines, because then we will understand that we're the ones that have all the power as workers," Zahra explained.

A new report by the Institute for Policy Studies think tank has found that between March 18 and April 10, the collective wealth of American billionaires increased by $282 billion, or 9.5%. The country's richest have continued to become richer while tens of millions of Americans lose their jobs. The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, a $2 trillion bill signed into law by US President Donald Trump on March 27, provides tax cuts to wealthy Americans while only providing a $1,200 stimulus check to the average American.

"They're still giving bailouts to these major corporations, and when you're looking at what's happening from afar, we're getting crumbs thrown at us As the labor movement, we need our own party. We cannot depend on the Republicans or the Democrats. Both parties have been bought and sold for the rich," Zahra added.

Despite the resurgence in the labor movement, more work needs to be done regarding trade unions, Zahra pointed out.

"I do think this COVID crisis, this global pandemic, has really sent a shock through our entire system, throughout our unions, and has really exposed the inability for our government to protect its own workers. There are so many workers who are now struggling, both union and nonunion," Zahra added.

"There's definitely a lot of work to be done, a lot of growth to ensure our unions are democratic, are representative of our membership and that we're bringing the unorganized sector into the fold we have a lot of workers who are still unorganized across the country. In the private sector we only have about 10% of workers unionized. In the public sector, it's around 30%," Zahra explained.

The views and opinions expressed in the article do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.

[May 02, 2020] Power of connections: Remdesivir approved for emergency use for Covid-19 treatment in US despite lackluster clinical trials

While a study of the experimental drug remdesivir as a treatment for Covid-19 published positive preliminary results on Wednesday, such treatment is likely to remain just as far out of reach as existing coronavirus care for many patients. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, nevertheless cheered the results, declaring the trial had " proven " that " a drug can block this virus ."
May 02, 2020 | www.rt.com

Remdesivir, made exclusively by Gilead, received FDA approval for emergency use on Friday after appearing to show clinical benefit in a single trial conducted by the National Institute for Allergy and Infections Disease (NIAID). Gilead has pledged to donate 1.5 million doses of the drug, and the stockpile currently on hand will be distributed to hospitals starting on Monday, according to Vice President Mike Pence.

FDA commissioner Steve Gottlieb called the drug an " important clinical advance. " Dr. Deborah Birx, head of the White House's coronavirus task force, gushed that it was " the first positive step forward " in treating Covid-19.

Emergency drug approval differs from full FDA approval in that it is only valid while the emergency declaration - in this case, the coronavirus pandemic - remains in effect. Remdesivir is not the first drug to receive such approval for treating Covid-19 - the malaria drugs chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine were approved on an emergency basis in late March. While their use remains controversial due to the vocal support of President Donald Trump, doctors in other countries (and even in the US) have anecdotally reported success in treating patients with the malaria pills in combination with the antibiotic azithromycin, though clinical trials have produced mixed results.

While the results of the NIAID's remdesivir trial reported on Wednesday were reportedly positive, indicating a 31 percent faster recovery time, the full data has not been publicly released, let alone peer-reviewed. Dr. Anthony Fauci, who heads the NIAID, nevertheless cheered the drug as having a " clear-cut, significant, positive effect in diminishing the time to recovery ." He insisted the drug " can block this virus " and suggested that no further studies with placebos were needed, declaring that scientists had an " ethical obligation " to let those receiving the sugar pills have access to the active drug - no further comparison needed.

Could Anthony Fauci explain why the investigators of the NIAID remdesivir trial did change the primary outcome during the course of the project (16th April)? Removing "death" from primary outcome is a surprising decision. https://t.co/ZnK9LiUzaX pic.twitter.com/Rq47FHqGyO

-- Didier Raoult (@raoult_didier) April 30, 2020

Skeptics have pointed to the NIAID's decision to change its trial's " endpoint " from mortality to duration of illness as proof remdesivir is not the miracle pill it is being portrayed as. Tellingly, the drug had no clinically significant effect on mortality for patients enrolled in the trial. Others have questioned whether a drug initially developed as a (failed) treatment for Ebola would have any effect on a totally different virus. Fauci's own comparison of the NIAID trial to the first trial of AZT for HIV treatment also raised a few eyebrows, as early high-dose AZT treatment was extremely deadly.

Another remdesivir trial Gilead has touted as positive in fact showed no difference in clinical improvement between five-day and 10-day treatment groups on the 14th day of observation. While the company suggested this meant more patients could be treated with the drug, the lack of a control group rendered the results all but meaningless. Nevertheless, Gilead flooded the media with positive releases about its two trials, drowning out concern about a Chinese trial whose results had already been published in the Lancet, showing no clinical benefit for the drug.

[May 01, 2020] Ten questions the U.S. needs to offer clear answers to the world regarding the #COVID19.

People's Daily, China
Notable quotes:
"... Among the reported influenza deaths in the US, how many cases were infected with COVID-19? Did the US government cover up the spread of coronavirus with the flu? When will the US government make public the samples of the US influenza virus and its genetic sequence, or allow experts from the WHO or the United Nations to sample and analyze? ..."
May 01, 2020 | www.facebook.com
Yesterday at 9:30 AM · Ten questions the U.S. needs to offer clear answers to the world regarding the # COVID19 .

1. Regarding the restarted avian influenza virus modification experiment last year, why does the US release no more updates?

The Science reported in February 2019 that US authorities had quietly approved the avian influenza virus modification experiment. The research, aiming to transform the H5N1 virus to be more capable of infecting mammals, was controversial and considered extremely dangerous. Some experts believe that the modification may increase the risk of human-to-human transmission of the virus. The question is why the US government decided to unfreeze the experiment 4 years after it was halted, and why there are no more updates regarding the experiment.

2. The United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) was previously closed. What is the truth behind ?

The Global Biodefence reported in April that the USAMRIID, US Army's primary institution and facility for biological research headquartered in Fort Detrick, Maryland, has resumed full operation. The institution was once ordered to halt the study of biological select agents and toxins (BSATs) last July. In March, there was a petition on the White House website demanding the clarification of the shutdown of USAMRIID. Given that these issues have become a primary public concern, what is the US government's response?

3. The US Department of Health and Human Services ran a scenario last year that was similar to the COVID-19 outbreak. Is this just a coincidence?

In March, the New York Times quoted a draft report obtained from the US government saying that from January to August 2019, the US Department of Health and Human Services ran a scenario called "Crimson Contagion" that simulated the fictional outbreak involving a group of tourists visiting China. They then became infected and flew to various countries, including the US. Last October, a high-level pandemic exercise named Event 201 was hosted by a couple of US organizations. The drill simulated a scenario that a fictional virus called CAPS, which causes more severe symptoms than SARS and transmits via the respiratory route like the common flu, had caused a pandemic. Like COVID-19, there is no vaccine for CAPS.

Given the fact that the simulated virus is so much like COVID-19, is this just a coincidence? Another question is, why did it not take enough preventive measures at the early stages of the coronavirus outbreak since the US has predicted a similar pandemic?

4. US intelligence officials warned of coronavirus crisis as early as last November. Why the warning was ignored?

In April, according to the American Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), it was said that, as early as late November 2019, US intelligence officials had warned the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Pentagon, and the White House that an infectious disease was sweeping through Wuhan, China.

Last November, the US National Center for Medical Intelligence (NCMI) issued a report detailing the coronavirus pandemic, which was later identified as "COVID-19". Some analysts believed that the outbreak in Wuhan might have evolved into a catastrophic event. According to the Washington Post, in more than two months from January to February, Trump had received intensive warnings from the US intelligence agencies about the coronavirus. Why did the US government not declare a "National Emergency" until March 13?

5. Among the reported influenza deaths in the US, can the US clarify how many cases are actually infected with COVID-19?

Japanese Asahi Television reported on February 21 that some of the 14,000 people reportedly killed by influenza in the US might have died from coronavirus, which became a hot topic soon after.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a report at the end of February, showing that there have been at least 32 million flu illnesses in the US that winter.

On March 11, at the House of Representatives, Robert Redfield, the director of the US CDC, admitted that some in the US who were previously thought to have been killed from the flu may have been infected with coronavirus.

Among the reported influenza deaths in the US, how many cases were infected with COVID-19? Did the US government cover up the spread of coronavirus with the flu? When will the US government make public the samples of the US influenza virus and its genetic sequence, or allow experts from the WHO or the United Nations to sample and analyze?

6. When did the novel coronavirus first appear in the US? Did community transmission of the coronavirus start sooner than it was reported?

A report released in late April by local health authorities suggests that a 57-year-old woman from Santa Clara County of California died from COVID-19 on February 6, some 20 days earlier than the date the US announced its first death caused by the virus.

The Los Angeles Times quoted Santa Clara County health officer Sara Cody in a piece saying, "we presume that each of them represents community transmission and that there was some significant level of virus circulating in our community in early February."

County Executive Officer Jeffrey V. Smith said this is evidence that the coronavirus was circulating in California as early as January or even earlier.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has ordered all counties in the state to review autopsies of suspected coronavirus deaths dating back to December.

When did the novel coronavirus first appear in the US? Did community transmission of the coronavirus start sooner than it was reported?

7. How did the US get the virus strains so soon to start the first human testing of a vaccine against COVID-19?

The Wall Street Journal on March 16 reported that the first human testing of Moderna Inc.'s experimental vaccine against the COVID-19 had already begun. Experts immediately raised questions about the speed of the vaccine development, saying that it would not be possible unless the US had obtained the virus strains from very early on. So how did the US start the first human testing of the vaccine so soon? When and how did they get the virus strains?

8. Why did the US government keep downplaying the pandemic while its officials privately dumped stocks?

According to the Washington Post, US Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr and his wife sold up to 1.7 million in 33 different stocks just one week before the market plunged. Why did these officials at the Committee act so quickly while the government was continually understating the pandemic?

Why is the vital information kept confidential to the public while the government officials were taking advantage to practice insider-trading?

9. Why are US experts not allowed to discuss COVID-19 in public?

The New York Times reported that the White House began tightening controls for all coronavirus messaging from health officials on February 27 after Vice President Mike Pence led the nation's epidemic prevention and control efforts.

Several scientists and government health officials, including the nation's leading infectious disease expert Anthony S. Fauci, have been asked to make statements or make public appearances about the COVID-19 only after consultation with the US vice president's office.

Why does the United States, which claims free speech, not allow experts and scholars to discuss the novel coronavirus in public? Does the US want to hide something or fear of something?

10. What research is being done in the US overseas biological laboratories? Why does the US keep tight-lipped about it?

Natalia Poklonskaya, deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Foreign Affairs, has proposed verifying the legitimacy of US biological laboratories around the world, according to Sputnik news agency.

Not long ago, a spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry expressed concern about the establishment of a biological laboratory in countries from the former Soviet Union.

Grigory Trofimchuk, a Russian expert in the field of internal affairs, foreign affairs, and national defense, said the work of these biological laboratories was never disclosed to the outside world, and that they had caused several problems, with widespread outbreaks of dangerous infectious diseases such as measles at the laboratory site.

What research is being done in these biological laboratories? Why does the US keep tight-lipped about the function, use, the safety of these biological laboratories?

[May 01, 2020] The virus is a problem and if you do a general lock down (1 month, 3 months, 6 months, 1 year..) you will create 100 further problems. Now you have 101 problems!

May 01, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Ric G , Apr 29 2020 23:50 utc | 76

The virus is a problem and if you do a general lock down (1 month, 3 months, 6 months, 1 year..) you will create 100 further problems. Now you have 101 problems!

The data is in that the virus, in the general community (not counting hospitals), only kills people over 70 years, or with medical issues.

So quarantine the over 70's, give them free delivered food, a laptop with Zoom so they can still communicate, and let the rest of the world live their lives. It is insane that two 20 year olds cannot go on a date without being fined, or someone on a rural beach has a chopper land beside them and they are fined. This is not a medical response, this is a psych-ops, that is manipulation of the human psyche on a grand scale. Some would say on a Satanic scale!

Here is what happens when money collapses, when the economy collapses, and in the turmoil some are going to be richer than Midas.

In the past, an inflationary collapse has usually affected currencies in isolation; but the modern tendency for governments to coordinate their inflationary stimulations raises a new factor, of strains between currencies collapsing at the same time but at different rates.

The most notable experience of it in modern times was in several European countries following the First World war. The inflations were individual to the nations, but the cause was the same, and Austria's inflationary collapse ran ahead of Germany's. A passage from a man who witnessed it, the Austrian writer Stefan Zweig, in his autobiographical The World of Yesterday vividly describes the consequences:

Every hotel in Vienna was filled with these vultures [foreign tourists]; they bought everything from toothbrushes to landed estates, they mopped up private collections and antique shop stocks before their owners, in their distress, woke to how they were being plundered. Humble hotel clerks from Switzerland, stenographers from Holland would put up in the deluxe suites of the Ringstrasse hotels. Incredible as it may seem, I can vouch for it as an eyewitness that Salzburg's first-rate Hotel de l'Europe was occupied for a period by English unemployed, who, because of Britain's generous dole were able to live more cheaply at that distinguished hostelry than in their slums at home. Whatever was not nailed down disappeared. The tidings of cheap living and cheap goods in Austria spread far and wide; greedy visitors came from Sweden from France; more Italian French Turkish and Romanian was spoken than German in Vienna's business district.[ii]

Among the Austrians impoverished in their own communities, the law-abiding starved and those prepared to break food rationing laws thrived. Savers, who had patriotically bought government bonds, lost everything. Germans from across the border, whose currency was yet to enter its final collapse, could swill six litres of Austrian beer for one of German, adding to the foreign revelry in Austria's misery.

In our contemporary fiat collapse, differences in its rate will create similar openings for an unsettling life arbitrage. In business dealings, any vestiges of decency and compassion are early victims as those with an early understanding of the opportunities provided by a monetary collapse profit from the innocence of the ignorant. But Germany was to suffer the inflationary fate of Austria the following year. Again, from Zweig:

A pair of shoe laces cost more than a shoe had once cost, no, more than a fashionable store with two thousand pairs of shoes had cost before; to repair a broken window more than the whole house had formerly cost, a book more than the printers shop with a hundred presses. For $100 one could buy rows of six-storey houses on Kurfürstendamm and factories were to be had for the old equivalent of a wheelbarrow

Towering over all of them was the gigantic figure of the super-profiteer Stinnes expanding his credit and in thus exploiting the mark he bought whatever was for sale, coal mines and ships, factories and stocks, castles and country estates, actually for nothing because every payment, every promise became equal to naught. Soon a quarter of Germany was in his hands and, perversely, the masses who in Germany always became intoxicated at a success that they can see with their eyes, cheered him as a genius.

The story of Hugo Stinnes brings us back to our current situation, how markets will evolve and who will profit.

[May 01, 2020] Sweden avoided lockdown with good results

May 01, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

kurious , Apr 30 2020 16:08 utc | 153

Sweden mocks the lockdown - new deaths per day.

https://en.wikipedia.org/api/rest_v1/page/graph/png/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_Sweden/0/335c26917c384c372fb322a67f5bb85eb4b55f1a.png


kurious , Apr 30 2020 16:11 utc | 155

It's looking good for Sweden -new deaths per day.

https://en.wikipedia.org/api/rest_v1/page/graph/png/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_Sweden/0/335c26917c384c372fb322a67f5bb85eb4b55f1a.png

james , Apr 30 2020 16:16 utc | 157
sweden total cases and totals deaths...21,092 / 2,586 deaths per 1 million - 256..
norway - same........................................7,738 / 207 - 38
finland ...................................................4,995 / 211 - 38
denmark............................................. 9,158 / 452 - 78...

sweden pop 10 mil.
norway, finland, denmark pop - 5 mil...

[May 01, 2020] ONE IN SEVEN Americans would avoid Covid-19 treatment for fear of cost, even as pricey new pill shows promise against virus

May 01, 2020 | www.rt.com

Some 14 percent of US adults would forgo medical care for Covid-19 symptoms because they couldn't pay for it, a new poll has found – yet oblivious health authorities act as if the epidemic will be solved by drugs alone. One in seven American adults would avoid seeking healthcare if they or a family member experienced symptoms of Covid-19, out of concern they would be unable to afford treatment, according to a Gallup poll published on Tuesday. Even if they specifically believed themselves to be infected with the coronavirus, nine percent would forgo care for financial reasons, the poll found. Their fears are well-founded – the average cost of coronavirus treatment in an intensive care unit runs over $30,000, according to a study released earlier this month by insurance industry group America's Health Insurance Plans. Even for those who avoid the ICU, American healthcare is the most expensive in the world, and stories of coronavirus patients being whacked with gargantuan medical bills are a dime a dozen two months into the pandemic.

Making matters worse is the unemployment crisis, as about 55 percent of Americans receive healthcare through their jobs. Upwards of 30 million have filed for unemployment in the last five weeks, adding an unprecedented number of families to the ranks of the uninsured – which were already estimated in December to include 27.5 million people, more than the population of Australia. Even those lucky enough to have kept their jobs and insurance may face steep co-pays or other surprise costs.

After a handful of highly-publicized cases in which Americans died of the virus after being turned away by hospitals for lack of money, President Donald Trump ordered hospitals to pay for the cost of Covid-19 treatment, and several large insurers promised at the beginning of the month to waive all co-pays for coronavirus testing for 60 days. However, those coverage pledges do not include other costs associated with hospitalization, like ambulance transportation; outpatient treatment; or treatment for non-Covid-19 patients. Individuals seeking treatment have been tested and received the good news that they don't have the virus – only to be hit shortly thereafter with the bad news that they're on the hook for thousands of dollars in costs. Low-income respondents were much more likely to report they would not seek care for financial reasons. Perhaps more troublingly, respondents with annual income under $40,000 were almost four times as likely as those with incomes over $100,000 to report that they or a family member had been turned away from a hospital for reasons related to overcrowding or high patient volume, the Gallup poll found.

[May 01, 2020] In pandemic blame distribution Fauci and the CDC top should get mayor shares

May 01, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Antonym , May 1 2020 14:03 utc | 15

In pandemic blame distribution Fauci and the CDC top should get mayor shares.

In financial crash blame distribution the New York FED with its top 5 controller / bail-out receiver banks have big parts. It still holds the world's other Central Banks hostage through its reserves and trade in U$ dollars only meme.

In the intelligence area it is not very different: also that branch of the US Deep State failed.

A multipolar world is getting closer..

[May 01, 2020] 47 old drugs that might treat the coronavirus... The Conversation - Sic Semper Tyrannis

From the article: Two potent antihistamines, clemastine and cloperastine , also displayed antiviral activity... ...Interestingly, a seventh compound – an ingredient commonly found in cough suppressants, called dextromethorphan – does the opposite: Its presence helps the virus.
May 01, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

In theory, any intersection on the map between viral and human proteins is a place where drugs could fight the coronavirus . But instead of trying to develop new drugs to work on these points of interaction, we turned to the more than 2,000 unique drugs already approved by the FDA for human use. We believed that somewhere on this long list would be a few drugs or compounds that interact with the very same human proteins as the coronavirus.

We were right." The Conversation

https://theconversation.com/we-found-and-tested-47-old-drugs-that-might-treat-the-coronavirus-results-show-promising-leads-and-a-whole-new-way-to-fight-covid-19-136789

deap , 01 May 2020 at 12:04 PM

Every good linked article - thanks. Important takeaway from very early research finings: OTC cough suppressant

..... "Interestingly, a seventh compound – an ingredient commonly found in cough suppressants, called dextromethorphan – does the opposite: Its presence helps the virus. When our partners tested infected cells with this compound, the virus was able to replicate more easily, and more cells died.

This is potentially a very important finding, but, and I cannot stress this enough, more tests are needed to determine if cough syrup with this ingredient should be avoided by someone who has COVID-19........"

[May 01, 2020] The CDC is actually a vaccine company. -- Robert F. Kennedy Jr., by Paul Craig Roberts

May 01, 2020 | www.unz.com

Watch this RT interview with Robert Kennedy to see how corrupt the CDC is. We cannot trust this corrupt organization with our health. The CDC has a large financial interest in pushing untested vaccines on the public.

WHO is even more under the control of Big Pharma. The organization is corrupt beyond the meaning of the word. "The WHO is a sock puppet for the pharmaceutical industry." -- Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

https://youtu.be/5CfLDXpC324

[May 01, 2020] Ventilators are generally not working for COVID-19

Monitoring oxygen is important. If your lip are blue you need to go to the hospital. Pulse Oximeter is a relatively cheap device.
May 01, 2020 | caucus99percent.com
Treatment for the Coronavirus is evolving. The disease is complicated and is not acting like influenza. They are finding that it also causes brain infections, heart infections, and neurological problems. Ventilators are generally not working. So now they are avoiding ventilators for the most part. Sixty to eighty percent of the people put on ventilators either die or end up with additional serious complications.

Instead doctors are now turning people on their stomachs and improving their oxygenation. Dr. Richard Levitan, an airway specialist who has practiced emergency medicine for over 30 years addresses these issues.

http://www.youtube.com

~~~

[May 01, 2020] Welcome to the era of the Great Disillusionment by Jonathan Cook

May 01, 2020 | www.unz.com

Now rogue academics, rogue journalists, rogue former officials – anyone, in fact – can go online and discover a myriad of things that until recently no one outside a small establishment circle was ever supposed to understand. If you know where to look, you can even find some of this stuff on Wikipedia (see, for example, Operation Timber Sycamore ).

The effect of this information overload has been to disorientate the great majority of us who lack the time, the knowledge and the analytical skills to sift through it all and make sense of the world around us. It is hard to discriminate when there is so much information – good and bad alike – to digest.

Nonetheless, we have got a sense from these online debates, reinforced by events in the non-virtual world, that our politicians do not always tell the truth, that money – rather than the public interest – sometimes wins out in decision-making processes, and that our elites may be little better equipped than us – aside from their expensive educations – to run our societies.

Two decades of lies

There has been a handful of staging posts over the past two decades to our current era of the Great Disillusionment. They include:

lack of transparency in the US government's investigation into the events surrounding 9/11 (obscured by a parallel online controversy about what took place that day); the documented lies told about the reasons for launching a disastrous and illegal war of aggression against Iraq in 2003 that unleashed regional chaos, waves of destabilising migration into Europe and new, exceptionally brutal forms of political Islam; the astronomical bailouts after the 2008 crash of bankers whose criminal activities nearly bankrupted the global economy (but who were never held to account) and instituted more than a decade of austerity measures that had to be paid for by the public; the refusal by western governments and global institutions to take any leadership on tackling climate change , as not only the science but the weather itself has made the urgency of that emergency clear, because it would mean taking on their corporate sponsors; and now the criminal failures of our governments to prepare for, and respond properly to, the Covid-19 pandemic, despite many years of warnings.

Anyone who still takes what our governments say at face value well, I have several bridges to sell you.

Experts failed us

But it is not just governments to blame. The failings of experts, administrators and the professional class have been all too visible to the public as well. Those officials who have enjoyed easy access to prominent platforms in the state-corporate media have obediently repeated what state and corporate interests wanted us to hear, often only for that information to be exposed later as incomplete, misleading or downright fabricated.

In the run-up to the 2003 attack on Iraq, too many political scientists, journalists and weapons experts kept their heads down, keen to preserve their careers and status, rather than speak up in support of those rare experts like Scott Ritter and the late David Kelly who dared to sound the alarm that we were not being told the whole truth.

In 2008, only a handful of economists was prepared to break with corporate orthodoxy and question whether throwing money at bankers exposed as financial criminals was wise, or to demand that these bankers be prosecuted. The economists did not argue the case that there must be a price for the banks to pay, such as a public stake in the banks that were bailed out, in return for forcing taxpayers to massively invest in these discredited businesses. And the economists did not propose overhauling our financial systems to make sure there was no repetition of the economic crash. Instead, they kept their heads down as well, in the hope that their large salaries continued and that they would not lose their esteemed positions in think-tanks and universities.

... ... ...

And recently we have learnt, for example, that a series of Conservative governments in the UK recklessly ran down the supplies of hospital protective gear , even though they had more than a decade of warnings of a coming pandemic. The question is why did no scientific advisers or health officials blow the whistle earlier. Now it is too late to save the lives of many thousands, including dozens of medical staff, who have fallen victim so far to the virus in the UK.

Lesser of two evils

Worse still, in the Anglosphere of the US and the UK, we have ended up with political systems that offer a choice between one party that supports a brutal, unrestrained version of neoliberalism and another party that supports a marginally less brutal, slightly mitigated version of neoliberalism. (And we have recently discovered in the UK that, after the grassroots membership of one of those twinned parties managed to choose a leader in Jeremy Corbyn who rejected this orthodoxy, his own party machine conspired to throw the election rather than let him near power.) As we are warned at each election, in case we decide that elections are in fact futile, we enjoy a choice – between the lesser of two evils.

Those who ignore or instinctively defend these glaring failings of the modern corporate system are really in no position to sit smugly in judgment on those who wish to question the safety of 5G, or vaccines, or the truth of 9/11, or the reality of a climate catastrophe, or even of the presence of lizard overlords.

Because through their reflexive dismissal of doubt, of all critical thinking on anything that has not been pre-approved by our governments and by the state-corporate media, they have helped to disfigure the only yardsticks we have for measuring truth or falsehood. They have forced on us a terrible choice: to blindly follow those who have repeatedly demonstrated they are not worthy of being followed, or to trust nothing at all, to doubt everything. Neither position is one a healthy, balanced individual would want to adopt. But that is where we are today.

Big Brother regimes

It is therefore hardly surprising that those who have been so discredited by the current explosion of information – the politicians, the corporations and the professional class – are wondering how to fix things in the way most likely to maintain their power and authority.

They face two, possibly complementary options.

ORDER IT NOW

One is to allow the information overload to continue, or even escalate. There is an argument to be made that the more possible truths we are presented with, the more powerless we feel and the more willing we are to defer to those most vocal in claiming authority. Confused and hopeless, we will look to father figures, to the strongmen of old, to those who have cultivated an aura of decisiveness and fearlessness, to those who look like down-to-earth mavericks and rebels.

This approach will throw up more Donald Trumps, Boris Johnsons and Jair Bolsonaros. And these men, while charming us with their supposed lack of orthodoxy, will still, of course, be exceptionally accommodating to the most powerful corporate interests – the military-industrial complex – that really run the show.

The other option, which has already been road-tested under the rubric of "fake news", will be to treat us, the public, like irresponsible children, who need a firm, guiding hand. The technocrats and professionals will try to re-establish their authority as though the last two decades never occurred, as though we never saw through their hypocrisy and lies.

They will cite "conspiracy theories" – even the true ones – as proof that it is time to impose new curbs on internet freedoms, on the right to speak and to think. They will argue that the social media experiment has run its course and proved itself a menace – because we, the public, are a menace. They are already flying trial balloons for this new Big Brother world, under cover of tackling the health threats posed by the Covid-19 epidemic.

Surveillance a price worth paying to beat coronavirus, says Blair thinktank https://t.co/AAb1nnv4pG 

-- Guardian news (@guardiannews) April 24, 2020

We should not be surprised that the "thought-leaders" for shutting down the cacophony of the internet are those whose failures have been most exposed by our new freedoms to explore the dark recesses of the recent past. They have included Tony Blair, the British prime minister who lied western publics into the disastrous and illegal war on Iraq in 2003, and Jack Goldsmith, rewarded as a Harvard law professor for his role – since whitewashed – in helping the Bush administration legalise torture and step up warrantless surveillance programmes.

Fmr. Bush admin lawyer/current Harvard Law prof Jack Goldsmith goes full-Thomas Friedman, credits China's enlightened authoritarian approach to information as "largely right" and laments the US' provincial fealty to the First Amendment as "largely wrong." https://t.co/1WyQtgE8bK pic.twitter.com/1M03ybxh0I 

-- Anthony L. Fisher (@anthonyLfisher) April 26, 2020

Need for a new media

The only alternative to a future in which we are ruled by Big Brother technocrats like Tony Blair, or by chummy authoritarians who brook no dissent, or a mix of the two, will require a complete overhaul of our societies' approach to information. We will need fewer curbs on free speech, not more.

The real test of our societies – and the only hope of surviving the coming emergencies, economic and environmental – will be finding a way to hold our leaders truly to account. Not based on whether they are secretly lizards, but on what they are doing to save our planet from our all-too-human, self-destructive instinct for acquisition and our craving for guarantees of security in an uncertain world.

That, in turn, will require a transformation of our relationship to information and debate. We will need a new model of independent, pluralistic, responsive, questioning media that is accountable to the public, not to billionaires and corporations. Precisely the kind of media we do not have now. We will need media we can trust to represent the full range of credible, intelligent, informed debate, not the narrow Overton window through which we get a highly partisan, distorted view of the world that serves the 1 per cent – an elite so richly rewarded by the current system that they are prepared to ignore the fact that they and we are hurtling towards the abyss.

With that kind of media in place – one that truly holds politicians to account and celebrates scientists for their contributions to collective knowledge, not their usefulness to corporate enrichment – we would not need to worry about the safety of our communications systems or medicines, we would not need to doubt the truth of events in the news or wonder whether we have lizards for rulers, because in that kind of world no one would rule over us. They would serve the public for the common good.

Sounds like a fantastical, improbable system of government? It has a name: democracy. Maybe it is time for us finally to give it a go.

Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His books include "Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East" (Pluto Press) and "Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair" (Zed Books). His website is www.jonathan-cook.net .

[Apr 30, 2020] The danger of untested vaccine for coronavirus. Rumsfeld and Geliad. We need a new definition for the term vulture capitalist.

Apr 30, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Lysander , Apr 29 2020 17:33 utc | 8

"The real threat isn't the virus that has killed 59,000 Americans. It is a nonexistent vaccine for it."

There are many valid comments in that post, but...call me crazy...I will not be taking any vaccine that's been rushed in a few months. Vaccines take quite a while to develop and the consequences of taking a poorly researched one are quite severe. However, I doubt it will come to that, as even the most optimistic vaccine estimate seems to be 18 to 24 months. By which time herd immunity will have happened whether anyone wants it to or not.

Clearly this is much worse than any flu in the past century. But I don't blame anyone for being suspicious when so many contract the disease either have mild symptoms or none at all.


Ghost Ship , Apr 29 2020 17:58 utc | 11

I really can't see COVID-19 as a bio-weapon, it's far too non-specific for that, but what I might think possible is that someone developed it plus corresponding vaccine and anti-COVID-19 drug to make billions out of it. The longer the release of the vaccine and drug are delayed, the more valuable they become. If someone had released the vaccine straight after COVID-19, it might be worth a few million dollars and the authorities would be very suspicious, but if release was delayed for a few months it would be worth billions and every country is so desperate for a vaccine/treatment they most likely be too bothered. It'd need a new definition for the term vulture capitalist.
Allen , Apr 29 2020 18:06 utc | 16
oldhippie@2

Can you link to that statement/story.

Let's also remember that Gilead/Rumsfeld were the driving forces with the Avian Flu Hoax (Tamiflu) that resulted in scandals and mass profiting- Rumsfeld himself who was once CEO of Gilead sold his Gilead shares and netted a handsome return.

https://www.globalresearch.ca/bird-flu-a-corporate-bonanza-for-the-biotech-industry/1190

https://constantinereport.com/donald-rumsfeld-gilead-the-bird-flu-hoax/

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-rumsfeld-makes-5m-killing-on-bird-flu-drug-6106843.html

Stonebird , Apr 29 2020 19:48 utc | 33
oldhippie | Apr 29 2020 16:52 utc | 2 + Allen @17

Don't forget Rumsfelds attraction to vast sums of money. After Tamiflu, Aspartame, and now Gilead there are still the two trillion $ that disappeared from Pentagon's accounts just before 9/11.(The records/archives were in Bat 7, and the thing that hit the Pentagon itself, exploded in the Finance/accounts section).

So statistically, where there is Rumsfeld it is 100% certain there is something that will be profitable. Or should that be, where there is some profit to be made from a disaster, it ought to be statistically possible to calculate the part that goes to Rummy?

H.Schmatz , Apr 29 2020 19:59 utc | 35
So statistically, where there is Rumsfeld it is 100% certain there is something that will be profitable. Or should that be, where there is some profit to be made from a disaster, it ought to be statistically possible to calculate the part that goes to Rummy?

Posted by: Stonebird | Apr 29 2020 19:48 utc | 33

And why is that this obviously crony dude is always absent from scrutiny by the media and Congress?
Why always the same circus of Biden and Trump?

[Apr 30, 2020] WHO Flip-Flops Again, Endorses Sweden's Lockdown-Free Approach To Tackling Coronavirus Live Updates

Apr 30, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

The WHO initially opposed, then embraced lockdowns, and now it's apparently back to opposing them again. Unlike other European states like Italy, Sweden implemented swift and early testing regimes to weed out infected patients. This allowed it to avoid lockdowns and border closures, relying instead on social distancing guidance. The country never closed its schools, and although mortality rates have been markedly higher than its neighbors, the virus never overwhelmed its hospital system. The Swedish government's approach is widely popular within Sweden.

The director of the WHO's health emergencies program said the notion that Sweden hadn't done much to combat the virus is simply not true.

Sweden has put in place a "very strong public health policy", said Dr. Mike Ryan. Unlike many other countries, Sweden chose to rely on its "relationship with its citizenry" and trust them to self-regulate. Its healthcare system has not been overwhelmed, he said, adding that its approach could be a "model" for other countries when lockdowns begin to relax. "There are lessons to be learnt by our colleagues in Sweden."

Remember the last time the WHO praised a "model" approach to tackling the virus? It was praising China's strict lockdowns.

[Apr 30, 2020] Tricky issues with mortality

Apr 30, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Hmpf , Apr 30 2020 16:40 utc | 162

@ vk | Apr 30 2020 16:22 utc | 160

So, if a HIV patient suffers from and dies of a bacterial pneumonia (pneumococcus and others) because his immune system is down due his HIV infection, then he's said to have died of HIV. Correct?

If another HIV patient acquires Covid-19 and suffers from a virological pneumonia and subsequently succumbs to it, then he has died of Covid-19? Did I get that right?

How about a Covid-19 positive person getting killed in a fatal car accident? Covid-19 then? What about cancer patients in their terminal phase, which in most cases ends by some fatal organ failure?

Why don't you stop making sh*t up just so it fits your narrative?

[Apr 30, 2020] Dirty political games around coronavirus mortality

Apr 30, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Allen , Apr 29 2020 16:41 utc | 1

Let's take a quick look at how CNN (Cuomo New Network) propaganda works. For but one example:

Here we get the apocalyptic, fear headline:

Deaths spiked as Covid-19 spread in March and April, new analysis finds

And then the story- on the side of your screen you will see a short interview with the ever-reliable and now regularly featured "expert" Dr. Gupta to lend even more credibility to this new "report."

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/27/health/deaths-spike-covid-spread/index.html

And what does the report actually say? The essence of the report is found in the following comment by Dan Weinberger, the lead epidemiologist(?), (or does he just study infectious disease?) in the report:

"Using data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the team found about 15,000 excess deaths from March 1 to April 4. During the same time, states reported 8,000 deaths from Covid-19. "That is close to double," Dan Weinberger, who studies the epidemiology of infectious diseases at Yale, told CNN.

The team could not show whether the increased deaths were due to coronavirus, Weinberger said. But there are strong indications that they were. For instance, the team also looked at data on doctor visits.

"What we see is that in many states, you see an increase in influenza-like illnesses, and then a week or two later, you see an increase in deaths due to pneumonia and influenza," Weinberger said. "It provides some confirmation that what we are seeing is related to coronavirus."

The first thing that stands out is that while the headline is worded so as to suggest (yet elusively) a spike in deaths to Covid (meant to increase hysteria in the viewers- and improve ratings) the report clearly states- "that it could not show whether the increased deaths were due to coronavirus." Based on anecdotal evidence though, the report's author itself then goes on to assert that as they have seen more "influenza like" illnesses that these "must be" Covid cases- and why is that? Let's also keep in mind in the vast majority of these cases no testing is being done to confirm or deny Covid.

Oddly deaths attributed to influenza (even as the CDC warned us in December we were in for a bad flu season) have completely stalled and deaths from pneumonia have dropped off significantly as well. Makes one wonder how all the flu and pneumonia deaths are being categorized.

But the deceptions get even worse – as you can see there is an embedded link to the study itself- and when you click that link you will be directed here:

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.15.20066431v1.full.pdf

The first item of note is who these authors get their funding from. As you can see the authors are awash in money from medical organizations that have deep ties to pharmaceutical companies. They are paid to do such studies.

Let's also keep in mind that this is a pre-print study that is not peer-reviewed yet CNN (and WaPo) featured it and represented this as if the study was factual and beyond reproach.

FUNDING:

(Dan Weinberger) DMW acknowledges support from grants R01AI123208 and R01AI137093 from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases/National Institutes of Health. VEP acknowledges support from grants R01AI112970 and R01AI137093 from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases/National Institutes of Health. NGR acknowledges support from grant R35GM119582 from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences/National Institutes of Health and 1U01IP001122 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). TC acknowledges support from R01AI146555 from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases/National Institutes of Health. LS acknowledges support from the Carlsberg Foundation grant # CF20-0046. FWC acknowledges support from NICHD grant 1DP2HD091799-01.

But it gets worse as stated in the next paragraph which precedes the study we can see the lead author of the study has direct conflicts of interest here through his connections to pharmaceutical companies that stand to profit handsomely from the entirety of the Covid business model:

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST:

DMW has received consulting fees from Pfizer, Merck, GSK, and Affinivax for topics unrelated to this manuscript and is Principal Investigator on a research grant from Pfizer on an unrelated topic. VEP has received reimbursement from Merck and Pfizer for travel expenses to Scientific Input Engagements unrelated to the topic of this manuscript.

An intrepid reporter certainly should ask each of the authors to disclose their stock holdings and also examine the financial contributions received by The Yale School of Public Health where these authors work.

So we are to trust a pre-print, non peer reviewed study by authors who have direct ties to the very companies that will profit from this? CNN believes we should- so are we to believe CNN?

[Apr 29, 2020] The number who fist responders tested positive fpr coronavirus antibodies is 10% for NYPD and 17% for FDNY/EMP

The latest round of 'surveillance' testing for coronavirus antibodies was done on first responders, and found that the number who tested positive was once again surprisingly high.
Apr 29, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

New York State has tested over 2,000 first responders for COVID-19 antibodies.

Preliminary results:

FDNY/EMT: 17.1% positive
NYPD: 10.5% positive

[Apr 29, 2020] Sweden is trying something different and seem to be no worse, probably better than the UK approach

Apr 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Ric G , Apr 29 2020 16:53 utc | 3

Sweden is trying something different and seem to be no worse, probably better than the UK approach.

Meanwhile some are making out like bandits!

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/americas-super-rich-see-their-wealth-rise-282-billion-three-weeks-pandemic

And we haven't paid our recent 'restaurant bill' now owed to the bankers, payable in about three years, when we are going to be drained of several pints of financial blood!

And in Australia, with about eighty deaths, the panic borders on the insane!

[Apr 29, 2020] Starvation from the loss of income is 100% lethal

Apr 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

JasonT , Apr 29 2020 20:16 utc | 37

It really astounds me that the Covid-19 hyperventilators fail to understand that starvation is 100% lethal, and immune compromised people due to malnutrition are much more susceptible to any disease that comes along.

As the supply lines collapse, and with winter in the northern hemisphere coming in a mere 6 months, you can expect that the number of dead by starvation, and from other diseases attacking mal-nourished people, will utterly dwarf the number of dead from Covid-19 complications.

[Apr 29, 2020] The ruling-class/establishment always portrays neo-liberal policies as beneficial to the working class/middle-class

Apr 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jackrabbit , Apr 29 2020 18:36 utc | 21

Many commenters here don't want us to hold our government accountable for that failure. They just want to move on.

The ruling-class/establishment always portrays neo-liberal policies as beneficial to the working class/middle-class. It is generally only superficially so. The fact is, neolib government policy is essentially:

corporate welfare (like bailouts) and pay-offs to the wealthy (tax cuts);

socialized bads (we're in this together!) among the lower classes.

... ... ...

IMO this is likely because Big Pharma and government budgets benefit from continuing failures that could best be summed up as culling the herd. Big Pharma could lose billions of dollars of potential profits from treating old people with expensive and/or experimental drugs. And governments (wealthy taxpayers, really) could save billions more if older people die quickly: the last year of care is the most expensive and pensions are underfunded.

!!

[Apr 29, 2020] 'FREE AMERICA' Elon Musk divides opinions after calling for lockdown to be lifted and tweeting 'give people their freedom back

Apr 29, 2020 | www.rt.com

Tech entrepreneur Elon Musk has come out in favor of reducing restrictions on freedoms and businesses, sparking a fierce debate on Twitter. Some lauded him and others chastised him for putting profits ahead of people's safety. The Tesla and SpaceX founder called on Wednesday for the US to lift the lockdown, tweeting "FREE AMERICA NOW" and "Give people their freedom back!"

FREE AMERICA NOW

-- Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 29, 2020

He also attached links to a Wall Street Journal article suggesting lockdowns were ineffective and to another praising Texas for announcing more businesses will be allowed to reopen on Friday.

The billionaire has been known as a vocal critic of the "panic" around the novel coronavirus, having previously branded the behavior "dumb" and keeping his Tesla car factory in California running despite local shelter-in-place laws.

But his new string of tweets has managed to quickly divide opinions online. While some praised Musk for his commitment to liberty, others accused him of being reckless and of placing profits over people.

There were those who accused Musk of being "drunk with power." Even his supporters, like one named Sylvia Kane, told the polymath to "get some sleep" .

What science are you following, EM? Clearly you know something the doctors and scientists don't

-- Bill Moseley (@choptopmoseley) April 29, 2020

Others chastised the SpaceX tycoon for seemingly choosing to ignore scientific evidence, with critics like actor Bill Moseley wondering "what science" Musk was now following, and sports presenter Dave Zirin saying that "wanting your workers to die for you while you stay in your compound isn't exactly courage."

However, there was no shortage of commenters praising Musk for his commitment to liberty, with President Donald Trump supporter Melissa A. responding to the tweet by saying "the scariest thing about this pandemic" was "seeing Americans bow down" to "corrupt politicians who promise them safety." Musk clearly approved of this take by replying: "True."

True

-- Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 29, 2020

A conservative media host Joey Saladino was quick to claim that "When the smartest man in the world is saying this, it is time to FREE AMERICA!"

Musk's "FREE AMERICA" comments appear to echo Trump's sentiments about the lockdown, after the president took to Twitter last week urging several US states to "LIBERATE" themselves.

Last month, Musk committed to providing California with 1,000 ventilators. However there seems to have been some confusion over whether or not Musk's aid has actually arrived. The Sacramento Bee reported on April 14 that no hospitals in the state had received any ventilators promised by the billionaire.

Musk vociferously denied that accusation, after it was picked up by CNN, saying that Tesla had delivered hundreds of ventilators.

Also on rt.com 'How do you still exist?' Musk unloads on CNN after claims his ventilators were never delivered to California hospitals

[Apr 29, 2020] It is possible to conclude that there is evidence of excess mortality in Portugal between March 1 and April 22, 2020 during the COVID-19 lockdown even using the usual baselines (mean, median).

Apr 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Vasco da Gama , Apr 29 2020 20:26 utc | 40

Just sharing a study made on Excess Mortality Estimation During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Preliminary Data from Portugal , it's conclusion:
It is possible to conclude that there is evidence of excess mortality in Portugal between March 1 and April 22, 2020 during the COVID-19 lockdown even using the usual baselines (mean, median).

By adopting baselines more consistent with the lockdown, the excess mortality becomes more evident, with estimated 2400 to 4000 potential excess deaths during this period.

The observed excess of mortality is associated with older age groups (over age 65). The reduction of more than 191,000 daily hospital ED visits occurred between March 1 - April 22 may potentially be associated with 1291 or more deaths .

Overall, these results point towards an excess mortality that is associated with and that is 3 to 5-fold higher than the official COVID-19 mortality.

(my emphasis, Acta Médica Portuguesa, direct pdf link )

It is interesting that the study chose to compare all-cause mortality but also against a different period of the year in an attempt to reflect the reduced movement under the lockdown more akin to the holiday period. The resulting increased excess-mortality give way for the authors hypothesis that this is explained by the reduction in visits to hospital.

I will comment though that the authors' estimating method could never be made official for the purposes that those are used, and their assessment of "3 to 5-fold higher than the official COVID-19 mortality" is being on the side of the sensationalistic if they are suggesting that we could replace one with the other. Despite this it is a welcome study.

[Apr 29, 2020] Now compare that to the worldwide death toll from coronavirus: 220,000. Let me say that again. Western aggressive wars to coronavirus: 5,000,000 : 220,000."

Apr 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Blue Dotterel , Apr 29 2020 18:02 utc | 14

Maybe some Craig Murray will provide a little perspective on COVid 19 and the ongoing genocide taking place in the ME https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2020/04/backing-the-wrong-horseman/#respond

"For the purposes of argument, I am going to put an extremely conservative figure of 5 million on the number of people who died as a result of Western military intervention, direct or proxy, in the Middle East.

Now compare that to the worldwide death toll from coronavirus: 220,000. Let me say that again.
Western aggressive wars to coronavirus: 5,000,000 : 220,000."

[Apr 29, 2020] Any death labeled cornivirus has been monetized.

Apr 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Othello , Apr 29 2020 19:20 utc | 27

This is one time I have to respectful disagree. The virus is certainly real but the hysteria is totally unjustified. I live in the city and state with supposedly the highest number of cornivirus death but yet you have hospitals and facilitysb designated for infected person are empty.....we have doctors and nurses being forced to label any death as cornivirus death..... and also any death labeled cornivirus has been monetized....

[Apr 29, 2020] "Four legs good, two legs bad." is now fully applicable to neoliberal MSM and especially to identity politics. But that does not mean that everything they say is wrong

Apr 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Apr 29 2020 20:22 utc | 38

@Allen #19

> The mainstream media being a lying machine doesn't automatically make everything they say wrong.

2 legs bad is no more idiotic applying to liberals as it does to conservatives, or mainstream media vs. alt media.

[Apr 28, 2020] Four of the coronavirus antibody tests produced false-positive rates ranging from 11 percent to 16 percent; many of the rest hovered around 5 percent

Apr 28, 2020 | www.nytimes.com

... ... ...

For the past few weeks, more than 50 scientists have been working diligently to do something that the Food and Drug Administration mostly has not: Verifying that 14 coronavirus antibody tests now on the market actually deliver accurate results.

These tests are crucial to reopening the economy, but public health experts have raised urgent concerns about their quality. The new research, completed just days ago and posted online Friday, confirmed some of those fears: Of the 14 tests, only three delivered consistently reliable results . Even the best had some flaws.

The research has not been peer-reviewed and is subject to revision. But the results are already raising difficult questions about the course of the epidemic.

Surveys of residents in the Bay Area, Los Angeles and New York this week found that substantial percentages tested positive for antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, the official name of the new coronavirus. In New York City, the figure was said to be as high as 21 percent. Elsewhere, it was closer to 3 percent.

The idea that many residents in some parts of the country have already been exposed to the virus has wide implications. At the least, the finding could greatly complicate plans to reopen the economy.

Already Americans are scrambling to take antibody tests to see if they might escape lockdowns. Public health experts are wondering if those with positive results might be allowed to return to work.

But these tactics mean nothing if the test results can't be trusted.

In the new research, researchers found that only one of the tests never delivered a so-called false positive -- that is, it never mistakenly signaled antibodies in people who did not have them.

Two other tests did not deliver false-positive results 99 percent of the time. But the converse was not true. Even these three tests detected antibodies in infected people only 90 percent of the time, at best.

The false-positive metric is particularly important. The result may lead people to believe themselves immune to the virus when they are not, and to put themselves in danger by abandoning social distancing and other protective measures.

It is also the result on which scientists are most divided.

"There are multiple tests that look reasonable and promising," said Dr. Alexander Marson, an immunologist at the University of California, San Francisco, and one of the project's leaders. "That's some reason for optimism."

Dr. Marson is also an investigator in the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, which partly funded the study.

Other scientists were less sanguine than Dr. Marson. Four of the tests produced false-positive rates ranging from 11 percent to 16 percent; many of the rest hovered around 5 percent.

[Apr 28, 2020] Consumer Beware Coronavirus Antibody Tests Are Still A Work In Progress

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... By JoNel Aleccia, Senior Correspondent at Kaiser Health News, who previously reported for The Seattle Times, NBCNews.com, TODAY.com and MSNBC.com. Originally published at Kaiser Health News ..."
Apr 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

By JoNel Aleccia, Senior Correspondent at Kaiser Health News, who previously reported for The Seattle Times, NBCNews.com, TODAY.com and MSNBC.com. Originally published at Kaiser Health News

After hearing for months about serious access issues involving tests that diagnose COVID-19 based on swabs from the nose or throat, Americans are being inundated with reports about promising new tests that look for signs of infection in the blood.

There are high hopes for these antibody tests, which detect proteins that form in blood as part of the body's immune response to an invading virus. Communities across the U.S. have been rolling out the results of serological surveys that examine blood samples from people who haven't been diagnosed with COVID-19 to see if they were, in fact, previously infected.

The thinking is, if there are blood markers that can detect when people have been infected, such tests should be able to tell us how widely the novel coronavirus has spread. And equally optimistic: those same antibodies could convey immunity to the disease, signaling someone is safe from reinfection and able to get back to work.

Such high hopes, however, are running smack into the roadblocks of reality.

Infectious disease experts are raising pointed questions about the reliability of the early tests and the studies that hinge on their results. And they warn that state and local governments -- as well as individuals -- should be wary of shaping policy or changing behavior based on any single report.

In the sharpest caution to date, officials with the World Health Organization on Saturday warned against plans for proposed "immunity passports," which would allow people who have recovered from the coronavirus to resume unrestricted travel and work.

"There is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from COVID-19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection," the agency wrote in a scientific brief.

Even before the WHO weighed in, other experts were urging restraint in interpreting early results of antibody screening.

"The science is catching up," said Dr. Liise-anne Pirofski, chief of the division of infectious diseases at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Health System. "Our ability to make a test at the moment is much greater than our understanding of what those antibodies we are testing for mean."

In the past few weeks, more than 180 academic centers, hospitals and private manufacturers have notified the federal Food and Drug Administration that they intend to create serology tests for COVID-19, spokesperson Stephanie Caccomo said in an email. They've been able to jump into the fray because the FDA in March relaxed regulations for developing tests as part of its emergency response to the pandemic.

But the FDA has not reviewed the vast majority of tests on the market, and their validity, particularly point-of-care blood tests that promise rapid results within minutes, isn't clear, said Dr. Michael Busch, director of the Vitalant Research Institute and a professor of laboratory medicine at the University of California-San Francisco.

"Some of them have sensitivities that are quite poor," he said. "You may even miss some infected people completely."

Other tests may flag people as positive for COVID-19 when they're not infected. That's especially true in regions of the country with little spread of the novel virus. If the prevalence of a disease is low, less than 5%, even an accurate test would yield a high number of false positive results because of the way such screening tools operate.

So when people see advertisements for finger-prick antibody tests becoming widely available at urgent care centers and medispas, they should think twice.

For one, antibody tests can't be used to diagnose the disease. Antibodies may not be present in high enough levels to be detected in the earliest days of an infection. And because there are several other known coronaviruses -- including those that cause the common cold -- people infected with those viruses could produce antibodies that cross-react with those produced in response to the new virus.

Scientists still know too little about whether antibodies to COVID-19 convey immunity that could allow people to put away masks and halt social distancing, said Dr. Mary Hayden, director of the division of clinical microbiology at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago.

Immunity to a virus is a complicated process that takes place over one to two weeks, the WHO noted. The immune system makes antibodies in response to an infection. But the body also makes T-cells that recognize and eliminate other cells infected with the virus, creating what's known as cellular immunity. Those two processes together may help a person recover and prevent reinfection. But it is not yet clear whether cellular immunity is required to bolster recovery and prevent subsequent infection with COVID-19.

"We do not know whether or not the antibodies detected are protective," Hayden told reporters last week on a call organized by the Infectious Diseases Society of America . "We recommend that people with antibodies not change their behavior in any way."

Scientists are hoping, however, that future COVID-19 studies may demonstrate immunity that could last for one or two years.

Concerns about the validity of the tests have cast a shadow on several recent reports aiming to quantify the spread of the virus in specific regions. Last week, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo revealed the results of a serological survey that suggested that 1 in 5 New York City residents had been infected with the coronavirus. Statewide, the figure was 13.9%, according to the study of 3,000 New Yorkers in 19 counties who were recruited at grocery stores.

But the results quickly drew criticism. Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, who directs the city's disease control, warned that the tests could produce "false negative or false positive results. " Florian Krammer, a microbiology professor at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai who designs such tests, tweeted -- and later deleted -- that the results were "BS."

"I think this is too high," he said in a later tweet. "It is possible. But a 20% plus infection rate seems too high for NYC due to a number of reasons. I would think 6-8%, maybe 10% are closer to the truth. It would be nice to know more about the test, its sensitivity and specificity and the test population."

Similarly, two serology studies in California, one in Santa Clara County and one in Los Angeles County, drew wide criticism about the recruitment of subjects and the analyses used.

In the Santa Clara study , Stanford University researchers tested 3,330 volunteers for antibodies showing exposure to COVID-19; about 1.5% were positive. They concluded that meant from 48,000 to 81,000 people were infected with the virus in the county.

"It was completely inadequate to interpret the results that 50,000 to 80,000 people were infected," Busch said.

The L.A. study, conducted by University of Southern California researchers, concluded that 2.8% to 5.6% of the county's adult population had been exposed to the coronavirus. That translates to 221,000 to 422,000 adult residents who have been infected. Critics, however, argued that the study sample was too small and that details of the methodology weren't immediately available.

Busch understands the drive to conduct such tests.

"People are asking the questions: What's the real denominator to judge the case counts and the death counts against?" he said. "People are urgently trying to get data."

Unfortunately, that data simply is not available yet, other experts said. This coronavirus has never been seen before, so the science that will inform efforts to help communities respond and recover is playing out in real time.

"The problem is that the science has not kept up with the tests," Hayden said. "Now we need to do the research to tell what the results mean."

On the positive side, most of the scientific community has pivoted to focus on finding solutions, said Pirofski, who was also on the IDSA call. "We just have to slow our roll."

"This is our first dive in trying to understand what's going on," she said. "I would say it's a start."

[Apr 28, 2020] The Meditations, by a Roman emperor who died in a plague named after him, has much to say about how to face fear, pain, anxiety and loss by Donald Robertson

Notable quotes:
"... First of all, because Stoics believe that our true good resides in our own character and actions, they would frequently remind themselves to distinguish between what's "up to us" and what isn't. Modern Stoics tend to call this "the dichotomy of control" and many people find this distinction alone helpful in alleviating stress. What happens to me is never directly under my control, never completely ..."
"... Marcus likes to ask himself, "What virtue has nature given me to deal with this situation?" That naturally leads to the question: "How do other people cope with similar challenges?" Stoics reflect on character strengths such as wisdom, patience and self-discipline, which potentially make them more resilient in the face of adversity. They try to exemplify these virtues and bring them to bear on the challenges they face in daily life, during a crisis like the pandemic. They learn from how other people cope. Even historical figures or fictional characters can serve as role models. ..."
"... fear does us more harm than the things of which we're afraid. ..."
"... Finally, during a pandemic, you may have to confront the risk, the possibility, of your own death. Since the day you were born, that's always been on the cards. Most of us find it easier to bury our heads in the sand. Avoidance is the No1 most popular coping strategy in the world. We live in denial of the self-evident fact that we all die eventually. ..."
"... "All that comes to pass", he tells himself, even illness and death, should be as "familiar as the rose in spring and the fruit in autumn". Marcus Aurelius, through decades of training in Stoicism, in other words, had taught himself to face death with the steady calm of someone who has done so countless times already in the past. ..."
Apr 25, 2020 | www.theguardian.com
T he Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus was the last famous Stoic philosopher of antiquity. During the last 14 years of his life he faced one of the worst plagues in European history. The Antonine Plague, named after him, was probably caused by a strain of the smallpox virus. It's estimated to have killed up to 5 million people, possibly including Marcus himself.

ss="rich-link tone-feature--item rich-link--pillar-arts">

="rich-link__link u-faux-block-link__overlay" aria-label="'What it means to be an American': Abraham Lincoln and a nation divided" href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/apr/11/abraham-lincoln-verge-book-ted-widmer-interview">

From AD166 to around AD180, repeated outbreaks occurred throughout the known world. Roman historians describe the legions being devastated, and entire towns and villages being depopulated and going to ruin. Rome itself was particularly badly affected, carts leaving the city each day piled high with dead bodies.

In the middle of this plague, Marcus wrote a book, known as The Meditations, which records the moral and psychological advice he gave himself at this time. He frequently applies Stoic philosophy to the challenges of coping with pain, illness, anxiety and loss. It's no stretch of the imagination to view The Meditations as a manual for developing precisely the mental resilience skills required to cope with a pandemic.

First of all, because Stoics believe that our true good resides in our own character and actions, they would frequently remind themselves to distinguish between what's "up to us" and what isn't. Modern Stoics tend to call this "the dichotomy of control" and many people find this distinction alone helpful in alleviating stress. What happens to me is never directly under my control, never completely up to me, but my own thoughts and actions are – at least the voluntary ones. The pandemic isn't really under my control but the way I behave in response to it is.

Much, if not all, of our thinking is also up to us. Hence, "It's not events that upset us but rather our opinions about them." More specifically, our judgment that something is really bad, awful or even catastrophic, causes our distress.

This is one of the basic psychological principles of Stoicism. It's also the basic premise of modern cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), the leading evidence-based form of psychotherapy. The pioneers of CBT, Albert Ellis and Aaron T Beck, both describe Stoicism as the philosophical inspiration for their approach. It's not the virus that makes us afraid but rather our opinions about it. Nor is it the inconsiderate actions of others, those ignoring social distancing recommendations, that make us angry so much as our opinions about them.

Many people are struck, on reading The Meditations, by the fact that it opens with a chapter in which Marcus lists the qualities he most admires in other individuals, about 17 friends, members of his family and teachers. This is an extended example of one of the central practices of Stoicism.

Marcus likes to ask himself, "What virtue has nature given me to deal with this situation?" That naturally leads to the question: "How do other people cope with similar challenges?" Stoics reflect on character strengths such as wisdom, patience and self-discipline, which potentially make them more resilient in the face of adversity. They try to exemplify these virtues and bring them to bear on the challenges they face in daily life, during a crisis like the pandemic. They learn from how other people cope. Even historical figures or fictional characters can serve as role models.

With all of this in mind, it's easier to understand another common slogan of Stoicism: fear does us more harm than the things of which we're afraid. This applies to unhealthy emotions in general, which the Stoics term "passions" – from pathos , the source of our word "pathological". It's true, first of all, in a superficial sense. Even if you have a 99% chance, or more, of surviving the pandemic, worry and anxiety may be ruining your life and driving you crazy. In extreme cases some people may even take their own lives.

In that respect, it's easy to see how fear can do us more harm than the things of which we're afraid because it can impinge on our physical health and quality of life. However, this saying also has a deeper meaning for Stoics. The virus can only harm your body – the worst it can do is kill you. However, fear penetrates into the moral core of our being. It can destroy your humanity if you let it. For the Stoics that's a fate worse than death.

Finally, during a pandemic, you may have to confront the risk, the possibility, of your own death. Since the day you were born, that's always been on the cards. Most of us find it easier to bury our heads in the sand. Avoidance is the No1 most popular coping strategy in the world. We live in denial of the self-evident fact that we all die eventually. The Stoics believed that when we're confronted with our own mortality, and grasp its implications, that can change our perspective on life quite dramatically. Any one of us could die at any moment. Life doesn't go on forever.

We're told this was what Marcus was thinking about on his deathbed. According to one historian, his circle of friends were distraught. Marcus calmly asked why they were weeping for him when, in fact, they should accept both sickness and death as inevitable, part of nature and the common lot of mankind. He returns to this theme many times throughout The Meditations.

"All that comes to pass", he tells himself, even illness and death, should be as "familiar as the rose in spring and the fruit in autumn". Marcus Aurelius, through decades of training in Stoicism, in other words, had taught himself to face death with the steady calm of someone who has done so countless times already in the past.

Donald Robertson is cognitive behavioural therapist and the author of several books on philosophy and psychotherapy, including Stoicism and the Art of Happiness and How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius

[Apr 28, 2020] Coronavirus Fact-Check #4: "Why are so many healthcare workers dying?"

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Media reports paint a picture of healthcare workers being hit very hard by the pandemic, but the statistics suggest otherwise ..."
"... substantially under-represented ..."
Apr 28, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Media reports paint a picture of healthcare workers being hit very hard by the pandemic, but the statistics suggest otherwise

A recent statistical study published in the Health Services Journal (HSJ) provides some important facts and context:

Firstly, let's establish the data: As of 22nd April, 119 "NHS workers" were reported to have died of Covid19. Thirteen of them were excluded from the study for being either retired or never confirmed to work for the NHS.

That left 106 NHS staff who died of alleged Covid19.

Secondly, we should clear up the misconception that this represents just "frontline" healthcare workers. It doesn't.

This number includes 35 nurses, 18 doctors and 27 healthcare assistants (HCAs), they are all "frontline" workers. But it also includes 36 others (dentists, psychiatrists, porters, administrators, receptionists etc).

Finally, let's put these numbers in some context:

The NHS is the biggest single employer in the UK. NHS England, NHS Scotland and NHS Wales employ roughly 1.5 million people (Wikipedia estimates over 1.7 million ). That's over 4% of the 38 million working-age adults, or 2.5% of the entire population of the UK.

As such, you would expect roughly 2.5% of the Covid19 victims to be NHS employees (assuming proportionate distribution).

However, the 106 NHS employees represent only 0.58% of the UK's 18,200 total Covid19 casualties as of April 22nd.

To put it another way:

Any randomly selected citizen of the UK has a 1/39 chance of being employed by the NHS. But any randomly selected "Covid19 related death" has a 1/172 chance of being employed by the NHS.

In summary: In direct contradiction of the media coverage, healthcare workers are NOT being disproportionately affected by Covid19. They are actually substantially under-represented .

[Apr 28, 2020] US attorney Robert F Kennedy Jr says that top Trump advisor Anthony Fauci has made the reckless choice to fast track vaccines, partially funded by Gates, without critical animal studies

Apr 28, 2020 | off-guardian.org

US attorney Robert F Kennedy Jr says that top Trump advisor Anthony Fauci has made the reckless choice to fast track vaccines, partially funded by Gates , without critical animal studies . Gates is so worried about the danger of adverse events that he says vaccines shouldn't be distributed until governments agree to indemnity against lawsuits.

But this should come as little surprise. The Gates Foundation and its global vaccine agenda already has much to answer for. Instead of prioritizing projects that are proven to curb infectious diseases and improve health – clean water, hygiene, nutrition and economic development – Kennedy notes that the Gates Foundation spends only about $650 million of its $5 billion budget on these areas.

It is fair to say that the Gates Foundation has an agenda: it believes that many of its aims can be delivered via the barrel of a syringe. It has been well documented in recent weeks about how the Gates Foundation has spread its tentacles into every facet of global health policy.

For instance, it is a major funder of the World Health Organization and donates to other pivotal players in the COVID-19 saga, not least Imperial College London whose Neil Ferguson produced hugely flawed data upon which the UK government implemented a lockdown, which entailed sanctioning draconian state powers and stripping of people's basic rights via the Coronavirus Emergency Act.

Although often alluded to, Gates's push for cashless societies is given less attention in the current climate but is just as important. It is not only the major pharmaceutical corporations which the Gates Foundation is firmly in bed with (along with the big agri-food players ), it is also embedded with Wall Street financial interests.

The global shift from cash towards digital transactions is being spearheaded by Bill Gates and US financial corporations who will profit from digital payments. At the same time, by controlling digital payments (and removing cash), you can control and monitor everything a country and its citizens do and pay for.

[Apr 28, 2020] Who is at RISK from COVID-19 -- UK DOCTOR -- Covid-19 Vlog #15

Highly recommended!
I recommend to listen to this video in full. It is really good !
Apr 28, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Rebecca Elliott , 4 days ago

Sign of a true expert - admitting when you don't know the answer to something

Mike Rees , 4 days ago

The format you have here with Dr Jenkins is really good. Almost like a podcast. You two have a great rapport

Sarah's Tarot , 4 days ago

Doctor Jenkins is so level headed. I imagine he must be a very reassuring presence for his patients

SuperLkelley , 4 days ago

As a research scientist in the life sciences at Imperial College, this interview is the best source of information I have seen on the internet. Thank you so much.

Daily Occasions , 4 days ago

This format where you ask a question and allow a detailed response was delightful! Watching this conversation between two highly skilled and intelligent doctors who are full of compassion has given me hope. Please do more video's like this ? Well done doctors well done!

[Apr 28, 2020] To end endless wars, I support 75% military spending cuts

This amount of money would end COVID-19 epidemic really quickly
Apr 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
blues , Apr 26 2020 21:26 utc | 31
Howie Hawkins -- Peace and Freedom Party 2020

I am a retired Teamster in Syracuse, New York, who joined the civil rights, antiwar, and environmental movements as a teenager in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1960s. In 1984, I co-founded the Green Party. In 2010, I was the first U.S. candidate to campaign for a Green New Deal in the first of three campaigns for New York governor that won Green Party ballot lines.

To end the climate crisis, I have detailed an Ecosocialist Green New Deal to create 38 million new jobs, 100% clean energy, and zero carbon emissions by 2030.

To end poverty and economic insecurity, I propose an Economic Bill of Rights: job guarantee, guaranteed minimum income, affordable housing, improved Medicare for all, tuition-free public education pre–K to college, and secure retirement by doubling Social Security.

To end endless wars, I support 75% military spending cuts, U.S. troops home, diplomacy, international law, human rights, and a Global Green New Deal.

To end the new nuclear arms race, I favor no first use, minimum credible deterrent, and ratification of the new Nuclear Weapons Ban Treaty.

I support unions, $20 minimum wage, worker co-ops, public banks, public energy, public railroads, progressive taxation, net neutrality, internet privacy, ending mass surveillance, no nukes, no fracking, abortion rights, student and medical debt relief, decriminalizing drugs, ending mass incarceration, police under community control, immigrant amnesty, African-American reparations, Indian and Mexican-American treaty rights, whistleblower and political prisoner pardons, and presidential elections by National Popular Vote using Ranked-Choice Voting. [Ranked Choice Voting is a huge fraud -- which many well-meaning people fall for]
// ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So --

HowieHawkins20 -- Account suspended -- Twitter suspends accounts which violate the Twitter Rules

You catching on yet?

[Apr 28, 2020] SARS-CoV-2 might cause cell necrosis in endothelial tissue.

Apr 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Apr 27 2020 0:05 utc | 50

I had posted this comment at the 'coronavirus and smoking' thread, but it looks like it may be a major advance on understanding COVID-19 and how it affects the body so will post it here as well.

http://www.en.usz.ch/media/press-releases/pages/covid-19-endotheliitis.aspx

Varga has been able to use an electron microscope to verify for the first time that SARS-CoV-2 is present and causes cell necrosis in endothelial tissue.

Endothelial tissue is a cell layer that acts as a protective shield in blood vessels and regulates and balances out various processes in the microvessels. The disruption of this regulatory process can, for example, cause circulatory disorders in organs and body tissue, resulting in cellular necrosis and thus to the death of these organs or tissue...

... This means that the virus not only triggers the inflammation of the lungs, which then causes further complications, but is also directly responsible for systemic endotheliitis, an inflammation of all endothelial tissue in the body which affects all vessel beds – in heart, brain, lung and renal vessels as well as vessels in the intestinal tract....

...The endothelial tissue of younger patients is usually capable of coping well with the attacks launched by the virus. The situation is different for patients suffering from hypertension, diabetes, heart failure or coronary heart diseases, all of which have one thing in common – their endothelial function is markedly impaired. If patients such as these become infected with SARS-COV-2, they will be particularly at risk, as their already weakened endothelial function will diminish even further, especially during the phase in which the virus reproduces the most.

[Apr 28, 2020] Ultraviolet Blood Irradiation (UBI) is an interesting idea

Apr 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , Apr 27 2020 0:40 utc | 54

Ultraviolet Blood Irradiation (UBI) is an interesting idea.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4783265/

It was actually quite a thing in the 1940's and 1950's for diseases like septicemia, pneumonia, tuberculosis, arthritis, asthma and even poliomyelitis.

Low and mild doses of UV kill microorganisms by damaging the DNA, while any DNA damage in host cells can be rapidly repaired by DNA repair enzymes.

Having done a bit of reading on porphyrins of late and seeing a NY doctor mentioning that covid-19 patients have hypoxia w/o pneumonia and good lung function got me thinking. This may be due to the porphyrin heme is unable to transport oxygen , perhaps because the virus somehow has displaced iron from the porphyrin (heme) , and makes me wonder if UV light can help in this regard .

Porphyrins are highly pigmented (heme gives blood its red color) fluorescent molecules . Strong pigments are always efficient energy absorbers, and if they are also fluorescent like porphyrins, they are also good energy transmitters.

Porphyrins are more efficient energy transmitters than any other of life's components. In technical terms, their ionization potential is low, and their electron affinity high. They are therefore capable of transmitting large amounts of energy rapidly in small steps, one low-energy electron at a time. They can even transmit energy electronically from oxygen to other molecules, instead of dissipating that energy as heat and burning up. That's why breathing is possible.

The word porphyrin is derived from the Greek porphura meaning purple. The pandemic exercise last year was named Crimson Contagion. Crimson is a strong, red color, inclining to purple like heme. Coincidence?

Could it be that whatever is causing COVID-19 , and we dont know for sure because kochs postulate was not fulfilled on the virus China said they isolated, that it is infecting or altering a porphyrin like heme?

Completely out of my depth here of course. Food for thought though.

krollchem , Apr 27 2020 16:04 utc | 94

Pft@62

UVC light has been proposed as a means to sterilize indoor areas to prevent COVID-19 infections in crowded areas such as shops.
https://news.columbia.edu/ultraviolet-technology-virus-covid-19-UV-light

Interesting comment about crimson contegion. The attack on hemogloblin was reported a few weeks ago but has since disappeared. Do not know if it was true. Perhaps UVC in conjunction with ECMO which involves shunting blood outside the body and then back again may be a means to kill the virus, thus suppressing the disease progression.

[Apr 28, 2020] How air pollution exacerbates Covid-19

Apr 28, 2020 | www.bbc.com

One recent study found that even small increases in fine particulate matter, known as PM2.5, have had an outsized effect in the US. An increase of just 1 microgram per cubic metre corresponded to a 15% increase in Covid-19 deaths , according to the researchers, led by Xiao Wu and Rachel Nethery at the at the Harvard University T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

The evidence we have is pretty clear that people who have been living in places that are more polluted over time, that they are more likely to die from coronavirus – Aaron Bernstein
For comparison, the safe limit designated by the US's Environmental Protection Agency is 12 micrograms PM2.5 per cubic metre , while the World Health Organization has a guideline figure of 10 micrograms per cubic metre as an annual mean.Parts of New York have annual PM2.5 levels consistently above this safe threshold . Researchers suggest that this could have played a part in the scale of New York State's coronavirus outbreak, with deaths as of April by far the highest of any state. "The evidence we have is pretty clear that people who have been living in places that are more polluted over time, that they are more likely to die from coronavirus," says Aaron Bernstein, the director of the Center for Climate, Health, and Global Environment at Harvard University.

The study, which looked across 3,080 counties in the United States, also found people who have lived in counties with long-term pollution exposure for 15-20 years have significantly higher mortality rates, says Wu.

While the study has yet to be peer-reviewed by independent experts, Wu says that the association is likely down to the higher risk of existing respiratory and heart diseases in areas of higher pollution. Air pollution is also known to weaken the immune system , compromising people's ability to fight off infection, according to the European Public Health Alliance.

"If Manhattan had lowered its average particulate matter level by just a single unit, or one microgram per cubic meter, over the past 20 years, the borough would most likely have seen 248 fewer Covid-19 deaths by this point in the outbreak [4 April 2020]," the researchers conclude.

A study of air quality in Italy's northern provinces of Lombardy and Emilia Romagna also found a correlation between Covid-19 mortality rates and high levels of pollution. Lombardy makes up the vast majority of the country's deaths, at 13,325 of Italy's 26,644 as of 26 April , while Emilia Romagna was the province with the next greatest death toll, at 3,386. The researchers questioned the role of low air quality in their becoming hotspots, concluding that: "the high level of pollution in northern Italy should be considered an additional co-factor of the high level of lethality recorded in that area".

You could pick any city in the world and expect to see an effect of air pollution on people's risk of getting sicker from coronavirus – Aaron Bernstein
These are not the first studies to highlight a substantial link between air pollution levels and deaths from viral diseases. A 2003 study found that patients with Sars, a respiratory virus closely related to Covid-19, were 84% more likely to die if they lived in areas with high levels of pollution.

[Apr 27, 2020] I checked just now and today the CDC has removed 'smoking' as part of the list of conditions that make ppl vulnerable.

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Noirette , Apr 26 2020 18:27 utc | 21

When the idea 'lungs affected by' 'pneumonia' plus 'smoking' plus 'Chinese men bigly smokers (women not)' came up, I posted, this is junk!

Smoking reduces ACE2 receptors, these being (reportedly ..) 'the' or 'one of the' entry avenues for cov-19 virus.

That social media was, is, filled with such rubbish is understandable, as smoking has become in many places a marker of low status, smokers are disgusting ppl, druggies, polluters, child killers, gutter filth.

Note the difference with cocaine users who tend to be quite well off - at least in EU - and get a pass, nobody is screaming your doc is mad high and will cut in the wrong place, or X leader is coked up talking BS...(Macron?)

Yet, that supposedly serious authorative organisms like the CDC in the US (and all the MSM following) blithely announce being a smoker as a condition that is co-morbid is worrisome. I checked just now and today the CDC has removed 'smoking' as part of the list of conditions that make ppl vulnerable.

What about the other conditions, characteristics? They are all correlated with older age, being in a 'rich' country, aka more elderly living taking a pile of pills everyday.

So is having gray hair (correlates with age), is losing 2 cms in height (correlates with age), taking X meds, eating junk food, or more, leading to cov-19 deaths? What really makes older ppl more susceptible to death by nov-19?

None of this informs us about the cellular (or more general) mechanisms of the virus, its attack, success in function of x y z factors or whatever. All very shoddy check boxes (with no solid support) parading as 'Your Gvmt top info.'

Plus, the few stand out group-differences that could lead to some insight, such as death of men, much higher vs. women, are not considered seriously (or only so in a few publications, etc.)


[Apr 27, 2020] The epidemic and the population dencity: among the top 12 states in terms of nCOV mortality almost all are also the densest populated states.

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Apr 27 2020 19:29 utc | 113

@Mina #102
All true, but again, not clear where density ranks in the grand scheme of nCOV impact.
Just for grins - I did a quick experiment on US states. Specifically I compared the absolute ranking of each state in terms of density vs. its ranking in nCOV mortality per unit population:
US state density vs. nCOV mortality

The top 12 states in terms of nCOV mortality - almost all of them are roughly also the densest states.

DC is the densest and is #7 in nCOV mortality.
New Jersey is #2 in both.
New York is #1 in mortality and #10 in density.

The major outliers in the top 12 nCOV mortality is Louisiana (due to Mardi Gras) and Michigan (?).

Other outliers: Washington state: +14 nCOV mortality vs. density - but of course Washington state is where nCOV kicked off in the US.

The 3 island territories and Hawaii are all hugely below their density rankings - that's clearly a case of isolation working.

Excluding those 4, the average state is +3 places in nCOV mortality vs. density.

The top 12 nCOV mortality average average +5 places in nCOV mortality vs. density.

This certainly doesn't prove anything, but is interesting.

[Apr 27, 2020] Unfortunately, this serological test yields very high false positives "due to past or present infection with non-SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus strains, such as coronavirus HKU1, NL63, OC43, or 229E."

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

krollchem , Apr 24 2020 19:38 utc | 40

Petri Krohn@12

Please do not trust the serological tests!

Several serological studies for the presence of IgM-IgG antibodies have concluded that the percentage of individuals infected with the COVID-19 virus SARS-CoV-2 is 50-80x higher than the recorded cases, due to recovered asymptomatic cases that were not tested during the infection using the RT-PCR test.

Unfortunately, this serological test yields very high false positives "due to past or present infection with non-SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus strains, such as coronavirus HKU1, NL63, OC43, or 229E." Yes, if a person has had a common cold they would likely test positive!!!
https://www.biomedomics.com/products/infectious-disease/covid-19-rt/

Other limitations mentioned by this manufacturer include:
(1) Lacks FDA review due to the urgency of testing;
(2) "Negative results do not rule out SARS-CoV-2 infection, particularly in those who have been in contact with the virus. Follow-up testing with a molecular diagnostic should be considered to rule out infection in these individuals.";
(3) "Results from antibody testing should not be used as the sole basis to diagnose or exclude SARS-CoV-2 infection or to inform infection status." "The COVID-19 IgM/IgG Rapid Test can be used to screen patients suspected of having been affected by the novel coronavirus. However, results of test should not be the only basis for diagnosis.";
(4) Only used on fresh samples and tested immediately;
(5) "Results are valid 10 minutes after sample and buffer are combined in the cassette sample well. ";
(6) This test has a low sensitivity, as it has been determined to detect only 88.66% of those confirmed to be positive by the PCR test;
(7) This test have a low specificity of 90.63%, as 9.37% of those patients tested were not SARS-CoV-2 infected;

Other issues with serological testing in the fore mentioned studies include":
(1) Lack of random sampling for age, sex, ethnic background, socio-economic status etc.
(2) Potential of super-recruiter bias from word of mouth of the drive by test site(s)

See also this video by a doctor of pathology on limitations of serological testing for COVID-19
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8Pv77R3g1E

Given the measured sensitivity and selectivity from the above test one can calculate the following for a 1% infection rate (10,000) among one million people:
Positive cases found =8,866 (0.8866%)
False positives found= 92,763 (9.2763%)
Ratio of false/real =92,763/92,763+8,866 = 91.28% of positive tests are false

Thus the herd immunity is greatly exaggerated in serological testing. For instance, if a serological study claims that 20% of the population has been exposed to COVID-19, the actual percentage of the population exposed to this virus is actually 1.74%.

All such studies using serological testing should contain a BIG disclaimer on the accuracy of the results.


[Apr 27, 2020] Covid-19 mutations underestimated, Chinese scientists warn, as DEADLIEST strains grip Europe and US

Apr 21, 2020 | www.rt.com
Chinese scientists have found that Europe and America's East Coast have been infected by some of the most aggressive Covid-19 strains, as they discovered dozens of virus mutations. These destroy a host's cells faster than others. The ability of the novel coronavirus to mutate has been previously vastly underestimated, a team from China's Zhejiang University, led by Professor Li Lanjuan, says in a new study. The group found as many as 33 virus mutations in just 11 coronavirus patients they examined in the city of Hangzhou.

The researchers say that 60 percent of the strains they discovered turned out to be entirely new. In a worrying development, they also discovered that the virus's mutations directly affect its deadliness. Their research revealed that the most aggressive type of Covid-19 could create a virus load 270 times greater than the least potent one.

Also on rt.com 'Not possible to determine' exact origins of Covid-19, but available evidence points to animal source – WHO

"Despite only 11 patient-derived isolates being analyzed in this study, we observed abundant mutational diversity, including several founding mutations for different major clusters of viruses now circulating globally," the study said.

The virus load is the measure of its quantity in a certain volume of bodily fluid, usually blood plasma. It particularly shows how quickly a pathogen could propagate through the organism and destroy its cells. Unfortunately for Europeans, one of the most aggressive strains found by the Chinese scientists appears to be similar to the one that has spread across the continent, particularly Italy and Spain, the pre-print of the study published on the website medRxiv.org revealed on Sunday.

The same strain came from Europe to New York, which has since become one of the worst affected US states. America's West Coast, however, appears to be infected by another, less deadly strain that arrived directly from China.

Nonetheless, that doesn't mean those on the West Coast have less cause for concern, as even less powerful strains can cause a serious ailment, the Zhejiang University team warns. They note that two of the observed patients, in their 30s and 50s, who contracted a weaker strain, still suffered severe symptoms.

Also on rt.com Worldwide Covid-19 death toll soars past 170,000 – Johns Hopkins University

Most importantly, though, the scientists say their discoveries could affect the development of the much-needed vaccine, because a one-size-fits-all solution might not work in case of Covid-19.

"Drug and vaccine development, while urgent, needs to take the impact of these accumulating mutations, especially the founding mutations, into account to avoid potential pitfalls," the team says.

Globally, the novel coronavirus has thus far infected more than 2.3 million people and claimed more than 170,000 lives.

Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!

[Apr 27, 2020] An argument for outdoor sports

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jen , Apr 25 2020 20:59 utc | 31

Dear B,

I have to say that the last few paragraphs of your post, in which you say that the most effective way of limiting the spread of COVID-19 is to isolate the sick in special quarantine conditions in clinics or hotels set aside for just that purpose, can be used to argue against a general shutdown of society across entire nations or regions, or even cities or communities where COVID-19 clusters exist.

The Chinese information suggesting that 99% of infections occur indoors should prompt builders, architects, engineers and aircdonditioning manufacturers to consider ways in which conventional airconditioning systems in enclosed environments might be adjusted or redesigned to mis fresh air with recycled and recycling air, so as to reduce the possibility of spreading COVID-19 and other contagions (like Legionnaire's) through internal systems.

There may be a case for reintroducing some sports events that are normally played outdoors, and even bringing professional indoor sports out into the open again. Basketball, netball and other sports using a ball and hoop could become completely outdoors in their professional formats like many other team sports, and might attract more fans. Gymnastics used to be an outdoor sport as well. No reason why major gymnastics events at regional, national and international levels can't be brought outdoors: special mats for floor exercises and for protection could be made and used for outdoor events.

Passer by , Apr 25 2020 21:19 utc | 36

Posted by: Jen | Apr 25 2020 20:59 utc | 31

Even back then during SARS 1 some infections occured via the ventilation system.

One chinese report recently claimed hydrogen peroxide vapor in the hospital ventilation system helped decrease Covid 19 symptoms among the patients.

HPV is highly effective for sterilisation purposes, including of N95 masks and hospital equipment.

On the outdoor issue it is known that sun and heat kill this and other viruses, so it is better if indoor activity also coincides with warm and sunny weather.

[Apr 27, 2020] On the point of family or shared domicile infections, this is a good article about the working class, immigrant area of Boston called Chelsea. It's a major hot zone of covid infections. The images coming out of Chelsea are heart breaking.

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Prof K , Apr 25 2020 21:21 utc | 37

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/25/us/coronavirus-chelsea-massachusetts.html

On the point of family or shared domicile infections, this is a good article about the working class, immigrant area of Boston called Chelsea. It's a major hot zone of covid infections. The images coming out of Chelsea are heart breaking.

That aside, the article shows that a key source of community spread is working class poverty and the types of cramped housing that result from it. Racism and immigration are obviously also part of the story.

But the article also sites, positively, the Chinese method of extracting people from their homes to protect everyone.

The article indirectly indicts American capitalism and political and civic institutions for being unable to replicate those effective Chinese methods.

The obvious implications of the article are that the covid crisis in the US is a social one, that poverty is death, and that the struggle against the virus is inextricable from the urgent necessity of socialist transformation.

[Apr 27, 2020] A two week quarantine in a hotel or public facility during which one is well provided for...It is hard to understand why some people continue to reject this.

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

oldhippie , Apr 25 2020 21:24 utc | 38

"A two week quarantine in a hotel or public facility during which one is well provided for...It is hard to understand why some people continue to reject this."

Because no one has ever seen government behave this way. Because we live in terror of the police. Because in USA there is no public health infrastructure at all and any such program would be administered by police.


VietnamVet , Apr 25 2020 22:16 utc | 53

The only way to combat COVID-19 is good old fashion public health principles of testing, tracing and isolating the ill. Western governments have failed at their most fundamental job of saving the lives of their citizens. This is not a coincidence. It is the direct result of the end of democracy and the rise of the multi-national plutocracy. This is shown by the corporate media's ignoring of the western national governments' failures to institute public health measures; instead, it harps on Donald Trump's letting the light shine inside the body to kill the virus.

The bankers got 4.5 trillion dollars. If a fraction of this was spent to prevent and stop the spread of the coronavirus, 50,000 Americans would not be dead today. But that would require a functional government and taxing the rich, homeless living inside Hilton hotels, the last thing oligarchs want. So, "it is just like the flu". "Freedom", scapegoating", "racism", and "shaming" are all used to hide the truth.

bevin , Apr 26 2020 0:54 utc | 66
This article is worth reading.
https://fair.org/home/economic-reporting-on-hardships-of-pandemic-should-explore-market-failures/

Whatever it is 'a flu', the 'common cold', an invention by the heroes of the Protocols of Zion or a pandemic of the sort most of us think that we see around us and some of us feel is a pure invention... whatever.

It is a crisis of Capitalism, a major crisis which calls all the conventional wisdom of the past seventy going on three hundred years into question.
How has the market been doing?

What do we think of the invisible hand now?


Commodity prices are crumbling, supply chains are drying up. And all that the capitalist can do is to scream racist insults- hoping that the people will forgive the famine if they can be fed hatred of foreigners instead.

There have probably been more strikes in the US in the past three months than there had been in the last ten years. A Universal Basic Income-the revival of the idea that the people have first call on all resources- the polar opposite to Capitalism's insistence that the only thing that makes people work is the fear of starving, is coming. It has to come, and when it does one of the foundation stones of the entire edifice of exploitation is removed.
Next week we will see what happens when the capitalists order workers to risk their lives by going back to work in workplaces that are unsafe, without proper masks and protective gear.

And we will see here whose side commenters are on and how many are ready to progress from trivialising the pandemic into strike breaking. Strike breaking in the name of anti-authoritarianism; strike breaking packaged as 'right to work' freedoms.

[Apr 27, 2020] Hydroxychloroquine controvercy

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

krollchem , Apr 26 2020 3:50 utc | 80

William Kierath@74

The "cardiologists" in this report are either irresponsible, paid by the pharma/vaccine lobby and/or are not keeping up with the medical literature.

Hydroxychloroquine is only effective in the onset of symptom and only in conjunction with organically bound available zinc. The doctors administered hydroxychloroquine in the ICU at a late stage of the dis-ease progression which is too late. They also used very high doses of hydroxychloroquine (without zinc), resulting in toxicity issues as with any chlorinated organic.

The arrhythmia issue may have been a clinical symptom of zinc deficiency:
https://knowledgeofhealth.com/modern-day-zinc-deficiency-epidemic/

Azithromycin should be incorporated as a precautionary as it prevents secondary lung infections but can enhance heart rhythm disorders .
https://www.drugs.com/azithromycin.html

Yes, COVID-19 is not only a sudden acute respiratory disease (SARS). However, it is not a blood infection either! The SARS-CoV-2 virus following infection, replication and release primarily from cell in the nasal passages, throat and trachea does infect lung cells causing fluid buildup and cellular debris, which provide nutrients for secondary bacterial infections as well as current infections with mycobacteria in TB.

Yes the virus does travel visa the blood and can bind to ACE2 receptors in many other organs besides the nasal passages, throat and lungs. It also binds to CD-127 receptors. The proposed blood infection (red blood cells) mode of action has not been proven.

Yes free radicals are increased in the blood in part to the mechanism you mention but also by reducing the vitamin C level in the bloodstream. The antioxidant properties of vitamin C is why a Seattle doctor was able to recover using IV vitamin C along with an anti-arthritis drug.

The principal cause of death is the cytokine storm that several posters have already described over a month ago. Associated with this inflammation of tissues, particularly the lung, is the deposition of fibrin in the capillary bed resulting in blockages and a lack of gas transfer. These blockages cause the blood pressure to rise and even the heart to "explode" if the blood has no where to go.
https://www.webmd.com/lung/coronavirus-complications#1
MedCram series

krollchem , Apr 26 2020 3:53 utc | 81

Statistician points out gross errors in the much cited Stanford serological study:
https://medium.com/@balajis/peer-review-of-covid-19-antibody-seroprevalence-in-santa-clara-county-california-1f6382258c25

Too bad he failed to notice that the serological test also is positive for other coronovirus infections such as the common cold.

[Apr 27, 2020] Some sanity from Georia Gov Brian Kemp, but differencial treatment on people over 65 is missing; it is also unclear if wearing masks in public places is enforced

Mass sport events still should be closed. The same is true for concert, mass prayers and such. It is generally desirable to move professional sport event outdoor now and enforce social distancing. Mega Churches should be closed until the Second Coming and prayers allowed only on open air with proper social distanceing.
Apr 27, 2020 | www.counterpunch.org

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp: "We will allow gyms, fitness centers, bowling alleys, body art studios, barbers, cosmetologists, hair designers, nail care artists, aestheticians, their respective schools, and massage therapists to reopen their doors this Friday, April the 24th."

[Apr 27, 2020] This scientist suggested a drug to treat Covid-19. 'Fact checkers' branded him fake news -- RT Op-ed

Apr 27, 2020 | www.rt.com

This scientist suggested a drug to treat Covid-19. 'Fact checkers' branded him fake news Nebojsa Malic Nebojsa Malic is a Serbian-American journalist, blogger and translator, who wrote a regular column for Antiwar.com from 2000 to 2015, and is now senior writer at RT. Follow him on Twitter @NebojsaMalic is a Serbian-American journalist, blogger and translator, who wrote a regular column for Antiwar.com from 2000 to 2015, and is now senior writer at RT. Follow him on Twitter @NebojsaMalic 26 Mar, 2020 06:50 Get short URL This scientist suggested a drug to treat Covid-19. 'Fact checkers' branded him fake news French professor Didier Raoult, director of IHU Mediterranee Infection Institute in Marseille, pictured on February 26, 2020 © AFP / GERARD JULIEN Follow RT on RT Amid a pandemic panic over the coronavirus, evidence for a possibly effective treatment has been denounced as 'fake news' – even when offered by a renowned scientist with decades of experience. Take Didier Raoult, a French microbiologist with undeniable expertise, even if some of his views are about as eccentric as his appearance. Though he may look like he just stepped out of an Alexandre Dumas novel, the director of the Mediterranean University Hospital Institute in Marseille cited not one but three different studies from China showing that the anti-malaria drug called chloroquine has been effective in treating Covid-19 patients.

#chloroquine Pr Didier Raoult : "C'est quand les patients ont des formes modérées, moyennes, ou qui commencent à s'aggraver, qu'il faut les traiter. A ce moment là on contrôle les virus qui se multiplient. Quand ils sont rentrés en réanimation, le problème ce n'est plus le virus" pic.twitter.com/WolGe2o05z

-- Alex (@AlexLeroy90) March 25, 2020

That did not stop Le Monde, France's biggest newspaper, of declaring his February 25 video as "partially false ." Raoult's 'sin' was to argue that the common anti-malaria drug used widely for decades resulted in "dramatic improvements " among those afflicted by the virus.

As a result of Le Monde's fact-check, anyone attempting to share Dr. Raoult's videos on Facebook gets a banner saying the information therein was "partially false" as "determined by independent fact-checkers."

The main argument put forward by those critical of the drug is that more testing is required before it can be officially approved as treatment for the coronavirus. As the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) puts it , "There are no currently available data from Randomized Clinical Trials to inform clinical guidance on the use, dosing, or duration of hydroxychloroquine" treatments for Covid-19.

Which is fair enough, but last time I checked, there was a pandemic going on, with billions of people locked in their homes and all business grinding to a halt across the globe, over apocalyptic predictions of hospitals brimming with corpses due to this coronavirus.

Should any kind of treatment – especially a drug that has been used safely for decades to treat something else, with side effects meticulously documented – be so cavalierly rejected, under the circumstances? Do "experts " really think the world has the luxury of waiting for months or even years for their controlled lab studies?

As for the fact-checkers, shouldn't they have applied the same rigor to the models used to scare everyone into hoarding toilet paper and setting off a depression orders of magnitude worse than anything the world has ever seen?

Also on rt.com Not letting a crisis go to waste: Some seize on Covid-19 to force change on America

To ask these questions is to answer them, yet no one seems to bother. Nor is this sort of selective blindness endemic to France; across the Atlantic, the mainstream media raised their voices in unison against chloroquine after US President Donald Trump brought it up as a possible treatment – apparently referring to Dr. Raoult's work.

They went so far as to widely circulate a deliberately misleading story about an Arizona couple that ate fish tank cleaner – chloroquine phosphate, clearly labeled not for human consumption – as somehow Trump's fault. Some of them quietly amended it to specify the difference, but long after the original story – implying they took the actual medication praised by the president – literally went viral and poisoned the minds of millions.

Worse yet, as a result of this media blitz, the governor of Nevada actually banned using chloroquine to treat Covid-19 patients this week, saying there was "no consensus among experts or Nevada doctors" that the anti-malaria drug can treat coronavirus sufferers. There were no angry editorials denouncing Steve Sisolak, a Democrat, for letting people die or the coronavirus rather than have them treated with a drug endorsed by the Republican president and the media's favorite hate object.

Read more Devil in the details: Media jumps to blame Trump for death of man who self-medicated with FISH TANK CLEANER containing chloroquine Devil in the details: Media jumps to blame Trump for death of man who self-medicated with FISH TANK CLEANER containing chloroquine

One would think the world paralyzed with fear of the invisible death would pounce on every possible solution, no matter how unlikely it seems. That's what we're shown in Hollywood disaster movies, after all. Yet when such a solution presents itself, it is dismissed and denounced as " not proven" !

We're supposed to blindly trust apocalyptic models produced by panic-mongering political hacks, but ignore the man who says the drug brought him back from the brink of death, even though his story can be easily verified and theirs cannot.

"Preferring opinions to facts is a disease ," Dr. Raoult told the French magazine Marianne last week . Just so.

I don't know if hydroxychloroquine works on Covid-19. Dr. Raoult seems to believe so, and he's not alone. In the absence of better solutions – and locking billions of people in their homes indefinitely is not one – don't we owe humanity to at least try? What do we have to lose?

In the three months or so since the coronavirus first appeared in China, there has been a lot of conflicting, confusing and outright false information about it. One thing that has consistently proven true, however, is that the biggest obstacle in effectively battling its spread and treating the afflicted has been the obtuse insistence of the political and medical establishment on blindly following their rules. If the virus is truly threatening to kill millions, as they say, they would not value procedures over saving lives. Nevertheless, they persist. It makes one wonder why.

Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

[Apr 27, 2020] Magic bullet for Covid-19 Scientists look to century-old plasma treatment, but there are some big 'BUTS' -- RT World News

Apr 27, 2020 | www.rt.com

As the world seeks a Covid-19 panacea, treating patients with plasma harvested from those who have recovered from the virus is being touted as a possible cure – but big challenges still remain, scientists say. It's been months since the novel coronavirus started to rage across China, spilling over to other countries and infecting more than a million people around the world, but there is still no clinically tested vaccine or medication. However, one possible treatment that has been around for over a century is attracting attention, with some scientists suggesting it could be a game-changer – provided that certain flaws are removed. What is this plasma treatment about?

The approach basically revolves around harvesting convalescent plasma, the yellowish liquid component of human blood, from someone who recovered from a viral infection and transfusing it to a newly infected patient.

In search of a coronavirus killer: Can existing drugs really turn the tide in the Covid-19 pandemic? READ MORE: In search of a coronavirus killer: Can existing drugs really turn the tide in the Covid-19 pandemic?

Plasma is essential here because it is rich in antibodies – proteins that bind to parts of the virus and neutralize it. Remarkably, antibodies are produced against specific types of viruses, effectively becoming an "anti-virus serum," Aleksey Kupryashov, head of blood transfusion at Bakulev Center of Cardiovascular Surgery, explained to RT.

The idea behind the therapy is very straightforward – sharing antibodies taken from patients with a robust immune system could help other, weaker ones to recover.

Conceptualized by German physiologist Emil von Behring – the first recipient of the Nobel Prize in Medicine – the method has actually been around for over a century. Just recently, in mid-March, Arturo Casadevall of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, and Liise-anne Pirofski of the Albert Einstein Medical College championed the treatment, claiming infusions of antibodies could potentially protect people from the virus for several weeks.

Later in the same month, their Chinese colleagues suggested that convalescent plasma had helped Covid-19 patients even on ventilation, but their study was based on only five cases. Is it efficient or at least SAFE?

As health workers used to say in the Hippocratic Oath, doing no harm is key in medicine. Can we be sure that treating Covid-19 patients with antibody-packed plasma will do no harm?

"We transfuse hundreds of thousands [or] millions of blood units in hospitals, and the severe outcomes are really low," Professor Jeff Bailey of the US-based Brown University told RT. The logic behind using plasma against Covid-19 is "very strong" because "a person who has recovered has good antibodies that will block and neutralize the virus," he explained. However, one big issue is that "it's a new disease, we haven't transfused a lot."

Blood donation breakthrough sees scientists convert all types to O using gut bacteria READ MORE: Blood donation breakthrough sees scientists convert all types to O using gut bacteria

Another concern that may arise is that every 200 or 400 milliliters of transfused plasma expands the patient's blood stream. This will present no problem if the patient's kidneys work well, but if they don't, the volume could increase fluid in their lungs, worsening the condition.

But will the therapy work for everyone, given that there are no compelling statistics showing whether the plasma transfusion is efficient against the Covid-19?

"You have to try it, only experimenting can tell us yes or no," argued Sergey Netesov, a leading virologist and member of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

At any rate, trying experimental therapy is better than "dying on the spot without any medication."

Physicians on the front line urgently need trials to study the benefits of plasma treatment as new drugs are being developed, Bailey agreed.

What you want to know is if this helps survival [by] 50 percent and something else helps survival [by] 25 percent, you probably want to go with the one that's 50 percent.

Dr Charles Rupprecht of the Department of Biomedical Sciences at Ross University said " there is no magic bullet" in the absence of peer-reviewed, large-scale, long-term, double-blinded studies proving the benefits of plasma in Covid-19 treatment.

The scientist, who leads the rabies section at his institution, referred to that disease as an example. Rabies immune globulin (RIG) – which also contains large amounts of antibodies from donated blood – is "one critical part of prevention after humans have been exposed to a rabid animal," but it's "short-acting" and is usually used in a healthy patient before "illness onset."

Still, no specific coronavirus treatment has been proven to be effective, so doctors and patients need "the tincture of time," as there are always safety issues to consider in the use of human blood products, he cautioned.

//www.youtube.com/embed/3w_WPHvSOpE

Even IF it helps, finding donors will be a problem

However, the hardest part here is finding and vetting donors, the number of which is appallingly small, especially compared to more than one million coronavirus cases globally. Also, plasma intended for Covid-19 patients must be free from other diseases, such as hepatitis or HIV/AIDS.

"As a matter of fact, up to 50 percent of donor blood is being rejected in most countries," Netesov revealed, citing the example of China – a pioneer in plasma treatment – where almost one-in-10 potential donors had hepatitis. Russia, for instance, has only a tiny number of recovered Covid-19 patients, and maybe only half of them could donate blood, limiting the pool to mere dozens, the scientist acknowledged.

"The number of patients is still larger than the number of the recovered. As long as this situation persists, we have nobody to take that plasma from," Kupryashov of the Bakulev Center agreed.

Finding the right dosage of plasma is equally crucial under the circumstances, because doctors have to know what concentration of antibodies is enough to help cope with the virus. In the long run, however, manufacturers will usually process plasma, increasing the amount of antibodies and allowing doctors to use smaller doses, Bailey said.

Also on rt.com The US was named the best equipped country to deal with a pandemic not a year ago -- what happened there? Who sees promise in plasma therapy?

Health authorities around the world have high hopes for plasma treatment, rapidly rolling out trials and authorizing it for compassionate use – allowing unapproved treatments to be prescribed if a dying patient has no other options, and if the potential benefits outweigh the risks.

In the US, where the number of coronavirus cases has now exceeded 312,000, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has spearheaded "a new national effort" to facilitate the use of plasma treatment. "There are some limited data to suggest that convalescent plasma and hyperimmune globulin may have benefit in the Covid-19 illness," the agency states.

This scientist suggested a drug to treat Covid-19. 'Fact checkers' branded him fake news READ MORE: This scientist suggested a drug to treat Covid-19. 'Fact checkers' branded him fake news

The Mayo Clinic will serve as the lead institution for the program, while the American Red Cross will collect plasma and distribute it to hospitals throughout the country.

In the UK, coronavirus patients are about to receive the experimental treatment, with experts calling on the NHS to urgently stockpile antibody-rich plasma for such needs. France is also set to start trials for the promising therapy next Tuesday.

Russia, too, is catching up with the trend. The country's famed Sklifosovsky Institute of Emergency Care will be the first to try infusing plasma in the coming days, local media have reported. Additionally, the Vector Institute – a leading research center of virology and biotechnology – has developed a test for measuring antibodies in those who have survived Covid-19. The institution has already screened blood samples from 11 people who recovered from the virus, Deputy Prime Minister Tatiana Golikova said.

Iran, recently a coronavirus hotspot, will also follow suit, as will Turkey, where the head of the Red Crescent insists that it could become "one of the world's most effective applications" against the contagion.

For the time being, many other treatment options are being considered by the international healthcare community, ranging from anti-malarial drugs to HIV medication. A range of Covid-19 vaccines are also being developed, although they seem to be months – if not years – away from being commissioned.

[Apr 27, 2020] Covid-19 vaccine may be far away, but these alternate treatments are next best thing -- study -- RT USA News

Apr 27, 2020 | www.rt.com

The most effective treatment recommended by the study, besides vaccines, are antivirals like nucleoside analogs, which mirror the virus's genetic material in order to get incorporated into it and stall its progress. Coronaviruses reportedly contain a "proofreading" enzyme that can reject such antivirals, but there are exceptions to the rule.

Other strategies include blood plasma from patients who have recovered from the virus and monoclonal antibodies, which are made through biotechnology to be clones of a parent cell. However, the latter of those also presents the obstacle of being a long process.

[Apr 27, 2020] Nicotine might have some protective effect against the infection by SARS-CoV-2

Apr 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

hopehely , Apr 25 2020 19:19 utc | 1

.

A French study has now confirmed this astonishing phenomenon:

In the study that two of us are reporting [ 1 ], the rates of current smoking remain below 5 % even when main confounders for tobacco consumption, i.e. age and sex, in- or outpatient status, were considered.

Compared to the French general population, the Covid-19 population exhibited a significantly weaker current daily smoker rate by 80.3 % for outpatients and by 75.4 % for inpatients.

Thus, current smoking status appears to be a protective factor against the infection by SARS-CoV-2.

Nicotine is known to influence the process that regulates the number of ACE2 receptors on the cell surface. Current smokers do have less ACE2 receptors than non smokers. SARS-CoV-2 bonds to that receptor to enter a cell.

The study was led by Professor Jean-Pierre Changeux who is quite famous for his discovery of that general regulation process and other findings. He now plans to use nicotine patches on Covid-19 patients to see if it can help in current cases.

Well if nicotine is the magic protector against covid, then wearing a nicotine patch or chewing nicorette gum will work too I guess. No need to inhale toxic fumes and tar our lungs.



farm ecologist , Apr 25 2020 20:28 utc | 14

The study was led by Professor Jean-Pierre Changeux who is quite famous for his discovery of that general regulation process and other findings. He now plans to use nicotine patches on Covid-19 patients to see if it can help in current cases.

Changeaux is indeed recognized as a pioneer in the field of receptor biochemistry. The idea to use nicotine patches seems sensible in light of the fact that this drug produces anti-inflammatory effects via alpha7-nicotinic receptors.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29331768

GeorgeV , Apr 25 2020 20:34 utc | 19
I think readers of MoA might be interested to know that the April 22 2020 edition of the NY Post carried a story mirroring what B has n written in his April 25 2020 post on the use of nicotine patches as a possible counter to the COVID-19 virus infection.

There is also an earlier story in the NY Post dated April 15 2020 about 82-year old British artist David Hockney who had written a letter to the UK Daily Mail claiming that smokers like himself, seemed to be less likely to get the COVID-19 infection. Hockney lives in Normandy France.

The Post is also reporting that the French government is also limiting the sales of nicotine gum and patches, to prevent runs on these items. I picked this up from the April 25 2020 Drudge Report. Make of it what you wish.

farm ecologist , Apr 25 2020 20:44 utc | 24
Posted by: Gregory Purcell | Apr 25 2020 20:30 utc | 16

Just great, I quit smoking four weeks ago because of coronavirus, and because it has become ridiculously expensive, now what do I do?

It's too early to know if nicotine will be a useful therapeutic to treat COVID-19 patients, and it seems unlikely that it would have a prophylactic effect against infection . Not a good reason to resume smoking (sorry) but going to nicotine patches or vaping would be relatively harmless.

Pft , Apr 25 2020 20:46 utc | 26
The smoking numbers suffer from an age bias. Those most likely to be in icu and die are elderly over 65 years of age. Over 65's have a lower smoking rate (9%) than average (15%). Part of that is smokers die earlier and another part is probably financial/health related.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.aginginplace.org/how-smoking-can-affect-the-elderly/amp/

Cytokine storm is more common in elderly because they have more complement molecules due to chronic inflammation from the aging process. Complement are molecules of the innate immune system which when can activated produce cytokines activating more immune molecules/cells.

Pft , Apr 25 2020 20:46 utc | 26
The smoking numbers suffer from an age bias. Those most likely to be in icu and die are elderly over 65 years of age. Over 65's have a lower smoking rate (9%) than average (15%). Part of that is smokers die earlier and another part is probably financial/health related.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.aginginplace.org/how-smoking-can-affect-the-elderly/amp/

Cytokine storm is more common in elderly because they have more complement molecules due to chronic inflammation from the aging process. Complement are molecules of the innate immune system which when can activated produce cytokines activating more immune molecules/cells.

Hoarsewhisperer , Apr 25 2020 21:18 utc | 35
Just great, I quit smoking four weeks ago because of coronavirus, and because it has become ridiculously expensive, now what do I do?
Posted by: Gregory Purcell | Apr 25 2020 20:30 utc | 16

Stay off the smokes and flaunt some smug.

The chart b has reproduced above shows that healthy non-smokers with no pre-existing health conditions handle a C-virus infection with far more aplomb than current and ex-smokers.

Write a How To Become an Ex-smoker booklet and relate your own 'journey' chapter & verse; then flog it on eBay for $x-00 per copy. There'll be a big market from desperate unemployed smokers hoping to ease the pain of quitting...

DomesticExtremist , Apr 25 2020 22:00 utc | 49
Interesting result regarding smokers, though as yet there is no evidence that nicotine is the causative agent in conferring resistance to Covid19.
as an ex-smoker turned vaper, I would be interested to know if vapers are equally protected.
It should be noted that tobacco smoke contains other substances as well as nicotine and for sure vaping is not the same physiologically as smoking and I'm not just talking about the reduced risk of smoking related disease.
IIRC the changes in nerve receptors take several years to occur, both at the beginning of nicotine addiction and also at the end (which is why ex-smokers have such a hard time after stopping), so a simple application of a nicotine patch may not produce any useful effect in a non-smoker.
farm ecologist , Apr 25 2020 22:27 utc | 54
Posted by: DomesticExtremist | Apr 25 2020 22:00 utc | 49

as an ex-smoker turned vaper, I would be interested to know if vapers are equally protected.

I would expect so. The benefit of nicotine presumably comes from its ability to reduce the synthesis and release of pro-inflammatory cytokines which cause "cytokine storms" in the lungs of severely infected individuals. Again, there is no reason to expect that nicotine would prevent infections from occurring, rather it would mitigate some of the more deadly symptoms.

Piero Colombo , Apr 25 2020 22:41 utc | 55
Some caution is indicated re the perceived negative correlation with smoking: 1. This is not an actual observational study but extrapolated from adjusted population rates -- the proportion of active smokers in the patient population was not sufficient by itself to draw conclusions with decent power. Then, there seems to be little difference between the ICU needed for former smokers and the patients with cardiovascular disease, diabetes or CRF. Finally, the in-vitro work quoted in the paper and shown here as "confirming" is certainly not confirming (or invalidating) any clinical data (which is introduced there as a clinical to the clinical paper.)
On the whole, interesting observation but would need a study with effective observation of sufficient numbers of smokers.
I'd tend to see this as suggesting that there may be something in persons who continue to smoke, not former smokers. And there lies the rub: practically all we know about smoking continues, generally lifelong, after cessation, except this phenomenon if verified. It's true that lung disease, cardiovascular disease, cancer (and cancer therapy), renal failure and the myriad other chronic conditions of the ex-smokers would be very likely to cancel any of the advantage seen in the active smokers. Essentially then, looks like continuing to smoke cancels all such problems in the active smoking patients (if, that is, the observation is credibly confirmed.)
Clueless Joe , Apr 25 2020 23:22 utc | 60
If it's smoking who alters ACE2, then it's definitely not nicotine in the bloodstream that will do the trick, it's smoking dirty nasty shit that fills your lungs that reduces ACE2 receptors. I expect nicotine patches to be fully useless - though I'll be glad to be provent wrong.

As for household contamination, I had read a month ago that the Chinese themselves were reporting that 3/4 of contaminations in Wuhan occurred at home between family members, so this not a big surprise.
On the other hand, a very recent report seems to show that UV are very effective at destroying the virus and indeed outdoor contamination is limited, because the virus won't last long in a sunny place. In a cold grey winterscape, it might be a bit different though.

Now, there are also more reports of non-pulmonary deaths, people having strokes, heart attacks, brain damages and the like because the virus wrecks havoc in blood vessels and clogs them. That's very worrying. The only thing I'm wondering, since these reports are mostly American ones, is what's the real condition of those victims. To put it simply: it's known that obesity is a massive pre-condition with the coronavirus and greatly increases the risk. Are these cardio-vascular deaths also linked to people's obesity, or is any normal or fit person at risk as well?

[Apr 26, 2020] Who is an idiot here: What's not fair is that you go out running, you bloody idiot! shouted a Spanish woman apparently filming the encounter

Highly recommended!
If 99% of cases of infection happen in closed spaces and/or in open spaces with very close and long contact (stadiums, parties, festivals, concenrts, atc) is it really wise to limit activities in which social distancing can be maintained, such as jogging, fishing, biking, etc
Also the policy on mitigation (complete suppression is impossible now) should vary by locality. What is good for NYC is idiotic for rural Pennsylvania.
Apr 26, 2020 | en.as.com

As the jogger struggled with police, screaming for help, she was filmed by residents who had absolutely zero sympathy for her plight. 'What's not fair is that you go out running, you bloody idiot!', shouted the woman apparently filming the encounter."

Coronavirus lockdown: Jogger resists arrest in Spain and is abused by onlookers , AS.com, (21st March 2020)

[Apr 26, 2020] A sad situation at the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA Medical Center

Notable quotes:
"... As of Thursday, 23 employees at the 4,000-employee VA hospital, had tested positive, according to an update the hospital director emailed to employees. Another 45 employees are home awaiting test results. The hospital declined to say how many of the employees who are positive or are awaiting results are nurses, or name which parts of the hospital they work in. ..."
"... Three VA nurses said they were given N95 respirators for several days early in the crisis in March, but after that they were given surgical masks, which provide less protection from the coronavirus. Another nurse reported wearing only a surgical mask the entire time caring for coronavirus patients. The nurses, who work in a unit that treats COVID-19 positive patients or patients awaiting test results who are suspected to be positive, spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to news media and their job security could be at risk if they spoke publicly. ..."
"... The hospital had 73 confirmed coronavirus cases among patients as of Friday, and four inpatient deaths. "Currently every health care system is taking steps to conserve PPE. VA is no different," Hodge wrote in a series of responses by email to questions. Hodge also said that the hospital is issuing surgical masks to all staff who work in non-COVID-19 units. ..."
"... "Those staff are provided one surgical mask weekly to assist in protecting high-risk patients who are asymptomatic," he wrote. ..."
"... Since the number of COVID-19 tests are limited nationwide, there is no COVID-19 testing capability at our CBOC locations. Please call your provider to determine whether you would be a candidate for testing. If so, then you may proceed to the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA Medical Center in Richmond, Virginia where Monday – Friday, 8:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m., a Drive-Thru Clinic is available for screening and testing (if you need it); you will be triaged according to your symptoms. Also, Monday – Friday, 8:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., you may be directed to be seen in the medical center's High Consequence Infections (HCI) Clinic. Last, depending on your symptoms, you may go to the hospital's Emergency Department or to an Urgent Care Center or Emergency Department in your area. ..."
"... Much of the federal stockpile of PPE sent to the states had passed their expire dates, 2010 for some, and was either useless or had to be repaired. I blame the failure on the person, or persons, charged with monitoring the wharehoused stockpiles. The president only knows what he's told. He can't micromanage the nation. He needs Jack Webb directing him to stick with the facts. ..."
"... I read somewhere the V.A. ordered the masks but F.E.M.A expropriated them on the directions of Jared Kushner, who will later decide who receives the masks...something about the National Emergency Stockpile...what a mess. ..."
Apr 26, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com


Colonel Lang sent me an eye opening link last night concerning the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA hospital in Richmond. Here are some excerpts from the Richmond Times-Dispatch article.

-- -- -- --

As of Thursday, 23 employees at the 4,000-employee VA hospital, had tested positive, according to an update the hospital director emailed to employees. Another 45 employees are home awaiting test results. The hospital declined to say how many of the employees who are positive or are awaiting results are nurses, or name which parts of the hospital they work in.

Three VA nurses said they were given N95 respirators for several days early in the crisis in March, but after that they were given surgical masks, which provide less protection from the coronavirus. Another nurse reported wearing only a surgical mask the entire time caring for coronavirus patients. The nurses, who work in a unit that treats COVID-19 positive patients or patients awaiting test results who are suspected to be positive, spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to news media and their job security could be at risk if they spoke publicly.

The hospital had 73 confirmed coronavirus cases among patients as of Friday, and four inpatient deaths. "Currently every health care system is taking steps to conserve PPE. VA is no different," Hodge wrote in a series of responses by email to questions. Hodge also said that the hospital is issuing surgical masks to all staff who work in non-COVID-19 units. "Those staff are provided one surgical mask weekly to assist in protecting high-risk patients who are asymptomatic," he wrote. (Richmond Times-Dispatch)

-- -- --

I'm not surprised by the numbers. Richmond, itself, is a virus hot spot although that is mostly due to several deadly assisted living/nursing home outbreaks. What shocks me is the PPE situation. The fact that nurses have to treat known Covid-19 patients with hospital masks rather than the N95 respirators is only moderately better than third world conditions in my view. Hospital masks offer the wearer no protection against the aerosolized virus. If the patients were wearing those masks, it would be more helpful than the nurses wearing them.

Here's a tip. If you can still smell odors like onions or bacon while wearing the mask, the aerosolized virus can get into your lungs. Hospital masks and other improvised masks protect those around the wearer, not the mask wearer. The concept behind the universal wearing of such masks is mutual protection. For any of you who spent time in the infantry, it's the same concept behind the DePuy fighting positions where you are not defending yourself. You are forming interlocking fields of fire to protect your comrades to the left and right of you. Protecting those around you actually provides the best protection for all of you. We wear masks in grocery stores and other such places to protect the entire community, not just our own sorry asses.

But back to the situation at McGuire. In the early days of the pandemic in America, the hospital instituted a screening program at the hospital entrances consisting of temperature and health interview. We were told to expect delays and to be given a mask for wear in the hospital. Not long after that, we were called to reschedule our appointments to May or beyond. By mid-April, this was the COVID-19 testing situation.

Since the number of COVID-19 tests are limited nationwide, there is no COVID-19 testing capability at our CBOC locations. Please call your provider to determine whether you would be a candidate for testing. If so, then you may proceed to the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA Medical Center in Richmond, Virginia where Monday – Friday, 8:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m., a Drive-Thru Clinic is available for screening and testing (if you need it); you will be triaged according to your symptoms. Also, Monday – Friday, 8:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., you may be directed to be seen in the medical center's High Consequence Infections (HCI) Clinic. Last, depending on your symptoms, you may go to the hospital's Emergency Department or to an Urgent Care Center or Emergency Department in your area.

McGuire seems to have had all its ducks in a row. It's what I expect. This VA medical center is well run. The professionalism, pride and morale among the staff is astoundingly high. It shows among us broke down old vets who show up for care. We are proud of McGuire. That this fine facility is now forced to ration out PPE to its staff is a travesty. The VA dropped the ball. The federal government dropped the ball for several administrations. PPE should have been stockpiled at all levels and those stockpiles should have been replenished by a push logistics system.

That's the long term screw up. In the more immediate term, the federal government should have been acquiring that PPE and forcing industry to massively produce supplies back in January. Trump should have invoked and used the Defense Production Act robustly in January rather than waiting until March and April to weakly wield that executive authority. Every hospital and every first responder should have had all the PPE needed. Every household could have been sent a dozen disposable masks with a note from President Trump telling us to keep these in case we need them. What a galvanizing message that would have sent across the nation. Even if Covid-19 proved to be a non-problem, it would have been a message of Churchillian defiance in the face of a potential threat. A missed opportunity for both the American people and Trump.

TTG

https://www.richmond.com/special-report/coronavirus/at-mcguire-va-hospital-in-richmond-nurses-fear-the-masks-they-wear-dont-protect-them/article_6da49ed3-84c7-52a6-b052-32ca3cd305b9.html?utm_source=RTD&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=Breaking%20News


Terence Gore , 25 April 2020 at 01:16 PM

Sorry to read your post and hope everyone fares well. Many nursing homes may be in the same situation.

https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/coronavirus-disease-covid-19/uchicago-medicine-doctors-see-truly-remarkable-success-using-ventilator-alternatives-to-treat-covid19

"The proning and the high-flow nasal cannulas combined have brought patient oxygen levels from around 40% to 80% and 90%, so it's been fascinating and wonderful to see," Spiegel said."


Possibly positive news.

Pj20 , 25 April 2020 at 02:19 PM
It isn't just the VA, hospitals all over the country are short of PPE. And that is one of the problems with opening up the country too soon. Unprotected staff in suddenly flooded hospitals become ill themselves risking the viability of local health systems.
JoeC100 , 25 April 2020 at 04:57 PM
TTG -

I read a while back that the key supply chain issue with N-95 masks is that their essential core material is a synthetic spun fiber that we are completely reliant on China for sourcing. In addition. the machines that make this fiber are complex, quite expensive and there is no capability to quickly and significantly ramp up their production. Further they are challenging to set up and operate.

And for perspective, of the 200 million masks China currently makes a day, only 600,000 are N95 standard masks, used by medical personnel,

So yet another "essential supply chain" item for a critical health system need that simply can't be ramped up out of this air.

Hopefully some one in the Federal system is looking for all similar needs and working on a plan to facilitate onshore manufacturing.

Full (scary/sobering) details are at: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/03/16/814929294/covid-19-has-caused-a-shortage-of-face-masks-but-theyre-surprisingly-hard-to-mak

I see this as a long term "lack of US preparedness" problem vs. something that could have been easily addressed if the administration had moved a couple on months earlier..

JohninMK , 25 April 2020 at 05:02 PM
We have the same problems here in the UK. With people, mainly it seems like in the MSM, blaming the Government's leadership for the supply issues.

Ignoring totally the management of our respective national health organizations who knew, at the latest in mid January, that there was probably a nasty contagious problem coming down the tracks, that would, based on already clear Chinese actions, need more PPE than was on their shelves.

Bear in mind that, in the UK at least, hundreds of these NHS bureaucrats earn twice what a Government minister earns and a few twice the PM's salary. In both nations they have failed their people dismally, seemingly like rabbits trapped in the headlights. None will be punished of course for failure, they are just pleased that the Government steps up and takes the blame.

Then we have the academics and think tank personnel. All accepted as impartial and offering honest opinions based on state of the art models. Again the Governments take what they are offered as gospel and acts on it. Only to discover that the models are more of the garbage in garbage out variety, not fit for purpose. Then we find how much funding the impartial academics are receiving from potentially very interested parties, as there are $Bs at stake. In the UK there was a Pandemic 2016 exercise to check things out. Result everything in NHS under control. In the real world under four years later, a shambles. Did you have a similar last autumn?

The real heroes and heroines in this saga are the doctors, nurses and their support and ancillary staff who are actually at the sharp end. Many working in appallingly unsafe conditions. Hats off to them.

Bobo , 25 April 2020 at 07:01 PM
For 200 plus years our hospitals utilized laundries to cleanse their medical protection gear (PPE) until the advent of synthetic PPE. The present generation is taught to utilize the N95 mask and other gear once and then trash it. This was derived as a manner in reducing Sepsis and MRSA in hospitals and an effective one though those diseases are still present.
Our hearts went out to these young medical personnel without the plastic masks and gear as they were working outside of what they were taught and they were much more susceptible to the Covid-19.
Now we all saw every Chinaman walking around Wuhan with a N-95 mask in January and unfortunately those were our masks that were re-routed to the Chinese people. Hopefully we have now learned a very hard lesson that Just in Time Inventory does not work for medical diseases or viruses and that the USA needs to manufacture all PPE and medicine in the USA amongst other things.
Regarding the political implications I can only say that the guy in the hot seat made things happen when the chips were down something his predecessors nor his competitor had/have the ability to do in a timely manner. Coercion worked.
optimax , 25 April 2020 at 11:00 PM
Much of the federal stockpile of PPE sent to the states had passed their expire dates, 2010 for some, and was either useless or had to be repaired. I blame the failure on the person, or persons, charged with monitoring the wharehoused stockpiles. The president only knows what he's told. He can't micromanage the nation. He needs Jack Webb directing him to stick with the facts.

We have two groups of psychopaths vying for political power.

https://time.com/5815652/national-stockpile-medical-supplies-unusable/

elaine, 26 April 2020 at 12:58 AM

I read somewhere the V.A. ordered the masks but F.E.M.A expropriated them on the directions of Jared Kushner, who will later decide who receives the masks...something about the National Emergency Stockpile...what a mess.

[Apr 25, 2020] Seventy percent of US citizens on over 65 age group have hypertension which is No.2 risk factor for COVID-19 (just after cardiovascular disease)

Most of those who have hypertension are also overweight.
Mar 12, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Joerg , Mar 11 2020 22:40 utc | 126

This was based on the virus' affinity for the ACE2 receptor in the lungs. It is also thought to have a higher prevalence in heavy smokers. Iran and Italy are countries where people smoke heavily. In Iran smoking related disease accounts for about 20% of fatalities in males.

Risk: Hypertension ( high blood pressure)

The graphs in my comment above (88) are from a German language article ( https://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Zahlen-bitte-3-4-Coronavirus-Fallsterblichkeit-False-Number-4679338.html?seite=all ). There I read that 70 % of US citizens have hypertension while in Japan it's only 16 % and in China - of those who were confirmed Covid-19- patients - it's only 12.8 %.

I believe that it is lecithin (soy, fish) that East-Asians [eat] protect from hypertension.

As a heavy smoker I got a "smoker-leg" some years ago. I got successfully rid of it with lecithin, because I read that lecithin dissolves 'bad fats'. These 'bad fats' can't be put into the liver, because unlike 'good fats' they would destroy the liver. And thus our blood puts the 'bad fats' into the walls of our arteries, which then swell like balloons. Lecithin dissolves/cracks these 'bad fats' so that they now can be eliminated by the liver.

As not only smoking produces 'bad fats' (too long molecules?) lecithin in general will make the blood vessels fit again and by this certainly lower blood-pressure.

[Apr 24, 2020] Medical Keynesianism

Apr 24, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Cynthia , April 24, 2020 at 9:50 am

I know for sure that hospitals across the country are getting a significant bailout. However, the bailout has a definite "no strings attached" aspect to it. Which may explain the rather wide variation in how hospitals have decided how to use this money.

For instance, my hospital decided to use its bailout money to give thousands of its employees so-called "COVID" pay so that they can continue to get paid despite not working at all. Needless to say, there is indeed a very good thing about this and other similar forms of medical Keynesianism: it keeps the local unemployment rate regarding hospital workers much lower than it would otherwise be.

OTOH, a similar nonprofit hospital just to the north of me, both in terms size and function, as well as having an equally significant reduction in patient admissions due to COVID-19, has elected NOT to use any of its bailout money to keep its employees employed. That hospital is Huntsville Hospital. It has instead decided to furlough and even lay-off many of its employees.

As to how Huntsville Hospital is using its bailout money, I can't say for sure. Nor can anybody else, for that matters, due to its overall lack of spending transparency, which is very common among hospitals in general, BTW. Despite that, my guess would be that Huntsville Hospital is using its bailout money to pay for capital improvements. There's probably a good side to this as well: it keeps the local unemployment rate regarding non-hospital workers much lower than it would otherwise be. Therefore, it too can be described as medical Keynesianism, though it is a more indirect and somewhat weaker form of it since hospital workers don't benefit from it.

[Apr 24, 2020] Every major organ system in the body can be affectedby coronavirus

Provably some effects are due to oxygen starvation and some due to virus binding ACE2 receptors
Apr 24, 2020 | www.washingtonpost.com

Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals, which operates 14 medical centers in Philadelphia and NYU Langone in New York City, found that 12 of their patients treated for large blood blockages in their brains during a three-week period had the virus. Forty percent were under 50, and had few or no risk factors. Their paper is under review by a medical journal, said Pascal Jabbour, a neurosurgeon at Thomas Jefferson.

Jabbour and his co-author Eytan Raz, an assistant professor of neuroradiology at NYU Langone, said that strokes in covid-19 patients challenge conventionally thinking. "We are used to thinking of 60 as a young patient when it comes to large vessel occlusions," Raz said of the deadliest strokes. "We have never seen so many in their 50s, 40s and late 30s."

Raz wondered whether they are seeing more young patients because they are more resistant than the elderly to the respiratory distress caused by covid-19: "So they survive the lung side, and in time develop other issues."

Jabbour said many of the cases he's treated have unusual characteristics. Brain clots usually appear in the arteries, which carry blood away from the heart, but in covid-19 patients, he's also seeing them in the veins, which carry blood in the opposite direction and are trickier to treat. Some patients are also developing more than one large clot in their heads, which is highly unusual.

"We'll be treating a blood vessel and it will go fine, but then the patient will have a major stroke" due to a clot in another part of the brain, he said.

... ... ...

In a letter to be published in the New England Journal of Medicine next week, the Mount Sinai team details five case studies of young patients who had strokes at home from March 23 to Apr. 7. They make for difficult reading: The victims are age 33, 37, 39, 44, and 49, and were all home when they began to experience sudden symptoms, including slurred speech, confusion, drooping on one side of the face and feeling dead in one arm.

[Apr 24, 2020] The mysterious connection between the coronavirus and the heart

Apr 24, 2020 | www.livescience.com

By Yasemin Saplakoglu - Staff Writer 16 days ago

Doctors say some patients with COVID-19 can have heart damage.

(Image: © Shutterstock)

The novel coronavirus mainly attacks the lungs. But doctors have been increasingly reporting cases of another battlefield raging within the body: the heart.

More than 1 in 5 patients develop heart damage as a result of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, one small study published March 27 in the journal JAMA Cardiology suggested. While some of these patients have a history of heart conditions, others do not. So what's going on?

Cardiologists say several scenarios could be unfolding: The heart may struggle to pump blood in the absence of enough oxygen; the virus may directly invade heart cells; or the body, in its attempt to eradicate the virus, may mobilize a storm of immune cells that attack the heart.

Related: Coronavirus Live Updates

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"We know that this is not the only virus that affects the heart," said Dr. Mohammad Madjid, an assistant professor at McGovern Medical School at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth). The risk of developing heart attacks, for example, is thought to increase about sixfold when a person is infected with the flu virus, according to a study published in 2018 in the New England Journal of Medicine .

What's more, during most influenza epidemics, more patients die from heart complications than from pneumonia , according to a review published March 27 in the journal JAMA Cardiology . Viral infections can disrupt blood flow to the heart, cause irregular heartbeats and heart failure, according to the review.

So while it doesn't "come as a surprise," that novel coronavirus called SARS-CoV-2 can lead to heart damage, it may be occurring more frequently in these patients than it does in people infected with other viruses, Madjid, the lead author of the review, told Live Science.

The double-edged sword

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The virus might be directly attacking the heart.

"We're seeing cases of people who don't have an underlying heart disease ," who are getting heart damage, said Dr. Erin Michos, the associate director of preventive cardiology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Heart damage isn't typical in mild cases of COVID-19, and tends to occur more often in patients who have severe symptoms and are hospitalized, she said.

Though the virus predominantly affects the lungs, it is circulating in the bloodstream; that means the virus could directly invade and attack other organs, including the heart, Michos told Live Science.

Related: 13 coronavirus myths busted by science

Both heart cells and lung cells are covered with surface proteins known as angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) -- these molecules serve as "doorways" for the virus to enter cells. But this enzyme is a "double-edged sword," she said. On one hand, the ACE2 molecule acts as a gateway for the virus to enter the cell and replicate, but on the other hand, it normally serves a "protective" function, Michos said.

When tissues in the body are damaged -- either by an invading virus such as SARS-CoV-2 or by other means, the body's natural healing response involves releasing inflammatory molecules, such as small proteins called cytokines, into the bloodstream. But paradoxically, too much inflammation can actually make things worse. The ACE2 enzyme acts as an anti-inflammatory, keeping immune cells from inflicting more damage on the body's own cells.

But when the virus latches onto ACE2 proteins, these proteins get knocked out of commission, possibly reducing the anti-inflammatory protection that they give. So the virus may be acting as a double-whammy by damaging cells directly and preventing the body from protecting tissues from inflammatory damage.

"If the heart muscle is inflamed and damaged by the virus, the heart can't function," she said.

The novel coronavirus might also indirectly damage the heart. In this scenario, the patient's immune system winds up "going haywire," Michos said. This scenario has played out in some really sick patients who have highly elevated inflammatory markers -- or proteins that signal high levels of inflammation in the body.

This is called a "cytokine storm," Michos said. Cytokine storms damage organs throughout the body, including the heart and liver, she added. It's not clear why some people have such an elevated response compared with others, but some people could be genetically prone to it, she added.

And then you have patients who have underlying heart disease who are at higher risk of developing severe symptoms of COVID-19 -- and higher risk of mortality. "You can imagine, if their heart already has difficulty working they don't have the capacity to meet this challenge" of not having enough oxygen because their lungs aren't working as well.

So COVID-19 can "exacerbate" underlying heart disease, Michos said. A new study, published April 3 in the journal Circulation , described four cases of heart damage among COVID-19 patients in New York, some with underlying conditions. (Michos is on the editorial board for the journal Circulation.)

Treatments and complications

Cardiologists identify heart damage using a blood test for a protein called troponin. When heart cells are injured, they leak troponin into the bloodstream. But "it's sometimes not that easy," to figure out what kind of heart damage a patient is having, Michos said.

"We are really seeing different cardiac involvement," Michos said. So it matters "what's causing the heart damage because you would treat it differently."

For example, if the virus is directly invading the heart, the patient may need antiviral medications. If instead the immune system is causing heart damage, the patient might need immunosuppressants. Right now, no direct treatments target COVID-19, and most of the treatment being used currently involves supportive care such as providing more oxygen.

What's more, people who have high blood pressure or other underlying heart conditions commonly take ACE inhibitors or angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) -- medications that widen blood vessels, therefore increasing the amount of blood the heart pumps and lowering blood pressure.

Cardiologists are hotly debating whether people should stop or start taking those medications if they're at high risk for COVID-19. (One paper suggested the drugs could be harmful, while some clinical trials are assessing the use of ARBs to reduce the severity of COVID-19, Live Science previously reported .)

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It's really hard to tease out whether having more ACE2 is helpful or harmful, as these proteins are how the virus enters the cells, but also known to protect the cells against injury, Michos said.

The current consensus is that if patients are already taking these medications, they should stay on them, she said. "Patients taking ACE-[inhibitors] and ARBs who contract COVID-19 should continue treatment, unless otherwise advised by their physician," according to a statement from the American Heart Association, the Heart Failure Society of America and the American College of Cardiology.

Experts from Australia and New Zealand similarly said they strongly recommend patients with hypertension, heart failure and cardiovascular disease who are already on these medications keep using them, according to a study preprint published on April 3 in The Medical Journal of Australia .

Complicating matters, certain drugs that are currently under investigation for treating COVID-19, including hydroxychloroquine -- the drug that President Trump has said is a game-changer -- could cause heart damage, those experts said. Now, the goal is to figure out if there's a genetic or biochemical reason some people are more prone to heart damage from COVID-19 -- and to figure out what drugs work best "to protect the heart from injury," Michos said.

Originally published on Live Science .

[Apr 24, 2020] Poverty and coronavirus: the existence of large unensured underclass means that the USA might have permanent hotspots and troubles getting out of this epidemic

Notable quotes:
"... more than 9,000 medical workers, many not adequately protected from the disease, have already contracted it. ..."
Apr 24, 2020 | consortiumnews.com

About 31 million people are today uninsured in America and 14 states have not even expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. The healthcare system is seemingly structured in defiance of the people it should serve, functioning as yet another way to maximize profits at the expense of millions.

In this coronavirus moment, many more Americans are finally awakening to the bitter consequences, the damage, wrought when even a single person does not have access to the resources he or she needs to live decently or, for that matter, survive.

With the spread of a pandemic, the cost to a nation that often treats collective care as, at best, an afterthought should become apparent. After all, more than 9,000 medical workers, many not adequately protected from the disease, have already contracted it.

Today, more than 38 million people officially live below the federal poverty line and, in truth, that figure should have shocked the nation into action before the coronavirus even arrived here. No such luck and here's the real story anyway: the official measure of poverty, developed in 1964, doesn't even take into account household expenses like health care, child care, housing, and transportation, not to speak of other costs that have burgeoned in recent decades. The world has undergone profound economic transformations over the last 66 years and yet this out-of-date measure, based on three times a family's food budget, continues to shape policymaking at every level of government as well as the contours of the American political and moral imagination.

...the 53 percent of every federal discretionary dollar that goes to the Pentagon , the trillions of dollars that have been squandered in this country's never-ending war on terror, not to speak of the unprecedented financial gains the wealthiest have made (even in the midst of the current crisis). Of course, this economic order becomes a genuine moral scandal the moment attention is focused on the three billionaires who possess more wealth than the bottom half of society.

Since the government began transferring wealth from the poor to the very rich under the guise of "trickle-down" (but actually gusher-up) economics, key public institutions, labor unions , and the electoral process have been under attack. The healthcare system has been further privatized, public housing has been demolished, public water and sanitation systems have been held hostage by emergency managers, and the social safety net has been eviscerated.

In these same years, core government functions have been turned over to the private sector and the free market. The result: levels of poverty and inequality in this country now outmatch the Gilded Age . All of this, in turn, laid the groundwork for the rapid spread of death and disease via the Covid-19 pandemic and its disproportionate impact on poor people and people of color.

When the coronavirus first became a national emergency, the Fed materialized $1.5 trillion in loans to Wall Street, a form of corporate welfare that may never be paid back. In the following weeks, the Fed and a congressional bipartisan stimulus package funneled trillions more in bailouts to the largest corporations. Meanwhile, tens of millions of Americans were left out of that CARES Act : 48 percent of the work force did not receive paid sick leave; 27 million uninsured people and 10 percent of the insured who couldn't even afford a doctor's visit have no guarantee of free or reasonably priced medical treatment; 11 million undocumented immigrants and their 5 million children will receive no emergency provisions; 2.3 million of the incarcerated have been left in the petri dish of prison; 3 million Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program recipients saw no increase in their benefits; and homeless assistance funds were targeted at only about 500,000 people, although eight to 11 million are homeless or housing insecure. Such omissions are guaranteed to prove debilitating, even potentially lethal, for many. They also represent cracks in a dam ready to break in a nation without a guaranteed living wage or universal healthcare as debt mounts, wages stagnate, and the pressures of ecological devastation and climate change intensify.

... ... ...

Across the Black Belt of the southern states, the poor and black are dying from the coronavirus at an alarming rate . In many of those states, wages are tied to industries that rely on now interrupted regular household spending. They also have among the least resources and the most vehement anti-union and wage-suppression laws. That, in turn, leaves so many Americans all that more vulnerable to the Covid-19 crisis, the end of which is nowhere in sight. Chalk this up, among other things, to decades of divestment in public institutions and the entrenchment of extremist agendas in state legislatures. The Black Belt accounts for nine of the 14 states that have not expanded Medicaid and for 60 percent of all rural hospital closures.

Nor are these the only places now feeling the consequences of hospitals being bought up or closed for private profit. In Philadelphia, for instance, Hahnemann Hospital, which had served that city's poorest patients for more than 170 years , was recently bought and closed by a real-estate speculator who then attempted to extract a million dollars a month from the local government to reopen it. Now, as the coronavirus ravages Philadelphia, Hahnemann's beds sit empty, reminiscent of the notorious shuttering of New Orleans' Charity Hospital in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

... ... ...

Liz Theoharis is a theologian, ordained minister, and anti-poverty activist. Director of the Kairos Center for Religions, Rights and Social Justice at Union Theological Seminary and co-chair of the Poor People's Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, she is the author of " Always With Us? What Jesus Really Said About the Poor ." She teaches at Union Theological Seminary in New York City.

[Apr 24, 2020] "What do you have to lose" - TTG - Sic Semper Tyrannis

Notable quotes:
"... A malaria drug widely touted by President Donald Trump for treating the new coronavirus showed no benefit in a large analysis of its use in U.S. veterans hospitals. There were more deaths among those given hydroxychloroquine versus standard care, researchers reported. ..."
"... The nationwide study was not a rigorous experiment. But with 368 patients, it's the largest look so far of hydroxychloroquine with or without the antibiotic azithromycin for COVID-19, which has killed more than 171,000 people as of Tuesday. The study was posted on an online site for researchers and has been submitted to the New England Journal of Medicine, but has not been reviewed by other scientists. Grants from the National Institutes of Health and the University of Virginia paid for the work. ..."
"... Researchers analyzed medical records of 368 male veterans hospitalized with confirmed coronavirus infection at Veterans Health Administration medical centers who died or were discharged by April 11. About 28% who were given hydroxychloroquine plus usual care died, versus 11% of those getting routine care alone. About 22% of those getting the drug plus azithromycin died too, but the difference between that group and usual care was not considered large enough to rule out other factors that could have affected survival. Hydroxychloroquine made no difference in the need for a breathing machine, either. ..."
"... Researchers did not track side effects, but noted hints that hydroxychloroquine might have damaged other organs. The drug has long been known to have potentially serious side effects, including altering the heartbeat in a way that could lead to sudden death. ..."
"... Earlier this month, scientists in Brazil stopped part of a hydroxychloroquine study after heart rhythm problems developed in one-quarter of people given the higher of two doses being tested. ..."
"... The interesting news is that ventilators are not required in all cases and indeed my do more harm for some. BoJo was only on a cpap. The harm mechanism may be impaired hemoglobin ..."
Apr 24, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

"What do you have to lose?" - TTG

A malaria drug widely touted by President Donald Trump for treating the new coronavirus showed no benefit in a large analysis of its use in U.S. veterans hospitals. There were more deaths among those given hydroxychloroquine versus standard care, researchers reported.

The nationwide study was not a rigorous experiment. But with 368 patients, it's the largest look so far of hydroxychloroquine with or without the antibiotic azithromycin for COVID-19, which has killed more than 171,000 people as of Tuesday. The study was posted on an online site for researchers and has been submitted to the New England Journal of Medicine, but has not been reviewed by other scientists. Grants from the National Institutes of Health and the University of Virginia paid for the work.

Researchers analyzed medical records of 368 male veterans hospitalized with confirmed coronavirus infection at Veterans Health Administration medical centers who died or were discharged by April 11. About 28% who were given hydroxychloroquine plus usual care died, versus 11% of those getting routine care alone. About 22% of those getting the drug plus azithromycin died too, but the difference between that group and usual care was not considered large enough to rule out other factors that could have affected survival. Hydroxychloroquine made no difference in the need for a breathing machine, either.

Researchers did not track side effects, but noted hints that hydroxychloroquine might have damaged other organs. The drug has long been known to have potentially serious side effects, including altering the heartbeat in a way that could lead to sudden death.

Earlier this month, scientists in Brazil stopped part of a hydroxychloroquine study after heart rhythm problems developed in one-quarter of people given the higher of two doses being tested. (AP News)

-- -- -- --

This was not a rigorously designed experiment and from what I've seen, VA patients almost inevitably have multiple heath problems before they walk into the clinic or VA hospital. We're a pretty banged up, broken down lot. However, the VA is skilled at doing this kind of evaluation of their vast patient population. Through their Million Veteran Program, they are conducting myriad studies involving genetic samples and health records. The results of this VA study is sobering and seems to help answer Trump's question of what do you have to lose.

In response to this study and several prematurely ended studies, Fauci's "National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases recommends against doctors using a combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin for the treatment of COVID-19 patients because of potential toxicities.

Maybe those with lupus and rheumatoid arthritis will have an easier time getting their medication. We have to do something with our stockpiled 29 million pills. Still, more studies need to be done. Perhaps an effective treatment involving hydroxychloroquine will be developed when we understand Covid-19 better. We're still learning of the full range of damage this virus is capable of inflicting. Maybe it will be an effective prophylactic, not a magic shield or miracle potion, but a helpful prophylactic. There's no reason to give up on this or any other proposed treatment or cure.

TTG

https://apnews.com/a5077c7227b8eb8b0dc23423c0bbe2b2

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.16.20065920v1.full.pdf

https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/04/21/840341224/nih-panel-recommends-against-drug-combination-trump-has-promoted-for-covid-19


Laura Wilson , 22 April 2020 at 02:56 PM

More studies, for sure. I always find it interesting other your take on VA matters...thank you for sharing your perspective to those of us without experience with the VA.
steve , 22 April 2020 at 04:12 PM
To be clear, the Institue guidance recommends agains the combination of HCQ and AZ. It makes to recommendation for or against HCQ by itself. These recommendations are only fo hospitalized pts. There are no recommendations for or against drugs for prophylaxis.

In our own internal studies we found higher rates of arrhythmias on HCQ and AZ, and found more problems related to AZ. We have stopped that. HCQ is no longer part of our standard protocol but docs may order it if they choose.

Steve

will.2718 , 22 April 2020 at 04:29 PM
The brazil study was of the Chloroquine diphosphate which has greater side effects than of the hydroxy form. The big trial is the one in NY state. Those results are not yet in.

The interesting news is that ventilators are not required in all cases and indeed my do more harm for some. BoJo was only on a cpap. The harm mechanism may be impaired hemoglobin . These medcram youtubes linked below are topnotch!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qc6VV7ue4cE

walrus , 22 April 2020 at 05:23 PM
Thank you for your thoughtful post TTG. It may still be that the drug has a useful effect. I know Fauci is infuriating a lot of people, but he is right: a double blind placebo controlled trial is the only way to really know.

Off topic, but when my wife had breast cancer she took part in such a trial of a new drug. That involved extra free visits to hospital for testing. We guessed she was given the drug afterwards because her oncologist and surgeon surprisingly found that her lymph nodes had been scoured clean of the cancer. It's now about four years of remission. The new drug is apparently going to be the new standard for treatment of that type of cancer.

Lars Moeller-Rasmussen , 22 April 2020 at 06:05 PM
I am surprised that "cloroquine phosphate", the name under which I know the drug, is now suddenly supposed to have serious side effects. When I was stationed in Egypt for one year with my family back in 1978, we all took cloroquine, as I remember it, once a week.
In my country, Denmark, drug regulation is pretty strict, so we assumed cloroquine was safe. Still, I went to ask my doctor when I had another one-year stationing to the Middle East coming up five years later. After looking at the guidelines, my doctor told me that cloroquine had been used for years without any side effects, and that the only side effects found after long trials on rabbits were some sort of residue settling in their eyes, though with no adverse effect on their eyesight.
Lars Moeller-Rasmussen
JMH , 22 April 2020 at 06:14 PM
This is not a controlled study. It is an analysis of medical records. It stands to reason that there were more fatalities amongst those who were given the drug, because it was desperation hour, so they therefore got the drug. The French guy says you have to use the drug early, not as a Hail Mary pass when the virus has done its work and left and all that remains in the pneumonia.

Oh the end-zone celebration on Morning Joe about this study! I guess you don't need a double blind six month controlled trial to have absolute metaphysical certainty after all. People who were given hydroxycloriquine died, said Mika when she spiked the football.

Deap , 22 April 2020 at 06:48 PM
From the CDC website right now: CDC information for travelers who want to avoid malaria:

CLOROQUINE
Drug Reasons that might make you consider using this drug Reasons that might make you avoid using this drug

Chloroquine
Adults: 300 mg base (500 mg salt), once/week.

Children: 5 mg/kg base (8.3 mg/kg salt) (maximum is adult dose), once/week. Begin 1-2 weeks before travel, once/week during travel, and for 4 weeks after leaving.

Some people would rather take medicine weekly
Good choice for long trips because it is taken only weekly

Some people are already taking hydroxychloroquine chronically for rheumatologic conditions. In those instances, they may not have to take an additional medicine

Can be used in all trimesters of pregnancy

Cannot be used in areas with chloroquine or mefloquine resistance
May exacerbate psoriasis

Some people would rather not take a weekly medication
For trips of short duration, some people would rather not take medication for 4 weeks after travel

Not a good choice for last-minute travelers because drug needs to be started 1-2 weeks prior to travel

Barbara Ann , 22 April 2020 at 07:12 PM
The quote cirsium provided above from Didier Raoult is worth repeating with emphasis IMO: "The HCQ-AZ combination, when started immediately after diagnosis , is a safe and efficient treatment for COVID-19..". The price of treatment only beginning when sufferers are bad enough to be hospitalized seems to be a one to two orders of magnitude increase in mortality rate.

Test, trace contacts & quarantine like the South Koreans and prescribe Didier's magic elixir to all positives right away. If this isn't accepted medical practice, then change the accepted medical practice.

English Outsider , 22 April 2020 at 07:21 PM
TTG - on treatment of the disease this protocol from the Eastern Virginia Medical School is interesting -

https://www.evms.edu/media/evms_public/departments/internal_medicine/EVMS_Critical_Care_COVID-19_Protocol.pdf

They haven't found that much use for ventilators, seems.

On the wider question of how the pandemic should be tackled an article in the Jerusalem Post led me to wonder how they were tackling it in Israel-

On contact tracing via Smartphone monitoring -

https://techcrunch.com/2020...

"Details of exactly how the tracking will work have not been released -- but, per the BBC, the location data of people's mobile devices will be collected from telcos by Israel's domestic security agency and shared with health officials."

Leads me to wonder whether the enthusiasm for smartphone tracking in the UK - HMG seems to be betting the farm on it - derives from the fact that GCHQ is geared up for that anyway.

Also group testing for speed -

https://www.tabletmag.com/s...

Plus what seems to be an extensive programme of testing both for antibodies and for detection of currently infected cases -

https://www.jpost.com/israe...

This seems to be a version of the American approach to containing local outbreaks after lockdown has been lifted -

"When we have more tests, we can open the economy in an aggressive way without any danger and without being surprised – and the moment there is an outbreak in a residential building or a school, you can go there [and close it] and not the whole city," Bennett said.

Also containing a reference to the progress made in ensuring the various tests are more accurate -

"There have been more than 20 rapid serological tests that have been developed worldwide – mainly in China – many of which have been found to provide inaccurate results.

"However, Roche and a handful of companies, such as US-based Abbott Laboratories and Becton Dickinson and Co., have created more sophisticated serological tests, which are expected to be validated.

"Ofer said that, "If we run these tests in conjunction with the molecular test, then we will get a full picture" – and as Bennett explained, "the closures will end."

Those are the roughly the references I put together to submit to an English site. On another English site I read a reference to how one Canadian area (unnamed) geared up for the pandemic -

We live in an Ontario health district, about the size of Connecticut (with 200,000 population), in a small city with a medical school. Our public health officer in January alerted nursing homes and hospitals to prepare, e.g. get supplies and train staff for higher hygiene standards. Example, auditing handwashing practices in nursing homes. As a result, we have 50 total positive cases, almost all cases traceable to travel. No nursing home outbreaks. No deaths. No ICU care. Two people currently in hospital."

So they got going on this back in January. If only ...

LJ , 22 April 2020 at 09:46 PM
Another discussion of chloroquine: only does any good if used early in the disease progress and with zinc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLSYRqcg0wo

[Apr 24, 2020] Various pre-existent types of pneumonia and now all put under COVID-19 tent

Apr 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

Hempus , says: Show Comment April 23, 2020 at 12:09 pm GMT

Before the Covid-19 "outbreak" there was a pneumonia known as the HAP "hospital-acquired pneumonia" and also the CAP "community-acquired pneumonia" in nursing homes.

Even the "ventilator-associated pneumonia" VAP, somehow disappeared in the phrase book because now some "experts" and Vaccination Pope Bill gates love to declare martial law to fight the "covid-19 associated pneumonia" COP.

If you have a little bit time to research where the "NEW" Pneumonia breaked out you find mainly:

Even Donald Trump was forced to demand carmakers to produce respiratory Ventilators ..to help in the war against Covid-19.
You would think after three and half years of "witch hunt" Donald Trump should be an expert but still he has the poisonous dwarf Dr. Fauci as an adviser this is like fighting the devil with satan.

Meena , says: Show Comment April 23, 2020 at 12:49 pm GMT
@Hempus HAP, VAP, and your CAP do not and can not prevent emergence of another Pneumonia of newer causative agents that can spread like fire
When did HAP VAP CAP overwhelm
911, and ICU and kill nurses doctor bus drivers police and fire officers and nursing home elderly in the nursing homes?

When did CAP VAP HAP and regular flu shit ever
cause this exponential rise in infectivity across the globe from 0 to 800,000 in 45 days in USA?

When did the illness cause from those agents liver failure , gi bleeding , kidney failure and resistant hypoxemia? When did any of those patients stay on ventilator for 3 weeks?
When did those illness show such diverse symptoms as by Corona at the beginning phase of the illness ? When did those illness cause such morbidity in the afflicted young ?

When did those surviving the ICU admission report ongoing morbidities of this extent?
Trump is a moron , a thug , a liar . He is full of crap who has taken the ' deplorable 'for a ride by throwing some fiery rhetorics .

meena , says: Show Comment April 23, 2020 at 5:00 pm GMT
@Hempus Your statement is illogical!
Why should a pneumonia previously called HAP, CAP and VAP and causes hundred thousands death each year prevent "Covid-19?"

Because this one is not one of them . . This virus is different genetically , morphologically and clinically . Theoretically they can coexist in same patients .

It is not the mortality but the morbidity and the sped of unravelling that are acute and overwhelming .

I don't agree with lockdown but I dont agree with this who wants to observe it What is irksome is the lying thug 's Trumps denial and then lying about the denial .
I also believe given the checkered history of US it is US who possibly released it in China either directly or indirectly .

When 2 patients aged 80 with same clinical and metabolic profiles in a nursing home are observed and are found out one of them has died from an acute infection in less than 30 days after symptoms appeared and other has continued to stay stable with no worsening and no infection – you blame the virus for the death .

antibeast , says: Show Comment April 23, 2020 at 5:32 pm GMT
@Been_there_done_that

Have you bothered to check how many countries you are referring to altogether, which purportedly had been forewarned about a possibly emerging epidemic, ahead of even the local Chinese government?

Take a look: NATO + Israel = 31

NATO is not a country but a military subsidiary of the USA.

So according to the unsourced report, which so many wishfully presume as a fact, with so many countries allegedly in on the "secret" briefing, not a single country's representative followed up to monitor developments or even corroborated the briefing, but most importantly, not a single country took any defensive preparations whatsoever in advance.

The USA informed NATO and Israel not those thirty European colonies.

This shows the level of credulity that people will descend down to when an obvious news fabrication happens to support their desired narrative. China worshippers here have become severely blinded in light of the epidemic. So many commentators are thus eagerly making themselves irrelevant, including Escobar, which I think is a good thing.

Dude, Esper thought that the report was such an "obvious news fabrication" that he didn't deny it but merely said: " Oh, I can't recall, George ," ( ) " But, we have many people who watch this closely ." So Esper didn't recall seeing the report but decided to " have many people who watch this closely " because it was such an "obvious news fabrication".

Peculiarly, one of the European countries that has handled the pandemic the best, according to the statistics, Austria, is not a NATO member and would not have been in on the "secret".

The USA didn't want to do anything about it but " have many people who watch this closely " as Esper puts it because it was just a " live exercise " as Pompeo puts it.

Yeah, I get it: you're one of those die-hard chinadidit people.

Michael888 , says: Show Comment April 23, 2020 at 5:33 pm GMT
We have had a constant continual stream of 'disinformation' about covid-19:

"Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China," the World Health Organization, January 14, 2020.

On February 29 on NBC's Today, for instance, Anthony Fauci said: "At this moment, there is no need to change anything you're doing on a day-by-day basis, right now the risk is still low, but this could change. When you start to see community spread, this could change, and force you to become much more attentive to doing things that would protect you from spread."

The National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (Fauci is the Head) gave a $3.7 million grant to the Wuhan Virology lab to study bat coronaviruses between 2010 and 2015. Was this just science, or to develop trust for cover to introduce COVID-19 into the Wuhan area and destroy the Chinese economy? ( https://jamesfetzer.org/2020/04/gordon-duff-documentary-proof-university-of-north-carolina-generated-covid-19/ )
Such conspiracy theories! If so, it boomeranged in a way only the CIA could produce.

[Apr 23, 2020] Changes in United States Data following the new CDC guidelines on "Case" and "Death" definition

Apr 23, 2020 | www.worldometers.info

Following new CDC guidelines : " As of April 14, 2020, CDC case counts and death counts include both confirmed and probable cases and deaths . This change was made to reflect an interim COVID-19 position statement issued by the Council for State and Territorial Epidemiologists on April 5, 2020. The position statement included a case definition and made COVID-19 a nationally notifiable disease.

A confirmed case or death is defined by meeting confirmatory laboratory evidence for COVID-19. A probable case or death is defined by i) meeting clinical criteria AND epidemiologic evidence with no confirmatory laboratory testing performed for COVID-19; or ii) meeting presumptive laboratory evidence AND either clinical criteria OR epidemiologic evidence; or iii) meeting vital records criteria with no confirmatory laboratory testing performed for COVID19" [ source ]

[Apr 23, 2020] Almost 50% of CoVid deaths in Europe are as a result of the practice in richer Euro countries of confining the elderly to nursing homes

Apr 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

LOL , Apr 23 2020 15:40 utc | 4

Almost 50% of CoVid deaths in Europe are as a result of the practice in richer Euro countries of confining the elderly to nursing homes

Bachman
@ElonBachman
Half of Europe's COVID-19 deaths are from nursing homes

https://mobile.twitter.com/ElonBachman/status/1250745852202749954

-----

Branko Milanovic
@BrankoMilan
Why is nobody discussing truly staggering differences in death rates between Eastern and Western Europe? In the @FT graphs none of Eastern European countries is even included. The gap is just striking. (Worldometer, 22 April)

https://mobile.twitter.com/BrankoMilan/status/1252812420357083137

[Apr 23, 2020] The researchers found that, among all patients, 57 percent had high blood pressure, 41 percent were obese and just over a third had diabetes."

Apr 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

JohnH , Apr 23 2020 16:55 utc | 18

... from NBC: "People with obesity, diabetes and high blood pressure are at greater risk for complications from the coronavirus, according to a large study of patients hospitalized with the illness it causes...

The study included data on 5,700 people hospitalized with COVID-19 in the New York City area.

Underlying conditions were common. The researchers found that, among all patients, 57 percent had high blood pressure, 41 percent were obese and just over a third had diabetes."

Ummm...about 70% of Americans over age 65 have high blood pressure. And they are by far the most severely afflicted group...

[Apr 23, 2020] Maybe Italy and New York and London have a different strain of virus, but from here, the calamitous effects of quarantine (effectively house arrest) upon the lives of the people is 10,000 times worse than the disease.

Apr 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Ric G , Apr 22 2020 18:56 utc | 28


I think 'B' is barking mad on this one. Australia and New Zealand are locked down but have almost negligible deaths. Maybe Italy and New York and London have a different strain of virus, but from here, the calamitous effects upon the lives of the people is 10,000 times worse than the disease.

We could just keep the border lock downs, no physical contact with strangers, etc, and I am sure all will be ok.

'B' also claims that only a small percentage of people have had contact with the virus, when it may already be 40%.

Russia detected 5,236 new coronavirus carriers yesterday. That is substantially less than yesterday. But this is not the story. It really should not matter that much how many new cases the Russians are able to dig up, because the big story is that according to Russia's own statistics upwards of 60% of those infected don't get sick and are asymptomatic:

https://www.anti-empire.com/russias-own-testing-data-shows-moscows-draconian-lockdown-is-not-warranted/

Why do they not present daily deaths and infections from normal influenza/flu/pneumonia, as well as Covid 19, or are they all lumped into one box now called Covid19.

I will run with the Guardian reaction, this smells like a giant '9-11' psych-ops, a seize for power, and a chance for the usual banking suspects to buy the world for cents in the dollar.


[Apr 23, 2020] Why Copper Is Good at Killing Viruses by Jim Morrison

Apr 14, 2020 | www.smithsonianmag.com

The SARS-CoV-2 virus endures for days on plastic or metal but disintegrates soon after landing on copper surfaces. Here's why

When researchers reported last month that the novel coronavirus causing the COVID-19 pandemic survives for days on glass and stainless steel but dies within hours after landing on copper, the only thing that surprised Bill Keevil was that the pathogen lasted so long on copper.

Keevil, a microbiology researcher at the University of Southampton (U.K.), has studied the antimicrobial effects of copper for more than two decades. He has watched in his laboratory as the simple metal slew one bad bug after another. He began with the bacteria that causes Legionnaire's Disease and then turned to drug-resistant killer infections like Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). He tested viruses that caused worldwide health scares such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and the Swine Flu (H1N1) pandemic of 2009. In each case, copper contact killed the pathogen within minutes. "It just blew it apart," he says.

In 2015, Keevil turned his attention to Coronavirus 229E , a relative of the COVID-19 virus that causes the common cold and pneumonia. Once again, copper zapped the virus within minutes while it remained infectious for five days on surfaces such as stainless steel or glass.

"One of the ironies is, people [install] stainless steel because it seems clean and in a way, it is," he says, noting the material's ubiquity in public places. "But then the argument is how often do you clean? We don't clean often enough." Copper, by contrast, disinfects merely by being there.

Ancient Knowledge

Keevil's work is a modern confirmation of an ancient remedy. For thousands of years, long before they knew about germs or viruses, people have known of copper's disinfectant powers. "Copper is truly a gift from Mother Nature in that the human race has been using it for over eight millennia," says Michael G. Schmidt, a professor of microbiology and immunology at the Medical University of South Carolina who researches copper in healthcare settings.

The first recorded use of copper as an infection-killing agent comes from Smith's Papyrus, the oldest-known medical document in history. The information therein has been ascribed to an Egyptian doctor circa 1700 B.C. but is based on information that dates back as far as 3200 B.C. Egyptians designated the ankh symbol, representing eternal life, to denote copper in hieroglyphs.

As far back as 1,600 B.C., the Chinese used copper coins as medication to treat heart and stomach pain as well as bladder diseases. The sea-faring Phoenicians inserted shavings from their bronze swords into battle wounds to prevent infection. For thousands of years, women have known that their children didn't get diarrhea as frequently when they drank from copper vessels and passed on this knowledge to subsequent generations. "You don't need a medical degree to diagnose diarrhea," Schmidt says.

And copper's power lasts. Keevil's team checked the old railings at New York City's Grand Central Terminal a few years ago. "The copper is still working just like it did the day it was put in over 100 years ago," he says. "This stuff is durable and the anti-microbial effect doesn't go away."

The East Tower of the Royal Observatory, Edinburgh. The contrast between the refurbished copper installed in 2010 and the green color of the original 1894 copper is clearly seen. (Wiki Commons)

Long-Lasting Power

What the ancients knew, modern scientists and organizations such as the Environmental Protection Agency have confirmed. The EPA has registered about 400 copper surfaces as antimicrobial. But how exactly does it work?

Heavy metals including gold and silver are antibacterial, but copper's specific atomic makeup gives it extra killing power, Keevil says. Copper has a free electron in its outer orbital shell of electrons that easily takes part in oxidation-reduction reactions (which also makes the metal a good conductor). As a result, Schmidt says, it becomes a "molecular oxygen grenade." Silver and gold don't have the free electron, so they are less reactive.

Copper kills in other ways as well, according to Keevil, who has published papers on the effect. When a microbe lands on copper, ions blast the pathogen like an onslaught of missiles, preventing cell respiration and punching holes in the cell membrane or viral coating and creating free radicals that accelerate the kill, especially on dry surfaces. Most importantly, the ions seek and destroy the DNA and RNA inside a bacteria or virus, preventing the mutations that create drug-resistant superbugs. "The properties never wear off, even if it tarnishes," Schmidt says.

Schmidt has focused his research on the question of whether using copper alloys in often-touched surfaces reduces hospital infections. On any given day, about one in 31 hospital patients has at least one healthcare-associated infection, according to the Centers for Disease Control, costing as much as $50,000 per patient . Schmidt's landmark study , funded by the Department of Defense, looked at copper alloys on surfaces including bedside rails, tray tables, intravenous poles, and chair armrests at three hospitals around the country. That 43-month investigation revealed a 58 percent infection reduction compared to routine infection protocols.

Further research stalled when the DOD focused on the Zika epidemic, so Schmidt turned his attention to working with a manufacturer that created a copper hospital bed . A two-year study published earlier this year compared beds in an intensive care unit with plastic surfaces and those with copper. Bed rails on the plastic surfaces exceeded the accepted risk standards in nearly 90 percent of the samples, while the rails on the copper bed exceeded those standards on only 9 percent. "We again demonstrated in spades that copper can keep the built environment clean from microorganisms," he says.

Schmidt is also a co-author of an 18-month study led by Shannon Hinsa-Leasure, an environmental microbiologist at Grinnell College, that compared the bacterial abundance in occupied and unoccupied rooms at Grinnell Regional Medical Center's 49-bed rural hospital. Again, copper reduced bacterial numbers. "If you're using a copper alloy that's always working," Hinsa-Leasure says, "you still need to clean the environment, but you have something in place that's working all the time (to disinfect) as well."

Harnessing Copper

Keevil and Schmidt have found that installing copper on just 10 percent of surfaces would prevent infections and save $1,176 a day (comparing the reduced cost of treating infections to the cost of installing copper). Yet hospitals have been slow to respond. "I've been surprised how slow it has been to be taken up by hospitals," Hinsa-Leasure adds. "A lot of it has to do with our healthcare system and funding to hospitals, which is very tight. When our hospital redid our emergency room, we installed copper alloys in key places. So it makes a lot of sense when you're doing a renovation or building something that's new. It's more expensive if you're just changing something that you already have."

The Sentara Hospital system in North Carolina and Virginia made copper-impregnated surfaces the standard across 13 hospitals in 2017 for overbed tables and bed rails after a 2016 clinical tria l at a Virginia Beach hospital reported a 78 percent reduction in drug-resistant organisms. Using technology pioneered in Israel , the hospital has also moved to copper-infused bedding . Keevil says France and Poland are beginning to put copper alloys in hospitals. In Peru and Chile, which produce copper, it's being used in hospitals and the public transit systems. "So it's going around the world, but it still hasn't taken off," he says.

If copper kills COVID-19, should you periodically roll a few pennies and nickels around in your hands? Stick with water, soap, and sanitizer. "You never know how many viruses are affiliated with the hand, so it may not completely get them all," Schmidt says. "It will only be a guess if copper will completely protect."

[Apr 21, 2020] What will this do to the COVID death count? What will this also do to the excess mortality rate as people are fearful of getting immediate treatment for very serious life or death conditions?

Apr 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Allen , Apr 20 2020 2:42 utc | 176

Now over the last two weeks, the city's fire officials said more than 2,192 New York City residents died in their homes, compared to 453 during the same time period last year.

On average there are 25 deaths in home per week in NYC- Tuesday, April 7th for example, there was 256. The reason? People are afraid to go to the hospitals, cardiologists are confirming this, lest they get infected with the "killer virus." This means when they are in the early stages of cardiac arrest, for example, they stay at home and some don't make it.

NYC officials stated that they WILL NOT be conducting tests on these at home deaths nor will they be doing any diagnostics on the cadavers.

NYC officials also confirmed that they will begin to count suspected COVID-19 deaths in addition to cases confirmed by a laboratory.

Stephanie Buhle, a spokeswoman for the New York City's Health Department, confirmed the change in protocol.

"The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME) and the NYC Health Department are working together to include into their reports deaths that may be linked to COVID but not lab confirmed that occur at home."

NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio in his infinite wisdom acknowledged that the vast majority of deaths taking place at home were likely also due to COVID-19. No tests, no diagnosis but the mayor with his crystal ball stated:

"We do want to know the truth about every death at home, but it's safe to assume that the vast majority are coronavirus related."

That's his exact quote.

What will this do to the COVID death count? What will this also do to the excess mortality rate as people are fearful of getting immediate treatment for very serious life or death conditions?

[Apr 21, 2020] Open-source firmware turns CPAP machines into coronavirus ventilators

Apr 21, 2020 | www.zdnet.com
Thanks to the coronavirus pandemic , we are woefully short of ventilators that can give the most gravely ill a chance for life. There are many efforts afoot to build more ventilators . Now, instead of building ventilators, a group of open-source developers has a new idea: Create a firmware update, Airbreak , which can transform common Constant Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) machines into non-invasive ventilators. ebook

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Their first effort -- a proof of concept -- converts the Airsense 10 CPAP machine , which is a common, inexpensive sleep apnea treatment device, into a ventilator. It does so by simply replacing its existing firmware with updated firmware .

With this upgrade, the Airsense could be used as an emergency ventilator until a better, purpose-built ventilator is available. It has the following ventilator features:

Adds a Pressure Control Ventilator (PCV) mode that oscillates between high and low pressure at a configurable breathing rate (stock firmware supports only a single pressure, with no breath rate control). Allows maximum pressure to be increased to 30 cm H2O, as required by clinical protocols (stock firmware is limited to 20cm H2O). Allows smooth rapid pressure change rates for respiration rates up to 30 breaths per minute (stock firmware changes pressure at less than 1cm/sec). Unlocks all the vendor modes and tunable configuration parameters, including ST and iVAPS modes present in the firmware. Provides access to all of the sensors (flow, pressure, temperature, tidal volume, minute ventilation, etc). Displays real-time graphs on the screen to show an immediate history of sensor data.

What the firmware is doing is changing a CPAP device into a Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure (BIPAP) . These aren't ventilators either, but hospitals -- like New York's Mount Sinai -- have been able to deploy these as ventilators . The reason why this is worth doing is CPAP machines are cheaper and more common than BIPAP devices. The FDA has already approved the use of modified BiPAP devices as ventilators .

Now, CPAP devices with this firmware patch are not drop-in-replacements for ventilators. Far from it. Additional equipment like viral filters and monitoring alarms are also required. As its creators state:

We want to be very clear here: This modified firmware should not be flashed on CPAP machines and used to treat COVID patients immediately. The firmware that we've developed is an effective demonstration of the capability, and while it has been reviewed and validated by expert researchers, biomedical engineers, and clinical pulmonologists , it has not yet been put through FDA [Food and Drug Administration] approval. Additionally, the Mt Sinai's protocols for off-label non-invasive ventilation require additional modifications such as viral filter and remote control before the machines would be ready for clinical use.

The programmers could send its firmware through the FDA approval process themselves, but its developers think "the best route for rolling out these upgrades is to work with the manufacturers to use their resources to validate and distribute these upgrades safely and at scale."

The code has great potential. It would also be easy to deploy. The five million CPAP devices shipped over the last three years have an always-on cellular connection. Thanks to that, these devices can easily be upgraded over-the-air by device manufacturers. With this, hundreds of thousands of CPAP machines could be upgraded overnight. This could easily bring millions of unused or underutilized CPAP machines into hospitals just when we need them.

Further coding, testing, and evaluation need to be done with FDA approval received before these patched CPAP machines can be deployed. But, the need is urgent, and it's a heck of a lot easier to wirelessly update firmware than it is to build and deploy millions of new hardware ventilators. This project isn't just a good idea -- it's one that deserves close attention from CPAP manufacturers and medical professionals as soon as possible.

[Apr 21, 2020] Obesity and COVID-19 mortality

Apr 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Alaric , Apr 20 2020 3:12 utc | 180

Sweden has roughly twice the obesity (21%] compared to 9.5% in Denmark and 44% of Swedes are overweight. Studies of deceased in US determined obesity to be the largest factor (outside of age) in covid mortality.

[Apr 21, 2020] Two important results in Switzerland and Germany show that it is the elimination of large gatherings together with mask wearing and social distancing that have had the main impact on reducing the infectivity of covid-19, not the lockdowns

Apr 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

BM , Apr 20 2020 11:09 utc | 263

Two important results in Switzerland and Germany show that it is the elimination of large gatherings together with mask wearing and social distancing that have had the main impact on reducing the infectivity of covid-19, not the lockdowns (which appear to have had relatively minor effects so far, according to these two results). Any measures have a built-in delay of 8 to 10 days before their effects, due to the incubation periods of successive infections.

(in German)

[Apr 20, 2020] BBC News

Apr 20, 2020 | www.bbc.com

"Девочки-неврологи плакали и шли в красную зону": как работают врачи в московских Covid-больницах Олеся Герасименко, Светлана Рейтер Би-би-си

тренировка в центре имени Пирогова Правообладатель иллюстрации Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS

Мэрия Москвы еще в двадцатых числах марта попросила столичные больницы оценить, сколько пациентов с коронавирусом они могут принять. На план перестройки и возведение необходимых перегородок им дали пять дней. Из больниц долечиваться домой отправили тысячи человек, оставив только тяжелых больных. Новых пациентов не с коронавирусом перепрофилированные клиники почти не принимают - разворачивают скорые в другие стационары.

"Реанимация заполнилась в течение одного дня, и рук перестало хватать"

Чтобы разграничить заразную зону от чистой, в больницах возвели новые стены, рассказывает главврач центра оказания медицинской помощи пациентам с подозрением на коронавирусную инфекцию НМЦХ им. Пирогова Виталий Гусаров. Устроили санпропускники, шлюзы, где сотрудники переодеваются перед входом в красную зону, и шлюзы, где они возвращаются из зоны.

Много сил при переделке клиник уходит на логистику: на каких лифтах будут ездить заболевшие пациенты, откуда будут уходить вылечившиеся, как медсестры будут передвигаться по корпусу, как вывозить медицинские отходы из красной зоны. По-другому теперь приходится даже простыни сдавать в стирку: все белье из Covid-отделения проходит дезинфекцию, и только потом его можно везти в прачечную.

В коронавирусный корпус Пироговского центра пошли работать неврологи, кардиологи, терапевты, хирурги, травматологи, говорит их главврач. "Мы все были заточены на помощь высокого уровня, - писал в "Фейсбуке" реаниматолог этой больницы, заведующий отделением анестезиологии-реанимации № 1 Борис Теплых. - Где-то слышались реплики, что использовать нас - все равно что микроскопом гвозди забивать. Но увидев в следующие дни бурю, ни у кого не осталось сомнений, что пришло время "засадных полков". Девочки-неврологи плакали, надевали защитные костюмы и шли в красную зону".

Правда, по словам Гусарова, коллега эмоции медиков преувеличил. "Все сотрудники с первого дня в красной зоне осознавали свою ответственность и были готовы к тяжелой работе, настоящие герои", - говорит он.

Но не все медики морально готовы работать с Covid-19. В Пироговском центре говорят о нехватке медсестер и санитарок. Медсестры отказывались из страха заразить своих близких, у кого-то сложная семейная ситуация и они не имеют возможности оставить свои семьи на время работы в госпитале, а многие пожилые ссотрудники оказались в группе риска из-за возраста.

Согласившиеся лечить коронавирус медики, не имеющие нужной специализации, работают в отделениях, где лежат не самые тяжелые пациенты. Для них, не инфекционистов по профилю, в больнице разрабатывают пошаговые инструкции. По словам Гусарова, их составляют из рекомендаций минздрава, столичного департамента, ВОЗ, федерации анестезиологов-ревматологов и других источников.

Работает в красной зоне и сам главный врач стационара Пироговского центра.

- В первую неделю, когда мы открылись, реанимация заполнилась в течение одного дня - и рук перестало хватать. А у меня специальность такая. Надо было и трахеостомию делать, и к ИВЛ подключать, мы пошли помогать ребятам.

- Вы, будучи главврачом, уже так делали?

- Я регулярно приходил в реанимационную на проведение обходов и разбора сложных случаев. Но чтобы из-за вала пациентов пришлось встать и оказывать экстренную помощь как врачу реанимации - нет, такого еще не было. С таким мы столкнулись впервые и остро.

"К концу смены в защитных костюмах некоторые падают в обморок"

Перед входом в красную зону, где лежат инфицированные коронавирусом, каждый надевает специальный защитный костюм. Он одноразовый. Под него - одноразовый же хлопчатобумажный костюм, какие носят хирурги, шапочка, одноразовые носки, кроксы и бахилы.

"Снимаем с себя всё, оставляем часы, ключи, мобильные телефоны. Никаких предметов быта в зоне. Иногда нательный крестик оставляют, но я бы не рекомендовал на себе хоть что-то носить", - рассказывает Александр Левчук, бывший главный хирург Военно-морского флота, работающий в Пироговском центре уже 14 лет. Левчук - советник по хирургическим вопросам, врач-онколог, профессор кафедры, доктор медицинских наук, заслуженный врач РФ.

Это уже четвертый карантин за карьеру 61-летнего хирурга. Первые три были в военных частях при дизентерии, малярии и холере. В центре он отвечает за сортировку больных, которых привозят скорые. Через четыре часа работы с пациентами костюм надо менять.

В 15-й инфекционной больнице имени О. М. Филатова в санпропускном шлюзе работают около 30 человек, которые помогают врачам переодеваться. "Ещё пока всё это не началось, мы выбирали одного добровольца из коллектива и на него раз двадцать надевали защиту, чтобы запомнить, как, например, респиратор правильно надевать", - рассказывает главврач Валерий Вечорко.

В красной зоне нельзя расстегиваться и ничего снимать тоже нельзя - ни респиратор, ни очки. "В защите жарко, хочется воды, плохо видно. В туалет ходить нельзя, пить и есть тоже. На всякий случай у нас лежат взрослые памперсы, некоторые ими уже пользуются. Но в них под костюмом сразу становится еще жарче, появляются проблемы с кожей, опрелости", - говорит главврач центра имени Пирогова.

На руки медики надевают две пары перчаток и сверху третью - для осмотра пациента. Их сразу выбрасывают, а первые две пары остаются на руках. "Я вам как хирург могу сказать - снижается тактильность. Сложно осматривать. Ну зато слышимость хорошая - костюмы сделаны не из прорезиненной ткани, не то, что в 80-е годы. В тех водолазных костюмах было совсем тяжело работать", - объясняет Левчук.

Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS Правообладатель иллюстрации Красильников Станислав
Image caption Так проходили тренинги по экипировке в Пироговском центре

В защите невозможно послушать дыхательные шумы и хрипы пациента - вместе с комплектом нельзя использовать фонендоскоп. Приходится ориентироваться на частоту дыхания, лихорадку и данные о насыщенности крови кислородом, говорит Гусаров. "Вообще в защите и в красной зоне оценить пациента сложнее раза в три, чем в обычной обстановке больницы", - рассказывает он.

В реанимации и на сортировке смены длятся по четыре часа, в коечных отделениях - по шесть. К концу смены в защитных костюмах некоторые падают в обморок, но встают и идут работать дальше. "Причем это не изнеженные создания, а, например, наша старшая сестра, которая любому мужчине даст фору по силам и здоровью", - говорит главврач Гусаров. Рассказывает о медсестре, которую накануне в красной зоне вырвало в респиратор от усталости, но она дорабатывала смену, не уходя от пациентов. "Это люди, перед которыми хочется встать на колени", - добавляет врач.

"Я люблю эту работу, я готов делать все, - говорит работающий в приемном покое Пироговского центра Левчук. - Вот я вообще военный хирург, а сейчас - на сортировке больных. Нужно - пойду носилки таскать".

Если соблюдать все санитарно-эпидемиологические нормы с самого начала и до самого конца, заразиться сложно, говорит Левчук. Но обычно, по его мнению, среди врачей заболевают люди, которые первые две недели о правилах помнят, а потом настает период самоуспокоения, и вот тогда совершаются ошибки - небрежно надевают костюм или маску или нарушают правило трех пар перчаток.

Тесты на коронавирус сотрудникам больниц делают раз в неделю. Почти все медики изолировались от семей, Гусаров снял квартиру, большинство других медиков его центра живут в гостинице напротив Пироговки - за них платит больница.

Главврач ГКБ №15 Валерий Вечорко рассказывает, что в больнице для врачей работают два кафе: одно с пальмами на месте старого бассейна, "как в Турции на пятизвездочном курорте", а второе под названием "Звезда" в двух армейских палатках на улице.

"Пока мы идем в потемках"

Что делают врачи с пациентами в красной зоне? Если человек в удовлетворительном состоянии, то ему нужно только наблюдение, жаропонижающее и обильное питье. Такие пациенты часто бывают недовольны. "Жалуются, что их не лечат. И капельниц не капают", - улыбается Гусаров. Но главная задача пребывания в стационаре - не пропустить ухудшения. Клиническая картина бывает скоротечной, утверждает хирург Левчук: пациенту может стать хуже за два-три часа, и он может оказаться на ИВЛ.

Пациенты в тяжелом состоянии получают противовирусные лекарства и препараты, направленные на уменьшение повреждений внутренних органов. "Мы пробуем тоцилизумаб, который блокирует человеческий интерлейкин-6. Этот противовоспалительный медиатор вырабатывает наша иммунная система, чтобы повреждать клетки, пораженные вирусом - вместе с тканями органов, куда он попал. В итоге страдают в первую очередь легкие и сердце".

Слишком сильный иммунный ответ на коронавирус и приводит к осложнениям, говорит Гусаров. "Так что распространенное сейчас пожелание сильного иммунитета как раз не очень подходит, - вздыхает он. - Есть ощущение, что все зависит от степени иммунной реакции на вирус. Чем она сильнее, тем хуже протекает болезнь. Препарат, к которому мы присматриваемся, блокирует эту сильную реакцию иммунитета. Но доказательной базы нет, и пока мы идем в потемках".

Весь персонал центра имени Пирогова для профилактики принимает противомалярийный иммуносупрессивный препарат. По поводу ультрафиолетовых ламп, которые сейчас покупают россияне для своих домов, врачи разводят руками: последние данные по ультрафиолету показали, что стандартные рециркуляторы воздуха не воздействуют на вирус.

Главврач больницы №15, после медицинского училища работавший в зоне Чернобыльской катастрофы, говорит, что тогда врачам было понятнее, с чем они столкнулись. "Там был один поражающий фактор, потом чётко отработанная помощь при этом факторе. А здесь, вот эта беда, она как снег на голову свалилась. Мы видели, что было в Китае, Италии, Испании, но никто до конца не понимает, что это за штука. Она очень подвержена мутациям".

"Многие не понимают самого главного - этот возбудитель постоянно мутирует, - согласен с Вечорко бывший военный врач Левчук. - Он становится всё сложнее и сложнее. Это не тот коронавирус, который был описан в 2005-м или в 2015 году. Это вирус, зло протекающий, вызывающий пневмонии, заканчивающиеся летальным исходом".

"Эти очаги невооруженным глазом видны"

В большинстве больниц коронавирус уже ставят по результатам компьютерной томографии (КТ), не дожидаясь тестов - их чувствительность не идеальна, говорит главврач ГКБ №15 Валерий Вечорко. "Больной к нам приехал, мы сделали КТ, сразу видно, как изменена ткань лёгочная - по типу матового стекла. Эти очаги, они невооруженным глазом видны. Даже при отрицательном тесте на Covid мы лечим так, как будто он есть", - объясняет он.

Аппарат КТ после каждого пациента дезинфицируют - медсестра моет аппарат антисептиками с хлором и опрыскивает помещение из специального пульверизатора. В красной зоне больницы №15 - три аппарата. В зоне центра имени Пирогова - один. Нагрузка на него колоссальная, но "пока работает". Закупиться впрок сейчас не получится, потому что зарубежные производители в пандемию работают на больницы внутри своих стран, а в России серийного производства томографов пока нет, говорит Гусаров.

На ИВЛ в больницах лежат пациенты возрастом от 25 до 90 лет. "Один из наших молодых пациентов - мальчик с ДЦП. Но по опыту наших коллег, с которыми мы постоянно на связи, на ИВЛ с тяжелой формой много молодых и без сопутствующих заболеваний", - рассказывает Гусаров. Или люди с ожирением и сахарным диабетом, добавляет Левчук. Эти болезни намного утяжеляют состояние. Диабет не позволяет адекватно лечить больного - много осложнений на легкие и почки, говорит врач.

Пациентами, по словам медиков, становятся те, кто столкнулся с заболевшим на работе или в семье, или где-то проехался или кого-то навестил, либо натолкнулся на бессимптомного носителя в магазине. В центре Пирогова лечится семейная пара, которая навестила в самоизоляции родственника-носителя Covid-19. Теперь муж лежит на ИВЛ, а жена в палате этажом выше.

"После ИВЛ надо научить больного дышать самостоятельно"

Человек, дышать которому помогает аппарат ИВЛ, не может говорить. Если у него стоит интубационная трубка, введенная через рот, то он, скорее всего, не может переносить это спокойно и его седатируют. Такие пациенты лежат в медикаментозном сне, без сознания. "Закон такой - пациент должен быть спокоен - или сам, или под действием седативных препаратов", - объясняет заместитель главврача больницы №15 Борислав Силаев.

Если заболевшему для поддержания дыхания наложена трахеостома - трубка заведена через разрез на шее ниже голосовых складок - и пациент спокойно это переносит, то его можно оставить в сознании. Тогда он общается с врачами губами, жестами, кивками. Могут сказать "да" или "нет" и даже что-то написать. Такие пациенты могут даже есть привычным способом. Остальных кормят, отправляя питательную смесь прямо в желудок через зонд, или, если состояние тяжелое, есть смеси, которые вводятся прямо в вену, рассказывает Силаев.

Пациентам на ИВЛ чистят зубы, их моют, регулярно меняют белье и перестилают постель. Иногда все это делают по несколько раз в день - и все это силами санитарок и медсестер. Если уход ослабить, то повышается риск бактериальных осложнений. Если они присоединяются к вирусной пневмонии, это делает шансы на выздоровление в разы ниже.

Болеющим коронавирусом легче дышать, лежа на животе. "В больницах это протокольная процедура - если содержание кислорода в легких снижается ниже допустимых пределов, мы переворачиваем пациента на живот, - говорит Силаев. - Они так могут лежать по восемь часов. Чтобы их переворачивать, тоже нужны руки, у санитарки сил не хватает вертеть здоровых мужчин".

Везучие обходятся кислородной маской и на ИВЛ не попадают. Но если у заболевшего стояла трахеостома, то лечение на ИВЛ продлевается на 2-3 недели, рассказывает врач Левчук. "Потому что потом надо научить больного дышать заново, самостоятельно, а это тоже непросто - каждый день уменьшается время работы аппарата ИВЛ, больной на некоторое время от него отключается, тренируется дышать сам. Трудная процедура", - поясняет хирург.

- Им страшно? Ведь врачи должны давать надежду, а вы сами впотьмах передвигаетесь. Ведь, как мы поняли со слов врачей, человек может 10 дней лежать в нормальном состоянии, а потом - бабах и на ИВЛ.

- Ну, во-первых, мы им об этом не рассказываем - что может наступить резкое ухудшение, - отвечает главврач центра имени Пирогова Гусаров. - Мы их ободряем, говорим, что все будет хорошо, объясняем, какой где катетер установлен и зачем какая трубка. Призываем держаться и слушаться медперсонала.

"Разговаривайте со своей собакой"

К началу второй недели обе реанимации Пироговского центра заполнились, и пациентов стали класть в операционные палаты. Всего здесь 33 реанимационные койки и 33 аппарата ИВЛ, но открыть их все врачи пока не могут: не хватает анестезиологов и медсестер, идет набор.

В крупной Филатовской больнице рук пока хватает, недавно пришли пять новых реаниматологов. "Сегодня у меня нет проблем с медицинскими работниками, а что завтра будет - не знаю, не могу сказать. Одно могу сказать - завтра это не закончится", - рассказывает Вечорко.

Пациентов в больнице №15 стало в два раза больше. Обычно здесь принимают по 150 человек в день, на прошлой неделе - было 300 в сутки. В основном это люди в состоянии средней степени тяжести или совсем "тяжелые" - с дыхательной недостаточностью.

- Сколько все это продлится?

- По тем поступлениям, которые мы видим, а у нас 1,5 тысячи пациентов с вирусной пневмонией, это только самое начало пика, - говорит Вечорко.

- В Москве сейчас 8 тысяч пациентов с Covid-19. Все-таки это не 30 и не 50. Это много? Почему уже сейчас, как говорят в мэрии, все трещит по швам? - спрашиваем мы у главврача Пироговского центра.

- Ну вы же понимаете, что пациенты с другими заболеваниями никуда не делись. Это плюс восемь тысяч, которые требуют экстренной медпомощи и работы персонала в принципиально новых для них условиях. Это почти предел. Если поток увеличится, мы перестанем справляться, - отвечает Гусаров.

- Как это будет выглядеть?

- Итальянский сценарий. Интубация на полу. Выбор между молодым и пожилым при переводе в реанимацию. Невозможность нормально осмотреть всех при поступлении: то есть приехали и лежат, а если ухудшается - хватай и беги с ним на ИВЛ.

- Как решают, молодой или пожилой? Есть протоколы для такого выбора?

- С точки зрения медицинской этики, таких протоколов нет и не может быть, мы обязаны помогать всем.

- А как тогда?

- Ну как решают во время боевых действий, когда массовое поступление раненых? Идет сортировка по состоянию. Легкораненые оказывают помощь себе сами. Люди с ранениями средней тяжести - группа, которой оказывают особое внимание, чтобы спасти их и вернуть в строй. А тяжелораненые остаются без него.

Бывший военный врач Левчук, работающий на сортировке в Пироговском центре, говорит, что каждый третий их пациент уверен, что у него не коронавирусная инфекция: "У людей очень высокая степень недооценки ситуации. А потом, когда они понимают, что с ними, они уже молчат".

Его коллега Гусаров вспоминает панику в глазах отрицателей коронавируса, когда они попадают в больницу с симптомами ОРВИ и сталкиваются там с тяжелыми пациентами. "Понимаете, здесь это ощущается острее. Они могли вчера все это отрицать, а толку? - вздыхает он. - Мне хочется попросить отрицателей все равно сидеть дома. А если выходите по неотложной надобности, например, с собакой гулять - то не общайтесь ни с кем, разговаривайте со своей собакой. Если этого не делать, здравоохранение захлебнется. Мы не сможем оказывать медицинскую помощь всем нуждающимся, если из-за отрицателей и нарушителей карантина поток будет расти".

И тогда, говорит Гусаров, люди должны быть готовыми к тому, что их будет интубировать травматолог или патологоанатом. И возможно, это будет последняя манипуляция в их жизни, добавляет он.

[Apr 20, 2020] Taiwan experience

Apr 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pacifica Advocate , Apr 20 2020 3:46 utc | 189

I live in Taiwan and I know for a fact that this entire post is a flat-out lie.

Tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of people were forcibly quarantined for the last three weeks after traveling, as well as entire sections of cities, based solely on whether they had traveled to districts in areas of Taiwan's largest cities or if there were confirmed cases in their neighborhood.

The quarantines were enforced with cel-phone apps that used GPS to confirm if the person in question was at home, doubled up with 4 phone calls a day to confirm of the person was near their phone or not.

Pft clearly either doesn't live on Taiwan or cannot access the local news (I.e.: doesn'tspeak or read Chinese), because this is pretty much all anyone has been talking about for the last month.

In addition, social distancing is being enforced in all markets (and yes, we have the "wet" ones here, too, except we call them "traditional," while the "dry" ones are called either "grain" or "North-South Goods", so all you fools slandering "wet markets" should also do us all a favor by cutting out your tongues), convenience stores, etc. All citizens were asked by the government to stay at home, the last 2 weekends. Masks are mandatory on all public transportation and anywhere food is purchased. Etc.

Pft is just wrong--completely and totally wrong.

[Apr 20, 2020] The virus can transmit between cats via respiratory droplets.

Apr 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Apr 20 2020 4:20 utc | 201

By this research, spread may be a lot faster and harder to control in populations or cultures with many domestic cats.

"SARS-CoV-2 is thought to have originated in bats; however, the intermediate animal sources of the virus are completely unknown. Here, we investigated the susceptibility of ferrets and animals in close contact with humans to SARS-CoV-2. We found that SARS-CoV-2 replicates poorly in dogs, pigs, chickens, and ducks, but efficiently in ferrets and cats. We found that the virus transmits in cats via respiratory droplets.'
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.30.015347v1.full

[Apr 20, 2020] Self-made masks

Apr 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Passer by , Apr 19 2020 19:59 utc | 82

Posted by: mark | Apr 19 2020 19:53 utc | 77

https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/best-materials-make-diy-face-mask-virus/

https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/coronavirus-pollution-masks-n95-surgical-mask/

[Apr 19, 2020] I can take it off if you'd like

Apr 19, 2020 | twitter.com

Emily Annette ‏ 1:50 PM - 9 Apr 2020

At the grocery. Wearing my mask. Lady behind me, snarky & loud enough to make sure I heard, "don't guess she realizes that stupid mask won't do any good." Me: "Honey, I'm an off duty nurse, I'm wearing it to protect YOU. But, I can take it off if you'd like." She practically ran.

[Apr 19, 2020] Greatest health care system in the world:

Apr 19, 2020 | twitter.com

The reality of the #COVID19 pandemic is that my patients have lost all faith in our healthcare system so even when they are very short of breath or have low oxygen levels they refuse to go to the ER bc they're afraid they will die in a corner and they would rather die at home.

-- uché blackstock (@uche_blackstock) April 15, 2020

[Apr 19, 2020] Changes in all-cause mortality will be the ONLY reliable way to judge the death toll.

Apr 19, 2020 | twitter.com

Alex Berenson ‏ 6:16 AM - 17 Apr 2020

Reminder: because of the aggressive way in which we code # COVID deaths - and because the virus mostly kills elderly people with pre-existing conditions (who may be dying WITH and not OF it), changes in all-cause mortality will be the ONLY reliable way to judge the death toll.

Gene Epstein ‏ 8:47 AM - 17 Apr 2020

I suggest we look at all-cause mortality EXCLUDING: --all transport-related deaths (which should be way down), ---suicides & deaths from drug overdose (should be up) --all crime-related deaths (should be down).

[Apr 19, 2020] 'Complete nonsense' Piers Morgan savages UK care minister over Covid-19 death toll among health and care workers (VIDEOS) -- RT

Apr 19, 2020 | www.rt.com

Piers Morgan has lashed out at the UK government's care minister, branding her numbers on Covid-19 deaths in the health and care sector "complete nonsense" as anger grows over the apparent lack of protection for frontline workers. The 55-year-old Good Morning Britain TV presenter grilled Care Minister Helen Whately in a heated interview on Wednesday morning on the working conditions for health and care staff at the center of the coronavirus crisis.

Morgan asked Whately what the death toll was for health and care professionals who have fallen victim to the deadly Covid-19 disease. The stuttering minister replied: "So the latest figures we have for NHS workers is that 19 [NHS] workers have sadly died."

'We don't have a figure for that' - Helen Whately @piersmorgan questions the Care Minister over the number of healthcare workers that have died on the front line from the coronavirus. pic.twitter.com/VFcqFJX5SE

-- Good Morning Britain (@GMB) April 15, 2020

Morgan, cutting in before Whately could finish her sentence, sniped: "That's complete nonsense." He added that the Mirror newspaper had reported as recently as Tuesday that 38 had died so far.

[Apr 19, 2020] Kids these days:

Apr 19, 2020 | twitter.com

Found the kid playing with her dog instead of Zooming with her teacher. She told me not to worry. She took a screenshot of herself "paying attention," then cut her video & replaced it with the picture. "It's a gallery view of 20 kids, mom. They can't tell." She is 10. #COVID19

-- Angie Maxwell (@AngieMaxwell1) April 15, 2020

[Apr 19, 2020] "Over 100 Hospitals Cut Staff as Pandemic Spreads"

Apr 19, 2020 | labornotes.org

[ Labor Notes ]. "More than 100 hospitals in the U.S. have laid off workers since the pandemic began. Tens of thousands of medical workers are furloughed at the exact moment hospitals should be staffing up and training everyone in intensive care. Expecting a tidal wave of very sick patients, many of whom could be unemployed and uninsured, many hospitals have ended all elective procedures, one of their most lucrative sources of revenue. Since insurance in the United States is primarily tied to having a job, hospitals anticipate being left with egregious costs they have no hope of ever being able to recoup."

[Apr 19, 2020] the doctor in the video above suggests, the medical profession needs to examine the *possibility* that COVID-19 is a *new* disease and that previous protocols may not apply.

Apr 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , Apr 18 2020 3:54 utc | 167

This interview by WebMD with a doctor at Maimonides in New York is important and should be viewed by everyone. What he is saying is that this virus causes a *new* disease that is *not* conventional ARDS (Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome) and (probably) should not be treated by the same protocols developed for treating ARDS.

Do COVID-19 Vent Protocols Need a Second Look?
https://tinyurl.com/yd3dxygf

The bottom line is that the doctors currently treating you for this virus (probably) *do not know* how to treat this virus! They are feeling their way through this thing. As the doctor in the video above suggests, the medical profession needs to examine the *possibility* that COVID-19 is a *new* disease and that previous protocols may not apply.

For patients on ventilators, the bottom line is that upwards of 50 percent - to seventy percent, according to this doctor - will not come out alive, based on current protocols.

This Webinar - which I believed was referenced here in an earlier thread by someone - is along the same lines (Warning: More technical than the above because it is a Webinar for doctors - but still valuable to watch):

Webinar on Avoiding Intubation and Initial Ventilation in COVID19
https://tinyurl.com/rch6qu8

chuteh , Apr 18 2020 5:30 utc | 172

This video explains much about the inter-action of SARS-Covid2 virus and... spike/ACEnzyme2 binding to AT2 lung cells, furin, membrane porosity via viroporons E and ORf3a, macrophages, cell-free heme, porphyrins, sabotage of ferrous/hemoglobin oxygen transport, ferritin hypoxia, ascorbate/DHA recycling, Nitric Oxide, Oxidative Bursts, etc.

I cannot judge its degree of truth and errors and omissions, but I could follow its detailed view of how the disease can be understood and handled. For that it was very helpful.

You might scan thru the introduction of the presenter and get right into her 1-hour , very tight review .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bV53h7MCu9I

[Apr 19, 2020] I was recently struck by how very much it reminded me of H.L. Mencken's description of growing up in late 19th century Baltimore, and how terrified the poor were at the prospect of "recieving treatment" in hospitals, from which few ever returned.

Apr 19, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

richard , April 16, 2020 at 3:33 pm

Looking at that uche blackstock tweet about patients not wanting to come in, and then seeing how much it was echoed (despite blackstock's dismay at people waiting) in the responses, I was struck by how very much it reminded me of H.L. Mencken's description of growing up in late 19th century Baltimore, and how terrified the poor were at the prospect of "recieving treatment" in hospitals, from which few ever returned.
Take a second and let that sink in. Then think of how south korea is treating sick people, where it actually appears to be 2020. Think about that too.
Then say your names like the 2nd daughter of Ned Stark, and knit yourself something.

chuck roast , April 16, 2020 at 5:32 pm

Yep, this is America our motto you're on your own and we all know it. And here is this PMC doctor shocked, shocked that the locals have figured out the American Public Health Care scam.

So, Il Douche will declare this annoying emergency over in a week or two, and we can all climb back on the monthly payment dreadmill. As a geezer, I will find that extremely comforting inasmuch as there will no longer be any uncertainty about my near term health I will be well and truly doomed. And will I be visiting Dr. Uche and his cohorts when I am drowning? Nah, that's not the plan! Besides, when the post-pandemic CV tidal wave hits what's left of the health care apparatus, who would want to be bothering the wretched, surviving nurses, PAs and docs?

BTW Ralph Reed, barring a last trip on the on the LSD, 100 µg, intramuscular I.V., do you have any of those purple dots left?

richard , April 16, 2020 at 6:23 pm

Reading through that thread, the doctor seems to me more aware and responsible to me than the french guy in casablanca :)

[Apr 19, 2020] Ron Paul: People 'Should Be Leery About' a Coronavirus Vaccine by Adam Dick

Apr 14, 2020 | ronpaulinstitute.org


Ron Paul, in a Monday interview with host Dan Dicks at Press for Truth, warns that people "should be leery about" coronavirus vaccines that may come out. Further, says Paul, a doctor and former United States House of Representatives member, "right now I wouldn't think there is any indication for anybody to take them," noting that "scare tactics" are being used to pressure people into thinking they should take such potential vaccines to protect against coronavirus.

Paul supports this conclusion by stressing in the interview the potential danger of a vaccine as well as the overstated threat from coronavirus.

Regarding the potential danger from a coronavirus vaccine, Paul discusses at the beginning of the interview how, in 1976 in his first week as a House member, Paul was one of only two members, both doctors, who voted against legislation that helped rush through a vaccine in response to swine flu. Paul describes the results of the push for people to take the swine flu vaccine as follows:

They rushed the vaccine through. The vaccine was not properly made. It had nothing to do with the virus that was out there, so it saved nobody's life from it. It caused a lot of harm. More people ended up dying from the inoculation than died from the flu that year. And that sort of was a lesson, like that's a little bit too extreme. But, that's about what happens when governments get involved and you do things for political reasons.

There was also, because a lot of people ended up getting the vaccine, I think there were like 50 people or more who got Guillain-Barré syndrome, which is temporary total paralysis and you can die from it but most of them did get better. But, it was a very, very serious complication of a viral injection, you know, a vaccine.

Paul also discusses in the interview the overstated danger from coronavirus that is being used to scare people to take actions including to potentially take a coronavirus vaccine.

Paul notes that many of the people whose deaths have been blamed on coronavirus are elderly people, including people living in nursing homes, who have multiple other diseases. Further, explains Paul, doctors have "been instructed by [the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] and other politicians that, when the doctors sign the death certificate, if [patients] have four different things but they happen to have a positive test for the virus that is to be put down as the major cause of death." "The numbers mean nothing," concludes Paul regarding the daily tabulation of coronavirus deaths.

In addition, Paul explains that many more people than officially recorded have contracted coronavirus. Some of these individuals never became sick. Others got better without any treatment, says Paul, pointing to his son Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) as an example. While Rand Paul was given a test that confirmed he had coronavirus, most people who have had coronavirus and suffered no to minor medical problems have not been tested. With "probably millions of people" having contracted coronavirus, Paul concludes that the percentage of people who have contracted coronavirus and have died as a result "is probably very, very small."

While Paul says he would choose not to take a vaccine for the coronavirus should one appear next week even if people claim it is 99 percent effective, he says that the decision to take or not take a vaccine is one that should be made by each individual, who can discuss the vaccine alternative with a doctor. Absolutely, Paul concludes, that decision should not be made by government.

Watch here Paul's complete interview, in which he also discusses how government actions taken in the name of fighting coronavirus are harming the economy and his support for people speaking out for ending coronavirus-justified encroachments on freedom:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/TblqxaQbtac


Copyright © 2020 by RonPaul Institute. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit and a live link are given.
Please donate to the Ron Paul Institute

[Apr 18, 2020] As one caustic virologist observed, getting out into the open air is a good defense against respiratory transmitted infections: avoiding infection is a walk in the park

Apr 18, 2020 | www.unz.com

A German team under Prof Streeck argues that workplaces don't spread the coronavirus as much as play spaces: singing in a choir produces an aerosol and spray cloud, dancing together in a room or bar, or nightclub apres-ski, also creates infective clouds, as would any confined space where lots of people are in close contact breathing heavily. Although public health guidance has been coy on this matter, orgies are probably best avoided.

On that theme, there are settings in which you are likely to get a big dose, a large viral load, and others where the globules will be few and far between. As one caustic virologist observed, getting out into the open air is a good defense against respiratory transmitted infections: avoiding infection is a walk in the park.

[Apr 18, 2020] Stanford Study Suggests Actual Number of COVID-19 Cases May Be Up to 85 Times Higher Than Official Data - Sputnik International

Apr 18, 2020 | sputniknews.com

The researchers think there could be a difference between the actual and official numbers due to a percentage of citizens who have been infected with the virus but do not show any symptoms. At the same time, they can potentially transmit it to other people, and the overall tally continues to grow. A group of scientists from California estimates that the actual number of COVID-19 cases in one county may be up to 85 times higher than the official data.

The Stanford University-led researchers took data from Santa Clara County as the basis for their study, where 3,330 adults and minors have been tested for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. According to their findings, the COVID-19 prevalence in the area ranged from 2.49 percent to 4.16 percent, representing 50-85 times more cases than the number confirmed by the authorities.

"Our data imply that, by 1 April (three days prior to the end of our survey) between 48,000 and 81,000 people had been infected in Santa Clara County. The reported number of confirmed positive cases in the county on 1 April was 956, 50-85-fold lower than the number of infections predicted by this study", the study says.

Apart from detecting asymptomatic carriers, recording previously unreported cases will also help provide better estimates on the prevalence of COVID-19, the study suggests.

According to the researchers, their findings will help make more accurate projections on the epidemic's spread and mortality rate in the future.

"While our study was limited to Santa Clara County, it demonstrates the feasibility of seroprevalence surveys of population samples now, and in the future, to inform our understanding of this pandemic's progression, project estimates of community vulnerability, and monitor infection fatality

[Apr 18, 2020] How Long Are You Contagious With Coronavirus For by Tambri Housen Amy Elizabeth Parry Meru Sheel ,

Notable quotes:
"... Read more: Coronavirus: how long does it take to get sick? How infectious is it? Will you always have a fever? COVID-19 basics explained ..."
"... Read more: How can I treat myself if I've got – or think I've got – coronavirus? ..."
"... Read more: Who can get tested for coronavirus? ..."
Apr 14, 2020 | nationalinterest.org

For COVID-19, the incubation period ranges from 1 to 14 days. But most people who develop COVID-19 symptoms do so 4 to 6 days after exposure.

Read more: Coronavirus: how long does it take to get sick? How infectious is it? Will you always have a fever? COVID-19 basics explained

How long are you infectious?

The " infectious period " means the time you're able to spread the virus to someone else.

For COVID-19, there is emerging evidence to suggest the infectious period may start 1 to 3 days before you develop symptoms .

The most infectious period is thought to be 1 to 3 days before symptoms start, and in the first 7 days after symptoms begin. But some people may remain infectious for longer.

Commonly reported symptoms for COVID-19 – such as fever, cough and fatigue – usually last around 9 to 10 days but this can be longer.

Why are some people infectious for longer?

Typically with viruses, the higher the viral load (the more virus circulating in the body), the higher the risk of transmission through known transmission pathways.

A study conducted in Hong Kong looking at viral load in 23 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 found higher viral loads in the first week of illness .

Another study from China looking at 76 hospitalised patients found that by 10 days after symptom onset, mild cases had cleared the virus. That is, no virus was detectable through testing.

However, severe cases have much higher viral loads and many continue to test positive beyond the 10 days after symptoms start.

So the more severe the illness and the higher the viral load, the longer you continue to shed the virus and are infectious.

Read more: How can I treat myself if I've got – or think I've got – coronavirus?

When are you no longer infectious?

If someone has been symptom-free for 3 days and they developed their first symptoms more than 10 days prior, they are no longer considered to be infectious.

But we're not sure whether people are infectious when they have recovered but the virus can still be detected in their bodies.

One study from Hong Kong found the virus could be detected for 20 days or longer after the initial onset of symptoms in one-third of patients tested.

Another study from China found found the virus in a patients' faecal samples five weeks after the first onset of symptoms.

But the detection of the virus doesn't necessarily mean the person is infectious. We need more studies with larger sample sizes to get to the bottom of this question.

Should you get tested again before going back into the community?

Due to a global shortage of coronavirus tests, the Commonwealth and state governments have strict criteria about who should be tested for COVID-19 and when.

Read more: Who can get tested for coronavirus?

People who have been self-quarantining , because they had contact with a confirmed case of COVID-19 and have completed their 14-day quarantine period without developing symptoms, can return to the community . There is no requirement to be tested prior to returning to the community. It is, however, recommended they continue to practise social distancing and good hygiene as a precaution.

The requirements are different for people who have been diagnosed with COVID-19.

At present, re-testing people who have experienced mild illness, and have recovered from COVID-19 is not recommended. A person is considered safe to return to the community and discontinue self-isolation if they are no longer infectious. This means they developed their first symptoms more than 10 days prior and have not experienced any symptoms for at least 3 days (72 hours).

[Apr 17, 2020] Clinical observations from ICU doctors report multi-organ (kidney heart GI testes) involvements

Apr 17, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

gm , Apr 16 2020 11:42 utc | 136

Hang onto your hats for this latest scary but data-driven 48 min long Chris Martenson YT:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vtX0s-nHKo

Covers all kinds of snowballing repercussions of the pandemic in US/world including:

-plummeting US economic activity indicators /bank reserves data

-food production/processing supply chain problems

-clinical observations from icu doctors world wide of new multi-organ (kidney heart GI testes) involvements, olfactory/neurological/pinkeye, etc phenomena (from Washington Post of all places).

[Apr 17, 2020] Nations with Mandatory TB Vaccines Show Fewer Coronavirus Deaths (bloomberg)

Apr 17, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

Posted by: Virgile | Apr 16 2020 21:42 utc | 59

[Apr 17, 2020] Soviet-era tuberculosis vaccinations (BCG vaccine) may have had an protective effect for COVID-19

Apr 17, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

COVID AND RUSSIA. Overall totals to today are 28K infected, 232 dead . This raises the question of why the death rate in Russia appears to be lower. One theory is that the widespread Soviet-era tuberculosis vaccinations ( BCG vaccine ) may have had an effect – just how or why is unclear, but there seems to be a statistical relationship .

A test of its effectiveness is beginning in Australia .

Over half the cases are in Moscow but every region except one reports cases: most of Sunday's infections in Shanghai came from a flight from Russia the day before . A pass system was introduced in Moscow yesterday but not very successfully (and many standing in line waiting to be checked). The new hospital in Moscow Region is up and running .

A vaccine prototype is undergoing human testing (including by the developer) . The Victory Parade is postponed .

Meanwhile Russian military specialists are working away in Italy. ( This, by the way, is why NBCW units were sent – not to spy , or for " gaining access to Italy's health and military system, which is part of a larger NATO structure ", or to create " A hybrid lie. Or a hybrid truth " or be useless or whatever else NATO flacks imagine).

[Apr 17, 2020] Scientists Discover Alarming Coronavirus Mutation That Could Render Vaccine Useless

Apr 17, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

The problem is that vaccines often aren't as effective against viruses that mutate, like the flu does every season (that's why you need to keep getting that flu shot year after year). And now, a new scientific paper that - like most of the coronavirus research being cited in the press - has yet to be peer reviewed claims to have identified a mutation in a sample of the virus collected in India that could create serious problems for researchers working on a vaccine.

Monitoring the mutation dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 is critical for the development of effective approaches to contain the 21 pathogen. By analyzing 106 SARS-CoV-2 and 39 SARS genome sequences, we provided direct genetic evidence that 22 SARS-CoV-2 has a much lower mutation rate than SARS. Minimum Evolution phylogeny analysis revealed the putative original status of SARS-CoV-2 and the early-stage spread history. The discrepant phylogenies for the spike protein and it receptor binding domain proved a previously reported structural rearrangement prior to the emergence of SARS-CoV-2. Despite that, we found the spike glycoprotein of SARS-CoV-2 is particularly more conserved, we identified a mutation that leads to weaker receptor binding capability, which concerns a SARS-CoV-2 sample collected on 27th January 2020 from India. This represents the first report of a significant SARS-CoV-2 mutant, and raises the alarm that the ongoing vaccine Development may become futile in future epidemic if more mutations were identified.

[Apr 16, 2020] Debunking Some Ideas About The Virus

Notable quotes:
"... These observations support the importance of hand hygiene after touching the outer surface of masks. ..."
Apr 16, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

mk , Apr 15 2020 6:20 utc | 125

New South Korean study on the effectivity of masks

https://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/2764367/effectiveness-surgical-cotton-masks-blocking-sars-cov-2-controlled-comparison

Background: During respiratory viral infection, face masks are thought to prevent transmission (1). Whether face masks worn by patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) prevent contamination of the environment is uncertain (2, 3). A previous study reported that surgical masks and N95 masks were equally effective in preventing the dissemination of influenza virus (4), so surgical masks might help prevent transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome–coronavirus 2 (SARS–CoV-2). However, the SARS–CoV-2 pandemic has contributed to shortages of both N95 and surgical masks, and cotton masks have gained interest as a substitute.
Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of surgical and cotton masks in filtering SARS–CoV-2.

...


Discussion: Neither surgical nor cotton masks effectively filtered SARS–CoV-2 during coughs by infected patients. Prior evidence that surgical masks effectively filtered influenza virus (1) informed recommendations that patients with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 should wear face masks to prevent transmission (2). However, the size and concentrations of SARS–CoV-2 in aerosols generated during coughing are unknown.

Oberg and Brousseau (3) demonstrated that surgical masks did not exhibit adequate filter performance against aerosols measuring 0.9, 2.0, and 3.1 μm in diameter.

Lee and colleagues (4) showed that particles 0.04 to 0.2 μm can penetrate surgical masks. The size of the SARS–CoV particle from the 2002–2004 outbreak was estimated as 0.08 to 0.14 μm (5); assuming that SARS-CoV-2 has a similar size, surgical masks are unlikely to effectively filter this virus.

Of note, we found greater contamination on the outer than the inner mask surfaces. Although it is possible that virus particles may cross from the inner to the outer surface because of the physical pressure of swabbing, we swabbed the outer surface before the inner surface. The consistent finding of virus on the outer mask surface is unlikely to have been caused by experimental error or artifact. The mask's aerodynamic features may explain this finding. A turbulent jet due to air leakage around the mask edge could contaminate the outer surface. Alternatively, the small aerosols of SARS–CoV-2 generated during a high-velocity cough might penetrate the masks. However, this hypothesis may only be valid if the coughing patients did not exhale any large-sized particles, which would be expected to be deposited on the inner surface despite high velocity. These observations support the importance of hand hygiene after touching the outer surface of masks.

This experiment did not include N95 masks and does not reflect the actual transmission of infection from patients with COVID-19 wearing different types of masks. We do not know whether masks shorten the travel distance of droplets during coughing. Further study is needed to recommend whether face masks decrease transmission of virus from asymptomatic individuals or those with suspected COVID-19 who are not coughing.

In conclusion, both surgical and cotton masks seem to be ineffective in preventing the dissemination of SARS–CoV-2 from the coughs of patients with COVID-19 to the environment and external mask surface.

[Apr 15, 2020] Coronavirus scam- 39 million masks exposed as fake

Apr 15, 2020 | www.latimes.com

A powerful California union that claimed to have discovered 39 million masks for healthcare workers fighting the novel coronavirus was duped in an elaborate scam uncovered by FBI investigators, the U.S. attorney's office said Friday.

U.S. Atty. Scott Brady of the Western District of Pennsylvania said FBI agents and prosecutors stumbled onto the arrangement while looking into whether they could intercept the masks for the Federal Emergency Management Agency under the Defense Production Act.

The federal government has been quietly seizing supplies across the country, taking the orders placed by hospitals and clinics and not publicly reporting where the products are being routed.

But in this case, there was no warehouse, and there were no masks to seize.

[Apr 15, 2020] Three subtypes of SARC-CoV-2 are spreading in different geographical regions

Is immunity to one type provide immunity to all three ?
Apr 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Peter AU1 , Apr 15 2020 10:05 utc | 152

And this

"When cuttlefish is in danger, it spits its ink to blacken the water and took the opportunity to take flight. It is a well known tactic of some political elites and western cultural. "They wanted to simply be attributed to China the responsibility for their own inability to cope with the epidemic and the multiple tragedies that followed, and so," to whiten completely. "

By the time I finished my text, I discovered a report on the Net. On 8 April, the academic journal world-renowned, PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) has published an article co-written by academics in British and German entitled network Analysis the phylogenetic genomes of SARS-CoV-2.

The first author of the article is Dr. Peter Forster of the University of Cambridge. According to the study, the researchers classified the new coronavirus in three types (A, B, and C) according to their development.

The type A is the closest of the virus extracts of the bat and pangolin. It is the one most frequently identified among hiv-infected patients in the United States and Australia. That is, what researchers call " the root of the epidemic ".

The strains of type B are variants of the type A and are mainly present in China. Those that are spreading on a large scale in Europe are those of the type C. Unfortunately, it appears that the results of the research of Dr Peter Forster are not interested in the western mainstream media.

[Apr 15, 2020] Note on virus panic porn

Notable quotes:
"... As soon as you see the real data released by the ONS you will immediately see that the cited twitter is blatant fake news! ..."
Apr 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

BM , Apr 15 2020 11:08 utc | 163

The graphs show the normal mortality rates in the England and Wales and in New York City and the current deviations from it. The flu does not create such graphs. Nor do the lock-downs.

I've got a nice bridge for sale, B, 2000 miles long and entirely made of NYT articles and twitter tweets.

The Twitter chart leaves the impression that the number of deaths suddenly soared up almost vertically by around 5500 just in the last few days ...

Good panic porn stuff that. Also take note of what sort of people appear in that thread - it is not a list of nobodies!

But wait - look more closely! That upturn is for week 14 - the week ending 3rd April, already 12 days ago. You can see the release of the data by the Office for National Statistics here (there is no more recent data released by ONS)

As soon as you see the real data released by the ONS you will immediately see that the cited twitter is blatant fake news!

That chart is specifically constructed to deceive. No actual cited figures, no actual dates, no links to the real data - just pure panic porn. Why not cite the specific dates covered? Because that would raise immediate suspicion with that sudden spurt, because it does not correspond to previously available figures. Why not cite the specific figures in the tweet? Because then it would be immediately obvious that this is fake news. Why not explain the cause of the strange shape of the graph? Because that would give the whole game away.

So what do you see when you look at the real data released by ONS, instead of the fake news in that twitter?

1) Total deaths registered in week 14 16387
2) Increase over week 13 5246
3) Increase over 5-year average for week 14 6082
*** BUT ***
4) Note that these figures are not the deaths which occurred in week 14, they are the deaths which were registered in week 14, irrespective of when the deaths actually occurred (registration is often delayed)
5) Note the warning given on that page: "Please note, where Easter falls in previous years will have an impact on the five-year average used for comparison"
6) 3475 deaths in week 14 " mentioned novel coronavirus (COVID-19)" on the death certificate - NOTE - this is not the cause of death specified on the death certificate!!!
7) 539 deaths in week 13 " mentioned novel coronavirus (COVID-19)" on the death certificate
8) But wait - 3475 is only about half the alleged excess deaths, and these are not even the deaths caused by covid-19 (see below) these are only the deaths where covid-19 "happens" to have been tested positive (car accident, for example!)

Look further!

9) Look at the row "Deaths where the underlying cause was respiratory disease (ICD-10 J00-J99)" under official WHO standards, that is the broad category under which the covid-19 deaths are to be listed, if it is considered by the doctor to be the cause of death. The row gives figures for each week of 2020 as follows (from weeks 1 to 14 in sequence):
2141 2477 2188 1893 1746 1572 1602 1619 1546 1581 1492 1515 1534 2106

VOILA!

This category - which is the actual recorded cause of death - includes covid-19 deaths, but it is a broad category of respiratory-related deaths which also includes many deaths which have nothing whatsoever to do with covid-19. Those 2141, 2477 and 2188 deaths registered in each of the first 3 weeks of 2020 were before there was even a single death from covid-19 in the UK! The average of the first 13 weeks is 1762, and the value for week 14 (2106) is only 344 more than that!

Also note that the deaths which "mention" covid-19 are 1369 greater (including car accidents, unrelated illness, etc) than the number of deaths caused by respiratory illnesses (including Covid-19), which already includes another 1500 to 1700 deaths not caused by covid-19!

This spurt of extra deaths registered in week 14 most certainly does not represent a sudden spurt of genuine covid-19 deaths - that is conclusively proven by the row of figures giving the underlying cause of death for each week's registrations.

If anything, the data may show a sudden spurt of deaths from other causes such as stress caused by the lockdown, food shortages, money shortages, unexpected homelessness, non-covid-19 illnesses not treated because the hospitals cancelled appointments and operations, stress, fear etc.

Such causes probably underlie at least a few of the unaccounted for excess deaths (conceaveably even most, perhaps), but it is also possible it is simply a statistical aberration and/or related to delays in registering deaths, including the unspecified effect of the Easter holidays on death registration. The aberration may also have been deliberate, to cover up government mishandling of the crisis, or it may result from staff shortages, or perhaps completely irrelevant reasons - we cannot know without detailed investigation of how the data were prepared and the patterns of death registration.

What is absolutely certain is that that twitter chart is unmitigated fake news deliberately designed to deceive .

The NYT is no better - completely non-sensical presentation of the data with no explanation of the meaning of the non-sensical presentation, deliberately designed to misrepresent.

Comments, B? Time to reconsider what you are doing?

I've been urging people to look more closely at what is happening, because the magicians have been very successful with their acts, recently. Things are not as they seem on the surface - you need to look more carefully at the small print.

That includes the details of lockdowns. Lockdowns kill, when they are done in the irresponsible and brutal and dishonest way they have been done in the UK and the USA.

China did NOT rely on lockdowns - they relied on an integrated combination of social distancing (including, where necessary, lockdowns, but mostly not , except in Hubei Province), tracing, and isolation of those infected or at risk.

Lockdowns as imposed by the UK and the USA are just suicide pacts, as described by Professor Sucharit Bhakdi, and are ineffective in dealing with covid-19.

[Apr 15, 2020] Wearing masks indoors in close quarters is prudent, while wearning them outside or inside a personal car when you drive alone is stupid and is a sign of the pandemic of panic

Notable quotes:
"... But it's especially outdoor behavior which gives psychological insight on the pandemic of panic. Yesterday I saw people walking alone on the sidewalk, for example a woman alone walking her dog, wearing masks. Evidently such people have regressed from the germ theory of infection to the miasma theory. They think the very air itself is the source of the bug. ..."
Apr 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Russ , Apr 15 2020 9:12 utc | 141

Wearing masks indoors in close quarters seems prudent, even though there's so much conflicting evidence and it's just as likely they're a stifling version of a rabbit's foot as that they confer any real protection.

But it's especially outdoor behavior which gives psychological insight on the pandemic of panic. Yesterday I saw people walking alone on the sidewalk, for example a woman alone walking her dog, wearing masks. Evidently such people have regressed from the germ theory of infection to the miasma theory. They think the very air itself is the source of the bug.

But the guy who instantly became my favorite representative of the whole hysteria (I wish I had a picture of him) was the idiot I saw perform an act of extremely dangerous jaywalking, dashing across a busy road with fast oncoming traffic both ways - wearing a mask.

[Apr 15, 2020] "Le microbe c'est rien, le milieu c'est tout" = the microbe is nothing, the environment is everything.

Apr 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Matthias , Apr 15 2020 9:16 utc | 142

Everyone seems fixated on the virus and how to protect against it. I remind you all of the famous proverb

"Le microbe c'est rien, le milieu c'est tout" = the microbe is nothing, the environment is everything.

Environment means the local conditions in the affected body, a combination of immune system and pre-existing illness.

We are facing a microbe that appears very dangerous in some places with case mortality 10..20% (heavily featured in the media and also in this blog), while in other places it does no more than a seasonal flu with overall mortality < 0.5%. This leads to two equally distorted biases: some people see the whole world as disaster area, some say there is no problem at all. One could question whether it is really the exact same virus, but I'm not going there.

Actually, with the proverb in mind we should be asking: what are the local conditions in the hotspots, what has weakened people's immune system in these places, and what kind of precondition exists there but does not exist in general. In simple words: why here and not there?
Not asking this question and focusing only on an alleged "killer virus" means you see a distorted picture and you would tend to roll out the same drastic protection lockdown measures everywhere, which suffocates the economy and culture unnecessarily and creates massive collateral. I'm in favor of a proportional response focusing on the hotspots, and otherwise teach people how to strengthen their immune system and protect themselves (voluntarily) if they see the need - of course they must have the means made available.

Known factors weakening the immune system and/or lungs:

1) Poor diet – the junk food (fast food, canned food, microwaved food) so typical of US and GB city dwellers. Without the necessary high-quality nutrition the immune system can only be weak. Natural vitamins and essential nutrients go very far in terms of virus protection.

2) Air pollution – Lombardia (Bergamo in particular) and NYC for example both suffer from high air pollution, and particularly in Manhattan the 9/11 event released a huge cloud of finest asbestos dust which caused a wave of lung cancer in the region and a lung precondition for everyone who was exposed at the time.

3) Negative emotions – intense anger and fear can reduce immune activity by 50% for several hours, as measured by IgA in the saliva. Likewise, positive emotions strengten it. Media have been feeding us shock and awe and disaster 24/7 for weeks now, you think that has no effect, think again. Check the amazing research done by HeartMath institute . Also, forced isolation and contact deprevation is wreaking havoc with people who love company or have psychic preconditions.

4) Radiation – there are hundreds of scientific papers on the non-thermal effect of low-energy microwave radiation on our physiology at cellular level, usually this medical research is ignored. An extensive linked collection is available by diagnose:funk (a German self-help society involving many M.D.s). Immune suppression is one of the effects. Where the COVID19 death toll is very high you have a dense WiFi and 4G coverage and yes, typically 5G pilot installations also exist. Most young people who died from COVID19 were working in IT companies and thus had very high exposure.

5) Vaccination – a vaccine protects from one specific virus but is known to weaken the immune system otherwise. North Italy is among the regions with the highest vaccination rate on this globe.

[Apr 15, 2020] COFFEE-FILTER FACE MASK

Apr 15, 2020 | caucus99percent.com

COFFEE-FILTER FACE MASK

What you need:

Two coffee filters
Two to three feet of craft ribbon or string
Tape

Keep the coffee filters nested. Place them with the cup side down.

Fold the bottom edges of the mask up about an inch (approximately 2-3 cm). Fold the top edge about a half inch (or about 1 cm).

Then fold the top over another half inch. This will make the top part of the mask slightly stiffer so it will hold the bend over your nose better.

Place the ribbon in the top and bottom troughs formed by the folded edges of the coffee filters. Tape the folded edges of the filters down to hold the ribbon in place.

Loop the ribbon over one ear and tie the free ends of the ribbon over the other ear to hold the mask in place over your face. Use a vertical piece of tape on the mask over each cheek to fit the mask to your face once you have put it on.

This mask will not stop lone viruses from getting through because the coffee filter is too porous. It will tend to block large droplets from coughing or sneezing. Droplets can contain huge numbers of viruses and be very infectious.

This mask is not nearly as good as a surgical mask, but better than nothing. It is much easier to wear a mask like this than to walk around holding a tissue in front of your face.

I found that I am sensitive to the odor of cheap masking tape but the cellophane tape was OK for me. Masks should be tested at home for comfort and allergens before trying to use them.

The coffee filters should be thrown away after the mask in used. Washing hands with soap and warm water will destroy the virus, so it is important to wash your hands after handling used masks. The roll of ribbon was 47 cents so this is not too expensive, but I plan on removing the ribbons and washing them in hot, soapy water to use again.

These coffee filter masks are easy to make, fit fairly comfortably and do not require sewing skills. Paper towels could probably be used to make masks but I do not use paper towels and am not about to brave the stores to wrestle other customers for the last roll. This virus can be destroyed by soap and water, acid and/or heat. It generally only survives a day or two on paper. If you cannot get enough coffee filters, leaving the mask in a hot car for a day should kill this virus. The hot-car treatment would not necessarily kill other germs that might be on the mask though.

[Apr 15, 2020] Covid-19 Research Updates- Chinese Study Reveals That Hypokalemia Present In Almost All Covid-19 Patients - Thailand Medical News

Apr 15, 2020 | www.thailandmedical.news

Covid-19 Research Updates: Chinese Study Reveals That Hypokalemia Present In Almost All Covid-19 Patients Source: Covid-19 Research Mar 09, 2020 1 month ago Covid-19 Research : A new research study by researchers from Wenzhou Medical University in Zhejiang province lead by Dr Don Chen revealed that almost all Covid-19 patients exhibited hypokalemia and that supplementation with potassium ions was one of the many factors that assisted in their recovery.

Hypokalemia is best described as low level of potassium (K+) ions in the blood serum. Mild low potassium does not typically cause symptoms. Symptoms may include feeling tired, leg cramps, weakness, and constipation. Low potassium also increases the risk of an abnormal heart rhythm, which is often too slow and can cause cardiac arrest.

It was found that as the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus attacks human cells via the ACE2 (Angiotensin- converting enzyme-2) receptors, it also attacks the renin–angiotensin system (RAS), causing low electrolyte levels in particularly potassium ions.

The study involving 175 patients in collaboration with Wenzhou Hospital found that almost all patients exhibited hypokalemia and for those who already had hypokalemia, the situation even drastically worsened as the disease progressed.

However, it was found from the study that patients responded well to potassium ion supplements and had a better chance of recovery.

The researchers noted that the end of urine K+ loss indicates a good prognosis and may be a reliable as a sensitive biomarker directly reflecting the end of adverse effect on RAS system.

The study has yet to be peer reviewed and has been published in the open platform medRvix : ( https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.27.20028530v1.full.pdf+html )

However, doctors at various hospitals in Wuhan, Shanghai and Guangdong have witnessed similar occurrences and also found that potassium ion supplementation helped patients towards recovery.

For the latest on Covid-19 research developments, keep checking at: Thailand Medical News

[Apr 15, 2020] Pretty ingeniou shopital trick: DIY Isopod with Negative Pressure and Air Scrubber

80% of infections happen in families when one member of the family became sick. Can be used in families with infected people. See also COVID-19 virus self isolation quarantine room at home using HEPA air filtration
Apr 15, 2020 | www.youtube.com

There are redymade isolation pods as well What does a Coronavirus isolation pod look like- - YouTube


0:24 / 7:28

ht="100%" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 36 36" width="100%">

ht="100%" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 36 36" width="100%">

ht="100%" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 36 36" width="100%">

ht="100%" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 36 36" width="100%"> DIY Isopod with Negative Pressure and Air Scrubber 4,917 views • Mar 25, 2020 93 0 SHARE SAVE HNMC Media 803 subscribers SUBSCRIBE How to make rooms negative pressure by using construction scrubbers with HEPA filters, and a DIY isopod using materials available in a local hardware store. If you would like to see a sample of these isopods - We will have one on display at Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck, NJ 07666. Please email Steve Mosser to review [email protected]

[Apr 13, 2020] Thoughts on the Gautret et al. paper about Hydroxychloroquine and Azithromycin treatment of COVID-19 infections

See also ISAC shares concerns about the Hydroxychloroquine and Azithromycin paper
Apr 13, 2020 | scienceintegritydigest.com
  1. Maisonneuve says: March 25, 2020 at 1:30 am Hello,
    This analysis is well done, as it's a very poor paper with plenty of conflicts of interests. The French context goes beyond the article. Too many non-scientists, mainly politicians, give opinions on radios and televisions. A well-known politician from Nice (Estrosi) took chloroquine for his coronavirus. He was cured in a few days without hospitalization.

    He gave interviews to explain that chloroquine was effective he is not the only politician with a media opinion on this treatment. Politicians and pseudo-science journalists comment on D Raoult's excellence, based only on the number of publications.

    In March 2020, D Raoult co-signed 5 papers in the International Journal of Antimicrobiol Agents ..

    There are too many fights in France about this publication, and the message that it is bad is not heard by the media.
    I suggest to read the 2012 D Raoult portrait in Science entitled 'Sound and fury in the microbiology lab'

    https://science.sciencemag.org/content/335/6072/1033.long

    Bonne journée
    Hervé Maisonneuve, MD, Paris

[Apr 13, 2020] American health care, as we call it today, and for all its high-tech miracles, has evolved into one of the most atrocious rackets the world has ever seen. By racket, I mean an enterprise organized explicitly to make money dishonestly by James Howard Kunstler

Highly recommended!
Apr 13, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com,

The ruins of Mary McClellan Hospital stand on hill overlooking the village of Cambridge, New York, in what was a "flyover" corner of the country until the planes stopped flying. The hospital cornerstone was laid July 4 1917. The USA had entered the war against Germany a few months earlier. The "Spanish" flu pandemic kicked off in January, 1918. The hospital opened in January 1919. The flu burned out a year later. The hospital shut down for good in 2003.

I've lived around here for decades and never actually got a look at the place until I went up there on a blustery spring Saturday before Easter to look around. I like to read landscapes and the human imprint upon them. This one is a ghost story, not just of the bygone souls who came and went here, but of an entire society, the nation that we used to be and stopped being not so long ago.

This is the old main building today. It's astounding how quickly buildings begin to rot when the human life within them is gone. The style was Beaux Arts Institutional, seen everywhere across America in that period in schools, libraries, museums, and hospitals, an austere neoclassicism that radiated decorum in a confident and well-run society ­– because that is what we were then. Note especially, the entrance and the beautiful bronze marquee above it. The message is this: You enter through a portal of beauty to a place of hope and trust.

This is Mary McClellan Hospital not long after it opened.

The site itself, on its hill, with views east across the state line to the Green Mountains, speaks of authority and command.

The America of 1919 was a deeply hierarchical society. Today we regard hierarchy as a bane and a curse. The truth is, it is absolutely required if you expect to live in a well-run society, and proof of that is the disordered mess of bureaucratic irresponsibility we live in today, with virtually every institution failing – well before the Covid-19 virus arrived on the scene - and nobody called to account for anything anymore.

Hierarchy must be fit to scale to function successfully. In small institutions like this, everybody knows who is responsible for what. That's what makes authority credible.

These are the ruins of the nursing school associated with the hospital (and also associated with Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, 25 miles west).

The nurses lived here, in Florence Nightingale Hall.

In the early 20th century, the profession favored young, unmarried women whose allegiance and attention to the patients would not be distracted by the needs of a family.

Was that exploitation? Or was it simply an intelligent way to organize a hospital subculture? The nurses lived here very comfortably. The institution cared for them, literally.

There's no record available of what exactly these buildings were for. The one in the foreground has a cut stone sign that says "The Junior" on it. I infer that this may have been where a couple of young, staff, resident physicians lived, young men probably, just out of their internships, close at hand and on-call for emergencies. The building in the background is a rather grand country cottage, possibly the residence of the chief surgeon or the hospital director. The hospital was, after all, a community unto itself, and it was important that authority have a visible presence there all the time. Both buildings display architectural grace-notes that humanized and dignify that resident authority. We no longer believe in grace-notes for the things we build, so is it surprising that we live in a graceless society?

This is the power plant for the whole operation, on the premises, ensuring that the electricity would stay on at all times. In the early 20th century, electric power was the new sine qua non of advanced civilization. America's rural electrification program really didn't get underway until the 1930s, so it's likely that many of the farms outside the village were not hooked up to a grid. The hospital generators must have been driven by coal, or perhaps oil. Somebody had to attend to all that machinery. The laundry ­– hospitals produce a lot of that – was also on-premises, as was all the meal preparation. The hospital maintained a large garden to furnish some of the food. All these tasks required crews of people working purposefully and getting paid. The hospital was a complex organism, a world within a nation within a world.

Things rise and self-organize beautifully into fully-formed systems and after while they run down, even while they over-grow; authority starts working more and more for its own sake and its own benefit; hierarchy breaks down into disrespect, lack of trust, fear; and then society loses its vital institutions, which is exactly what happened at Mary McClellan Hospital in little Cambridge, New York.

It dwindled and then quickly collapsed. The town lost a part of itself, the part that welcomed people in a particular kind of trouble and cared for them, as it cared for those who did the caring. By the way, in 1919, a private room was $7-a-day (a bed on a ward was $3). Imagine that! The town also lost a vital component of its economy. And that was all of-a-piece with its decline into the flyover place it became in our time.

American health care, as we call it today, and for all its high-tech miracles, has evolved into one of the most atrocious rackets the world has ever seen. By racket, I mean an enterprise organized explicitly to make money dishonestly. This is what we've become, and the fact that we seem to be okay with that tells you more about what we have become. The advent of Covid-19, along with the extreme economic disorders it has triggered, will probably be the beginning of the end of that racket. We have no idea how medicine will re-organize itself, but I'd guess that it will happen at a much more primitive scale ­– because that's usually what happens when human societies overshoot badly. Alas, history is not exactly symmetrical.

But read these photos and meditate on what we were once capable of putting together in this land, and maybe you will find some clues about what was truly admirable about the American condition before we stopped caring.

[Apr 13, 2020] China Cancels Gilead Study

Apr 13, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Beijing had shut down a branch of its closely watched global remdesivir that was studying patients in 'severe' condition in Wuhan. After showing early promise, the study was allegedly shuttered by the government because there weren't enough patients who qualified.

[Apr 13, 2020] Doctors Fear Coronavirus Survivors May Have Lasting Damage To Multiple Organs

Apr 13, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

For the sickest patients, infection with the new coronavirus is proving to be a full-body assault, causing damage well beyond the lungs. And even after patients who become severely ill have recovered and cleared the virus, physicians have begun seeing evidence of the infection's lingering effects .

In a study posted this week, scientists in China examined the blood test results of 34 COVID-19 patients over the course of their hospitalization. In those who survived mild and severe disease alike, the researchers found that many of the biological measures had "failed to return to normal." - Los Angeles Times

One alarming observation have been test results indicating that recovered patients continue to have impaired liver function after patients had been cleared for discharge.

Another concern from cardiologists are the immediate effects of COVID-19 on the heart , raising questions over how long the damage may last. As the Times notes, "In an early study of COVID-19 patients in China, heart failure was seen in nearly 12% of those who survived, including in some who had shown no signs of respiratory distress. "

Heart damage can easily occur when the lungs cannot deliver sufficient oxygen to the body, however when this happens without respiratory distress, "doctors have to wonder whether they have underestimated COVID-19's ability to wreak lasting havoc," according to the report.

"COVID-19 is not just a respiratory disorder," according to Yale cardiologist Dr. Harlan Krumholtz, who added "It can affect the heart, the liver, the kidneys, the brain, the endocrine system and the blood system."

Of course, there are no long-term survivors of the disease - which was unknown to mainstream science less than five months ago. Even its first victims in China are just over three months removed from their ordeal, while physicians swamped with the ongoing pandemic have been too busy treating critical patients to closely monitor the some 370,000 patients classified as 'recovered.'

Still, doctors are worried that in its wake, some organs whose function has been knocked off kilter will not recover quickly, or completely . That could leave patients more vulnerable for months or years to come.

" I think there will be long-term sequelae ," said Yale cardiologist Dr. Joseph Brennan , using the medical term for a disease's downstream effects.

"I don't know that for real," he cautioned. "But this disease is so overwhelming" that some of the recovered are likely to face ongoing health concerns , he said. - Los Angeles Times

Meanwhile, questions have emerged over whether COVID-19 actually leaves the body - possibly lying dormant for years only to re-emerge later in a different form.

Several viruses already do this such as chicken pox - which can come back as shingles, and hepatitis B, which can cause liver cancer years after the primary infection clears up. Ebola is another example - hiding in the vitreous fluid of victims' eyeballs in some cases, causing blindness or impaired vision in 40% of survivors.

Of course, then there's the lungs - which the novel coronavirus tends to target first. In another closely related coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), around 1/3 of recovered patients had impaired lung function after three years - though they largely resolved over the next 15 years. And, 1/3 of those who survived Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) had permanent scarring of the lungs known as fibrosis.

According to a mid-March publication which tracked a dozen COVID-19 patients discharged from a Hong Kong hospital, two or three reported having difficulties with activities they had no problem performing in the past.

Dr. Owen Tsang Tak-yin, director of infectious diseases at Princess Margaret Hospital in Hong Kong, told reporters that some patients "might have around a drop of 20 to 30% in lung function" after their recovery.

Citing the history of lasting lung damage in SARS and MERS patients, a team led by UCLA radiologist Melina Hosseiny is recommending that patients who have recovered from COVID-19 get follow-up lung scans "to evaluate long-term or permanent lung damage including fibrosis."

As doctors try to assess organ damage after COVID-19 recovery, there's a key complication: Patients with disorders that affect the heart, liver, blood and lungs face a higher risk of becoming very sick with COVID-19 in the first place . That makes it difficult to distinguish COVID-19 after-effects from the problems that made patients vulnerable to begin with -- especially so early in the game. - Los Angeles Times

And while doctors and researchers are still discovering COVID-19's secrets, what they do know is that when patients show signs of infection, several organ systems are affected - and that when one begins to fail, others often follow. This is all wrapped in an inflammatory response, which can pry "plaques and clots from the walls of blood vessels and causing strokes, heart attacks and venous embolisms," according to the report.

Dr. Krumholtz, the cardiologist, says the infection can cause damage to the heart and the sac which encases it, causing heart failure and arrhythmias in some patients during the acute phase. This means that former COVID-19 patients can become lifelong cardiology patients after they 'recover' from the primary illness.

What's worse, blood abnormalities that can make clots more likely can persist as well.

In a case report published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine, Chinese doctors described a patient with severe COVID-19, clots evident in several parts of his body, and immune proteins called antiphospholipid antibodies .

A hallmark of an autoimmune disease called antiphospholipid syndrome , these antibodies sometimes occur as a passing response to an infection. But sometimes they linger, causing dangerous blood clots in the legs, kidneys, lungs and brain. In pregnant women, antiphospholipid syndrome also can result in miscarriage and stillbirth. - Los Angeles Times

Yale's Dr. Brennan says that at the end of the day, we just don't have enough data to make a long term prognosis for coronavirus patients.

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[Apr 13, 2020] The Whistle-giver: the story of Ai Fen, the director of the emergency department of Wuhan Central Hospital

Highly recommended!
Apr 13, 2020 | scienceintegritydigest.com

Whistler-Riptide

The text message from Ai Fen (艾芬), the director of the emergency department of Wuhan Central Hospital, agreeing to be interviewed, was sent at 5 am on March 1. About half an hour later, at 5.32 am on March 1, her colleague and director of thyroid and breast surgery Jiang Xueqing, who was infected with new coronavirus pneumonia, died. Two days later, Mei Zhongming, deputy director of ophthalmology at the hospital, died. He and Li Wenliang were in the same department.

As of March 9, 2020, 4 members of the medical staff of Wuhan Central Hospital have died of new coronavirus pneumonia infection. Since the outbreak, this hospital, located just a few kilometers away from the Huanan Seafood Market, has become one of the hospitals in Wuhan with the largest number of employees that are infected. According to media reports, more than 200 employees in the hospital were infected, including three deputy deans and multiple working department directors. Multiple department directors are currently being maintained with ECMO [extracorporeal membrane oxygenation].

The shadow of death hangs over this, Wuhan's largest tertiary hospital. A doctor told People [a news site – EB] that in the social media group of hospital staff, almost no one spoke publicly; they mourned and discussed in private.

This tragedy could have been prevented. On December 30, 2019, Ai Fen received a virus test report for a patient with an unknown pneumonia. She circled the word "SARS coronavirus" in red. When asked by a college classmate who is also a doctor, she took a picture of the report and circulated it. That night, the report spread in doctor circles in Wuhan, and those who forwarded the report included the eight doctors who were disciplined by the police.

This caused trouble for Ai Fen. As the original source of the information, she was interviewed by the hospital disciplinary committee and suffered an "unprecedented and severe reprimand"; it was said that she was acting unprofessionally by creating false rumors (谣).

In the afternoon of March 2nd, Ai Fen did an interview with People in the Nanjing Road location of Wuhan Central Hospital. She was sitting alone in the emergency room office. The emergency department, which had been admitting more than 1,500 patients a day, had returned to quiet. There was only one tramp lying in the emergency hall.

Some previous reports called Ai Fen "another severely reprimanded female doctor who has emerged" and some people called her a "whistleblower". Ai Fen corrected this; she said she was not a whistleblower, but the one who distributed the "whistles".

During the interview, Ai Fen mentioned the word "regret" several times, and said she deeply regretted that she hadn't continued to whistle resoundingly after she was reprimanded at a disciplinary review meeting. She has especial regrets when it comes to her deceased coworkers. "If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn't care about the pressure (from my leader), and I would [expletive] speak everywhere, all right?"

What have Wuhan Central Hospital and Ai Fen experienced in the past two months or so? The following is what Ai Fen told us:

An unprecedented reprimand

On December 16, last year, we received a patient at the Nanjing Road emergency department. They had an inexplicably high fever, and they weren't responding to standard medications, their body temperature wasn't going down at all. On the 22nd, the patient was transferred to the respiratory department, a bronchoscopy was done, and bronchoalveolar fluid taken and sent out for high-throughput genetic sequencing. Afterwards, the coronavirus result was relayed verbally. At that time, the colleague who was responsible for the patient told me clearly: "Director [主任] Ai, that person's diagnosis is coronavirus". Later we learned that the patient worked in the Huanan Seafood Market.

Immediately afterwards, December 27th, another patient arrived at Nanjing Road. He was the nephew of a doctor in our department. He was in his 40s, without any preexisting conditions. His lungs were in a terrible state, and his blood oxygen saturation was only 90%. He was under hospital care for almost 10 days without any improvement, and was admitted to the respiratory department. A flexible bronchoscopy was also done, and the alveolar lavage fluid sent for testing.

At noon on December 30th, an old classmate at Tongji (同济) Hospital sent me a screenshot of a WeChat conversation, which said: "You don't want to go to Huanan [Market] just now, there are lots of people with high fever " He asked if it was true. At the time, I was watching a CT [scan] of a typical patient with pulmonary infection on the computer. I sent him a 11-second video of the CT and told him it was a patient who had come to our emergency department in the morning, a Huanan Seafood Market case.

Just after 4 pm that day, a colleague showed me a diagnostic report that said: "SARS coronavirus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, 46 strains of bacteria [菌, bacteria and/or fungi] which colonize the oral cavity and/or respiratory tract". I read the report very carefully many times, and the supplementary information read: "SARS coronavirus is a single-stranded positive-strand RNA virus. The main mode of transmission of the virus is close-range droplet transmission or contact with respiratory secretions of patients, which can cause an unusual pneumonia that is highly contagious and can affect multiple organ systems, also known as atypical pneumonia."

At the time, the diagnostic report scared me, I broke into a cold sweat, this was a terrifying thing. The patient was admitted to the respiratory department, the situation needed to be reported to the respiratory department, but to ensure attention, I immediately phoned and reported it to the hospital's public health division and infectious disease [?院感] division. At that moment, the director of the respiratory department of our hospital happened to be passing my office door, someone who had been involved with SARS. I grabbed the director and said, "We found this in one of the patients in your department." The director took one look and said it was worrying. I knew the matter was worrying.

After calling the hospital, I also circulated this report to my fellow-learners (同学[; student or former classmate]). I purposely drew a red circle around the words "SARS coronavirus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, 46 strains of bacteria [菌, bacteria and/or fungi] which colonize the oral cavity and/or respiratory tract" to bring the warning to their attention. I also sent the report to the doctors in the department to warn everyone to take precautions.

That evening, the message was spread widely; the screenshots of the transmission show the photos of the report I'd marked with a red circle, including the ones that I later learned that Li Wenliang passed on to the [chat] group. At the time, I was thinking it might be bad. At 10:20, the hospital passed on a message [reportedly on the Central Hospital WeChat group]. It was a relayed notification from the city Health Protection Committee (市卫健委). Their main point was that information on the pneumonia of unknown cause should not be arbitrarily released, to avoid causing panic among the public; if panic was caused by information leakage, there would be a thorough investigation (要追责).

I was very scared at the time and immediately passed this information on to my fellow-learners. About an hour later, the hospital sent another notice, again stressing that information the group had on this subject could not be leaked. One day later, at 11:46 pm on January 1st, the head of the hospital's disciplinary inspection committee sent me a message to come [for an employee review] the next morning.

I didn't fall asleep that night, I was worried and thought things through over and over again, but I felt that there are always two sides to everything; even if it had caused adverse effects, it was not necessarily a bad thing to remind medical staff in Wuhan to take precautions. At 8 o'clock the next morning, before I finished the shift, I was called in for the disciplinary review.

In that disciplinary review, I suffered an unprecedented and very severe reprimand.

At that time, the leader of the discussion said, "We can't afford to raise our heads when we go out for a meeting. The director of XX criticizes our hospital. As the director of the emergency department of Wuhan Central Hospital, you are a professional, how can there be this lack of principle, this lack of organizational discipline, this creating and spreading of false rumours (谣)?" This is the original sentence. So I should go back to the 200-odd people in the department to convey the news to them verbally, one by one; we can't send information by WeChat or SMS, we can only talk face-to-face or call, we can't say anything about this pneumonia, "you can't even tell your own husband", they said

I was utterly stunned. I hadn't been criticized for not working hard, but made to feel that what I'd done had ruined Wuhan's prospects and its future. I felt strong depair. I am a serious and hard-working person. I felt that everything I had done was in accordance with the rules and well-founded. What did I do wrong? After I read the lab result, I had also reported it to the hospital. My students and my colleagues had communicated among ourselves about how to handle the condition of a patient, we hadn't given out any of the patient's personal information; this is equivalent to discussing a medical case among medical students. As a clinical doctor, I already knew that a very important virus had been found in patients. When other doctors asked, how could you not say so? This is your instinct as a doctor, right? What did I do wrong? I have done what a doctor and a person should normally do. I think anyone would do the same.

I was very emotional at the time, saying that I had done this, and it had nothing to do with the rest of the people; you can just arrest me and jail me. I said that I was not suitable to continue to work in this position, and I wanted to take a break. The leader did not agree, saying that this was the time to test me.

I went home that night, I remember it quite clearly, I told my husband just after I walked in the door, if something goes wrong, you must care for and raise the child -- because my second treasure is still very young, only just over 1 year old. At the time, my husband was perplexed by this. I didn't explain.

On January 20th, after Zhong Nanshan [prominent Chinese epidemiologist] told people [about the epidemic], I told my husband what had happened that day. In the interim, I just warned my family not to go to crowded places, and to wear surgical face masks when going out.

Peripheral departments

Many people worried that I was among the eight people who were admonished [by police]. In fact, I wasn't warned by the Public Security Bureau. Later, a good friend asked me, are you a whistleblower? I said that I am not a whistleblower, I am the one who sent the whistle.

But that disciplinary review hit me hard, it affected me very severely. When I came back, I could see that everyone's morale had collapsed. We had been working with such drive and dedication, and doing our jobs conscientiously. Everyone kept asking me questions, and I couldn't answer.

All I could do was get the emergency department to focus on protection. We have over 200 people in the emergency department. From January 1st, I asked everyone to strengthen their protection. Everyone must wear masks, hats, and use gloves (用手快消). I remember one day, there was a nurse who did not wear a mask during the shift; I scolded him then and there, saying "Don't come to work without a mask in the future".

On January 9th, while off-shift, I saw a patient coughing on the pre-examination table. From that day on, I asked everyone to put a mask on both the patient and on anyone seeing the patient, one for each person; I said, don't try to save money at this time. At the time, they were still telling us that there was no human-to-human transmission, and I want to emphasize here that wearing a mask to strengthen protection was a big issue.

That time was really depressing and very painful. Some doctors proposed wearing and out layer of isolation clothing. The hospital's internal operations committee (医院里开会) said they wouldn't allow it; they said that wearing isolation clothing would cause panic. I asked the people in the department to wear an isolation gown inside a white coat. This was out-of-specification and ridiculous.

We watched more and more patients arrive, as the radius of the infection area became larger and larger. At first, they might be connected to the Huanan Seafood Market; then it spread, and the radius became larger and larger. Many of the cases were family-transmitted. Among the first seven people, there was a case of infection in which the mother had given the son food. The clinic [dispensary? 诊所] boss got sick, infected by the patients who came for injections. It was very serious, whether they got infected or not. I knew there must be human-to-human transmission. If there was no human-to-human transmission, well, the Huanan Seafood Market had been closed on January 1, so why were there more and more patients?

I often thought, if only they hadn't reprimanded me like that, if they'd asked for details calmly, and then asked other respiratory experts to communicate with them, maybe the situation would be better, and I could at least communicate a bit more in the hospital. If everyone had been as alert on January 1, there would not be so many tragedies.

On the afternoon of January 3, in the Nanjing Road Hospital, doctors of urology gathered to review the work of the senior director, 43-year-old Dr. Hu Weifeng (胡卫峰), who is now in emergency care; on the afternoon of January 8, the Nanjing Road Hospital Director [of thyroid and breast surgery] Jiang Xueqing (江学庆) also organized the first Wuhan City breast disease patient recovery get-together (武汉市甲乳患者康复联欢会), on the 22nd floor. On the morning of January 11, the department reported to me that Hu Ziwei (胡紫薇), a nurse in the emergency room of the emergency department, was infected. She'd be the first infected nurse in the central hospital. First-off, I called the Chief of the Medical Department to report it, and then the hospital held an emergency meeting. At the meeting we were instructed to change the report of "double lung infection, viral pneumonia?" to "scattered infection of both lungs" ("两下肺感染,病毒性肺炎?" to "两肺散在感染"). At the weekly meeting of January 16th, a deputy dean was still saying, "Everyone must have a little medical common sense, and certain senior doctors should not go about scaring people." Another leader spoke, and continued, "Human-to-human transmission is not possible; it can be prevented, treated and controlled." One day later, on January 17, Jiang Xueqing was hospitalized, and 10 days later he was intubated and put on ECMO.

The toll at the central hospital is so large, and it's connected to the lack of transparency for our medical staff. If you look at the people who fell ill, the emergency department and the respiratory department suffered less heavily, because we had a sense of the need for protection, and we knew we should quickly rest and get treatment as soon as we got sick. The worst cases are in the peripheral departments; Li Wenliang was an ophthalmologist, and Jiang Xueqing is a nail specialist.

Jiang Xueqing was really a very good person, with excellent medical skills. He held one of the two Chinese Physician Awards in the hospital. And yet we were neighbors, we were a unit; I'm located on the 40th floor, he was on the 30th floor, our working relationship was very good, but because I am too busy at work, I only met him during meetings and hospital activities. He was a workaholic, always either in the operating room or at the clinic. No one would go to tell him specifically, "Director Jiang, you have to pay attention and wear a mask". He didn't have the time and energy to inquire about these things, and he must have brushed it off with: "What's the matter? It's pneumonia." This was what people in that department told me.

If these doctors had been warned in time, perhaps this day wouldn't have come. So that's why, as one closely involved, I regret what I did. If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn't have cared about the reprimand, I would have [expletive] spoken of it everywhere, to everyone, wouldn't I?

Although I worked in the same hospital as Li Wenliang (李文亮) did before he died, I didn't know him, because the hospital had over 4,000 people on staff and was usually busy. The night before his death, the director of the ICU called me to borrow a cardiac press (心脏按压器; CPR device?) from the emergency department, and said it was Li Wenliang who was going to be resuscitated. The news shocked me. I do not understand everything that happened to Li Wenliang, but could his condition have been affected by his emotional state after being reprimanded? I have to ask, with my experience; I felt it myself.

Later, when things got to this point, it proved that Li Wenliang was right. I can understand his state of mind very easily. It could be my own. I don't feel excitement or happiness, but regret. Regret that I didn't continue to shout out loudly at the beginning, when people intervened and scolded us. I often find myself thinking, if only we could turn back time, and do it right.

Just surviving is good

On the night before the city was shut down on January 23, a friend from the relevant department called to ask me about the true situation of emergency patients in Wuhan. I said, are you asking in a private or public capacity? He said, private. [I said,] I will tell you the truth when I speak on my behalf: On January 21, our emergency department saw 1,523 patients, three times as many as usual, of which 655 had fever.

The situation in the emergency department during that time will never be forgotten by those who experienced it, it completely changes your outlook on life.

If this is a war, the emergency department is the front line. But at the time, the inpatient wards were saturated, and basically none of the patients were accepted, and the ICU was resolutely refused to accept them. They said that there were uninfected patients in them, and they became contaminated as soon as they entered. More patients kept rushing in to the emergency department, and the inpatient beds were not open, so they all piled up in the emergency department. Patients queued for a few hours to see a doctor. We couldn't take any time off work at all. There was no distinction between the fever clinic and the emergency department. The hall was full of patients. The emergency room, the IV room, everywhere was filled with patients.

Another patient's family came in, wanting a bed for their dad, who couldn't make it in from the car, because the underground garage was closed at the time, and the car couldn't get in. I couldn't do anything about that, but I ran to the car with people and equipment. I saw immediately that he was already dead. What can you say, it's very difficult to bear. The man died in the car, he didn't even get out of the car.

There was also an old man, his wife had just died at Jinyintan Hospital, her son and daughter were infected, and she was given an IV, her son-in-law was caring for her. As soon as I saw that she was very ill, I contacted the respiratory department to admit her to the hospital. Her son-in-law was obviously a cultured person. He came over and wished to thank the doctor and so on. As a result, she died. It only took a few seconds, but it was a delay of a few seconds. That quick "thank you" weighs heavily on me.

And yet there were many people who sent their families to the ward (监护室[; guardianship room]? in the sense of trustee), and that's the last time you'l see them, you'll never see them again.

I remember when I came to work on the morning of the Chinese New Year [Friday, January 24, 2020]. I said that we'd take a picture to commemorate the New Year. I also sent it to a circle of friends. No one wished anyone a happy new year that day. At the time, just surviving was good.

In the past, if you made a small mistake, for example, if you didn't give an injection in time, the patient might still be in trouble. Now there's no one, no one is to raise it with you, no-one is going to take issue with it. Everyone's overwhelmed by the sudden onslaught, we work blindly.

The patients died, and it was rare to see family members weeping and grieving, because there were too many, too many. Some family members didn't say "Doctor, please save my family", but said to the doctor, "Right, let's do this quickly"; it came to that. Everyone was afraid of being infected.

The queue at the fever clinic was 5 hours long, every day. A woman waiting in line collapsed, a woman in a leather coat, with a purse and high heels, very carefully dressed. A middle-aged woman; no one dared to step forward to help her, and she lay on the ground for a long time. I had to call the nurse and doctor to help her.

On the morning of January 30, I came to work. The son of a white-haired old man had died at the age of 32. He stared blankly at the doctor giving him the death certificate. There are no tears at all, how can one cry? There's no way to cry. From the style of his clothing, the old man might be a rural migrant worker, there's no way to be sure. Without a diagnosis, his son became a death certificate.

This is what I want to call for. The patients who died in the emergency department were all undiagnosed, and their causes of death could not be confirmed. After this epidemic has passed, I hope to give an explanation and give their families some comfort. Our patients wake compassion, a great deal of compassion.

"Lucky"

Having been a doctor for so many years, I always felt that no difficulty could overwhelm me, not with my experience and personality.

When I was nine, my father died of gastric cancer. At that time, I thought of growing up to be a doctor, to save the lives of others. Later, when I did my the college entrance examination, all my preferences were in medicine, and I finally got to go to Tongji Medical College. After graduating from medical college in 1997, I went to the Central Hospital. I previously worked in cardiovascular medicine, and I became the director of the emergency department in 2010.

I feel the emergency department is one of my children. I built it up, I nurtured a tight-knit group, which really doesn't make this situation easier, but it's what makes this group such a treasure; I really cherish this team.

A few days ago, one of my nurses sent a message to a friends group saying "I really miss the old big busy emergency department"; that kind of busy and this kind of busy are totally different concepts.

Before this epidemic hit, our emergency department dealt with myocardial infarctions, cerebral infarctions, gastrointestinal bleeding, trauma and so on. That kind of busy gives a sense of accomplishment, it has a clear purpose, there's a smooth flow of procedures for all the various types of patients. There are very mature procedures, there's not a single wasted step, what to do next is not a problem. But in this time there were so many critically ill patients whom we had no way to deal with and who couldn't be admitted to hospital, and our medical staff was still at risk. This kind of busyness is desperate, it's deeply distressing.

One day at 8 in the morning, a young doctor in our department sent me a WeChat, and it was quite personal, saying they wouldn't come to work that day, not well. Since what we do here, if someone is not well, they need to tell me about it in advance; if they tell me at 8 o'clock, where do I go to find someone? The doctor lost their temper with me in WeChat, and said that a large number of highly suspect cases were put back into the community by the emergency department I led. We understand that this is sin! I understand this person, because this is a doctor's professional ethics, but I was also anxious, and I said you can denounce me, but tell me, what would you do if you were the director of the emergency department?

Later, the doctor came back to work after a few days of rest. The doctor didn't say that they feared death or feared harm; no, they were affected the conditions; suddenly having to deal with so many patients at once, they felt utterly overwhelmed.

And the work of the medics, especially for the many medics who came to support us, it was psychologically unbearable. There were doctors and nurses in tears. Some were crying for others, others were crying for themselves, because no-one knows when it will be their turn to become infected.

Around mid-to-late January, the hospital's leaders also became ill, one after another, including our director of the office and three vice-presidents. The daughter of the Chief of Medical Services was also ill and resting at home. So basically there was no administration or management; you just had to fight there, that was the feeling.

The people around me also started to come down with it one by one. On January 18, at 8:30 in the morning, our first doctor collapsed, saying "I caught it just like the director did", no fever, did a CT first off, and the lungs had a lump of ground-glass opacification (坨磨玻璃). Not long after, the duty nurse in charge of the isolation ward told me they'd fallen ill. That night, our head nurse fell ill. My very real first feeling at that time was -- good luck, because falling ill early, you could get off the battlefield for a little bit.

I've been in close contact with these three people. I just work every day with the belief that I must fall ill. Everyone in the hospital thought I was a miracle. I've thought about it myself, perhaps it's because I have asthma and I'm using some inhaled hormones, perhaps it inhibits the deposition of these viruses in the lungs.

I've always felt that the people who work in the emergency department have feelings, too. In Chinese hospitals, the status of the emergency department is relatively low among the departments, because everyone thinks that the emergency department is nothing more than a route into the hospital, it just needs to admit patients. During this epidemic, this sort of neglect has always been present.

In the early days, they're weren't enough supplies. Sometimes the quality of the protective clothing assigned to the emergency department was very poor. I was angry when I saw that our nurses wore such clothes to work and spoke up about it in Zhouhui Qun [a WeChat group for MDs in that hospital]. After that, many directors gave me all the protective clothing they kept in their departments.

There were also problems with food. When there are many patients, the management gets confused. They simply can't think that the emergency department still has to have something to eat. Many departments had food and drink after shift changeover, they had a big spread, and here, we had nothing. In the fever clinic's WeChat group, doctors complained: "Our emergency department has only disposable diapers " We were the front-line response, and we had to deal with that sort of thing, sometimes it made me really angry.

Our team is really good. Everyone held the line, they were only off work when they were sick. More than 40 people in our emergency department were infected. I built a group of all the sick people, originally called the "Emergency Department Sick Group"(急诊生病群); the head nurse said that was unlucky, and changed it to "Emergency Department Re-energizing Group" (急诊加油群). Even the people who are sick weren't thinking in terms of despair or blame. They were all very positive, that is, everyone had the attitude that we needed to help one another to get thorough the crisis together.

These kids, these young people are very good, it's just that they, like me, have to live with feeling slighted. I hope that after this epidemic, the country will also increase its investment in emergency departments. In many countries' medical systems, the emergency department is highly valued.

Unattainable happiness

On February 17th, I received a WeChat message from the old classmate at Tongji Hospital. He said "Sorry" to me. I said: it's fortunate that you passed the message on and warned some people in time. If he hadn't passed it on, they might not have Li Wenliang and the eight others, but people would probably know less.

This time, we had the entire families of three female doctors get infected. Two female doctors had their father-in-law and mother-in-law infected, and their husbands, and another had her father, mother, sister, and husband infected, and five close relatives. Everyone thinks that the virus was discovered so early on, and yet this is the result, it caused us such great loss, took such a terrible toll.

It took this toll in many different ways, too. In addition to those who died, those who were sick also suffered.

In our "Emergency Department Re-energizing group", people often exchange physical conditions. Some people ask: a heart rate that's always 120 beats per minute, does it matter? Surely it matters, they panic as soon as they move. This will affect them for life, and is heart failure likely? It's hard to say. In the future, others will be able to go hiking and traveling, and they might not be able to, all that is possible.

And Wuhan. You said that our Wuhan is a lively place; now it's very, very quiet on the streets. Many things can't be bought and we have to support the whole country. A few days ago, a nurse of a medical team in Guangxi suddenly fell into a coma while at work, and was resucitated. Her heart restarted, but she is still in a coma. If she hadn't come to work, she could have had a good time at home, and this kind of thing wouldn't have happened. So, I think we owe everyone, really.

Having been through this epidemic, many people in the hospital have been hit hard. Several medical staff below me have thoughts of resignation, including some backbones of the department. Everyone's previous ideas, all the things everyone knows about this profession, they're are inevitably a little shaken -- it's that you work so hard, isn't it? Just like Jiang Xueqing, he worked too hard, he was too good to the patients, he was doing surgery every year during [Chinese] New Year. Today, someone sent a WeChat written by Jiang Xueqing's daughter, saying that her father's time was all given to his patients.

Myself, I've had countless thoughts of going back home to be a housewife. After the epidemic began, I basically didn't go home, I lived separately from my husband. My sister helped take care of my children at home. My second treasure didn't recognize me, didn't react to me when he saw me on video. I felt very lost. It wasn't easy for me to give birth to this second child. He was 10 kg at birth. I had to wean him abruptly -- when I made that decision, that was hard for me to do. My husband told me that these things happen in life, and you're not only a participant, you're also choosing to lead the team to fight this epidemic; that's also a very meaningful act, and when everything returns to normal for everyone, then you'll remember; it's a valuable experience to have had.

The leader (领导) talked to me on the morning of February 21st. Actually, I would have liked to ask a few questions, such as, do you think that that criticism was wrong that day? I hoped to be given an apology. But I dared not ask. No one said sorry to me on any occasion. I still feel that these events are an even clearer demonstation of why each person should stick to their own independent ideas, regardless, because if someone wants to stand up and tell the truth, there must be someone, and the world must hear a dissenting voice, right?

I'm Wuhanese, who doesn't love their own city? Now we remember what extravagant happiness we enjoyed in the most ordinary life. I now feel that holding the baby, going out to play with him on a slide, or going out to watch a movie with my husband, even things we never did all that often in the past, they are now all a kind of happiness, an unattainable happiness.

[Apr 13, 2020] How to Make (and Use) a Disinfectant Against Coronavirus

Apr 13, 2020 | www.nytimes.com

Complete disinfecting protocol includes four steps: Pre-cleaning, disinfecting (dwell time), wiping clean and rinsing with water. "But we're lucky if we get two," meaning dwell time and wipe-up, said Mark Warner, education manager at the Cleaning Management Institute, a provider of training and certification for professional cleaning services. Pre-cleaning is most important on heavily soiled surfaces, because dirt can shield pathogens underneath; it's fine to use soap and water or a household cleaner. Disinfecting for the proper dwell time, of course, is nonnegotiable. Wiping afterward is essential because disinfectants can leave a sticky residue where pathogens can quickly resettle. And rinsing finishes the process.

.... ... ...

Multiple sources give different bleach-to-water ratios for use with regular bleach. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that "unexpired bleach will be effective against coronaviruses" in a 1:48 solution (⅓ cup of bleach per gallon of water, or 4 teaspoons per quart). Clorox recommends a slightly stronger 1:32 ratio (½ cup per gallon or 2 tablespoons per quart). Mark Warner recommends a much stronger 1:10 ratio (about 1½ cups per gallon of water, or about ⅓ cup per quart). Some medical disinfectants are basically the same solution.

Whichever ratio you use, let it sit on the surface for 10 minutes: Warner told us that this is the Environmental Protection Agency's guideline for any new or unknown pathogen, and it is also the dwell time listed for the regular household bleaches on the E.P.A.'s List N, which means it is approved to eliminate the coronavirus when properly used.

Don't mix up more than you will use within a day or two. Bleach degrades fairly rapidly once taken from its original storage container, becoming less effective each day

[Apr 13, 2020] The danger of vaccines and Bill Gates activites

Apr 13, 2020 | caucus99percent.com

22 users have voted.

wendy davis on Sun, 04/12/2020 - 12:27pm

wooot!

via Gates Expert jacob levitch's twit account: April 09, 2020 , Gates' Globalist Vaccine Agenda: A Win-Win for Pharma and Mandatory Vaccination , RFK, Jr, Chairman, Children's Health Defense

[hope you won't mind if i paste it all in, CB.]

'Vaccines, for Bill Gates, are a strategic philanthropy that feed his many vaccine-related businesses (including Microsoft's ambition to control a global vaccination ID enterprise) and give him dictatorial control of global health policy.
Gates' obsession with vaccines seems to be fueled by a conviction to save the world with technology.

Promising his share of $450 million of $1.2 billion to eradicate Polio, Gates took control of India's National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (NTAGI) which mandated up to 50 doses (Table 1) of polio vaccines through overlapping immunization programs to children before the age of five. Indian doctors blame the Gates campaign for a devastating non-polio acute flaccid paralysis (NPAFP) epidemic that paralyzed 490,000 children beyond expected rates between 2000 and 2017. In 2017, the Indian government dialed back Gates' vaccine regimen and asked Gates and his vaccine policies to leave India. NPAFP rates dropped precipitously.

In 2017, the World Health Organization (WHO) reluctantly admitted that the global explosion in polio is predominantly vaccine strain. [?] The most frightening epidemics in Congo, Afghanistan, and the Philippines, are all linked to vaccines. In fact, by 2018, 70% of global polio cases were vaccine strain.

In 2014, the Gates Foundation funded tests of experimental HPV vaccines, developed by Glaxo Smith Kline (GSK) and Merck, on 23,000 young girls in remote Indian provinces. Approximately 1,200 suffered severe side effects, including autoimmune and fertility disorders. Seven died. Indian government investigations charged that Gates-funded researchers committed pervasive ethical violations: pressuring vulnerable village girls into the trial, bullying parents, forging consent forms, and refusing medical care to the injured girls. The case is now in the country's Supreme Court.

In 2010, the Gates Foundation funded a phase 3 trial of GSK's experimental malaria vaccine, killing 151 African infants and causing serious adverse effects including paralysis, seizure, and febrile convulsions to 1,048 of the 5,949 children.
During Gates' 2002 MenAfriVac campaign in Sub-Saharan Africa, Gates' operatives forcibly vaccinated thousands of African children against meningitis. Approximately 50 of the 500 children vaccinated developed paralysis. South African newspapers complained, "We are guinea pigs for the drug makers." Nelson Mandela's former Senior Economist, Professor Patrick Bond, describes Gates' philanthropic practices as "ruthless and immoral."

... ... ...

In addition to using his philanthropy to control WHO, UNICEF, GAVI, and PATH, Gates funds a private pharmaceutical company that manufactures vaccines, and additionally is donating $50 million to 12 pharmaceutical companies to speed up development of a coronavirus vaccine. In his recent media appearances, Gates appears confident that the Covid-19 crisis will now give him the opportunity to force his dictatorial vaccine programs on American children.'

[Apr 12, 2020] When total morbidity statistics are sorted out we qill find that there is no excess morbidity, no pandemic, just reclassification of causes of death

Apr 12, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

skeptic23 , Apr 11 2020 17:25 utc | 191

will see about this "pandemic" when total morbidity statistics are sorted out...no excess morbidity, no pandemic, just reclassification of causes of death, viz. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=207&v=V0lIWZpiRU0&feature=emb_logo There is no reliable data on Covid19, but everybody "knows" what is going on 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/

[Apr 12, 2020] Tolstoy advice that is useful in regina of self-isolation

Apr 12, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Bruce , Apr 12 2020 13:39 utc | 10

"If, then, I were asked for the most important advice I could give, that which I considered to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you." Leo Tolstoy

[Apr 12, 2020] Coronavirus in NY: Nurses working in dangerous conditions demand PPE from Cuomo by Carl Campanile and Isabel Vincent

Does Cuomo really need those 17K ventilators he ordered from China ?
Apr 11, 2020 | nypost.com
Enlarge Image NYPD officers give out food and beverages to working nurses and doctors at Montefiore Hospital. Richard Harbus More On: Coronavirus in NY Business analysts see potential summer recovery for economy Now is not the time to play the partisan blame game over coronavirus: Goodwin Act of Car-trition: Church offers drive-thru confession amid pandemic Race and coronavirus: There are no easy answers New York State nurses and other hospital workers are being exposed to "dangerous working conditions" amid the coronavirus pandemic because of "critical shortages" of personal protective gear , and they want "urgent action" from Gov. Andrew Cuomo to provide them with the equipment they need.

That's the message in a blistering April 11 letter sent by the New York State Nurses Association's director to Howard Zucker, the state health commissioner, obtained by The Post.

The letter contradicts comments made by Melissa de Rosa, secretary to Gov. Cuomo, at a press briefing last week, in which she said that hospitals were receiving stockpiled PPE equipment and that no health care facilities in the state would have to resort to "crisis conservation."

That means the reusing of masks, hospital gowns and other equipment meant to guard against the spread of COVID-19.

"At this point most hospitals and nursing homes in the New York City metropolitan area, which is the national epicenter of the pandemic, continue to operate under 'crisis conservation' standards because they do not have enough PPE to distribute to our desperate staff," wrote Patricia Kane, the executive director of the Nurses Association, the union which represents 42,000 frontline nurses in the state.

Enlarge Image Nurses at Mount Sinai West wearing garbage bags
Nurses at Mount Sinai West wearing garbage bags as PPEs. Criselle Cruz Bermas

In the letter, Kane went on to describe "widespread" crisis protocols for re-using scarce protective equipment.

She described how N95 masks are only being used by nurses and other staff in ICUs and the masks, designed for one-time use, must be recycled for up to five days before being discarded.

She described how the delay of delivery of PPEs to many hospitals have forced health care workers to collect and re-sterilize used PPE equipment which would be discarded under normal circumstances.

see also PPE maker 3M sues New Jersey company for falsely claiming affiliation Personal protective equipment manufacturer 3M says a New Jersey company...

"If the state is in possession of stockpiles of PPE, they should be immediately distributed to our facilities so that our nurses and other staff can provide can provide care for patients under safe conditions," Kane said.

"We urge you to treat this matter with the urgency that the situation warrants and act to protect the safety and lives of the nurses and other direct care workers on the front lines of this fight.

"Our nurses do not need expressions of appreciation and promises. They need to see ample supplies of PPE on their units."

[Apr 12, 2020] It is possible that the virus attack hemoglobin and ventilators are more harmful then useful

The guy claims that this is oxygen insufficiency and ventilator can cause ARDS.
Notable quotes:
"... COVID actually attacks hemoglobin causing hypoxia in the lungs ..."
Apr 12, 2020 | www.youtube.com

M , 6 hours ago

Question: Why the hell do all of you in the comments assume this guy is right, and literally every SINGLE other doctor and physician is wrong? Just because he's contradicting the consensus? He hasn't presented a shred of evidence apart from his "theories". How likely is it that literally nobody else agrees with him? Essentially zero. Why are you all jumping on this? Cause of some insane conspiracy that every physician in the world is part of some conspiracy to lie to you?

CaptTurbo , 2 days ago

The virus is attaching to the hemoglobin, breaking the iron free so the red blood cells can't carry oxygen. This guy is on the right track!

Richard Duarte , 1 day ago (edited) div tabindex="0" role

="article"> RT here. I'd consider using an esophageal balloon catheter and adjusting vent settings according to transpulmonary pressures. A lot of places are using ARDSnet protocol and this is a great start, but transpulmonary pressure monitoring is really the next step up to achieving optimal and safe ventilator settings. I have a high suspicion that if you place a balloon in a patient on ARDSnet setting, their PEEP would be suboptimal and their transpulmonary pressure will be negative, suggesting alveolar collapse with every breath, leading to atelectrauma and lung injury. I've had patients in APRV, placed a balloon and switched back to conventional ventilation with balloon guided settings, and have drastic improvements in both oxygenation and ventilation. Increasing PEEP to achieve PtpExp 0-5 to avoid alveolar collapse and adjusting tidal volumes/inspiratory pressures to maintain PtpInsp(Driving Pressure) <15 to avoid overdistention.

Will Kelly , 1 day ago

div>I tentatively suggest it may be worth researching Viagra as a possible treatment - Viagra causes the blood to flow more freely and more oxygen flow in the body - Viagra is commonly used by high altitude climbers to help them combat the severe lack of oxygen at high altitude - see my previous comments. Maybe Viagra could help get desperately needed oxygen in to the blood of Covid 19 patients and help save lives. It's definitely worth considering - as it is an existing approved drug that could easily be re-appropriated without lengthy clinical trials. At this point we have nothing to loose - if Viagra could possibly help, then it is tentatively worth looking in to. (Possibly Coca leaves too - as they are also used to help the body uptake oxygen at high altitude where there is very little oxygen - but I suppose Coca leaves would never get official approval) I would be very interested to hear peoples thoughts. Please read my previous comment for more info. Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Elizabeth Mitchell , 1 day ago (edited)

iv>Looks like the Covid19 has at least 3 stages of progression: Stage 1: fever, cough, diarrhea, headache, within 7-10 days of infection Stage 2: as disease gets deeper into the lungs, shortness of breath, low levels of oxygen by approximately day 11-15 days. At this point the Respirators helps patients Stage 3: at about 3 weeks. The patients are very sick, acute respiratory distress, shock, cardiac failure and death. Most probable, they are experiencing the effects of the 'Cytokine storm' due to the viral overload, and a massive release of cytokines, causing serious damage to the lungs, loss of lung function and fatal outcome.

GT380man , 2 days ago div class="comment-

renderer-text-content expanded">Thank you, doctor. I'm a recently retired PhD veteran of respiratory research out of pharma & biotech. I'm so relieved someone with credibility has finally called it correctly. I have friends in Italy I've known for decades through the medical/ research community. They've told me EXACTLY what you've found. Further, in some Italian case series, 97% died on ventilators. A similar case series given high oxygen CPAP often survived. Now imagine hundreds of elderly people, ill & having a positive covid19 PCR test, being put on transport ventilators attended by physicians inexperienced in ITU. I would not expect many to survive, but this is our "surge capacity" we've set up in UK.

Tracey Continelli , 6 days ago div class="c

omment-renderer-text-content expanded">This is exactly what I have been suspecting. This was recently published in Nature. "The results showed the ORF8 and surface glycoprotein could bind to the porphyrin, respectively. At the same time, orf1ab, ORF10, and ORF3a proteins could coordinate attack the heme on the 1-beta chain of hemoglobin to dissociate the iron to form the porphyrin. The attack will cause less and less hemoglobin that can carry oxygen and carbon dioxide. The lung cells have extremely intense poisoning and inflammatory due to the inability to exchange carbon dioxide and oxygen frequently, which eventually results in ground-glass-like lung images." 1. The virus attaches to the hemoglobin via ORF8 (a protein) and glycoprotein. Hemoglobin is an iron rich protein that that allows red blood cells to carry oxygen from the lungs to the rest of the body. 2. This allows it to cut off the iron 3. This reduces the amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide available to the lung cells. (it is well known that anemia causes shortness of breathe, for example, because your body does not get enough oxygen rich blood). 4. This results in intense poisoning and inflammation, which results in lung damage, the ground glass like lung images, and sometimes death. Sickle cell disease is caused by a mutation in the hemoglobin-Beta gene found on chromosome 11. Hemoglobin transports oxygen from the lungs to other parts of the body. Red blood cells with normal hemoglobin (hemoglobin-A) are smooth and round and glide through blood vessels. This may be why an anti-malaria drug like Plaquenil might be effective against this virus. Sickle cell anemia mutates the hemoglobin-Beta gene, which then provides protection from malaria. COVID-19 attacks the beta-hemoglobin. Doctor, I came to the same conclusion myself. Please pass this along to your colleagues. https://chemrxiv.org/articles/COVID-19_Disease_ORF8_and_Surface_Glycoprotein_Inhibit_Heme_Metabolism_by_Binding_to_Porphyrin/11938173/5?fbclid=IwAR1K50u0wRWhOCv0_rxS2_bYk7p3mT-OWX08GXaa0Tm13bzT8Wl8MYfTAI8

tobi foong , 1 day ago (edited)

There seems to be some evidence that hemoglobin is being disrupted and Iron ions are being released and the Free iron ions are poisoning the lung cell. this needs to be researched. Mitigated by providing O2 may be needed.

Paul Furber , 4 days ago

You are correct sir. COVID actually attacks hemoglobin causing hypoxia in the lungs : https://chemrxiv.org/articles/COVID-19_Disease_ORF8_and_Surface_Glycoprotein_Inhibit_Heme_Metabolism_by_Binding_to_Porphyrin/11938173

Emanuele Frati , 5 days ago

In Italy some (few) hospitals started using ozone therapy and the very first experiences are rather promising. I really hope that they can find an effective treatment of Covid-19.

Adriane C , 1 week ago

iv> TY-I posted this on my FB and am sharing with all the pulmonologists I know. You are spot on. Many of us nurses have had similar questions. Why is Vent to death rate nearly 2x faster with this than pneumonia? This is what I posted on my FB w your video. Please please keep talking - everyone please keep talking and being public. Doctors and nurses are the ones who will raise public awareness and create change and save lives. Nobody else. Seriously we are on our own. Our union nurses have been making the news daily. We need to continue to take over Social media and the news and use the public trust to advance care of our patients and protection for us (need PPE) and our families. "This is NOT pneumonia. I 100% agree with him. There's no other answer to the poor response and rapid decline with "traditional" treatment regimens. Please get this video out to all providers-especially ICU-Critical Care Providers-Pulmonologists- Infection Disease doctors. There has to be a different paradigm. Steroid use must be questioned. Suppression of febrile state must be questioned? Why not allow the immune response to run its course up to 40C? Pay attention to ACE2 receptor and microbiology of it's actions and role. Check out Med Cram or John Campbell on Youtube as well. They speak to the same questions. We are all learning and this is something totally new."

vitola1111 , 4 days ago

Malaria is also linked to hypoxia because the malaria parasite uses hemoglobin as a nutrient source. HCQ is effective in protecting the hemoglobin in the blood which is why it is showing success against COVID-19 as well.

eugene smetannikov , 3 days ago (edited) div tabindex="0" class="comment-renderer-text

" role="article"> There are four types of hypoxia: hypoxic, stagnant, anaemic and cytotoxic - as I am sure you know. If your theory is correct this would equate to anaemic hypoxia, but instead of lack of haemoglobin it would be dysfunctional. Similar, in a way, to CO poisoning: HB doesn't unload oxygen, so there is a tissue hypoxia without cyanosis. What you would see is normal or high pa02 (partial pressure of oxygen in arterial blood) and discordantly low arterial haemoglobin saturation. On the other hand, if pa02 is low it indicates that the primary problem is pulmonary, that is oxygen does not diffuse across the alveolar membrane. If haemoglobin is the primary problem then blood transfusion would indeed improve the outcome. What is the typical blood gas like in these patients? I am in Australia, and we don't have many severe cases, luckily. From what get to the Internet I gather these patients are also hypercarbic. Which is the opposite of the altitude sickness, where a patients hyperventilates, causing hypocarbia and respiratory alkalosis, with consequent symptoms. Hence acetazolamide treatment. So, what's the typical arterial blood gas like in COVID patients? High pa02 and low Sa02? Both low? What's paCO2 like?

Roger Moore , 1 day ago

According to Chinese research, it's because the red blood cells are unable pick up oxygen, like malaria. Obviously, the cure would be to enable red blood cells to carry oxygen again - something a ventilator does not do. https://www.thailandmedical.news/news/must-read-research-reveals-that-covid-19-attacks-hemoglobin-in-red-blood-cells,-rendering-it-incapable-of-transporting-oxygen--current-medical-protoco

Richard W , 2 days ago

Your video was linked in this article which points to an interesting take on Covid-19 attacking red blood cell's ability to carry iron and thus oxygen. https://www.thailandmedical.news/news/must-read-research-reveals-that-covid-19-attacks-hemoglobin-in-red-blood-cells,-rendering-it-incapable-of-transporting-oxygen--current-medical-protoco

Global Agenda , 4 days ago

Thank you for covering this doctor. I am sharing. I noticed that they have not rushed to put Boris Johnson on a ventilator and Dr. Oz brought up the ventilator issues on a recent broadcast. There are not enough qualified personnel running these machines throughout the States and that is a cause for concern because as you have noted they need to be monitored and adjusted accordingly. Stay safe. We have your back.

maarit gneleah , 3 hours ago (edited) div tabindex="0" role

="article"> Video: Ari Whitten speaks with Scott Antoine, MD -- a board-certified emergency physician and a functional and integrative medicine doctor about the latest findings on COVID-19: A potential breakthrough on COVID-19 treatment." Show Notes: The difference between ARDS and COVID-19 ( 0:59 ) The danger of the cytokine storm ( 8:28 ) How COVID-19 may not be a respiratory condition ( 16:20 ) The pros and cons of ventilators ( 25:13 ) Why Methylene blue shows promise for treating COVID-19 ( 31:00 ) Other potential factors that could help COVID-19 treatment ( 47:33 ) How Vitamin C works in COVID-19 treatment ( 55:09 ) https://www.theenergyblueprint.com/blue/?inf_contact_key=7c7cb8a0e1a3404449b49e79b5046d61d18a532c4142cb79caf2b269de1401fa

Phred Ziphell , 1 day ago (edited) div tabindex="0" role="a

rticle"> Fantastic analysis, backed by a prospective explanation. I'm a physician in upstate NY and confirm Dr. Kyle-Sidell's observations. HFNC (high-flow nasal cannula) appears to be a good intermediary between typical face-mask O2 and traditional ventilators .. but these machines are not in widespread use. Optiflow by Fisher & Paykal https://www.fphcare.com/us/hospital/adult-respiratory/optiflow/ and Hi-VNI Precision Flow by Vapotherm https://vapotherm.com/hi-vni-technology/ are two companies that make these units. I have no financial interests in either of these companies.

PAiL Awareness Campaign , 3 days ago div tabindex="0" role=

"article"> The symptoms of individuals presenting with suspected "CoVid 19" are similar to individuals with radiation sickness. What is your experience with treating radiation sickness? Have you attempted to utilize radiation sickness treatment protocol to address the symptoms you are witnessing in individuals presenting with suspected "CoVid 19"? You feedback is appreciated, thank you in advance. https://rarediseases.org/rare-diseases/radiation-sickness

Nurse C , 1 day ago div c

lass="comment-renderer-text-content expanded"> You are right. My hospital has a 0% success rate using ventilators on covid patients. These patients can be sitting comfortably talking to you on a non-rebreather with no use of accessory muscles and have a pulse ox of 75%. They appear to have no issue moving air into and out of the lungs like you would see if it were ARDS. They all have horribly high ferritin levels and go into kidney failure long before their respiratory system crashes.

This virus destroys the oxygen carrying capacity of the blood through the iron binding sites of the red blood cells. So what then is the solution?

Mijagi1976 , 1 hour ago

iv> This is from CDC web site (description of malaria): Severe malaria occurs when infections are complicated by serious organ failures or abnormalities in the patient's blood or metabolism. The manifestations of severe malaria include the following: Cerebral malaria, with abnormal behavior, impairment of consciousness, seizures, coma, or other neurologic abnormalities Severe anemia due to hemolysis (destruction of the red blood cells) Hemoglobinuria (hemoglobin in the urine) due to hemolysis Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), an inflammatory reaction in the lungs that inhibits oxygen exchange, which may occur even after the parasite counts have decreased in response to treatment Abnormalities in blood coagulation Low blood pressure caused by cardiovascular collapse Acute kidney injury Hyperparasitemia, where more than 5% of the red blood cells are infected by malaria parasites Metabolic acidosis (excessive acidity in the blood and tissue fluids), often in association with hypoglycemia Hypoglycemia (low blood glucose). Hypoglycemia may also occur in pregnant women with uncomplicated malaria, or after treatment with quinine. Severe malaria is a medical emergency and should be treated urgently and aggressively. Now, what we have at hand is viral malaria type disease. Same symptoms. Now, BIll Gates was working on the cure for malaria, right? Maybe he found something else. Malaria and COVID 19 both respond well to HCQ. You guys make your own conclusions.

Jim Chin , 3 days ago (edited) div tabindex="0" role="artic

le"> With regards to Hypoxia and Covid-19 ask hemotology Has erythrocytapheresis been tried with super saturated 2,3,BPG erythrocytes as temporary solution or test before ventilation ?. Has hematological study been done on the extracted old erythrocytes ? 2,3-Bisphosphoglycerate effects oxygen affinity significantly https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/j.1365-2044.1977.tb10002.x https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/327846 So anywhere along the way or lowering adenosine and/or inosine concentrate reduces 2,3 Bisphoglycerate . Virus replication maybe sucking up or modifying adenosine https://www.cell.com/cell-host-microbe/pdf/S1931-3128(17)30201-9.pdf https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pub28618265med/ in the erythrocyte or be affecting the A2A receptor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adenosine_A2A_receptor https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6168195/ . This accounts for the effect seen. In the affected erythrocytes, O2 is not binding and not delivering O2 to the tissues and organ. It will be important to look at the 2,3 Bisphoglycerate concentration or A2A receptors. It maybe cause of the hypoxia and tissue damage. Not breathing or neurological symptoms may really be CNS or respiratory nerve of Bell (,root C5, C6, C7) infections by Sars-coV2 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.22.20026500v1.full.pdf , https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32104915 https://www.thailandmedical.news/news/breaking-news-coronavirus-can-also-attack-the-nervous-system,-causing-neurological-conditions-and-even-viral-encephalitis Hopefully , they can find the answer for you and help change protocol

Larry Hawes , 3 days ago

Did you ever wonder if the disease itself gets a foothold because of the oxygen saturation level of the patients involved? Could it be that the most severely compromised already have lowered oxygen levels? Certainly exacerbated by COVID-19 but perhaps initiated by initial lowered oxygen levels?

SapereAude , 4 days ago

Dr Bill Deagle of Nutrimedical Report recently said in his broadcast that COVID-19 is like a high altitude sickness - just as you've concluded Dr Kyle-Sidell. Dr. Bill Deagle (a bit rough around the edges yet brilliant) claims to have treatment solutions that are effective. Perhaps you should contact him immediately and have a conversation. It may steer the course to brighter outcomes for us all. God speed! 🇺🇸

david77james , 1 day ago

Good, but so few doctors have the nuts to speak out as this physician did. Treating Lungs, when the lungs ARE WORKING FINE and only get damaged by the ventilator. It's blood disease, where hemoglobin is destroyed and cannot deliver oxygen to the organs. We need Hydroxychloroquine widely distributed as a preventative AND CURE, and open up our society again!! FIRE FAUCI!

Kathy C , 3 hours ago

Red blood cell destruction - oxygen transport problem ... similar to Malaria rendering Red cells non functional - QUININE

SMG Scorpion , 1 day ago div tabindex="0" role="articl

e"> You must clear out the phlegm in both lungs first. This virus consumes & breaks down lung cells to replicate itself. As more cells are consumed more pinkish phlegm will continue to form inside both lungs and blocking the air. Eventually the lungs will be liquefied. Put down that American pride and start working with the Chinese experts to SAVE LIVES. Enough time has been wasted on playing the blame game https://covid-19.alibabacloud.com/

Nurse Judy , 3 days ago div tabindex="0" role="artic

le"> ARDS, oxidative stress, PAP.( Pulmonary Alveolar Proteinosis), " It has been proposed that lower iron saturation of Tf decreases iron-mediated oxidative stress and rescues respiratory failure [89,90]. Secondary PAP can accompany infection, particle exposure and malignancies [38], most of which are associated with altered iron homeostasis. Together, a remarkable relationship between PAP and iron metabolism exists" " it has been proposed that the presence of pro-oxidant iron in lung epithelial fluid may contribute to susceptibility to oxidative damage [28]. Lavage fluid of ARDS patients has elevated levels of total and nonheme iron as well as cellular content of Tf, ferritin and Lf [86]. This indicates impaired pulmonary homeostasis of iron in ARDS, although it is unclear whether this is due to general increase in membrane permeability or altered iron metabolism." ARDSAcute Respiratory Distress SyndromeBALBronchoalveolar LavageDcytbDuodenal cytochrome bDMT1Divalent Metal Transporter 1FPNFerroportinLfLactoferrinLfRLactoferrin ReceptorNramp1Natural Resistance-associated Macrophage Protein 1PAPPulmonary Alveolar ProteinosisRBCRed Blood CellsTfTransferrinTfRTransferrin Receptor I copied and pasted exerpts from the study. Interesting Read between correlation of Iron Homeostasis / Regulation and ARDS, Lung Inflammation etc https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5718378/

Wolf Moon , 6 days ago div tabindex="0" role="article"

> Cameron - I'm a retired scientist and former climber who got this disease back in January (classic symptoms, including shortness of breath - now permanent), and what you are describing is EXACTLY what I thought. I have been telling people that "I'm permanently stuck at 7000 feet in the Colorado Rockies". I sleep worse just like when I was in the mountains. Very lucky I'm not at 11,000 feet - that would not have been long-term survivable for me. I can likely live 10-20 more years with this, if it doesn't progress, but I have a feeling that it DOES PROGRESS. I don't think the virus is gone. It seems like it's still there. Quinine and zinc helped me AFTER recovery, but the side effects of quinine are nasty, so I'm taking a break. I had to get MacGyver and self-treat because I'm supposedly cured and can't get HCQ/AZM/Zn and my doc is not a specialist, etc. Nobody knows how to deal with this, so my fellow online researchers are working constantly on understanding (wqth.wordpress.com). We think a lot of us got it - two of us had intermediate cases like mine (no hospitals). Would love to get into a study.

Jan Beute , 2 days ago

You are the first colleague that also seems to have discovered that COVID-19 is not an ordinary viral pneumonia. I think I may know how to prevent respiatoy failure in an early phase and therefore no need for mechanical ventilation.

WillsDuffy , 1 week ago (edited) div tabindex="0" role=

"article"> Hi Doctor. My experience of COVID-19 over the last 4 weeks precisely as you are describing. I instinctively felt when I got it that it was not what the experts described. I could feel through my knowledge with my body that the problem with my system as it started to breakdown was in the drop in the oxygen levels being the main source of my distress. The way I got COVID-19 the symptoms of fever, dry cough, aches and pains were such that they did not distract from the main problem itself which was my system not taking in oxygen, I have been trying to puzzle this out during my recovery and I definitely think that as your explain it here it is the case with how the COVID-19 virus takes down the individual. You must forge ahead with this. Let me offer an example in my own treatment of this ... I deliberately removed certain remedies I was using like Vit C for a period of time to see what the effect would be then I returned to a regime of taking it and the oxygen in-take into my system returned and my system improved with the simple increase of Vit C I felt my oxygen intake improve and I felt immediately less stressed. Also, a constriction in the back of my throat alongside my swallowing action indicated to me when my system was struggling with oxygen intake levels moving up and down. I definitely do agree with your findings here from my experience of being a victim of this Virus in a significant way.

Paincakes , 1 day ago

I've been sick for 22 days, this makes sense to me. I have no cough, no fever, and feel like I'm running out of air.

JerryHFreeman , 6 days ago div tabindex="0" role="arti

cle"> Email from another doctor in New York City to a colleague: "We have zero success story for patients who were intubated. Our thinking is changing to postpone intubation to as long as possible, to prevent mechanical injury from the vent. "Those patients tolerate arterial hypoxia surprisingly well. Natural course seems to be the best. Yesterday did not intubate patient with 86% [blood oxygen saturation percentage] on non re breather ( gave the best sat, desated on CPAP). Today he is sating 96%. If he would have been intubated, he will be dead in three days."

hock wah hoo , 2 days ago

High frequency low volume ventilation to reduce baro trauma

Karen Robenstine , 5 days ago div tabindex="0" role="artic

le"> Doctor Ming Lin an emergency room doctor with 17 years of experience was fired for going public about poor hospital room safety and shortage of medical supplies and PPE. He was employed by a physician staffing firm at Joseph Medical Center in Bellingham,Washington. A third of hospital emergency rooms are staffed by 2 physician staffing companies TeamHealth and Envision Healthcare, owned by Wall Street investment firms. Patients and insurance companies then can be overcharged for needed emergency care. Blackstone's owner of Teamhealth CEO, Stephan Schwarzman a part of the president's circle would not want an employee to express information contrary to the political rhetoric of the current administration. The navy relieved Captain Brett Cozier for also sounding the alarm about lack of medical supplies and supplies. Do not be naive enough to believe money and power trumps the wellbeing of the citizens of this country.

Steve Stark , 3 days ago

Could it not be an IHA reaction, also associated with the vulnerabilities to Covid? Suppress that response and allow more time to overcome viral replication.

jaggafeen , 4 days ago

Tracey Continelli1 day ago This is exactly what I have been suspecting. This was recently published in Nature. "The results showed the ORF8 and surface glycoprotein could bind to the porphyrin, respectively. At the same time, orf1ab, ORF10, and ORF3a proteins could coordinate attack the heme on the 1-beta chain of hemoglobin to dissociate the iron to form the porphyrin. The attack will cause less and less hemoglobin that can carry oxygen and carbon dioxide. The lung cells have extremely intense poisoning and inflammatory due to the inability to exchange carbon dioxide and oxygen frequently, which eventually results in ground-glass-like lung images." 1. The virus attaches to the hemoglobin via ORF8 (a protein) and glycoprotein. Hemoglobin is an iron rich protein that that allows red blood cells to carry oxygen from the lungs to the rest of the body. 2. This allows it to cut off the iron 3. This reduces the amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide available to the lung cells. (it is well known that anemia causes shortness of breathe, for example, because your body does not get enough oxygen rich blood). 4. This results in intense poisoning and inflammation, which results in lung damage, the ground glass like lung images, and sometimes death. Sickle cell disease is caused by a mutation in the hemoglobin-Beta gene found on chromosome 11. Hemoglobin transports oxygen from the lungs to other parts of the body. Red blood cells with normal hemoglobin (hemoglobin-A) are smooth and round and glide through blood vessels. This may be why an anti-malaria drug like Plaquenil might be effective against this virus. Sickle cell anemia mutates the hemoglobin-Beta gene, which then provides protection from malaria. COVID-19 attacks the beta-hemoglobin. Doctor, I came to the same conclusion myself. Please pass this along to your colleagues. https://chemrxiv.org/articles/COVID-19_Disease_ORF8_and_Surface_Glycoprotein_Inhibit_Heme_Metabolism_by_Binding_to_Porphyrin/11938173/5?fbclid=IwAR1K50u0wRWhOCv0_rxS2_bYk7p3mT-OWX08GXaa0Tm13bzT8Wl8MYfTAI8 Bob Sapp20 hours ago Tracey Continelli I'm trying to understand why the anti-malaria drug would work. Are you saying the drug will mutate our hemoglobin and then the virus wouldn't be able to attach itself to our red blood cell? Tracey Continelli11 hours ago (edited) @Bob Sapp YES. Before the Nature article came out, multiple studies have been done showing that the anti-malaria drug Plaquenil alters the intracellular structure. One article I found stated that it had the ability to alter the protein structure. If this is true - and based on the article in Nature, the virus attaches itself to the PROTEIN on the outside of the red blood cells - then it is effectively PREVENTING the virus from attaching itself to the proteins and glycoproteins on the red blood cells, where it then "kicks out" the iron ion, which then prevents the lung cells from getting the necessary oxygen, which then causes the respiratory distress and damaged lungs that clinicians are seeing. Tracey Continelli10 hours ago (edited) I'm a health researcher and college professor. Hydroxychloroquine is hypothesized to be exerting a multi-pronged effect on this virus. One, by altering the cellular structure, it can make it difficult to replicate and reproduce itself. Two, it can make it difficult to attach to the red blood cell wall and kicking out the iron ion, causing the deprivation of oxygen to the lungs and patients becoming hypoxemic. Three, as someone noted, because it dampens down the immune system (it is given to patients with lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, both of whom have hyperactive immune system) it should lower the risk of a cytokine storm. Sermo just conducted a study of over 6000 physicians around the world, asking them what treatments for COVID-19 they had used, and which they considered to be the most promising. Sermo regularly surveys physicians around the world, it is an established organization. As a professor/researcher I was able to access the data myself and ran the numbers. Excluding already approved treatments, such as Tylenol, antibiotics, etc, I isolated ONLY the four experimental treatments and computed the percentages. Here they are: Hydroxychloroquine - 49% Anti-HIV retrivirals - 30% Plasma - 8% Remdesivir - 13% Sermo computed the percentages differently by including other drug treatments, but still found that hydroxychloroquine was rated as most effective. https://www.sermo.com/press-releases/largest-statistically-significant-study-by-6200-multi-country-physicians-on-covid-19-uncovers-treatment-patterns-and-puts-pandemic-in-context/?fbclid=IwAR36GA79oiUF5cuCjuweV2pqys0Eneu6AAbqoOfikK1PgYepVvLP1tKC5cc

James Grove , 2 hours ago div tabindex="0" role="articl

e"> Thoughts on COVID-19 Pathophysiology and Therapeutic Intervention Posted on Quora on 5/10 in response to the video. Quora: Does Covid-19 really cause ARDS? Dr. Cameron Kyle-Sidell questions treating COVID-19 with the present medical paradigm of ARDS. ........ "We should consider that part of the pathophysiological mechanism of COVID-19 is resulting from an acquired hemoglobinopathy or dyshemoglobinemia" .

Mark Hartman , 4 days ago

Dr. Kyle-Sidell, if you haven't read this article - even though it is anonymous - you may want to. It has a rational, NON-RESPIRATORY explanation for the hypoxic symptoms in your patients, and a simple test of its conclusions would be to give a patient a single unit of packed cells. http://web.archive.org/web/20200405061401/https://medium.com/@agaiziunas/covid-19-had-us-all-fooled-but-now-we-might-have-finally-found-its-secret-91182386efcb

Dan Ecklund , 4 days ago

I think this may answer some of your questions about oxygenation vs ventilation. https://archive.is/ONUmi#selection-183.0-183.75 Says that CV causes the iron to dissociate from the heme groups, causing dysfunctional hemoglobin. And the Fe+++ causes massive oxidative damage. That is why intravenous Vitamin C has been so effective at avoiding the cytokine storm. Even explains chloroquine effect. Highly recommended.

[Apr 11, 2020] The virus has successfully installed itself in the population and is impossible to eradicate without a year-long lock down, making herd immunity the preferential goal to achieve.

Apr 11, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

mk , Apr 10 2020 16:13 utc | 5

A German team lead by virologist Hendrick Streeck has now researched the German Hot Spot Heinsberg. They tested 1000 randomized people and found that a whopping 15% was infected - most of them without showing any symptoms.

Based on this preliminary findings the scientists conclude that the lethality of COVID-19 is 0,37%. They also conclude that the virus has successfully installed itself in the population and is impossible to eradicate without a year-long lock down, making herd immunity the preferential goal to achieve.

Video of press conference (in German):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=on8rqsikm88

[Apr 11, 2020] Ventilators their use and misuse

Apr 11, 2020 | www.healthline.com

Ventilator-associated lung injury - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Ventilator-associated_lung_injury Ventilator-associated lung injury (VALI) is an acute lung injury that develops during mechanical ventilation and is termed ventilator-induced lung injury (VILI) if it can be proven that the mechanical ventilation caused the acute lung injury. In contrast, ventilator-associated lung injury (VALI) exists if the cause cannot be proven.

When & How Medical Ventilators Are Needed https://www.healthline.com /health/ventilator A ventilator can cause lung damage. This can happen for several reasons: too much pressure in the lungs ; pneumothorax (air leaks into space between the lungs and chest wall)

Here's What Happens to the Body After Contracting the ... https://www.healthline.com /health-news/heres-what-happens-to-the-body-after-contracting-the-coronavirus These cause damage to the lungs , which leads to fluid leaking from small blood vessels in the lungs . The fluid collects in the lungs' air sacs, or alveoli. This makes it difficult for the lungs ...

Coronavirus in the Lungs : What Does COVID-19 Really Do to ... https://www.webmd.com /lung/what-does-covid-do-to-your-lungs COVID-19 is a serious respiratory disease, but how does it really affect your lungs if you get infected? Here's what coronavirus can do to your lungs in mild- to -moderate, severe, and critical cases.

Here's the Damage Coronavirus (COVID-19) Can Do to Your Lungs https://health.clevelandclinic.org /heres-the-damage-coronavirus-covid-19-can-do-to-your-lungs/ Here's the Damage Coronavirus (COVID-19) Can Do to Your Lungs . New evidence shows how coronavirus (COVID-19) can damage your lungs , leading to severe respiratory issues.

Ventilator/Ventilator Support | National Heart, Lung , and ... https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov /health-topics/ventilatorventilator-support Using a ventilator also can put you at risk for other problems, such as: Pneumothorax (noo-mo-THOR-aks). This is a condition in which air leaks out of the lungs and into the space between the lungs and the chest wall. This can cause pain and shortness of breath, and it may cause one or both lungs to collapse. Lung damage.

Side Effects of Being Intubated | Healthfully https://healthfully.com /side-effects-of-being-intubated-3715884.html Collapsed Lung . Damage or perforation of internal organs within the chest during intubation can lead to lung collapse in certain people. A collapsed lung , also called pneumothorax, can result in additional side effects such as cough, severe, stabbing chest pain, or shoulder or back pain.

Coronavirus and the lungs : Does COVID-19 cause more severe ... https://www.cleveland.com /coronavirus/2020/03/coronavirus-and-the-lungs-does-covid-19-cause-more-severe-pneumonia-or-ards-than-other-viruses.html Coronavirus and the lungs : Does COVID-19 cause more severe pneumonia or ARDS than other viruses? ... but it's clear the most serious cases involve severe respiratory symptoms that can damage a ...

Coronavirus: What is acute respiratory distress syndrome ... https://www.usatoday.com /story/news/health/2020/03/19/coronavirus-what-acute-respiratory-distress-syndrome-ards/5066412002/ ‎Mar‎ ‎19‎, ‎2020 The reaction can cause small blood vessels in the lung to leak fluid and fill up the alveoli, which are tiny air sacs in the lung that process oxygen, according to the American Lung Association ...

COVID-19 tough on lungs , can cause difficult- to -treat ... https://www.upi.com /Health_News/2020/03/26/COVID-19-tough-on-lungs-can-cause-difficult-to-treat-pneumonia/5651585241656/ ‎Mar‎ ‎26‎, ‎2020 March 26 (UPI) -- The COVID-19 pandemic started in Wuhan, China, as a cluster of unusually severe pneumonia cases of unknown cause. Now that the disease has spread globally, the lungs continue to ...

[Apr 11, 2020] DOES COVID-19 REALLY CAUSE ARDS?

Ventilator settings wrong
Apr 11, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
dltravers , Apr 11 2020 1:18 utc | 100
Another doctor comes forward...
FROM NYC ICU: DOES COVID-19 REALLY CAUSE ARDS??!!

I thought it might be some guy making a fake video but I guess not...
Ventilator settings wrong

[Apr 11, 2020] NY's Cuomo pleases crowds with 'Hero Compensation Fund' for healthcare workers - after 9 years of hospital cuts by Helen Buyniski

Notable quotes:
"... New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has launched a fund to support sick healthcare workers and their families, but some blame him for the dire working conditions facing the state's caregivers after nine years of hospital budget cuts. Cuomo announced the state is working on a "Covid-19 Heroes Compensation Fund" to support healthcare workers and their families who have been diagnosed with the coronavirus during his daily briefing on Friday. It was heralded by his growing Democratic fan club as a generous, thoughtful move from a politician who cares about the "frontline workers." ..."
Apr 11, 2020 | www.rt.com

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has launched a fund to support sick healthcare workers and their families, but some blame him for the dire working conditions facing the state's caregivers after nine years of hospital budget cuts. Cuomo announced the state is working on a "Covid-19 Heroes Compensation Fund" to support healthcare workers and their families who have been diagnosed with the coronavirus during his daily briefing on Friday. It was heralded by his growing Democratic fan club as a generous, thoughtful move from a politician who cares about the "frontline workers."

Absent from the lovefest was any mention of how the governor had - just the previous day - deferred 2 percent pay raises to some 80,000 state workers for 90 days, and potentially for longer. Many of those affected are healthcare workers in the state's prisons and mental health facilities.

Union leaders were outraged. "It's inexcusable to require our workers to literally face death to ensure the state keeps running and then turn around and deny those very workers their much-deserved raise in this time of crisis, " Civil Service Employees Association president Mary Sullivan told the Times Union, while NY Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association chief Michael Powers called the postponement a "slap in the face" to workers facing "some of the most dangerous conditions in the state."

While Cuomo is being praised for his leadership amid the coronavirus outbreak, the problems he is scrambling to solve are largely of his own making. Although aware of a 2015 report highlighting the desperately-depleted state stockpile of ventilators, he didn't take any actions on it, and has spent his tenure shuttering and downsizing hospitals across the state, mostly those serving low-income clients. The state has eliminated 20,000 hospital beds in the last two decades, at least half under his leadership.

The New York state budget passed at the beginning of the month included deep cuts to Medicaid and may have rendered the state ineligible for $6 billion in federal aid, infuriating liberal lawmakers who were less enchanted with the new #Resistance hero. State Senator Gustavo Rivera (D-Bronx) told the New York Daily News that Cuomo's latest budget "only offered harsh austerity for the poorest and most vulnerable" New Yorkers.

The state's Democrat-controlled senate called on Cuomo to tax the wealthy - New York has the highest economic inequality in the country, and a tax on the richest .01 percent has upwards of 90 percent approval among voters - only to be turned down by the politician who has earned the nickname "Governor One Percent."

The latest cost-cutting moves resulted in New York City deprived on $200 million in sales tax revenue when the big apple is at the epicenter of the US coronavirus outbreak.

The pandemic has hospitals so understaffed that NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation has apparently been reduced to contracting dodgy medical-temp agencies - one, Kansas-based disaster-staffing group Krucial Staffing, was sued earlier this week for luring out-of-state medical professionals to work in city hospitals under false pretenses, promising them cushy posts with ample protective equipment and no Covid-19 exposure - to fill vacancies. The suit alleges Krucial's misrepresentation of working conditions placed healthcare workers' medical licenses and lives in danger.

It's unclear how many medical workers have contracted and died of the disease in the state, as New York, along with several other states, does not tract infections among medical staff. According to a BuzzFeed News review of the reports by 12 states, which made their data public, at least 5,400 nurses and doctors tested positive nationwide, while dozens have succumbed to the lethal illness. Among them, Kious Kelly, an assistant nurse manager at Mount Sinai West, whose death from the coronavirus on March 24 sparked protests among the personnel and led to the hospital eventually allowing workers to receive tests – but only those already showing symptoms.

Some 7,887 New Yorkers have died with coronavirus since the beginning of the outbreak, the majority of them - 5,820 - in New York City.

Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!

[Apr 11, 2020] The difference between lockdown and contact tracing

Apr 11, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Apr 10 2020 17:12 utc | 20

Not lockdown - contact tracing and testing ( Atlantic source )
In Italy, two similar regions, Lombardy and Veneto, took different approaches to the community spread of the epidemic. Both mandated social distancing, but only Veneto undertook massive contact tracing and testing early on. Despite starting from very similar points, Lombardy is now tragically overrun with the disease, having experienced roughly 7,000 deaths and counting, while Veneto has managed to mostly contain the epidemic to a few hundred fatalities.

[Apr 11, 2020] Wet market is partially "fresh food" market

Hygienic standards are difficult to enforce in both.
Apr 11, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Antoinetta III , Apr 10 2020 17:49 utc | 34
At Gruff, #3

"Wet markets really are just farmers' markets that also happen to sell fresh fish (thus the "wet" part of their label) and poultry and sometimes beef and pork."

"Readers can display how susceptible they are to mass media driven hysteria and jingoism and perhaps also reveal unacknowledged racism by insisting that there is something fundamentally different about Asian farmers markets from the local ones they themselves shop at for the freshest foods. "

I would respond that the fact that our local farmers markets don't generally sell the "wet" stuff is in and of itself a "fundamental difference." If there are disease-vector issues with wetmarkets, the issue will likely have originated in the "wet" part of the market.

Antoinetta III

Miss Lacy , Apr 10 2020 17:54 utc | 37

PS re the wet market bs. Let's all grow up. Nearly every coastal town I've ever visited on four continents has a "wet market" i.e. tanks full of shell fish or crayfish or lobsters. There are plenty of places you can buy a live chicken and have it cut up. In souther murka they do love their trotters - i.e. pig's feet (gross in my opinion.) sea urchins any one? How about sea slugs? There's a tasty meal. I know, let's just call it a "fresh food" market. Hmmm?

With the deepest respect for your inner beauty. Cheers.

[Apr 10, 2020] A relative and her husband returned to China recently from UK expecting to go to hotel for 14 days quarantine. Instead another passenger developed symptom on flight so all passengers isolated for testing.

Apr 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Ghost Ship , Apr 9 2020 8:47 utc | 97

Peter AU1 @ 88

A relative and her husband returned to China recently from UK expecting to go to hotel for 14 days quarantine. Instead another passenger developed symptom on flight so all passengers isolated for testing. Relative and husband tested positive but were asymptomatic (except she lost sense of taste & smell). Now in isolation hospital for minimum of 14 days until given all clear, then they'll spend another minimum of 14 days in quarantine in hotel until cleared again. How many western countries are doing/planning to do this?

[Apr 10, 2020] All Americans asked to wear cloth masks while in public

Apr 10, 2020 | www.washingtontimes.com

The U.S. surgeon general on Sunday trumpeted the administration's new recommendation that all Americans wear cloth masks in public, a reversal of its previous advice as the country braces for a dramatic surge in COVID-19 cases and potential fatalities this week.

"The next week is going to be our Pearl Harbor moment. It's going to be our 9/11 moment. It's going to be the hardest moment for many Americans in their entire lives," Vice Admiral Jerome Adams warned on NBC's "Meet the Press," as he made rounds of political talk shows.

The push to wear masks follows updated guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is not mandatory but masks offer added protection against spreading the coronavirus, especially when people cannot practice 6-foot social distancing.

[Apr 10, 2020] Effective home-made mask insert/liner material: Two brands of cheap widely available blue shop towels are found to work great

Apr 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

gm , Apr 10 2020 15:54 utc | 2

Re: Effective home-made mask insert/liner material: Two brands of cheap widely available blue shop towels are found to work great: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNDE12HymYc (starts at minute 31:20).

Re: bubonic plague in Mongolia. Sporadic human Yersinia pestis infections have been endemic in American Southwest for many years.

[Apr 10, 2020] Tucker: In crisis, nothing is more important than staying connected to reality

Highly recommended!
Tucker comments on Fauci above face with estimating the number of deaths: first around 3 million, not less then 60K.
Hospitals are staying half empty. So much for Fauci flattening the curve efforts
Apr 10, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Mike Jordan , 14 hours ago

Being "connected" is a huge part of the cause of this mess, before internet propaganda was limited to newspapers and magazines, it was much slower and manageable.

Don Nix , 9 hours ago

I do find it funny how wealthy folks spread the "don't worry WE will all be fine" garbage. WE....no, tell that to someone who has lost their business and has dependents.

Karel Moulík , 10 hours ago

When everything can be solved by propaganda it's time for revolution.

Massive-Headwound Harry , 12 hours ago

I hate the "We're going to be ok. We're all in this together" ads. All of them celebrities, pro athletes, and actors. Not one has to worry about whether they'll be able to buy food next week. Elites telling the little people everything's ok.

Joe Shaloom , 14 hours ago

It's really sad when Tucker Carlson is the only person who ever admitted he was wrong on Fox News. Hannity still claims he never called the virus a hoax even though he did it on TV.

[Apr 10, 2020] Hydroxchloroquinine is toxic if combined with metformin. Diabetics who take it beware.

Apr 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Apr 9 2020 17:27 utc | 110

Hydroxchloroquinine is toxic if combined with metformin. Diabetics who take it beware.
source
Note the link above also lists all of the known drug interactions of HCH with other drugs - there are 332 total of which 59 are considered "major".

[Apr 10, 2020] Fauci had previously supported the use of Hydroquinone for similar virus. What changed?

Apr 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

jared , Apr 8 2020 13:41 utc | 26

On the subject of who does our government serve:
https://www.zerohedge.com/health/why-did-fauci-cheer-use-untested-drug-coronavirus-2013-now-hes-skeptical

Fauci had previously supported the use of Hydroquinone for similar virus. What changed? However, to the matter of Israel and the virus:
I thought they were having strangely little impact from virus.

Anyway, this is all very revealing.

You know how people always question:
Why did that woman remain in that abusive relationship?


c1ue , Apr 8 2020 14:44 utc | 36

@jared #26
I don't consider anything coming out of ZH to be credible until verified.
Fauci has been very consistent: he is cautious about whether hydroxychloroquinine is a efficacious treatment for nCOV/COVID-19.
Note there are multiple levels of potential use:
1) The drug doesn't hurt/kill you. At normal levels, HCH passes this test but the levels it has been used at to treat nCOV - they're much higher than existing anti-malaria/malaria preventative/rheumatoid arthritis use.
At these higher levels, it isn't clear how safe HCH is - particularly for really old people who are the primary nCOV at risk group.
2) Does the drug decrease negative outcomes? i.e. maybe it doesn't cure (which it shouldn't) but it makes it less likely that nCOV infected get pneumonia or worse. This would be fantastic but it is 100% unproven.
3) Does the drug cure? By itself or with other things like the antibiotic azithromycin? There have been studies saying yes - but I look at a couple - and they're frankly poor studies. To me, it is very unclear.

Hydroxychloroquinine/chloroquinine phosphate shows promise as a way to treat nCOV in its early stages, but this is so far completely unverified. Nor do we know what the optimal dosage might be to balance between known risks and side effects induced by HCH use vs. optimal nCOV impact.

I've gotten a prescription sufficient for a couple of courses, but am not taking it as a preventative (nor is there any proof it actually works this way).

Lots of people taking HCH as a preventative when it doesn't work or as treatment when dosages/outcomes aren't known *will* increase the likelihood that nCOV will evolve resistance against it, so it isn't like side effects are the only bad outcome to uninformed use.

gottlieb , Apr 8 2020 15:04 utc | 38
The Trump regime's goal is only ever to enrich themselves through the Presidency. Reportedly, Kushner's National Stockpile has been, uh, stockpiling Hydroxychloroquine as the President has been snake-oiling it. As the USA is become completely privatized it is not hard to arrange government contracts to middle-man the stockpile to its needy 'customers.'

And I can't believe all the raging antisemites here. Surely the Israelis have procured all those masks to help out those poor Palestinians for whom they care so deeply.

Finally; can we see the endgame? Whip up a worse-case scenario of fear mongering that our leaders miraculously save us from, yet institute a 'new normal' ripped from the pages of Orwell to protect us from the 'next time' which they promise is a matter of when not if.

Don Wills , Apr 8 2020 15:37 utc | 41
@38 - Chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine are not sufficient by themselves for treating COVID-19. CQ and HCQ create a pathway for zinc ions to get inside the cells to disrupt the coronavirus replication. It's the zinc that actually is the medicine. See this study for details - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21079686/

[Apr 10, 2020] The more I read about ventilators, the more sure I am that I do not want one if I get sick from the evil virus.

Apr 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Trailer Trash , Apr 8 2020 22:20 utc | 73

With all the endless hand-wringing regarding ventilators, this article deserves much more attention:

With ventilators running out, doctors say the machines are overused for Covid-19


Even as hospitals and governors raise the alarm about a shortage of ventilators, some critical care physicians are questioning the widespread use of the breathing machines for Covid-19 patients, saying that large numbers of patients could instead be treated with less intensive respiratory support.

If the iconoclasts are right, putting coronavirus patients on ventilators could be of little benefit to many and even harmful to some.

What's driving this reassessment is a baffling observation about Covid-19: Many patients have blood oxygen levels so low they should be dead. But they're not gasping for air, their hearts aren't racing, and their brains show no signs of blinking off from lack of oxygen.


The more I read about ventilators, the more sure I am that I do not want one if I get sick from the evil virus.

susan , Apr 9 2020 5:35 utc | 92

Trailer Trash @ 73

My understanding is that currently the UK has a 50% mortality rate of Covid sufferers who've been put on ventilators. They started using CPAP masks several weeks ago according to Dr. John D. Campbell UK. Much less invasive.

Interesting link you share -- it mentions acute symptoms are more like altitude sickness, with low 02 but CO2 still being cleared

[Apr 09, 2020] And b has posted previously directions for making masks. The advantage is you can throw them in the washing machine to clean, or even hand wash as they are small items

Highly recommended!
Apr 09, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

juliania , Apr 8 2020 15:04 utc | 37

My daughter who is a hospital worker showed me her mask, made by her sister. And b has posted previously directions for making masks.

While homemade or even professional surgical mask do not protect the wearer from all particles they do protect one much better from them than when one wears no mask at all.

A person rarely gets infected by just one virus particle. They come in millions attached to tiny droplets. We do not know yet how the dose of the novel coronavirus that infects a person affects the intensity of the disease. But we do know from other viruses that the dose matters. People who catch a higher dose of viruses will usually have a more intense disease. A mask can lower the virus load the wearer may receive.

One can improvise a mask from simple household objects. One can sew a mask like a surgeon does in this video . This is my preferred model which is officially recommended by German fire departments. (The pdf is in German but the pictures tell the story). This is the mask I made by following those instructions.


bigger

It is made of a folded sheet cut from a triangular arm-sling out of an old first-aid kit. A HEPA microfilter (as used in a vacuum cleaners) is in between the folded sheet. A piece cut from a clean bag for vacuum cleaners will do as well. Do not use a sheet or insert that is too tight to breathe through. If one does that the air will come in from the sides of the mask and the total protection effect will be less. It can be arduous to breathe through such a mask. If you have breathing problems leave the insert out. The sheets alone are already good protection. There is a piece of wire from a big paper clip fixed inside the middle of the upper seam to fit the mask tightly around the upper nose. The lower part goes under the chin. I shaved my beard to make it a tighter fit. As I had no sewing equipment I used a stapler to fix the seams and the ribbons.

The HEPA filter catches particles down to 0.3 micrometer. Viruses are some 125 nanometer in diameter so they are smaller and could slip through. But the viruses are attached to some droplet that are bigger. HEPA filter are essentially labyrinths of small fiber and the viruses would have to bounce multiple times to get through. Finally the dose also matters.

To clean the mask of potential viruses I put it into the oven for 30 minutes at 70C (158F).

The science says that masks work. Everyone should use one. #MaskUp!

The advantage is you can throw them in the washing machine to clean, or even hand wash as they are small items.

The masks in question here, surgical ones, being only meant to protect the patient from the practitioner, seem somewhat flawed in any case.

Better to make better ones; let the Israelis have those not so good ones. A great gift from a family member to their hardworking sibling.

There ought to be an industrial production plant producing the cloth masks with disposable inserts - how about taking over a diaper factory - a lot of folk still use the cloth ones - have such been totally outsourced? (I'd make 'em deluxe, organic cotton only! But for us home bodies, an old sheet well washed, suitably patterned is better than nothing at all.)

[Apr 09, 2020] What temperature should you wash your clothes to kill viruses and bacteria Express.co.uk

Soap disintegrates viral lipid coating in less then a minute and the virus collapses. So even warm water might be OK
Apr 09, 2020 | express.co.uk

Dr Beckmann spokeswoman Susan Fermor revealed a wash at 60C is enough.

She said: "There's a common misconception that people should wash clothes on the hottest possible setting to kill bacteria, but it's unnecessary.

"Tests have proven that washing your clothes at 60C, with a good detergent, is perfectly adequate to kill bacteria.

"Just make sure that you check all garments are suitable to be washed at this temperature before putting them in the washing machine and take care not to ruin your clothes by boil washing."

... ... ...

The NHS said people should keep these items separately from those bearing the virus.

They released the following advice:


[Apr 09, 2020] Covid-19 Can 'boosting' your immune system protect you

Notable quotes:
"... You might also like: ..."
"... Read more about what evidence exists for the idea that spices can affect your health , and how hot drinks will not protect you from Covid-19 ). ..."
"... Unfortunately, the idea that pills, trendy superfoods or wellness habits can provide a shortcut to a healthy immune system is a myth. In fact, the concept of "boosting" your immune system doesn't hold any scientific meaning whatsoever. ..."
"... In this case, the mucus helps to flush out the pathogen, the fever helps to make your body an uncomfortably hot environment in which it's harder for it to replicate, and the aches and general malaise are by-products of the inflammatory chemicals that course through your veins, telling immune cells what to do and where to go. (These symptoms also help signal to your brain that it's time to slow down and let your body recover). ..."
"... There is no evidence that vitamin supplements will protect you from infections, unless you are deficient (Credit: Reuters) Making the other aspect of immunity – the adaptive immune system – generally more active could also be extremely unpleasant. For example, allergies occur when overzealous immune cells learn to treat innocuous foreign bodies, such as pollen, as though they are harmful. Each time they find the offending substance, they switch on the innate immune response too – cue lots of sneezing, itchy eyes and general fatigue. Again, this is probably not what the people championing these remedies have in mind. ..."
"... If you're healthy, forget supplements – except vitamin D ..."
"... Many multivitamins claim to provide "immune support" or to help "maintain healthy immune function". But as BBC Future reported in 2016, vitamin supplements generally don't work in already healthy people – and some may even be harmful. ..."
"... there is little evidence to support vitamin C's mighty reputation for helping us to fight off colds and other respiratory infections. A 2013 review by Cochrane – an organisation renowned for its unbiased research – found that in adults "trials of high doses of vitamin C administered therapeutically, starting after the onset of symptoms, showed no consistent effect on the duration or severity of common cold symptoms". ..."
"... high doses of this vitamin can lead to kidney stones . ..."
"... Brightly coloured fruits and vegetables tend to contain the most antioxidants, because the compounds are often pigmented (Credit: Getty Images) In the developed world, most people get enough vitamins from their diets (unless they are restricted – vegans, for example, are more likely to have certain deficiencies ). However, there is one exception – vitamin D. Iwasaki explains that taking this supplement wouldn't be a bad idea. ..."
"... In fact, many immune cells can actively recognise vitamin D, and it's thought to play an important role in both the innate and acquired immune response – though exactly how remains a mystery. ..."
"... (Read more about who needs to take vitamin D and why ). ..."
"... And we get some of our reserves of these compounds from our diets. Brightly coloured fruits, vegetables and spices tend to contain the most, because antioxidants are often pigmented: they give carrots, blueberries, aubergines, red kale, turmeric, and strawberries their hues. ..."
"... Wellness products aside, there are some approaches you can ..."
Apr 09, 2020 | www.bbc.com

Forget kombucha and trendy vitamin supplements – they are nothing more than magic potions for the modern age. "Spanish Influenza – what it is and how it should be treated," read the reassuringly factual headline to an advert for Vick's VapoRub back in 1918 . The text beneath included nuggets of wisdom such as "stay quiet" and "take a laxative". Oh, and to apply their ointment liberally, of course.

The 1918 flu pandemic was the most lethal in recorded history , infecting up to 500 million people (a quarter of the world's population at the time) and killing tens of millions worldwide.

But with crisis comes opportunity, and the – sometimes literal – snake oil salesmen were out in force. Vick's VapoRub had stiff competition from a panoply of crackpot remedies, including Miller's Antiseptic Snake Oil , Dr Bell's Pine Tar Honey, Schenck's Mandrake Pills, Dr Jones's Liniment, Hill's Cascara Quinine Bromide , and A. Wulfing & Co's famous mint lozenges. Their adverts made regular appearances in the newspapers, where they starred alongside increasingly alarming headlines.

Fast-forward to 2020, and not much has changed. Though the Covid-19 pandemic is separated from the Spanish flu by over a century of scientific discoveries, there are still plenty of questionable medicinal concoctions and folk remedies floating around. This time, the theme is "boosting" the immune system.

Of the rumours currently circulating on social media, one of the more bizarre is the idea that you can raise your white blood cell count by masturbating more. And as always, nutritional advice abounds. This time, we're being encouraged to seek out foods rich in antioxidants and vitamin C (back in 1918, the public were told to eat more onions), while pseudoscientists are peddling trendy products such as kombucha and probiotics .

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According to one source, cayenne pepper and green tea can provide better protection against Covid-19 than face masks – a bold and highly dubious claim, considering that some face masks reduce your risk of contracting respiratory viruses by a factor of five. ( Read more about what evidence exists for the idea that spices can affect your health , and how hot drinks will not protect you from Covid-19 ).

There's no such thing as boosted immunity

Unfortunately, the idea that pills, trendy superfoods or wellness habits can provide a shortcut to a healthy immune system is a myth. In fact, the concept of "boosting" your immune system doesn't hold any scientific meaning whatsoever.

"There are three different components to immunity," says Akiko Iwasaki, an immunologist at Yale University. "There's things like skin, the airways and the mucus membranes that are there to begin with, and they provide a barrier to infection. But once the virus gets past these defences, then you have to induce the 'innate' immune response." This consists of chemicals and cells which can rapidly raise the alert and begin fighting off any intruder. An Italian advert for a remedy during the 1918 flu pandemic (Credit: Getty Images)

The 1918 flu pandemic was an opportunity for snake oil salesmen to market their useless - and sometimes harmful - products (Credit: Getty Images)

"When that is not enough, then we kick in the adaptive immune system," she says. This involves cells and proteins – antibodies – which take a few days or weeks to emerge. Importantly, the adaptive immune system can only target particular pathogens. "So, for example, a T-cell specific to Covid-19 will not respond to influenza or bacterial pathogens."

Most infections will trigger adaptive immunity eventually. But there's another way to get it going, and that's vaccination: exposing the body to live or dead microbes, or parts of them, can help the body to identify the real deal when it comes along.

The concept of "boosting" a person's immune system would, presumably, involve making these responses more active, or stronger.

In actuality, you wouldn't want to do this.

Take the symptoms of a cold – body aches, a fever, brain fog, copious amounts of snot and phlegm. Most of these problems aren't actually caused by the virus itself. Instead, they're triggered by your own body, on purpose: they're part of the innate immune response.

Many "immunity-boosting" products claim to reduce inflammation
In this case, the mucus helps to flush out the pathogen, the fever helps to make your body an uncomfortably hot environment in which it's harder for it to replicate, and the aches and general malaise are by-products of the inflammatory chemicals that course through your veins, telling immune cells what to do and where to go. (These symptoms also help signal to your brain that it's time to slow down and let your body recover).

The mucus and chemical signals are part of inflammation, which is the bedrock of a healthy immune response . But the process is exhausting, so you wouldn't want to have it turned up to 11 all the time. And most viruses, including Covid-19, will trigger it anyway. If kombucha, green tea or any of the various "immune-boosting" concoctions on the market really had any impact, they wouldn't give you a healthful glow: they'd give you a runny nose.

Ironically, many "immunity-boosting" products claim to reduce inflammation. Empty vitamin shelves in a supermarket (Credit: Reuters)

There is no evidence that vitamin supplements will protect you from infections, unless you are deficient (Credit: Reuters) Making the other aspect of immunity – the adaptive immune system – generally more active could also be extremely unpleasant. For example, allergies occur when overzealous immune cells learn to treat innocuous foreign bodies, such as pollen, as though they are harmful. Each time they find the offending substance, they switch on the innate immune response too – cue lots of sneezing, itchy eyes and general fatigue. Again, this is probably not what the people championing these remedies have in mind.

But let's give those saying you can "boost" your immune system the benefit of the doubt and assume they mean that certain products can improve the immune response in a useful way – rather than literally "boost" it.

"The problem is that many of these claims have no grounding in evidence," Iwasaki says. So what are they based on – and is there anything that can help?

If you're healthy, forget supplements – except vitamin D

Many multivitamins claim to provide "immune support" or to help "maintain healthy immune function". But as BBC Future reported in 2016, vitamin supplements generally don't work in already healthy people – and some may even be harmful.

Take vitamin C. The health effects of this antioxidant have been steeped in mythology ever since the two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling became obsessed with its ability to fight the common cold. After studying the vitamin for years, eventually he started taking 18,000 mg per day – around 300 times the current recommended daily amount.

Vitamin supplements aren't beneficial to your immune system unless you are deficient
However, there is little evidence to support vitamin C's mighty reputation for helping us to fight off colds and other respiratory infections. A 2013 review by Cochrane – an organisation renowned for its unbiased research – found that in adults "trials of high doses of vitamin C administered therapeutically, starting after the onset of symptoms, showed no consistent effect on the duration or severity of common cold symptoms".

In fact, many experts consider the vitamin C market to be a bit of a racket , as most people in the developed world get enough from their diets already. Though scurvy is thought to have killed two million sailors and pirates between the 15th and 18th Centuries, the numbers now are far lower. For example, just 128 people in England were hospitalised with the disease between 2016 and 2017. On the other hand, high doses of this vitamin can lead to kidney stones .

"Vitamin supplements aren't beneficial to your immune system unless you are deficient," says Iwasaki. An assortment of vegetables in a wooden crate (Credit: Getty Images)

Brightly coloured fruits and vegetables tend to contain the most antioxidants, because the compounds are often pigmented (Credit: Getty Images) In the developed world, most people get enough vitamins from their diets (unless they are restricted – vegans, for example, are more likely to have certain deficiencies ). However, there is one exception – vitamin D. Iwasaki explains that taking this supplement wouldn't be a bad idea.

Several studies have linked low vitamin D levels to a higher risk of respiratory infections , and more severe symptoms when they develop. They've also been implicated in the development of autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis.

In fact, many immune cells can actively recognise vitamin D, and it's thought to play an important role in both the innate and acquired immune response – though exactly how remains a mystery.

But crucially – and unusually – vitamin D deficiencies are endemic in many countries, even wealthy ones. As of 2012, it was estimated that about a billion people worldwide weren't getting enough. And with more and more people urged to stay indoors, it's easy to see how even less sunlight exposure could lead to more deficiencies. (Read more about who needs to take vitamin D and why ).

No, masturbation won't help either

Historically, this form of sexual activity was held in deep suspicion by Western medicine. After an 18th Century doctor claimed that the loss of one ounce of semen (28 millilitres) had the same effect on the body as losing 40 ounces (1.18 litres) of blood, masturbation was blamed for all kinds of health problems for hundreds of years, from blindness to neurosis.

Now the tables have turned, and recent research has shown that it can come with some surprising health benefits. In men, for example, it's thought to help keep sperm healthy and may reduce a person's risk of developing prostate cancer .

The question of whether antioxidants can help is slightly more complicated
Alas, any claims that masturbation can improve your immunity or protect you from Covid-19 are overblown. It's true that one study found that men had higher white blood cell counts when they were sexually aroused, and during orgasm. However, there is no evidence that this translates into protection from infections.

There is one way that the practice might protect you – by keeping away from other people. On Twitter, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene recently reminded their followers that, in the age of Covid-19, " you are your safest sex partner ".

There's no need to stock up on antioxidant pills

The question of whether antioxidants can help is slightly more complicated.

As part of the inflammatory response, white blood cells release toxic oxygen compounds. These are something of a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they can kill bacteria and viruses and stop them from being able to make more copies of themselves. On the other, they can damage healthy cells, leading to cancer and ageing – and wearing out the immune system.

To stop this from happening, the body relies on antioxidants. These help to control those unruly oxygen compounds and keep our cells safe.

And we get some of our reserves of these compounds from our diets. Brightly coloured fruits, vegetables and spices tend to contain the most, because antioxidants are often pigmented: they give carrots, blueberries, aubergines, red kale, turmeric, and strawberries their hues. A glass of kombucha, a type of fermented tea (Credit: Getty Images)

Wellness experts like to promote kombucha as more than just a drink - but there's no evidence that it can treat or prevent any illnesses, including Covid-19 (Credit: Getty Images) There's currently a trial in the works to test if giving people with Covid-19 antioxidant supplements might help their recovery.

However, the trial is just one of hundreds looking into potential treatments for Covid-19. And despite decades of research, not a single placebo-controlled, peer-reviewed study on humans has ever shown that high doses of antioxidants can "boost" the immune system, or treat or prevent viral infections in humans.

Probiotics may help or they may not

If you believe the wellness experts and homeopaths, kombucha is much more than a sweet, fizzy drink made from fermented tea. The internet is teeming with outrageous claims about the product, including that it can treat cancer and even Aids (it can't).

Now some websites are suggesting that it can help to stop you getting Covid-19 (and it probably can't).

Like probiotics, kombucha contains live microorganisms. However, no studies have ever confirmed whether the drink has these in high enough concentrations to be considered one – and there is currently no evidence that kombucha specifically can treat or prevent any illnesses whatsoever.

The picture is less clear for probiotics in general.

There is currently no evidence that any kind of probiotic can protect you from Covid-19
One 2015 review found that probiotics – beneficial microorganisms which are concentrated in foods, drinks, or pills – significantly reduced the number of upper respiratory tract infections that people got and made them less severe. They also slightly reduced the use of antibiotics and led to fewer school absences. The authors concluded that they might be better than placebo treatments, but pointed out that the quality of the available evidence was low.

(You can find out more about what we do and don't know about gut health , as well as how to eat your way to a healthy gut by checking out BBC Future's series on gut bacteria from last year. We found that it's true that gut bacteria are important – but that taking probiotics is unlikely to help you much, and that the best way forward is to simply eat a varied diet.)

Importantly, there is currently no evidence that any kind of probiotic can protect you from Covid-19.

So what has been proven to work?

Iwasaki says most of these myths are relatively innocuous – but the danger is that falling for them will give you a false sense of security. "One thing I do warn against is when people feel like they're protected. They shouldn't feel empowered to go out there and, you know, start having parties," she says.

Wellness products aside, there are some approaches you can take to help support your immune system. They aren't especially sexy, and you won't see many wellness influencers selling them in a bottle. They are, however, proven to work – and they don't require shelling out your hard-earned cash: get enough sleep, exercise, eat a balanced diet, and try not to be stressed.

Failing that, there is one sure-fire way to improve your immunity to certain pathogens: vaccination.

--

[Apr 09, 2020] Growing numbers of fake medicines linked to coronavirus are on sale in developing countries, the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned

Apr 09, 2020 | www.bbc.com

Growing numbers of fake medicines linked to coronavirus are on sale in developing countries, the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned.

A BBC News investigation found fake drugs for sale in Africa, with counterfeiters exploiting growing gaps in the market.

The WHO said taking these drugs could have "serious side effects".

One expert warned of "a parallel pandemic, of substandard and falsified products".

Around the world, people are stockpiling basic medicines. However, with the world's two largest producers of medical supplies - China and India - in lockdown, demand now outstrips the supply and the circulation of dangerous counterfeit drugs is soaring.

In the same week the World Health Organization (WHO) declared coronavirus a pandemic last month, Operation Pangea, Interpol's global pharmaceutical crime fighting unit, made 121 arrests across 90 countries in just seven days, resulting in the seizure of dangerous pharmaceuticals worth over $14m (£11m).

From Malaysia to Mozambique, police officers confiscated tens of thousands of counterfeit face masks and fake medicines, many of which claimed to be able to cure coronavirus. "The illicit trade in such counterfeit medical items during a public health crisis, shows a total disregard for people's lives," said Interpol's Secretary General Jurgen Stock.

According to the WHO, the broader falsified medicines trade, which includes medicines which may be contaminated, contain the wrong or no active ingredient, or may be out-of-date, is worth more than $30bn in low and middle-income countries.

"Best case scenario they [fake medicines] probably won't treat the disease for which they were intended", said Pernette Bourdillion Esteve, from the WHO team dealing with falsified medical products.

"But worst-case scenario they'll actively cause harm, because they might be contaminated with something toxic."

The supply chain

The global pharmaceutical industry is worth more than $1 trillion. Vast supply chains stretch all the way from key manufacturers in places such as China and India, to packaging warehouses in Europe, South America or Asia, to distributors sending medicines to every country in the world.

There is "probably nothing more globalised than medicine" said Esteve. However, as the world goes into lockdown, the supply chain has already begun to uncouple.

Several pharmaceutical companies in India told the BBC they are now operating at 50-60% of their normal capacity. As Indian companies supply 20% of all basic medicines to Africa, nations there are being disproportionately affected. Fake medicine

Speaking to pharmacists and drug companies around the world, the global supply of antimalarials is now under threat.

Ever since US President Donald Trump began referring to the potential of chloroquine and a related derivative, hydroxychloroquine, in White House briefings, there has been a global surge in the demand for these drugs, which are normally used to tackle malaria.

The WHO has repeatedly said there is no definitive evidence that chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine can be used against the virus that causes Covid-19. However, at a recent news conference, whilst referring to these antimalarials, President Trump said: "What do you have to lose? Take it."

As the demand has soared, the BBC has discovered large quantities of fake chloroquine in circulation in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Cameroon. The WHO has also found the fake medicines for sale in Niger.

The antimalarial chloroquine is normally sold for about $40 for a pot of 1,000 tablets. But pharmacists in the DRC were found to be selling them for up to $250.

The medicine being sold was allegedly manufactured in Belgium, by "Brown and Burk Pharmaceutical limited". However, Brown and Burk, a pharmaceutical company registered in the UK, said they had "nothing to do with this medicine. We don't manufacture this drug, it's fake." As the coronavirus pandemic continues, Professor Paul Newton, an expert in fake medicines at the University of Oxford, warned the circulation of fake and dangerous medicines would only increase unless governments around the world present a united front.

"We risk a parallel pandemic, of substandard and falsified products unless we all ensure that there is a global co-ordinated plan for co-ordinated production, equitable distribution and the surveillance of the quality of the tests, medicines and vaccines. Otherwise the benefits of modern medicine... will be lost."

[Apr 08, 2020] WATCH Perspectives on the Pandemic #2

Apr 08, 2020 | off-guardian.org

The Interviewer : John Kirby is the director of FOUR DIED TRYING, a feature documentary and series on the major assassinations of the 1960's and their calamitous impact on the country. To join the struggle for justice for Dr. King, Malcolm X, and John and Robert Kennedy.

The Interviewee: Professor Knut Wittkowski was head of The Rockefeller University's Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Research Design for 20 years.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/lGC5sGdz4kg

Journeyman Pictures sits down with Prof Knut Wittkowski to discuss lockdowns, social-distancing and the best way to handle the spread of a new disease.


Dennis Brown ,

Another superb contribution by Off Guardian.

In Canada, according to the Covid-19 Daily E.P.I Update of April 7th there have been 17,046 confirmed cases out of a total population in Canada of 37.6M.

344 have died.

62% of all reported hospitalizations, 62% reported I.C.U. admissions , and 92% of deaths occurred among individuals 60-79 years of age. 73% of hospitalized cases reported having one or more pre-existing conditions.

The data in Canada , at least, seems to conform very closely to Prof. Knut Wittkowski's hypothesis in this video. What a outrage that this information is being deliberately ignored by the mainstream media!

Thank you again Off Guardian for providing this vitally needed information.

Fair dinkum ,

Oligarchs and their underlings (politicians and corporate types) love to hold court, particularly over a banquet at their preferred eating establishments.
With most of these establishments closed due to lockdowns, where are the parasites dining?
Do they have five star glutton rooms hidden away?
Will they tire of take away meals?
How can they strut their stuff without the requisite surroundings?
It's a problem that must keep them awake at night.

Gary Weglarz ,

We were moved to tears and ready to go to war when they told us about those non-existent "Kuwaiti incubator babies" that Iraqi soldiers were throwing on the cold hard ground to die – but weren't!

We were paralyzed and terrified when they told us that steel and concrete buildings can simply vaporize into billowing dust clouds in mid- air – so we in America gladly became in effect a surveillance police state complete with torture chambers.

We were filled with anger and fear when they told us about those non-existent Iraqi weapons of mass destruction about to obliterate us at any moment but, uhh, it appears in retrospect they didn't happen to exist in this particular universe that we currently inhabit! Perhaps in another dimension?

We were revolted and filled with outrage when they told us about Gaddafi's non-existent "viagra fueled rape camps" – just before we turned Libya into rubble and an open slave market – "in order to save the women" – who weren't being raped in non-existent viagra fueled rape camps. Many admire Hillary because she valiantly stood with those women, who weren't being raped, in those non-existent rape camps – and Hillary of course could not contain her glee when publicly discussing the murder of a head of state and the destruction of an entire nation – cackling like the psychopath that she is.

We were repulsed when they told us about Assad's deranged non-existent gas attacks on his own people done for "kicks" no less – as the valiant White Helmeted jihadist crazies we in the West supported fearlessly slaughtered innocent civilians – well, let's not talk about that right now – let's focus on something upbeat, like those film awards the White Helmets got for their feature length – "documentary" – entered in the "complete freaking fantasy" category – always a Hollywood favorite.

And we were no doubt all moved to loathing and contempt and to deranged Cold War deja vu fervor when they told us for three straight years that – "Russia hacked American democracy" – installing in office an orange haired, gonad grabbing, "Putin Puppet!" Surely there is a good reason they then gave said "Putin Puppet" renewed "Patriot Act" powers and more military spending money than he asked for – all in such defiance of rational thought and argument that it should make one's head hurt. Alas, here in America the ability to experience cognitive dissonance appears to have evaporated among the masses simultaneously with the loss of critical thinking abilities.

So buoyed by this brief trip down memory lane we should quite naturally all credulously believe Western MSM and our political class now as they tell us that "they" – (err, uhh, I mean "the virus") – crashed the global economy – leading them to then have no choice but to bail out our wealthiest corporations and our biggest banks – "for our own good" – of course, well, it goes without saying doesn't it?

And unfortunately they now will have to keep us all under house arrest until this all blows over – "for our own good!" I mean it is certainly only "for our own good" that they don't want to risk another Occupy Wall Street insurrection, or want to take the risk that the Yellow Vests might start building working guillotines in every village and every neighborhood in Paris.

I mean and sure it may kind of look bad that American elites have continued to use amoral sanctions to brutalize, starve and kill the poor in Iran, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Yemen and elsewhere – WHILE they are showing their vast concern for the rest of us by placing us under house arrest, but let's face it – "it is for those poor people's own good," I mean their starvation and dying of course, because we have to regime-change those folks governments "in order to save them." Or something like that.

I mean think about it, what have our elites ever done to cause us to so much as question their humanitarian values and actions? Ok, ok, that half million dead Iraqi children "are worth it" shtick wasn't their best PR moment, but hey, they obviously "meant well" by killing a half a million kids -- right? I mean I'm sure they had their "reasons." Just like they have their reasons for killing poor people all around the world every day.

– I must confess that I am absolutely stunned and disheartened by how few people I know who are so much as registering even a faint whiff of skepticism about what is happening globally, and the narratives being spun by MSM and the political class. I know so few who are asking even the most basic and fundamental questions about our so called "pandemic," our lock down, and our collective loss of liberties – even among those who didn't swallow the propaganda narratives on Russiagate or Syria. Instead we appear to have a massive segment of the American population simply willing to allow the same amoral always lying war-criminal media and political class – (which ALWAYS serve elite interests) – to "tell them how to think" and "what to think" and "how high" to jump – and now even "when they can leave their own home." An absolutely stunning level of obedience – to say the least.

Maxwell ,

"I'm not paid by the [corporation] government, so I'm entitled to actually do science."

Says it all.

Shaking My Head ,

I am not some kind of anti-government conservative at all, but I do think the dependencies academics, doctors, and scientists have on what can be very uncertain government funding is the reason why I haven't seen any loud critical voices from them in Canada. All the scholars whether of humanities or law, where are they in denouncing an obvious transformation into a police state? All the talk about 'civil liberties' over the years and how they must be protected, where did all of that go? Not one peep these last weeks! And as for doctors and scientists, why aren't there are any like the Germans such as Sucharit Bhakdi or Wolfgang Wodarg or Knut Wittkowski, or Americans such as John Ioannidis, Jay Bhattacharya, Michael Levitt, (John/Jay/Michael all at Stanford), Shiva Ayyadurai (I'm a bit suspicious of his political aspirations though). And there are other Germans I saw mentioned in the experts article on Off-Guardian or Swiss Propaganda Research article. Yet in Canada, it's total silence. But if you look on Twitter, there are a number of everyday people from the US and UK who are criticizing the phoniness and deception as they see it. So if the common people can call things out, where are the others with more status and reach? It's sickening.

Sam ,

I've been thinking this since this all blew up. Bhattacharya said (in this interview) that he got a deal of backlash from colleagues over his WSJ article raising questions about the fatality estimates: he was told to "get with the program". Groupthink is very powerful today, more powerful than I remember in my lifetime, and few will buck the party line. It's indeed sickening and disturbing.

Ken ,

But as self-appointed lord and emperor of the world, Bill Gates, has said we can't have herd immunity.

Shaking My Head ,

Bill Gates has recently been granted some very accommodating interviews all of a sudden. Here he is with Trevor Noah operating as a good PR rep: https://twitter.com/21WIRE/status/1246577506309857280 And here he was on PBS News Hour today: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/bill-gates-on-outlook-for-a-covid-19-vaccine-and-where-pandemic-will-hurt-most Not a single tough question about anything towards him. Maybe he funds PBS directly or indirectly. This is so fishy.

Shaking My Head ,

Bill Gates has also donated to Imperial College (I saw a comment stating he was the biggest donor but I didn't have time to research that): https://philanthropynewsdigest.org/news/gates-foundation-awards-35-million-for-mosquito-research "With its latest award of $35 million, the foundation has now invested a total of $75 million in the Target Malaria project, which is based at Imperial College, London"

[Apr 08, 2020] Mortality in UK does not support the hypothesis about pandemic

Apr 08, 2020 | off-guardian.org

In strict meaning the pandemic is when the the particular infection increases mortality in all affected countries... It did not happened.

Doctortrinate ,

Latest figures Gov uk. Deaths registered in the year-to-date, Week 1 to 13. Looking at the year-to-date (using refreshed data to get the most accurate estimates), the number of deaths is currently lower than the five-year average. The current number of deaths is 150,047, which is 3,350 fewer than the five-year average. Of the deaths registered by 27 March 2020, 647 mentioned the coronavirus (COVID-19) on the death certificate; this is 0.4% of all deaths.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/deathsregisteredweeklyinenglandandwalesprovisional/weekending27march2020

U.K Lockdown – evening of the 23'rd March – Deaths, of 'or' with Covid ? Tests, false positive / incorrect diagnosis = ? ? %

[Apr 08, 2020] In March, US Deaths From COVID-19 Totaled Less Than 2% Of All Deaths

Apr 08, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

About 2.9 million people die in the United States each year from all causes. Monthly this total ranges from around 220,000 in the summertime to more than 280,000 in winter .

In recent decades, flu season has often peaked sometime from January to March, and this is a major driver in total deaths. The average daily number of deaths from December through March is over eight thousand .

So far, total death data is too preliminary to know if there has been any significant increase in total deaths as a result of COVID-19, and this is an important metric, because it gives us some insight into whether or not COVID-19 is driving total death numbers well above what would otherwise be expected.

Indeed, according to some sources, it is not clear that total deaths have increased significantly as a result of COVID-19. In a March 30 article for The Spectator , former UK National Health Service pathologist John Lee noted that the current number of deaths from COVID-19 does not indicate that the UK is experiencing " excess deaths ." Lee writes :

The simplest way to judge whether we have an exceptionally lethal disease is to look at the death rates. Are more people dying than we would expect to die anyway in a given week or month? Statistically, we would expect about 51,000 to die in Britain this month. At the time of writing, 422 deaths are linked to Covid-19 -- so 0.8 per cent of that expected total. On a global basis, we'd expect 14 million to die over the first three months of the year. The world's 18,944 coronavirus deaths represent 0.14 per cent of that total. These figures might shoot up but they are, right now, lower than other infectious diseases that we live with (such as flu). Not figures that would, in and of themselves, cause drastic global reactions.

How do these numbers look in the United States? During March of 2020, there were 4,053 COVID-19 deaths according to Worldometer. That is 1.6 percent of total deaths in March 2019 (total data on March 2020 deaths is still too preliminary to offer a comparison). For context, we could note that total deaths increased by about four thousand from March 2018 to March 2019. So for March, the increase in total deaths is about equal to what we already saw as a pre-COVID increase from March 2018 to March 2019.

As Lee notes, total COVID-19 deaths could still increase significantly this season, but even then we must ask what percentage of total deaths warrants an international panic. Is it 5 percent? Ten percent? The question has never been addressed, and so far, a figure of 1 percent of total deaths in some places is being treated as a reason to forcibly shut down the global economy.

Yet, as a CDC report recently noted , pneumonia deaths have often been far more common than COVID-19 deaths are right now: "Based on National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) mortality surveillance data available on March 26, 2020, 8.2 percent of the deaths occurring during the week ending on March 21, 2020 (week 12), were due to [pneumonia and influenza]."

Meanwhile there is a trend toward to attributing more of those pneumonia deaths to COVID-19 rather than influenza, although this doesn't actually mean the total mortality rate has increased. The CDC report continues: "the percent of all deaths with Influenza listed as a cause have decreased (from 1.0% to 0.8%) over this same time period. The increase in pneumonia deaths during this time period are likely associated with COVID-19 rather than influenza." This doesn't represent a total increase in pneumonia deaths, just a change in how they are recorded.

This reflects an increased focus on attributing deaths to COVID-19, as noted by Lee:

In the current climate, anyone with a positive test for Covid-19 will certainly be known to clinical staff looking after them: if any of these patients dies, staff will have to record the Covid-19 designation on the death certificate -- contrary to usual practice for most infections of this kind. There is a big difference between Covid-19 causing death, and Covid-19 being found in someone who died of other causes. Making Covid-19 notifiable might give the appearance of it causing increasing numbers of deaths, whether this is true or not. It might appear far more of a killer than flu, simply because of the way deaths are recorded.

Given this rush to maximize the number of deaths attributable to COVID-19, what will April's data look like? It may be that COVID-19 deaths could then indeed number 10 or 20 percent of all deaths.

But the question remains: will total deaths increase substantially compared to April 2019 or April 2018? If they don't, this will call into question whether or not COVID-19 is the engine of mortality that many government bureaucrats insist it is. After all, if April's mortality remains "about the same" as the usual total and comes in around 230,000–235,000, then obsessive concern over COVID-19 would be justified only if it can be proven April 2020 deaths would have plummeted year-over-year had it not been for COVID-19.

Update:

Meanwhile the CDC is instructing medical staff to report deaths as COVID-19 deaths even when no test has confirmed the presence of the disease. In a Q and A on death certificates published by the CDC on March 24, the agency advises:

COVID-19 should be reported on the death certificate for all decedents where the disease caused or is assumed to have caused or contributed to death . Certifiers should include as much detail as possible based on their knowledge of the case, medical records, laboratory testing, etc. If the decedent had other chronic conditions such as COPD or asthma that may have also contributed, these conditions can be reported in Part II. [emphasis in original.]

This is extremely likely to inflate the number of deaths attributed to COVID-19 while pulling down deaths attributed to other influenza-like illnesses and to deaths caused by pneumonia with unspecified origins. This is especially problematic since we know the overwhelming majority of COVID-19 deaths occur in patients that are already suffering from a number of other conditions. In Italy, for example, data shows 99 percent of COVID-19 deaths occurred in patients who had at least one other condition. More than 48 percent had three other conditions. Similar cases in the US are now likely to be routinely reported simply as COVID-19 cases.

Source: Total death and flu/pneumonia death data via National Center for Health Statistics ( www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/weeklyarchives2019-2020/data/nchsData12.csv ). COVID-19 totals via Worldometer COVID stats.

Unfortunately, because total death data is not reported immediately, we have yet to see how this plays out.

We do know historically, however, that deaths attributed to flu and pneumonia over the past decade have tended to make up around five to ten percent of all deaths, depending on the severity of the "season." Last week (week 14, the week ending April 4) was the first week during which COVID-19 deaths exceeded flu and pneumonia deaths, coming in at 11 percent of all death for that week. The prior week, (week 13, the week ending Mar 28) COVID-19 deaths made up 3.3 percent of all deaths.

Until we have reliable numbers on all deaths in coming weeks, it will be impossible to know the extent to which COVID-19 are "cannibalizing" flu and pneumonia deaths overall. That is, if the COVID-19 totals skyrocket, but total deaths remain relatively stable, than we might guess that many deaths formerly attributed simply to pneumonia, or to flu, are now being labeled as COVID-19 deaths. Potentially, this could also be the case for other patients, such as those with advanced cases of diabetes.

[Apr 08, 2020] The books are being cooked, not only in this way, but also by "lying with statistics" through not having a reliable means of understanding the overall infection rate, nor the mechanisms of infection

Apr 08, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

JerseyJeffersonian , 06 April 2020 at 12:03 PM

To add to the discussion of how the CDC's rules on assigning primary causation to coronavirus for deaths (and analogously, how other nations medical Grey Eminences also handle this issue), regardless of the presence of underlying co-morbidities, I drop this link here. It is a quite well written comment from the poster, The Right Doctor, an older, senior physician who explains the "cause of death" assignment process, and discusses past practices, and what has changed in this with the advent of CoVID-19. Very illuminating.

http://thezman.com/wordpress/?p=20188#comment-157790

The books are being cooked, not only in this way, but also by "lying with statistics" through not having a reliable means of understanding the overall infection rate, nor the mechanisms of infection. W

Without a handle on the overall infection rate in the population, it is child's play to exaggerate the lethality by focusing solely on the death rate among those groups with co-morbidities, the significance of which is itself a moving, anecdotal target absent focused study.

Here is a report of a study to address those issues being implemented in Germany. Sorry, the link is from The Guardian (I brandish a crucifix in one hand, and fondle my necklace of heads of garlic with the other...), but it is still valuable in increasing understanding of what we don't know, but should in order to make optimal policy choices.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/31/virologists-to-turn-germany-worst-hit-district-into-coronavirus-laboratory

[Apr 08, 2020] Something did not compute: Mortality in the USA from Influenza and Pneumonia was much higher two years ago.

Apr 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Alfred (Cairns) , Apr 6 2020 19:07 utc | 17

Here is the latest chart from the CDC. As can be seen mortality in the USA from Influenza and Pneumonia was much higher two years ago.

http://alongchat.com/stuff/influenzausa.jpg

The original report is here: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm

It is panic for fake reasons.

[Apr 08, 2020] Why America Can't Respond to the Current Crisis by Robert Reich

Mar 17, 2020 | www.truthdig.com

... ... ...

Instead of a public health system, we have a private for-profit system for individuals lucky enough to afford it and a rickety social insurance system for people fortunate enough to have a full-time job.

At their best, both systems respond to the needs of individuals rather than the needs of the public as a whole. In America, the word "public" – as in public health, public education or public welfare – means a sum total of individual needs, not the common good.

Contrast this with America's financial system. The Federal Reserve concerns itself with the health of financial markets as a whole. Late last week the Fed made $1.5 trillion available to banks at the slightest hint of difficulties making trades. No one batted an eye.

When it comes to the health of the nation as a whole, money like this isn't available. And there are no institutions analogous to the Fed with responsibility for overseeing and managing the public's health – able to whip out a giant checkbook at a moment's notice to prevent human, rather than financial, devastation.

Even if a test for the Covid-19 virus had been developed and approved in time, no institutions are in place to administer it to tens of millions of Americans free of charge. Local and state health departments are already barebones, having lost nearly a quarter of their workforce since 2008, according to the National Association of County and City Health Officials.

Healthcare in America is delivered mainly by private for-profit corporations which, unlike financial institutions, are not required to maintain reserve capacity. As a result, the nation's supply of ventilators isn't nearly large enough to care for projected numbers of critically ill coronavirus victims unable to breathe for themselves. Its 45,000 intensive care unit beds fall woefully short of the 2.9 million that are likely to be needed.

The Fed can close banks to quarantine financial crises but the US can't close workplaces because the nation's social insurance system depends on people going to work.

Almost 30% of American workers have no paid sick leave from their employers, including 70% of low-income workers earning less than $10.49 an hour. Vast numbers of self-employed workers cannot afford sick leave. Friday's deal between House Democrats and the White House won't have much effect because it exempts large employers and offers waivers to smaller ones.

Most jobless Americans don't qualify for unemployment insurance because they haven't worked long enough in a steady job, and the ad-hoc deal doesn't alter this. Meanwhile, more than 30 million Americans have no health insurance. Eligibility for Medicaid, food stamps and other public assistance is now linked to having or actively looking for work.

It's hard to close public schools because most working parents cannot afford childcare. Many poor children rely on school lunches for their only square meal a day. In Los Angeles, about 80% of students qualify for free or reduced lunches and just under 20,000 are homeless at some point during the school year.

There is no public health system in the US, in short, because the richest nation in the world has no capacity to protect the public as a whole, apart from national defense. Ad-hoc remedies such as House Democrats and the White House fashioned on Friday are better than nothing, but they don't come close to filling this void.

[Apr 08, 2020] Los Angeles has become one of the country's first localities to mandate the use of face masks while shopping

Apr 08, 2020 | nationalinterest.org

The requirement will commence midnight as Thursday turns to Friday. Starting then, all customers entering the necessary businesses that have been allowed to stay open despite the quarantine must be wearing some kind of cloth mask. These businesses include grocery stores, pharmacies, hotels, and any kind of taxi or ride-sharing service. These locations are permitted to refuse service to anyone not covering their mouth and nose.

All employees of these businesses must wear masks as well, and employers must reimburse the cost of such items. Included in the new rule are regulations on essential businesses mandating that they ensure every worker has access to a clean restroom and has an opportunity to wash their hands at a minimum of thirty-minute intervals. While Los Angeles public health officials have recommended implementing the use of plexiglass doors between employees and customers where possible, this was not included in the order

[Apr 08, 2020] Medical group endorses anti-malarial drug treatment for coronavirus patients NY Post - Sic Semper Tyrannis

Apr 08, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

"Medical group endorses anti-malarial drug treatment for coronavirus patients" NY Post


"America's major medical society specializing in the treatment of respiratory diseases has endorsed using hydroxychloroquine for seriously ill hospitalized coronavirus patients.

The American Thoracic Society issued guidelines Monday that suggest COVID-19 patients with pneumonia get doses of the anti-malaria drug.

"To prescribe hydroxychloroquine (or chloroquine) to hospitalized patients with COVID-19 pneumonia if all of the following apply: a) shared decision-making is possible, b) data can be collected for interim comparisons of patients who received hydroxychloroquine (or chloroquine) versus those who did not, c) the illness is sufficiently severe to warrant investigational therapy, and d) the drug is not in short supply," the Thoracic Society said." NY Post

--------------

So, the Thoracic Society says 1- Hydrochloroquin is only rarely dangerous 2. It is widely available and 3 - Why not give it a shot if the patient is in bad shape.

I could have bought some of this an Z-pac before the madness started. Like a lot of old SF men I had quite a lot of medical instruction in training and assisted my team medical sergeants in the their work among the unfortunate. IOW I self treat a lot and have a stash of antibiotics, etc.

Fauci says we should never shake hands again and should expect the economy to be shut down for 18 months. IMO if we accept the 18 month thing that cat won't bounce. pl

https://nypost.com/2020/04/06/medical-group-backs-giving-hydroxychloroquine-to-coronavirus-patients/

just another old guy , 08 April 2020 at 11:50 AM

In the previous post about the use of chloroquine for treating Covid-19 I posted a link to a research paper which concluded that there was no clinical benefit to its use for those severely ill. As far as i know this was the first actual research performed on this subset of the issue.

Below is another one I found this morning from the Pasteur Hospital in Nice. In this instance they are using the hydroxychloroquine-azithromycin drug suggestion on more mildy ill patients. This is the drug combination which so many have placed their hopes in a miracle on. The result is that it has turned out to be so toxic that it had to be discontinued. This is not the final answer as there are more variations to check out - but don't get your hopes too high.

Thus we have no seen so far that this drug idea has either no effect or is too toxic. Anecdotally, I and the teams I worked with when I was younger had to take choloroquine for long periods of time. The frequency and unpleasantness of side effects were such that many eventually refused to take the drug and took their chances with getting malaria - and we were seeing malaria all the time so this was not an uniformed choice. I have questioned this idea from the get go - but that is, of course, just a gut reaction and not valid or scientific.

I think it fair to say the stress of the situation is driving us to grasp at straws and hope for miracles. No one wants to wait the time it normally takes to work our way to a scientific solution. But that is almost certainly what we are going to end up doing anyway as the alternative has only worked on the rarest of occasions. A very interesting discussion can also take place regarding the likelihood of developing a successful vaccine as after near 20 years of working on SARS and MERS there are still no vaccines for them approved.

Link is a Goggle translate from french.

https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=fr&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nicematin.com%2Fsante%2Fcoronavirus-nous-avons-deja-du-interrompre-le-traitement-de-hydroxychloroquine-azithromycine-au-chu-de-nice-489118%23Echobox%3D1586243253

turcopolier , 08 April 2020 at 02:03 PM
just another old guy

i took chloroquine for a year and it gave me the runs but that was the only side effect I experienced.

[Apr 08, 2020] US hospitals firing people because their usual business no longer makes money:

Apr 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

b , Apr 6 2020 18:59 utc | 15

@Noirette

Here as long thread of U.S. hospitals firing people because their usual business no longer makes money:

U.S. healthcare system is so overwhelmed by COVID-19 that hospitals are laying off staff.

Yes, you read that right. Due to coronavirus lockdown and fears, no one's going except in absolute emergencies. Hospitals are getting slammed--by lack of business.
...

[Apr 08, 2020] No, we can't blame Trump for the entire privatized US healthcare system. However, he owns part of this, as recently published information clearly shows

Apr 08, 2020 | consortiumnews.com

Andrew Thomas , April 7, 2020 at 10:32

No, we can't blame Trump for the entire privatized US healthcare system. However, he owns part of this, as recently published information clearly shows. Having said that, his shamelessness has, along with the Fed, and Congress, and the Supreme Court, and state governments all over the country, have also clarified the state of play very well indeed. This is a shithole kleptocracy merged with a kakistocracy. Voting has lost all of its meaning. The only thing left to us is an active boycott in November, assuming the farce isn't called off by a presidential decree. The ruling of the Supreme Court on the Wisconsin election on Monday would seem to make the Court's approval of such a thing unlikely. However, it's not exactly the same question, and the Federalists are nothing if not both inventive and supine when it comes to the exercise of corporate-backed executive power. My guess is that it won't happen, if only because Trump will be crushing the Dems in the polls.

AnneR , April 7, 2020 at 07:32

Indeed, Mr Cook, indeed.

The US (its ruling, plutocratic elites and their fellow traveling political hench-folks) has never wanted to expend taxpayer (i.e. the hoi polloi's taxes, the rich-ultra rich not paying any or very little of their "earnings" to the IRS) monies (however much cheaper, in reality, such a medical system would have been and be) on a single payer, free-at-point-of-service medical care system for all of its citizens. Such a system is "communist," "socialist." The fact that the remainder of the western world has some such construct without apparently being communist or even truly socialist escapes the US ruling elite consciousness. Deliberately.

Indeed, the attitude among many of those elite 20%ers would seem to be along the lines of an Arizonan politico who expressed this worldview on Obamacare (hardly single payer, not free at point of service or anything close to, nor does it cover every American – the poorest are beyond its scope): in answer to some question about the ACA, this politico (doubtless with medical coverage paid for by taxpayers) said that some people could afford Mercs, others Fords, some could only afford umpteenth-hand vehicles and then there were those who couldn't afford any vehicle. Access to medical care falls along the same lines – and that's the way things naturally are.

She was a Reprat – but Mr Biden thinks along the same lines, it would seem.

Yes, the US populace – the hoi polloi, vox populi, the bewildered herd, us – want M4A and as a single payer non-profiteering system. Or most do. But the profiteering companies – pharma, hospitals, clinics, med insurance companies, doctors, medical staffing (for Emergency Depts etc.,) companies – do NOT want anything to do with such a system. And they are among the election funders of those DC politicos (many themselves among the rich) who balk at the very notion of M4A. The medical and the political system here is corrupt. Not only does Power corrupt, but profiteering also corrupts and does so as absolutely as absolute power.

And this system, this political, medical system isn't likely to change without some drastic overhaul – and is that likely?

Other changes – increasing surveillance e.g. – may well take place. But profit before life? One only has to consider the eagerness with which the US Congress – both sides of the Janus party – signed onto the Strumpet's obscenely enormous MIC funding last year, continuing the Profit before People (at home and in the countries devastated by us) construct that is DC.

[Apr 08, 2020] Coronavirus hits men harder. Here's what scientists know about it

Apr 08, 2020 | www.theguardian.com

[Apr 08, 2020] Results from a Controlled Trial of Hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19 contagion live

Apr 08, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Crimson King , 05 April 2020 at 08:34 AM

New new study found the reason for the effectiveness of chloroquine:
https://chemrxiv.org/articles/COVID-19_Disease_ORF8_and_Surface_Glycoprotein_Inhibit_Heme_Metabolism_by_Binding_to_Porphyrin/11938173
In short, the SARS-CoV-2 virus has three protein configurations on its outside which attack hemoglobine, dissolving the iron ion from the molecule. The hemoglobin looses the ability to bind oxygen and CO2 without the iron, thus cannot transport it anymore (the effect of hydocyanic acid or carbonmonoxide, but both block the binding location, they do not destroy it).

As a consequence, the O2 load in the blood decreases dangerously even if the lungs still are working. Chloroquine seems to cover the hemoglobine binding location, so the virus cannot attack it anymore. Against the malaria parasite, the coverage by chloroquine seems to block the parasite from consuming proteins from the blood cells which it needs for reproduction.

Strange collection of features: The unique furine cleavage site (known from other, completely different highly contagious flu viruses), the CD147 docking site (known only from the dangerous Coxsakie virus and expressed strongly by cancer cells), the GRP78 docking site (expressed by cells under stress) and the attack on hemoglobine, five distinctive pathways to attack cells and cause damage. All not found in any other corona virus genome...

just another old guy , 05 April 2020 at 03:25 PM
I note that the link posted by CK is not actual results of research into whether chloroquine is effective regarding its use against covid-19 but rather an analysis of physical functions which 'suggests' that it might be. Actual research is required to prove the point.

Conversely there is a new research report on the effectiveness of chloroquine on treating those with severe symptoms from covid-19 just published and the conclusion for that set of patients is that it has 'No Evidence of Rapid Antiviral Clearance or Clinical Benefit ..."

I have read articles from Dr's and PhD experts who postulate both ways on this issue. Actual testing will be required to answer this and this first result is not optimistic at least in the case of severe symptoms.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0399077X20300858

[Apr 07, 2020] Flu Season That's Sickened 26 Million May Be at Its Peak

Apr 07, 2020 | www.usnews.com

At least 14,000 people have died and 250,000 have already been hospitalized during the 2019-2020 flu season, according to estimates from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 26 million Americans have fallen ill with flu-like symptoms.

"There is a deadly respiratory virus that is circulating throughout the United States, and it is at its peak. It is not novel coronavirus," said Dr. Pritish Tosh, an infectious disease specialist with the Mayo Clinic, in Rochester, Minn.

This flu season has come in two waves and has been particularly hard on children, the experts said.

The season started early, in October, with an unusual wave of influenza B virus.

Influenza B is less likely than other strains to mutate and become more virulent. That means it poses a greater threat to young people than to older folks, who may have gained immunity because they encountered the strain before.

The percentage of deaths attributed to flu and pneumonia currently is 6.8%, which is below the epidemic threshold of 7.3% , according to the CDC.

[Apr 07, 2020] Turkey orders all citizens to wear masks as infections surge

Apr 07, 2020 | www.nytimes.com

Turkey has ordered all citizens to wear masks when shopping or visiting crowded public places and announced it will start to deliver masks to every family, free of charge, as infections sharply increase in the country of 80 million.

Turkey has over 30,000 confirmed cases of the virus and has registered 649 deaths. More than 1,300 patients are in intensive care units and at least 600 medical workers have been infected, according to figures released by the Health Ministry.

The number of cases places Turkey among the top 10 worst affected countries , a sharp rise since its first confirmed death from the disease on March 17.

Health Minister Fahrettin Koca, however, said on Monday that the increase in confirmed cases was low when compared with the increase in testing, which has been ramped up to more than 20,000 per day.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has introduced measures to contain the spread of the virus, asking people to stay at home and imposing a curfew on those over 65 and under 20, but resisting a nationwide lockdown.

[Apr 07, 2020] New York has lost a staggering 20,000 hospital beds over the last two decades to budget cuts and insurance overhauls, complicating local and state efforts to battle the coronavirus, according to records and experts.

Apr 07, 2020 | nypost.com

New York has lost a staggering 20,000 hospital beds over the last two decades to budget cuts and insurance overhauls, complicating local and state efforts to battle the coronavirus, according to records and experts.

The Empire State had 73,931 licensed hospital beds in 2000 before years of cuts and closures shrank the number to just 53,000 in 2020, according to records obtained by the New York State Nurses Association from the state Health Department and stats provided by officials.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday the health officials believe they will need anywhere from 55,000 to 110,000 hospital beds to treat the expected wave of coronavirus victims.

"New York has closed too many beds. They went too far," said Judy Wessler, former head of the NY Commission on the Public's Health System, about the 28 percent drop in beds.

Those cutbacks mean the state is in a significantly deeper deficit as it searches for ways to expand its capacity to treat COVID-19 victims.

"This is going to crash the health care system," Cuomo warned, as he again reiterated his request to President Trump that the Army Corps of Engineers be dispatched to help New York state build emergency hospital capacity.

[Apr 07, 2020] Why the U.S. Flip-Flopped on Masks While Asia Stayed the Course

Apr 07, 2020 | www.usnews.com

But now, after evidence that asymptomatic people can spread the disease, the CDC is recommending that all Americans wear masks when out in public to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus. And while the CDC now recommends Americans wear masks, they recommend only cloth coverings, or homemade masks, and ask that medical-grade masks still be reserved for health care professionals.

The move is a win for those who have been publicly questioning the government's guidance and edges the U.S. closer to the practices of East Asian countries where masks are commonplace.

But the U.S. is not alone in its reluctance to recommend the widespread use of masks. The WHO is standing its ground in saying that masks won't help prevent the spread of disease. Though, notably, it said that countries where cleaning and physical distancing are difficult could consider widespread mask wearing.

The science of infection hasn't changed, but experts point to a better understanding of how the coronavirus spreads as the reason for the shift. Since some people are asymptomatic and could still be infecting others without knowing they have the disease, experts say it is prudent for everyone to wear a mask.

[Apr 06, 2020] Wearing a mask is a rare case when a selfish motive to save your own life produce a greater good

Highly recommended!
Apr 06, 2020 | www.unz.com

utu , says: Show Comment April 3, 2020 at 10:45 pm GMT

@Dreadilk By wearing a mask you reduce the probability of getting infected by x while a mask on an infected person reduces the probability of infecting another person by y and y>x (I can't formally prove this inequality at this point but it is intuitively obvious to me.). Since you do not know whether you are infected or not by wearing a mask you are protecting other more than yourself on average. This is a rare case when a selfish motive to save your own life produce a greater good. Not wearing a mask would be an inverse-altruism where you are willing to sacrifice yourself for an idea of killing others , i.e., doing what a suicide bombers do who are aware of y>x calculus.

[Apr 06, 2020] Difficulties of computing real COVID-19 mortality

Apr 06, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Leser , Apr 6 2020 8:07 utc | 158

C1ue @91: why the exponential growth observed now if the virus has been around for months? The numbers you see reported is cased discovered by testing. Testing is what ramps up exponentially now. The % of tested people showing the virus is only very mildly growing. In other words, the underlying base of infected is large and relatively stable as part of the total population. The more you test, the more you find.

Tom @151: "covid causing nerve damage" . That's conjecture stemming from the fact that all test-positive deceased are declared covid victims, including those without symptoms. Rather than state the correct cause of death for almost all those deaths (old age - average age 81 of corona deaths in Italy, 99% with one or multiple chronic diseases, dehydration of care patients whose staff ran back to their Eastern European homes under the panic of border closures, hospitals overwhelmed like every flu winter and now compounded by panic, doctors stuck at home looking after their children), new unseen ways of covid killing are invented.

[Apr 06, 2020] Statistically COVID-19 is just blip on the screen

Apr 06, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

frances , Apr 5 2020 17:46 utc | 31

Of 200,000 people die in the US with COVID-19 out of a population of 330 million people that is 0.06% of the population. That is to say a six hundredths of a percent chance of dying from the virus. Destroying the economy and losing our rights for a 0.06% chance of dying is not reasonable.

And worldwide, Covid-19 Worldwide deaths as of April 4th, 64,518 divided by 7,000,000,000 world population. = 9.21 millionths of one percent. Corona virus, Covid-19, is IMO an orchestrated hysteria.

Consider:
World Health Organization: Yearly Death Rate Comparisons
• Influenza (Various): 290 000 to 650 000 respiratory deaths
• Cholera: 21 000 to 143 000 deaths
• Malaria: 405 000 deaths (2018)
• Typhoid: 128 000 and 161 000 deaths.
• HIV-related causes: 770 000 deaths (2018)
• Measles: 140 000 people died (2018) – mostly children under the age of 5
• Pneumonia: 808 694 children deaths under 5 years in 2017.
• Drowning: 320 000 deaths
• Road Traffic Crashes: 1.35 million deaths

This is EVERY year.

[Apr 06, 2020] Covid19 Death Figures "A Substantial Over-Estimate" by Kit Knightly

Notable quotes:
"... What has happened to the British working class ethos of never believing the authorities? Where I live they're more likely to grass you up than question anything. ..."
"... Also if someone has to go to emergency for other reasons: heart attack, stroke, even a broken leg, if the conditions there are worsened by excess patients who should not be there, they too being weak, may catch some infection, which could in their case due to the secondary issues make them worse, and give them severe breathing issues and so on, which in a normal year they would avoid, because excess contagious patients are not crowded in hospitals when they dont need to be in hospital. ..."
Apr 05, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Covid19 Death Figures "A Substantial Over-Estimate" Bizarre guidelines from health authorities around the world are potentially including thousands of deceased patients who were never even tested Kit Knightly

A few weeks ago we reported that, according to the Italian Institute of Health (ISS), only 12% of Italy's reported Covid19 deaths actually listed Covid19 as the cause of death .

Given that 99% of them had at least one serious co-morbidity (and that 80% of them had two such diseases) this raised serious questions as to the reliability of Italy's reported statistics.

Prof Walter Ricciardi, advisor to Italy's health minister, explained this was caused by the "generous" way the Italian government handles death certificates:

The way in which we code deaths in our country is very generous in the sense that all the people who die in hospitals with the coronavirus are deemed to be dying of the coronavirus.

Essentially, Italy's death registration process does not differentiate between those who simply have the virus in their body , and those who are actually killed by it .

Given the amount of fear and panic Italy's comparatively alarming numbers caused around the world, you would think other nations would be eager to avoid these same mistakes.

Surely all the other countries of the world are employing rigorous standards for delineating who has, and has not, fallen victim to the pandemic, right?

Wrong.

In fact, rather than learning from Italy's example, other countries are not only repeating these mistakes but going even further.

In Germany, for example, though overall deaths and case-fatality ratio are far lower than Italy's, their public health agency is still engaging in similar practice.

On March 20th the President of Germany's Robert Koch Institute confirmed that Germany counts any deceased person who was infected with coronavirus as a Covid19 death, whether or not it actually caused death.

This totally ignores what Dr Sucharit Bhakdi calls the vital distinction between "infection" and "disease", leading to stories such as this, shared by Dr Hendrik Streeck :

In Heinsberg, for example, a 78-year-old man with previous illnesses died of heart failure, and that was without Sars-2 lung involvement. Since he was infected, he naturally appears in the Covid 19 statistics.

How many "Covid19 deaths" in Germany, fall into this bracket? We don't know, and will likely never know.

But at least Germany is actually limiting itself to test positive cases.

In the United States, a briefing note from the CDC's National Vital Statistics Service read as follows [our emphasis]:

It is important to emphasise that Coronavirus Disease 19, or Covid-19, should be reported for all decedents where the disease caused or is presumed to have caused or contributed to death.

"Presumed to have caused"? "Contributed"? That's incredibly soft language, which could easily lead to over-reporting.

The referenced detailed "guidance" was released April 3rd , and is no better [again, our emphasis]:

In cases where a definite diagnosis of COVID–19 cannot be made, but it is suspected or likely (e.g., the circumstances are compelling within a reasonable degree of certainty), it is acceptable to report COVID–19 on a death certificate as "probable" or "presumed." In these instances, certifiers should use their best clinical judgement in determining if a COVID–19 infection was likely.

Are careful records being kept to separate "Covid-19" from "presumed Covid-19"? Are the media making sure they respect the distinction in their reporting?

Absolutely not.

Whenever the alleged casualties are referenced we are fed one large all-inclusive number, without context or explanation, which – thanks to lax reporting guidelines – could be entirely false.

Government agencies all across the UK are doing the same thing.

Northern Ireland's HSC Public Health Agency is releasing weekly surveillance bulletins on the pandemic, in those reports they define a "Covid19 death" as :

individuals who have died within 28 days of first positive result, whether or not COVID-19 was the cause of death

NHS England's Office of National Statistics releases weekly reports on nation-wide mortality. Its latest report (Week 12 – March 14th-20th) was released on March 31st and made special mention of Covid19, explaining they were going to c hange the way they report the numbers in future .

The ONS system is predicated on the registration of deaths. Meaning they count, not the number of people who die every week, but the number of deaths registered per week. This, naturally, leads to slight delays in the recording of numbers as the registration process can take a few days.

However, with coronavirus deaths, since its a "national emergency", they are now including "provisional figures" which will be "included in the dataset in subsequent weeks". This leaves them wide open to – either accidentally or deliberately – reporting the same deaths twice . Once "provisionally", and then once "officially" a week later.

That's just one peculiar policy decision. There are many others.

Up until now, the ONS reported those Covid19 numbers collated by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC). The DHSC records only those who died in hospital and have tested positive for the coronavirus as Covid19 deaths.

BUT, from now on, the ONS will also include Covid19 deaths "in the community" in their statistics. That "includes those not tested for Covid19" and where " suspected Covid19″ [our emphasis] is presumed to be a "contributory factor".

Here are some screencaps of the relevant sections :

The official NHS guidance for doctors filling out death certificates is just as vague [our emphasis]:

if before death the patient had symptoms typical of COVID19 infection, but the test result has not been received, it would be satisfactory to give 'COVID-19' as the cause of death, and then share the test result when it becomes available. In the circumstances of there being no swab, it is satisfactory to apply clinical judgement .

The government is telling doctors it is OK to list "Covid-19" as a cause of death when there is literally no evidence the deceased was infected . That means there are potentially huge numbers of "Covid19 deaths" that were never even tested for the disease.

Further, any possible mistakes will never be noticed or rectified, thanks to recent changes to the law.

Usually, any death attributed to a "notifiable disease" had to be referred to a coroner for a jury hearing.

Under UK law Covid19 is a "notifiable disease", but the new Coronavirus Bill alters the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 , to specifically exempt alleged Covid19 deaths from jury inquests .

Further, according to the office of the Chief Coroner , the Coronavirus Bill means that these deaths don't have to be referred to a coroner at all , and that medical practitioners can sign off a cause of death for a body they have never even seen :

Any registered medical practitioner can sign an MCCD [Medical Certificate for Cause of Death], even if the deceased was not attended during their last illness and not seen after death, provided that they are able to state the cause of death to the best of their knowledge and belief.

Deaths "in the community" can be listed as Covid19 deaths without being tested for the disease, or even seen by a doctor at all . These deaths will not necessarily be referred to a coroner, and certainly not heard by a jury.

By enacting this legislation the UK government has not only made false reporting of Covid19 deaths more likely , they actively removed the safeguards designed to correct it. Recording accurate fatality numbers in this situation is borderline impossible.

This is, at best, totally irresponsible and at worst incredibly sinister.

Now, before you roll your eyes at the whacky alternate media and their crazy paranoia, the idea deaths are being over-estimated is not a fringe concept or a "conspiracy theory". It is actually addressed in the mainstream frequently, people just seem to not hear it, drowned out as it is by the fear-inducing headlines.

Dr John Lee, a professor of pathology and retired consulting pathologist with the NHS, wrote in a column for the Spectator :

Why Covid-19 deaths are a substantial over-estimate

Many UK health spokespersons have been careful to repeatedly say that the numbers quoted in the UK indicate death with the virus, not death due to the virus – this matters.
[ ]
This nuance is crucial ­– not just in understanding the disease, but for understanding the burden it might place on the health service in coming days. Unfortunately, nuance tends to be lost in the numbers quoted from the database being used to track Covid-19
[ ]
This data is not standardised and so probably not comparable, yet this important caveat is seldom expressed by the (many) graphs we see. It risks exaggerating the quality of data that we have.

In fact, Dr Lee goes out of his way to emphasise:

The distinction between dying 'with' Covid-19 and dying 'due to' Covid-19 is not just splitting hairs.

The BBC dealt with the same issue in an article on April 1st [again, emphasis ours]:

The death figures being reported daily are hospital cases where a person dies with the coronavirus infection in their body – because it is a notifiable disease cases have to be reported.

But what the figures do not tell us is to what extent the virus is causing the death.

It could be the major cause, a contributory factor or simply present when they are dying of something else.

These absurd rules contributed to this recent example, referenced in the BBC article, but not widely reported at the time:

An 18-year-old in Coventry tested positive for coronavirus the day before he died and was reported as its youngest victim at the time. But the hospital subsequently released a statement saying his death had been due to a separate "significant" health condition and not connected to the virus.

This story is completely true. The boy was widely reported as the UK's "youngest coronavirus victim" on March 24th , before the hospital issued a statement saying:

[The hospital] had tested for COVID-19 on the day before he died, but this was not linked to his reason for dying.

Despite the hospital correcting the press, the case was still being reported in the tabloids a week later on March 31st .

However, the important detail here is being lost: Going by the current NHS rules, despite the hospital officially saying it was not his cause of death, this boy is still part of the official coronavirus fatality statistics.

How many more people fit that profile? We will never know.

*

Italy, Germany, the United States, Northern Ireland and England.

That's five different governments, across four countries, all essentially saying it's OK to just assume a patient died of Covid19, and then add that to the official statistics.

Is that really responsible practice during a potential pandemic?

Are any other countries doing the same?

To what extent can we trust any official death statistics at all, at this point?

As Dr Lee points out, Covid19 is not a disease that presents with a unique – or even rare – collection of symptoms. The range of severity and type of presentation is in line with literally dozens of extremely common respiratory infections.

You cannot see "fever" and "cough" and then diagnose "probable covid19" with even the slightest chance of accuracy.

This has become one of those nuggets of information we all know by heart, but between 290000 and 650000 people die of flu, or "flu like illness", every year. If just 10% of those cases are incorrectly assumed to be "probable" coronavirus infections, then the fatality numbers are totally useless.

At a time when good, reliable information is key to saving lives and preventing mass-panic, global governments are pursuing policies which make it near-impossible to collect that data, whilst stoking public fear.

Due to these policies, the simple fact is we have no reliable way of knowing how many people have died from this coronavirus . We have no hard data at all. And governments and international organisations are going out of their way to keep it that way.

It's time we started asking why.


Grafter ,

A must see on what is about to happen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CCVUc5ZMZo

lundiel ,

What has happened to the British working class ethos of never believing the authorities? Where I live they're more likely to grass you up than question anything.

Seamus Padraig ,

You know what I think? You know how economist John Williams has that website shadowstats.com , where he shows you what the real unemployment and inflation figures would be if the government and the media didn't lie? Well, I think there should a shadowstats for Corona virus infection figures, too.

tonyopmoc ,

"It's time we started asking why."

The answer is quite simple. The "Authorities" are doing the exact reverse of what they are claiming to do. I don't necessarily blame them, because they are brainwashed too, as are the vast majority across most of the world.

They are trying to kill most of us off, and I think they are highly likely to succeed.

This used to be a crazy conspiracy theory – which even I didn't take seriously.

The Georgia Guidestones (1980) are hardly Stonehenge "Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.", and have always been dismissed on the basis, that the USA contains some very rich and powerful religious nutters, but it seems we completely underestimated how powerful they are. The "elite" Malthusians are almost certainly of British origin.

I never thought they could pull this off on a world wide basis, but they have. They have succeeded in terrorising almost everyone.

It's not COVID – The Coronavirus that will do it, but the panic reaction to it, and the total crashing of the world wide economy. Supply lines are certain to break down, and in fact already have done for the most vulnerable.

Not only do I see little if any resistance to this madness, most people are fully engaged and a part of it.

The only response I have to it, is to become as self sufficient as possible, by digging up my garden to grow food. Most people think I am nuts, and think everything will be back to normal in a few weeks time, but the people in control, would not have crashed the entire world economy in pursuit of their Malthusian Agenda, to give up after a few weeks, when their well designed plans, all based on the most powerful psychological techniques are working so well, just as they envisaged, and game tested starting of course with 9/11 – where most people still believe the official story, which is literally impossible, because it does not conform with the most basic laws of physics and maths.

Tony

Willem ,

Here is an idea

1) Test everyone who according to the triage system should be tested on covid19 with PCR

2) distinguish pcr+ vs pcr- negative and follow both groups over time (for example 28 days)

3) then see which group dies more often: the pcr positive group or the positive negative group

4) the relative risk will then show the excess risk of pcr positive Covid 19 vs Covid 19 negative cases

I am surprised that this research has not been done yet. It is plain and simple but apparantly nobody cares about a comparison group. And that is weird, as in normal circumstances you always compare with your competing neighbor, football club, fellow student, etc. But for Covid19 comparisons don't matter. The mortality rate is just high (compared to what?)

Mucho ,

Last night on Steven Nolan, quite early on in the show, a genuine NHS worker called in to relay his experience. He said that where they suspect Covid19 in a patient, sometimes they have to do up to four tests to get back the Covid positive result they are looking for. Utterly insane. They get three negatives on the bounce, but when the fourth one rolls in positive, it's all good and Covid19 is established. (are the tests for Coronavirus Normal or specifically Covid19?) No need to take into account the potential for a false positive, because they already know what the patient has. This is barmy. Gotta start raising the alarm people. This is not a drill. (Well maybe it is, but a drill for something much effing worse so alarm bells still totally necessary).

I am very concerned about the building of these "Nightingale" hospitals. What have they got lined up for us to make sure these places are full of patients on ventilators? Because we have firmly established that this current pandemic is a fake. If it were half as bad as they were predicting, people would be dropping like flies in the UK by now, but we all know that they're not. They have rigged the legal system and all kinds of checks and balances have been nullified to enable them to give the appearance of a pandemic, but what is the endgame here?

"We're not gonna have a war, we're gonna the appearance of a war." From Wag The Dog, Brendon O Connell fave. Best case scenario is that the new hospitals are there for window dressing to give the scam crisis authenticity through the visual action being taken, photo opportunities and emotional manipulation of the public becoming invested when they see "our boys" and the NHS "pulling together" in the crisis and doing everything they can. It psychologically consolidates the slave/master relationship very nicely too. Worst case scenario, genocide incoming. That we can legitimately raise these issues is symptomatic of a very real disease that is controlling our world.

fritzi cohen ,

We need to expose industrial agriculture's possible contribution. Rob Wallace wrote a book about this in 2016. Of course no one paid attention even if they knew about his research.

The American Scholar: How Global Agriculture Grew a theamericanscholar.org/who-should-we-blame-for-coronavirus

Evolutionary biologist Rob Wallace, of the Institute for Global Studies at the University of Minnesota, has some answers. For the past 25 years, he's been studying the evolution and spread of influenzas and other pathogens.

Hail ,

The latest expert to emerge slamming CoronaPanic is Dr. Knut Wittkowski, who attacks head-on at the very premise, less on the margins over numbers (which is also important work).

Wittkowski says long-term social distancing for the vast majority, low-risk people, does more harm than good, even from a strictly disease-control standpoint (will cause more death, not less) and also repeatedly questions the wild projections. He says the coronavirus small spike in flu is totally unremarkable and behaves like every other observed flu pandemic does, not a second-rate-movie-like World-Shattering Mass Killer.

Valuable:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/lGC5sGdz4kg

Alan Tench ,

Just finished listening to the government press conference here in the UK (Lt Gruber hosting it). Two mildly challenging questions, both sidestepped. The final question from The Scotsman newspaper was much more challenging, about the status of the Scottish Chief Medical Officer. This question was completely evaded by Hancock, and he didn't even allow the Deputy Chief Medical Officer to say what she thought, or confirm whether she's visited her second home, if indeed she has one. What a bloody shower they are!

Bettynho Zirigdum ,

Here in Brazil the Minister of Health authorized burials without a death certificate. When the death cause is not known, the death "may" be recorded as a Covid-19 death.

https://veja.abril.com.br/saude/por-covid-19-mandetta-e-cnj-autorizam-sepultamentos-sem-atestado-de-obito/

Thom ,

It's only a mistake if you think their main objectives are to tell the public the truth and protect public health. Given that the lockdowns, discouragement of exercise, putting millions out of work and torpedoeing health budgets will kill far more than the virus, then there are plainly other agendas here.

Look at how nervous the politicians get when the public aren't scared 'enough' of the virus. And this evening, in the UK, we even have Queen drafted in to frighten people and stir up panic. How low can they go?

MrChops ,

Forgot to join in with the clap-a-thon for the health workers

Why not join Peekay for some 'Effin n jeffin' for the NWO ..

https://www.youtube.com/embed/cAekgQ1ziZk?version=3&rel=1&fs=1&autohide=2&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&wmode=transparent

elsewhere ,

Again good stuff at

https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/

(April 5 entry)

A sample: "The medical specialist portal Rxisk points out that various drugs can increase the risk of infection with corona viruses by up to 200% in some cases. It is also known that vaccination against influenza viruses may increase the risk of coronavirus disease."

stonecircle ,

Interesting about the possible increase in susceptibility to severe C-19 due to having the flu jab. Tragically many nurses and doctors are dying from C-19 even though they are comparatively young. Medical staff are put under a lot of pressure to have the flu jab each winter. It would be very interesting to see some hard data investigating this issue.

Anecdotally: I had C-19 in mild form last week – high temperature, headache – but was almost better in two days. I am aged 70 and never have the flu jab as I worry it might weaken my immune system. All my peers have the jab and have had more persistent illnesses this winter than I have.

MLS ,

We have no idea how many health workers are dying of COVID19. All we know is how many of them have it on their death certificate.

Not the same thing. As this article should have made clear to you.

And let's also remember the euromomo statistics show that excess deaths are not happening. The pandemic is a lie created by reclassifying ordinary flu deaths as COVID19

crank ,

Seeing as the daily (total) death rate in the UK averages about 1600 per day, then I would like to think that 'COVID deaths' might top out at that. However, the effects of lockdown will push the death rate up considerably, I would predict, so who knows, maybe Trump is actually right in saying there will be 'lots of death' ? In the statistical mobius strip/ self re-inforcing/ feedback loop so clearly described by Kit, all these deaths could, in the end, be classified as 'COVID deaths'. In theory at least, to take the idea to the extreme, the virus could be completely harmless and no more than a marker – a new means of counting death.
Kafka could not have devised anything so insane.

Steve Hayes ,

"To what extent can we trust any official death statistics at all, at this point?" By focusing on all cause mortality. These are reliable numbers. Presently, they do not show any cause for concern. Yet the government and parliament have seen fit to introduce the Coronavirus Act 2020, which gives the government the power to do anything, forever.

It is of some interest to note that Jeremy Hunt on LBC stated that the government had prepared for a pandemic after an exercise in 2016 (when he was Health Secretary) by drafting legislation to give the government emergency powers: which explains how they were able to produce the three hundred and twenty page Coronavirus Bill so quickly.

Harry Stotle ,

Off-G has opened a really important conduit to talk about the Corona outbreak in term of its wider economic and geopolitical context – this is to be applauded. However I can promise you that in living memory there has never been a higher number of patients suffering with ARDS (acute respiratory distress syndrome) presenting to hospital services, in such concentrated numbers over a relatively short time interval.

> 95% of those who died in Italy, died of ARDS https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/Report-COVID-2019_20_marzo_eng.pdf

Ventilator use in London has risen 12-fold because people can hardly breath (the lungs fill with interstitial fluid impairing normal gaseous exchange) – once the lungs fail other organs follow the same fate downstream: heart, kidneys, liver, etc.
https://www.icnarc.org/About/Latest-News/2020/03/27/Report-On-775-Patients-Critically-Ill-With-Covid-19

At the moment there is no way to stop COVID-19 related ARDS from developing, while survival rates post-ventilation may be no better than 50/50 for vulnerable groups (older patients with co-morbidities) – the jury is still out on this question.

Getting on for 5,000 deaths have been reported over a period of 4 weeks in the UK – it is likely most are COVID-19 related because they exhibit the typical cluster of finding (bilateral infiltrates on chest x/ray, hyperferritinaemia, lymphocytopaenia, elevated d-dimer, elevated troponin and profound hypoxia on arterial blood gas despite hi-flow oxygen). [citation requested -ed]

From conversations I have been privy to the approach of China has been held up as the key strategy to control the spread (because of the difference in death rates pre and post lockdown).

We will probably get a better idea of how things look once countries that find it difficult to follow the Chinese model (because of things like poverty or over-crowding) experience higher numbers of infections, and thus a growing numbers who develop ARDS – India, Brazil and Palestine come to mind (I know the death toll is low at the moment).

None of this addresses the collateral damage bound to arise from lack of access to medical services (because of the selective focus on COBID-19) or the economic time-bomb that will explode once the size of the debt mushrooms out of control.

I am the first to admit I simply do not have any answers to these questions – I am simply reporting what I have experienced on the shop floor.

anita ,

Usually if you have pneumonia, you stay at home and a doctor prescribes some basic antibiotic as precaution. Even in severe cases among already fragile people, usually you then slowly recover. Today if you have pneumonia, either you will have no doctor you can see in town, or else they will send you to hospital because of the scare created, or else you yourself will go to hospital because of the scare. This is just with pneumonia, there are plenty of other illnesses like a very bad flu and so on that can be as bad.

Hence hospitals will get overloaded with patients which they dont usually get. And I can tell you, having nursed my mother after her stroke, and having had to take her a few times to emergency over a number of years, that emergency was each time overcrowded, and you are left for hours in corridors. So hospitals are getting more people because of above than a normal already overcrowded year.

As for the patients, those that would normally be cured at home, they are in hospital surrounded by a whole lot of other people also with contagious diseases, apart from the nosocomial disease you may anyhow catch in a hospital nowadays, and in conditions which because of above have overwhelmed the hospital staff. So these patients being already weakened get worse, possibly die.

Also if someone has to go to emergency for other reasons: heart attack, stroke, even a broken leg, if the conditions there are worsened by excess patients who should not be there, they too being weak, may catch some infection, which could in their case due to the secondary issues make them worse, and give them severe breathing issues and so on, which in a normal year they would avoid, because excess contagious patients are not crowded in hospitals when they dont need to be in hospital.

On top of this there is a shortage of staff from other years for multiple reasons. I can think of 2 without any effort: In no other year staff with a virus but not ill (first they in that case would not know that had a virus) are not put on quarantine.

Secondly, at least in West Europe, a major proportion of the medical staff at all level is from outside West Europe. Many, when the confinement measures and closures of borders were made, have returned to the home countries, to be with their families, especially those coming from countries that have not taken from such draconian measures.

Hence what you are actually seeing needs to be analysed to be understood. By merely saying what you are seeing without analysing the cause is only likely to give a wrong justification for the measures and increase the panic among people. As a result, the entire
thing is going to go worse.

Harry Stotle ,

We are talking about are two different conditions with different pathologies and different outcomes – ARDS is a hyperinflammatory response, that in the context of COVID-19 is not amenable to antibiotics.

Pneumonia is generally caused by a more localised lung infection although in some cases pneumonia can lead to ARDS as a secondary complication.

In the case of COVID I am unaware of any therapy that presents ARDS ftom developing – ARDS is what kills you.

Croach ,

The icnarc report raises a question.
If we have close to 5000 deaths but few hospitals are breaching ICU capacity (London and the West Midlands, the two biggest disease clusters have reported they're within capacity, nightingale hospital not needed yet etc.) why is icnarc reporting only 346 deaths in ICU/Critical care beds?
Where are all the rest dying?
If there is spare capacity in ICU why weren't they in ICU beds when they died?

Also, do you know why the percentages in table 5 regarding the presence or not of severe comorbidities (yes,no) add up to more than 100% in the covid-19 column and less than 100% in the pneumonia comparison column?

Rhys Jaggar ,

This is precisely why everyone is so cynical. A propaganda narrative was written long ago and the data is crafted around that narrative, rather than a true narraitve emerging from whatever data happens to present itself.

The narrative is that CoVid19 is so dangerous that we will all have to be locked down unless we all have a vaccination, testing and can be digitally tracked.

Now if that were even to be half acceptable, the digital certificates would be owned and issued by the people, not by TNC billionaires. The data generated through tracking and testing would never be owned privately and any public official disclosing such information to corporations would be issued with the metaphorical Black Spot.

What this is all about is billionaires owning everyone lock stock and barrel: their movements, their medical history, their private actions, their travel, their purchases etc etc.

If Bill Gates thinks he can afford to buy all that data he is living in cloud cuckoo land. I would value my lifetime private data at £100,000 minimum, so for 5 billion humans (just for round figures), that might come to £500 trillion.

I think that is about 5,000 times Bill Gates' net worth ..

I have not signed away my private data to anyone, will not do so and consider it illegal for anyone to nick it, pass it on, hand it over, sell it on etc etc etc.

bob ,

If people in the uk don't address the issue of organ donation then the state will claim it owns their bodies – the law changed in April to make it important that people who do not wish to donate their organs they have to opt out – at a time like this when family/friends cannot be with a person dying who knows what's happening – does anybody still trust the british state?? Get it sorted is my advice and don't let the state steel the bodies

Mucho ,

The concept of policy decision being made and then a mad dash to find evidence to support that policy decision was highlighted in this excellent report, which I think every reader here will find interesting.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/afIW8P_CNLA

madness ,

".. provided that they are able to state the cause of death to the best of their knowledge and belief"

Surely, in Australia, many the death of many people will be the result of their sins, especially if the conservatives continue to engineer health policies. This is the best of their belief.

Shaking My Head ,

This circus is maddening. Is anyone else in Canada? There is a complete lack of dissent here. The first Canadian I've seen online with any critical perspective is Rosemary Frei's article here on Off-Guardian. Are there any other Canadians speaking out? It seems like people are openly welcoming more of the police state rather than questioning anything.

AlexCanadianJones ,

Also in Canada. You aren't alone.

We have to keep in mind that everyone is at home isolated, everyone that feels and is thinking the way do, feels they are alone and that other Canadians. The Media has unprecedented influence during this crisis and they are cherry picking 'socially accepted responses' to the virus to make us think we are in the minority, it is mind games to keep us all feeling powerless.

Keep spreading your opinions, while we still have freedom of speech. Make sure all of those in your life to you know are getting the information you are getting.

Shaking My Head ,

I hope you are right but it seems like Canadians are so much more acquiescent than the French who have had mass protests. Here it seems you will get snitched out for walking in the park. I saw a photo of several police in an empty park and the comments were all supportive of these measures to 'keep us safe'. I suppose there could be a small but loud segment of the population who are generally quite terrified of life, who feel powerless, and now are enabled to exercise their inner authoritarian to grasp at some semblance of importance by self-policing and policing others.

[Apr 06, 2020] n France, the sudden loss of smell is considered proof of Covid-19 infection, no further tests required

Apr 06, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

marcel , Apr 6 2020 17:29 utc | 1

In France, the sudden loss of smell is considered proof of Covid-19 infection, no further tests required.

[Apr 06, 2020] Peter Navarro Explodes At Fauci In Heated Showdown Over Hydroxychloroquine

Notable quotes:
"... Washington Times ..."
"... Washington Times ..."
Apr 05, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
White House economic adviser got into a massive argument with the coronavirus task force's Anthony Fauci over the doctor's ongoing resistance to the use of hydroxychloroquine to treat COVID-19, despite reports of the drug's widespread efficacy.

Via Axios :

According to the report, towards the end of the meeting Hahn began a discussion of the commonly used malaria drug hydroxychloroquine - which was recently rated the ' most effective therapy ' for coronavirus according to a global survey of more than 6,000 doctors .

After Hahn gave an update on various trials and real-world use of the drug, Navarro got up and dropped a stack of folders on the table to pass around .

According to Axios 's source, " the first words out of his [Navarro's] mouth are that the studies that he's seen, I believe they're mostly overseas, show 'clear therapeutic efficacy,' " adding "Those are the exact words out of his mouth.

Fauci - who's not got his own Twitter hashtag, #FireFauci - began pushing back against Navarro, repeating his oft-repeated contention that 'there's only anecdotal evidence' that the drug works against COVID-19.

Navarro exploded - after Fauci's mention of anecdotal evidence "just set Peter off." The economic adviser shot back "That's the science, not anecdote," while pointing to the stack of folders on the desk, which included the results of studies from around the world showing its efficacy.

Here's what unfolded next, via Axios :

Navarro started raising his voice, and at one point accused Fauci of objecting to Trump's travel restrictions, saying, "You were the one who early on objected to the travel restrictions with China," saying that travel restrictions don't work. (Navarro was one of the earliest to push the China travel ban.)

According to a source familiar with the coronavirus task force, "There has never been a confrontation in the task force meetings like the one yesterday," adding "People speak up and there's robust debate, but there's never been a confrontation. Yesterday was the first confrontation."

Meanwhile, 37% of 6,227 doctors across 30 countries felt the drug was the "most effective therapy" out of 15 options in treating coronavirus, according to a poll reported by the Washington Times .

The drug has been prescribed in 72% of cases in Spain, 49% in Italy, 41% in Brazil, 39% in Mexico, 28% in France, and 23% in the USA . Overall, 19% of physicians have prescribed the drug for high-risk patients, and 8% for low-risk patients.

More from the Sermo poll (via the Washington Times )

***

Sermo CEO Peter Kirk called the polling results a "treasure trove of global insights for policy makers."

"Physicians should have more of a voice in how we deal with this pandemic and be able to quickly share information with one another and the world," he said. "With censorship of the media and the medical community in some countries, along with biased and poorly designed studies, solutions to the pandemic are being delayed."

The survey also found that 63% of U.S. physicians believe restrictions should be lifted in six weeks or more, and that the epidemic's peak is at least 3-4 weeks away.

The survey also found that 83% of global physicians anticipate a second global outbreak, including 90% of U.S. doctors but only 50% of physicians in China.

On average, U.S. coronavirus testing takes 4-5 days, while 10% of cases take longer than seven days. In China, 73% of doctors reported getting rest results back in 24 hours.

In cases of ventilator shortages, all countries but China said the top criteria should be patients with the best chance of recovery (47%), followed by patients with the highest risk of death (21%), and then first responders (15%) .

[Apr 06, 2020] Wearing masks in public places is the most cheap and effective way to lower R0 for the virus

Apr 06, 2020 | www.unz.com

yakushimaru , says: Show Comment April 3, 2020 at 6:47 am GMT

@Philip Owen The most important thing is to have a cheap way to lower the R0.

Herd immunity is one, but it is expensive to get there.

Masks, widespread use of masks, is another, and it is relatively cheap. The virus lives mainly in lungs, after all. Accidental touching of mask's dirty side etc. can be a problem, but the virus would have to cross one mask to reach out, then go into air to touch another surface, then wait for some accidents to happen to go through your mask to reach your lungs.

Social distancing, widespread use of masks, and contact tracing, and 14 days wait period for people suspected of infection. The pandemic can be controlled, and normal life can largely resume when we wait for vaccine and cure.

[Apr 06, 2020] Around 81% have mild symptoms, 14% severe symptoms requiring hospitalization, 5% critical.

Apr 06, 2020 | www.unz.com

Daniel Chieh , says: Show Comment

[Apr 06, 2020] All that test does does is to indicate the presence of virus RNA not the illness itself

Apr 06, 2020 | www.fda.gov
  1. Read here – https://www.fda.gov/media/134922/download

    It says there, black on white – " Detection of viral RNA may not indicate the presence of infectious virus or that 2019-nCoV is the causative agent for clinical symptoms. "

[Apr 06, 2020] The Use of Facemasks and Respirators during an Influenza Pandemic: Scientific Evidence Base Review

It make sense to wear mask only for a limited time (no more then 2 hours for a single mask) and only in public places. Should always be combined with strict hand hygiene. Without hand hygiene wearing of masks can be counterproductive.
Notable quotes:
"... Given the potential loss of effectiveness with incorrect usage, general advice should be to only use masks/ respirators under very particular, specified circumstances, and in combination with other personal protective practices. ..."
Apr 06, 2020 | service.gov.uk

Executive summary

Conclusions: Despite a further review of all the available evidence up to 30 November 2012 there is still limited evidence to suggest that use of face masks and/or respirators in health care setting can provide significant protection against infection with influenza when in close contact with infected patients. Some evidence suggests that mask use is best undertaken as part of a package or 'bundle' of personal protection especially including hand hygiene, the new evidence provides some support to this argument particularly within the community or household setting. Early initiation and regular wearing of masks/respirators may improve their effectiveness in healthcare and household settings, again an argument marginally strengthened by the updated evidence.

The effectiveness of masks and respirators is likely to be linked to consistent, correct usage and compliance; this remains a major challenge – both in the context of a formal study and in everyday practice.

Given the potential loss of effectiveness with incorrect usage, general advice should be to only use masks/ respirators under very particular, specified circumstances, and in combination with other personal protective practices.

... ... ...

None of the trials found, in the main analyses, a significant difference between non-intervention and mask-only arms (surgical masks or N95/P2 respirators) in either clinically diagnosed (influenza-like-illness/ILI) or laboratory-confirmed influenza. However in four of the household trials, sub-analyses of the datasets revealed some evidence of protection.

One trial observed that household contacts who wore a P2 respirator 'all/most' of the time were less likely to develop an influenza-like illness compared to less frequent users.

A second trial found a significant reduction in laboratory-confirmed influenza among household contacts that began hand hygiene or hand hygiene plus a face mask within 36 hours of the index case's illness.

... ... ...

One of these studies found that there was a significantly lower frequency of H1N1 pdm09 infection in healthcare workers wearing a mask when compared to those not wearing a mask. Furthermore, a sub-analysis of nurses and nurse assistants in a seroprevalence study identified an increased risk of acquiring H1N1 pdm09 infection when not wearing a mask, however while the authors described this result as significant (p-value significant), the confidence interval was not significant

... ... ...

There is some weak evidence to suggest that facemasks may be protective when they are used early (after recognition of an index case in a household setting); if better compliance (using the masks for longer periods of time) is achieved, and when combined with hand-washing practicing.

Background

Minimising transmission of influenza requires a range of personal and public health measures taken by individuals and communities such as respiratory etiquette and hand hygiene and possibly proactive school closures (and other measures sometimes called social distancing). Use of personal protective equipment is generally advised according to the risk of exposure to the influenza virus and the degree of infectivity and human pathogenicity of the virus. A particularly vexing issue for policy makers has been the paucity of scientific evidence upon which to base guidance for use of masks and respirators in healthcare and community settings to prevent transmission of seasonal, pandemic and animal influenzas.

... ... ...

Participants were allocated to wear either a fit-tested N95 or a surgical face mask when providing care (including aerosol generating procedures) to patients with a febrile respiratory illness during the influenza season. No difference in influenza infection was detected in the two groups. The final hospital based study stratified 1441 health care workers across 15 Beijing hospitals to analyse the effectiveness of surgical masks compared to both fit-tested and non-fit tested N95 respirators (6). The wearers of N95 respirators had lower, but non-significant attack rates, compared to those wearing surgical masks. However the intention to treat analysis (when adjusting for clustering of hospitals) identified that non-fit-tested N95s had a statistically significant protective effect against clinical respiratory illness when compared to surgical masks in healthcare workers. Additionally a multivariate analysis ( post hoc ) found that wearing any N95 mask type protected against clinical respiratory illness

... ... ...

A cluster randomized controlled trial in Australia compared household contacts of paediatric index cases (0-15 years) with a febrile respiratory illness that were randomised to control, surgical mask or non-fit-tested P2 respirator intervention groups (9). No differences in rates of influenza-like infection or rates of respiratory virus isolation were observed in an intention-to-treat analysis. In a survival analysis that evaluated risk factors for influenza-like illness, use of P2 respirators or surgical masks grouped together was found to significantly reduce the risk for illness in those household contacts who reported wearing the device 'all' or 'most' of the time for the first five days; however, the study was underpowered to detect a difference in efficacy between P2 and surgical masks.

... ... ...

A study in Berlin, conducted across two influenza seasons (2009/10 and 2010/11), randomised households to three groups; control, face mask or face mask and hand-hygiene with the analyses stratified by influenza type (seasonal or pandemic cases), season, and early implementation of interventions (12). This was the only example of a trail that analyzed specific H1N1 pdm09 secondary household attack rates. In the intention-to-treat multivariable analysis, pooling of both intervention groups resulted in a significant reduction in lab-confirmed influenza when stratified for either early intervention or pandemic-only cases; however there was no statistically significant effect of intervention groups on secondary household attack rates. When a per-protocol analysis was applied the odds ratios in both the mask-only and mask/hand-hygiene 24 groups were between 0.2 and 0.3 suggesting a strong protective effect. Although a statistically significant reduction was found in the mask-only groups.

... ... ...

Larson and colleagues examined hand-sanitiser and hand-sanitiser/mask use (both with education) effectiveness amongst crowded households in upper Manhattan (15). In this study, both household caretakers and symptomatic individuals were asked to wear masks. The study found that mask wearing coupled with hand-sanitiser use significantly reduced secondary transmission of aggregated upper respiratory infection/ ILI and lab-confirmed influenza outcome compared with control households (education but no intervention) in the final logistic regression model. Unfortunately there was not a mask-only group, but the observation that hand sanitizer alone resulted in no reduction in the aggregated outcome suggests that mask use, in combination with hand-sanitiser had an impact on transmission. There was also limited power to detect differences amongst the three groups and there was also observed cross-contamination with use of hand-sanitizer in the control group

... ... ...

It was observed that there was a statistically significant difference in H1N1 pdm09 infection between individuals wearing masks at any point and those not wearing masks (0% seropositive individuals when using either surgical masks or N95 respirators in comparison to 14% individuals in the no mask/respirator group). The study however lacked power to detect significant differences between those wearing N95 respirators against those wearing surgical masks. In addition to this the study suffered for a large number of other limitations such as potential measurement and recall bias.

[Apr 06, 2020] The shadow of Spanish flu

Apr 06, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

dltravers , Apr 5 2020 17:28 utc | 26

most people who dies form Spanish flue also have lungs full of liquid

BM @ 10

Interesting, I had a Chinese coworker show me some videos of autopsies from China on Covid patients. The lungs were full of mucus. He translated for me and they were saying that drinking very hot liquids helps to keep things in check if you are sick. Coffee, tea and the like.

What we would call anecdotal reports from experts.

[Apr 06, 2020] Why Do Rural Hospitals Close

Apr 06, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

run75441 | April 5, 2020 8:15 pm

One of the serious issues with healthcare today is the lack of universal availability of it across the nation. In citified areas, the availability of it mostly meets the demand of the people requiring it and is in close proximity. If you travel one to two hours outside of the city, the availability of it begins to drop off until a person in need must travel hours to get to help. The resource in more rural areas begins to drop off in a precipitous manner. Not to make light of the healthcare situation, if you watch the move " Doc Hollywood ," small community with an aging doctor, a small clinic, staff nurse, a large number of patients, and a distant hospital. Dr. Ben Stone is on his way to LA in his 356 Cabriole (almost bought one in the eighties). The resources bypass rural America mostly for monetary reasons.

Here is a list of reasons:

Medicaid expansion was associated with improved hospital financial performance and substantially lower likelihoods of closure in rural markets. The addition of work requirements by states will negate much of the Medicaid's expansion gain.

You will hear many complaints about narrow insurance corridors. The result of Section 227 was Coops going bankrupt, insurance companies withdrawing, people having to find other plans, premiums increasing, etc. causing much of the narrowing. Rather than solve the issue, Republicans as led by Fred Upton of Michigan chose to use this in an effort to dismantle the ACA. The ACA Risk Corridor Program was to last 3 years and is similar to the Republican created Risk Corridor Program in Part D which is ongoing.

Medicare reimburses at much lower rates than does private insurance in my specialty. If you work in a place with a high percentage of Medicare (or Medicaid which is worse) like we do, you cannot come close to earning market salaries. So we, many years ago, ended up working 95th percentile or worse hours (over 70 per week) while earning in the 15th-20th percentile in income. We lost a lot of staff. The hospital had to make up the difference so that we could hire and retain people. We were fortunate that our hospital had the resources to do that.

Up north of us another hospital faced a similar situation, but they didn't have the resources to subsidize their staff. So they fired a good team and brought in another. Told them it was OK to not bill in accordance with what the hospital accepted, like the prior group did. That let the new group earn enough, for a while, to hire and retain people. Hospital eventually failed anyway and had to be bought out.

Mayo Clinic in Minnesota closed one smaller hospital and two clinics due to a lack of personnel and utilization. The result was people having to make a much longer trip to get to the hospital and staffing goes where the money is in many cases.

It is a problem begging for a solution.

More Rural Hospitals Closing in States Refusing Medicaid Coverage Expansion , Center for Children & Families (CCF) of the Georgetown University Health Policy Institute, Adam Searing, October 2018

The Quiet Crisis Of Rural Hospital Closures , Kaiser Health News, January 2020

170 Rural Hospital Closures , NC Rural Health Research Program

Michael Oder , April 5, 2020 8:51 pm

Another reason is that we've privatized our medical industry. Many hospitals used to be owned by counties and municipalities who had established them to provide healthcare for their citizens. Throughout the 90s and early 2000s, these were systematically privatized often to cover short-term budget crises. For-profit providers have different priorities in mind and providing effecting and available treatment is not at the top of the list.

Event before shuttering the hospitals they were already cutting services:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S109830151204154X

kwark , April 5, 2020 10:02 pm

This quote from the doctor sort of encapsulates what is wrong with our s0-called "system" of healthcare: "If you work in a place with a high percentage of Medicare (or Medicaid which is worse) like we do, you cannot come close to earning market salaries." Medicine has devolved into a scheme to extract absolutely the most money possible all the time regardless of the long-term outcome for society or, it appears, the short term outcome for the patient. Doctors were supposed to follow "first, do no harm" but nowadays they're forced to play with the definition of harm.

[Apr 06, 2020] What Wall Street Doesn't Want You to Know About Hospital Emergency Rooms

Apr 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com
Yves here. We've written regularly on Eileen Appelbaum and Rosemary Batt's important investigations into how private equity has taken over more and more of hospital staffing, including of emergency rooms. This in turn has allowed them to override patient efforts to have only in-network doctors assigned to their case, as well as to engage in other practices that greatly inflate patient charges (so-called surprise billing).

The legal fig leaf that allows private equity firms like Blackstone and KKR to play doctor is that their deals are structured so that MD or group of MDs is the nominal owner of the specialty practice, even though the business is stripped of its assets and the operating contracts are widely believed to strip them of any say. The now-notorious incident of Blackstone's TeamHealth firing whistleblower Dr. Ming Lim confirms who is really in charge.

By Eileen Appelbaum, the Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research and visiting professor, School of Management, University of Leicester, UK and Rosemary Batt, the Alice Hanson Cook Professor of Women and Work, Cornell University ILR School. Produced by Economy for All , a project of the Independent Media Institute

Doctor Ming Lin is the first emergency room doctor to be fired for going public with his concerns about poor hospital emergency room safety practices and shortages of medical supplies and protective gear for health workers. He won't be the last.

Like many hospitals in the US, PeaceHealth St. Joseph Medical Center in Bellingham Washington, where Ming Lin worked for the past 17 years as an emergency room doctor, has outsourced the management and staffing of its emergency rooms. So, Lin works on-site at the hospital's emergency room, but he is employed by a physician staffing firm that runs the emergency room. These staffing firms are often behind the surprise medical bills for emergency room services that patients receive after their insurance company has paid the hospital and doctors, but not the excessive out-of-network charges billed by these outside staffing firms.

About a third of hospital emergency rooms are staffed by doctors on the payrolls of two physician staffing companies -- TeamHealth and Envision Health -- owned by Wall Street investment firms. Envision Healthcare employs 69,000 healthcare workers nationwide while TeamHealth employs 20,000. Private equity firm Blackstone Group owns TeamHealth, Kravis Kohlberg Roberts (KKR) owns Envision.

Care of the sick is not the mission of these companies; their mission is to make outsized profits for the private equity firms and its investors. Overcharging patients and insurance companies for providing urgent and desperately needed emergency medical care is bad enough. But it is unconscionable to muzzle doctors who speak out to advocate for the health of their patients and co-workers during the global pandemic that is rapidly spreading across the US.

Yet, that is what Blackstone-owned TeamHealth just did. Why would an experienced emergency room doctor be fired in the middle of a pandemic? One clue may be that Blackstone's CEO, Stephen A. Schwarzman, is part of President Trump's inner circle . He may not want to risk that relationship by allowing TeamHealth's doctors to inform the public about Washington's mishandling of the allocation of supplies and protective gear. The President might conclude that TeamHealth doctors didn't appreciate him enough, and where would that leave Schwartzman?

PeaceHealth St. Joseph Medical Center may have the distinction of being the first hospital to have a doctor outsourced from a physician staffing firm unceremoniously fired for telling the public the truth. But it won't be the last. Hospitals are now telling doctors treating coronavirus patients they will be fired if they speak to the press.

The American Academy of Emergency Medicine protested Dr. Lin's ouster and questioned how TeamHealth is allowed to provide hospital services when the law requires that physician practices must be owned by a licensed medical practitioner. TeamHealth skirts the law by owning all the assets of the physician practices it acquires -- the real estate, offices, equipment, supplies, inventory, and even accounts receivable.

On paper, the physician practices are owned by a doctor-led organization that TeamHealth has set up to comply with the law. But what does it mean to own a physician practice if the practice has no assets and no possibility to exist on its own?

The furor over patients hit by surprise medical bills revealed that TeamHealth controls the billing for the doctors it supplies to hospital emergency rooms. The firing of Doctor Ming Lin pulls back the curtain and reveals that TeamHealth controls the doctors as well.


sd , April 4, 2020 at 5:54 am

Private Equity = Non Essential

Furiouscalves , April 4, 2020 at 12:13 pm

So anyone who works for TeamHealth or Envision needs to stay home until the virus subsides Or until PE is out of ER. Right now is the time to be going after them hard. If they come out the other side of this with no changes to PE control of ER, it will be a missed opportunity to bring them to heel.

dan , April 5, 2020 at 8:54 am

Thats called group organizing. Our present gov. won't allow it. Or will they they don't seem to have much control over virus spreads.

Mel , April 4, 2020 at 12:53 pm

Way back when, an American banker named Paul Erdman tried to start an American bank in Switzerland, and wound up taken down, tried, and convicted under by a charge in Swiss law called (IIRC, this whole comment is IIRC basically) untreu Gesellshaftshandlung . He went on afterwards to write popular novels about what -- meanies -- Swiss bankers are. The one I read is really pretty good.
Anyway, although it would be really heavy lifting creating an American law against untreu Gesellshaftshandlung in the face of the modern American concept of business, a law like that could have excellent effects. It could penalize people who destroy the businesses they are pretending to manage. Think how wonderful that would be.

divadab , April 4, 2020 at 6:54 am

In what ethical system is profiteering on the sick and injured who are having a health emergency morally correct? What kind of people are these Blackstone owners? The kind of people who rob the dead and wounded on a battlefield, apparently. Ghouls. Morally depraved scum.

That Peace Health, which is owned by the Catholic Church, has contracted with these looters, is indicative of how low the Church has fallen in its mission in the world. They kicked out the nuns from any oversight of the hospital and brought in these Blackstone demons. Is it any wonder the moral authority of the Church is a thin thread when rather than supporting their flock they prey upon them? When did the Church start subcontracting to Satan?

ambrit , April 4, 2020 at 6:58 am

Oh for a reset. In olden times, often the victorious officers would mandate shoot on sight for looters caught on a battlefield.

Tom Doak , April 4, 2020 at 7:21 am

Yes, but unfortunately, that's what the "winners" in private equity are doing to us.

Off The Street , April 4, 2020 at 7:45 am

Gives new meaning to the Neo-Liberal 1-2 punch.
1. Because Markets.
2. Go Die.

hemeantwell , April 4, 2020 at 11:33 am

ambrit's suggested reset brought to mind another frame, the role of the tribunes in early Roman society. I've enthused about them before here, re their ability to block measures deemed harmful to the people, and the oath sworn to protect them, whereby anyone laying a hand on them would be hung by the rightfully enraged citizenry.

What we're seeing going on now between the administration and some of the governors is a loose fit. They are speaking out against the administration's deadly neglect and acting against it, while, hopefully, having a degree of immunity against reprisal. We'll see about a hanging, electoral or otherwise.

Billy , April 4, 2020 at 2:48 pm

Substitute " corporate board of directors ",
and or possibly, depending on the crime,
" upper level management "
for "looters."

allan , April 4, 2020 at 7:29 am

"What kind of people are these Blackstone owners?"

Steve Schwartzman is on the list of billionaires who supposedly urged Trump to reopen as soon as possible.
Given Blackstone's medical investments, that is quality talking-your-book.

NotTimothyGeithner , April 4, 2020 at 8:41 am

Start?

For the modern era, I would say john Paul II. He largely had free reign to control the bishop selection process (which for a long time was tied to local governance) and stamped out any opportunity for good or not heinous bishops to serve as counter examples or exist as threats to leadership.

tonycat , April 4, 2020 at 12:48 pm

Blackstone was a firm that was behind the stealing of houses from American homeowners in the foreclosure fraud heyday since 2008's financial crisis, I believe. I think they were owners of document-forging firms.

Ian , April 5, 2020 at 8:48 pm

tonycat,
I didn't think Blackstone had anything to do with document forgery, that was primarily the realm of LPS, ( lender processing services), who changed their name to Black Knight Services. Owned by Fidelity National , yes, the title insurance company.
Blackstone bought tens of thousands of foreclosed homes, the ones with irretrievably corrupted chains of title, formed a subsidiary to do so, and rented them all out.
If you could let me know who you have reason to believe Blackstone owned as far as document processors , or forgers, pls respond to me thanks-

Kirk Seidenbecker , April 4, 2020 at 1:21 pm

PeaceHealth . should be HealthGrift.

Billy , April 4, 2020 at 3:00 pm

Before the information is taken down, search for and file save
the board of directors. Save as a file on your hard drive. Guarantee that these same people will pop up like moles in future disasters and national looting.
https://www.blackstone.com/the-firm/our-people

Never (let them) forget.

That Peace Health, which is owned by the Catholic Church, has contracted with these looters, is indicative of how low the Church has fallen in its mission in the world. They kicked out the nuns from any oversight of the hospital and brought in these Blackstone demons."
How does the Catholic church contracting with them still allow their tax exempt status?
Care to comment?
PeaceHealth System Services
1115 SE 164th Avenue
Vancouver, WA 98683
360-729-1000

Knot Galt , April 4, 2020 at 3:21 pm

In what ethical system is profiteering on the sick and injured who are having a health emergency morally correct?

Isn't the answer obvious? It's called ObamaCare.

Am I wrong?

EoH , April 4, 2020 at 9:13 pm

Yes.

Procopius , April 5, 2020 at 6:36 am

When did the Church start subcontracting to Satan?

I believe it was around 325 A.D., when they made a deal with the Emperor Constantine. It may have been earlier, when the tax collector, Saul of Tarsus, said, "Can't get new converts? Hold my beer."

jackiebass , April 4, 2020 at 7:04 am

Where I live our local hospital emergency room is staffed by doctors and nurses that aren't hospital employees. They are employed by a private group. This has been the case for at least a decade. There are signs telling people that they will get separate bills from the doctors. My wife and I both are on traditional medicare and a supplemental policy. Fortunately this group is part of my supplemental network. Also the hospital sold its dialyses unit to a private company. They used to do their own laundry now it is done by a private company. The same is true for the janitor services. The head of the hospital used to be a doctor. Now the head is an MBA. This hospital is considered a nonprofit hospital. Since all of these changes has been happening I have noticed that care has become just another business transaction. Tho corporations own everything , even doctors who are now employees. If you need to see a doctor immediately you now have to go to one of two walk in clinics. Health care in my area has become just another money making business. This is a county in upstate NY with a population of about 100,000 people. There are only 2 corporations providing all of the care. Both operate with the same business plan. My doctor of 13 years decided to move out of the area. Instead of the health care organization hiring a replacement his patients were left out in the cold to find a new doctor. My wife has had 5 primary care doctors in the last 2 years. Health care has become just another money making business with no real competition.

Susan the other , April 4, 2020 at 1:11 pm

There are lots of dimensions to the outsourcing going on in American hospitals. My experience last summer is instructive. My husband (on Medicare) got sepsis from a carpet tack, he's diabetic so it was very dangerous and I took him to the ER on instructions from his podiatrist. The ER hemmed and hawed, tried to confirm with the podiatrist who just happened to turn off his beeper so the ER called Bill'r regular doctor. His regular doctor was playing the system like a violin: because he gets bonuses for any cost saving measures he achieves. This was one – so instead of getting Bill on an emergency IV, his doctor sent him home with some crappy antibiotics, which he threw up; we lost a good 24 hours which could have been the diff between life and death. I was furious and I called all the people I knew on the board of the new hospital to complain. We returned to the ER the next morning and I was already a cat-5 tornado. They got Bill on an IV and they literally hid from me. After 10 days he was cured but his nitwit doctor (to cover his own ass) recommended some expensive anerobic antibiotics for another 7 days – by mouth. The gave me a prescription to get filled. No pharmacy in town had the stuff – it was special order only and took up to 3 days. Long-short when I finally got my hands on the pills, I called the hospital complaint line and told them how inept they were to let a patient go from the hospital with an un-fillable prescription – and she told me that that was not hospital policy, that hospital policy was to send such a patient home with a 3 day supply for the interim. So I only wish I had had the phone number of the person paying Bill's doctor his bonus for endangering his recovery in such a callous and insouciant manner. I tried to get through to Medicare to complain about him but I was blocked every time. It's a shame because that's first class malpractice in my opinion – and the system that encourages it is unconscionable. All those cost cuts by the system are death by a thousand cuts for patients – and an equivalent amount of profits in the pockets of the corporation.

cnchal , April 4, 2020 at 7:17 am

>. . . But what does it mean to own a physician practice if the practice has no assets and no possibility to exist on its own?

Public sector pension funds are investors in Pirate Equity, in case anyone has forgotten, so you could ask them or at the Trump's press conference today, ask him. He would know.

JTMcPhee , April 4, 2020 at 11:00 am

Pensioners don't have much, if any, say in how the people who run the pension funds do what they do. The long look we have had at CalPERS gives some idea of the corruption and malfeasance that's going on, protecting the "fees" and extractions of the "advisers" who in turn get their spiffs from the "market."

Not sure what your point is. The structuring of the "deal" obviously seems to be to maximize all looting possibilities and to shed any possible "legal" avenues of either control or redress by any of the institutions of governance.

Bryan , April 5, 2020 at 9:21 am

Luring the public sector pension funds into private equity was the historical turning point. Private equity has now lashed itself to the ship of state, its main goal.

John , April 4, 2020 at 7:27 am

Private equity is too greedy and rapacious to be permitted to exist.

Tom Doak , April 4, 2020 at 8:26 am

Instead of calling them private equity "firms" and "executives ", we should start consistently labeling them in the same way The New York Times labels the dictators we don't like with unflattering terms.

Since they have a long and questionable history in medicine, I nominate the term "private equity leeches".

Billy , April 4, 2020 at 3:06 pm

Tom, Don't be such a easy going pushover, how about

"Health Criminals"
=
"War Criminals"

They should be identified, shamed and or prosecuted the same way authentic Nazis and Human Rights violators were, and are, in the U.S.

The Historian , April 4, 2020 at 7:32 am

A doctor in Boise was fired for wearing her own M95 mask that she needs because of her own health problems. Listen to the runaround she got! This doctor wasn't afraid to speak out because she works for herself!

https://www.ktvb.com/article/news/local/208/idaho-doctor-says-she-was-fired-after-trying-to-wear-a-mask-at-a-boise-hospital/277-008a2b17-fef4-4fc1-a070-672166c6286e

c_heale , April 4, 2020 at 10:29 am

This is happening in the UK too

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/04/nhs-worker-quit-when-she-was-stopped-from-wearing-face-mask

JBird4049 , April 4, 2020 at 7:56 pm

"The list included: if you wear it, everybody will want to wear PPE and we don't have it,"

In her termination phone call, Buckalew asked to see the policy saying she couldn't wear a mask.

"I need to have it in writing that you are asking me to leave because I want to protect myself," Buckalew said.

Still, she said nobody has been able to show her that policy. She was informed though that she was officially labeled as insubordinate, incompetent, and unethical for her actions.

I wonder how the hospital would handle mass death? Financially of course seeing as ethics don't matter.

Paul Jurczak , April 4, 2020 at 10:00 pm

The most telling sign that we are firmly in the post-truth era is the non-response statement from Encompass Health:
"We are continuing to tap every resource available to provide personal protective equipment that meets the needs of our patients and staff [ bla, bla, bla]".
Corporate PR considers not addressing the issue and spewing some unrelated sugar coated BS a normal operating procedure these days. Before you think that corporations are bad people, think about bad people inside the corporations. There are thousands of middle class employees who are writing these kinds of statements on behalf of their paymasters. Humanity has a lot of rot in it.

Billy , April 4, 2020 at 10:12 pm

Call me "The Listmaster"

Keep every letter, every email, better yet, email them back and ask for clarification about who authorized, authored, directed the policy. If you phone, record the call. Look up the board of directors, save the webpage, their names.
This will be useful in the future for potential prosecutions at the judicial and activist level.

pricklyone , April 5, 2020 at 12:28 am

Sorry Billy, it IS good advice, but others have suggested similar, like "when signing the authorization for treatment, include a statement about in-network only ".
While logical, in every hospital, doctors office, clinic, etc, in my network, you sign all of these authorizations on a "signature pad" attached to a computer. No addendums or changes can be made by the patient, and the staff are not authorized to alter it either.
Anything you want as a hard copy, they tell you you can print from the "patient portal"
on the web THEIR version, of course, perhaps not the same as the one you signed.
In the case of any legal actions, their politically connected 18 lawyer team will select their preferred judge, who will promptly throw out all of your careful documentation
MBAs and automation/IT run amok.

Rod , April 4, 2020 at 8:20 am

With 8b$ in the bank a 'non-profit" Atrium compensates the top well:

Atrium Health 's top 11 executives made a combined $27.6 million in 2019, the Charlotte-based health system said on Friday. That's a nearly 15% jump from a combined $24.05 million in 2018. Atrium CEO Gene Woods was at the top of the list with $7.25 million in compensation in 2019.

Here's what Atrium Health's top executives earned in 2019
http://www.bizjournals.com/charlotte/news/2020/02/07/heres-what-atrium-healths-top-exe

Rod , April 4, 2020 at 8:40 am

Here's a trick they used to get to that Executive pay which was stopped in 2018–

The Department of Justice announced a settlement with Atrium Health, formerly known as Carolinas HealthCare System, that prohibits Atrium from using "anticompetitive steering restrictions" in contracts between commercial health insurers and its providers in the Charlotte, North Carolina metropolitan area. The settlement, revealed Thursday, also bans Atrium from seeking contract terms or acting in such a way as to prohibit, prevent, or penalize steering by insurers in the future.

KLG , April 4, 2020 at 9:32 am

Working link
https://www.bizjournals.com/charlotte/news/2020/02/07/heres-what-atrium-healths-top-executives-earned-in.html

jfleni , April 4, 2020 at 8:27 am

SUprise billing is just a pluticrat swindle that will increase by millions when Biden gets in; Bernie was right and every body knows
it. Consider every advanced country has medicare for all BUT not
here in plutocrat heaven; Bernie was totally right!!!

rd , April 4, 2020 at 5:34 pm

Other countries have systems different from Medicare for all, especially some of the European ones. But they are heavily regulated which eliminates all of the efficiencies and improvements you get with a free market .. I assume that is why we have such an inexpensive and effective system compared to the heavily regulated ones.

Noel Nospamington , April 4, 2020 at 10:38 pm

From a Canadian perspective I don't understand why the vast majority of Americans don't support political candidates which promote universal single payer healthcare.

Maybe healthcare isn't something most people think about until they have the misfortune of accidents or illnesses.

If there is one positive outcome from the current pandemic, it might be that many more Americans will be shown how badly broken their health care is, including the per capita death rate compared to other countries.

However right wing parties are masters of deception, and they are likely working on some dog whistle issues to change the focus away from health care after the pandemic settles down.

Jonathan , April 5, 2020 at 11:10 am

Because most have been brainwashed since birth and couldn't imagine better governance exists elsewhere.

From a Singaporean perspective, US is such a crappy place in terms of income versus overall cost of living + public safety + government efficiency + convenience that it makes me LOL whenever I hear Americans dissing us as "an authoritarian nanny state". Well, I say they have the freedom to keep believing whatever that floats their rotten boats.

rob , April 4, 2020 at 8:34 am

What is mind boggling is the dysfunction that can be wrought by lawyers.
It seems to me that the fulcrum under private equity's; arrogance,greed,uninhibited vile existence leading to the takeover of the public medical infrastructure ; rests on peoples ability to "BS" some excuse to a bunch of lawyers . and have it "cleaned" up into some legal footing that can be defended. Not because of the merit of the idea . but because of some standing granted to a "legal framework" of some kind.
The reality completely divorced from the effort to promote the scheme.
On all sides.
Not only the vile, morally repugnant private equity types.
But the people on the other side of the negotiation, who are enticed to make a quick buck ,by selling out the ship the passengers without a lifeboat, are floating on.
And all of this dealing is made "right" ,by lawyers .
Is it because there is some contagion in law school? that divorces people from "right and wrong" Or is it partly, sociopaths finding a setting where they fit right in?
Whether it is the prosecutors all over the country, "legally" screwing nominally guilty people of all kinds of things, making money for their systems by taking it from the general public
Or the ones who fight to allow every scumbag with a dollar to get non disclosure agreements , so they can "pay off" justice and continue to go about damaging society.
Or the ones who allow these medical ownership rule "work-arounds" by saying to private equity," now , we all know that you are looking to plunder a population but hey . we can just say "you're helping them on to their final journey" and "it all meets the requirements" . so sign here how about a round of golf ,down at the club?

Felix_47 , April 4, 2020 at 9:23 am

Great comment. That is the real cancer we are facing in this society. I note Joe Biden is a lawyer, I believe he said he was at the top of his class at Syracuse, and Sanders is not a lawyer. Americans seem to want lawyers as leaders because they know how to make everything look fine and they can keep a straight face saying it.

Schtubb , April 4, 2020 at 12:33 pm

Biden lies about his academic record:

https://apnews.com/cd977f7ff301993f7976974ba07c5495

"WASHINGTON (AP) _ Sen. Joe Biden claimed during a campaign appearance in New Hampshire last spring that he finished in the top half of his law school class, although records indicate he finished near the bottom."

sd , April 4, 2020 at 6:43 pm

Why am I not surprised.

DJ , April 4, 2020 at 10:55 am

Whatever else is going wrong, at the root we are experiencing a crisis of integrity. Such a word, "integrity." It requires that we say it like it is. "The state of being whole and undivided" the dictionary says. It is not, of course, a state that we, being human, can fully achieve. But it is something that we, as humans, must aspire to achieve. Our huckster society places no value on the simple virtue of telling the truth. It is a loser's creed, a false refuge of Pollyannas, we are told by the grizzled veterans of economic warfare. In fact, though, it is the lubricant that ensures the smooth functioning of all of society. We are awash in falsehood, victims of Bill Black's "Gresham's Dynamic." We can get back on course by punishing false representation, starting at the highest levels, where the greatest damage is done by those entrusted with the greatest responsibility, who should be punished accordingly. We should do this not out of a sense of retribution against the bad guys (a class which, in fairness, may include many of us), but as a necessary means of survival.

David in Santa Cruz , April 4, 2020 at 3:06 pm

Former SIGTARP Neil Barofsky was interviewed by Bill Moyers earlier this week. Barofsky expressed his concern that we have developed a culture of casual lying at every level of our society:

It is different. They lied then. They lied now. That hasn't changed. But the way those lies are perceived, and how people have their alternate realities, I think that's very different, and very scary as we go into this next crisis.

https://billmoyers.com/story/here-we-go-again/

The human race is entering its extinction event, and there is no longer any such thing as long-term thinking. Personal honor was the first casualty. Many people suddenly feel entitled to "get theirs" at the expense of everyone else.

I see this sort of casual lying every day now.

Billy , April 4, 2020 at 10:17 pm

That is a symptom of civic decay, not a cause. Once moral relativism is acceptable in "choices", then it becomes so in civics, then contracts then the entire society. You reap what others have sowed and you casually accepted.

eg , April 4, 2020 at 1:44 pm

Yup.

Read all about the history of this in Katharina Pistor's "The Code of Capital"

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2019/09/26/book-review-the-code-of-capital-how-the-law-creates-wealth-and-inequality-by-katharina-pistor/

pebird , April 4, 2020 at 8:57 am

Universal service
High quality
Profit

Pick 2 of 3

periol , April 4, 2020 at 2:53 pm

I'll take Universal Service and High Quality for $400, Alex

Answer: Daily Double

I'll risk everything.

Answer: How do we MAGA?

Jesper , April 4, 2020 at 9:17 am

Private equity might be leading the decline, however, the decline happens everywhere. In the public sector it might be seen less but it happens due to New Public Management (NPM): https://www.managementstudyguide.com/new-public-management.htm

As far as I can tell the story is:
Once an organisation gets large enough (private or public) then it starts to attract management accountants (often MBA degree holders). The management accountant believe they can improve efficiency using the tools that (often) worked in improving efficiency in manufacturing. Process flow-charts and statistical analysis leading to the use of Key Performance Indicators (KPI). Sadly the management accountants are often lacking in knowledge and they are often insecure so they don't dare to ask questions. Their understanding of statistics is either bad or they simply decide to torture data to get their preferred (or indeed any as they need an) answer.
The end result is often KPIs which are seldom Key and often not even Indicators of Performance.
(Their own KPI is billable hours which can and often does affect the quality/usefulness of their work)

In medicine then it might result in something like providing a doctor with a KPI of number of patients seen during a day. Seems reasonable, right?
The problem with that KPI is that the patients differ, some visits are short and some take longer. That might lead to a doctor deciding to call in patients who might as easily have been helped over the phone. The doctor needs the quick and easy visits to meet the KPI, the patient might end up with a two hour trip for something that might have been resolved over the phone but the doctor might have no choice but doing this to meet the KPI.
Or alternatively, if the KPI is about resolving queries over the phone then patients who needs to come to the office are instead refused to come in and instead treated/diagnosed (or as it happens, not) over the phone.

The drive for efficiency can lead to more waste and worse outcomes, when it comes to management accountants then my opinion is: A little knowledge (and that is all they have, a little) can be a dangerous thing. Their lack of knowledge has caused and is continuing to cause a lot of waste and a lot of problems for many people.

Oregoncharles , April 4, 2020 at 3:38 pm

What struck me about the story is that the hospital(s) are every bit as guilty as the PE's. Why would they sign these contracts? There must be some sort of kickbacks for them. Ultimately, it's nothing but a way to squeeze more blood out of the turnips – and that seems to be exactly the way they think of patients.

Technical question: are hospitals legally responsible for the quality of care and honesty of billing in their own emergency rooms? Seems to me that question should be settled by a big, expensive lawsuit by cheated patients.

Jesper , April 4, 2020 at 7:08 pm

My guess is that the hospital first tried outsourcing the canteen and the outsourcing of the canteen might have worked well so they then decided to outsource something else. Why the ER was chosen for the outsourcing might be related to wanting to be able to blame the outsourcer for things that might cause bad publicity. Surprise-billing in the ER might cause bad publicity. By outsourcing the ER the hospital might get more money from the ER and deflect blame for the surprise-billing to the outsourcer.
And I would not be surprised if another reason for signing those deals might have generated some personal benefits for the people who signed the agreement on behalf of the hospital. Probably not a common occurrence but there is a risk that it could happen.

jrkrideau , April 4, 2020 at 9:39 pm

I have worked for an industrial catering firm and properly managed by the contracting organization contracting out a peripheral function such as as food services can work well. Contracting out your key business is madness.

Billy , April 4, 2020 at 10:23 pm

Sodexo-Marriot has replaced many fine in house hospital cafeterias.

From "just OK, to excellent food" has become corporate, tasteless, expensive, profit wringing slop.

Boycott any place that tries to foist that off on you in a captive audience situation.

pricklyone , April 4, 2020 at 11:43 pm

I have been operating under the hypothesis that the escape from legal liability was key to these subcontracting deals.
I am not an insider and have not direct knowledge of such a mechanism, but JTMcPhee may have some insight, if he thinks about it for a few

JTMcPhee , April 5, 2020 at 10:45 am

There's probably no way a hospital, as a business entity, can avoid being sued In a malpractice situation. The law on this is murky and fact-driven. Plaintiffs' attorneys sue all deep pockets where there is a "colorable claim" and assets and insurance behind the defendant. The hospital corps have deep pockets that fund the best lawyers and expert opinion providers that money can buy. They can drown many victims in paper and procedure. So your lawyer can sue the hospital, but will have an uphill battle piercing through to the imposition of liability on the hospital.

Here's an article discussing the issue of entity liability in malpractice:

https://www.plaintiffmagazine.com/recent-issues/item/when-is-a-hospital-liable-for-a-physician-s-malpractice

Often a case against the hospital turns on whether "vicarious liability" can be established. As you note, the structure discussed is an effort to maximize the distance between the hospital entity and the physician. And of course the PE real-party-in-interest owners of the profitable part of the business are even further removed.

I've got to say, firing Dr. Lin was maybe unwise since it establishes a much closer link between the PE entity as controlling the physician's practice and thus makes it easier to establish agency, direct employee and vicarious liability by the PE entity. Though of course those snakes are very careful to revise their own trench-warfare defenses against personal liability in constructing their shells and disconnects.

Jeff , April 4, 2020 at 9:19 am

Yves, I don't get it. Why would a hospital not hire these docs in the ER and give up that revenue stream to a private company? If it's so profitable, why would a hospital just give that money away? I can see why a small rural hospital or single site facility might not have the consistent ER volume to justify multiple ER docs, but larger hospital groups can move er docs around in a geography to cover greater needs.

Felix_47 , April 4, 2020 at 9:55 am

As a doc the answer is management and cost control. If they have a lot of doctors they get a hefty discount on malpractice premiums which can be in the hundreds of thousands or they self insure with umbrella coverage. ER billing is a huge issue. It requires full time people and a lot of phone calls and follow up and tons of paperwork. Don't forget the insurance carriers see their job as looking for loopholes to not pay and the doctor groups see their job as bypassing those loopholes. If it is a large group and someone goes on vacation or is sick or can't make a shift coverage has to be maintained. A large pool of doctors makes that possible. A lot of ER doctors chose the specialty because they did not want to be tied down to an office and a business. They want to do the job and then have time off. For that they are willing to take a substantial cut in pay. Overhead costs could easily be over 50%. Pay for doctors has really not kept up with inflation over the last 30 years .unless they cheat .and the more the payers cut them the more that happens. And consider the risk of seeing children with fevers brought in to ERs by non English speaking people often without insurance at 3 in the morning. One case of meningitis, and a certain small percentage will have it, and you could be wiped out. The lawyers are all over it. Think about the two febrile kids who died with ICE a few months ago as they were brought over the border by the parents. Combining these sorts of high risk cases with our legal system is more than a single doc or small group can handle. For example, I alway saw the problem with the asylum wave to be more the legal risk of holding these folks than anything else. I think there were hefty settlements in those cases and I am sure the doctors did not do much wrong .just bad luck .but their careers might well have been significantly impacted. The only answer is a national health system with significant tort reform in medicine. Doctors should be on government salary just like firemen. There is no reason the payment structure should change between the most important moments of care like 911 and the next part after you go through the swinging doors of the ER. If health care is a government guaranteed right then it should be free of profiteering and should be provided by the government and that goes for the pharma and hospital industry as well. The recent primary suggests that Americans like the health care they have and the way it is done. It is no accident the health insurance stocks bumped up to 30% the day after Super Tuesday.

Rod , April 4, 2020 at 10:47 am

thanks for this insight overall.
You state the bottom line:

The only answer is a national health system with significant tort reform in medicine.

rd , April 4, 2020 at 12:21 pm

Canada

UK-NHS is similar but way underfunded compared to Canada.

Societal Illusions , April 4, 2020 at 10:11 pm

I'm not convinced the "only" answer is the one you provide – national healthcare with significant tort reform.

that said, it certainly is one answer. i wonder if most any answer could be worse than what we have currently.

wonder how the super tuesday voting would have changed if done over now?

lyman alpha blob , April 4, 2020 at 10:23 am

I had no idea that hospitals did this. Just when you think you can't get any more cynical

cripes , April 4, 2020 at 10:08 pm

lyman alpha blob:

I commend your healthy lifestyle choices that have kept you from an ER visit over the past 10 years or so and from the out-of-network double billing that is now endemic. Everywhere.

vegeholic , April 4, 2020 at 10:24 am

People have developed an exquisitely tuned sensitivity to some swindles, such as when the oil companies collude to increase gasoline prices, with or without justification. They even invented a phrase to describe the practice called "price gouging", and demand action from their elected representatives. Everyone becomes a raging, full-throated socialist when being squeezed by this particular variety of market leverage. Yet when faced by other, even more egregious looting, such as described in this post, they fall in line like compliant sheep being led to the slaughter. I don't get it. Maybe someone can explain this.

a different chris , April 4, 2020 at 11:25 am

I am not going to claim to be able to explain it, but:

I *think* it's the horrible cross-pollination of the complexity issue vs the dire outcome of the wrong choice.

You can, although most won't, find a way to save gas. It's pretty understandable, your vehicle gets X MPG and you drive so many miles. You can adjust the second usually, and also occasionally adjust the first. You have a chance (even if your in negative territory you can buffer that period with a credit card) to somehow buy time while you make the adjustments.

How the heck do you figure out if you really need to be cut open (your GP choice), who to actually cut you open (references?) and where to have him/her do it (if the surgeon works across hospitals).

And if the GP is right, the clock is ticking .

Oregoncharles , April 4, 2020 at 3:44 pm

Medicine is a massive example of market failure, for the reasons your example outlines. So all that stuff about "choice" and "markets" is just self-serving BS.

K teh , April 4, 2020 at 10:27 am

The University Hospital Complex system is the most corrupt part of the economy, and as we now see it is the weapon being employed. The curtain comes down.

Government essentially guarantees private corporate revenue, so those corporations can focus on minimizing costs, which are labor. The non-profits sow up the trap with legal exemptions, generating profit that is not taxed. The three-headed hydra is the least common denominator of herd behavior, distilling labor.

That money supply chart is essentially an implosion ripe for explosion. You want to harness that and direct parts of that energy toward some useful function.

K teh , April 4, 2020 at 10:31 am

If you gotta go, talk to the overnight secretary and get the best nurse and PA to keep an eye on you.

The doctors signed their life away when their education began.

Dean , April 4, 2020 at 10:46 am

Is there a place on the web where these relationships and transactions are published / researched? State boards of medicine? State Attorney's General? Or is this another opaque backwater where the details don't see the light of day?

jef , April 4, 2020 at 11:08 am

Private equity is like someone standing between you and the milk at the grocery store where you say "excuse me I need to get a gallon of milk" and he says "Ok, that will be six dollars" and you say "but it says four dollars right there" he says "well I say six dollars is the new price take it or leave it".

It's about time we told these a$$hole$ to get the hell out of the way.

JTMcPhee , April 4, 2020 at 11:31 am

A little anecdote from my Army basic training experience that might be a potential scenario as all this goes "healthSouth:"

Troop barracks used to be these two-story buildings with "Open plan" layout -- ten double bunks down each side, a latrine (bathroom facilities with a row of unenclosed toilets and sinks and gang showers.) If you have seen "Full Metal Jacket," you remember the drill. In any event, forty males on each floor sharing everything including microbes.

My experience was at Ft. Leonard Wood ("Fort Lost-In-The-Woods, in the state of Misery",) in the fall and early winter of 1966. Meningitis started in the troop population, so the Commanding General mandated that all the windows were alternately to be kept open 9 inches, top and bottom, to air the place out. This with outside air temps being in the 20s.

So despite the window-open attempts to limit the spread of this infectious disease in a pretty bad kind of social propinquity situation, one of the guys in in my barracks, a draftee farm kid from Iowa, started having really bad headaches and a stiff neck. He was finally allowed to go to "sick call" at the dispensary, the equivalent of the Emergency Room. He went, they gave him Tylenol, and sent him back to duty. This was repeated for three days.

On the morning of the fourth day, his squad members found him in convulsions with a raging fever and he was carted off by a GI ambulance. He died that night in the base hospital, from meningitis. We troops were then made to remove his gear and bedding which was burned, and also to "GI" ("deep clean") the whole barracks with some nasty disinfectant from a 55-gallon drum in GI green.

A week or so later, the guy's father showed up with a shotgun. He'd collected his son's body Earlier, but someone had told him about his son's failed efforts to get treatment. He wanted to find the NCOs, officers and the sick bay doctor and staff that were responsible. The MPs showed up in force and hauled him off to the stockade (jail).

I wonder if there have been episodes like this happening in our current looting-based system? For sure, they are not likely to be reported very widely.

And the corporate scum have done a pretty good job of insulating themselves from visibility, let alone responsibility and liability. Kind of unfair to shoot the ER doctor or the mope in the billing department that was "just following orders."

flora , April 4, 2020 at 11:59 am

Thanks. Yep, and the higher ups who allowed that probably got promoted. Whereas commanders (and now doctors and nurses) who do the right thing to save lives get fired.

Capt. Crozier.

https://twitter.com/mccaffreyr3/status/1246146257480908801

The heros are the one's doing the right thing in the face of threats and retaliation. Crozier is a hero. So are the ER docs.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/03/opinion/coronavirus-crozier-roosevelt.html

rd , April 4, 2020 at 12:25 pm

Expect COVID-19 case numbers to spike upwards soon along with deaths attributed to it. Trump rejected re-opening Obamacare and therefore hospitals will rely on Federal CARES dollars for reimbursement of Covid testing and care. So they will have every incentive to test everything but a dog or cat that walks through their door to ensure they will get paid because they will only be assured of being paid by the Feds if it is Covid.

ambrit , April 4, 2020 at 1:35 pm

They can also test cats and dogs, since, supposedly, they can catch it from humans, and bill it to the Agriculture Department.

Knot Galt , April 4, 2020 at 3:12 pm

PPE, NOT PE.

antidlc , April 4, 2020 at 3:35 pm

About a third of hospital emergency rooms are staffed by doctors on the payrolls of two physician staffing companies -- TeamHealth and Envision Health -- owned by Wall Street investment firms. Envision Healthcare employs 69,000 healthcare workers nationwide while TeamHealth employs 20,000. Private equity firm Blackstone Group owns TeamHealth, Kravis Kohlberg Roberts (KKR) owns Envision .

Anybody know if these guys have anything to do with Envisionrx?
https://envisionrx.com/

mtnwoman , April 4, 2020 at 3:51 pm

This got a hearty Amen! from me:

Stop Silencing Doctors: A Clinical Manifesto

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mvlqh0JN55M&feature=youtu.be&app=desktop

antidlc , April 4, 2020 at 5:40 pm

About a third of hospital emergency rooms are staffed by doctors on the payrolls of two physician staffing companies -- TeamHealth and Envision Health -- owned by Wall Street investment firms. Envision Healthcare employs 69,000 healthcare workers nationwide while TeamHealth employs 20,000. Private equity firm Blackstone Group owns TeamHealth, Kravis Kohlberg Roberts (KKR) owns Envision .

Same Envision as envisionrx -- or is envisionrx owned by something else?
https://envisionrx.com/

Carla , April 4, 2020 at 6:13 pm

The whole story here is that for-profit medicine won't work. And in the U.S. of A., ALL medicine is for-profit, including our beloved (which has always required supplemental insurance, and now with "Advantage" plans is increasingly crapified) Medicare system.

Capitalism and Caring Cannot Co-Exist.

Give it up!

CanCyn , April 4, 2020 at 6:17 pm

As a Canadian, I had to stop reading this article when I got to the paragraph about Dr. Ming Lin working for a staffing company. I. Can't. Even.
The entire US healthcare system is complete and utter insanity! I don't know how anyone can even try to have a rational discussion about it.
Privatization and for profit craziness is creeping around the edges of Canada's system and has f'd up our long term care system (certainly in Ontario where I live). It scares the bejeezus out of me to think that anyone in Canada would want to go down the US road and I hope I never live to see the day.
The head or our provincial, Conservative, gov is quite to the right (fun fact : he is the brother of the crazy Toronto drug using mayor, Rob Ford, whose notoriety some of you may remember from a few years back) his mother-in-law is apparently in long term care, where Covid is hitting hard here in Canada and Ontario. I am hoping (faint though the hope might be) that this personal experience wakes him up to the complete and utter wrong that is profit in healthcare.

jrkrideau , April 4, 2020 at 9:51 pm

It's hard to tell but I almost get the feeling Doug is growing up. I think the Covid-19 pandemic was a real awake call for him.

Once we are out of the worst of it he probably go back to being an ***hole but I hope a better one.

BTW, we should be able to get Dr. Ming Lin an expedited visa and provisional licensing in no time.

Tom Stone , April 4, 2020 at 10:00 pm

I have long been aware that the only way the American Healthcare system could be reformed was if it totally collapsed, which is happening now.
Lots of unnecessary pain and death.

As many of you know I have in excess of $300K in medical debt accrued in roughly 18 months, the last trip to the Hospital ran $88K and change for a 32 hour stay.

If I had any easily ascertainable assets I'd have been sued multiple times already.
Fortunately every spare penny for the last 5 years has gone to my Daughter Rosetta's 529 plan, between that and a very nice scholarship she will graduate debt free.
And yes, that really is her name.
She's cool with it and we're planning to get matching Mohawks when I'm done with Chemo, I'll likely go with the same cobalt blue I did when I knew Chemo was on the way.
A man's gotta do

Jonathan , April 5, 2020 at 1:16 pm

All of that medical debt would be $0 if you lived in Singapore and opted in to pay ~USD300 per year in cash premiums for upgraded govt insurance, assuming you are in the 30-40 age bracket Even if you didn't opted in and without employer insurance, you most likely won't fork out more than USD 20K cash copay cash after all is said and done.

Also, you would probably pay only <1% of your total yearly income in income taxes and not be blowing some USD 2-3K in rent every month.

So frankly I have NO idea how you Americans can tolerate living in that "exceptional" sh!thole called the US.

mrtmbrnmn , April 5, 2020 at 12:53 am

In Pagan days human sacrifices were thrown into the fiery pits to appease the Mad Gods & Big Nature. We may want to revisit that in the present terrible circumstances. High on the list of nominees would be the Werewolves of Wall Street & all those Hedge Fund Hooligans.

Sound of the Suburbs , April 5, 2020 at 4:47 am

In Europe, doctors are facing difficult life and death decisions they are not prepared for.
US doctors are fully prepared to make difficult decisions.
Do you have health insurance?
If not, get lost.

That's what I like to see.
Markets forces at work.
If you can't afford it, you get nothing.

[Apr 05, 2020] Case of substitution: Pneumonia deaths down. Covid-19 deaths up.

Apr 05, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

dltravers , Apr 5 2020 15:12 utc | 6

Not sure what to make of this one..

Pneumonia deaths down.

Covid-19 deaths up.

Pneumonia and influenza survey from the CDC

Anyone in a position to plot this?

Data in csv format format CDC


Norwegian , Apr 5 2020 16:56 utc | 21

@dltravers | Apr 5 2020 15:12 utc | 6
Not sure what to make of this one..

Pneumonia deaths down.

Covid-19 deaths up.


Reallocations. The numbers are manipulated.

[Apr 05, 2020] Mortality by age group

Apr 05, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

S , Apr 2 2020 16:23 utc | 5

Verity et al. (March 30, 2020) have estimated the (adjusted) case fatality ratio, infection fatality ratio, and proportion of infections requiring hospitalization:

             Crude    Adjusted           Hospitalization
             CFR (%)  CFR (%)   IFR (%)  Rate (%)

    0-9       0.000   0.00260   0.00161   0.00
    10-19     0.182   0.0148    0.00695   0.0408
    20-29     0.193   0.0600    0.0309    1.04
    30-39     0.237   0.146     0.0844    3.43
    40-49     0.443   0.295     0.161     4.25
    50-59     1.30    1.25      0.595     8.16
    60-69     3.60    3.99      1.93     11.8
    70-79     7.96    8.61      4.28     16.6
    80+      14.8    13.4       7.80     18.4

    Total     2.29    1.38      0.657

[Apr 05, 2020] The percentage of deaths by Covid19 in the USA is 17.8 per million citizens, which corresponds to the usual percentage of seasonal influenza.

Apr 05, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Luc GUTHRIE , Apr 3 2020 15:13 utc | 279

Message from France :

First premise: This year, the percentage of influenza patients in relation to the total population is the same as in previous years.

Second premise: In previous years, seasonal influenza had a percentage of certain coronaviruses. This year the percentage is similar.

Third premise: The percentage of deaths among people who are infected is no different from other years.

Fourth premise: The media falsifies the percentage of deaths among those who are infected. The only serious study concerning the real mortality in the country where according to the media there are the most deaths (Italy) is the one carried out by the Italian Ministry of Health. It reveals that it is not 12% but 1.2% of sick patients, which corresponds to the usual mortality of influenza.

Fifth premise: this study reveals that the average age of the deceased is 80 years.

Additional information: The percentage of deaths by Covid19 in the USA is 17.8 per million citizens, which corresponds to the usual percentage of seasonal influenza.

Be careful, don't be an accomplice in the panic they want to create: This is essentially a media attack to disguise the economic meltdown they've created.

https://www.mediterranee-infection.com/covid-19/

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

[Apr 05, 2020] Today 4-3-20, Covid is the third cause of death in USA

Apr 05, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

DFC , Apr 2 2020 22:11 utc | 103

Today 4-3-20, Covid is the third cause of death in USA, with around 1.100 deaths per day is only behind heart disease (1.774/day) and cancer (1.641/day), but in two weeks is expected to be clearly the leading cause of death in USA as it is now in Italy and Spain. It is a matter of when start to decrease the number of deaths to see if will be, or not, the leading cause of deaths in absolute terms (I expected and I think it will not)

https://www.sacbee.com/news/coronavirus/article241677891.html

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm

A lot of people are still saying it is a hoax, I think they will continue saying this even if connected to a ventilator (/sarc)

[Apr 05, 2020] 'Govt sends us NAKED against Covid-19' RT speaks to French nurse from caregivers' undressing flashmob

Apr 05, 2020 | www.rt.com

French caregivers battling Covid-19 are appallingly underequipped and overloaded with fresh cases, a local nurse said, explaining a recent action which saw medics posing naked to show their vulnerability to the deadly contagion. The unorthodox demonstration kicked off earlier this week, with dozens of nurses undressing in a silent protest against the government "sending us naked to face this pandemic," as Melina Dufraigne-Laflechelle, one of the nurses behind the flashmob, put it on RT France.

Using the hashtag #apoilcontrelecovid (naked against the Covid), the silent protest featured medics of all ages posing with small signs concealing their private parts.

"As you all know, to be able to treat patients with dignity and not take risks for ourselves and our patients, we need a set of equipment which we don't have," said Dufraigne-Laflechelle.

Old-fashioned masks are the only protective gear local medical staff have received from the government, she claimed.

[Apr 05, 2020] Of the medications you have personally prescribed or have seen used, please indicate which ones are most effective

Apr 05, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

...37% of 6,227 doctors across 30 countries felt the drug was the "most effective therapy" out of 15 options in treating coronavirus, according to a poll reported by the Washington Times .

The drug has been prescribed in 72% of cases in Spain, 49% in Italy, 41% in Brazil, 39% in Mexico, 28% in France, and 23% in the USA. Overall, 19% of physicians have prescribed the drug for high-risk patients, and 8% for low-risk patients.

Overall (2171) US (580) NY (112) Europe (827) Italy & Spain (671) China (109) Rest of world (543)
Hydroxychloroquine or Chloroquine 37% 23% 25% 37% 62% 44% 55%
Azithromycin or similar antibiotics 32% 18% 25% 32% 45% 33% 48%
Nothing 32% 51% 42% 29% 16% 4% 18%
Analgesics (e.g., Paracetamol/Acetaminophen) 31% 21% 29% 34% 37% 20% 39%
Anti-HIV drugs (e.g. Lopinavir plus Ritonavir) 16% 5% 6% 15% 28% 42% 25%
Cough medications 13% 13% 15% 12% 8% 22% 11%
Compassionate use of experimental drugs 13% 10% 8% 12% 20% 35% 14%
(e.g. Remdisivir)
Drugs used to treat flu (e.g., Oseltamivir) 12% 4% 11% 9% 10% 39% 19%
Expectorants (e.g., Mucinex 10% 10% 9% 8% 8% 28% 10%
Interferon-beta 7% 1% 3% 3% 11% 41% 15%
Antihistamines/Decongestants 7% 7% 6% 5% 5% 17% 8%
Plasma from patients who have recovered from COVID-19 7% 3% 6% 4% 6% 48% 6%
Vitamin D 6% 4% 6% 6% 5% 12% 7%
Zinc tablets 5% 6% 10% 4% 2% 8% 4%
Glycopyrolate inhaler 3% 2% 3% 1% 1% 19% 3%

[Apr 05, 2020] How healthy and strong your respiratory system has a lot to do with fending off the scourge of viruses. viruses.

Apr 05, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Enough OK. How healthy and strong your respiratory system has a lot to do with fending off the scourge of viruses. Governments generally do very poor record in tackling Pollution(s).

There is a ' Great ' gift from the US to countries around the world: Please welcome Petroleum Coke, or ' petcoke '. This is the bottom-of-the-barrel leftover from refining .. tar sands crude and other heavy oils, is cheaper and burns hotter than coal. But it also contains .. far more heart- and lung-damaging sulfur."
American companies don't like to use it, and "are sending it around the world. Laboratory tests on imported petcoke used near New Delhi found it contained 17 times more sulfur than the limit set for coal, and a staggering 1,380 times more than for diesel."

Big Corporations are literally pooping all over the planet, and virtually pooping inside our lungs , with impunity; we have to live in such conditions. Can this situation be stopped and reveresed?

[Apr 05, 2020] The big mistake in the U.S. and Europe, in my opinion, is that people aren't wearing masks

Highly recommended!
Apr 05, 2020 | www.sciencemag.org

Science has tried to interview George Gao, director-general of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), for 2 months. Last week he responded.

Q : What mistakes are other countries making?

A: The big mistake in the U.S. and Europe, in my opinion, is that people aren't wearing masks. This virus is transmitted by droplets and close contact. Droplets play a very important role -- you've got to wear a mask, because when you speak, there are always droplets coming out of your mouth. Many people have asymptomatic or presymptomatic infections. If they are wearing face masks, it can prevent droplets that carry the virus from escaping and infecting others. Q: People who tested positive in Wuhan but only had mild disease were sent into isolation in large facilities and were not allowed to have visits from family. Is this something other countries should consider?

A: Infected people must be isolated. That should happen everywhere. You can only control COVID-19 if you can remove the source of the infection. This is why we built module hospitals and transformed stadiums into hospitals.

[Apr 05, 2020] Drug Wars How Big Pharma Raises Prices and Keeps Generics off the Market - Kindle edition by Feldman, Robin, Frondorf, Evan. P

Apr 05, 2020 | www.amazon.com

While the shockingly high prices of prescription drugs continue to dominate the news, the strategies used by pharmaceutical companies to prevent generic competition are poorly understood, even by the lawmakers responsible for regulating them. In this groundbreaking work, Robin Feldman and Evan Frondorf illuminate the inner workings of the pharmaceutical market and show how drug companies twist health policy to achieve goals contrary to the public interest. In highly engaging prose, they offer specific examples of how generic competition has been stifled for years, with costs climbing into the billions and everyday consumers paying the price. Drug Wars is a

... ... ...

Price increases had occurred across the board, on everything from gallstone treatments to, A shocking Wall Street Journal piece revealed that between 2010 and 2014, U.S. prices for the thirty best- selling drugs rose four times faster than prescription volume, and eight times faster than inflation. 24 Put another way, 80 percent of the growth in profits of the twenty largest drug companies in 2015 resulted from price increases. 25 Put still another way, customers of CVS Health spent 12.7 percent more on drugs in 2015 than in the previous year, and more than 80 percent of that additional spending was the result of price increases. -- U.S. President Barack Obama even got into the academic mix, publishing a paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association that, in part, called attention to rising spending on prescription medication. 22 And in the days before his 2017 inauguration, the next U.S. president, Donald Trump, sharply criticized the pharmaceutical industry. "We have to . . . create new bidding procedures for the drug industry because they're getting away with murder. . . . Pharma, pharma has a lot of lobbies and a lot of lobbyists and a lot of power." --

The brunt of the pain is felt by U.S. citizens - one drug that costs less than $400 a year in some countries has a list price around $300,000 in the United States. 24 The rest of the world, however, has not been immune to the plague of skyrocketing prices...

[Apr 05, 2020] Please provide a reference that says an asymptomatic person is contagious. If you are referring to the article published in the NEJM (New England Journal of Medicine), that turned out to be flawed as the women did display symptoms when she returned to Germany.

Apr 05, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

PokeTheTruth , Apr 2 2020 23:57 utc | 145

Richard Steven Hack @129

You wrote, " The difference between this virus and most previous viruses is that they required one to have a fever, i.e., symptoms, before being contagious. This one does not for at least one to two days before symptoms appear. So we know it's possible to be asymptomatic for at least one to two days and still be contagious."

Asymptomatic means no symptoms i.e., no sneezing, coughing or postnasal drip.
As far as transmission by sputum (spitting) or other secretions, I think that is a such a rare occurrence that it is too infinitesimal to statistically count. I mean come on, how many times have you touched someone's spit? Kissing is not known to spread the disease from an asymptomatic carrier either.

The other observations that suggest presymptomatic transmission of infection (meaning no symptoms) cannot be confirmed because it is unknown if the disease was present and active on surfaces before the subjects came in contact with it and with each other.

The disease is spread by sending a plume into the air as a result of a cough, sneeze or postnasal drip. A person comes in contact with the virus by being in the vicinity of the plume or when the virus falls on a surface and a person touches it and then somewhere on their body that allows entry (eyes, nasal passages or mouth.)

Please provide a reference that says an asymptomatic person is contagious. If you are referring to the article published in the NEJM (New England Journal of Medicine), that turned out to be flawed as the women did display symptoms when she returned to Germany.

Source: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/02/paper-non-symptomatic-patient-transmitting-coronavirus-wrong# .

[Apr 04, 2020] Should schools be closed?

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Petri Krohn , Apr 3 2020 20:24 utc | 36

There is a fear that schools are a vector in spreading COVID-19 from one family to another. But we know that children, especially young children under 10 are almost alway asymptotic. Wouldn't this mean that kindergartens and primary schools would be unable to sustain an epidemic? So is there any point in closing schools?

There is one danger. If an infection is transmitted form one adult to another then it would be untraceable. If a parent of one child is infected, then all parents of his or her classmates would need to be quarantined.

P.S. - It looks like social distancing measures in Finland have pushed R0 to 1 or slightly under.

[Apr 04, 2020] I believe we're approaching peak fear right now

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Realist , Apr 3 2020 20:11 utc | 34

I believe we're approaching peak fear right now

++++++


Only peak CV fear

After that peaks people will start to wake up a little from their quartine fear-induced stupor and some at least will start to notice what's being done economically, some thing which effects all plebs equally.

Then we can expect the imminent arrival of peak fiscal fear

[Apr 04, 2020] Flu will kill the same groups that are always susceptible

Apr 04, 2020 | www.unz.com

NPleeze , says: Show Comment April 3, 2020 at 3:32 pm GMT

@Sick of Orcs

#coronahoax aka ccp flu will kill the same groups that are always susceptible

Yes but it seems to kill them in far greater numbers. I thus agree about opening society, but not completely.

The vulnerable are about 5-10% of the population and generally unproductive (retired or too sick to work). They can self-quarantine (or, if you are an authoritarian statist, use law – a gun – to force them to quarantine) – importantly, including from their non-quarantined family members! , who will spread it to them – and everyone else go about their business.

In this case, the virus will roll over the population during the first season/year. It will kill some of the non-vulnerable as well – like all flus/diseases do – but roughly along annual lines. After that year, society will have achieved "herd immunity".

The problem with a partial quarantine is that the virus continues to circulate, and since the vulnerable and non-vulnerable people intermix (intimately, at home), the vulnerable will keep getting infected – this could go on for years. The result: vastly more dead, and a destroyed economy (which the Rulers will buy up for pennies on the dollar – diseases can be very profitable!).

[Apr 04, 2020] WATCH Trump's coronavirus task force gives update at White House

That was one of the worst decisions Trump administration made. Now they change their stance. Better later then never...
Notable quotes:
"... Part of the reason was to preserve medical-grade masks for health care workers who desperately need them at a time when they are in continuously short supply. ..."
Apr 04, 2020 | www.youtube.com

The C.D.C. has recommended that all Americans wear cloth masks if they go out in public. This is a shift in federal guidance reflecting new concerns that the coronavirus is being spread by infected people who have no symptoms .

Until now, the C.D.C., like the W.H.O., has advised that ordinary people don't need to wear masks unless they are sick and coughing.

Part of the reason was to preserve medical-grade masks for health care workers who desperately need them at a time when they are in continuously short supply.

Masks don't replace hand washing and social distancing.

[Apr 04, 2020] N95 vs FFP3 FFP2 masks what's the difference

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

A User , Apr 3 2020 22:36 utc | 85

There is still confusion between what is a mask & what is a respirator -basically a mask will protect others from your sputum & a respirator protects yourself from others.
I discovered a site N95 vs FFP3 & FFP2 masks – what's the difference? which explains the different masks & respirators and most importantly what the standards are. eg n95 amerika = KN95 China. As well as explaining the problems of valved devices versus unvalved etc.
It is clear layman style stuff free of dense bullshit, read it if you want to understand this stuff.

[Apr 04, 2020] I'll wear a mask to protect you, and you wear a mask to protect me

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Grieved , Apr 4 2020 3:24 utc | 118

I haven't seen this specifically mentioned so I'll offer it. My local newspaper of all things, published an editorial today calling for more people in our community to "mask up". It included this wonderful phrase that captures the true social dynamic and the logic of the situation:

"I'll wear a mask to protect you, and you wear a mask to protect me."

What's nice about this social compact is that it costs almost nothing, is in plentiful, makeshift supply (we're including bandanas and scarves - anything), and surely must do more good than harm, no matter how real or unreal the danger is, nor how prone to mishap or not the wearing of a mask is.

Such a compact surely must be a social good. If only there had been masks in the US - or leadership willing to plunge humble and naked into the realities of the situation and learn from Asia so we could all start making our own masks - then perhaps the US would not have had to do the most stupid thing possible to its lean productive economy, namely, shutting down the entire entrepreneur class of the country and throwing their employees into hazard and poverty.

Given that there was no safety net, and never was going to be despite the talk of the first few days, it could have saved countless deaths from poverty if the people if the US had learned the new social rules, including mask and physical distance etiquette immediately, and kept many of the businesses open instead of driving them to bankruptcy.

So the US is very late to the party, and will pay the price, but now the people who survive must learn how to live in the new normal. Masking-up in public seems the least impactful of all responses.

[Apr 04, 2020] Virus size and Brownian motion

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

A User , Apr 3 2020 22:56 utc | 92

re b's comment : "The HEPA filter catches particles down to 0.3 micrometer. Viruses are some 125 nanometer in diameter so they are smaller and could slip through. " .
That isn't strictly correct, there is a solid reason for the 0.3 micrometer limit related to Brownian motion,as I learned after reading a piece from the link I posted above - to wit:
The reason for the focus on 0.3 microns is because it is the "most penetrating particle size" (MPPS). Particles above this size move in ways we might anticipate, and will get trapped in a filter with gaps smaller than the particle size. Particles smaller than 0.3 microns exhibit what's called brownian motion – which makes them easier to filter. Brownian motion refers to a phenomenon whereby the particle's mass is small enough that it no longer travels unimpeded through the air. Instead it interacts with the molecules in the air (nitrogen, oxygen, etc), causing it to pinball between them, moving in an erratic pattern.

According to researchers this point between "normal" motion and brownian motion is the hardest particle size for filters to capture.

What we can take away from this, is that high filter efficiency at 0.3 micron size will generally translate to high filter efficiency below this size also.

[Apr 04, 2020] Vitamin D deficiency is common in the winter, has profound effects on human immune system

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Stonebird , Apr 3 2020 20:22 utc | 36

juliania | Apr 3 2020 19:06 utc | 13

Immunity can also be obtained naturally rather than by "vaccine".
You can ask your doctor for a strong Vitamin D supplement and probably buy them elswhere. The simplest is to go out in the same beautiful sunshine as we are now having in Europe.

vitamin D deficiency is common in the winter, and activated vitamin D, a steroid hormone, has profound effects on human immunity. D acts as an immune system modulator, preventing excessive expression of inflammatory cytokines and increasing the 'oxidative burst' potential of macrophages. Perhaps most importantly, it dramatically stimulates the expression of potent anti-microbial peptides, which exist in neutrophils, monocytes, natural killer cells, and in epithelial cells lining the respiratory tract where they play a major role in protecting the lung from infection.

The link.

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/02/fight-the-virus-with-sunshine/
. . . . .

For information; one group that suffered from Vitamin D deficiency was Saudi Arabian women. Their Abbayas (full head covering with no eyes visible, right down to the toes. Maybe not the correct spelling of abbaya) did not let in the sun. So .....
Even face "masks" were not very efficient at "letting the sun shine in". However, the abbayas had one advantage; that was women suffered less from trachoma, an illness that is provoked by rubbing the eyes regularly (irritated because of the sand). The eye flips inward permanently, leaving only the white of the eye showing. ie. Blindness.

Personally my doctor prescribes a 200'000 UI D dose (drinkable) to be taken twice a year in November/December and February. Which I naturally took just before the Coronavirus hit around here.

[Apr 04, 2020] Use 30 minutes at 70 C in oven with the respirator put in a paper bag over put over something wooden in the oven

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Passer by , Apr 3 2020 19:48 utc | 22

Surgical masks are pretty good at stopping bacteria and larger droplets, but not aerosols (small particles). They also have lower quality fit, just like ordinary masks too.

Surgical masks are very good for blocking you own droplet emissions.

Simply use N99 respitator or FFP 3 respirator (EU standard).
Blocks 99 % of small particles, including virus transporting ones. It is used by medical personnel who handle corona and other viruses.

Use 30 minutes at 70 C in oven with the respirator put in a paper bag over put over something wooden in the oven. This method can be used for up to 20 times with minimal damage to the respirator filtration capacity, according to several studies. Another good method is putting it in commercial steam bag used for sterilisation of baby items for 3 minutes in a microwave oven, metal presence should not be a problem according to the study because the metal gets coated by the steam. This method can be used up to 10 times with minimal loss to the quality of the respirator. It is good for surgical masks too. Also use eye protection and gloves. These simple methods are good and some hospitals started using them.

Another way is 7 to 10 days keeping the mask in dry bag with acces to air, that significantly decreases viral load for most viruses. During this time use another respirator.

For homemade masks these methods should be good too.

Methods that decrease respirator quality are spirt based solutions, bleach based solutions, and longer exposure to steam. UVGI light and Hydrogen peroxide bath are also are relatively good methods for disinfection of masks.

Importantly do not touch the respirator's main surface with your fingers, secure a good fit, and always clean hands before and after handling the respirator.

Combine respirator mask with eye protection, raincoat and gloves. Put the raincoat and any new item you bring into the home for 3 days quarantine in some special room.

Stay away from people at minimum 7 meters, especially from those who don't have masks.

Use ethanol to clean your gloves before and after you visited a store.

For disinfection purposes ethanol is good, it kills 100 % of viruses and bacteria. Ethanol is used by russian Covid 19 disinfection teams in Italy for surface disinfection.

b , Apr 3 2020 20:10 utc | 33

@Passer by

Simply use N99 respitator or FFP 3 respirator (EU standard).
Blocks 99 % of small particles, including virus transporting ones. It is used by medical personnel who handle corona and other viruses.

1. None of such mask are currently available.
2. Even for hospital staff N95 aka FFP2 is sufficient to protect against SARS-CoV-19.
3. It is already very hard to wear and breathe through a N95 mask for a longer time. N99 masks are even worse!
4. The N99 masks have exhalatation valves which let the air from the person who wears it flow out freely. That defeats the current purpose of #MaskUp which is to protect from unknown spreaders.

I have trained for chemical warfare in the military. Wearing a tight mask with a filter (FFP3) system while moving around is physically very tiring after even an hour or so. You don't select a mask that is more difficult to breathe with than actually required.

[Apr 04, 2020] The Science Says #MaskUp - A Look At Two New Virus Studies

Notable quotes:
"... Infections from asymptomatic cases have an R 0 of 0.1 or 4% of all new infections. ..."
"... More new infections are created during the three pre-symptomatic days the virus carrier runs around then during the symptomatic one. ..."
"... Washing ones hands helps but environmental infections happen only in 10% of all new infections. The pre-symptomatic carriers are, without knowing it, the biggest spreader of the disease. Millions of the many billions of viruses that get created in their throat can attach to tiny water droplets or aerosols while a person breathes, speaks or coughs. ..."
Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Dors , Apr 3 2020 19:05 utc | 10

The virus starts to replicate in significant numbers (billions per mililiter) on day 2 after the infection. The virus first replicates in the upper throat and the infected person starts to spread it to others simply by breathing, talking or coughing. Only on day 5 the infected person starts to develop first symptoms. The virus migrates into the lower lung and replicates there. The virus load in the upper throat will then start to decline. The immune system intervenes and defeats the virus but also causes additional lung damage which can kill people who have already other preexisting conditions . (Interestingly smokers seem not to develop a cytokine storms during a Covid infection and are thereby less prone to end up in the ICU.) On day 10 only few viruses will be found in the upper throat and the person will generally no longer be infectious.

The typical hospitalization point in China was only on day 9 to 12 after the onset of symptoms. At that point a test by swabs is nearly useless as the infected person will normally no longer have significant numbers of the virus in the upper throat. Reports of "defective tests from China" were likely caused by a lack of knowledge about this phenomenon. The diagnose in these later cases should be done by a CT scan which will show the lung damage.

We do know since late January that people can transmit the virus even when they have not yet developed symptoms. An open question was how many of new infections happen during this phase.

The new Science study investigated how many infections were created by each of four infection phases or types:

The study says that R 0 for pre-symptomatic infections is 0.9 or 46% of all new infections. Infections from a symptomatic persons happen with an R 0 of 0.8 which is equal to 40% of all new infections. Environmental infections have an R 0 of 0.2 or 10% of all new infections. Infections from asymptomatic cases have an R 0 of 0.1 or 4% of all new infections.

More new infections are created during the three pre-symptomatic days the virus carrier runs around then during the symptomatic one.

Washing ones hands helps but environmental infections happen only in 10% of all new infections. The pre-symptomatic carriers are, without knowing it, the biggest spreader of the disease. Millions of the many billions of viruses that get created in their throat can attach to tiny water droplets or aerosols while a person breathes, speaks or coughs.

Such spreading can be prevented when everyone wears a mask. A different new study shows that masks are very effective. Published in Nature the study is titled:

Respiratory virus shedding in exhaled breath and efficacy of face masks .

The graphic (here cut off for only corona viruses) shows how masks can keep away your droplets from the people you meet and talk to.


bigger

If the carrier of a virus wears a mask the spreading of viruses due to speaking, coughing or even breathing goes basically down to zero.

But a mask does not only protect the carrier of the viruses. While homemade or even professional surgical mask do not protect the wearer from all particles they do protect one much better from them than when one wears no mask at all.

A person rarely gets infected by just one virus particle. They come in millions attached to tiny droplets. We do not know yet how the dose of the novel coronavirus that infects a person affects the intensity of the disease. But we do know from other viruses that the dose matters. People who catch a higher dose of viruses will usually have a more intense disease. A mask can lower the virus load the wearer may receive.

One can improvise a mask from simple household objects. One can sew a mask like a surgeon does in this video . This is my preferred model which is officially recommended by German fire departments. (The pdf is in German but the pictures tell the story). This is the mask I made by following those instructions.


bigger

It is made of a folded sheet cut from a triangular arm-sling out of an old first-aid kit. A HEPA microfilter (as used in a vacuum cleaners) is in between the folded sheet. A piece cut from a clean bag for vacuum cleaners will do as well. Do not use a sheet or insert that is too tight to breathe through. If one does that the air will come in from the sides of the mask and the total protection effect will be less. It can be arduous to breathe through such a mask. If you have breathing problems leave the insert out. The sheets alone are already good protection. There is a piece of wire from a big paper clip fixed inside the middle of the upper seam to fit the mask tightly around the upper nose. The lower part goes under the chin. I shaved my beard to make it a tighter fit. As I had no sewing equipment I used a stapler to fix the seams and the ribbons.

The HEPA filter catches particles down to 0.3 micrometer. Viruses are some 125 nanometer in diameter so they are smaller and could slip through. But the viruses are attached to some droplet that are bigger. HEPA filter are essentially labyrinths of small fiber and the viruses would have to bounce multiple times to get through. Finally the dose also matters.

To clean the mask of potential viruses I put it into the oven for 30 minutes at 70C (158F).

The science says that masks work. Everyone should use one. #MaskUp!

---
Here some additional links which might be of interest.

So far, to the frustration of both the White House and the intelligence community, the agencies have been unable to glean more accurate numbers through their collection efforts.

That's because the Chinese numbers are as correct as they can get

Since none of us is an expert or eminently knowledgeable on this topic, for the sake of sharing information to develop our views here is data that suggests otherwise...

via https://twitter.com/denisrancourt/status/1246070568090288128

Emerging Infectious Diseases journal, Volume 26, Number 6—June 2020
Research Letter : Serial Interval of COVID-19 among Publicly Reported Confirmed Cases
Abstract. We estimate the distribution of serial intervals for 468 confirmed cases of 2019 novel coronavirus disease reported in China as of February 8, 2020. The mean interval was 3.96 days (95% CI 3.53–4.39 days), SD 4.75 days (95% CI 4.46–5.07 days); 12.6% of case reports indicated presymptomatic transmission .

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/6/20-0357_article

[Apr 04, 2020] The majority of viral infections come from prolonged exposures in confined spaces with other infected individuals. COVID-19 doesn't spread as easily as first thought

There was another study suggesting that many infection do not go beyond mild common cold, with a conjecture that with small initial number of viruses the organism, T-cells in the mouth and throat etc. learn to eliminate viruses in time to prevent severe lung infection. Thus gives value to masks that are not 100% effective.
You can will mark my mask for each day of the week and rely on the fact that after paper or fabric is completely dry ythe virus fdies in 72 hours.
Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Allen , Apr 3 2020 21:33 utc | 69
The World Health Organization released a study on how China responded to COVID-19. Currently, this study is one of the most exhaustive pieces published on how the virus spreads.

The results of their research show that COVID-19 doesn't spread as easily as first thought.

The majority of viral infections come from prolonged exposures in confined spaces with other infected individuals. Person-to-person and surface contact is by far the most common cause. From the WHO report, "When a cluster of several infected people occurred in China, it was most often (78-85%) caused by an infection within the family by droplets and other carriers of infection in close contact with an infected person.

Routes of transmission

COVID-19 is transmitted via droplets and fomites during close unprotected contact between an infector and infectee. Airborne spread has not been reported for COVID-19 and it is not believed to be a major driver of transmission based on available evidence; however, it can be envisaged if certain aerosol-generating procedures are conducted in health care facilities.

Household transmission

In China, human-to-human transmission of the COVID-19 virus is largely occurring in
families. The Joint Mission received detailed information from the investigation of clusters and some household transmission studies, which are ongoing in a number of Provinces. Among 344 clusters involving 1308 cases (out of a total 1836 cases reported) in Guangdong Province and Sichuan Province, most clusters (78%-85%) have occurred in families. Household transmission studies are currently underway, but preliminary studies ongoing in Guangdong estimate the secondary attack rate in households ranges from 3-10%.

Full Reprt Here:

https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/who-china-joint-mission-on-covid-19-final-report.pdf

Piotr Berman , Apr 3 2020 21:35 utc | 70

The coefficient from the simulation are selected to match observed infections and they are not "facts" but useful guidelines. The bottom line is that the infection happen in some proportion, a large part from asymptomatic people. There was another study suggesting that many infection do not go beyond mild common cold, with a conjecture that with small initial number of viruses the organism, T-cells in the mouth and throat etc. learn to eliminate viruses in time to prevent severe lung infection. Thus gives value to masks that are not 100% effective.

Surely, the actual infection rate depends on the customs in a particular area. Oriental people are not in habit of kissing, embracing, clasping hands etc., plus they are quick to wear masks. Mediterranean people, which may include Iran, embrace, clasp hands and even kiss (I assume that Muslim would greet only people of the same gender in that way). Masks are not a habit. Crowded subway, buses etc. involve a lot of very close contacts, which may be OK if EVERYONE has a decent mask.

I guess I will mark my mask for each day of the week and rely on the fact that after paper or fabric is completely dry, viruses die (cease to become viable) within hours, so one does not have to rush the drying process by special heating. On the other hand, one could try to gently dry in the cloth drier in a bag for female underwear. We do not damage viruses by heat but by the lack of moisture. Masks seems to be limited.

[Apr 04, 2020] Face Mask Disinfection Sterilization for Viruses

Apr 04, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard Steven Hack , Apr 3 2020 22:35 utc | 84

@Passer by | Apr 3 2020 19:48 utc | 22

Excellent advice. This is what I've gleaned as well from some of the articles I've posted here in earlier threads.

This article gives more detailed advice although it seems to require a fair amount of work:

Covid-19 Pandemic: Face Mask Disinfection & Sterilization for Viruses
https://tinyurl.com/qtehozu

These are the reuse recommendations I'll be following, from Dr. Peter Tsai, the inventor of the filtration fabric in the N95 mask:
N95 Re-Use Instructions (Updated as of April 3, 2020)
https://www.sages.org/n-95-re-use-instructions/

I intend to follow the advice of rotating masks - once I have masks. It's likely that four days would be sufficient to dry out any droplets or aerosols and inactivate any virus. However, longer obviously would be better.

I'm going to order some masks from China today, if I can. Also perhaps some impermeable food surface plastic gloves to deal with contact infections.

.... .... ...

[Apr 04, 2020] Here's Every Vaccine And Treatment In Development For COVID-19, So Far

Apr 04, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

As the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases continues to skyrocket, healthcare researchers around the world are working tirelessly to discover new life-saving medical innovations.

As Visual Capitalist's Nick Routley notes , the projects these companies are working on can be organized into three distinct groups:

  1. Diagnostics: Quickly and effectively detecting the disease in the first place
  2. Treatments: Alleviating symptoms so people who have disease experience milder symptoms, and lowering the overall mortality rate
  3. Vaccines: Preventing transmission by making the population immune to COVID-19

Today's graphics provide an in-depth look at who's in the innovation race to defeat the virus, and they come to us courtesy of Artis Ventures , a venture capital firm focused on life sciences and tech investments.

Editor's note: R&D is moving fast on COVID-19, and the situation is quite fluid. While today's post is believed to be an accurate snapshot of all innovations and developments listed by WHO and FDA as of March 30, 2020, it is possible that more data will become available.

Knowledge is Power

Testing rates during this pandemic have been a point of contention. Without widespread testing, it has been tough to accurately track the spread of the virus, as well as pin down important metrics such as infectiousness and mortality rates . Inexpensive test kits that offer quick results will be key to curbing the outbreak.

Here are the companies and institutions developing new tests for COVID-19:

The ultimate aim of companies like Abbott and BioFire Defense is to create a test that can produce accurate results in as little as a few minutes.

In the Trenches With Coronavirus

While the majority of people infected with COVID-19 only experience minor symptoms, the disease can cause severe issues in some cases – even resulting in death. Most of the forms of treatment being pursued fall into one of two categories:

  1. Treating respiratory symptoms – especially the inflammation that occurs in severe cases
  2. Antiviral growth – essentially stopping viruses from multiplying inside the human body

Here are the companies and institutions developing new treatment options for COVID-19:

A wide range of players are in the race to develop treatments related to COVID-19. Pharma and healthcare companies are in the mix, as well as universities and institutes.

One surprising name on the list is Fujifilm . The Japanese company's stock recently shot up on the news that Avigan, a decades-old flu drug developed through Fujifilm's healthcare subsidiary, might be effective at helping coronavirus patients recover. The Japanese government's stockpile of the drug is reportedly enough to treat two million people.

Vaccine

The progress that is perhaps being watched the closest by the general public is the development of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Creating a safe vaccine for a new illness is no easy feat. Thankfully, rapid progress is being made for a variety of reasons, including China's efforts to sequence the genetic material of Sars-CoV-2 and to share that information with research groups around the world.

Another factor contributing to the unprecedented speed of development is the fact that coronaviruses were already on the radar of health science researchers. Both SARS and MERS were caused by coronaviruses, and even though vaccines were shelved once those outbreaks were contained, learnings can still be applied to defeating COVID-19.

One of the most promising leads on a COVID-19 vaccine is mRNA-1273. This vaccine, developed by Moderna Therapeutics , is being developed with extreme urgency, skipping straight into human trials before it was even tested in animals. If all goes well with the trials currently underway in Washington State, the company hopes to have an early version of the vaccine ready by fall 2020. The earliest versions of the vaccine would be made available to at-risk groups such as healthcare workers.

Further down the pipeline are 15 types of subunit vaccines. This method of vaccination uses a fragment of a pathogen, typically a surface protein, to trigger an immune response, teaching the body's immune system how to fight off the disease without actually introducing live pathogens.

No Clear Finish Line

Unfortunately, there is no silver bullet for solving this pandemic.

A likely scenario is that teams of researchers around the world will come up with solutions that will incrementally help stop the spread of the virus, mitigate symptoms for those infected, and help lower the overall death toll. As well, early solutions rushed to market will need to be refined over the coming months.

We can only hope that the hard lessons learned from fighting COVID-19 will help stop a future outbreak in its tracks before it becomes a pandemic. For now, those of us on the sideline can only do our best to flatten the curve .

[Apr 03, 2020] The problem of distinguishing "from coronavirus deaths and "with coronavirus" deaths

Apr 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

PokeTheTruth , Apr 2 2020 19:52 utc | 61

A postmortem by a competent pathologist is the only way to confirm cause of death.

Americans must not be led like lemmings over the cliff of disease paranoia chased by an invisible bug unless there is irrefutable proof that COVID-19 and ONLY COVID-19 was the principle reason attributed to a person's demise.

Investigative journalists ( b?) must dig into the facts and interview some of the hundreds of ME's (medical examiners) who performed autopsies on these people and ask these questions:

1. Did the autopsy reveal the presence of other chronic diseases pulmonary or otherwise, that could have contributed to the death of the person (e.g., influenza, COPD, emphysema, tuberculosis, heart disease, cancers, etc.?

2. Was the deceased taking medication that suppressed the immune system such as for rheumatoid arthritis?

3. Did the autopsy reveal the presence of disease of the respiratory system due to harmful inhalants (smoking tobacco, vaping)?

4. Did the autopsy show the patient had heart or vascular problems and had surgeries to correct them such as stent implants, pace maker or other medical devices?

5. Did the deceased receive chemotherapy treatment for cancer related illness?

Unless every answer to the above questions is an affirmative 'No", the public must not believe that only COVID-19 caused the death of these people. This calls into question the number of reported COVID-19 deaths has been deliberately inflated to cause panic in America as well as around the world.

The next question is, for what other purpose are governments doing this?

David F , Apr 2 2020 20:19 utc | 67

PokeTheTruth | Apr 2 2020 19:52 utc | 61

Can you not see the il-logic in your criteria? Suppose a person has an underlying illness, that will eventually prove fatal. If I shoot that person in the head are we going to say that the cause of death was the underlying illness, or are we going to say it was the bullet to the head?

Many people live with underlying illnesses for years. The criteria that should be used is: why did that person die right now? If what killed them right now is a viral infection, then the fact that the underlying illness would have killed them eventually is meaningless, the cause of death is the viral infection.

I think that some people are adamant that they will not believe there is a deadly virus in our midst. Nothing said to them is going to make them believe this, they will keep changing their reasons for the denial. This is somewhat understandable to a point. Yes our government lies about everything, and yes they take every opportunity to enrich themselves and increase their power. My initial reaction was dismissive, I too thought it was a case of overblown hype, but as the days and weeks passed, and the facts changed, so did my opinion.

The overwhelming evidence is pointing to a serious, deadly virus in our midst, and it is time people start acting appropriately. Even the people who understandably ignored the boy who cried wolf, eventually came to the realization that there was indeed a wolf in their midst.

[Apr 03, 2020] Truth about masks: does it help? yes, every little bit is better than nothing

Apr 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

A.L. , Apr 2 2020 19:46 utc | 59

Truths about mask:

1. does it stop you from catching the bug 100%? No, including N95, P100, whatever. there's leakage and also many other infection vectors.

2. do most people know how to don, adjust and handle used masks properly? No

3. does it help? yes, every little bit is better than nothing

4. dirty little secret - for most of Asia with exception of probably Japan, people wear mask not because they are trying to protect others if they are asymptomatic carriers. They do it out of good old self preservation. it DOES, however, have the useful side effect that the end result is the same - asymptomatic carriers are also covered.

[Apr 02, 2020] Some plausible but unverified guidelines

Apr 02, 2020 | hub.jhu.edu

Statement about listerine is obviously wrong.

George Obrien 7 days ago • edited ,

Did Johns Hopkins issue the following guidelines (I don't think they did)?

1. The virus is not a living organism, but a protein molecule (DNA) covered by a protective layer of lipid (fat), which, when absorbed by the cells of the ocular, nasal or buccal mucosa, changes their genetic code. (mutation) and convert them into aggressor and multiplier cells.

2. Since the virus is not a living organism but a protein molecule, it is not killed, but decays on its own. The disintegration time depends on the temperature, humidity and type of material where it lies.

3. The virus is very fragile; the only thing that protects it is a thin outer layer of fat. That is why any soap or detergent is the best remedy, because the foam CUTS the FAT (that is why you have to rub so much: for 20 seconds or more, to make a lot of foam). By dissolving the fat layer, the protein molecule disperses and breaks down on its own.

4. HEAT melts fat; this is why it is so good to use water above 25 degrees Celsius for washing hands, clothes and everything. In addition, hot water makes more foam and that makes it even more useful.

5. Alcohol or any mixture with alcohol over 65% DISSOLVES ANY FAT, especially the external lipid layer of the virus.

6. Any mix with 1 part bleach and 5 parts water directly dissolves the protein, breaks it down from the inside.

7. Oxygenated water helps long after soap, alcohol and chlorine, because peroxide dissolves the virus protein, but you have to use it pure and it hurts your skin.

8. NO BACTERICIDE SERVES. The virus is not a living organism like bacteria; they cannot kill what is not alive with anthobiotics, but quickly disintegrate its structure with everything said.

9. NEVER shake used or unused clothing, sheets or cloth. While it is glued to a porous surface, it is very inert and disintegrates only between 3 hours (fabric and porous), 4 hours (copper, because it is naturally antiseptic; and wood, because it removes all the moisture and does not let it peel off and disintegrates). ), 24 hours (cardboard), 42 hours (metal) and 72 hours (plastic). But if you shake it or use a feather duster, the virus molecules float in the air for up to 3 hours, and can lodge in your nose.

10. The virus molecules remain very stable in external cold, or artificial as air conditioners in houses and cars. They also need moisture to stay stable, and especially darkness. Therefore, dehumidified, dry, warm and bright environments will degrade it faster.

11. UV LIGHT on any object that may contain it breaks down the virus protein. For example, to disinfect and reuse a mask is perfect. Be careful, it also breaks down collagen (which is protein) in the skin, eventually causing wrinkles and skin cancer.

12. The virus CANNOT go through healthy skin.

13. Vinegar is NOT useful because it does not break down the protective layer of fat.

14. NO SPIRITS, NOR VODKA, serve. The strongest vodka is 40% alcohol, and you need 65%.

15. LISTERINE IF IT SERVES! It is 65% alcohol.

16. The more confined the space, the more concentration of the virus there can be. The more open or naturally ventilated, the less.

17. This is super said, but you have to wash your hands before and after touching mucosa, food, locks, knobs, switches, remote control, cell phone, watches, computers, desks, TV, etc. And when using the bathroom.

18. You have to HUMIDIFY HANDS DRY from so much washing them, because the molecules can hide in the micro cracks. The thicker the moisturizer, the better.

19. Also keep your NAILS SHORT so that the virus does not hide there.

omer92 George Obrien 6 days ago ,

IMHO only 20% of the note shows some imprecise or wrongly interpreted examples (like f i Listerine) , but when 80% looks correct, we ABSOLUTELY need to find the source and disseminate it in order to help people understand and , why not, start thinking on why and how apply the recommendations AFTER having understood the logic behind the detailed and practical recommendations which do make sense but which we need to justify and assess before we carry them further as full "truth"

[Apr 02, 2020] Is it okay to take ibuprofen to treat coronavirus symptoms?

Apr 02, 2020 | wired.co.uk

On March 14, French health minister Olivier Véran made a blunt statement on Twitter – warning that people should stay away from using ibuprofen to treat coronavirus symptoms. Some patients in France had experienced adverse affects using non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs to treat the disease. The tweet has sparked rampant disinformation on WhatsApp and social media, but there is currently no strong evidence that ibuprofen can make coronavirus worse. Even so, the NHS is still advising that – until we have further evidence – people should avoid using ibuprofen to treat coronavirus symptoms and take paracetamol instead. If you can't take paracetamol, or are taking ibuprofen on the advice of a doctor, make sure you check with a doctor before you make any changes to your medication.

Updated 04.03.20, 11:05 GMT: The article has been updated to clarify that some alcohol gels are effective against norovirus.

Matt Reynolds is WIRED's science editor. He tweets from

[Apr 02, 2020] We need to look into why the most active countries that do not practice self isolation, while wearing face masks, have very lowest death rates compared to case numbers. I.e., Singapore, South Korea, Russia, Japan, etc...

Apr 02, 2020 | hub.jhu.edu

FFClementi5 hours ago • edited ,

We need to look into why the most active countries that do not practice self isolation, while wearing face masks, have very lowest death rates compared to case numbers. I.e., Singapore, South Korea, Russia, Japan, etc...

ZWaqar Kahlon FFClementi4 hours ago ,

There is difference among people born and raised in different countries with different vaccinations given at birth and afterwards. There is also difference of many local diseases very common; like malaria and others in Asian courtiers, which are almost non-existent here in USA. It gives us some directions to fight Covid-19 employing mass spectrometry and many other tools.

Richard Wightwick4 hours ago ,

I am over 70 and last year in the UK I had a vaccine for pneumonia, which I understand is of one of the stages in the desease's cycle. Might it be possible that a pneumonia vaccine would provide some kind of immunity for Covid-19?

ZWaqar Kahlon Richard Wightwick3 hours ago ,

The vaccine for pneumonia may have a limited scope compared to Covid-19 attack on immune system, but studies of the blood samples looking for anti-bodies after vaccine for pneumonia may provide us further insight. The best practice would be to try staying away from Covid-19 exposure and try to boost our immune system.

[Apr 02, 2020] People with blood type A may be more vulnerable to coronavirus, China study finds

Apr 02, 2020 | hub.jhu.edu

Alfonso Eslava2 days ago ,

I would like to share some information I happen to find coming out from Chinese Social Media South China Morning Post: "People with blood type A may be more vulnerable to coronavirus, China study finds".
A claim from scientists from Chinese study at Zhognan University Hospital in Wuhan and Shenzhen city. They screen 2000 medical record of patients infected with the SARS CAVID19 to find a higher proportion of patients belonging to the Blood group A, as well as greater proportion of them suffering from more severe disease. As we know most scientific papers from China are written in Chinese language and their scientific perspective may not be as ours, we cannot confirm that is a reflecting a true fact. Nevertheless, it wouldn't be so difficult nor expensive to have a look into the matter. If it turns out to reflect a confirmed fact, it will change our perception about the susceptibility to this germ. We already know that there is a very wide spectrum of severity of symptoms in our population and in part that might be due to factors as those mentioned above. My only recommendation is please take it easy we do not want another problem as we did with toilet paper or Chloroquine.
Be safe, keep yourself at home.

[Apr 02, 2020] FAKE: Tito vodka kills coronavirus

Apr 02, 2020 | www.distractify.com

Publications like Good Housekeeping and USA Today are printing retractions and corrections after accidentally spreading information that vodka can be used to kill the coronavirus .

Per the CDC, hand sanitizer needs to contain at least 60% alcohol. Tito's Handmade Vodka is 40% alcohol, and therefore does not meet the current recommendation of the CDC. Please see attached for more information. pic.twitter.com/plYf54HPLn

-- TitosVodka (@TitosVodka) March 4, 2020

[Apr 02, 2020] The coronavirus and hot weather

Apr 02, 2020 | hub.jhu.edu

Carlos Alejandro Pérez3 days ago

You can certainly bet on that the virus can spread in hot seasons. In these days, in Argentina, we have temperatures about 35 Celsius (almost 100 Fahrenheit), and the virus still gained momentum in such environments. The strict social isolation has been proven to be our best option so far. In economics terms, and even in social mood, it seems to be a very high price to pay. But relaxing or terminating this forced quarantine may led us to the worst case scenario.

CARLOS ALBERTO RANGEL11 hours ago ,

Here in Brazil we have high temperatures right now. And the daily contagion rate is much lower than in countries or places where the climate is much colder. I believe that the virus will not spread as well in hot climates.

jehangir khan6 hours ago ,

why is the infectivity and mortality in indian subcontinent lower?
as they are poor countries and with minimum facility to do distancing....

MSUS2005 EricD.5 days ago ,

I'm currently in mid-Florida there it has been in the upper 80's to mid 90's every day for the last several weeks. The infection is increasing here as far as in Michigan. Also, it's hotter down towards Miami and the infection levels are even higher down there. I wouldn't put any faith and hot days killing it

BenSashko MSUS20053 days ago ,

because tens of thousands of infected new-yorkers escape from NYC to Florida

tg411 Dustin Sidley8 days ago ,

"those countries are poor and have no testing" - but what about their death rate then? As of right now, the ENTIRE CONTINENT of Africa has just a few dozen deaths TOTAL..

Extreme heat/cold are known to be formidable environments to most viruses. Odds are that this one is too, but only time will tell I guess.

Nadine O'Connor Dustin Sidley7 days ago ,

Australia is not poor and absolutely does have testing!!! We have over 3000 infected (that has been identified) and 13 deaths. Do not count on weather conditions offering some form of protection.

Jake Westen Nadine O'Connor4 days ago ,

Sydney is 21C / 69F and Melbourne is 18C / 64F. That isn't hot weather. That is winter weather here in Texas.

Laszlo Lebrun Jake Westena day ago ,

Temperature isn't the only parameter, air-conditioning and the related irritation of mucous membranes are favouring coughs and sneezing and by consequence the spread of viruses.

[Apr 01, 2020] Does COVID-19 produce excessive mortality in comparison with seasonal flu epidemic?

Apr 01, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Lev Ke , Apr 1 2020 15:57 utc | 247

Here, b. The Swiss Propaganda Research did the work for you and brought us via its Dutch sister website the official mortality numbers of Holland over the past years up until 18/3/20.
It's a huge pity that I can't paste a picture here, because this graph really says it all.

It's a graph of numbers recorded by the same official source that simply collects the weekly death rates in Holland. Numbers that up until now were totally apolitical and neutral. Nobody cared.

Two years ago, due to a heavy flu season, a whopping 9,444 excess deaths were counted. The present corona mortality is nowhere near such numbers and will probably never get there.
But two years ago there was no panic, no lockdown, no nothing. Just an unfortunate heavy flu season.

Not a good enough reason to question anything? No need to get this truth out? No need for rationality and a woke population? No need for whatever MoA is meant to be?

https://www.rivm.nl/monitoring-sterftecijfers-nederland

[Apr 01, 2020] The "excess deaths" and the number of hospitalized people are two important metrics for the sizing the epidemic

Apr 01, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

BM , Apr 1 2020 11:07 utc | 206

Add to the above from the link Yerige kindly posted

The Covid-19 death toll is for abusing the deranged masses; it's the other data that's important
Posted by: Yerige | Apr 1 2020 9:44 utc | 194

As from today the daily "Covid-19" death toll will include data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) regarding deaths that occur external to hospital. Basically, anyone who dies and is not being treated in a hospital at the time, but nevertheless has "Covid-19" registered on the associated death certificate, will be counted in the official toll. Those of us who are not prone to become unhinged at the slightest nudging towards it by Government psychological manipulation will have the sense to realise that this development will not be wholly unrelated to the arrival of the Coronavirus Bill, and how it has created an environment where there is potential for a good deal of abuse in order to create the impression of copious amounts of death by "Covid-19"

...

The reason why excess death is a crucial way of getting a handle on the issue should be well understood by a FBEL reader, but to explain briefly: it has been the tendency by the medical establishment to attribute death by other causes to so-called Covid-19 (and now, if the reader examines the corporate-media reportage carefully, coronavirus)†. As such, we should expect to see no great deal of excess death (or more death than usual), but instead numbers under one column on a ledger shifted across to another headed "Covid-19".

...

Even so, when the Chief Executive says that [nine] thousand people are hospitalised, it might sound scary to the psychologically damaged masses that would be intensely following the "war reports" of the sort that Stevens was holding. However, one should consider how there are 100,000 "general and acute" beds in NHS England, and how, in the year 2018-19, the institution saw 626,000 admissions for "influenza, pneumonia". The source for this data is the House of Commons briefing paper, Number 7281, 20 February 2020, "NHS Key Statistics: England, February 2020", which is online for anyone who isn't deranged to find.

Peter AU1 , Apr 1 2020 11:25 utc | 210

BM 206

If somebody dies of pneumonia and lung biopsy turns up coronavirus then it likely coronavirus caused the death. It would be interesting though to see how officialdom does actually determine if a death outside hospital is determined but I take it that would be done by autopsy. Something the writer at your link didn't look into or mention.

[Apr 01, 2020] In Italy over 6K doctors and nurses were infected

Apr 01, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Apr 1 2020 12:27 utc | 215

Yandex translation.

"the Day after the day lengthens the list of doctors who died on the field for Covid-19. And the total up to 51.
Are 6.414 health care workers infected."
https://www.repubblica.it/cronaca/2020/03/27/news/coronavirus_situazione_italia-252433461/?ref=RHPPTP-BH-I252331136-C12-P2-S4.4-T1

[Apr 01, 2020] The Epidemiological Characteristics of an Outbreak of 2019 Novel Coronavirus Diseases (COVID-19) -- China, 2020

Apr 01, 2020 | weekly.chinacdc.cn

The early days of the outbreak have been reminiscent of SARS and MERS, and indeed, the discovery that the causative agent was a closely-related, never-before-described coronavirus predicted potential for nosocomial transmission and so-called "super-spreader" events ( 8 ). Unfortunately, 2019-nCoV did indeed infect health workers in China via nosocomial transmission. Here we offer a first description of the 1,716 confirmed cases among health workers.

Overall, they also display a likely mixed outbreak pattern -- perhaps the data are characterized by a point source curve beginning in late December 2019, which was eclipsed by a higher magnitude continuous source curve beginning on January 20, 2020. To date, there is no evidence of a super-spreader event occurring in any of the Chinese health facilities serving COVID-19 patients. However, we do not know whether this is due to the nature of the virus itself or whether these events have been successfully prevented.

[Apr 01, 2020] Family infections are the most dangerious one

Apr 01, 2020 | www.unz.com

AnonFromBeijing , says: Show Comment March 30, 2020 at 8:20 am GMT

You misunderstood something about Chinese measures to fight this virus.
We did not just simply lock down cities and everybody stay home to wait for the good ending.
It's far from enough.
We check check and check.
Find out those infected, took them into hospitals. Find them as much as we can. DO NOT leave them goof around/stay home to infect the whole family.
Find out those who are close to the infected, took them into isolation to observe if they will catch the virus. Find them as much as we can.
Track those who were close to the infected, check out the asymptomatic one who is out of the radar and secretly give the virus to the infected. Isolate this asymptomatic person who may continue to spread the virus to others. Yes, you need to find out who infected whom, and how. You need to build the detective teams on infection. You find them out, learn from it, publish it, avoid it.
It's a mission impossible, but still, you do it, with enough endeavor, it's mission possible.
check, check, check track, track, track isolate, isolate, isolate
In the same time, you do all you capacity to guarantee the medic, the logistic, the supply, it's a whole system. Not simply lock down, not just stay at home.

China has more than 70% family cases because social cases are effectively avoided by lock down and stay at home, while those family cases at early stage in Wuhan especially can not be avoided since we don't have this system at the time. Things happened in Wuhan too fast!
You need to react fast! You need to do lot of things at the same time. You need to find them, all of them, really fast. Take them into hospital, into isolation, into observation, under your radar.

Lock down and stay at home works! But that's not all about it. That's just a start of it.
There are cases that people go out for grocery, without masks, get infected by another buyer, within seconds!

If you guys don't wear mask, don't follow stay at home and social distance strictly, whatever your government doing is in waste.
But if your government don't respond fast and find out all of them for treatment and isolations, still the same: this virus thing will just goes on and on and on and on and on

At the end of the day, you may reach herd immunity (if this virus is that friendly: once cured, never infected again, we are not sure about that since somebody already has two strains of this virus in the body at the same time, which suggest something quite different)
In that case, there will be herd immunity gap between you strong survival guys who passed the virus test and we the untested weaker ones who avoided the test by all means.

Who knows, you might win by lost the burden of the old the sick the weak the poor the idiot.
We may also win by guard our value and our people as an unity.
Win-Win

As for fundamental changes of life style and governing method. We didn't think much about it before as we sincerely believed this would be a short term thing. We believed in ourselves and expected everything back to normal in Apr. until you guys join this virus thing.

Now everything changed. Things become really complicated.

[Apr 01, 2020] Youtube to the rescue: DIY masks

The US government incompetence as for mask stockpiling is just staggering. Will go into textbooks about bureaucratic incompetence.
For a country with a trillion dollar military budget to have shorages of mask is really amazing feat.
See for example: DIY Fabric Tie Face Mask with Jenny Doan of Missouri or How to Sew a Face Mask with Filter Pocket or How To Make DIY Face Masks To Donate To Healthcare Workers, or HOW TO SEW A MEDICAL FACE
Apr 01, 2020 | www.unz.com

Republic , says: Show Comment March 31, 2020 at 5:56 pm GMT

@AKAHorace Many Youtube videos address this issue regarding the making of masks

[Apr 01, 2020] FFP2 and N95 masks must be recycled for the moment

Apr 01, 2020 | www.unz.com

Furthermore, I tried to communicate the importance of recycling FFP2 masks, without any success. It is a matter of life and death. These masks are considered for single use and staffs throw them away too quickly. This is not the place to be technical, but I have proposed four methods to recycle them and they must be implemented according to the sterilization equipment available in hospitals, information that I have still not been able to obtain. We must educate medical staff on how to extend the life of these masks and recycle them, today, the urgency is immense.

The army, firefighters and probably the police have gas masks, which should not be left in the barracks, they are even more effective than the FFP2. We do not care if it looks crazy to see doctors with gas masks, I prefer to see them stay alive and able to care for patients, and also it would prevent them from becoming vectors of spread themselves. How many gas masks, which are cleanable and reusable, are available?

FFP2 masks for the population, a simple solution for returning to work.

To finish with the masks, let us understand that what will get us out of confinement, lockdown, and will allow the population to resume almost normal work, is the massive production of FFP2 masks for the entire population, small (children) and adults (adults). The faster the necessary production tools are put in place, the faster Belgium can get back to work, it's really that simple.

During the minimum 4 weeks of lockdown, massive screening is needed, and the establishment of the task force is a step in the right direction. We cannot lift the lockdown until our ability to track down infected individuals has been greatly increased.

At Vo'Euganeo in Italy, all the confined residents (3,300) were tested a month ago. Result: out of 89 positive cases, there are only handful contaminations, reports La Voix du Nord. The approach I propose works when you can combine lockdown and massive screening.

Chinaman , says: Show Comment March 31, 2020 at 8:42 am GMT

It was true yesterday, it is true today, it is enough to see how Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore handled the crisis from the start, and how China and South Korea recovered.

CountLess life could have been saved if white people just didn't have an illogical aversion to masks.

Everyone wear masks in asia. Ironically, It is not the Chinese who is spreading it In Asia. The people who are spreading the disease where I live are the white people returning from overseas and refuse to wear masks. They should go back to wherever they come from.

these people should be physically assaulted for NOT wearing a mask in Asia like Asians are assaulted in the West for wearing one.

[Mar 31, 2020] Hospitals Firing Doctors Who Talk To The Press

Notable quotes:
"... Ming Lin, an emergency room physician in Washington state, lost his job last week after he spoke to a local media outlet about the lack of protective gear for staff at Puget Sound area hospitals. ..."
Mar 31, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

US Health care systems have warned emergency room doctors and nurses that if they speak out about working conditions inside a hospital, they will be fired, reported Bloomberg .

Ming Lin, an emergency room physician in Washington state, lost his job last week after he spoke to a local media outlet about the lack of protective gear for staff at Puget Sound area hospitals.

Hospital staff at the NYU Langone Health system were recently warned that if they spoke to the media without authorization, they would be terminated.

"Hospitals are muzzling nurses and other health-care workers in an attempt to preserve their image," said Ruth Schubert, a spokeswoman for the Washington State Nurses Association. "It is outrageous."

With confirmed virus cases over 163,000 and 3,170 deaths , hospital systems across the country are seeing a massive influx of patients that is straining the system.

Doctors and nurses "must have the ability to tell the public what is really going on inside the facilities where they are caring for Covid-19 patients," Schubert said.

As we noted in January, a hospital doctor in Wuhan, China, the epicenter of COVID-19, tried to inform the world about a fast-spreading disease. However, he was quickly silenced by the Chinese government, and since, more than 800,000 people around the globe have been infected, with 39,000 deaths.

One reason that nurses and doctors must be informative about evolving conditions inside hospitals is that public donations of medical equipment or gear could help out a local facility.

"It is good and appropriate for health-care workers to be able to express their own fears and concerns, especially when expressing that might get them better protection," said Glenn Cohen, faculty director of Harvard Law School's bioethics center. Hospitals are likely trying to limit reputational damage because "when health-care workers say they are not being protected, the public gets very upset at the hospital system."

NYU Langone Health employees received notification last week that if they spoke with media, they would be "subject to disciplinary action, including termination."

New York's Montefiore Health System requires doctors and nurses to get permission from superiors before speaking to the media.

"Associates are not authorized to interact with reporters or speak on behalf of the institution in any capacity, without pre-approval," according to the policy, which was seen by Bloomberg News.

Lauri Mazurkiewicz, a Chicago nurse at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, was fired after she told the hospital staff to wear more protective equipment:

"A lot of hospitals are lying to their workers and saying that simple masks are sufficient and nurses are getting sick and they are dying," Mazurkiewicz said.

Doctors and nurses have also tweeted their frustrations with hospital systems – this has also led to some systems tightening the noose on what employees can and cannot say on social media:

My babies are too young to read this now. And they'd barely recognize me in my gear. But if they lose me to COVID I want them to know Mommy tried really hard to do her job. #GetMePPE #NYC pic.twitter.com/OMew5G7mjK

-- Cornelia Griggs (@CorneliaLG) March 29, 2020

Nisha Mehta, a radiologist from Charlotte, North Carolina, runs several Facebook groups for physicians. She says members in her groups have reached out to her and want their stories told about working conditions:

"I'm hearing widespread stories from physicians across the country and they are all saying: 'We have these stories that we think are important to get out, but we are being told by our hospital systems that we are not allowed to speak to the press, and if we do so there will be extreme consequences," Mehta said.

America's hospital system could be cracking , like what happened in China and Italy. If everything were fine, doctors and nurses wouldn't be flooding media outlets and social media platforms, warning the public about hospital conditions and or about how deadly the virus is.

[Mar 30, 2020] If you get COVID-19 infection in the shop, office or transport, you probably will be sick two weeks, but if you get if from your wife - probably four, and mother-in-law -- six

Highly recommended!
Jokes aside, infection on family settings might lead to more severe outcomes, as virus load is higher.
Mar 30, 2020 | time.com

In this sense, COVID-19 behaves a lot like seasonal flu. Common rooms often mean common pathogens and higher dose of virus then from strangers. There are some indications that the doze of virus that you get affects the severity of the disease.

Families are great places for socialization and provide a means to stay active and engaged, but can serve as pathogenic petri dishes

Based on current research, it takes about 2 weeks between the onset of symptoms to the clinical recovery of patients with a mild form of the disease

[Mar 30, 2020] Austria mandates face masks for shoppers by Latika Bourke

Mar 30, 2020 | smh.com.au

Austria says anyone shopping will have to wear face masks, bringing it in line with the neighbouring Czech Republic which, on March 18, ordered face masks be worn in public.

Masks will be supplied to supermarket retail chains which will distribute them to shoppers as they enter stores.

The government cautioned that the masks do not protect wearers but are meant to prevent them from spreading infectious cough droplets.

[Mar 30, 2020] Medical workers do need help

Mar 30, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Circe , Mar 29 2020 20:03 utc | 46

So there are a lot of wacky theories out there. Here's mine and warning: I'm pissed at what I'm witnessing.

1. The way health industry workers including maintenance support personnel are carrying the load on the front lines of this pandemic is UNSUSTAINABLE and inhumane both for staff and patients. This story must be EXPOSED in every global hot spot.

2. This pandemic is a WAR, so let's attack it and behave like we are in the midst of a World War.

3. All gloved hands must be on deck for this. Healthcare workers should not be burdened and risking everything in the manner that we are starting to become aware of now in the West. Why should they be subjected to such stress and burden and all the risk while millions of ABLE-BODIED PEOPLE languish at home collecting a check for doing nothing. Where is the government on balancing this chaotic, unjust situation?

4. There are many, many service jobs associated with healthcare and needs brought out by this pandemic that don't involve close contact. The need is great.

5. Governments think the military can help in this crisis? Use it! Better to use them for healing than killing.

6. Need more help? Then recruit college and university students without underlying health conditions between the ages of 17 to 35. Hell, recruit from all healthy, able people under 50 collecting UI.

7. No one should be languishing at home collecting free money while everyone working in the healthcare service industry, and senior residences suffer 24/7 with crazy shifts getting sick!

I know what I'm bitching about. Both my parents were afflicted with cancer a few years apart. I practically lived my life in the hospital and witnessed need wherever I turned in normal times and helped in whatever way I could through the entire ordeal. There is an aging population crisis happening around us and everyone's acting like this is la-la land and who cares!

8. This pandemic is emphasizing deficiencies everywhere in the system, especially moral deficiencies.

9. This pandemic is war, and many are needed on deck to end it! If able bodies want a free ride, to collect a check and languish while others suffer...damn it...draft them or cut off the funds!

10. It's time to go above and beyond the clapping, already! Everyone should be shouldering the need wherever they can.

It's time to organize and share in the work and responsibility involved.

[Mar 30, 2020] Molecular test labs do not grow on trees nor are they conductive to mass large scale testing

Mar 30, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

dltravers , Mar 29 2020 20:20 utc | 48

Molecular test labs do not grow on trees nor are they conductive to mass large scale testing...

Why It Takes So Long To Get Most COVID-19 Test Results

[Mar 29, 2020] Medical Expert Who Corrects Trump Is Now a Target of the Far Right

Money quote " There is this sense that experts are untrustworthy, and have agendas that aren't aligned with the people"
That was always true about neoliberal economists. So it might well be true about mecuacl bureaucrats like Fauci. Did he disclose his stock holdingd and financial interests? Is he a part of neoliberal "medical-industrial complex" which wants to rake profits at the expense of people health?
His email to Hillary suggest that he is medical professional but a politician.
Actually any top medical honcho in Washing is compromised as they did nothing to stop "balance billing" fraud and too over of ambulance business by private equity sharks.
Notable quotes:
"... There is this sense that experts are untrustworthy, and have agendas that aren't aligned with the people ..."
"... In the email, Dr. Fauci praised Mrs. Clinton for her stamina during the 2013 Benghazi hearings. The American Thinker falsely claimed that the email was evidence that he was part of a secret group who opposed Mr. Trump. ..."
Mar 29, 2020 | www.nytimes.com

Adding that Dr. Fauci is bearing the brunt of the attacks, Mr. Bergstrom said: " There is this sense that experts are untrustworthy, and have agendas that aren't aligned with the people . It's very concerning because the experts in this are being discounted out of hand."

... ... ...

Anti-Fauci posts spiked, according to Zignal Labs. Much of the increase was prompted by a March 21 article in The American Thinker, a conservative blog, which published the seven-year-old email that Dr. Fauci had written to an aide of Mrs. Clinton.

In the email, Dr. Fauci praised Mrs. Clinton for her stamina during the 2013 Benghazi hearings. The American Thinker falsely claimed that the email was evidence that he was part of a secret group who opposed Mr. Trump.

... ... ...

In an interview, Mr. Fitton said, "Dr. Fauci is doing a great job." He added that Dr. Fauci "wrote very political statements to Hillary Clinton that were odd for an appointee of his nature to send."

...One anti-Fauci tweet last Sunday read: "Dr. Fauci is in love w/ crooked @HillaryClinton. More reasons not to trust him."

[Mar 28, 2020] Meet The 'Covidiot' A Dense Creature That Ignores Simple Instructions, Endangers Others

Mar 24, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
...On Saturday, a new term caught the internet by storm, that is, 'Covidiot' – and first defined on Urban Dictionary , with the top definition:

"Someone who ignores the warnings regarding public health or safety. A person who hoards goods, denying them from their neighbors."

[Mar 28, 2020] What I have found when yesterday I ventured into Wal-Mart to shop with the other deplorable people that the elite child molesters, sexual perverts, and sociopaths out in Hollyweird, NYC and Washington like to look down on

Notable quotes:
"... Speaking of "suited and booted", shouldn't these people be wearing one of those full body suits and booties over their shoes as well? ..."
Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

Trinity , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 3:13 pm GMT

Yesterday I ventured into Wal-Mart to shop with the other local deplorable people that the elite child molesters, sexual perverts, and sociopaths out in Hollyweird, NYC and Washington like to look down on.

Wasn't that crowded and I probably noticed about 10 customers "suited and booted" wearing various masks of different shapes and styles and latex gloves.

Speaking of "suited and booted", shouldn't these people be wearing one of those full body suits and booties over their shoes as well?

[Mar 28, 2020] Looks like in Italy Coronavirus mostly speed up the demise of already severely sick and very old persons.

Mar 28, 2020 | www.unz.com

Brabantian , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 4:31 pm GMT

Extensive details from medical professionals, on just what an exaggerated scam this coronavirus Covid-19 panic is

In reality, what we have is a somewhat worse flu season 99% affecting the elderly and chronically ill, e.g., a young person dying turned out to have hidden leukemia

'A Swiss Doctor on Covid-19'
published by Swiss Propaganda Research
https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/
also here
https://www.globalresearch.ca/swiss-doctor-covid-19/5707642
(Much material is below the original article and footnotes, in the daily updates toward the bottom)

[Hide MORE]

Most major media falsely report that Italy has up to 800 deaths per day from the coronavirus. In reality, the president of the Italian Civil Protection Service stresses that these are deaths WITH the coronavirus and not FROM the coronavirus. In other words, these persons died while also testing positive [not nececessarily causal]

Between those who died *from* the coronavirus and those who died *with* the coronavirus, it is not clear whether the person died from the pre-existing chronic diseases

Renowned Italian virologist Giulio Tarro argues that the mortality rate of Covid19 is below 1% even in Italy and is therefore comparable to influenza. The higher values only arise because no distinction is made between deaths with and by Covid19 and because the number of (symptom-free) infected persons is greatly underestimated.

Stanford Professor John Ioannidis showed that the age-corrected lethality of Covid19 is between 0.025% and 0.625%, i.e. in the range of a strong cold or the flu

A Japanese study showed that of all the test-positive cruise passengers, and despite high average age, 48% remained completely symptom-free; even among the 80-89 year olds 48% remained symptom-free, while among 70 to 79 year olds it was an astounding 60% that developed no symptoms at all.

The Italian example has shown that 99% of test-positive deaths had one or more pre-existing conditions, and even among these, only 12% of the death certificates mentioned Covid19 as a causal factor.

Average age of the positively-tested deceased in Italy is currently about 81 years. 10% of the deceased are over 90 years old. 90% of the deceased are over 70 years old.

80% of the deceased had suffered from two or more chronic diseases. 50% of the deceased had suffered from three or more chronic diseases.

Less than 1% of deceased were healthy persons

Northern Italy has one of the oldest populations and the worst air quality in Europe, which had already led to an increased number of respiratory diseases and deaths in the past

Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera points out that Italian intensive care units already collapsed under the marked flu wave in 2017/2018.

Argentinean virologist and biochemist Pablo Goldschmidt explains that Covid19 is no more dangerous than a bad cold or the flu.

Dr. Goldschmidt speaks of a „global terror" created by the media and politics. Every year, he says, three million newborns worldwide and 50,000 adults in the US alone die of pneumonia.

German Professor Karin Moelling, former Chair of Medical Virology at the University of Zurich, stated in an interview that Covid19 is „no killer virus" and that „panic must end".

Countries like South Korea and Japan that introduced no lockdown measures have experienced near-zero excess mortality in connection with Covid-19

Swiss deaths so far were also high-risk patients with chronic diseases, an average age of more than 80 years and a maximum age of 97 years

According to all current data, for the healthy general population of school and working age, a mild to moderate course of Covid-19 can be expected.

Official data on deaths from pneumonia in the US. There are usually between 3000 and 5500 deaths per week and thus significantly more than the current figures for Covid19

[Mar 28, 2020] It has been suggested that a profitable class of antihypertensives (ACE inhibitors) is linked with worse COVID19 outcomes.

Mar 28, 2020 | www.unz.com

gfhÄndel , says: Show Comment March 26, 2020 at 7:27 pm GMT

To clarify: chloroquine and like agents are antimalarials which also have immunosuppressive properties. They are used in COVID19 to dampen the acute respiratory distress syndrome [ARDS], the pathologic exaggerated immune response which is the cause of most COVID19 fatalities.
It is not without significant side effects (eg retinopathy).
Nevertheless, any suspicions about big pharma's motives in this context are warranted.
It has been suggested that a profitable class of antihypertensives (ACE inhibitors) is linked with worse COVID19 outcomes.

[Mar 28, 2020] Beware padding unproven advertising of Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquione as cures for COVID-19 from Esxobar and similar unqualified folk

Mar 28, 2020 | www.unz.com

KA , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 3:03 pm GMT

Hydroxyxhloroquine is antimalarial,works on the DNA , and accumulates in white blood cells . Corona virus is RNA. Possible other mechanism includes suppression of T lymphocytes , decreased white blood cell migration to the injured area ,stabilization of lysosomal enzymes which means the enzymes that can attack pathogen and also human normal cells are being prevented from release from inside the immune cells and suppression of DNA and RNA synthesis.

I am not aware that has ever been to be effective against any virus in the past. It doesn't work on the Angiotensin receptor or signal transduction down stream .

Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquione are used for Rheumatoid arthritis but they don't alter the bone damages They are not very effective DMARDs ( disease modifying anti rheumatic drugs ) .It is also used against Graft versus Host rejection . Not effective enough.

Any antiviral medicine has to work on one of these sites or on combination of these sites- attachment of virus to cells, f penetration ( nucleus) , uncoating, protien synthesis , nucleic acid synthesis, packaging , and assembly of new virus , then the last part -viral release from cell to attack new cells. Hydroxychloroquine is not known to attack any of these processes .

Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquine are known to work differently in rheumatoid and graft vs host disease or in some patients with SLE.

I am not sure if these 2 can be considered as an orphan drug and approved by FDA

I am not sure how French jumped to the idea that this medication would work ( usually a possible mechanism of action or anecdotal data have to be furnished before trying or have two have animal data )

So let's not celebrate French microbiologist or IHU and jump to some theories on the behaviors of French ministers or pharmaceuticals.

JT , says: Website Show Comment March 26, 2020 at 10:55 pm GMT
Since March 17th the pin on my twitter profile promotes the preventive use of chloroquine to treat the Novel Coronovirus. I've been following the debate about this anti-malarial (polio and yellow fever) drug closely. I like Escobar's article, but there are several problems with it, that even I, as a proponent of chloroquine cannot ignore.

First, the claim that Agnes Buzyn (mispelled twice in the article as "Buzy"), classified the drug as a poison, thus requiring prescription.

this is false. Chloroquine, in its market French form known as Nivaquine, was never over the counter. Never. In fact very few Western countries ever sold it over the counter. In most US states, it was prescription based. It is lethal when used inappropriately.

Second, with all due respect to Dr. Raoult, he is absolutely wrong about viral load in terminal stages of Covid-19. Corona virus is anything but low or nearly absent. In fact, its viral load is extremely high and a good measure of patient outcome at admission, and no amount of antiviral treatment can reduce it on its own at this point. Raoult was either trying to say that corona is not the cause of mortality, which is technically true, or like 99% of doctors fighting Corona, has no grasp of what the virus actually does.

The gist of the Escobar article is problematic. Nothing concrete about how Sanofi or Big Pharma is planning on cashing in by delaying chloroquine production. Last week Sanofi donated 300,000 "dosses" of chloroquine to the United States. The drug has been around for 60 years and is listed by the WHO as a required drug in all medical systems with required possibilities of local production. The criteria of which are known only to experts.

As for the theory that chloroquine supplies have been pilfered my French sources told me supplies had been seized. Macron may be pursuing a policy of herd immunity, but doesn't have the political luxury of being public about it, and a little less literalism is a helpful corrective for wild speculation. Herd immunity strategies cannot be pursued openly, being political (reelection) liabilities.

Far far more important to the coronovirus debate is how one is supposed to cure with vaccines, if the jury is still out on acquired immunity. One cannot work without the other, suggesting that the MSM acceptance of possible vaccine treatment ipso facto means acquired immunity is a given, but that's not the way the MSM and governments are presenting this, suggesting that either vaccines cannot possibly work, or that immunity is being aquired as we speak, while the facade of a fight is kept up.

utu , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 4:24 am GMT
@The Obscurantist Coronavirus : Agnès Buzyn a-t-elle interdit la vente libre de chloroquine en pleine épidémie
https://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2020/03/25/agnes-buzyn-a-t-elle-interdit-la-vente-libre-de-chloroquine-en-pleine-epidemie-de-covid-19_6034372_4355770.html

Since this decree, the hydroxychloroquine molecule marketed under the name of Plaquenil is therefore no longer available over the counter. A prescription from a doctor is now mandatory. But this new classification, which came into effect in January, contrary to what some conspiratorial publications suggest, predates the appearance of the new coronavirus. Its cousin, chloroquine, appears on this list "in injectable and oral form", since a decree taken in 1999.

As LCI explains, the National Health Security Agency (ANSES) had been asked for an opinion on a proposal for an order to include hydroxychloroquine in List II of poisonous substances in October 2019, "in order to ensure appropriate patient care ". Two months before the appearance of the new coronavirus in China.
ANSES had given the green light on November 12, 2019. It is therefore false and dishonest to claim that the former Minister of Health, Ms. Buzyn, would have made this decision herself during the Covid-19 epidemic.

CCZ , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 2:37 pm GMT
@onebornfree The Quinism Foundation is a nonprofit charitable organization established to support education and research on chronic quinoline encephalopathy and other medical conditions caused by poisoning, or intoxication, by mefloquine, tafenoquine, chloroquine, and related quinoline drugs.

Executive Director Dr. Remington Dr. Nevin noted his concern that members of the public may even attempt to obtain therapeutic quantities of quinine through questionable channels. "Tonic water, whose bitter taste is produced by the addition of quinine or related naturally-occurring quinolines, is limited by U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulations to 83 mg per liter of quinine and related cinchona alkaloids," said Dr. Nevin. "However, drinking several bottles of tonic water will result in consuming pharmaceutical quantities, and therefore potentially harmful, amounts of these drugs", said Dr. Nevin. "Tonic water is a prescription medication masquerading as a cocktail mixer."

oneworld , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 11:44 am GMT
A single, non-randomized observational trial is close to the bottom of the list in terms of meaningful medical research, down there with anecdotal reports, particularly in a novel viral disease with highly variable clinical manifestations and outcomes.

There are also significant potential cardiac risks caused by the Q-T lengthening on one's EKG caused by both azithromycin and chloroquine. Don't grasp at straws.

Turk 152 , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 9:05 pm GMT
@KA You seem quite a knowledge so I hope to obtain your insights, I am not medical.

I heard that the likelihood of ARDS (cytokine storm?) can be detected by a Serum Ferritin test. If it levels are high, the patient should be given Anakinra, the rheumatoid arthritis medication, which will prevent ARDS. Neither the test, nor the treatment are being given because the average Doc who does not specialize in this field, does not know to test for this.

I understand that Hydroxychloroquin will reduce virulent symptoms in high risk patients but should be given cautiously.

Toubib Thawr , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 10:06 pm GMT
KA,
I am commenting here first time but have been reading the site for years.
I have two decades of biotech research experience.
I just finished a literature survey about effects of these active pharmaceutical ingredients or APIs (chloroquine, hydroxychloroquine, hydroxychloroquine phosphate).
The APIs have been in human application for very long time and their side effect profile might be broad but it is not widespread. The most serious problems arise from eventual eye degenerative effects but those are very-very rare.
These APIs do act on several steps of what you mentioned, starting with receptor binding interference (ACE2 glycosylation changes), viral entry (impairment of endosome formation), then viral DNA offloading (interference with virus-containing endosomes fusing with lysosomes), through viral "work" (impairment of protein synthesis and virion assembly through stopping of Golgi- and endoplasmatic reticular budding and traffic).
The most interesting part of their actions might however be the inhibition of the viral RNA-dependent RNA polymerase enzyme. This is done through increasing Zn++ concentration in the cytoplasm because all of these APIs are ionophores and bring Zn++ ions into the cytosol through the lipid membrane. High Zn++ "levels" inside the cell block the "xerox machine"of the viral RNA. So indeed these have at least theoretical effects and in vitro proof is abundant.

On the contrary, if one looks at the now not too worthwile treatment compilation from Alipay and Zhezhiang University the use of different antiviral drugs is quite dangerous to the liver. Many patients on anti-retrovirals developed liver problems. I think the Shanghai Protocol is much more adequate but to each his own.

With regards to the origins of the virus someone earlier wrote about haplotypes. There are 58 haplotypes (called as such in peer-reviewed publications) and 5 haplogroups of the virus in two clades (L and S). According to a non peer-reviewed publication at ChinaXiv, 5 haplogroups have only been reported from the US so far. Mainland Chinese enjoyed the society of only 4 haplogroups while the fifth could be found in Taiwan.

Felix Keverich , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 10:44 pm GMT
For your information, Russia will now be using chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine for treatment of COVID-19 in moderate to severe cases.

https://static-3.rosminzdrav.ru/system/attachments/attaches/000/049/877/original/COVID19

[Mar 28, 2020] Handbook on COVI-19 treatment put out by Chinese doctors.

Mar 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Mar 27 2020 21:35 utc | 47

Handbook put out by Chinese doctors.
alibabacloud.com/universal-service/pdf_reader

[Mar 28, 2020] Awareness of the risk of chloroquine phosphate causing acute poisoning or even death should be strengthened

Mar 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Likklemore , Mar 27 2020 21:18 utc | 44

@ mpn 8

Here is one published Abstract, specific to COVID-19 warns of the toxicity.

Department of Forensic Medicine, Tongji Medical College, Huanzhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China. LINK

The Trial of Chloroquine in the Treatment of Corona Virus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) and Its Research Progress in Forensic Toxicology.

[.]Since December 2019, COVID-19 (corona virus disease 2019) outbreaks caused by SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) has occurred in China and many countries around the world. Due to the lack of drugs against COVID-19, the disease spreads rapidly and the mortality rate is relatively high. Therefore, specific drugs against SARS-CoV-2 need to be quickly screened. The antimalarial drug Chloroquine phosphate which has already been approved is confirmed to have an anti-SARS-CoV-2 effect and has been included in diagnostic and therapeutic guidelines. However, awareness of the risk of chloroquine phosphate causing acute poisoning or even death should be strengthened. The dosage used according to current clinical recommended dosage and course of treatment are larger than that of previous treatment of malaria. Many provinces have required close clinical monitoring of adverse reactions. This paper reviews the pharmacological effects, poisoning;[.]

Peter AU1 , Mar 27 2020 22:02 utc | 53

This is the antiviral treatment recommended in the hand I linked above.
Antiviral Treatment
At FAHZU, lopinavir/ritonavir (2 capsules, po q12h) combined with arbidol (200 mg po q12h) were applied as the basic regimen. From the treatment experience of 49 patients in our hospital, the average time to achieve negative viral nucleic acid test for the first time was 12 days (95% CI: 8-15 days). The duration of negative nucleic acid test result (negative for more than 2 times consecutively with interval ≥ 24h) was 13.5 days (95% CI: 9.5 - 17.5 days).If the basic regimen is not effective, chloroquine phosphate can be used on adults between 18-65 years old (weight ≥ 50 kg: 500 mg bid; weight ≤50 kg: 500 mg bid for first two days, 500 mg qd for following five days).Interferon nebulization is recommended in Protocols for Diagnosis and Treatment of COVID-19. We recommend that it should be performed in negative-pressure wards rather than general wards due to the possibility of aerosol transmission.Darunavir/cobicistat has some degree of antiviral activity in viral suppression test in vitro, based on the treatment experience of AIDS patients, and the adverse events are relatively mild. For patients who are intolerant to lopinavir/ritonavir, darunavir/ cobici-stat (1 tablet qd) or favipiravir (starting dose of 1600 mg followed by 600 mg tid) is an alternative option after the ethical review. Simultaneous use of three or more antiviral drugs is not recommended.

Course of Treatment
The treatment course of chloroquine phosphate should be no more than 7 days. The treatment course of other regimens has not been determined and are usually around 2 weeks. Antiviral drugs should be stopped if nucleic acid test results from sputum specimens remain negative for more than 3 times

[Mar 28, 2020] Neoliberalism and medicine

Mar 28, 2020 | www.unz.com

JackOH , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 12:06 pm GMT

Pepe, thanks.

As I've seen it, America's medical establishment enjoys extraordinary powers of initiative and veto in its engagement with the public, and much of that originates in the asymmetric doctor-patient relationship, the bad consequences of which were noticed by Hippocrates 2500 years ago when he tried calling physicians to their better instincts with his oath.

Good health is indeed a very important factor in Big Medicine's public engagement. So, too, revenues and profits, autonomy of practice, fee for service, overwhelming influence and downright control of the distribution of medicine for its own purposes, etc. Will elements of Big Medicine sacrifice good health for those other factors?

Yes. But you have to look at discrete instances to see how Big Medicine's players are tempted to go outright criminal. See, for example, the oxycodone killings.

I can't speak to the specifics of your article, Pepe, but it sure as hell meets some minimum threshold of plausibility to warrant further investigation in my opinion. Thanks again.

[Mar 28, 2020] The best book on big pharma criminality

Mar 28, 2020 | www.unz.com

tomo , says: Show Comment March 27, 2020 at 12:44 pm GMT

@Mustapha Mond this is the best book on big pharma criminality I have ever seen (written by an English doctor who writes for the Guardian )
You will not believe what's 'legal' for them to do in their 'research'
It's beyond criminal – but they obviously got their politicians/friends to change laws to allow what they are doing to proceed – it's really almost unbelievable
and it seems to be even worse in Europe than in the US (another thing I initially found hard to believe)

https://read.amazon.com/kp/card?preview=inline&linkCode=kpd&ref_=k4w_oembed_h8hKOfsbUkiUQn&asin=B008RLTUUA&tag=kpembed-20

[Mar 27, 2020] Not Just China U.S. Reliance on Foreign Medical Supplies is Staggering by Alan Tonelson

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Put together, they reveal how big a share of the American markets for drugs, medical devices, and protective gear is controlled by goods made overseas. The big takeaway is that the nation could be in big enough trouble if supply disruptions were to occur in normal times (say, due to natural disasters in manufacturing centers abroad). During a high-mortality pandemic like the CCP Virus, these levels of foreign dependency are high enough to guarantee significant numbers of needless deaths. ..."
"... And in fact, the import penetration trends for these products exemplify the nation's health care security weaknesses. In 2002 -- a good baseline, since that's the first year China was a member of the World Trade Organization -- imports overall accounted for 16.7 percent of all surgical appliances and supplies used in the United States (measured by value, not numbers of masks or pairs of gloves). During the first full year of the Great Recession, 2008, this share totaled 28.08 percent. ..."
"... Keeping this qualification in mind, overall, 32.41 percent of surgical appliances and supplies were imported from other countries by 2011, according to these figures. In 2016, that number reached 41.81 percent of a $33.71 billion U.S. market. It may well be higher these days, as between then and last year, U.S. overseas purchases jumped by more than 29 percent. (Interestingly, in light of domestic shortages, U.S. exports in appliances and supplies actually rose by more than 13 percent during this period!) ..."
"... Ventilators, sadly, have been in the news, too; they and related products like oxygen tents and bronchoscopes and inhalators and suction equipment are found in a big goods category called surgical and medical instruments. In 2002, imports from all corners of the world represented 22.04 percent of American consumption. By 2016, this figure stood at 35.91 percent of a $37.5 billion national market, and over the next three years, imports grew nearly 31 percent. (Exports expanded at a relatively slow 11.84 percent.) ..."
"... exclusive U.S. reliance on China for the chemical ingredients of numerous medicines has now become a major federal government concern. ..."
"... The main foreign suppliers to the American pharmaceuticals market as of last year look encouragingly diversified and encouragingly friendly. For example, Ireland was number one, with 22.15 percent of such shipments, followed by Switzerland with 14.05 percent. But third and fourth, with 8.87 percent and 8.39 percent of imports, were Germany and India, respectively, both of which have limited or embargoed their medical exports this year. And number five, at 7.38 percent, was Italy -- whose current CCP Virus devastation could easily bring about export restrictions. ..."
"... Last year, America's leading foreign supplier of surgical and medical instruments (the ventilators category) was Mexico, which sold U.S. customers 28.58 percent of the $17.62 billion of total imports. But export-curber Germany was number three, at 9.43 percent, and China was sixth, at 6.93 percent. ..."
"... Purely domestic policy steps, like mandating more stockpiling or new recycling and re-use strategies, undoubtedly can add to national medical products supplies. But even these general import penetration figures, along with the shortage reports that keep pouring in, make clear that enduring national health care security can't be restored without a major ramping up of domestic output. And since export-heavy economies like China's and Germany's will undoubtedly work overtime to keep their American health care customers -- including with all manner of predatory economic practices -- it's similarly clear that big, lasting U.S. departures from standard free trade policies will be unavoidable. ..."
Mar 27, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Not Just China: U.S. Reliance on Foreign Medical Supplies is Staggering

The government's own numbers tell a frightening tale of how this happened, and when.

Virus pandemic having exposed scary domestic shortages of critical medical goods ranging from safety masks to ventilators, along with potential shortages of pharmaceuticals, political leaders across the spectrum are finally regretting having allowed so much output of these products to migrate offshore.

China's role in global supply chains has understandably sparked much of the alarm, since its government has all but threatened to withhold supplies of medicines whenever it wishes. But all told, at least 38 countries (including the 27-member European Union) have curbed exports of anti-pandemic products at some point since the CCP Virus began dominating headlines.

So potential foreign chokeholds in the nation's health care-related supply chains appear global in scope. The federal government's best data make clear just how widespread the problem has become, and how steadily it's been growing.

The figures come from the government's statistics on industry-by-industry manufacturing output and on exports and imports. (The output data can be accessed through databases created by the Census Bureau for its Annual Survey of Manufactures that are located at this link . The trade numbers can be retrieved at an interactive database maintained by the U.S. International Trade Commission that's located at this link .)

Put together, they reveal how big a share of the American markets for drugs, medical devices, and protective gear is controlled by goods made overseas. The big takeaway is that the nation could be in big enough trouble if supply disruptions were to occur in normal times (say, due to natural disasters in manufacturing centers abroad). During a high-mortality pandemic like the CCP Virus, these levels of foreign dependency are high enough to guarantee significant numbers of needless deaths.

These statistics aren't problem-free. Principally, because the manufacturing output figures are so granular, and therefore take so long to compile, import penetration rates for these (and other manufactures) can be calculated only through 2016. Yet the more timely import numbers can provide a reasonable indication of whether vulnerabilities are worsening or shrinking. At the same time, the government's main trade data aren't nearly as detailed as the production numbers. As a result, it's not possible to know the percentage of, say, safety masks used in the United States that are produced abroad. But it's easy to come up with this number for the category in which masks (and other protective gear) are grouped -- surgical appliances and supplies.

And in fact, the import penetration trends for these products exemplify the nation's health care security weaknesses. In 2002 -- a good baseline, since that's the first year China was a member of the World Trade Organization -- imports overall accounted for 16.7 percent of all surgical appliances and supplies used in the United States (measured by value, not numbers of masks or pairs of gloves). During the first full year of the Great Recession, 2008, this share totaled 28.08 percent.

Notably, these imports from China were a tiny 1.5 percent in 2002, and had actually dropped to 0.49 percent by 2008. By 2016, they accounted for a seemingly modest 6.54 percent of American consumption. But here's where another weakness in the data emerges: they say nothing about the origin of the materials, parts, and components of the final goods.

Keeping this qualification in mind, overall, 32.41 percent of surgical appliances and supplies were imported from other countries by 2011, according to these figures. In 2016, that number reached 41.81 percent of a $33.71 billion U.S. market. It may well be higher these days, as between then and last year, U.S. overseas purchases jumped by more than 29 percent. (Interestingly, in light of domestic shortages, U.S. exports in appliances and supplies actually rose by more than 13 percent during this period!)

Ventilators, sadly, have been in the news, too; they and related products like oxygen tents and bronchoscopes and inhalators and suction equipment are found in a big goods category called surgical and medical instruments. In 2002, imports from all corners of the world represented 22.04 percent of American consumption. By 2016, this figure stood at 35.91 percent of a $37.5 billion national market, and over the next three years, imports grew nearly 31 percent. (Exports expanded at a relatively slow 11.84 percent.)

Again, the China figures are small beans -- the import penetration rate for 2016 was a mere 2.35 percent. But these products often contain lots of electronics parts, and half the world's printed circuit boards, for example, are made in the People's Republic. In other words, lots of existing global surge capacity throughout the sector is ultimately controlled by Beijing.

Thanks to the work of researchers like the Hastings Center's Rosemary Gibson and independent journalist Katherine Eban, heavy and sometimes exclusive U.S. reliance on China for the chemical ingredients of numerous medicines has now become a major federal government concern. Indeed, the Food and Drug Administration is keeping an especially close eye on the availability of no fewer than 20 pharmaceutical products that use Chinese raw materials. (Unfortunately, the FDA won't say what they are, which calls for some Freedom of Information Act requests, pronto.)

But the import penetration figures make clear that supply disruptions could also originate elsewhere. Between 2002 and 2016, drugs produced overseas more than doubled their share of America's consumption (which stood at nearly $200 billion three years ago), from 17.23 percent to 38.51 percent. As of 2019, moreover, U.S. drugs imports were 20.34 percent higher than in 2016.

The main foreign suppliers to the American pharmaceuticals market as of last year look encouragingly diversified and encouragingly friendly. For example, Ireland was number one, with 22.15 percent of such shipments, followed by Switzerland with 14.05 percent. But third and fourth, with 8.87 percent and 8.39 percent of imports, were Germany and India, respectively, both of which have limited or embargoed their medical exports this year. And number five, at 7.38 percent, was Italy -- whose current CCP Virus devastation could easily bring about export restrictions.

Nor is this pattern restricted to pharmaceuticals. Last year, America's leading foreign supplier of surgical and medical instruments (the ventilators category) was Mexico, which sold U.S. customers 28.58 percent of the $17.62 billion of total imports. But export-curber Germany was number three, at 9.43 percent, and China was sixth, at 6.93 percent.

For surgical appliances and supplies (the masks and protective gear category), Ireland topped the 2019 foreign supplier list, selling the United States 24.09 percent of its $18.21 billion of total imports. But China was second, at 15.29 percent, and in third place, at 9.68 percent, stood Malaysia, which banned mask exports on March 20.

Purely domestic policy steps, like mandating more stockpiling or new recycling and re-use strategies, undoubtedly can add to national medical products supplies. But even these general import penetration figures, along with the shortage reports that keep pouring in, make clear that enduring national health care security can't be restored without a major ramping up of domestic output. And since export-heavy economies like China's and Germany's will undoubtedly work overtime to keep their American health care customers -- including with all manner of predatory economic practices -- it's similarly clear that big, lasting U.S. departures from standard free trade policies will be unavoidable.

Alan Tonelson is the founder of RealityChek, a public policy blog focusing on economics and national security, and the author of The Race to the Bottom .

[Mar 27, 2020] There are shortages of masks and gloves for the frontline medical staff

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Likklemore , Mar 26 2020 18:54 utc | 2

there are shortages of masks and gloves for the frontline so joe and jane may not be allowed. Governments are partnering with manufacturing companies. How bad is it?

In the Inbox: As a result of these posts on social media -
Hospitals Muzzle Doctors and Nurses on PPE, COVID-19 Cases

"Physicians are being warned not to speak or post publicly about their COVID-19 experiences, including PPE shortages, case specifics, and the percentage of full hospital beds,[.]

and who shall live and who shall die...

Hospitals across U.S. consider universal do-not-resuscitate orders for coronavirus patients

Hospitals on the front lines of the pandemic are engaged in a heated private debate over a calculation few have encountered in their lifetimes - how to weigh the "save at all costs" approach to resuscitating a dying patient against the real danger of exposing doctors and nurses to the contagion of coronavirus.

The conversations are driven by the realization that the risk to staff amid dwindling stores of protective equipment - such as masks, gowns and gloves - may be too great to justify the conventional response when a patient "codes," and their heart or breathing stops.

Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago has been discussing a universal do-not-resuscitate policy for infected patients, regardless of the wishes of the patient or their family members - a wrenching decision to prioritize the lives of the many over the one.[.]

Canada and U.S. were in discussions?
U.S. considers putting troops at Canadian border.

Really? How does one divide the library?
Canada says unnecessary

[Mar 27, 2020] High quality Microfilter bags for vacuum cleaners as apoor man mask

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

aleksandar , Mar 26 2020 20:00 utc | 26

@uncle tungsten
High quality Microfilter bags for vacuum cleaners are ways better
And you can wash them
Take care

[Mar 27, 2020] The masks are useful even if they aren't 100% useful in blocking water droplets, insofar as wearing a mask makes it much less likely that you will touch your mouth with your hands or stick your finger in your nose.

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Yeah, Right , Mar 26 2020 21:31 utc | 57

The masks are useful even if they aren't 100% useful in blocking water droplets, insofar as wearing a mask makes it much less likely that you will touch your mouth with your hands or stick your finger in your nose.

If you also get into the habit of vigorously washing your hands before and after eating, well, you have done most of the hard yards in avoiding infection.

[Mar 27, 2020] Some important details on the France ibuprofen warning

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 27 2020 12:36 utc | 189

Some important details on the France ibuprofen yes or no debate:
Source
The trouble over ibuprofen began March 11, when researchers at University Hospital Basel, in Switzerland, and Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, in Greece, published a letter in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine. The letter reviewed three early sets of case reports from China, covering almost 1,300 patients gravely ill with Covid-19. The letter's authors observed that significant numbers of those patients had high blood pressure and diabetes, from 12 percent to 30 percent depending on the study, and theorized that higher rates of expression of a particular enzyme, known for short as ACE2, might be raising the risk of coronavirus infection.

ACE2 provides a place on cell surfaces for the coronavirus to attach and enter in order to replicate. High blood pressure and diabetes are treated with drugs that suppress inflammation, called ACE inhibitors; the inhibitors, paradoxically, cause ACE2 to rise. That interaction is where the authors spotted a possible connection between patients experiencing chronic diseases and then becoming infected with Covid-19.

And that's where ibuprofen entered the unfolding story, too. The over-the-counter drug doesn't only knock down fever. It also reduces inflammation (the class of drugs it belongs to are known as NSAIDs, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs). That effect, as with the anti-inflammatory drugs given to chronic disease patients, can cause ACE2 to rise.

So any anti-inflammatory - whether ibuprofen or actual anti-inflammatory drugs - *can* (not will) cause ACE2 to rise. And ACE2 is what nCOV latches on to.

So the acetominophen/paracetamol vs. ibuprofen has nothing to do with the fever reduction side but the potential increase of ACE2, which *might* increase susceptibility to nCOV.

[Mar 27, 2020] Do not steam your masks. they are made of polyester and will shrink into a blob

Steam can be used for decontamination of cotton, but not polister
You can spay them with alcohol
Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Passer by , Mar 26 2020 19:04 utc | 7
On the protection issue, use FFP 3 respirator masks (EU), or N99 (US) or KN 99 (China) and scarf over it. These masks filter 98 % of micro particles, including viruses. In case of mask shortages steam can be used to decontaminate masks. Also use gloves, eye protection and raincoat when in risky areas. Everything new taken in your home must be under 3 - 4 days quarantine in separate room. The raincoat too. After this quarantine items can be further cleaned with steam, ethanol, bleach + water, and groceries via soap and water.

Virus can stay for 3 hours in mid air (room) and 3 days on some surfaces. And it is possible that can even survive for up to 17 days on some surfaces, which would be pretty bad news. At least 5 meters distance between people outside is needed.

A.L. , Mar 26 2020 19:57 utc | 24

PSA:

1. do not steam your masks. they are made of polyester and will shrink into a blob. people have tried and failed. you can wash with soap and dry or low temp bake as B suggested. they will eventually fail from delaminating or the elastic band snapping.

2. stop behaving like you don't want to catch it, behave like you have it and you don't want others to catch it. we'll all be better off.

3. going on 2 - wearing masks with exhaust valves will just spray virus straight out of you're infected. if you're not sure you're infected (and you don't) wearing a valves N95 is just a dick act.

4. when PPE were in short supply in China, what they did was to wear N95 with surgical mask over the top. it's definitely off-label use but at least you can then reuse your precious N95 as it's shielded from external pathogens, at the same time your own exhaust valve (see 3) is also shielded from others.

[Mar 27, 2020] Malaria vs. coronavirus

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Mar 27 2020 11:53 utc | 184

Malaria is a single cell bug called a protozoa. My understanding that is a class of bugs like bacteria and viruses are classes of bugs.

Mosquitoes carry or host the bug and pass it onto people. The quinine type drugs block the bug and prevent it from attaching or entering cells. That is how the drug also works against the corona viruses. Various strains of the malaria bug have developed resistance to various drugs.

Because SARS-CoV-2 is a new bug, it should not have developed a resistance to any drug.

Human immunity is directed at pathogens and seems very specific even to strains as can be seen with influenza vaccines, and the malaria protozoa is a very different animal to the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

That's the basics as I know it. Others here may be able to explain it a little better.

[Mar 27, 2020] The problem in the USA is that this will require the reconstruction of the government and a national public health system to run the monitoring and quarantine system. Instead, the corrupt oligarchy will use government money to rescue themselves rather than saving the lives of Americans.

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

VietnamVet , Mar 27 2020 3:03 utc | 121

Exactly, a containment strategy with universal testing and quarantine of the infected (ill and asymptomatic) at home or safe facilities is required keep western society from collapsing from this and future waves of the novel coronavirus until a treatment or vaccine is developed.

The problem in the USA is that this will require the reconstruction of the government and a national public health system to run the monitoring and quarantine system. Instead, the corrupt oligarchy will use government money to rescue themselves rather than saving the lives of Americans.

[Mar 27, 2020] The neoliberal wrecking of our hospital system has been widely cited as a cause of the crisis. Among other things, hospitals reduced the number of beds, sold ventilators, and ran down supplies of masks and protective clothing in order to increase profitability.

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

john brewster , Mar 26 2020 22:56 utc | 77

The neoliberal wrecking of our hospital system has been widely cited as a cause of the crisis. Among other things, hospitals reduced the number of beds, sold ventilators, and ran down supplies of masks and protective clothing in order to increase profitability.

On the way to this crisis, the private hospital industry gave the American public the actions and the rhetoric of the Milo Minderbinder character from Catch-22:

What's good for M & M Enterprises will be good for the country.

Milo stripped out and sold all kinds of life-saving kit: morphine vials, parachutes, CO2 inflator cartridges for life vests. Milo epitomizes the neoliberal short-term, bottom-line, zero-redundancy world view that has looted America and corrupted its democracy over the last 40 years.

Just like the hapless flightcrew in Catch-22, Americans are discovering the true meaning behind the private hospitals' claim that what was good for their corporations was good for the "crew" as they survey the looted and privatized corpse of their healthcare system.

What was satire 50 years ago, is reality today. We had a preview of this when Rumsfeld ran the DoD.

Was Donald Rumsfeld channeling Milo (and laughing up his sleeve) when he said:

It is clearly cost-effective to have contractors for a variety of things that military people need not do, and that, for whatever reason, other civilians, government people, cannot be deployed to do...

But I personally am of the view that there are a lot of things that can be done on a short-time basis by contractors that advantage the United States and advantage other countries who also hire contractors. And that any idea that we shouldn't have them, I think, would be unwise.
- D. Rumsfeld, Rumsfeld's Speech on the Future of Iraq (2005)

Exactly when did America become a bunch of out-takes from Catch-22?

[Mar 27, 2020] This is an hour with experts who ran the Singapore response

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

jayvee , Mar 27 2020 1:53 utc | 110

This is an hour with experts who ran the Singapore response. It answers many of our questions and also those which cannot yet be answered. I resisted listening because it's an hour, but it was worthwhile.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3w8gu9S3lo

[Mar 27, 2020] We must also introduce the wearing of a mask in public as a new social norm:

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

MoA - More Bits On The Corona Crisis

Tests and care for Covid-19 must be for free. We need hospitals to care for only the critical cases. We need quarantine centers to isolate the milder cases from the wider population. Many hotels, sport arenas and exhibition halls are currently empty. They can be converted into quarantine stations within a day or two. People will have to stay for only two weeks. They would be fed and would have medical attention. That is a small restriction of the freedom of a few for a large benefit for our societies.

We must also introduce the wearing of a mask in public as a new social norm:

A number of studies have reported that a significant portion of people are even spreading the virus while presymptomatic -- in the day or two before they start to feel ill. Presymptomatic spreaders are, well, gonna spread. It's not their fault.

How much this type of transmission is driving the pandemic is unclear but it could be significant. Gabriel Leung, dean of medicine at the University of Hong Kong, has estimated about 40% of cases transmit before symptoms develop. A recent preprint -- a study that has not yet been peer-reviewed -- from China pooled data from seven countries and estimated a very similar 43%.

The novel coronavirus is spread to a large part by people who stay asymptomatic and by people who do not yet feel sick but will later show symptoms. When they talk, sneeze or cough they release small droplets that carry viruses. The droplets can stay in the air for some time. If a person coming along inhales those droplets the viruses will likely infect that person.

Those who have have the virus or might spread it should wear a mask because it prevents their droplets from flying out. Those who do not have the virus should wear a mask to prevent droplets from entering their body.

We were told that 'masks don't work' because they are not a 100% protection. The very tiny viruses can pass behind the mask at its sides or they can slip through its webbing. But the virus is not traveling alone but as part of a droplet. Even a relatively wide webbing may hold it up. If it is doubled with a sheet of cosmetic paper towel in between the protection will be even better. Microfilter bags for vacuum cleaners and so called HEPA filters are also effective materials that are readily available and easy to turn into masks.

The development of the epidemic will depend on how many people will start to regularly wear masks when they are not at home. Even if the protection masks prevent only 50% of new infections the speed with which the epidemic will unfold will be significantly lower.


Source: Financial Times - bigger

Consider that the societies in the blue circle are all ones where people regularly wear masks while the other countries (except China which was surprised by the outbreak) are societies were wearing a mask is seen as unusual. These 'blue' countries, which also gained experience during the SARS and MERS epidemics, show significant flatter trajectories.

Graphs similar to the above for all U.S. states and territories can be found here .

Meanwhile U.S. media continue to spread anti-China propaganda:

Two European Countries Report High Error Rate For Chinese Supplied Coronavirus Tests

Medical personnel in Spain and the Czech Republic have reported that the coronavirus rapid tests their respective countries have received from China are faulty and have a high error rate.

Several labs in Spanish hospitals have reported that the test kits they purchased, manufactured by Chinese company Bioeasy and based in Shenzhen, have a sensitivity of 30% when the sensitivity should be above 80%, Spanish newspaper El País reported Thursday. Due to the test's lack of reliability, medical personnel in Spain have switched back to the PCR test, which takes up to four hours for a diagnosis, while rapid tests take between 10 to 15 minutes

The Spanish government purchased 340,000 tests from the Chinese company, a similar quantity to the tests ordered by the Czech Republic, where medical personnel also report an 80% failure rate.

When one checks the original reports from Spain and from the Czech Republic one learns that these countries bought anti-body tests which only react when a person has had the virus for some time and developed anti-bodies against it. These tests can obviously not be used to find persons who are infected but have not yet developed anti-bodies.

China's ambassador in Spain also pointed out that these tests have yet to be verified by the regulator and were imported without the help or knowledge of the Chinese government.

The anti-body tests are valuable to identify people who have developed current immunity against the virus. These people can then care for those who are most endangered by the disease. Anti-body tests are quick. They can be used anywhere.

The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests which are currently necessary to find if someone has the virus take at least four hours and specialized laboratories to process them. We will need a much quicker reliable test if we want to put our economies back to work. Luckily several companies and academic groups are already working on these and a 45 minute test is now ready to be marketed .

When we have a quick test for the virus and a quick test for anti-bodies available in mass we can restart the economy by 'filtering' through the population on a large scale. Movement restrictions would then only be needed for those who show virus-positive and anti-body negative results. All others could go back to work.

There would certainly still be outbreaks from people who escaped the 'filtering' process but with easy testing and care in place those clusters can be locally contained.

It may take another two month or so to get to that point. Until then there is little we can do but to stay apart as much as possible and to wear our masks.

[Mar 27, 2020] Questions, questions, questions

Mar 27, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

chu teh , Mar 27 2020 3:01 utc | 120

@Richard Steven Hack | Mar 26 2020 23:39 utc | 88

re spread of CV19--yr post interests me.

Have seen no data on how many viral particles it takes to cause a serious effect. Likely, such data would be in terms of probability at X [number of viral particles]. Such is known for many infective agents in surface and aerosol form, but CV19 may be very different.

Can CV19 vapor aerosol from mouth/breath in still air, exclusive of explosive discharge via cough/sneeze, cause full-blown case beyond 6 feet? I'd like to know.

Also, have not seen any data re time duration of infective after it enters throat passage on journey to lungs. I posit that there are anti-viral liquids that might be effective if small amount were trickled down throat 2x per day; surely just before bedtime to discourage the next 7-hs of undisturbed incubation. I do take something that I am guessing may be effective. [E.g., I also
"heard" OliveOilExtract as anti-viral but I have no experience with it.]

Another thought: Re different strains of CV19 having very different outcomes...Anyone suggestion that US forms collectively having, say, milder outcomes relative to China/Iran/LombardyItaly, etc? Seems to be an aversion to testing the general population, or even publishing all results of the small amount of tests with time+place data. Where are the lists of 1st observations of "unusual flu" in US? that would NORMALLY, provoke tracking + names/places of sequential contacts?

Routine discovery and mapping of communication lines is very likely to uncover a lot of truth. That is what rational folks desire.

[Mar 26, 2020] 'The director of the German National Health Institute (RKI) confirmed that they count all test-positive deaths, irrespective of the actual cause of death, as coronavirus deaths". The average age of the deceased is 82 years, most with serious preconditions. As in most other countries, excess mortality due Covid19 is likely to be near zero in Germany.'

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

cranc , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 8:04 am GMT

I think that Ron Unz is gravely mistaken in his analysis here.
There is a growing body of opinion amongst medical professionals and academics that questions the benefits of a lockdown balanced against what we know of the danger from the virus. Ron has not included any of this in his article here, and he should.
Studies are emerging which are indeed showing that infection stats may be orders of magnitude higher than official estimates, that hospitalisation rates are therefore much lower, and the overall threat overshaddowed by the consequences of closing down the economy and open society.
As ever the media is the prime culprit in spreading fear and hysteria. Alt media have an obligation to question the very basis of the covid pandemic response.
'The director of the German National Health Institute (RKI) confirmed that they count all test-positive deaths, irrespective of the actual cause of death, as „coronavirus deaths". The average age of the deceased is 82 years, most with serious preconditions. As in most other countries, excess mortality due Covid19 is likely to be near zero in Germany.'
https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/
12 experts speak out:
https://off-guardian.org/2020/03/24/12-experts-questioning-the-coronavirus-panic/
From yesterday in WSJ ('Is The Coronavirus as Deadly as They Say?'):
https://archive.fo/cgCff
A study from Oxford University Epdemiologists confirming doubts about lethality:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/oxmu2rwsnhi9j9c/Draft-COVID-19-Model%20%2813%29.pdf?dl=0
Even the UK government website confirms that the covid virus has been re-classified as no longer on the register of High Consequence Infectious Diseases (on March 19th, just before the government closed down the whole society).
There is more going on here than the virus. Maybe it is incompetence and panic, or something more disturbing. Either way, alt media voices have a duty to report the growing doubt about how deadly this virus really is or isn't.
Alfred , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 9:01 am GMT

According to Dr. Ferguson the "best case" scenario is that the Coronavirus will kill over a million Americans.

According to the pie chart below, which is based on the Italian experience, 99.2% of those who die have one or more pre-existing health condition. I suspect that if you were to exclude those under 60, the result would go up to 99.9%

This data strongly suggests that only those who are over 60 should be obliged to remain at home. This virus has seemingly been going around the USA since last September and a lot of those who caught it and died were classified as flu victims or something else.

Every year, several millions die in the USA. That is normal. The deaths allegedly from this virus would have probably died anyway. At worst, their useless lives would have been curtailed by one or two years. Don't forget that 90% of a person's lifetime health costs are expended in the past year of "life". BTW, I am 69 so don't accuse me of ageism or any such nonsense please.

[Mar 26, 2020] Accuracy of death data is high suspect

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

Realist , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 11:24 am GMT

Similarly, New York reported its first death on March 14th. Yet just ten days later, deaths in that state were running at 50 per day, and rapidly accelerating.

You mean first death attributed to Covid-19 after testing started. How many died of Covid-19 before testing? It is not known at what stage of the epidemic, testing started therefore accuracy of data is suspect.

[Mar 26, 2020] Virus hype and Hubei province reality

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

Weston Waroda , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 3:22 pm GMT

The Coronavirus epidemic may soon produce the greatest American disaster since our Civil War over 150 years ago, and numbers reveal the possible magnitude.

The current data out of China, and Wuhan in particular, suggest otherwise. They have closed all 19 temporary hospitals set up there to treat the coronavirus infections. The only way you can believe a minimum of one million Americans will die from the coronavirus is to believe that these figures from Hubei province have been falsified in some way.

Hubei, China
Confirmed: 67,801
Deaths: 3,163
Recovered: 60,811
Existing: 3,827

Nevertheless, your figures are very sobering.

[Mar 26, 2020] There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

follyofwar , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 3:26 pm GMT

@niteranger When considering what the authorities, both medical and political, are constantly telling us about how deadly this pandemic is, I think back to my college Statistics course of nearly 50 years ago. On the first day of class the professor told the old joke that "there are lies, damned lies, and statistics." I'm sure most who read here have heard of that bromide, but it is still well to keep it in mind. Don't forget, most have an agenda.

[Mar 26, 2020] If the New York Post is correct in reporting that half the UK population have already been infected with Covid-19, while only 422 deaths have resulted, we can infer that the death rate from this virus is in the order of 0.0006%, give or take the odd zero.

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

CanSpeccy , says: Website Show Comment Next New Comment March 25, 2020 at 5:03 pm GMT

If the New York Post is correct in reporting that half the UK population have already been infected with Covid-19 , while only 422 deaths have resulted, we can infer that the death rate from this virus is in the order of 0.0006%, give or take the odd zero.

If that's the case, then maybe I don't need to worry that most of the people where I live seem, like St-Germain, above, too dumb to understand the meaning of the term social distancing .

[Mar 26, 2020] In Italy for seniors in high risk group time between symptoms and death is just around eight day

Mar 26, 2020 | www.lastampa.it

For the victims of coronavirus the median time from the first symptoms to hospitalization is 4 days, and the median time to death is 8 days, according to a report by the Italian National Institute of Health.

The study comes as the number of Covid-19 deaths in the country continues to increase. On Wednesday, the number of people who have died from coronavirus jumped to 2,978, recording the largest one-day increase - 475 - since the beginning of the outbreak, while the​​​​​​​ number of infected people rose to over 28,000.

According to the study, which was run on 2,003 patients who have died from coronavirus, the most affected region is Lombardy reporting around 71.1% of the deaths, followed by Emilia-Romagna (17.3%) and Veneto (3.9%).

The​​​​​​​ median age of death is 80.5 while the median age of the people who got infected is 63. As of March 17, among the coronavirus victims only 17 people were younger than age 50 and only 30% were women. The​​​​​​​ majority of patients were treated with antibiotics (83%), while antiviral therapies were used in 52% of cases.

According to the study, most of the people who have died suffered from previous illnesses before contracting the coronavirus. Based on a sample of 355 out of 2003 fatalities, the institute found that almost half of the victims had three or more illnesses, a quarter had either two or one prior medical condition - such as high blood pressure (76%), diabetes (35.5%) and heart disease (33%) - and only 3 people, or 0.8% of the sample, had no previous illnesses.

[Mar 26, 2020] Oxford's Centre for Evidence Based Medicine is providing regular updates of an estimate of the infection fatality rate for Covid-19. Their current estimate is 0.20% (95% CI, 0.17 to 0.25).

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

Ami , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 6:36 am GMT

@NPleeze Oxford's Centre for Evidence Based Medicine is providing regular updates of an estimate of the infection fatality rate for Covid-19. Their current estimate is 0.20% (95% CI, 0.17 to 0.25).

Two Stanford doctors writing in The Wall Street Journal suggest that the fatality rate could be as low as 0.01%, which is about one-tenth the mortality of seasonal flu. They suggest that a better strategy than widespread lockdowns would be to focus on protecting vulnerable members of the population, particularly the elderly.

Both of these estimates would result in far, far fewer deaths than the garbage-in garbage-out models produced by Imperial College and others.

[Mar 26, 2020] This is about more then American gullibilty

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

refl , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 9:53 am GMT

@Gleimhart Mantooso

show me where all the non-gullible people live

You are right. While corona in my view is absolutely bonkers, and as my conviction mounts with every half witted calculation that I come across, it gains its own dimension in reality. The cause is non-existent but the consequences are real:
People die in overwhelmed hospitals in run down health systems. The world economy is breaking down, as it was going to anyhow. The convenient scapegoat has been found and the interest for the PTB to allow the truth to come out is zero.
Will we get laws that make Corona-denial illegal? Because it dishonors the dead and traumatizes their families?

I am praying to Saint Ron to fearlessly tell the truth, but he goes corona full steam.

I have written this before. My Damaskus moment was Kiew in february 2014. Since then I have known that the same people who were behind that thing would set my country and the world on fire in time.
I marvel at their inventiveness.

This is about more then American gullibilty.

Anonymous [545] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 10:14 am GMT

Similarly, once government lockdowns or other similar measures are taken, the doubling-period of the infection becomes much longer.

I'm pretty certain that there's no doubling once a country, (province, city, whatever) enacts a relatively comprehensive lockdown and people themselves take it seriously. I'm in one of those countries and if I look around it's clear that the R0 ratio is way below 1. Probably less than 0.1 to be honest.

If I remember correctly, COVID-19 R0 ratio in China was somewhere around 3.5 when the country was still figuring it out. That's a horrible number but it's easy to see how it can be brought down to a tiny fraction when 95% of risky contacts get removed and the remaining 5% approached with protective gear and caution. The virus doesn't stand a chance in that kind of environment.

So, the numbers in my neck of the woods will almost certainly start decreasing rapidly in the coming weeks but the problem of international travel will remain for many months (years?).

[Mar 26, 2020] Reflections on a Century of Junk Science

Highly recommended!
Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

Kratoklastes , says: Show Comment Next New Comment March 25, 2020 at 6:16 pm GMT

@thotmonger

I also remember some of early estimates of Mad Cow disease in humans in UK and they turned out to be very exaggerated.

When the political class was trying to de-gay HIV/AIDS in 1987, they had Oprah tell everyone that 20% of heterosexual people would be dead before 1990.

The first I learned of Oprah's jaw-droppingly sensationalist remarks, was in a piece a couple of days ago on AmericanThinker (which sounds like a rare bird indeed, if not an outright oxymoron – but it has good stuff from time to time).

Anyhow, it was an interesting piece – entitled " Reflections on a Century of Junk Science " by the author of " Hoodwinked: How Intellectual Hucksters Have Hijacked American Culture ", which I will acquire today. (The book's 11 years old, but sounds like it will be along the same lines as Kendrick's " Doctoring Data: How to Sort Out Medical Advice from Medical Nonsense ", which was excellent).

[Mar 26, 2020] As of March 19th five Italian doctors and 13 medics have lost their lives with 2,629 health workers infected, or 8,3 per cent.

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

Pandour , says: Website Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 4:04 pm GMT

@UncommonGround ,,,As of March 19th there were 93 Corona deaths in Bergamo and counting. As of March 19th five Italian doctors and 13 medics have lost their lives with 2,629 health workers infected, or 8,3 per cent.

[Mar 26, 2020] Nearly 40% of the Italian fatalities were using ACE inhibitors (and this may be an underestimate as pre-admission medication charts were lacking). The virus binds to the pulmonary ACE2 receptor.

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

gfhÄndel , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 11:48 am GMT

I will keep this comment as brief as possible.
I welcome refutation of these theses, which I believe are crucial to any analysis of the response to the pandemic:
1. Current screening tests for COVID19 (a PCR test, not an antibody test) have a high rate of false positives (see excellent contributions on this topic from Kratoklastes).
2. Draconian public health responses are allegedly aimed at minimizing serious COVID19 disease (severe respiratory distress, up to and including ARDS). "Positive" testing individuals overwhelming do not fall into this category.
3. At this juncture, our best single metric is death from COVID19. Unfortunately the definition of a COVID19 fatality varies between jurisdictions. To be counted as such a fatality, the current best definition would be: novel coronovirus IgM (+/- IgG) positive (proof of recent infection) plus ARDS (radiologically, if not pathologically, confirmed).
4. Alleged COVID19 fatalities are overwhelming patients >70 having 3 or more serious comorbidities.
5. There is an association between ACE-inhibitor or AT-receptor antagonist use and likelihood of death from infection by novel coronavirus.

To the last point: nearly 40% of the Italian fatalities were using ACE inhibitors (and this may be an underestimate as pre-admission medication charts were lacking). The virus binds to the pulmonary ACE2 receptor.
Conceivably the use of ACE-inhibitors (or the related AT-receptor antagonists) induces upregulation of this receptor, but this is purely conjecture on my part.
Anecdotally, use of this medication class is lower in Germany, which has been proffered among reasons for its lower fatality rates.

[Mar 26, 2020] An antibody test for COVID-19 virus exposure is near to becoming commercially available and this is likely to be widely used in order to identify people who can safely volunteer to help with the pandemic it may provide some interesting statistics and a different management perspective.

Mar 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

macilrae , says: Show Comment Next New Comment March 25, 2020 at 6:36 pm GMT

@Realist I have two family members in UK who have already recovered after testing positive and I, myself, suffered ten days with an unpleasant dry cough, malaise and low grade fever late in February – which has since cleared uneventfully. I was never tested and, following my GP, discounted being infected with COVID-19 at that time.

An antibody test for COVID-19 virus exposure is near to becoming commercially available and this is likely to be widely used in order to identify people who can safely volunteer to help with the pandemic – it may provide some interesting statistics and a different management perspective.

[Mar 25, 2020] Via the CDC As of March 20, 2020 there Are 100 times as many Flu Deaths in US this Season than Coronavirus Deaths

Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

Agent76 , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 2:22 pm GMT

March 20, 2020 STUNNING! Via the CDC As of Friday There Are 100 TIMES AS MANY Flu Deaths in US this Season than Coronavirus Deaths

According to the weekly CDC flu report -- flu deaths are up by 1,000 over last week. And according to the global coronavirus trackers US coronavirus deaths are up by 218 this week.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/03/stunning-via-the-cdc-as-of-friday-there-are-100-times-as-many-flu-deaths-in-us-this-season-than-coronavirus-deaths/

Nov 4, 2019 Event 201 Pandemic Exercise: Segment 4, Communications Discussion and Epilogue Video

Event 201 is a pandemic tabletop exercise hosted by The Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. The exercise illustrated the pandemic preparedness efforts needed to diminish the large-scale economic and societal consequences of a severe pandemic.

[Mar 25, 2020] Difificulties of correctly estimating mortality

Notable quotes:
"... The reason younger Americans are dying is because Americans are extremely unhealthy. I wager all the very sick younger Americans are obese, probably with diabetes, don't exercise, and eat unhealthy foods, leading to heart and other weaknesse ..."
"... I share your skepticism. Do the "tests" prove that COVID-19 causes illness? Is it possible that some or even all of the deaths associated with COVID-19 have been primarily caused by other factors? Is it possible that COVID-19 is very widespread in contemporary populations and is harmless in most or even all people in which it exists? ..."
Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

Pft , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 4:51 am GMT

"However, the Coronavirus death statistics are certainly far more solid and reliable"

Are they really?

Report shows up to 88% of Italy's alleged Covid19 deaths could be misattributed

"The way in which we code deaths in our country is very generous in the sense that all the people who die in hospitals with the coronavirus are deemed to be dying of the coronavirus [ ] On re-evaluation by the National Institute of Health, only 12 per cent of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus, while 88 per cent of patients who have died have at least one pre-morbidity – many had two or three,"

– Professor Walter Ricciardi, scientific adviser to Italy's minister of health
Report in English:

https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/Report-COVID-2019_20_marzo_eng.pdf

Truth3 , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 4:55 am GMT
@Trinity Trinity, I'm about 99% sure I had this thing.

Stay safe. It's brutal.

Let the assholes like utu, FB, Frannie, CoMike, Lot, and all their (((kind))) get it.

What comes around goes around. Zio-Bio didn't end with Dr. Zack.

NPleeze , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 5:10 am GMT

the Coronavirus death statistics are certainly far more solid and reliable

But still quite unreliable. Nobody knows what tests are being performed or how accurate those tests are. For all we know they are calling flu/pneumonia deaths as COVID-19 deaths, whether deliberately/recklessly (pressured) or because the tests are simply faulty.

If we assume a mortality rate of 1%

Based on what? As noted, the best case of a general population exposure is the Diamond Princess – where all passengers were exposed fully for 2 weeks and then under terrible quarantine conditions for 4 weeks. Of the 3,177 passengers and crew, some 677 (20%) took ill, and 7 (0.2% of the population, and 1% of the ill) died, all of them in their 70s and older (and indeed the data released by the Japanese health ministry indicates the ship had twice the number of people in each age category 60-79, 70-79, and 80+ than does the US).

Conveniently, everyone repeating the hysteria line completely omits to look at the best data available.

Number of infected = Number of Deaths / Mortality_Rate * 2^(Mortality_Period/Doubling_Period)

Nothing in nature is exponential as everything runs up against some barrier, usually sooner than later. I can make the argument about rabbit reproduction: each female rabbit can produce 60 rabbits per year in three litters. This would indicate that each male/female pair increases 10-fold every 3 months – a far faster growth rate than your virus. And under certain conditions, they can, for a time, accomplish that before they hit the proverbial brick wall.

Let's look at Italy. The first recorded death (FWIW) was Feb. 21. Now using your assumptions, there had been 100 new infections three weeks earlier (on Jan. 31). Next, as you assume a doubling-period of 6 days, those 100 infections would have increased to 100 x 2^(37/6) = 7,183 infections by the time of March 8, when the emergency orders went into effect. However, on March 8 there had already been 366 deaths. Since the disease, according to your model, takes 3 weeks to kill, this means we need to look at the number of infections on Feb. 21, which, in your model, equals 100 x 2^(21/6) = 1,131.

In other words, on Feb. 21 there were 1,131 persons infected, and of those, 366 had died by March 8. For a mortality rate of 32.3%.

But let's work backwards from another date. By Mar. 24, there had been 6,820 deaths. To arrive at that, using your assumed death rate, that means by Mar. 3, 682,000 people had to be infected (since 1% of them would die within 3 weeks). Which means, according to your model, that 341,000 were infected on Feb. 26, 170,500 on Feb. 20. But your model already showed that only 1,131 were infected on Feb. 21.

In other words, this "model" is utter bunk.

What we do know is as follows: the death rate on the Diamond Princess, under terrible conditions, was 0.2%, all over 70.

The global death rate is about 18,000 dead out of 7 billion. The annual tuberculosis death number is between 1 and 2 million.

That people who are very old (and thus have compromised immune systems) or people who have various chronic diseases are the ones who die from this disease. This is because the virus can attack numerous receptors, including those in the kidney, liver, heart, white blood cells, and pancreas (a sort of "frankenstein" bio-engineered virus). Thus anyone with a weak pancreas (diabetes), kidney, liver, heart (hypertension, etc.), or lungs (smokers, etc.) are susceptible to having an organ fail.

The death rate will grow only among this segment of the population. It is enough to isolate them (or, better yet, have them self-isolate).

The reason younger Americans are dying is because Americans are extremely unhealthy. I wager all the very sick younger Americans are obese, probably with diabetes, don't exercise, and eat unhealthy foods, leading to heart and other weaknesses.

All of this apart from the issue, of how long this virus has been in the wild. It seems my mother caught this disease in early February, in a small Midwestern isolated community – she had what are given at the symptoms, but nobody was looking for it at the time, so there is no diagnosis of her illness.

alan kerns , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 5:15 am GMT
@Trinity

I share your skepticism. Do the "tests" prove that COVID-19 causes illness? Is it possible that some or even all of the deaths associated with COVID-19 have been primarily caused by other factors? Is it possible that COVID-19 is very widespread in contemporary populations and is harmless in most or even all people in which it exists?

These questions deserve forensically rigorous investigation – conducted and reported honestly.

[Mar 25, 2020] A new study shows the coronavirus mortality rate in Wuhan, China, may have been lower than previous estimates

Mar 25, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Allen , Mar 24 2020 16:00 utc | 8

A new study shows the coronavirus mortality rate in Wuhan, China, may have been lower than previous estimates.

According to research published in the monthly Nature Medicine journal, the death rate from the coronavirus disease, COVID-19, in Wuhan -- the epicenter of the global outbreak -- was 1.4%.

"Using public and published information, we estimate that the overall symptomatic case fatality risk (the probability of dying after developing symptoms) of COVID-19 in Wuhan was 1.4%," reads the body_abstract of the study.

The study -- titled "Estimating clinical severity of COVID-19 from the transmission dynamics in Wuhan, China" -- said the estimate was "substantially lower than both the corresponding crude or naive confirmed case fatality risk".

Previous estimates placed the mortality rate in Wuhan between 2% to 3%.

Underlining that fatality risk was higher for the elderly, the study found 2.6% mortality rate among people over 60 years in Wuhan, 0.5% for people aged between 30 to 59, and 0.3% for people under 30 years.

The COVID-19 outbreak that started in Wuhan has been declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Data compiled by the U.S.-based Johns Hopkins University shows the virus has now spread to 167 countries and regions.

Over 341,700 cases and 14,750 deaths have been reported worldwide since last December, while more than 98,860 people have recovered.

Transmission in China has slowed down over recent weeks, with authorities reporting no new indigenous cases on Monday.

There were also no new infections in Wuhan city for the fifth consecutive day, according to China's National Health Commission.

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/asia-pacific/covid-19-wuhan-death-rate-lower-than-prior-estimates/1775864

[Mar 25, 2020] COVID 19 vs seasonal flu

Mar 25, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

brian , Mar 23 2020 21:30 utc | 78

#COVIDー19 vs #flu
'So far, #COVIDー19 has led to > 220,000 illnesses and >9,300 deaths worldwide. But that's nothing compared with the flu. In the US alone, flu has caused an estimated 36 million illnesses, 370,000 hospitalizations and 22,000 deaths this season, according to CDC. ' https://www.livescience.com/new-coronavirus-compare-with-flu.html

[Mar 25, 2020] Does virus spread exponentially

Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

utu , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 11:20 am GMT

@Agathoklis
"Italian deaths are not rising exponentially. "

I am pretty sure they were in the initial period but once the epidemic spreads into areas with different population densities where doubling periods are different and when new countermeasures are being implemented you will see departures from the exponential growth.

Even w/o countermeasures when more and more people get infected the reproduction number R0 will be getting smaller resulting in a steady decrease of the exponential coefficient.

Zhanwei Du et al. studied the exponential growth in Wuhan in the period before quarantine was imposed. See the Appendix in

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/5/20-0146_article
The COVID-19 epidemic was growing exponentially during December 1, 2019– January 22, 2020, as determined by the following: dI(t) = I0 × exp(λ × t) in which I0 denotes the number of initial cases on December 1, 2019, and λ denotes the epidemic growth rate during December 1, 2019–January 22, 2020.

What is important about Ron Unz approach is that by looking at daily death increments one can gage the number of new infections and as the epidemic progresses the changes in doubling period would be adjusted from daily death increments.

In times when very few tests are being done to asymptomatic patients and no serum tests are performed to determine who already went through infection and recovered this approach is very useful and simple method to estimate the extent of the epidemic.

[Mar 25, 2020] When stat-molesters jump in to inform me that pneumonia is known, but COVID-19 is new its spread could be exponential

Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

Will , says: Show Comment Next New Comment March 25, 2020 at 7:01 pm GMT

"This, of course, is when stat-molesters jump in to inform me that pneumonia is known, but COVID-19 is new & its spread could be exponential

BUT, you'd need to base this on something far less moronic than using infection & death rates among the sick to project to the population"

https://twitter.com/saifedean/status/1242487066711273473

"So far we know:
-tests have large error margin
-positive tests only associated with small chance of being sick
-vast majority of COVID-19 cases have other serious diseases
-We have 80x more pneumonia cases than COVID-19

Are these good reasons to suspend the lives of billions?"

https://twitter.com/saifedean/status/1242489837409701894

[Mar 25, 2020] The critique of one simplistic model

Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

NPleeze , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 5:10 am GMT

the Coronavirus death statistics are certainly far more solid and reliable

But still quite unreliable. Nobody knows what tests are being performed or how accurate those tests are. For all we know they are calling flu/pneumonia deaths as COVID-19 deaths, whether deliberately/recklessly (pressured) or because the tests are simply faulty.

If we assume a mortality rate of 1%

Based on what? As noted, the best case of a general population exposure is the Diamond Princess – where all passengers were exposed fully for 2 weeks and then under terrible quarantine conditions for 4 weeks. Of the 3,177 passengers and crew, some 677 (20%) took ill, and 7 (0.2% of the population, and 1% of the ill) died, all of them in their 70s and older (and indeed the data released by the Japanese health ministry indicates the ship had twice the number of people in each age category 60-79, 70-79, and 80+ than does the US).

Conveniently, everyone repeating the hysteria line completely omits to look at the best data available.

Number of infected = Number of Deaths / Mortality_Rate * 2^(Mortality_Period/Doubling_Period)

Nothing in nature is exponential as everything runs up against some barrier, usually sooner than later. I can make the argument about rabbit reproduction: each female rabbit can produce 60 rabbits per year in three litters. This would indicate that each male/female pair increases 10-fold every 3 months – a far faster growth rate than your virus. And under certain conditions, they can, for a time, accomplish that before they hit the proverbial brick wall.

Let's look at Italy. The first recorded death (FWIW) was Feb. 21. Now using your assumptions, there had been 100 new infections three weeks earlier (on Jan. 31). Next, as you assume a doubling-period of 6 days, those 100 infections would have increased to 100 x 2^(37/6) = 7,183 infections by the time of March 8, when the emergency orders went into effect. However, on March 8 there had already been 366 deaths. Since the disease, according to your model, takes 3 weeks to kill, this means we need to look at the number of infections on Feb. 21, which, in your model, equals 100 x 2^(21/6) = 1,131.

In other words, on Feb. 21 there were 1,131 persons infected, and of those, 366 had died by March 8. For a mortality rate of 32.3%.

But let's work backwards from another date. By Mar. 24, there had been 6,820 deaths. To arrive at that, using your assumed death rate, that means by Mar. 3, 682,000 people had to be infected (since 1% of them would die within 3 weeks). Which means, according to your model, that 341,000 were infected on Feb. 26, 170,500 on Feb. 20. But your model already showed that only 1,131 were infected on Feb. 21.

In other words, this "model" is utter bunk.

What we do know is as follows: the death rate on the Diamond Princess, under terrible conditions, was 0.2%, all over 70.

The global death rate is about 18,000 dead out of 7 billion. The annual tuberculosis death number is between 1 and 2 million.

That people who are very old (and thus have compromised immune systems) or people who have various chronic diseases are the ones who die from this disease. This is because the virus can attack numerous receptors, including those in the kidney, liver, heart, white blood cells, and pancreas (a sort of "frankenstein" bio-engineered virus). Thus anyone with a weak pancreas (diabetes), kidney, liver, heart (hypertension, etc.), or lungs (smokers, etc.) are susceptible to having an organ fail.

The death rate will grow only among this segment of the population. It is enough to isolate them (or, better yet, have them self-isolate).

The reason younger Americans are dying is because Americans are extremely unhealthy. I wager all the very sick younger Americans are obese, probably with diabetes, don't exercise, and eat unhealthy foods, leading to heart and other weaknesses.

All of this apart from the issue, of how long this virus has been in the wild. It seems my mother caught this disease in early February, in a small Midwestern isolated community – she had what are given at the symptoms, but nobody was looking for it at the time, so there is no diagnosis of her illness.

OscarWildeLoveChild , says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 12:38 pm GMT
@NPleeze 12 experts tend to agree with you

https://off-guardian.org/2020/03/24/12-experts-questioning-the-coronavirus-panic/

Isn't the real issue this (numerically and culturally): we have a health care system, which is obviously not made to provide services to every single American whenever they need it, all at the same time , and this pandemic is likely to kill say, a million old people (given how large our overall population is), and since no one "gets" to just die (ala Soylent Green) but instead gets sick at 70, 80, etc and has to be preserved forever so anything that "burns" through what would be an otherwise healthy population, as with all animals (including humans) historically, instead becomes such a serious risk (if not somewhat random) to the old or infirm, that we shut everything down, potentially causing all sorts of other human catastrophes so that some old folks get to choose another death (maybe the flu?) over a Covid-19 death?

Long run on sentence, but isn't that really what this is all about now ?

[Mar 25, 2020] An error occurred.

Mar 25, 2020 | www.youtube.com

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[Mar 25, 2020] Fearmongering via mathiness: Neill Ferguson of Imperial College London argues that every fatality represents an infected population one thousand strong.

The gullibility of population might have been temporarily upped by Covid-19 worries
Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

Bmac says: Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 12:28 pm GMT 100 Words Neill Ferguson of Imperial College London argues that every fatality represents an infected population one thousand strong.

See:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/4g7Qpvhh5m4?feature=oembed

He notes:

A case fatality rate of 1% – which means that on average, every fatality at the time of their infection represents a population of one hundred.

Given the rate of transmission, those one hundred will infect another nine hundred during the average incubation period of three weeks.

[Mar 25, 2020] Sterilization of used face masks

Probably the simplest is ironing with iron set to 200F or so
Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

Saggy , says: Website Show Comment March 25, 2020 at 1:13 pm GMT

@joe webb You can google up several papers on the subject, apparently the best method is to use UV light https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/health/coronavirus-masks-reuse.html
I just ordered a UV sterilization box from Amazon or Ebay (can't remember), you need to check that it's shipped from the US as most are shipped from China and take a while. The other easily available method is heat, but here it's difficult to determine the time/temp parameters https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0186217

[Mar 25, 2020] 12 Experts Questioning the Coronavirus Panic – OffGuardian

Notable quotes:
"... The state governments prefer that all schools be closed while Canberra is receiving advice from Dr Brendan Murphy, Chief Health Officer of Australia, that schools not be closed because children would be at more risk of picking up COVID-19 from adults at home, and from congregating in areas where they are not being supervised by adults if they decide not to stay at home for various reasons (because among other things they would also be at risk from domestic violence). ..."
"... Please don't feel brainwashed into taking totally unnecessary extra precautions beyond normal levels of hygiene in order to protect yourself from a common coronavirus. ..."
"... The behavior of elites across the globe suggest a level of collective anxiety not seen in before in my lifetime. Certainly endless decades of oligarchic control maintained through keeping Western populations mystified by means of coordinated mass propaganda – has seen rather significant cracks develop through the emergence of progressive independent journalism shared across the world via the web. One would think those ever widening cracks in the indoctrination system have perhaps clarified for our betters that their fairy tales are falling upon ever greater numbers of deaf ears around the globe. ..."
"... Given currently unfolding events one is tempted to think that elites – perhaps rather than being left to respond to events completely out of their control – like a system-crashing spontaneous economic collapse – are collectively choosing to instead to – "control what they can" – through this supposed 'pandemic' response operation. ..."
"... That this over the top elite led pandemic response appears an effort to lead the credulous masses into whatever straightjacket has been prepared for us is simply impossible to ignore. ..."
Mar 24, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Below is our list of twelve medical experts whose opinions on the Coronavirus outbreak contradict the official narratives of the MSM, and the memes so prevalent on social media.

* * *

Dr Sucharit Bhakdi is a specialist in microbiology. He was a professor at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz and head of the Institute for Medical Microbiology and Hygiene and one of the most cited research scientists in German history.

What he says:

We are afraid that 1 million infections with the new virus will lead to 30 deaths per day over the next 100 days. But we do not realise that 20, 30, 40 or 100 patients positive for normal coronaviruses are already dying every day.

[The government's anti-COVID19 measures] are grotesque, absurd and very dangerous [ ] The life expectancy of millions is being shortened. The horrifying impact on the world economy threatens the existence of countless people. The consequences on medical care are profound. Already services to patients in need are reduced, operations cancelled, practices empty, hospital personnel dwindling. All this will impact profoundly on our whole society.

All these measures are leading to self-destruction and collective suicide based on nothing but a spook.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/JBB9bA-gXL4

*

Dr Wolfgang Wodarg is a German physician specialising in Pulmonology, politician and former chairman of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. In 2009 he called for an inquiry into alleged conflicts of interest surrounding the EU response to the Swine Flu pandemic.

What he says:

Politicians are being courted by scientists scientists who want to be important to get money for their institutions. Scientists who just swim along in the mainstream and want their part of it [ ] And what is missing right now is a rational way of looking at things.

We should be asking questions like "How did you find out this virus was dangerous?", "How was it before?", "Didn't we have the same thing last year?", "Is it even something new?"

That's missing.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/p_AyuhbnPOI

*

Dr Joel Kettner s professor of Community Health Sciences and Surgery at Manitoba University, former Chief Public Health Officer for Manitoba province and Medical Director of the International Centre for Infectious Diseases.

What he says :

I have never seen anything like this, anything anywhere near like this. I'm not talking about the pandemic, because I've seen 30 of them, one every year. It is called influenza. And other respiratory illness viruses, we don't always know what they are. But I've never seen this reaction, and I'm trying to understand why.

[ ]

I worry about the message to the public, about the fear of coming into contact with people, being in the same space as people, shaking their hands, having meetings with people. I worry about many, many consequences related to that.

[ ]

In Hubei, in the province of Hubei, where there has been the most cases and deaths by far, the actual number of cases reported is 1 per 1000 people and the actual rate of deaths reported is 1 per 20,000. So maybe that would help to put things into perspective.

Audio Player 00:00 00:00 00:00 Use Up/Down Arrow keys to increase or decrease volume.

*

Dr John Ioannidis Professor of Medicine, of Health Research and Policy and of Biomedical Data Science, at Stanford University School of Medicine and a Professor of Statistics at Stanford University School of Humanities and Sciences. He is director of the Stanford Prevention Research Center, and co-director of the Meta-Research Innovation Center at Stanford (METRICS).

He is also the editor-in-chief of the European Journal of Clinical Investigation. He was chairman at the Department of Hygiene and Epidemiology, University of Ioannina School of Medicine as well as adjunct professor at Tufts University School of Medicine.

As a physician, scientist and author he has made contributions to evidence-based medicine, epidemiology, data science and clinical research. In addition, he pioneered the field of meta-research. He has shown that much of the published research does not meet good scientific standards of evidence.

What he says :

Patients who have been tested for SARS-CoV-2 are disproportionately those with severe symptoms and bad outcomes. As most health systems have limited testing capacity, selection bias may even worsen in the near future.

The one situation where an entire, closed population was tested was the Diamond Princess cruise ship and its quarantine passengers. The case fatality rate there was 1.0%, but this was a largely elderly population, in which the death rate from Covid-19 is much higher.

[ ]

Could the Covid-19 case fatality rate be that low? No, some say, pointing to the high rate in elderly people. However, even some so-called mild or common-cold-type coronaviruses that have been known for decades can have case fatality rates as high as 8% when they infect elderly people in nursing homes.

[ ]

If we had not known about a new virus out there, and had not checked individuals with PCR tests, the number of total deaths due to "influenza-like illness" would not seem unusual this year. At most, we might have casually noted that flu this season seems to be a bit worse than average.

– "A fiasco in the making? As the coronavirus pandemic takes hold, we are making decisions without reliable data", Stat News , 17th March 2020

*

Dr Yoram Lass is an Israeli physician, politician and former Director General of the Health Ministry. He also worked as Associate Dean of the Tel Aviv University Medical School and during the 1980s presented the science-based television show Tatzpit.

What he says :

Italy is known for its enormous morbidity in respiratory problems, more than three times any other European country. In the US about 40,000 people die in a regular flu season and so far 40-50 people have died of the coronavirus, most of them in a nursing home in Kirkland, Washington.

[ ]

In every country, more people die from regular flu compared with those who die from the coronavirus.

[ ]

there is a very good example that we all forget: the swine flu in 2009. That was a virus that reached the world from Mexico and until today there is no vaccination against it. But what? At that time there was no Facebook or there maybe was but it was still in its infancy. The coronavirus, in contrast, is a virus with public relations.

Whoever thinks that governments end viruses is wrong.

– Interview in Globes , March 22nd 2020

*

Dr Pietro Vernazza is a Swiss physician specialising Infectious Diseases at the Cantonal Hospital St. Gallen and Professor of Health Policy.

What he says:

We have reliable figures from Italy and a work by epidemiologists, which has been published in the renowned science journal ‹Science›, which examined the spread in China. This makes it clear that around 85 percent of all infections have occurred without anyone noticing the infection. 90 percent of the deceased patients are verifiably over 70 years old, 50 percent over 80 years.

[ ]

In Italy, one in ten people diagnosed die, according to the findings of the Science publication, that is statistically one of every 1,000 people infected. Each individual case is tragic, but often – similar to the flu season – it affects people who are at the end of their lives.

[ ]

If we close the schools, we will prevent the children from quickly becoming immune.

[ ]

We should better integrate the scientific facts into the political decisions.

– Interview in St. Galler Tagblatt , 22nd March 2020

*

Frank Ulrich Montgomery is German radiologist, former President of the German Medical Association and Deputy Chairman of the World Medical Association.

What he says :

I'm not a fan of lockdown. Anyone who imposes something like this must also say when and how to pick it up again. Since we have to assume that the virus will be with us for a long time, I wonder when we will return to normal? You can't keep schools and daycare centers closed until the end of the year. Because it will take at least that long until we have a vaccine. Italy has imposed a lockdown and has the opposite effect. They quickly reached their capacity limits, but did not slow down the virus spread within the lockdown.

– Interview in General Anzeiger , 18th March 2020

*

Prof. Hendrik Streeck is a German HIV researcher, epidemiologist and clinical trialist. He is professor of virology, and the director of the Institute of Virology and HIV Research, at Bonn University.

What he says :

The new pathogen is not that dangerous, it is even less dangerous than Sars-1. The special thing is that Sars-CoV-2 replicates in the upper throat area and is therefore much more infectious because the virus jumps from throat to throat, so to speak. But that is also an advantage: Because Sars-1 replicates in the deep lungs, it is not so infectious, but it definitely gets on the lungs, which makes it more dangerous.

[ ]

You also have to take into account that the Sars-CoV-2 deaths in Germany were exclusively old people. In Heinsberg, for example, a 78-year-old man with previous illnesses died of heart failure, and that without Sars-2 lung involvement. Since he was infected, he naturally appears in the Covid 19 statistics. But the question is whether he would not have died anyway, even without Sars-2.

– Interview in Frankfurter Allgemeine , 16th March 2020

*

Dr Yanis Roussel et. al. – A team of researchers from the Institut Hospitalo-universitaire Méditerranée Infection, Marseille and the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Marseille, conducting a peer-reviewed study on Coronavirus mortality for the government of France under the 'Investments for the Future' programme.

What they say :

The problem of SARS-CoV-2 is probably overestimated, as 2.6 million people die of respiratory infections each year compared with less than 4000 deaths for SARS-CoV-2 at the time of writing.

[ ]

This study compared the mortality rate of SARS-CoV-2 in OECD countries (1.3%) with the mortality rate of common coronaviruses identified in AP-HM patients (0.8%) from 1 January 2013 to 2 March 2020. Chi-squared test was performed, and the P-value was 0.11 (not significant).

[ ]

it should be noted that systematic studies of other coronaviruses (but not yet for SARS-CoV-2) have found that the percentage of asymptomatic carriers is equal to or even higher than the percentage of symptomatic patients. The same data for SARS-CoV-2 may soon be available, which will further reduce the relative risk associated with this specific pathology.

– "SARS-CoV-2: fear versus data", International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents , 19th March 2020

*

Dr. David Katz is an American physician and founding director of the Yale University Prevention Research Center

What he says :

I am deeply concerned that the social, economic and public health consequences of this near-total meltdown of normal life -- schools and businesses closed, gatherings banned -- will be long-lasting and calamitous, possibly graver than the direct toll of the virus itself. The stock market will bounce back in time, but many businesses never will. The unemployment, impoverishment and despair likely to result will be public health scourges of the first order.

– "Is Our Fight Against Coronavirus Worse Than the Disease?", New York Times 20th March 2020

*

Michael T. Osterholm is regents professor and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.

What he says :

Consider the effect of shutting down offices, schools, transportation systems, restaurants, hotels, stores, theaters, concert halls, sporting events and other venues indefinitely and leaving all of their workers unemployed and on the public dole. The likely result would be not just a depression but a complete economic breakdown, with countless permanently lost jobs, long before a vaccine is ready or natural immunity takes hold.

[ ]

[T]he best alternative will probably entail letting those at low risk for serious disease continue to work, keep business and manufacturing operating, and "run" society, while at the same time advising higher-risk individuals to protect themselves through physical distancing and ramping up our health-care capacity as aggressively as possible. With this battle plan, we could gradually build up immunity without destroying the financial structure on which our lives are based.

– "Facing covid-19 reality: A national lockdown is no cure", Washington Post 21st March 2020

*

Dr Peter Goetzsche is Professor of Clinical Research Design and Analysis at the University of Copenhagen and founder of the Cochrane Medical Collaboration. He has written several books on corruption in the field of medicine and the power of big pharmaceutical companies.

What he says :

Our main problem is that no one will ever get in trouble for measures that are too draconian. They will only get in trouble if they do too little. So, our politicians and those working with public health do much more than they should do.

No such draconian measures were applied during the 2009 influenza pandemic, and they obviously cannot be applied every winter, which is all year round, as it is always winter somewhere. We cannot close down the whole world permanently.

Should it turn out that the epidemic wanes before long, there will be a queue of people wanting to take credit for this. And we can be damned sure draconian measures will be applied again next time. But remember the joke about tigers. "Why do you blow the horn?" "To keep the tigers away." "But there are no tigers here." "There you see!"

– "Corona: an epidemic of mass panic", blog post on Deadly Medicines 21st March 2020


Gary Wilson ,

What happened in Wuhan will eventually happen everywhere. Any new pathogen will rapidly spread in the susceptible population (those with some degree of a compromised immune system). After a period there will be no more susceptible people left to infect and the disease will disappear. Government regulations to prevent the spread is of no use if someone infected with the pathogen can infect others before they get the symptoms that they have the disease. Lots of money is spent fighting the virus (there is money to be made!) while no money is spent to improve the immune system of those people with weakened immune systems.

fred ,

Btw, the only major sporting event still going on right now is the Chess Candidates Tournament (which is a qualification for the World Championship) taking place in Yekaterinburg, Russia. (Which has freezing temperatures right now and is covered in snow.)

Players get a health check up twice daily, but are not tested for the coronavirus specifically. This means that if any one of the players gets a cold or mild temperature: coronavirus!

Therefore I expect the tournament to be halted mid-way any day now. (Also if one of the players feels like the tournament is not going well, or that his preparation is not working, they might pretend to be sick to get the tournament postponed.)

https://www.chess.com/news/view/coronavirus-testing-at-fide-candidates-chess-tournament

Norman Pilon ,

BTW: is that 12 or 13 experts?

fred ,

Tokyo 2020: Olympic and Paralympic Games postponed because of coronavirus (was scheduled for 24 July in Japan)
Chess Olympiad postponed (was scheduled for August 5-17 in Russia)
UEFA postpones EURO 2020 (was scheduled for June/July)

Norman Pilon ,

Nice! You've saved me and a lot of other people a lot of time. Of course, I'm also sharing this through the miracle of 'copying-and-pasting.'

Doctortrinate ,

oh, yeah – lets blitz those oppressive nasties !

there's nothing greater than you and me .Love will conquer if you just believe .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WmPeLOLDnA

Jen ,

Dear Off-Guardian,

You may be well aware that the Australian Federal government is at loggerheads with New South Wales and Victorian state governments over the issue of closing all schools.

The state governments prefer that all schools be closed while Canberra is receiving advice from Dr Brendan Murphy, Chief Health Officer of Australia, that schools not be closed because children would be at more risk of picking up COVID-19 from adults at home, and from congregating in areas where they are not being supervised by adults if they decide not to stay at home for various reasons (because among other things they would also be at risk from domestic violence).

Please find at this link an article which among other things gives the opinions of various medical and health experts who oppose the closure of schools during the current lock-downs here in Australia.

An example of such advice from the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee:

The AHPPC met on Tuesday 17 March to consider the issue of school closures in relation to the community transmission of COVID‑19. The Committee's advice is that pre-emptive closures are not proportionate or effective as a public health intervention to prevent community transmission of COVID-19 at this time Previous studies suggest that the potential reduction in community transmission from pre‑emptive school closures may be offset by the care arrangements that are in place for children who are not at school. Children may require care from older carers who are more vulnerable to severe disease, or may continue to associate (and transmit infection) outside of school settings. Broadly, the health evidence on school closures from previous respiratory epidemics shows the costs are often underestimated and the benefits are overestimated. This may be even more so in relation to COVID-19 as, unlike influenza, the impact on otherwise healthy children has been minimal to date. School closure is associated with considerable costs. Studies have estimated that around 15% of the total workforce and 30% of the healthcare workforce may need to take time off work to care for children. This burden will be significant and will fall disproportionately on those in casual or tenuous work circumstances. At this stage, the spread of COVID-19 in the community is at quite low levels. It may be many months before the level of Australian community infection is again as low as it is at the moment More than 70 countries around the world have implemented either nationwide or localised school closures, at different times in the evolution of the local COVID-19 epidemic, however it should be noted the majority of these have not been successful in controlling the outbreak. Some of these countries are now considering their position in relation to re-opening schools. Singapore has had success in limiting the transmission of COVID-19 in the community without closing schools" [however the successful period in Singapore coincided with school holidays and when students returned they were temperature-tested ]

Antonym ,

This cure is worse than the disease, true.

Governments made lock downs in haste, erring on the heavy handed side just to be "sure". Who can prove them wrong afterwards? The voters.

Airplanes have been the worse spreaders.

Some religious preachers have shown to be immune to public self isolate calls in Asia.

Maybe a good Global practice run for when a really deadly virus breaks loose?

Let East Asian and central African wildlife wet markets be forbidden and enforced with long jail and financial sentences.

Virus Guy ,

Nonsense. It was not in haste or error. No government is going to hastily shut down its economy out of too much tender concern for its citizens, and we have teams of analysts and advisors on infectious disease working for governments who would never have advised this insane level of 'precautions ' for a moderate coronavirus showing no evidence of extreme infectivity or fatality.

As in China the reaction has anticipated a non-existent problem and then gone beyond any accepted protocol to 'respond.' This has all the hallmarks of an entirely manufactured crisis.

Virus Guy ,

Please don't feel brainwashed into taking totally unnecessary extra precautions beyond normal levels of hygiene in order to protect yourself from a common coronavirus.

fred ,

[Potential False-Positive Rate Among the 'Asymptomatic Infected Individuals' in Close Contacts of COVID-19 Patients] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32133832/?fbclid=IwAR1x58i9MUS16isOtdzAOJHr1TZNpVz4kw-6S5mtyRG_MUg3XVK_RajavAI

Results: When the infection rate of the close contacts and the sensitivity and specificity of reported results were taken as the point estimates, the positive predictive value of the active screening was only 19.67%, in contrast, the false-positive rate of positive results was 80.33%. The multivariate-probabilistic sensitivity analysis results supported the base-case findings, with a 75% probability for the false-positive rate of positive results over 47%. Conclusions: In the close contacts of COVID-19 patients, nearly half or even more of the 'asymptomatic infected individuals' reported in the active nucleic acid test screening might be false positives.

Gary Weglarz ,

The behavior of elites across the globe suggest a level of collective anxiety not seen in before in my lifetime. Certainly endless decades of oligarchic control maintained through keeping Western populations mystified by means of coordinated mass propaganda – has seen rather significant cracks develop through the emergence of progressive independent journalism shared across the world via the web. One would think those ever widening cracks in the indoctrination system have perhaps clarified for our betters that their fairy tales are falling upon ever greater numbers of deaf ears around the globe.

Given currently unfolding events one is tempted to think that elites – perhaps rather than being left to respond to events completely out of their control – like a system-crashing spontaneous economic collapse – are collectively choosing to instead to – "control what they can" – through this supposed 'pandemic' response operation.

That is to initiate a prefabricated "response" – proactively to a projected impending system catastrophe that is only a matter of time. Or perhaps this is simply a "testing operation," a "dry run" so to speak for when the uncontrollable event that crashes the system does take place. A chance to gauge public reactions and further fine tune future response options?

That this over the top elite led pandemic response appears an effort to lead the credulous masses into whatever straightjacket has been prepared for us is simply impossible to ignore.

Gary Weglarz ,

On the breathtaking clairvoyance of our wealthiest elites:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/QA183AnUxMM?version=3&rel=1&fs=1&autohide=2&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&wmode=transparent

fred ,

youtube.com/watch?v=lUXHB5U-Vl4

Croach ,

And here we have it.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/weeklyprovisionalfiguresondeathsregisteredinenglandandwales

Slight uptick in overall registered deaths although still below average for this time of year. But they've omitted the figures for deaths where the underlying cause was respiratory illness. I can think of no legitimate reason why they would do so.

These are registered deaths, everybody knows they don't represent the true current number of deaths.

There is no legitimate rationale for 'waiting for more accurate data' or any such excuse. Even if the data is incomplete it's published. It's a registry of deaths not an adjusted death rate.

I really can't keep a sense of humour about this. Or take any satisfaction from 'knowing better' or 'I told you so'. I thought what was happening now would be a process of years. I don't expect sites like this will survive very long, regardless of how fringe or maligned they are.

I'd like to say invest in printing presses. But it's probably too late for that now.

fred ,

So on the one hand we get: "Don't travel! Close the borders! Stop the virus!"
And on the other:
Government tells New Zealanders to come home
US government tells citizens to come home
Australia tells citizens to come home
Canadians abroad urged to come home
Norway urges citizens to return home

Does this not contradict their own narrative? Does this not show how it's all bullshit?

Donna ,

Excellent post! Thank you.

We have a new religion sweeping over the Earth claiming new adherents in nearly every country! 😄
https://www.maravipost.com/covid-19-and-common-sense-religion/

Terje Maloy ,

The cat is slowly being let out of the bag Recently leaked (or unofficially released) Norwegian government papers says the Corona measures are expected to be in place for 12 to 18 months, not just for a few weeks. Presumably it will be the same in as good as every (NATO)-country.

The emergency laws introduced in Norway are conspicuously similar to a highly unusual law proposal for increased government powers in case of a civil emergency from September 2019, now they have been rushed through parliament.

paul ,

Don't worry, folks, pandemics are profitable.
Bezos dumped $3 billion of stock just before the crash.
Makes Feinstein's paltry $6 million look like chump change.

Boeing want $60 billion, the airlines want $50 billion (for starters), $150 billion for hotels, a trillion or so for shopping malls. A few billion here, a few billion there, and pretty soon you're talking serious oney.
$3 trillion to date, but have patience, it's early days yet.

We can all rest easy.
The billionaires will emerge with their wealth more than doubled, just like last time.
Certainly puts my mind at rest.

Savorywill ,

We can rest easy because the government will just print more money. Plenty to go around! Every one gets $3000 plus insurance covers their absent paychecks, so everything is back to normal, money wise, and no one has to do anything. This can probably go on forever, until trucking companies also go out of business, so no food or supplies can be transported into NYC, and then the shit will well and truly hit the fan. I don't think AOC's green new deal will be of much use in such a situation But, hopefully, it won't come to that.

xdream ,

Somewhere further down this thread somebody used the word:

Plandemic.

Could I suggest another variant on this theme a mutant perhaps:

Scamdemic.

[Mar 25, 2020] Now that the panic's been hyped up, there's no way out. For reasons of how democracy works, the panic will be appeased

When experts directly or indirectly have monetary interest in certain outcome they are not expect, they are lobbyists.
Mar 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

AaronInMVD says: Website Show Comment March 24, 2020 at 12:01 am GMT 100 Words @Anon For reasons of math and historic examples of how viral pandemics work in mammals, the fastest way out would be to do nothing and ignore the virus so that it burns through quickly. This happens with surprising frequency when the folks picking strain for the year's flu vaccine guess wrong. And, no business is non-essential to the people depending on it for their livelihood. So far Most people getting sick with the COVID-19 get unpleasantly sick or don't realize they were sick. 99% of the fatalities are in the morbidly old or morbidly ill.

Now that the panic's been hyped up, there's no way out. For reasons of how democracy works, the panic will be appeased. Expensively. Very Expensively.

More will suffer and experience pre-mature mortality due to the economic consequences of the panic than than virus itself, because the economic damage here is going to last far longer.

[Mar 25, 2020] Chinese government services personnel had been redeployed into affected areeas and was put in roles far from their usual ranges of expertise. He saw a woman giving instructions to medical personnel on how to wear medical gowns. He assumed she herself was a doctor; she turned out to be a receptionist.

Mar 25, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jen , Mar 25 2020 0:27 utc | 117

Arby @ 114:

I was reading an article in a specialist medical newspaper at the doctor's surgery this morning while waiting to pick up my blood test results. The article was written by a doctor who was part of an Australian medical delegation visiting China recently. Among other things the doctor mentioned was that government services personnel had been redeployed into other areas away from their usual ranges of expertise. He saw a woman giving instructions to medical personnel on how to wear medical gowns. He assumed she herself was a doctor; she turned out to be a receptionist.

[Mar 25, 2020] Sun helps but not absolutly

Mar 25, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

TJ , Mar 23 2020 21:02 utc | 67

@54 Per/Norway

" The second thing that's good about it is the sun. Ultraviolet light kills viruses."

The disease is spreading in the southern hemisphere which is in summer with much higher UV just as rapidly as the northern hemisphere which is in winter with much less UV. So the data at least in this case says no. BTW she retired in 2008, and she seems to have done some impressive work in the past, though as they say in the small print of adverts for investments, past performance is no predictor of future performance.

[Mar 24, 2020] In Italy the median age of those dying of the coronavirus is 81 and the population is very old and frail and smokes more. Most of the dead are men

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Arby , Mar 24 2020 7:16 utc | 185

"Italy is known for its enormous morbidity in respiratory problems, more than three times any other European country. In the US about 40,000 people die in a regular flu season and so far 40-50 people have died of the coronavirus, most of them in a nursing home in Kirkland, Washington."

"The characteristics in every country are different. In Italy the median age of those dying of the coronavirus is 81 and the population is very old and frail and smokes more and among the dead are more men." - Professor Yoram Lass / https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-lockdown-lunacy-1001322696

[Mar 24, 2020] Exaggerated case fatality rate is not based on evidence. The evidence point out to mortality around 0.2 percent

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , Mar 24 2020 1:34 utc | 128

Exaggerated case fatality rate (CFR):

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/eci.13223

European Journal of Clinical Investigation
"Coronavirus disease 2019: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measure
John P.A. Ioannidis
First published: 19 March 2020


Early reported CFR figures seem exaggerated.

The most widely quoted CFR has been 3.4%, reported by WHO dividing the number of deaths by documented cases in early March.

This ignores undetected infections and the strong age-dependence of CFR. The most complete data come from Diamond Princess passengers, with CFR=1% observed in an elderly cohort; thus, CFR may be much lower than 1% in the general population; probably higher than seasonal flu (CFR=0.1%), but not much so.

Observed crude CFR in South Korea and in Germany, , the countries with most extensive testing, is 0.9% and 0.2%, respectively as of March 14 and crude CFR in Scandinavian countries is about 0.1%. Some deaths of infected, seriously ill people will occur later, and these deaths have not been counted yet. However even in these countries many infections probably remain undiagnosed. Therefore, CFR may be even lower rather than higher than these crude estimate

[Mar 24, 2020] A 2016 Johns Hopkins study concluded that 250,000 Americans die annually from medical negligence. And that's just mortality; imagine the morbidity.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

SafeNow , says: Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 4:25 am GMT

I posted this before but it bears posting again. A 2016 Johns Hopkins study concluded that 250,000 Americans die annually from medical negligence. And that's just mortality; imagine the morbidity.

Long waits for short appointments. Protective, sanctimonious medical front offices. A lifetime of frustrating, humiliating, frightening fighting for access. If a presidential candidate made a promise to double the number of physicians, starting right now, he would be elected in a landslide. Sure, it would take seven years before this kicked in. But start right now. For this coming fall semester, the medical schools need only to have more seats.

As long as I am talking about laws that nearly everyone would support .about those leaf blowers

[Mar 24, 2020] China on Jan 22 had 571 case and on Feb 1 14,308 cases while the US on March 8 had 541 cases and it reached 13,789 cases on March 19. So US is about 45 days behind China

Mar 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

Philip Owen , says: Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 5:43 pm GMT

@Ron Unz Wrong!

We know from the Diamond Princess and now the Costa Luminosa that SARS-CoV-2 is not extremely contagious.

17% of the people on the DP were infected, half without symptoms (perhaps even false positives -- the jury is out). 52 from 3711 (1.4 %) became critically ill or died.

On the CL 74 (known to be an overcount, in a shared cabin both were counted as critical) from 1471 (5% or less) became critically ill or died according to current information.

So, in cases of 100% population exposure, or as close as it will be in this world we see 1 to 5% critically ill (assuming a consistent definition of critically ill).

They could easily be lost in the everyday winter flu statistics in the US. The deaths from vaping are a key clue.

utu , says: Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 7:08 pm GMT
@Philip Owen "not extremely contagious" -- You are making a wrong conclusion. Passengers on Diamond Princess were isolated in their cabins. Passengers who tested positive were taken out of the ship to military hospital in Japan. Diamond Princess was not a peri dish! The epidemic was arrested there and stopped.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/trapped-on-virus-ravaged-cruise-ship-shocked-passengers-struggle-to-keep-spirits-up/2020/02/05/6fbae50c-47d3-11ea-91ab-ce439aa5c7c1_story.html

" passengers who tested positive [ ] have been transferred to hospitals "

"For those left on board, there is nothing to do but sit in their cabins, wait for meals to be delivered, watch television or choose from a limited selection of movies on demand. Those lucky enough to have a balcony can at least sit in the sun, look at the ocean and talk to their neighbors."

[Mar 24, 2020] Why the neoliberal media reports death from COVID-19 in Las Vegas but not death caused by Type A flu

Mar 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

Carlton Meyer , says: Website Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 4:23 am GMT

After 9-11, the Feds surveyed hospitals to determine if they were prepared to handle extreme emergencies where they couldn't handle the patient load and were forced to triage and delay treatments. They learned that most hospitals were already overwhelmed every Friday and Saturday night, and many were unable to handle the demand every night. So the photos, videos, and reports of packed emergency rooms and hospitals unable to properly handle COVID-19 cases is normal.

News from my blog:

Mar 22, 2020 – Coronavirus Hoax?

I am no medical expert but can check stats. Take a look at the flu stats at the Southern Nevada Health District (aka Las Vegas metro area).
http://media.southernnevadahealthdistrict.org/download/epi/influenza/2019-2020/Influenza-Weekly-10.pdf

As of March 7th, the flu has killed 39 people while news reports that one died from the COVID-19 virus. The Type A flu killed 28, or 28 times more than the COVID-19 virus. Updated stats should appear this week, but the media reported a second death from COVID-19 in Las Vegas, with no mention of the others killed by Type A flu. I expect COVID-19 deaths to rise quickly, but will be surprised if they exceed the Type A flu deaths.

[Mar 24, 2020] Italian medics are doing military triaging and medical workers are about to collapse.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

John Johnson , says: Show Comment March 24, 2020 at 3:47 am GMT

@AaronInMVD Yes, being sick sucks. Just would many of these people who are sick and suffering have gone to the hospital if it wasn't for the damned panic.

In Italy the hospitals are completely overwhelmed and it has nothing to do with panic.

They are doing military triaging and medical workers are about to collapse. They have more hospital beds per capita than the US so we definitely don't want to end up like them.

In the US there are probably people showing up at hospitals for tests but that is the fault of the government (including Democrats) for not getting enough tests ready. Even today there aren't enough tests and it is unlikely they will meet demand within weeks if not months.

Democrats are blaming Trump but they were the ones calling travel bans racist and they didn't have anything to say about tests when it was starting to spread two months ago. They were focused on the primary and getting rid of Bernie.

[Mar 24, 2020] #Coronavirus - Israeli Defense Minister Gives A Speech

His main advice is to separate old people from young and wait until young people will be immune to the virus.
Mar 24, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Georgios Paraskeva , 1 day ago

'' want it or not the rest of the population is gonna get the Coronavirus''...wow !!! you are are sooo sure about it ...i bet you know thinks that we don't , probably you knew this since last year

Devrat1 , 2 days ago

Very informative .. Thank you and I agree almost totally.. only thing that I find is an error is immunity to virus. Immunity will be there with young and active people. The virus can still be transmitted. Older generation will continue to be susceptible to the virus unless we have a medicine for corona virus.

Valkyrie angel , 15 hours ago

Haha No grandma hugs grandson.. once the epidemic over grandma and grandpa come out... its way so light to express... cute..

[Mar 24, 2020] Most humans were busy working and stay afoot to question what network TV the fishwraps told them about 911 or coronavirus. The level of detachment from reality due intensive tabloid indoctrination is simply amazing.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

A User , Mar 24 2020 8:29 utc | 194

FFS can we stop with the endless debate about who did what to whom in the early days of this virus' existence?
Not only are such debates entirely pointless because it is out among us now, it is pointless because whether they want it or not a full investigation including non-fiction backtrace is inevitable if we the people who look past the lies, play our cards right.

It has been said that like 911 the coronavirus pandemic will be a game-changer, that is the world will be different after the lockdowns, lies and beat ups than it was before.

There is however one major difference. Most humans were busy working and looking to keep their families going to do more than lap up what network TV & the fishwraps told them about 911. The far from reality attitudes too many still hold, date from that intensive tabloid indoctrination.

This time is pretty much opposite, people are stuck at home with too much time to think, but not enough they believe they can do.

If ever there was a time when it was possible to assist our fellow humans to see the world as it is rather than how the media tells them it is, that time is right now.

Many humans are already pissed about this; plans they had made for their 2020 are kyboshed, no one really trusts politicians anymore so everyone is asking themselves if this enforced income cut is really as essential as the pols claim it is(sure some nations have trickled a little down for the durationbut even there no one is gonna be better off, everyone normal is going to be copping an income cut).
That means most people are going to be somewhat resistant to the usual bland pol platitudes.
Have no fear the neolibs see the danger and will be pumping out the bulldust 24/7, the difference this time is Jo/Joe Blow finally has the time to consider other points of view, especially those which are expressed entertainingly rather than didactically, so WTF are people wasting time and energy arguing the toss about matters of interest to so few other humans?

I'm germinating a notion of what I am going to try to combat the tosh being pumped out by the elite it would be great if other humans considered the same as I'm certain most will come up with far better means to help others see than what I dream up.

[Mar 24, 2020] An argument to be made that we are destroying economies and lives (and possibly killing far more people than Covid-19) in an hysterical over-reaction based on flawed modelling and sparse and unreliable data?...

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Allen | Mar 23 2020 20:33 utc | 55

Allen , Mar 24 2020 1:29 utc | 127
(Coronavirus is a fake emergency))

I've also pondered the question of whether the 'cure' is worse than the 'disease' in net/overall effect. However, it's important to remember that the reason the pandemic has been declared an emergency IN EVERY COUNTRY, whether Commie or Fake Democracy, is that it's making people sick enough to require hospital treatment. And these patients are ADDITIONAL patients which the health system hadn't planned for. When the flood of COVID-19 patients eases, then hospitals will return to normal levels of bed vacancy - nationwide.

For your preferred theory to be true, it would be necessary to prove that many, or most, of these extra patients are faking the seriousness of their illness AND the medics are too uneducated/inexperienced to tell the difference. You'd probably also have to prove that there are lots of people would rather be in hospital, pretending to be sick, than anywhere but hospital...

Italy had an excess number of deaths attributed to influenza of 25,000 in the 2016/17 season, the last year numbers are available, what we are seeing at present is not an aberration from recent years as that 16/17 season was representative of recent trends. This is directly as a result of the severely degraded environment in which they live. As others have pointed out both the air and water quality in that region is horrendous- as it has become in recent years in Wuhan, Madrid and Tehran. One has to be beyond obstinate not to understand this and connect the dots.

At present there is great uncertainty as to deaths from Covid versus deaths with Covid. In some reporting Covid deaths were identified using a case definition that included pulmonary disease e.g

This distinction is crucial as it points to causal factors that allowed the virus to replicate, to flourish- and disputes the narrative that the corona virus (which BTW is decidedly not novel only this mutation is which brings us to another discussion) is the causal factor. The causal factors are the specific modes of production that created horrendous living conditions in these areas to begin with (most of the planet by now) which have destroyed people's abilities (immune system e.g.) to ward off disease.

By focusing solely on the corona virus and considering it to be the causal factor this allows the capitalist class off the hook for being the very ones who have created the conditions for all sorts of diseases to proliferate. Further by keeping the focus solely on corona history tells us that the capitalists will not only use this for any draconian measures they deem "essential" but also a means to explore all manner of profiteering- the "next magic cure" (for the disease they created) being the most obvious pot of gold.

If you want to pursue a more analytical line of inquiry start by examining the severely degraded air quality in Madrid, Wuhan, Tehran and the Po River Valley and the accompanying health problems in those areas and start connecting some dots.

Some links:

Richard , Mar 24 2020 7:08 utc | 183

In the flu season 2015/2016, Italy reported 20,259 deaths attributable to influenza (just as now, these were almost all in the 65+ age group). (Source: Journal of Infectious Diseases)...and nobody proposed shutting down the world then. If it's now being suggested the virus has been around since November then the numbers don't add up even more (i.e. Italy's Covid-19 deaths so far are around the 6,000 mark which would make the virus far less deadly than the 2015/16 flu).

Is there not an argument to be made (as says John P.A. Ioannidis -- professor of medicine and professor of epidemiology and population health at Stanford University) that we are destroying economies and lives (and possibly killing far more people than Covid-19) in an hysterical over-reaction based on flawed modelling and sparse and unreliable data?...

https://richardhennerley.com/2020/03/23/enough-of-the-coronavirus-doom-porn-already/

Hoarsewhisperer , Mar 24 2020 7:11 utc | 184

Posted by: Allen | Mar 23 2020 20:33 utc | 55

[Mar 24, 2020] Push back against virus fearmongering

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

SharonM , Mar 24 2020 1:41 utc | 129

@97 Richard Steven Hack

"The number of idiots everywhere on the Internet proclaiming the following:
1) The virus won't prove to be any more dangerous than ordinary flu..."

Yeah sure, we should have just shut up and believed...

Russia interfered in the election
Russia invaded Crimea
Russia invaded Georgia
Iran is making nuclear bombs
The Skripals were poisoned by Russian agents
Assad is using chemical weapons
Saddam has weapons of mass destruction

"etc, etc., ad nauseum.
I could go on and on. The number of people who just *have to have an opinion* is staggering. And they'll argue that they're right until the cows come home."

@99 Michael Weddington

"The virus deniers here remind me of the global warming deniers."

Why not holocaust deniers? In fact, since you didn't say holocaust deniers you must be an antisemite holocaust denier nazi, right? It's not like you two are at CNN's website, you're in the alternative media, where we actually questions things instead of just having blind faith.

[Mar 24, 2020] She is at a private hospital and this is at the public hospital. no medical staff working with this patient wore protective gear.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Mar 24 2020 2:13 utc | 140

Talking to my daughter this morning. Husband and wife returns from overseas. No testing an quarantine for people coming . They go home do whatever, husband feels a bit crook, tests positive for coronavirus. Hospitalized, on a ventilated and will soon die. She is at a private hospital and this is at the public hospital. no medical staff working with this patient wore protective gear.
I had thought we where following China closely on dealing with this but man was I wrong. Total fuckwits collecting seashells on the seashore as the tsunami approaches.
Sent my daughter links to the pdf handbook put out by the Chinese doctors who worked on the frontlines. Covers PPE and much else. She is now passing it around to the other nurses.
Doctors in Australia had started using chloroquine if they could not obtain other antivirals. Apparently the government has now stopped them from doing this.

[Mar 24, 2020] A case story of two female 29 year old Chinese health workers, one survives, one dies.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Vig , Mar 24 2020 6:52 utc | 180

Pundita's here is a case story of two female 29 year old Chinese health workers, one survives, one dies.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/03/13/world/asia/coronavirus-death-life.html

[Mar 24, 2020] So why should people who already see a max of 5 persons a week be under house arrest? Masks are evidently a solution

Notable quotes:
"... Instead the French authorities are now trying to prepare people for work by saying that people should not go out at all because when they do they touch the left button, the doors etc. ..."
"... They can just wear gloves and clean up whatever they touch with alcohol, no? Why aren't such cheap things not distributed widely, household by household? ..."
Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Mina , Mar 24 2020 9:54 utc | 200

Another interesting feature of the shock strategy currently applied is that until planes and trains and stadiums were not plugged off, one can imagine that the virus was spreading on a much bigger scale than without these going on as usual.

So why should people who already see a max of 5 persons a week (close enough) be under house arrest? masks are evidently a solution.

Instead the French authorities are now trying to prepare people for work by saying that people should not go out at all because when they do they touch the left button, the doors etc.

But what of asking people for responsibility?

They can just wear gloves and clean up whatever they touch with alcohol, no? Why aren't such cheap things not distributed widely, household by household?

The French are doing worse because they have no community planning, unlike Belgium, the Netherlands, the UK and other northern countries. I haven't heard anyone on French media say that the municipalities or district social centres could play a role in better mapping the needs.

It seems to be entirely on the shoulders of our super-centralized gov and the hospitals! With the results we see (and we are actually doing not so bad: 5 % of the positive seem to die, vs 10% in Spain and Italy -using the figures given here

https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest)

[Mar 24, 2020] COVID-19 Symptoms Could Include Loss Of Smell And Taste

Mar 24, 2020 | www.youtube.com

There's growing concern among health officials about so called silent spreaders, people who are infected with the coronavirus, but aren't sick. Now some UK doctors say there may be a clue to who's carrying it and they want the loss of smell and taste added to the list of symptoms.

[Mar 24, 2020] Jack Ma placed a message on Twitter regarding availability of a Handbook related to Coronavirus for medical workers and anyone else who is interested.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Tom_LX , Mar 24 2020 7:01 utc | 182

Jack Ma placed a message on Twitter regarding availability of a Handbook related to Coronavirus for medical workers and anyone else who is interested.

Jack Ma Handbook

[Mar 24, 2020] NYT reports that loss of sense of smll night be an important symptom that you are infected with the corornovirus

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

blues , Mar 24 2020 4:32 utc | 165

This may be an important new clue:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ //
Lost Sense of Smell May Be Peculiar Clue to Coronavirus Infection
The New York Times - March 22, 2020

A mother who was infected with the coronavirus couldn't smell her baby's full diaper. Cooks who can usually name every spice in a restaurant dish can't smell curry or garlic, and food tastes bland. Others say they can't pick up the sweet scent of shampoo or the foul odor of kitty litter.

Anosmia, the loss of sense of smell, and ageusia, an accompanying diminished sense of taste, have emerged as peculiar telltale signs of Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, and possible markers of infection.

On Friday, British ear, nose and throat doctors, citing reports from colleagues around the world, called on adults who lose their senses of smell to isolate themselves for seven days, even if they have no other symptoms, to slow the disease's spread. The published data is limited, but doctors are concerned enough to raise warnings.
// ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Mar 24, 2020] Half Of All Americans Have Been Ordered To 'Stay At Home' As More Countries Impose Mass Quarantines To Fight COVID-19

Notable quotes:
"... This is specifically about coronavirus testing. In fact, CDC very much screwed up -- its test had a contaminated assay, the negative control, which made it unusable. ..."
Mar 24, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

By CNN's count, at least 13 states and 13 municipalities in the US have ordered 144,522,931 people to stay home as a result of the pandemic, according to data compiled by CNN using US Census population estimates.

Update (1324ET): President Trump on Tuesday once again tried to deny that his administration dropped the ball on the coronavirus response, while saying he would like to see the country re-open by Easter.

Of course, the CDC's botched handling of the tests has been well-documented, and the fact that nobody in the administration acting to overule the CDC and start stockpiling tests from elsewhere might be remembered as one of the administration's biggest screwups in handling the crisis.

Trump: "We did not screw up."

This is specifically about coronavirus testing. In fact, CDC very much screwed up -- its test had a contaminated assay, the negative control, which made it unusable.

World Health Organization offered us test it had been using in China.

We refused.

-- Alexander Nazaryan (@alexnazaryan) March 24, 2020

[Mar 24, 2020] Exponencial growth of the virus is not susptainable

Notable quotes:
"... "We showed that it was precisely the patients with the most acute symptoms who are the most infectious, both because of the high viral load [meaning, the amount of a virus in one's body] and also because of the increase in the number of encounters between people: The acute patients were dying, so everyone came to take their leave from them," Yamin says. "I was pleased that Liberia adopted our recommendations and isolated those who were seriously ill. In retrospect, we know that that new policy helped curb the epidemic." ..."
"... the coronavirus can be expected to disappear from this region with the same dizzying speed with which it entered our lives ..."
"... But in practice, the most rapid mutations occur in animals, and they only infect us then, and obviously it's less probable that we will be infected again by a bat in the near future. ..."
"... "The actual number of people who are sick with the virus in South Korea is at least double what's being reported, so the chance of dying is at least twice as low, standing at about 0.45 percent – very far from the World Health Organization's [global mortality] figure of 3.4 percent. And that's already a reason for cautious optimism." ..."
"... "And Netanyahu talked about a mortality rate of between 2 percent and 4 percent. And do you know what's most absurd? That in the final analysis [U.S. President Donald] Trump was right . Not that the coronavirus is just plain flu – it absolutely isn't – but as he put it: 'This is just my hunch – way under 1 percent' [will die].' ..."
"... At some stage, we will have to resume a regular routine, and then the R0 will stabilize at 2 again. Effectively, we are delaying the inevitable. I have no criticism of the decisions made until now. On the contrary: With such a large area of uncertainty, Israel's decision makers are considering not only a reasonable scenario but also a margin of safety. ..."
"... "It's not only a function of hygiene, it's mainly a function of contact between people. Picture the average old person. How many different people does he encounter in a day? And what is the nature of those encounters? The older we get, the less we caress and kiss others. Also, children constitute the only age group that comes into contact with all other age groups – not just theirs. That's why it is the key population in spreading respiratory diseases." ..."
Mar 24, 2020 | www.haaretz.com

Dr. Yamin is an engineer, not a physician. But in 2008, when he was a graduate student at Ben-Gurion University in Be'er Sheva, a certain research study caught his eye.

"It was an analysis of a dynamic model for the spread of smallpox," Yamin, 38, says. "The researchers used tools from game theory. It was so interesting that I decided to conduct a similar study on influenza – which turned into a doctoral thesis on disease-spread models.

"If, 40 or 50 years ago, epidemiology researchers came exclusively from the field of medicine, today we understand that in order to predict the spread of diseases, it's also necessary to understand how humans behave as a collective, to be able to analyze big data and to have the ability to create models and perform mathematical simulations – and for that you need engineers."

Yamin encountered his first real epidemiological crisis while doing postdoctoral work at the the Center of Infectious Disease Modeling and Analysis at Yale University's school of public health.

"At Yale we worked for three weeks, with almost no sleep, to create models based on engineering tools for the spread of Ebola. The dilemma of the Liberian health ministry regarded whom to prioritize, given a serious shortage of isolation facilities. The Liberians assumed that it would make more sense to quarantine those who were ill with less serious symptoms, because the others could not be saved in any case.

"We showed that it was precisely the patients with the most acute symptoms who are the most infectious, both because of the high viral load [meaning, the amount of a virus in one's body] and also because of the increase in the number of encounters between people: The acute patients were dying, so everyone came to take their leave from them," Yamin says. "I was pleased that Liberia adopted our recommendations and isolated those who were seriously ill. In retrospect, we know that that new policy helped curb the epidemic."

Yamin currently heads the Laboratory for Epidemic Modeling and Analysis in TAU's engineering faculty. His primary field of work is development of models for the spread of infectious diseases, with an emphasis on viruses responsible for respiratory ailments, such as flu and RSV (respiratory syncytial virus), which causes bronchitis. He is actually somewhat optimistic about the models he has developed for the spread of the coronavirus , which is also a respiratory disease.

"The big, open question is what the chance is of dying from the virus," Yamin explains.

"When you ask epidemiologists what the most important datum is concerning a virus, they will say it's the rate of the basic reproductive ratio, or R0 [often called "R nought"] – the average number of people a sick person will infect. That's an interesting question, but a theoretical one.

"The R0 of measles is 12, meaning that each person who is ill with measles infects 12 people on average. However, only 5 percent of the population can actually be infected, because most of us have been immunized or had measles in the past. So that is the upper limit of its spread."

But we know that the R0 of the coronavirus is 2, and we still don't know whether anyone is naturally immune to the disease.

Yamin: "The overwhelming majority of people are apparently not immune, because it's not a common disease. After all, there is no precedent for such an infectious and violent type of virus from the corona family, so it's safe to assume that the majority has not been exposed to the virus before this and that they can be infected. However, that's not to say that the majority of the population will actually contract the disease.

"The basic principle is that a virus with an R0 of 2 in a non-immune population can be expected to infect 50 percent of the population. After that the R0 will reach a value of 1 or less, and the disease will be contained. By the way, it will recede in a converging exponential; in other words, the coronavirus can be expected to disappear from this region with the same dizzying speed with which it entered our lives."

But we don't know for certain whether a person can be infected twice.

"No, but with the majority of viruses, if you're infected and you have recovered, you won't be re-infected, because of immunological memory. And if you are infected again, the symptoms will be less acute the second time. The exception to the rule is influenza: Its mutation frequency is so high that you can be infected by it year after year. Last year alone, the flu underwent 17 mutations. Whereas the last time we heard about corona was 17 years ago, with SARS. In other words, the coronavirus did not undergo mutations at the same frequency as the flu. Of course, the mutations themselves are a function of the number of infections: The more infections there are, the greater the likelihood that mutations will occur. But in practice, the most rapid mutations occur in animals, and they only infect us then, and obviously it's less probable that we will be infected again by a bat in the near future.

"By the way, viral mutations are more frequent in bats, whose immune system is astonishingly weak, while their social network is extensive and characterized by a lot of interaction."

So we're talking about maximum rate of infection – that is, of becoming a carrier – of 50 percent. That's still a lot of patients, a lot of hospitalizations and mainly a lot of deaths.

"Again, the most interesting issue for decision makers is the mortality rate. When we look at the dry data, we see a very high mortality rate, of 4 to 7 percent, in countries like Italy and Spain, alongside far lower numbers in countries like Germany and South Korea.

"And then there's China, though it's very difficult to believe the numbers coming out of there – and in any event no country in the West can allow itself to adopt the measures that China adopted to contain the spread. Now ask yourself: How do you check the mortality rate in all those countries? You take the total number of deaths and divide it by the total of reported patients."

So the research is biased.

"Very biased. If I can only carry out few tests, I will test those who have the highest chance of becoming ill, and then, when I check the mortality rate among them, I will get very high numbers. But there is one country we can learn from: South Korea. South Korea has been coping with corona for a long time, more than most Western countries, and they lead in the number of tests per capita. Therefore, the official mortality rate there is 0.9 percent. But even in South Korea, not all the infected were tested – most have very mild symptoms.

"The actual number of people who are sick with the virus in South Korea is at least double what's being reported, so the chance of dying is at least twice as low, standing at about 0.45 percent – very far from the World Health Organization's [global mortality] figure of 3.4 percent. And that's already a reason for cautious optimism."

'Worst-case scenario'

Let's move from percents to people.

"Just a minute. Although we're both Westernized countries, we are absolutely not South Korea. South Korea has one of the highest proportions of elderly people in the world, whereas Israel tops the graph in fertility, and we have a very young population. So, if we use the upper limit [of mortality] of South Korea and normalize the mortality rate for the population in Israel, we are talking about the probability of a mortality rate of 0.3 percent among those who have been infected.

"Now we'll go to a severe scenario in which no one is immune and every second person is sick, so that the disease is incapable of spreading further – namely, a situation where there's a maximum infection rate of 50 percent.

"We are a country of nine million citizens. So in the worst-case scenario, we are talking about 4.5 million Israelis who will become ill with the coronavirus. Multiply 4.5 million by 0.3 percent and you get 13,500 Israelis who are liable to die from the disease. By comparison, 700 to 2,500 Israelis die every year of complications from other respiratory ailments."

But German Chancellor Angela Merkel talked about a rate of infection of 70 percent in Germany.

"And Netanyahu talked about a mortality rate of between 2 percent and 4 percent. And do you know what's most absurd? That in the final analysis [U.S. President Donald] Trump was right . Not that the coronavirus is just plain flu – it absolutely isn't – but as he put it: 'This is just my hunch – way under 1 percent' [will die].'

"We must be cautious, of course, but at the moment a high probability is emerging that the risks are far lower than what the World Health Organization presented. Under two assumptions – that the health system doesn't collapse and that life continues as usual – we are not likely to see more than 13,500 victims of the coronavirus in Israel." (About 45,000 people die in Israel in a normal year, which would make for a rise of approximately one-third.)

But, social distancing should lead to fewer cases of infection and death, no?

"No, because we won't be able to isolate ourselves completely or forever. At some stage, we will have to resume a regular routine, and then the R0 will stabilize at 2 again. Effectively, we are delaying the inevitable. I have no criticism of the decisions made until now. On the contrary: With such a large area of uncertainty, Israel's decision makers are considering not only a reasonable scenario but also a margin of safety.

"In my opinion, the Health Ministry deserves tremendous credit for being ahead of the world by having instituted so few measures. In the same breath, the public needs to understand that these measures of social distancing mean that we will find ourselves with corona for a longer period, even to 2023."

A quarantine ward being set up at Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan. Tomer Appelbaum

That long?

"Take the swine flu, from 2009. Reliable models show clearly that it was contained in Israel because its appearance coincided with the Jewish holidays in the fall [when people weren't out much in public]. From the virus' point of view, the timing wasn't good for it in Israel. By contrast, in the United States there was significant infection in 2009-2010. But in the end, it balances out. So we saw swine flu in Israel both in 2009-10 and in 2010-11, whereas in the United States it just came and went. The American population as a whole was exposed to the virus at high rates, so those who fell ill and recovered served as a 'human shield' for those who did not get sick."

So what you're saying is to tear the bandage off in one fell swoop, and explose everyone at once, the way they tried to do in Britain.

"We need to make decisions based on the most precise models possible. What should be done? Of course, we must significantly increase testing, using the rapid PCR test, and that is what is actually being done. In parallel, serologic tests should be conducted. These differ from regular tests in that they examines an individual's immunological reaction to exposure. That's the only way we will be able to get an accurate picture of the distribution of the virus in Israel, and thereby also of the mortality rates."

What will that test be able to tell us?

"It will solve the riddle of the young people: It's still not clear whether young people are infected by the coronavirus but don't develop symptoms, or are simply immune and thus don't become infected. This is different from most respiratory ailments. With those illnesses, like RSV or flu, this is a key population: The 5-to-19 age group is not at risk but they are responsible for infecting others."

Because children don't wash their hands, and they drool on themselves?

"It's not only a function of hygiene, it's mainly a function of contact between people. Picture the average old person. How many different people does he encounter in a day? And what is the nature of those encounters? The older we get, the less we caress and kiss others. Also, children constitute the only age group that comes into contact with all other age groups – not just theirs. That's why it is the key population in spreading respiratory diseases."

.... ... ...

Oded Carmeli

Haaretz Contributor

[Mar 24, 2020] On Coronavirus, Reason To Hope by Rod Dreher

Notable quotes:
"... A drug like chloroquine doesn't have to be extremely effective in order to have a huge benefit on our ICU density. A small effect could have a big impact. And if chloroquine turns out not to work, there are other promising drugs such as Remdesivir, though chloroquine has the advantage of being cheap and easy to produce. ..."
Mar 23, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com
Reader Ryan Booth writes:

Rod, I was one of those screaming at our public officials to shut stuff down. I was extremely frustrated by President Trump's brushing off of our problem for a long time. I asked my Facebook friends if anyone wanted to help with a recall petition of Governor Edwards, after he took very mild steps against COVID-19 instead of the necessary firmer ones. I bristled with a mixture of horror and astonishment as New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell allowed bars to pack people in last weekend to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. I argued with friends on Facebook who insisted to me that "this is just a cold" and told me that I was irrational and needlessly spreading fear and panic.

So I have consistently supported strong steps to contain this virus, but I have now become very optimistic that the tide is about to turn, and I want to share why.

Testing is about to expand exponentially.

We've been steadily growing our testing ability since the outbreak began. America tested 44,176 people today, and every day sees a big increase. Yesterday, we tested 34,654 and it was 27,372 the day before that. A week ago, it was 4,124.

But these increases are small compared to what's in the pipeline. This week we saw FDA approval of new testing systems from Roche and from Abbott labs that run tests ten times faster than current methods. To give you an idea of what this means, Roche brags that their Cobas 8800 machine can process over 3000 tests per day. Until today, Louisiana hadn't had a total of 3000 people tested. Roche is now making and shipping 400,000 test kits per week in the US, while Abbott is making a million of their test kits each week. Those systems will be coming online this coming week.

Today, we got even more good news, with Cepheid getting FDA approval for their new test, which will detect the virus in 45 minutes and can be used in over 5000 Cepheid machines already in US hospitals. This will allow hospitals to test all their staff and every incoming patient on a consistent basis, so that we can keep our doctors and nurses safe and our hospitals don't spread the disease. Those testing kits are getting shipped out this coming week.

And there are more companies in the process of getting approval. In two weeks, we should be able to test 150,000 – 200,000 Americans daily, and that means that we don't all need to stay home anymore.

Let me explain how this works.

Suppose that Boudreaux, who works for the state of Louisiana, wakes up and has a fever. Right now, it's not easy for him to get tested – and if he could get tested, he wouldn't get his results for days. Let's say that Boudreaux is a good citizen and stays home at this point. That's great, except that Boudreaux went to work yesterday and exposed his coworker Pierre, and he also got his hair cut and exposed his barber, T-Boy. His wife Marie doesn't isolate from him, because she thinks that Boudreaux is just lazy and doesn't want to work, so she is also exposed. Unless Boudreaux gets sick enough that he needs to go to the hospital, he's not going to be tested, and Pierre, T-Boy, and Marie might all get the virus and – and this is key – then spread it themselves.

That's been our situation, and the only solution that we've had was to keep Boudreaux at home in the first place. That's why the state is keeping non-essential workers at home. That's why many places are forcing barbershops to close. So, now, our governmental restrictions keep T-Boy and Pierre from getting infected, though Marie is still at risk.

Now, imagine our original situation with easy, high-speed testing. Boudreaux wakes up with a fever, he goes to the drive-thru testing site and is notified about four hours later that he is positive. Now, everyone in his family and workplace immediately gets tested, as does T-Boy – and the virus does not spread beyond them.

The ability to test everyone who needs to be tested is how South Korea and Singapore have been able to control their outbreaks without significant societal restrictions. Their schools, restaurants, etc. are all open. And their economies are not wrecked. Again, we'll be at that point in less than two weeks.

Evidence strongly suggests that COVID-19 is seasonal.

A recent Chinese study compared transmission rates for all 100 Chinese cities outside of Wuhan that had at least 40 cases before their national lockdown, to see if the virus spread more slowly in warmer, more humid parts of China. Their conclusion:

"High temperature and high relative humidity significantly reduce the transmission of COVID-19, respectively, even after controlling for population density and GDP per capita of cities This result is consistent with the fact that the high temperature and high humidity significantly reduce the transmission of influenza. It indicates that the arrival of summer and rainy season in the northern hemisphere can effectively reduce the transmission of the COVID-19."

That study, as an example, predicted a R value of 1.3 in Tokyo for the Olympics -- with zero intervention! (For those of you who don't know what that means, it means that instead of spreading the disease to about 2.6 people, which is what happens now, the average person would only infect half as many people.) If this study were correct, it would mean that, with some control measures, it would be easy to keep COVID-19 from spreading during the Olympics.

Besides this study, we have the basic observation that the world's serious outbreaks have occurred in cold, dry weather. Jakarta and Milan both had nonstop flights to Wuhan during Wuhan's outbreak, but Italy has suffered a horrific crisis and Indonesia has not. Scientists believe that this is because COVID-19 is mainly transmitted by coughing , and the microdroplets emitted when someone coughs travel about twice as far in cold, dry air. Additionally, the water vapor present in humid air interacts with those microdroplets to stop them.

If COVID-19 is indeed a seasonal disease, then we should be able to almost eliminate it this summer, to the point that there will be zero restrictions on ordinary life. Sports leagues can fill stadiums with fans and political conventions can meet, and we won't have to worry that we're fanning a new outbreak.

Improved treatment will improve COVID-19 patient outcomes.

If you have watched President Trump on TV or follow him on twitter, then you know that he is hopeful about the promise of chloroquine (and its close relative hydroxychloroquine).

President Trump has perhaps overpromised what chloroquine can do, as the evidence of its benefit is still rather thin. But, if it has any benefit at all, it's a game-changer in terms of our ICUs. If chloroquine works, it works by lowering the amount of virus in the body. When you combine this with earlier testing, there's a tremendous advantage. The people who end up in the ICU don't get there until they've been sick for a week or so, as the virus grows in their body and then inflames the alveoli in the lungs, leading to shortness of breath. If chloroquine works, an at-risk patient would be given it right after testing positive, and hopefully, the viral load in their body never gets high enough for the patient to develop severe shortness of breath, and he stays out of the ICU.

A drug like chloroquine doesn't have to be extremely effective in order to have a huge benefit on our ICU density. A small effect could have a big impact. And if chloroquine turns out not to work, there are other promising drugs such as Remdesivir, though chloroquine has the advantage of being cheap and easy to produce.

Is the situation going to get worse in the US? Yes. Is the end in sight? I believe that it is. I write this to encourage each of you to hold on. If we can stay and home, enduring the claustrophobia, the family bickering, and the often severe economic consequences, we can beat this virus.

I miss my church. A streamed service tomorrow is not a true substitute for the togetherness in Christ that I need more than ever at this time. And my business is suffering. I think that I can make it another month, but I don't know about longer than that. I expect that our nation's psychiatrists and therapists are swamped right now, as stress and depression skyrocket.

But there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

[Mar 24, 2020] The mainstream media is pushing the fear full stop

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

gepay , Mar 23 2020 23:28 utc | 107

I think b has not been very good with this corona virus reporting. He thinks he was wrong on his initial reporting and changed as new facts emerged. however he basically repeats the mainstream line. I certainly am no expert, But then again it seems thee is a wide divergence of views from the "experts" but there is a mainstream conclusion which b agrees with. And the mainstream media is pushing the fear full stop.

I still think this is not a specially dangerous virus. almost entirely it is old people dying. almost entirely most of them have pre-existing conditions. My initial take was people who would die fairly soon or might die if they got a bad flu are dying but sooner. I know my wife went to the hospital and acquired a very bad pneumonia. She was on a respirator for over a week and afterwards was diagnosed with COPD. How many of these deaths are people who are sick with corona virus and go to the hospital and get a hospital acquired infection but are counted as dying from COV-18? Virologist have been heavily researching corona viruses since the SARS and MERS outbreaks that didn't kill very many people
I do agree that this virus seems exceptionally communicable. That nature article b cited seemed as if it was written to dismiss the idea that the virus was made in some biolab. I have read an article debunking this Nature article - the writer was trying to make a case that it came from a Chinese lab He agreed it wasn't manufactured by gene editing but was created by passing a corona virus through ferrets who do have the same ACE receptor that humans have and COV-19 uses to infect cells.

Engineered bat virus stirs debate over risky research ...

the announcement by Ralph Baric and co-workers at the University of North Carolina that they had created a chimeric SARS-like virus, which expresses the spike (attachment protein) of a bat coronavirus in a mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone (4). As in the cases of the genetically modified H5N1 avian influenza viruses, the newly generated SARS-like virus is potentially an extremely dangerous, possibly pandemic pathogen... That was 5 years ago.

https://www.nature.com/news/engineered-bat-virus-stirs-debate-over-risky-research That was 2015.

I agree with the uselessness of bioweapons as a military operation. The economic blowback we are now seeing is proof

But But what if this global crisis is exactly what those who want to totally control us would want to happen. It is precipitating the roll out of medical martial law.

There are laws on the books that give extraordinary powers in the event of a global epidemic or even a pandemic.

Not to mention in the US the Continuity of Government provisions strengthened massively after 9/11. Every year the state of emergency triggered by 9/11 has been renewed. Mandatory vaccinations for everyone. Quarantine powers granted The initiation of martial law. Now you don't have to be a terrorist but just said to be infected and away you go.

I don't think COV-19 is the one to justify the full implementation but it is another giant step for setting up the population for the full implementation.

[Mar 24, 2020] A woman in Chicago has developed a new function for the bra, one half of bra can serve as a mask

Mar 24, 2020 | www.youtube.com

SCODI OFFICER:001 , 4 days ago

Y'all know the chinese already did this back when SARS was around.

Ennis XU , 2 days ago

Somehow better than strawberry containers from ALDI

[Mar 24, 2020] Titillating advice

Mar 24, 2020 | www.youtube.com

A woman in Chicago has developed a new function for the bra, one that could help people escape dange - YouTube

alan king , 12 hours ago

titillating advice

[Mar 24, 2020] The US Department of Justice announced Sunday it had shut down a website claiming to sell a coronavirus vaccine

Highly recommended!
Mar 22, 2020 | news.yahoo.com

US authorities are working to combat the spread of misinformation that has blossomed since the start of the coronavirus pandemic

The US Department of Justice announced Sunday it had shut down a website claiming to sell a coronavirus vaccine, in its first act of federal enforcement against fraud in connection with the pandemic.

Lawsuits had been filed against the site coronavirusmedicalkit.com, which claimed to sell vaccines for COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, when in fact there is no such vaccine, the Justice Department said in a statement.

A Texas federal judge on Saturday ordered the site to shut down, according to the statement. Its homepage, however, was still accessible as of Sunday evening.

"Due to the recent outbreak for the Coronavirus (COVID-19) the World Health Organization is giving away vaccine kits. Just pay $4.95 for shipping," read a statement on the homepage.

It was followed by a place to leave bank account information to pay shipping fees.

The Justice Department did not specify how many people fell victim to the scam, but the investigation is ongoing to identify who is behind the fraud and how much money was stolen.

The intervention by the federal judiciary system is part of ongoing efforts by US authorities to combat the spread of misinformation that has blossomed since the start of the pandemic.

Attorney General Bill Barr last week urged federal prosecutors to make stopping misinformation a priority and called US civilians to report all such abuses to the National Center for Disaster Fraud.

He also warned citizens against a variety of scams including selling fake treatments online, imitating emails from the WHO or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) intended to collect personal data, and asking for donations for imaginary organizations.

Simultaneously, the US judicial system is on the warpath to combat price gouging of products such as hand sanitizer or hygienic masks.

More than 33,000 people have been infected by the coronavirus in the US, and 416 have died, according to a tracker managed by Johns Hopkins University.

[Mar 24, 2020] Whenever these people decide on a narrative, they are loath to back down once they are proven wrong. They don't want to lose face.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

Digital Samizdat , says: Show Comment March 22, 2020 at 1:27 pm GMT

@prime noticer What if–as seems to be happening in Italy–the journalists simply pretend that bodies are piling up, perhaps by attributing other deaths to Corona?

Beware: whenever these people decide on a narrative, they are loath to back down once they are proven wrong. They don't want to lose face.

https://off-guardian.org/2020/03/19/iss-report-99-of-covid19-deaths-already-ill/

#CoronaHoax

[Mar 24, 2020] The numbers for Italy have come down just a little bit more. Restrictions on the other hand have got even tighter, now only people who do essential work are allowed out of their homes.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

dan of steele , Mar 23 2020 18:31 utc | 11

There is a bit more encouraging news tonight. the numbers for Italy have come down just a little bit more. Restrictions on the other hand have got even tighter, now only people who do essential work are allowed out of their homes.

As I mentioned yesterday in a post that got swallowed by the ether, Italy is going through some hard times financially.

Some self inflicted by governments spending more than the took in to stay in power and some because the banks refused to take a haircut.

Many small businesses are just barely survive and a couple of months without income is going to really hurt.

[Mar 24, 2020] The virus itself is exaggerated, it is the social and political impacts of it that are worrisome.

Mar 24, 2020 | www.unz.com

anon [837] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 7:02 pm GMT

@Trinity The virus itself is exaggerated, it is the social and political impacts of it that are worrisome.
John Chuckman , says: Website Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 7:04 pm GMT
Something to think about

Here is an interesting item, an interview with a world-class virologist about the virus:

Quite different the what we see in the papers day after day:

https://www.anti-empire.com/german-virologist-of-international-renown-warns-government-lockdowns-are-a-horrible-mistake-will-make-crisis-worse/

[Mar 24, 2020] Joe Rogan Experience #1439 - Michael Osterholm

Highly recommended!
Michael Osterholm - Wikipedia (born March 10, 1953) is an American infectious disease epidemiologist, regents professor, and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.
Scientific establishment want money, want importance, wants political influence. That create difficult dilemma and force some people play the role of fear mongers.
Mar 24, 2020 | www.youtube.com

parcos79 , 13 hours ago

12 million views...holy cow

MKingston , 1 week ago

BUMP 00:10 Intro 0:40 How bad is Coronavirus 4:00 Is the virus an "old persons" disease 5:18 Incubation period 7:50 What can be done to prevent infection 13:45 Drug shortages 15:20 Sauna use effect on infections 18:00 Was Coronavirus man-made 22:00 American Wild Deer diseases and Prions 32:00 Is Corona seasonal 35:00 Corona could be 10 times worse than the flu 35:25 Corona will stay around for months 36:10 Coronavirus vs Spanish flu 38:30 How can we prepare our immune system 43:20 Do hand sanitizers and masks work 50:00 We stockpile weapons more than medical goods 54:30 Will people panic if they are told the truth 56:00 Vaccines 1:02:00 Why a virus would originate from China 1:11:30 What to do if you get the flu 1:15:45 Lime disease and ticks 1:23:00 Effects of fire suppression on ecosystem 1:30:00 Vaccine for Coronavirus

whisperingsage , 4 days ago (edited)

Sick nurses working, I have experienced that in every nursing home I have worked in in the US. In California and NV. Luckily, I found the trick, If I have a headache that won't be resolved with hydration, I figure it's a flu, I take 4 grams of C and 20,000 IU of D, and usually that takes care of it, no more symptoms. In the case that it persists, I keep taking 4 grams of C ever few hours and high dose D until the symptoms subside. Usually doesn't take too long, and ( a few hours) symptoms don't get bad.

Joan Anundson-Ahr , 1 day ago

Beware of any expert that promotes fearfulness and helplessness and tells us to just wait for a "miracle" vaccine. Why didn't he tell us the truth about the success of vitamin C therapy? Why didn't he tell us that some common medications like ibuprofen and heart medications can impede healing of the virus.

KW0311 USMC , 1 week ago

Joe doesnt like hearing his sauna and probiotics arent the cure for everything.

MiZzShiN3 , 7 hours ago (edited)

15:25 - 18:04 sauna myth

Aventura , 2 days ago (edited)

div> It´s funny and very predictable how programmed into fear people have become when it´s never the virus that kills you, but a weak immune system´s panick reaction. If you believe the MSM is not aligned with certain agendas, the WHO is not inherently corrupt, the pharmaceutical vaccine pushing industries have your best interests at heart and doctors really know what they are talking about when they always look at the parts as seperated and never the whole living system, then you will be shocked to learn the truth. https://www.youtube.com/user/drvashiva/videos I really look forward to a time, probably thanks to this crisis it will be in the not so distant future, where people will begin to wake up, see through the BS we are being bombarded with from the parasitical class of "rulers" or "elites". Then a paradigm shift in so many ways will begin to take place... Greetings from a tireless truth seeker!

Gina Jonson , 1 day ago div c

lass="comment-renderer-text-content expanded"> the difference between COVID 19 and the spanish flu and the fear rampant about this comparison is that our health care system is a little more advanced than what was available back in 1919 AND we are also so much more informed regarding hygiene practices.........not discounting the seriousness of this unprecendented occurrence.........but still great to focus on the "little" advantages we can monopolise on. in order to tackle this global crisis head on and rationally

WJK , 5 days ago (edited) div

> @PowerfulJRE - Joe PLEASE have Michael Osterholm back on asap and please ask Michael the following questions...

1) Are highly infectious airborne cold viruses killed by ozone from ozone/ion generators(?) and

2) Why do medical facilities and schools no longer install or utilize UV disinfection lighting like they use to utilize/install in entranceways, hallways, and rooms of hospitals and school classrooms like they use to do 50-75 years ago(?)

Steve Ward , 5 days ago

43:12 real good info about hand sanitizer and face masks

J_M_W_77 , 5 days ago

N95 masks....remember kids its a one way valve on the front of those things....breath in, and it filters the air....breath out, valve opens and the air goes out, " unfiltered". If you're sick, these masks will not prevent you from spreading it around.

Rodney Higgins , 2 days ago

China's only biosafety level 4 (BSL–4) laboratory is in Wuhan. Coincidences happen.

Tessangela Beck , 3 days ago div tabindex="0" role="article"

> Osterholm is a catalog of infectious disease info that is beyond valuable . . he's in his 60s . . maybe the planet has others who could fill his shoes in my home state of Minnesota; of course, I hope so! He also has a good sense of humor, managing a little chuckle when Joe suggested if any president could get around the informed consent issue of testing vaccines on prisoners, such as nasty rapists, it would be Trump. I'm glad to receive all the helpful info without a steady dose of politics and conspiracy chitchat. Now I know that my prebiotic and probiotic pills are only good for temporary relief and that my natural flora and fauna in the gut will take over...

GAiPS , 1 week ago (edited)

51:46 "We spend about 0.001% on public health compared to our defense department and yet look how vulnerable...it's the bugs...it's not a war...it's not a missile...is bringing the world economy down right now....it's a darn virus."

Noelf , 1 week ago

Can you imagine if even half the US defence budget was redirected into health care and research!! We (the world) spend trillions on arms and now we are fighting an enemy that bullets can't kill!! Infuriating!! 😡😡😠😠

Qidi Wang , 1 day ago div tabindex="0" role="article"

> How do you draw the conclusion that such viruses would always come from China? MERS was first discovered in the middle east, the 2009 flu originated in mexico, the Spanish flu originated in Kansas. I mean like if you search China on the pandemic wikipedia page there's only SARS and several flu outbreaks.

Also Wild life is not part of the cuisine in most of China, and it's really more of a status symbol for rich people to be able to find exotic food

Niels Raider , 5 days ago

In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way. Franklin D. Roosevelt

Roedy Green , 4 days ago (edited) div tabindex="0" role=

"article"> There is another nasty virus going around here in Victoria BC Canada that is a bit like CORVID-19.. I got it in mid-December and I am just getting over it. My friends recovered in two to three weeks. The symptoms include a cough that goes on and on leaving you breathless, extremely sore throat, runny nose, extreme weakness. Even the emergency room doctor said she had it. Have you heard of it? I think I got it travelling in a Handi-dart van with some elderly, sneezing Chinese speaking males.

Santino Rider , 5 days ago (edited)

51:40 Good reminder of war against missiles vs virus. Budgets... 53:00 his talk to banking/finance people. Scary. Like children, whereas Michael is more analytical, like engineers/scientists, see it all as problem-solution.

[Mar 24, 2020] Super-spreaders - mostly young fools ignoring social distancing on beaches, in parks, restaurants etc - are now popping up, most recently returning from Florida spring break

Mar 24, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Trisha , Mar 23 2020 19:06 utc | 27

Thanks b for the update.

Unfortunately, we in the US are way behind the curve in finding and locking down clusters. In fact super-spreaders - mostly young fools ignoring social distancing on beaches, in parks, restaurants etc - are now popping up, most recently returning from Florida spring break to Utah. Testing rates remain abysmal.

Idaho cases just went exponential, doubling about every 3 days. Republic Governor there is pretty much a copy of Trump, as in a dangerous idiot, giving press conferences with multiple staff hovering around, downplaying the risks, lying about test availability, talking about protecting businesses, etc.

[Mar 23, 2020] There is by now lots of material on the internet for the reader to understand how deaths by pre-existing illness have been attributed to Covid-19

Mar 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

john , Mar 22 2020 15:30 utc | 5

UK Government's Chief Science Advisor Reveals "Covid-19" Deaths Are Deaths As Normal; BBC Admits It Too

There is by now lots of material on the internet for the reader to understand how deaths by pre-existing illness have been attributed to Covid-19, and this site provides a reasonably good starting place (please see the article linked to above titled, Covid-19 and pneumonic immune system overreaction).

On the other hand, the effort to get to grips with the reason that a fake pandemic has been used by governments in the west to destroy the livelihoods of their governed is something that has not solidified into a coherent and demonstrable idea, and perhaps the only proof of the pudding will be in the eating; i.e. we will only know when it is happening to us.

However, at that stage knowledge of Covid-19 as the phantom scapegoat will be well established.

And just as the widespread exposure of al-Qaeda, which was the equivalent bogeyman device in the War on Terror as an Orwellian tool of those executing the reaction to (their own) terrorist provocation, proved to undermine and cause to fail a plan for domination of foreign territory by Globalist financier class interests, so too will widespread appreciation of the true nature of Covid-19 undermine and cause to fail the irregular warfare that is now being unleashed on domestic territories

[Mar 23, 2020] deaths to infections are around 1.5% and deaths to total world population are negligible to the point of irrelevancy. Other tropical diseases kill millions annually with hardly a blink from anyone or any government. Deaths from road accidents worldwide must be in the hundreds of thousands. Why is there no shutdown or driver quarantine internationally ?

Mar 23, 2020 | www.unz.com

calculator , says: Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 1:20 pm GMT

@Digital Samizdat I agree the thing is a HOAX.

First of all I see few people wearing masks in my city. In photos on the internet and media websites those that do seem to be staged photos. The thumbnail photo for this article supposedly shows Italy, the country allegedly hardest hit, the Roman Arena in the background but only one girl wearing a mask. Yet I hear the virus is spreading like "wildfire" and such nonsense. I read congregations of more than 50 people is prohibited but yet see supermarkets full of folks jostling each other. Even on the internet I see photos beating the virulence and destructive power of the virus, photos with 20 people and only 2 wearing masks.

Second, every country is "locking down" although deaths to infections are around 1.5% and deaths to total world population are negligible to the point of irrelevancy. Other tropical diseases kill millions annually with hardly a blink from anyone or any government. Deaths from road accidents worldwide must be in the hundreds of thousands. Why is there no shutdown or driver quarantine internationally ? One is at greater risk of violence in modern day urban centers. We have African countries with germs scientists have not even discovered "locking down".

Third, the "experts" seem to be clueless and clued out. One minute everyone has to self quarantine and now I see the leading WHO expert saying everything cannot be locked down. They need to identify the infected and their contacts and isolate THEM or else the virus "could jump up again". Other experts not to be outdone assert the virus could reappear in September. Then there is all the jargon like social distancing and flattening the curve.

Fourth, all the billions now being thrown around for the "War" on the virus is like spilling honey on an ants nest. I dont want to be crass but will health units accurately test and report results. Lets say a Government has set aside $100,000 per infected citizen. Go to the hospital with a sniffle and you may well be diagnosed with the virus, the health professionals only too happy to bill the Government. Since it is you, a wife and three kids and you had a birthday party recently with 14 other relatives one is now running into the millions. There seems to be too much incentive to flog this virus and milk every penny possible from whoever is shovelling out the cash.

Fifth, this virus seems to be killing people well up in their age whose immune systems are already weak. Germs, insects and pests and scavengers always congregate where there is filth. Poor eating habits, bad diet, lack of exercise, smoking, drinking and use of recreational and other drugs weaken the immune system and make the blood dirty leaving it open to infection by ANY germ or virus that comes along. In any case the media seems to tout statistics in a dishonest way. For example "Country X now has 30,000 infections" is spun as if the 30,000 died or "Deaths shatter records, rise by 30%" when in fact the 30% rise amounts to three people.

I could go on for another 2000 words. Even poor Harvey, locked away in jail is now infected. Everyone is looking for an angle and flogging this virus. Everyone forgets we went through this with Swine Flu, Bird Flu, West Nile, Sars and Anthrax. Now it is COVID ! Everyone is looking for a payout. The herd instinct s strong, monkey see monkey do. States with no infections are locking down.

Finally, there si all the finger pointing about the origin of the virus and the name squeezes out accusations of racism, bigotry and whatever. It now seems fashionable to have the virus with Mr and Mrs Rich and Famous claiming to have tested for it and so forth. Yahoo had an article today showing a well dressed white girl wearing a black mask in front of a chinese building. Looked like a photoshoot and recently there was an article from a boy telling what is was like to have the virus. He looked very healthy with a big smile. I guess he is one of those rare characters who can be flat on their backs for 2 weeks with a deadly virus and come out looking like Clark Gable.

As to why this would NOT be a hoax. Why would the market crash and the economy be ruined ? The answer to me is that it started as a virus and people saw a way they could exploit it. Maybe they never expected the reaction in terms of shutdowns and lockups , maybe they never expected the reactions to be so out of control but ultimately the reason is MONEY.

The public gets fooled everytime with this nonsense or some other rubbish. The traditional media and social media flog this virus ad nauseum to the point where ordinary folks panic from the sheer volume of information and opinions and "research" .Brace yourselves, 2021 or 2022 will bring another "catastrophe" and we will fall for the b/s all over again. I dont know about other commentators but I am tired of the whole thing and the cure will decimate many more than the virus itself.

[Mar 23, 2020] Credible insights into the Coronavirus by Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg

A very interesting discussion by Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg. He compare this epidemic hype with famous Andersen tale about the Naked King. He points out on the fact that test for the virus was developed in a hurry and it is unclear how many false positive it allow.
All-in-all a very interesting, educational discussion by Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg even you do not agree with him.
Mar 15, 2020 | www.youtube.com

I just made the English voiceover. Original video is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_Ayu...

Learn about Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgan...

Compare with

Joe Rogan Experience #1439 - Michael Osterholm - YouTube

[Mar 23, 2020] Way Past Time for Proper Perspective on Corona Virus by Larry C Johnson

Mar 23, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Deap , 23 March 2020 at 12:38 PM

Two issues continue to be misrepresented which systematicly allow "corona" to take on the spectre of the Zombie Apocalypse:

1. Social distancing keeps people out of the sneeze-cough zone for droplet contamination by air. Yet social shunning of those who continue to cough and sneeze in public in fact is what needs to be made the primary line of defense. Not the crowds of people stocking up on toilet paper but virtuously standing 6 feet apart, clueless about their own role fostering the Zombie Apocalypse imagery.

2. Self-inoculation is the second source of infection, and way under-emphasizied while again disguised by virtuous but meaningless ritual behavior.

All the talk is about hand washing, surface decontamination and hand sanitizers which ultimately are a fools errand since this additional new, and critical ritual behavior often fails to emphasize the absolutely important disease connection that comes from sticking your very own (presumed) dirty fingers into one's own nose, mouth and/or eyes.

Few are 100% observant about how many surfaces they actually touch before the stick their "washed or sanitized hands" back into their own mouth, nose or eyes.

Washing your hands remains #1 in importance, but so does WATCHING your hands.

"Don't touch your face" misses the point too - another message fail - one must vividly make the connection between their own fingers and their own body orifices leading to the upper respiratory tract. And continue to be aware of this connection 24/7 - no exceptions.

Organic homemake hand sanitizers are as good as the last thing you touched or the next person who cough next to your clorox-wiped surfaces.

The media goes out of its way to instill the Zombie Apocalypse vision of this "flu" - it is everywhere, you must fear everything and nothing can protect you. If you touch it, you will die. If it is in the air, you will die. You never know who has it. You are a victim. And it is someone else's fault.

So one can pretend to do useless and ritual activities but ignore one's own role and one's own personal responsibility for its contact and spread.

1. Socially shun anyone who fails to protect their coughs or sneezes, until they learn new habits - how does staying 6 feet away from everyone teach the offenders new habits?

2. Wash your hands and watch what you touch. 100% of the time.

TSA is now with us 100% of the time after 911- regardless of the numerical threat. Proper self-hygiene needs to be with us 100% of the time too - and never should have left us.

Bring back white gloves. Now we know why.

JohninMK , 23 March 2020 at 12:42 PM
Here in the UK either our management are incompetent of they know something we don't is my take.

Apart from summary figures broken down by Health district for 'got it' or 'dead from it' there is nothing. Testing apart from in hospitals is unknown unless you are famous so no-one has any idea what the viruses progress is in the community. What is happening at individual hospitals is probably a state secret now.

Even though, between themselves, they knew it was coming at the latest in mid January, they did nothing. No extra orders for masks, ventilators etc.

Yet they are allowing fear and panic to rip through the community and huge economic damage.

I haven't yet properly worked out cui bono but I have my suspicions. But they are passing some draconian laws.

TournezVite , 23 March 2020 at 01:15 PM
The actual mortality rate may be closer to 1% or less with most of it concentrated in the over 70s. The reasonable thing to do would have been to protect seniors while letting everyone else go about their business. Nuking the economy with lockdowns is the politicians' way of competing with each other to show they're "doing something." It's craven behavior not leadership.

A number of notable virologists have advocated for a more level-headed approach, among them Dr. David Katz. See https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/opinion/coronavirus-pandemic-social-distancing.html.

This daily updated page https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/ has compiled a lengthy list of doctors and virologists who are critical of the panic mongering.

Nornert M Salamon , 23 March 2020 at 03:11 PM
Thank you Larry for the sobering analysis of Corvid-19.

I only disagree with your emphasis that the social distancing is the main cause of economic collapse.

Methinks that the everything bubble in coordination of unrepayable debt fiasco has arrived, and the ELITES/media are distracting from refinancing the Wall Street gamblers, Share-buyback artists, Private equity leveraged asset strippers and the offshore artist looser.

We are replaying the 2008 modus operandi get the elites saved financially and let the poor people try to survive on their own as they assume all the obligation of the
elite rescue

English Outsider , 23 March 2020 at 03:57 PM
Larry Johnson - I'm afraid I'm rather more of JJ Jackson's view as to the potential seriousness of this disease.

But the economic effects are already pretty devastating. 10% of world trade is tourism and related. Entertainment is a big industry. Both hard hit and other sectors too. Pensioners spend a fair bit and many are no longer doing so.

So whether we panic or not that's the reality. A reality superimposed on a weak and vulnerable economy. Also on a financial system already on life support.

That's more the case in my country than yours, by quite a long chalk. Even so, though I believe the US is in a better position to recover, the hit's coming our way wherever we live. You can't take that amount of economic activity out and expect there to be only a few bumps in the road.

Theoretically the best approach is yours. Business as usual, tuck the vulnerable away, take such casualties as come along among the less vulnerable. Could even be an opportunity for economic regeneration along Trump 2016 lines.

This hasn't happened and I doubt it would have even had the strategy been agreed on and adopted early on. And there's too much disconnect between the rulers and ruled for anything constructive much to happen now, certainly in UK politics though it would be presumptuous in me to venture an opinion here about yours. This is already a big deal and should be treated as such.

I've been following your analyses on Russiagate and they're on the money every time. I hope the pandemic isn't used as an opportunity to bury that disgraceful affair. But there'll be plenty hoping it's just that.

[Mar 23, 2020] a New York Times opinion piece, authored by a "writer, producer and yoga teacher" who apparently contracted the virus, and had to be hospitalized noting that it did not keep her (Fiona Lowenstein) from taking a "selfie", apparently with a non-sterile, yet-somehow-permitted-in-the-hospital room cell phone?

Mar 23, 2020 | www.unz.com

OscarWildeLoveChild , says: Show Comment March 23, 2020 at 1:37 pm GMT

@Dd I don't know, but I have a lot of questions about things I have been reading, from the data, demonstrating the weakness of the virus, and non-lethality, to a New York Times opinion piece, authored by a "writer, producer and yoga teacher" who apparently contracted the virus, and had to be hospitalized noting that it did not keep her (Fiona Lowenstein) from taking a "selfie", apparently with a non-sterile, yet-somehow-permitted-in-the-hospital room cell phone? You normally have all that stuff bagged up. I dunno. Check out the article and her pic, judge for yourself.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/23/opinion/coronavirus-young-people.html/?2020-03-23T09%3A00%3A09%2000%3A00

It isn't that I don't think it is possible, or true, about this or other similar stories, or that the data is fake or false .there's just so much to digest and some of it seems incredulous and/or contradictory.

[Mar 23, 2020] Coronavirus NHS doctors feel like 'lambs to slaughter' without protective kit, warns senior medic by Lizzy Buchan

From comments: "They had three months to prepare. Their attitude: "They need us more than we need them. Get ready for brexit." That is all they care about. Their criminal neglect and insane obsession has consigned tens of thousands to death. "
Notable quotes:
"... nearly 4,000 NHS workers appealed to the prime minister to "protect the lives of the life-savers" and resolve the "unacceptable" shortage of protective equipment. ..."
"... Dr Parmar told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show: "We have had doctors tell us they feel like lambs to the slaughter, that they feel like cannon fodder. GPs tell us that they feel absolutely abandoned. ..."
"... In an open letter to The Sunday Times, some 3,963 doctors said staff were "putting their lives on the line every day" by treating coronavirus patients without appropriate protection. ..."
"... The letter said: "Frontline doctors have been telling us for weeks that they do not feel safe at work. ..."
Mar 23, 2020 | independent.co.uk

Coronavirus: NHS doctors feel like 'lambs to slaughter' without protective kit, warns senior medic. 'We must really stress to the prime minister that we need to protect the front line here'

Doctors battling the coronavirus outbreak feel like "lambs to the slaughter" without adequate protection equipment, a senior medic has said.

Dr Rinesh Parmar, chair of the Doctors' Association, said frontline NHS staff were being treated as "cannon fodder" as he launched a desperate appeal to Boris Johnson for more resources to keep medics safe.

Dr Parmar, a consultant anaesthetist who is working on a Covid-19 intensive care ward, said it was the "calm before the storm" and NHS staff were braced for a surge in cases.

His warning came as nearly 4,000 NHS workers appealed to the prime minister to "protect the lives of the life-savers" and resolve the "unacceptable" shortage of protective equipment.

Dr Parmar told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show: "We have had doctors tell us they feel like lambs to the slaughter, that they feel like cannon fodder. GPs tell us that they feel absolutely abandoned.

... ... ...

In an open letter to The Sunday Times, some 3,963 doctors said staff were "putting their lives on the line every day" by treating coronavirus patients without appropriate protection.

The letter said: "Frontline doctors have been telling us for weeks that they do not feel safe at work.

"Intensive care doctors and anaesthetists have told us they have been carrying out the highest-risk procedure, putting a patient on a ventilator, with masks that expired in 2015."

[Mar 23, 2020] Some inventive modern ways to disinfect masks

Microware can be used for cleaning if you make the mask slightly wet. In this case they will heat to over 60 0 C. Other then using alcohol this is probably the fastest method of disinfection
Mar 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Don Utter , Mar 23 2020 18:11 utc | 4
Can a mask be cleaned by a microwave?

Taffyboy , Mar 23 2020 18:51 utc | 21

@4

If you can, get one of these, and there are 110 volt UVC lamps also.

https://www.amazon.ca/Germicidal-Lamp-Ozone-Light-Covers/dp/B07RWZ5SG6/ref=sr_1_10?crid=2RDBYXDA7Q4F2&keywords=uvc+lamp+germicide&qid=1584989398&sprefix=uvc+lamp%2Caps%2C913&sr=8-10

[Mar 23, 2020] Chronology of the death of a French doctor today

Mar 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Mina , Mar 22 2020 17:05 utc | 31

Chronology of the death of a French doctor today. Came back from a trip to Madagascar a month ago in good shape. Was working at Compiegnes, which because a cluster in mid-February when it received a taxi driver who was positive and treated him without special precautions. Got sick and was quarantined 3 weeks ago, i.e. early March, two weeks after exposition.
Died today. That is to say that most of the dead we see now might have been affected since mid-Feb.

[Mar 23, 2020] Fake science: Dr. Dan Lee Dinke claims that breathing hot air in a sauna for 20 minutes will mostly clean the upper respiratory tract of corona-viruses

Sauna or hot tube might help as it raise body temperature to fever levels and as such inhibit spreading of the virus.
Mar 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
LP , Mar 22 2020 18:50 utc | 52
Sauna is your friend:

https://youtu.be/vz5KmKKiuqk

Dr. Dan Lee Dinke: All Corona-viruses have a common weakness:heat kills them. Specifically relative short exposure to 56°C. Breathing hot air in a sauna for 20 minutes will mostly clean the upper respiratory tract of corona-viruses, but a hair dryer can also help if no sauna available.

The video is worth to watch and could save lives through such a simple method.

c1ue , Mar 22 2020 19:22 utc | 57

@LP #52
Wrong. The lower respiratory tract - the temperature is stable via mixing outside air with inside. Otherwise people could not survive in extreme cold or extreme heat situations.

The hot air might kill the virus outside; it won't kill the virus in the lower respiratory tract.

[Mar 23, 2020] Wuhan coronavirus death toll rises to 56 as healthcare workers say medical supplies are running out

Jan 26, 2020 | cnnphilippines.com

In Wuhan, ground zero for the virus, four healthcare workers -- including doctors -- have told CNN of the difficulties facing medical crews on the ground. They have asked to remain anonymous to avoid repercussions.

Through telephone conversations with CNN and posts on Chinese social media, they told of low hospital resources. In private groups online, those identified as hospital staff are coordinating with members of the public to import protective equipment as they treat an increasing number of infected patients.

"In terms of resources, the whole of Wuhan is lacking," one Wuhan-based healthcare worker told CNN by phone. This person said they were looking for more protective clothing, protective goggles and masks.

"It's really like we're going into battle stripped to the waist," one healthcare worker added, using a Chinese idiom that equates to "going into battle without armor".

One hospital staff member claims healthcare workers have resorted to wearing diapers to work so as to avoid having to remove their HAZMAT suits, which they say are in short supply. A doctor on her Chinese social media Weibo page described similar accounts at another Wuhan hospital.

"My family members are definitely worried about me, but I still have to work," another doctor told. But she said that she is hopeful they will ultimately get the gear they need. "Our bosses, our hospital suppliers will definitely find a way to get these stocks to us," she added.

It's not clear if these accounts are anecdotal or whether there are widespread shortages across Wuhan.

Chinese state media has also shared posts from multiple Wuhan hospitals in which they ask for public donations of medical supplies. They report that one hospital staff member said the current supplies "are only able to sustain three or four days".

The Wuhan Health Commission has requisitioned over 10,000 beds from 24 hospitals to be used in the treatment of confirmed and suspected cases.

On Friday, Wuhan officials acknowledged that local hospitals were struggling to accommodate people seeking medical attention and said measures were being put into place to alleviate the situation.

State media also reported that the city aims to build a 25,000 square meter (269,100 square foot) new facility within a week, increasing hospital capacity by 1,000 beds, and that several medical centers in Hubei province are asking for medical gear donations.

[Mar 23, 2020] Perspectives of using mRNA technology for a vaccine for the COVID-19

Mar 23, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Likklemore , Mar 22 2020 14:55 utc | 2

I read of the new tool scanning online messages. Checking in: late afternoon my two comments, in reply, failed to appear in the "Western Governments failures" thread.

Coronavirus, Vaccines and the Gates Foundation -
F. William Engdahl delves into the new mRNA vaccine.


[.] Gates Foundation monies via CEPI are financing development of a radical new vaccine method known as messengerRNA or mRNA.

They are co-funding the Cambridge, Massachusetts biotech company, Moderna Inc., to develop a vaccine against the Wuhan novel coronavirus, now called SARS-CoV-2. Moderna's other partner is the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Head of NIAID is Dr Anthony Fauci, the person at the center of the Trump Administration virus emergency response. Notable about the Fauci-Gates Moderna coronavirus vaccine, mRNA-1273, is that it has been rolled out in a matter of weeks, not years, and on February 24 went directly to Fauci's NIH for tests on human guinea pigs, not on mice as normal. Moderna's chief medical adviser, Tal Zaks, argued, "I don't think proving this in an animal model is on the critical path to getting this to a clinical trial."

Another notable admission by Moderna on its website is the legal disclaimer, "Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements: These risks, uncertainties, and other factors include, among others: the fact that there has never been a commercial product utilizing mRNA technology approved for use." In other words, completely unproven for human health and safety.

Another biotech company working with unproven mRNA technology to develop a vaccine for the COVID-19 is a German company, CureVac. Since 2015 CureVac has received money from the Gates Foundation to develop its own mRNA technology. In January the Gates-backed CEPI granted more than $8 million to develop a mRNA vaccine for the novel coronavirus.[.]

======
early fall the CDC planning and forgot to order test kits and ventilators:---{hapstance} ---the recruitment of

Public Health Advisors (Quarantine Program) country wide major cities, every state
Open Period:2019-11-15 to 2020-05-15 Salary $511440. to $93077.
Job summary: - responsible for preventing the importation and spread of communicable diseases from abroad and spread of these diseases domestically.[.]

Duties:
[Provide technical assistance, consultation and guidance to national, state and / or local agencies; health organizations; federal, state and local law enforcement agencies [.] and quarantine activities [.] ]

[Mar 22, 2020] The death rate in Hubei province is 5% of all infected

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Mar 22 2020 6:19 utc | 100

"It is the existence of these serious cases (absurdly estimated at 15% of the cases, probably in reality 10 times less) that justifies not simply relying on group immunity. ..."

Hubei is the best figures we have at the moment. Still 5,000 or so active cases there but everything has stabilized enough to get an idea of percentages.

Numbers at the moment

Recovered 59,432
Deaths 3,144
Active 5224

That gives a death rate of around 5% of those infected. There will also be a good number have suffered permanent lung damage, perhaps another 5%.

No medical care and those numbers go a lot higher.

[Mar 22, 2020] There didn't need to be a crisis or a panic. But a CRISIS! is something that is politically useful: to direct hate against China; to provide extraordinary support to favored interests like Banks and Wall Street and Boeing.

Notable quotes:
"... By mid-February, it was clear that certain drugs and anti-virals were effective. It was important to have widespread tests so that these drugs could be administered early, especially to vulnerable populations. Yet weeks later, the West (especially USA) was still unprepared to test. ..."
Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jackrabbit , Mar 22 2020 6:40 utc | 102

@101

I raised the same issues a couple of days ago:

The real danger was always in the possibility that the healthcare system is overwhelmed. Then you get large numbers of unnecessary deaths.

So a country needs to flatten the curve. The best way to do that is to close the schools as soon as community spread is detected. In the West, this should've been done in early February - it wasn't.

By mid-February, it was clear that certain drugs and anti-virals were effective. It was important to have widespread tests so that these drugs could be administered early, especially to vulnerable populations. Yet weeks later, the West (especially USA) was still unprepared to test.

There didn't need to be a crisis or a panic. But a CRISIS! is something that is politically useful: to direct hate against China; to provide extraordinary support to favored interests like Banks and Wall Street and Boeing.

The Empire Games Covid-19

<> <> <> <> <>

In addition, it seems that USA/Trump was hoping that remdesivir, developed by Gilead Sciences, would be the (expensive) drug of choice to treat Covid-19.

!!

[Mar 22, 2020] Best Coronavirus Trump Statements Timeline Synopsis Ever Put Together

1 minute 22 second video with Trump statements in chonological order @ https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/1240985096838053889
There is a saying the you fight the war with the army you have, not with the army you want.
Notable quotes:
"... Ok. Let me start by stating that I am not a "staunch" Trump supporter. However, I just really despise the constant visceral negative, hatred towards our Country's President. ..."
"... As I am sure you are aware, it is a tremendously difficult job, especially in today's crisis. I would think it would be better serve of your time and efforts to be constructive and optimistic, and hopeful. Rather than pinpointed every single steps and missteps he makes. He is certainly no perfect - but his goal is the same as all of ours: to defeat this virus in the best manner possible with the resources available. ..."
"... For the entire Trump Presidency it was all about the stock market. So, here we are. ..."
Mar 22, 2020 | moneymaven.io

Please play this.

Anthony Scaramucci @Scaramucci

I hope this is played everyday everywhere until Nov 8. Unless ⁦ @ realDonaldTrump ⁩ resigns as he should immediately.

https://twitter.com/i/videos/tweet/1240985096838053889

35.6K 8:54 AM - Mar 20, 2020 Twitter Ads info and privacy

23.6K people are talking about this

Mish

20 hours ago Here is a 1 minute 22 second video timeline of Trump's amazing handling of the coronavirus.

Please play this.

It will take less than two minutes of your time.

One missing key quote is a statement Trump made bragging about having natural talent coupled with a proclamation that he could have been a scientist instead of president.

More Questions:

Mike "Mish" Shedlock

njbr 20 hrs

The dumb-asses in DC still don't get it. "Top" leaders crowding around a single microphone in a stage no larger than a public restroom. Working toward a 1 time $1200 check that probably wont be issued/delivered for another couple weeks. What about the weeks after that--are they going to spend the next couple weeks going around about the next check?? Has the production of ventilators actually been accelerated-who could tell from what has been said? Why are nurses and doctors in my area asking the public for donations of PPE at the very beginning of the serious phase? What happens when the doctors and nurses start tipping over? Two partially ready hospital ships may help in one spot each on the coast, but what about everywhere else? Has anyone even checked on the production capacity for the maybe helpful malaria medicine--has anyone been directed to begin proactive super-production of this product? On and on.

DeeDee3 20 hrs

hard to prove deliberate neglect when you eliminate all of the evidence. No testing means "no virus" and sadly supported the hoax theory.

Another doc died in the city today. ER's are unprotected. what conclusion can we draw from all of this?

Zardoz 20 hrs

Thousands will die because of his incompetence... and his followers will blame the Chinese

egilkinc 20 hrs

There should be a tracker of the number of cases [among medical personnle] in the US along with this

Sechel 20 hrs

Oh my g-d. This is excellent! I think Trump has learned some bad lessons from Goebbels. Repeat the lie and repeat it often and people will take your version of events. This really serves to correct the record! Good work!

PecuniaNonOlet 20 hrs

And yet there will be an avalanche of Trump supporters defending the idiot. It is truly beyond me.

michiganmoon 20 hrs

Actually, Trump should resign and give the GOP a chance this November.

Had Trump not downplayed this and had tests ready, he could have played on a loop Biden on January 31st saying travel restrictions from Wuhan were racist and xenophobic.

thesaint0013 20 hrs

Ok. Let me start by stating that I am not a "staunch" Trump supporter. However, I just really despise the constant visceral negative, hatred towards our Country's President.

As I am sure you are aware, it is a tremendously difficult job, especially in today's crisis. I would think it would be better serve of your time and efforts to be constructive and optimistic, and hopeful. Rather than pinpointed every single steps and missteps he makes. He is certainly no perfect - but his goal is the same as all of ours: to defeat this virus in the best manner possible with the resources available.

To criticize previous tweets, interviews, and depict his flaws and errors does not help the common goal. The nature of some of the questions posed to him during the press conferences should be a bit more respectful and again, it doesn't serve any positive outcome to try and "catch" him in a lie, and how he may have said something that was not factual or false.

Again, he's not perfect and neither are anyone of us. However he is our President and we should support his and all of our common goal to defeat this virus.

Russell J 20 hrs

Not making excuses for Trump at all but he/we have people who are specialists and are responsible for being ready at all times for something like this and are responsible for being on the look out for this. Somebody should have came forward, even as a whistleblower. I've been aware for about 2 months now.

Thank you WWW.PEAKPROSPERITY.COM, MISH and WWW.ZEROHEDGE.COM

This was an epic failure of Trump, his administration and America in general.

ghoffa 20 hrs

Hi,
@MishTalk @Mish
I wanted to sincerely thank you MISH from my whole extended family. I have been reading you since 2007 when Ron Paul removed the scales from my eyes on the Fed and govt., Jekyll Island book, the "financial markets" (all modern day money changers). Every picture I see of Fed chairpersons, their eyes look dead black sharks eyes (to quote a famous book which I subscribe, the eyes are the windows to the soul).

In addition our mob style duolopoly govt and for the most part complicit MSM (all with significant influencing billionaire ownership to control the news - easily searched). I've learned so much from this blog and the many commentors in this space ( a personal fav is @Stuki ) . Nothing short of brilliant and reminds me of my fav news source Zerohedge and it's articles and commentors.

A special thanks for pointing us to Chris Martenson (peakprosperity.com) as my wife and I have watched every day his free daily videos since JAN @24th and our extended family is as prepared as we can be. God help us all with what's coming.

For those who haven't watched it, Dr. Martenson has a great 3 min video on exponential growth on YTube. Search his name and exponential. It will help you prepare for what our govt knows is coming in enourmous exponential growth in fatalities. Even knowing, it will be an emotional thing to prepare for. Prepping home supplies is one thing, prepping emotionally is also important per Dr. Martenson. HCWs be damned.

As this impacts people personally, I expect insider leaks to come from many fronts. We're working with neighbors to get prepared as we're all on our own now as the money changers (evil) bail out the money changers (evil) amidst a system that is so debt leveraged it can't likely be bailed out. "everything's a nail and the Fed has a hammer".

Lastly this brings a famous quote to mind as the people rise up against corrupt govt, corp bailouts after stock buy backs, etc. Let alone the monsters upon monsters creating lab viruses (regardless of the source of this virus), and unregulated GMOs changing the fabric of life.....

"All it takes for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing". Margaret Mead
G

QE2Infinity 20 hrs

Come on! First off, anyone can be made to look bad by taking snippets out of context and stringing them together. That said, Trump does tend towards braggadocio. If that is off putting to you, he can be annoying. I much prefer a transparent fool to the more sly variety that plays the part well while sticking a knife in your back.

But let's be honest here. The president can do very little. The bureaucracy of the government is a jobs program for the less ambitious and politically inclined. It's staffed with incompetent bureaucrats that show up, surf the web and may get around to an hour or two of honest work. Public unions guarantee they can't be fired.

Obama converted the CDC into a PC jobs program for lefties, just like he converted NASA into a Muslim outreach program.

May one ask: why is a self proclaimed libertarian screaming for more government action? Wouldn't it be great if one of the outcomes of this crisis is that local communities became more self reliant and more self sufficient!

Sechel 20 hrs

that's from a website called therecount.com looks interesting.

Greggg 20 hrs

For the entire Trump Presidency it was all about the stock market. So, here we are.

numike 20 hrs

while we all point fingers lets look at a useful guide regarding the mess we are ALL in now https://www.seriouseats.com/2020/03/food-safety-and-coronavirus-a-comprehensive-guide.html

Food Safety and Coronavirus: A Comprehensive Guide Questions about COVID-19 and food safety, answered. www.seriouseats.com

Tengen 20 hrs

The graphic at the end of the video already looks out of date and shows how rapid the spread has been. For March 2020 it shows 5,002 cases in the US (and counting) but right now I'm seeing 24,137 cases.

So much for "in a couple of days the 15 is going to be down close to zero".

njbr 20 hrs

What can the President do?

Force and organize the production of necessary goods.

Mish Editor 19 hrs

May one ask: why is a self proclaimed libertarian screaming for more government action? Wouldn't it be great if one of the outcomes of this crisis is that local communities became more self reliant and more self sufficient!

Mish Editor 19 hrs

Trump did not Drain the Swamp. He IS the swamp

Mish Editor 19 hrs

Anyone who still supports this President's actions is a TDS-inflicted fool.

Jim Bob 19 hrs

I've followed Mish for ~ 12 years online and on the radio for brilliant economic analysis. Lately his work has been undermined by irrational political opinion. Mish has turned into Krugman. I won't be back.

abend237-04 19 hrs

The Donald is obviously afflicted with the same narcissistic megalomania prerequisite for a successful run at any elective office above County Coroner, anywhere in this country.

That said, he can apparently read a graph, and he's right: The two drug combination of Hydroxychloroquine and Azithromycin are working to treat this damn thing, BUT:

It is, indeed, not a Covid-19 preventative.

If you get it, and you dink around at home too long waiting for improvement, arriving at ICU needing ventilation leaves you with roughly the odds of Russian roulette of surviving, especially if you're older.

Lacking testing, the only remaining means available to knock the transmission rate down quickly is social distancing/lockdown. But, enough of that prevention can leave us wishing we were dead anyway.

Unfortunately, all the college kids jamming the bars and beaches is setting the stage for continued exponential growth by hordes of asymptomatic spreaders.

The march of folly continues.

I like what I'm seeing of Cuomo. He'd be a good guy to have in the room in a serious fight; This qualifies.

DBG8489 19 hrs

As someone who hates all politicians, there is zero love lost between Trump and myself. I had hopes when he was elected that he would make a difference but it was clear based on how he looked after his private meeting with Obama on inauguration day that he was in over his head.

Having said that, I will say this:

From at least the "major" state level up, it would appear that not one single elected official or the top advisors and bureaucrats who work for them have shown anything but complete and utter failure in their handling of this emergency.

You have senators selling off piles of stock while either saying nothing or telling the rest of us that it was bullshit. And trust me - they were not the only ones. If anyone cares to investigate, they will likely find this problem rampant. Elected officials should not even be allowed to trade stocks when they control the entire economy - not even through alleged "blind trusts" - it's bullshit. But that's a conversation for another time.

You have congressional reps and senators blaming each other and/or the other party and passing laws and bailouts without even reading the bills they are passing.

You have the Treasury and the Fed printing money and throwing it at every hole that opens up without the slightest regard for what the unintended consequences of those actions may entail.

You have governments of the "major" states (CA, NY, NJ...etc) who know they can't simply print money being exposed using any extra money they had (along with taxes based on tourism that have now disappeared) to fund God knows what now demanding that everyone else pony up to pay for their failure to plan...

The lack of leadership in the major states and at the Federal level is abysmal ACROSS THE BOARD.

And that includes members of BOTH parties and nearly every single bureaucratic agency involved.

You can single Trump out if you want, but he's not alone. He's just an easy target because 49% of the population hated him before this started.

njbr 18 hrs

....Top health officials first learned of the virus's spread in China on January 3, US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Friday. Throughout January and February, intelligence officials' warnings became more and more urgent, according to the Post -- and by early February, much of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the CIA's intelligence reports were dedicated to warnings about Covid-19.

All the while, Trump downplayed the virus publicly, telling the public the coronavirus "is very well under control in our country," and suggesting warm weather would neutralize the threat the virus poses....

...The administration did begin taking some limited action about a month after Azar says the administration first began receiving warnings, blocking non-citizens who had been to China in the last two weeks from entering the country on February 3 -- a move public experts have argued at best bought the US time to ramp up its testing capabilities, which it did not use, and at worst had no beneficial effects at all.

Trump finally assembled a task force to address the virus, putting Vice President Mike Pence in charge of the effort on February 26, and declared a national emergency on March 13. And, just this week -- nearly three months after first receiving warnings from his intelligence officials -- the president's public tone about the crisis shifted: "I've always known this is a real -- this is a pandemic," he said Tuesday as he admitted, "[the virus is] not under control for any place in the world."....

Realist 18 hrs

I have been watching political leaders in my own country get on television daily. They have all done a great job of informing the public about the dangers of this virus. They have all relied on the experts to relay information to the public about what the government is doing, and what individuals should be doing. This is true at the national, regional, and local levels.

In addition businesses have been sending out emails, radio announcements and tv messages explaining what they are doing in regard to this pandemic.

In fact, I am amazed at what a good job everyone is doing.

I am also watching what is happening in the US. Every US state governor and city mayor I have seen on tv has done a wonderful job of presenting the facts to the public and provided instructions as to what they are doing and what the public should be doing.

Then there is the gong show that is Trump. I could not imagine that anyone could be as bad as he is; months of lies, denials, suppression of the truth, and a complete and utter lack of preparation for something he was warned about many times. Denying one day that the virus was a pandemic; only to claim the very next day that he had known it was a pandemic for months; and then the very next day say that no one could have seen this coming; and finally saying that his response to the virus rates a 10 out of 10.

Worst President ever. Sadly, many, many Americans are going to suffer and die because America had this moron in charge.

Mish keeps referring to worldometer to get stats from. Their numbers seem to match up with numbers I see in my own country and in the US.

Disturbingly, today, the mortality rate for closed cases ticked up 1% to 12%. 12978 deaths and 94674 recovered. That is not the direction I expected it to go.

daveyp 17 hrs

You get what you vote for. To have such a malignant narcissist of such profoundly limited intellectual honesty and capacity "leading" your nation through this is truly tragic for your country. Even the hideously vile ultimate Washington insider Hilary would have done a better job.

truthseeker 17 hrs

Mish I agree with much of the criticism of Trump, yet had he done everything you and others suggest, there is this implied assumption that everything would have worked out perfectly. You know I am impressed the way the country seems to be uniting to such a great degree, that I think there is at least some hope for our country's future though there are huge challenges that lay ahead absolutely!

abend237-04 17 hrs

I will now proceed, once again, to bitch about the root cause of our current pandemic, which is causing many to experience cosmic scale frustration with The Donald, which I share:

Civilization has now been hit squarely in the head with three killer coronavirus outbreaks in 18 years, yet still has no unified global new viral antigen detection system. We could have if our world "leaders" would make it happen.

Local supercomputers, however massive, will never crack this nut, but the billions of powerful, web-accessible smartphones could if linked and used by a parallelized, intelligent scheduler to raise the alarm when a new antibody/pathogen is discovered in human blood anywhere.

Such a system could have lifted the burden from a lonely doctor struggling to raise the alarm in Wuhan, before Covid-19 killed him, and placed it squarely in front of disease control experts, worldwide. It can be done; We must do it.

Sars cov-3/4/5/6/7/8/9/n could kill us all if we don't.

[Mar 22, 2020] Intelligence agencies and the virus

Highly recommended!
Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

kiwiklown , Mar 22 2020 10:11 utc | 128

@Jackrabbit | Mar 21 2020 22:32 utc | 50

"These officials "failed us" in the same way that our media "fails us": they serve the interests of the EMPIRE-FIRST Deep State."

Yuppp. Our error is to assume all 17 intelligence agencies; the presstitudes; and US "leadership" exist to serve the American people. And so, yes, they "fail" the people. But, from the point of view of the controllers of those agencies and of those "leaders", they hardly ever fail !!!

While the people argue over virulent minutae, they are once again helping themselves to the US Treasury.... Trillions of USDs.... LOL

kiwiklown , Mar 22 2020 10:36 utc | 132

@Jackrabbit | Mar 21 2020 23:10 utc | 54

"Caitlin Johnstone also sees the response being manipulated to focus hate on China...."

Yuppp, blaming China, hating on China achieves several objectives:

Just look at how US leadership has been hating on Russia for the last 100 years, waiting to whack them with a sneak attack if feasible.

kiwiklown , Mar 22 2020 11:25 utc | 137
@Jackrabbit | Mar 22 2020 2:45 utc | 79

".... was then told to STOP TESTING...... A medical person would not try to suppress testing. That would be a "management decision" and its the Nation Security Council that was running the show (and which had classified all discussions related to virus preparations)...."

Thanks for reminding us of Dr Chu's story. What if the US leadership:

[Mar 22, 2020] The soccer team Manchester United has opened up its hotel free of charge for medical staff, so that they can return from work to a neutral place rather than to their families and spread the bug further.

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Mina , Mar 22 2020 12:57 utc | 154

Another reason for the curves in chaotic Fr/It/Sp is a point underlined by Campbell on 19/3 about
the fact the soccer team Manchester United has opened up its hotel free of charge for medical
staff, so that they can return from work to a neutral place rather than to their families and spread
the bug further. Such measures have been applied in Asia and they should have been on the mind of
the EU gov, but apparently they were too busy thinking about their luxury holidays or their shares
in the stocks.

[Mar 22, 2020] No One Was Ready Europe's Desperate Doctors Use Trash Bags As Hazmat Suits

That's stupid solution. changing clothing more often is more effective. Clothing can be disinfected with regular stream.
Mar 22, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
Huge jumps in COVID-19 deaths and cases have been reported in the UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, and France this weekend. Hospital systems in many of these countries are running out of supplies, staff, hospital beds, and ICU-level treatments.

The shortage of protective gear for medical staff at many European hospitals has forced some to tape trash bags to their bodies as makeshift biohazard suits.

Nurses in England Wearing Trash Bags to Protect from COVID-19

Bloomberg interviewed Samantha Gonzalez,52, who works at the Txagorritxu hospital in Vitoria-Gasteiz, Alava, Spain. She warned: "This is not the first world anymore -- it's a war" amid surging virus cases in the country.

Across Europe on Saturday, deaths accorded to the fast-spreading virus soared, with Italy reporting a record 793 deaths on Friday, and Spain reporting another 300 cases, bringing their totals to 4,825 and 1,326.

The UK also reported another string of deaths, as millions await a lockdown order on London , while hospitals and intensive care units in Italy and Spain are struggling to cope, despite some Madrid hotels being temporarily converted and of the Fair of Madrid, the capital's main exhibition space.

One of the leading hospitals in Bergamo, northern Italy, the current epicenter of the virus outbreak in Europe, has run out of hospital beds, and ICU-level treatment, as an influx in patients, has overwhelmed the facility . The sick are being transferred to offsite locations, equipped with oxygen machines.

From Italy to Spain to other regions in Europe, hospital systems are at full capacity, canceling non-urgent surgeries, and appointments to handle the influx of virus patients. In a couple of weeks, countrywide shutdowns like what's happening in Italy could be the norm across many European countries.

Giovanni Rezza, head of the infectious diseases department at Rome's Superior Health Institute, said, "Italy wasn't completely prepared for the coronavirus:"

"It's only in some two weeks that Italy will find out whether the government's nationwide lockdown and social distancing rules have had an impact," said Rezza.

"The lockdown is only delaying the spread of the epidemic, we expect that there will be new outbreaks in future. But in the meantime we have to equip hospitals with more intensive care beds, even in Lombardy which is one of the best-equipped regions in Europe."

The biggest challenge for European hospital systems is having enough protective gear for medical staff.

In Spain, 3,500 Spanish doctors have contracted the virus, which is 12% of the total number of cases detected. With the lack of gear, doctors and nurses are more susceptible to contracting the virus, which could cause medical staff shortages that would undoubtedly lead to high mortality rates.

COVID-19 Map

"Just in the nephrology department, three out of 13 colleagues have fallen ill, one of them seriously," said Giuseppe Remuzzi, a former head of the department of medicine at the Papa Giovanni XXIII hospital in Bergamo, Italy, who has joined efforts to contain the pandemic. "This is a scary, terrible situation."

Medical staff have been instructed to swap out old protective gear every four hours, which includes changing face masks, splash guard googles, and biohazard suits. Since supplies are limited, doctors and nurses are making their own bio hazmat suits with taping garbage bags on their body.

"This thing blew up on us," said Pelayo Pedrero, the head of labor risk prevention at doctors' union AMYTS in Madrid, Spain. "No one was ready for this. They didn't buy the supplies, they didn't prepare the hospitals to receive and treat all these patients. Not just in Madrid or Spain, but all over Europe."

To sum up, the evolution of the virus crisis is that medical gear shortages could lead to labor shortages at hospitals across Europe because medical staff aren't adequately protected against the virus. Europe has become the new China. And in the weeks ahead, parts of the US could transform into Italy .

[Mar 22, 2020] In 1918, anyone at the emergency hospital in Boston who had contact with patients had to wear an improvised face mask.

Mar 22, 2020 | medium.com

Face Masks Coronavirus and Flu

Surgical masks are currently in short supply in China and elsewhere. They were worn 100 years ago, during the great pandemic, to try and stop the influenza virus spreading. While surgical masks may offer some protection from infection they do not seal around the face. So they don't filter out small airborne particles. In 1918, anyone at the emergency hospital in Boston who had contact with patients had to wear an improvised face mask. This comprised five layers of gauze fitted to a wire frame which covered the nose and mouth. The frame was shaped to fit the face of the wearer and prevent the gauze filter touching the mouth and nostrils. The masks were replaced every two hours; properly sterilized and with fresh gauze put on. They were a forerunner of the N95 respirators in use in hospitals today to protect medical staff against airborne infection.

... ... ...

Putting infected patients out in the sun may have helped because it inactivates the influenza virus.[7] It also kills bacteria that cause lung and other infections in hospitals.[8] During the First World War, military surgeons routinely used sunlight to heal infected wounds.[9] They knew it was a disinfectant. What they didn't know is that one advantage of placing patients outside in the sun is they can synthesise vitamin D in their skin if sunlight is strong enough. This was not discovered until the 1920s. Low vitamin D levels are now linked to respiratory infections and may increase susceptibility to influenza.[10] Also, our body's biological rhythms appear to influence how we resist infections.[11] New research suggests they can alter our inflammatory response to the flu virus.[12] As with vitamin D, at the time of the 1918 pandemic, the important part played by sunlight in synchronizing these rhythms was not known.

[Mar 22, 2020] Coronavirus and the Sun a Lesson from the 1918 Influenza Pandemic by Richard Hobday

Notable quotes:
"... The masks were replaced every two hours; properly sterilized and with fresh gauze put on. They were a forerunner of the N95 respirators in use in hospitals today to protect medical staff against airborne infection. ..."
Mar 10, 2020 | medium.com

Fresh air, sunlight and improvised face masks seemed to work a century ago; and they might help us now.

by Richard Hobday

When new, virulent diseases emerge, such SARS and Covid-19, the race begins to find new vaccines and treatments for those affected. As the current crisis unfolds, governments are enforcing quarantine and isolation, and public gatherings are being discouraged. Health officials took the same approach 100 years ago, when influenza was spreading around the world. The results were mixed. But records from the 1918 pandemic suggest one technique for dealing with influenza -- little-known today -- was effective. Some hard-won experience from the greatest pandemic in recorded history could help us in the weeks and months ahead.

<img src="https://miro.medium.com/max/2400/1*7pNa3EQCs1VsWXRWL8_Uig.jpeg" width="1200" height="892" role="presentation"/>
Influenza patients getting sunlight at the Camp Brooks emergency open-air hospital in Boston. Medical staff were not supposed to remove their masks. (National Archives)

Put simply, medics found that severely ill flu patients nursed outdoors recovered better than those treated indoors. A combination of fresh air and sunlight seems to have prevented deaths among patients; and infections among medical staff.[1] There is scientific support for this. Research shows that outdoor air is a natural disinfectant. Fresh air can kill the flu virus and other harmful germs. Equally, sunlight is germicidal and there is now evidence it can kill the flu virus.

`Open-Air' Treatment in 1918

During the great pandemic, two of the worst places to be were military barracks and troop-ships. Overcrowding and bad ventilation put soldiers and sailors at high risk of catching influenza and the other infections that often followed it.[2,3] As with the current Covid-19 outbreak, most of the victims of so-called `Spanish flu' did not die from influenza: they died of pneumonia and other complications.

When the influenza pandemic reached the East coast of the United States in 1918, the city of Boston was particularly badly hit. So the State Guard set up an emergency hospital. They took in the worst cases among sailors on ships in Boston harbour. The hospital's medical officer had noticed the most seriously ill sailors had been in badly-ventilated spaces. So he gave them as much fresh air as possible by putting them in tents. And in good weather they were taken out of their tents and put in the sun. At this time, it was common practice to put sick soldiers outdoors. Open-air therapy, as it was known, was widely used on casualties from the Western Front. And it became the treatment of choice for another common and often deadly respiratory infection of the time; tuberculosis. Patients were put outside in their beds to breathe fresh outdoor air. Or they were nursed in cross-ventilated wards with the windows open day and night. The open-air regimen remained popular until antibiotics replaced it in the 1950s.

Doctors who had first-hand experience of open-air therapy at the hospital in Boston were convinced the regimen was effective. It was adopted elsewhere. If one report is correct, it reduced deaths among hospital patients from 40 per cent to about 13 per cent.[4] According to the Surgeon General of the Massachusetts State Guard:

`The efficacy of open air treatment has been absolutely proven, and one has only to try it to discover its value.'

Fresh Air is a Disinfectant

Patients treated outdoors were less likely to be exposed to the infectious germs that are often present in conventional hospital wards. They were breathing clean air in what must have been a largely sterile environment. We know this because, in the 1960s, Ministry of Defence scientists proved that fresh air is a natural disinfectant.[5] Something in it, which they called the Open Air Factor, is far more harmful to airborne bacteria -- and the influenza virus -- than indoor air. They couldn't identify exactly what the Open Air Factor is. But they found it was effective both at night and during the daytime.

Their research also revealed that the Open Air Factor's disinfecting powers can be preserved in enclosures -- if ventilation rates are kept high enough. Significantly, the rates they identified are the same ones that cross-ventilated hospital wards, with high ceilings and big windows, were designed for.[6] But by the time the scientists made their discoveries, antibiotic therapy had replaced open-air treatment. Since then the germicidal effects of fresh air have not featured in infection control, or hospital design. Yet harmful bacteria have become increasingly resistant to antibiotics.

Sunlight and Influenza Infection

Putting infected patients out in the sun may have helped because it inactivates the influenza virus.[7] It also kills bacteria that cause lung and other infections in hospitals.[8] During the First World War, military surgeons routinely used sunlight to heal infected wounds.[9] They knew it was a disinfectant. What they didn't know is that one advantage of placing patients outside in the sun is they can synthesise vitamin D in their skin if sunlight is strong enough. This was not discovered until the 1920s. Low vitamin D levels are now linked to respiratory infections and may increase susceptibility to influenza.[10] Also, our body's biological rhythms appear to influence how we resist infections.[11] New research suggests they can alter our inflammatory response to the flu virus.[12] As with vitamin D, at the time of the 1918 pandemic, the important part played by sunlight in synchronizing these rhythms was not known.

Face Masks Coronavirus and Flu

Surgical masks are currently in short supply in China and elsewhere. They were worn 100 years ago, during the great pandemic, to try and stop the influenza virus spreading.

While surgical masks may offer some protection from infection they do not seal around the face. So they don't filter out small airborne particles.

In 1918, anyone at the emergency hospital in Boston who had contact with patients had to wear an improvised face mask. This comprised five layers of gauze fitted to a wire frame which covered the nose and mouth. The frame was shaped to fit the face of the wearer and prevent the gauze filter touching the mouth and nostrils.

The masks were replaced every two hours; properly sterilized and with fresh gauze put on. They were a forerunner of the N95 respirators in use in hospitals today to protect medical staff against airborne infection.

Temporary Hospitals

Staff at the hospital kept up high standards of personal and environmental hygiene. No doubt this played a big part in the relatively low rates of infection and deaths reported there. The speed with which their hospital and other temporary open-air facilities were erected to cope with the surge in pneumonia patients was another factor. Today, many countries are not prepared for a severe influenza pandemic.[13] Their health services will be overwhelmed if there is one. Vaccines and antiviral drugs might help. Antibiotics may be effective for pneumonia and other complications. But much of the world's population will not have access to them. If another 1918 comes, or the Covid-19 crisis gets worse, history suggests it might be prudent to have tents and pre-fabricated wards ready to deal with large numbers of seriously ill cases. Plenty of fresh air and a little sunlight might help too.

Dr. Richard Hobday is an independent researcher working in the fields of infection control, public health and building design. He is the author of `The Healing Sun'.

References

  1. Hobday RA and Cason JW. The open-air treatment of pandemic influenza. Am J Public Health 2009;99 Suppl 2:S236–42. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2008.134627.
  2. Aligne CA. Overcrowding and mortality during the influenza pandemic of 1918. Am J Public Health 2016 Apr;106(4):642–4. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2015.303018.
  3. Summers JA, Wilson N, Baker MG, Shanks GD. Mortality risk factors for pandemic influenza on New Zealand troop ship, 1918. Emerg Infect Dis 2010 Dec;16(12):1931–7. doi:10.3201/eid1612.100429.
  4. Anon. Weapons against influenza. Am J Public Health 1918 Oct;8(10):787–8. doi: 10.2105/ajph.8.10.787.
  5. May KP, Druett HA. A micro-thread technique for studying the viability of microbes in a simulated airborne state. J Gen Micro-biol 1968;51:353e66. Doi: 10.1099/00221287–51–3–353.
  6. Hobday RA. The open-air factor and infection control. J Hosp Infect 2019;103:e23-e24 doi.org/10.1016/j.jhin.2019.04.003.
  7. Schuit M, Gardner S, Wood S et al. The influence of simulated sunlight on the inactivation of influenza virus in aerosols. J Infect Dis 2020 Jan 14;221(3):372–378. doi: 10.1093/infdis/jiz582.
  8. Hobday RA, Dancer SJ. Roles of sunlight and natural ventilation for controlling infection: historical and current perspectives. J Hosp Infect 2013;84:271–282. doi: 10.1016/j.jhin.2013.04.011.
  9. Hobday RA. Sunlight therapy and solar architecture. Med Hist 1997 Oct;41(4):455–72. doi:10.1017/s0025727300063043.
  10. Gruber-Bzura BM. Vitamin D and influenza-prevention or therapy? Int J Mol Sci 2018 Aug 16;19(8). pii: E2419. doi: 10.3390/ijms19082419.
  11. Costantini C, Renga G, Sellitto F, et al. Microbes in the era of circadian medicine. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2020 Feb 5;10:30. doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2020.00030.
  12. Sengupta S, Tang SY, Devine JC et al. Circadian control of lung inflammation in influenza infection. Nat Commun 2019 Sep 11;10(1):4107. doi: 10.1038/s41467–019–11400–9.
  13. Jester BJ, Uyeki TM, Patel A, Koonin L, Jernigan DB. 100 Years of medical countermeasures and pandemic influenza preparedness. Am J Public Health. 2018 Nov;108(11):1469–1472. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2018.304586.
7.9K 7.9K claps

Dr. Richard Hobday is an internationally recognized authority on health in the built environment.

[Mar 22, 2020] It seems that chloroquine and its use as a 'potent inhibitor of the coronavirus infection' has been known for a long time - since August 2005

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

alaric , Mar 22 2020 3:26 utc | 84

I see nothing wrong with testing Hyrodroxychloroquine together with azithromycin as long as its done safely and ethically to gain additional data. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work.

A lot of people are going to reject it just because it came from Trump's mouth. Drug companies will fight against it because they'd rather sell more expensive drugs.

Anti malaria drugs are part of the primary or secondary treatment recommendations in China and Korea. I'm pretty sure they were used in Japan as well so the first half of it (hydroxychloroquine) seems pretty legit though maybe not effective enough. Lets see what happens. I'd agree we lack sufficient data to make an adequate evaluation. Hydroxychloroquine is also being used with other things in trials. We'll see what happens there too.

** A dutch professor has announced an aerosol version of i believe hydroxycholoquine but it might just be chloroquine that is able to penetrate the lungs they claim. They also claim it can be manufactured immediately.

https://www.rtvnoord.nl/nieuws/220259/RUG-onderzoekt-effect-malariamedicijn-op-corona


ted01 , Mar 22 2020 4:03 utc | 87

It seems that chloroquine and its use as a 'potent inhibitor of the coronavirus infection' has been known for a long time - since August 2005.

https://virologyj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1743-422X-2-69

No money for big pharma therefore no interest.
They would rather let people die.

alaric , Mar 22 2020 4:19 utc | 88
We should all certainly be skeptical of such a small study (HCQ and azithromycin) but do keep in mind that you really can't trust industry and their legion of paid doctors and experts either.

For example:

The CEO of Ericsson once said "CDMA will never work." Maybe that was because Ericsson didn't have it working for cellular systems at the time. I worked in the cell phone industry as an analyst for some time. People say anything to sell their stuff. I'm sure pharma is equally bad.

Peter AU1 , Mar 22 2020 4:35 utc | 92
ted01 "No money for big pharma therefore no interest. They would rather let people die."

That is about it. A dirt cheap generic drug can't possibly be any good. A pity so many here prefer to believe big pharma rather than the frontline doctors using it.

Peter AU1 , Mar 22 2020 5:02 utc | 94
Chinese doctors Chloroquine or Chloroquine Phosphate - Formula C18H26ClN3
Trump Hydroxychloroquine - Formula C18H26ClN3O

Two different chemicals but I take it their mode of action is similar.

Hydroxychloroquine

"The wholesale cost in the developing world is about US$4.65 per month as of 2015, when used for rheumatoid arthritis or lupus.[7] In the United States the wholesale cost of a month of treatment is about US$25 as of 2020" (wikipedia)

Chloroquine Phosphate

"The wholesale cost in the developing world is about US$0.04.[9] In the United States, it costs about US$5.30 per dose." (wikipedia)

Easy to see why Trump and big phama don't like Chloroquine.

Richard Steven Hack , Mar 22 2020 8:55 utc | 112
Link to a review of available evidence for chloroquine treatments cited:

A systematic review on the efficacy and safety of chloroquine for the treatment of COVID-19
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0883944120303907?via%3Dihub

Click the PDF link at the top of the page. 5 Pages.

Peter AU1 , Mar 22 2020 9:36 utc | 117
This from link @ Richard Steven Hack | Mar 22 2020 8:55 utc | 114

"chloroquine was highly effective in reducing viral replication, with an Effective Concentration (EC)90 of 6.90 μM that can be easily achievable with standard dosing, due to its favourable penetration in tissues, including in the lung"

Veritas X- , Mar 22 2020 9:41 utc | 119
re: Jackrabbit | Mar 22 2020 6:46 utc @ 106

You may find the following, interesting:

>>>
Brasco_Aad
@Brasco_Aad
Israeli Pharmaceutical Company Teva to send 10 million doses of hydroxychloroquine to the United states, free of charge. | The Times of Israel
Quote Tweet
Brasco_Aad
@Brasco_Aad
· Mar 20
-significant-

Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis to donate 130 million doses of hydroxychloroquine to the United States.

50 million doses now and another 80 million doses by the end of may.

Enough to treat millions of Americas who have been infected with COVID-19 | Reuters
12:09 AM · Mar 21, 2020
https://twitter.com/Brasco_Aad/status/1241139799077117952
<<<

I don't have the time nor need to try to do any 'confirmation'.
Regards X- in Sweden

Peter AU1 , Mar 22 2020 9:57 utc | 122
Chloroquine I have noticed is also called chloroquine phosphate. Phosphate I believe is the binder that holds the chloroquine powder in tablet form. According to the paper linked by RSH @114 there is 300mg of chloroquine in a 500mg chloroquine phosphate tablet.

[Mar 22, 2020] A pretty good overview on the major avenues to attack nCOV/COVID-19 from a treatment perspective

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 22 2020 14:05 utc | 171

Here's a pretty good overview on the major avenues to attack nCOV/COVID-19 from a treatment perspective: Ars Technica overview

In particular, this article talks about targeting different aspects of the nCOV life cycle and how these are targeted by treatments to attack nCOV:
1) Reproduction: remdesivir and others
2) [viral] protein processing: protease inhibitors such as HIV drugs
3) [viral] packaging: attack the final protein packaging of the virus such as a Hep B treatment - but very few such examples exist, of any kind
4) viral shell: plasma distilled from existing recovered victims used to prime immune system of ongoing infected. Vaccines will eventually enable this via manufacturing processes.
5) new infection capability: chloroquines. In particular

One of these targets is the drop in pH. This is the step that's targeted by chloroquine, the antimalarial drug. Chloroquine can cross membranes and so can enter the sac containing the virus. Once there, it can neutralize the pH.

That's significant, because many proteases are only active at lower pH. If the pH inside the sac doesn't change, it's possible that the coronavirus spike protein won't be cut and thus won't be activated. This appears to be the case in cultured cells infected by the virus, and there are anecdotal case reports of chloroquine helping COVID-19 patients.


It is also clear - from this description - why evolutionary pressures could create defenses against this type of attack (chloroquine pH change)

Again, a theoretical operation, even the clinical test tube trials, doesn't equate to effective therapy.
However, IMO, the cost and risk factor for chloroquines makes for a far better gambit than anything else at this moment in time. And note that because of the way chloroquines are supposed to affect nCOV - if chloroquines work, they have to be taken when symptoms first appear or potentially even as a preventative.
I would discourage the preventative use though - that will likely accelerate the nCOV evolution around the chloroquine pH attack.

Another reason: it appears the US only has 160,000 ventilators available Johns Hopkins estimate
of which a bit under 30K are being used for neonatal/pediatric care.
Yow.

Walter , Mar 22 2020 14:15 utc | 174

hydroxycloroquine overdose, the boffins say, can destroy the retina of the eyes.

Not a trivial side effect. Nothing to play with. Fer what it worth, better read up on the drug and pay attention. Eyes are nice to have.

Overdose of Q is Bad.

Wally read 60 years ago in Rome newspaper story that British air-line pilots, who drank their Gin an' Tonics, had been discovered to have very poor glare recovery. That, they said, was from the quinine in the tonic water. Henceforth, they were forbidden the tonic water, alas!

But Wally never drives at night and his airplane days ended back in the mists...

He's saving the quinine he's got, for now.

[Mar 22, 2020] Liberal NPCs Hate Russia, Conservative NPCs Hate China

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jackrabbit , Mar 21 2020 23:10 utc | 54

Caitlin Johnstone also sees the response being manipulated to focus hate on China: Liberal NPCs Hate Russia, Conservative NPCs Hate China

But she sees this China-bashing as mostly a political reaction:

In reality these people are rallying behind the campaign to blame China for the health crisis they're now facing because they understand that otherwise the blame will land squarely on the shoulders of their president, who's running for re-election this year.
instead of a deliberate Deep-State strategy (which is my view).

We can argue who created the virus (I'm still looking for any rebuttal to the Chinese claim that USA must be the source because it has all five strains of the virus), but the Empire's gaming of the virus outbreak seems very clear to me.

!!

[Mar 22, 2020] Medics leave Wuhan after supporting the coronavirus-hit city

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

JC , Mar 21 2020 22:04 utc | 41

ben | Mar 21 2020 20:49 utc | 19

Best watch CGTN....

Live: Medics leave Wuhan after supporting the coronavirus-hit city

https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-03-21/Live-Medics-leave-Wuhan-after-supporting-the-coronavirus-hit-city-P2dA7TKQr6/index.html

Last night watched CGTN TV with Huawei Honor smartphone.

"....team from SW China's Sichuan Province leaves Wuhan today...brings you this bittersweet goodbye."
- Worked 8-12hrs shift.... 100 plus medical workers, 57 days ago leaving spouse, children and parents behinds
- Initially none or limited N95 masks - wore double for protection..
- In capitalist USA.... Fxxk the company or country, Strike, protests...
- 16 makeshift hospitals disbanded but two 16,000 beds still in operations.

[Mar 22, 2020] Equivalent respirator standards by country

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Mar 21 2020 22:18 utc | 44

Equivalent respirator standards by country
. N95 (United States NIOSH-42CFR84)
• FFP2 (Europe EN 149-2001)
• KN95 (China GB2626-2006)
• P2 (Australia/New Zealand AS/NZA 1716:2012)
• Korea 1st class (Korea KMOEL - 2017-64)
• DS (Japan JMHLW-Notification 214, 2018)

I just received an email from a contact in China offering to help get FFP2 respirators if I needed or wanted any. She said KN95 were virtually non existent in China but there are limited supplies of the FFP2 respirators.

TJ , Mar 21 2020 22:29 utc | 47

@44 Peter AU1

If you or anyone else is interested in masks / respirators I would recommend watching the videos by weaponsandstuff93 on YouTube. I am no expert on the subject but on his recommendation I got myself a mask that takes 40mm NATO filters ( the mask is a Belgium BEM4 ) and some P3 level filters ( mine are Scott Pros ) this is different to 40MM GOST filters which were the Soviet standard.

[Mar 22, 2020] Make your own face masks?

Mar 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Ian2 , Mar 21 2020 21:04 utc | 26

Make your own face masks? Pfff...it appears the Japanese found a better idea from the Philippines government... panties . OR, you could order a custom one from Pantsu Mask . ROFL

[Mar 22, 2020] WTO stance on Covid-19 propaganda and manipulation

Returning to the Covid-19 epidemic and the way governments are reacting to it, Thierry Meyssan stresses that the authoritarian decisions of Italy and France have no medical justification. They contradict the observations of the best infectiologists and the instructions of the World Health Organization.
Mar 22, 2020 | www.voltairenet.org

In all of its messages, the WHO stressed : the low demographic impact of the epidemic; the futility of border closures; the ineffectiveness of wearing gloves, masks (except for health care workers) and certain "barrier measures" (for example, the distance of one metre only makes sense with infected people, but not with healthy people); the need to raise the level of hygiene, including hand washing, water disinfection and increased ventilation of confined spaces. Finally, use disposable tissues or, failing that, sneeze into your elbow.

However, the WHO is not a medical organization, but a United Nations agency dealing with health issues. Its officials, even if they are doctors, are also and above all politicians. It cannot therefore denounce the abuses of certain states. Furthermore, since the controversy over the H1N1 epidemic, the WHO must publicly justify all its recommendations. In 2009, it was accused of having let itself be swayed by the interests of big pharmaceutical companies and of having hastily sounded the alarm in a disproportionate manner [ 4 ]. This time it used the word "pandemic" only as a last resort, on March 12th, four months later.

[Mar 21, 2020] The New Dark Age

Notable quotes:
"... Voltaire Network ..."
"... the Iranian population is the world's most lung-weakest. Almost all men over the age of sixty suffer from the after-effects of the US combat gases used by the Iraqi army during the First Gulf War (1980-88), as did the Germans and the French after the First World War. Any traveller to Iran has been struck by the number of serious lung ailments. ..."
"... The Diamond Princess is an Israeli-American ship, owned by Micky Arison, brother of Shari Arison, the richest woman in Israel. The Arisons are turning this incident into a public relations operation. The Trump administration and several other countries airlifted their nationals to be quarantined at home. The international press devoted its headlines to this story. Referring to the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918-1919, it asserts that the epidemic could spread throughout the world and potentially threaten the human species with extinction [ 2 ]. This apocalyptic hypothesis, not based on any facts, will nevertheless become the word of the Gospel. ..."
"... It is not known at this time whether tycoons deliberately spread panic about Covid-19, making this vulgar epidemic seem like the "end of the world". However, one distortion after another, governments have become involved. Of course, it is no longer a question of selling advertising screens by frightening people, but of dominating populations by exploiting this fear. ..."
"... Let us remember that never in history has the confinement of a healthy population been used to fight a disease. Above all, let us remember that this epidemic will have no significant consequences in terms of mortality. ..."
"... The two governments panic their populations by distributing unnecessary instructions disavowed by infectious diseases doctors: they encourage people to wear gloves and masks in all circumstances and to keep at least one metre away from any other human being. ..."
"... It is too early to say what real goal the Conte and Macron governments are pursuing. The only thing that is certain is that it is not a question of fighting Covid-19. ..."
Mar 21, 2020 | williambowles.info

Covid-19: propaganda and manipulation by Thierry Meyssan March 21, 2020 21 March 2020 -- Voltaire Network

Returning to the Covid-19 epidemic and the way governments are reacting to it, Thierry Meyssan stresses that the authoritarian decisions of Italy and France have no medical justification. They contradict the observations of the best infectiologists and the instructions of the World Health Organization.

The Chinese Prime Minister, Li Keqiang, came to lead the operations in Wuhan and restore the "celestial mandate" on January 27, 2020.

On November 17, 2019, the first case of a person infected with Covid-19 was diagnosed in Hubei Province, China. Initially, doctors tried to communicate the seriousness of the disease, but clashed with regional authorities. It was only when the number of cases increased and the population saw the seriousness of the disease that the central government intervened.

This epidemic is not statistically significant. It kills very few people, although those it does kill experience terrible respiratory distress.

Since ancient times, in Chinese culture, Heaven has given a mandate to the Emperor to govern his subjects [ 1 ]. When he withdraws it, a disaster strikes the country: epidemic, earthquake, etc. Although we are in modern times, President XI felt threatened by the mismanagement of the Hubei regional government. The Council of State therefore took matters into its own hands. It forced the population of Hubei's capital, Wuhan, to remain confined to their homes. Within days, it built hospitals; sent teams to each house to take the temperature of each inhabitant; took all potentially infected people to hospitals for testing; treated those infected with chloroquine phosphate and sent others home; and treated the critically ill with recombinant interferon Alfa 2B (IFNrec) for resuscitation. This vast operation had no public health necessity, other than to prove that the Communist Party still has the heavenly mandate.

During a press conference on Covid-19, the Iranian Deputy Minister of Health, Iraj Harirchi, appeared contaminated.

Propagation in Iran

The epidemic spreads from China to Iran in mid-February 2020. These two countries have been closely linked since ancient times. They share many common cultural elements. However, the Iranian population is the world's most lung-weakest. Almost all men over the age of sixty suffer from the after-effects of the US combat gases used by the Iraqi army during the First Gulf War (1980-88), as did the Germans and the French after the First World War. Any traveller to Iran has been struck by the number of serious lung ailments.

When air pollution in Tehran increased beyond what they could bear, schools and government offices were closed and half of the families moved to the countryside with their grandparents. This has been happening several times a year for thirty-five years and seems normal.

The government and parliament are almost exclusively composed of veterans of the Iraq-Iran war, that is, people who are extremely fragile in relation to Covid-19. So when these groups were infected, many personalities developed the disease.

In view of the US sanctions, no Western bank covers the transport of medicines. Iran found itself unable to treat the infected and care for the sick until the UAE broke the embargo and sent two planes of medical equipment.

People who would not suffer in the other country died from the first coughs due to the wounds in their lungs. As usual, the government closed schools. In addition, it deprogrammed several cultural and sporting events, but did not ban pilgrimages. Some areas have closed hotels to prevent the movement of sick people who can no longer find hospitals close to their homes.

Quarantine in Japan

On February 4, 2020, a passenger on the US cruise ship Diamond Princess was diagnosed ill from the Covid-19 and ten passengers were infected. The Japanese Minister of Health, Katsunobu Kato, then imposed a two-week quarantine on the ship in Yokohama in order to prevent the contagion from spreading to his country. In the end, out of the 3,711 people on board, the vast majority of whom are over 70 years old, there would be 7 deaths.

The Diamond Princess is an Israeli-American ship, owned by Micky Arison, brother of Shari Arison, the richest woman in Israel. The Arisons are turning this incident into a public relations operation. The Trump administration and several other countries airlifted their nationals to be quarantined at home. The international press devoted its headlines to this story. Referring to the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918-1919, it asserts that the epidemic could spread throughout the world and potentially threaten the human species with extinction [ 2 ]. This apocalyptic hypothesis, not based on any facts, will nevertheless become the word of the Gospel.

We remember that in 1898, William Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer, in order to increase the sales of their daily newspapers, published false information in order to deliberately provoke a war between the United States and the Spanish colony of Cuba. This was the beginning of "yellow journalism" (publishing anything to make money). Today it is called "fake news".

It is not known at this time whether tycoons deliberately spread panic about Covid-19, making this vulgar epidemic seem like the "end of the world". However, one distortion after another, governments have become involved. Of course, it is no longer a question of selling advertising screens by frightening people, but of dominating populations by exploiting this fear.

For the WHO Director, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, China and South Korea have set an example by generalising screening tests; a way of saying that the Italian and French methods are medical nonsense.

WHO intervention

The World Health Organization (WHO), which monitored the entire operation, noted the spread of the disease outside China. On February 11th and 12th, it organized a global forum on research and innovation on the epidemic in Geneva. At the forum, WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called in very measured terms for global collaboration [ 3 ].

In all of its messages, the WHO stressed : the low demographic impact of the epidemic; the futility of border closures; the ineffectiveness of wearing gloves, masks (except for health care workers) and certain "barrier measures" (for example, the distance of one metre only makes sense with infected people, but not with healthy people); the need to raise the level of hygiene, including hand washing, water disinfection and increased ventilation of confined spaces. Finally, use disposable tissues or, failing that, sneeze into your elbow.

However, the WHO is not a medical organization, but a United Nations agency dealing with health issues. Its officials, even if they are doctors, are also and above all politicians. It cannot therefore denounce the abuses of certain states. Furthermore, since the controversy over the H1N1 epidemic, the WHO must publicly justify all its recommendations. In 2009, it was accused of having let itself be swayed by the interests of big pharmaceutical companies and of having hastily sounded the alarm in a disproportionate manner [ 4 ]. This time it used the word "pandemic" only as a last resort, on March 12th, four months later.

At the Franco-Italian summit in Naples on February 27, the French and Italian presidents, Giuseppe Conte and Emmanuel Macron, announced that they would react together to the pandemic.

Instrumentation in Italy and France

Modern propaganda should not be limited to the publication of false news as the United Kingdom did to convince its people to enter the First World War, but should also be used in the same way as Germany did to convince its people to fight in the Second World War. The recipe is always the same: to exert psychological pressure to induce subjects to voluntarily practice acts that they know are useless, but which will lead them to lie [ 5 ]. For example, in 2001, it was common knowledge that those accused of hijacking planes on 9/11 were not on the passenger boarding lists. Yet, in shock, most accepted without question the inane accusations made by FBI Director Robert Muller against "19 hijackers". Or, as is well known, President Hussein's Iraq had only old Soviet Scud launchers with a range of up to 700 kilometers, but many Americans caulked the windows and doors of their homes to protect themselves from the deadly gases with which the evil dictator was going to attack America. This time, in the case of the Covid-19, it is the voluntary confinement in the home that forces the person who accepts it to convince himself of the veracity of the threat.

Let us remember that never in history has the confinement of a healthy population been used to fight a disease. Above all, let us remember that this epidemic will have no significant consequences in terms of mortality.

In Italy, the first step was to isolate the contaminated regions according to the principle of quarantine, and then to isolate all citizens from each other, which follows a different logic.

According to the President of the Italian Council, Giuseppe Conte, and the French President, Emmanuel Macron, the aim of confining the entire population at home is not to overcome the epidemic, but to spread it out over time so that the sick do not arrive at the same time in hospitals and saturate them. In other words, it is not a medical measure, but an exclusively administrative one. It will not reduce the number of infected people, but will postpone it in time.

In order to convince the Italians and the French of the merits of their decision, Presidents Conte and Macron first enlisted the support of committees of scientific experts. While these committees had no objection to people staying at home, they had no objection to people going about their business. Then Chairs Conte and Macron made it mandatory to have an official form to go for a walk. This document on the letterheads of the respective ministries of the interior is drawn up on honour and is not subject to any checks or sanctions.

The two governments panic their populations by distributing unnecessary instructions disavowed by infectious diseases doctors: they encourage people to wear gloves and masks in all circumstances and to keep at least one metre away from any other human being.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/8L6ehRif-v8?version=3&rel=1&fs=1&autohide=2&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&wmode=transparent

The French "reference daily" (sic) Le Monde, Facebook France and the French Ministry of Health undertook to censor a video of Professor Didier Raoult, one of the world's most renowned infectiologists, because by announcing the existence of a proven drug in China against Covid-19, he highlighted the lack of a medical basis for the measures taken by President Macron [ 6 ].

https://www.youtube.com/embed/n4J8kydOvbc?version=3&rel=1&fs=1&autohide=2&showsearch=0&showinfo=1&iv_load_policy=1&wmode=transparent

It is too early to say what real goal the Conte and Macron governments are pursuing. The only thing that is certain is that it is not a question of fighting Covid-19.

Thierry Meyssan

Translation

Pete Kimberley

[ 1 ] The Mandate of Heaven and The Great Ming Code, Jiang Yonglin, University of Washington Press (2011).

[ 2 ] Human Extinction and the Pandemic Imaginary, Christos Lynteris, Routledge (2020).

[ 3 ] " Nouveau coronavirus : solidarité, collaboration et mesures d'urgence au niveau mondial s'imposent ", Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Organisation mondiale de la Santé, 11 février 2020.

[ 4 ] Pandemics, Science and Policy. H1N1 and the World Health Organization, Sudeepa Abeysinghe, Plagrave Macmillan (2015).

[ 5 ] " The techniques of modern military propaganda ", by Thierry Meyssan, Translation Pete Kimberley, Voltaire Network, 18 May 2016.

[ 6 ] " "La chloroquine guérit le Covid-19" : Didier Raoult, l'infectiologue qui aurait le remède au coronavirus ", Étienne Campion, Marianne, 19 mars 2020.

[Mar 21, 2020] Air pollituion as an important factor in this virus epidemic

Mar 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Allen , Mar 22 2020 1:06 utc | 68

I urge everyone to read the first article that is linked. What is happening this year is decidedly NOT a unique phenomenon for Italy or elsewhere that has been cited below. You might call it an acceleration or culmination or "perfect storm" but this is not a unique situation.

I wish to stress the following:

Estimated excess deaths of 7,027, 20,259, 15,801 and 24,981 attributable to influenza epidemics in the 2013/14, 2014/15, 2015/16 and 2016/17 seasons in Italy.

Anyone remember a global outcry about these excess deaths during any of these years?

Pollution; The Po river contains some of the worst waste from industrial pig farms upriver. The air quality in the Po River Valley is some of the worst only behind an area in Poland where they still use coal fired power plants in overall poor quality.

The people in N Italy have been subjected to constant bombardment of this pollution which destroys their respiratory functions and weakens their immune systems- a perfect milieu for viruses to proliferate. The same is true for those in N China and Tehran. Tehran's air quality has deteriorated dramatically since the US sanctions as they have gone to using a cheaper gas, laced with sulfur, to provide fuel for their people.

Northern Italy has one of the oldest populations and the worst air quality in Europe, which has already led to an increased number of respiratory diseases and deaths in the past and is likely an additional risk factor in the current epidemic.

According to the latest data of the Italian National Health Institute ISS, the average age of the positively-tested deceased in Italy is currently about 81 years. 10% of the deceased are over 90 years old. 90% of the deceased are over 70 years old.

The Italian Institute of Health moreover distinguishes between those who died from the coronavirus and those who died with the coronavirus. In many cases it is not yet clear whether the persons died from the virus or from their pre-existing chronic diseases or from a combination of both.

This is not a coincidence that these environmental factors have created a milieu in which all sorts of diseases can proliferate. Now capitalism will come up with the magic bullet like a vaccine or a pill to "fix" the problem- rinse and repeat if the current social order/forms of production aren't radically changed.

A virus which impacts upper respiratory functions attacking those who are vulnerable due to years of having their upper respiratory systems assaulted non-stop by heavy doses of pollutants of all varieties- that's what we are seeing. None of this is new except to the degree. In all the areas listed below, N Italy, N China, Madrid, Tehran they have been experiencing a dramatic increase in upper respiratory disease for years now.

And please don't tell me the solution is some vaccination or some great new cure that will be discovered (and profited from) by the miraculous men of modern medicine. The solution is to clean up the environment so that we are not vulnerable in the first place. Without that prepare for COVID-20 the sequel or whatever name the thoroughly bought off WHO and CDC and...wish to place upon this next "pandemic."

Investigating the impact of influenza on excess mortality in all ages in Italy during recent seasons (2013/14–2016/17 seasons)

In recent years, Italy has been registering peaks in death rates, particularly among the elderly during the winter season. Influenza epidemics have been indicated as one of the potential determinants of such an excess.

We estimated excess deaths of 7,027, 20,259, 15,801 and 24,981 attributable to influenza epidemics in the 2013/14, 2014/15, 2015/16 and 2016/17, respectively, using the Goldstein index. The average annual mortality excess rate per 100,000 ranged from 11.6 to 41.2 with most of the influenza-associated deaths per year registered among the elderly.

https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(19)30328-5/fulltext

Nitrogen dioxide and fine particles are threatening Po valley air quality

https://vitesy.com/blog/air-pollution/nitrogen-dioxide-fine-particles-po-valley-air-quality/

Italy's polluted Po Valley gasps for fresh air

https://phys.org/news/2019-02-italy-polluted-po-valley-gasps.html


How a 'Toxic Cocktail' Is Posing a Troubling Health Risk in China's Cities

https://e360.yale.edu/features/how-a-toxic-cocktail-is-posing-a-troubling-health-risk-in-chinese-cities


The new study argues that smogs in China contain more ingredients than those found either in the legendary "pea-soupers" of 19th- and 20th-century Europe and North America or in modern rich-world, vehicle-generated smogs. Something new is happening: The unprecedented speed of industrialization and urbanization has combined two eras of pollution.

Investigating air quality status and air pollutant trends over the Metropolitan Area of Tehran, Iran over the past decade between 2005 and 2014


https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6044178/

Overall, trends have been progressed to worsening, the number of healthy days has been declined and the number of unhealthy days has been increased in recent years.

Tehran is rated as one of the world's most polluted cities. Parts of the city are often covered by smog, making breathing difficult and causing widespread pulmonary illnesses. ... According to local officials, 3,600 people died in a single month due to the hazardous air quality.

Air Pollution, a Silent Form of Death for Tehran Citizens

https://www.iranfocus.com/en/life-in-iran/34172-air-pollution-a-silent-form-of-death-for-tehran-citizens


Madrid air pollution reaches alarming levels

You don't have to step into the street for Madrid's roads to pose a hazard to your health: air pollution from cars in the city might just knock you over. Scientists are finding links between the gases and disease.

......

According to studies by Julio Diaz, a researcher at the Carlos III Health Institute in Madrid, even small increases in air pollution can cause the number of people admitted to hospitals with circulatory and respiratory illnesses to rise.

https://www.dw.com/en/madrid-air-pollution-reaches-alarming-levels/a-16739363

[Mar 21, 2020] Vietnam is now requiring everyone to wear masks in public places.

Mar 21, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Hope , Mar 22 2020 1:02 utc | 67

There's much attention being given to how China and South Korea have reacted to the virus, but amazingly little to the response in Vietnam. The first cases in Vietnam arrived with the new lunar year, via Wuhan; quite quickly the number of cases rose to sixteen, and for several weeks stayed at that number. The Vietnamese government acted quickly, strongly and effectively, until all sixteen recovered (and the district near Hanoi which had been placed under lockdown had completed their isolation.
On March 2nd a flight from London, carrying a woman who was returning from the Milan fashion week:
"The country's 17th case, imported on a flight from London, kicked off a new wave of cases, [now nearing 100].

Even with a new wave of cases, the numbers are far from those witnessed in the western world. The issue has been taken seriously, with all suffering symptoms put in quarantine and tested, while their places of residence are locked down and sanitised. Việt Nam was one of the first nations to declare an epidemic and has been quick in its response, both in handling current cases and ensuring the spread of the virus is as limited as possible. "
- taken from https://vietnamnews.vn/life-style/expat-corner/653815/keeping-calm-and-carrying-on-viet-nam-sets-a-coronavirus-example.html

It is notable that almost all cases of infection have been brought into the country, or at one-person distance from the person bringing it into the country.

Today there has been the announcement of the seventeenth reported recovery in Vietnam. So far there has been not one death.

Points in the reaction:
Public gatherings were stopped right away - even local community Women's Day lunches.
All citizens and all foreigners are now required to report on health, on recent travel, etc.
Everyone is now required to wear masks in public places.

[Mar 21, 2020] There is NO REASON to destroy your country because of this. NONE. Something else is in play.

Mar 21, 2020 | thesaker.is

Akhmat on March 19, 2020 , · at 9:41 pm EST/EDT

Covid-19! H1N1! Names of guns on Call of Duty! Scary! I call it a Cold. The Flu killed many more than this will 2 years ago. I propose to change the name of the Flu to "Putin Plague". That will do it.

Russia has 1 death, few cases, a massive border with China, huge numbers of Chinese tourists, officials, students, etc. India has 4 deaths, a border with China, and many Chinese. How are any of you buying that?

If this was the end of the world would Putin be almost disinterested in his demeanor? Would Kadyrov laugh it off on national tv? Are the Russians that stupid or do they know something?

If this was big, Kadyrov would be in full-action. Special Corona uniform, big guns, lots of hitting the pads, plenty of screams of Akhmat Sila! Instead, he is complaining that he is bored because there are no fights to watch.

Let me tell you something that is not being discussed. Millions, yes millions, died from the Flu a few seasons back. It was horrible. Hospitals could not handle it. Yet, the media was dead silent. Zero concerns. No mention. It was just a bad Flu season and life went on for you. Maybe you buried Grandma. Maybe you were dog sick (I was and I had a Flu shot!). What you did not have was 24/7 hysteria. Hysteria is NEVER good. NEVER.

At the beginning of this year, I suddenly started getting these horrible videos from China of healthy-looking men falling face down on the street. What the ? Healthy men walking down the street and then – BAM! Straight down. They went viral. Freaked the Western world out. Millions and millions of views. We now know that IS NOT the virus. Whoever created those videos knows more than we do.

–Steps Russia Seems To Be Taking–

If a patient dies make sure to list the cause of death as whatever they were suffering from (healthy people RARELY die from this) prior to the illness.

Use regional heads (Ramzan!) to dampen any hysteria. Chechens have been told that they will die eventually why worry about a cold. Go drink some tea. Don't be a wimp. This kind of talk is dangerous to soft Europeans/Americans, but is part of the Caucasian spirit.

Get the FSB to run EVERYTHING. Rumor is it that the guy in charge of tests has been in charge of security for Putin. I promise you that the FSB is in total control of all results. If the numbers look bad – Lie. Slowly add a death here and there. Make sure that it appears that you did not let anyone die from this because of lack of equipment. This is not a health issue. This is an actual war. Yes, war. You do what you can medically, you just don't create mass hysteria. Make sense? Many countries are doing this and will be better off for this. More lives will be saved because healthy people will not be taking up space that belongs to the very sick. Hysteria is the last thing you want.

*NOTE* Have you noticed how Russians are furious with Italy while the West cries for them? The West is furious with China while Russia is happy for them. Topsy turvy world.

There is NO REASON to destroy your country because of this. NONE. Something else is in play. I can promise you that millions of Americans have it or have had it. The CDC has said this! There were no testing kits. If there are no testing kits you cannot officially die from a Call of Duty weapon.

[Mar 21, 2020] Coronavirus - A Laymans Update By Walrus

Mar 21, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Larry Kart , 20 March 2020 at 07:57 PM

FWIW, Dr. Fauci pretty much threw cold water on the Chloroquine option at today's Trump press conference, saying that no clinical trials have been conducted and leaving the impression that he was highly dubious. Again, FWIW.

P.S. I wonder how long Fauci will be welcomed onto that podium.

[Mar 20, 2020] Coronavirus reduced mortality in GB

Mar 20, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Steve Hayes ,

According to the Office of National Statistics, in the week ending the 6th of March 10 895 deaths were registered in England and Wales. The average number of deaths registered for the corresponding week over the previous five years was 11 498. So the coronavirus appears to be reducing mortality. https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/weeklyprovisionalfiguresondeathsregisteredinenglandandwales

[Mar 20, 2020] Peel the onion back further and reveal if the elderly who died had previous pulmonary problems (e.g. emphysema, COPD, asthma, pulmonary fibrosis, cystic fibrosis, lung cancer, tuberculous, etc) and what immuno-suppressant medications they were taking.

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

PokeTheTruth , Mar 19 2020 19:09 utc | 130

The American people need to demand the age groups of all the deaths due to the SARS-CoV-2 variant of coronavirus. We will find the highest group that have succumbed to the disease are 60 years and older. I want to see numbers for each State in the Republic, not percentages.

Then peel the onion back further and reveal if the elderly who died had previous pulmonary problems (e.g. emphysema, COPD, asthma, pulmonary fibrosis, cystic fibrosis, lung cancer, tuberculous, etc) and what immuno-suppressant medications they were taking.

If in fact it turns out the majority who perish are old people, then the deaths could be attributed to influenza, which is the epidemic that is going on right now in the country. There are 29 million people infected and more than 4,500 have died so far with two months to go in the flu season.

The patients are not being swabbed for influenza and testing for that disease, just COVID-19. This skews the numbers away from influenza so the media screams every day about COVID-19.

[Mar 20, 2020] This all reminds me of the movie 'Citizen Kane'

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

joetv , Mar 20 2020 1:37 utc | 257

Whether this virus jumped species or was made in a bath tub, I can't say. What I can do is count. in 2019 there were 30,000 deaths in the USA attributed to the Flu. Now, here we are in 2020 with the first quarter of the year nearing coming on, and there are less than 75 deaths traced to ncov19. So, in my estimation maybe we may record 2,000 dead this year.

Is it rational that we're watching our hard earned 401k's tank, self quarantining, suffering food shortages, told to distance, avoid our neighbors, and panic over what is little more than the common cold?

Why must the President address the nation every morning with the Dow Jones numbers flashing in sync? Why are people in hazmat suits poking around our cities spreading fear, and asking inane questions such as: do you have a cough, have you recently been to Iran, China, N. Korea or Iran? I was screened at my local VA hospital on the March 13th, and those were the questions asked of me. After saying negative a purple wrist ban was put on me and I was allowed access.

This all reminds me of the movie 'Citizen Kane'. For those old enough to remember it Orson Welles played the owner of a major newspaper. One day his headline read "WAR DECLARED IN (some fictitious country)" Consequently, the President of said fictitious country called the editor by phone, and complained that the paper had it wrong, and there wasn't any war going on in his country, and how could he. However, Orson responded quite cavalierly with something on the order of; "Why of course there is a war, because I said there is"
This theatre has gone far enough.

[Mar 20, 2020] Looking back on past pandemcs

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , Mar 20 2020 5:07 utc | 286

Looking back

1918 Spanish Flu. WWI ongoing. 675 , 000 deaths in US (300K excess deaths based on mortality stats published at the time) , 15 million estimated worldwide deaths in 7 months. No significant impact on GDP due to war

1950-1952 Polio peak panic-Korean War. No significant economic impact. 16,000 paralysis cases, 3000 deaths annually (mostly children)

1957 -58 influenza pandemic- over 100 K deaths in half the population. Significant recession in 1958 following Eisenhower's cutting DOD spending. Cold War ramped up to boost spending. Business as usual for most people during the pandemic

1968 influenza pandemic, over 100k dead, peak Vietnam War, no significant economic impact

1976 Swine Flu- minimal deaths (dozens) Public health induced hype led to 45 million rushed to market vaccines. 450 people got Guillain-Barré syndrome from vaccines causing paralysis . No serious economic impact, business as usual except for vaccination

2003 SARS outbreak. Panic in China/Asia, 800 deaths. Significant economic disruption to Greater China region due to travel bans and quarantine measures. Iraq war began at same time. No economic impact in US

2009 H1N1 Pandemic. 12,000 estimated deaths in US. CDC recommended against testing in July. Not much panic. Country already in recession due to subprime crash. Obamacare passed in December. Arab spring followed. US government bought 229 million doses of vaccine mostly unused. Former CDC director hired by Merck probably got a nice bonus. Total cost 4 billion. About 2 billion went for vaccines,

2019- virus starts to spread in China starting from November 17. A month after Event 201 . This was attended by Dr Gao of China CDC. China covers up initially then began limited testing reporting few cases until January 18 when they expanded testing and cases spiked. . Did not quarantine Wuhan until Jan 23 allowing millions to leave city for other locations due to up upcoming Lunar New Year Holidays when everything shuts down fir 1-2 weeks anyways. Significant economic disruption and depression follow as West inflates panic among citizens with the help of MSM and altmedia to gain support for adopting Chinas draconian measures and curtailment of freedoms, with censorship sure to follow. Can another war to lift the West out of depression be far behind, or will that war be fought against the bottom 90% after lightbulbs go off and they realize they got played.

Experimental DNA changing vaccines being rushed to market. Total cost for everything will be tens of trillions. Thats a lot of pork. Helicopter money coming soon. Freedom and Democracy will be a pipe dream. That was Trumps role all along, to put the finishing touches on a 120 year program to destroy Democracy and replace it with an Elitist Dictatorship ruled by Philosopher Kings and Corporate Technocrats and enforced by the Military.

[Mar 20, 2020] Somebody please inform Donald J. Trump that the virus probably originated ourside of China

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Circe , Mar 20 2020 0:34 utc | 242

Please inform Donald J. Trump that he needs to stop spreading disinformation on the Coronavirus.

Trump calls Coronavirus, the China virus and Chinese virus and blamed China for spreading it to the U.S.

Tom Cotton, the dumb as a rock Senator from Arkansas wants to go to war with China over the Coronavirus.

warmonger-tom-cotton-openly-threatens-china-claims-beijing-inflicted-coronavirus

You can't make this stuff up.

[Mar 20, 2020] Pompeo myth that USA and the West were unprepared because China withheld information about the virus.

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

occupatio , Mar 19 2020 20:16 utc | 161

@b Another myth to add to your collection ...

... that USA and the West were unprepared because China withheld information about the virus.

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Mar 19 2020 18:20 utc | 106

The "Report of the WHO-China Joint Mission on COVID-19" states that China transparently reported the identification of virus to the WHO and the international community on January 3rd, and a WHO investigative team was invited to Wuhan a week after that.

From January 3rd, 2020, information on COVID-19 cases has been reported to WHO daily.

On January 7th, full genome sequences of the new virus were shared with WHO and the international community immediately after the pathogen was identified.

On January 10th, an expert group involving Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwanese technical experts and a World Health Organization team was invited to visit Wuhan.

From page 31 of:
https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/who-china-joint-mission-on-covid-19-final-report.pdf

[Mar 20, 2020] The governments's reactions to COVID-19 can be explained by the fact that nowadays governments are mainly made up of incompetent empire-compatibles stooges of MIC. In the same way the empire gets away with bombing away poor people, those incompetents get away with evry single stupidity they commit.

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

willie , Mar 19 2020 19:24 utc | 142

To make a just evaluation of the health danger of Covid-19 it could be useful to make a computerized simulation model based on the data from an influenza virus seasonal outbreak some years ago,but with the actual medical extended reaction to it like testing on a bigger scale then normally.(I don't even know how it is ,in normal wintertime flu.

I guess the numbers tested equal those who seek medical help,or maybe they test all citizens taking part in the free government proposed vaccination,that pretty soon follows the outbreak(how do they find the vaccin so quickly?)) improvising hospitals and other medical stuff.And also take in account the appreciation of the illness by the general public.The high number of medical staff that went ill after weeks of treating patients with it seems not to be an annual affair.The outcome should make clear the real danger ratio of Covid-19.

Still pondering over those Italian deaths. Average said to be 81 years.10% over 90 years old.90 % over 70 years old.Nobody died from it under seventy years old?

The governments's reactions to CV are another chapter.

Nowadays governments are mainly made up of incompetent empire-compatibles. In the same way the empire gets away with bombing away poor people, those incompetents get away with every single stupidity they commit. They rarely step down. When they do they are sure to find an even better con-job;(Cf.Christine Lagarde,van der Leyen and so many others)

The general public accepts incompetence, so the politicians know they can do anything their overlord wants them to. They are shouted at some times, made fun of in accomplice media, ridiculized by the workers, they don't care.

In the evening they have their ration of high quality cocaine and they are feeling very special when they look down upon you common plebs next morning. Incompetence is the excuse of the century, but not a reason to loose the job.

A third question that I want to raise.

So it was in Wuhan in September 2019 that the World Military Games were held. I never heard of before, but yeah its just a sportive meeting between army personal from all over the world, in an olympic spirit I wager.

Then it seems there was on the same day the opening of something called Event 201 said to be a simulation (Real time?computer game,Viral!?) of a virus outbreak.OK. So what?

I don't want to look myself into this, because I've never liked Bill Gates, who did this, but I like to know from more inquisitive barflies ,if such a thing has really taken place. How long did it last? What was the outcome? And has this study been taken in account by government officials, be it in the USA or abroad?

Because what if there was really nothing, just the announcement?

CitizenX , Mar 19 2020 19:46 utc | 151

Biological weapon Pentagon Programs- 01.16.18

https://www.naturalblaze.com/2018/01/bio-weapons-pentagon.html


Bulgarian journalist confronts US official over secret biolabs... 06.14.19

http://armswatch.com/bulgarian-journalist-confronts-us-official-over-secret-biolabs/

[Mar 20, 2020] I vaguely recall the polio era. There was a fair amount of panic. I don't remember lockdowns or anything like that. Other than polio and tuberculosis, maybe epidemics were more accepted 60 years ago?

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Trailer Trash , Mar 19 2020 19:05 utc | 128

I vaguely recall the polio era. There was a fair amount of panic. I remember lining up in the school gymnasium with everyone else in town to get a dose of oral vaccine. My father had a friend with a leg damaged by polio. He played slide guitar in a Country & Western band.

I don't remember lockdowns or anything like that. Other than polio and tuberculosis, maybe epidemics were more accepted 60 years ago? Everyone got measles, mumps, chicken pox. That's just the way it was. I don't think most people thought about it much; too busy trying to make a living, just like nowadays.


karlof1 , Mar 19 2020 19:49 utc | 152

Here's a report on the current war against the unseen enemy . The question about polio is relevant IMO, but for a vastly different reason than what the OP likely had in mind. At the time, the ongoing war against the unseen enemy was taken very seriously as it affected all classes and especially city dwellers.

Recall for centuries the Miasma Theory of Disease and related piety and fear of god were the primary explanations for the unexplainable. That dogma was challenged by a Persian scholar in the mid 1000s when the Arab world was where genuine science was being pursued while the West went looking for Devils, witches and heretics, but even the Arab world couldn't accept what we now know to be the truth of the matter.

We needed to await the arrival of microscopes and Bacteriology to establish the Germ Theory of Disease in 1870. Death was everywhere and quite powerful.

I recall the average life expectancy for Philadelphia in 1740 to be 20--lots of early childhood and child bearing deaths--with little differentiation between the slowly growing urban regions within the Colonies.

Charlestown was the worst with its residents abandoning the city during Summer.

FDR was the first genuinely handicapped POTUS, but he tried his best to conceal his disability. My Maternal Grandfather was kept stateside in 1918 thanks to the flu epidemic, while his cousin wasn't so lucky and died in the trenches, his mother never forgave my Maternal Grandmother for Fate's result.

While dated (2010) this graphic illustrates the top 15 Communicable Diseases. Some will find this essay on the use of quarantine helpful by providing some historical context to the ongoing war against the unseen world.

Red Ryder , Mar 19 2020 19:53 utc | 157
@107 . Bluemot5

There was no quarantine. They closed beaches. Told people to no go into the water. That was for a summer or two at most.
I don't recall anything else. A kid up the street got it. He was a hell of an athlete but wound up with a brace on one leg. He was away fro some time and his return was the only sign that polio was really bad.

People were deathly afraid of the first vaccine, injected. Dr. Salk invented that first vaccine.
The Oral Vaccine really changed everything. Dr. Sabin changed the paradigm and saved several generations.

[Mar 20, 2020] Tucker Carlson and China bashing

Mar 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Minnesota Mary , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 11:37 pm GMT

@FB I, too, have been disappointed in Tucker Carlson's China bashing. I have thought that he was the best on FOX News, but now he is getting to be as bad as Sean Hannity.

We may never know the origin of the coronavirus. It is foolish to try and assign blame at this point.

[Mar 20, 2020] It used to be part of the American ethos, the idea that it's better to die on your feet than to live on your knees

Mar 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Twodees Partain , says: Show Comment March 20, 2020 at 12:26 am GMT

@follyofwar Well, as the Cheyenne used to say, "It's a good day to die". If the ones who think they can rule over others push it too far," then the the sun will shine upon a good day to die". I remember that line from the novel "Little Big Man".

It used to be part of the American ethos, the idea that it's better to die on your feet than to live on your knees. Levon Helm wrote a line in a song in the '80s: "You give your life to live your life". Some of us still see it that way.

[Mar 20, 2020] Some plausible scenarios of the origin of the coronavirus

Mar 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Thomasina , says: Show Comment March 20, 2020 at 1:02 am GMT

Kevin Barrett – excellent article!

There are so many scenarios. I haven't read all of the comments, so what I'm about to say may already have been touched on.

1. The virus happened naturall y, transferred from a bat and eventually to humans.

2. The virus accidentally escaped the Wuhan lab.

3. The globalists did it. The globalists (the Chinese elite in concert with the U.S. multinational corporate elite) don't want things to change as both groups of elites are getting filthy rich off of the offshoring of jobs to China.

Trump is a nationalist. He is upsetting their apple cart as he's placing tariffs on the goods manufactured in China by the U.S. multinational corporations, trying to force the U.S. multinationals to come back home. They don't want to, so they manufactured the virus thinking it would bring down the economy/stock market, thereby bringing down Trump.

China plays along, feigns ignorance, and accuses the U.S. of trying to infect their citizens, Xi wears a mask. A few thousand old people dying is a small price to pay, in their minds.

4. The U.S. multinational corporate elite did it alone, without China's knowledge , for the same reasons as stated in #3, to throw a wrench in the works, purposely sink the economy. With Trump gone, globalism could continue.

5. The U.S. did it alone, without China's knowledge. The U.S. globalists realize globalism is ending and they have acquiesced to the U.S. nationalists. They are angry that China has not followed through with their part of the original deal, which is that China gets the offshored jobs, their elite get rich, and they get money to modernize, but she must open up more to the U.S. corporations and financial firms, which she has been reluctant to do.

6. The nationalists did it in order to bring down globalism, put an end to it once and for all . Once people realize that supply lines (especially pharmaceuticals) thousands of miles away is a recipe for disaster, they'll scream for things to be changed. Trump has said he likes President Xi and the Chinese people, this is nothing personal, but he wants the jobs to return.

7. China did it alone . The Chinese elite realize that globalism is ending, and they know the Chinese citizens will blame them for the loss of their jobs. The Chinese elite worry that the citizens will wonder why they've become filthy rich and they haven't. The Chinese elite plant the virus, but blame it on the U.S.

8. The world elites, in collusion with the central banks, have blown massive financial bubbles. They realize they can't continue blowing the bubbles any bigger, but they don't see any way out without being blamed. They plant the virus in order to bring down the world economy, deflate the bubble. The virus takes the blame, not them. China blames the U.S., the U.S. blames China, some old people are sacrificed, and they raise a glass to the devil.

I'm leaning towards #8.

[Mar 20, 2020] The Chinese have officially accused the US to have, at a minimum, covered up early Covid-19 infections that took place in America several weeks before the epidemic broke out in Wuhan.

Mar 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Iris , says: Show Comment March 20, 2020 at 2:03 am GMT

... I don't know whether you realise how the rest of the world is feeling at the moment: people are stunned as if the Apocalypse has come. They are worried about their very survival, and things are only going to get worse because the containment, lockdown, military special powers will likely extend for weeks and months ahead, as it will take months to gain control over the epidemic.

The Chinese have officially accused the US to have, at a minimum, covered up early Covid-19 infections that took place in America several weeks before the epidemic broke out in Wuhan.

Separate Japanese and Taiwanese epidemiologists have previously determined that only the US had the five strains of Coronavirus that could have generated the Covid-19:

https://www.globalresearch.ca/covid-19-further-evidence-virus-originated-us/5706078

The Chinese have scientists, military might and a powerful voice in the concert of nations.

They are respected and credible, because they respect others' sovereignty and help in time of crisis.

They won't passively stand accused of a crime committed by the US ... for which the whole world will soon want to hold somebody accountable for.

Tor597 , says: Show Comment March 20, 2020 at 1:48 am GMT
@Ron Unz Too many Americans are stuck on Pax Americana la la land and will never admit something so grave to American status. We saw exactly this during 9/11.

[Mar 20, 2020] The virus and the Deep state

Mar 20, 2020 | www.unz.com

Ron Unz , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 3:43 am GMT

Well, I think there's a certain amount of circumstantial evidence suggesting that the Coronavirus outbreak may have been an American bioweapon attack against China (and Iran).

But if so, I'm *extremely* skeptical that the perpetrators ever intended or imagined that it would leak back into the US and inflict the horrific economic and social damage that now seems unavoidable. How to explain this lack lack of foresight?

The most obvious answer is that they were stupid and incompetent, but here's another point to consider

In late 2002 there was the outbreak of SARS in China, a related virus but that was far more deadly and somewhat different in other characteristics. The virus killed hundreds of Chinese and spread into a few other countries before it was controlled and stamped out. The impact on the US and Europe was negligible, with just a small scattering of cases and only a death or two.

So if American biowarfare analysts were considering a Coronavirus attack against China, isn't it quite possible they would have said to themselves that since SARS never significantly leaked back into the US or Europe, we'd similarly remain insulated from the Coronavirus?

Obviously, such an analysis was foolish and mistaken, but would it have seemed so implausible at the time?

https://www.unz.com/article/was-coronavirus-a-biowarfare-attack-against-china/#comment-3775042

Father O'Hara , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 3:55 am GMT
Well, I have only recently heard of a guy named Francis Boyle,a law professor out of the Univ. Of Illinois. He is apparently an expert on bio-warfare treaties. He claims covid-19 is manmade,period.
That is a very scary notion,from which most people will flee.
As I have accepted that 9/11 was "the usual suspects," I guess it is definitely possible.
Sasha , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 4:00 am GMT
@Ron Unz Maybe, but my take is an engineered market crash. This looks to me like a Nathan Rothschild sort of trick (according to legend) – propagating fake news about Napoleon's victory at Waterloo, crashing the markets, then snapping up the whole LSE for a penny to the pound. If so, you have to admire it, the sheer genius, the psychopathic beauty of it all.

As a bonus, the Reichstag Fire also is an extremely efficient delivery system for the eugenics payload – a very virulent strain that almost exclusively targets the social burden (pensioners and already ill) while leaving alone the tax-farm base! Never in the history of tax-farming have the sheeple been stampeded and fleeced so thoroughly! Bravo!

Flubber , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 4:13 am GMT
"The US cannot win a trade war with China."

What kind of bollocks is this.

Of course the US can win a trade war.

The US is the customer, with the enormous trade deficit. Trump has been hugely effective with his tariff's policy in rehoming manufacturing to the US – a process that will vastly accelerate thanks to the Corona virus outbreak.

I agree that 9-11 stink to high heaven and that PNAC are unmitigated bastards, but this capitulation to China is balls.

Delta G , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 4:16 am GMT
@Ron Unz Stupidity is certainly an American Military essential behavior for promotion and success in the current US Armed Forces.

But you can't have someone clever enough to create a Recombinant Designer Pathogen and be in the US Military.

However, the psyops fucks would likely be ready to game the system should a natural outbreak occur which would be called a Pandemic even when its not and make everyone of our low quality leaders $hit their pants and go totally crazy. A mild fart with the claim its poison gas would make the Stock Markets Collapse.

Carlton Meyer , says: Website Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 4:22 am GMT

But if so, I'm *extremely* skeptical that the perpetrators ever intended or imagined that it would leak back into the US and inflict the horrific economic and social damage that now seems unavoidable. How to explain this lack lack of foresight?

This is the same issue with cyberwar viruses. One can infect computers in Iran, but with the internet they may be passed onto the entire world, just like rap music.

antibeast , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 4:41 am GMT
@Ron Unz

But if so, I'm *extremely* skeptical that the perpetrators ever intended or imagined that it would leak back into the US and inflict the horrific economic and social damage that now seems unavoidable. How to explain this lack lack of foresight?

One word: Trump. Because he could very well lose his reelection bid if the pandemic causes an economic recession which now seems highly likely given the stock market collapse.

Cui Bono ? The people OPPOSED to Trump, variously referred to as the "Deep State" or the "National Security State" as described by Gore Vidal in his book which by the way Julian Assange was holding while being hauled away from the Ecuadorian Embassy.

After Russiagate and Ukrainegate, THEY finally hit the bullseye with Coronagate.

Si1ver1ock , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 5:05 am GMT
This is a pretty good article. I'll probably link to it.

Some people think this is coming from City of London types. The US pursued a "strategy of tension" with China that may have allowed third party actors to intervene and get them fighting each other.

There has been some Bad Blood between British elites and China for awhile now. It's not clear why.

In this scheme, the US is the patsy, the Oswald to take the blame.

Anonymous [392] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 5:16 am GMT
@Polemos Check this link out:

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/03/17/coronavirus-universal-basic-income-andrew-yang-134922

The real gem in the whole article are the observations made by Yang himself:

YANG: That's what freaks me out about the whole thing. What we're doing is saying things like, "Keep your social distance," and trying to stop the spread that way, which is fine. But we have shit for data. Like, we don't know what the infection rate is. And so, there's no reason we would ever be able to give the 'all-clear.' If you don't have any data, this whole thing is a nightmare that doesn't end. When you close schools, what gives you the all-clear to say, "OK, open them again"? Nothing. There's no data to compare it to. This whole thing is a fear-based approach with no end in sight. There's no catalyst to ever sound the all-clear. This whole thing is so fucked up.

YANG: I think the nature of that guidance has to be different, personally. I think they need to be transparent about what kind of data we're relying on, to give people a sense of the timeline. Right now, our sense of the future is so cloudy. And you get the sense the president went from not taking this seriously to suddenly realizing its seriousness, and now we're reacting in various ways to slow the spread of the virus. But then what? I would be clearer as to what the timeline looks like, what data we're going to rely upon, how we're going to get that data, what steps we're taking to increase testing capacity and just give people a sense of the future.

We need to know now what the future can look like under different scenarios and then be presented with what scenario we're in when that time comes. We've been on lockdown for half a week. Right now, the American people don't have any visibility into whether it's going to be four more weeks or four more months, and we don't know how those judgments are going to determined. As president, I would say, "Look, here's the information, here's the dashboard, here's what we're lining up, here's what we're hoping for, here's how circumstances could change, and thank you for doing your part -- if you proceed with like the rest of the country in flattening the curve and keeping things under this level, then we can look forward to this. " You know, so we could actually have a sense of accomplishment and purpose.

So here we have it, replicated throughout the whole of the Western world. An open-ended clamp-down based on fear, with no timeline or road map, and no conditions set on when (or IF) things will get back to normal.

For now, smells really fishy. Even if DS (Deep State) did not intentionally engineer this circumstance, they are decisively and very swiftly exploiting it to exert extreme control over everything .

Franklin Ryckaert , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 5:31 am GMT
@antibeast On the contrary, for the deep state Trump is the ideal puppet. Those who are against Trump belong to the surface state , i.e. Democrats, Leftists in general and the equally Leftist main stream media. Real policy in the US is only made by the deep state .

[Mar 20, 2020] No specific vulnerability of East Asians?

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Kassandra , Mar 19 2020 22:00 utc | 201

No specific vulnerability of East Asians?

"The East Asian populations have much higher AFs in the eQTL variants associated with higher ACE2 expression in tissues (Fig. 1c), which may suggest different susceptibility or response to 2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2 from different populations under the similar conditions."

This is a "we do not know yet", not a "we can exclude".

No lab-generated strain?

The Furin docking cleavage site has not been found yet in any other beta-CoV strain, it is only known from other completely different viruses and seem to be related there with being highly contagious. In adition, a recent study found a third docking option via GRP78 expressions on the cell surface (usually by cells experiencing stress), https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-15157/v1 . This is already two strange features more compared to SARS and MERS.

There is only a "there is no proof, neither a direct hint found yet", not a "we can exclude", but a mere belief.

Most irritating is that there is are not intermediate or other similar strains found yet, and that there is a strange pattern of first occurences in the early phase in Wuhan (and probably also in the US). We still have no sound explanation how it came into existence, not even some plausible facts suggesting a pathway. Given the technical capabilities since 15 years, the multitude of stakeholders working on gene editing, for vaccine research also on dangerous stains, and some irritating cui bono issues, it is too early to discard some suspicions already. The scope of potential perpetrators (by accident or intentionally with a not expected outcome) is broad and - given the very intransparent transnational companies - quite opaque. In issues of global security and extreme relevance for humanity, transparency should be enforced and secrecy for corporate interests should not be tolerated in such cases.

Anyway, most important now is to mitigate the ongoing desaster, we should only not forget some issues for later investigation.


antitermite , Mar 19 2020 22:23 utc | 208

The argument that cov19 isn't engineered because biowar researchers & the empire that incubates them are 1. Sane and 2. Indequately funded
Nope, not buying it on either count.

https://www.globalresearch.ca/the-geopolitical-deployment-of-biological-weapons/5703005

The hegemony has military labs all around the globe (though the Fort Detrick closure is suspicious).

Even if it weren't engineered, a virus doesn't need to be vat-grown to be politically useful - anthrax, smallpox and bubonic plague - all natural & deadly pathogens - exist within bioweapon labs, for research purposes of course.

I am a little doubtful about the wuhan games being the vector - think of the timing, right before CNY.
Surely a "Diplomat" with a diplomatic bag could have a far wider range of opportunities (via proxies) for more precise delivery.

Unlike what other posters here have been reporting, most Chinese markets are quite clean, at least those I've seen. Yes they are certainly diverse. Here's a good example (not Wuhan though)
https://viktoriajean.com/2019/10/25/qingdao-starfish-sea-urchin-and-other-exotic-foods/

bevin , Mar 19 2020 22:32 utc | 209
An interesting story at Common Dreams
"A look at financial records reveal that Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Sen. Richard Burr last month -- just as he was big-dollar donors, but not the general public about the looming threat of the coronavirus -- personal stock holdings worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, many of them in industries now seriously impacted by the outbreak..."

".....In an audio recording obtained by NPR, the North Carolina Republican was heard telling donors at a luncheon on Feb. 27 that the coronavirus, officially called COVID-19, would likely spread through the population aggressively -- and suggested it could kill hundreds of thousands of people.

"It is much more aggressive in its transmission than anything that we have seen in recent history," Burr said.

"It is probably more akin to the 1918 pandemic," he added, referring to the flu pandemic which killed more than 600,000 Americans...."
There is audio here

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/19/while-warning-donors-reassuring-public-gop-intel-chair-unloaded-personal-stocks

Bongocero , Mar 19 2020 22:41 utc | 215
Here is the patent application filed in 2004 showing that the virus was invented in a lab: https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/e0/4e/2e/09e238c87e2d20/EP1694829B1.pdf
H.Schmatz , Mar 19 2020 22:43 utc | 216
Really, it is hard stop thinking this was a preplanned event...

Wall Street is pressuring key healthcare firms to hike prices over the coronavirus crisis. Audio here of bankers asking drug companies, firms supplying N95 masks & ventilators, to figure out how to profit from the Covid-19 emergency.

https://twitter.com/lhfang/status/1240716348939833344

karlof1 , Mar 19 2020 22:50 utc | 217
Today's Keiser Report declares petrodollar and fiat dollar dead and announces the world will need to have a confab to arrange a new commercial currency or currency basket. Other interesting food for thought's discussed. The 2nd half interview is with a metals broker who says we must demand physical delivery instead of paper because the derivatives aren't properly reflecting physical price. An item from Shadowstats's Daily Update, "the February 2020 Cass Freight Index® Continued in Annual Decline for the 15th Straight Month, Down by 7.5% (-7.5%)," further ongoing confirmation that we've actually been in a recession for at least that long.
Mao , Mar 19 2020 23:07 utc | 221
In the wake of the coronavirus outbreak, investors who bought "pandemic bonds" from the World Bank in 2017 are set to lose hundreds of millions of dollars.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbfWuk1r6dY

vk , Mar 19 2020 23:17 utc | 223
It seems people here don't understand the concept of "burden of proof".

Burden of proof arives from a logical necessity. If you treat every hypothesis existent in the universe for which there are no scientific evidence as a priori true, the it would mean they are all true at the same time. The same if you treat them as all false.

That, of course, would be a logical fallacy, since contradictory hypotheses would be true or false at the same time.

That's why the absence of evidence the SARS CoV-2 isn't a bioweapon doesn't make it a bioweapon. Since we don't know that, that would make, by the same logic, it a bioweapon and a not-bioweapon at the same time. It is the same fallacy of religion: you can't prove God doesn't exist (and you really can't, since God is a metaphysical concept, not a physical one), therefore it must exist in the eyes of the religious.

Except that, in the case here, there is strong evidence the SARS CoV-2 is fruit of evolution, so I don't even know why people are bringing the opposite hypothesis here without even a hint of evidence.

Pft , Mar 19 2020 23:25 utc | 224
"Some Indian researchers found four genome sequences in the novel coronavirus that can also be found in the HIV virus. They self published their findings in a paper that was not peer reviewed. We discussed that paper in detail on February 1 in our second post on the virus and we strongly expressed our doubt about its veracity. A few days later the paper was retracted by its authors after other scientists had pointed out that the lengths of each of the four sequences they had compared were way too small to be of statistical significance."

The authors retracted the study temporarily to allow it to be peer reviewed. They did not concede their results were insignificant. The stated reason for retracting the study from one of the authors is because the study was being used to promote conspiracy theories that the virus was intentionally released as weapon since they made no such contention

"Asian people are not more genetically receptive for the novel coronavirus."

Yet the study you linked to states "The East Asian populations have much higher AFs in the eQTL variants associated with higher ACE2 expression in tissues (Fig. 1c), which may suggest different susceptibility or response to 2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2 from different populations under the similar conditions."


There is zero evidence that the virus is from a Chinese or U.S. or other (weapon) laboratory and the claim actually makes no sense. The genome of the virus consists of more then 23,000 'letters'. It is significantly different than the genome of other known viruses."

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Actually, its pretty similar to the bat virus found in 2013 as reported by Shi Zheng Li in January , 2020. And the key word is "known". How stupid would you have you have to be to publish the sequence data in public papers of the exact virus that will be used as a weapon before unleashing the virus. Shi Zhengli was involved in gain of function research for over a decade working with Ralph Baric at UNC on some research.

If you look at the research thats been done on corona viruses gain of function and corona virus/ebola/zika virus vaccines you run into the same names a lot, Chinese scientists like Shi Zhengli, American scientists like Ralph Baric of UNC, Wuhan institute of Virology/BSL-4 lab, ,Duke University and USAMRIID, both of which has ties with Wuhan University-Institute of Medical Virology all funded by USAMRIID, DARPA, NIAD, BARDA, NIH , chinese military, chinese CDC, Bill Gates (WHO, Event 201, AMC, CEPI) , and various vaccine makers such as Innovio, Moderna, NanoViricides, etc, often in collaboration with each other. George Gao of China CDC attended Event 201.

Look close at Project Bioshield-The Department of Homeland Security uses intelligence reports to decide which diseases and biological threats are considered "material," or realistic threats to US security. It then refers these findings to Health and Human Services (HHS), which determines whether it's necessary for the government to order new drugs from pharmaceutical companies to combat the threats.

A funding agency within HHS called the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) hands out lucrative contracts for research, parts of which can be paid up front.

The parent agency (HHS) in charge of funding drugs and vaccines for the national stockpile, is also the one that is separately funding research into new diseases that could result in a bioterror or accidental infection, which would in turn demand a response from the national stockpile. Sounds like a racket

More on Ralph Baric- also known as the Godfather of Corona Virus due in part to a corona virus vaccine patent in 2002 as well as his subsequent research. But Dr. Ralph Baric's lab
is designed to develop drugs against new emerging pathogens focuses on coronaviruses. Baric and his 30-person team partnered with Gilead Sciences, Inc. six years ago to test antiviral drugs such as Remdesivir to curb emerging viral diseases that were then largely overlooked by big pharmaceutical companies.

Gilead Science as you recall struck gold with Tamiflu thanks to Bird Flu scares that followed after SARS. Also known for its association with Donald Rumsfeld.


[Mar 20, 2020] Looks like COVID-19 is more contagious then evne Spalish flu

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

S , Mar 20 2020 2:08 utc | 263

PokeTheTruth #150:
Also there is no proof that COVID-19 is "more contagious" either by laboratory analysis or in fielded studies than influenza. If you know of such a paper, I would appreciate a link so that I can examine it for myself.

From the Wikipedia article " Basic reproduction number " (see the article for references):

    Disease                           R0

    COVID-19                          1.4–3.9
    Influenza (1918 pandemic strain)  1.4–2.8
    Influenza (2009 pandemic strain)  1.4–1.6
    Influenza (seasonal strains)      0.9–2.1

More comparisons between COVID-19 and influenza: How does the new coronavirus compare with the flu? ( Live Science ).

[Mar 20, 2020] Virus and air pollution

Mar 20, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jen , Mar 19 2020 20:17 utc | 162

James @ 47:

There have been articles posted online about high levels of air pollution in Italy's Po River valley region, where Lombardia province is located. Do a search on Google or DuckDuckGo and they appear.

Much of that pollution probably occurs at particular times of the year. Milan is said to be notorious for temperature inversions, as is Tehran in Iran. These occur in winter-time in Tehran nearly every year. Cold air sinks under warm air in river valleys or inter-mountain valleys and plateaux so air is trapped and cannot circulate, trapping pollutants. Milan, Tehran and probably Wuhan beside the Jiangzi River sit in these kinds of physical environments.

Italy does seem to have a history of industrial accidents. I have a double CD set of urban folk by Alessandro Monti, "Unfolk + Live Book", which is partly inspired by an industrial poisoning incident that occurred somewhere in northern Italy in the 1970s. Can't remember any details and can't look up now, being on smartphone, but it was a major incident, large numbers in the vicinity were poisoned, many died and others still struggling with long-term effects. May have been some form of dioxide poisoning.

[Mar 19, 2020] The only place place that has all five haplotypes is the US.

Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

occupatio , Mar 19 2020 16:38 utc | 63

The fixation on bats distracts from the important fact, which is that China primarily has one haplotype (with instances of three others in small counts, including those brought in from from abroad). The China haplotype is distinct from the Iran one, and the Italy one. Therefore none of these locations can be the origin, because where the 'parent' of the virus comes from would also be a place that would have multiple 'children' or haplotypes of the virus. The only place place that has all five haplotypes is the US. You can talk all day about bats but that is to ignore the scientific data about haplotypes and the parent-child relationship it implies.

On the ideological level, I see many comments saying its not racist to talk about Asians and weird foods. Let me point out that racism is not just discrimination, but discrimination from a position of power. A black slave cannot be racist against his plantation master no matter how much he hates him, because his individual 'prejudice' against the master does not alter the world and its system of prejudice. Racism issues from power, so viruses that originate from the US or western countries are NOT stigmatized as linked to white people or white culture, but viruses that originate from Africa or Asia are racially stigmatized. In any place, there are some people who eat 'weird' food, whether it be gator meat in Florida or bats in Palau. But only non-white countries get branded as places of 'disease'. That's because racism is the perpetuation of structures of power.

Black slaves were prized in southern plantations because they were resistant to diseases like malaria. That is a fact, but it is also a historical reality that how people talk about diseases is part of racial and racist discourse.

[Mar 19, 2020] Side effects of panic are not initially totally obvious

Notable quotes:
"... ...The notion of panic is best studied in the context of war. Subjected to fire, explosion etc. a military unit can be reduced to an unthinking mass, fleeing, dropping weapons and massacred by the advancing opponent. This is called panic, and it is never advisable, unlike a retreat performed in a controlled manner, minimizing the losses of the material, life and territory. ..."
Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Piotr Berman , Mar 19 2020 15:43 utc | 39

...The notion of panic is best studied in the context of war. Subjected to fire, explosion etc. a military unit can be reduced to an unthinking mass, fleeing, dropping weapons and massacred by the advancing opponent. This is called panic, and it is never advisable, unlike a retreat performed in a controlled manner, minimizing the losses of the material, life and territory.

On personal level, I think I witnessed a trace of panic when I visited supermarket today. There is a wide aisle with paper goods on one side and frozen goods on the other. Toilet paper seems 95% gone, and so are frozen vegetables on the other side. Frozen stuff from other aisles seem untouched. Personally, I had to substitute canned peas for frozen peas I planned to buy. In any case, few reasons to expect major shortages.

On a larger level, a number of governments in Europe reacts with panic, doing things that can seriously make things worse. When small countries close borders, there can be serious havoc. Tens of thousands of people, thousands of trucks are stuck.

At least in USA, states have no authority to close borders. A smallish country like Slovakia can have severe shortages if hysterical neighbors (Poland and Hungary, I am not sure about Czechia) close borders. As supply chains cross borders to a large degree in EU, interrupting the border traffic can create unpredictable shortages.

Additionally, creating big crowds (of stranded people) is very, very stupid under the circumstances.

Rational policies would be to create the balance of needs and resources, take measures to increase critical supplies including test kits, medical equipment and medicines, find ways of humane and rational handling of travelers and so on.

[Mar 19, 2020] US bad availability actually isn't bad: there are spots where 20% infection in 12 months is bad, but overall the US seems in decent shape

Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 19 2020 17:48 utc | 95

Propublica has published a model showing hospital bed availability vs. nCOV infection rates, nationwide: bed vs. infection rate
It actually isn't bad: there are spots where 20% infection in 12 months is bad, but overall the US seems in decent shape. 20% in 6 months - significant red coverage.

But interestingly - my Eyeball Mark I shows the negative effects mostly in the liberal zones = cities.

[Mar 19, 2020] All the funny videos about Chinese making masks out of women's bras, water bottles: not so funny now

Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 19 2020 17:44 utc | 93

All the funny videos about Chinese making masks out of women's bras, water bottles: not so funny now: Washington hospital making masks out of office supplies

And people are really saying there weren't racist currents?

[Mar 19, 2020] Chloroquine/hydrochloroquinine was determined to be effective for the treatment of the coronavirus by Chinese clinicians early in February, and the Chinese government announced this on February 17 this year.

Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jack R , Mar 19 2020 16:33 utc | 58

Chloroquine/hydrochloroquinine was determined to be effective for the treatment of the coronavirus by Chinese clinicians early in February, and the Chinese government announced this on February 17 this year. Today (March 19) Trump and his staff amazingly announced that medical personnel in American health agencies have discovered, developed and were testing these drugs without any mention of the considerable Chinese, as well as Korean, published experience and success using these closely-related and relatively safe malarial drugs. Shameful and highly deceitful, to say the least. This deceit should be revealed again and again without letup.

[Mar 19, 2020] People have completely lost their minds here and that is due to decades of social engineering which has created a culture devoid of critical thinking skills and a frighteningly docile populace

Notable quotes:
"... Now moving on to the COVID-19 virus and the reactions. At present it is without question, based on the statistical evidence, an overreaction of historical proportions. ..."
"... The three areas, so far, where the virus has been the worst, N Italy, N China and Iran each have one thing in common - some of the worst air pollution on the planet which has been widely cited and as much as a decade ago it was noted that the results would be compromised immune systems, diminished lung functions and outbreaks of related health issues. So what we have essentially is an environment which was ripe for such viruses to proliferate and population that is vulnerable to such things. ..."
"... BTW Russ is correct on his note about bio-weapons and the funding for such things is always there even as the accounting methods serve to hide where these funds go. ..."
Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Allen , Mar 19 2020 14:27 utc | 28

People have completely lost their minds here and that is due to decades of social engineering which has created a culture devoid of critical thinking skills and a frighteningly docile populace. Accepting the narrative of so-called (and ideologically and often financially) experts is demanded of everyone lest you be cited as a "conspiracy monger." We could cite literally all day the number of "whacked out" conspiracies that ended up being factual but that's for another time.

Having said that it is the case that at present all of what b is saying in this post is almost certainly the case- excepting the bio weapons narrative which is virtually impossible to prove and if this is the case it was a very poor job of utilizing those bio-weapons. And there is most definitely a racist element to this amongst the right-wingers which will be played up.

Now moving on to the COVID-19 virus and the reactions. At present it is without question, based on the statistical evidence, an overreaction of historical proportions. The only option that changes this is if there is something further that we do not know and for this we are to place our faith in governments and institutions that have consistently lied to us and manipulated the public for decades. Someone tell me that we are actually suppose to hold our noses and this time believe the "official narrative." It would actually go against the proven evidence, that these entities are proven liars, for us to do so.

The virus itself is just that - a virus even if it is particularly virulent which is still up for debate. The notions of how to address this, at least the ones peddled to us, are simply wrongheaded and fit a certain model of the medical establishment that BTW is part and parcel of the same system that has brought us to the point of massive ecological collapse. Let's not separate that out.

The three areas, so far, where the virus has been the worst, N Italy, N China and Iran each have one thing in common - some of the worst air pollution on the planet which has been widely cited and as much as a decade ago it was noted that the results would be compromised immune systems, diminished lung functions and outbreaks of related health issues. So what we have essentially is an environment which was ripe for such viruses to proliferate and population that is vulnerable to such things.

Keep in mind that viruses constantly mutate and there are myriad viruses that are unknown and never to be known until something like this occurs. So all talk of some "silver bullet"- be it vaccine or other medical discovery- is at best short-term if not a Trojan Horse.

The solution is to have an economic social order that creates environments where the external environment is such that the inhabitants are less likely to be impacted by such contagions. Right now we have the exact opposite. So say what you want about COVID and pretend that you can find a "fix" but once this passes if we are forced to return to the same omnicidal economic system we will be right back here a few years from now.

BTW Russ is correct on his note about bio-weapons and the funding for such things is always there even as the accounting methods serve to hide where these funds go.

[Mar 19, 2020] Drastic measures taken by governments and private institutions suggest that they view the coronavirus as a huge threat but the facts does not confirm that. That only logical explanation of such an overreaction is that they rightly or wrongly suspect that this is an artificially created virus that escaped labs

Mar 19, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Aug a day ago • edited

I will unfortunately have to go against the grain here and say that I still fail to see the immense danger of the virus.

The argument this article makes - particularly in its third paragraph - that drastic measures taken by governments and private institutions means that the virus is a huge threat doesn't logically follow. No matter how drastic the measures, how large the public's panic or how rabid the panic buying, my chance of dying from the virus even if contracting it is, as a sub-60 year old, healthy person still at roughly 1%, not much higher than viruses that gain little to no media or political attention.

The fact that it affects old people, but unlike many other viruses not babies is another factor that should lessen fear, rather than increase it.

This article summarizes the poll but mentions no reasons why those who do not believe the mainstream narrative should change their opinions other than empty polemic statements (such as "It would require deliberately ignoring these developments or accepting a completely false narrative about them to conclude that the threat has been overblown at this point.")

In lieu of proper counter-arguments, it is false to assume that only those willfully ignorant or believing in false narratives would not be as concerned about this virus as those in the media and others blowing it out proportion.

Michael Cole Aug a day ago
A thought. I have often heard the regime in Beijing described as evil, but not stupid. Why on earth would they have shut down an entire province and partially shut down their whole country with all the attendant societal disruption and economic devastation if they didn't think COV is a lot more than flu? Remember, the Chinese are famously fatalistic about life and death (that is a polite way of saying that they care less about individual human lives than we do). And what about the Italians. Were they just nervous nellies who had an irrational panic attack over nothing? OBVIOUSLY they, and many other countries, think this is a lot more serious than influenza.
sglover Aug a day ago
my chance of dying from the virus even if contracting it is, as a sub-60 year old, healthy person still at roughly 1%, not much higher than viruses that gain little to no media or political attention. The fact that it affects old people, but unlike many other viruses not babies is another factor that should lessen fear, rather than increase it

Nobody really has *any* solid idea of the epidemiology of this yet, so your blithe 1% is a kind of wish-thinking. In the States, thanks to the lack of testing (i.e., the failure to ramp up basic precautionary public health responses), **any** confident assertions of rates and chances really just serve to flag the speaker as somebody who doesn't know how much he doesn't know. Nassim Yaleb has some interesting thoughts about the real logic of our situation:

Play Hide
Aug sglover a day ago
First of all, you assume that I don't give a damn. I do. I don't think the virus is unimportant. No virus is.

Second, the lack of certainty plays in favor of my argument rather than yours: We do already have numbers on the amount of people infected, the amount of people who recovered and the amount of people who died. From the latter two, we can surmise the percentage chance of a person surviving an infection. Combining this with the percentage of people who died who were over the age of 60 (80%) and the number of those people who had pre-existing, severe conditions (75%) gives us a good idea.

Those who became infected with the virus but either didn't know that it was more than a common fever or who became infected and had symptoms mild or even non-existent won't figure into the number of people infected. Hence, the actual percentage chance of dying from the virus is even lower, since only those who had symptoms severe enough and got tested will figure into it. The reverse doesn't apply.

Hence, the actual risk of dying is even lower than the numbers suggest.

sglover Aug a day ago
We don't even know if reinfection is a possibility. As I said, at this point *all* serene predictions of the disease's likely course are fatuous. What the hell are you, The Hobby Epidemiologist?
Aug sglover a day ago
Funny how you specify that "serene" predictions in particular are fatuous while excluding pessimistic ones. Perhaps it's you who is driven not by data but something else, rather than me?

LeeInWV sglover 4 hours ago

You are right. We are flying blind as long as we are not testing widely. However, there is a lot of data available from other places and using that data we can actually extrapolate quite a bit. Check this out:

https://medium.com/@tomaspu...

[Mar 19, 2020] Do not fall for the barrage of fake news in the Western MSM about "promising cures, treatments and vaccines" coming from some alleged geniuses at some unicorn in some First World country:

Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Noirette , Mar 18 2020 18:18 utc | 50

TJ @ 3, adding:

Chloroquine was proposed as an efficient anti-viral for Cov-19 (short for the virus and disease) by Dr. Raoult in France, right from the start. He is supposedly the no.1 expert *World* on Communicable diseases. See list of names in the > right column.

http://expertscape.com/ex/infectious+diseases

This type of grading - ranking - endorsing, certifying, etc. some 'experts', does NOT per se correlate with their knowledge, honesty, ingenuity, insight (which may be random), etc. It is very much a social acceptance by the PTB scene based on no. of publications, contacts, financial awards, contacts with pols, getting more funding, being able to run a team, etc.

Yet, Dr. Raoult (Marseilles) is not in F considered a great expert at all, as he is not part of the Paris-Nexus.

https://www.connexionfrance.com/French-news/French-researcher-in-Marseille-posts-successful-Covid-19-coronavirus-drug-trial-results

This short clip 4 mins on Jan. 21, he is questioned about the coronaviruses (well before huge alarm in F) shows the personage. In F no subs, but have a look-see for 30 secs.

https://youtu.be/qoBoryHuZ6E

Here he explains why chloroquine can treat Cov-19 infections. In F.

https://youtu.be/fcNRmALkpTA

Imho several anti-virals will turn out to have some supressive / effective action, just like for HIV.


TJ , Mar 18 2020 18:35 utc | 55

Coronavirus Pandemic Update 39: Rapid COVID-19 Spread with Mild or No Symptoms, More on Treatment from MedCram about the French using chloroquine to treat patients with COVID-19.
JC , Mar 18 2020 19:16 utc | 62
Weekly Monday-Wednesday-Friday. Live from WHO Headquarters

"Live from WHO Headquarters - COVID-19 daily press briefing 18MAR2020"


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wucieL5YxCs

vk , Mar 18 2020 19:24 utc | 64
@ Posted by: donkeytale | Mar 18 2020 18:49 utc | 61

Did you see my link? Japan has a daily test capacity of only some 7,000 (South Korea, for example, is testing 20,000 per day). To make things worse, it is using just one sixth of this capacity. My source is the Japan Times, so you cannot invoke propaganda.

The Chinese doctors are using at least 22 different broad-spectrum antivirals to try to treat the infected. Not surprised one of them is Japanese, but that's irrelevant information (one of them, for example, is Cuban).

As I've posted in the previous thread, in moments of pandemic crisis against a disease without cure, doctors on the field have the poetic license to try whatever they want to. So they threw practically everything in Wuhan (shots in the dark after shots in the dark). It's acceptable medical practice in these extraordinary cases.

But none of the 22 antivirals are cures. Not even close. Best case scenario, they gain some time for some patients. Do not fall for the barrage of fake news in the Western MSM about "promising cures, treatments and vaccines" coming from some alleged geniuses at some unicorn in some First World country:

Zhong Nanshan: No evidence that COVID-19 originated in Wuhan

Zhong made the remarks at a press conference in Guangzhou on Wednesday, stressing that so far there is no targeted therapeutic COVID-19 drug and international cooperation is still needed for new experiments.

The fight against the COVID-19 should not be reliant on "herd immunity," Zhong added, saying that the production of an effective COVID-19 vaccine is at present the top priority, and the development requires international cooperation.

Zhong also made very clear the laissez-faire tactic won't work:

"There is no evidence of immunity for life after one infection of the virus," Zhong added.

[Mar 19, 2020] Virus and air quality

Mar 19, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jen , Mar 18 2020 20:25 utc | 77

Ken Garoo @ 43:

Iran (especially Tehran), northern Italy (Po River valley region) and Wuhan are also areas of high levels of air pollution. Populations in these regions are located in river valleys or plateaux in mountainous areas where temperature inversions leading to thick smog are common. I've read that Tehran experiences annual temperature inversions once a year, in the past occurring in December but in recent times starting earlier in November. Qom, where Iran's COVID-19 outbreak started, is not far from Tehran and itself is becoming more industrialised.

Northern Italy is reputed to have the worst air quality of any region in Europe.

jayc , Mar 18 2020 20:49 utc | 82

Interesting that there was a flood of comments yesterday - here, at Off Guardian, and other similar sites - all pushing the concept that the virus is a mild flu and that best practices, particularly social distancing, were in fact a scam designed to initiate the new world order/global police state, or something. Rational responses were met with all-caps freak outs and down-voting.

In my area, vehicle traffic has been down by at least 50%. The skies are noticeably clearer. A colleague pointed out that satellite imagery over northern Italy has shown that the air quality there has visibly improved.

[Mar 19, 2020] SK doctors have been using the malaria/arthritis drug hydrochloroquine to treat patients with much success, now a doctor in France has found that a combination of that drug and a common antibiotic azithromycin has cured up to 70% of patients after 3 to 6 days

Mar 19, 2020 | www.unz.com

Anon [279] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment March 19, 2020 at 1:56 am GMT

People should take a closer look at the stats coming out of Germany and S. Korea, both countries known for extensive testing. There are over 8,100 cases in Germany, yet death remains at 12, which makes the death rate <0.15%, almost on par with the flu. SK's death rate is around 0.65%.

SK doctors have been using the malaria/arthritis drug hydrochloroquine to treat patients with much success, now a doctor in France has found that a combination of that drug and a common antibiotic azithromycin has cured up to 70% of patients after 3 to 6 days:
https://dailycaller.com/2020/03/18/hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-covid19-cure-study/

Hopefully this is the cure we've been waiting for.

[Mar 19, 2020] I look to the narrative we get in North America, irrespective of the topic, and the pattern is the same

Highly recommended!
Mar 19, 2020 | www.unz.com

Curmudgeon , says: Show Comment March 18, 2020 at 5:40 pm GMT

@eah

I'm agnostic on the subject of COVID-19: its origin, how it first infected humans, its epidemiological spread

Perhaps agnostic is not the best choice of words, but overall, I agree.

It is not impossible that the virus did not "escape" from the Wuhan Lab, but it is unlikely.

That the Chinese have sequenced a virus to do something unexpected, then published it, is unremarkable. That others may have done the same or similar and not published it, would be remarkable. I would consider the "Five Eyes" and Israel entirely capable – and likely to do that, given they operate as one.

I look to the narrative we get in North America, irrespective of the topic, and the pattern is the same:
1- "report" the topic;
2- announce "breaking news" to establish the narrative;
3- repeat the narrative endlessly saturating the media;
4- ignore contrary evidence;
5- if #4 becomes too difficult, discredit it by a bait and switch;
6- pronounce the narrative is still solid and alternative information false;
7- rinse and repeat.
(I suppose, if all else fails, blame Russia/Putin could be added.)

In context of the above, I am leaning toward that it wasn't an accident and in all likelihood it wasn't China.

[Mar 18, 2020] A stance not too removed from Dr Joel Kettner's

Mar 18, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Norman Pilon ,

A stance not too removed from Dr Joel Kettner's:

Source of all that follows: wolfgang wodarg

01/03/2020 Corona-Hype:

[. . .]

by [Dr.] Wolfgang Wodarg

The corona hype is not based on any extraordinary public health danger. However, it causes considerable damage to our freedom and personal rights through frivolous and unjustified quarantine measures and restrictions. The images in the media are frightening and the traffic in China's cities seems to be regulated by the clinical thermometer.

Evidence based epidemiological assessment is drowning in the mainstream of fear mongers in labs, media and ministries.

The carnival in Venice was cancelled after an elderly dying hospital patient was tested positive. When a handful of people in Northern Italy also were tested positive, Austria immediately closed the Brenner Pass temporarily.

Due to a suspected case of coronavirus, more than 1000 people were not allowed to leave their hotel in Tenerife. On the cruise ship Diamond Princess 3700 passengers could not disembark., Congresses and touristic events are cancelled, economies suffer and schools in Italy have an extra [holiday].

At the beginning of February, 126 people from Wuhan were brought to Germany by plane and remained there in quarantine two weeks in perfect health. Corona viruses were detected in two of the healthy individuals.

We have experienced similar alarmist actions by virologists in the last two decades. WHO's "swine flu pandemic" was in fact one of the mildest flu waves in history and it is not only migratory birds that are still waiting for "birds flu". Many institutions that are now again alerting us to the need for caution have let us down and failed us on several occasions. Far too often, they are institutionally corrupted by secondary interests from business and/or politics.

If we do not want to chase frivolous panic messages, but rather to responsibly assess the risk of a spreading infection, we must use solid epidemiological methodology. This includes looking at the "normal", the baseline, before you can speak of anything exceptional.

Until now, hardly anyone has paid attention to corona viruses. For example, in the annual reports of the Robert-Koch-Institute (RKI) they are only marginally mentioned because there was SARS in China in 2002 and because since 2012 some transmissions from dromedaries to humans have been observed in Arabia (MERS). There is nothing about a regularly recurring presence of corona viruses in dogs, cats, pigs, mice, bats and in humans, even in Germany.

However, children's hospitals are usually well aware, that a considerable proportion of the often severe viral pneumonia is also regularly caused or accompanied by corona viruses worldwide.

In view of the well-known fact that in every "flu wave" 7-15% of acute respiratory illnesses (ARI) are coming along with coronaviruses, the case numbers that are now continuously added up are still completely within the normal range.

About one per thousand infected are expected to die during flu seasons. By selective application of PCR-tests – for example, only in clinics and medical outpatient clinics – this rate can easily be pushed up to frightening levels, because those, who need help there are usually worse off than those, who are recovering at home. The role of such s selection bias seems to be neglected in China and elsewhere.

Since the turn of the year, the focus of the public, of science and of health authorities has suddenly narrowed to some kind of blindness. Some doctors in Wuhan (12 million inhabitants) succeeded in attracting worldwide attention with initially less than 50 cases and some deaths in their clinic, in which they had identified corona viruses as the pathogen.

The colourful maps that are now being shown to us on paper or screens are impressive, but they usually have less to do with disease than with the activity of skilled virologists and crowds of sensationalist reporters.

We are currently not measuring the incidence of coronavirus diseases, but the activity of the specialists searching for them.

Wherever such the new tests are carried out – there about 9000 tests per week available in 38 laboratories throughout Europe on 13 February 2020 – there are at least single cases detected and every case becomes a self-sustaining media event. The fact alone that the discovery of a coronavirus infection is accompanied by a particularly intensive search in its vicinity explains many regional [clusters].

The horror reports from Wuhan were something, that virologists all over the world are waiting for. Immediately, the virus strains present in the refrigerators were scanned and compared feverishly with the reported newcomers from Wuhan. A laboratory at the Charité won the race at the WHO and was the first to be allowed to market its in-house tests worldwide. Prof C. Drosten was interviewed on 23rd of january 2020 and described how the Test was established. He said, that he cooperated with a Partner from China, who confirmed the specific sensitivity of the Charitè-Test for the Wuhan coronavirus. Other Tests from different Places followed soon and found their market.

However, it is better not to be tested for corona viruses. Even with a slight "flu-like" infection the risk of coronavirus detection would be 7% – 15% . This is, what a prospective monitoring in Scotland (from 2005 to 2013) may teach us. The scope, the possible hits and the significance of the new tests are not [yet] validated. It would be [interesting] to have [some] tests not only on airports and cruising ships but on [German] or [Italian] cats, mice or even bats.

If you find some new virus RNA in a Thai cave ore a Wuhan hospital, it takes a long time to map its prevalence in different hosts worldwide.

But if you want to give evidence to a spreading pandemic by using PCR-Tests only, this is what should have been done after a prospective cross sectional [protocol].

So beware of side effects. Nowadays positive PCR tests have tremendous consequences for the everyday life of the patient and his wider environment, as can be seen in all media without effort.

However, the finding itself has no clinical significance. It is just another name for acute respiratory illnesses (ARI), which as every year put 30% to 70% of all people in our countries more or less out of action for a week or two every winter.

According to a prospective ARI-virus monitoring in Scotland from 2005 to 2013, the most common pathogens of acute respiratory diseases were: 1. rhinoviruses, 2. influenza A viruses, 3. influenza B viruses, 4. RS viruses and 5. coronaviruses.

This order changed slightly from year to year. Even with viruses competing for our mucous membrane cells, there is apparently a changing quorum, as we know it from our intestines in the case of microorganisms and from the Bundestag in the case of political groups.

So if there is now to be an increasing number of "proven" coronavirus infections. in China or in Italy: Can anyone say how often such examinations were carried out in previous winters, by whom, for what reason and with which results? When someone claims that something is increasing, he must surely refer to something, that has been observed before.

It can be stunning, when an experienced disease control officer looks at the current turmoil, the panic and the suffering it causes. I'm sure many of those responsible public health officers would probably risk their jobs today, as they did with the "swine flu" back then, if they would follow their experience and oppose the mainstream.

Every winter we have a virus epidemic with thousands of deaths and with millions of infected people even in Germany. And coronaviruses always have their share.

So if the Federal Government wants to do something good, it could learn from epidemiologists in Glasgow and have all clever minds at the RKI observe prospectively (!!!) and watch how the virom of the German population changes from year to year.

Some questions for the evaluation of the current findings:

1) Which prospective, standardised monitoring of acute respiratory diseases with or without fever (ILI, ARI) is used for the epidemiological risk assessment of coronavirus infections observed in Wuhan Italy, South Korea, Iran and elsewhere (baseline).

2) How do the comparable (!) results of earlier observations differ from those now reported by the WHO? (in China, in Europe, in Italy, in Germany, etc.)

3) What would we observe this ARI-season if we would ignore the new PCR-testing?

4) How valid and how comparable are the detection methods used with regard to sensitivity, specificity and pathogenetic or prognostic relevance?

5) What is the evidence or probability that the observed corona viruses 2019/2020 are more dangerous to public health than previous variants?

6) If you find them now, how can you [prove], they were not there (e.g. in animals) before.
What considerations have been made or taken into account to exclude or minimise sources of bias (sources of error)?

Note: the original source of this quote contains embedded links not here apparent.

https://youtu.be/p_AyuhbnPOI

[Mar 18, 2020] Panic is unwarranted: the number of cases are exponential for several weeks after epidemic starts and then they begin to decrease. That's happened in China, South Korea, and is happening in Italy and Iran right now.

Mar 18, 2020 | www.statnews.com

Richard Tovar March 18, 2020 at 12:30 am

Finally, a great perspective on this fiasco. I agree, we cannot make such important decisions with so little data to back it up. I would also add that we do have some data that suggests that it's not an extinction level event as it's being portrayed.

Look at the numbers in the countries that have been through it already, number of cases are exponential for about 2 weeks and then they begin to decrease. That's happened in China, South Korea, and is happening in Italy and Iran right now.

If China has 3,200 deaths (plus 2600 critical condition patients) and Italy has 2500 deaths (plus 2000 critical condition cases), why would we expect much more in the US?

According to the CDC MMWR, during week 9 of 2020, pneumonia killed 2280 people and the flu another 384; during week 8 of 2020, 2911 died of pneumonia and the flu killed another 415.

That's more deaths in 2 weeks in the US than all of China's deaths due to covid-19 since the epidemic started.

Why are we not talking about this? I know that we have a pretty good idea of what the flu does every year and I agree that we had no idea what covid-19 was going to do in a country in January, but it's March and we have seen what it's done in a couple of countries and it's not any worse than any other disease that we encounter every year.

I also agree that when this is all done and we finally get more data, the fatality rate for covid-19 will certainly be less than 1%. Then what? After the extensive damage to every part of our society? For what? What about the people that rely on a weekly paycheck? The small business that rely on heavy customer traffic? Will we hold someone responsible? Will it be the news media trying to sell newspapers with negative headlines?

Scientists that arrive to a conclusion with no evidence to support it? Are we going to freak out every year because bad things can possibly happen? Maybe if we work really hard this year we can come up with something for next year that will really kill us all but it won't be a virus this time, it will be our own stupidity and lack of common sense.

[Mar 17, 2020] The tremendous stress of medical personnel in Italy

Notable quotes:
"... "The staff is exhausted. I saw the tiredness on faces that didn't know what it was despite the already exhausting workloads they had. I saw a solidarity of all of us, who never failed to go to our internist colleagues to ask, 'What can I do for you now?' ..."
"... "Doctors who move beds and transfer patients, who administer therapies instead of nurses. Nurses with tears in their eyes because we can't save everyone, and the vital parameters of several patients at the same time reveal an already marked destiny. ..."
"... "There are no more shifts, no more hours. Social life is suspended for us. We no longer see our families for fear of infecting them. Some of us have already become infected despite the protocols. ..."
Mar 17, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

DFC , Mar 17 2020 20:59 utc | 35

What is happening now in Italy explained by one of the doctors fighting the pandemic in Bergamo, this was on 9 March, today the situation in Bergamo and all Italy is much worse with this "normal flu" (sarc):

Dr Daniele Macchini's post, translated by Dr Silvia Stringhini

"After much thought about whether and what to write about what is happening to us, I felt that silence was not responsible.

"I will therefore try to convey to people far from our reality what we are living in Bergamo in these days of Covid-19 pandemic. I understand the need not to create panic, but when the message of the dangerousness of what is happening does not reach people I shudder.

"I myself watched with some amazement the reorganization of the entire hospital in the past week, when our current enemy was still in the shadows: the wards slowly 'emptied', elective activities were interrupted, intensive care were freed up to create as many beds as possible.

"All this rapid transformation brought an atmosphere of silence and surreal emptiness to the corridors of the hospital that we did not yet understand, waiting for a war that was yet to begin and that many (including me) were not so sure would ever come with such ferocity.

"I still remember my night call a week ago when I was waiting for the results of a swab. When I think about it, my anxiety over one possible case seems almost ridiculous and unjustified, now that I've seen what's happening. Well, the situation now is dramatic to say the least.

"The war has literally exploded and battles are uninterrupted day and night. But now that need for beds has arrived in all its drama. One after the other the departments that had been emptied fill up at an impressive pace.

"The boards with the names of the patients, of different colours depending on the operating unit, are now all red and instead of surgery you see the diagnosis, which is always the damned same: bilateral interstitial pneumonia.

"Now, explain to me which flu virus causes such a rapid drama. [post continues comparing Covid19 to flu, link here]. And while there are still people who boast of not being afraid by ignoring directions, protesting because their normal routine is 'temporarily' put in crisis, the epidemiological disaster is taking place. And there are no more surgeons, urologists, orthopedists, we are only doctors who suddenly become part of a single team to face this tsunami that has overwhelmed us.

"Cases are multiplying, we arrive at a rate of 15-20 admissions per day all for the same reason. The results of the swabs now come one after the other: positive, positive, positive. Suddenly the E.R. is collapsing.

"Reasons for the access always the same: fever and breathing difficulties, fever and cough, respiratory failure. Radiology reports always the same: bilateral interstitial pneumonia, bilateral interstitial pneumonia, bilateral interstitial pneumonia. All to be hospitalized.

"Someone already to be intubated and go to intensive care. For others it's too late... Every ventilator becomes like gold: those in operating theatres that have now suspended their non-urgent activity become intensive care places that did not exist before.

"The staff is exhausted. I saw the tiredness on faces that didn't know what it was despite the already exhausting workloads they had. I saw a solidarity of all of us, who never failed to go to our internist colleagues to ask, 'What can I do for you now?'

"Doctors who move beds and transfer patients, who administer therapies instead of nurses. Nurses with tears in their eyes because we can't save everyone, and the vital parameters of several patients at the same time reveal an already marked destiny.

"There are no more shifts, no more hours. Social life is suspended for us. We no longer see our families for fear of infecting them. Some of us have already become infected despite the protocols.

"Some of our colleagues who are infected also have infected relatives and some of their relatives are already struggling between life and death. So be patient, you can't go to the theatre, museums or the gym. Try to have pity on the myriad of old people you could exterminate.

"We just try to make ourselves useful. You should do the same: we influence the life and death of a few dozen people. You with yours, many more. Please share this message. We must spread the word to prevent what is happening here from happening all over Italy.

"I finish by saying that I really don't understand this war on panic. The only reason I see is mask shortages, but there's no mask on sale anymore. We don't have a lot of studies, but is it panic really worse than neglect and carelessness during an epidemic of this sort?"

And now let the people make "normal life" and acquire "herd immunity", BoJo and a good part of the western governments (if not all) are criminals

[Mar 17, 2020] Which objects to sanitize to avoid spreading the deadly disease

Notable quotes:
"... our own hands can be the biggest culprit when it comes to adding germs and bacteria onto your phone. ..."
"... mobile telephones are particularly dirty because people do not necessarily wash their hands before touching them. ..."
"... Shaking hands is a frequent transmission route for disease in hospitals. ..."
Mar 17, 2020 | express.co.uk
...Express.co.uk has compiled advice to show which objects to sanitise to avoid spreading the deadly disease. Trending
Mobile phones

Research has found mobile phones can be 10 times dirtier than toilet seats. Your own hands can be the biggest culprit when it comes to adding germs and bacteria onto your phone.

Assistant professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, Emily Martin, said mobile telephones are particularly dirty because people do not necessarily wash their hands before touching them.

She told Time.com: "Because people are always carrying their cell phones even in situations where they would normally wash their hands before doing anything, cell phones do tend to get pretty gross."

ATMs or ticket machines

Ticket machines and ATMs will be touched by many people which means it poses a risk to spreading coronavirus.

Coronavirus warning: Coronavirus has killed more than 94,000 people around the world (Image: GETTY) Telephones

Your mobile phone can pose a risk, but additionally so can shared office telephones.

Office kitchens

Coffee machines or kettles will be handled by multiple people, so it's a good idea to use hand sanitiser after doing the tea round.

Lift buttons

Lift buttons can be touched by potentially hundreds or thousands of people depending on how many people use the lift regularly.

This means it can pose a threat to spreading coronavirus.

Handrails

Escalators, tube handrails, bannisters will all be touched constantly, potentially by thousands of people a day.

Dr Tait-Burkard told the Guardian: "If you're on public transport, there's no way not to touch the handrails.

"So when you get off, disinfect your hands."

Coronavirus warning: More than 75 countries have reported cases of coronavirus (Image: GETTY) Communal bathrooms

Communal bathrooms can pose a threat as they are enclosed spaces which will be accessed by several people.

The door handles, soap dispensers, hand dryers, bins and other objects could be touched by many people.

Additionally, people often blow their noses in the bathroom which can help spread the virus.

Hospitals

Hospitals can be hotbeds for disease, so it is advisable to wash your hands thoroughly before and after visiting a hospital.

Professor Haas told the Guardian: "Shaking hands is a frequent transmission route for disease in hospitals.

"It's why health personnel are supposed to regularly disinfect their hands."

[Mar 17, 2020] In might make sense to wash you nose with saltwater. To gaggle you throat with the mouth wash.

There is only limited evidence to suggest it actually helps. However, saltwater rinses have not been shown to prevent respiratory infections in the past. The NHS said: “There is no evidence that regularly rinsing the nose with salt water protects you from coronavirus”. The real question is how long it take the virus to get inside the cell: is this hours or minutes?
BTW Research has found mobile phones can be 10 times dirtier than toilet seats.
Gargling with slat war is probably completely false: FALSE Gargling salt water ‘eliminates’ coronavirus
The use of saline (salt water) irrigations for the nose and sinuses has been shown to be highly effective in improving allergy symptoms and shortening the duration of a sinus infection. Typically, for allergy sufferers, doctors recommend irrigating the sinuses once every day to every other day with 8 ounces of salt water. Make your own saline rinse Combat sinus infections
Mar 17, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Stonebird , Mar 17 2020 20:33 utc | 25

As an Asthmatic I found this information interesting. You might need to scroll down - as simple solutions (mainly before you really get it !) are near the end.

https://thesaker.is/how-to-treat-coronavirus-infection-covid-19/

Quotes; A: Are you asking for some simple recommendations? First of all, take a good care for the nasal mucosa and oropharyngeal area.

Q: To wash it with saltwater?
A: Yes, wash it thoroughly. But "lors" – non-prescription medications and sinus cleaners to stop running nose and for an effective lavage. That is, the feeling of free unobstructed breath should come after all. The second thing is the oropharyngeal area behind the uvula. And there, too, you need to make a good lavage of the oropharyngeal region.

Q: So you don't just have to squirt it up your nose, you have to gargle it deep down your throat?
A: Yes, and rinse it out. And don't be lazy. Do do it until you get a feeling of clean, good airways. Of all the ways, this is the most effective. I would advise those people who can afford to buy a nebulizer or

Q: Do you mean, it's aerosol, right? With ultrasound?
A: Yes. And it allows the hygiene of the upper respiratory tract to be brought to a good state. When a cough starts, it is desirable to still apply the medications that we prescribe for patients with bronchial asthma. This is either Berodual, or Ventolin, or Salbutamol. Because these drugs improve mucociliary clearance, relieve spasm.

Q: You mean expectorant?" Mucolytic ACC?
A: Yes, ACC and Fluimucil. And what you can't do is use glucocorticosteroids. This virus replication is rapidly increasing by them.

Q: What does that mean?
A: Corticosteroids is prednisone, methylprednisolone, dexamethasone, betamethasone.

Q: So you don't need to inject hormones, relatively speaking, if you have a viral infection?
A: There are inhaled steroids. But there are patients with asthma who are ill and are on this therapy. But this has to be a tailor-made solutions.

------------

b's and most western Government's change of heart, makes sense if the re-infection rate is much higher and more lethal than the first onset of the virus. I don't know the truth about this but there was a small, quickly suppressed, report from *researchers* in Hubei that this is the case. The second time round we are talking about an attack on the "vital" organs (heart etc) in a relatively short period of days.

What will happen is a societal collapse, or a total financial scam where the billionaires come out of hiding and take everything for a few shekels. Remember that debts can be "claimed" decades after they are made. So ordinary people will have to pay back all these massive "aids" later, through taxes.

Richard Steven Hack , Mar 17 2020 20:57 utc | 34

@Stonebird | Mar 17 2020 20:33 utc | 25

I keep seeing people recommending this salt water lavage. So I looked it up on the Internet. No, it does *not* kill the virus. It might ease the symptoms, but does nothing to eliminate the virus.

As far as I know from reading so far, there are *no* "home remedies" that can deal with this virus.

I have seen suggestions to boost your vitamin intake in hopes of boosting your immune system. I've upped my C to 3 grams a day instead of my usual 1 and my D-3 to 6,000 units instead of my usual 4,000.

[Mar 17, 2020] First of all, take a good care for the nasal mucosa and oropharyngeal area.

Mar 17, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Stonebird , Mar 17 2020 20:33 utc | 25

As an Asthmatic I found this information interesting. You might need to scroll down - as simple solutions (mainly before you really get it !) are near the end.

https://thesaker.is/how-to-treat-coronavirus-infection-covid-19/

Quotes; A: Are you asking for some simple recommendations? First of all, take a good care for the nasal mucosa and oropharyngeal area.

Q: To wash it with saltwater?
A: Yes, wash it thoroughly. But "lors" – non-prescription medications and sinus cleaners to stop running nose and for an effective lavage. That is, the feeling of free unobstructed breath should come after all. The second thing is the oropharyngeal area behind the uvula. And there, too, you need to make a good lavage of the oropharyngeal region.

Q: So you don't just have to squirt it up your nose, you have to gargle it deep down your throat?
A: Yes, and rinse it out. And don't be lazy. Do do it until you get a feeling of clean, good airways. Of all the ways, this is the most effective. I would advise those people who can afford to buy a nebulizer or

Q: Do you mean, it's aerosol, right? With ultrasound?
A: Yes. And it allows the hygiene of the upper respiratory tract to be brought to a good state. When a cough starts, it is desirable to still apply the medications that we prescribe for patients with bronchial asthma. This is either Berodual, or Ventolin, or Salbutamol. Because these drugs improve mucociliary clearance, relieve spasm.

Q: You mean expectorant?" Mucolytic ACC?
A: Yes, ACC and Fluimucil. And what you can't do is use glucocorticosteroids. This virus replication is rapidly increasing by them.

Q: What does that mean?
A: Corticosteroids is prednisone, methylprednisolone, dexamethasone, betamethasone.

Q: So you don't need to inject hormones, relatively speaking, if you have a viral infection?
A: There are inhaled steroids. But there are patients with asthma who are ill and are on this therapy. But this has to be a tailor-made solutions.

------------

b's and most western Government's change of heart, makes sense if the re-infection rate is much higher and more lethal than the first onset of the virus. I don't know the truth about this but there was a small, quickly suppressed, report from *researchers* in Hubei that this is the case. The second time round we are talking about an attack on the "vital" organs (heart etc) in a relatively short period of days.

What will happen is a societal collapse, or a total financial scam where the billionaires come out of hiding and take everything for a few shekels. Remember that debts can be "claimed" decades after they are made. So ordinary people will have to pay back all these massive "aids" later, through taxes.

Richard Steven Hack , Mar 17 2020 20:57 utc | 34

@Stonebird | Mar 17 2020 20:33 utc | 25

I keep seeing people recommending this salt water lavage. So I looked it up on the Internet. No, it does *not* kill the virus. It might ease the symptoms, but does nothing to eliminate the virus.

As far as I know from reading so far, there are *no* "home remedies" that can deal with this virus.

I have seen suggestions to boost your vitamin intake in hopes of boosting your immune system. I've upped my C to 3 grams a day instead of my usual 1 and my D-3 to 6,000 units instead of my usual 4,000.

[Mar 17, 2020] Panic Pandemic Why are people who should know better buying the Covid19 hype OffGuardian

While definably overhyped, the threat does exist; especially for older people and smokers. So measures taken by governments are not an overkill.
Mar 17, 2020 | off-guardian.org

What is nCoV19? I honestly do not know.

The more the fear porn ramps up, the less certain I become of any aspect of the narrative surrounding it. We are definitely all being discouraged from questioning its virulence, discouraged from referring to its official fatality and case numbers, which do not correlate with the level of fear we are being told is appropriate. There is certainly a massive and multifaceted attempt to fudge and inflate those numbers to bring them in line with the 'response'.

This brings us back to our revelation that good old Wikipedia have been downgrading the CFR of the Spanish Flu. It's hard not to see this as part of the same process.

The actual death rates just aren't high enough. So talk them up, play pea and thimble games with the stats, and do some Memory-Holing so that the 1918 pandemic suddenly has a very similar CFR, allowing your tame media to make all the right comparisons in their op eds and editorials, pointing out how many millions died back then despite it only having a fatality ratio of 2.5%.

They seem aware of the discrepancy, and are making efforts to prevent people researching it. The WHO are warning people not to read "too much" about the disease in order to protect their mental health. In a write up on the reccomendations, the BBC says this :

There is a lot of misinformation swirling around – stay informed by sticking to trusted sources of information such as government and NHS websites

Whether this virus is as imaginary as some are saying, or entirely real, it's being hyped to a point beyond any connection with reality, and not just in the media. It's a multi-pronged assault on our minds right now. Allegedly reliable and authoritative medical professionals are just as likely to talk propaganda at you as some government minister or media halfwit.


Gary Weglarz ,

Veterans Today describes itself as follows at its website: ("VeteransToday.com (VT) is an independent alternative journal for the clandestine services focused on U.S. Foreign Policy and Military Issues.")

A rather interesting report from VT to say the least.

https://www.veteranstoday.com/2020/03/15/china-us-brought-covid19-to-china-during-army-games-hid-disease-in-us-as-influenza/

John ,

RT has a headline "21 year old Spanish football coach dies of corona virus" Click on the story. He had leukemia.

Dungroanin ,

Will just sticking to actual facts make a blind bit of difference to the panicked? I fear not.

97% of all infected in the whole world seem to have recovered.

Of the 3% who didn't the AVERAGE age is above 70.

There is a trade off between a shorter period and more cases at the same time and the same total number but not so many at the same time over a longer period by trying to isloate people who do get it.

A safe vaccine must be ar least a year away for the NEXT return of the virus.

Is there any objection to these facts?
-- --

Facts?
Apparently italians are so far advanced in their doom they are letting a body remain in a house without collecting it .

Apparently the 'young man' in his 50's was killed by the virus in the UK.

Are These 'facts' true? Can anyone post any links to them?

Thom ,

It's fairly clear the coronavirus is both a cover and an excuse for a) temporary financial collapse; b) a vicious trade war with China and c) gaslighting the peoples of western 'democracies' into accepting semi-fascist government. As soon as the markets are at rock bottom and China, Iran and the eurozone damaged as much as possible, a vaccine will most probably be 'found', the markets will 'soar' and the majority will thank their political leaders for pulling them back from the abyss – forgetting that many of the control measures will still be in place and their pensions, investments and, quite likely, bank accounts will have been quietly ransacked.

aspnaz ,

Totally agree. Here in HK we have had 4 deaths from Covid-19 over the past three months. Here is a link to the HK covid-19 website that even gives you details of every case https://wars.vote4.hk/en/ . Initially the HK people paniced and most improved their personal hygiene: hand washing, masks etc. All public gathering facilities were closed, such as all the public sports facilities, but now they are all opening again and things are returning to normal as the predictions of massive death prove to be false. I don't know what is happening in other countries, but here in HK (and the same according to relatives in Taiwan) it has turned out to be a bit of a nothing burger. Strangely, I have posted this comment on a number of fear porn alt websites and had it removed.

Bryan ,

The modelling suggests that people over 60 are particularly vulnerable (for obvious age related issues) and that the sheer numbers from this group will quickly overwhelm health provision – so few will be priority treated and many will die from avoidable complications. This is not hype and requires a serious intetventionalist response. I do not doubt however that such measures may be come a permanent part of our slide towards the authoritarian Right.

Jen ,

There is now news of a 21-year-old Spanish football coach, a guy called Francisco Garcia , dying from COVID-19. He had an underlying condition (leukaemia) which he did not know of until he had symptoms of COVID-19 infection and went to hospital.

Garcia is likely to be the tip of the proverbial iceberg of young people who do not know that they have dormant health issues until their immune systems become stressed or infection with COVID-19 stirs up the dormant health problems.

During their late teenage / young adult years, people often pick up diseases or pathogens – the various herpes viruses and the Epstein-Barr virus that causes glandular fever come to mind – and for the most these issues resolve or their symptoms go away but the viruses that cause them continue to stay in the body and create problems later when the immune system is stressed by another pathogen.

How many young people these days might have dormant conditions, viruses or bacteria causing no problems at all until they come into situations where their immune systems are stressed, such as but not limited to situations like working two or more jobs in insecure or dangerous conditions, living in share arrangements with strangers whose medical histories are unknown, and being unsure of future prospects? They may also be vulnerable to COVID-19 more than we realise.

Mucho ,

"If you ever doubted that corruption is now endemic and all our institutions – political, legal, medical – are stacked with yes-men and jobsworths or fools prepared to put their names to any junk proclamation that might get them a raise or save their professional skins, just think of this article."

Not forgetting the enormous army of dependable chaps from "The Lodge", who can always be relied upon to grit their teeth and say whatever is required to "retain order."

George Mc ,

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

Attributed to Mark Twain.

Dave Hansell ,

Presumably that would also include statistics on previous years flu cases, suicide statistics, deaths from car accidents statistics, deaths from knife crime, or Ben population statistics?

Or are some statistics more valid than others depending on their utility in arguing a particular case or agenda?

George Mc ,

Twain – or whoever- was drawing attention to the easiness of manipulating statistics – which is why we should scrutinise them as Catte has done above.

George Mc ,

By a coincidence this wondrous Lancet article is one I accessed myself just a few days back and I noted that arresting statement:

We re-estimated mortality rates by dividing the number of deaths on a given day by the number of patients with confirmed COVID-19 infection 14 days before. On this basis, using WHO data on the cumulative number of deaths to March 1, 2020, mortality rates would be 5·6% (95% CI 5·4–5·8) for China and 15·2% (12·5–17·9) outside of China.

i.e. mortality rates outside China are three times greater than inside. Scary stuff. I presume that the number of deaths mentioned are from within the confirmed infected sample? Surely it would be too cynical to assume that they added in deaths from outside? But, as with the UK deaths so far, the dead may have had other illnesses too.

... ... ...

Willem ,

Here is a report from Northern Italy of an Italian dr that I consider to be true.

He says that the origen of the virus is the media who created a panic instead of a pandemic and much more. Tempting to quote but better read for yourself.

Hat tip to Milosovic who previously added this link

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2020/03/13/the-real-case-fatality-rate-of-the-novel-coronavirus-in-italy-is-at-least-10-times-lower-than-the-official-data/

RobG ,

I'd be very cautious about anything that 'authority' tells you. I'm in a part of south west France that geographically is not far from northern Italy.

Just about everyone where I am is saying that the covid 19 stuff is complete and utter bullshit.

Remember, covid 19 is brought to you by exactly the same people who brought to you 9/11, and the invasion of Iraq, etc, etc, etc.

Ivan ,

In Italy today there were 345 deaths from coronavirus, 368 yesterday. There is an endless flood of patients in the hospitals, hospitals are being divided into hospitals trating coronavirus cases and hospitals for non infected people. An emergency call for which the medics arrived before in 10 minutes, now takes 50 minutes (Lombardia).

You don't know what you are talking about. Go take a look at the Italian news sites (google translate).

Barovsky ,

Hmmm . Well I'm almost 75 with a heart condition and don't want to die gasping for breath. So yes, for most, it's no big deal but anyone over 40 is at risk, so even if 'only' 1% die in the UK, that's a lot of people. But most important of all, is the threat (potentially) it poses to capitalism. Things will never be the same again.

Ieuan Einion ,

As I understand it, 30,000 people have died of this winter's particular strain of influenza in the USA, which is par for the course, around 0.01% of those infected. If the Italian and Iranian experiences to date are anything to go by, the infection/mortality ratio is much greater for CorviD-19.

[Mar 17, 2020] COVID-19 vs. tuberculosis

Mar 17, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Emily Durron ,

In line with the vitally important reference in the article to WHO estimates that 290 000-650 000 respiratory deaths occur each year associated with seasonal flu, the following cannot be repeated often enough.

The ONS reported that in the 2017 to 2018 winter period, there were an estimated 50,100 excess winter deaths in England and Wales alone. The report attributed these deaths to "the predominant strain of flu, the effectiveness of the influenza vaccine and below-average winter temperatures".

Source: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/excesswintermortalityinenglandandwales/2017to2018provisionaland2016to2017final

So far, nCov has killed fewer than 50 people in the entire UK.

And yet, two years ago, not a single person wore a face mask, no flights were cancelled, nobody refused to shake hands, not a single academic institution switched to distance learning, no football was postponed, the England cricket team was not called home from a sunlit corner of the former empire and no damn fools ran out to Tesco to clear the shelves of toilet rolls and pasta.

And while we are talking about infectious respiratory diseases, the following are WHO statistics for 2018. The name of the disease (see if you can guess) comes at the end.

• A total of 1.5 million people died from this disease in 2018.
• An estimated 10 million people fell ill with this disease worldwide.
• In 2018, 1.1 million children fell ill with it globally, and there were 205 000 child deaths due to it.
• There were cases in all countries and age groups.

But this disease is curable and preventable.

The fact is though that the western media, governments and the ignorant population do not give a shit about it because eight countries account for two thirds of the total, namely India followed by China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Pakistan, Nigeria, Bangladesh and South Africa.

The disease is, of course, TB.

[Mar 17, 2020] Here are three most helpful and competent sources

Mar 17, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Dilara , Mar 17 2020 1:58 utc | 115

There are three most helpful and competent sources "How to treat Coronavirus infection COVID-19"
1. An advice from a pathologist who's been tracking the virus since 1970: United Nursing Services "Good luck for all of us"
2. The RT-Interview with the member of the Russian Academy of Science Alexander Chuchalin Translated by Scott Humor
3. Das Coronavirus-Update mit Christian Drosten | NDR.de ...
https://www.ndr.de/nachrichten/info/podcast4684.html
The German Virologie-Professor gives a lot of informations in a podcast everyday for half an hour, today was the 14th. If anybody knews the German language, it is a must to hear. He does not speak only about the medical but all the sociological problems, the media and the scientistic "fakes".

[Mar 16, 2020] One promising way to decrease chances of your infection via nose and throat this is salt water gargling and nasal rinses with the same. Also you can wear gloves when out

Mar 16, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

gepay , Mar 16 2020 19:03 utc | 6

The Saker has a good article - How to treat Coronavirus infection COVID-19 - by an international recognized virologist, Dr Chuchalain.

Contrary to what I have read in other articles, he says the virus does cause runny nose and sore throat along with mild fever.

The best way to deal with this is salt water gargling and nasal rinses with the same.

A method to reduce getting infected is to wear gloves when out. Handwashing is more effective than masks.

If you are infected masks do help you not infecting others. It is when the virus bypasses your immune system and infects the lower lungs that danger appears.

Then other opportunist pathogens -- pneumonia causing bacteria and fungi take up residence in the lower lungs often leading to death or lasting damage by fibrosis. Obviously it is much better to stop it before this with then no lasting effects.

If dry cough and shortness of breath appear seek medical help immediately.

[Mar 16, 2020] The US will be offering free drive-up testing to practically everyone. I now believe the United States now has a better change at containing the pandemic than Europe.

Mar 16, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Petri Krohn , Mar 16 2020 19:56 utc | 28

Analyzing the swab in a lab is simple and cheap, but getting the swab to the lab is expensive. Normal testing procedures assume that the tested person is already infected. Therefore the health worker doing the swabbing will have to wear full protective clothing. Moreover, before testing the next patient he will have to disinfect and change protective clothing. One estimate put the price of a COVID-19 test in the US at $1200. Of the sum $1000 was charged for the biohazard.

In most countries testing is done only where there is a strong suspicion the person is infected with the new coronavirus. Therefore the measures against biohazards may be called for.

Testing for coronavirus must be separated from health care. People who have symptoms but do not need medical care should stay as far away from hospitals as possible. The safest and most effective way to do high-throughput testing is drive-up or drive-in testing. The patient or suspect stays inside the car and only opens a window. This way he or she does not infect others. The testing team wears full protective clothing, including a gas mask. This video by NBC News shows how it is done. A tent is set up on a huge parking lot. Hundreds of cars wait in line. The testers wear disposable aprons which they change after each suspect.

I watched VP Pence's press conference yesterday. I was actually impressed! The US will be offering free drive-up testing to practically everyone. I now believe the United States now has a better change at containing the pandemic than Europe.

The problem here and especially in countries other that the USA is that the patient needs a car. Walk-in testing is more difficult to organize as the patients need to be isolated from each other. The simplest test would be one were the test subject swabs his own mouth, puts the swab in a plastic tube and seals it in an envelope.

In the mean time Sweden has stopped testing all together, except for hospital patients. Britain and Finland have followed suit. People with symptoms are simple told to lock themselves up in their homes and not come out for two weeks. The Chinese edition of the Global Times has called the Swedes out for the surrender monkeys they are.

Containing an epidemic and avoiding a pandemic requires testing large parts of the population to locate any unknown cluster of infections. Once a case is found, the anti-corona task force must locate all contacts, test them and place them under quarantine even if they do not show symptoms.

[Mar 16, 2020] The USA now experience the period when the medical personnel became the most prominent victim of the authorities incompetence

Highly recommended!
Mar 15, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

likbez , March 15, 2020 6:13 pm

In most countries COVID-19 is regional with one province (and within this province one large city) as the epicenter.

Jim Bianco's model is too primitive and as such unnecessary alarmist.

The early stages of any flu epidemic are always exponential. But from some point propagation slows down considerably as the virus has difficulties to find new vulnerable people either because number of people with immunity increases (COVID-19 on average lasts less then a month; often just two weeks and around 90% of cases are mild ), or the measures were taken to "flatten the curve", or the weather or other conditions became unfavorable to the virus.

Current exponential growth can also be explained by the fact that CDC completely botched testing. So a better availability of tests with time produces a false exponential increase in cases.

In a sense the first half of March in the USA corresponds to the first half of Jan in Wuhan when the authorities did not yet resort to drastic actions (especially true for NYC, which looks like a giant cruise ship to me with all corresponding problems with AC, high density of population, frequent interaction with sick people via public transport including subway as infection points, etc ).

This is also the period when the medical personnel became the most prominent victim of the authorities incompetence.

I am no so much concerned with number of infection among "commoners" as with the number of infections of medical personnel. Depletion of medical personnel will greatly complicate the picture.

Working in hazmat suits exhaust people, especially women, very quickly and thus make them more susceptible to the infection. In many cases you also need to wear adult pampers. It might well be that this is an overkill for this particular infection and less drastic measures like surgical scrubs can be as effective to protect medical workers.

Research published in Feb had found that out of 138 patients studied at one Wuhan hospital, 29% were healthcare workers. Over 3K medical workers in China were infected and at least 18 died with ~ half of them under 40. Looks like heavy contact with infected patients make medical workers prognosis worse than for "commoners"

Retired people over 70 now should self-quarantine and outside of senior facilities they are by-and-large responsible for their own health. When I see them on cruse ships in late Feb and March I just think how many reckless persons are among older folk. Most of them are also wealthy enough to order food via home delivery, not to drive to the store.

Still on recent visit to department store there were a lot of grannies in the lines (and completely depleted shelves ;-). Looks like they are braving possible infection with the regular flu, if not coronavirus as typically several people cough within the large store.

There should be some level of individual responsibility here , especially among seniors who are retired.

But, at the same time, "Whom the Gods would destroy they first make mad"

likbez , March 16, 2020 12:34 am

Terry, March 15, 2020 7:25 pm

Thanks for your last comment Run. You saved me the trouble.

Famous quote “They had learned nothing and forgotten nothing” is applicable to the current situation in the USA. Looks like the US authorities learned nothing from SARC epidemics, which BTW hit Toronto.

Let me clarify my previous post (which does suffers from wordiness as run75441 correctly pointed out).

There are two diseases bunged into one in COVID-19: one is flu-like and is no threat (just a nuisance and Bert Schlitz is absolutely correct about this part) and the second is the SARC-like destructive virus pneumonia which is an extremely serious threat that has long time health consequences for survivors (lung fibrosis of various degrees similar to those which is the consequence of pneumonia caused by electronic cigarettes.)

Those curves above do not distinguish between them and as such have no value.

IMHO the curves that matter are “serious and critical cases” and the “medical workers who are in serious or critical conditions.”

[Mar 16, 2020] Covid-19 The Sun A Lesson From The 1918 Influenza Pandemic

Mar 16, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Covid-19 & The Sun: A Lesson From The 1918 Influenza Pandemic by Tyler Durden Sun, 03/15/2020 - 23:10 Authored by Richard Hobday via Medium.com,

Fresh air, sunlight and improvised face masks seemed to work a century ago; and they might help us now.

When new, virulent diseases emerge, such SARS and Covid-19, the race begins to find new vaccines and treatments for those affected. As the current crisis unfolds, governments are enforcing quarantine and isolation, and public gatherings are being discouraged. Health officials took the same approach 100 years ago, when influenza was spreading around the world. The results were mixed. But records from the 1918 pandemic suggest one technique for dealing with influenza -- little-known today -- was effective. Some hard-won experience from the greatest pandemic in recorded history could help us in the weeks and months ahead.

Influenza patients getting sunlight at the Camp Brooks emergency open-air hospital in Boston. Medical staff were not supposed to remove their masks. (National Archives)

Put simply, medics found that severely ill flu patients nursed outdoors recovered better than those treated indoors. A combination of fresh air and sunlight seems to have prevented deaths among patients; and infections among medical staff. There is scientific support for this. Research shows that outdoor air is a natural disinfectant. Fresh air can kill the flu virus and other harmful germs. Equally, sunlight is germicidal and there is now evidence it can kill the flu virus .

`Open-Air' Treatment in 1918

During the great pandemic, two of the worst places to be were military barracks and troop-ships. Overcrowding and bad ventilation put soldiers and sailors at high risk of catching influenza and the other infections that often followed it. As with the current Covid-19 outbreak, most of the victims of so-called `Spanish flu' did not die from influenza: they died of pneumonia and other complications.

When the influenza pandemic reached the East coast of the United States in 1918, the city of Boston was particularly badly hit. So the State Guard set up an emergency hospital. They took in the worst cases among sailors on ships in Boston harbour. The hospital's medical officer had noticed the most seriously ill sailors had been in badly-ventilated spaces. So he gave them as much fresh air as possible by putting them in tents. And in good weather they were taken out of their tents and put in the sun. At this time, it was common practice to put sick soldiers outdoors. Open-air therapy, as it was known, was widely used on casualties from the Western Front. And it became the treatment of choice for another common and often deadly respiratory infection of the time; tuberculosis. Patients were put outside in their beds to breathe fresh outdoor air. Or they were nursed in cross-ventilated wards with the windows open day and night. The open-air regimen remained popular until antibiotics replaced it in the 1950s.

Doctors who had first-hand experience of open-air therapy at the hospital in Boston were convinced the regimen was effective. It was adopted elsewhere. If one report is correct, it reduced deaths among hospital patients from 40 per cent to about 13 per cent. According to the Surgeon General of the Massachusetts State Guard:

`The efficacy of open air treatment has been absolutely proven, and one has only to try it to discover its value.'

Fresh Air is a Disinfectant

Patients treated outdoors were less likely to be exposed to the infectious germs that are often present in conventional hospital wards. They were breathing clean air in what must have been a largely sterile environment. We know this because, in the 1960s, Ministry of Defence scientists proved that fresh air is a natural disinfectant. Something in it, which they called the Open Air Factor, is far more harmful to airborne bacteria -- and the influenza virus -- than indoor air. They couldn't identify exactly what the Open Air Factor is. But they found it was effective both at night and during the daytime.

Their research also revealed that the Open Air Factor's disinfecting powers can be preserved in enclosures -- if ventilation rates are kept high enough. Significantly, the rates they identified are the same ones that cross-ventilated hospital wards, with high ceilings and big windows, were designed for. But by the time the scientists made their discoveries, antibiotic therapy had replaced open-air treatment. Since then the germicidal effects of fresh air have not featured in infection control, or hospital design. Yet harmful bacteria have become increasingly resistant to antibiotics.

Sunlight and Influenza Infection

Putting infected patients out in the sun may have helped because it inactivates the influenza virus. It also kills bacteria that cause lung and other infections in hospitals. During the First World War, military surgeons routinely used sunlight to heal infected wounds. They knew it was a disinfectant. What they didn't know is that one advantage of placing patients outside in the sun is they can synthesise vitamin D in their skin if sunlight is strong enough. This was not discovered until the 1920s. Low vitamin D levels are now linked to respiratory infections and may increase susceptibility to influenza . Also, our body's biological rhythms appear to influence how we resist infections. New research suggests they can alter our inflammatory response to the flu virus. As with vitamin D, at the time of the 1918 pandemic, the important part played by sunlight in synchronizing these rhythms was not known.

Face Masks Coronavirus and Flu

Surgical masks are currently in short supply in China and elsewhere. They were worn 100 years ago, during the great pandemic, to try and stop the influenza virus spreading. While surgical masks may offer some protection from infection they do not seal around the face. So they don't filter out small airborne particles. In 1918, anyone at the emergency hospital in Boston who had contact with patients had to wear an improvised face mask. This comprised five layers of gauze fitted to a wire frame which covered the nose and mouth. The frame was shaped to fit the face of the wearer and prevent the gauze filter touching the mouth and nostrils. The masks were replaced every two hours; properly sterilized and with fresh gauze put on. They were a forerunner of the N95 respirators in use in hospitals today to protect medical staff against airborne infection.

Temporary Hospitals

Staff at the hospital kept up high standards of personal and environmental hygiene. No doubt this played a big part in the relatively low rates of infection and deaths reported there. The speed with which their hospital and other temporary open-air facilities were erected to cope with the surge in pneumonia patients was another factor. Today, many countries are not prepared for a severe influenza pandemic. Their health services will be overwhelmed if there is one. Vaccines and antiviral drugs might help. Antibiotics may be effective for pneumonia and other complications. But much of the world's population will not have access to them. If another 1918 comes, or the Covid-19 crisis gets worse, history suggests it might be prudent to have tents and pre-fabricated wards ready to deal with large numbers of seriously ill cases. Plenty of fresh air and a little sunlight might help too.

[Mar 16, 2020] Scott Humor's translation of the video provided by Saker of Russian pulmonary specialist, Dr Aleksandr Chuchalin

Mar 16, 2020 | www.unz.com

Mustapha Mond , says: Show Comment March 15, 2020 at 6:28 am GMT

Scott Humor's translation of the video provided by Saker of Russian pulmonary specialist, Dr Aleksandr Chuchalin : https://thesaker.is/how-to-treat-coronavirus-infection-covid-19/

Not a very pretty read. Those who get the virus bad, and survive the pneumonia, are likely to have pretty scarred up lungs once they recover, if we can call it that. Let's hope not. But with the Han Chinese supposedly having a vastly larger ACE-2 presence in their lungs than other races, it would seem this virus is uniquely able (designed?) to cripple the Chinese long-term, via creating a vast population of people with significant pulmonary problems (pulmonary fibrosis) for the remainder of their lives, and perhaps more likely to have terrible problems requiring extensive medical care should they ever become re-infected in the future. All of which would be significant burdens on the PRC's future.

Hopefully, the Chinese government's overwhelming response to the virus will minimize this possibility.

Let's also hope this nasty bug doesn't decimate the seniors in the USA. If it does, one can already hear the MSM whipping the proles into an anti-China frenzy with, "Them damn Chinese killed your grandma and grandpa!"

And if the virus was engineered, maybe that was some pre-planned fortuitous blow-back that cuts down on the aging boomer "useless eaters" (as the supreme useless eater Dick Cheney called them), and which thereby offers enormous opportunities for world-wide anti-China propagandizing (and perhaps even a possible casus belli for the next president to mull over after the 2020 election .. )

[Mar 15, 2020] Those that bent the curve enough to keep their health care providers from being overwhelmed and who have enough tests administered to get a better count of infections, seem to be slightly less than 1% mortality.

Mar 15, 2020 | angrybearblog.com
  1. JaneE , March 15, 2020 3:40 pm

    There is a wide divergence in the death rates between countries. Those that bent the curve enough to keep their health care providers from being overwhelmed and who have enough tests administered to get a better count of infections, seem to be slightly less than 1% mortality. Those with overwhelmed systems and hospitals are 3 or 4% or higher. That is still close to 10 times the flu at best. If we do get to the "overwhelmed" category, the death rate may go much much higher.

[Mar 15, 2020] How to treat Coronavirus infection COVID-19

Mar 15, 2020 | thesaker.is

Interview with the member of the Russian Academy of Science Alexander Chuchalin

Translated by Scott Humor

Source

If a situation with the CAVID-19 coronavirus infection follows the same scenario as the SARS epidemic, then by April- May the problem will be less acute. In his interview to the RT the academic Alexander Chuchalin, the Head of Department of Hospital therapy of the Russian National Research Medical Pirogov University. In his opinion, the Russian healthcare system has done its best to protect the country from coronavirus. The doctor also says that, contrary to popular belief, infection with CAVID-19 can be accompanied by a runny nose.

Q: Not only are you one of the best pulmonologists in Europe, you are also in the main risk group now for coronavirus. Could you, please, give some recommendations for people of your generation and those who are younger, those who, as we see, are really susceptible to high mortality -- especially in China, Italy, and Iran.

A: In order to understand the risk groups for this disease: first of all, these are people who come into contact with animals that represent a biological reservoir. For example, in 2002 it was African cats, in 2012 it was camels, and now the science is a little confused, it has not been fully established. There is more evidence that this is a certain kind of bat -- the one that the Chinese eat.

This bat spreads the coronavirus through its bowel movements. After that a seeding process takes place. Let's say, it's a seafood market or some other products, and so on. But, right now we're talking about an epidemic, we are talking about people infecting people. Therefore, this phase has already arrived. The infection spreads person to person.

Coronaviruses are a very, very common viral infections, and people encounter them many, many times in their lives. Within a year a child carries diseases that we call acute colds up to ten times. And behind this acute cold are certain viruses.

And the second place in its prevalence is occupied by the coronavirus. The problem is that these seemingly harmless pathogens were dismissed, and they could never understand the cause-and-effect relationship between a common cold and a virus. If, say, a child has a cold, he has a runny nose, what will follow? And so on. For about two weeks, a child or an adult gets sick -- and all this disappears without a trace.

But in 2002, 2012, and now in 2020, the situation has changed qualitatively. Because the serotypes that have started to circulate they affect the epithelial cells.

Epithelial cells are cells that line the respiratory tract, gastrointestinal tract, and urinary system. Therefore, a person infected has pulmonary symptoms and intestinal symptoms. And in the study of urine tests, too, allocate with such a viral load.

But these new strains, which we are now talking about, they have these properties -- to come into contact with the second type of receptor, the angiotensin-converting enzyme. And this receptor is associated with such a serious manifestation as cough.

Therefore, a patient who has symptoms of damage to the lower respiratory tract, a characteristic sign is a cough. This affects the epithelial cells of the most distal parts of the respiratory tract. These breathing tubes are very small.

Q: Distal, is it distant?

A: It's far and small in diameter.

Q: So this is what we have next to the bronchi?

A: This is bronchi, then we have bronchioles, respiratory bronchioles. And when the air, the diffusion of gases goes on the surface of the alveoli, they pass just this section of the respiratory tract.

Q: That is, the primary symptom is a cough

A: No, the first is a runny nose, and a sore throat.

Q: They say that there is no runny nose.

A: No, these are big data issues. 74 thousand medical records were processed, and all of them have rhinorrhea (runny nose. – RT). When you are told this -- there are really some nuances. Biology is like this. The biological target of the virus is epithelial cells. The nose, oropharyngeal region, trachea, and then small bronchioles, targeting these regions are especially dangerous to humans. And it turned out that, having this mechanism, the virus leads to a sharp breakdown of the immune system.

Q:Why?

A: An explanation that science gives today is that a protein called interferoninduced protein-10 is involved in the process. It is with this protein that the regulation of innate immunity and acquired immunity is associated. How should we see this? As a very deep damage to lymphocytes.

Q: So you can see lymphocytes falling immediately on the general test?

A: Yes. And if there are white blood cells increase, platelets will increase, and it is more stable lymphopenia, that is, the lymphotoxic effect of the viruses themselves. Therefore, the disease itself has at least four outlined stages. The first stage is virusemia. A harmless cold, nothing special. Seven days, nine-approximately in this interval.

But starting from the ninth day to the 14th, the situation changes qualitatively, because it is during this period that viral and bacterial pneumonia is formed. After damage to epithelial cells in the anatomical space of the respiratory tract, colonization of microorganisms occurs, primarily those that inhabit the human oropharyngeal region.

Q: Do you mean bacteria that is already there?

A: Bacteria, Yes. Therefore, these pneumonias are always viral and bacterial.

Q: So the virus, so to speak, fills the alveoli, where some bacteria live all the time? And they live somewhere by themselves, in some quantity?

A: In general, we believe that the lower respiratory tract is sterile. This is how the defense mechanism works for the lower respiratory tract.

Q: There's nothing there?

A: It's not inhabited. When the virus has entered and it has broken this barrier, where there was a sterile environment in the lungs, microorganisms begin to colonize and multiply.

Q: So it's not a virus that causes pneumonia? Still, pneumonia is caused by bacteria, of course.

A: It's the association of virus-bacteria.

This is the window where the doctor must show his skill. Because often the virusemic period is like a mild disease, like a slight cold, malaise, runny nose, a slight temperature is small, subfebrile. But the period when the cough increased and when there is a shortness of breath -- these are two signs that say: stop, this is a qualitatively different patient.

If this situation is not controlled and the disease progresses, then more serious complications occur. We call it respiratory distress syndrome, shock. A person cannot breathe on their own.

Q: Pulmonary edema?

A: You see, there are a lot of different edemas of a lung. In fact, it depends on how it happens. To be precise, we call this non-cardiogenic pulmonary edema. If, say, cardiogenic pulmonary edema can be treated with certain medications, then this pulmonary edema can only be treated with a mechanical ventilation machine or advanced methods such as extracorporeal hemoxygenation.

If a person transfers to this phase, the immunosuppression caused by the defeat of the acquired and innate immunity becomes fatal and the patient is joined by such aggressive pathogens as Pseudomonas aeruginosa, fungi. And the cases of death that occurred -- 50% of those who were on artificial ventilation for a long time, the alveoli are all filled with fungi.

Fungi appear during the stage of deep immunosuppression. What is the fate of the man who endured all this? That is, he suffered virusemic period, he suffered viral-bacterial pneumonia, he suffered respiratory distress syndrome, non-cardiogenic pulmonary edema, and he suffered septic pneumonia. Will he be healthy or not? And, in fact, today the world is concerned about this: what is the fate of those 90 thousand Chinese who have suffered a coronavirus infection?

Q: But those 90 thousand -- they recovered by themselves, they weren't kept on on a ventilator, they did not get fungi. ARI or acute respiratory infection, that's it?

A: But the problem itself is very important. Because practical medicine is faced with the fact of a sharp increase in the so-called pulmonary fibrosis. And this group of people who have had a corona virus infection develops fibrosis of the lung within a year.

Q: That is, when the lung tissue thickens?

A: Yes. A lung becomes like burnt rubber, if the analogy is to be made.

Q: Say, you get an elderly person who has been accurately diagnosed with a coronavirus. And he is not yet on the ninth day, that is, he does not need to be put on a ventilator yet. How will you treat him?

A: You know what the problem is: we do not treat such patients yet, because there are no medications, medicines that should be used in this phase. There is no panacea. Because a drug that would act on virusemia, on the viral-bacterial phase, on non-cardiogenic pulmonary edema, on sepsis -- is a panacea, this drug doesn't exist.

Because if we go back to the experience of 2002, when we saw the vulnerability of medical personnel, doctors and nurses were recommended to use Tamiflu and oseltamivir -- an anti-influenza drug. And with certain serotypes of the coronavirus, indeed, the mechanism of introduction into the cell is the same as with influenza viruses. Therefore, it has been shown that these drugs can protect individuals who are at high risk of developing this disease.

Or, he is identified as a carrier of the virus, he is given these drugs and so on. But this, I want to say again, has no serious evidence base. The situation that is most threatening, because it determines the fate of a person. A cold is one thing. And another thing a viral-bacterial pneumonia, it is a fundamentally different thing.

And here it is very important to emphasize that it is problematic to help such a patient only with antibiotics. There must be a combination therapy, which includes means that stimulate the immune system. This is a very important point.

Q: What do you mean? So, relatively speaking, you will prescribe him Amoxiclav with some kind of immunomodulator?

A: Yes, we would usually prescribe fourth-generation cephalosporins, not Amoxiclav, in combination with vancomycin. This combination is broad, because very quickly there is a process of a change of gram-positive and gram-negative flora. But what immunomodulatory drug to prescribe is a question for scientific research.

So, we understand that the immune system will suffer dramatically. We understand the high vulnerability of a person to the infection that begins to colonize the respiratory tract. So, unfortunately, we don't have a clear line. But what really can help such patients in this situation is immunoglobulins. Because this is substitution therapy.

And therefore, such patients are prescribed high immunoglobulins so that they do not develop sepsis, at least they do not enter the sepsis phase. American doctors used this drug in their Ebola patient. This is a group drug, an analog of nucleosides. This is a group of drugs that are used for herpes, cytomegalovirus, and so on.

Q: So this is antiviral or antiviral-supporting therapy, right?

A: No, this is a drug that still acts on the mechanisms in the cell that resist virus replication. Here in my hands (photo of US President Donald trump. – RT). He gathered all the top people who could speak out on promising drugs. Two questions that he raised, he was preparing for this conference. The first question is: how ready are scientists in the United States of America to introduce the vaccine?

Q: Eighteen months.

A: Yes, absolutely. That's two years. He asked what in this case? Does the country have drugs that could protect? And, as a matter of fact, they said: Yes, there is such a drug.

Q: What?

A:What kind of drug is this? It's called Remdesivir

Q: Let's look at it.

A: That's what scientists said, given the experience that we have, and discussions and so on. Although, of course, there are other drugs that are being actively studied. In general, this direction is very interesting: in fact, it is considered promising. The use of mesenchymal stem cells is considered promising. But at what stage?

Q: As a person who has been doing this for many years, treating everything from asthma to pneumonia, can you somehow try to predict the development of this epidemic, for example, in Russia?

A: I want to say that if we compare Russia with the surrounding world in case of the coronavirus of 2002. We didn't have a single patient here.

Q: Maybe we just didn't diagnose them?

A: As you know, there are strong aspects of Russian healthcare in this situation, and I would like to stress this. This is the work of our sanitary and epidemiologic services. They really did their best to protect our country. This is on one side, as if punitive measures. And on the second side is the work of the Vector Research Institute, which made diagnostics for the coronavirus in a very short time, and they did everything absolutely. And it was tested at the CDC, and they got a certificate indicating high specificity and sensitivity.

Q: The Vector diagnostic kit is the only certified

A: Yes.

Q: The virus is already in Russia, no matter how much the sanitary service tries. How do you think it will develop? Will it end in the spring, for example, with the arrival of summer?

A: You know, I think the picture repeats what it was then with the SARS. If you remember

Q: Then? Do you mean in 2002? When it was SARS?

A: Yes, that's the one. If we follow this scenario, we should say that somewhere in April or May this problem will become less acute.

Q: Just because of the seasonal cessation of respiratory infections?

A: Yeah. The climate factor and a number of other factors. Now, the trouble, of course, comes to us not from China, but from Europe. Those who return from these countries, primarily from Italy, today, remember: Carlo Urbani . He accomplished a lot of things. I think this is just a hero of a doctor who has done so much. He was a virologist from Milan.

Q: Back in 2002?

A: He was a WHO expert. I met with him through the World Health Organization. He was on the list as an expert on coronaviruses. And then he was sent to Hanoi. They were dispatching doctors, and he got to go to Vietnam. And in Vietnam, when he arrived, there was a panic. Their doctors stopped coming to work. Their medical staff, also. There had patients, but there wasn't any medical personnel and no doctors.

He assessed the situation. With difficulty, he managed to break it, to remove this panic situation that was then in the hospital. But most importantly, he began to communicate with the government and said: close the country to quarantine. That's where it all came from. It came from Urbani. They started to fight back.

Q: The Vietnamese?

A: Yes, the government of Vietnam. That this would affect the economy, tourism, and so on. But, he found these words, he convinced them. And Vietnam was the first country to come out of this. And he thought his work was done. He collected material for a virological examination and boarded a plane to Bangkok.

He was supposed to meet with the American virologists there. During the flight, he realized that he got ill. He got sick, just like those poor Vietnamese in that hospital. And he began to write everything down and describing it. This is this exact time, and this is how I feel.

Q: The flight was about three hours?

A: Yes, about three hours. And during these three hours, he became an invalid who couldn't get up and move on his own. Here we see how the window itself works, and we understand when pneumonia joins -- this window can be extremely, extremely short in duration. And when he was barely able to get down the aircraft ladder, he left the last entry: "I'm waving to them so they don't come near me."

That is, American virologists wanted to meet Urbani, but he said: let's not contact. He died in an intensive care unit. And there was an autopsy. And from his lung tissue was isolated a strain that was named after him – "Urban I-2". Here is a very story that I am telling you. A tragedy, of course.

Q: What would you recommend to a person who finds himself Well, we have already agreed that the virus is in the general population. We can't really control it anymore.

A: Are you asking for some simple recommendations? First of all, take a good care for the nasal mucosa and oropharyngeal area.

Q: To wash it with saltwater?

A: Yes, wash it thoroughly. But "lors" – non-prescription medications and sinus cleaners to stop running nose and for an effective lavage. That is, the feeling of free unobstructed breath should come after all. The second thing is the oropharyngeal area behind the uvula. And there, too, you need to make a good lavage of the oropharyngeal region.

Q: So you don't just have to squirt it up your nose, you have to gargle it deep down your throat?

A: Yes, and rinse it out. And don't be lazy. Do do it until you get a feeling of clean, good airways. Of all the ways, this is the most effective. I would advise those people who can afford to buy a nebulizer or

Q: Do you mean, it's aerosol, right? With ultrasound?

A: Yes. And it allows the hygiene of the upper respiratory tract to be brought to a good state. When a cough starts, it is desirable to still apply the medications that we prescribe for patients with bronchial asthma. This is either Berodual, or Ventolin, or Salbutamol. Because these drugs improve mucociliary clearance, relieve spasm.

Q: You mean expectorant?" Mucolytic ACC?

A: Yes, ACC and Fluimucil. And what you can't do is use glucocorticosteroids. This virus replication is rapidly increasing by them.

Q: What does that mean?

A: Corticosteroids is prednisone, methylprednisolone, dexamethasone, betamethasone.

Q: So you don't need to inject hormones, relatively speaking, if you have a viral infection?

A: There are inhaled steroids. But there are patients with asthma who are ill and are on this therapy. But this has to be a tailor-made solutions. Of course, 2020 will go down in medical history as a year of a new disease. We must admit that we have understood this new disease. Two new pneumonias have arrived. First is pneumonia, which is caused by e-cigarettes, vapes, and now in the United States, people have died from this

Q: several thousand teenagers. Yes, this is a well-known fact, and how to treat it is unclear. You put them on a ventilator -- they die immediately.

A: Yes. Do you understand what the problem is? Here they develop those changes in the lungs that occur during this process. They seem to be similar (to the changes from the coronavirus). This is respiratory distress syndrome, which we are talking about. The literature raises very serious questions: the role of coronaviruses in transplantation. One of the problems is obliterating bronchiolitis, which occurs especially during transplantation.

Q: A lung transplant?

A: Yes, lungs and bone marrow. Stem cell. As a matter of fact, everything is well done, everything is normal, the person has responded to this therapy, and the problem of respiratory failure is beginning to grow. And the cause of these bronchiolitis was caught -- it is a coronavirus That is, new knowledge has come.

How to treat Coronavirus infection COVID-19 in Russian

https://www.youtube.com/embed/FbRJLcRBSOY?feature=oembed

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48 Comments

Larchmonter445 on March 14, 2020 , · at 11:05 pm EST/EDT

Scary as hell.

What a biological horror.

They want everyone to socially distance themselves. Just read this interview.

Scott on March 14, 2020 , · at 11:15 pm EST/EDT
I had SARS back then. My regular dentist called sick, and his partner just came from Vietnam.
I was ill bedridden for 6 weeks with a viral pneumonia. Refused to be hospitalized, though.
Socializing was the last thing on my mind.
Harry_Red on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:10 am EST/EDT
I can attest from experience that a mixture of salt and warm water is the number one remedie in the arsenal against these types of infections.

Use it aggressively !

Two to three teaspoons of salt in a glass mixed with warm water. Try to gargle it in small to medium sips for about 5 minutes. You might not finish the entire glass in 1 sitting. Save the glass.

Repeat this process every 2 to 3 hours. It is one of God's miracles ;-) .

Besides viral infections, you can even cleanse your teeth and gums regularly with salt water.

Another important remedie for soar throats is squeezing half a lemon and mixing it with the highest quality honey available to you, without diluting the mix in water. Let it burn your throat, if it does, it will eventually have a soothing feeling after repeated sips and repeating sittings.

May God keep you all in good health !

Anonius on March 15, 2020 , · at 11:03 am EST/EDT
Funny, this is what my mother's family always used. Salt and water is also very effective on swellings and bruising.
Babushka in Oz on March 14, 2020 , · at 11:30 pm EST/EDT
Thanks Saker and Scott a very timely translation.

Regarding the treatment steps, the following relates to asthma, but may be of interest

The National Asthma Council Australia video on how to perform nasal irrigation.

https://www.nationalasthma.org.au/living-with-asthma/how-to-videos/how-to-perform-nasal-irrigation-with-fess-sinu-cleanse

Maiden PEI on March 15, 2020 , · at 12:41 am EST/EDT
I CAN TESTIFY TO THE GREAT EFFECTIVENESS OF NASAL RINSES

If I start nasal rinses as soon as I feel the throat tickle of a cold coming on, I don't get the cold.

I haven't had one in years.

This year, though, I mustn't had started the rinses soon enough as I did get the cold.

BUT, instead of stopping the rinses, I upped them to every 2hrs & I never had to blow my nose ONCE all through the two week cold!

AND it wasn't miserable, like usual, at all.

I gradually decreased the frequency of the rinses as the cold got better.

I was continuing the rinses, preventatively, every day, but now with the added risk of COVID-19, I will increase that to AM & PM, as recommended &, of course, will increase that if I become symptomatic.

Babushka in Oz on March 15, 2020 , · at 2:37 am EST/EDT
As a former yoga teacher I can also recommend Alternate Nostril breathing.

To clean the sinus, clear the head and calm the mind and spirit. Super essential now to supercharge our bodies with positive energy and clear the lungs.

I have the advantage of living near a beach and this is part of my daily walk and deep breathing ritual. I have not had a cold or sniffle for a many years, nor do I ever have the flu injection.

https://www.healthline.com/health/alternate-nostril-breathing

Pamela on March 15, 2020 , · at 2:08 pm EST/EDT
I recently learned of this too Babushka. It's helpful for learning how blocked – often from internal swelling due to inflammation – they can be. Breathing with both, we learn to interpret the compensation, so we can easily think "Oh I dont have a problem. This can be wrong, as I discovered I was.. When I tried to alternate nasal breathe, I was shocked at how I almost couldnt. Breathe, that is. It was an eye opener for me.

I had been suffering from internal nasal swelling due to my reaction to Salicylates – which I'm among those people intolerant of. I've had it since childhood but just let it go, eating the fruits I love so much. But on realising how bad the nasal results were, I got checked for polyps and then just cut the food out.

I also learned the saline nasal washes from the Indian nurses and Doctors I made friends with years ago in UK. You dont need a machine – as I'm sure you know. They just pour normal saline** into a cupped palm of hand, close off the opposite side nasal with opposite hand, and slowly inhale it to reach the back of the nasal passage, then repeat changing sides.

** N/Saline is roughly 1 tsp salt in 1L water!!

Glad to see you are staying well. Are you as glad as I you dont live in UK, now that we'd be condemned to isolation for 4 months
And then some wonder why I keep saying – the reaction is out of all proportion to the infection!!

Babushka in Oz on March 15, 2020 , · at 6:03 pm EST/EDT
Thanks Pamela

Yes, keeping as well as possible as the insanity descends on this great land.

My husband is a great believer in cold water swimming to keep the immune system in good tune – does it all year round – every day ritual. Not my thing, but turning the shower to cold for the last few bursts will also close the pores and boost immunity.

Btw – I am a different person to Babuška, who also lives in Aussie and shares her wonderful wisdom in the cafe.

S75ponny on March 14, 2020 , · at 11:58 pm EST/EDT
Many thanks to Alexander Chuchalin for sharing his expertise and also to Scott Humor for this translation.

Abundance of information which I was waiting for.

TEP on March 15, 2020 , · at 12:03 am EST/EDT
Excellent informative article. This should be shared extensively in the current COVID-19 environment, particularly among healthcare professionals.
S75ponny on March 15, 2020 , · at 12:50 am EST/EDT
"This should be shared extensively in the current COVID-19 environment, particularly among healthcare professionals."

Done already at fairly high level, so far no applause. Let's give them time to digest and overcome their sense of innocent supremacy

Just saying

Jim Dukarm on March 15, 2020 , · at 12:07 am EST/EDT
Scott, молодец.
Oliver K on March 15, 2020 , · at 2:23 am EST/EDT
I do not understand the general recommendations:

"A: Are you asking for some simple recommendations? First of all, take a good care for the nasal mucosa and oropharyngeal area.
Q: To wash it with saltwater?
A: Yes, wash it thoroughly. But "lors" – non-prescription medications and sinus cleaners to stop running nose and for an effective lavage. That is, the feeling of free unobstructed breath should come after all. The second thing is the oropharyngeal area behind the uvula. And there, too, you need to make a good lavage of the oropharyngeal region.
Q: So you don't just have to squirt it up your nose, you have to gargle it deep down your throat?
A: Yes, and rinse it out. And don't be lazy. Do do it until you get a feeling of clean, good airways. Of all the ways, this is the most effective. I would advise those people who can afford to buy a nebulizer or
Q: Do you mean, it's aerosol, right? With ultrasound?
A: Yes. And it allows the hygiene of the upper respiratory tract to be brought to a good state. When a cough starts, it is desirable to still apply the medications that we prescribe for patients with bronchial asthma. This is either Berodual, or Ventolin, or Salbutamol. Because these drugs improve mucociliary clearance, relieve spasm."

1. Okay, the "washing with sea water" I associate with the sea water nasal sprays -- is this roughly correct?
2. But what is meant with "lavage"? Gurgling with salt water, say?
3. And then the aerosol thing, what is that? Is this related to the good old method of putting hot water with something into a bowl, your head over it, and cover with a towel?

Maiden PEI on March 15, 2020 , · at 4:13 am EST/EDT
WASHING WITH SEA WATER – he is talking about what is called "nasal rinses" also called "nasal washes" or "nasal lavages" look online for videos how to do it.

LAVAGE – is French for "wash", here he means "nasal washes" not gurgling.

BOTH nasal washes & gurgling (back of throat) should be done for regular/usual nose & mouth hygiene, to prevent colds/flu & to relieve cold/flu symptoms.

AEROSOL – no, not putting head over hot water, that's "steam inhalation" aerosol is a fine mist, either sprayed or inhaled from a device, like for asthma.

Hope this explanation helps!

Oliver K on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:16 am EST/EDT
Thanks.
I understand now the "nasal washes" part: found
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasal_irrigation
Wikipedia Nasal irrigation
and also found (simple) devices which one can purchase. That solves that.

But the "gurgling" is still unclear to me. The text sound as if it weren't just ordinary gurgling, but part of the nasal irrigation, somehow.

Concerning the mist to be inhaled: in recent weeks I was searching for information and devices about that, but couldn't find much solid information for the simple uses related to colds. So I opted for buying a simple small device which boils water, and one puts some essential oils in it. This steam inhalation is traditional, easy to understand, and one feels the effect.
Found
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nebulizer
Wikipedia Nebulizer
but that also doesn't speak about the non-medical use. One can buy devices, but information is always about the medical cases. So for now I stay away from that.

Just an ordinary pleb on March 15, 2020 , · at 9:48 am EST/EDT
He means "Gargling" I believe. Sage tea was a common gargle for sore throats etc in the past.
Oliver K on March 15, 2020 , · at 10:19 am EST/EDT
Indeed, I meant "gargling".
For some time I used in the UK the word "gurgling" when I mean "gargling" -- people would then always "gurgle", but never say something (I guess they thought I wanted to be funny ;-)).
Anonius on March 15, 2020 , · at 11:07 am EST/EDT
Not so fast, water heavy on salt is excellent for gargling your sore throat. Centuries old method. Of course other natural methods work also.
Michel V. on March 15, 2020 , · at 4:42 pm EST/EDT
Hi, you can also use a "nebulizer" to nebulize essential oils without water as a carrier: the essential oils will have an easy way to go deep into the respiratory system. (I would use all kind of soft essential oils and in some case add a little bit of strong oils).
I made some French and Dutch pages about this, here is a link to an avi, showing the working of such a nebulizer. Not to confound with the fancy products that use water as a carrier!
No spam intended as I have not enough to sell here anyway I'm in France and we are almost in complete lockdown anyway now: to moderators)

http://www.cevenat.fr/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/diffuseur.avi

You also have ventillators that "diffuse" essential oils through a pad, less effective than the "real nebulizers", but still effectif in hospitals:
Voir aussi :
Voici deux liens (anciens), de l'utilisation de diffuseurs dans l'hôpital de Manchester au Royaume-Uni:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4116053.stm
Article de 2004, dans le contexte des maladies nosocomiales.

Le lien suivant, de l'hôpital de Wytenshawe montre un appareil par ventilation plus grand:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/manchester/6471475.stm

Un autre lien relaté sur la puissance des huiles essentielles.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/sussex/8584753.stm

Staph Infection ressources:
https://www.staph-infection-resources.com/prevention/airborne/

Daniel on March 15, 2020 , · at 3:44 am EST/EDT
The Saker

The Russian Academic is a smart fellow, but I think following the money can yield results quicker and easier. Covid-19 may be a new virus, but the script is old and worn out from overuse. I personally got acquainted with this bloody script during the aids pandemic. The script albeit macabre, is simple and makes good business sense. Recurring expenditure by patients makes for guaranteed income for big "Pharma". Hence the cure for almost all diseases is permanent medication for the patient. This is called "Corporate Interests" and Doctors, Academics, politicians, me and you are under its complete domination. Summer is coming to the Northern hemisphere and with it come the reprieve from the pandemic, but please keep your focus on the money for that's were they will reveal themselves.

Saji Hameed on March 15, 2020 , · at 4:56 am EST/EDT
I am much inclined to agree with Daniel.

I was a bit confused by the Russian academician's assertion that the lower respiratory tract (lungs etc.) are not inhabited by bacteria. This is not true https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6297685/ Therefore, some of the assertions by the good physician might be incorrect to some degree.

What is known for sure is that a huge scare campaign is going on among the world's media, and governments are forced to do things that may not be in the states' best interests. Accompanying this is a distinct lack of objective information related to the disease and the virus responsible for it.

I hope the discourse turns sane soon; in a large sense, the impact of the virus has been negligible considering that it has been out there at least for 3 months at the end of the winter season.

I too look forward to understand who will profit from this scare.

Lumi on March 15, 2020 , · at 8:18 am EST/EDT
Yes Daniel, yes Saji, I happily agree with you. Let's not succumb to fear. Thanks Harry for the salt water reminder. Thanks translators for this informative Interview.
Makedonia on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:38 am EST/EDT
I must say that I am quite disappointed with both Russia and China in that they are more or less following or copying the Western model of conventional medicine and it seems either the medical professional there are either just looking at how to make as much money as possible from human suffering or it's just more "modern" to adopt the Western way of doing things. The Chinese themselves are abandoning 5000 years of proven traditional medicine that has shown effectiveness in dealing with almost all disease as well as successfully fighting various plagues that have attacked their country over the centuries. As is the case, Chinese now want to look modern and use Western pharmaceuticals. It's a massive shame that Russia and China don't get together and create a new model of medicine incorporating both traditional and modern scientific means. They both have the resources, knowledge and ability to do so. People don't even realize the miraculous innovations that Soviet doctors accomplished but have been lost along with other feats of that era. Western medicine or Big Pharma preys on people's suffering for the sake of profit. Even Goldman Sachs admitted there is no profit in the cure of cancer.
Anyway, in regard to the current situation, what I do is follow Dr Andrew Saul's protocol to fight the virus. It involves cheap and effective vitamins including vitamins C and D3, selenium, zinc and magnesium. Vitamin C is so so important. Even Chinese doctors are now using it in their fight against the virus. Also I take elderberry, medicinal mushrooms, olive leaf and other antiviral supplements. I urge you to do an internet search on these and in particular Andrew Saul's protocol. Additionally, I do a lot of things to strengthen my immune system like taking infra-red saunas. And if I needed treatment I would consider ozone therapy and hyperthermia to kill the virus. Listen to podcasts by Gary Null, Mike Adams of Natural News, Dr Ronald Hoffman of Intelligent Medicine, and a great interviewer on http://www.extremehealthradio.com . These guys are a treasure trove of information and who I consider the real American heroes.
I write this because it's not intended to replace professional medical advice but is only what I do and what I would do regarding both the coronavirus and good health in general.
But in the end, the current medical system based on greed and profit must be replaced or we will forever see loved ones needlessly suffer and die.
Blue Dotterel on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:43 am EST/EDT
Thanks for the translation Scott,

An article in Zero Hedge also addresses this issue in a slightly different way:
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/tverberg-it-easy-overdo-covid-19-quarantines

The conclusion is one that I would advocate based on my life experience:

"We also need to be looking for new approaches for fighting COVID-19. One approach that is not being used significantly to date is trying to strengthen people's own immune systems. Such an approach might help people's own immune system to fight off the disease, thereby lowering death rates. Nutrition experts recommend supplementing diets with Vitamins A, C, E, antioxidants and selenium. Other experts say zinc, Vitamin D and elderberry may be helpful. Staying away from cold temperatures also seems to be important. Drinking plenty of water after coming down with the disease may be beneficial as well. If we can help people's own bodies fight the disease, the burden on the medical system will be lower."

I have rarely suffered from the "flu", maybe 3 or 4 times in my 60+ years, and rarely suffer from colds (usually ending within 3-4 days). When I do suffer from the latter, it is usually as a result of improper dress for inclement weather, or a week of inadequate eating; that is, not usually eating a well balanced diet, as I usually strive to do.

So instead of accentuating the negative, maybe, we should consider strengthening the positive things we can do. Of course, the aged and infirm need to be dealt with otherwise. But the key for the rest of us is strengthening our immune systems.

Opport Knocks on March 15, 2020 , · at 6:39 am EST/EDT
In my experience, the best preventative is an alkaline diet as viruses need a human blood environment that is slightly more acidic than the normal 7.35 to 7.45 range in order to propagate. I have been 5 years cold/flu free.

If you start to experience symptoms, one trick to quickly elevate blood pH is to sleep with a piece of sliced onion (yellow are best) in your socks. The sulfides in the onions will elevate blood pH and by morning the symptoms are gone.

https://www.mynaturaltreatment.com/natural-ways-to-prevent-coronavirus-covid-19-infection

Daniel on March 15, 2020 , · at 7:51 am EST/EDT
Following the Scientific way to understand an economic stunt like Covid-19 is time wasting. Big "Pharma" will come with a solution and it is called lifetime medication (jokingly called 'three times a day). During the Aids epidemic, I did a lot of research on Virology and Toxicology in order to understand certain logic defying things regarding the epidemic progression. All I could come up with is that medicine has long parted ways with objective scientific practice under immense pressure from Big Pharma. People it doesn't pay to cure a disease but it is highly profitable to come with a so called "life prolonging substance" (aka Patenting).. Unfortunately during this phase of instilling mortal terror in the masses, a lot of innocent lives will be lost during the winter season. Things will clear up in summer and by then more information will be available and patterns would be clearly discernible.
Robert Shule on March 15, 2020 , · at 4:20 pm EST/EDT
I wonder if the Covid-19 pandemic will subside when the MSM ratings begin to decline because people will be getting tired of the regurgitated news, and a new news story will come up?

By the way, Russian Doctor gives very sensible advice. This is the kind of information we should be getting on the MSM, but are not.

metamars on March 15, 2020 , · at 10:17 am EST/EDT
I'm not a doctor, but I thought this information was so important, I immediately alerted my doctor. I encourage everyone else to do so, also. Most of it, we can't actualize, directly. However, the information about lavage could be life saving, and I haven't heard that ANYWHERE else, certainly not in official pronouncements or mainstream media. (With one exception, viz. Dr. Oz, I haven't even heard about people boosting their Vitamin D levels. This, in spite of research showing that going from Vitamin D deficiency to sufficient supplementation can cut your risk of upper respiratory infection in half.)

I am wondering why this doctor did not mention Vitamin D, either. Yes, it's of limited usefulness after an infection already sets in, but, at least in the US, we are looking at the medical system getting overwhelmed. Some people put Vitamin D deficiency levels in the US at 40%. If we can cut the risk of needing a ventilator in half, for 40% of the population, that might flatten the curve enough to avoid forcing doctors to cut off treatment to people over a certain age. (I have read that this is being done in Italy, though I don't know, for sure.)

Note to commentator: moderation policy is no use of caps .. caps have been removed mod

teranam13 on March 15, 2020 , · at 10:55 am EST/EDT
Scott, a million thanks. Now you are talking my language. I'm e mailing this to all my friends especially the ones in the medical field.

I'd like to know more about the Vector disposal kits, however. Will research it.

teranam13 on March 15, 2020 , · at 11:36 am EST/EDT
From Mike Adams at Naturalnews.com

put in an essential oil diffuser or a deep lung nebulizer

3% hydrogen peroxide ( phew! is really strong, go easy)
2 drops of iodine
colloidal silver ( my little generator makes 12ppm)

Probably the total liquid amount will be 50cc or 1/8 cup? depending on the capacity of your device. Usually respiratory treatments are from 10-15 minutes. My guess would be to mix the colloidal silver 2:1 as a liquid base. Colloidal silver is touted to interfere with viral wall and its replication abilities.

PeterP on March 15, 2020 , · at 11:51 am EST/EDT
Vaping for the 65+ ..1 tablespoon of Vick's dissolved in a quart of boiling water, breath in deeply repeatedly.
V on March 15, 2020 , · at 12:12 pm EST/EDT
Thank you so much Scott for translating this important information – I am going to email to family and friends. Also going to stock up on more salt. Already do the Vit D.

Funnily enough my mother said to me back in early February that gargling and cleansing with salt water was the best thing to use to avoid the Covid 19 virus she was so right!

Why aren't our governments, health services and media telling us to do this? Such a simple thing that everyone can afford to do ..I think we all know .

Craig Mouldey on March 15, 2020 , · at 12:32 pm EST/EDT
Well, this is not 'just a cold'. It is much worse. This finally would explain the extraordinary measures taken worldwide to try and contain it.
And I'm 66.
Col...'the farmer from NZ' on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:14 pm EST/EDT
Yeah Craig, that idiotic brigade has so much egg on their faces now they will be looking like fried omelets!
I'm 66 this September too.

Take great care
Col

Craig Mouldey on March 15, 2020 , · at 12:49 pm EST/EDT
It was rather eye-opening with his remarks that if someone contracts Corona virus within a year changes occur to the lungs. A thickening.
California on March 15, 2020 , · at 1:10 pm EST/EDT
Birdseed. The Russians seem to have left a clue. One should ask what the number is of this useful protein. If it is Nsp15 it is in my exotic birds' mix. I ordered 8 pounds of the specific seed which were delivered last Thursday and will order another batch when possible. If the virus doesn't get me, my husband will. I am no scientist but there are some coincidences here.

Favorov explains that the virus mimics a useful protein consumed by human cells. It seems that the cells of an older organism require this "useful" substance in much larger quantities and thus fuse with the virus more actively.
https://www.rt.com/news/482612-coronavirus-specialists-odds-catching-surviving/

I knew researchers were homing in on Nsp15 and this is what gets interesting. Virology gives the role of Nsp15 in coronavirus replication as enigmatic. When I read virology I thought-weird- Nsp15 is acting like two different proteins. Then I saw Favorov's explanation, the real protein and an imposter protein. "EndoU-deficient coronaviruses were viable and replicated to near wild-type virus levels in fibroblast cells." This would explain why the elderly are hit hardest.

Tuesday, March 3, 2020 2:19PM
RIVERSIDE (KABC) -- A team that includes UC Riverside researchers has identified a protein in a virus from the previous decade that might prove beneficial in developing a vaccine to combat novel coronavirus, according to the university.

Researchers isolated a protein designated, designated as "Nsp15," from the severe acute respiratory syndrome – SARS – outbreak of 2003 that could be useful in testing for vaccines intended to prevent or reduce the threat of coronavirus, also known as COVID-19. The protein found in coronavirus is 89% identical to a protein discovered in SARS, suggesting that drugs developed to treat that disease could work for the current outbreak plaguing countries around the world.

Virology. 2018 Apr;517:157-163. doi: 10.1016/j.virol.2017.12.024.
EpuCoronavirus EndoU is encoded within the sequence of nonstructural
protein (nsp) 15, which was initially identified as a component of the
viral replication complex. Biochemical and structural studies revealed
the enzymatic nature of nsp15/EndoU, which was postulated to be
essential for the unique replication cycle of viruses in the order
Nidovirales. However, the role of nsp15 in coronavirus replication was
enigmatic as EndoU-deficient coronaviruses were viable and replicated
to near wild-type virus levels in fibroblast cells. A breakthrough in
our understanding of the role of EndoU was revealed in recent studies,
which showed that EndoU mediates the evasion of viral double-stranded
RNA recognition by host sensors in macrophages. This new discovery of
nsp15/EndoU function leads to new opportunities for investigating how
a viral EndoU contributes to pathogenesis and exploiting this enzyme
for therapeutics and vaccine design against pathogenic coronaviruses.

teranam13 on March 15, 2020 , · at 1:42 pm EST/EDT
immunolgy is not my forte but this article discusses how testing is done..
It is a bit academic but the concepts are there.

https://www.creative-diagnostics.com/Immunochromatography-guide.htm

and this further explains the concept and why it is handy in the field

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2268275/

Col...'the farmer from NZ' on March 15, 2020 , · at 1:55 pm EST/EDT
Interesting .Not so much as a murmur yet from the idiotic "its just a cold" brigade.
KINZAZA on March 15, 2020 , · at 4:04 pm EST/EDT
PLANdemic is a new word that is becoming very popular. Here is a nice overview of the medical marshal law, and how it all came about. Very detailed and superbly researched. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW2oHhN3heo

Saw lots of military today in my area, and yet I feel like there is something isn't working for the insects who self-elected themselves to rule over humanity. The theater curtains are full of holes, and too many people can see the genocidal actors and their pathetic scripts.

Ishkabibble on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:05 pm EST/EDT
Assuming that I French kiss a person who has covid, how much time from the moment that kiss is ended, if any, do I have to wash away "all traces" of that kiss from my mouth in order to prevent being infected with covid? A. Impossible to prevent infection. B. Mere seconds. C. A few minutes. D. An hour. E. 24 hours.

Assuming that I "catch" covid from an infected person TODAY, in exactly how much time will the most sensitive test available report/confirm that I am indeed infected with covid? A. An hour. B. 24 hours. C. 48 hours. D. 72 hours. E. 7 days. F. 14 days. G. 30 days? What is the market name for the most sensitive test available for earliest possible detection? How do the 15-minute, Chinese-developed blood tests stack up against the most sensitive?

Assuming that I "catch" the covid infection today, in exactly how much time will/can the covid in ME be transmitted to others? For example, if I sneeze into the air tomorrow and someone inhales some of those droplets, will those droplets "infect" that person with covid? If not tomorrow, how many days down the road?

Thanks.

Col...'the farmer from NZ' on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:09 pm EST/EDT
Money, Money, Money Trump language yet another example of obscene unveiled greed it will not go down well with the Germans.
A quote from the below link

"According to an anonymous source quoted in the newspaper, Trump was doing everything to secure a vaccine against the coronavirus for the US, "but for the US only".

The German government was reportedly offering its own financial incentives for the vaccine to stay in the country.

The German health minister Jens Spahn said that a takeover of the CureVac company by the Trump administration was "off the table". CureVac would only develop vaccine "for the whole world", Spahn said, "not for individual countries".

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/15/trump-offers-large-sums-for-exclusive-access-to-coronavirus-vaccine

PokeTheTruth on March 15, 2020 , · at 5:10 pm EST/EDT
Excellent article, thank you Saker and Scott for the translation. I have five questions.

1. Can a person be infected with influenza and coronavirus at the same time? I ask because there is an epidemic of influenza in the U.S. with 29,000,000 (29 million) so far and the symptoms are nearly the same between them (e.g., coughing, sneezing, body chill, muscle ache, intestinal disorder, fever.)

Source: https://www.contagionlive.com/news/us-flu-cases-reach-29-million-have-we-hit-peak-season

2. We read of the horrific numbers coming out of Italy. Are there different strains of coronavirus active, some being more virulent than others? Can those different strains be identified by microscopic examination?

3. Did Dr. Chuchalin have an opinion as to whether this epidemic of coronavirus was developed in a laboratory as oppose to in nature?

4. Did Dr. Chuchalin have an opinion about more than one "patient zero" originating from geographic locations other than from Wuhan, China?

5. Vaccines such as for influenza introduce antigens to stimulate the immune system and create antibodies to neutralize that particular strain of the virus. Every year a vaccine is created to address new strains of the flu. However if a person does not receive the yearly vaccine (like me), the body will fight off the infection and once an antibody has been produced, a copy remains in the body so that if the same antigen appears again, it can be dealt with more quickly.

Source: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/320101#immunity

My question: If a person contracts cononavirus and successfully recovers through normal palliative care, does he/she now have immunity to that strain of coronavirus like what happens with influenza?

Milan on March 15, 2020 , · at 6:28 pm EST/EDT
Warning here about nasal rinses. My Doctor was adamant never ever use regular water it is extremely dangerous. The water has to be sterile which means buy distilled water otherwise you are playing a very dangerous game one that will kill you.

Be healthy and safe.

teranam13 on March 15, 2020 , · at 7:06 pm EST/EDT
The question was posed can one have two viral infections at the same time? Since in the USA the medical incompetents did not test, no one knows what they have when they exhibit symptoms unless the person becomes critical.

The first testing in the USA took 24-72 hours because the Feds forbade the state labs from testing so samples had to be sent to the CDC in Atlanta. Lab testing takes awhile.

Now in the above article Mr.Chuchalin mentions Vector diagnostic kits–with this one can get a result in 10 minutes and the amount of training necessary to administer and read it is minimal. 10 freaking minutes!!!!

So all I can tell you is my experience here at ground zero in Roseville, CA which hosted the first fatality ( at least the first diagnosed one). I had the usual flu which I contained after 10 days. Then I had to have some very needed dental surgery ( two hours worth) after which strangely enough I contracted an unusual rhinitis–watery flow from my nose and into the back of my throat. I never get this. Then there came a dry cough and an ache in my upper chest. ( no temperature and no shortness of breath). I am on antibiotics for the dental surgery so that actually is good. ( old school ampicillin). So now I have a stint of staying in, gargling to prevent migration deep into the lungs. , giving myself breathing treatments with colloidal silver, taking all sorts of anti viral herbal medicines to cut viral reproduction etc. Thanks to the above article I was able to focus in on what was possibly going on and rather than continue to be puzzled by it or ignore it, I am on it!!!

So, in my opinion,,,yes, one can have two viral infections at once or one after another.

Azorka1861 on March 15, 2020 , · at 8:05 pm EST/EDT
2019–20 coronavirus pandemic by country and territory and Template

2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data / WHO situation reports on March 15, 2020

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019%E2%80%9320_coronavirus_pandemic

Jim on March 15, 2020 , · at 8:47 pm EST/EDT
Scary stuff yet surely a vital statistic is missing. These people must have a clear understanding of the mortality rate associated with this infection. They are locking down the entire world so it seems likely they would have looked into this a little bit.

The number of celebrities contracting the disease seems to be flatlining possibly because this phenomenon strongly advertisers a widespread contamination. If such large scale contamination exists in the populace it follows that the mortality rate is far lower than stated.

Anyway stock markets have crashed but only so far. They are predicting the end of the economic system as we know it. Someone somewhere does not believe them.

JC on March 15, 2020 , · at 8:52 pm EST/EDT
Life saver: Stabilized allicin extracted from garlic (Allimax/AllicinMax). This is such strong medicin to all kinds of infections that first time users should be aware of the possibility of herxheimer reactions if more than the recommended amount of capsules are taken.

My brother-in-law suffered from Lyme disease in the brain where it is very hard to get rid of because of the blood-brain barrier. No medication did him any good until he started taking AllicinMax capsules that cured him completely.

In case of infection of the lungs allicin in a sterile solution can be inhaled with the help of a nebulizer. No kidding, 100% corona proof!

More info here:
US: https://www.allimax.us/
CA: https://allimax.ca/
UK: https://www.allicin.co.uk/
DE: https://www.allicin-allimax-deutschland.de/

Stay healthy!

[Mar 15, 2020] French Health Minister Warns Certain Drugs May Aggravate Coronavirus Infection

Mar 15, 2020 | sputniknews.com

French Health Minister Olivier Veran, a qualified doctor and neurologist, on Saturday warned of certain types of anti-inflammatory drugs that may worsen the infection and the spread of the coronavirus.

"The taking of anti-inflammatories (ibuprofen, cortisone ) could be a factor in aggravating the infection. In case of fever, take paracetamol. If you are already taking anti-inflammatory drugs, ask your doctor's advice," Veran tweeted.

⚠️ #COVIDー19 | La prise d'anti-inflammatoires (ibuprofène, cortisone, ...) pourrait être un facteur d'aggravation de l'infection. En cas de fièvre, prenez du paracétamol.
Si vous êtes déjà sous anti-inflammatoires ou en cas de doute, demandez conseil à votre médecin.

-- Olivier Véran (@olivierveran) March 14, 2020

French heath officials also warned of using anti-inflammatories as they are known to pose a risk to people with infectious diseases because they tend to reduce the body's immune system response, according to The Guardian .

They rather recommend taking paracetamol because "it will reduce the fever without counterattacking the inflammation".

"Anti-inflammatory drugs increase the risk of complications when there is a fever or infection," warned Jean-Louis Montastruc, the head of pharmacology at Toulouse Hospital, according to The Guardian.

The French Health Ministry has reportedly been advising patients since mid-January to consult pharmacies when purchasing common pain relievers such as ibuprofen, paracetamol and aspirin, to be reminded of the risks.

France is one of the worst-affected countries in Europe, which has been declared a new virus hotspot after infections on the continent rose dramatically this month, while those in China have been reported to be leveling off.

On Saturday, French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe announced that the number of infection cases in France jumped 4,499, among which 154 are in critical condition, whereas the death toll had risen to 91 people.

Philippe has also announced that the country would shut most shops, restaurants and entertainment facilities beginning midnight on Saturday and people should stay home as long as possible as the spread of coronavirus accelerates.

As part of the country's response to the pandemic, a number of iconic monuments in Paris have been closed, including the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre Museum, the Versailles Palace, Louvre, Orsay Museum and Centre Pompidou.

[Mar 15, 2020] A Planet of Viruses Second Edition Zimmer, Carl 9780226294209 Amazon.com Books

Mar 15, 2020 | www.amazon.com

That same year, another scientists named Dana Willner led a virus-hunting expedition of her own. Instead of a cave, she dove into the human body. Willner had people cough up sputum into a cup, and out of that fluid she and her colleagues fished out frag- ments of DNA. They compared the DNA fragments to millions of sequences stored in online databases. Much of the DNA was hu- man, but many fragments came from viruses. Before Willner's ex- pedition, scientists had assumed the lungs of healthy people were sterile. Yet Willner discovered that, on average, people have 174 species of viruses in the lungs. Only 10 percent of the species Will- ner found bore any close kinship to any virus ever found before.

[Mar 14, 2020] All viruses mostly kill elderly, all eventually burn out and reappear in a less virulent form. I do not see how COVID-19 is different from that.

Mar 14, 2020 | www.unz.com

Pft says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 5:07 am GMT 500 Words Actually, this is so wrong.

AK: Comment is plagiarized (h/t utu). Go to the source: https://slate.com/technology/2020/03/coronavirus-mortality-rate-lower-than-we-think.html

[Hide MORE]

We dont actually know the CFR for covid-19 or influenza. Few people are tested for influenza. Cdc uses models. Cdc says between about 70 percent and 85 percent of seasonal flu-related deaths have occurred in people 65 years and older. A typical year has 30,000 flu deaths so thats 20,000 -25,000 deaths in elderly per year and thats with vaccination.

The elderly with severe pneumonia from flu requiring a hospital stay have a 20% fatality rate

The true case fatality rate, known as CFR, of this virus is likely to be far lower than current reports suggest. Even some lower estimates, such as the 1 percent death rate recently mentioned by the directors of the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, likely substantially overstate the case.

We shouldn't be surprised that the numbers are inflated. In past epidemics, initial CFRs were also exaggerated. For example, in the 2009 H1N1 pandemic some early estimates of 12% CFR, declined to 1.28 percent in the end (probably overstated since cdc recommended no testing by summer of 2009 and used models ). In Wuhan, the CFR was more than 4 percent. As the virus spread to other parts of Hubei, the number fell to 2 percent. As it spread through China, the reported CFR dropped further, to 0.2 to 0.4 percent. As testing begins to include more asymptomatic and mild cases, more realistic numbers are starting to surface. John Hopkins University published a report suggesting actual cases in Hubei were an order of magnitude higher since they did few testing for 2 months, testing only serious/cases. That brings the cfr down in hubei to 0.3% like the rest of China which is heavily polluted with most of the male population smoking

In China, 9 million people die per year, which comes out to 25,000 people every single day, or around 1.5 million people over the past two months alone. Many of these deaths results from diseases like emphysema/COPD, lower respiratory infections, and cancers of the lung and airway whose symptoms are clinically indistinguishable from the nonspecific symptoms seen in severe COVID-19 cases. During the peak of the outbreak in China in January and early February, around 25 patients per day were dying with SARS-CoV-2. Most were older patients in whom the chronic diseases listed above are prevalent.

This is where the Diamond Princess data provides important insight. Of the 3,711 people on board, at least 705 have tested positive for the virus . Of those, more than half are asymptomatic, while very few asymptomatic people were tested in China. With flu we know 16% of those infected are asymptomatic. Some estimates put it as high as 60%. Especially if you use pcr tests which dont tell you anything about if thr RNA fragments were from currently infectious particles. On the Diamond Princess, 7 deaths have occurred among the passengers, constituting a case fatality rate of 1% percent. 0.2% of the ships passengers died. All of the passengers were elderly while the younger crew members /passengers were much better off. Its not unknown what percentage of passengers were elderly but lets assume 25%. That gives a fatality rate among the elderly of 0.8%. Same as flu.

I rest my case.

utu , says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 6:30 am GMT

@Anonymous (n) 60,000 people die every month in Italy. Many of them old. Now we have 1,000 reported dead due to the Covid-19. Most of them old. Many of them would have died anyway from some cold or flu that would further aggravate their poor state of health. This year Covid-19 got there first.

[Mar 14, 2020] Of the 3500 people trapped on the first cruise ship - less than 20% got it. You can't get a better infection setup than having people breathing the same air with infected people, with another 1000 service people sharing a huge dorm with no walls and bringing food to everyone

Mar 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 14 2020 0:21 utc | 161

@John Dowser #130
Zero credibility numbers.
Of the 3500 people trapped on the first cruise ship - less than 20% got it. You can't get a better infection setup than having people breathing the same air with infected people, with another 1000 service people sharing a huge dorm with no walls and bringing food to everyone.
So 20% is very likely the worst case in 1 year.
1% of that is still bad, but again, a function of timing. Are they evenly spread out over, say, 6 week time frames? Then its bad but doable.
If they're getting it all in the same quarter, then it is really bad.
But that's why states are ordering lockdowns: pro and college sports cancelled, music/entertainment cancelled, conferences etc.

c1ue , Mar 14 2020 0:26 utc | 163

@conspiracy theorists: try and use some critical thinking.
We have had a number of novel viruses break out in the recent past: Ebola, swine flu, SARS, MERS among the major ones.
Why is it so surprising that we finally got one that happens to be significantly transmissible (unlike SARS), deadly but not too deadly (unlike Ebola) and situated in a region where people travel to/from a lot (unlike MERS)?

Secondly, the genetic sequencing is quite advanced and in the hands of a lot of different people. There is a 96% match between Wuhan bat coronavirus and nCOV; 99% match between pangolin coronavirus and nCOV. Secondly, viruses in general mutate because they are mostly really shitty in error correcting when replicating - so we know they will change over time.

The reality is that governments and scientists simply do not have the capabilities to design a virus to this specification - at least, not yet.

[Mar 14, 2020] Coronavirus Brand new problem, same old reaction

Mar 14, 2020 | off-guardian.org

In another article, Foreign Policy also suggests the pandemic should be a reason to suspend the presidential election campaigning in the US. Opening the article with the foreboding line:

It's time to ask, during a time of plague, whether -- and if so, in what form -- democracy can continue as usual.

Which means no big crowds chanting Bernie's name, no televised debates where Biden forgets where he is, and no lines of voters being turned away from the democrat primaries over "misunderstandings".

The article even dances around the idea of postponing the vote itself. Voting "during a time of plague" can have an impact on the turnout and result, Laurie Garrett argues. She stops short of that, but only because "Orange Man Bad". If it was Hillary in the White House, not Trump, the media would already have vociferously called for a postponement of the election altogether.

As it is, they make do with this:

Actual voting can, and should, proceed with heavy emphasis on mailed ballots .

George Mc ,

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51889957

As of 14/3/20 at 10.30 pm:

Total tested: 37,746
Total tested positive: 1,140
Infected as a percentage: 3%
Total deaths: 21
Mortality rate: 1.8%
Deaths as a percentage of all tested: 0.06%

Is this a catastrophe? Well I did a bit of extrapolating and found that, projected onto the UK population (given as 66.44 million), the total number of deaths we could expect would be just under 40,000. Sounds impressive – until you look at the 21 victims and consider the age groupings:

https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-what-we-know-about-the-uk-victims-11957568

2 deaths with no further information.
1 in the 70s and 4 in the 80s

All the other deaths are listed as having other conditions:

3 in 60s
4 in 70s
4 in 80s
1 in 90s
1 described as "elderly"
1 described as "older" (This is the one in Scotland.)

Summary: of the 21 deaths, 19 were over 60 and 14 of these definitely had other conditions.

[Mar 14, 2020] Stunning toilet paper feeding frenzy caught on camera - YouTube

Mar 14, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Mar 9, 2020

CCTV footage has captured the moment toilet paper-hungry Australians caused unrest at an Aldi store where a crowd of shoppers can be seen rushing down an aisle to claim the scarce commodity before it was all taken.


omino jaku , 4 days ago

The coronavirus is worried about catching these fools

rer1967 , 1 day ago

LOL, they're acting as if toilet paper is the cure.

I010110 1o01o1 , 1 day ago (edited)

lol They're acting like it's Black Friday at an Apple or Wal-Mart store's tv section.

Jacinta Tate , 4 days ago (edited)

I honestly never thought this would happen in my own country and I feel disgusted by this behavior. 3 people over the ages of 70 have died in the entire nation or 30 million people. Stop being selfish and ridiculous. This is not they end of the world and if citizens went about their shopping as per normal there would be plenty for all. I have 4 rolls in my cupboard at home and no idea where to buy more but I'll do the best with what I've got. its worrying me that people in a 1st world nation have fallen to these lows.

satos1 , 4 days ago (edited)

Today's society would walk straight over you if given half a chance. Very sad how we all have become.

Curtis C , 3 days ago

The only reason there is a shortage here in America is because of the media. They have everyone so panicked that if one person sneezes 9 others shit their pants in fear.

James R , 1 day ago

The joke's on them! The Coronavirus will have passed by the time they get through the checkout at Aldi.

Carnage , 2 days ago

Dont Worry Fools Coronavirus Don't Want To Infect An Idiot

[Mar 14, 2020] We are forced to watch disaster porn

Mar 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Jeff Harrison , Mar 14 2020 5:02 utc | 203

Sorry. Hysteria. China which was ground zero for this particular flavor of a respiratory virus only had about 81,000 cases (so far) out of a population of how many billions? These projections that posit that half the US population will become infected are wildly excessive. And, yes, the fatality rate for COVID 19 is larger than the seasonal flu, it's larger than a small number which is, itself, a small number. You guys have been watching too much disaster porn.

[Mar 14, 2020] The most primitive testing for coronavirus in an autopsy or living person is as easy as looking through a microscope and positively identifying the virus as they are present in large qualtities

Mar 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Mar 14 2020 6:26 utc | 215

Siotu
Testing for coronavirus in an autopsy or living person is as easy as looking through a microscope and positively identifying the virus. Just a bit slow or labour-electron microscope intensive for wholesale testing of populations.

[Mar 14, 2020] Media hysteria does not correlates with actual development of the epidemic on board of cruise ships: the most cruel natural experiment possible

Mar 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Guidoamm , Mar 14 2020 5:01 utc | 202

I would like someone to explain why there have been so few infections and even fewer fatalities on board the cruise ships.

We have 9000 (nine thousand) people, the majority of whom are well over the age of 50, aboard 3 ships that have lived at very close quarters, in a confined environment where Covid19 had been detected.

Where are the infections and where are the dead? By my last count, 6 elderly passengers from the Diamond Princess passed away of complications related to Covid19. It is now over 6 weeks since that incident has taken place. In California, so far, 1 former passenger from the Grand Princess has succumbed and there seems to be 29 infected people that are now under observation or in care.

What am I missing?

[Mar 14, 2020] H. L. Mencken about coronarovirus epidemic

Notable quotes:
"... The "worst case scenario" doesn't look very credible. If less than 20% of the people on a cruise ship - trapped for multiple weeks - contracted nCOV, the notion that 2/3rds of Americans will seems far too high. ..."
"... And just for extra fun: The number of hospital beds in the US declined 5% from 2005 to 2017 ..."
"... The explosion of hate and blame and fear flying around online with regard to this pandemic is more than alarming and ultimately useless and damaging. In a way it scares me more than the flu itself at the moment because of the implications of how it will hinder our ability to cooperate and deal with this. ..."
Mar 13, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Greenbean950 , Mar 13 2020 14:15 utc | 5

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

H. L. Mencken

Paul Bogdanich , Mar 13 2020 15:15 utc | 17

Why are you stoking this irrational panic? Quoting the New York Times. What's the matter with you? I find it reassuring that high profile figures here and there have caught the COVID-19 flu. Madamm Trudeau, President Bolsinaro, etc. When they're back at their regular public duties in a week or so maybe it will sink into peoples thick skulls what a bunch of scardey cat ninnies the politicians are. The panic is doing more damage than the virus. IMHO. Time will tell.
c1ue , Mar 13 2020 15:16 utc | 18
The "worst case scenario" doesn't look very credible. If less than 20% of the people on a cruise ship - trapped for multiple weeks - contracted nCOV, the notion that 2/3rds of Americans will seems far too high.

However, a lockdown has its own issues:

  1. Reportedly 100,000 children in New York will starve if they can't go to school and get fed. Is this going to be a lot different elsewhere?
  2. What about the salaries, vs. the debts, for the hourly workers that won't be able to work in a lockdown situation? A large percentage of Americans are extremely financially precarious.
  3. Then there's the US health care system. Even disregarding the secondary economic/social effects noted above - how will $500-$3000 nCOV testing impact people? Much less the cost of hospitalizations?

And just for extra fun: The number of hospital beds in the US declined 5% from 2005 to 2017: source

The number of hospital beds is rising in prosperous zip codes and falling everywhere else. The amount of hospital beds fell by five percent nationally between 2006 and 2017. Over the same time period, the number of beds increased by 10 percent in prosperous zip codes, which were the only group to see an increase. Prosperous zip codes tend to be growing quickly: The number of residents of prosperous zip codes increased by an estimated 20 percent over the study period, faster than the population of any other quintile. Combined with their initially low bed-counts, the rise in hospital beds in prosperous communities may reflect a rebalancing in the landscape of beds towards the locations where more and more Americans live.
So while richer areas got more hospital beds, the number don't reflect the population increase. The other areas are just SOL.
Joanne Leon , Mar 13 2020 15:17 utc | 19
The explosion of hate and blame and fear flying around online with regard to this pandemic is more than alarming and ultimately useless and damaging. In a way it scares me more than the flu itself at the moment because of the implications of how it will hinder our ability to cooperate and deal with this.

The panic has set in, to some extent, but people are adjusting. There is a hyper focus on the federal government and opportunistic political attacks with the goal of ruining the current administration in the lead up to 2020 elections (an administration already paranoid from 3+ years of being targeted to an extent I've never seen in my life). That much is really obvious if you can look at things rationally, even if, like me, you're opposed to this administration ideologically, politically and in almost every other way. I think that's beyond reckless and extremely dangerous at a time like this, but my opinion won't change much in a political environment that has been so carefully manipulated to a level of toxicity that is maybe unprecedented. Maybe people will get their priorities straight when/if things get really rough. Remains to be seen.

What the media and others aren't paying attention to at all to local and state authorities who have been mobilizing. We don't rely on the federal government for everything. We have extensive town, city, county and state infrastructures that handle most things in daily life. The states themselves vary but every one has an extensive infrastructure.

The testing issue is clearly a major league failure. How important is it compared to mobilizing? It's important because information is important for supply networks and decision making. But is it more important in the short term than getting the population to prepare at home, isolate to varying extents, to be informed about symptoms etc and be able to ride this out as well as possible until the bigger, higher level infrastructure catches up?

And that is happening here in the US, at least in my state of NJ (bumped up against/integrated with 2 of the biggest cities in the country). There is massive mobilization. Colleges going into spring break right now and switching to online instruction after spring break, large events canceled, people working from home when possible, state government hotlines and online reporting in place, and tons of other things. This is anecdotal but my son told me today that friends who work in electronics stores, restaurants will be paid for furloughs, which surprised me. He's a student with a part time restaurant job and no shut down or word of furlough pay as yet.

At a recent small biz related gathering - people already adopted modified non-handshakes on their own. Maybe seems a little silly but shows how quickly people adapt in real world regardless of the hate and panic flying around in MSM and social media. That doesn't get us more hospital beds and respirators but it's important at the prevention end of things. As for possible need for rapid expansion of medical facilities, I guess we'll find out soon if the trillions we spend on military/national guard can benefit people at home if we hit that crisis point. Supposedly, this type of logistics is one of their strengths.

[Mar 13, 2020] Age mortality profile for Italian pacients

Mar 13, 2020 | www.unz.com

utu , says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 2:17 pm GMT

@Daniel Chieh Few quotes from

https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2820%2930627-9

" the percentage of patients admitted to intensive care units reported daily in Italy, from March 1, up until March 11, was consistently between 9% and 11% of patients who were actively infected."

"If this trend continues for 1 more week, there will be 30 000 infected patients. Intensive care units will then be at maximum capacity; up to 4000 hospital beds will be needed by mid-April, 2020."

"Considering that the number of available beds in intensive care units in Italy is close to 5200, and assuming that half of these beds can be used for patients with COVID-19, the system will be at maximum capacity, according to this prediction, by March 14, 2020."

" we can assume that we will need approximately 4000 beds in intensive care units during the worst period of infection, which is expected to occur in about 4 weeks from March 11. This is challenging for Italy, as there are now just over 5200 intensive care beds in total. "

"We predict that if the exponential trend continues for the next few days, more than 2500 hospital beds for patients in intensive care units will be needed in only 1 week to treat ARDS caused by SARS-CoV-2-pneumonia in Italy."

And age mortality profile

"Of the patients who died, 42·2% were aged 80–89 years, 32·4% were aged 70–79 years, 8·4% were aged 60–69 years, and 2·8% were aged 50–59 years (those aged >90 years made up 14·1%). The male to female ratio is 80% to 20% with an older median age for women (83·4 years for women vs 79·9 years for men)."

[Mar 13, 2020] The academic consensus for mortality is currently around 0.3-1% (WHO)

Mar 13, 2020 | www.unz.com

LondonBob , says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 8:58 am GMT

Something a little more positive from the China perspective

We are increasing our understanding of this disease. It is clearly very infectious, at least in some circumstances. As we have explained this means that the case severity is likely to be lower than the crude fatality rates in many media reports. We have explained the dilemma of mortality early in epidemics here. The academic consensus for mortality is currently around 0.3-1% (WHO). It could be higher but it could be lower if blood testing eventually confirms more widespread, mild disease. The hospital mortality over the age of 80 years is 15%. Another way of looking at this data is that of every 100 people over the age of 80 who contract COVID-19 and become ill enough to go to hospital. 85% make a full recovery.

[Mar 13, 2020] Structure of high risk population in Italy

Mar 13, 2020 | www.thelancet.com

https://www.thelancet.com/pb-assets/Lancet/pdfs/S0140673620306279.pdf

The mean age of those who died in Italy was 81 years and more than two-thirds of these patients had diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, or cancer, or were former smokers.

Of the patients who died, 42·2% were aged 80–89 years, 32·4% were aged 70–79 years, 8·4% were aged 60–69 years, and 2·8% were aged 50–59 years (those aged >90 years made up 14·1%). The male to female ratio is 80% to 20% with an older median age for women (83·4 years for women vs 79·9 years for men).

[Mar 13, 2020] Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis called Merkel's remark "unhelpful" and said it could cause panic

Mar 13, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Dr. Brian Monahan, attending physician of Congress, told a closed-door meeting of Senate staffers this week that 70 million to 150 million Americans -- a third of the nation -- could contract the coronavirus. Dr. Anthony Fauci testified that the mortality rate for COVID-19 will likely run near 1 percent.

Translation: between 750,000 and 1.1 million Americans may die of this disease before it runs its course. The latter figure is equal to all the U.S. dead in World War II and on both sides in the Civil War.

Chancellor Angela Merkel warns that 70 percent of Germany's population -- 58 million people -- could contract the coronavirus. If she is right, and Fauci's mortality rate holds for her country, that could mean more than half a million dead Germans.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis called Merkel's remark "unhelpful" and said it could cause panic. But Harvard epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch seemed to support Merkel, saying between 40 percent and 70 percent of the world's population could become infected.

Again, if Fauci's 1 percent mortality rate and Lipsitch's estimate prove on target, between 3 billion and 5 billion people on earth will be infected, and 30 million to 50 million will die, a death toll greater than that of the Spanish Flu of 1918.

There is, however, some contradictory news.

China, with 81,000 cases, has noted a deceleration in new cases and South Korea appears to be gradually containing the spread of the virus.

Yet Italy, with its large elderly population, may be a harbinger of what is to come in the West. As of Thursday, Italy had reported 12,000 cases and 827 deaths, a mortality rate of nearly 7 percent. This suggests that the unreported and undetected infections in Italy are far more numerous.

In the U.S., the death toll at this writing is 40, a tiny fraction of the annual toll of the tens of thousands who die of the flu.

But the problem is this: COVID-19 has not nearly run its course in the United States, while the reaction in society and the economy approaches what we might expect from a boiling national disaster.

The stock market has plunged further and faster than it did in the Great Crash of 1929. Trillions of dollars in wealth have vanished. If Senator Bernie Sanders does not like "millionaires and billionaires," he should be pleased. There are fewer of them today than there were when he won the New Hampshire primary.

What does the future hold?


[Mar 13, 2020] Data about NYC epidemics are actually very encoraging

Mar 13, 2020 | www.unz.com

OscarWildeLoveChild , says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 12:21 pm GMT

@Carlton Meyer I've been following a few doctors on Youtube, for about a month now (dispassionate, evidence-based docs), and their opinions vary on how serious this is.

What I don't is, if this is as contagious as they say (and it does seem to be) and as life-threatening as they say, then given that there are several cases in NYC, why are we not already seeing thousands of deaths there- a city where millions are crammed together daily, many without good hygiene, many who have been for several weeks now, using public transportation. I don't get it. It would seem the effects of any virus that were as bad as they're saying, would already be reaching peak zombie level conditions in places like NYC, Chicago, Boston, SF and DC.

Scratching my head.

[Mar 13, 2020] Lifespan is not equal healthspan

Mar 13, 2020 | www.unz.com

Svevlad says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 12:19 pm GMT 200 Words But would a drop in life expectancy be a bad thing?

Like the man on viriculture.com used to say, healthy life =/= long life. We work towards extending one's lifespan, yet we don't extend their "health span". We just extend the period when one is already falling apart. The older you are, the more meds you need, the more healthcare you need etc etc.

So the longer the lifespan the bigger the load on healthcare and pension funds.

The main problem is, that our economic and cultural systems are at this point, 90% biologically incompatible with us. A good chunk of our lives we study (especially so when you study something like medicine, i believe at this point it's for genuine masochists). By the time you get to a nice position in your career you're probably going to be older than 35. For good birth rates etc that's unnaceptable.

So, the solution is to extend the "health-span". Preferably, you need to slow aging down at least by 10, maybe even 15 years, while keeping the overall lifespan the same. The current way is simply unsustainable

[Mar 13, 2020] Like all the other viruses that have floated around over the years be this one is being hyped up

Mar 13, 2020 | www.unz.com

Calculator , says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 11:55 am GMT

@Kratoklastes ...Like all the other viruses that have floated around over the years be this one is being hyped up.

The hype works precisely because of your remark #3 but it will die a natural death after everyone makes their money and the public gets bored.

I mean if just 1B people get a shot costing $50 that is a whole lot of Yuan. Store owners also appear to be sneaking that extra markup on soaps and disinfectants and toilet paper. Y2K also comes to mind and I am sure that Aids /HIV continues to kill more people annually than this virus ever will. In the meantime I caution all nose pickers to leave those buggers alone and not report any unusually large specimens. It will only skew the statistics and increase the panic.

[Mar 13, 2020] MSM dirty dange around human mortality

Mar 13, 2020 | www.unz.com

utu , says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 6:30 am GMT

@Anonymous (n)
60,000 people die every month in Italy. Many of them old. Now we have 1,000 reported dead due to the Covid-19. Most of them old. Many of them would have died anyway from some cold or flu that would further aggravate their poor state of health. This year Covid-19 got there first.

[Mar 13, 2020] Steve Bannon is just using inflammatory language throughout, to diss the CCP

Mar 13, 2020 | thesaker.is

Analyst on March 12, 2020 , · at 11:23 pm EST/EDT

Dear Saker: I am a little confused here.

You request that opinions should be limited to fact based
but in the next sentence you state "The truth is that NONE OF US really knows for a fact what this virus can do, we are all guessing."

well .whether fact based or speculative here are two alternate views>

"My own view on the Coronavirus situation, is that I trust the Chinese Government to be doing all it can possibly do, to contain the epidemic.

There are a lot of people there, living in close proximity

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlF0LcQO9Tg

In that context, Steve Bannon is just using inflammatory language throughout, to diss the CCP

I can well understand why the CCP will not allow any US personel anywhere near the patients, nor allow them to have access to any of the medical data.

If Bannon is implying that the CCP has something to hide, then the CCP also has its own suspicions as to how this virus suddenly appeared

A lot of stuff has in the past come out of Livermore Labs and in the UK from Porton Down, which "should not" be released I know of southern coastal cities in the UK being sprayed with viruses from the air in the 1950s – a deliberate programme supported by the UK government

The CCP will also be fully aware of British activities within Syria and then there is the Skripal incident, a home-grown Boris the Buffoon manufactured crisis

If one looks at UK and US official government behaviour towards Hong Kong, then one can easily surmise that there are attempts to find other means to destabilise China

Just saying "

Another view >

"There was an interesting item on Facebook a few days back, claiming to be written by a Chinese military official, a staunch supporter of the communist party and the government, but a man 'with a conscience.'

He claimed the virus was manufactured with a view to causing reduction of higher brain functions (i.e. lowering the IQ) and inducing docility into those who are protesting in Hong Kong.

It was first tested, according to his narrative, more discreetly on rounded-up Uighurs in the prison camps, well away from anywhere likely to be observed, and everyone who was exposed, died. There was a massive clean-up and cover-up operation

Realising it needed more work if it was to be deployed in HK, they did some further modifications and had intended to do a new test in Hubei, but this was pre-empted by a shoot-out near the meat market that has been mooted as the source of the outbreak. Someone, I'm not sure now who he reckoned it was, attempted to 'kidnap the bio weapon in order to grab the technology it represented, but the consignment was hit by a bullet and the virus escaped. Those in charge ensured there were no survivors as witnesses in that area.

He further claimed that the mortality rate is actually 100% but that it has been put about that it is only 2% – this underplaying being with the complicity of the USA, Russia and the UK and presumably the EU, in order to forestall mass panic. He claimed only those wearing hazmat suits stand any chance, and that the pandemic will claim the lives of all but top officials who have recourse to protective measures. He said that the actual symptoms in the final stages are up to five days of agonising pain with internal organs haemorrhaging in a similar way to Ebola.

Of course, the article was anonymously written, as he said his life and that of his family would be forfeit if he were to be identified. Which makes it a narrative that is easy to fake but impossible to completely refute. "

[Mar 13, 2020] I do not think the corona virus outbreak was deliberate. The first thing that people crafty enough to unleash this sort of thing would think of is blowback

Mar 13, 2020 | thesaker.is

Patricia Ormsby on March 12, 2020 , · at 8:04 pm EST/EDT

Like the Saker, I do not think the corona virus outbreak was deliberate. The first thing that people crafty enough to unleash this sort of thing would think of is blowback.

Perhaps the depopulationists–but this is a really ineffective way of going about it.

I do think, however, that it arose in a "laboratory" of tens of millions of human subjects all undergoing an enormous experiment. Please humor me a moment.

If there were a deliberate element in all of this, it would be the hype and rush be the first to implement an untested technology about which dire warnings were already being sounded.

... ... ...

AndyT on March 12, 2020 , · at 10:19 pm EST/EDT
Virologists and epidemiologists have yet to discount that the coronavirus was a bio attack. This does NOT mean that it was an attack, merely that the possibility of a bio attack cannot be discounted. While there remains a lot of circumstantial and anecdotal "evidence" that this was an economic attack perpetrated by America against China, this does NOT prove conclusively that such an attack took place, nor does it prove that such an attack did not take place. There is an abstract submitted to ChinaXIV (a research website) that, although not yet peer reviewed, suggests that the virus dd NOT originate at the Wuhan Seafood Market and that it was introduced:

http://www.chinaxiv.org/abs/202002.00033

Any reference as to who introduced the coronavirus to the market is pure speculation at this juncture, although the circumstantial and anecdotal evidence could be construed as overwhelming against the US considering the timing, geographic location and proximity to the Wuhan Seafood Market of the US soldiers present for the International Military Games.

I am not a virologist or epidemiologist (I am an engineer), however it is not completely out of the realms of possibility for a virus to make the transition from animal to human host; and the conditions in which animals are kept in Wuhan and surrounding areas is certainly not of the same standard as the West – both from the perspective of hygiene and humanitarian considerations. Another abstract that does looks into the origins of the virus states:

"The genomic features described here may in part explain the infectiousness and transmissibility of SARS-CoV-2 in humans. Although genomic evidence does not support the idea that SARS-CoV-2 is a laboratory construct, it is currently impossible to prove or disprove the other theories of its origin described here, and it is unclear whether future data will help resolve this issue. Identifying the immediate non-human animal source and obtaining virus sequences from it would be the most definitive way of revealing virus origins."

http://virological.org/t/the-proximal-origin-of-sars-cov-2/398

Much mention has been made of the corona-virus in question (COVID-19) binding to the ACE-2 receptors found in the lungs and heart – most particularly in those of Asian heritage. It would not be outside the realms of science for this to be a logical target for the virus, given its geographic location, but the hypothesis of it being engineered to target a specific racial genotype is also not outside the realms of possibility.

"Our findings indicated that no direct evidence was identified genetically supporting the existence of coronavirus S-protein binding-resistant ACE2 mutants in different populations (Fig. 1a). The data of variant distribution and AFs may contribute to the further investigations of ACE2, including its roles in acute lung injury and lung function12. The East Asian populations have much higher AFs in the eQTL variants associated with higher ACE2 expression in tissues (Fig. 1c), which may suggest different susceptibility or response to 2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2 from different populations under the similar conditions."

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41421-020-0147-1

I agree with Andrei's analysis that a bio-weapon is both unwieldy and difficult to control when used in a purely military application, but when used as an economic weapon, the possibility is mentioned in the odious The Project for a New American Century's (PNAC) report titled "Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century."

"advanced forms of biological warfare that can 'target' specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."

This does not prove that the tragedy unfolding out of Wuhan was a bio-weapon, but certainly demonstrates the possibility of intent. At this juncture, neither side of the argument can provide any proof, so the the hypothesis remains pure speculation. The Chinese government is not directly accusing the US of a bio attack, but it is extremely worrying that both the Russian and Chinese governments remain highly suspicious.

[Mar 13, 2020] "CORONAVIRUSES HAVE ALWAYS INFECTED HUMANS, PANIC IS UNWARRANTED"

the MSM news cycle is clearly a tool for disinformation and misdirection – propaganda is what has been engineered
Mar 13, 2020 | thesaker.is

Jorge L Borges on March 12, 2020 , · at 2:45 pm EST/EDT

"CORONAVIRUSES HAVE ALWAYS INFECTED HUMANS, PANIC IS UNWARRANTED"
Posted by agencycyta | Mar 9, 2020 | Science , Featured , Health | 0 |

"Coronaviruses have always infected humans, panic is unwarranted"
According to an Argentine virologist in France, Pablo Goldschmidt, there is no evidence to indicate that the fatality or morbidity of COVID-19 is superior to that caused by influenza viruses or the common cold.

(CyTA-Leloir Foundation Agency) -. For the virologist and infectious disease specialist Pablo Goldschmidt, the panic surrounding the strain of coronavirus identified in China (COVID-19) is as unwarranted as the one created in 2003 with severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). ) or in 2009 with the influenza A (H1N1) virus.

"The ill-founded opinions expressed by international experts, replicated by the media and social networks repeat the unnecessary panic that we have previously experienced. The coronavirus identified in China in 2019 causes neither more nor less than a strong cold or flu, with no difference until today with the cold or flu as we know it, "says Professor Goldschmidt, also a biochemist, pharmacist and psychologist graduated from the UBA, volunteer for the World Health Organization (WHO), former praticien hospitalier of the public hospitals in Paris and author of the book "People and microbes, invisible beings with whom we live and make us sick" (2019).

The Argentine specialist lives more than four decades in Europe. At the Faculty of Medicine of the hospital center de la Pitié-Salpetrière in Paris, he obtained diplomas in pharmacokinetics, clinical pharmacology, neuro-psychopharmacology and pharmacology of antimicrobials. At the Université Pierre et Marie Curie Paris VI he received a doctorate in molecular pharmacology. The theoretical and practical training of the Paris Curie and Pasteur Institutes also concluded with degrees in fundamental virology and molecular biology. As a volunteer at the WHO, he integrates humanitarian missions in Guinea Conakry, Bissau, Pakistan, Ukraine, Cameroon, Mali and the Chad border with Nigeria. And it aspires to obtain from the Argentine State a mandate to exercise the right to speak before the international organization.

In dialogue with the CyTA-Leloir Agency, Goldschmidt expresses its tension in the face of the global terror generated by the quality of information that is disseminated about the new coronavirus and considers it necessary that the data that is propagated be placed in the geographical and social context. "You can't create hysteria on the entire planet," he says.

-Which viruses are considered responsible for respiratory diseases?

Viral respiratory conditions are numerous and are caused by several viral families and species, among which the respiratory syncytial virus (especially in infants), influenza (influenza), human metapneumoviruses, adenoviruses, rhinoviruses, and several coronaviruses, already described years ago. It is striking that earlier this year global health alerts have been triggered as a result of infections by a coronavirus detected in China, COVID-19, knowing that each year there are 3 million newborns who die in the world of pneumonia and 50,000 adults in the United States for the same cause, without alarms being issued.

– The fact that it is transmitted by saliva or by cough increased the fear of the population?

Many microorganisms are transmitted by this route in humans. The cold, transmitted by saliva and cough, is caused by more than 150 rhinoviruses. Ten million people were infected by saliva and cough with the tuberculosis agent in 2018, of which 1 million were children and 205 thousand died. The same happened with bacterial meningitis, transmitted by saliva, which affected more than a million people in a year. Measles is also transmitted by saliva, hence the urgency to protect the population with vaccines.

-You. Do you consider the international alerts launched due to the coronavirus to be exaggerated?

Our planet is the victim of a new sociological phenomenon, scientific-media harassment, triggered by experts only on the basis of laboratory molecular diagnostic analysis results. Communiqués issued from China and Geneva were replicated, without being confronted from a critical point of view and, above all, without stressing that coronaviruses have always infected humans and always caused diarrhea and what people call a banal cold or common cold. Absurd forecasts were extrapolated, as in 2009 with the H1N1 influenza virus.

And the risk of complications?

A cold can present as a benign, self-limiting disease; but it is known that all respiratory diseases, however banal they may be considered, can severely affect the frailized people, people with cardiocirculatory problems over 65 years, people with metabolic disorders, immunosuppressed, transplanted and, above all , to poorly fed people without shelter, and to those who do not have access to competent health teams that provide them with effective medicines. This situation, clearly revealed for so many other diseases, is repeated in all infections and COVID-19 is no exception.

Why does each individual become infected and react differently to viral infections?

The first step for a virus to infect a person depends on the virus's ability to recognize "locks" or proteins on the surface of cells in certain organs, not all. Once it attaches to its lock, it can penetrate the cell and put all the cellular machinery of the infected subject at its service to replicate itself. It has been determined that there are individuals with many "locks", others with few and others with easier "locks" to open, which is determined by the genes. On the other hand, there is a defensive apparatus of proteins encoded in DNA that is known by the name of "reactoma". In short, all humans are unique living beings against microbial aggression and against the malignant transformations of our tissues. Therefore, in certain individuals,

Is the coronavirus detected in China a new agent?

Those who launched the international alerts did not take into account data that shows whether this virus or other similar viruses circulated in previous years. Or if people who were already exposed to other coronavirus variants have partial or total protection against the 2019 strain.

-Why do you not accept the extrapolation from one country to the other of the forecasts issued by international agencies?

First, it is appropriate to compare the mortality and morbidity data with the number of positive cases (those confirmed by the laboratory in relation to the number of severe cases or the number of deceased persons). The first thing that emerges from the data, beyond the biological criteria referring to the individual capacity to get sick and defend against viral aggression, are doubts regarding the figures, if it is not considered that the affected people did or did not have access to competent and equipped health, and if they received timely treatments with adequate and bioequivalent drugs.

– Would these factors contribute to explain the differences in mortality and morbidity between countries?

If there is no biological justification for individual predisposition, the difference could be due to the quality of the medical institutions, the reasons that caused the time to pass before the affected people go to health centers, or the quality of the training of medical centers and the availability of resources to treat acute respiratory diseases. We must impose moderation and use concrete data. There is no evidence to show that the 2019 coronavirus is more lethal than respiratory adenoviruses, influenza viruses, coronaviruses from previous years, or rhinoviruses responsible for the common cold.

[Mar 13, 2020] Vaccine is on horizon

Mar 13, 2020 | www.unz.com

Oscar Peterson , says: Show Comment March 13, 2020 at 2:59 pm GMT

@another anon

I'd rather take my chances with the virus than consume an Israeli vaccine

Don't blame you at all, but you don't have to make that choice!

A Canadian company says that it has produced a COVID-19 vaccine just 20 days after receiving the coronavirus's genetic sequence, using a unique technology that they soon hope to submit for FDA approval.

Medicago CEO Bruce Clark said his company could produce as many as 10 million doses a month. If regulatory hurdles can be cleared, he said in a Thursday interview, the vaccine could start to become available in November 2021.

An Israeli research lab has also claimed to have created a vaccine. But Clark says his company's technique, which has already been proven effective in producing vaccines for seasonal flu, is more reliable and easier to scale.

"There are a couple of others who are claiming that they have -- well, we will call them vaccine[s]" for COVID-19, he said. "But they're different technologies. Some are RNA- or DNA-based vaccines that have not yet been proven in any indication yet, let alone this one. Hopefully, they'll be successful."

https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2020/03/breaking-weve-got-vaccine-says-pentagon-funded-company/163739/?oref=d-river

And it's all thanks to DoD:

In 2010, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, put together a $100 million program dubbed Blue Angel to look into new forms of vaccine discovery and production. A big chunk of that money went to Medicago to build a facility in North Carolina, where they showed that they could find a vaccine in just 20 days, then rapidly scale up production.

But it won't be ready for actual people for 18 months.

[Mar 12, 2020] Italy Closed; Wall Street Hosed; Trump Exposed

Mar 12, 2020 | www.medpagetoday.com

More GOP congressmen who attended the CPAC political event last month are self-isolating -- and one of them just flew on Air Force One with President Trump . Another was seen on video shaking hands and chatting face to face with the president before entering self-quarantine. ( CNBC, Reuters )

Note to Pence:

Televangelist Jim Bakker's TV show was among seven companies receiving FDA/FTC warnings about "fraudulent" sales pitches for coronavirus treatments.

[Mar 12, 2020] Turn Up the Humidity in Your House

Mar 12, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

run75441 | March 12, 2020 12:46 pm

Healthcare Hot Topics This is coming from MEDPAGE TODAY , "Track the U.S. COVID-19 Outbreak in Real Time," Comments Section (3 comments), March 11, 2020 with regard to COVID-19

"The mechanism of seasonal effect for seasonal respiratory virus spread is believed to be humidity, not temperature. In New York state which has 220 cases, fomites lose moisture where indoor humidity is low, allowing the lighter particles to stay longer in the aerosol. In Florida and Arizona, with 38 cases, fomites gain moisture and weight from the humid air and fall to the floor faster. Northern Italy, where people wear winter coats in the media reports has dry, heated indoor air, while Southern Italy has humid indoor air.

Humidifying indoor air in schools, stores, churches, etc. may reduce seasonal influenza, respiratory syncytial virus, coronoviruses which produce the common cold, rhinoviruses and Covid-19, Airports, airliners, airport shuttles should be the highest priority. The goal should be humidifying to the level seen in summer without transmitting Legionella."

"The Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, Hong Kong have warmer, more humid air and much less Covid-19. Southern Italy has warmer, more humid indoor air than Northern Italy where indoor air is dry. The photographs in the media from places with the highest rate of Covid-19 spread show people wearing winter jackets."

"In warm humid climates, fomites absorb water from indoor air and sink to the floor. There is a fine layer of dust everywhere indoors and viral particles attach to charged dust particles.

The mechanism for seasonal respiratory virus transmission is: fomite size in dry heated indoor air promotes viral spread. Larger fomites in humid air fall to the floor and react with charged dust particles."

fomite definition: objects or materials which are likely to carry infection, such as clothes, utensils, and furniture.

microbiology definition: A fomes (pronounced /ˈfoʊmiːz/) or fomite (/ˈfoʊmaɪt/) is any inanimate object that, when contaminated with or exposed to infectious agents (such as pathogenic bacteria, viruses or fungi), can transfer disease to a new host.

This would include counter tops, etc.

likbez , March 12, 2020 4:10 pm

I think incompetent politicians who want to be seen to be acting but do not implement the necessary for containing the epidemics steps or take them too late are more important danger in this coronavirus outbreak then the disease itself.

Humidity about 50% is a double edge sword: it greatly stimulates growth of various bacteria and fungus. And Legionnaires disease is more dangerous type of virus pneumonia than COVID-19.

Legionnaires' disease is the cause of an estimated 2–9% of pneumonia cases that are acquired outside of a hospital.[1] An estimated 8,000–18,000 cases a year in the United States require hospitalization

Respiratory-care devices such as humidifiers and nebulizers used with contaminated tap water may contain Legionella species, so using sterile water is very important.[29]

It is also not clear if 50% humidity is enough to adversely affect the coronavirus virus.

https://www.hvac.com/faq/recommended-humidity-level-home/

•Excess moisture promotes the growth and spread of mold, mildew, fungi, bacteria, and viruses. These contaminants diminish indoor air quality, causing illness, and can also cause damage to your home.

•When indoor humidity levels are too high, asthma and allergy sufferers may experience worse or more frequent symptoms.

•High humidity indoors causes the home to feel muggy. You may notice visible condensation on windows and walls.

At 80% or higher humility your sheets feel wet. This for example is the case in Dominican republic.

In general, this temperature guide will show you where to keep your indoor relative humidity levels to ensure comfort.

•Outdoor temperature over 50˚F, indoor humidity levels shouldn't exceed 50%

•Outdoor temperature over 20˚F, indoor humidity levels shouldn't exceed 40%

Over 50% humility can probably be maintained for prolong time only along with ultraviolet lamp disinfection of the room and daily change of bed sheets and weekly washing of pillows.

It is also not clear if the coronavirus can survive after drying of aerosol saliva particles that carry them. Probably not.

At the same time places with a very high humidity such as Hong Kong and Taiwan were less affected by the coronavirus.

[Mar 12, 2020] The NYT now has a section of free coronavirus coverage

The NYT now has a section of free coronavirus coverage, including our live briefing, maps of confirmed cases and advice on how to prepare for the outbreak
Quote: "If you begin to have a high fever, shortness of breath or any other more serious symptom, the best thing to do is to call your doctor to let them know and inquire about next steps. (Testing for coronavirus is inconsistent right now -- there are not enough testing kits, and it's dangerous for people with coronavirus to go into a doctor's office and risk infecting others. So please follow your doctor's instructions.) Check the C.D.C. website and your local health department for advice about how and where to be tested"
Mar 12, 2020 | www.nytimes.com

Latest Updates

Trump says domestic travel restrictions are a possibility. Days after being with Trump and Pence, Brazilian official tests positive for the virus, reports say. Europe condemns the U.S. travel ban as more nations add restrictions. Pence says to expect thousands of more cases in the U.S. California calls for a ban on large gatherings as states take measures to rein in the spread. Wall Street opens sharply lower after European markets tumble. A JetBlue passenger learns, in the air, that he has the virus. How to Prepare for the Coronavirus Keep your hands clean, and keep your distance from sick people Stay home if you are sick Unless you are already infected, face masks won't help Stock up on home supplies, medicine and resources Prepare your family, and communicate your plan With children, keep calm and carry on -- and get the flu shot Concerned about the stock market? Take a deep breath. Here's what you can do: Keep your hands clean, and keep your distance from sick people Stay home if you are sick Unless you are already infected, face masks won't help Stock up on home supplies, medicine and resources Prepare your family, and communicate your plan With children, keep calm and carry on -- and get the flu shot Concerned about the stock market? Take a deep breath.

[Mar 12, 2020] Brain Aging Tied to Leisure Time Physical Activity MedPage Today

Mar 12, 2020 | www.medpagetoday.com

TORONTO -- More leisure-time physical activity -- walking, gardening, swimming, or dancing, for example -- was associated with larger brain volume in older adults, a cross-sectional study showed.

Adults with an average age of 75 who had the most physical activity had a total brain volume that was 1.4% larger than those with the least activity, reported Yian Gu, PhD, of Columbia University in New York City, and co-authors, in an early-release abstract from the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting , which will be held here in April. MedpageToday share to facebook share to twitter share to linkedin email article An elderly couple potting plants outside

TORONTO -- More leisure-time physical activity -- walking, gardening, swimming, or dancing, for example -- was associated with larger brain volume in older adults, a cross-sectional study showed.

Adults with an average age of 75 who had the most physical activity had a total brain volume that was 1.4% larger than those with the least activity, reported Yian Gu, PhD, of Columbia University in New York City, and co-authors, in an early-release abstract from the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting , which will be held here in April.

The effect was equal to about 4 years of brain aging, Gu noted.

"These results are exciting, as they suggest that people may potentially prevent brain shrinking and the effects of aging on the brain simply by becoming more active," she said in a statement.

Previous research has linked physical activity with cognition in older adults. A systematic review in 2018 showed that exercising for 52 hours over 6 months was associated with improvements in processing speed and executive function . Last year, a longitudinal study showed that a higher level of daily physical activity was tied to slower amyloid-beta related cognitive decline in clinically normal older adults.

In their analysis, Gu and colleagues studied leisure-time physical activity and MRI measures of 1,557 older adults in the Washington/Hamilton Heights-Inwood Columbia Aging Project ( WHICAP ) study, a community-based, multi-ethnic cohort of older adults.

No participants had dementia, but 296 people had mild cognitive impairment and 28% carried the APOE E4 allele. Participants had a mean 11.4 years of education and body mass index of 28.4. In total, 64% were women; 26% were non-Hispanic white, 34% were African American, and 38% were Hispanic.

[Mar 12, 2020] Korean model is that grocery are ordered (online or phone?) and delivered to the door, increasingly, people pick the grocery without physical contact with delivery people

Mar 12, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Mina | Mar 11 2020 17:20 utc | 10

Sorry to say but... social distancing is one thing but how do you get some food? are you ready to wash up everything you bought at supermarket and change your clothes each time you go out and your bedsheets every morning?

Piotr Berman , Mar 11 2020 17:29 utc | 16

Korean model is that grocery are ordered (online or phone?) and delivered to the door, increasingly, people pick the grocery without physical contact with delivery people. Korean cities are quite dense from what I understand. Initially, shoppers abandoned big supermarket for neighborhood stores, neighborhood stores usually belong to big chains, like in Germany, so there are website for ordering groceries, but they are delivered over short distances.

Because having food delivered was already popular, a massive increase could be easy to handle. E.g. with more orders to the same address (high rise living is the norm), it takes less time for an individual delivery.

Piotr Berman , Mar 11 2020 17:37 utc | 20

I was thinking that "no contact shopping" in USA could be more practical with people arriving at their big supermarket (or local store in a rural area) and picking up pre-paid boxes (could be just open boxes that could be left empty).

[Mar 11, 2020] Interview with Michael Osterholm, internationally recognized expert in infectious disease epidemiology

Mar 11, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

oldman22 , 11 March 2020 at 03:01 PM

highly recommended:

interview with Michael Osterholm, internationally recognized expert in infectious disease epidemiology. He is Regents Professor, McKnight Presidential Endowed Chair in Public Health, the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP), Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Division of Environmental Health Sciences, School of Public Health, a professor in the Technological Leadership Institute, College of Science and Engineering, and an adjunct professor in the Medical School, all at the University of Minnesota.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3URhJx0NSw

[Mar 11, 2020] Lancet article on COVID-19 for those interested in data instead of propaganda from politicos

Mar 11, 2020 | www.thelancet.com

... 191 patients (135 from Jinyintan Hospital and 56 from Wuhan Pulmonary Hospital) were included in this study, of whom 137 were discharged and 54 died in hospital. 91 (48%) patients had a comorbidity, with hypertension being the most common (58 [30%] patients), followed by diabetes (36 [19%] patients) and coronary heart disease (15 [8%] patients). Multivariable regression showed increasing odds of in-hospital death associated with older age

...Cardiac complications, including new or worsening heart failure, new or worsening arrhythmia, or myocardial infarction are common in patients with pneumonia. Cardiac arrest occurs in about 3% of inpatients with pneumonia.21

Risk factors of cardiac events after pneumonia include older age, pre-existing cardiovascular diseases, and greater severity of pneumonia at presentation.22

Coronary heart disease has also been found to be associated with acute cardiac events and poor outcomes in influenza and other respiratory viral infections

... For survivors, the median duration of viral shedding was 20 days (IQR 17·0–24·0) from illness onset, but the virus was continuously detectable until death in non-survivors ( table 2 ; figure 1 ).

[Mar 11, 2020] Self-isolation is important for people most vulnerable for COVID-19

Notable quotes:
"... I have no illusion this behavior will guarantee anything, but que faire? ..."
Mar 11, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Brooklin Bridge , March 11, 2020 at 11:49 am

I just got a call yesterday from close friends who must still think this is a joke and they wanted me to come out to a restaurant with them in about a weeks time. Six weeks ago, I would have gone.

I just told them the truth, thanking them very much for being so thoughtful, and also suggesting that this was more serious than people might realize, but I didn't go into too much detail as I've learned it's counter productive. I did, however, point out that due to our for profit health care system, we will get a much greater and faster spread of covid-19 due to prohibitive costs of any health care visit.

Couldn't resist that one; talk about res ipsa loquitur.

For a couple of weeks now, I have been quite up front with close friends, slightly less so with others, but refuse to go out unless I have to and can somewhat control how many people will be around (as in going to the super market very early am during the week).

I have no illusion this behavior will guarantee anything, but que faire?

[Mar 11, 2020] By e-mail, from National Nurses United:

Mar 11, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Registered nurses are outraged to learn that the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) on Tuesday further weakened its guidance on measures to contain COVID-19. These changes include, among other things, rolling back personal protective equipment (PPE) standards from N-95 respirators to allow simple surgical masks; not requiring suspected or confirmed COVID-19 patients to be placed in negative pressure isolation rooms at all times; and weakening protections for health care workers collecting diagnostic respiratory specimens. These are moves that National Nurses United nurses say will gravely endanger nurses, health care workers, patients, and our communities

"If nurses and health care workers aren't protected, that means patients and the public are not protected," said Bonnie Castillo, RN and CNA/NNOC and NNU executive director. "This is a major public health crisis of unknown proportions. Now is not the time to be weakening our standards and protections, or cutting corners. Now is the time we should be stepping up our efforts."..

In addition to lobbying almost every federal health agency, the presidential administration, and members of Congress, and California health agencies to step up protections, NNU recently surveyed RNs nationwide, finding that the vast majority of the nation's health care facilities are unprepared for COVID-19, with only 29 percent of nurses reporting that their hospitals have a plan in place to isolate a coronavirus patient, and only 30 percent saying their employer has enough personal protective equipment if there is a rapid surge in patients with possible COVID-19 infections.

Many hospitals and healthcare facilities have failed to provide adequate personal protective equipment to nurses working with COVID-19 patients. Some facilities are telling nurses to continue to work while asymptomatic, even though they've been exposed to the virus and might be contagious. Testing at hospitals has been sporadic.

[Mar 11, 2020] Avoidance of couded places is now of paramount importance. Specialists suggested ramping up alternatives to face-to-face visits, tetemedicine, "car visits", telephone consultation hotlines.

Mar 11, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Expat2uruguay , , March 11, 2020 at 6:31 am

I found this very interesting personal report on flutrackers:

Something else to share, here (reproduced exactly as I received it):

3/8/2020

Notes from the front lines:

I attended the Infectious Disease Association of California (IDAC) Northern California Winter Symposium on Saturday 3/7. In attendance were physicians from Santa Clara, San Francisco and Orange Counties who had all seen and cared for COVID-19 patients, both returning travelers and community-acquired cases. Also present was the Chief of ID for Providence hospitals, who has 2 affected Seattle hospitals under his jurisdiction. Erin Epson, CDPH director of Hospital Acquired Infections, was also there to give updates on how CDPH and CDC are handling exposed health care workers, among other things. Below are some of the key take-aways from their experiences.

1. The most common presentation was one week prodrome of myaglias, malaise, cough, low grade fevers gradually leading to more severe trouble breathing in the second week of illness. It is an average of 8 days to development of dyspnea and average 9 days to onset of pneumonia/pneumonitis. It is not like Influenza, which has a classically sudden onset. Fever was not very prominent in several cases. The most consistently present lab finding was lymphopenia (with either leukocytosis or leukopenia). The most consistent radiographic finding was bilateral interstitial/ground glass infiltrates. Aside from that, the other markers (CRP, PCT) were not as consistent.

2. Co-infection rate with other respiratory viruses like Influenza or RSV is 24 hours apart.

... ... ...

10. All suggested ramping up alternatives to face-to-face visits, tetemedicine, "car visits", telephone consultation hotlines.

11. Sutter and other larger hospital systems are using a variety of alternative respiratory triage at the Emergency Departments.

12. Health Departments (CDPH and OCHD) state the Airborne Infection Isolation Room (AIIR) is the least important of all the suggested measures to reduce exposure. Contact and droplet isolation in a regular room is likely to be just as effective. One heavily affected hospital in San Jose area is placing all "undifferentiated pneumonia" patients not meeting criteria for COVID testing in contact+droplet isolation for 2-3 days while seeing how they respond to empiric treatment and awaiting additional results.

Feel free to share. All PUIs in Monterey Country so far have been negative.

Martha.

Martha L. Blum, MD, PhD

Ignacio , March 11, 2020 at 6:52 am

Consequences of widespread denialism. At home, the virologist was not taken seriously until last Monday. I advised my wife last week not to assist to some meeting in closed doors, my son not to go to a concert, a friend of mine not to travel to Switzerland. They finally conceded I was right this week. The runners chat was complaining about cancellation of events until yesterday and I have received in chats lots of hyperventilating noises. Not helpful. We are now in Madrid replicating quite exactly events occurring in Italy 7-10 days before. Expect the same elsewhere.

Wukchumni , March 11, 2020 at 7:27 am

I’d mentioned yesterday that a group of 14 people from LA had all contracted Covid-19 @ an Italian ski resort, and 3 are very ill.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8094515/Doctor-treating-coronavirus-patients-LA-suburb-calls-schools-shut-immediately.html

I’m thinking of making up some lame excuse to not go skiing next week, a phantom injury or some other malady of my imagination.

Why not just admit to my friends that i’m afraid of mixing with a large group of people, especially so @ lunch, where we are in close proximity to a lot of other folks all milling around?

We are still in heavy denial-myself included, in that I feel my friends will think less of me if I was to give them the real reason, in that I don’t want to die, just yet.

An e-mail to my family regarding how bad the crisis is and will be here soon, was similar to my frantic e-mails & calls in the summer of 2008 regarding how shaky things are financially on Wall*Street, please be ready! They did nothing.

When I related that ‘Dr Drew’ (a sister sent me a video of his-after I sent out the Bergamo doctor’s account) who claimed Covid-19 was a press engineered fantasy, was just an addiction specialist and judging from where he hangs his hat (Breitbart, Washington Examiner, erc) everything he does is politically motivated hard right, one of my sisters asked me not to politicize the matter.

Being a Cassandra ain’t all that.

vlade , March 11, 2020 at 8:30 am

We took our daughter from school even before they closed them, because we suspected (rightly, as it turned out), that some parents coming from midterm sky trips to Italy will ignore the quarantine.

A friend of mine sent half of his staff WFH, and some of his business contacts see him as mad now.

That said, majority of people here support the drastic reaction, and would be happy to support even more dramatic ones. For example, a CEO of a major movie theater chain got quite a bit of kudos today when he said that while they could keep smaller theatres open, he doesn’t see how it’s better to keep 50 people bunched together than 100, so they close it all until further notice.

Wukchumni , March 11, 2020 at 2:34 pm

This sums it up for me…

You might have fears today: What if I overreact? Will people laugh at me? Will they be angry at me? Will I look stupid? Won’t it be better to wait for others to take steps first? Will I hurt the economy too much?

But in 2–4 weeks, when the entire world is in lockdown, when the few precious days of social distancing you will have enabled will have saved lives, people won’t criticize you anymore: They will thank you for making the right decision.

https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-act-today-or-people-will-die-f4d3d9cd99ca

rtah100 , March 11, 2020 at 3:37 pm

(from the little book of VC aphorisms):
– Nobody thanks you for being right.

[Mar 11, 2020] China approves Favilavir as first antiviral drug against ...

Mar 11, 2020 | vuuzletvph.com

Your browser indicates if you've visited this link https://vuuzletvph.com /favilavir-first-covid-19-drug-approved/ The government of Taizhou in Zhejiang province declared Sunday that Favilavir, formerly known as Fapilavir, an antiviral that has shown efficacy in the treatment of the novel coronavirus (), has been approved to be sold in the market.It is the first antiviral drug approved by the National Medical Products Administration for marketing since the outbreak happened.

[Mar 11, 2020] Does the sun kill the new coronavirus Expert explains

Mar 11, 2020 | cntechpost.com

Special Report: Fighting The New Coronavirus

Can the virus freeze to death at low temperatures? Will it disappear as the temperature rises? With the outbreak of a new coronavirus in Wuhan and across China, there have been more and more recent statements about the virus and temperature.

These judgments lead to different conclusions no matter true or false, but they are widely circulating.

Does the sun kill the new coronavirus? Expert explains-cnTechPost <img alt="Does the sun kill the new coronavirus? Expert explains-cnTechPost" src="https://img.cntechpost.com/images/2020/01/28/071.jpg" />

How resistant is the new coronavirus to temperature? Is it suitable for outdoor activities after fine weather? Ma Ke, deputy chief physician of the Department of Infectious Diseases of Tongji Hospital, answers these questions.

1. Is the new coronavirus more afraid of heat or cold?

Coronavirus is more sensitive to heat.

The virus is moderately stable in a suitable maintenance solution at 4 °C and can be stored for several years at -60 ° C.

However, as the temperature increases, the virus's resistance decreases, but it must reach a certain temperature for a certain time to inactivate the virus.

2. Does the ambient temperature affect the infectivity of the virus? Is there a difference in transmission in different regions (such as Northeast and Hainan)? Will the infectivity of the virus decrease as the temperature rises?

It can survive in different body fluids and even the surface of the object at room temperature for 2-10 days. Temperature mainly affects the survival time of the virus and does not affect its infectious capacity.

Because coronaviruses can be transmitted through respiratory aerosols, inactivating the virus in various ways and adopting multifaceted protective measures can minimize the possibility of infection.

3. How much and how long does the high temperature have a killing effect on the virus? High-temperature environment disinfection? Does turning on air conditioning and heating work?

The virus is sensitive to heat and can effectively inactivate the virus when it reaches a temperature of 56 ° C for 30 minutes. However, it is impossible to achieve the effect of inactivating the virus by raising the ambient temperature by heating with an air conditioner, and the effect of the virus cannot be achieved by heating the temperature.

4. In addition to fear of heat, what is the virus afraid of? (Disinfectant, ethanol, chlorine-containing disinfectant, etc., correct use)

In addition to killing the virus at high temperatures, lipid solvents such as ether, 75% ethanol, chlorine-containing disinfectants, peracetic acid, and chloroform can effectively inactivate the virus.

Air disinfection method:

1. Some people open the window twice a day for 30 minutes each time.

2. When there is an ultraviolet lamp, irradiate the ultraviolet lamp once a day in an unmanned room for more than 1 hour each time.

3. Disinfection method for the surface and ground of environmental objects: use 1000mg / L chlorine-containing disinfectant or peroxyacetic acid and hydrogen peroxide paper towels to wipe and disinfect thoroughly, twice a day.

Experts remind:

First, the sun's irradiation temperature cannot reach 56 degrees, and the intensity of ultraviolet rays in sunlight can not reach the intensity of ultraviolet lamps.

Second, it needs a duration of 56 degrees and 30 minutes, and the ultraviolet lamp is irradiated for 60 minutes. The conditions must be met at the same time, which is difficult to achieve in the ordinary outside environment.

[Mar 11, 2020] COVID-19 (Coronavirus Disease 19) - causes, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, pathology

Good presentation
Feb 14, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Gnarwhal , 2 weeks ago

Excellent video. Well done. I can't tell you how many updates I've seen on this pandemic that have increased my paranoia over the situation. This is genuinely the first that comforted me. Thank you for that

Aimes Seyer , 3 weeks ago (edited)

The number of videos that talk about the coronavirus spreads faster than the coronavirus itself. Better to increase awareness to control it sooner rather than later. RIP to all lives lost to this fight. ❤️

Renn Li , 2 weeks ago

I'd still wear a surgical mask when I'm in crowded, touristy areas, not risking some guy who may be carrying the virus coughing into my face.

Stephen Marquardt , 3 weeks ago

This video is the best video on COVID 19 so far. Very comprehensive. And thank you Dr. Li Wenliang. RIP.

J P , 6 days ago

As a fellow healthcare professional, you have my greatest respect for dedicating your video to Dr. Li Wenliang... brought tears to my eyes to see that. Keep up the good work.

[Mar 11, 2020] Corona Virus COVID-19 Experienced doctor's opinion

He correctly stated "Hysteria is going out the roof"
Mar 04, 2020 | www.youtube.com

Older doctor's assessment of the new Coronavirus. His many years of experience and his opinion of this new "chest flu". They talk about the terrible flu of 1918 when 50 million died.

We have had just as bad "pandemics" since then but we now have antibiotics for the bacterial pneumonia and better hospital care. Few people went into hospitals back then.

The first president to be born in a hospital was Jimmy Carter. Many people still die from world wide infections (called pandemics). HIV and HPV are pandemics also.

[Mar 11, 2020] Coronavirus (COVID-19) What People With Asthma Need to Know

Mar 11, 2020 | community.aafa.org

The CDC has also released new guidelines for people who are at high risk, which includes people with asthma. They recommend people at high risk:

If there is an outbreak in your local community, they also recommend you stay home as much as possible.

With this update, we have also added more questions and answers below from Dr. Mitchell Grayson from AAFA's Medical Scientific Council.

The new coronavirus is estimated to spread at a similar rate to the flu. It is important to take steps to prevent getting sick, like frequent hand-washing and avoiding people who are sick.

In the U.S., flu activity is still high. According to CDC estimates, the flu may have infected as many as 49 million people this season, and as many as 52,000 may have died. If you get sick, it is more likely it is the flu unless you live in an coronavirus outbreak area.

Note: Because this is a constantly changing situation, this data may not represent the most up-to-date numbers as state health departments and the CDC independently confirm infections and deaths. We will update this blog when possible.


The 2019 new coronavirus (also known as COVID-19 or 2019-nCoV) is a hot topic in the news. Now that it has spread to the U.S., you may wonder if you should be concerned. It is a respiratory virus , meaning it affects the lungs, so what do people with asthma need to know?

COVID-19 Cases in the U.S. (according to the CDC as of 3/10/2020)
Travel-related (confirmed) 83
Person-to-person spread (confirmed) 36
Being investigated 528
Total cases 647
What Is Coronavirus (COVID-19)?

A coronavirus is a type of virus that often occurs in animals. Sometimes, it can spread to humans. This is rare.

In December 2019, a new coronavirus started spreading. Experts think people first caught the virus at a fish and live animal market. Now it is spreading from person to person.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), coronavirus symptoms can include:

The CDC believes symptoms may appear two to 14 days after coming in contact with the virus.

As of March 10, 2020, there are more than 113,851 cases of COVID-19 in the world. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared it a global health emergency.

How Is It Spread?

The virus is spread through coughing and sneezing. The virus will be in droplets that are coughed or sneezed out into the air. These are heavy droplets and they quickly fall to the ground/surface below.

People who are within 1 to 2 meters (3 to 6 feet) of someone who is ill with coronavirus may be within the zone that droplets can reach. If someone who is sick coughs or sneezes on your face, you may get infected. This is why it is recommended that people who are sick should cough/sneeze into their elbows or a tissue and throw it away and wash their hands. People who are sick should also wear a mask to help stop the spread of illness.

The coronavirus may also live on surfaces that people have coughed and sneezed on. If you touch a surface with the virus on it and then touch your mouth, nose or eyes, you may get sick.

Who Is at Risk From the Coronavirus?

Most Americans are still at a low risk of getting coronavirus, says the CDC.

At this time, little is known about how the coronavirus affects people with asthma . One study of 140 cases showed no link to asthma. 1 According to the WHO and the CDC, the highest risk groups include:

People with asthma should take precautions when any type of respiratory illness is spreading in their community.

[Mar 10, 2020] How US counts the sick when CDC test kits are unreliable amd by-and-large unavailble?

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Tom_LX , Mar 9 2020 19:35 utc | 23

Posted by: charliechan | Mar 9 2020 19:30 utc | 20

Charli Chan ask right question.

charlie cha wonders how US counts the sick when CDC test kits are unreliable.

and unavailable in quantities necessary !!!!

[Mar 10, 2020] Facebook and idiocy of population

Notable quotes:
"... Nothing speaks more loudly of the dumbed down, idiotic, Fakebook groupthink of the age than the current rush to buy toilet roll as a response to the Coronavirus crisis. ..."
Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Richard , Mar 10 2020 16:40 utc | 150

No need to worry about the corona virus - it'll all be okay as long as you buy enough toilet roll...

Nothing speaks more loudly of the dumbed down, idiotic, Fakebook groupthink of the age than the current rush to buy toilet roll as a response to the Coronavirus crisis.

You've seen it on the tele and (un)social media – supermarket shelves denuded of bog roll and fat birds beating seven shades of sh*t out of each other over the last bag of ass wipe.

I mean, what the hell!? Is this how stupid and pathetic we've become? Someone sees a post on Fakebook that says its a good idea to respond to a potentially fatal virus by buying lots of bog roll and within 5 minutes there's a massive rush on the stuff – after all, you gotta buy it, right, COS IT SAYS SO ON FAKEBOOK...

https://richardhennerley.com/2020/03/10/of-coronavirus-toilet-roll-and-idiocy/

[Mar 10, 2020] The USA is particularly poorly set up to cope with COVID-19 epidemics, thanks to our fragmented public health system and overpriced, privatized and less than comprehensive health care. That bad situation is made worse by the CDC being short on resources and hamstrung further by the Trump Administration's PR imperatives

Mar 10, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

New Wafer Army , March 9, 2020 at 5:29 am

The glue appears at the start of the article:

"the US is particularly poorly set up to cope, thanks to our fragmented public health system and overpriced, privatized and less than comprehensive health care. That bad situation is made worse by the CDC being short on resources and hamstrung further by the Trump Administration's PR imperatives."

Basically, it is expected that Europe manages the crisis less badly.

Eustache de Saint Pierre , March 9, 2020 at 12:18 pm

It has been interesting watching Dr. John Campbell's growing realisation & some shock that everything is not well with the US healthcare system & he has received some abuse but also support from Americans for his growing criticism.

His listing as requested of his 2 degrees & Phd, never mind his long front line experience & his books I think shut some up for perhaps thinking that he was only a nurse, but perhaps he shouda gone to NakedCapitalism.

[Mar 10, 2020] Think before spreading narratives based on outlier views from a few people, try to question yourself as to whether all you're doing is chasing your own confirmation bias, try to find and understand valid reasons why most knowledgeable people are not jumping to the same conclusions

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Sunny Runny Burger , Mar 9 2020 22:17 utc | 65

I think vk is right about what could cause a belief in the narrative of a biological weapon because the narrative itself is utterly pointless; the people claiming it is a weapon don't seem to understand that it makes no positive or meaningful difference whether or not they should turn out to be right.

Not only that but it doesn't help with anything and only makes things worse in that it potentially obstructs from for example the continued search for the intermediary hosts and potential original animal host population which -- if/when identified -- can help avoid future outbreaks. In addition to that they stress and scare people unnecessarily which makes it easier for them to become infected.

Think before spreading narratives based on outlier views from a few people, try to question yourself as to whether all you're doing is chasing your own confirmation bias, try to find and understand valid reasons why most knowledgeable people are not jumping to the same conclusions.

[Mar 10, 2020] When a "name" gets attached to the regular flu season, panic increases exponentially

Mar 10, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

D , 09 March 2020 at 04:32 PM

However, it has been learned when a "name" gets attached to the regular flu season, panic increases exponentially. Particularly when that name gets extended to "Trump's Katrina" or the latest "Trump's Chernobyl".

The real infection is Democrat hysteria, so desperate to get their hands back on the taxpayer's check book.

[Mar 10, 2020] Lots of money to be made by hyping this though. When the market carnage is done with lots of buying opportunities for the rich. Former CDC director working at Merck sold off half her shares in January for millions.

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , Mar 9 2020 22:09 utc | 59

Coronavirus is not a new virus. There are several strains in circulation every year. This is a new strain. Like other cold viruses, it mutates, so nobody ever has full immunity. Thats why flu vaccines have low effectiveness. Thats why people get the flu and colds repeatedly through their lifetimes.

People seem to have little understanding of how our immune system works. Most of us don't need antibodies to fight off a cold or flu virus. Our innate immune system is the first line of defense and for most people sufficient to defeat the virus. Antibodies take up to 2 weeks to be produced in sufficient quantities after infection. While antibodies can help minimize symptoms after reinfection, if the new virus is sufficiently different, something called the original antigenic sin comes into play and can actually cause worse symptoms.

In older people, which are more severely affected by covid-19, an over reaction by the complement system of the innate system is responsible. Due to chronic inflammation due to aging the elderly have more active complement molecules than younger people. When antibodies are produced after a couple of weeks this actually amplifies the complement response and symptoms worsen, followed by death in some cases. Younger people who have no more humoral immunity than older people are not severely affected as they have less inflammation and complement molecules. Indeed young children's immune systems respond differently than adults as their innate immune system works to minimize inflammation.

Now, people like to recite the CFR. Unfortunately, the mortality rate must be calculated by deaths divided by total infections. Confirmed cases are not total infections. Total infections are an order of magnitude higher because mild cases afe not tested and confirmed. The flu mortality figures reported by cdc are not based on testing and confirmed cases, its based on models. If they reported data based on actual testing. There would be far fewer deaths and mortality rate would be higher.

Measles is a good example. In 1963 before vaccines, 400 deaths and 400,000 reported cases. A fatality rate of 1000. However, doctors know that every child got measles during childhood, although most were mild and not reported. So measles infections had to be 4 million a year. This brings the mortality rate to 1/10,000. Big difference.

Outside of hubei, italy and iran, mortality rate based on confirmed cased is under 1%. For those under 50 its less than 0.2%. The actual mortality rate is likely 10 times lower.

So, hate to say it, but Trump is right.

Lots of money to be made by hyping this though. When the market carnage is done with lots of buying opportunities for the rich. Former CDC director working at Merck sold off half her shares in January for millions. Going to be sone choice scraps to buy when markets hit bottom.

[Mar 10, 2020] Analogy with measles

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 10 2020 16:04 utc | 145

@Pft #59
It is interesting that you keep leaving out the numbers of hospitalizations associated with the measles data point you keep repeating.
nCOV isn't extremely dangerous from a guaranteed decimation of the population perspective, it is dangerous because 20% of infected require hospitalization.
If the 20% don't get the respirator support, then decimation can occur (10% dead or more). In the US, there's the extra bonus of the respirator/ICU support being a life-changing financial event for a lot of people.

Here's what the CDC says about measles in 1963: CDC Measles presentation

Close to 500,000 cases were reported annually to CDC, resulting in:
-48,000 hospitalizations
-1,000 cases with encephalitis (brain swelling)
-400 to 500 deaths

So your deaths number is somewhat accurate, if downplayed, but 500K cases of measles, 48,000 hospitalizations and 1000 cases of brain swelling = damage, if not death?
Well, that's certainly nothing to worry about.../sarc

Tom_LX , Mar 10 2020 16:34 utc | 148

Posted by: Pft | Mar 10 2020 12:30 utc | 127

Despite mass vaccination in Germany in 2019 measles ARE BACK !!!!

Measles erupted in the Neuwied district

Use Google Translate

[Mar 10, 2020] Looks like COVID-19 does not like warmweather

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , Mar 10 2020 1:03 utc | 88

Reports out of China say the virus likes cooler temps. This bodes well as we head toward warmer months

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.22.20025791v1

At the risk of incurring Gretas wrath, turn up the heat.

From WHO's latest situation report

Outside Hubei in China/HK/Taiwan, with a population over 1.3 billion people, after over 2 months there were only 13, 000 cases, 116 deaths. CFR 1%. Assuming actual cases underreported, which is likely, CFR is not more than flu. Only 9 new confirmed cases and 2 deaths in last 24 hrs.

In Western Pacific, 8100 cases, 62 deaths, only 2 new deaths last 24 hrs. CFR 0.7% based on confirmed cases

Southeast Asia (warm places)
109 cases, 1 death. 16 new cases 1 death in last 24 hrs.

Americas , 362 cases, 12 deaths (10 from nursing home). CFR may be an outlier as explained below

Europe (ex Italy) 4600 cases, 36 deaths, 0.8%. Last 24 hrs 1300 cases, 11 deaths.

For whatever reason, Iran, Italy, US and Hubei have more cases and higher mortality rates. I'm not sure what they have in common with each other. Hubei has extraordinary pollution and an aging population (as does China as a whole). Irans medical system is probably messed up due to sanctions.
Italy has an aging population.

From the wsj


"In Italy, which has the oldest population in the world after Japan, 58% of Covid-19 patients who died so far were over 80 years old, and a further 31% were in their 70s, according to the National Institute of Health, Italy's disease-control agency.
"If we break it down by age group, our death rates are similar, or even lower, than those reported in China," Giovanni Rezza, the institute's chief epidemiologist, told reporters on Monday. "For better or for worse, we have a very old population."

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj.com/amp/articles/italy-with-elderly-population-has-worlds-highest-death-rate-from-virus-11583785086

Also, "Italy's testing policy also contributes to a higher ratio of deaths compared with known infections, said Mr. Rezza. Italy has so far tested around 54,000 people, but is focusing tests on those with clear symptoms and known contacts with high-risk areas. That means many people who carry the virus but have mild or no symptoms aren't being tested."

And in US (Washington) most of deaths were from a nursing home. Like Italy the high fatality rate in US is probably related to under testing. This is probably true in Iran and Hubei as well.

Take home is to be cautious about CFR. Deaths are probably accurate and should be the best indicator. Globally we have 3800 deaths among 8 billion people, the vast majority of whom are older. Obviously, there will be more but still. Not much reason to panic.

But people are easy to scare, and there is money to be made and power to be seized, so they scare people .


Pft , Mar 10 2020 1:10 utc | 90

Jared@84

They have an untested vaccine, something they were working on for animals for 4 years. There are at least 20 companies beginning testing of vaccines they have developed. None will be ready in the near future, and tests on SARS vaccines in animals suggest those vaccinated might be more susceptible to subsequent infection (flu vaccines are only about 50% effective so vaccinated people get flu), so you would be in worse shape if it was not effective and you get infected

stevelaudig , Mar 10 2020 2:29 utc | 98
Open borders was always a mistake. Tight borders are firebreaks.
Perimetr , Mar 10 2020 4:16 utc | 102
The virus has an extremely high R0 value , calculated to be between 4.7 and 6.6, which makes it as infectious as smallpox and polio.

Coronavirus is spread via aerosols that can travel much further than droplets (several meters at least). This type of spread can allow one infected person sitting in a bus to infect many of the other passengers, even those sitting quite far away. The virus also remains infectious for days on surfaces touched by an infected person.

This means that unless very drastic measures are taken to quarantine and restrict transmission, it will multiply exponentially and will likely overwhelm any healthcare system, including the US healthcare system.
See this video by Chris Martenson The US is in Deep Trouble that explains the exponential spread of the virus. Estimating that there were about 2000 case in the US on March 6, there will likely be 1 million cases in the US by the end of April, and 2 million by the end of the first week May. Because there are only only about 330,000 hospital beds that are open in the US (there are less than 1 million total and less than 100,000 ICU beds), it means that by sometime in May-- at the latest -- all the hospital beds in the US will likely be filled.

The situation will be made much worse because of shortages of masks and medications, which will also cause the infection of many healthcare workers. The US gets 97% of all its medications from China .

The Vice President will be praying for you.

[Mar 10, 2020] Soap is probably more effective or as effective against COVID-19 as alcohol-based hand sanitizer

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Since this is going to be a post about the coronavirus, let's start off with this PSA: wash your hands. These viruses have a lipid envelope that is crucial to their structure and function, and soaps and detergents are thus very effective at inactivating them. It's fast, it's simple, and it's one of the more useful things that any individual can do under these conditions. ..."
"... Since I read this, when I come home, I just grab a plain ordinary bar of soap, and lather up my hands real well, and leave the soap on my hands for 10 or 15 seconds or so. I now believe that ordinary soap is very effective at neutralizing this particular virus. ..."
"... So I will not go out and fight the crowds to buy some 'sanitizer'. At least not for CVD-19. ..."
Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

blues , Mar 10 2020 6:40 utc | 110

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ //
American Association for the Advancement of Science
By Derek Lowe 4 March, 2020
ScienceMag - Pipeline

Since this is going to be a post about the coronavirus, let's start off with this PSA: wash your hands. These viruses have a lipid envelope that is crucial to their structure and function, and soaps and detergents are thus very effective at inactivating them. It's fast, it's simple, and it's one of the more useful things that any individual can do under these conditions.
// ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This involves just a bar of soap.

This fellow is a real hot-shot big-time microbiologist. Since I read this, when I come home, I just grab a plain ordinary bar of soap, and lather up my hands real well, and leave the soap on my hands for 10 or 15 seconds or so. I now believe that ordinary soap is very effective at neutralizing this particular virus.

So I will not go out and fight the crowds to buy some 'sanitizer'. At least not for CVD-19.

I am now also taking:

~6,000IU Vitamin D3
30mg Zinc Gluconate
500mg Vitamin C (this is a low amount)
1,000mcg Vitamin K2
250mg Niacinamide (not just 'niacin')
1 'One-A-Day' high quality vitamin combo

I'm no doctor, but that is what I am taking.


bluedotterel , Mar 10 2020 6:47 utc | 112

uncle tungsten , Mar 10 2020 6:55 utc | 113
blues #111
So I will not go out and fight the crowds to buy some 'sanitizer'. At least not for CVD-19.


There won't be any sanitiser soon.

Recipe for sanitiser:
Ingredients
• 3 TB aloe vera
• 2 TB witch hazel or rubbing alcohol, if using alcohol reduce to 1 TB
• 1/2 tsp vitamin E oil or olive or whatever
• 20 drops tea tree essential oil
• 10 drops lavender essential oil
Instructions
1. Combine all the ingredients in a bowl. Mix well and squeeze through muslin cloth into another bow and store in a small jar or a squeeze tube.

Remedy for toilet paper madness:
install bidet spray and a drying cloth.
Wash cloth daily or whatever.

Krollchem , Mar 10 2020 8:01 utc | 115
blues@111

Good start on enhancing your immune system. Perhaps the following daily additions may help:
(1) increase vitamin C to 1 g and use the liposomal form.
(2) Consider quercitin at 1-2 g per day as it is useful as an anti-viral and supports many metabolic functions (common component in fruits and vegetables).
https://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/a-made-in-canada-solution-to-the-coronavirus-outbreak/
(3)n-acetyl glutathione or the glutathione precurser N acetyl-L-cysteine (NAC) 600-1200 mg as it supports mitrochondrial function and reduces pulmonary fibrosis.
(4)Selenium at 200 mcg to improve thyroid health. Careful as selenium at much higher levels
(5)curcumin as it provides protection from cytokine storms due to viral infections.
(6) omega-3 oils (1-2 g) and avoiding of omega-6 fats which cause inflammation.

[Mar 10, 2020] Encapsulated viruses normally have a protein shell structure, like a geodesic dome, but the overlay this with some of the of the animal cell membrane as it exits the host cell. This is a phospholipid by-layer, so basically fatty. Hence hot water and and washing up liquid do exactly what they do on your greasy plates

Notable quotes:
"... I have graphs from 2009 flu, 1918 flu, Ebola and they all went through the 'Hockey stick' growth phase visible in the daily confirmed case counts in Europe. Humans can mess with this natural pattern with containment measures making artificial problems for the pathogen in finding its next target. ..."
Mar 10, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

robt,

A friend who was a known cellular and structural biologist explained that washing with soap and water is just about the best thing a person can do externally about viruses, as it kills just about everything. In the case of viruses, the soap basically dissolves or penetrates the outside boundary of the virus and it collapses. Unfortunately, my friend passed away not long ago, or he could provide a lot of insight into numerous issues and unanswered questions about this "coronavirus".

One question is whether a virus has a life span or "shelf life", such that after some period of months or time, it ceases to be active, or is mutated out of effective existence. We talked about that once in general terms, but I do not remember clearly what was said, and so I do not want to repeat it here.

JJackson , 09 March 2020 at 06:03 PM

robt,

Encapsulated viruses normally have a protein shell structure, like a geodesic dome, but the overlay this with some of the of the animal cell membrane as it exits the host cell. This is a phospholipid by-layer, so basically fatty. Hence hot water and and washing up liquid do exactly what they do on your greasy plates.

akaPatients NO! I am sorry to be so blunt but what you are saying is dangerous. Seasonal flu has a CFR of 0.02 ish for COVID we do not know yet but I guess about 1% (i.e. your are 50 times more likely to die of it) IF you get a reasonable level of care and hospitalisation if you need it. The 1918 flu pandemic had a CFR of about 2% and killed 25 million people in about as many weeks and 50 million plus overall. The population at the time was under 2 billion and is now 7.8 so these numbers need to be multiplied by 4. The very severe age related CFR curve means this does not fall evenly by age groups and the China data gives the CFR for the over 80s as 20%+ and the over 60s at 8%. I will link the WHO fact finding post which has graphs for age distribution and the Chinese case growth curves.

ulenspiegel is on the money and I will try and explain why below because the point raised is important in the next epidemic phase - which we have not yet entered.

Population dynamics and Epidemiology are mature sciences with well defined rules. If you infect a yeast cell with virus and let it grow in a vat of yeast cells its growth curve looks just like one from an ebola, flu or CoV outbreak. It starts as exponential growth until it meets a problem e.g. most of the cells are dead or the hosts are immune from previous infection at which point it levels off and then declines.

I have graphs from 2009 flu, 1918 flu, Ebola and they all went through the 'Hockey stick' growth phase visible in the daily confirmed case counts in Europe. Humans can mess with this natural pattern with containment measures making artificial problems for the pathogen in finding its next target.

We can also change the CFR through good patient care and the 1% CFR based on Chinese, Korean and the Diamond Princess data are based on this. What ulenspiegel is talking about is what occurs when the patient numbers are such that those who need a bed and oxygen or a ventilator can not get them. Then the fatalities rise very sharply giving a much higher CFR. COVID puts immense strain on some very specific hospital kit for which their is very little surge capacity. PPE is the first item to cause a problem as very few people in a hospital normally need the level of PPE that COVID does and consequently demand is outstripping supply and if not rectified soon HCWs are going to be faced with the dilemma of treating patients, or not, with no protection. If too many get ill polling data shows they will not work and put their families at risk until adequate PPE is available. After PPE the next item that is going to run out is ventilators. As severe double pneumonia is the common symptom for the severe cases the standard treatment is induced coma and mechanical ventilation to oxygenate the blood until the immune system can clear the infection to the point the lungs can take over again. This requires an ICU bed and highly trained staff. England has about 4000 CCs (critical care beds - one level down from ICU but these will include the ICUs) for 50 million population of which 75% are normally in use. In bad flu seasons this capacity will max out.

Which brings us to testing as a containment measure. The aim is stop, or at least slow, spread. If we follow the typical outbreak scenario then patient 0 comes in from outside, he breezes through airport security as he has no temp or symptoms. After a day or two he gets mild general symptoms as the virus begins replicating and may start shedding after another day or two he definitely does not feel well and has a temp then dry cough (normally not a runny nose or much sputum) and suspects COVID and gets tested. It is those 2 or 3 days where he is infecting others that seed the next generation of cases. The trick with contact tracing is finding those contacts and isolating them before they have their turn in spreading the virus. Get to the testing fast and the contact tracing very fast and you can break the transmission chain and end the cluster. Do it repeatedly and you put the epidemic in reverse which frees up more contact tracers so it gets progressively easier to end the epidemic. This is a proven technique that works for most diseases but not flu. China and Korea have used it fairly successfully to bring numbers down to manageable levels but not to stop all transmission. Assuming China can maintain its current case burden they will ONLY have had 100,000 cases in 1.4 billion or 0.1% of the population. If the disease gets out of control this could grow to 20% or more so we are in the very early stages of a full blown pandemic if we can not control it the daily case counts could reach the 100s of thousands. This is not something any of our health systems could cope with and most severe cases would die without ever getting near a hospital. Even if we can not stop it making sure bad city clusters come one after the other - where help can come in from outside - and not in parallel will help spread the load over time so the surge limit is not badly overrun for any length of time.

[Mar 10, 2020] Those virus that have lipid coats are rendered non-infectious when exposed to detergents (i.e. soaps) especially in warm water.

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

ToivoS , Mar 9 2020 22:10 utc | 60

Brewster #30 writes : "But, viruses do not have lipid coats."

Absolutely incorrect. Many viruses do NOT have lipid coats but many other do. And those that do have such coverings are rendered non-infectious when exposed to detergents (i.e. soaps) especially in warm water.

[Mar 10, 2020] The coronavirus that causes Covid-19 can linger in the air for at least 30 minutes and travel up to 4.5 metres further than the "safe distance" advised by health authorities around the world, according to a study by a team of Chinese government epidemiologists.

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

jonku , Mar 10 2020 15:47 utc | 141

The original article about coronavirus in the air, quoting a peer-reviewed study in the journal Practical Preventive Medicine:

South China Morning Post .

The article states the peer-reviewed study was withdrawn by the journal, no other explanation given:


Note: The study at the centre of this article on the transmission of the coronavirus was retracted on Tuesday by the journal Practical Preventive Medicine without giving a reason. The South China Morning Post has reached out to the paper's authors and will update the article.

The coronavirus that causes Covid-19 can linger in the air for at least 30 minutes and travel up to 4.5 metres – further than the "safe distance" advised by health authorities around the world, according to a study by a team of Chinese government epidemiologists.

The researchers also found that it can last for days on a surface where respiratory droplets land, raising the risk of transmission if unsuspecting people touch it and then rub their face.

[Mar 10, 2020] Time honored recipe for hand or any utensil sanitizer in the absence of alternatives: 80 proof vodka

Mar 10, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

frances , Mar 10 2020 16:58 utc | 152

@uncle tungsten | Mar 10 2020 6:55 utc | 113

I am considering my father's time honored recipe for hand or any utensil sanitizer in the absence of alternatives: 80 proof vodka:)

Just pop a hand pump dispenser in the top and voila!

He swore by it anyway.

[Mar 10, 2020] In order to become infected in warm/hot weather a higher virus load is necessary and the possibility for a mild or very mild infection is higher.

Mar 10, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Ignacio , March 9, 2020 at 8:46 am

On surfaces SARS CoV 1 has shown to retain infectivity for longer when these are dry. Then, you cannot separate easily the effects of humidity and temperature but usually the higher the temperature, the higher the absolute humidity, and this means our epithelial mucosae are better hydrated and less susceptible to infection, in part probably because protective microflora in good shape helps to protect us.

So, in order to become infected in warm/hot weather a higher virus load is necessary and the possibility for a mild or very mild infection is higher.

I personally think that passing a mild cough these summer would be preferable to something more serious next winter, though I am not sure if a mild infection would trigger a protective immune response.

[Mar 10, 2020] The factors leading to a fatal lung infection: is either because the immune response is slow, and let the virus multiply too much in the lungs, or there are several infections occurring at the same time, and even if the immune system reaction time is normal, there are too much virus in the lungs after that time.

Mar 10, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Charles 2 , March 9, 2020 at 7:50 am

This article gives a very cogent identification of the factors leading to a fatal lung infection. To distill it in few words : it is either because the immune response is slow, and let the virus multiply too much in the lungs, or there are several infections occurring at the same time, and even if the immune system reaction time is normal, there are too much virus in the lungs after that time.

In both cases, the immune system response to too much virus triggers an irreversible necrosis of lung tissues.

Young and healthy fatalities clearly belong to the second group, and explain why young Doctors and Nurses are impacted.

Therefore the strategy must be self isolation of fragile people (old is not equivalent to fragile, both way, and yes, being immuno-depressed by chemo sucks, it is really being thrown between a rock and a hard place), and frequent rotation of healthcare workers. Ideally, one should have them work one day, then send them home three days, test and send back to work is negative.

Another way is too have 2 health systems, one for the virus, one for the rest. This is what one of the main hospital in Paris did : they installed their reception and triage area in a tent separate from the rest of the hospital

For others, lowering the absolute quantity of virus to which they are exposed when they contract the virus is essential : open these windows if you can !

Eclair , March 9, 2020 at 11:02 am

Clive, as an almost-80 year old myself, I appreciate your care for your mother-in-law. I have been touched by the daily concern of my son and daughter-in-law, as they check in with me a couple of times a day, offer to do grocery shopping, drop off little bags of herbal tea and chocolate cookies. It means a lot.

Last night, I had read the 'testimony' of the hospital physician in Bergamo, whom Yves quotes above. One thing to watch for is the speed at which this virus results in respiratory distress (and this was mentioned by the Seattle-area care home staff recently; a patient was symptomatic but not distressed, then, boom, they can't breathe, and they die.)

The Bergamo doctor explains the difference between the 'normal' seasonal flu and this virus: " in classical flu, besides that it infects much less population over several months, cases are complicated less frequently: only when the virus has destroyed the protective barriers of our airways and as such it allows bacteria (which normally resident in the upper airways) to invade the bronchi and lungs, causing a more serious disease. Covid 19 causes a banal flu in many young people, but in many elderly people (and not only) a real SARS because it invades the alveoli of the lungs directly, and it infects them making them unable to perform their function. The resulting respiratory failure is often serious and after a few days of hospitalization, the simple oxygen that can be administered in a ward may not be enough. "

[Mar 10, 2020] The real story is how over a billion people fully believe the official narrative of the virus growth and how this huge portion of the population can now be coaxed to move in any direction by closely-knit groups controlling political and institutional power.

Mar 10, 2020 | www.unz.com

Jon Baptist , says: Show Comment March 4, 2020 at 5:22 pm GMT

Great in-depth research by Hall.

"You want [the audience] to accept, no matter how outrageous what's going on." – https://www.neh.gov/article/fake-news-orson-welles-war-worlds-80

The real story is how over a billion people fully believe the official narrative of the virus growth and how this huge portion of the population can now be coaxed to move in any direction by closely-knit groups controlling political and institutional power. Who owns the broadcast and publishing rights? Who dictates what is being transmitted over the airwaves?

What kind of emotional footprint and controlling mechanism has been placed on the underdeveloped minds of the youth throughout the world? Who has the power to manipulate these kids in the future by using a fabricated fear of acquiring a mysterious virus?

"We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of." – https://archive.org/details/BernaysPropaganda/page/n3/mode/2up

"The medium is the message" – Marshall McLuhan

[Mar 10, 2020] Cautionary note about the claims of Francis Boyle

Mar 10, 2020 | www.unz.com

Antiwar7 , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 5:57 am GMT

Cautionary note: before getting too excited about the claims of Francis Boyle, one should be aware that during the Bosnian War (1992–1995), Boyle took at face value all the wildly exaggerated disinformation put out by the Bosnian Muslim government side. Ask the Saker about how truthful that stuff was; he was in a position to know.

As such, I question Boyle's judgement. Though perhaps this coronavirus issue is closer to his area of expertise.

Been_there_done_that , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 10:20 am GMT
This essay is interesting for the contextual background information it provides but should have been presented earlier since it is no longer completely up-to-date. For instance, there are no references to the recent viral outbreaks in Iran and Italy, which have become comparatively severe. Also, though Prof. Boyle is mentioned more than a dozen times, it does not cite the live interview he gave nearly three weeks ago*, in which he stated that he was revising his prior suspicion that the Wuhan coronavirus could have come from stolen material from the Winnipeg lab and was instead almost certain that a key component came from a university lab in North Carolina, which was then enhanced ("gain of function", another key term not in this essay) in Wuhan to be more "effective" (deadly).

It would be nice to read a follow-up report that provides revelations pertaining to more recent developments regarding this topic. Surely the hundreds of deaths in Europe in the past weeks could not possibly have been primarily of eastern Asiatic victims, so if this is basically still the same virus that initially emerged in Wuhan, it was likely not designed to be race-specific. This is yet another indication that would tend to invalidate the conjecture about an intentional release by American operatives during the time of the Wuhan military games. (See link below regarding this debate in the comments.)

* See my comments in a parallel thread for the interview links (video and transcript) provided:

https://www.unz.com/pgiraldi/who-made-coronavirus-was-it-the-u-s-israel-or-china-itself/

[Mar 10, 2020] On Friday, Macron urged the French to limit visits to elderly people, who are most vulnerable to a coronavirus infection.

Mar 10, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Clive , March 9, 2020 at 6:56 am

Thus far, the WHO is sticking to its line that:

Those most at risk for severe influenza infection are children, pregnant women, elderly, those with underlying chronic medical conditions and those who are immunosuppressed. For COVID-19, our current understanding is that older age and underlying conditions increase the risk for severe infection.

And in France, Macron is saying similar :

Macron urges limits to visiting elderly

On Friday, Macron urged the French to limit visits to elderly people, who are most vulnerable to a coronavirus infection.

Macron admitted this could prove "heartbreaking" at times but said the measure was simply one of common sense.

He emphasised that young people should not be visiting the old because "as we know, they (the young) transmit the virus a lot".

Those who died in France so far have been old with pre-existing conditions.

The French president shook up his agenda last week to include a visit to an old age home, where he stressed his government's commitment to helping those most vulnerable to the disease.

"Our absolute priority is to protect the people who are the most fragile in the face of this virus," Macron said. "The nation is behind our old people."

They could all be lying or misleading by omission or selectivity, of course.

Same in the U.K. and on the Diamond Princess -- deaths were in the older cohort.

That isn't to say that some young people won't get sick and some won't get serious illnesses and some won't die. But so far, the reliable (i.e. non-China) data does continue to support the age-indicator for the likelihood of morbidity.

What is -- and continues to be -- a big mystery is the lack of deaths in Germany.

[Mar 09, 2020] The Great Chinese Bat Flu Panic of 2020 Dissident Voice

Mar 09, 2020 | dissidentvoice.org

Pray for me, my friends, because I have the flu

... ... ...

Or, I don't know, maybe it is the Bat Flu. The more I read the corporate press, the more I'm beginning to suspect it is. My suspicion isn't based on facts. I don't have any of the Bat Flu symptoms. It's just a feeling like the feelings people had that Saddam had secret WMDs, and that Trump was a Russian intelligence asset, and that the world was going to end in the year 2012.

OK, those feelings turned out to be wrong, but this one feels like an accurate feeling, and not like just the result of being relentlessly bombarded with hysterical headlines, pictures of people in hazmat suits, and obsessively researching ever-changing, wildly-varying statistics on the Internet, which I really need to stop doing that.

... ... ...

Plus, even if I just have the flu (i.e., the regular flu, not the Chinese Bat Flu), the statistics on that are pretty scary. I don't know the numbers here in Germany, but, according to the CDC , since 2010, in the United States, the regular old garden variety flu has resulted in the following, annually:

When you multiply all those numbers by 10 (because it's been 10 years since 2010), you get:

That's 450 million possible cases and over half a million deaths, and that's just in the United States! To make it concrete, if you stood all those dead people on top of each other, head to toe, so that everyone was standing on everyone's head, and used them as an enormous ladder, you could climb to the moon and back four times or once or twice at the very least.

And that's nothing compared to this Covid-19!

No, according to The Guardian , Covid-19 is "about ten times more deadly than the seasonal flu," so that's 610,000 deaths just this year, and if the CDC tracks it for a full 10 years, that's pretty close to 6 million dead people, which will make it just as bad as the Holocaust (although the Holocaust only lasted four years, so I'll have to adjust my math for that).

And, remember, that's just in the United States, which is only 4.25 percent of the total global population. So you multiply the Holocaust by 95 percent (you can round the numbers to make this easier) and you end up with 7 billion dead people, which is nearly every last person on Earth, except for 700 million people! Which, OK, that sounds like a lot of people (i.e., the 700 million, not the 7 billion), but it's fewer than there were in the 14th Century; i.e., before the "Black Death" plague killed everybody!

... ... ...

Or, I don't know, maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe I just have the flu. I mean, what if this whole Corona thing is just nature doing what nature does and not the end of civilization? Look, I don't want to sound paranoid, but I can't help wondering whether this virus warrants all the mass hysteria that the corporate media have been pumping out at us, relentlessly, for the last two months, and the states of emergency that are being declared, and the quarantines that are going into effect, and the curfews, and banning of public gatherings, and whatever other "emergency measures" are going to be imposed in the coming weeks and months.

C. J. Hopkins is an award-winning American playwright, novelist and political satirist based in Berlin. His plays are published by Bloomsbury Publishing and Broadway Play Publishing, Inc. His dystopian novel, Zone 23 , is published by Snoggsworthy, Swaine & Cormorant. Volume I of his Consent Factory Essays is published by Consent Factory Publishing, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Amalgamated Content, Inc. He can be reached at cjhopkins.com or consentfactory.org . Read other articles by C. J. .

[Mar 09, 2020] Simply 17 coronavirus jokes to help take the edge off (a little bit) The Poke

Mar 09, 2020 | thepoke.co.uk

Just been sensibly stocking up on 45 packets of pasta and noticed a lot of idiots panic buying.

-- Simon Blackwell (@simonblackwell) March 6, 2020

To be honest, staff at my local Sainsburys were under the assumption that I've been panic buying alcohol for the last four and a half years. #coronavirusUK #toiletpaperpanic

(@thatjimdavis) March 6, 2020

The guy who invented hand sanitiser must be rubbing his hands together right now

-- Kate PT3 (@KateMMA3) March 5, 2020

[Mar 09, 2020] President Trump's (and by extension, prayerful Vice President Pence's) incompetence and his self-serving, empathy-free approach to the coronavirus

Notable quotes:
"... This article first appeared NewVandal . ..."
Mar 09, 2020 | www.counterpunch.org

As COVID-19 begins its inevitable "community transmission" phase around the United States, the purveyors of the conventional wisdom are largely focused on President Trump's (and by extension, prayerful Vice President Pence's) incompetence and his self-serving, empathy-free approach to the coronavirus. And it is true that, as with all things Trump, it seems that all he really cares about is the stock market and its effect on his reelection bid. But Trump's narcissism obscures something both far more pernicious and far more permanent than his oft-televised obsession with himself and that's the fact that he's been busily making Milton Friedman's "Supply Side/The Bottom Line Is The Only Line" dream an intractable reality.

It was a dream that first took flight when Ronald Reagan was elected in 1980. The dream was often made manifest by the neoliberal lurch and deregulatory impulses of President Bill Clinton. But it is Trump who's come closest to fully realizing the dream of ending responsive government. It should come as no surprise, though. Trump lifted, among other things , his " Make America Great Again " slogan from the Gipper. He's also taken Reagan's anti-FDR pitch about the dangers of government (see "The Deep State") and, with the help of a motley crew of Tea Partiers, Evangelicals and corporate Republicans, transformed it into, as Steve Bannon calls it, a " War on the Administrative State ."

Since taking office and taking complete control of the news-cycle, Trump has been systematically starving Federal agencies of resources, personnel and attention. He has, through the sycophants and lobbyists he's installed around the Executive Branch, been pushing out career professionals and barely replacing them with also-rans. And he is dismantling every aspect of government he cannot use to reward his corporate clients or punish political apostates.

The idea is to cripple the Federal government from within instead of doing the hard legislative work of changing the laws that legally compel government action. As a result, many of the regulations on the books are becoming functionally irrelevant . Some laws are being rewritten by the lobbyists who used to lobby against 'em, but mostly the Executive Branch is being systematically emaciated by the political equivalent of chronic wasting disease.

It's an approach first pioneered by Reagan devotee Grover Norquist, who advocated " starving the beast " of government down to a manageable size before "drowning it" in a bathtub. It's an idea currently being implemented with wide-ranging effect by Trump, who, like Reagan before him , is accelerating the bankrupting of the already debt-laden treasury with a combo of tax cuts and massive spending on a world-dwarfing defense industry. Eventually, the theory goes, the "safety net," a.k.a. "entitlements," and other "common good" spending will collapse under the weight of the financial limitations generated by profuse borrowing to fund market-distorting tax cuts and to dole out subsidies and tax gifts to cronies and key corporations. All the while, the ever-less regulated chemical, oil, defense, agricultural and (most importantly of all) financial industries will continue to hoard assets through the rinsing and repeating of the supply side boom-and-bust scheme, a.k.a. the business cycle.

Frankly, this all looks like the endgame of a long plan to undo the demand side economy created by the New Deal. Along with the seemingly (but not) contradictory spike in Unitary Executive power (which is about protecting rackets, shielding enforcers from prosecution and about enforcing political compliance), this is a transformation decades in the making and Trump is the perfect salesman for this final episode even better than Reagan or Clinton because his "flood the zone" narcissism is the ultimate, 24/7 distraction for a people addicted to binge watching, inured to scripted reality shows and motivated by belligerent infotainment.

Reagan was the first actor to hit his marks on a stage set for him by the interlocking forces of Big Oil, Big Defense and Wall Street. Not coincidentally, this same Venn Diagram of power has profited mightily from Trump's Presidency. Rather than an actor, though, Trump is the barking emcee of the final season of the American Dream Gameshow a program that was initially cancelled in 1980, but somehow kept running in syndication on one of the two crappy channels a "free" people have been given to chose from. But now, the final credits are closer to rolling that ever before.

As such, Trump is the omega to Reagan's alpha. And any coronavirus-related "incompetence" you see being reported is a feature, not a bug, of this Re-Great'd America. And that's because Trump is not an outlier. He is a culmination.

This article first appeared NewVandal .

JP Sottile is a freelance journalist, published historian, radio co-host and documentary filmmaker (The Warning, 2008). His credits include a stint on the Newshour news desk, C-SPAN, and as newsmagazine producer for ABC affiliate WJLA in Washington. His weekly show, Inside the Headlines w/ The Newsvandal, co-hosted by James Moore, airs every Friday on KRUU-FM in Fairfield, Iowa. He blogs under the pseudonym " the Newsvandal ".

[Mar 09, 2020] What Are the Symptoms of a Coronavirus Infection

"The coronavirus seems to be more deadly than seasonal flu and almost as contagious"
Fever and dry cough are the most reliable symptoms: "The World Health Organization believes that only about 1 percent of cases never develop a fever or any other symptoms."
Mar 09, 2020 | www.nytimes.com
What symptoms should I look out for?

Symptoms of this infection include fever, a dry cough, fatigue and difficulty breathing or shortness of breath. The illness causes lung lesions and pneumonia. Some of these symptoms overlap with those of the flu, making detection difficult, but runny noses and stuffy sinuses are not normally among the first symptoms.

Patients may also exhibit gastrointestinal problems or diarrhea. Most people fall ill five to seven days after exposure, but symptoms may appear in as few as two days or as many as 14 days .

In some cases, people who had appeared stable rapidly deteriorate in the second week ; anyone infected needs careful monitoring.

How does the virus spread?

The new coronavirus seems to spread very easily , especially in confined spaces like homes, hospitals, churches and cruise ships. It appears to spread through droplets in the air and on surfaces from a cough or sneeze.

Whether a surface looks dirty or clean is irrelevant . If an infected person coughs and a droplet lands on a surface, a person who then touches that surface could pick it up.

A study of other coronaviruses found that they remained on metal, glass and plastic for two hours to nine days . But there is good news: The virus is relatively easy to destroy using any simple disinfectant or bleach.

Droplets can sit on the surfaces of latex gloves. Some experts suggest wearing cloth or leather gloves that absorb droplets and are bulky enough to discourage you from touching your face .

Will the virus disappear in the summer?

That is still unknown. This is a new virus, and everyone is believed to be susceptible.

Flu transmission decreases in hot weather every year, and the SARS coronavirus emerged in winter and was eliminated by the following June. But SARS was beaten by aggressive containment measures, not by the weather. The four mild coronaviruses that cause common colds still circulate in warm weather and cause “summer colds.”

In the 1918 and 2009 flu pandemics, there was a second wave in the fall.

[Mar 09, 2020] Coronavirus Doc in Wuhan High Blood Pressure Is Major Death Risk

Mar 09, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

Patients with hypertension appear to be at a higher risk of dying from the coronavirus, said a top Chinese intensive care doctor who's been treating critically ill patients since mid-January.

While there's been no published research yet explaining why, Chinese doctors working in Wuhan, the central Chinese city where the virus first emerged, have noticed that infected patients with that underlying illness are more likely to slip into severe distress and die.

Of a group of 170 patients who died in January in Wuhan -- the first wave of casualties caused by a pathogen that's now raced around the world -- nearly half had hypertension.

"That's a very high ratio," said Du Bin, director of the intensive care unit at Peking Union Medical College Hospital, in an interview with Bloomberg over the phone from Wuhan. He was among a team of top doctors sent to the devastated city two months ago to help treat patients there.

[Mar 09, 2020] How did the virus come to the United States?

Mar 09, 2020 | www.unz.com

Godfree Roberts , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 11:28 am GMT

This just in, from Dr. Emily Landon, University of Chicago Medicine
https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/prevention-and-screening-articles/wuhan-coronavirus :

Q. How did the virus come to the United States?

A. The first known patients in the U.S. contracted the virus while traveling in other countries or after exposure to someone who had been to China or one of the other affected areas. But now, a few cases here cannot be traced to these risk factors. This is concerning because it suggests the illness may be spreading across communities for which the source of infection is unknown, which we call community spread/transmission. We don't know how severe this will be, but it may cause significant disruptions in our daily lives.

[Mar 09, 2020] MSM are selling coronavirus fears for good money

Mar 09, 2020 | www.unz.com

Johnny Walker Read , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 6:09 pm GMT

Investigative journalist Jon Rappoport stated that death by itself does not equal coronavirus, and that the word 'death' is being matched with the virus to make people believe in lethal outbreaks. He analyzed the nine deaths in Washington state and revealed that the body count included "presumed" coronavirus deaths that could have other causes. It is unknown whether the people who died were treated with toxic anti-viral drugs or whether they had preexisting lung conditions.

https://needtoknow.news/2020/03/patient-deaths-are-deployed-to-sell-the-coronavirus-story/

[Mar 09, 2020] Elon Musk Calls Coronavirus Panic 'Dumb'

Mar 09, 2020 | dailycaller.com

"Virality of C19 is overstated due to conflating diagnosis date with contraction date & over-extrapolating exponential growth, which is never what happens in reality," he said in a tweet Sunday, noting that people mistakenly believe the rate of spread will continue exponentially.

Musk added : "Fatality rate also greatly overstated. Because there are so few test kits, those who die with respiratory symptoms are tested for C19, but those with minor symptoms are usually not. Prevalence of coronaviruses & other colds in general population is very high!"

U.S. officials are taking the matter seriously , telling people to prepare for the worst if the virus spreads.

California, for one, is monitoring at least 8,400 people who might have come into contact with the virus, California Gov. Gavin Newsom said during a news conference Thursday.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned Americans on Tuesday to prepare for the "expectation that this might be bad," with Italy emerging as the focal point of the virus in Europe, while Iran and China seeks ways of fighting the spread as confirmed cases grow.

[Mar 09, 2020] Like Russian oligarchs on crossing the border Chinese's criminals escaping justice instantly became freedom fighters

Mar 09, 2020 | www.unz.com

denk , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 5:20 pm GMT

The relationship of this pandemic to internal disagreements within China has been put on full display in Steve Bannon's coverage of the crisis entitled War Room: Pandemic. A prominent member of US President Donald Trump's inner circle, Steve Bannon is often accompanied on the daily show by Chinese billionaire dissident , Miles Guo (aka Guo Wengui, Miles Haoyun, Miles Kwok)

.

You mean Chinese billionaire fugitive , wanted in China for fraud, embezzlement and rape

Guo is an outspoken Chinese refugee . He is a persistent critic of virtually every facet of the policies and actions of the Chinese Communist Party.

Some refugee !

'outspoken critic of CCP

I'd presume that 'political exiles' like Guo's well being in the [[[Washington cesspool]]] depends on his performance as an 'outspoken former insider' ?

HEHEHHE

[Mar 09, 2020] Since the death toll* has not been commensurate with the scare propaganda -- completely disproportionate -- something else seems to be behind the propaganda.

Mar 09, 2020 | www.unz.com

Anon [369] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 2:20 pm GMT

@Anon

I think a lot of people here are leaning towards USrael -- developed in Fort Derrick and Haifa.

Sorry, Fort Detrick (autocorrect).

Since the death toll* has not been commensurate with the scare propaganda -- completely disproportionate -- something else seems to be behind the propaganda. Either it was seized upon for political and/or geostrategic purposes or it is a bio-weapon and its source let it be known through back channels that this is DEFCON-1 level serious.

*The worldwide death toll from 3 years of the Coronavirus-SARS in the early to mid-2000's was equivalent to the number of death in 3 days of the flu in the U.S. As someone else posted here, on the worst day for coronavirus (02/10/20) there were 108 deaths from Coronavirus in China. Meanwhile on that same day there where 450 deaths from the flu in the U.S. On that day there were more deaths from snakebites than Coronavirus.

[Mar 09, 2020] Behaviour of mediccal personnel in Wuhan was exemplary. They demonstrated a lot of courage in a very difficult, fuzzy situation. Several young medics died.

Mar 09, 2020 | www.unz.com

Godfree Roberts , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 10:28 am GMT

@Thomasina I've asked my Chinese friends to look into Dr. Li's death and will get back to you if they turn up anything.

There have been at least 18 reported deaths of medical workers involved in the COVID-19 response as of Monday, including nurses and doctors who died–not because of infection but because of cardiac arrest or other ailments due to overwork and fatigue. One was hit by a car while taking temperatures on a highway.

The most recent were three doctors who died in one day, all infected with COVID-19. One of them, Xia Sisi, a gastroenterologist in Wuhan, was 29. Another physician, Peng Yinhua, also 29, died in Wuhan of infection on Feb. 20. He had delayed his Feb. 1 wedding, promising his pregnant fiancee they'd have the ceremony after the outbreak had passed.

Most of the infected medical workers are in Hubei, many of them part of the initial response in Wuhan, when shortages of protective gear, understaffed hospitals and transportation shutdowns collided with an overwhelming number of patients. The stories of doctors and nurses tell of clever improvisation and quiet perseverance in a war against a mysterious virus.

A doctor in Wuhan told The Times in a phone interview Jan. 29 that 12 out of 59 doctors in his hospital were showing symptoms of the virus, including lung infections -- but continued to treat patients while wearing insufficient protective gear.

Mustapha Mond , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 1:35 pm GMT
@Godfree Roberts My wife is Chinese and keeping daily tabs on what is going on there.

Bottom line: these doctors in China are heroes, working their asses off nearly round the clock. They are in the front lines, severely over-worked and ultra stressed out trying to save the lives of their fellow countrymen. If there is a recipe for a young person with no other risk factors to become susceptible to the virus, this is it.

Although I hope so, I wonder if our doctors here in America would be so fearless and patriotic to undergo the rigors and risks these Chinese doctors are doing, especially if it was without substantial 'hazard pay' above their already very generous remunerations.

Let's hope we don't have to find out ..

[Mar 09, 2020] HIV-1 did not contribute to the 2019-nCoV genome

Mar 09, 2020 | www.unz.com

utu , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 6:06 am GMT

Dr. Shoham [the Israeli academic] notes that the government of China became a signatory in 1984 to UN's Biological Weapons Convention of 1972.

Too bad that the author did not mention that Israel is not a signatory to UN's Biological Weapons Convention.

The heart of the essay introducing readers to the genesis of China's biological warfare capacities highlights a speech given in 2005 by Chi Hoatian, an important General in the People's Liberation Army.

Wasn't the author alarmed by the audacity of content of the alleged speech? Who actually made available the speech in 2005? Wasn't it The Epoch Times, the press organ of Falun Gong? Imo, the speech does not pass the smell test to be authentic. It is a psyop.

Zero Hedge was permanently deplatformed by the corporate censors at Twitter

I get an impression that for the author the fact of deplatforming alone somehow legitimizes Zero Hedge and by extension Senator Cotton, Indian propaganda outfit GreatGameIndia, Steve Bannon and ultimately the busybody Israeli operative Dr. Dany Shoham. Is it possible that this deplatforming was intentional to make the conspiracy theory pushed by Zero Hedge that China did it more appealing than the other conspiracy theory that China was attacked by the external enemy?

The initial findings of the researchers have been published on line in a paper entitled, "Uncanny Similarity of Unique Inserts in the 2019-nCoV Spike Protein to HIV-1 gp120 and Gag." At the time of writing this essay, the University of Delhi's much-smeared contribution to COVID-19 research continues to be available on the line even though it is still making its way through the process of peer review with possible future revisions.

Here is more recent Chinese response to it

HIV-1 did not contribute to the 2019-nCoV genome
Emerg Microbes Infect. 2020 Dec;9(1):378-381. doi: 10.1080/22221751.2020.1727299.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32056509

[Mar 09, 2020] Dr Li actual story is different from presented by MSM

Mar 09, 2020 | www.unz.com

Godfree Roberts , says: Show Comment March 4, 2020 at 11:43 pm GMT

Great survey. Some quibbles:

Before going down himself in the line of duty, Dr. Li faced a harsh reprimand from representatives of the Chinese Communist Party. Dr. Li was accused of spreading rumors and illegally threatening the social order with his tweets and posts and personal interventions. Nevertheless, Dr. Li was soon vindicated in calling attention to the coming plague .

Not really. Li was a junior ophthalmologist at a Wuhan hospital who overheard a rumor that SARS had broken out again. Li did not inform China's CDC, which was already investigating it. Instead, Li used social media to repeat the rumor to family and friends and they told their friends .

Li was wrong professionally: it was not SARS, as he asserted in his tweets. Li was wrong legally: it is illegal to spread rumors likely to cause panic. Li was neither harshly questioned nor convicted of anything. After an hour of questioning the police concluded that he had merely acted irresponsibly and he was allowed to return to work.

The Wuhan Coronavirus epidemic of 2020 is causing the once-firm ground beneath many established institutions to shake uncontrollably. One of those institutions, the Chinese communist government, is encountering its Chernobyl moment .

Every multilateral public health body that has studied the outbreak has praised the timeliness, thoroughness, and effectiveness of China's response. Don't be fooled by our media's selective use of outbursts on Chinese social media. This may be seen as much a triumph for China as a failure for its principal critic, the US. China's government was, and remains, the most trusted on earth.

The fact that ground zero of the Novel Coronavirus is Wuhan, home of China's newest and most sophisticated microbiology laboratory, naturally casts a shadow of doubt over narratives minimizing the role of human agency in creating the new strain of Coronavirus .

Ron Unz's comments, above, cast a much darker shadow, given America's track record of waging biological warfare on China, Cuba, et al.

Clearly the Party initially failed the people by not intervening early and decisively enough after the first cases of Coronavirus illness began to show up .

The Chinese Communist Party took half the time to intervene in this outbreak that the American Capitalist Party took to intervene in the its home-brewed H1N1 outbreak. See the two timelines here: https://youtu.be/rJiKxV4rTCQ

Jeremygg5 , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 4:42 am GMT
Dr Li Wenliang was NOT a whistleblower. He wrote to his private chat group about the re-emergence of SARS at 5:35pm on Dec 30 2019.

However the health authority of Wuhan received the genetic report of the virus earlier the day, and released two official announcements the same day afternoon to thousands of medical personnel. Dr Li was an eye doctor and probably saw the memo, and wrote to his private chat group saying that it was SARS. He was reprimanded because the disease was still unknown at that time.

Two emergency notices issued on Dec 30:

d dan , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 5:34 am GMT
@Tony Hall

" Dr. Li who was reprimanded for refusing to go along with the CCP denial of the Novel Coronavirus's existence."

What a dumb author who still can manage to make two mistakes in half a sentence, even after so many rounds of clarifications by so many people.

CCP did not deny the existence of COVID-19, they were investigating it at that time. And Dr Li was not reprimand for refusing to go along, but was reprimanded because he was shouting fire in a crowded cinema, a type of speech that US Supreme Court won't allow too.

"Nathan Rich might try explaining not only the block on Facebook in China but the nature of the larger Internet firewall."

Nathan Rich did explain about the blocking on Facebook in China:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/f2srfDwM2sQ?feature=oembed

Just to smash on the head of those ignorant clowns: China didn't block Facebook, Google or others. These companies refuse to obey Chinese laws. That is the reason they can't operate in China. For example, Facebook refuses to remove hundreds of hate-China groups (7:50 of the video), including some that advocate using violence to destroy China. It is a flagrant violation of Chinese laws. If Facebook dare to allow violent hate-US groups, you think it won't be banned in US too?

This, of course, is in contrast to Huawei, who agrees to obey every single US law but yet is still banned to operate in US.

Parfois1 , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 6:43 am GMT
@Tony Hall

I look at the treatment of Dr. Li who was reprimanded for refusing to go along with the CCP denial of the Novel Coronavirus's existence. The attack on Dr. Li as a Chinese version of a "conspiracy theorist," when he was in fact a whistle blower, speaks to me of similar patterns I perceive in the West. Dr. Li is a symbol of the assault on free expression on both China and the so-called West.

You took no notice of Godfree Roberts clarification about Li's involvement, namely the fact that he was spreading a rumour about which he had no authority or expertise to speak about when the medical competent bodies were still studying the nature of the viral infections. He was wrong on both counts anyway: by spreading a rumour and that it was a false rumour. Besides, as far as I remember the sequence of events, by the time the rumour started the medical authorities were about to, or in the cusp of, making a public announcement about the virus.

It was a minor issue anyway – the fellow was reprimanded, not shot. Why bloviating it out of all proportions?!!! Because the capitalist mass media did it, the Chinese billionaire dit it, and Tony Hall must also do it?

I also note the tendentious lean of your comment by the crude reference to the Chinese Communist Party as if this issue is a political contest. China has a properly constituted government like any country and a functioning department of health to deal with health issues. The Communist Party has no function to perform here or anywhere in the public administration.

Your comment suggests only an ignorant or malevolent intention, probably both. Perhaps these are harsh words, possibly meant to impress on you the importance of using language appropriately and properly to be credible.

Anon [310] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment March 9, 2020 at 7:19 am GMT
I've never trusted this Dr.Li story to be honest, it made my internal fake meter go off big time. In fact this whole corona virus issue seems like badly done deep state propaganda. All of the evidence that we have so far, both from the main stream sources like Governments and from the alternative sources like social media is fishy at best. Of course you have some videos where you see people who are genuinely worried and in some cases terrified. But how do we know these people are not simply fooled by the propaganda themselves, or are perhaps deep state actors? We all know how easily people are fooled.

I'll be the first to admit that my suspicions are wrong if and when I witness real proof of a pandemic, but as of now, I don't buy any of it, none, ziltch.

Now that being said, there is zero doubt that something big is afoot! And that whatever the case may be, it is all being done with extreme intention. That is obvious.

Whether this op is sinister or not? Well as good book teaches us to do, I'll judge by the fruits that spring forth once the dust settles.

[Mar 09, 2020] All the Devastating Epidemics That Coronavirus is Distracting Us From by Tamara Pearson

Mar 06, 2020 | www.counterpunch.org

Almost every day the BBC's One-minute World News provides the latest death tally from coronavirus. The short news wrap-up typically covers about three news items only, meaning that for the BBC, the virus has been among the top three most important issues for the world, daily for the last two months.

All the other mainstream media outlets are likewise reporting on every single angle to this story they can, including regular updates of the global tally and a country-by-country breakdown.

The impact of such intense coverage of the virus is widespread fear, even though pedestrians are still 13 times more likely to be killed by a car than by this virus.

Further, media-based concern about irreversible climate change and the ubiquitous sexual abuse of women seems to have died down. Those issues have become less of an emergency, and the sense that governments and businesses need to rectify straight away, has diminished.

While 3,000 people have unfortunately died from coronavirus over the past two months (50 people per day), here are some stats on some comparatively atrocious epidemics that we should also be informed about every single hour, in lurid detail, until something changes:

... ... ...

... ... ...

And the mainstream media will not talk much about these things. That isn't just because rich people can't catch poverty, it's because the mainstream media is capitalist and it does not recognize systemic issues, and certainly not the causes and solutions to them. The media pretends not to, but it does have an agenda, and that agenda is in fact counter to the one that us serious journalists commit to – to revealing the bruises of the world and the screaming injustices and holding those in power accountable.

Panic and fomenting fear are well-tried methods of control, distraction, and of shifting popular support towards the rightwing. On the other hand, raising awareness of the sickening global inequality and the daily pain so many are subject to develops critical thought, and would be empowering and disrupting, and so the mainstream media does not do that.

Tamara Pearson is a long-time journalist based in Latin America, and author of The Butterfly Prison . Her writings can be found at her blog . Join the debate on Facebook More articles by: Tamara Pearson

[Mar 09, 2020] COVID-19 burst the asset price bubble. In a new low, Pompeo passes buck to Beijing

Mar 09, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

CitizenX , Mar 9 2020 2:58 utc | 57

"Perhaps this will finally burst the out-of-control asset price bubble and drop-kick the Outlaw US Empire's economy into the sewer as the much lower price will rapidly slow the recycling of what remains of the petrodollar. Looks like Trump's reelection push just fell into a massive sinkhole as the economy will tank."

Posted by: karlof1 | Mar 9 2020 1:29 utc | 49
....

Call me crazy- but this Virus provides great cover as to why the economy plummets, the Murikan sheeple will eat it up. Prepare for the double media blitz on the virus AND the economy tanking as its result.

Don't worry...just continue to go shopping and take those selfies.


vk , Mar 9 2020 3:37 utc | 60

Pompeo accuses China of giving "imperfect data" on COVID-19, blame it for US failure in containing the virus:

In new low, Pompeo passes buck to Beijing

It will be hard for the American people to swallow that one. From day 1 I've read a lot of "articles" and "papers" from know-it-all Western doctors and researchers from commenters here in this blog, all of them claiming to have very precise and definitive data on what was happening. A lot of bombastic conclusions I've read here (including one that claimed R0 was through the roof - it's funny how the R0 is being played down after it begun to infect the West; suddenly, it's all just a stronger cold...).

And that's just here, in MoA's comment section. Imagine what was being published in the Western MSM. I wouldn't be surprised there was a lot of rednecks popping their beers celebrating the fall of China already.

--//--

China to back global virus fight with production boost

Since China allegedly had a lot of idle industrial capacity - that is, if we take the Western MSM theories seriously (including the fabled "ghost towns" stories) - then boosting production wouldn't be a problem to China.

Disclaimer: it's normal for any kind of economy - socialist or capitalist - to have a certain percentage of idle capacity. That's necessary in order to insure the economy against unexpected oscillations in demand and to give space of maneuvre for future technological progress. Indeed, that was one of the USSR's mistakes with its economy: they instinctly thought unemployment should be zero, and waste should also be zero, so they planned in a way all the factories always sought to operate at 100% capacity. That became a problem when better machines and better methods were invented, since the factory manager wouldn't want to stop production so that his factory would fall behind the other factories in the five-year plan's goals. So, yes, China indeed has idle capacity - but it is mainly proposital, not a failure of its socialist planning.

--//--

... ... ...

vk , Mar 9 2020 3:56 utc | 61
This is important. The only reason I didn't comment about it is I hadn't the data:

Follow the money: Understanding China's battle against COVID-19

By the latest count, in addition to yuan loans worth 113 billion U.S. dollars granted by financial institutions and more than 70 billion U.S. dollars paid out by insurance companies, the Chinese government has allocated about 13 billion U.S. dollars to counter fallout from the outbreak.

The numbers could look abstract. However, breaking the data down reveals how the money is being carefully targeted. The government is allocating the money based on a thorough evaluation of the system's strengths.

...

Local governments are equipped with more local knowledge that allows them to surgically support key manufacturers or producers that are struggling.

Together, they have borne the bulk of the financial responsibility with an allocation of equivalently more than nine billion U.S. dollars. It is carefully targeted, divided into hundreds of thousands of individual grants that are tailor-made by and for each county, town, city and business.

This is the mark of a socialist system.

The affected capitalist countries will simply use monetary devices (so the private sector can offset the losses) and burn their own reserves with non-profitable palliatives such as masks, tests, other quarantine infrastructure etc.

Pft , Mar 9 2020 4:44 utc | 64
Sounds like US socialism. Basically corporate socialism. Loans are just dollars created out of thin air, same as in US. Insurance payouts come from premiums, nothing socialist about that, pure capitalism. Government hand outs to provinces, cities, state owned corporations,well all of these are run by the party elite, its called pork. US handed out a lot of pork during the last financial crisis. None of it trickled down to the little people. I doubt it does in China either.

All crisis are opportunities for the elite to get richer. Those Biolake firms in Wuhan will make out like bandits. Chinese firms will double the price of API's sold to India and US. China will knock out the small farmer in the wake of concurrent chicken and swine flu so the big enterprises take over, a mimicry of the US practice over the last century. China tech firms will double up on surveillance apps, censoring tools, surveillance and toughen up social credit restrictions. 5G will allow China to experiment with nanobots to monitor citizens health from afar (thanks to Harvards Dr Leiber).

Oh yes, socialism with Chinese characteristics is a technocratic capitalists dream. Thats why the West has never imposed sanctions on China since welcoming them to the global elites club. Sanctions are reserved for those with true socialism, especially those who preach equality and god forbid, democracy.

uncle tungsten , Mar 9 2020 8:35 utc | 83

CitizenX #57

Call me crazy- but this Virus provides great cover as to why the economy plummets, the Murikan sheeple will eat it up. Prepare for the double media blitz on the virus AND the economy tanking as its result.


Don't forget the Russians.. They have to be to blame. See they just kept the price of oil low so now the rest of the world gets gas cheaper than the USA. The USA motorist now has to bail out the dopey frackers and shale oil ponzis.

Global envy will eat murica. Maybe they will just pull out all their troops and go home. ;)

[Mar 09, 2020] Angry Bear " Covid-19 data

Good overview from the CDC .
Mar 09, 2020 | angrybearblog.com
  1. run75441 , March 8, 2020 7:27 pm

    More Info: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339008515_The_2019_Wuhan_outbreak_is_caused_by_the_bacteria_Prevotella_which_is_aided_by_the_coronavirus_possibly_to_adhere_to_epithelial_cells_-_Prevotella_is_present_in_huge_amounts_in_patients_from_both_Chin?fbclid=IwAR0ukN0qbtX7bS6LkTgOq2eFs-puoF3Y0-2qx9T0_BKFL5raCGvmHNaVa1g

    A hitherto unknown cause of the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak [1–3] is reported here – a bacteria from the Prevotella genus.

    The number of Wuhan coronavirus deaths in mainland China has overtaken the SARS epidemic in the country. The high mortality is being caused by targeting only the virus (which is also present).

    This is a two pronged attack, as previously noted in 'infection with human coronavirus NL63 enhances streptococcal adherence to epithelial cells' [6]. Prevotella is a well known pathogen, and can induce 'Severe Bacteremic Pneumococcal Pneumonia in Mice with Upregulated Platelet-Activating Factor Receptor Expression' [7].

    The RNA-seq data from Wuhan, China (PRJNA603194) has millions of reads of Prevotella proteins, and a few thousands from 2019-nCoV (Table 1).

    Similarly, the DNA sequences (PRJNA601630) of 6 patients from the same family in Hong Kong [3] shows significant presence of this bacteria.

    These sequences can be found at SI:China.RNA-seq/SampleSequences.fa(n=480K) and SI:HongKong/ALLsequences.fa(n=50k).Finally, the expression levels (Table 2) shows that the elongation factor Tu is the most expressed.

    'Elongation factor Tu (Tuf) is a new virulence factor of Streptococcus pneumoniae that binds human complement factors, aids in immune evasion and host tissue invasion' [8].

    These are the only two studies I could find. Detection of the Prevotella in other samples will add more credence to this theory.

    Detection of the nCoV can be made very specific by looking for a 500bp in the spike protein [4], which would be a good candidate for vaccine development, protein-inhibition and diagnosis (which was non-specific for SARS in many cases, including the CDC test [5]).

    Anti-virals need to be supplemented with anti-bacterial agents to treat this disease.

[Mar 09, 2020] If you're a vulnerable person, take it seriously, particularly when you have community spread

For retired person taking it serious means self-isolation and restricting external contacts to minimum. Of course this makes sense only if there are active cases in the community and/or the state. Otherwise the risk is too low to overreact.
Mar 09, 2020 | www.bloomberg.com

"We're getting a better sense as the days go by" of the scope of the outbreak in the U.S., Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on NBC's "Meet the Press." "Unfortunately, that better sense is not encouraging, because we're seeing community spread."

"If you're a vulnerable person, take it seriously, because particularly when you have community spread, you may not know at any given time that there are people who are infected," Fauci said of the idea of social distancing, or actions that include avoiding large gatherings. "It's common-sense stuff."

Gottlieb, who departed as Trump's FDA commissioner in April, said Sunday on CBS's "Face the Nation" that ... "We'll get through this, but it's going to be a hard period. We're looking at two months, probably, of difficulty."

[Mar 09, 2020] Momento Mori - Unpopular Thoughts on Corona Virus by Craig Murray

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... But there was no massive panic, no second by second media hysteria, over Hong Kong flu. Let me start being unpopular. "Man in his 80's already not very well from previous conditions, dies of flu" is not and should not be a news headline. The coverage is prurient, intrusive, unbalanced and designed to cause hysteria. ..."
"... It is also worthy of comment and I'm sure great relief to parents, that of the thousands of deaths, not one has been below the age of 10. ..."
Mar 09, 2020 | craigmurray.org.uk

The Hong Kong flu pandemic of 1968/9 was the last really serious flu pandemic to sweep the UK. They do seem extraordinarily regular – 1919, 1969 and 2020. Flu epidemics have much better punctuality than the trains (though I cheated a bit there and left out the 1958 "Asian flu"). Nowadays "Hong Kong flu" is known as H3N2. Estimates for deaths it caused worldwide vary from 1 to 4 million. In the UK it killed an estimated 80,000 people.

If the current coronavirus had appeared in 1968, it would simply have been called "flu", probably "Wuhan flu". COVID-19 may not be nowadays classified as such, but in my youth flu is definitely what we would have called it. The Hong Kong flu was very similar to the current outbreak in being extremely contagious but with a fairly low mortality rate. 30% of the UK population is estimated to have been infected in the Hong Kong flu pandemic. The death rate was about 0.5%, mostly elderly or with underlying health conditions.

But there was no massive panic, no second by second media hysteria, over Hong Kong flu. Let me start being unpopular. "Man in his 80's already not very well from previous conditions, dies of flu" is not and should not be a news headline. The coverage is prurient, intrusive, unbalanced and designed to cause hysteria.

Consider this: 100% of those who contract coronavirus are going to die. 100% of those who do not contract coronavirus are also going to die. The difference in average life expectancy between the two groups will prove to be only very marginal. That is because the large majority of those who die of COVID-19 will already be nearing the end of life or have other health problems.

... ... ...

What worries me about the current reaction to coronavirus, is that it seems to reflect a belief that death is an aberration, rather than a part of the natural order of things. As the human species continues to expand massively in numbers, and as it continues casually to make other species extinct, it is inevitable that the excessive and crowded human population will become susceptible to disease.

... ... ...

Yes wash your hands, bin your tissues, keep things clean. Don't hang around someone who has the flu. Take advantage of everything modern medicine can do to help you. But don't be too shocked at the idea that some sick people die, especially if they are old. We are not Gods, we are mortal. We need to reconnect to that idea.

... ... ...

Reply ↓

Chic McGregor , March 7, 2020 at 23:05

Craig, you might want to check out https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

... ... ...

It is also worthy of comment and I'm sure great relief to parents, that of the thousands of deaths, not one has been below the age of 10.

It is unusually age selective. Whereas in many past epidemics both the elderly and very young have been the most susceptible groups in this instance, 80% of deaths have been in the over 60s.

Ralph Clark , March 8, 2020 at 11:36

And that could be why Europe has seen a higher death toll – do elderly people in poor health make up a higher fraction of our population?

Flak Blag , March 8, 2020 at 02:57

Another excellent article, thank you Craig Murray. Some thoughts

When this story initially broke I was somewhat dismissive of it. I remember avian flu, and particularly swine flu, when hysteria was purposefully whipped up in order to boost the profits of big pharma, and of course to keep the population in it's usual state of paralyzed anxiety. I am not qualified to comment on the suggestions other's have made relating to this being a bio-weapon, deployed either by accident or design. As far as I can see it's too early to tell, speculation and rumor abound, the dust has yet to settle.

I agree that it is normal and desirable for old people to die, and while I have no wish to hasten the death of individuals within any demographic group, it seems that the current fashion of prolonging the lives of the aged at the expense (financially and environmentally) of subsequent generations is questionable. Perhaps it is emblematic of the mechanistic, materialistic, individualistic and narcissistic agenda so aggressively promoted to justify the consumerism currently infecting the world. I was taught that the debt we owe to our parents we repay to our children, that is is better to subsist on crusts if it means our children may have jam. Some would rather eat jam today than leave crusts for their progeny tomorrow, maybe because as a society we see individual gratification as the meaning of life

... ... ...

mass medical event , March 8, 2020 at 09:47

Beautiful thoughts, Craig With respect to the Corona Virus: The Patriot Act had been prepared prior to the catastrophic event on 9/11 and was ready to be immediately enacted. One did not see the shape of things to come while the event was unfolding.

... ... ...

Medicine opens new frontiers for exploitation because ill health is a regular earner. There is nothing left to sell in the capitalist system but business services, Intellectual Property and 'Apps' perhaps. The Smart Phone market is saturated. The Russians, and other nations like Iran have still got endless supplies of gas, oil, etc.

... ... ...

MBC , March 8, 2020 at 13:06

With all respect Craig I think you may be wandering into areas you are not qualified to judge. Mea culpa also, I am not a medic either. But I regularly see very senior medical experts saying that they are very concerned about this virus and they must have good reason because these people are clinicians not politicians.

As for the deaths from ordinary flu: how on earth do we know? I have had flu several times in my life and never bothered notifying my GP. I stayed home, isolated myself, and self-medicated. I suspect most people are the same. So the mortality of flu is limited to serious cases which comes to GPs' attention and is therefore an underestimate and more like 0.1% or even 0.01% than the claimed 1% as most people will not report it.

Peter , March 8, 2020 at 14:38

This might put things in perspective:
The Covid-19 . does not compare with seasonal flu, which is not new but harmful no less. According to the CDC's weekly U.S. flu report of February 22, 2020, "So far this season there have been at least 32 million flu illnesses, 310,000 hospitalizations and 18,000 deaths from flu."

Worldwide, up to 650,000 individuals die from complications of seasonal flu each year. Take a moment to think about that. We can compare this number with other causes of death around the globe, like 470,000 people who lose their lives to homicide and many more who do to suicide. Nearly 1.35 million individuals die each year as a result of car accidents (an additional 20 to 50 million suffer injuries) ..
Covid-19 is a viral disease and appears to have a fatality rate of roughly 1 percent or less. It is dangerous, but it is not so dangerous we should put our lives on hold. Remember, we all take risks every single day and are exposed to hundreds of potential threats. The goal is to live our lives while also doing what is necessary to reduce the likelihood of being seriously harmed (and harming others). Do not increase your anxiety by staying home and constantly watching the news about the spread of the virus around the globe.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/finding-new-home/202003/coronavirus-countering-your-fears

nevermind , March 8, 2020 at 14:40

Thanks for a levelled coherent comparison. The hoovering up response of the media is an obvious news management issue.

... ... ...

There are only two important happenings in all our lives, our birth and our death everything inbetween is merely filling in time with chaws, multiplying and breathing.

glenn_uk , March 8, 2020 at 21:18

Hah!

James Penn-Dunnett , March 8, 2020 at 17:14

Nice picture Craig, you all look amazingly well.

In August '68 I caught H3N2 while stationed in Hong Kong. I was brought unconscious to the Gurkha military field hospital in Shek Kong and was kept there until my temperature returned to normal after a week. There was no attempt at quarantine or to trace victims or any follow up by the authorities. The HK Police and military were too busy dealing with communists and illegals crossing from China. Hong Kong Flu then spread to Vietnam via US sailors and other military who used HK for shore leave from the Vietnam War.

So naturally after that experience and being a 24/7 carer I am taking precautions. No not bulk buying but plenty of hand washing with soap, minimising people contact and trying not to cough or sneeze near anyone.

Here are a couple of useful links:

https://mobile.twitter.com/PalliThordarson/status/1236549305189597189

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1235127363341553667.html

Tony_0pmoc , March 8, 2020 at 17:52

Another brilliant post by Craig Murray You survived all that, well even a couple of weeks ago, queuing to get into jail for Julian Assange's trial. You are quite obviously as tough as old boots. Even the CIA have given up trying to kill you. The Coronavirus, if you get it is unlikely to have any effect on you.

Read Linh Dinh's too, check out his photography, and buy his book in Hardback – it has High Definition photos too "Postcards from the End of America". He was born in Vietnam, about the same age as Craig Murray, and travels around a lot, mostly by bus.

"Sick Days, Market Crash and Shut Borders"

https://www.unz.com/ldinh/sick-days-market-crash-and-shut-borders/

Tony

Patrick Haseldine , March 8, 2020 at 20:11

"Memento Mori – Unpopular Thoughts on Corona Virus" (Corrected by Wikispooks)

Consider this: 100% of those who contract coronavirus are going to die. 100% of those who do not contract coronavirus are also going to die. The difference in average life expectancy between the two groups will prove to be only very marginal. That is because the large majority of those who die of COVID-19 will already be nearing the end of life or have other health problems.

( https://wikispooks.com/wiki/Document:Memento_Mori_%E2%80%93_Unpopular_Thoughts_on_Corona_Virus )

rtah100 , March 8, 2020 at 21:22

It is reasonable to be sceptical and phlegmatic (no pun intended), given past pandemics. The problem with the coronavirus is that:
– we have no partial immunity from previous strains
– it results in a much greater hospitalisation rate and cases take weeks to resolve
– it is explosively more infectious than any flu since the second wave of Spanish flu, which peaked in three weeks in some places. It has R0 of 3.5 according to latest Chinese paper.

What that means is that entire healthcare systems will become saturated and people who might have been expected to live will die from lack of care, not old age. It will be luck of the draw who lives and diss, unless we agree turn off ventilation on older people in favour of the young when they have equal survival chances if ventilated . It also means that noncoronavirus healthcare is overwhelmed and people die indirectly.

With vigorous countermeasures, the peak of infection can be reduced, ideally below healthcare capacity. 40% peak reduction and 20% mortality reduction was possible in 1918 where implemented. Wuhan measures reduced R0 to 0.3, I.e. Killing transmission in three serial intervals of infection.

It is a public health and moral imperative not to be fatalistic here, Craig, and your normal humanism is lacking here.

Roger , March 7, 2020 at 14:39

I for one have not given up, and see plenty of life to experience ahead unlike this bloke. If it takes me out, at least I can go knowing that I have done everything possible to prevent it. That will bring comfort. Dying for no good reason does not seem like something good to dwell on during those last moments. The very fact that this old guy has been able to pen a coherent and interesting article without the effects of dementia or other old age related maladies demonstrates that even he has something left to contribute. Although in this case, I do not agree with his message.

Steve Hayes , March 7, 2020 at 14:44

The only evidence I have seen of mass hysteria is in the corporate mass media.

Vivian O'Bliviion , March 7, 2020 at 14:55

The American CDC rejected the notion of replicating the WHO approved Coronavirus test, in favour of developing its own test (resulting in a delayed launch date and continued lag in delivery). The CDC test is being billed at $1,200 (for those lucky enough to have sufficient insurance). In S. Korea testing is free if a prospective patient is running a temperature. If the subject is not running a temperature the test is billed at $120 (presumably this is an approximation of cost price). Some folks in America are going to make a whole pile of money out of the situation.
Reliable figures for infection and mortality rates should arrive before the Presidential election. It will be interesting if there is an appreciable differential between mortality rates in countries where healthcare is allocated according to medical need and countries where healthcare is allocated according to private insurance cover.
If America does experience heightened mortality rates to other industrialised countries, will this impact on the outcome of the election? I suspect not.

J Arther Nast , March 7, 2020 at 14:59

"The mass hysteria around the current coronavirus is being driven by a societal rejection of the notion that the human species is part of the wider ecology, and that death and disease are unavoidable facts, with which it ought to be part of the human condition to come to terms".

Well Crag that's one theory, buy what about all the other stuff that's going on, reaction to globalism, extinction, and all the other concerns. This corona virus is a seed falling on to fertile soil in more ways than one,

Luboš Motl , March 7, 2020 at 15:07

An excellent, wise text. I wrote a followup at
https://motls.blogspot.com/2020/03/humans-are-part-of-ecosystem.html

James Cook , March 7, 2020 at 16:13

The Swerve: How the Renaissance Began or The Swerve: How the World Became Modern: Stephan Greenblatt tells the story of how Poggio Bracciolini, a 15th-century papal emissary and obsessive book hunter, saved the last copy of the Roman poet Lucretius's On the Nature of Things from near-terminal neglect in a German monastery.

I am with you Craig .. Reading Lucretius's On the Nature of Things will set you free!

Stevie Boy , March 7, 2020 at 15:21

With all the (politically motivated ?) hype, I had a look at the official mortality figures for our annual common flu.
Over the last five years the average death rate is 17,000 per year in England, with a high of 28,000 and low of 1,600 !!!
Apparently, we happily live with these large death rates without the "The worlds going to end" hyperbole. People go about their business, going to work, travelling and all the normal trappings of daily life.
What is it with this Corona virus tosh ? What's going on, who's benefiting ? Is it part of the China propaganda ?
Utter madness.

Fleur , March 7, 2020 at 15:24

Very sensible – and thoughtful – commentary on the latest flu episode Craig. Thanks.

Your ruminations on the desire for, and even a belief in, the possibility of achieving immortality (or at least a very long life) are also timely, as these drive pivotal sections of the policy making and system creating sectors. Julian Assange has spoken about the belief – prevalent in Silicon Valley – that a world will soon be created where we can 'upload our brains' to the cloud, and so live on forever in whatever fantasy world appeals.

In the meantime, we live in bodies increasingly beset by toxic pollutants from chemical additives in water, BigAg food, polluted air, over prescribed drugs, radiation from our proliferating cellphones & wifi devices, and by stress generated by our loud, over-lit environment and mean, abusive work environments / economic system.Despite this, many people would rather panic over a virus than question the factors making us (and our children and seniors) so susceptible to such viruses.

I too have a lung condition, and have also experienced several very close brushes with death due to other factors (such as a recent, brutal home invasion). I also have experienced the deaths of many of the people close to me – people of all ages, from a range of factors. I suspect that those experiences make people much less afraid of death, and so much less likely to share the current panic, or to share the very common illusion that we can live forever – if we just spend enough on "research" and have enough superfoods, expensive drugs (and vax).

In my view we would all be better off concentrating on making our lives MEAN something while we have them (as Julian has done) than on obsessing over the latest media-driven "threat to security" propaganda – be that about a virus or something else.

Sue , March 7, 2020 at 15:34

This is a vey well written and thought provoking opinion piece. However, in this case, I do believ death and getting in infected, are both avoidable. And because few humans chose to be irresponsible with their choices, we now have a pandemic. People all around the world are on edge. Its not ok that millions of people died in the past pandemics, and if there was enough information back then, those numbers would have been small. Young parents with little children ear death a lot more than older parents, for obvious reasons. So, it's great if one doesn't buy into the hysteria, but it's the opposite if such a person becomes the cause for say, spreading the virus in a school!

Magic Robot , March 7, 2020 at 17:52

"chose to be irresponsible with their choices, we now have a pandemic."
And:
"great if one doesn't buy into the hysteria, but it's the opposite if such a person becomes the cause for say, spreading the virus"

Rely on newspaper, radio and TV warnings; buy into the hysteria; buy masks, wear them at all times in public, wash hands when entering the shops to buy your food, use cards not cash to pay, remain indoors until told otherwise, etc. OR ELSE! – Welcome to the new world of the 'virus police.'

Weechid , March 7, 2020 at 16:54

Thank you Craig, for being a voice of reason. I was just asking if this was any worse than other flu epidemic or if, for some reason, it was being made to seem so. I've also been wondering why they gave it another name rather than "flu". Is it just to make it sound more "scary" because most people don't understand that flu is more than just a bad cold? As far as I know I am healthy and have very little to fear from this latest flu. I do look after a relative with COPD and I'm concerned for him – in the same way that I'm concerned for him every winter as I know flu could kill him. The hysteria is driving me up the wall so it's good to see that some are remaining calm. The best of health to you, sir.

Mark Russell , March 7, 2020 at 16:54

I sincerely hope the virus outbreak isn't as dire as predicted, but like you, peccavi, peccabo, *as we see the catastrophic effects of human beings on the environment, including on other species and the climate*, it makes one wonder if it really is a catastrophe if predictions are accurate or underestimated..

Nature's schadenfreude – our comeuppance. If it were to be a natural evolutionary pathogen – but even if proves the stuff of nightmares and the deliberate release of an engineered virus – would it be a "bad thing" if 99% of humanity was culled?

This feels like the final scenes in "On the Beach" with Gregory Peck. At least they still had loo paper at the end

Jan Pietrasik , March 7, 2020 at 17:22

We in the Western imperialist nations don't like the idea of death but have no qualms about delivering death and disease to weaker nations we sanction, bomb, invade, occupy especially when modern warfare means there is very little risk to ourselves. Millions have died and continue to die across MENA, many of them children in our never ending wars for resources and geopolitical advantage sold as 'humanitarian intervention.'

[Mar 09, 2020] The point is, that until it IS confirmed, it could be anything: pollution, lung infection, 'regular flu'.. well anything, but the media plaster it all over the world as if it HAS been confirmed. This surely, is irresponsible.

Mar 09, 2020 | craigmurray.org.uk

Ottomanboi , March 7, 2020 at 19:09

The common cold may kill too if the virus finds a suitable host.
Wuhan is a heavily polluted city region. https://www.numbeo.com/pollution/in/Wuhan
Respiratory complications caused by that environment may be significant.
Have you been to Delhi? Try it! Not pleasant even for those who consider themselves young and healthy.
I know what i'm talking about, doubt you do.

Magic Robot , March 7, 2020 at 20:14

Glenn,

The point is, that until it IS confirmed, it could be anything: pollution, lung infection, 'regular flu'.. well anything, but the media plaster it all over the world as if it HAS been confirmed. This surely, is irresponsible.

I cannot help with your hysteria.

Tom Welsh , March 7, 2020 at 21:18

Befoe asking rhetorical questions, it is a good idea to ascertain the answers.

"Air Pollution in Italy: Health Hazards to Be Aware Of"
https://www.worldnomads.com/travel-safety/europe/italy/pollution-other-health-hazards-in-italy

"Air pollution is a huge problem in Italy. A report in 2018 showed that air quality levels were a red alert for Italy. Way back in early 2011, officials reported that pollution in Italy was reaching crisis levels. What's particularly troublesome is particle pollution that pervades Italy, and accounts for breathing and heart problems, causing a whopping 9% of deaths of Italians over the age of 30.

"When you visit Italy, you will see why there is so much smog and fog: heavy traffic in tiny areas. Officials sometimes order drivers to leave the car at home on alternate days to avoid too much pollution in the air.

"In Northern Italy, including big cities like Milan and Turin, has some of the worst pollution in all of Europe. In December 2017, both cities introduced traffic restrictions to try and reduce the impact of smog and air pollution".

[Mar 09, 2020] The MSM coverage of COVID-19 epidemic is prurient, intrusive, unbalanced and designed to cause hysteria.

Notable quotes:
"... Without duplicating your detailed survey, here in the US the news has become "all coronavirus all the time", although of course the political equivalent of the professional-wrestling elimination tour, aka the 2020 presidential campaign, is still featured when hysteria permits. ..."
"... I appreciate that much of the news coverage is presented as altruistic public service. In the US, local mass-media "news" venues thickly lay on this altruistic, parental mode; there is considerable "news you, the consumer, can use" creep. Thus, one sees articles such as "Ten Tips for Not Touching Your Face", or even "How to make your own 'hand sanitizer' at home"– the latter because panic buying have exhausted the supply of manufactured hand sanitizers. ..."
"... Over 3400 Americans died (out of > 27,000 hospitalized from >115,000 cases) in the 2009 flu outbreak that began in Mexico/Texas. I do not remember the same level of hysteria and opprobium heaped on the US as the western MSM has heaped on China. ..."
Mar 09, 2020 | craigmurray.org.uk

Ort , March 7, 2020 at 18:48

The coverage is prurient, intrusive, unbalanced and designed to cause hysteria.

Just so. Thanks for this eminently sane perspective.

Without duplicating your detailed survey, here in the US the news has become "all coronavirus all the time", although of course the political equivalent of the professional-wrestling elimination tour, aka the 2020 presidential campaign, is still featured when hysteria permits.

I've even gotten unsolicited e-mails from healthcare providers touting their responses to the ostensible crisis. I don't know what the responses are, because I haven't read them and feel no compelling need to do so. I realize that Normals, as I call them, are distressed and panicky, and may cling to such dross as if they are life preservers.

I appreciate that much of the news coverage is presented as altruistic public service. In the US, local mass-media "news" venues thickly lay on this altruistic, parental mode; there is considerable "news you, the consumer, can use" creep. Thus, one sees articles such as "Ten Tips for Not Touching Your Face", or even "How to make your own 'hand sanitizer' at home"– the latter because panic buying have exhausted the supply of manufactured hand sanitizers.

Perhaps the would-be "cure" isn't really worse than the disease, but as you note the mass-media publicity is pernicious and debilitating. Thanks again.

Ken Garoo , March 7, 2020 at 21:05

Over 3400 Americans died (out of > 27,000 hospitalized from >115,000 cases) in the 2009 flu outbreak that began in Mexico/Texas. I do not remember the same level of hysteria and opprobium heaped on the US as the western MSM has heaped on China.

Tom Welsh , March 7, 2020 at 11:55

"The flu has already killed 10,000 across US as world frets over coronavirus".
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/03/the-flu-has-already-killed-10000-across-us-as-world-frets-over-coronavirus.html

Every year (with infrequent exceptions) over 20 million people catch flu in the USA alone. That's more than 1,000 times the number of Coronavirus cases worldwide so far.

Every year (with infrequent exceptions), over 20,000 people die from flu in the USA alone. That's 60 times the number of deaths from Coronavirus worldwide so far.

Mist001 , March 7, 2020 at 11:56

The hysteria over this is absolutely ridiculous. My son is worried about it but what can you do? The laughable 'advice' we're getting makes no sense to him. We live in France where kissing on the cheek and shaking hands is their default setting and yet, the 'advice' is not to do that. It simply can't be avoided here plus he goes to school, so he's mixing with crowds, something else which we're advised not to do so despite my attempts at reassurance, is it any wonder he's up to 90 about it? I suspect this is the same as the majority of the population just now too. It's shameful behaviour from the media and health 'experts'. They're actively inducing panic rather than calming things down.

On a more personal note, what I dislike is that I'm being dragged into a situation about which I'm deeply skeptical and can't take the hysteria seriously. My family need food, same as everyone else but what about all these people panic buying and stocking up on food?
What can you do? If all these people are panic buying and stocking up on food, then there's going to be nothing left for us to buy normally, so we might struggle for food. I object to the fact that we're being dragged into even considering buying and stocking up too, even though we don't want to, but we might have to.

I could go on but to spare any readers patience I won't, except to say that the whole thing is ridiculous. It'll all be forgotten about by the time summer arrives.

[Mar 09, 2020] Northern Italy under lockdown

Mar 09, 2020 | www.worldometers.info

Northern Italy under lockdown - Lombardy region (entire region, all provinces)
- Piedmont (provinces of Alessandria , Asti , Novara , Verbano Cusio Ossola , and Vercelli )
- Veneto (provinces of Padua , Treviso , and Venice)
- Emilia Romagna (provinces of Modena , Parma , Piacenza , Reggio Emilia , and Rimini )
- Marche (province of Pesaro Urbino ) In the above areas:

National restrictions

[Mar 08, 2020] The average age of deceased and positive patients in Covid-2019 in Italy is 81 years, mostly men. Neoliberal MSM instigate panic

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

KamNam , Mar 7 2020 0:23 utc | 58

Snip:
The average age of deceased and positive patients in Covid-2019 is 81 years, mostly men. They, in more than two thirds of cases, have three or more pre-existing pathologies.
This was confirmed by an analysis conducted by the Istituto Superiore di Sanità on 105 Italian patients who died up to 4 March.
...
The average age of the patients examined is 81 years, about 20 years higher than that of the patients who contracted the infection. There are 28 women (26.7%).

According to ISS data, 42.2% of the deaths are in the age group between 80 and 89 years. 32.4% were between 70 and 79, while 8.4% between 60 and 69, 2.8% between 50 and 59 and 14.1% over 90 years.
end Snip:
With luck Congress will be cleaned out of old world thinking, and replaced with new world thinking, (alas, same as old world thinking as it is controlled by the same thought group. One lives in hope of change for the better.


KamNam , Mar 7 2020 0:42 utc | 61

Another thought has just come to me. The age of the Media Barons all seem to be in the high to highest end of the fatality spectrum. Wonder if it is a coincidence we are having such a panic media attack, free on facts yet huge on speculation and shunting blame to all and sundry. Just a thought
Joetv , Mar 7 2020 0:46 utc | 62
Could it be ncov19 is no worse than the common cold, and what we are experiencing is the power of the media as it follows the order to create a world wide panic designed to prop up calls for a 1 world government. Deaths recorded are in the 80+ age range with at least 3 pre-existing conditions. The public can't get enough of this soap opera.
KamNam , Mar 7 2020 1:03 utc | 66
ATN Apli @22

Raw figures for Italy and Iran at 14.00 GMT Friday Mar 6
Italy Infected 4636 Deaths 197 Recovered 523
Iran Infected 4747 Deaths 124 Recovered 913

Remember Iran is under very strict Sanctions from USA et al. not helping their situation. Death rate is mostly those over 50 ramping up each decade over the 60 mark. (This get s rid of old farts like me easier and faster :-) ) As for Israel, take that with a pinch of salt they love to brag. I am not denying we live with truly evil people pulling strings for profit. Cheers

[Mar 08, 2020] The real COVID-19 virus mortality rate might well be below one percent

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

michaelj72 , Mar 7 2020 8:08 utc | 106

fyi

https://news.yahoo.com/coronavirus-spreads-one-study-predicts-101552222.html

....On Tuesday, the WHO noted that the global death rate for the novel coronavirus based on the latest figures was 3.4% -- higher than earlier figures of about 2%. The WHO's director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said the new coronavirus was "a unique virus with unique characteristics.".....

....In the low-severity model -- or best-case scenario of the seven -- ANU researchers estimate a global GDP loss of $2.4 trillion, with an estimated death toll of 15 million.....


Al , Mar 7 2020 8:36 utc | 107

I like how without any testing or information MOA knew EVERYTHING and that now any take has to orbit the original assumptions.

You don't have to speak with authority on everything.

fairleft , Mar 7 2020 9:08 utc | 108
michaelj72 @102:

The 3.4% 'mortality rate' is simply the raw number: # of deaths / # of confirmed coronavirus cases. It's NOT comparable to the mortality rate for the common flu, which has long been established as .1%.

The experts in your link (see below) state that the rate will go down as more people are tested.

As far as I know, only China and perhaps South Korea now have reliable figures on how many have been infected with the virus. For example, the U.S. and Japan have been a tragic embarrassment when it comes to actually testing people.

Business Insider:

The death rate is likely to change further as more cases are confirmed, though experts predict that the percentage of deaths will decrease in the longer term since milder cases of COVID-19 are probably going undiagnosed.

"There's another whole cohort that is either asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic," Anthony Fauci, the director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said at a briefing last month. "We're going to see a diminution in the overall death rate."

[Mar 08, 2020] Mortality for COVIL-19 is exaggerated. As long as not a significant number of all people in a certain area are tested, regardless of whether they show symptoms or not, no one can tell the real death rate.

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 6 2020 19:01 utc | 2

I saw a posting on Propublica that made an important point: death rates are skewed early during an outbreak because deaths are solid markers (numerator) but number of infected known is certainly a subset of actual people who have the disease - particularly when testing isn't available and common.
Also, early during an outbreak, the known infected tend to be those that have serious cases such that they end up in the hospital - so that also skews numbers.

Cemi , Mar 6 2020 19:11 utc | 3

If there is a significant number of symptomless infections the real (death rate) number will be even lower.

That's the point. As long as not a significant number of all people in a certain area are tested, regardless of whether they show symptoms or not, no one can tell the real death rate. No one knows the number of symptomfree infectants.

[Mar 08, 2020] Biden and Sanders are in this late sevetees and COVID-19 is a serious threat for both

Sanders has a heart attack and now has stents so he is in real danger...
Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
s , Mar 7 2020 12:43 utc | 121
Biden and Sanders are both campaigning actively and meeting voters in many different states. Plenty of hugs/handshakes. I am wondering what precautions they have taken against the coronavirus. Note they are both in their late 70's.

[Mar 08, 2020] How big is asymptomatic population for COVID-19 ? Hubei data suggest that it might be very tiny indeed.

Mar 08, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

JJackson , 06 March 2020 at 06:38 AM

... As the Hubei cases have fallen from 2000+ per day to 1 or 2 hundred they have had capacity to widen their testing to contacts and very mild suspect cases. Sadly they are not seeing the hoped for asymptomatic population. Serology tests will give a more accurate answer, and are underway, but are not performed until a month or more post infection to allow time for antibody build up.

I wrote a much more detailed explanation of the Epidemiology, testing system, virology etc. here (posted 1st Jan) and two follow ups as the situation changed first to a downward trend in China and again, recently, as cases outside China moved into an exponential phase currently doubling once every 6 days (graph in current WHO update link below).
https://flutrackers.com/forum/forum/the-pandemic-discussion-forum/jjackson-s-workshop/826486-covid-ncov-preliminary-thoughts-jjackson-personal-opinion

This one is to the WHO daily situation reports with graphs & tables giving updates by country.
https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/situation-reports/

[Mar 08, 2020] COVID-19 might function as neurotoxin: the death of infected animals or patients may be due to the dysfunction of the cardiorespiratory center in the brainstem.

Mar 08, 2020 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Charlotte Danan , 06 March 2020 at 07:43 PM

Well as I guessed, the presence of fever and dry cough are not determinant to suspect COVID-19....

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/jmv.25728

According to this professional paper by Chinese researchers, there could be also neuroinvasion by SARS-COV-2, with some patients showing headache, nausea, and vomiting, in absence of other observed symptoms..but in the end deriving in inhability to breath spontaneusly...

Masks seem to be in fact an effective way to protect against the entry of the virus via intranasal through the CNS..
..

Also it seems that the use of corticosteroids that would be beneficial for classical lung edema, and are of common use at ICUs, would accelerate the replication of the virus in the neural tissue...leading to breath failure... by failure of brain functions...What it is still unknown is how the virus reach the neural tissue...

Some interesting excerpts:

...In light of the high similarity between SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV2, it is quite likely that the potential neuroinvason of SARS-CoV-2 plays an important role in the acute respiratory failure of COVID-19 patients. According to the complaints of a survivor, the medical graduate student (24 years old) from Wuhan University, she must stay awake and breathe consciously and actively during the intensive care. She said that if she fell asleep, she might die because she had lost her natural breath.

...The exact route by which SARS-CoV or MERS-COV enters the CNS is still not reported. However, hematogenous or lymphatic route seems impossible, especially in the early stage of infection, since almost no virus particle was detected in the non-neuronal cells in the infected brain areas.

...Of interest, viral antigens have been detected in the brainstem, where the infected regions included the nucleus of the solitary tract and nucleus ambiguus. The nucleus of the solitary tract receives sensory information from the mechano- and chemoreceptors in the lung and respiratory tracts 40-42, while the efferent fibers from the nucleus ambiguus and the nucleus of the solitary tract provide innervation to airway smooth muscle, glands, and blood vessels. Such neuroanatomic interconnections indicate that the death of infected animals or patients may be due to the dysfunction of the cardiorespiratory center in the brainstem.

...Based on an e pidemiological survey on COVID-19, the median time from the first symptom to dyspnea was 5.0 days, to hospital admission was 7.0 days, and to the intensive care was 8.0 days. Therefore, the latency period is enough for the virus to enter and destroy the medullary neurons. As a matter of fact, it has been reported that some patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 did show neurologic signs such as headache (about 8%), nausea and vomiting (1%).

.... If the neuroinvasion of SARS-CoV-2 does take a part in the development of respiratory failure in COVID-19 patients, the precaution with masks will absolutely be the most effective measure to protect against the possible entry of the virus into the CNS. It may also be expected that the symptoms of the patients infected via facal-oral or conjunctival route will be lighter than those infected intranasally.

.... It is also urgent to find effective antiviral drugs that can cross the blood-brain barrier. Moreover, corticosteroids, which are used frequently for severe patients, may have no treatment effect, but rather accelerate the replication of the virus within the neurons. Since SARS-CoV2 may conceal itself in the neurons from the immune recognition, complete clearance of the virus may not be guaranteed even the patients have recovered from the acute infection.

In support of this, there is evidence that SARS-CoV-2 is still detectable in some patients during the convalescent period 43. Therefore, given the probable neuroinvasion the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection may be currently underestimated.

Thus, it seems that, in the end, behaves like a neuro-chemical agent, isn´t it...? Too much for a simple flu...and pangolins´ stories... What the hell is happening here?

[Mar 08, 2020] AIPAC conference as COVID-19 infection spread vector

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

bjd , Mar 6 2020 20:25 utc | 16

krollchem , Mar 6 2020 20:26 utc | 17

A Jewish lawyer in New York City and nine members of his family have tested positive for SARS CoV-2. His family is prominent and may have infected people at a large Bar Mitzva, a Jewish university, a place of worship, and commuters on the subway to and from his law office.

Many of these exposed Jews attended the recent 2020 AIPAC jamboree. About 70% of the US Congress also attended this AIPAC mass event, potentially making Washington DC a super spreader locale. AIPAC issued a warning to all attendees to self quarantine. The state of Israel has imposed mandatory quarantines for all returning attendees of the AIPAC conference. Israel is mirroring the aggressive steps that China is taking to quell the epidemic as currently 100,000 Israeli citizens are under quarantine.
https://www.trunews.com/stream/aipac-super-spreader-did-israeli-lobbyists-infect-u-s-congress-with-coronavirus

There is evidence that the virus originated in the US, as it is the only source with all six haplotypes (strains) of SARS CoV-2 and has multiple incidences of containment failure.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/china-coronavirus-shocking-update/5705196

Other studies have shown that China is fighting the "C" haplotype which has mutated into the "L" form from the older "S" form. Apparently, the "L" form is more virulent, but is better contained via mandatory quarantines.
https://academic.oup.com/nsr/advance-article/doi/10.1093/nsr/nwaa036/5775463

Failure to impose quarantines will likely result in to proliferation of the "L" form of the "C" haplotype of SARS CoV-2. Countries where government medical officials must clear their statements with uninformed political hacks face a more pronounced impact from this outbreak. The proper approach is for politicians to have to clear their blather with health professionals

[Mar 08, 2020] China is testing five drugs and vaccine for COVID-19

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

JC , Mar 6 2020 22:19 utc | 34

Posted by: Zanon | Mar 6 2020 22:05 utc | 27

Latest China most likely test 5 drugs or antivirus before end of April. China is far ahead of any nations.

Coronavirus: vaccines 'on track for emergency use' in April
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3073850/coronavirus-no-n

[Mar 08, 2020] Youtube video on how China has dealt with the virus epidemic

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Krollchem , Mar 8 2020 3:31 utc | 188

Youtube video on how China has dealt with the virus epidemic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=21&v=XU9FVqwO4TM&feature=emb_logo

Krollchem , Mar 8 2020 3:40 utc | 189

c1ue@184

There are a number of non vaccine treatments being used in China, such as:
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_87189.shtml

Vaccines may also have increase the cytokine storm as has been observed with corticosteroids.

[Mar 08, 2020] The USA CDC became a tragic embarrassment when it comes to actually testing people for COVID-19

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

vk , Mar 7 2020 3:19 utc | 88

Americans' Demands for Coronavirus Tests Grow as Cases Spread

In California, where thousands are being monitored for the virus, only 516 tests had been conducted by the state as of Thursday. Washington health officials have more cases than they can currently process. And in New York, where cases have quadrupled this week, a New York City official pleaded for more test kits from the C.D.C.

"The slow federal action on this matter has impeded our ability to beat back this epidemic," the official said in a letter Friday.

California already has 300 confirmed cases, with 14 deaths. And they've just managed to test 516 people. That's a 58% rate of infection.

So, which numbers are you willing to trust more, barflies? China's or USA's (or the rest of the west)?

DFC , Mar 7 2020 9:24 utc | 110

Everybody and his mother knows from at least two and half months ago, that seeing the news from China (so many millions people quarantined) that this disease will be an epidemic, and for sure it will hit USA, and now we learn the CDC and the Trump administration have only few thousands tests available and they are convinced they are managing the situation very well...

Well we are going to see a good experiment: the result of the private health care system scam in front of a dangerous pandemic, it will be a Darwinian experiment we can call "The Survival of the Richest".

For sure we will never know the number of cases and fatalities for Corona in the USA, because they won´t allow to make a significant number of tests, but in two years we will see how the life expectancy in USA will be compare with the others developed countries with socialize health care

[Mar 08, 2020] The only country so far with all five strains COVID-19 identified as present is the United States

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Grieved , Mar 7 2020 2:01 utc | 77

As for the virus, there are five strains, we now know (or rather, we have so far determined). China's strain is different from Korea's and different again from Iran's. Interestingly, Iran's shows the greatest lethal nature. And yet the numbers shown up-thread @64, if correct, suggest a greater ability of Iran to neutralize the mortality of the virus than of Italy, which has one of the lesser strains.

Interestingly also, as karlof1 alludes to above, the virus having five identified strains so far leads us to the most basic logic in virology, which is to ask, where did these strains mutate from? Where is "patient zero"? And the only country so far with all five strains identified as present is the United States.

Usually the US has about 55,000 deaths from flu each year. Last year it had 80,000 deaths. One wonders how much of that was undiagnosed Covid-19.

One wonders how much of that came from Fort Detrick.

I could link and document all this but I have been unable to read all the threads here lately so I must assume the readership is au fait with the latest evidence on these virus matters.

Duncan Idaho , Mar 7 2020 2:11 utc | 78

Usually the US has about 55,000 deaths from flu each year.

"In recent years, flu-related deaths have ranged from about 12000 to -- in the worst year -- 56000, according to the CDC."
(2018 had even more)

The reason for this wide variation: Deaths peak when the H3N2 strain of influenza A dominates. When it's H1N1 or influenza B, the toll is quite a bit lower. Scientists can guess which strain may predominate in a given year, but it's only a guess. That's why the flu vaccine doesn't work in some years. But it usually does.

[Mar 08, 2020] Looks like Italy has problmes containing the edpimics

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

DFC , Mar 6 2020 22:40 utc | 39

They will not contain the epidemic

Take a look to the numbers of Italy to have a taste of what is happening outside China, supposed with less censorship:

ITALY
Total Nº cases 4.636
Nº Deaths 197
Rate deaths/total cases 4,25%
Nº recovered 523
Nº Serious-critical condition 462
Rate serious-crit/total 9,97%
Rate recovered/total 11,28%
Rate serious-crit/active cases 11,23%
Rate deaths/(deaths+recovered) 27,36%

You can see that the Fatality Rate is 4,25%, higher than in China and globally, but YOU HAVE ONLY 11,3% OF PEOPLE RECOVERED , that means you do not have an outcome yet for the rest.
If you consider the ratio deaths compare with the cases that have an outcome (recovered + dead), we have a fatality rate of 27,36%, in the case of China is 6% (but this could be false).

When we now analyze the fatality rate of the 1918 Spanish Flu we analyze with all the people or recovered or dead, all have an outcome, and that is the only way to know the REAL fatality rate of an epidemic.

So I do not know the total fatality ratio of this epidemic, but seems is quite high, and it seems it affects the white people (in North Italy) in similar ways as in Asia.

This is NOT a "normal flu", and this virus has many new and fantastic features, it affects strongly the CNS (Central Nervous System):

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/jmv.25728

Good luck

[Mar 08, 2020] Taking China's numbers as the true numbers, we can easily come to the conclusion the numbers in the rest of the world are clearly underreported - both in infected rates and death rates.

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

vk , Mar 7 2020 14:40 utc | 131

My methodology (and I was one of the commenters who got it right from the beginning) was very simple: I assumed the CCP is honest about this epidemic and really has the welfare of its own people in mind; I assumed the CCP has the means to contain this epidemic to the best of today's technology and; I assumed China's numbers are the holotype because of those two previous reasons.

So, taking China's numbers as the true numbers, we can easily come to the conclusion the numbers in the the rest of the world are clearly underreported - both in infected rates and death rates.

I never trusted the opinion of those western famous infectologists/virologists for one simple reason: they came up with a conclusive diagnosis with almost no data in hands. They all made absurd extrapolations from the numbers that came out from the Chinese media. There's a reason many countries forbid medical consults from distance (telephone or internet): medicine is an art that requires eye-to-eye contact between doctor and patient. It is heavily reliant on lots and lots of empirical evidence. It is more an art than a science: a doctor must always assume every patient is unique, and apply statistics to this unique case. To put it simply, doctors are not good theoreticians.

That's also why any study that is not coming out of China or is not using Chinese papers, or was not written in direct collaboration with the Chinese on COVID-19 is useless right now.

Virology is a very complex and test-heavy science: even basic comprehension over a common virus takes decades and hundreds of doctors to produce.

Those bombastic articles and papers coming out from outside China must be treated mainly as Western propaganda - and I'm not necessarily blaming the doctors involved for this, it may be a case where the journalist induced the doctor and distorted what he/she said.

[Mar 08, 2020] China bashing and the real origin of the virus

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Godfree Roberts , Mar 6 2020 23:26 utc | 51

Our China bashing (which flew in the face of scientific advice) may come back to haunt us.

It appears that, since the 2009 outbreak of Swine Flu (300,000 dead) we've gotten much better at tracing viral outbreaks to patient zero. We're even going back and revising our understanding of past epidemics. The first cases of H1N1 swine flu were reported in California and Texas in late March, 2009 but subsequent genetic analysis suggests that it may have started circulating in humans in January*.

Just so, China's top respiratory specialist, Zhong Nanshan said, "Though the COVID-19 was first discovered in China, it does not mean that it originated from China.

To me, that means China has cracked the case. They're pretty damn sure that it had a foreign origin. Japanese journalists think so, too. Asahi TV reported that some of the 14,000 Americans who have died of influenza in the past 120 days may have unwittingly contracted the coronavirus went viral on Chinese social media and that the US government may have failed to grasp how rampant the virus is in the US.

Then Taiwanese** TV presented flow charts suggesting the coronavirus originated in the US. Apparently, when viruses mutate they do so linearly and researchers can tell the order in which mutations occur and where they are detected.

Says Larry Romanoff, "One of his main points is that the type infecting Taiwan exists only in Australia and the US and, since Taiwan was not infected by Australians, the infection in Taiwan could have come only from the US. The basic logic is that the geographical location with the greatest diversity of virus strains must be the original source because a single strain cannot emerge from nothing. He demonstrated that only the US has all the five known strains of the virus (while Wuhan and most of China have only one, as do Taiwan and South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam, Singapore, and England, Belgium and Germany), constituting a thesis that the haplotypes in other nations may have originated in the US."

This stoked speculation in China that the coronavirus may have originated in the US. The PRC, which normally clamps down on such speculation, instead told citizens, "Discuss the matter rationally."

The People's Daily lent its considerable weight by publishing a SinaWeibo post, "Perhaps the US [military] delegates brought the coronavirus to Wuhan in October, and some mutation occurred to the virus, making it more deadly and contagious, and causing a widespread outbreak this year." (February 23)

Shen Yi, professor of international relations at Fudan University, noted that global virologists and intelligence agencies are working to track the origin of the virus, "The symptoms and the contagiosity of the COVID-19 are evident to all. It is impossible to conceal the origins of the disease," Shen said, urging the public to seek truth from facts.

* https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18063-timeline-the-secret-history-of-swine-flu/#ixzz6FuuLl9rH
** https://www.globalresearch.ca/china-coronavirus-shocking-update/5705196

occupatio , Mar 7 2020 1:15 utc | 70

more scapegoating. The WSJ blames the virus and effects on global economy on the Chinese government. (prep regime-change music)

Wall Street Journal:

How It All Started: China's Early Coronavirus Missteps

China's errors, dating back to the very first patients, were compounded by political leaders who dragged their feet to inform the public of the risks and to take decisive control measures. The result is an epidemic that has gripped the global economy.

[Mar 08, 2020] China Bashing on Fox News challel

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Likklemore , Mar 6 2020 21:34 utc | 24

@ NemesisCalling 13; 14

No China Bashing? Really. See my link @ 6. The slants by AP and Reuters dutifully repeated by their subscribers. And a reminder; Zerohedge lost its Twitter account.

Only today, once again, the Globaltimes, CN editorial asks, "Show us some compassion."

Grab this: Fox host hits new low on politicizing disease
LINK

Fox News host Jesse Watters blatantly asked the Chinese for "a formal apology" because "this coronavirus originated in China." His cohost asked, "What if the outbreak had started here [the US]?" Watters asserted that the epidemic started in China. He even stated in his show, "They are very hungry people. The Chinese communist government cannot feed the people, and they are desperate. This food is uncooked. It's unsafe, and that is why scientists believe that's where it originated." These remarks make him look like a hooligan.

The Communist Party of China "cannot feed the people" so that Chinese have no choice but to eat "raw bats and snakes." Is this how a popular American host sees China? Watters' complete and utter nonsense on the TV show makes people wonder how distorted US public opinion is against China. It seems that if one scolds China, he does not need to beat his brains or use common sense at all; he can talk as tough as he wants of China without being held accountable.

Imagine that a Chinese host demanded a formal apology from the US people on a TV show after the 2009 H1N1 flu spread to the world from the US, or after AIDS, a disease reportedly first tracked in North America, became a global epidemic. Let alone how the US and the international community would respond, could the Chinese public accept his performance? [.]

[Mar 08, 2020] Virus fearmongeing is exptemly profitable for big pharma

Mar 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , Mar 6 2020 22:50 utc | 42

Its a big money grab. Billions and billions have already been handed out. Big Pharma stands to make a killing with a new vaccine down the road.

H1N1 fizzled out. Came nowhere near the doomsday predictions. As did SARS, MERS, Zika, Ebola which led to billions and billion spent on research not just for vaccines but to modify these viruses to be more deadly in order to understand them so as to make better vaccines. You can see the danger, those who create these viruses , or tests confirming them, stand to benefit from them

Lets take a closer look at H1N1. In July 2009 the WHO Director General predicted that: "as many as 2 billion people could become infected over the next two years -- nearly one-third of the world population." It was a multibillion bonanza for Big Pharma. Margaret Chan reported "Vaccine makers could produce 4.9 billion pandemic flu shots per year in the best-case scenario"

The media went into high gear . Obama jumps on board saying
"Swine flu could strike up to 40 percent of Americans over the next two years and as many as several hundred thousand could die if a vaccine campaign and other measures aren't successful." The U.S. expected to have 160 million doses of swine flu vaccine available sometime in October"

Some of the tricks used will probably be repeated. In 2009 on July 24, following the WHO decision to shift from quantitative to qualitative assessments and not to require governments to ascertain the data through lab testing, the CDC announced that it had discontinued the process of data collection by testing . From April 15, 2009 to July 24, 2009, states reported a total of 43,771 confirmed and probable cases of novel influenza A (H1N1) infection. Of these cases reported, 5,011 people were hospitalized and 302 people died. During this period 7,500 people per day from all causes died. In a regular flu season over 30,000 die from flu (CDC model estimates). On July 24, 2009, confirmed and probable case counts were discontinued. CDC announced that it had developed a model "to to determine the true number of novel H1N1 flu cases in the United States".

To counter the underwhelming numbers obtained by testing. CDC claimed that the data sent to them by the states was "underestimated". Its new model then hiked up these figures of "unconfirmed" cases, many of which are cases of seasonal influenza and then pronounced more than one million people became ill with novel H1N1 flu between April and June 2009 in the United States. The model was then used to predict the spread of swine flu and to justify a national health emergency. "

This is a process of statistical manipulation (fraud), and no doubt we are seeing some of that now and will no doubt see a replay of 2009.

As we know now, the pandemic never happened. Millions of doses of swine flu vaccine had been ordered by national governments from Big Pharma. Millions of vaccine doses were subsequently destroyed. Lots of profits made though. For those who did get shots there were many adverse effects which were underreported, but Big Pharma has no liability for vaccines.

Back to the present. Fortunately they are smart enough not to unleash anything too deadly. After all,the elites dont want to get sick and are smart enough not to trust rushed to market vaccines. Something that accelerates the demise of rapidly aging populations is just the thing. Death rates in the under 50 crowd are only 0.3% and that is likely overstated by a factor of 10 since most mild cases are not tested. In the elderly and sick, we see rates in the double digits, similar to ordinary flu

The US and China have 7500 and 25000 deaths per day, for COVID-19 in 3 months there are fewer than 3000 deaths. Yet its panic. You ask me there is a dumb virus going around and its been around for at least 40 years. Picking up steam though.

[Mar 08, 2020] The notion that the US itself had a major Coronavirus outbreak back in 2019 seems pretty implausible to me.

Notable quotes:
"... If what my brother died of was the novel coronavirus, as I now strongly suspect, that means it was already spreading on Manhattan in late December. ..."
Mar 08, 2020 | www.unz.com

Ron Unz , says: Show Comment March 6, 2020 at 1:59 am GMT

@Godfree Roberts

Larry Romanoff's latest article, whose footnotes I have not yet checked, is perhaps the most interesting of all, in that it points to a US coverup of a domestic outbreak prior to China's

Well, I just lightly skimmed through the piece, but the notion that the US itself had a major Coronavirus outbreak back in 2019 seems pretty implausible to me.

By all accounts, the virus is extremely contagious. So any such American outbreak would surely have resulted in many hundreds of thousands if not millions of cases. Enough people, at least the elderly, would have become gravely ill or died that we would have noticed it.

lysias , says: Show Comment March 6, 2020 at 2:47 am GMT
@Ron Unz A brother of mine aged 84 died of pneumonia on or about Feb. 10 in New Jersey. From what I heard about his condition and medical developments, it sure sounded like what we later learned about Wuhan coronavirus. He had been being treated for cancer for 14 years, so his immune system was severely compromised.

Shortly before Christmas, he went to Sloan Kettering in Manhattan for consultations, and a few days later he collapsed and had to be sent to a hospital. He never really recovered and weeks later died. His fortyish son, who had spent a lot of time with him in hospital, came down with a severe cold that incapacitated him for a week.

If what my brother died of was the novel coronavirus, as I now strongly suspect, that means it was already spreading on Manhattan in late December.

[Mar 07, 2020] Stealing sanitizer from clinics

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

matthew 15 hours ago

My best friends brother is a physician working in the midwest town in which I live. I asked him about all of these stories of people stealing things like hand sanitizer from clinics and he said nothing is any different from what it was 2-3 months month ago. Maybe this is a bad thing, but It seems that outside of the few areas right now that we are reading about in the media, most people in this country are treating it like Baton Rouge or the city in which I live. People in general just are not that worked up by it. I work in an urban school district in medium size, midwestern city and so far other than a general notice to wash our hands and not touch our face, nothing has been even talked about in regards to handling a massive outbreak. Again, in hind sight this could be a huge mistake, but until people see this touching places across the heartland and reaching into every corner of society it looks like they will assume its a mostly big city, densely populated area problem. Of course if it reaches these places it will be too late to do anything, but I guess that is how these things always work.

[Mar 07, 2020] Funny, I thought conservatives told us that empty shelves and sky-high black market prices only happen when socialists are in charge.

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

AlmostNormalTexan matthew an hour ago

I live in Houston and cannot find a single bottle of hand sanitizer or Clorox wipes on a store shelf. I have been to grocery stores, Walmart, Target, dollar stores, office supply stores, Home Depot, drug stores. Everyone is out and nobody who works there has any idea when their stock will be replenished. Meanwhile prices for the stuff on Amazon have spiked into the hundreds of dollars.

Funny, I thought conservatives told us that empty shelves and sky-high black market prices only happen when socialists are in charge.

[Mar 07, 2020] CDC Catch 22

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Jeremy Kee 14 hours ago

The following makes me want to riot:

"They said they would not test me because if I were wearing the recommended protective equipment, then I wouldn't have the coronavirus."

The CDC is blaming human error - BASED ON CDC GUIDELINES - for the contraction of the virus? Or is it more like the novel Catch 22 - if you were too mentally unwell to fly then you were excused from missions, but if you said you were too unwell to fly then you were clearly well enough to assess your mental health.

[Mar 07, 2020] At least if we're all gonna die of coronavirus, there's no point in worrying about climate change

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Nick Stuart 5 hours ago

<gallows_humor>At least if we're all gonna die of coronavirus, there's no point in worrying about climate change.</gallows_humor>

[Mar 07, 2020] Silver lining in the dark cloud

Mar 07, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

periol , March 6, 2020 at 1:23 pm

Some of my darker thoughts on CV have noted that if this spreads through the country, Social Security and pension funds will be able to relax, homes will come on the market and prices will go down, and we could even be looking at generational political turnover.

I'm not wishing for it in the slightest, but the potential is there.

[Mar 07, 2020] Test of coronavirus vaccine are expected to begin next month

Mar 07, 2020 | dailymail.co.uk

The first human trials of a coronavirus vaccine are expected to begin next month at a university in London and pharmaceutical company in the US.

Scientists at Imperial College in the English capital have been trialling their attempt at a vaccine on animals since mid-February.

And they could move onto human trials – the last phase of development before a drug can be used – as soon as April.

Meanwhile, US pharmaceutical companies Moderna and Inovio have also said they plan to start their own human trials next month.

The coronavirus, which causes a disease called COVID-19 and has infected more than 94,000 people around the world, cannot currently be cured or prevented.

[Mar 07, 2020] First British COVID-17 pacient, who is 25 old, describes coronavirus

An interesting case of severe case of virus affecting 25 years old patient (a teacher of Eglish, originally from Australia) story from Wuhan.
The illness lasted three weeks and wan uneven with bad days and "good" days intermixed...
Mar 07, 2020 | dailymail.co.uk
... ... ...

Day 12: I’ve had a relapse. Just as I thought the flu was getting better, it has come back with a vengeance. My breathing is laboured. Just getting up and going to the bathroom leaves me panting and exhausted. I’m sweating, burning up, dizzy and shivering. The television is on but I can’t make sense of it. This is a nightmare.

By the afternoon, I feel like I am suffocating. I have never been this ill in my life. I can’t take more than sips of air and, when I breathe out, my lungs sound like a paper bag being crumpled up. This isn’t right. I need to see a doctor. But if I call the emergency services, I’ll have to pay for the ambulance call-out myself. That’s going to cost a fortune. I’m ill, but I don’t think I’m dying — am I?

Surely I can survive a taxi journey. I decide to go to Zhongnan University Hospital because there are plenty of foreign doctors there, studying. It isn’t rational but, in my feverish state, I want to see a British doctor. My Mandarin is pretty good, so I have no language problem when I call the taxi. It’s a 20-minute ride. As soon as I get there, a doctor diagnoses pneumonia. So that’s why my lungs are making that noise. I am sent for a battery of tests lasting six hours.

... ... ...

Day 24: Hallelujah! I think I’m better. Who knew flu could be as horrible as that, though?

[Mar 07, 2020] Do not hoard masks/sanitisers. These are to be used rationally and more so by the frontline health workers. DO NOT PANIC! We need to collectively step up our hygiene and microbiological barrier as a society. Do not fall for quacks.

Mar 07, 2020 | twitter.com

6:17 AM - 7 Mar 2020

For Public Attention: Do not hoard masks/sanitisers. These are to be used rationally and more so by the frontline health workers.

DO NOT PANIC!

We need to collectively step up our hygiene and microbiological barrier as a society.

Do not fall for quacks.

# COVID2019 .

[Mar 07, 2020] Diabetes greatly increases the risk of getting pneumonia with ordinary flus, and 9.4% of Americans have diabetes

Mar 07, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Yves Smith Post author , March 6, 2020 at 9:54 pm

... Diabetes greatly increases the risk of getting pneumonia with ordinary flus, and 9.4% of Americans have diabetes.

[Mar 07, 2020] Covid19 pandemic: cause, prediction, prevention

Mar 07, 2020 | slate.com

Peter Daszak is a zoologist who works in China and runs the EcoHealth Alliance, an organization that studies the connections between human and wildlife health. So coronaviruses, like the new one that's spreading right now, are one of his areas of expertise.

... ... ...

Mary Harris: Tens of thousands of people have been diagnosed with this disease worldwide, with more than 3,000 deaths. Yet there have been few deaths in the U.S. so far. Do we actually know how many cases are stateside? It's been reported that we're not testing that much, but that might change soon.

"I would say we are the cause of almost all emerging diseases." -- Peter Daszak

Peter Daszak: In most outbreaks, you never really know when it begins, what the true caseload is, what the environment is. All you can see are the people who come to the hospital and get tested and diagnosed. You don't see people with mild infections, or people who are pretty sick in poor communities and just don't make it, or people in communities that have trouble traveling.

When people start rolling out those test kits, we're going to find a lot of cases in the U.S. and it's going to look like this is spreading out of control. The truth is: It's probably already been there, probably, and we're now finding that out.

You know how this story goes. First there's the panic, the search for something or someone to blame. In the case of the novel coronavirus, there was the story that the outbreak got its start at a local food market in Wuhan. But stories like that can get in the way of the bigger picture: More and more people are also living and working closer to wildlife. It isn't about one or two individuals putting people at risk. The risk also comes from clear-cutting rainforests, remote mining, and even widespread suburbanization.

I would say we are the cause of almost all emerging diseases.

... ... ...

There are over a million viruses like the novel coronavirus out there. You've found 500 different coronaviruses in bats alone, but it took you 10 years to do that work.

We need to do that on this scale so that we discover all the rest of those viruses. We need many more groups in many more regions doing this work. We then need to get those sequences we find into the hands of vaccine designers, because what's the point in spending billions of dollars designing a vaccine to SARS if the virus that emerges this year is 20 percent different, and the vaccine doesn't work? Let's have vaccines across the whole group. We've heard about the universal flu vaccine. Let's have a universal coronavirus vaccine. Let's have a universal Ebola virus vaccine. I think that's common sense.

[Mar 07, 2020] The Neoliberal Plague by Rob Urie

Highly recommended!
Creating employment insecurity was the entire point of neoliberal reforms such as outsourcing, de-skilling and contingent employment. Neoliberal theory had it that desperate workers work both longer and harder. And they die younger.
We can view "Creepy Joe" and Trump as representatives of "neoliberal plague" The slogan should be " No Pasaran " ( Dolores Ibárruri's famous battlecry appeal for the defense of the Second Spanish Republic)
Notable quotes:
"... For those who aren't familiar with Albert Camus' The Plague , disparate lives are brought together during a plague that sweeps through an Algerian city. ..."
"... Through the virus, a new light is being shone on four decades of neoliberal reorganization of political economy. The combination of widespread economic marginalization and a lack of paid time off means that sick and highly contagious workers will have little economic choice but to spread the virus. And the insurance company pricing mechanism intended to dissuade people from overusing health care ('skin in the game') means that only very sick people will 'buy' health care they can't afford. ..."
"... If this last part reads like (Ayn) Randian social theory as interpreted by a budding sociopath in the basement of his dead parent's crumbling tract home, it is basic neoliberal ideology applied to circumstances that we can see playing out in real time. ..."
"... While the American response to the Coronavirus threat seems to be less than robust, there was a near instantaneous response from the Federal Reserve to a 10% decline in stock prices. ..."
"... If priorities seem misplaced, you haven't been paying attention. The statistics on suicides, divorces, drug addiction and self-destructive behavior that result from the loss of employment were understood and widely published by the early 1990s, at the peak of that era's round of mass layoffs. Creating employment insecurity was the entire point of neoliberal reforms such as outsourcing, de-skilling and contingent employment. Neoliberal theory had it that desperate workers work both longer and harder. And they die younger. ..."
"... But how likely is it that people will 'demand' too much healthcare? The starting position of Obamacare was that the American healthcare system provided half the benefit at twice the price of comparable systems. ..."
"... Milton Friedman, one of the founders of neoliberalism through the Mont Pelerin Society, produced a long career's worth of half-baked garbage economics. On the rare occasions when he wasn't helping Chilean fascists toss students out of airplanes in flight, he was pawning his infantile theories off on future Chamber of Commerce and ALEC predators. His positivism was already known to be a farce when he took it up. Here is a primer that explains why it is, and always will be, a farce. ..."
Mar 07, 2020 | www.counterpunch.org

For those who aren't familiar with Albert Camus' The Plague , disparate lives are brought together during a plague that sweeps through an Algerian city. Today, by way of the emergence of a lethal and highly communicable virus (Coronavirus), we -- the people of the West, have an opportunity to reconsider what we mean to one another. The existential lesson is that through dread and angst we can choose to live, with the responsibilities that the choice entails, or just fade away.

Through the virus, a new light is being shone on four decades of neoliberal reorganization of political economy. The combination of widespread economic marginalization and a lack of paid time off means that sick and highly contagious workers will have little economic choice but to spread the virus. And the insurance company pricing mechanism intended to dissuade people from overusing health care ('skin in the game') means that only very sick people will 'buy' health care they can't afford.

Market provision of virus test kits, vaccines and basic sanitary aids will, in the absence of government coercion, follow the monopolist's model of under-provision at prices that are unaffordable for most people. The most fiscally responsible route, in the sense of assuring that the rich don't pay taxes, is to let those who can't afford health care die. If this means that tens of millions of people die unnecessarily, markets are a harsh taskmaster. ( 3.4% mortality rate @ 2X – 3X the contagion rate of the Spanish Flu @ 4 X 1918 population).

If this last part reads like (Ayn) Randian social theory as interpreted by a budding sociopath in the basement of his dead parent's crumbling tract home, it is basic neoliberal ideology applied to circumstances that we can see playing out in real time. According to Ryan Grim of The Intercept, Bill Clinton eliminated the ' reasonable pricing ' requirement for drugs made by companies that receive government funding. This has bearing on both commercially developed Coronavirus test kits and vaccines.

Leaving aside technical difficulties that either will or won't be resolved, how would any substantial portion of the 80% of the population that lives hand-to-mouth be effectively quarantined when losing an income creates a cascade effect of evictions, foreclosures, starvation, repossessions, shut-off utilities, etc.? The current system conceived and organized to make desperate and near desperate workers labor with the minimum of pay and benefits is a public health disaster by design.

While the American response to the Coronavirus threat seems to be less than robust, there was a near instantaneous response from the Federal Reserve to a 10% decline in stock prices. The same Federal Reserve that has been engineering a non-stop rise in stock prices since Wall Street was bailed out in 2009 knows perfectly well how narrowly stock ownership is concentrated amongst the rich -- it publishes the data. It quickly lowered the cost of financial speculation as the cost of Coronavirus tests and a vaccine -- and the question of who will bear them, remain indeterminate.

If priorities seem misplaced, you haven't been paying attention. The statistics on suicides, divorces, drug addiction and self-destructive behavior that result from the loss of employment were understood and widely published by the early 1990s, at the peak of that era's round of mass layoffs. Creating employment insecurity was the entire point of neoliberal reforms such as outsourcing, de-skilling and contingent employment. Neoliberal theory had it that desperate workers work both longer and harder. And they die younger.

The brutality of the logic used by the Obama administration in constructing the ACA, Obamacare, is worthy of exploration. The premise behind the 'skin in the game' idea is neoliberalism 101, developed by a founder of neoliberalism, economist Milton Friedman, to ration health care. The basic idea is that without a price attached to it, people will 'demand' more health care than they need. That from a public health perspective, oversupplying health care is better than undersupplying it, is ignored under the premise that public health concerns are communistic. (Read Friedman).

But how likely is it that people will 'demand' too much healthcare? The starting position of Obamacare was that the American healthcare system provided half the benefit at twice the price of comparable systems. Through the 'market' pricing mechanism that existed, the incentive was for people to avoid purchasing healthcare because it was / is wildly overpriced. Not considered was that through geographical and specialist 'natural monopolies,' health care providers had an incentive to undersupply health care by providing high-margin services to the rich.

Furthermore, why would a healthcare system be considered from the perspective of individual users? In contrast to the temporal sleight-of-hand where Obamacare 'customers' are expected to anticipate their illnesses and buy insurance plans that cover them, the entire premise of health insurance is that illnesses are unpredictable. Isn't the Coronavirus evidence of this unpredictable nature? And through the nature of pandemics, it is known that some people will get sick and other people won't. Not known is precisely who will get sick and who won't.

While there are public health emergency provisions in Obamacare that may or may not be invoked, why does it make sense in any case to require that people anticipate future illnesses? Such a program isn't health care and it isn't even health insurance. It is gambling. Guess right and you live. Guess wrong and you die. Why should we be guessing at all? Prior to Obamacare, health insurance companies gamed the system with life and death decisions. In true neoliberal fashion, Obamacare randomized the process as health insurers continue to game the system.

As I understand it, the public health emergency provision in Obamacare might cover virus testing and the cost of a vaccine if one is ever found. Great. What about care? How many readers chose a plan that covers Coronavirus? How many days can you go without a paycheck if you get sick or are quarantined? Who will take care of your children and for how long? How will you pay your rent or mortgage? Who will deliver groceries to your house and how will you pay for them? How will you make the car payment before they repossess it and how will you get to work without it if you recover?

The rank idiocy -- and the political content, of the frame of individual 'consumers' overusing health care quickly devolves to the fact that some large portion of the American people can't afford to go to the doctor when they need to. Even if they can afford the direct costs, they can't afford the indirect costs. When Obamacare was passed, the U.S. had the worst health care outcomes among rich countries. Ten years later, the U.S. has the worst healthcare outcomes among rich countries . And medical bankruptcies are virtually unchanged since Obamacare was passed.

The reason for focusing on Obamacare is it is the system through which we encounter the Coronavirus. In the narrow political sense of getting a health care bill passed, Obamacare may or may not have been 'pragmatic.' In a public health care sense, it is a disaster decades in the making. The problem wasn't / isn't Mr. Obama per se. It is the radical ideology behind it that was posed as pragmatism. Mr. Obama's success was to get a bill passed -- a political accomplishment. It wasn't to create a functioning healthcare system.

The otherworldly nature of neoliberal theory has led to a most brutal of social philosophies. Mr. Obama later put his energy into lengthening drug company patents to give drug companies an economic advantage provided by the government. Economist Dean Baker has made a career out of hammering this general point home. Michael Bloomberg benefited from government support for both technology and finance. His fortune of $16 billion in 2009 followed stock prices higher to land him at $64.2 billion in 2020.

Donald Trump inherited a large fortune that likewise followed stock and Manhattan real estate prices higher. Both he and Mr. Bloomberg could have put their early fortunes into passive portfolios and received the returns that they claim to be the product of superior intelligence and hard work. Analytically, if the variability of these fortunes tracks systemic, rather than personal, factors, then systemic factors explain them. The same is true of most of the great fortunes of the epoch of finance capitalism that began around 1978.

The point of merging these issues is that they represent flip sides of the neoliberal coin. In a broad sense, neoliberalism is premised on economic Darwinism, the quasi-religious (it isn't Darwin) idea that people land where they deserve to land in the social order. This same idea, that systemic differences in economic outcomes are evidence of systemic causes, applies here. However, differences in intelligence, initiative and talent don't map to systemic outcomes , meaning that concentrated wealth isn't a reward for these.

The ignorant brutality of this system appears to be on its way to getting a reality check through a tiny virus. Unless the Federal government figures this out really fast, most of the bodies will be carried out of poor and working class neighborhoods like mine. Few here have health insurance and most health care providers in the area don't take the insurance they do have. More than a day away from work and many of my neighbors will no longer have jobs. Evictions are a regular state of affairs in good times. There are no resources to facilitate a larger-picture response.

Liberalism, of which neoliberalism is a cranky cousin, lives through a patina of pragmatism until the nukes start flying or a virus hits. Getting healthcare 'consumers' to consider their market choices follows a narrow logic up to the point where none of the choices are relevant to a public health emergency. One I plus another I plus another I doesn't equal us. The fundamental premise of neoliberalism, the Robinsonade I, has always been a cynical dodge to let rich people keep their loot.

The mortality rate and contagion factor recently reported for Coronavirus (links at top) place it above the modern benchmark of the Spanish Flu of 1918 in terms of potential lethality. What should make people angry is how the reconfiguration of political economy intended to make a few people really rich has put the rest of us at increased risk. These are real people's lives and they matter.

Finally, for students of neoliberalism: there is no conflation of neoliberalism with neoclassical economics here. Milton Friedman, one of the founders of neoliberalism through the Mont Pelerin Society, produced a long career's worth of half-baked garbage economics. On the rare occasions when he wasn't helping Chilean fascists toss students out of airplanes in flight, he was pawning his infantile theories off on future Chamber of Commerce and ALEC predators. His positivism was already known to be a farce when he took it up. Here is a primer that explains why it is, and always will be, a farce.

Rob Urie is an artist and political economist. His book Zen Economics is published by CounterPunch Books.

[Mar 07, 2020] Dr. Drew Pinsky Threat Of Coronavirus An Overblown Press-Created Hysteria Video

Notable quotes:
"... We have in the United States 24 million cases of flu-like illness, 180,000 hospitalizations, 16,000 dead from influenza. ..."
Mar 07, 2020 | www.realclearpolitics.com

After a community transmitted case of coronavirus was reported in California,

Dr. Drew Pinsky talks about the coronavirus:

PINSKY: I don't know what they're talking about. We used to point at the way Indiana responded to the opiate and the HIV epidemic as the model for the country. I don't know what they're talking about. The only reason I felt comfortable with Pence as Vice President was I was aware of his track record in Indiana in handling these serious problems, and they handled them better than most states did, almost any other state. So, I don't know what the hell people are talking about. That is fake news...

We have in the United States 24 million cases of flu-like illness, 180,000 hospitalizations, 16,000 dead from influenza. We have zero deaths from coronavirus. We have almost no cases. There are people walking around out there with the virus that don't even know they have it, it's so mild.

So it's going to be much more widespread than we knew. It's going to be much milder than we knew. The 1.7% fatality rate is going to fall. Where was the press during the Mediterranean Corona outbreak, where the fatality rate was 41%? Why didn't they get crazed about MERS or SARS?

This is an overblown press-created hysteria. This thing is well in hand. President Trump is absolutely correct.

[Mar 07, 2020] Trump's idea of "going to work"

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Jefferson Smith 9 hours ago

".....when Trump said sick people go to work, he was talking about telecommuting."

In his defense, Trump's idea of "going to work" is sitting for long hours in self-quarantine watching Fox and tweeting about it. So maybe he thought most other people's jobs are like that too.

[Mar 07, 2020] COVID-19 will most likely become endemic, like colds and seasonal flu.

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Al_21 13 hours ago

This is a good primer on COVID-19 and coronaviruses in general. 2019-nCoV will most likely become endemic, like colds and seasonal flu. Play Hide
SatirevFlesti

[Mar 07, 2020] In Seattle the city administration has recommended that anyone over 60 should consider avoiding public places, particularly crowded ones. This isn t hysteria. In the face of the facts at the Life Care Center it s simple prudence.

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Seattle Reader SatirevFlesti 5 hours ago

Allow me to weigh in from rainy Seattle.

Local long term care facility in a local upscale neighborhood. Sixty-nine residents. Currently, eleven dead from Covid-19. Sure, almost all of them were over 60 and had health issues. That also describes me, my wife, and most of my close friends and family. The arguments over death rates are absurd. On average, this is just the flu by another name! If you're 16, hey, no big deal.

Why all the hysteria?

Too many old folks around anyway! But for quite a few of us, getting this thing with no chance to vaccinate against it seems tantamount to a death sentence.

The city administration has recommended that anyone over 60 should consider avoiding public places, particularly crowded ones. This isn't hysteria. In the face of the facts at the Life Care Center it's simple prudence.

[Mar 07, 2020] About some exaggerated fears: And what if Covid-19 has been around for years and we just now became aware of it because of better testing?

People who vacationed in Dominican republic in spring of 2019 were hit with the virus that closely resemble COVID-19 symptoms.
Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

brucenyc a day ago

There are between 20 and 70 thousand deaths from the flu in the US every year. Equivalent numbers in China would be something like 80 and 300 thousand for China. They have reported 3000 to date. Even if they have underestimated by a factor of 10, this virus is still way less of a problem than the annual flu.

And what if Covid-19 has been around for years and we just now became aware of it because of better testing? We do know of other corona viruses; some cause the common cold.

Paolo Pagliaro a day ago
I agree with Trump, and I live in Lombardy, the Italian region most hit by coronavirus.
Maybe closing schools and other public and private places saves some life. Why, then, don't we abolish cars? roughly 1.3 millions lives are lost every years in car accidents.

There's a price to be paid shutting down public life for an infection. As usual, Trump is criticized as if he were an imbecile - even by Dreher - while his stance is as reasonable as others.

I see this hysteric trend as another exemplification of a dangerous and noxious approach to life, according to which: adverse events not only are to be avoided, but are an infringement on my absolute right to be happy, and all the world must stop to protect me.

[Mar 07, 2020] Trump had chosen a dangerous path and might be buried by the virus epidemics

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

FL Transplanta day ago

Among other things my background includes some game theory and scenario planning--skills that were extremely useful in some of the various projects I was involved with in my past. There were two obvious ways Trump could have handled this

(1) Minimize the potential for a crisis; nothing to see here, it's all a plot, move along now. Potential outcomes:
A. It turns out to be nothing. He looks good for keeping his cool while everyone about him is losing their head. MAGA!
B. It turns out to be really serious. He's recognized as an incompetent, ignorant doofus and is reviled for generations as the President who fiddled while Rome burned.

(2) Play it serious, energize the federal government and work closely with state and local governments to deal with the potentiality for a massive medical, economic, and social crisis. Potential outcomes:
A. It turns out to be nothing. He saved the country! A hero!
B. Despite the best efforts of all involved, despite all the resources and energy thrown into the fight, there's still a massive problem . We did all we could, everything we know how to do, and still were unsuccessful. You can't defeat Mother Nature, fight the tide, sometimes even wearing your lucky rocketship underpants isn't enough. But no one could have done more.

He chose path (1). The wrong choice--viruses, like weather, don't respond to insults, tweets, bullying, lawsuits, and happytalk in front of supporters. Right now it appears that we're going down the (1)B path of the decision tree. I do expect his Cult of Personality defenders to invoke (2)B in his defense, though--it wouldn't have mattered what he did, so it was all good.

... ... ...

JustAMom23a day ago
Trump's on Twitter (because it's not like he has any work to do) bragging about his travel ban and how we only have a few cases, and we're keeping the number as low as possible. Gee, I wonder why they haven't banned travelers from Italy yet. Anyone?

The US health care system is a rent seeking profit machine. We do not have a robust public health system. No kidding they're going to miss their target of a million tests. We're not going to do anything beyond talk about paid sick leave either. We're just going to sit back and let this spread. Maybe if we don't test for it, we can pretend we don't have any cases?

The Emperor Has No Clothes.

I don't have much faith in the US learning anything from this debacle. Never was a nation so convinced of its superiority as the USA. Well.....maybe the Roman Empire.

Ramza JustAMom23a day ago
Rome was utterly dominant for a thousand years, we barely made 75 before utter and complete incompetence derailed us. We ain't Rome. We ain't Byzantium. Hell we ain't even imperial Spain.
Raskolnik 18 hours ago
Look, I am not a fan of Trump, and everything you've said here about his having bungled the response to COVID is correct.

Nevertheless, for two months Our Moral Superiors were whinging about the dangers of "racism" and how it would be "xenophobic" to close the borders, which would have been the correct response at the time. Even now, the SJWs who somehow managed to wrangle control of the CDC are more concerned with policing people's language than with giving them solid advice on how to prepare for the coming outbreak.

My point is: had Trump taken the correct, necessary, broadly authoritarian measures--close the borders, institute mandatory military quarantine, etc.--they'd be calling him Hitler (I mean, more than they normally do), and federal judges would be issuing nationwide injunctions claiming mandatory quarantine is a violation of Civil Rights law. So I have a hard time blaming him entirely for this, and an even harder time taking the critics seriously.

Awake and Uttering a Song Raskolnik 14 hours ago
"...had Trump taken the correct, necessary, broadly authoritarian
measures--close the borders, institute mandatory military quarantine,
etc.--they'd be calling him Hitler (I mean, more than they normally do),
and federal judges would be issuing nationwide injunctions claiming
mandatory quarantine is a violation of Civil Rights law."

Jeez freakin' Louise. He needs to grow a pair and just do the right thing NO MATTER what he is called or how many lies are told about him.

Voltaire Raskolnik 14 hours ago
I would be able to forgive bungling the balance between civil liberties and quarantine in this situation. You are correct on the difficulties Trump faces with that.

I have a more difficult time forgiving Trump's downplaying of the disease and the overall unpreparedness of our country. Yes, we need to control panic. That can be done without trivializing the potential seriousness of what we face. Yes, we had a short time to prepare. However, we could have had clear and well articulated plans in place to get better testing developed and into the hands of medical professionals.

I understand that Trump's opponents are politicizing this. That is unconscionable. But, it is not an excuse for Trump's handling of the situation.

We cannot stop the spread of COVID-19, but we can have more or less effective responses. If my family member is suffering from this, it is meaningless to me whether to blame Trump or his opponents. I expect them all to step up and start acting like adults.

Franklin_Evans Raskolnik 13 hours ago
Well, I won't belabor you with a long post, researched citations and such, because I expect them to fall on blind eyes. You are wrong, factually and demonstrably, on every point you try to make.

The one potential exception is your what-if. If Trump had the moral integrity of a 10-year-old caught red-handed, hand in cookie jar, he would have done the authoritative things and stood up against the over-reactions. You are wrong about the court injunctions in your what-if, with very long precedent to show for it.

anon Raskolnik 12 hours ago
The virus was in the US by the time Wuhan fell. Closing the borders and imposing martial law and 24/7 mandatory curfews would not have changed that fact.

We needed to be preparing a pandemic response, but the group responsible for that had been cut. We needed to get sound information out, but we opted for spin. We needed to prepare our hospitals and doctors and nurses to care for the infected, and we *still have not done that*.

Walls did not stop the black death, they can't stop this, either.

Raskolnik anon 3 hours ago
Walls and quarantines slow down the rate of infection, giving hospitals more ability to help people who get sick. Not overwhelming the hospital system is maybe the single most important thing.
Rod Dreher Moderator Raskolnik an hour ago
That's something that a lot of the "what, me worry?" crowd is missing: the death rate might -- might -- be relatively low, but all those hospital beds will be taken up with coronavirus patients, and not them, with their other problems. Seattle doc on the radio tonight said they're now postponing elective surgeries to keep beds open. Another doc said today that his clinic is overwhelmed by people with coronavirus symptoms (they don't know if they have the virus because they can't get tested), but the phones are ringing with people with other problems bitching about where's their cholesterol test result, dammit? These people have no freaking clue about what's actually happening in the world of medicine. They want service, and they want it NOW!
IanDakar Passp0rts 14 hours ago
They aren't. By how it sounds both the 2-3% and 1% are estimates of the CFR.

The story that's creating the mixed numbers is based on what happened in China. Accordingly, the CFR started at about 3-4% when the virus first started, but now the CFR is sitting at .7% due to better treatments, the hospitals being better prepared, and tests now finding more cases (including milder cases that aren't resulting in death). The key takeaway is that we're basing all of this on the results of China which isn't exactly the most known for open communication of their issues. Europe and the US are too new in their outbreaks to really give us a clear picture on CFR.

We also have a good few people who are REALLY trying to push a certain narrative, from the Trump administration wanting a low number to make the disease look weak to his opponents who want this to be proof that ends his career. It's making finding accurate information VERY annoying.

It also doesn't help that the coronavirus has VERY different effects depending on the person. For healthy people, it's very much possible for them to have mild symptoms they mistake for an annoying cold or, a least 'not enough to risk losing your job by trying to stay home.' For people who are vulnerable to respiratory infections or have immune issues, it turns into a nightmare fast.

Best I can gather is that the disease, at first, looks like an easier form of a dangerous disease with lots of people getting it and 3-4% of them dying. But then you realize it's MUCH more common than it looks as it 'stealth' infects most of the population with most not really realizing it. Thus while we watch a Nursing Home struggling to fight it off entire cities suffer from 'mild sneezing' until a hospital a few states off suddenly swells with a swarm of bad cases.

I'm betting that .7% is probably close to accurate for the CFR and that 60% infection might be underestimating.

[Mar 07, 2020] Coronavirus Crisis And Denial

Mar 07, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Even 73 percent of Republicans polled agree that Trump is "self-centered." Pew notes that even though most Republicans don't like the way he conducts himself, they still approve of the job he's done. That's sustainable when things are going well for the country. But we are at the beginning of a pandemic that, public health considerations aside, is going to have massive social and economic impact. The markets are diving not because the media are telling them to, but because investors can see clearly the long-term significance of this crisis. I remind you that China has all but shut down its economy to fight this thing. That doesn't happen over nothing.

Think of it: Boeing enters this crisis in serious trouble over its self-inflicted 737 Max problem. Now it is facing an airline industry that expects catastrophic losses. This will have obvious impact on Boeing's orders. What will it mean to the American economy, and to the economy in Washington state, if Boeing goes under?

No president has the power to prevent this pandemic from reaching our shores, and it would be unfair to blame Trump for it. But it is perfectly fair to give him credit or blame for the way he handles the crisis. Trump has enormous political liabilities in the best of times and suddenly, these are not the best of times, and they are not going to be good for the foreseeable future. The idea that the President of the United States is sitting in the White House thinking only about himself, sending out childish tweets about his political enemies, and blaming the media for hyping the coronavirus threat -- well, the political idiocy of this response could easily be the thing that not only gives the White House to the Democrats, but also costs the GOP the Senate. Trump has no cushion here.

So it goes. I cannot for the life of me understand why, leaving aside the public health aspects of the president's response, people cannot see what a political disaster he's making for himself and the GOP. He doesn't have to act like the zombie apocalypse is upon us. He only has to behave like Rudy Giuliani did as Mayor of New York City in the fall of 2001. But then, as we know, Donald Trump saw the Twin Towers fall, and thought about himself:

https://youtu.be/PcKlPhFIE7w

An account of an event today with the chief epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins:

My notes trom a Morgan btanley hosted event with John
Hopkins Chief Epidemiologist. JH is forecasting a
widespread outbreak, they est 40-60% of the world pop will
be infected over 1-2 years. They est true death rate will be
.1% -.5%. They expect it to peak in the spring...

ITS NOT THAT BAD- many no symptoms, to cold, to flu-like

Dangerous for elderly and immunocompromised, as reported

No incentive right no to test mild cases, so the death rate will be massively
overstated

They expect there to be school closures, but that they will not be particularly
effective

They believe this will be a circulating annual virus like the flu that will peak in the
spring

They believe this has been circulating for some time, most cases are very mild,
under-tested

He stated "i will likely get the virus, as I will be treating these patients"

"I will not wear a mask because it will be useless"

The biggest risk to travel is flying to an international destination and then having
the govt cancel travel

Hospitals are likely to be overwhelmed, ICUs will be stressed and undersupplied

Social distancing unlikely to be effective, basically just wash your hands and don't
touch your face

By 2022 we will likely have vaccines and ultimately we will have routine childhood
immunizations

He emphasized that this is a fluid situation and this information can quickly become
stale, but this is their best guess at this time #COVlDi9 #coronavirus

[Mar 07, 2020] Coronavirus Kids About as Likely as Adults to Become Infected; What Happens When School Closures Become Widespread naked ca

Notable quotes:
"... On the surface it does sound reasonable but I think about the numbers here. So an infected kid goes to school and infects several dozen kids (and teachers) who infect their families when they go home. When they go for medical treatment, then several dozen nurses and the like are infected who have to be taken out of the fight for a fortnight. ..."
"... In short, this approach actually floods the hospitals with patients all at the same time whereas if that kid had stayed home, he could only infect his own family. It seems that with Coronavirus, it is mostly a numbers game. ..."
Mar 07, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

David , March 6, 2020 at 8:55 am

Macron was asked about this yesterday by the French media and made, for him, a sensible point. He said that although France would soon have to declare an actual epidemic (423 cases as of last night and a significant increase over the previous day) the government had decided that there was no point in closing all schools now, or soon.

His argument was that many of the health workers who would be needed to fight the epidemic themselves have children, and would be obliged to stay home and look after them, thus potentially bringing the services themselves to a halt after a time. (France's extensive nursery system would have to be closed as well).

This strikes me as a reasonable argument, and one with wider implications. What are the second- and third-order effects of school closures on societies where it's now taken for granted that in the majority of families with children of school age, both parents work?

The Rev Kev , March 6, 2020 at 10:02 am

On the surface it does sound reasonable but I think about the numbers here. So an infected kid goes to school and infects several dozen kids (and teachers) who infect their families when they go home. When they go for medical treatment, then several dozen nurses and the like are infected who have to be taken out of the fight for a fortnight.

In short, this approach actually floods the hospitals with patients all at the same time whereas if that kid had stayed home, he could only infect his own family. It seems that with Coronavirus, it is mostly a numbers game.

[Mar 06, 2020] End of Trump? It really is a proper Greek tragedy. Trump won't be taken down by anyone in the media or on the left, but by his own mouth.

Notable quotes:
"... I agree with you about Trump. This reminds me of George W. Bush telling America their most patriotic duty after 9/11 was to go shopping and spend money. ..."
"... Western institutions may at some level be corrupted but at least you've got institutions! Most countries don't have effective ones. Secondly, despite the degradation of them (partly thanks to market fundamentalists) I wouldn't wholly endorse Rod's pessimistic hype..there's hope yet. Er..they're running out of hand sanitizer here..maybe you're right after all! ..."
Mar 06, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

alierakieron a day ago

It really is a proper Greek tragedy. Trump won't be taken down by anyone in the media or on the left, but by his own mouth.
Mike alierakieron a day ago • edited
He's his own worst enemy. He could have let the actual medical experts deal with the response and if he wanted to reassure the nation read out a teleprompter speech written by said experts. Neither underplay nor overplay the situation,just the facts. Unfortunately he wants to be the bride at every wedding and the corpse at every funeral. Self absorbed and vainglorious don't begin to cover it. No, he's not responsible for COVID19 but he's responsible for the scattershot response and lack of message discipline.
SirMagpieDeCrow1 Mike 8 hours ago
Unfortunately he wants to be the bride at every wedding and the corpse at every funeral.

One of the best descriptions of the man's personality I have ever seen.

Victor_the_thinker alierakieron a day ago
It's even better than that. Trump, the guy who ran on building a wall because of dangers from abroad and who ran on China bashing, could be taken down because when an actual threat from abroad came, he downplayed the threat even though that threat came from China. You couldn't make this stuff up.
Robert Kirby alierakieron a day ago
Greek tragedy requires the protagonist to be a noble man, so it isn't quite that. You know what it reminds me of? President Merkin Muffley in "Dr Strangelove," trying to babytalk Premier Kissoff about "the bomb ( pause ) the nuclear bomb, Dmitri," and General Buck Turgidson, in the same movie, making the argument to Muffley that the Air Force should go all in: "I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed, Mr President. 70, 80 million casualties, tops."
Matt in VA a day ago
I agree with you about Trump. This reminds me of George W. Bush telling America their most patriotic duty after 9/11 was to go shopping and spend money. Concern with the stock market over all else. The power that the DOW and the Line Going Up Up Forever has over Republicans is really something else, and it continues.

That said, the World Health Organization and various "public health" authority figures have consistently been telling us that we have more to fear from "stigma" and "racism" and "victim-blaming" in relation to the coronavirus than we do from the virus itself. It's far from clear to me that our "public health" authorities have been all that much better.

DavidBN Matt in VA a day ago
More or less. There was a strong bipartisan motivation to ignore COVID19 in February, with the right worried about market disruption and the left worried about stoking the fires of xenophobia.
James Kabala Matt in VA a day ago
No one likes George W. Bush anymore - and for good reason! - but the actual quotation was about fear, and the paraphrase really distorts the meaning. This is one my pet peeves.

Actual remark: "When they struck, they wanted to create an atmosphere of fear. And one of the great goals of this nation's war is to restore public confidence in the airline industry. It's to tell the traveling public: Get on board. Do your business around the country. Fly and enjoy America's great destination spots. Get down to Disney World in Florida. Take your families and enjoy life, the way we want it to be enjoyed."

Khalid mir Matt in VA 21 hours ago
"Consistently". Is that really true, Matt? I somehow doubt it. Of all the statements made by public health authorities I'd be surprised if more than a very small proportion focus on racism!

I raise this point reluctantly since you're one of the most perceptive commenters here. But could it be that you're reading this through an ideological lens? From what I've been reading the experts have consistently been saying that this * could* develop into a pandemic and been consistently trying to outline practical measures that might slow down the spread of it. Calm heads are what are needed now. That's not to deny scepticism toward experts but at this stage I think we need to carefully listen to what is being said by them.

Matt in VA Khalid mir 12 hours ago
Here are 24 different articles published before February 27 about the coronavirus. This is by no means all of them.
"WHO Call on World Leaders to Stop Stigma and Hate Surrounding Coronavirus Outbreak", CNBC, Feb. 15
"What's Spreading Faster Than Coronavirus in the US? Racist Assaults and Ignorant Attacks Against Asians", CNN, Feb. 21
"In Europe, Fear Spreads Faster than the Coronavirus Itself: People and Places Associated with the Virus Face Stigmatization," NYT Feb 19
"The New Coronavirus and Racist Tropes" Columbia Journalism Review Feb 25
"Far Right Trolls Use Coronavirus Meme to Spread Subtle Anti-Chinese Racism," Daily Dot, Jan 30
"Xenophobia and Racism Related to the 2019-2020 Coronavirus Outbreak," Dedicated wikipedia article established in Jan 2020 at a time when there was still no dedicated article on wikipedia on symptoms of coronavirus or practical steps for preventing the spread of coronavirus
"The latest targets of racist rumors about coronavirus," Washington Post Feb 25
"No Chinese Allowed: Racism and Fear are Now Spreading along with the Coronavirus", MarketWatch Feb 3
"Let's Call It Trumpvirus," Feb. 27 NYT
"Coronavirus Is Prompting Alarm on American College Campuses. Asian-American Discrimination Could Do More Harm," Chronicle of Higher Ed, Feb 5
"Coronavirus Task Force Another Example of Trump Administration's Lack of Diversity," CNN Jan 30
"Doctors and Nurses at Melbourne Hospital Racially Abused over Coronavirus Panic," The Guardian Feb 26 (in the article there is only one single confirmed incident in which a rude comment was made to a single medical professional, although the title of the article refers to plural incidents)
"Asian caucus urges fellow lawmakers not to perpetuate racist stereotypes amid coronavirus fears," The Hill, Feb 26
"How Covid-19 Coronavirus is Uncovering American Racism," Forbes Feb 18
"Chinese People in The UK Targeted with Abuse over Coronavirus", Guardian Feb 18
"The Pathogen of Prejudice: Coronavirus Spreads Racism Against Ethnic Chinese," The Economist Feb 17
"The World in Grips of Epidemic More Dangerous than Coronavirus," -- Racism, of course! Al Jazeera, Feb 20
"Australia Condemns Coronavirus Racism," Voice of America, feb 14
"Fear of Coronavirus Fuels Racist Sentiment Targeting Asians," LA Times, Feb 3
"The coronavirus exposes the history of racism and 'cleanliness,'" Vox Feb 7
"How to contain the virus of racism during coronavirus outbreak," San Francisco Chronicle Feb 12
"The new coronavirus is not an excuse to be racist," The Verge Feb 4
"Xenophobia is a Pre-Existing Condition. How Harmful Stereotypes and Racism are Spreading Around the Coronavirus" Time Magazine Feb 3
"The Coronavirus and the Long History of Using Diseases to Justify Xenophobia," Washington POst Feb 13
"the Panic Over Chinese People Doesn't Come from Coronavirus: Casual acts of racism against Asians were spreading more quickly than the virus itself." Slate, Feb 4
"On Social Media, Racist Responses to Coronavirus Can Have Their Own Contagion," NPR Feb 2
"Covid-19 Coronavirus racism: viral videos" [ongoing series] The Star Feb 14
"Coronavirus: UK Sees rise in racism targeting Asian people" Sky News Feb 6
"The Ugly History of Blaming Ethnic Groups for Outbreaks," Bloomberg News, Feb 16

In the face of a pandemic which is already killing thousands of people and causing widespread economic disruption, the main response from media was to portray this as fundamentally a problem of bigotry. Those were the only terms in which they could understand what was happening.

Why would you bet against me here, Khalid? You're smarter than this. I think you know, on some level, that vast amounts of the West's institutions and "thought leaders" and the people with megaphones have a single hammer -- megacorporate-compatible wokeness/anti-racism/mandatory idpol -- and they treat everything they come across as a nail. It's never failed them yet.

Khalid mir Matt in VA 9 hours ago
Matt,

I think there are different things going on here. I'm not sure if one can lump together 'thought leaders' , the media, politicians and scientific experts. Furthermore, to talk about 'the media' doesn't make much sense to me: where, when? Most of the news that I follow (UK news) has very little about "racism" etc.

To say that it's been "the main response" really does sound -and pardon me for saying this- slightly unhinged. To say that there are some concerns about racism is one thing, to say it's the *main* story is a rather remarkable claim (to me, at least).

I think your broader point about institutions and hammers obviously has some validity. Maybe we could discuss that sometime (you have on previous occasions-and with great eloquence)?

Come on Matt, it's not about betting against you or anything like that. Nothing personal, my friend. I simply don't agree with you!

Western institutions may at some level be corrupted but at least you've got institutions! Most countries don't have effective ones. Secondly, despite the degradation of them (partly thanks to market fundamentalists) I wouldn't wholly endorse Rod's pessimistic hype..there's hope yet. Er..they're running out of hand sanitizer here..maybe you're right after all!

[Mar 06, 2020] Coronavirus Kids About as Likely as Adults to Become Infected; What Happens When School Closures Become Widespread naked ca

Mar 06, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Lost in OR , March 6, 2020 at 10:25 am

Chris Martensen at Peak Prosperity states this dilemma better than I've seen anywhere else.
Here's his latest. https://www.peakprosperity.com/a-crisis-within-a-crisis

1. The need to get R 0 below 1.0 requires Non-Pharmaceutical Interventions or tight containment and isolation actions (quarantine).
2. The need to keep the economy going (or risk a crash).
3. The need to keep the infection level below that which would swamp hospitals.

While young people may be minimally affected by the virus, they can certainly be disease vectors for us not so young people.

Travis Bickle , March 6, 2020 at 5:58 pm

These are among some of the leverage points/ point of conflict to watch.

Then, do the numbers based on the statistics from Korea if you don't like the ones from China, extrapolating on to the world population. It's going to simply be too pervasive not to be economically devastating unless the R0 is driven down.

That R2+ in China may reflect their culture; in the US there's simply less touching and crowding, at least outside a handful of big cities. State/local public health is capable of educating at those levels, and at this point they represent the only hope I can imagine.

The vulnerability of the US in the current political environment comes because this regime, versus that of the Chinese, doesn't realize it's better to take their economic lumps at the front-end, stopping this thing before it goes wild. That is certainly what Trump etal are allowing to happen under the radar. (Scratch that: having deliberately turned the radar OFF!)

What I foresee is a lag of some time in the US before it hits, and hits hard. Until then, individual cases will be effectively shrugged off as one-offs, lumped in with flu/pneumonia.

Was also interested in noting the revised incubation time noted, of 4.8 days. That would make strangling this thing immediately quite the strategy to take, before it breaks-out into the exponential and overwhelming growth that's now just a matter of time.

Yves Smith Post author , March 6, 2020 at 8:20 pm

Huh? You need to stay 6 feet away from people to be sure of not being infected by coughing. Are you telling me Americans don't stand in lines at grocery stores? Sit near each other waiting to see doctors or in the waiting areas of service firms or government offices? How about elevators?

But the bigger infection vector seems to be surfaces and the virus can live on them for up to 9 days. So shopping cart handles, any ATM or payment device, parking meters, the valet who handles tons of cars handling your steering wheel and key fob .

HuckFinn , March 6, 2020 at 10:40 am

Hmmm . that is interesting. About 10 years ago, I worked in the Canadian health care sector, for the feds delivering a project that involved identifying best practices for emergency response plans for hospitals. The long and short, most hospital emergency response plans already included responses to support staff by providing childcare options during crises, to account for schools being closed. It was already rather widely embedded, something we did not initially expect. For those who may be interested, two BPs we did identify that were surprising in different way – local sourcing of food supply because in Ontario, for example, the food was often prepped in Toronto and shipped around the province, as well updating/standardizing generators and other emergency power systems.

[Mar 06, 2020] I just read a credible summary of the 1918 flu, and there were a series of waves, or possibly mutations, with it. Much of this history has been reconstructed forensically, given the lack of science at the time

Mar 06, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Travis Bickle , March 6, 2020 at 6:18 pm

This is one of those technically important issues I'd want to have real expertise comment on.

I just read a credible summary of the 1918 flu, and there were a series of waves, or possibly mutations, with it. Much of this history has been reconstructed forensically, given the lack of science at the time. HOWEVER, there were definitely waves. It may have been a case, in my reading, of the bug working its way through virgin hosts who somehow ducked it the first time around. But there were several of these "waves".

Towns like Crested Butte in Colorado and a small handful of other towns, had some smart doctors who knew what was up and were largely able to manage it through closing access to their town until it finally "ran its course," whatever that actually means.

It does have the same genetic structure as flu, so seasonal vaccines would presumably be possible. But, the mutations you mention, two of which were documented in China, make me want to be educated. Modest genetic variations allow scientists to track the bug, as has happened in Washington State. But ..someone really needs to provide more resolution to this picture.

[Mar 06, 2020] Estimates of mortality are always too high because a lot of mild and asymptomatic cases are not reported.

Mar 06, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Travis Bickle , March 6, 2020 at 6:34 pm

Best to be careful with the language here; The WHO declared nothing.

The joint WHO/Chinese CDC report OBSERVED a 3.4 death rate. There were plenty of qualifiers on that figure, mainly due to potential asymptomatic cases. However, their search for cases to test has been as robust as an authoritarian state can make it, and they worked hard to factor all the variables in, so the report minimized how much lower it could be.

What may be more pertinent for the US is the South Korean experience, with their true western healthcare system. I think there was a link to the figures on NC. Both experiences have something to contribute to our understanding: consider them together.

With 5300+ cases there were 32 fatalities, making for a overall .6 mortality rate. Assuming any number of infected that weren't screened would only drive that % down, while fatalities you could pretty reliably expect to should up in the dead column.

Yves Smith Post author , March 6, 2020 at 8:24 pm

No, you have this wrong. Don't get authoritative your supposed facts when you don't have them right. So stop misleading readers. It's called agnotology, or informally, "making shit up" and is a violation of our written site Policies, which I strongly suggest you read before commenting again.

The China CDC's study released mid February found a case fatality rate of 2.3%.

The WHO most assuredly DID say the fatality rate was 3.4% based on global data.

The dispute began March 3 when the head of the WHO announced that the mortality rate for the new coronavirus was 3.4%, which was higher than previously believed and made it far more deadly than the seasonal flu.

"Globally, about 3.4% of reported COVID-19 (the disease spread by the virus) cases have died," said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at a briefing. "By comparison, seasonal flu generally kills far fewer than 1% of those infected."

https://www.factcheck.org/2020/03/trump-and-the-coronavirus-death-rate/

Moreover, the study, as we indicated, says it takes ~30 days for the coronavirus to run its course. Fatalities will usually occur late in this time frame, since the coronavirus typically acts like a normal flu for 5-7 days, then generates viral pneumonia in severe cases.

With a rapidly rising infection rate, the number of infections mainly includes people at early phases in the infection process, and hence naive computation of mortality rates (deaths/reported cases) are misleading on the low side.

likbez , March 6, 2020 at 8:58 pm

Yves,

Estimates of mortality are always too high because a lot of mild and asymptomatic cases are not reported.

Brooklin Bridge , March 6, 2020 at 8:24 pm

Dr. Tedros, Director General of the World Health Organisation, said that 3.4% of all reported cases have died. This is a CFR (case fatality rate) of 3.4% The British Chief Medical officer claims that approximately 1% of reported cases are fatal.

Both of those statements are covered in the first minute or two of Dr. John Campbell's video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HpU_x9OgQ4 I leave to the those who watch the first 100 seconds of the video to decide for themselves which estimate Dr. Campbell finds more realistic.

... ... ...

[Mar 06, 2020] Propaganda war: Pompeo Blames China For US Outbreak, Says Lack Of Transparency "Left Us Behind The Curve"

Mar 06, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

JC , Mar 6 2020 19:27 utc | 59

A Russian in Wuhan, Hubei YouTube (below)- 1,209,416 views, 31:29 minutes
Must watch real autocratic LOCKDOWN . CGTN reported Hubei should be free from Covid-19 by end of April, maybe not 100% but at least close.

Pompeo Blames China For US Outbreak, Says Lack Of Transparency "Left Us Behind The Curve"

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/pompeo-blames-china-us-outbreak-says-lack-transparency-left-us-behind-curve

China. Trip to Infected Zone. What's Fake and Truth about Coronavirus // How People Live(2020)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1yXTlvTB08

[Mar 06, 2020] The Potential Economic And Societal Impacts Of Covid-19

Mar 06, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Before I address supply chain disruptions and other societal impacts, I want to address how the government and the Center For Disease Control have totally failed and endangered the medical professionals and law enforcement officers of the United States.

They failed in the following ways:

Coronavirus tests have been expensive for some.

The fees for the coronavirus test are hard for many to cover. Insurance does not cover all of the fees but there are some states such as NY attempting to require insurance agencies to waive the cost. An unaffordable cost discourages people that suspect they may have the virus from coming forward, thus further endangering the health of the public. In an article from The Miami Herald a man claimed that he received a bill for $3,270 for a test and was responsible for $1400 of that after his insurance. The man had recently returned from China and arrived in Miami.

This is shameful.

The people that work hard to provide medical and emergency services for us are being let down and we will all pay for this in the future. What happens when the people trained to take care of us when we are sick and keep communities safe cannot because they are sick too?

[Mar 06, 2020] It's better to get sick later ;-)

Mar 06, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

S , Mar 6 2020 2:40 utc | 45

A new paper on SARS-CoV-2, " On the origin and continuing evolution of SARS-CoV-2 ", has identified two types:
Population genetic analyses of 103 SARS-CoV-2 genomes indicated that these viruses evolved into two major types (designated L and S), that are well defined by two different SNPs that show nearly complete linkage across the viral strains sequenced to date. Although the L type (∼70%) is more prevalent than the S type (∼30%), the S type was found to be the ancestral version.

Whereas the L type was more prevalent in the early stages of the outbreak in Wuhan, the frequency of the L type decreased after early January 2020.

Human intervention may have placed more severe selective pressure on the L type, which might be more aggressive and spread more quickly.

On the other hand, the S type, which is evolutionarily older and less aggressive, might have increased in relative frequency due to relatively weaker selective pressure.

This suggests that it's better to get sick later.

[Mar 06, 2020] Would the United States, faced with a similar challenge, do better than China?

Notable quotes:
"... Researchers have discovered that smooth (non-porous) surfaces like door knobs transmit bacteria and viruses better than porous materials like paper money because porous, especially fibrous, materials absorb and trap the contagion, making it harder to contract through simple touch. ..."
"... A majority of respiratory viruses are enveloped (parainfluenza virus, influenza virus, RSV, and coronavirus) and survive on surfaces from hours to days . ..."
"... Studies have demonstrated that viral transfer from hands to surrounding surfaces is possible in 7 out of 10 viruses reviewed. Generally, research evidence suggests that a large portion of enteric and respiratory illnesses can be prevented through improved environmental hygiene, with an emphasis on better hand and surface cleaning practices. ..."
"... "Our structural analyses confidently predict that the Wuhan coronavirus uses ACE2 as its host receptor," the investigators wrote. That and several other structural details of the new virus are consistent with the ability of the Wuhan coronavirus to infect humans and with some capability to transmit among humans. ..."
"... Imagine trying to quarantine the Chicago metro area. That's the enormity of the task we're talking about. ..."
"... People who travel to and from China generally will be on the wealthier side and are likely to be covered in a US healthcare system. If the virus gets into the US uninsured population, then it is much less likely that they will seek medical help quickly, which should also aid in transmission, especially in the US as many other developed countries will be much better prepared to address a population-wide challenge. ..."
"... IF it gets out of control here, I foresee a nationwide Super Dome after Katrina situation. Tent cities full of sick folks ..."
"... I was there on 9/11 and there is a calm and sense of cohesion that happens during calamities ..."
"... 10,000 people died of the flu in the US in 2019, ..."
"... How many people can even tell the difference between a cold and flu? The pressure to go to work even when we have sick leave or vacation days can be intense. And the lack of information . ..."
"... the people who actually need hospitalization for the disease need mechanical ventilation, and this is a highly specialized resource that's in much shorter supply than mere hospital beds. ..."
Feb 02, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

... ... ...

Transmission Methods

First, there is the possibility that the virus may be transmitted by touching surfaces. MedPage Today :

[Maria Van Kerkhove, of WHO's emerging diseases and zoonosis division] said that evidence indicates the virus can be transmitted through the respiratory route, via droplets, and physical contact between people, but also from fomites, as the virus can live on surfaces for a short period of times

Sidebar for the word of the day: fomite :

Any inanimate object, that when contaminated with or exposed to infectious agents, such as pathogenic bacteria, viruses or fungi, can transfer disease to a new host. In addition to objects in hospital settings, other common fomites for humans are door knobs, light switches, handrails, elevator buttons, television remote controls, pens, and other items that are frequently touched by different people and that may be infrequently cleaned.

Researchers have discovered that smooth (non-porous) surfaces like door knobs transmit bacteria and viruses better than porous materials like paper money because porous, especially fibrous, materials absorb and trap the contagion, making it harder to contract through simple touch.

So far as I know, there is no case of #2019-nCoV with a history of fomite transmission, so we will have to look to other viruses for indications. End sidebar.

From the American Society for Microbiology, " Significance of Fomites in the Spread of Respiratory and Enteric Viral Disease " (2007), a review of the literature:

There is now growing evidence that contaminated fomites or surfaces play a key role in the spread of viral infections.

Virus spread by person-to-person contact can be interrupted with isolation of the viral carrier. Yet, isolation may prove to be impractical or difficult if there are many people or if the source of infection is unknown (69). Consequently, interrupting disease spread via indoor fomites is one of the more practical methods for limiting or preventing enteric and respiratory viral infections.

A majority of respiratory viruses are enveloped (parainfluenza virus, influenza virus, RSV, and coronavirus) and survive on surfaces from hours to days .

Studies have demonstrated that viral transfer from hands to surrounding surfaces is possible in 7 out of 10 viruses reviewed. Generally, research evidence suggests that a large portion of enteric and respiratory illnesses can be prevented through improved environmental hygiene, with an emphasis on better hand and surface cleaning practices.

(So clean your keyboards, light switches, etc. besides washing your hands!) For a corona virus, although not #2019-nCoV specifically, from the American Society for Microbiology, "Effects of Air Temperature and Relative Humidity on Coronavirus Survival on Surfaces" (2010):

The potential reemergence of SARS or the emergence of new strains of pandemic influenza virus, including avian and swine influenza viruses, could pose serious risks for nosocomial disease spread via contaminated surfaces. However, this risk is still poorly understood, and more work is needed to quantify the risk of exposure and possible transmission associated with surfaces.

From the American Society for Microbiology, " Human Coronavirus 229E Remains Infectious on Common Touch Surface Materials ":

Animal coronaviruses that "host jump" to humans result in severe infections with high mortality, such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and, more recently, Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS). We show here that a closely related human coronavirus, 229E, which causes upper respiratory tract infection in healthy individuals and serious disease in patients with comorbidities, remained infectious on surface materials common to public and domestic areas for several days. The low infectious dose means that this is a significant infection risk to anyone touching a contaminated surface.

Again, however, we don't have any kind of case data whatever, so for now I'm putting this into the category of things one might worry about (as opposed to things one should absolutely not do, like standing next to a coughing person from Wuhan for any period of time). Fascinatingly, the article concludes:

However, rapid inactivation, irreversible destruction of viral RNA, and massive structural damage were observed in coronavirus exposed to copper and copper alloy surfaces.

So if your bathroom fixtures are made out of copper, you're good. Alternatively, one could visit the local home and garden store and experiment . (Kidding! Copper sprays are poisonous!)

The second route of transmission is a bit less esoteric: Fecal transmission. Once again, from Bloomberg :

The novel coronavirus was detected in the loose stool of the first U.S. case -- a finding that hasn't featured among case reports from Wuhan, China, the epicenter of the outbreak. However, that doesn't surprise scientists who have studied coronaviruses, nor doctors familiar with the bug that caused SARS.

Squat latrines, common in China, lacking covers and hands that aren't washed thoroughly with soap and water after visiting the bathroom could be a source of virus transmission, said [John Nicholls, a clinical professor of pathology at the University of Hong Kong], who was part of the research team that isolated and characterized the SARS virus.

A virus-laden aerosol plume emanating from a SARS patient with diarrhea was implicated in possibly hundreds of cases at Hong Kong's Amoy Gardens housing complex in 2003. That led the city's researchers to understand the importance of the virus's spread through the gastrointestinal tract, and to recognize both the limitation of face masks and importance of cleanliness and hygiene, Nicholls said.

I wouldn't classify face masks as virtue signaling, exactly, but the more I read, the more 19th-Century basic hygiene measures assume salience. (I'm not sure whether fecal matter as such would be considered a fomite, as opposed, say, to the metal handle of a flush toilet.)

Travel Bans

From STAT News :

Travel and trade restrictions can lead to dire economic consequences for countries involved, creating a disincentive for them to quickly disclose potential outbreaks to the WHO or other nations. They can hinder the sharing of information, make it harder to track cases and their contacts, and disrupt the medical supply chain, potentially fueling shortages of drugs and medical supplies in the areas hit hardest by the outbreak. They also send a punitive message, which could contribute to discrimination and stigmatization against Chinese nationals, experts warned.

Any effort and money spent crafting and enforcing travel and trade restrictions also take away already-stretched resources from public health measures that have been proven to be far more effective, experts said. Those measures include providing assistance to countries with weaker health systems, accelerating the development of a vaccine or rapid diagnostic test, and clearly communicating with the public about when and how to seek care.

I've gotta say I'm of two minds about this. I accept the argument that a travel ban will only slow, and not stop, the acceleration of a virus (since original propagators will have already been in-country). And apparently the Chinese interpreted Trump's punitive message all too clearly. Still, if increased social distance is a good method to stop an epidemic, what social distance is easier to increase than that between countries? (Perhaps an exception could be made for scientists and medical personnel.) For example :

[T]ravel has made the world far more interconnected than in 2003, accelerating the rate of infection. China -- the starting point for both viruses -- has become the world's largest outbound tourism market and one of the engines driving the global economy. In the intervening years since the SARS outbreak, global airline capacity into China is 3.8 times larger than it was in 2005. China flights now account for 12 percent of total worldwide available seat kilometers versus only five percent 15 years ago, according to PlaneStats.com, Oliver Wyman's aviation data portal.

Is mass tourism that important?

The Danger of Mutation

One of the issues with viral epidemics is that the viruses mutate, sometimes becoming more lethal. Sadly, there is a path for #2019-nCoV to do this. From, once again, the American Society for Microbiology, " Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Receptors Show Similarities to SARS-CoV, According to New Analysis " (Jan. 30, 2020):

Decade-long structural studies by Fang Li of the University of Minnesota, et al. have shown how the SARS virus (SARS-CoV) interacts with animal and human hosts in order to infect them. The mechanics of infection by the Wuhan coronavirus appear to be similar. These investigators used the knowledge they gleaned from multiple SARS-CoV strains -- isolated from different hosts in different years -- and angiotensin-converting enzyme-2 (ACE2) receptors from different animal species to model predictions for the novel Wuhan coronavirus. (Both viruses use ACE2 to gain entry into the cell, but it serves normally as a regulator for heart function.)

"Our structural analyses confidently predict that the Wuhan coronavirus uses ACE2 as its host receptor," the investigators wrote. That and several other structural details of the new virus are consistent with the ability of the Wuhan coronavirus to infect humans and with some capability to transmit among humans.

"Alarmingly, our data predict that a single mutation [at a specific spot in the genome] could significantly enhance [the Wuhan coronavirus's] ability to bind with human ACE2 ," the investigators write. For this reason, Wuhan coronavirus evolution in patients should be closely monitored for the emergence of novel mutations at the 501 position in its genome, and to a lesser extent, the 494 position, in order to predict the possibility of a more serious outbreak than has been seen so far.

Ulp. Great work on the science, though!

No, #2019-nCoV Is Not a Bioweapon

At least one finance-adjacent blog (not this one) promoted a bioRxiv pre-print entitled "Uncanny similarity of unique inserts in the 2019-nCoV spike protein to HIV-1 gp120 and Gag", containing the inflammatory passage "The finding of 4 unique inserts in the 2019-nCoV, all of which have identity/similarity to amino acid residues in key structural proteins of HIV-1 is unlikely to be fortuitous in nature." That paper has now been withdrawn. From Richard Sever, Assistant Director of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Editor of CSH Perspectives, bioRxiv Co-Founder:

Authors of disputed "uncanny" 2019-nCoV preprint to voluntarily withdraw preprint:
"It was not our intention to feed into the conspiracy theories we appreciate the criticisms and will get back with a revised version" https://t.co/zGcT1440D0

-- Richard Sever Ⓤ (@cshperspectives) February 1, 2020

Here is what one bioinformatics research had to say about the now-withdrawn paper:

The 2019-nCoV genome does not contain remarkable genomic properties which need explaining, and for which we'd look to some kind of bioengineering as a cause.

The virus has a close 96% sequence overlap to a naturally occurring bat coronavirus, and coronaviruses have been known to jump from bats to humans by way of intermediates before, like the SARS coronavirus. The differences between the genome sequences, including the ones identified by the Indian study, are in variable regions of the genome that we'd expect to differ, and the 4% difference in the genomes is hard to call as "high" or "low," given that we don't know exactly which bats the 2019-nCoV strain came from or when it diverged from its closest known ancestor.

Nor is it surprising that the known 2019-nCoV sequences all contain the same genomic changes relative to a known relative. They all came from the same outbreak from the same animal reservoir, i.e. they only diverged from each other a few months ago at most. It's not surprising that they haven't evolved very much away from each other.

Nor does the clinical presentation of 2019-nCoV have novel features which need explaining. Its symptom profile, degree of transmissibility, severity, mortality rate, duration, incubation and latent period, ability to jump from animals to humans, and ability to transmit asymptomatically and by skin contact are all within the precedents established by other human coronaviruses.

That is, the 2019-nCoV genome and the way it affects humans have, by themselves, no special anomaly which needs explaining.

( More on 2019-nCoV and bat corona viruses here .) Further, from Infection, Genetics and Evolution, " Full-genome evolutionary analysis of the novel corona virus (2019-nCoV) rejects the hypothesis of emergence as a result of a recent recombination event ":

The levels of genetic similarity between the 2019-nCoV and [BatCoV] RaTG13 suggest that the latter does not provide the exact variant that caused the outbreak in humans, but the hypothesis that 2019-nCoV has originated from bats is very likely. We show evidence that the novel coronavirus (2019-nCov) is not-mosaic consisting in almost half of its genome of a distinct lineage within the betacoronavirus.

Conclusion

There's been a good deal of dunking on how China's government and health care system has handled the #2019-nCoV epidemic (or pandemic). For example, from the China Media Project, a really interesting media critique, " As an Epidemic Raged, What Kept Party Media Busy? ". It concludes:

On January 25, there were at last two reports about the epidemic on the right-hand side of the People's Daily front page. Either of these stories would have merited top billing on the page, but this was not the case. Priority was given instead to a report in the anti-poverty propaganda series, "The General Secretary Visited Hour Home."

During this key period, from January 21 to 25, many party members, cadres and ordinary people were full of suspicions. They wondered how it was that no member of the CCP Standing Committee had yet managed to visit the scene of the epidemic in Wuhan, something that had happened in the case of both the SARS epidemic and the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake. When people felt fearful and at a loss, why was there all this focus on peace and happiness?

The blame certainly does not fall on the shoulders of the top editors of these Party papers. Since the start of the year, the pages of China's Party newspapers have been given their "assigned seats." The activities in which leaders would take part had already been fixed, and the themes to be emphasized had been more or less carved in stone. Inspections, greetings, expressions of condolence, banquet speeches – everything had already been planned. There would be no detracting from the prestige of the "leader."

The system of the CCP is like a great big elephant. It is difficult for the sudden and unexpected to force any change to its huge and lumbering gait .

All of the deception and miscalculation that has happened in the wake of the revealing of the epidemic has been a source of immense public anger.

However, NC readers have are familiar with and have expressed a rather robust critique of the health care system in the United States. Can we -- a country that until last year was experiencing dropping life expectancy -- say we would do better than China?


Ranger Rick , February 2, 2020 at 5:26 pm

Imagine trying to quarantine the Chicago metro area. That's the enormity of the task we're talking about.

rd , February 2, 2020 at 5:39 pm

I think these fellows will be fine with being quarantined. https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/g30734613/frankfort-kentucky-gun-owners-red-flag-law-protest-photos/?slide=20

JTMcPhee , February 2, 2020 at 5:56 pm

More like Dallas-Fort Worth, or Atlanta. Lake Michigan at least creates one physical boundary delimiting ground travel.

Anyone been to Tokyo lately? Paris? London?

rd , February 2, 2020 at 5:31 pm

A couple of transmission observations:

The fecal route is interesting. Most public restrooms don't have lids and modern water efficient toilets are designed to be energetic, so they send sprays up into the air where the little droplets can contaminate many surfaces in a bathroom. This should be a particularly efficient transmission route in airports.
https://www.today.com/home/it-necessary-close-toilet-lid-when-you-flush-t143776

People who travel to and from China generally will be on the wealthier side and are likely to be covered in a US healthcare system. If the virus gets into the US uninsured population, then it is much less likely that they will seek medical help quickly, which should also aid in transmission, especially in the US as many other developed countries will be much better prepared to address a population-wide challenge.

... ... ...

Monty , February 2, 2020 at 5:44 pm

IF it gets out of control here, I foresee a nationwide Super Dome after Katrina situation. Tent cities full of sick folks who are left to die and not allowed to leave. Chinese people getting gunned down for sneezing in Walmart. Every man for himself. Empty supermarket shelves. No sign of the brave police who will refuse to go to work / get out of their cruisers. Doctors taking a long vacation en masse. Gas shortages. Mass layoffs. Widespread starvation.

Don't you?

lina , February 2, 2020 at 7:36 pm

I think 8 across the country is making people worried. If this moves even into the hundreds, people will start to get scared But I'm not sure about complete mayhem and pandemonium. I was there on 9/11 and there is a calm and sense of cohesion that happens during calamities. But that was different than this.

I do think there will be a market crash and probably a global "something" (retraction, recession, not sure).

What's the Chinese saying – may you live in interesting times? LOL. The next 2-4 weeks will be very interesting indeed.

cocomaan , February 2, 2020 at 6:53 pm

Of course there will be problems, but people have an uncanny ability to come together during disasters. This was written about in A PARADISE BUILT IN HELL, by Rebecca Solnit. She talks about different disasters and the lack of looting and other shenaningans.

Daryl , February 2, 2020 at 7:46 pm

No, I don't. 10,000 people died of the flu in the US in 2019, and that didn't happen.

JTMcPhee , February 2, 2020 at 6:00 pm

How's the Rapture Index today? The Union of Atomic Scientists' Doomsday Clock is down to counting in seconds, not minutes: https://thebulletin.org/doomsday-clock/current-time/

katiebird , February 2, 2020 at 6:15 pm

How many people can even tell the difference between a cold and flu? The pressure to go to work even when we have sick leave or vacation days can be intense. And the lack of information . Does going to doctor help? What if a person gets stuck in an isolation ward for observation who pays for that? Or do doctors send people home with a list of instructions?

And if we have thousands being held in hospitals -- Who pays. Will hospitals hold uninsured?

If people don't have insurance when then they won't go to the doctor if they think it is JUST a cold or flu. Even having insurance I had a couple of bronchitis events where I didn't go to the doctor until I was crazy sick. Hardly able to draw a breath without horrific cough.

So what does #2019-nCoV do to us? Just thinking .

WobblyTelomeres , February 2, 2020 at 6:29 pm

I was reading that Chinese men who were taking an ACE inhibitor were suffering fewer severe complications from CV. I can't find the report though. Anyone know of this?

Stephen The Tech Critic , February 2, 2020 at 7:09 pm

I didn't see this report linked here yet:

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2001191?query=featured_home

"[ ] We report the first case of 2019-nCoV infection confirmed in the United States and describe the identification, diagnosis, clinical course, and management of the case, including the patient's initial mild symptoms at presentation with progression to pneumonia on day 9 of illness. [ ]"

Being that this is only a single case, any conclusions drawn should be considered tentative at best. However, the information is still useful. My big take-away from this and other sources is that this coronavirus disease may be like a common cold on steroids. In fact, it may be symptomatically indistinguishable from a cold until it enters its more severe phase where it turns into a nasty pneumonia. The pneumonia may occur many days after initial symptoms appear, so many suffers may assume they merely have a cold until it takes a turn for the worse, right about the time they expect to be feeling better.

If you ask me, this is close to a worst case scenario for a pandemic disease. Not only are the periods of incubation and asymptomatic transmission likely long, but the early symptoms may not be distinctive enough for people to stay home from work, much less admit themselves to a hospital where they might get tested and quarantined.

Also, I want to note that so far it seems that the people who actually need hospitalization for the disease need mechanical ventilation, and this is a highly specialized resource that's in much shorter supply than mere hospital beds. Even a relatively contained outbreak, could cripple the ICU services in any affected city. This has the potential to directly and severely impact essentially everyone except a handful of elites with exclusive concierge service, whose price may be about to go up a lot. Maybe all those bunkers in New Zealand will be seeing some warm bodies soon?

RickV , February 2, 2020 at 7:51 pm

"I wouldn't classify face masks as virtue signaling, exactly". Agree, but here's a link to how to properly put on and test a face mask that may add protection: https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/docs/2010-133/pdfs/2010-133.pdf Note, N95 masks are also useful for those of us in wildfire prone areas, as they protect against smoke. Also, for exposed eyes there are several options, wrap around glasses or sunglasses, paintball protection plastic glasses, swimmer goggles, ski goggles, etc.

All the above will increase survival odds if it comes to that. Lets hope we never need to use them.

[Mar 06, 2020] Coronavirus Cases by Country - 2020-03-05

51 new cases and 1 new death in the United States. 11 in New York State: 3 are in serious condition and are treated in intensive care units. New cases include a man in his 40s and a woman in her 80s. 1st case in Nevada, Tennessee, New Jersey
Mar 06, 2020 | moneymaven.io
Country.

Other

Total

Cases IF

New

Cases

Total

Deaths

New

Deaths

Active

Cases

Total

Recovered

Serious,

Critical

China 80,430 +160 3,013 +32 25,158 52,259 5,952
S. Korea 6,088 +467 40 +5 5.913 135 52
Italy 3,858 +769 148 +41 3.296 414 351
Iran 3,513 +591 108 +16 2.666 739
Diamond Princess 696 6 478 212 35
Germany 545 +283 528 17 2
France 423 +138 7 +3 404 12 23
Japan 361 +30 6 312 43 29
Spain 282 +54 3 +1 276 3 7
USA 209 +51 12 +1 188 9 8

[Mar 06, 2020] If you had at-least-moderate close-quarter dealings with a COVID19-infectee, your odds of getting it could well be less than 1 in 30. Obviously this would rise with very close-quarter, long-term contact

Mar 06, 2020 | www.unz.com

Hail says: Website Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 12:27 am GMT 300 Words @unit472 What we know so far suggests more the World War Z narrative (hitting wealthy, jet-set countries hard) than your proposed narrative of China's BRI buddies getting hit hard. At least in terms of the virology, not the soft-power hit, on which I would more agree.

But, then, we do not have perfect information. There may be many cases in certain countries we have heard nothing of. As Anatoly says:

Meanwhile, carriers need not be symptomatic to transmit. At such early stages, you are only going to identify these clusters by intensive testing, which as I understand nobody apart from Italy and South Korea is really doing yet. One might make a comparison to a tsunami. Undetectable when it's out in the deep ocean, unless you're specifically looking for it

The latest I have seen is that South Korea's testing situation was as follows (this is about as of 24 hours ago):

37,000 persons tested, mainly cases stemming from the Shinchonji cult
– 22,550 found not infected
– 13,250 results pending
– 900 confirmed infected , of which 9 dead.

Among the current pool of testees, it will presumably to rise to 25 to 35 deaths , if the S.Korea deaths follow the same death rate as observed elsewhere and including the likely infected among the results-pending group.

Of those with results known (22,550 negative + 900 positive = 23,450), the infection rate of contactees was therefore 3.5% to 4% . They only use the limited testing resources on people who came into contact with a known infected person, so this suggests that if you had at-least-moderate close-quarter dealings with a COVID19-infectee, your odds (actually an East Asian's odds) of getting it could well be less than 1 in 30. Obviously this would rise with very close-quarter-, long-term contact.

The odds of death, in turn, are known to be less than 1 in 200 (<0.5%) for most people without preexisting health problems, and as low as 1 in 500 (0.2%) for healthy, core-working-age people. The chance of dying from a single case of close contact with a COVID19-infectee are therefore no higher for most of us than 1-in-1500, at least the way I read the data.

[Mar 05, 2020] Measles Cases Top Last Year's Total

Notable quotes:
"... (Warning: source paywalled; alternative source ), ..."
Mar 05, 2020 | science.slashdot.org

BeauHD on Tuesday April 02, 2019 @10:30PM from the it's-not-a-competition dept. An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Wall Street Journal: So far this year there have been 387 confirmed U.S. measles cases, more than 2018's full-year total and the second-largest number since the disease was declared eliminated in 2000 (Warning: source paywalled; alternative source ), according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The disease has spread to 15 states in 2019, with six continuing outbreaks of three or more cases each in Washington, New York, New Jersey and California. The development has sparked new policies aimed at boosting inoculation and curbing misinformation about the measles vaccine.

Measles cases have has risen since 2000 as infected travelers bring the disease to the U.S. Those travelers -- unvaccinated foreign nationals or Americans who become infected abroad -- have spread the highly contagious disease to others in the U.S. who aren't vaccinated or hadn't previously had measles. These cases have fueled outbreaks in communities where large numbers of people haven't been inoculated because of personal or religious exemptions to the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine. The largest growth in infections since measles was eliminated totaled 23 outbreaks and 667 cases in 2014. Last year there were 17 outbreaks and 372 confirmed cases. The number of cases in 2019 could increase in the coming months. Measles is a seasonal disease, with cases rising in late winter and early spring in temperate climates, according to the World Health Organization.


Mashiki ( 184564 ) writes: < mashiki@gmail . c om > on Wednesday April 03, 2019 @08:46AM ( #58377618 ) Homepage

Re:Something missing in the head ( Score: 4 , Informative)
Is that really true? Country kids are much more likely to be vaccinated than city kids?

I can't speak for the US, but in Canada it's around 93% rural vaccinated vs 61% urban. Got a bit different a few years ago when the laws got changed that if you have a kid in public school they must be vaccinated here in Ontario. There was a huge outbreak of measles and chickenpox in the Ottawa/Hull area a few years ago, basically one year after the other. Only 13% of the kids were vaccinated, all of their parents worked in government, or education, or were in various specialty areas relating to government work(NGO's and such). And all of those kids attended private schools. You can dig up the articles on it from the globe and mail, or ottawa times if you're really interested in it.

Personally having had chickenpox during the big outbreak back in the 1980's, I sure as hell wished that the vaccine was covered by OHIP at the time instead of being $400/pop(about $850 today). Something my parents couldn't afford. Seeing the reactivation of it in shingles with my grandparents was pretty bad, my one grandmothers reaction was bad enough it put her into the hospital.

Jason Levine ( 196982 ) , Wednesday April 03, 2019 @08:16AM ( #58377454 ) Homepage
Re:Something missing in the head ( Score: 5 , Insightful)

Part of the problem is that vaccines were too successful. Most parents nowadays have no first hand knowledge of how bad these diseases were. This is a good thing, of course, but it also means parents can easily assume that a low severity for measles ("you just get a rash for a week and then you're fine") and other diseases (Whooping cough: "you just cough for a bit"). Combine this with Internet misinformation inflating the risk of vaccines ("They've got toxins... TOXINS!!!") and you have a recipe for a bad risk calculation. Sadly, it might take a few more outbreaks before some parents really get the message that the vaccination risk is much lower than the disease risk.

Trailer Trash ( 60756 ) , Wednesday April 03, 2019 @06:41AM ( #58377092 ) Homepage
Re:Something missing in the head ( Score: 5 , Insightful)
Speaking of a sense of proportion.... in the United States you're three times as likely to die from a shark attack (1 death per year on average) as you are from from the measles (1 death every 3 years on average from 387 reported measles cases per year).

To put that into further perspective, the U.S. averages [ufl.edu] 11 deaths from fireworks and 24 from train crashes per year. Death from a literal lightning strike is 141 times as common than dying from the measles in the United States.

So let's not overreact quite yet.

Yes, there are things that kill you other than measles. The difference is that measles is pretty easily preventable - people just have to get vaccinated.

The other issue with measles - and most of the "childhood diseases" - is that they have other complications besides death.

https://www.cdc.gov/measles/ab... [cdc.gov]

"About one child out of every 1,000 who get measles will develop encephalitis (swelling of the brain) that can lead to convulsions and can leave the child deaf or with intellectual disability."

"Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE) is a very rare, but fatal disease of the central nervous system that results from a measles virus infection acquired earlier in life. SSPE generally develops 7 to 10 years after a person has measles, even though the person seems to have fully recovered from the illness. Since measles was eliminated in 2000, SSPE is rarely reported in the United States."

That last line is ironic.

magzteel ( 5013587 ) , Wednesday April 03, 2019 @08:18AM ( #58377468 )
Re:Something missing in the head ( Score: 5 , Interesting)
In the USA vaccine makers have blanket immunity from lawsuit. You can not sue them due to harm, vaccine makers have no accountability. If you were a profit making corporation with no liability for harm, would you maybe give less of a crap sometimes and maybe use the old familiar trick of adding mercury to boost the vaccine production in some batches? Maybe, who cares if you did? No one can sue you for damages!

This system was created to insure vaccine makers would continue creating vaccines. It is fallout from the incident at Cutter labs where their polio vaccine was produced according to government guidelines but still gave some people polio. The company was sued for negligence even though they hadn't actually been negligent.

jeff4747 ( 256583 ) , Wednesday April 03, 2019 @10:22AM ( #58378190 )
Re:Something missing in the head ( Score: 5 , Informative)
In the USA vaccine makers have blanket immunity from lawsuit.

You misunderstand the law. It's not that they are immune to lawsuits. The government has assumed the liability.

So you can indeed sue due to vaccine injury. You'll just be suing the government instead of a corporation.

And you don't actually have to sue. The government set up a vaccine injury program where you can file a claim and get paid without a lawsuit. You are still free to sue if you'd like.

Also, the FDA stops a whole lot more vaccines than lawsuits ever could. It's not like there's nothing between the corporation coming up with something and the free market, as you imply. And if you want to claim regulatory capture, you'd have to show some vaccines that would not pass trials yet got released.

use the old familiar trick of adding mercury to boost the vaccine production in some batches?

:faceplam:

Thiomersal is a preservative. It has nothing do do with boosting production rates. It was introduced into vaccines in order to let doctors use one vial to treat multiple patients. Pull out a new, empty syringe, fill it with a dose of vaccine from a vial, give the patient the shot, toss the syringe. The alternative is syringes pre-loaded with vaccine, which cost you a lot more money .

Thiomersal is also ethyl-mercury, which you pee out. Not methyl-mercury that stays in your system. If you want to say something stupid like "it's got mercury so it's all the same!!!" consider ethanol vs methanol. One will get you drunk. One will kill you very quickly. They're almost identical. Ethyl-mercury vs methyl-mercury is similar.

So, congrats on making vaccines cost more. Also at a higher profit to "big pharma". Also, Thiomersal was removed from childhood vaccines in 2000, with no reduction in autism rates, so you did all this for nothing.

Before you go off half cocked, don't forget, migrants carry disease

Only if the vaccination rate in their country is lower than the vaccination rate in the US.

And since you're making a very obvious dogwhistle, the vaccination rate in Central and South American countries is higher than the US.

migrants expose themselves and their new host community to new strains of pathogens

This doesn't matter for the MMR vaccine. The different strains on the planet are still covered by the vaccine. You need a high-mutation-rate disease like influenza for strains to be relevant

JustAnotherOldGuy ( 4145623 ) , Tuesday April 02, 2019 @11:05PM ( #58376032 )
Stupidity Is Winning ( Score: 5 , Interesting)

This shit just makes me shake my head....all the work and effort and time and money that went into developing vaccines, and these ninnies won't use them.

And it's all because discredited former British doctor (Andrew Wakefield) published a bullshit medical paper claiming that vaccines were unsafe. That's all it took- the morons and dumbshits ate it up and stopped vaccinating their children.

Now we have measles epidemics again, yay.

Michael Woodhams ( 112247 ) , Wednesday April 03, 2019 @04:26AM ( #58376780 ) Journal
Measles is eradicable ( Score: 5 , Interesting)

The only infectious human disease we have ever eradicated is smallpox, which was eradicated way back in the 1970s. From an eradication point of view, measles and smallpox are very similar: they are viruses, they are highly infectious, they do not mutate super-fast, they infect only humans, it is obvious when someone has the disease, there is a very effective vaccine. From a technical point of view, eradicating measles is a very similar task to eradicating smallpox.

However, there is one significant difference: measles is a fairly worrying disease, whereas smallpox is absolutely terrifying. This means there hasn't been the social and political will to push an eradication program. If the will did exist, we could wrap it up in about 10 years (wild guess on my part), and then nobody would ever need a measles vaccination ever again. Don't like vaccinations? Push for eradication. Your kids will get the jab, but your grandkids, great-grandkids, etc. forever, will not.

The list of diseases considered eradicable (as of 2008) is quite short. For example, influenza is not - it readily jumps species (so eradication from humans would require vaccinating wild ducks, for example) and it mutates rapidly, so new vaccines are constantly needed.

The list: [wikipedia.org]
Smallpox (eradicated)
Polio (on the verge of eradication, probably 5 to 10 years off)
Dracunculiasis/Guinea worm (on the verge of eradication)
Yaws (on the verge of eradication)
Malaria (eradication still decades away)
Hookworm
Lymphatic filariasis
Measles
Mumps
Rubella
Lymphatic filariasis
Cysticercosis

CrimsonAvenger ( 580665 ) , Wednesday April 03, 2019 @09:24AM ( #58377858 )
Re:Interestingly... ( Score: 5 , Informative)

Replying to myself.

A quick check of Clark County, WA, indicates that of 73 cases reported at the time of the article, 63 were NOT vaccinated, three had had only one vaccination (as opposed to the two that are standard), and the remaining seven were "vaccination status unknown".

So, I repeat, where is the evidence that "EVERYONE who got the measles had been vaccinated"? Evidence seems to support at least 90% NOT vaccinated....

[Mar 05, 2020] US Health Workers Responding To Coronavirus Lacked Training and Protective Gear

There is nothing special in lack of preparedness to a serious epidemic. But it looks like this epidemics is not that serious.
They were not provided training in safety protocols until five days later, the person said. That's a classic bureaucratic incompetence. nothing new here. move on.
Mar 05, 2020 | science.slashdot.org
Posted by msmash on Thursday February 27, 2020 @06:54PM from the Breaking-news dept. Federal health employees interacted with Americans quarantined for possible exposure to the coronavirus without proper medical training or protective gear then scattered into the general population, The New York Times reported Thursday, citing a government whistle-blower. From the report: In a portion of a complaint filing obtained by The New York Times that has been submitted to the Office of the Special Counsel, the whistle-blower, described as a senior leader at the Department of Health and Human Services, said the team was "improperly deployed" to two military bases in California to assist the processing of Americans who had been evacuated from coronavirus hot zones in China and elsewhere.

The staff members were sent to Travis Air Force Base and March Air Reserve Base and were ordered to enter quarantined areas, including a hangar where coronavirus evacuees were being received.

They were not provided training in safety protocols until five days later, the person said.

Without proper training or equipment, some of the exposed staff members moved freely around and off the bases, with at least one person staying in a nearby hotel and leaving California on a commercial flight. Many were unaware of the need to test their temperature three times a day ROTFLMAO ( Score: 2 ) by sit1963nz ( 934837 ) on Thursday February 27, 2020 @07:01PM ( #59775768 ) Please tell the world again how great the USA is, because from the outside you look like fucking morons.

[Mar 04, 2020] The Virus might originate outside of China

Mar 04, 2020 | www.globalresearch.ca

According to the Global Times:

A new study by Chinese researchers indicates the novel coronavirus may have begun human-to-human transmission in late November from a place other than the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan.

The study published on ChinaXiv, a Chinese open repository for scientific researchers, reveals t he new coronavirus was introduced to the seafood market from another location(s), and then spread rapidly from the market due to the large number of close contacts. The findings were the result of analyses of the genome data, sources of infection, and the route of spread of variations of the novel coronavirus collected throughout China.

The study believes that patient(s) zero transmitted the virus to workers or sellers at the Huanan seafood market, the crowded market easily facilitating further transmission of the virus to buyers, which caused a wider spread in early December 2019. (Global Times, February 22, 2020, emphasis added (2)

Chinese medical authorities – and "intelligence agencies" – then conducted a rapid and wide-ranging search for the origin of the virus, collecting nearly 100 samples of the genome from 12 different countries on 4 continents, identifying all the varieties and mutations. During this research, they determined the virus outbreak had begun much earlier, probably in November, shortly after the Wuhan Military Games.

They then came to the same independent conclusions as the Japanese researchers – that the virus did not begin in China but was introduced there from the outside.

China's top respiratory specialist Zhong Nanshan said on January 27

"Though the COVID-19 was first discovered in China, it does not mean that it originated from China"

"But that is Chinese for "it originated someplace else, in another country". (4)

This of course raises questions as to the actual location of origin. If the authorities pursued their analysis through 100 genome samples from 12 countries, they must have had a compelling reason to be searching for the original source outside China. This would explain why there was such difficulty in locating and identifying a 'patient zero'.

Japan's Media: The Coronavirus May Have Originated in the US

In February of 2020, the Japanese Asahi news report (print and TV) claimed the coronavirus originated in the US, not in China , and that some (or many) of the 14,000 American deaths attributed to influenza may have in fact have resulted from the coronavirus. (5)

... ... ....

These claims stirred up a hornet's nest not only in Japan but in China, immediately going viral on Chinese social media, especially since the Military World Games were held in Wuhan in October, and it had already been widely discussed that the virus could have been transmitted at that time – from a foreign source.

"Perhaps the US delegates brought the coronavirus to Wuhan, and some mutation occurred to the virus, making it more deadly and contagious, and causing a widespread outbreak this year." ( People's Daily , February 23, 2020) (1)

... ... ...

Taiwan Virologist Suggests the Coronavirus Originated in the US

Then, Taiwan ran a TV news program on February,27, (click here to access video (Chinese) , that presented diagrams and flow charts suggesting the coronavirus originated in the US. (6)

...The basic logic is that the geographical location with the greatest diversity of virus strains must be the original source because a single strain cannot emerge from nothing. He demonstrated that only the US has all the five known strains of the virus (while Wuhan and most of China have only one, as do Taiwan and South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam, Singapore, and England, Belgium and Germany), constituting a thesis that the haplotypes in other nations may have originated in the US.

Korea and Taiwan have a different haplotype of the virus than China, perhaps more infective but much less deadly, which would account for a death rate only 1/3 that of China.

Neither Iran nor Italy were included in the above tests, but both countries have now deciphered the locally prevalent genome and have declared them of different varieties from those in China, which means they did not originate in China but were of necessity introduced from another source. It is worth noting that the variety in Italy has approximately the same fatality rate as that of China, three times as great as other nations, while the haplotype in Iran appears to be the deadliest with a fatality rate of between 10% and 25%. (7) (8) (9)

...The Virologist further stated that the US has recently had more than 200 "pulmonary fibrosis" cases that resulted in death due to patients' inability to breathe, but whose conditions and symptoms could not be explained by pulmonary fibrosis. He said he wrote articles informing the US health authorities to consider seriously those deaths as resulting from the coronavirus, but they responded by blaming the deaths on e-cigarettes, then silenced further discussion.

The Taiwanese doctor then stated the virus outbreak began earlier than assumed, saying, "We must look to September of 2019".

He stated the case in September of 2019 where some Japanese traveled to Hawaii and returned home infected, people who had never been to China. This was two months prior to the infections in China and just after the CDC suddenly and totally shut down the Fort Detrick bio-weapons lab claiming the facilities were insufficient to prevent loss of pathogens. (10) (11)

He said he personally investigated those cases very carefully (as did the Japanese virologists who came to the same conclusion).. This might indicate the coronavirus had already spread in the US but where the symptoms were being officially attributed to other diseases, and thus possibly masked. The prominent Chinese news website Huanqiu related one case in the US where a woman's relative was told by physicians he died of the flu, but where the death certificate listed the coronavirus as the cause of death.

Just for information

In the past two years (during the trade war) China has suffered several pandemics:

The standard adage is that bad luck happens in threes, not sixes.

***

Note to readers: please click the share buttons above or below. Forward this article to your email lists. Crosspost on your blog site, internet forums. etc.

Larry Romanoff is a retired management consultant and businessman. He has held senior executive positions in international consulting firms, and owned an international import-export business. He has been a visiting professor at Shanghai's Fudan University, presenting case studies in international affairs to senior EMBA classes. Mr. Romanoff lives in Shanghai and is currently writing a series of ten books generally related to China and the West. He can be contacted at: [email protected] . He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Notes

[Mar 04, 2020] Is it neoliberal treatment of labor helps to spear epidemics such as Coronarovitus?

The answer is definitely yes, as neoliberalism stimulates sick people to come to work.
Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Superduperdave , March 4, 2020 at 6:37 am

Is it finance making people sick?

What about the WHO's refusal to declare a global pandemic? Maybes Yves can weigh in on the "pandemic bonds" issued by the World Bank on which investors stand to lose tens of millions of dollars.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/the-time-has-come-to-cash-out-our-pandemic-bonds/2020/03/02/564bc326-5cb3-11ea-b014-4fafa866bb81_story.html

[Mar 04, 2020] As the virus strikes mostly old and infirm and strikes then hard: isolation of pensioners should be considered in all infectiou areas as they stress the health system and contribute to shortages of the facilities

Pensioners do not need come to work to earn basic income and as such is the national group to isolate in this particular epidemic.
Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

rtah100 , March 4, 2020 at 8:46 am

Again, we have to take the Italian figures carefully.

– The population is skewed elderly (I am not saying elderly deaths don't count, I am saying that the different age structure of the population will produce a different CFR from China despite the same virus properties).

– The early cluster was of hospital transmission, so a lot of people who were already sick in hospital for other reasons have died of it

– There have only been one or two deaths of "healthy" patients (the 60 year old doctor yesterday for example). Same in South Korea, the one 35 year old who died was a Mongolian health tourist with liver and renal failure in SK for a liver transplant.

I am not minimizing the impact of the virus in S Korea or Italy – we have to take the population we have, so the CFR will be higher – but the terrible dead/recovered ratios we are seeing are an artefact of two high income countries with high quality care which, in normal times, keep alive a lot of frail people, and the excess mortality will be concentrated in these cohorts – very elderly and serious comorbidities (which are strongly correlated anyway).

The virus enters in the healthcare systems. Many of these people are going to die in this epidemic, of competition for resources if not of coronavirus. You could say that COVID-19 is a disease of weak / dissolute healthcare systems (and by extension governments/polities) and we are going to find out which national bodies can resist it .

samhill , March 4, 2020 at 10:34 am

we are seeing are an artifact of two high income countries with high quality care which, in normal times, keep alive a lot of frail people, and the excess mortality will be concentrated in these cohorts

excellent!

MLTPB , March 4, 2020 at 9:00 am

It would seem basic income helps more than work guarantee, if a lot of people have to stay home.

[Mar 04, 2020] PLA top epidemiologist-led team achieves breakthrough in COVID-19 vaccine R D: report

Mar 04, 2020 | www.globaltimes.cn

JW | Mar 4 2020 2:47 utc | 121

@119

America: Who cares if all of us die as long as we can demonize China to the last man?

Sunny Runny Burger | Mar 4 2020 5:21 utc | 122

Thank you very much for the link vk!

A very small and partial quote from the article:

"Chinese scientists have now managed to separate some high-quality antibodies"

Besides the rush towards a vaccine this is a required step towards making serology tests available. It will take some time of course but it is very encouraging that they've achieved this. In time this might also help explain some things about how the virus seems to be so tricky to detect very early after infection since when serology becomes available one can compare swabbing and serology from both suspected cases and those that seem entirely uninfected.

Countries around the world ought to be eager to cooperate closely with and support China and benefit from these efforts but "our" local politicians seem like they might be too proud or dumb to do so. That could change for the better.

[Mar 04, 2020] Neoliberalism is powerful catalyst of flu infections

Mar 04, 2020 | crookedtimber.org

Chris Adams 02.28.20 at 2:05 pm (no link)

Along similar lines, in the United States simply expanding paid sick leave to restaurant workers showed a 5% decline in flu cases for the entire city:

https://www.nber.org/papers/w22530.pdf

It really seems like a good angle for public health would be prioritizing transmission risk: a healthy 25 year old working in a restaurant or public school would be worth targeting from the angle of exposure even if they're not likely to have an especially bad personal experience.

[Mar 04, 2020] Possible measures for people with weakened immune system

Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Tom Stone , March 4, 2020 at 6:21 am

I'm taking it very seriously, being immunosuppressed due to Chemo.

No more gym, no more broker's meetings, stopped doing volunteer work at the jails after 15 years,Deep cleaned and disinfected my home and vehicle and continue disinfecting doorhandles etc daily. started shopping a times when stores have few customers, nitrile gloves in public and thorough handwashing ,

Close to a self quarantine until my immune system recovers.

Unfortunately my Chemo requires a hospital stay of roughly 30 hours and there are four more to go a month apart, the next one tomorrow, my most likely point of exposure.

Brooklin Bridge , March 4, 2020 at 9:18 am

Best of luck with that , Tom. That your exposure happens only once a month is of course vastly better than every day. Fingers crossed!

[Mar 04, 2020] The situation in Singapore

Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Jason , March 4, 2020 at 8:42 am

And in Singapore (admittedly a best case scenario), there have been 110 total cases. 79 are discharged from hospitals. 33 are still warded of which 7 are in critical condition. No deaths.

charles 2 , March 4, 2020 at 11:14 am

Singapore is the only country in SE Asia where I trust the figures, so I follow them closely. What is impressive is that they are still quite successful at contact tracing (12 cases only unresolved out of 110) and the number of clusters is still quite small. Considering they have not closed schools, nor closed borders (300,000 passages a day), that is quite encouraging. My take is that the virus can't take the heat, so we really should yearn for summer

[Mar 04, 2020] Here is how the most powerful country in the world with a beautiful fabulous health care system is identifying and testing for coronavirus

Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Here is how the most powerful country in the world with a beautiful fabulous health care system is identifying and testing for coronavirus

rd , March 4, 2020 at 9:31 am

Here is how the most powerful country in the world with a beautiful fabulous health care system is identifying and testing for coronavirus: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/one-womans-miserable-experience-trying-to-get-tested-for-the-coronavirus-2020-03-03?mod=home-page

I think the genie is out of the bottle and nobody has a clue where it is except the Chinese and Koreans.

clarky90 , March 4, 2020 at 4:41 am

A tip of the hat, to Karl Denninger, who I learned the following from .

The sick room of a covid19 patient should always be at negative pressure . This is especially important in a hospital setting. The air in the sick room (or covid19 wing of the hospital) should be exhausted to the outside, (but well away from other people). This means that virus laden air is not forced back, into the rest of the hospital or house by positive pressure (by conditioned air, blown into the sick room.) This simple tech greatly protects the uninfected from infection by the virus.

FI, if a covid19 patient is sheltering at home with other, uninfected people in the house; Put the patient in a sick room with an en suite. Have an exhaust fan in their bedroom window which sucks the tainted air out of their room and into the outside. or, better yet, up a chimney (if present).

Also, in Wuhan, the patient's door, into the home, would be sealed with tape, and the patient would lower a basket on a rope out their window to get food and supplies. Their rubbish would be double bagged and thrown out the window for collection. This is real quarantining. So simple, practical and medieval!

Please somebody who has a better grasp of the concept, jump in with a clearer explanation.

Years ago, people would have open windows and open doors, with a breeze blowing through the sick room, to clear out air born pathogens bringing in fresh, clean air, which was already partially sterilized by the UV radiation of the sunlight.

[Mar 04, 2020] Russia is attacked by visious disinformation campaign by foreign sources spreading vicious rumors about virus epidemics

Mar 04, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

According to the Guardian , Russia has been targeted by "enemies" spreading fake news about the coronavirus to sow panic and discord across the country, President Vladimir Putin said:

His remarks came as Russia's communications regulator said it had shut down access to some social media posts containing falsehoods about the virus outbreak.

"The Federal Security Service reports that they (the fakes) are mainly being organised from abroad. But unfortunately this always happens to us," Putin said on Wednesday, in televised remarks at a government meeting.

"The purpose of such fakes is clear: to sow panic among the population."

Reuters reports that a Russian cyber security company, Group-IB, on Monday identified what it said were thousands of fake news posts on messaging services and social networks such as Russia's VK alleging that thousands of Muscovites have caught the virus.

[Mar 04, 2020] Looks like the number of cases of COVID-19 without overt symprom is negigble; Cases with mild symptoms are numerous and able to transmit the infection. Cases with mild symptoms are not always aware of their potential infectivity, and some people with mild symptoms have sought medical care, thereby infecting health care workers

Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

rd , March 4, 2020 at 9:46 am

China and Korea have done enough testing to come up with a lot of negative tests. This makes WHO's current interpretation that most COVID-19 cases end up with significant observable symptoms and that there aren't a lot of undetected cases that just go away without symptoms credible.

I think it is the long incubation period that throws people for a loop. We are used to getting exposed and then getting sick within a handful of days. Something that takes a week to three weeks to create symptoms does not fit well into our brains' acclimation to instant feedback on everything. This is more of an information exchange using handwritten letters via US Post than Twitter.

It is also why there is probably a rising issue lurking in the US because it is taking time to get people who are showing symptoms tested, never mind screening people they may have been in contact with. By the time they are diagnosed, they could have exposed dozens of people.

Ignacio , March 4, 2020 at 10:17 am

Direct comparison between flu and SARS-CoV2 regarding all aspects from epidemiology to diagnostics and clinical development is not advisable.

From EU-CDC : Cases with mild symptoms are numerous and able to transmit the infection. Cases with mild symptoms are not always aware of their potential infectivity, and some people with mild symptoms have sought medical care, thereby infecting health care workers;

rtah100 , March 4, 2020 at 8:26 am

To be precise:
– WHO rejected the contention there is a large number of unconfirmed mild cases *outside* Hubei
– WHO confirmed that there are asymptomatic patients, their infectiousness is unclear.

Here is the transcript re Hubei (from the Aylward press conference at WHO HQ).
https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/who-audio-emergencies-coronavirus-press-conference-aylwardb-25feb2020-final.pdf?sfvrsn=9d732ce3_0

"00:47:42

[Bruce Aylward speaking]

I would say one point, because I know there will be questions, and I'll stay as long as we need to try and help with any of those, but one of the big questions that we keep hearing about is how much transmission is going on in communities? And you keep hearing the tip of the iceberg, we can't see this thing, there are millions of people infected, etc. So, we tried to look at those kinds of questions as well. Again, you're at war here and there's a huge fog in any war. You're trying to find those little bits of information that can add up and give you some confidence in what you're saying.

We tried to look at where was there sampling of people in the population that might give us a sense of how widely this virus was spreading? And again, this is where it's great to look at these things in China because the numbers are so big. But you've probably heard that there's something called an influenza like illness surveillance system that runs around the world with many sentinel sites that collect 20 samples every month and we get them analysed. But this happens in multiple places in China, and what you can do is look at those data and they can show you, here's our data, our sampling, here's all the flu cases that are coming up, in November, December of last year, they all went back to look.

Because once we had a COVID-19 test and they went back to test all of these, nobody found it. It wasn't there. They found lots of flu. But then in January, they did find it, it comes up in the first couple of weeks in January. But outside of Hubei, very rare. One might be positive here or one there, it wasn't like all of these samples were positive, like there was a lot of it circulating. And then another thing we did was in places that were heavily infected, more and more people were coming to fever clinics and wanted to get tested.

00:49:40

And in one place, it might have been Guangdong, they had tested 320,000 samples for the COVID virus. 320,000 is going to give you some sense of what's going on. And when they started the sampling of those, about 0.49% of them were positive, so less than 05%. And in the recent period, it's something like 0.02%. So, I know everybody has been out there saying, this thing is spreading everywhere and we just can't see it, tip of the iceberg. But the data that we do have don't support that. What it supports is sure, there may be a few asymptomatic cases, and that probably is a real issue, but there's not huge transmission beyond what you can actually see clinically.

"

So, in Hubei, retrospective testing of flu cases showed up COVID-19 but in Guangdong large-scale population sampling shows minimal undiagnosed/asymptomatic cases.

And here is the transcript on asymptomatic cases (from the WHO press conference in China the previous night):

"
[Liang Wannian speaking for China National Health Commisson]

The proportions of mild, severe, and critically ill patients are about 80%,
13%, and 6%, respectively. Some asymptomatic patients have been found. However,
whether such cases are patients with asymptomatic infections or carriers whose virus is
still in the incubation period warrants further study. It is unclear whether the
asymptomatic carriers can also spread the disease."

[Mar 04, 2020] Mortality estimate based on South Korea data is around one percent

Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

PlutoniumKun , March 4, 2020 at 6:39 am

I did a rough estimate of SK figures assuming around 10 days lag (just a guess), and I came up with just over 1%. The problem they face is that the overall numbers now are manageable in hospitals. What happens when they run out of respirators and isolation wards? I would expect death rates to climb significantly. Also I think early mortality rates are likely to be very dependent on the population cohort hit first – we've seen how in Italy it spiked dearly because it seems to have hit a major hospital first. In SK, its mostly older churchgoers, but from what I've seen, older right wing xtian South Koreans are a hardy bunch.

Silver linings – yes, CO2 levels are dropping, and this may even be long term. A lot of older foundries and power stations may not be worth restarting once they go cold. This may fundamentally change the world travel market, especially if the airlines take a serious hit which would stop them from investing in more capacity. I doubt if there is much appetite at government level for supporting big airlines. Boeing is toast, which might fundamentally reduce production capacity. It may even lead to the closure of coal mines and oil/gas fields.

[Mar 04, 2020] Why Are We Being Charged? Surprise Bills From Coronavirus Testing Spark Calls for Government to Cover All Costs by Jake Johnson

Highly recommended!
Notes of disaster capitalism in action...
Notable quotes:
"... The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is not billing patients for coronavirus testing, according to Business Insider . "But there are other charges you might have to pay, depending on your insurance plan, or lack thereof," Business Insider noted. "A hospital stay in itself could be costly and you would likely have to pay for tests for other viruses or conditions." ..."
"... Congress needs to immediately pass a bill appropriating funding to cover 100% of the cost of all coronavirus testing & care within the United States. We will not have a chance at containing it otherwise. @tedlieu - as my rep, can you please ensure this is brought up? ..."
"... In the case of the Wucinskis, Kliff reported that "the ambulance company that transported [them] charged the family $2,598 for taking them to the hospital." ..."
"... Last week, the Miami Herald reported that Osmel Martinez Azcue "received a notice from his insurance company about a claim for $3,270" after he visited a local hospital fearing that he contracted coronavirus during a work trip to China. ..."
"... Did anyone expect the unconscionable greed of capitalism to cease when a public health crisis emerges? This is just testing for the virus, wait until a vaccine has been developed so expensive that the majority of the US populace can not afford it at all and people are dropping like flies. Wall Street, never-the-less, will continue to have its heydays ..."
"... The very idea that the defense and "Homeland" security budgets are bloated and additional funding approved year after year but the citizens of this country are not afforded 100% health coverage In a time of global health crisis that could become a pandemic. ..."
Mar 03, 2020 | www.commondreams.org

"Huge surprise medical bills [are] going to make sure people with symptoms don't get tested. That is bad for everyone." by Jake Johnson, staff writer Public health advocates, experts, and others are demanding that the federal government cover coronavirus testing and all related costs after several reports detailed how Americans in recent weeks have been saddled with exorbitant bills following medical evaluations.

Sarah Kliff of the New York Times reported Saturday that Pennsylvania native Frank Wucinski "found a pile of medical bills" totaling $3,918 waiting for him and his three-year-old daughter after they were released from government-mandated quarantine at Marine Corps Air Station in Miramar, California.

"My question is why are we being charged for these stays, if they were mandatory and we had no choice in the matter?" asked Wucinski, who was evacuated by the U.S. government last month from Wuhan, China, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak.

"I assumed it was all being paid for," Wucinski told the Times . "We didn't have a choice. When the bills showed up, it was just a pit in my stomach, like, 'How do I pay for this?'"

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is not billing patients for coronavirus testing, according to Business Insider . "But there are other charges you might have to pay, depending on your insurance plan, or lack thereof," Business Insider noted. "A hospital stay in itself could be costly and you would likely have to pay for tests for other viruses or conditions."

Lawrence Gostin, a professor of global health law at Georgetown University, told the Times that

"the most important rule of public health is to gain the cooperation of the population."

"There are legal, moral, and public health reasons not to charge the patients,"

Gostin said.

Congress needs to immediately pass a bill appropriating funding to cover 100% of the cost of all coronavirus testing & care within the United States. We will not have a chance at containing it otherwise. @tedlieu - as my rep, can you please ensure this is brought up?

-- William LeGate (@williamlegate) March 2, 2020

In the case of the Wucinskis, Kliff reported that "the ambulance company that transported [them] charged the family $2,598 for taking them to the hospital."

"An additional $90 in charges came from radiologists who read the patients' X-ray scans and do not work for the hospital," Kliff noted.

The CDC declined to respond when Kliff asked whether the federal government would cover the costs for patients like the Wucinskis.

The Intercept 's Robert Mackey wrote last Friday that the Wucinskis' situation spotlights "how the American government's response to a public health emergency, like trying to contain a potential coronavirus epidemic, could be handicapped by relying on a system built around private hospitals and for-profit health insurance providers."

We should be doing everything we can to encourage people with #COVIDー19 symptoms to come forward. Huge surprise medical bills is going to make sure people with symptoms don't get tested. That is bad for everyone, regardless of if you are insured. https://t.co/KOUKTSFVzD

-- Saikat Chakrabarti (@saikatc) March 1, 2020

Play this tape to the end and you find people not going to the hospital even if they're really sick. The federal government needs to announce that they'll pay for all of these bills https://t.co/HfyBFBXhja

Last week, the Miami Herald reported that Osmel Martinez Azcue "received a notice from his insurance company about a claim for $3,270" after he visited a local hospital fearing that he contracted coronavirus during a work trip to China.

"He went to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where he said he was placed in a closed-off room," according to the Herald . "Nurses in protective white suits sprayed some kind of disinfectant smoke under the door before entering, Azcue said. Then hospital staff members told him he'd need a CT scan to screen for coronavirus, but Azcue said he asked for a flu test first."

Azcue tested positive for the flu and was discharged. "Azcue's experience shows the potential cost of testing for a disease that epidemiologists fear may develop into a public health crisis in the U.S.," the Herald noted.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, highlighted Azcue's case in a tweet last Friday.

"The coronavirus reminds us that we are all in this together," Sanders wrote. "We cannot allow Americans to skip doctor's visits over outrageous bills. Everyone should get the medical care they need without opening their wallet -- as a matter of justice and public health."

Last week, as Common Dreams reported , Sanders argued that the coronavirus outbreak demonstrates the urgent need for Medicare for All.

The coronavirus reminds us that we are all in this together. We cannot allow Americans to skip doctor's visits over outrageous bills.

Everyone should get the medical care they need without opening their wallet -- as a matter of justice and public health. https://t.co/c4WQMDESHU

-- Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) February 28, 2020

The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the U.S. surged by more than two dozen over the weekend, bringing the total to 89 as the Trump administration continues to publicly downplay the severity of the outbreak.

Dr. Matt McCarthy, a staff physician at NewYork–Presbyterian Hospital, said in an appearance on CNBC 's "Squawk Box" Monday morning that testing for the coronavirus is still not widely available.

"Before I came here this morning, I was in the emergency room seeing patients," McCarthy said. "I still do not have a rapid diagnostic test available to me."

"I'm here to tell you, right now, at one of the busiest hospitals in the country, I don't have it at my finger tips," added McCarthy. "I still have to make my case, plead to test people. This is not good. We know that there are 88 cases in the United States. There are going to be hundreds by middle of week. There's going to be thousands by next week. And this is a testing issue."

Our work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. Feel free to republish and share widely.


Harry_Pjotr 13h

Did anyone expect the unconscionable greed of capitalism to cease when a public health crisis emerges? This is just testing for the virus, wait until a vaccine has been developed so expensive that the majority of the US populace can not afford it at all and people are dropping like flies. Wall Street, never-the-less, will continue to have its heydays

Smerl fern 12h

A wall street bank or private predator may own your emergency room. A surprise bill may await your emergency treatment above insurance payments or in some instances all of the bill.

An effort was made recently in congress to stop surprise billings but enough dems joined repubs to kill it. More important to keep campaign dollars flowing than keep people alive. fern Smerl 12h I know emergency rooms are being purchased by organizations like Tenet (because they are some of the most expensive levels of care) and M.D.s provided by large agencies. I'm not as up on this as I should be but a friend of mine tells me that some of this is illegal. I have received bills that were later discharged by challenge. This is worth investigating further. Atlas oldie 11h Hmmmm A virus that overwhelmingly kills the elderly and/or those with pre-exisitng conditions.

Sounds like a medical insurance companies wet dream. As well as .gov social security/medicare wet dream.

Just sayin'

Ticki 11h

The very idea that the defense and "Homeland" security budgets are bloated and additional funding approved year after year but the citizens of this country are not afforded 100% health coverage In a time of global health crisis that could become a pandemic. And as has been stated, the unconscionable idea suggested that a possible vaccine (a long way away or perhaps not developed at all) might not be affordable to the workers who pay the taxes that fund the government? That's insane.

leftonadoorstep 11h

Another example of "American Exceptionalism." China doesn't charge its coronavirus patients, neither does South Korea. I guess they are simply backward countries.

Barton 11h

I own my own home after years of hard work paying it off. It's the only thing of value, besides my old truck, that I have. If I get the virus, I will stay home and try to treat it the best I can. I can't afford to go to the hospital and pay thousands in medical bills, with the chance that they'll come after my possessions. America, the land of the _______. Fill in the blank. (Hint: it's no longer free).

fern 1 Barton 11h

There are other ways to protect your home. Homesteading or living trust. I'm not good at this but I know there are ways to do it. Hopefully, it would never come to that but outcomes are not certain even with treatment in this case.

Giovanna-Lepore oldie 11h

As someone who lost a mother at 5 years old I can sympathize with your grief in losing a daughter-in-law and especially seeing her four children orphaned. However, I think you miss the point here: This is about we becoming a society invested in each others welfare and not a company town that commodifies everything including the health and well being of us all.

fern 1 Giovanna-Lepore 11h

I'm going by: https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1129/text

As a revision it is better but flawed. It is a cost containment bill based on the same research as the republican plan with global budgets and block grants.

Edited: I encourage you to read this:
-ttps://www.rand.org/blog/2018/10/misconceptions-about-medicare-for-all.html Giovanna-Lepore 10h oldie:

Part D

Higher education is not free but they do need to become free for the students and payed by us as a society.

Part D is a scam, a Republican scam also supported by corporate democrats because of its profit motive and its privatization

Medicare only covers 80% and does not cover eye and dental care and older folks especially need these services. Medicaid helps but there are limits and one cannot necessarily use it where one needs to go. Expanded, Improved Medicare For All is a vast improvement. because it covers everyone in one big pool and, therefore, much more dignified than the rob Paul to pay peter system we have.

Social Security too can be improved. Why should it simply be based on the income of the person which means that a person working in a low paying job in a capitalist system gone wild with greed will often work until they die.

Pell grants can be eliminated when we have what the French have: publicly supported education for everyone.

The demise of unions certainly did not help but it was part of the long strategy of the Right to privatize everything to the enrichment of the few.

Yunzer SuspiraDeProfundis 10h

Thank goodness for the "/s". Poe's Law you know

The overall competence that Canada is handling this outbreak, compared to the USA, is stark. First world (Canada) versus third-world (USA). Testing is practically available for free, to any suspect person, sick or not, as Toronto alone can run 1000 tests a day and have results in 4 hours. That is far more than all the US's capacity for 330 million people.

I wonder how long before Canada closes its borders to USAns? Me and my wife (both in a vulnerable age/medical group) should seriously consider fleeing to my brother's place in Toronto as the first announced cases in Pittsburgh are probably only days away. What about our poor cat though? We could try to smuggle her across the border, but she is a loud and talkative kitty

Greenwich 10h

Don't want to discourage anyone from any protective measures – but the "low down" from my veggie store today was that a lot of health professionals shop there and they think it's being hyped by media. Did get this from my NJ Sen. Menendez –

Center for Disease and Control and Prevention (CDC)

There is currently no vaccine to prevent coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The best way to prevent illness is to avoid being exposed to this virus. However, everyday preventive actions can help prevent the spread of respiratory diseases:

  • Wash your hands often
  • Avoid close contact with people who are sick.
  • Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth.
  • Stay home when you are sick.
  • Cover your cough or sneeze with a tissue, then throw the tissue in the trash.
  • For more information : htps://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/prevention-treatment.html
  • How it spreads : The virus is thought to spread mainly from person-to-person. It may be possible that a person can get COVID-19 by touching a surface or object that has the virus on it and then touching their own mouth, nose, or possibly their eyes, but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads. [Read more.]
    https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/transmission.html )
  • Symptoms : For confirmed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases, reported illnesses have ranged from mild symptoms to severe illness and death. Symptoms can include fever, cough, and shortness of breath.
Seeker 9h Greenwich:

Don't want to discourage anyone from any protective measures – but the "low down" from my veggie store today was that a lot of health professionals shop there and they think it's being hyped by media.

I agree it is being hyped by the media to the point of being fear mongering. At the same time it is being ignored by the administration to such an extent that really little almost nothing is being done. At some point the two together will create an even bigger problem.

It is like the old adage: "Just because you are paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you." Each over/under reach in considering the reality of the situation has its own problem, which multiply when combined. Every morning when I wake up I say a little atheistic prayer to myself before I get out of bed: "Another day and for better or worse...".

Seeker 8h

Well, two reported here in Florida tonight. One in my county, one in the county next door. And more of the "we already knew, but told you late". One person checked into the hospital on Wednesday. We hear it Monday night. Both were ignored far a long time it seems, and 84 in particular are being watched (roommates, friends, hospital workers not alerted for several days, the usual). But no one knows every place they had been since becoming infected.

Oh, and they have tested a handful of people. No worry?

I can't see anyway that this level of incompetency is an accident. Spring break is just starting usually a 100's of thousand tourist bonanza.

So the question is do they want to kill us, or just keep us in fear?

I think the later. But the end result is a crap shoot. So once again, it is a gamble with our lives.

Archie1954 7h

The business of America is business. Sometimes that can go too far and this is one of those times. Making money from the loss, distress, harm and suffering of others is perverse beyond belief.

[Mar 04, 2020] Nowcasting COVID-19 for public health control: learning from the Chinese experience for global preparedness by Gabriel Leung

Highly recommended!
An excellent, if technical video from 27 Feb. The speaker is a HK Chinese (English speaking) Epidemiologist.
He point out "family clustering" of Chinese cases and most cases originating from Hubey province, not local clusters. He also pointed out the Wuhan has large cluster of old population.
Feb 27, 2020 | lshtm.ac.uk

John Snow Lecture Theatre, LSHTM

WHO Collaborating Centre. The University of Hong Kong Center for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Control

[Mar 04, 2020] Around 80% of cases are "mild". Mild means that they don't require hospitalization to recover.

Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Stephen The Tech Critic , , March 4, 2020 at 6:15 am

When it comes to estimating mortality, I think it's helpful to keep in in mind the concept of multiple tiers and required care at each tier. My numbers here are very roughly derived from case report data from a handful of sources. Uncertainties are large here, and I mostly just want to illustrate the point.

First, we are told that around 80% of cases are "mild". Mild means that they don't require hospitalization to recover. That's "tier zero" as it requires no significant health-care resources.

About 20% of cases, require a hospital bed and supplemental oxygen. About 3 in 4 of these cases (15% of total) recover without additional measures, and these "serious" cases make up "tier one".

This implies about 5% of cases need mechanical ventilation. About 3 in 4 of these cases (3.75% of total) will recover without additional measures, and these "severe" cases make up "tier two". About 1.25% of cases need extreme measures that can only be delivered in highly equipped ICUs.

About 3 in 4 of these cases will survive (although they can tie up other hospital resources for many weeks), and these "critical" cases make up "tier three".

Finally, even with all resources brought to bear, some small fraction of cases (like 0.3%???) still die anyway ("tier 4").

Like I said, all these numbers are uncertain, but you can see how resource shortages at each tier are likely to impact mortality variance from region-to-region, and how reducing the spread of the disease through containment measures can make a huge impact on the number of lives lost. Of course if the whole point is to keep the hospitals from overflowing, whatever containment measures are necessary are likely to have to remain in place for a long time with such a contagious disease. This means that the knock-on effects of such policies (i.e., a cratering of economic demand in the services) are likely to be more severe. What a nasty trade-off!

IMO, it may be time for helicopter money in addition to NDMS health-care. And someone should figure out how to accurately test for immunity so that people who are (hopefully) already immune can be recruited rapidly for jobs that are high risk.

[Mar 04, 2020] Italy Begins Nationwide Quarantine For Seniors As New York Reports 6th Case

China epidemic subside -- only 119 additional cases. That's compared with 125 additional cases and 31 new deaths the previous day. The new cases bring the total number of mainland cases to 80,270 and death toll at 2,871. In a couple of months China part of epidemic probably will be over.
Isolating seniors who are at risk is a very reasonable measure. Should probably be implemented in all areas with high number of infections.
On the bright side there is now an indirect evidence that summer weather slows the virus down .
Mar 04, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

[Mar 04, 2020] "Smoking" is a prior condition that predisposes patients to more severe respiratory complications

Mar 04, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Samuel Conner , March 4, 2020 at 9:24 am

For apples to apples, I think one needs to look at end states of all patients infected at the same time; one doesn't have this and so the ratio evolves as end states are reached. Also, in early stages of an epidemic, incidence is rising and if mortalities occur quicker than recoveries (as appears to be the case in this epidemic), the #died/(#died + #recovered) can be extremely high at first.

In China, in both Hubei and "all China other than Hubei", this ratio has been declining day by day since Feb 17 (for Hubei) and Feb 19 (for China ex Hubei), ie since the first day I have been tracking the daily JHU CSSE numbers for the respective regions.

China ex Hubei is (assuming the reported numbers are accurate), as of late 3/3, at 0.96%, with about 1500 unresolved cases (of 11300 total cases) and almost no new fatalities in recent days. I think this gives a plausible guess at a final ratio of around 0.8% if all future outcomes of the current cases in this region were known. But that was with very aggressive containment measures. One would be justified to wonder whether there is sufficient will to do this in US.

--

It would be very helpful, I think, to know whether, or the extent to which, "smoking" is a prior condition that predisposes patients to more severe respiratory complications. China consumes a lot of tobacco products. There appears to be a very high prevalence of smoking in China.

Ignacio , March 4, 2020 at 6:55 am

Estimating mortality is quite complicated. Given the rapid progress of infection the (not accumulated but current) casualties have not to be compared with current confirmed cases but with the number of infected about 7-10 days ago, which is not exactly the same as confirmed one week ago. Even in SK because they have different rules for testing are detecting many more cases than elsewhere, there are almost certainly many undetected infections and there are also some unknown numbers of let's call them atypical infections.

[Mar 03, 2020] Availability of free tests is critical for containing the coronavirus epidemic

Mar 03, 2020 | angrybearblog.com
  1. likbez , March 3, 2020 1:47 pm

    Ian Fellows,

    Yes, you made reasonable corrections/clarifications. Thank you !

    That said, the number of identified non-Chinese cases looks to be doubling every two weeks or so. That'll be a big deal soon unless we can bend the curve through large scale action like in China, or the dynamics change as the weather gets warmer (sorry southern hemisphere ).

    I agree then 20% susceptibility is probably too optimistic. It is interesting that susceptibility of medical personal exposed to patients in Wuhan is over 50%. And that are people with well trained immune system.

    Health care personnel infected
    ◦3.8% (1716 of 44 672)
    ◦63% in Wuhan (1080 of 1716)
    ◦14.8% cases classified as severe or critical (247 of 1668)
    ◦5 deaths

    So my 20% figure is definitely suspect.

    At the same time doubling each two weeks for the initial stages of epidemic is what you can expect in any flu epidemics.

    The situation in the USA complicated by the fact the people are pushed coming to work even with slight flu symptoms.

    Also healthcare is weakened by neoliberal healthcare and dominance of the private equity sharks in emergency rooms.

    For all practical purposes I would classify the situation in the USA as similar to the situations in the third world countries. And that will increase the cost and duration of the epidemic considerably.

    Much depends on availability of a reliable and free test. Currently the test cost money and that greatly complicates the situation in the USA increasing the number of infections and prolonging its duration. Probably considerably unless God and spring help us.

    Last week, the Miami Herald reported that Osmel Martinez Azcue "received a notice from his insurance company about a claim for $3,270" after he visited a local hospital fearing that he contracted coronavirus during a work trip to China.

    If test cost money, that will also help to kill more old and infirm ("disaster capitalism" in action). which could be saved if intervention come on easily stages of the disease (this is just a virus pneumonia after all)

    And the private equity sharks with their exorbitant ambulance and emergency room changes need to be put in place and limited to what Medicare pays.

    Sarah Kliff of the New York Times reported Saturday that Pennsylvania native Frank Wucinski "found a pile of medical bills" totaling $3,918 waiting for him and his three-year-old daughter after they were released from government-mandated quarantine at Marine Corps Air Station in Miramar, California.

    In the case of the Wucinskis, Kliff reported that "the ambulance company that transported [them] charged the family $2,598 for taking them to the hospital."

    So hopefully Congress will provide emergency funding for that. We are wasting so much money of homeland security that I would take those money from them.

[Mar 03, 2020] COVID-19 Coronavirus A Fake Pandemic Who's Behind It Global Economic, Social and Geopolitical Destabilization by Prof Michel Chossudovsky

Notable quotes:
"... The latest FluView surveillance from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that as of January 18, 2020, there have been 15 million cases of flu, 140,000 hospitalizations, and 8200 deaths in the US this influenza season. (emphasis added) ..."
Mar 03, 2020 | www.globalresearch.ca

The media hype and disinformation campaign regarding the spread of the COVID-19 novel coronavirus have created a Worldwide atmosphere of fear and uncertainty following the launching of a global public health emergency by the WHO on January 30th.

The fear campaign is ongoing. Panic and uncertainty. National governments and the WHO are misleading the public.

"About 84,000 people in at least 56 countries have been infected, and about 2,900 have died" says the New York Times. What they fail to mention is that 98% of those cases of infection are in Mainland China. There are less than 5000 confirmed cases outside China. (WHO, February 28, 2020)

While COVID-19 is a matter of Public Health concern, at the moment, there is no real pandemic outside Mainland China. Look at the figures.

At the time of writing, the number of "confirmed cases" in the US was 64.

A low number and the media is spreading panic.

Meanwhile, there are 15 Million Cases of Influenza in the USA .

The latest FluView surveillance from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that as of January 18, 2020, there have been 15 million cases of flu, 140,000 hospitalizations, and 8200 deaths in the US this influenza season. (emphasis added)

Data on the COVID-19 pandemic:

The World Health Organization (WHO) reported on February 28, 2020 83,652 confirmed cases of COV-19 of which 78,961 are in Mainland China. Outside China, there are 4691 "confirmed cases" (WHO, February 28, 2020, See table on right).

The WHO has also reported 2,791 deaths of which only 67 have occurred outside Mainland China .

These figures confirm that the pandemic is largely limited to Mainland China.

Moreover, recent data suggests that the epidemic in China is firmly under control. On February 21, 2020, China's National Health Commission reported that 36.157 patients were designated as cured and discharged from hospital. (see graph below).

Chinese reports confirm that people have received treatment and are recovering from the virus infection. Concurrently, the number of infected patients is declining.

According to the National Medical Products Administration of China, hospitals are using Favilavir, an anti-viral drug, "as a treatment for coronavirus with minimal side effects".

.

Lets Crunch the Numbers

Why the Propaganda? Racism directed against Ethnic Chinese

A campaign against China was launched, a wave of racist sentiment against ethnic Chinese is ongoing largely led by the Western media.

The Economist reports that "The coronavirus spreads racism against -- and among -- ethnic Chinese"

Fear of covid-19 makes people behave badly, including some Chinese

"Britain's Chinese community faces racism over coronavirus outbreak" according to the SCMP

"Chinese communities overseas are increasingly facing racist abuse and discrimination amid the coronavirus outbreak. Some ethnic Chinese people living in the UK say they experienced growing hostility because of the deadly virus that originated in China."

And this phenomenon is happening all over the U.S.

Economic Warfare against China

US strategies consist in using COVID-19 to isolate China, despite the fact that the US economy is heavily dependent upon Chinese imports.

The short-term disruption of the Chinese economy is largely attributable to the (temporary) closing down of the channels of trade and transportation.

The WHO Global Public Health emergency is coupled with media disinformation and the freezing of air travel to China.

Panic on Wall Street

Spearheaded by media disinformation, there is another dimension. Panic in the stock markets.

The Coronavirus fear has triggered the drop of financial markets Worldwide.

Coronavirus Epidemic: WHO Declares a "Fake" Global Public Health Emergency

According to reports, roughly $6 trillion have been wiped off the value of stock markets Worldwide. The decline in stock market values so far is of the order of "15 percent or more".

Massive losses of personal savings (e.g. of average Americans) have occurred not to mention corporate failures and bankruptcies.

It's a bonanza for institutional speculators including corporate hedge funds. The financial meltdown has led to sizeable transfers of money wealth into the pockets of a handful of financial institutions.

In a bitter irony, analysts in chorus have casually linked the market collapse to the escalation of the coronavirus at a time when there was less than 64 confirmed cases in the US.

It's not surprising that the market went down because the virus has gotten so expanded. '

Was it Possible to "Predict" the February Financial Crash?

It would be naive to believe that the financial crisis was solely the consequence of spontaneous market forces, responding to the COVID-19 outbreak. The market was carefully manipulated by powerful actors using speculative instruments in the market for derivatives, including "short-selling". Media disinformation on the "escalation of the COVID-19 pandemic certainly played a role.

... ... ...

Timeline

[Mar 03, 2020] The Italian government recommendations for Coronavirus epidemic

Mar 03, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Meanwhile, the Italian government is about to release a series of recommendations to try to halt the coronavirus outbreak, the Guardian reports.

The tips are contained in a document issued by the the country's scientific committee that will be released within the next few hours. They include:

Social distancing : remaining away from crowded environments and maintaining a distance of two meters from other people; especially within enclosed spaces.

Greetings: avoiding kisses and hugs when greeting people.

Elderly population: people older than 75 years with underlying health conditions are advised to remain at home and avoid social events.

.... ... ...

The death toll from Covid-19 in Italy has risen to 79 and confirmed cases to 2.263, the emergency commissioner and civil protection chief Angelo Borrelli has said.

[Mar 03, 2020] We're science educators at Harvard, and we want to help you understand the coronavirus and where it came from.

Mar 03, 2020 | www.reddit.com

the_jends 301 points · 8 hours ago

If you're infected, what would be the typical experience you'd go through? A lot has been said on prevention but less so on treatment. level 2 PercyXLee 313 points · 8 hours ago · edited 2 hours ago

There's is no treatment at the moment. (In fact, there's very little treatment for viruses in general). The virus is brand new and nobody has any clue about it.

You go through a typical flu symptom if you're infected. For most healthy and young people, that's all. Severe symptoms need to be put on oxygen to help breathing.

Don't try to self diagnose and take drugs if you believe you have it. It could mess up your immune system and make you more vulnerable. Maintain a healthy diet and sleep is important.

Info from news and youtube channels hosted by doctors.

Edit: since there are a lot of arguments over the definition of "treatment", i should clarity that in the sentence, "treatment" did not include supportive care, treatments of secondary infections, and experimental clinic trial being conducted. Divesto 6 points · 7 hours ago

What if hospital beds fill up and we need to? Is dayquil/nyquil, advil going to be worth anything at all if we can't get into a hospital and need to self quarantine? Pedialyte? level 4 bronsteezy 4 points · 5 hours ago

I'm not a medical worker so I can't commeny on the fever reducers. Pedialyte (or just google how much salt and sugar to mix in water to get an optimal ORS) is absolutely needed if you're self quarantining because fluid replenishment is essential for any condition that causes sweating (in this case, the cause is a fever) or diarrhea or other water loss like frequent urination. Just drinking water is not as effective, as your kidneys will excrete a larger portion of it, whereas higher-than-optimal molarity drinks like Gatorade can cause stomach upset. artgo 62 points · 8 hours ago

There's is no treatment at the moment.

You seem to be using the word "treatment" in a way that distorts things. Do you mean "cure" or "vaccine"?

There are lots of treatments for flu symptoms. They don't remove the flu, but they can make the experience more tolerable. level 4 PercyXLee 73 points · 7 hours ago

I'm using treatment as in any medical procedures that could help with recovery/survival. I don't consider symptom relief drugs "treatments", because they only make the experience more tolerable. (Notice most OTC flu drugs would only claim to be "Rapid Relief" or similar)

"Vaccine" is not a treatment, it is a preventative measure.

"Cure" is too strong of a word choice. Antibiotics are cures for bacterial infections. But

I think "treatment" is the correct word of choice here. waiting4myteeth 5 points · 7 hours ago

Would it be best to avoid OTC drugs that reduce fever because the fever is there to fight the infection? level 6 artgo 4 points · 6 hours ago

Some doctors have emphasized just that. But thee are limits. And it is important to monitor.

For example, this Doctor ( Dr. Natalie Azar) said 104, seek professional medical help: https://www.today.com/health/what-are-coronavirus-symptoms-t174824 level 6 PercyXLee 5 points · 6 hours ago

Low grade fever, yes. Over reactions from immune system can kill you too. But it could be complicated so if it the symptoms are severe you need to see a doctor.

[Mar 03, 2020] Fighting panic and fearmongering

Mar 03, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

likbez , March 3, 2020 4:34 pm

Fighting panic and fearmongering

1. The World Bank announced Tuesday afternoon that it would fund an initial $12 billion in financing to combat the Covid-19 outbreak that is threatening to plunge the global economy into recession

2. WHO: https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/02/1057991

"Does this virus have pandemic potential? Absolutely, it has. Are we there yet? From our assessment, not yet," Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told journalists in Geneva.

He explained that the decision to use the word 'pandemic' is based on an ongoing assessment of the geographical spread of the virus, the severity of disease it causes, and the impact on society.

" For the moment, we are not witnessing the uncontained global spread of this virus, and we are not witnessing large-scale severe disease or death ," he said, adding that what is occurring is coronavirus epidemics in different parts of the world, which are affecting countries differently.

3. US government: administration has shifted from a strategy of prevention to containment, recommending that labs test any suspect patients, even if connections to other patients are not clear.

the nation's public health labs could run up to 10,000 tests per day by the end of the week, according to figures provided by the Associated of Public Health Laboratories.

[Mar 03, 2020] Coronavirus Systems Fragility by Rod Dreher

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... I have been a physician now for almost 30 years. It has been a career spanning the very end of the "Marcus Welby" era, and then piece by piece the complete dismantling of the medical profession by the insurance companies and now "non-profit" corporations. When I was young, the leadership structure in the hospitals was completely and utterly controlled by three groups: the physicians, the nurses, and in the case of Catholic hospitals, the church and the nuns, or in non-Catholic hospitals, philanthropic community leaders. ..."
"... There were no four-star mahogany and marble lobbies. There were no 2 million dollar annual salaries for the hospital CEOs. There were no non-profit corporate boards extracting every bit of wealth from the patients to maintain multimillion dollar salaries for the board members and the middle managers. ..."
"... In further conversation, the doctor said that we should be thinking about a world in which a large number of health care workers can't come to work because they are in quarantine or sick with the virus. We are looking at this problem right now. ..."
Mar 02, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com
Here's a link to an unrolled Twitter thread by former USAID official Jeremy Konyndyk. It begins:

Later in the thread:

Read the whole thread. His basic point is that the US Government did not want to see data that would indicate community transmission, so it didn't look for that. What do you think? I'm especially interested in what medical professionals in this blog's readership have to say.

I received this e-mail from Wyoming Doc a couple of days ago, and have his permission to post it:

I have just learned of the first Coronavirus Death in the USA. It is now getting real.

I would point you to the following links -- I am seeing myself -- but to a greater degree hearing about rather concerning things happening in our hospitals across the country.
The first is this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iz0dQbGLbE

The second is this website I showed you the other day:

https://www.oftwominds.com/blog.html

I would start first with a little background. I have been a physician now for almost 30 years. It has been a career spanning the very end of the "Marcus Welby" era, and then piece by piece the complete dismantling of the medical profession by the insurance companies and now "non-profit" corporations. When I was young, the leadership structure in the hospitals was completely and utterly controlled by three groups: the physicians, the nurses, and in the case of Catholic hospitals, the church and the nuns, or in non-Catholic hospitals, philanthropic community leaders.

The focus at the time was mostly on taking care of the most patients the best that could be done in a compassionate way with the resources available. And believe it or not, in my opinion, the care that was given in that time was far superior than what is going on now. The leaders of the hospitals were community leaders, and so was the medical and the nursing staff. To put it succinctly: they cared about their neighbors. Many, many nights while on call I would see the nuns right along side the nurses and physicians working themselves to death to take care of sick patients. These hospitals were never in debt -- the resources and the donations coming in were used for the expenses going out. There were no four-star mahogany and marble lobbies. There were no 2 million dollar annual salaries for the hospital CEOs. There were no non-profit corporate boards extracting every bit of wealth from the patients to maintain multimillion dollar salaries for the board members and the middle managers.

When I was a young medical student, a very old professor taught a course in medical ethics. In one of his most pressing lectures, he discussed the fact that the goals and ideals of medicine and public health were a complete 180 degrees from the wants and desires of a free market. He added that every time combining public health/medicine and free markets had been tried in history it ended in tears -- usually bankrupting the society. It was his fervent desire that we not allow this to happen to the profession as we entered its ranks, and to keep an eye out for this at all times.

Well, as everyone knows by now, his worst fears have been realized. Many, probably not most, members of my profession -- especially the procedure-based specialists and surgeons -- in the past 10-15 years have completely lost sight of the public well-being. Their sights are now on lucre. The one desire for many of them has been how to make more money more quickly. They have been aided and abetted by the governing agencies and Boards of all the various medical specialties. These national leadership organizations have made all the activities of being a physician so onerous and the billing so difficult that the vast majority of physicians have no choice but to become employees of these mega-corporations. The physicians have made a deal to take a back seat to these "businessmen" to keep the cash coming. The leadership of our hospital systems are no longer physicians, nurses, nuns, and philanthropists. Nope –it is all MBA all the time. Even the physicians who are nominally in charge -- ie the ubiquitous Chief Medical Officers of the corporations -- do not get considered for the jobs unless they have an MBA after their name. And the credentialing of the leadership teams are just absolutely ridiculous. Look at the websites of your local hospital and its leadership. It is usual to see things like this: John Doe, MD MBA FACP PhD FACC. The non-MD credentialing is even more hilarious -- I have no idea what 95% of these abbreviations mean -- but they have to puff themselves up anyway. The hubris and the arrogance would be hilarious, but now the crisis is upon us.

About 10-15 years ago, the change began in earnest. One by one, the physicians in charge were replaced with MBA bureaucrats. The usual committee structure in the hospital -- "Pharmacy & Therapeutics", "Patient Care Committee" etc -- had their physicians, nurses and pharmacists replaced with bureaucrats. Some of these bureaucrats were MDs and RNs -- the paycheck was awesome -- and they turned their backs on their duties and their colleagues and patients on the ground to keep the cash coming. I even lived to see the day when one of my hospitals fired the MD and RN leadership of the Medical Ethics Committee and replaced them with an MBA.

Suddenly, the only ethical thing to do was whatever was needed to maximize cash flow. And any MD or RN who did not like it? Well, you're fired -- see you later. We began to completely corporatize medical care. Advertisements and billboards everywhere, customer service feedback surveys flowing in the mail, the list is endless. Public health concerns began to be confined strictly to things that would boost revenue: colonoscopies, mammograms, labs, vaccinations, bone density studies, etc. Things that have no revenue flow -- like mental health issues, opioid abuse, elder care -- well, who cares about that? Very soon, the hospitals began to merge into gigantic corporations and then they began to collude to control the health care costs in the community. Our health care systems in all our big cities are gigantic monopolies. This despite the fact that this kind of behaviour is illegal under federal statutes. And please note: this is why insurance costs are so enormously high in this country -- and getting higher every year. Obamacare did NOTHING to stop this; it actually in many ways has made it much easier to pull off.

Because of this situation and for many other reasons, I decided to make a change in my life a few years ago. I have now moved to a very small hospital in rural America. In my life now, the corporate board has now been replaced by a board elected by the taxpayers: they are truly leaders of the community and do everything in the spirit of what the people need and are counting on from their hospital. The hospital is led by an MD -- and there are administrators -- but they too are members of the community. There is an obvious care about the community and its needs. I have spoken to colleagues across the country this week -- some big hospitals have done nothing at all to prepare for the crisis. It is no surprise to me that people in all levels at my current hospital have gone to enormous lengths to make sure everyone here is ready to go. I feel like I have stepped back in time twenty years. It is a very good feeling.

In the big city, I had become very accustomed to going to important meetings in the hospitals -- all controlled by the business leadership now -- and no medical facts or issues being discussed at all. Anything medical is distilled down to number crunching, revenue cycles, and "profit centers." Never a word is said about medical facts, public health, impact on patients, or morality like it used to be -- at least most of the time. Anyone who voices dissent is ostracized, and finds themselves disinvited and even dismissed from employment.

So the Youtube video is old hat to me. The people in charge of these critical things in our world often look like Barbie and Ken. They are cool cucumbers. They know all about branding, deceptive advertising, maximizing revenue, hiding truths, sucking up. But when actually asked questions that are critical to the issue at hand -- they often know nothing. And because they know nothing, nothing gets done. I have seen it many times before and am sure I will see it again. I read commentary online that people were shocked by that DHS Chief's answers to questions. I am not shocked -- I am very accustomed to it. Please note: our entire corporate health care system at the local hospital level in the big cities is now under the control of people just like him. They are looking for every way they can to defuse this crisis with calming advertising, words, pleasantries, smiles, and soothing statements. I am sure that they are also looking for any way they can profit financially from it as well. All I can say is: Good Luck.

A case in point was the following interaction I was told about yesterday by an old student of mine who is now a fellow at a major medical center on the East Coast. I heard the same exact recollection of the story from someone else in the room.

This was a meeting with the upper administration of the hospital system and heads of departments and multiple physicians and nurses. It occurred between the CEO and a DOC who is older and near retirement and who is an infectious disease specialist. The discussion about the current crisis went something like this:

CEO: I am not sure that we need to be preparing like this – this is obviously overblown – and is really going to damage our budget projections. The HHS seems to think this is going to go away in the spring anyway.
DOC: Why in God's name would you want it to go away in the spring?
CEO: (chuckling) What the hell are you talking about? We all want this thing to go away as soon as possible.
DOC – Historically, when pandemics are spread by aerosol droplets, and are as infectious as this one seems to be, they may recede in the spring -- but then come back in the fall with horrific fury. Remember the last one -- the Spanish Flu? The first wave was nothing, but the second and third waves turned the planet into a funeral home.
CEO: Oh for God's sake – don't you get it? That will give us time to get a vaccine -- we will not need to worry about it in October.
DOC: A vaccine? you must be kidding. It is never a good idea to rush a vaccine. Remember the first polio vaccine was rushed to market. It did not work and actually harmed many children. Remember the swine flu vaccine in the 1970s? It was not properly tested. Very few died from the swine flu. Hundreds and thousands were maimed or killed by Guillain Barré Syndrome because of it. And I doubt that half of our population would be even willing to take it. You do not understand.

CEO: Oh I understand way more than you obviously do. There is already an antiviral -- we will have that as well.

DOC: Really? Again, not really fully tested. And have you looked at the cost? Even a conservative estimate at the dosing they are using it would be $5000 a day. What is that going to do to your budget projections when you have 100 people in here in the hospital on that drug? Do we even have enough in the country for a sudden mass need? I do not know.

And then CEO looked DOC in the eye and just moved on to something else.

And DOC found out later that he would no longer be welcome at any of these meetings.

Please know this: viruses are not Republicans, they are not Democrats. Viruses are not going to respond to advertising, sweet words, or revenue cycles. They are going to accomplish their mission, and that alone. There may be things we are able to do, but we will need all the medical wisdom in the world focusing on our country as a whole and our local communities. That is just not happening to the extent it should be. We are going to fight this one with business school principles.

I again pray all the time that this virus will burn out -- that it will stop, that it will not get worse. I pray that God will have mercy and allow this to be a close call. But I am afraid that we have let our society crumble in so many ways –not just medicine -- that it is going to take a punch in the face to get our attention. This coronavirus may very well be the brass knuckles.

A follow-up e-mail from him:

This has been one of the most harrowing weeks in my career. The patients are really wigged out. Multiple times this week, I have seen patients with a cough or fever -- and we cannot ID a pathogen. That has caused a constant boogeyman to be sitting on my shoulder: fear. I can see the fear in my staff's eyes, and then on Friday, a nurse suddenly after lunch developed a 101 fever and a bad cough -- again no pathogens. I have a feeling this is happening in many other places in this country.

We have no way to test these people. I can offer little if any hope. I am telling them to stay at home, and I can see the horror in their eyes. I am now at the same level of those physicians in Milano 700 years ago –

So when I get this kind of soul crushing fear in my life, I always call one of my elder family members. My parents and grandparents are all gone now. The only one left is my 92 year old Auntie Marina. She lived through hell in Greece during the Nazi occupation and immediately thereafter. She is an amazing woman. And this is what she said to me.

"My dear, I was there when your parents handed your life and everything you are over to God. I was right on the front row. He has been preparing you every day of your life since you were a baby for the duties that you must now perform. Be brave, and sturdy, and do everything in His name. He will surround you with courage -- and fear not, if he decides this is your time to go, you will be welcomed by all the saints and angels. But here in our house, we are going to be lifting you up in prayer, multiple times a day. And I am certain that your parents are looking down and are very very proud of you."

I am a member of my community and my church. I cannot leave my post -- and I would ask that you pray for me and my staff for the bravery to continue on. I know that is a lot of drama, but we are really having fear here on the front lines. I would ask that you keep all the health care workers in America in your prayers right now.

In further conversation, the doctor said that we should be thinking about a world in which a large number of health care workers can't come to work because they are in quarantine or sick with the virus. We are looking at this problem right now.

He also recommends that people follow the coronavirus Reddit, which he says is well-moderated, and a source of solid information: https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/

[Mar 03, 2020] Coronavirus hype vs reality

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... the official Chinese numbers as unreliable, with large error bars in unpredictable directions. Look to South Korea and Singapore for reliable data; both are actively and aggressively testing, and both are strong open information societies. ..."
Mar 03, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

It is possible that a known pharmaceutical called remdesivir inhibits the reproduction of the Covid-19 coronavirus. It inhibits (some) RNA dependendent RNA Polymerases -- the type of enzyme the virus uses to replicated its genome and express its genes. It is known that it is a potent inhibitor of the RNA dependendent RNA Polymerases used by the MERS coronavirus

update: here is a good site for Covid-19 data.


likbez , March 2, 2020 6:51 pm

> The risk of business as usual is a small chance of tens of millions of deaths, because drug shortages prevent effective control of the epidemic

Does not look this way. In China epidemic is almost over with mortality between 2 and 3%. Cases in other countries has mortality on 0.1% much like for a regular flu.

I think chances of infection of a billion people are non-existent. Trump might have a point that spring can help -- coronaroviruses worst period of spreading is winter (although there are exceptions)

As the virus is very similar (I think 80% of the genome) to chicken flu the creation of vaccine is possible. Israeli scientists claim that 'In a few weeks, we will have coronavirus vaccine'

https://www.jpost.com/HEALTH-SCIENCE/Israeli-scientists-In-three-weeks-we-will-have-coronavirus-vaccine-619101/

[BUT] after scientists sequenced the DNA of the novel coronavirus causing the current worldwide outbreak, the MIGAL researchers examined it and found that the poultry coronavirus has high genetic similarity to the human one, and that it uses the same infection mechanism, which increases the likelihood of achieving an effective human vaccine in a very short period of time, Katz said.

"All we need to do is adjust the system to the new sequence," he said. "We are in the middle of this process, and hopefully in a few weeks we will have the vaccine in our hands. Yes, in a few weeks, if it all works, we would have a vaccine to prevent coronavirus."[.]
Akunis said he has instructed his ministry's director-general to fast-track all approval processes with the goal of bringing the human vaccine to market as quickly as possible.

"Given the urgent global need for a human coronavirus vaccine, we are doing everything we can to accelerate development," MIGAL CEO David Zigdon said. The vaccine could "achieve safety approval in 90 days," he said.[.] (emphasis added)

I think the danger of the pandemic was exaggerated. In no way this is a new Spanish flu. Not even close.

Which means chances of tens million of more death are very exaggerated, highly unrealistic estimate.

Robert Waldmann , March 2, 2020 7:04 pm

There is no basis for the 0.1% death rate outside of China assertion. The ratio of deaths to cases is greater than that and many people are in serious or critical condition. The death rate is not statistically signficantly higher in China than in other countries. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Other countries have neither the public health competence nor the ruthlessness of China (I am thinking mostly of other developing countries but the USA does seem to have problems with testing kits).

A candidate vaccine will be available soon. It will not be proven safe and effective and then mass produced soon. The argument that it is better to consider costs and benefits and not stick to the rule that first second and third do no harm applies to vaccines much more than to remdesivir (known to be safe can be quickly tested for effectiveness).

All experts agree that a vaccine will be available in a year or two. They know that candidate vaccines will exist soon. They know that the problem is proving safety and effectiveness and then producing a lot. A vaccine could be available in much less than a year. It would be used well within a year if people listened to me. But they won't.

It probably won't be like the Spanish Flu, because of vigorous quarantine type counter measures. A vaccine will help, but could be too late for tens of millions. Remdesivir will probably work and this will be proven fairly soon. I will probably make a difference. It could make a larger difference.

Erik , March 2, 2020 8:02 pm

All commenters: please note that official numbers from China are almost certainly inaccurate, both in numerator and denominator.

The total number of cases diagnosed is limited by test kits, which have recently moved from 300 kits manufactured per day to 4000 kits/day. Which is still at least an order of magnitude lower than the number of known cases. And anecdotal data coming from Chinese physicians and health workers indicates both a higher patient population than official, and many deaths not attributed to Covid (an epidemic of "pneumonia" deaths in Wuhan preceding the announcement of Covid, for example). Much is being hidden – not from us, they don't care about us; they're hiding the information from their own people, which they do as a general policy on most subjects.

Which is all mostly to say, treat the official Chinese numbers as unreliable, with large error bars in unpredictable directions. Look to South Korea and Singapore for reliable data; both are actively and aggressively testing, and both are strong open information societies.

likbez , March 2, 2020 9:43 pm

> There is no basis for the 0.1% death rate outside of China assertion

Low mortality rate for COVID-19 is masked by high (15%) mortality rate of persons over 80.

For people younger then 40 it is a reasonable assertion as deaths concentrate on the age group starting from 50-59. Men are approx. twice more susceptible then women.

Case-Fatality Rates (CFR) China by Age as of 2/11/20
80+ 14.8%
70-79 8.0%
60-69 3.6%
50-59 1.3%
40-49 .4%
30-39 . 24% (18/7,600)
20-29 .19% (7/3,619)
10-19 .02% (1/549)
0-09 0 (0/416)

Per country currently the worst in 4.4% (Iran.) With 8,000-Plus deaths in US alone, flu is far more deadly than the coronavirus
See https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

The most cruel experiment was with the Diamond Princess cruise ship (close space, high level of contact between passengers, lack of qualified medical personnel and supplied, etc)

Six people died and 700 people were infected out of 3700. For all other the immune system managed to kill the virus. Which suggests susceptibility rate of around 20%. It suggests 0.2% mortality

Two Japanese passengers – an 87-year-old man and an 84-year-old woman – were the first to die from the disease on February 19.

In the USA out six deaths at least four have been among residents of a long-term care facility called Life Care Center, where more than 50 residents and staff members have shown symptoms of the virus.

Only 14% of cases are more severe then a regular flu:

Spectrum of disease (N = 44 415)
Mild: 81% (36 160 cases)
Severe: 14% (6168 cases)
Critical: 5% (2087 cases)

I believe your hypothetic case about the possibility of the pandemic with high mortality rate is without merit.

We do not need to contribute to the panic, which already started in the USA with population buying masks, isopropyl alcohol and hand sanitizers as if there no tomorrow (a friend told me that bottle of hand sanitizer on Amazon today in $60 or so ;-).

And masks are effective mostly for sick people (block spreading of infected aerosol from lungs) , mush less for healthy people as they do no follow proper decontamination procedures anyway.

BTW in China epidemics is already subsiding. Again only 14 percent of cases are severe (which means more serere than a regular flu):

The health ministry on Tuesday announced just 125 new cases of the virus detected over the past 24 hours, the lowest number since authorities began publishing nationwide figures on Jan. 21. Another 31 deaths were reported, all of them in the hardest-hit province of Hubei. The figures bring China's total number of cases to 80,151 with 2,943 deaths.

China's U.N. ambassador says the government believes that "victory" over the coronavirus won't be far behind the coming of spring.

[Mar 03, 2020] Characteristics of and Important Lessons From the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Outbreak in China

Mar 03, 2020 | jamanetwork.com

[Mar 03, 2020] Panic in the USA already started with the population buying masks, isopropyl alcohol and hand sanitizers as if there no tomorrow. Shelves are now empty.

Mar 03, 2020 | angrybearblog.com
  1. likbez , March 2, 2020 9:43 pm

    > There is no basis for the 0.1% death rate outside of China assertion

    Low mortality rate for COVID-19 is masked by high (15%) mortality rate of person over 80.

    For people younger then 40 it is a reasonable assertion as death concentrate on age group starting from 50-59. Men are approx. twice susceptible then women.

    Case-Fatality Rates (CFR) China by Age as of 2/11/20
    80+ 14.8%
    70-79 8.0%
    60-69 3.6%
    50-59 1.3%
    40-49 .4%
    30-39 . 24% (18/7,600)
    20-29 .19% (7/3,619)
    10-19 .02% (1/549)
    0-09 .0 (0/416)

    Per country currently the worst in 4.4% (Iran.) With 8,000-Plus Deaths in U.S. Alone, Flu Far More Deadly Than Coronavirus
    See https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

    The most cruel experiment with the Diamond Princess cruise ship (close space, high level of contact between passengers, lack of qualified medical personnel and supplied, etc)

    Six people died and 700 people were infected out of 3700. For all other the immune system managed to kill the virus. Which suggests susceptibility rate of around 20%.

    It suggest 0.2% mortality and the around 20% population are susceptible for the virus. For 80% the immune system proved to be strong enough to kill the virus.

    Two Japanese passengers – an 87-year-old man and an 84-year-old woman – were the first to die from the disease on February 19.

    In the USA out six deaths at least four have been among residents of a long-term care facility called Life Care Center, where more than 50 residents and staff members have shown symptoms of the virus.

    Only 14% of cases are more severe then a regular flu:

    Spectrum of disease (N = 44 415)
    Mild: 81% (36 160 cases)
    Severe: 14% (6168 cases)
    Critical: 5% (2087 cases)

    I believe you hypothetic about the possibility of the pandemic with high mortality rate is without merit.

    We do not need to contribute to the panic, which already started in the USA with population buying masks, isopropyl alcohol and hand sanitizers as if there no tomorrow (a friend told me that bottle of hand sanitizer on Amazon today in $60 or so ;-).

    And masks are effective mostly for sick people (block spreading of infected aerosol from lungs) , mush less for healthy people as they do no follow proper decontamination procedures anyway.

    BTW in China epidemics is already subsiding:

    The health ministry on Tuesday announced just 125 new cases of the virus detected over the past 24 hours, the lowest number since authorities began publishing nationwide figures on Jan. 21. Another 31 deaths were reported, all of them in the hardest-hit province of Hubei. The figures bring China's total number of cases to 80,151 with 2,943 deaths.

    China's U.N. ambassador says the government believes that "victory" over the coronavirus won't be far behind the coming of spring.

[Mar 03, 2020] U.S. Surgeon General asks people not to buy masks

Mar 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Peter AU1 , Mar 2 2020 9:31 utc | 77

I thought the twitter name was just some joker but it turns out to be genuine.

U.S. Surgeon General
@Surgeon_General
Feb 29
Seriously people- STOP BUYING MASKS!
They are NOT effective in preventing general public from catching #Coronavirus, but if healthcare providers can't get them to care for sick patients, it puts them and our communities at risk!

https://twitter.com/Surgeon_General/status/1233725785283932160

vk , Mar 2 2020 11:35 utc | 78

Two US deaths reported amid signs coronavirus has been spreading unchecked for several weeks

Where was the free press? Where were the whistleblowers?

I remember the narrative was that countries with "freedom of speech" would have an immediate response to the outbreak of the virus, therefore being much more efficient than China in containing the epidemic...

... meanwhile, cases in Italy have skyrocketed by 50% in one day.


China's ruling elite stumbles into a 'disaster'

Source: an exiled activist called Wu'er Kaixi. I thought the era of making shit up from refugee stories was over with the end of the Cold War. Looks like I was wrong.

Medical staff suffers extreme fatigue as outbreak continues

Not seeing memes on the internet or other dramatic stories about the poor doctors in South Korea suffering under the heavy hand of the State.

--//--

Joke of the week: Europe (and yes, that includes Britain) can still be a superpower The sub is even funnier: "The key to European power projection isn't institutional reform, it's a shift in attitude and a willingness to cooperate"

Translation: we'll go with neoliberalism till the end.

Walter , Mar 2 2020 12:50 utc | 80
A User | Mar 2 2020 4:20 utc | 68 (alcohol/hand)

Astonished they've made iso hard to get in Kiwi. I see that your indigenous kitchen chemists making smack can make all the iso the might wish from acetone. Copper and chromium oxide catalyst & hydrogenation...

Wiki says 75% ethanol/25% water or 75/25 iso are equivalent as hand-sanitizers... But 75% ethyl alcohol is roughly 150 proof - Such concentration of ethyl alcohol are often sold for drinking...but dangerous (overdose) and expensive. Iso is a neurotoxin, ethyl less toxic.

I'd use the vodka approach...or wear gloves (which I do! (and not because of CV - it's an old habit))

[Mar 03, 2020] Here's a video made by a Russian, but dubbed into English, which films what's actually going on in China

Mar 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

c1ue , Mar 2 2020 18:17 utc | 100

Here's a video made by a Russian, but dubbed into English, which films what's actually going on in China - multiple locations including in Hubei province actual China footage under nCOV

[Mar 03, 2020] How differing societies are reacting to Coronavirus epidemic

Mar 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

karlof1 , Mar 2 2020 19:06 utc | 105

Global Times has published two editorials dealing with the COVID-19 issue. This one looks at how differing societies are reacting:

"South Korea, Japan, and European countries have suffered fewer losses in economic activities than most parts of China, although they are facing a higher risk from the epidemic than in the Chinese mainland, except for Hubei.

"It is uncertain whether their approach of 'as much prevention as available' will ultimately lead to a serious humanitarian crisis or help them become resilient to the epidemic. Much will depend on the mortality rate of COVID-19."

The second looks at the Outlaw US Empire's extreme wealth disparity and lack of insurance for millions in how it will react:

"Some Americans like to compare the US system with those of other countries. These people tend to describe how other systems are inferior to theirs, as if the US system is the standard in the world. But what really tests a country's system? It is whether the government has the ability to let all people receive equal and timely assistance.

"Due to the expensive healthcare system in the US, many people cannot afford even to pay for a test for COVID-19, not to mention the cost of treatment after diagnosis."

The initial gloating within the Outlaw US Empire at China's predicament will soon be replaced by outrage. The CDC continues to issue contradictory statements, particularly about masks and their effectiveness. Current pictures from China show Xi and his aides all wearing masks. From a WHO official: "I'm not saying you shouldn't wear masks – you should, but there's no guarantee." The reason there's no guarantee is the virus can enter through the eyes and ears which masks don't cover. Within the Outlaw Empire, the problem as admitted is there's only 10% of the needed amount of masks, so officials are lying about effectiveness to deter people from buying.

IMO, China's method of reaction shows it took the correct measures to protect the vast majority of its populace. No other nation will do as well because they lack China's system.

karlof1 , Mar 2 2020 19:48 utc | 106

Good concise report about COVID-19 and its affects on public health policy in this election year and how it's very likely to cause a vitally needed change in direction. Sanders's statement on the matter is primarily why Trump is downplaying the extent of the rising crisis:

"The coronavirus reminds us that we are all in this together. We cannot allow Americans to skip doctor's visits over outrageous bills.

"Everyone should get the medical care they need without opening their wallet -- as a matter of justice and public health."

This article discusses how Trump's used the outbreak as a political tool and worse. Apparently, the WaPost's attacks were effective, but could only be so due to Trump's behavior and willful distortions.

[Mar 03, 2020] How Markets And The Media Have Overhyped Coronavirus by Josh Owens

Feb 29, 2020 | oilprice.com
In my last article, Are Oil Markets Overreacting To The Coronavirus? , I warned of the power of media hype when it comes to epidemics. The human brain has a tendency to mix up the severity of an outcome with how likely that thing is to happen. Just like our fear of terrorism or shark attacks , when it comes to epidemics we are incredibly poor judges of how much of a danger they really pose.

Our intensely interconnected societies and sensationalist media mean that this failure of judgment can translate into mass hysteria and fear in the markets that can have a tangible impact on the world economy. Oil prices have collapsed, stock markets have fallen by the largest amount since the 2008 financial crisis and the Dow Jones saw its largest single-day points drop in history. All of this has come from the spread of the coronavirus from China to South Korea, Italy, Iran, and Japan. But as this spread continues there is one key factor that market observers appear to be missing, highlighted by the below chart.

This is an epidemic curve showing the number of new cases per day in China (the world's second-largest economy and the world's largest importer of goods). It appears that China is in the process of successfully containing the coronavirus and, for that reason, has already begun to reboot its economy.

The large jump in the middle of the above graph was caused by China changing its recording method from positive test cases to clinical diagnosis. The trend can perhaps be seen more clearly in the Guangdong outbreak in the curve below.

You can follow more epidemic curves updated regularly on Hong Kong's Centre for Health Protection , including the more recent and smaller outbreaks beyond China's borders. All of the Chinese data suggests that the epidemic is coming under control there.

Here is a graph of containership congestion levels in the Outer Pearl River Delta:

China is getting back to work. And you can be sure that the Chinese government will be doing everything in its power to stimulate growth. Related: Coronavirus Meltdown Continues As Brent Drops Below $50

Here are some other key indicators that show the same thing:

But these are generally not the statistics or the graphs reported by the media. Instead, they report cumulative data and crude numbers out of context.

These cumulative graphs suggest that coronavirus deaths and cases are increasing and therefore the epidemic is getting worse. Of course, in a cumulative graph, the cases will only ever go up or plateau.


John Hopkins CSSE

This graph, which is far more relevant, shows a general downward trend in global new confirmed cases per day and an increase in new recovered cases. This data would suggest that containing the coronavirus is very much a possibility and if governments continue to follow good practice the new outbreaks can be controlled without impacting the economy too severely.

In fact, the largest threat to the markets at the moment is not an epidemic of disease but an epidemic of hysteria. Governments and medical institutions are reacting, as they should, to prevent a worst-case scenario. But for societies and markets to react in the same way is neither logical nor healthy.

For example, the WHO recently upgraded the global risk of the coronavirus outbreak to 'very high', a fact that spread across media outlets like wildfire. At the same time, the head of the WHO stressed that the biggest challenges to overcome were fear and misinformation. It is this fear and misinformation that is driving a huge portion of the negative sentiment in global markets.

Another way that media spreads this fear is by reporting the number of deaths and cases without context. Take the numbers below.

Yet, when compared to the global annual mortality of other diseases, the number of total deaths is relatively insignificant.

Measles: 140,000 deaths

Influenza: 650,000 deaths

Tuberculosis: 1.5 million deaths

Infectious gastroenteritis: 1.8 million deaths

Imagine a world in which every death from the flu was reported on the front page of every media outlet. You might be surprised, for example, to find out that in the U.S. 105 children have died from the flu so far in 2020 - the second-highest number of deaths at this time of year since records began in 2004.

Another piece of relevant data that is frequently excluded from articles about the coronavirus is the age and health of coronavirus victims. With the death rate for an infected individual aged 50 or lower under 1% and the death rate of an infected individual without a pre-existing condition also below 1%. Related: Saudi Arabia Aims For Additional Cuts As Oil Plunges Below $50

A vital point to understand when it comes to public health measures designed to contain an epidemic is that it is always a trade-off between the deaths caused by the epidemic and the deaths caused by economic stagnation. Poverty is the single largest determinant of health , and economic growth is the single most powerful instrument for reducing poverty . This is not a zero-sum game and it will be a calculation that the Chinese government must make as its population returns to work.

It is possible that stock markets were in a bubble at the start of 2019 and the coronavirus was the black swan event necessary to bring it all crashing down to earth. As for oil markets, there is plenty of bearish news at the moment, with an oil supply glut, Russia angling to leave the OPEC+ deal and Libyan oil production poised to come back online . Chinese demand has undoubtedly fallen in Q1 and everything from refinery runs to imports have been hit extremely hard. An oil price crash was entirely justified then. But the data doesn't suggest that the coronavirus is escalating. The data suggest China has already started coming back online. The question is, when will that data begin to show in the markets?

By Josh Owens for Oilprice.com

[Mar 02, 2020] That is also a great mixture to spray on bed to refresh but mainly to slaughter dust mites

Mar 02, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

uncle tungsten , Mar 2 2020 7:40 utc | 75

A User #68
Of course hand sanitizer isn't essential but if more people make their own it could prevent the inevitable price jump that will accompany its return to supermarket shelves.

Add a few drops of tea tree oil and eucalyptus oil, maybe one drop or two of thyme oil. Not excess on the thyme. That is also a great mixture to spray on bed to refresh but mainly to slaughter dust mites. I mop the floors with that sort of mix and its great.

[Mar 02, 2020] The coronavirus epidemic is almost defeated in China. There were only 13 new cases diagnosed yesterday outside city of Wuhan. Most of these people have likely been infected over two weeks ago.

Mar 02, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Petri Krohn , Mar 2 2020 5:46 utc | 71

CHINA IS SAFE - WORLD FACES PANDEMIC!

The coronavirus epidemic is almost defeated in China. There were only 13 new cases diagnosed yesterday outside city of Wuhan. Most of these people have likely been infected over two weeks ago. The epicenter, Wuhan still under quarantine had only 196 new cases, less than half as many as the day before.

The number of cases outside still China follows an exponential trend. Italy had 585 new cases, twice as many as yesterday. Thousands more have been exposed and infected but are not yet showing symptoms. Three people in Finland are ill and 130 under quarantine after one tourist brings the virus from northern Italy.

The United States has 8 new cases for a total of 77. The American health care system is totally unsuited and incapable in dealing with an outbreak if the virus ever succeeds in entering the US population in general.

The previous post on Moon of Alabama sums up what is needed:

Tests must be freely available for anyone with even slight symptoms. Those who test positive must be isolated. There must be teams to trace and alarm all their contacts. All costs for COVID-19 cases, including money to pay people during for quarantine, must be paid by the government.

Services must be set up for deliveries to people who quarantine themselves at home. Each new cluster must receive an immediate response on a large scale. Health staff needs to get extra pay.


[Mar 02, 2020] Virus spreads to 60 countries. Tourism industry looking at a heavy blow. The first case was registered on Dominican republic

Mar 02, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Likklemore , Mar 1 2020 20:09 utc | 22

Virus spreads to 60 countries. Italy hard hit. Tourism industry looking at a heavy blow.

AP: Dominican Republic records its first; an Italian man had arrived Feb 22 without showing signs of symptoms. Cruise ship denied docking.

[Mar 02, 2020] WHO says coronavirus danger is "very high" by Benjamin Mateus

Time is working against the virus as spring is coming. Due to measures already taken the spread of the virus is slow and the number of death are minuscule and comparable with a regular flu epidemics: On Friday, Iran had 388 cases (+143 from the day before) with only 34 deaths (+8); Italy had 889 (+234) with only 21 deaths (+4); South Korea had 2,337 (+571) with only 16 deaths (+3).
Feb 29, 2020 | www.wsws.org

The World Health Organization (WHO) has upgraded its assessment of the danger posed by the coronavirus to "very high," stopping short of calling the outbreak a pandemic. Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a recent press conference, "For the moment, we are not witnessing the uncontained global spread of this virus, and we are not witnessing large-scale severe death or disease."

The coronavirus has now been documented in at least 56 countries.

... ... ...

A declaration of a pandemic would trigger emergency-grade response plans at local and state levels. These measures would include school closures, the use of essential personnel only, the use of telecommunications for the conduct of business, the closure of public events – sporting events, conferences, political rallies and conventions – and the possible use of massive quarantine measures, to include the deployment of military or police forces to enforce regulations. These measures have been employed by many nations that are essentially preparing for massive outbreaks in their communities.

The last time the WHO declared a pandemic was in 2009 when the H1N1 flu, better known as the swine flu, infected over 1 billion people on the globe and killed over half a million people. The WHO was severely criticized for its declaration of a pandemic and handling of the crisis. It was cited for the needlessly complex definition of a pandemic, potential conflict of interest with the vaccine industries, and responding with lack of resolve after declaring the pandemic.

According to the New York Times , "Countries that needed technical help could not obtain it in enough languages, and the WHO bureaucracy created an unmanageable number of documents."

During a 2011 review of the pandemic, the WHO noted in its draft that the "core national and local capacities called for in the International Health Regulation (IHR) are not yet fully operational and are not now on a path to timely implementation worldwide." Essentially, the WHO lacks enforceable sanctions. In other words, it cannot make countries subscribe to its recommendations.

In its summary conclusion 3, the WHO wrote that the world is "ill-prepared to respond to a severe influenza pandemic or any similarly global, sustained and threatening public health emergency." It continued: "Beyond the implementation of core public health capacities called for in the IHR, global preparedness can be advanced through research, strengthened health care delivery systems, economic development in low- and middle-income countries and improved health status."

There are presently 84,175 cases of Covid-19, with 2,876 deaths so far. The number of people who have recovered from the disease is 36,884.

The three countries posing serious acceleration in cases - Iran, Italy and South Korea – reported more than 3,500 infections on Friday, doubling in two days. On Friday, Iran had 388 cases (+143 from the day before) with 34 deaths (+8); Italy had 889 (+234) with 21 deaths (+4); South Korea had 2,337 (+571) with 16 deaths (+3).

[Mar 02, 2020] COVID-19, even if it could somehow remain in body and be infectious, is not fatal except to 0.2-2% of people. In fact outside China and Iran it seems to be no more than 0.1% fatal, same as flu

Mar 02, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Pft , Mar 1 2020 23:22 utc | 40

Don Willis@39

COVID-19 is not a new virus. Its a new strain of an old virus. Corona virus is an old virus. It does not stay within the body like some viruses do.

For example, chicken pox virus is not cleared from the body but lies dormant, but when reactivated it causes shingles which is not very infectious. HIV stays infectious and supposedly fatal without treatment. COVID-19, even if it could somehow remain in body and be infectious , is not fatal except to 0.2-2% of people. In fact outside China and Iran it seems to be no more than 0.1% fatal, same as flu.

So in such a case, if everyone eventually harbors COVID -19, and there is no evidence for this, there is nobody left to infect, we will all be carriers, natural selection will ensure the human race will live comfortably with this virus as it does with many other viruses, becoming harmful only when the immune system fails.

Now COVID-19 might be able to reinfect people, like the flu. However, unless its like Dengue, subsequent reinfections would be milder except in a few people susceptible to immune enhancement where an overwhelming immune response due to previous sensitization might cause complications. This could explain the higher fatality rates in China and Iran which were previously exposed to SARS and MERS.

Likklemore , Mar 1 2020 23:58 utc | 43

@ Willis 39

You hug that thought on a few "rare cases." I could present a few dozens links on peer reviewed published papers and audio on the advances made in Immunobiology and immunotherapy to include cancer as well.

Taking up the discussion on COVID-19. It may interest you that researchers in Israel say they have developed a vaccine, anticipating it will be available in 90 days. Look at their findings!

Israeli scientists: 'In a few weeks, we will have coronavirus vaccine'

LINK

[BUT] after scientists sequenced the DNA of the novel coronavirus causing the current worldwide outbreak, the MIGAL researchers examined it and found that the poultry coronavirus has high genetic similarity to the human one, and that it uses the same infection mechanism, which increases the likelihood of achieving an effective human vaccine in a very short period of time, Katz said.

"All we need to do is adjust the system to the new sequence," he said. "We are in the middle of this process, and hopefully in a few weeks we will have the vaccine in our hands. Yes, in a few weeks, if it all works, we would have a vaccine to prevent coronavirus."[.]

Akunis said he has instructed his ministry's director-general to fast-track all approval processes with the goal of bringing the human vaccine to market as quickly as possible.

"Given the urgent global need for a human coronavirus vaccine, we are doing everything we can to accelerate development," MIGAL CEO David Zigdon said. The vaccine could "achieve safety approval in 90 days," he said.[.] (emphasis added)

20 global centres are rushing to develop an effective vaccine for COVID-19

[Feb 29, 2020] Blowing the Whistle on the Administration s Coronavirus Incompetence by Daniel Larison

Notable quotes:
"... The federal government's response to the coronavirus has been woefully lacking from the start. Between the president's own attempts to The federal government's response to the coronavirus has been woefully lacking from the start. Between the president's own attempts to dismiss the severity of the situation and the CDC's inexplicable delays in testing patients, it is clear that the relevant authorities are not taking this outbreak as seriously as they should be. ..."
"... The administration seems to be more concerned with the damage that the virus could do to the president's political fortunes than they are with halting its spread and providing the necessary resources to treat those infected by it. ..."
"... The account surfaced after President Trump sought to play down the danger of a domestic coronavirus outbreak amid bipartisan concern about a sluggish and disjointed response by the administration to an illness that public health officials have said is likely to spread through the United States. The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air Force Base this week. The account surfaced after President Trump sought to play down the danger of a domestic coronavirus outbreak amid bipartisan concern about a sluggish and disjointed response by the administration to an illness that public health officials have said is likely to spread through the United States. The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air Force Base this week. ..."
Feb 27, 2020 | theamericanconservative.com

The New York Times reports on the contents of a whistle-blower complaint in the Department of Health and Human Services that describes the government's incompetent handling of the quarantining of Americans exposed overseas to the coronavirus. This incompetence appears to have led to the spread of the virus into the general population:

Federal health employees interacted with Americans quarantined for possible exposure to the coronavirus without proper medical training or protective gear, then scattered into the general population, according to a government whistle-blower.

In a portion of a complaint filing obtained by The New York Times that has been submitted to the Office of the Special Counsel, the whistle-blower, described as a senior leader at the health agency, said the team was “improperly deployed” to two military bases in California to assist the processing of Americans who had been evacuated from coronavirus hot zones in China and elsewhere.

The staff members were sent to Travis Air Force Base and March Air Reserve Base and were ordered to enter quarantined areas, including a hangar where coronavirus evacuees were being received. They were not provided training in safety protocols until five days later, the person said.

Without proper training or equipment, some of the exposed staff members moved freely around and off the bases, with at least one person staying in a nearby hotel and leaving California on a commercial flight. Many were unaware of the need to test their temperature three times a day.

The federal government's response to the coronavirus has been woefully lacking from the start. Between the president's own attempts to The federal government's response to the coronavirus has been woefully lacking from the start. Between the president's own attempts to dismiss the severity of the situation and the CDC's inexplicable delays in testing patients, it is clear that the relevant authorities are not taking this outbreak as seriously as they should be.

The administration seems to be more concerned with the damage that the virus could do to the president's political fortunes than they are with halting its spread and providing the necessary resources to treat those infected by it. The exposure of federal health workers occurred in the same part of California where the first domestic case of coronavirus recently appeared: The exposure of federal health workers occurred in the same part of California where the first domestic case of coronavirus recently appeared:

The account surfaced after President Trump sought to play down the danger of a domestic coronavirus outbreak amid bipartisan concern about a sluggish and disjointed response by the administration to an illness that public health officials have said is likely to spread through the United States. The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air Force Base this week. The account surfaced after President Trump sought to play down the danger of a domestic coronavirus outbreak amid bipartisan concern about a sluggish and disjointed response by the administration to an illness that public health officials have said is likely to spread through the United States. The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air Force Base this week.
The article details the inadequacy of the preparation and training provided to the staff that received the evacuees: The article details the inadequacy of the preparation and training provided to the staff that received the evacuees:
The staff members, who had some experience with emergency management coordination, were woefully underprepared for the mission they were given, according to the whistle-blower. "They were not properly trained or equipped to operate in a public health emergency situation," the official wrote. "They were potentially exposed to coronavirus; appropriate measures were not taken to protect the staff from potential infection; and appropriate steps were not taken to quarantine, monitor or test them during their deployment and upon their return home." The staff members, who had some experience with emergency management coordination, were woefully underprepared for the mission they were given, according to the whistle-blower. "They were not properly trained or equipped to operate in a public health emergency situation," the official wrote. "They were potentially exposed to coronavirus; appropriate measures were not taken to protect the staff from potential infection; and appropriate steps were not taken to quarantine, monitor or test them during their deployment and upon their return home." "They were not properly trained or equipped to operate in a public health emergency situation," the official wrote. "They were potentially exposed to coronavirus; appropriate measures were not taken to protect the staff from potential infection; and appropriate steps were not taken to quarantine, monitor or test them during their deployment and upon their return home." "They were not properly trained or equipped to operate in a public health emergency situation," the official wrote. "They were potentially exposed to coronavirus; appropriate measures were not taken to protect the staff from potential infection; and appropriate steps were not taken to quarantine, monitor or test them during their deployment and upon their return home."

It appears that the administration's shoddy handling of the situation has already put the public at greater risk of exposure unnecessarily, and this episode hardly inspires confidence that they will be able to manage a larger outbreak here in the U.S. It appears that the administration's shoddy handling of the situation has already put the public at greater risk of exposure unnecessarily, and this episode hardly inspires confidence that they will be able to manage a larger outbreak here in the U.S.

[Feb 29, 2020] The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air Force Base this week.

Feb 29, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

polistra24 2 days ago
Nonsense. They started managing it early. A couple weeks ago they took US passengers off the infected cruise ship and flew them in tight security to isolation facilities in various places. One of those facilities is at a hospital here in Spokane, and they've been training and waiting for four years. This is the first use of the facility. I'd call that preparation.
Awake and Uttering a Song polistra24 2 days ago • edited
Any response to this (other than "nonsense"):

"The staff members were sent to Travis Air Force Base and March Air Reserve Base and were ordered to enter quarantined areas, including a hangar where coronavirus evacuees were being received. They were not provided training in safety protocols until five days later..."

"Without proper training or equipment, some of the exposed staff members moved freely around and off the bases, with at least one person staying in a nearby hotel and leaving California on a commercial flight. Many were unaware of the need to test their temperature three times a day."

"The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air Force Base this week."

SFBay1949 2 days ago
This country is so scr*wed. Trump and his band of completely incompetent people will lead to thousands infected and hundreds dead. I think the only upside is that this debacle will end with the removal of Trump from office. How can any thinking person let this happen?
Bob K. SFBay1949 16 hours ago
Indeed! Any thinking person should be wondering why Trump has not cancelled the Democratic Primaries!
marku52 2 days ago
Yeah well, the merry band of Trump Grifters and Cronies can easily turn a disaster into a catastrophe. The latest info shows that the people charged with quarantining the infected people from the cruise ship in No Cal were under trained and did not have protective equipment. Now there is an infected case from that same county that is not traced to China travel. Workers who complained were told "they weren't good team players".

And I am not smiling as I write this.

Taras77 2 days ago
Competence in any phase of governing seems to be non-existent in this admin-it is tragic that it is so obvious in this disaster.
Awake and Uttering a Song fuow 2 days ago • edited
The refusal by some Trump followers to even acknowledge the ineptness and incompetence (see below), is Jim-Jones-level (Jonestown) cult behavior. A real moral/spiritual sickness with self-deception at its core.

---------

"The staff members were sent to Travis Air Force Base and March Air Reserve Base and were ordered to enter quarantined areas, including a hangar where coronavirus evacuees were being received. They were not provided training in safety protocols until five days later..."

"Without proper training or equipment, some of the exposed
staff members moved freely around and off the bases, with at least one person staying in a nearby hotel and leaving California on a commercial flight. Many were unaware of the need to test their temperature three times a day."

"The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air Force Base this week."

Awake and Uttering a Song Mighty Whig 2 days ago
Heckuva job, Trumpie.

"The staff members were sent to Travis Air Force Base and March Air
Reserve Base and were ordered to enter quarantined areas, including a
hangar where coronavirus evacuees were being received. They were not
provided training in safety protocols until five days later..."

"Without proper training or equipment, some of the exposed
staff members moved freely around and off the bases, with at least one
person staying in a nearby hotel and leaving California on a commercial
flight. Many were unaware of the need to test their temperature three
times a day."

"The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact
with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged near Travis Air
Force Base this week."

gnt Mighty Whig a day ago
In fact, other Trump policies will probably contribute to the spread. What happens when illegal immigrants start catching the virus? In general, they are trying to avoid all contact with the government, and cannot afford to pay for health care, so they are not likely to seek early treatment. Many of them have jobs that involve handling food or cleaning living spaces.

I'm not advocating that we ignore illegal immigration, but I think there are situations in which it makes sense to turn a judicious blind eye to the problem. I don't think this administration is capable of that kind of nuance.

Mighty Whig gnt a day ago
Interesting, but we are not even close to that. Still only 60 US cases. They might actually be better conditioned to avoiding the virus, at least in those industries.
Bob K. Mighty Whig 16 hours ago
Agree. And by all means stay away from places like the upcoming Democratic Primaries and Caucuses where the risk of catching it can be very high! The Democratic leadership refuses to cancel them.
Dodo 2 days ago
US government's response is no better than China.

Despite a female chief doctor has reported this disease on Dec. 26 last year as a unknown contagious pneumonia, Chinese officials didn't treat it seriously other than did routine such as notified UN on Jan. 7 this year.

Only until patients with high fever crowded hospitals' emergency room, then, they realized this is a big issue.

Hopefully, we won't that happen in US but it is possible.

Government needs to stock necessary medical suppliers, need to select hospitals to treat this highly contagious diseases, need ... many things but it seems that they only prepare to brag that through their efforts, this disease doesn't spread.

bumbershoot 2 days ago
I agree with 2014-era Donald Trump. We need an expert with "experience in infectious disease control" in charge of pandemic response.

Yet instead we get the former governor of Indiana.

DJT, 10/17/2014: "Obama just appointed an Ebola Czar with zero experience in the medical area and zero experience in infectious disease control. A TOTAL JOKE!"

Jeffrey Samuels 2 days ago
So I understand that Trump has appointed Mr. Pence and two highly placed FINANCIAL ADVISORS to manage our national response. His priorities could not be more blatant .Why is it that our Republican legislators are not beating him over the head with this obvious mismanagement of a potential medical crisis, and allow him to focus on the financial ramifications (and associated impacts on his reelection campaign)?
Awake and Uttering a Song Jeffrey Samuels 2 days ago
"Why is it that our Republican legislators are not beating him over the
head with this obvious mismanagement of a potential medical crisis, and
allow him to focus on the financial ramifications (and associated
impacts on his reelection campaign)?"

Hey, a pile of Coronavirus corpses is just par for the course in MAGA-land.

Bob K. Awake and Uttering a Song 16 hours ago
Just pile them up with the ones who got the virus while attending the Democratic primaries!
credibility 2 days ago
Trump's constant lying, his focus on appearances instead of reality, his rewarding loyalty over competence, expertise, and integrity, all of it has hindered the government response to this crisis. If we avoid the worst, we'll owe thanks to God, certainly not to Trump and his bunch of liars and incompetents. My 2016 vote for Trump was the worst one I ever cast.
TheSnark 2 days ago
Trump's been very lucky so far, there have been no crises other than those he created himself. Now we have a real one, and his government's initial response has been muddled at best.

Appointing Pence is just a way to deflect the blame. Whether Pence can handle the job or not doesn't matter anyway...Trump will be constantly sticking his nose and Twitter thumbs into the process and making it impossible for anyone to do the job, even if they were competent.

Old Man Shadow a day ago
If this lasts until November and his polling numbers aren't looking great, a part of me wonders if he'll 'postpone' the elections out of 'public health' concerns.

But the rest of me tells me that I'm skirting a little too close to the Q crazy line by thinking about that.

Name a day ago
Incompetence is not a bug of the Trump administration. It is a feature. The Government is the problem, so declared Saint Ronald, and the Donald is the guy who will finally bring it to its knees, just in time for a pandemic. Who knew that a moron could not be trusted with the office of POTUS. I did not see this coming
Dodo 8 hours ago
Bottom line - neither the administration nor Democratic Party response the coronavirus issue as a public health issue. They all want to score in their political ambitions:

1. At the epidemic lost control in China, the administration is busy to use it to contain China and hope to achieve de-coupling and de facto economic blockage - travel ban announced

2. As the epidemic reaches US and stock market tumbles - both sides want their ^&#%$@

Very few politicians care:

1. Do we have a strategy to handle the epidemic if it spread out in US?

2. Do we have enough hospital beds to handle this?

3. Have we designated hospitals to treat this highly contagious diseases (not to mingle with other patients)

4. Do we have enough supplies to handle an e[odemic

Of course, there are more to be considered.

Meanwhile, politicians and their supporters DESERVE bad outcomes from their political operations.

[Feb 29, 2020] Chinese government reported that larger factories reached 85.6% of their capacity by the middle of last week.

Feb 29, 2020 | www.theguardian.com

World stock markets are expected to fall further next week after the first surveys of China's economic health since the coronavirus outbreak showed factory output has plunged and the country's service sectors have contracted.

.. ...

Investors expect to find out in the next few days whether the outbreak is accelerating in the US, the world's biggest economy, and how far central banks and governments are prepared to go to deal with an epidemic.

"Right now the market is saying that this is unbounded. We don't know what the limits are and we don't know where it's going to peak," said Graham Tanaka, the chief investment officer at New York-based Tanaka Capital.

... ... ...

Last weekend China's president, Xi Jinping, told local officials that low-risk areas should "resume full production and normal life". The government reported that larger factories reached 85.6% of their capacity by the middle of last week.

Analysts at ING said: "This isn't as positive as it sounds. Even if China's factory production can recover in March, it will still face the risk of a low level of export orders. This is because the supply chain will continue to be broken, this time in South Korea, Japan, Europe, and the US, where Covid-19 has begun to spread."

Unofficial reports show that factories outside Hubei province, where the virus started, could be working at no more than 75% of their capacity and many nearer 25% to 50% while millions of workers remain trapped in their home province, unable to travel back to their place of work.

Hundreds of corporate events have been cancelled or postponed in recent days in response to calls for a clampdown on large gatherings

[Feb 29, 2020] Covid-19 is probably 3 times more contagios that a "regular" flu

Feb 29, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Sackerson , Feb 29 2020 19:47 utc | 2

...focus on precautions, preparations and resources for the elderly and those with certain chronic health conditions.
https://theylaughedatnoah.blogspot.com/2020/02/covid-19-keep-calm-and-make-plan.html

Krollchem , Feb 29 2020 19:57 utc | 4

Tulsi Gabbard on why politics as usual must be discarded in order to prevent a public health crisis:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sj_tMTmZn-U&t=95s
Ilya Grushevskiy , Feb 29 2020 20:33 utc | 17
@14

The risk is limited - this kills the old and infirm.

MOA was accurate in all the panic - China controlled its initial outbreak (although a re-entry is not unlikely imo). That the rest of the world didn't react fast enough, is expected though, but saying that before it was a thing would have been unnecessarily scare-mongering I'd say.

Jackrabbit , Feb 29 2020 22:26 utc | 42
Normal flu has R0 of about 1.3

Los Alamos Labs calculates Covid-19 R0 at between 4.7 to 6.6.

Bottomline: Covid-19 is much easier to spread / quick to spread.

!!

CJ , Feb 29 2020 22:15 utc | 38
Hi B,
looks like the guys at New England Biolabs have a very rapid assay for COVID-19 --- Rapid Molecular Detection of SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) Virus RNA Using Colorimetric LAMP

Yinhua Zhang, Nelson Odiwuor, Jin Xiong, Luo Sun, Raphael Ohuru Nyaruaba, Hongping Wei, Nathan A Tanner

Its a preprint -- but this is the way to go an isothermal loop mediated amplification (LAMP) assay. You ought to be able to get a result in about 30 minutes -- faster once they really automate it. Should cost virtually nothing a few cents.

Other versions of it might be adapted so you can use them in the field so a general practitioner or even a soldier will be able to make the diagnosis at the bed side-- its a simple color change in a tube. All you need is a pipette the assay tube a hot block and a timer. True positive rate 99.99% false positive about 1% or less. This what the CDC needs. Problem is that they have to mass produce the assay tubes -- we need 100 million like yesterday. The other thing is that we might need martial law to quarantine people and we need to train people to use the kits and fast.

All the best
CJ

Venom , Feb 29 2020 22:16 utc | 39
All of a sudden, "freedom isn't free" axiom acquires a really macabre meaning. The inevitable devastation in countries with laissez-faire approach to this emergency will eventually prove "totalitarian" Chinese measures as being vastly superior.
The US will undoubtedly - if grudgingly - adopt Beijing MO, but only after hundreds of thousands of people die needlessly, and America's healthcare system falls apart under the pressure of millions of patients unable to pay exorbitant bills.
oldhippie , Feb 29 2020 22:26 utc | 43
The American mind does not know what "public health" is.

"Public health" is not a thinkable thought. b's paragraph beginning with "Tests must be freely available..." is a sequence of events that cannot exist even in fiction in America. Only someone who has never lived here could write that paragraph. None of b's suggestions are happening. And because these simple measures cannot happen, a price will be paid.

Spike , Feb 29 2020 22:54 utc | 46
The overreaction to this will cause much, much more damage than the virus would have if it were responded to in a conventional, sensible way. Those in positions of responsibility are terrified of underreacting, and it's easy to rationalize that it's better to be safe than sorry.

If measures taken cause unnecessary disruption, if they increase the level of stress, the levels of disease and the amount of death will rise rather than fall. There is more to disease than just microbes.

This is not to say that we should be laissez-faire. Our response to the yearly outbreak of the flu is, in my opinion, insufficient. Schools are an unprecedented institution of prolonged propinquity. Children go to school, are with their classmates in enclosed rooms all day, and bring the disease home. Children survive, but grandma and grandpa might not. Schools can be shuttered during outbreaks, and the technology exists, at least for the relatively fortunate, to continue the instruction online. People should also be encouraged to avoid stressful prolonged propinquity situations such as travel on planes, trains, and interstate buses.

It's occurred to me that the death rate statistics might be misleading. Since China closed their schools, one can assume that the disease rate among children fell substantially. However, elderly people who live in care facilities, which is a high density living situation, would not enjoy the falling infection rate, and they are exactly the population most susceptible to a fatal outcome. This alone, perhaps, might make the death rate higher for COVID19 than for the flu.

Here, I think, is a very good take.


jadan , Feb 29 2020 22:56 utc | 47
The US healthcare system, the privatized system of exploitation of the sick for greater investor profits, is not capable of dealing with a pandemic. Trump and his gang of thieves, charlatans, and unapologetically incompetent followers of Ayn Rand and graduates of the Koch Brothers University, will prevent the socialization of medicine if they possibly can. Will a future cover of Time Magazine show them all hanging from lamp posts?

Whether this pandemic provokes the rapture of Pence & his 144,000 elect and the much anticipated End Times, or whether it fizzles out, I do heartily wish for one outcome: the disenfranchisement of Donald J Trump, his heirs & assigns, and all those who seem unable to smell the stink of his bullshit.

Thank you Jesus! Amen.

Pft , Feb 29 2020 21:53 utc | 33
Jackrabbit@30

CDC estimates 30 million flu cases each year with 30,000 deaths and 500,000 hospitalizations. I think we are a long way from any real concern. The US is nowhere near as polluted or densely populated as China. Also, I don't think we know how the disease spreads among non Asians. They are keeping that under wraps. Aside from those captives on the cruise ship there really has not been much spread from those who returned from China (visitors or citizens).

Mark2 , Feb 29 2020 21:12 utc | 26
Let s see America pass the 'Build a 2000 bed hospital in ten day test.
... ... ...
Krollchem , Feb 29 2020 21:12 utc | 24
Russ@ 12

Agreed that the US leadership is clueless and their thrashing around in order to protect corporate capitalism is xenophobic and dangerous to the world. Came across this research on a plant bioflavonoid that you might find useful in the treatment of SARS COV-1 (aka COVID-19).

Michel Chretien is setting up trials for combatting COVID-19 using a derivative of quercetin, which is a natural anti-inflammatory plant component.
https://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/a-made-in-canada-solution-to-the-coronavirus-outbreak/

In depth interview of this research in Canadian French:
https://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/1538011/quercetine-coronavirus-michel-chretien-ircm-montreal-patrice-roy

Dr. Michel Chretien's background and research:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6H0VJZG2Pjk

Quercetin and the mixture of isoquercitrin have already been found to suppress the arthropod-borne Mayaro virus (MAYV) occurring in forested areas in tropical South America:
https://parasitesandvectors.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1756-3305-7-130

Numerous other research articles on plant bioflavonoids such as Quercetin are readily available in the medical literature.

stephen laudig , Feb 29 2020 20:47 utc | 20
It's always Groundhog Day in the USA.
It's always late August 2005.
It's always New Orleans.
It's always Hurricane Katrina [or something else] on the horizon.
It's always a Republican Administration in power.
Who needs external enemies when we have such internal incompetents available to do the work of sabotage?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundhog_Day_(film)
Russ , Feb 29 2020 20:21 utc | 12
Neither Reps nor Dems are psychologically capable even of conceiving the kinds of measures the post calls for. Trump's stooge already proclaimed that profit is the one and only goal of any response ("the market must decide"), while the Dem leadership as well can speak and think only in terms of making care "affordable", IOW the main purpose of the whole process still has to be corporate control and profit, even if a few stray Dems do want government to subsidize some victims. The purpose still is money changing hands, profit, commerce. Until the Big One levels the karma of this place that will never change.

It seems almost like fate is teeing up one practice play each time, just to show the US how hollowed out it is, before the real play begins. First was the Iranian reprisal strike which could have been so much more devastating. And now, although it's too early to tell how severe this pest ultimately will be, it looks so far like it won't completely cleanse the place. But if so that won't be for the lack of the US economic and cultural system giving it every opportunity it can use.

I have no doubt the US learns zero from either test case. By now the US is too berserk and stupid to deduce anything from its very survival than confirmation of the excellence of its policy and encouragement to further escalate and accelerate.

Trailer Trash , Feb 29 2020 19:59 utc | 6
The idea that Uncle Sam will do something useful and timely is simply laughable. I have been mostly housebound due to severe illness for the past five years. Imagine a five year quarantine! In all that time I have had zero social support besides receiving a disability pension. I hire a personal shopper every two weeks to bring groceries; everything else comes via UPS or FedEx. I frequently go two weeks at a time and never see anyone except maybe a delivery driver.

There is no system to take care of housebound people. For me there is no medical personal to make housecalls, no social support, no personal care workers, nothing. And this at a time when nationwide there are only small numbers of people like myself. Multiply this non-system by 100 or 1000 and people will die at home and no one will even notice.

Uncle Sam's Day of Reckoning may be fast approaching. And we will have well-earned every bit of suffering headed our way.

Ilya G Poimandres , Feb 29 2020 19:59 utc | 5
Funny thing, b was right - China (and online deliveries as well really) managed to snuff the spread out well, and it seems that the rest of the world and their 'representative bureaucracies' will show all how limited they are when a fast acting 'unknown unknown' (Rummy, how you made sense here!) does its thing.

[Feb 29, 2020] Dettol sales surge as markets fall again

This is a mutation of a typical seasonal Coronavirus flu, so all measured affective for a regular flu apply. Do not touch your face and especially nose and eyes by hands is one important safety measure. Disinfect hands with alphobol and glycerin mix is another. Wearing mask in public places might be necessary in areas with many cases, but for areas without them is probably an overkill. But it can help against a regular seasonal flu.
The main concern is that the flue will serve as a catalyst for the "Coronarovirus recession." The panic already exposed weaknesses of the global supply chains created by neoliberal globalization. Looks like this process is already under way.
Alcogol (including Isopropil alvhogol) is quite effective disinfectant, so the need for something like Lizol is questionable outside bathrooms. There is no data that daily disinfestations of door knobs and such might help.
The most important think is that sick people who have no symptoms or minor symptoms do not spread the deases by wearing masks. So wearing a mask is not that important for healthy people but is extremely important for infected people to slow the spread of the flu.
Notable quotes:
"... The disinfectant is seen as providing protection against the spread of the disease, although its effectiveness has not yet been scientifically proven. ..."
Feb 29, 2020 | www.bbc.com

The disinfectant is seen as providing protection against the spread of the disease, although its effectiveness has not yet been scientifically proven.

Dettol owner Reckitt Benckiser said in its results on Thursday. "We are seeing some increased demand for Dettol and Lysol products and are working to support the relevant healthcare authorities and agencies, including through donations, information and education. We do see increased activity online for our consumers in China,"

[Feb 29, 2020] Trump Fears The Coronavirus Crisis Will Spoil His Reelection Campaign

Notable quotes:
"... The Trump administration has done exactly the opposite: It has slashed funding for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and its infectious disease research. For fiscal year 2020, Trump proposed cutting the CDC budget by US$1.3 billion, nearly 20% below the 2019 level. ..."
Feb 29, 2020 | www.youtube.com

James Miller , 1 day ago

“As coronavirus continues to spread, the Trump administration has declared a public health emergency and imposed quarantines and travel restrictions. However, over the past three years the administration has weakened the offices in charge of preparing for and preventing this kind of outbreak.

Two years ago, Microsoft founder and philanthropist Bill Gates warned that the world should be “preparing for a pandemic in the same serious way it prepares for war.” Gates, whose foundation has invested heavily in global health, suggested staging simulations, war games and preparedness exercises to simulate how diseases could spread and to identify the best response.

The Trump administration has done exactly the opposite: It has slashed funding for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and its infectious disease research. For fiscal year 2020, Trump proposed cutting the CDC budget by US$1.3 billion, nearly 20% below the 2019 level.

As a specialist in budgeting, I recognize that there are many claims on public resources.

But when it comes to public health, I believe it is vital to invest early in prevention. Starving the CDC of critical funding will make it far harder for the government to react quickly to a public health emergency.”

[Feb 29, 2020] Trump campaign blasts media for 'massively dishonest' claim POTUS called coronavirus a 'hoax'

Feb 29, 2020 | www.foxnews.com

"This is massively dishonest," tweeted Tim Murtaugh, director of communications for Trump's campaign. He was responding to a tweet claiming a local outlet said Trump called the virus a "hoax." The tweet from the outlet has since been deleted.

"Trump says the media's hysteria-inducing coverage of the government response is the hoax, not the virus itself. Willful and malicious dishonesty," Murtaugh said. He also blasted The Washington Post's Dana Milbank and commentator Bill Kristol arguing that their claims proved Trump's point about Democratic hysteria surrounding the illness.

[Feb 29, 2020] Estimates of contagion rate and incubation period for COVID-19

Below age 50, the risk of death is 0.4% or less. Men, especially smokers, are significantly more vulnerable than women
One positive factor in containing epidemics in the USA is that the US population is much more socially isolated than many other nations. At the same time since the disease affects working age people far more mildly, it is very possible that it is more widespread but is largely indistinguishable from the regular flu for those people.
It is doubtful that the political lobbyists for the US health care industry would support any form of government response that interferes with their profit-making machinery.
Notable quotes:
"... The threshold contagion rate for an epidemic is R1, i.e. on average each person passes the disease on to one more ..."
Feb 29, 2020 | theylaughedatnoah.blogspot.com

Covid-19 is much less fatal than SARS, but has a similarly high level of transmission from person to person.

The threshold contagion rate for an epidemic is R1, i.e. on average each person passes the disease on to one more

MERS https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/middle-east-respiratory-syndrome-coronavirus-(mers-cov) and the highly deadly H5N1 https://www.cdc.gov/flu/avianflu/h5n1-people.htm were below this rate, but SARS was in the region of R2-R3 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4558759/ and Covid-19 is now thought to be similarly infective https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/01/how-fast-and-far-will-new-coronavirus-spread/605632/ , though earlier estimated at R4 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.01.27.20018952v1 .

What makes the latest coronavirus more dangerous is that it seems to have a longer incubation period https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/as-coronavirus-spreads-many-questions-and-some-answers-2020022719004#q2 than SARS' 2-7 days https://www.cdc.gov/sars/about/faq.html , so there is a greater chance that it will slip through basic screening measures at airports etc.

It also vastly expands the network of possible contacts before and after a case of infection, so containment becomes exponentially more difficult. The UK's twentieth case, appearing in Surrey on Friday, is the first to have occurred here through secondary or tertiary transmission but given a prolonged pre-symptom period the trail can easily go cold.

https://news.sky.com/story/first-case-of-coronavirus-confirmed-in-wales-and-two-more-in-england-11945201

[Feb 29, 2020] Media Whipping Covid19 Panic to Unprecedented Heights by Kit Knightly

Notable quotes:
"... We've been over the statistics , there's no need to go over them again. Thus far, scientifically speaking, the Coronavirus is nothing all that remarkable . And yet here we are. A world on the verge of all-out, no-holds-barred panic. Two days ago the scare was related to a woman in Japan who allegedly got the disease twice . Today the authoritarians mouths are watering over discussion of stadium quarantines in Australia and the possibility of the military having to aid the struggling NHS in the UK. ..."
"... Fewer than fifty people, total, have been infected across those two countries. The media are certainly taking to the task of spreading as much hysteria as they can, as quickly as they can. The Guardian is especially on the ball, as they always seem to be when it comes to spreading baseless, ephemeral fear. Firstly they have a neat little "fact check" piece, trying to stop people gaining any sense of perspective. ..."
"... if you more properly compare hospitalised flu cases with the hospitalised COVID19 cases, the regular flu actually has a much higher mortality rate. 5.6% (in the US) compared with 1-3%. ..."
"... Elsewhere, one headline warns us of the dangers of "superspreaders" , and another declares that "An epidemic is coming: Europe struggles to contain coronavirus." It doesn't mention that the "epidemic" Europe is "struggling to contain" has only infected 1093 people on the entire continent, or that only 23 of them have died. (They have since changed the headline to something less theatrical ) ..."
"... There's also the money angle. Not just the vaccine research grants or the tests being sold and shipped out by the case, but also the stock market game. It's all over the headlines that this "pandemic" is causing the biggest crashes in stock prices since 2008, but markets declining are still opportunities to make a lot of money. ..."
"... This is greatest mass-panic I can remember in a long time, maybe since Y2K. Either the world is truly facing a global instance of mass hysteria, or some powerful hand is about to make a big play. ..."
"... Just follow the MONEY: https://www.gurufocus.com/shiller-PE.php The overblown bubble is popping – the usual centuries long play – over inflate assets, get the small investors debt laden make profits from their borrowing against these assets then -POP the bubble ! And hey presto all the assets end up with the bankers! ..."
"... A number of investment banks issued global travel restrictions. JPMorgan issued a ban on non-essential travel on Thu. GoldmanSachs, Citigroup, CreditSuisse, BNPParibas, DeutscheBank and other investment banks have restricted travel to Italy. ..."
"... It's an instinctive reaction for hedge fund vultures to swoop about ready to feast on every economic disaster by buying low and selling high – this is how financial scavengers operate –they're capitalists to the bone .. That being said, I doubt Xi Jinping and China's cabal of oligarchs took a COVID-19 financial hit just to eliminate the orange buffoon in 2020. ..."
"... The death rate from COVID-19 is 3.427% and rising. Here is a good website which tracks the progress of COVID-19 around the world – the number of confirmed cases, the number of deaths and the number of recovered. It is updatetd twice or thrice a day, so refresh it twice or three times a day: ..."
"... As we ought to know from Naomi Klein's "Shock Doctrine" any event, whether man-made or natural, provides a window of opportunity for the corporate vampires whipped up by their armies of owned journalists, NGOs, dystopian trolls. There is indeed a plague upon Mankind, but it is not caused by sneezing and coughing, but by the influenza of evil. No wonder we say "Bless you" when somebody sneezes. The US is at war with Mankind and the enemies du jour are Russia and China. In this globalist world, when China sneezes, we all catch a cold. ..."
Feb 29, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Another day, another round of shrill headlines. The coronavirus could spread to "every country in the world" (like chickenpox), we might have to cancel the Olympics . Ban handshakes! We're running out of masks !

https://www.youtube.com/embed/liiVX55tJ7E

We've been over the statistics , there's no need to go over them again. Thus far, scientifically speaking, the Coronavirus is nothing all that remarkable . And yet here we are. A world on the verge of all-out, no-holds-barred panic. Two days ago the scare was related to a woman in Japan who allegedly got the disease twice . Today the authoritarians mouths are watering over discussion of stadium quarantines in Australia and the possibility of the military having to aid the struggling NHS in the UK.

Fewer than fifty people, total, have been infected across those two countries. The media are certainly taking to the task of spreading as much hysteria as they can, as quickly as they can. The Guardian is especially on the ball, as they always seem to be when it comes to spreading baseless, ephemeral fear. Firstly they have a neat little "fact check" piece, trying to stop people gaining any sense of perspective.

"Yes, it is worse than the flu: busting the coronavirus myths" , it headlines, before telling us coronavirus is "10 times more deadly" than the flu, which they claim has a death rate of "only 0.1%".

This is a) clearly aimed at countering articles like this one that try to bring some realism to bear (apparently that now counts as myth-making), and b)so deceptive it verges on a total lie.

If you include every single known or estimated case of flu in the world then sure you can bring the death rate down to 0.1%. But if you more properly compare hospitalised flu cases with the hospitalised COVID19 cases, the regular flu actually has a much higher mortality rate. 5.6% (in the US) compared with 1-3%.

So, why aren't they closing the world down to save us from this familiar but deadly pathogen?

Elsewhere, one headline warns us of the dangers of "superspreaders" , and another declares that "An epidemic is coming: Europe struggles to contain coronavirus." It doesn't mention that the "epidemic" Europe is "struggling to contain" has only infected 1093 people on the entire continent, or that only 23 of them have died. (They have since changed the headline to something less theatrical )

That's just the "facts" (formerly sacred), the opinion is even better.

Gabby Hinsliff, the forgettable face of the dystopian future-builders , think's Britain is "too selfish" to properly deal with the coronavirus these days (all 20 victims of it). Rounding on people who haven't had their kids vaccinated, and rambling incoherently about the "greater good".

Meanwhile, Jonathan Freedland talks about the "war on disease", slapping the West on the back for being "open and honest" (unlike China and Iran), whilst taking aim at the only person he ever criticises now Jeremy Corbyn is standing down as Labour leader – Donald Trump.

Apparently Trump should be doing more to combat the disease which, thus far, has infected only 60 US citizens, none fatally. More Americans are in danger from high-fructose corn syrup, or Flint's poisoned water (but as those can't be lazily attributed to the political monster of the week, Freedland will never write about them).

But what is all this in aid of? It's hard to say, except that every authoritarian agenda seems to be sticking its oar in.

We have the anti-cash campaign claiming money spreads the disease, we have anti-vaxxers being pilloried by Vox (as if that is any way relevant), while Facebook is "cracking down" on "misinformation" .

More generally, we're being encouraged to think of the "big picture", that being curfewed and quarantined and banned from travelling will all be best for the group. There hasn't been much talk of mandatory vaccinations yet, but you see whispers of it here and there (that Gabby Hinslif piece is very much a straw in the wind for that issue).

There's also the money angle. Not just the vaccine research grants or the tests being sold and shipped out by the case, but also the stock market game. It's all over the headlines that this "pandemic" is causing the biggest crashes in stock prices since 2008, but markets declining are still opportunities to make a lot of money.

Buying stocks low and waiting for the market recovery, shorting currency, or the ridiculous derivatives market (essentially gambling on whether stocks will go up or down). All can make you a fortune if you play the recession right, which is made much easier when you can predict a crash coming say, by stoking a lot of fear.

Anybody familiar with Event 201, a staged exercise focusing on a zoonotic form of a novel coronavirus , will have known it predicted a complete crash in the financial markets.

When a very similar real-life event started occurring, they would have a motive to start trading some derivatives and stoking up the fear machine. It's easy money, like gambling on a fixed game. The event was held by the NGO Center for Health Security , and sponsored by Johns Hopkins' Bloomberg School of Medicine and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. (The exercise ended with a list of seven recommendations, which you can read here .)

All the while, an important trial is getting no coverage at all, whilst Turkey might actually start a full-fledged war with Syria. Crickets chirp in the media where these stories might appear. Reality has no place in our headlines right now.

This is greatest mass-panic I can remember in a long time, maybe since Y2K. Either the world is truly facing a global instance of mass hysteria, or some powerful hand is about to make a big play.

Stay tuned.


Amarka ,

Coronavirus is a generic term for ALL cold and flu viruses!

5 Million Cases of flu Worldwide, 650,000 Deaths Annually: The Seasonal Corona Flu Virus is a "Serious Concern", But the Wuhan Coronavirus Grabs the Headlines

sharon marlowe ,

Another very good article from OffGuardian on the virus panic. Thank you:)

"This is greatest mass-panic I can remember in a long time, maybe since Y2K."

This quote got me thinking. I actually don't remember Y2K being anything more than a curiosity. I don't believe that I knew anyone who thought it was serious.
But I would say Daesh(ISIS) caused panic, even outside the Internet. I think Russia/Putin caused panic, but mostly on the Internet. Of course, Trump caused panic, both on and off the Internet. Trump caused a syndrome that people still haven't gotten over:D
But probably the three biggest panics that I've seen, here in the U.S., were the 9/11 event and the housing crisis/stockmarket plunge.

sharon marlowe ,

*two biggest, not three:)

Dungroanin ,

Just follow the MONEY: https://www.gurufocus.com/shiller-PE.php The overblown bubble is popping – the usual centuries long play – over inflate assets, get the small investors debt laden make profits from their borrowing against these assets then -POP the bubble ! And hey presto all the assets end up with the bankers!

Just need a good story and a fall guy villain to blame it on. This time the villain was to be China and Xi. It seems the Chinese leadership were aware of that danger and have moved too quickly for the bankers story to gain legs – it also therefore seems to implicate skullduggery in Hubei.

It explains why the Donald is sanguine and has handed the hot potato to his hapless VP – knowing it will be dropped! A perfect opportunity to play the 'you're fired' line and replace with another running mate just in time for the elections!

And if one scrys further it reveals the direction to the media and the messaging, across the spectrum , as they deploy the play and try to fire fight in the alt-media too.

Beyond the Gates Foundation and WEF fronts are the REAL players.

Schiller long term correction requires 30% drop.
Scalpers may want more.

Dungroanin ,

And right on cue to prove my point

9:49 am Feb 29

A number of investment banks issued global travel restrictions. JPMorgan issued a ban on non-essential travel on Thu. GoldmanSachs, Citigroup, CreditSuisse, BNPParibas, DeutscheBank and other investment banks have restricted travel to Italy.

Lol – sometimes you have to get your own hands dirty when the dumb media hype is failing ..

Charlotte Russe ,

"Buying stocks low and waiting for the market recovery, shorting currency, or the ridiculous derivatives market (essentially gambling on whether stocks will go up or down). All can make you a fortune if you play the recession right, which is made much easier when you can predict a crash coming say, by stoking a lot of fear."

It's an instinctive reaction for hedge fund vultures to swoop about ready to feast on every economic disaster by buying low and selling high – this is how financial scavengers operate –they're capitalists to the bone .. That being said, I doubt Xi Jinping and China's cabal of oligarchs took a COVID-19 financial hit just to eliminate the orange buffoon in 2020.

In any case, the real issue is that medical care in a civilized society should never be commodified. The barbarity of how healthcare is accessed is revealed every time someone with substantial assets has exclusive concierge treatment while millions are left to fend for themselves.

This is the consequence when profits surpass compassion.

The carnage of millions is required for a multibillion dollar medical industry to operate exclusively for profit–the deaths of the poor, old, and sickly are merely viewed as collateral damage .

Longevity is based on being the most physically and economically fit. This is the requisite libertarian mentality required to complete the neoliberal main dish. Simply put, the implementation of worldwide neoliberalism (gangster capitalism) requires the murder of millions–an economic phantasm which thrives on collateral slaughter.

Economic sanctions against nation-states like Iran and Venezuela is really economic warfare against indigenous populations who die from lack of medical care. This is similar to how healthcare is dispensed to indigent Americans–they're also sanctioned by the US medical system. The result is the same– genocide.

Fair dinkum ,

"Listen to us, watch us, read us, believe in us, bow down to us, buy this, eat this, drink this, wear this" _ _ _ _ etc, etc, ad nauseum.
Give it a fucking rest you pricks, we're not all that gullible.

Vierotchka ,

The death rate from COVID-19 is 3.427% and rising. Here is a good website which tracks the progress of COVID-19 around the world – the number of confirmed cases, the number of deaths and the number of recovered. It is updatetd twice or thrice a day, so refresh it twice or three times a day:

https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

Dungroanin ,

V, lets see if we can explain this

'10:28 am Feb 29

'Good news! With 39,002 COVID19 recovery cases, the tally surpasses the total 37,414 confirmed cases as of Friday end, for the first time in the Chinese mainland: NHC.'

&
'Hubei Province reported 423 new cases of novel coronavirus pneumonia on Feb 28, with 45 new deaths and 2,492 cases of recovery. The total number of infections in the province climbed to 66,337, with 28,895 recovered and 2,727 dead.'

(Indicating mortality of 4.1% average)
-- -- -

1. I haven't come across autopsy reports confirming ncov19 in the deaths – have you?

2. I haven't come across what is the definitive test for ncov19 – have you?

3. The confusion introduced by WHO in creating a classification of COVID without a clear link to n-Cov19 is staggering!

4. There have been few genomes mapped and the research quoted often is 'in silico' – i.e computer modelling

As a non-expert I think we (you, me other non connected or compromised opinions) ought to collaborate in our head-banging ways to rattle the truths out of the jar.

Hugh O'Neill ,

I think you doth protest too much.

As we ought to know from Naomi Klein's "Shock Doctrine" any event, whether man-made or natural, provides a window of opportunity for the corporate vampires whipped up by their armies of owned journalists, NGOs, dystopian trolls. There is indeed a plague upon Mankind, but it is not caused by sneezing and coughing, but by the influenza of evil. No wonder we say "Bless you" when somebody sneezes. The US is at war with Mankind and the enemies du jour are Russia and China. In this globalist world, when China sneezes, we all catch a cold.

[Feb 28, 2020] The 20th century model of [pandemic] containment was protecting lives. The 21st century model is protecting markets

Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Geo , , February 27, 2020 at 2:36 pm

"The 20th century model of [pandemic] containment was protecting lives. The 21st century model is protecting markets."

https://twitter.com/jonst0kes/status/1233088857060626433?s=21

[Feb 28, 2020] No matter what happens with the coronavirus, I'm sure Trump has it under control by Alexandra Petri

Feb 27, 2020 | www.washingtonpost.com

At a news conference Wednesday, the president announced that the president was doing a wonderful job handling the coronavirus, a statement that filled me with confidence, as it came from the president himself. The vice president and HHS head also announced that the president was doing a great job, and the president, at that point, officially put the vice president in charge of coordinating the outbreak response.

...What's best is that even if he gets overwhelmed, Jared Kushner is there, a man who can be counted upon to provide a solution to any issue , no matter how complicated.

... ... ...

"I want you to understand something that shocked me when I saw it," the president said at Wednesday's news conference. " I think most people are amazed to hear it. The flu in our country kills from 25,000 people to 69,000 people a year. That was shocking to me." This is just a sign of how the president is working carefully to understand the issue! Once his great brain is applied to it, we need fear nothing.

Also, we do not need to worry about the cuts to health programs his budget was asking for; we can always hire more doctors! Once we hire them, it will turn out that they have been working on the virus for months and developing expertise in combating it. Passionately, in their spare time, the same way the response was being coordinated.

[Feb 28, 2020] World Health Organization in the Philippines says that Covid-19 can survive both hot and humid climates

Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

David Carl Grimes , February 28, 2020 at 10:59 am

World Health Organization in the Philippines says that Covid-19 can survive both hot and humid climates.

https://news.mb.com.ph/2020/02/08/who-ph-2019-ncov-can-survive-both-hot-humid-climates/

rd , February 28, 2020 at 11:57 am

The good news is that many of the hot, humid countries don't have the money or technical capability to test for COVID-19, so it won't be in their countries. Just like it is not in the US, because if it was we would know even in the absence of testing.

[Feb 28, 2020] The hubs the US hospitals use are made in Wuhan, China

Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

David Carl Grimes , February 28, 2020 at 2:03 pm

This guy is saying that if there's a real pandemic, Doctors and Nurses won't show up because Healthcare has become a career and not a calling. They wouldn't want to risk their lives to save others, especially the poor ones.

http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2020/02/could-covid-19-pandemic-collapse-us.html

upstater , February 28, 2020 at 2:25 pm

An acquaintance repairs advanced medical imaging systems. The various units are tied together using a router/hub, making the images accessible to PCs all over the network (e.g., radiologists, other specialists and permanent patient records).

The hubs are made in Wuhan, China. The end-use seller practices JIT inventory management. Very few are kept in stock, since another FedEx shipment was just an order and a few days away. Needless to say, the hubs have become unavailable These hubs are designed with proprietary architecture, so the seller can screw the customers with exorbitant rent-seeking pricing, so you can't buy them off the shelf someplace else.

Consider a large US hospital that has maybe a dozen of these imaging systems and their hub goes down how does it get put back into service now? Answer: it doesn't.

One example or probably tens or hundreds of thousands others.

Wukchumni , February 28, 2020 at 2:33 pm

Thanks for the story, its a different kind of spanner that's gummed up the works, the spanner in question being the tyranny of distance.

[Feb 28, 2020] Increase attraction of Bernie "Democratic Socliasm" (in reality the restoration of the elements of the New Deal) agenda

Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

TMoney , February 28, 2020 at 11:18 am

*DISCLAIMER THIS IS NOT A CALL FOR REVOLUTION*

Servants to the Professional Managerial Class (PMC), Janitors, Secretaries, Food Services Workers – Now is your chance for paid sick leave. Come to work with the Coronavirus, cough on everyone. You can't afford to stay home. Paid Sick Leave Now.

Can't let a good crisis go to waste can we ?

*END DISCLAIMER*

TMoney , February 28, 2020 at 12:18 pm

I don't disagree, however, the bottom rungs of society, the working poor are going to do this anyway, they CAN'T afford to stay home. How many pay checks can you miss at the bottom – none. The PMC have told the rest of us to work or die, poor people understand this and will work, even if they spread an infectious disease. The working poor are going to skip getting tested if it interfers with getting paid, they will work until they collapse on your desk.

This is going to happen, which is why it's not a call for revolution. It's just a fact.

TMoney , February 28, 2020 at 12:36 pm

I did work at a company that switched from sick time to PTO, were sick time and vacation counts the same.
Flu meant no summer on the beach. I went to work with flu. If the boss or coworkers got sick it was of no economic consequence to me. The loss of my holiday on the other hand .

Perhaps this anecdote makes me a bad person, but I didn't change the rules, just played by them.

Corona Virus is the same but worse since it can kill, however the symptoms are such that if I were scraping along I would cross my fingers and not get tested. Ignorance is plausible deniability, especially if I can't afford a test that tells me I can't work.

jrs , February 28, 2020 at 1:11 pm

Well sure it makes you a bad person. Because when others get sick because of you coming in, they MIGHT use their vacation time for sickness that you refused to. So you are just FOBing it off on the next guy and making them lose their vacation instead of you. And some of them may not even have paid time off (are they contract workers, what about the janitor etc.?) But you've got yours.

I would give up summer on the beach in a New York nanosecond to be able to stay home sick. Not even "for the good of society and infecting others", but for far more selfish reasons: the pleasure of the vacation ISN'T WORTH the suffering it entails to work while feeling aweful. When I have worked without any time off it made me long with all my being for time off for things like sickness and doctors visits. My priorities got real real, real fast, and it wasn't about vacation, but it was about seeing the doctor, what if I got sick, etc.. I mean look if I lived in a country that believed in vacation then it would be one thing, but we have to deal with actual reality here.

Reply

TMoney , February 28, 2020 at 1:32 pm

Agreed, I selfishly chose what was best for me. I did not optimize for the greater good. Please note, the company made the same choice first.

I did make sure to tell my managers in advance of the consequences of the change to PTO.

It's an interesting example of "economic man", I only followed my own interests, when I had sick time, I took it and everyone was better off because of it.

I felt it was worth suffering at work to spend time off with family.

Reply

You're soaking in it! , February 28, 2020 at 1:52 pm

"Ihr Herren, redet euch da gar nichts ein:
Der Mensch lebt nur von Missetat allein!"

(Don't kid yourself, boss; people can only survive by doing 'bad' things)

[Feb 28, 2020] Coronavirus Collateral Damage How a Case in Korea Hit a Small Business in the US

Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Louis Fyne , February 28, 2020 at 10:35 am

the situation in Korea is remarkably orderly -- -news reports/video of queues of citizens waiting for 3+ hours to buy their face mask at pharmacies, post offices, stores -- definitely a "keep calm and carry on" mentality.

would the situation in the US be similar if the US had a similar per capita rate of the virus? Or would much of the US voluntarily hunker down?

i don't know the answer but really hope that Americans can band together -- but then again the media and pundits give me no hope.

Samuel Conner , February 28, 2020 at 10:44 am

It seems to me that people who can afford to hunker down are the ones who have sufficient $$ on hand or easily obtainable that they can stock up necessities. But the typical US household cannot meet a $400 unexpected expense.

How does that saying go? "the wealthy do what they can, and the poor what they must"?

====

I have the sense that the case for "democratic socialism" is getting stronger by the day. There may be vast political consequences to this entirely foreseeable but not foreseen event.

Colhearted Liberal , February 28, 2020 at 11:50 am

I was told today that: If you got to a hospital in Korea to get checked for the virus, it will cost you 160$. If you have it, the government will pay you back. If you don't you're stuck with the bill.

If the government orders you for home quarantine, it will also pay you to stay home(I don't know the rate though). If you violate the quarantine, it's $10,000 fine or something. The church members are in a lot of heat because they refuse to follow the quarantine orders.

Ignacio , February 28, 2020 at 10:53 am

In fact, the more efficient are supply chains and the logistics "on time" and "without stocks", the more sensitive to disruptions. Quarantines doing more harm than good because the "bug" can also go around, over or after the hurdles. This joke from yesterday is still germane.

Harold , February 28, 2020 at 12:07 pm

My relative was a senior contracting specialist for the federal government, who also ordered supplies for the military. According to him, contracting specialists have always been very aware of the need for redundancy and the many dangers of reliance on just one supplier. I guess the efficiency geniuses, globalists, & disruptors at McKinsey have no clue. Why do we always have to be reinventing the wheel?

[Feb 28, 2020] The impact of coronavirus on Trump reelection chances

Highly recommended!
Feb 28, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

likbez , February 27, 2020 10:57 pm

There is a silver lining in any dark cloud.

Trump might not survive the Coronavirus, literally (he is over 70 and has a high range of contacts; the mortality to this age group is close to 10%), or figuratively as voters might not forgive him inadequate and/or incompetent response (which is given) .

Unfortunately, Bernie is at even higher risk as mortality for 80+ is over 15%, and pre-existing cardiovascular disease is a serious negative factor.

One can wonder if this will be " Straw that broke the camel's back " for Trump. With 10% drop of S&P500 (aka "correction") it is difficult to talk about booming economy on rallies ( 20% decline marker defines a recession and some stocks -- like oil sector are already in this territory ). High yield bonds are also going down, although more slowly. Now suddenly, Trump has nothing to talk about on his rallies, and he knows it.

A part of rich retirees who are overexposed to stocks constitutes a sizable part of remaining avid "Trumpers" voter block (kind of double stupidity, if you wish :-) , and some of them might not forgive Trump the liberty of depriving them honestly earned in 2019 ~10% of their 401K accounts.

IMHO troubles for Trump just started. Being incompetent DJT and his merry band of grifters will almost definitely botch the response.

They already made three blunders.

1. When asked if, and when, a vaccine is produced, would the vaccine be affordable to everyone? They replied; We'll let the "market" decide that. And some part of electorate probably noted that.

2. The last December, they cut the budget for the CDC (center for disease control).

3. They exposed government workers to the virus without any need to do that, only due to bureaucratic incompetence: https://science.slashdot.org/story/20/02/27/2353236/us-health-workers-responding-to-coronavirus-lacked-training-and-protective-gear-whistle-blower-says

In this sense appointing Pence as the head of the coronavirus response may be a smart move by Trump. When and if the pandemic hits big time, exposing the mass incompetence and unpreparedness of the US government, in combination with the tanking of the stock market, Trump can, of course, blame Christian Zionist neoconservative Israeli apartheid supporter Pence for his troubles :-)

But, unfortunately, that will not do him any good.

[Feb 28, 2020] Last December, Trump administration cut the budget for the CDC (center for disease control). Now Trump might be cooked by Coronavirus

Trump administration will be held responsible and that will affect behaviour of voters.
Feb 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Trailer Trash , Feb 27 2020 18:00 utc | 9
At CDC it is important to know how to kiss ass, administer contracts, do public relations, organize meetings, and write memos. Actual medical and research skills are far, far, far down the list. Everything they do is contracted out and takes forever to happen. It is impossible for the bureaucracy to respond to a crisis. One might as well ask a whale to walk on land.

US peons are about to find out just what it means to live in a crumbling, hollowed-out empire-shell made of corruption and incompetence. Hint: it's gonna suck.

(Here is an article that explains why I hate CDC: Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and the CDC: A Long, Tangled Tale )

Tick Tock 17 , Feb 27 2020 18:01 utc | 10

The Revenge of the Intelligent. That is what this is. Too bad it has backfired and seems to kill the Elderly at a much higher rate.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention isn't yet ready to detect whether the coronavirus is spreading across the country.

Just 12 of more than 100 public health labs in the U.S. are currently able to diagnose the coronavirus because of problems with a test developed by the CDC, potentially slowing the response if the virus starts taking hold here. The faulty test has also delayed a plan to widely screen people with symptoms of respiratory illness who have tested negative for influenza to detect whether the coronavirus may be stealthily spreading.
...
Only six states -- California, Nebraska, Illinois, Nevada, Tennessee, and Idaho -- are now testing for the virus, the Association of Public Health Laboratories told POLITICO.
...
Under current rules, each positive test must be confirmed by a second round of testing at the CDC. [Director Robert Redfield] told lawmakers that the agency can now screen 350-500 samples per day.
...
"I understand very much the FDA is focused on quality control, but there's also a need to have a system that can respond to their needs," [Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiology professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health,] said. "China tested 320,000 people in Guangdong over a three-week period. This is the scale we need to be thinking on."

Stupid is as Stupid does. Totally inexcusable for the lack of a test, but exactly what would be the most certain outcome with the pseudo education in the US for the last 30 years.

ben , Feb 27 2020 18:04 utc | 11
B said, in part;"The Trump administration seems to be far behind them."


Gee imagine that. For DJT and his merry band of grifters, this virus is just a liberal plot to hinder their ability to make money, and disparage DJT's admin.

When asked if, and when, a counter measure is produced, would the vaccine be affordable to everyone, they replied; We'll let the "market" decide that.

Incredible, but, consistently mercenary in today's " if you can't afford die" mentality, here in the U$A..

And, last December, they cut the budget for the CDC (center for disease control)...

ben , Feb 27 2020 18:04 utc | 11
B said, in part;"The Trump administration seems to be far behind them."


Gee imagine that. For DJT and his merry band of grifters, this virus is just a liberal plot to hinder their ability to make money, and disparage DJT's admin.

When asked if, and when, a counter measure is produced, would the vaccine be affordable to everyone, they replied; We'll let the "market" decide that.

Incredible, but, consistently mercenary in today's " if you can't afford die" mentality, here in the U$A..

And, last December, they cut the budget for the CDC (center for disease control)...

Joseph Dillard , Feb 27 2020 18:30 utc | 18
Appointing Pence head of the coronavirus response may have been a smart move by Trump. When the pandemic hits big time, exposing the mass incompetence and unpreparedness of the US government, in combination with the tanking of the stock market, Trump can blame Christian Zionist neoconservative Israeli apartheid supporter Pence. He might even dump him and select someone who he thinks will bring in more votes. It won't make any difference; Trump is a goner. This time next year we will have been without the Golden Gollem of Greatness for some 37 days.
Virgile , Feb 27 2020 18:32 utc | 19
One was wondering what could stop Trump from been elected in view of the 'fantastic' boom in USA economy.
Maybe mismanaging Covid will do the job!

[Feb 28, 2020] For the life of me I don't understand why Mike doesn't get up and say hi I'm Mike Bloomberg and I promise to put a chicken, a Covid 19 test kit, a hazmat suit and a respirator in in every pot.

Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

blowncue , , February 27, 2020 at 7:40 pm

For the life of me I don't understand why Mike doesn't get up and say hi I'm Mike Bloomberg and I promise to put a chicken, a Covid 19 test kit, a hazmat suit and a respirator in in every pot. In fact I'm going to go broke starting today doing just that.

And I'm going to make damn sure that if you are a community physician and Bethesda is not listening to you I'm going to take your call and I'm going to throw as much money as needed to make what needs to happen, happen.

And then walk off the stage.

Nobody from that moment forward would give a damn about his negatives. And I say that as a Sanders supporter, who admittedly does not think that Elizabeth Warren is Jack Kemp in a dress.

One thing that I do want to throw out to the commentariat is that we're going to see and we're seeing it now, the dynamic where DC and Bethesda have their head up their ass and local community providers scream bloody murder and that gets things moving.

For example where UC Davis Physicians want the CDC the test for the coronavirus and the CDC says no, based upon what is now outdated criteria.

South Korea has done like what 20,000 tests they have drive-thru testing!

Back in the 1980s clinicians in Manhattan. (CRI/Sonnabend), and SF started small-scale clinical trials especially focusing on opportunistic infection treatment which Bethesda was completely neglecting as they were shoveling out AZT for HIV like it was candy.

Now the same dynamic is happening only with test kits.

[Feb 28, 2020] Five hundred new COVID19 cases in South Korea since yesterday after 13K tests were administered

That's less then 5 people per hundred tested
Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

clarky90 , , February 27, 2020 at 5:27 pm

"Eric Feigl-Ding
@DrEricDing
Gee- +505 new #COVID19 cases in South Korea since yesterday, up 40% in one day! Crazy they've done also >13,000 tests in just one day to find the new 505 cases.

SKorea has now completed 66652 total Test tubetest runs! America needs to match that. #TESTVIRUSNOW https://cdc.go.kr/board/board.es?mid=a30402000000&bid=0030 "

Grant , , February 27, 2020 at 6:30 pm

US having our inefficient, chaotic and deadly healthcare system will make a pandemic far worse. The idea that a person opposed to a rational and efficient national healthcare system would be a good match for a pandemic is a bit absurd. Trying to plan a system like this is infinitely more difficult. If he wants to help with a pandemic though, he doesn't have to be president. Let him spend the money he would spend to buy the presidency in opening healthcare clinics in rural areas and poor communities, people who would be least able to see a doctor if they think they may be sick. And people who would be far more likely to use public transportation, which would quicken the spread of the disease.

I used to live in China. Because of my work schedule there, I had to shop on the weekends. It was a special form of torture. The buses would all be so packed you couldn't move, and the stores themselves weren't tons better. Ever shopped in a store so packed with people you could barely move? Imagine black Friday all the time. So, if a person had the virus and didn't know it in China, they would almost certainly get around by public transportation, absolutely packed with people, and then would go to crowded places to shop. When I say crowded, again, not something that could be put into words for you all to understand, it must be experienced. The situation in rural areas is often the same, high density, heavy reliance on public transport, and there is far less of a healthcare infrastructure in rural areas. So, not only could people be sick and not know it, not only would they get around in packed busses and trains, not only would they shop and go about very densely populated cities, in rural areas people are poor and access to doctors and nurses is often lacking. The government has tried to create in recent years a "socialist countryside", where there are investments in rural areas, hospitals, public housing and the like, but there is still a massive gap between living standards between coastal areas and inner China, and rural and urban areas. Here in the US, one thing going for us is that people in many parts of the country get around in private cars. That lessens the exposure to a virus, which could maybe buy us a little more time, having such a car-centric mode of transport. But, one thing we do have that other developed countries don't, is a horrible, inefficient, chaotic healthcare system. And that is why things could get worse here in ways it wouldn't if we had single payer. Bloomberg opposes a system that could deal with this, is indifferent to 68,000 a year dying from this system, and seems even opposed to moderate improvements that would at least inch us closer to such a system. And keep in mind, the costs of the pandemic among those with insurance will be transferred to those paying into insurance pools managed by private corporations. We will socialize costs in very inefficient ways. We're doomed if he gets power. He and Biden should be non-starters.

[Feb 28, 2020] Coronavirus will thrive because of corporatist, neoliberal, admin and management in healthcare and government

Feb 28, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

ajc , , February 27, 2020 at 2:53 pm

The actual disruption of the pandemic.

CNN is reporting multiple medical personnel were exposed to coronavirus from the first community spread victim because the CDC or whomever wouldn't allow testing since the patient was outside of the federal guidelines. This is with doctors requesting it. This is with the case occurring in the same county as Travis AFB, where people repatriated with coronavirus are being quarantined.

Coronavirus will thrive because of corporatist, neoliberal, admin and management in healthcare and government. Because the people in those roles are promoted and lionized for their lack of imagination and inability to be perturbed by a threat to the status quo. Iran is more a prediction of our future in the US than China. Can you even imagine a months long heroic effort by American medial staff like the Chinese? Our medical pros at university hospitals can't take enough precautions with a suspected coronavirus case to keep dozens of them from being possibly infected.

The death of neoliberal magical thinking is going to require many deaths in the heart of empire, while the economy crumbles. And even then, that may not be enough, if the heroin epidemic is any indicator.

[Feb 28, 2020] Virus Spreads Over The Planet As Governments React Too Slowly

Feb 28, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Virus Spreads Over The Planet As Governments React Too Slowly

After a uneven first response China did its very best to limit the spread of the nCov-19 virus and the Covid-19 disease the virus causes. The extreme quarantine, which began in mid January, has come at a great economic cost but bought the rest of the world time to prepare for the inevitable surfacing of the virus in other countries.

Unfortunately many governments did not use the month given to them and botched their responses. The number of newly confirmed cases per day outside of China is now bigger than the new daily number inside of China. South Korea alone reported 334 new confirmed cases today while the much larger China only reported 433.


bigger

China has shown that it is possible to successfully fight and stop the epidemic. Unfortunately other countries are not ready to follow its example. This is now making it likely that the epidemic in China will become a pandemic and will spread mostly uninhibited all over the globe.

South Korea, Japan, Iran, Italy and the U.S. are now the countries which will see the next great impacts. Other countries will follow in a third wave as Brazil, Pakistan, North Macedonia, Greece, Georgia, Algeria, Norway and Romania all saw their first cases in the last 24 hours.

The wide spread in South Korea came through a religious cult which demands mandatory participation in overcrowded services . It was patient 31 and her contact with 1160 other persons that led to the wider spread:

It's not clear where Patient 31 became infected with the virus, but in the days before her diagnosis, she travelled to crowded spots in Daegu, as well as in the capital Seoul. On February 6 she was in a minor traffic accident in Daegu, and checked herself into an Oriental medicine hospital. While at that hospital, she attended services at the Daegu branch of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, on February 9 and again on February 16.

In between those visits, on February 15, doctors at the hospital said they first suggested she be tested for the coronavirus, as she had a high fever. Instead, the woman went to a buffet lunch with a friend at a hotel. In an interview with local newspaper JoongAng Ilbo, the woman denied that doctors had advised her to be tested. As her symptoms worsened, however, doctors say they once again advised her to be tested. On February 17, she finally went to another hospital for the test. The next day, health authorities announced she was the country's 31st confirmed case. In only a matter of days, those numbers had soared as hundreds of people at the Shincheonji Church and surrounding areas tested positive.

The quarantine of a whole cruise ship in Japan and the incompetent bureaucratic response to it made a further spread in that country inevitable :

On Saturday, the health minister admitted that 23 passengers had been released from the ship without taking a valid recent test and had traveled by public transit after disembarking this past week.

Now that the quarantine has ended and most of the passengers have left, the concern is that they could start spreading the virus on shore.

Japan now has 200 cases and its government has decided to close all schools throughout March.

In Iran the epidemic came from China with people who went to Qom for religious training. The spiritual center of Iran has many religious schools and universities and many pilgrim visit the shrines in the city. They contributed to the further spread of the virus. Iran now has a total of 254 confirmed cases including two lawmakers, a vice president and a deputy minister.

The Iranian government first blamed foreign broadcasts in Farsi language for creating a panic. That was not without reason when one consider the racist reporting like in the New York Times : 'Recipe for a Massive Viral Outbreak': Iran Emerges as a Worldwide Threat . The Gulfnews even blamed Iran for all Covid-19 cases in the Middle East while the first cases in the Emirates came from contacts with Chinese tourists .

Yesterday Iran still rejected to close its shrines and to prohibited religious services. Today it canceled tomorrows Friday prayers.

Italy has some 400 cases of which 190 are confirmed. It put 55,000 residents in the northern regions of Lombardy and Veneto under lockdown.

The above countries have now grasped the severity of the issue. The Trump administration seems to be far behind them.

The U.S. is likely to already have a significant number of cases but a lack of testing capacity has made any realistic estimate impossible.

Chinese scientists had published the genome sequence of the virus on January 12 and, based on it, developed test kits within a few days. The U.S. Center of Disease Control and Prevention also developed a test kit but had problems with its first version and its wider distribution. More than a month later it is still not ready for the foreseeable need:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention isn't yet ready to detect whether the coronavirus is spreading across the country.

Just 12 of more than 100 public health labs in the U.S. are currently able to diagnose the coronavirus because of problems with a test developed by the CDC, potentially slowing the response if the virus starts taking hold here. The faulty test has also delayed a plan to widely screen people with symptoms of respiratory illness who have tested negative for influenza to detect whether the coronavirus may be stealthily spreading.
...
Only six states -- California, Nebraska, Illinois, Nevada, Tennessee, and Idaho -- are now testing for the virus, the Association of Public Health Laboratories told POLITICO.
...
Under current rules, each positive test must be confirmed by a second round of testing at the CDC. [Director Robert Redfield] told lawmakers that the agency can now screen 350-500 samples per day.
...
"I understand very much the FDA is focused on quality control, but there's also a need to have a system that can respond to their needs," [Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiology professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health,] said. "China tested 320,000 people in Guangdong over a three-week period. This is the scale we need to be thinking on."

A case in Los Angeles shows where this leads to :

It took several days to test a coronavirus patient in Northern California who might be the first to have contracted the disease through community exposure in the United States.

The individual is a resident of Solano County and is receiving medical care in Sacramento County, according to the state Department of Public Health.

UC Davis officials said the patient arrived at UC Davis Medical Center from another hospital Feb. 19. But the patient was not tested until Feb. 23.

The test results were only known three days later.

Under the U.S. medical system testing will be expensive for the patients. Insurances may not pay for it. Many people will be unable or unwilling to spend money on it. Care for serious cases will also be limited by high prices. This guarantees that the virus will spread further. China was smart enough to guarantee 100% state coverage for testing and all necessary care. The U.S. should follow that principle but is unlikely to do so.

Trump announced that Vice-President Pence, a man who does not believe in science, will lead the response. The libertarian and neo-liberal approach to the problem will further the epidemic's growth. Only after it becomes really severe will the necessary measures be taken.

To assess the wider global impact of the pandemic this table is most helpful:

* Death Rate = (number of deaths / number of cases) = probability of dying if infected by the virus (%). This probability differs depending on the age group. The percentage shown does NOT represent in any way the share of deaths by age group . Rather, it represents, for a person in a given age group, the risk of dying if infected with COVID-19.

In an unrestricted pandemic the virus will infect between 40 to 70 percent of the population. The virus is more deadly than a normal flu but mostly for elderly people with severe preconditions. Children and grown ups in their most productive years can carry the virus without showing symptoms and will only rarely become critical cases. This guarantees that our societies will continue to function. The pandemic will have severe, but not catastrophic, economic consequences as quarantines and fear will limit production and trade on all levels.

Trump's reelection chances are sinking as Covid-19 cases rise. The incompetence of his administration will come under new light. The stock markets will continue to tumble and erase the economic gains Trump had claimed. Bernie Sanders' chances to win, if he survives the pandemic, will increase as his prime campaign promise -Medicare for all- will become even more acceptable when the problems with the current U.S. healthcare system come under new public scrutiny.

There are only few personal measures one can take to protect oneself from exposure. One should avoid personal contacts where possible. Wearing a mask, unless it is a special N-95 respirator which also makes it difficult breathe, does not prevent one from catching the virus. But infected persons should use masks to protect those they may come in contact with from droplet infections. Stocking up on basic foodstuff and other needs might help to avoid potential shortages.

---
Previous Moon of Alabama posts on the issue:

Posted by b on February 27, 2020 at 16:53 UTC | Permalink

[Feb 28, 2020] Why Is the FDA Stalling on More Coronavirus Testing

Feb 27, 2020 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Kent 17 hours ago

"The agency can be a force for good but only by letting innovators get life-saving medications and tests to market."

Limited intelligence displayed in this article. Anyone who thinks pharma and lab execs are anything but short-term shareholder value regardless of the public are kidding themselves. That being said, there are ways to make it happen, though this author would never be able to imagine them.

Make private lab testing subject to the following rules:

1. They are paid by the federal government, not the pharma companies.
2. They are selected by the federal government to perform the tests, not the pharma companies.
3. Their labs and methods are regularly tested and approved by the federal government, failure would mean a massive loss of revenue.

These simple rules ensure lab testing can be efficiently performed by the private sector while working in the best interests of the population, not any individual pharma shareholder. Far too complex a thought for our author though.


gnt EdMan 8 hours ago

The relationship of the FAA to the commercial aircraft industry is analogous. When the FAA was actively involved in all levels of testing, we managed to produce very safe aircraft. When the FAA started relying on the aircraft manufacturers for testing, we get the 737 Max. It is too tempting to take shortcuts when there are a lot of profits and bonuses to be made.

Standard economic theory contends that manufacturers will be too concerned about their long term reputations to cheat. Unfortunately for the theory, there are too many people within the manufacturer that have incentives to grab as much as they can and move on before the long term costs are apparent.

MPC EdMan 5 hours ago
The government can be incompetent or corrupt, yes, but the private sector can also be driven by desire for short term profit. Both have their weaknesses.

We seem likely to get the worst of both right now.

polistra24 16 hours ago
Maybe they're going slow because they recognize that this alleged "pandemic" isn't as bad as everyone in the media and NYC world is making it. Going fast usually breaks things. See Elon or Boeing or any other "tech" innovator.
B King 14 hours ago
Tens of millions of people die from viral influenza every year. Some estimates are over 60 million a year world wide. Some people who contract this new Coronavirus never get sick or exhibit symptoms at all, some only get mild flu symptoms. In other words there's nothing different here. Even if there were there isn't a damn thing that can be done about it now. It's global and obviously airborne - everyone will get it. Coronavirus parties! Lets get it over with
Begemot 12 hours ago
The cost of bringing a new medication to market is now more than $2 billion and patients have to wait more than a decade to see life-saving drugs become available.

Does this regime also apply to flu vaccines? They release a new one every year. Are these also decades in the making?

LeeInWV Begemot 11 hours ago
Car companies release "new" cars every year. Do they cost the same as the development of a new car? Tweaks to an existing thing do not cost what development from nothing costs. The yearly flu vaccine is tweaked depending on which strains they think will be prevalent given current and expected environmental conditions. It is not a "new medication".
Begemot LeeInWV 10 hours ago
Sounds likely. I'm sure the definition of "new" versus "tweaked" can be adjusted to suit requirements.
LAURA KEY 11 hours ago • edited
The face mask suppliers are doing a booming biz.
However... Eventually -- face masks will run out of supply. Then everyone will resort to rubber bands attached to automatic coffee maker filters.

[Feb 27, 2020] Torn - Natalie Imbruglia (Coronavirus Parody) by Kathy Makattack

This is also a nice way to suppress panic ;-)
Notable quotes:
"... This is epic, very well written and thought of, and it matched the original lyrics tone very well. Well done Kathy, I love it! ..."
"... As someone working in the healthcare sector... Thanks for bringing some much needed laughter and humour for stress relief :) <3 ..."
"... So many perfect, funny lines that fit! Perfect physical comedy at the end. Great attitude that I am sure brightened up the day of many a confined person and gave a needed laugh in a sad time. Thank you so much! Make more like this! ..."
Feb 09, 2020 | www.youtube.com
A parody to the song "Torn" originally by Natalie Imbruglia about the situation in Hong Kong in response to the #conronavirus crisis.

James Cheng , 2 weeks ago

This is epic, very well written and thought of, and it matched the original lyrics tone very well. Well done Kathy, I love it!

Gary Ward , 2 weeks ago

Using humour, and song, to cope with a situation in which many people feel totally helpless, a perfect approach and it lifted my spirits!! :-)

linnyzenny , 2 weeks ago

As someone working in the healthcare sector... Thanks for bringing some much needed laughter and humour for stress relief :) <3


truthsearch911
, 2 weeks ago

So many perfect, funny lines that fit! Perfect physical comedy at the end. Great attitude that I am sure brightened up the day of many a confined person and gave a needed laugh in a sad time. Thank you so much! Make more like this!

J. Burton Erik , 1 day ago

Flawless lyrics, funny and on point. Stay strong Hongkongers! Sounds so natural as if it's the original lyrics!!

akitsukishirahime , 1 week ago

This is PERFECT. Much needed humour at these trying times! Man supermarkets are like warzones these days. Though I'll still buy that pasta, cheese, and corn thank you.


bowieknife
, 1 week ago

Great lyrics and performance! Really had a good laugh while I am indeed hibernating at home with a lowering supply of toilet rolls hahaha.

[Feb 27, 2020] Will A Face Mask Really Protect You From The Coronavirus

Mask in one thing, but decontamination protocol after wearing one is no less important.
Feb 27, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com
Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,

Health officials have been suggesting the use of face masks to prevent the spread and transmission of the coronavirus, which is quickly spreading around the globe. But the real question is do they really protect you from the virus?

The simple answer is yes, but efficacy is still not 100%. As masks sell out everywhere, it's time to understand what they do to help.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/5M7saVTtBQI

If you decide to use a face mask, choose a NIOSH-approved N100 mask because it protects the wearer by fully covering the mouth. An N100 mask will help prevent inhalation of 99.7% of airborne germs, which means they aren't a totally fail-proof method. N95 and N99 masks can also be effective. They are still your best bet IF you have a proper fit and it is not loose on the sides. Protection from debris and materials that are larger than 0.3 microns or greater can be achieved with both N100 and P100 respirators, as well as N95 and N99 respirators.

Since the general consensus has been that the coronavirus is expelled from an infected person and remains on dust particles and water droplets in the air, these can be effective at preventing the inhalation of infected debris as long as the fit is correct.

Also, it's important to note that the "N" designation means that these respirators are not resistant to oil. The "P" indicates that a P100 respirator is oil proof, meaning it should also work, but may cost you a bit more. If that's all you can find , however, it could boost your chances of not getting sick. But again, the mask needs to fit correctly and that cannot be stressed enough.

Don't just use a mask and expect that to be enough either. Even if it's properly worn, it's only about 80% effective, according to doctors. Take the same precautions you would with the flu. Avoid public places and crowds, stay at least six feet away from others, and cover your cough or sneeze. Wash your hands well and sanitize the surfaces of your home frequently ( bleach works wel l and it's inexpensive), especially those often touched. Teach your children proper handwashing techniques and send them to school with hand sanitizer. Practice good hygiene and make sure you do the best you can to keep your immune system running on all cylinders.

If this becomes a pandemic, you'll want to make sure you have stored extra food and water to keep from having to go to the grocery store often.

Prep For Cold & Flu Season: How To Boost Your Immune System Naturally

5 Easy Ways To Boost Your Immune System Naturally During Cold And Flu Season

Eat right , avoid too much stress, avoid overconsumption of alcohol and nicotine , and get an adequate amount of sleep to help your immune system stay on track. The coronavirus seems to be more deadly to those with a less effective immune system, such as the elderly .

Best Immune System-Boosting Foods To Get You Through Flu Season

The best way to beat the coronavirus is to not get it and not spread it. lay_arrow


BobPaulson , 2 minutes ago

The .gov advice to people on this drives me into a rage. All over the place, you see guys like HuffPo saying "masks don't fully protect you, so we don't recommend them", then in the same article they say the masks reduce transmission 70-80%!!! That is a massive improvement, what the hell are all these news media up to all saying "they aren't perfect, so don't use them". Can you imagine if they said that for condoms?

The point is they are more concerned with behaviour control (trying to stop mask hording or facial recognition jamming) than letting helpful information into the public. It will kill people.

Agent P , 12 minutes ago

It's a line of defense, not guaranteed protection. I wouldn't never discourage using a line of defense. Besides, if someone is infected and wears a mask, it helps prevent spreading the virus, so I say mask up, bitchez!

Daddy Cool , 25 minutes ago

Face masks work. Any person working in a hospital in the US is required to receive an injection of a flu vaccine every year (originally mandated by Obamacare) even though face masks are proven to ward against the flu much better than a vaccine that doesn't work half the time. Since the flu vaccine became a requirement for healthcare workers the drug companies profits for the flu vaccine are up over 1000%. Not to mention the toxins the flu vaccine still contains even though they say it's perfectly safe.

E5 , 24 minutes ago

AND a decontamination protocol when you enter your home...

accept it. You and your family are going to catch this.

I am more concerned this will have the second bloom that SARS (it is SARS) has. It will kill the children.

of course the idea that that 30% HIV genome actually leaves survivors with HIV is unnerving

[Feb 26, 2020] Studying the mortality stats, at first glance, this looks like a sound chemical attempt to resolve the pension fund crisis

Paraphrasing Chomsky: When the press focuses on the health status of the population reach for your pocket, and see who's pulling out your wallet.
Feb 26, 2020 | off-guardian.org

Tim Jenkins ,

Oh well, studying the stats, at first glance, this looks like a sound chemical attempt to resolve the pension fund crisis

Excuse the skeptic, now withdrawing gracefully.

Gall ,

If I was being cynical I'd agree.

RobG ,

Many people are speculating that this coronavirus malarky is all about the coming global financial meltdown.

The way coronavirus is being mega fear hyped, along with unprecedented 'lock-downs' and enforced quarantine for huge numbers of people, does seem to suggest that the psychopaths who rule us know that when the global financial meltdown comes there'll be mega civil unrest, and what better way to control this unrest than a Frankenstein bug?

[Feb 26, 2020] No Weapon Left Behind The American Hybrid War on China by Pepe Escobar

Coronarovis is an indiscriminate tool. That exclude using it as a weapon, as boomerang tends to return. But propaganda campaign against China unleashed is a very real.
Also what is about the fact that the pandemic if occurs will crash the entire capitalist system worldwide?
Feb 26, 2020 | www.unz.com

Branding BRI as a "pandemic"

As the usual suspects fret over the "stability" of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Xi Jinping administration, the fact is the Beijing leadership has had to deal with an accumulation of extremely severe issues: a swine-flu epidemic killing half the stock; the Trump-concocted trade war; Huawei accused of racketeering and about to be prevented from buying U.S. made chips; bird flu; coronavirus virtually shutting down half of China.

Add to it the incessant United States government Hybrid War propaganda barrage, trespassed by acute Sinophobia; everyone from sociopathic "officials" to self-titled councilors are either advising corporate businesses to divert global supply chains out of China or concocting outright calls for regime change – with every possible demonization in between.

There are no holds barred in the all-out offensive to kick the Chinese government while it's down.

A Pentagon cipher at the Munich Security Conference once again declares China as the greatest threat , economically and militarily, to the U.S. – and by extension the West, forcing a wobbly EU already subordinated to NATO to be subservient to Washington on this remixed Cold War 2.0.

The whole U.S. corporate media complex repeats to exhaustion that Beijing is "lying" and losing control. Descending to sub-gutter, racist levels, hacks even accuse BRI itself of being a pandemic , with China "impossible to quarantine".

All that is quite rich, to say the least, oozing from lavishly rewarded slaves of an unscrupulous, monopolistic, extractive, destructive, depraved, lawless oligarchy which uses debt offensively to boost their unlimited wealth and power while the lowly U.S. and global masses use debt defensively to barely survive. As Thomas Piketty has conclusively shown, inequality always relies on ideology.

We're deep into a vicious intel war. From the point of view of Chinese intelligence, the current toxic cocktail simply cannot be attributed to just a random series of coincidences. Beijing has serial motives to piece this extraordinary chain of events as part of a coordinated Hybrid War, Full Spectrum Dominance attack on China.

Enter the Dragon Killer working hypothesis: a bio-weapon attack capable of causing immense economic damage but protected by plausible deniability. The only possible move by the "indispensable nation" on the New Great Game chessboard, considering that the U.S. cannot win a conventional war on China, and cannot win a nuclear war on China.

A biological warfare weapon?

On the surface, coronavirus is a dream bio-weapon for those fixated on wreaking havoc across China and praying for regime change. Yet it's complicated. This report is a decent effort trying to track the origins of coronavirus. Now compare it with the insights by Dr. Francis Boyle, international law professor at the University of Illinois and author, among others, of Biowarfare and Terrorism . He's the man who drafted the U.S. Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989 signed into law by George H. W. Bush.

Dr. Boyle is convinced coronavirus is an "offensive biological warfare weapon" that leaped out of the Wuhan BSL-4 laboratory, although he's "not saying it was done deliberately."

Dr. Boyle adds, "all these BSL-4 labs by United States, Europe, Russia, China, Israel are all there to research, develop, test biological warfare agents. There's really no legitimate scientific reason to have BSL-4 labs." His own research led to a whopping $100 billion, by 2015, spent by the United States government on bio-warfare research: "We have well over 13,000 alleged life science scientists testing biological weapons here in the United States. Actually this goes back and it even precedes 9/11."

Dr. Boyle directly accuses "the Chinese government under Xi and his comrades" of a cover up "from the get-go. The first reported case was December 1, so they'd been sitting on this until they couldn't anymore. And everything they're telling you is a lie. It's propaganda."

The World Health Organization (WHO), for Dr. Boyle, is also on it: "They've approved many of these BSL-4 labs ( ) Can't trust anything the WHO says because they're all bought and paid for by Big Pharma and they work in cahoots with the CDC, which is the United States government, they work in cahoots with Fort Detrick ." Fort Detrick, now a cutting-edge bio-warfare lab, previously was a notorious CIA den of mind control "experiments".

ORDER IT NOW

Relying on decades of research in bio-warfare, the U.S. Deep State is totally familiar with all bio-weapon overtones. From Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki to Korea, Vietnam and Fallujah, the historical record shows the United States government does not blink when it comes to unleashing weapons of mass destruction on innocent civilians.

For its part, the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) has spent a fortune researching bats, coronaviruses and gene-editing bio-weapons. Now, conveniently – as if this was a form of divine intervention – DARPA's "strategic allies" have been chosen to develop a genetic vaccine.

The 1996 neocon Bible, the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), unambiguously stated, "advanced forms of biological warfare that can "target" specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."

There's no question coronavirus, so far, has been a Heaven-sent politically useful tool, reaching, with minimum investment, the desired targets of maximized U.S. global power – even if fleetingly, enhanced by a non-stop propaganda offensive – and China relatively isolated with its economy semi paralyzed.

Yet perspective is in order. The CDC estimated that up to 42.9 million people got sick during the 2018-2019 flu season in the U.S. No less than 647,000 people were hospitalized. And 61,200 died.

This report details the Chinese "people's war" against coronavirus. It's up to Chinese virologists to decode its arguably synthetic origin. How China reacts, depending on the findings, will have earth-shattering consequences – literally.

Setting the stage for the Raging Twenties

After managing to reroute trade supply chains across Eurasia to its own advantage and hollow out the Heartland, American – and subordinated Western – elites are now staring into a void. And the void is staring back. A "West" ruled by the U.S. is now faced with irrelevance. BRI is in the process of reversing at least two centuries of Western dominance.

There's no way the West and especially the "system leader" U.S. will allow it. It all started with dirty ops stirring trouble across the periphery of Eurasia – from Ukraine to Syria to Myanmar.


TG , says: Show Comment February 22, 2020 at 5:41 pm GMT

I would believe anything of the US government, but: that they are capable of actually carrying out such a fiendish plot? I doubt their competence as much as I know their corruption.

As far as escaping from a lab, I work in science, and I can say with certainty: these biosafety labs are leaky. Human beings simply cannot maintain the required safety protocols without a single lapse for years/decades, it can't be done. So if China had such a virus in a lab in Wuhan, it is very plausible that it would escape into the general population.

Side note : all countries keep putting their labs with dangerous pathogens in the middle of big cities. It makes it easier to staff them with qualified people, but it's BLOODY MADNESS. For example, after 9/11, a concerned US congress decided to fund the construction of new research centers with hazardous organisms in dozens of major cities all over the country. I feel safer already

And finally: if this was indeed a US plot, as usual they have shot themselves in the foot. Remember: the US elites have (treasonously) shifted the bulk of US manufacturing to China. If this virus really hammers China's economy, it will also hammer the US economy, because of all those US-owned factories in China. And don't forget that China is the source of most of the pharmaceutical the US uses

At this point, shutting down trade with China would hurt the US elites more than it would hurt China.

clickkid , says: Show Comment February 22, 2020 at 10:46 pm GMT
China's strengths – especially in this situation;

Strong political will of the central authority.

Ability of that authority to declare something to be an absolute priority and then direct resources to it.

Chinese culture values social responsibility higher than individual rights.

China is actually a nation. Genetically related oeople with a common story, a common identity, going back 5000 years. America, by contrast,, is a collection of individuals from all over the world who just happen to live in the same legal jurisdiction.

follyofwar , says: Show Comment February 23, 2020 at 2:50 am GMT
@clickkid Escobar's essay is not that different from that of Metallicman, published on this site only a week or so ago. If some American madmen are behind this Coronavirus pandemic, and I pray they are not, there will be global war. No doubt Chinese leadership is planning its retribution even as I write.
Biff , says: Show Comment February 23, 2020 at 9:21 am GMT

The whole U.S. corporate media complex repeats to exhaustion that Beijing is "lying" and losing control.

It's a numbers game – the only need a majority of the American public to believe their medium then they are winning.

But the big war is yet to be decided

The_seventh_shape , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 11:12 am GMT
@Jason Liu China is totally backward when it comes to propaganda and isn't able to compete with the US's/West's devilishly sophisticated propaganda machine. CGTN pales by comparison with Russia's RT and is often like watching the BBC. They use the crude tool of censorship instead of a more sophisticated offensive strategy like Russia does with RT, trying to get its version of events across to people in the West. It's a major strategic weakness. East Asian's supposed deficits in 'verbal intelligence' seem to hold them back in this domain.
Tony Hall , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 11:30 am GMT
@Just Passing Through @ Just Passing Through.

First case detected on Dec. 1st. That doesn't say when the infection started. Another factor here is that the period between contracting the virus and its becoming symptomatic and detectable is sometimes 30 days, not two weeks. The long and short of it is that the delay between the timing of the games and the timing of the identification of the early cases of COVID-19 fits very well the scenario of USA as source. Its circumstantial of course. The time argument doesn't on its own prove the US did it.

The other long and short of it is that the public is being messed with by all the obfuscation on where the disease comes from. When someone disagrees, the biggest serial liar media offenders often just say "conspiracy theorist," as if this cliche actually explains something. Of course there are laws and a UN Convention prohibiting preparation for biological warfare so no national government is likely to volunteer it has been breaking the law, not China or not US.

There is lots on record to suggest US actually does biological warfare, not just studies it. The evidence is considerable, for instance, that the US government was behind the bioweapon attack on Congress in Oct. of 2001 in order to clear aside the resistance of Senators Leahy and Daschle to the passage of the Patriot Act. Of this phenomenon Prof. Francis Boyle has commented

"The Pentagon and the C.I.A. are ready, willing, and able to launch biowarfare when it suits their interests. They already attacked the American People and Congress and disabled our Republic with super-weapons-grade anthrax in October 2001."

https://worldbeyondwar.org/boyle-charges-u-s-germ-warfare-program-is-criminal-enterprise/

Prof. Boyle has put the anthrax attacks in the context of the 9/11 psy op as follows:

"Could the real culprits behind the terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001, and the immediately-following terrorist anthrax attacks upon Congress ultimately prove to be the same people? Could it truly be coincidental that two of the primary intended victims of the terrorist anthrax attacks – Senators Daschle and Leahy – were holding up the speedy passage of the pre-planned USA Patriot Act an act which provided the federal government with unprecedented powers in relation to US citizens and institutions?"

http://patriotsquestion911.com/professors.html#Boyle

P. McSorley , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 1:11 pm GMT
@Ghali

I like to disagree with one important point in the article. Dr Boyle statement that the CoronaVirus "leaped out of the Wuhan BSL-4 laboratory" is an anti-China propaganda. Evidence ( posted on UNZ and elsewhere) show that the U.S. is the most likely source of the Virus.
Yes, it is a Biological warfare weapon introduced by the U.S. in a very important time of the year. China was very careful and open about its efforts to contain the Virus. China managed very well to stop its spread, never mind the few tourists who left China taking the Virus with them

Dean Koontz had it all figured out in his 1981 novel, The Eyes of Darkness . Like in 3 Days of the Condor I believe the CIA read novels to get ideas.

Lol , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 1:32 pm GMT
@Alfred The elderly in other cultures aren't just geriatric fools who expect respect and feel entitled to loot their children for the great job they did at ruining their countries with debt and immigration.

The respect for the elderly mantra exists only within cultures with high mortalities where being old was hard. Stop complaining like an easy woman wanting the respect studly men get. All you did to get to your age was breathe longer than the rest of us.

And writers don't have the onus to educate their readership. Only bad writers feel the need to explain everything so that senile idiots won't feel excluded. Good writers focus on the flow of ideas.

And you'd know that if you'd have published any academic article where prior knowledge is implied and documentation for prior ideas is provided.

FYI, anybody with at least two functioning neurons would have told the correct PPP is the first Google result from the context in which it was used.

Jake , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 2:31 pm GMT
@TG You have nailed why US globalist economic policy is not merely stupid; it is akin to treason.

And then there's this – "China largely beats the U.S. on patent filings and produces at least 8 times as many STEM graduates a year than the U.S., earning the status of top contributor to global science."

The US wastes fortunes bribing girls to go into STEM, and trying to find any smart Numinous Negroes to follow suit.

Just Passing Through , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 2:38 pm GMT
@Rollmop Global White identity only exists in the minds of Americans as America was in its early days a pan-European project. In Europe the nationalists are still involved in their little squabbles with eachother.
Old and grumpy , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 2:40 pm GMT
The US government works for the multinational corporations. Their supply lines are drying up due to China's shutdown. For instance 97% of American antibiotics come from China. P&G has issued a statement all their products are being impacted. American car makers are having part problems. So if this is a war act, its really an act of stupidity on the deep state's part. Or maybe China took the hit of offing some old folks to sink the U.S.? Prof Boyle suggested on Alex Jones this could be bioweapon to attack Russia to kill off Russians for much needed real estate. It's Infowars, but Russia did shut the border fairly quickly.

Personally I think these all labs are in cahoots with each other. They are employed by the one precent-transhumanist crowd, and working on some weird stuff to kill us off. China just did what China does, cut some corners. Oops!

Alfred , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 3:07 pm GMT
@P. McSorley I believe the CIA read novels to get ideas.

Brilliant. I agree. The CIA gets ideas from novels.

They also use novels and movies to exaggerate their own prowess and successes. I once tried to read a fat novel by Tom Clancy with that character Jack Ryan. Stomach churning stuff. I couldn't read more than a few pages. My American nephews loved it.

The Russians have a very simple way of finding out who is CIA at any embassy. They look at what sort of car the guy drives and where he lives and whether he keeps a mistress. Since they earn a lot more than real diplomats, they always give themselves away. They just cannot keep away from the toys.

AaronB , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 3:58 pm GMT
@Jason Liu Its not exactly lets trade and leave each other alone.

Its warfare according to a different set of rules. In ancient times China was divided into many small states, like in Europe, who were constantly at war with each. Like in Europe, these wars were extremely vicious, cruel, and self-destructive. Like in Europe, there seemed no way out of the cycle of aggression. It seemed that humanity must eventually destroy itself and have no future.

The best Chinese minds of the time tried to figure out a way out. Lao Tzu thought the solution was "inaction" – non-response to aggression. Sun Tzu developed this theme – he didn't think aggression could be entirely avoided, but he tried to develop means of warfare that relied on deception, illusion, managing appearance, and using the minimum of effective force only when necessary.

In the Chinese rules of war, in order to avoid destructive mass bloodshed that might destroy humanity, aggression is channeled into deceptive practices. In this system, you're allowed to steal technology, deceive, bend the rules, gain illicit influence, etc – this isn't supposed to lead to actual war. If you get caught, some kind if negotiation is supposed to settle the matter.

Now, this system is very wise – it accepts realistically that human aggression is regrettably not going away, and it tries to channel it into less destructive forms.

The problem is that today it is clashing with the European based system, which is based on different principles. Europe faced the exact same problem China did – extremely destructive warfare between small states with no end in sight, seemingly leaving no future for humanity.

But Europe developed a different answer – a rules-based system where you aren't allowed to cheat at all. Aggressive tendencies are supposed to be channeled into competition within a set of clearly defined rules, like a sports match – where cheating ruins the whole point of the competition and actually demonstrates the opposite of dominance and success.

A necessary element of the European system was the suppression of national pride, which left unchecked quickly leads to warfare. In the Chinese system, however, national pride doesn't need to be suppressed, just the manner of fighting has to be channeled by tacit agreement.

So we are dealing with two clashing systems designed to deal with the exact same problem – and it's tragic because really both sides want to have a system that limits and channels aggression a way from self destructive forms, but are going about it in opposite ways.

I guess that will lead to aggression and war – and from the ashes a new system will develop that everyone agrees on. Or the clash of the two systems will create some sort of hybrid.

SolontoCroesus , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 4:28 pm GMT
@P. McSorley

Like in 3 Days of the Condor I believe the CIA read novels to get ideas.

I believe you have the concept not exactly backward but inside-out: novelists like Koontz, Baldacci, Silva, Thor, Meltzer, David Ignatius -- a raft of others who have made it to NYTimes best seller status, are (I speculate) on some US department payroll to prepare or socially engineer the public to begin to perceive as normal and acceptable things like assassinations (i.e. Daniel Silva's plot lines parallel Ronen Bergman, Rise and Kill First);
infiltrating other nation's universities, research labs to turn scientists into traitor-spies for USA (David Ignatius -- The Increment, Quantum Spy);
Almost everything Baldacci writes is "ripped from the headlines" of the latest foreign policy scandal -- sometimes even before the headlines become headlines.

USA has been doing this at least since WWI.

Public libraries in the US are a major outlet for US government propaganda pumped out in collaboration with major publishing firms.
Public libraries spend hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of dollars -- tax payer dollars– on these pop culture novels -- far more than is spent on balanced coverage of US wars.

I was still young and innocent when I started to notice that the bad guy, either the main bad guy or at very least some ancillary bad actor is German, Iranian, Italian, Arab. If Nazis/Holocaust/Hitler/white supremacists are not mentioned in one of these NYTimes best seller-dude's books it's a rarity.
There was never a Jewish villain in these pop novels: the Jewish character was always benign, kindly, a victim, or a helper, but never an evil doer.
Then -- face palm: NYTimes best seller. You know, where you'd find David Irving, and Carlo Mattogno and Arthur Butz -- that NYTimes.

John B. Hench's Books as Weapons: Propaganda, Publishing, and the Battle for Global Markets in the Era of World War II is an eye-opener, disturbingly so: Hench is retired VP of the American Antiquarian Society -- a harmless, maybe dotty old man, right?
Wrong.
I've come to think of Hench as a depraved warmonger, one step removed from a neocon who applauds as Germany and Western Europe were raped of their own culture while American publishing houses raced to fill the vacuum with their ideas -- and revenue-generators– of what Europeans and the rest of the world ought to read and think and believe.

AaronB , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 5:05 pm GMT
@denk Part of the reason the Western rules based system is breaking down today is in response to the challenge of a China playing by a different set of rules.

As I said, I don't think China is a chaotic or malicious actor – they are just playing the eternal game of human aggression and competition by a different set of rules that Chinese culture developed in order to avoid endless warfare and guarantee humanity a future.

It is hard for Westerners to grasp, but in its own way when China steals technology and uses deceptive trade practices it is as noble as when the West competes within clear, rigid rules that leaves many people as losers and with harsh, bleak lives.

From one perspective, the Western system of fair play based on rigid rules is extremely inhumane and harsh, creating as it does so many broken lives and losers, despite being "fair" and "honest". From another perspective, the Chinese system is manifestly dishonest and unfair, despite being based on the noble desire to avoid the immense suffering caused by endless warfare.

The problem is human aggression – as long as you accept that human aggression has a place in life, you must accommodate immorality in some form. The question then becomes which is is the least damaging form that leaves most space for human goodness, and different cultures answer this differently – and now two different answers, both based on good intentions, are clashing.

Practical moral philosophy must, at least in the foreground, be based on mitigating aggression rather than eliminating it. That is the most moral stance one can take in practical philosophy.

FvS , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 5:09 pm GMT
@clickkid Just watch videos from China of their lackadaisical approach to workplace safety, their driving habits, or their escalator/elevator maintenance standards, and one will begin to see why human error is a very real possibility in this situation. China may use fancy infrastructure projects to maintain a facade of modernity, but they're not all the way there yet.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_safety_incidents_in_China
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-food-safety-idUSKBN14D046
Omegabooks , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 5:10 pm GMT
When some actual eyewitness who was actually there in whatever lab developing whatever bio-weapon and knows actually what was done with it and who did it, when, where, how, why comes forward to a trustworthy media source right, all three of them to actually tell the truth about all this, let me know. Because right now I trust absolutely no media source on this: MSM, alt-left, alt-right, alt-whatever. It's all opinion or forced-fake news, IMHO, to line someone's or some group's pocket.

Bash this all you want I do not care.

denk , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 5:23 pm GMT
@AaronB Economic hit man,
Regime change,
Assassinations,
Bombings,
R2p[lunder],
War of terror

due to the Chinese 'challenge' ?

Tor597 , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 6:15 pm GMT
@AaronB You're not allowed to cheat in the European system? Lol what kind of nonsense is that? That is not reflective of Euroculture.

Just look at Italy with its mafia or France with its massive corruption.

You can say that about Anglos with its attempt at the rule of law, but even that is deceptive as it was never universal and ended up as a means of one group to scalp another.

Tor597 , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 6:20 pm GMT
@AaronB The west rules bases system is breaking down because it was never legit to begin with.

From the beginning it was not universal. There were people it applied to and people it did not apply to.

In modern times, the west can only blame themselves for the collapse. The wests voracious appetite to have something for nothing is breaking down because it is running out of people to colonize and stronger countries like China, Russia, and Iran are fighting back.

CanSpeccy , says: Website Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 6:22 pm GMT
@animalogic

But, it is passing strange that China has had so many viral "problems" over a relatively short period of time.

Not so.

A huge rural population living in close proximity with pigs, chickens and fish (raised in ponds and paddies), all harboring viruses or other agents capable of transmission to humans, with much coming and going between urban and rural populations by means of China's magnificent new roads and railways, China is a natural spawning ground for novel human pathogens. And China has been spawning novel human pathogens since at least the Fourteenth-Century Black death.

CanSpeccy , says: Website Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 6:35 pm GMT
@utu

The Epoch Times is CIA/Falun Gong operation.

What is a "CIA/Falun Gong operation"? Are you saying the CIA created Falun Gong, or they infiltrated it, or that Falun Gong infiltrated the CIA, or what? And what's the evidence for this relationship, whatever it is?

AaronB , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 6:50 pm GMT
@Tor597 Sure, but no system is perfectly followed. There are always infractions, some bad actors, subverters, lapses, and loopholes.

The same can be said about China's system – it didn't always prevent bloodshed and war, and was often imperfectly followed. Revolutions were not uncommon.

But both systems worked fairly well for decent lengths of time. Although the West's system is post WW2, so its hard to say how it would have stacked up in the long run.

The important thing is to realize these systems both have a moral logic to them – they are serious and noteworthy works of practical moral philosophy.

Perhaps today, as in many areas, better systems can be designed that combine elements from both traditions. Christianity has instilled in the West a basic aversion to deception – this isn't the place to discuss the metaphysical assumptions that this is based on, but suffice it to say the East has always thought deception can be moral in certain uses – for instance, Buddhism developed the notion of "upaya" (skillful means), where a statement may not be strictly true but may be a relative truth that has a legitimate use in advancing spiritual growth. This is based on very different metaphysical assumptions about the nature of reality – basically, that everything revealed to us by our senses and mind are only relative truth anyways.

Now, of course I am not saying that the West doesn't engage in deception – of course it does. But Western moral philosophers are reluctant to make deception part of a moral system – failing to realize that a system of honest competition may be very harsh and inhumane on those it leaves behind, and ultimately lead to bloodshed and war.

By contrast Sun Tzu, who more than just a brilliant strategist was a great moral philosopher whose main concern was preventing the immense suffering and bloodshed involved in war, recognized the moral uses of deception. In the West, only Machiavelli recognized the potential moral dimension of deception.

CanSpeccy , says: Website Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 6:55 pm GMT
Escobar is a lively writer and sometimes says something I didn't know. But this is just boiler plate, Unzite, paranoid, anti-American, drivel. I started making a note of the crazy, unsupported assertions, such as:

From the point of view of Chinese intelligence, the current toxic cocktail simply cannot be attributed to just a random series of coincidences.

the incessant United States government Hybrid War propaganda barrage, trespassed by acute Sinophobia

everyone from sociopathic "officials" to self-titled councilors are either advising corporate businesses to divert global supply chains out of China or concocting outright calls for regime change

There are no holds barred in the all-out offensive to kick the Chinese government while it's down.

Until I realized I'd have to note almost the entire article.

What's more, with one or two possible exceptions, no one here know's nuthin' more than Escobar, and it is likely, given the general obscurity of complex biological events, that the world never will know how the current China-originated viral pathogen emerged.

But since almost everyone's bullshitting, here's my theory. The novel corona virus is particularly deadly to old folks, while it manifests as little more than a cold in the young. Thus, Trump and Xi plotted together to release this virus to rectify China's demographic problem, and America's too: an aging population. Thus will Social Security in America be saved: by getting rid of the most expensive recipients.

Anon [248] Disclaimer , says: Website Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 7:09 pm GMT
@AaronB I think that a lot of your general thesis is correct.

However, I do not think that wars leave no future for "humanity."

European countries fought many wars from the Middle Ages all through to the Mid 20th century, and yet, their populations grew.

Having a war every 20 years that kills 10% of the young men still does not greatly affect your population's prospects. I believe that most warrior nations understand and accept this. I believe that MOST white people understand and accept this.

But European violence and patriotism did threaten other groups. (You are Jewish, right?) warring Europeans might threatens certain other groups' survival, such as Jews and maybe native Americans (although it seems *relatively* few Americans were actually murdered by whites).

The peaceful, globalized world actually is far more threatening to the survival of the Western man than were the days of war. We are headed down a path where, in 150 years, whites will be a tiny minority of every Western city. Racial amalgamation will leave few whites in US, Canada, UK, France, (maybe) N. European countries, by 300 years, except for "rural backwaters," to use the terminology of the anti-alt-right intellectual Eric Kaufman.

War neurosis – the extreme commitments we must make to end all wars – is genociding us. War is preferable to genocide.

The Wild Geese Howard , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 7:38 pm GMT
@P. McSorley

Dean Koontz had it all figured out in his 1981 novel, The Eyes of Darkness.

For the curious, this book is not worth your time. I wasted a few hours reading it last weekend.

The Wuhan-400 virus is simply a MacGuffin to sew things up neatly at the end.

The plot is very linear and the protagonists are the embodiment Gary Stu/Mary Sue. The tone of the novel is more young adult than anything else.

The final chapters are nothing but an endless stream of deus ex machina events on the way to the neat and tidy conclusion.

AaronB , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 8:04 pm GMT
@Anon Sure, endemic small scale war isn't a threat to civilization. It can even be fun and healthy, for those inclined. This is a kind of limited war, often fought according to limiting rules – chivalry was one such system. Trying excessively to eliminate this kind of thing can do more harm than good, I agree.

But there is a kind of total war that becomes extremely vicious and destructive and which is felt as so horrific and threatening to civilization that it becomes a "problem" to be solved.

In Europe, the Wars of Religion were such an episode, and the Thirty Years War in Germany – which reduced the population by an incredible 30% and left in its wake depopulated villages inhabited by wolves – was a representative sample. This inspired strenuous efforts by thinkers in Europe to find a solution to what was seen as qualitatively different than previous wars. From this was born many key elements of the modern liberal order, such as religious tolerance, free speech, compromise, a commitment to reasonableness, etc.

WW1 of course was the next such episode, and inspired the further development of ideas that mitigate the ferocity of total war – like anti-nationalism, which was thought to be a massive contributing factor to Europe's self-immolation, and the League of Nations.

Now, I do take your point that solutions have to be found that are not worse than the disease, but the problem is a very grave one for humanity – especially now with nuclear weapons.

Please not, I am not recommending the abolishment of war, i.e human aggression and competition. That would be impossibly utopian. So competition and aggression are a given – what is the best way to mitigate it?

The recent Western way of extreme anti-nationalism coupled with total competition within transparent rules that leave no sympathy for the losers is, as I mentioned, a sub-optimal system.

Anonymous [324] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 8:05 pm GMT
@Sean

Whether or not the United States has the knowhow and the will, I just don't think the relevant part of the US elite have the moral courage to do it.

Sean, you comment frequently on China, especially on the growing rivalry between the US and China. It seems like every other day or so you make a comment on this. Furthermore, you often claim in these comments that because of China's economic growth and its potential to become economically larger than the US, the US will in the very near future engage in military action to curb China's economic growth.

Given the fact that US military action against China would be far more dangerous, risky, and destabilizing, and potentially risk a world war and nuclear war, why do you think that it's a near inevitability that military action and war against China will be undertaken by the US elite in the near future to curb Chinese economic growth, but that a covert operation deploying a severe flu primarily harming older impaired people and mainly causing economic and political damage to China and disrupting its economic growth is somehow totally out of the realm of possibility?

Isn't military war and potentially risking world and nuclear war much riskier and requiring much more courage?

Tor597 , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 10:05 pm GMT
@AaronB Your perspective is heavily biased.

Basically, white people are high minded people trying to institute the rule of law and Asians are sneaky bastards trying to conceive their way through life. You have that perspective because you are white.

You say it worked for a very long time, but worked for whom? It didn't work for black people who were enslaved, nor for red people who were wiped out, nor for yellow people who were colonized, nor for poor white people who were also enslaved and genocides.

The people at the top, white Anglos in America, did well for awhile. But that does not make it moral.

If anything, what defines white people us this path of winner takes all where there is an elite that makes out but everyone else gets exploited.

Tor597 , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 10:10 pm GMT
@CanSpeccy It's not paranoid, PNAC literally mentions using bioweapons and how it is a useful tool. Plus Darpa has done a lot of research into Corona Virus as a weapon.

" combat likely will take place in new dimensions: in space, "cyber-space," and perhaps the world of microbes advanced forms of biological warfare that can "target" specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."

https://archive.org/details/RebuildingAmericasDefenses/page/n5/mode/2up

AaronB , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 10:50 pm GMT
@Tor597 I was trying to show how the so called rule of law can be harsh and inhumane, and how deception can be a way to channel aggression into more manageable forms.

I am trying to introduce nuance into the ordinary view.

Sean , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 11:00 pm GMT
@Anonymous First of all nuclear weapons are a deterrent to nuclear war, not conventional war, because the threat of an incredible action is not a credible deterrent. If a China mounts an offensive to take Vladivostok (to teach Russia a lesson) then Russia is going to fight conventionally. No one is going to start a nuclear war, although they all would retaliate to a nuclear first use.

Given the fact that US military action against China would be far more dangerous, risky, and destabilizing, and potentially risk a world war and nuclear war, why do you think that it's a near inevitability that military action and war against China will be undertaken by the US elite in the near future to curb Chinese economic growth, but that a covert operation deploying a severe flu primarily harming older impaired people and mainly causing economic and political damage to China and disrupting its economic growth is somehow totally out of the realm of possibility?

Clearly a a covert operation deploying a severe flu for causing economic damage to China is by no means an impossibility if it was the action of some tiny clique inside the Deep State. But they would have to be acting alone because as I tried to explain in the gist of mycommnet, the US elites are not like the Chinese elite , which is coelesed in the Chinese Communist Party. American elites as they have a plurality of interests; being Deep State, Wall St, political officials and elements of the executive and the economic elites are the most deeply invested in China. Even Trump is backing off the tariffs because he knows China cannot be taken down sharply without hurting the average person in the US.

This outbreak seems to be not very bioweapon like because it has not killed young people of many people. An actual bioweapon would be about as carefully guarded as nuclear weapons, which is very carefully indeed by special military police and with officers demanding triplicate countersigned before releasing them. For drone hitting that Iranian the officers asked to see the written order. The slightest slip up with protocols for nukes is the end of a officer's career. You cannot get them out their repositories without multiple top level authorisation, except in the movies.

Even if the scientists created such a bioweapon without asking questions as to the provenance of the order, it would be obvious to them it was intended to be used in peacetime to be releases and would necessarily kill innocent people and all over the world including America would not be handed over targeting Chinese would have to be the product of a very well funded program authorized by someone in authority. It would not be under the CIA, but a different institution. Dubious that the US even has the capacity to create a super flu, let alone one that that kills mainly Chinese and not too many of them. Much too obvious to just start an outbreak in China, and so the US Deep State would use Russia as a cat's paw if it was doing it.

The odds are that because of China's economic growth and its potential to become economically larger than the US, the US and China are fated to get into military pressure, possibly proxy war . However, the Chinese know that is best avoided while they are still in a vulnerable stage with an economy than needs to become more powerful. Once they are a strong as you know what they will act like it.

https://thediplomat.com/2012/03/godzilla-attacks/

Mearsheimer writes: "My theory of international politics says that the mightiest states attempt to establish hegemony in their own region while making sure that no rival great power dominates another region. The ultimate goal of every great power is to maximize its share of world power and eventually dominate the system." Because no power can truly make itself a global hegemon – resources are too finite, distances that attenuate power too great – the most any state can realistically hope to accomplish is to enforce its own rules in its geographic environs while keeping others from posing a serious extra-regional threat.

Trump is the worst thing that has happened to China and I really do not think he can be seen as part of one of the US's aforementioned elites. The Deep State hate Trump, and I think this is because they–still fixated on the Cold War–see Russia as the threat. That China is infiltrating and hollowing out the America is not something the Deep Staters worry about , apart from Gen (Ret) Rob Spalding who was forced out daring to talk about the issue

@robert_spalding
"In sum: Whoever rules the words rules the world. In the eyes of the CCP, the West's superior discourse power is an existential threat more imminent than the remote possibility of a foreign military invasion."

Anonymous [951] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 11:45 pm GMT

Even Trump is backing off the tariffs because he knows China cannot be taken down sharply without hurting the average person in the US.

This outbreak seems to be not very bioweapon like because it has not killed young people of many people.

It does not follow that just because an outbreak doesn't kill everybody that it cannot be a bioweapon. That's like saying the assassination of Soleimani couldn't have been a US drone strike because it didn't kill the rest of the Iranian military and government.

Trump is not "backing off the tariffs" on China. Most of the tariffs remain in place. The point of tariffs is to gradually reduce the US trade deficit with China and to slow down Chinese economic growth. It's not supposed to be a sharp dislocation that causes too much sudden pain to most average Americans. A putative bioweapon behind this outbreak would be similar in that it would not be too deadly and too much of a sudden escalation.

In the eyes of the CCP, the West's superior discourse power is an existential threat more imminent than the remote possibility of a foreign military invasion.

And we've been seeing this superior discourse power during the coverage of this outbreak, shaping perceptions and reality for people around the world. This discourse power is more powerful and a greater threat to China than the virus outbreak itself.

Anon [112] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 11:50 pm GMT
@Tor597 AaronB is not talking about the world of American slavery or European colonialism, he already told you that. If you read his comments, he is talking about what European countries began to do after the World Wars ("Although the West's system is post WW2").

He is talking about the post-colonial world of the UN, trade agreements, international law, etc. The world is not one of winner-take-all for white people anymore.

Also, I'm pretty sure that AaronB is Jewish, so he is not going to be too pro-white.

CanSpeccy , says: Website Show Comment February 26, 2020 at 11:52 pm GMT
@Tor597

It's not paranoid, PNAC literally mentions using bioweapons

Well obviously bioweapons exist for possible use, as with every other type of weapon.

But no war has been declared and there is no reason for a state of war to exist.

The US an China have a massive bilateral trade relationship by which both parties benefit. Why would either declare war or engage in surreptitious war against the other?

And why, if they intended to wage war, would the US use a biological weapon that would inevitably come back on them?

Your assumption is completely unsupported by real evidence and anyway makes no sense.

Tor597 , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 1:06 am GMT
@Anon That is an arbitrary point to argue. Post WW2 was not like an age of enlightenment for white people or anything.

During this stage white people still brutally colonized the rest of the world. See the Korean war, Vietnam War, Iraq War, assasinations, etc etc. This is actually a worse period for the rest of the world because it is when the west established itself as the most powerful, and used its power to establish hegemony throughout the world.

This was definitely not the period of the rule of law or some other nonsense.

By the way, it still is a winner take all world for white people. It's just that it's not for all white people. Only the whites at the very top benefit, while the poor non elite whites get harvested like everyone else.

Sebastian Hawks , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 1:09 am GMT
@Naill Well it bodes pretty well with my experience of Mainland Chinese. A decade back the unemployment office sent me over to a local business that I got hired on with, it is owned by a mainland Chinese dual citizen who reserves all the good positions for his nepotistic family hires, even making fake unnecessary positions for them, some even live in other states, check in on the computer once or twice a day and get a direct deposit paycheck. I've found them to be EXACTLY LIKE THE FERENGI ON STAR TREK. Whoever wrote those Ferengi episodes centering on Quark's Bar on Deep Space 9 must have had first hand experience with Mainland Chinese. Foul, selfish, offensive, cheap, and arrogant. They are also quite incompetent and peddle total junk that doesn't work. I can't believe the government lets this crap into the country, on Amazon and Ebay you can bypass the professional purchasing managers who know their craft in the brick and mortar stores. Now I know a whole lot of these online sellers at Amazon are really Mainland Chinese infesting our country peddling shoddy goods. The brothers at work joke and call it "fake ass shit" it's not outright counterfeits, just strange off brand knock offs with domestic Chinese consumer grade quality. They are also big liars, I don't believe a word they say.
Tor597 , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 1:13 am GMT
@CanSpeccy This is very easy to explain.

There is no official war declared, but we are in a new Cold War with China. This is obvious even though it is not stated directly. See the trade wars, war against Huawei, fight for control in Africa and the ME.

Both parties benefit from trade, but China more so. This is mainly because our banking system is parasitical and serves to extract wealth instead of creating wealth.

But never the less, the powers that be in America see the writing on the wall. If momentum Carrie's through as is, China will surpass the west and become too powerful to contain.

The real threat to America is the threat to dollar hegemony. At some point China could have an alternate to the dollar, and at that point America could not just print money. America would just be like any other country and have to earn wealth the hard way.

Biological warfare, especially one targetted by race, is pretty much the only card America had left to play. America could not win a conventional war. Neither could it win a nuclear war.

America could win a biowar, since there is plausible deniability and the intention was to wreck China while America was left unaffected.

Sean , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 1:15 am GMT
@Anonymous I think there are problems with thinking it is a bioweapon at all; much too specialised and asking scientist to develop something like that and then ordering it used by the CIA would be impossible. I don't think the people would obey orders because they would know they were illicit. A huge reason for doubting it is a bioweapon is it surely is beyond the state of the art at present. Even if it was not this is not the kind of thing that would be developed except for surreptitious peacetime use, as the scientist s commissioned to create it would understand. Moreover they would know too much in the aftermath, and knowingly be signing their own death warrant; they would not be left around to talk. Inasmuch it looks very like another of the Chinese bat origin flus, and is hitting immune compromised especially the old hardest, there is no compelling reason to think it it is anything but a naturally arisen disease.

It could be a incredibly sophisticated bioweapon, yet supposing that was true the Chinese (who are no fools and have their own scientists) would know that had been attacked and return the favour by tweaking it to kill Americans and releasing it in America, wouldn't they? And all that is assuming the original bioweapons scientists could know how lethal it would be. They would have to have tested it to gauge its lethality, and yet how it would spread in a city (speed of spread affects virulence) would be impossible to know with any degree of certainty. It could infect most of the world's population and kill orders of magnitude more people than projected quite easily. I think people tend to assume that secret services like 007's Q, have all kinds of capabilities far beyond current state of the art, and they are staffed with fanatics who are, without question comment or misgivings, willing to flush their life down the toilet just because some superior tells them to. Malevolence does not confer capability .

Anonymous [248] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 1:22 am GMT

There's still a lingering desire for "let's trade but leave each other alone". That's not gonna happen. It was never gonna happen. I hope they smarten up.

I don't think China is as naive as you think. Why is it that all our high schools are now teaching Chinese as a foreign language? Practically all the teachers are from China, paid for by the Chinese government. In addition, many of our colleges now have a "Confusion Institute", again paid for by the Chinese government. People of Chinese descent in the US, regardless of whether they are or were Chinese citizens, find the CCP mouthpiece China Daily mysteriously appearing in their driveway every Friday, unless they call some mysterious number to stop it. They get knocks on their doors from China people they've never met asking if they spoke Chinese.

The Chinese government has been secretly recruiting ethnic Chinese in the US to work on their behalf for years now. The US is playing a dangerous and stupid game. You cannot simultaneously launch a war against China and then continue to accept large numbers of citizens from that country into the US, giving them student visas, 10 year tourist visas, EB5 visas, work visas, green cards, citizenships. These people can only be loyal to China, no matter what passport they hold. If the US is to win this war, the first thing we need to do is repatriate every single Chinese citizen in this country, present and former. Send them packing or we will have the fifth columnists working against us from within.

Anon [260] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 1:33 am GMT
@CanSpeccy

The US an China have a massive bilateral trade relationship by which both parties benefit. Why would either declare war or engage in surreptitious war against the other?

And why, if they intended to wage war, would the US use a biological weapon that would inevitably come back on them?

Geopolitics is a zero-sum game. The more powerful country X becomes, the less powerful country Y does.

The more China trades with the US and other countries, the greater its economic growth, which translates to greater political and military power. The greater the Chinese political and military power, the lesser the power of the US in the zero-sum game of geopolitics.

The Trump administration and many in the US foreign policy establishment have said that the trade relationship with China, regardless of its economic benefits, is a problem because it supports Chinese economic growth, which then supports Chinese political and military power. The point of the tariffs and moving supply chains and production out of China is to reduce or slow down the Chinese economic growth which supports China's political and military power.

A bioweapon like this coronavirus in this context is the perfect weapon. It slows down China's economy and image as a trade partner around the world, promotes the movement of supply chains and production out of China and back into the US or into US allies, builds up political capital for China hawks who want greater decoupling from China and a more hostile stance towards it, and its collateral damage is relatively low such that even if it hits the US it will not be too devastating but like a severe flu outbreak.

This bioweapon needs to be seen as an alternative weapon, not as a military weapon whose efficacy is measured solely in terms of physical casualties. It's an economic, political, cultural, psychological weapon. It should be viewed as akin to tariffs, sanctions, media propaganda.

Remember that former Sec. of State Madeleine Albright responded affirmatively when she was asked if the sanctions against Iraq were "worth it" even if as it was estimated half a million children had died as a result of them. The human toll of those sanctions supported by the US against Iraq were far worse than this outbreak in China.

Anonymous [316] Disclaimer , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 2:12 am GMT
@Sean It's well established that this sort of research and development into bioweapons has been going on for decades in many countries.

Yes, retaliation would be bad, but if the possibility of retaliation were sufficient to prevent any kind of initiative, nothing would ever happen. Things do happen. Moreover, retaliation would accelerate decoupling and hostilities, which would not be unwelcome from the point of view of those who would choose to go down this road in the first place.

AaronB , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 2:15 am GMT
@Tor597

This was definitely not the period of the rule of law or some other nonsense.

Law does not mean benevolence – it means competition within certain limits, that are clear and transparent, that limits the level of aggression. It does not mean benevolence.

I did not suggest the West was acting in a benevolent manner – I suggested it devised a system of limits on aggression, a set of clear rules, for the purpose of preventing aggression from getting out of control. Within those limits, selfish aggression is permitted.

It is based on the idea that it is impossible to eliminate selfish aggression from the world, so the practical moralist tries to prevent it from getting too destructive.

So I wasn't idealizing the West. Morally, I do not see why brute force is better than cunning, although the person who excels at brute force may well wish to convince others of that.

Brute force and blunt confrontation may lead to devastating bloodshed, as the West discovered most recently in WW1 and 2 and China discovered in ancient times. Moving away from brute force and towards cunning may be a way to save lives.

I am not promoting this morality – no good person would act with cunning or force for selfish ends. It is certainly not a morality one should personally practice. I am saying that if we wish to constrain the most selfishly aggressive people in society, we have to accept their disposition as it is and try and push it into channels that will allow them to carry on their competition in wats that won't destroy civilization.

denk , says: Show Comment February 27, 2020 at 2:44 am GMT
@Alfred There's another one.
During the SARS1 attack, JOn Rapopport was one of my go to guy

He correctly identified SARS1 as an economic warfare against not only China, but Asia.

SARS AS ECONOMIC WARFARE

May 12. Toronto will suffer half a billion dollars worth of lost business. Economies in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and mainland China are taking heavy hits. Global airline $$ have fallen off.

Trade wars go on all the time, and the US versus Asia is no exception. The US CDC has pitched in to put a major crinkle in Asia's economies

http://whale.to/v/sars1.html

The current SARS2 [covid 19] is obviously the hot phase of Trump's economic blitzkrieg , just see how [[[they]]] are salivating for a economic melt down in China .[[[Gordon Chang]]] is finally vindicated LOL !

Yet Rapopport has gone full retard about 'a Chinese FF to cover up their smog and suppress their dissidents' !

Jeeze !
what happens to these people, have they
been doing limited hand out all these years in order to earn some street cred and they'r showing their true color now ???

[Feb 25, 2020] China was able to arrest the epidemic

See also https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
Feb 25, 2020 | www.unz.com

utu , says: Show Comment February 24, 2020 at 11:09 pm GMT

Official Figures February 24
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Coronavirus Cases: 79,774

Active cases: 51,873
Mild Condition 40,306 (78%)
Serious or Critical 11,567 (22%)

Resolved Cases: 27,901
Recovered 25,272 (91%)
Deaths 2,629 (9%)

See also the 'Daily Increase' plot at:

https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

that shows that for the last six days the number of 'New Recovered' cases is larger than 'New Confirmed' cases by a factor close to 2. This means that at least China was able to arrest the epidemic.

[Feb 25, 2020] Coronavirus Hysteria reaches tipping point by Catte Black

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... There currently 80,348 cases, or 0.000011% of the global population. Over 77,000 (97%) cases, and 2664 deaths (98%) are from China, and a large portion of those were "clinically diagnosed" (ie. untested). The 2707 deaths (allegedly) due to Coronavirus mean it has death rate of just 3.4%. (For cases outside China, that number drops to 1.6%) Conversely, over 40,000 cases are considered mild, and over 27,000 have been cured. ..."
"... Some (including US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo ) are claiming the disease is being under-reported by China (and Iran), and the panic is a response to much more alarming but hidden statistics. ..."
"... similar claims were made about SARS, Swine Flu and all the other non-event overhyped 'death bugs' we have been told about in recent times. ..."
"... At this stage, it might seem more likely that 'new CV' is just another one of these. The latest scare tactic being used to close down rational thinking in the world populace and normalise increased government control. ..."
"... coronavirus is definitely being used to spread and deepen Sinophobic hatred, by organisations of Evil like the villainous BBC. ..."
Feb 25, 2020 | off-guardian.org

In Hubei Province, China, where the 'new' virus was first diagnosed, and where the vast majority of the cases have occurred, it's no longer considered necessary to test for the presence of CV antibodies before diagnosing the disease.

Let's say that again.

The epicentre of the so-called new virus outbreak is currently diagnosing new cases of the disease without testing for the virus.

Instead they are relying on 'clinical diagnosis' , which is defined as [our emphasis]:

The estimated identification of the disease underlying a patient's complaints based merely on signs, symptoms and medical history of the patient rather than on laboratory examination or medical imaging.

Which means physicians look at presenting symptoms and make a guess on what is causing them.

Now if you're talking about something like Smallpox that option can make some sense – because Smallpox presents with one very distinct clinical feature – a recognisable rash – that makes it fairly easy to distinguish from other viral agents or other disease processes.

But the 'new' coronavirus does not do that. In fact, symptoms of the 'new' CV are exactly like symptoms of the numerous 'old' CVs, and indeed of the common cold or flu. Cough, fever, malaise, upper respiratory tract inflammation and (in severe cases) lung involvement – up to and including full-blown pneumonia.

The only way to differentiate a case of 'new' CV from severe regular flu, viral pneumonia or even environmental lung disease, is by testing for antibodies. If they aren't doing this, physicians in Hubei Province are now at grave risk of essentially diagnosing every single case of pneumonia or lung inflammation they see as the new CV.

Which goes quite a long way to explaining the sudden increase in cases [our emphasis]:

China's Hubei province reported an additional 242 deaths and 14,840 new cases as of Feb. 12 -- a sharp increase from the previous day. The province said it is starting to include "clinically diagnosed" cases in its figures and that 13,332 of the new cases fall under that classification .

By CNBC's figures, fully 89% of the "new cases" reported in Hubei province have never been tested for the virus .

According to Our World in Data , roughly 180,000 people die of pneumonia in China every year. Under this new system, all of those people could be diagnosed with coronavirus .

Further, "signs of pneumonia" don't have to be a sign of any disease at all. Pneumonic symptoms can come simply as the result of being exposed to a heavily polluted air , something very common in China's densely populated urban centres.

A major question here has to be – why? Why take a step that inevitably increases the number of false positives? Why intentionally inflate the apparent caseload? What rational benefit can there be in that?

Is it some form of hyper-caution? They would rather throw the net too wide than risk missing cases?

Or is it, as Jon Rappoport suggests , a cynical bid to drive up the numbers in pursuit of ever-valuable fear porn?

That this alleged outbreak is being used to promote fear as a backing for a number of control-based agendas is undeniable, and we have already pointed this out in previous articles (not to mention the financial aspect ). The simple truth is that the reality of this 'new' virus, even as defined by those promoting panic, does not merit the fear being sold to us on its behalf.

Here are some stats for you, compiled by Kit Knightly.

There currently 80,348 cases, or 0.000011% of the global population. Over 77,000 (97%) cases, and 2664 deaths (98%) are from China, and a large portion of those were "clinically diagnosed" (ie. untested). The 2707 deaths (allegedly) due to Coronavirus mean it has death rate of just 3.4%. (For cases outside China, that number drops to 1.6%) Conversely, over 40,000 cases are considered mild, and over 27,000 have been cured.

For the sake of further reassurance, study these tables:

<table omitted -- see the original for full text>

Essentially, unless you are either elderly or already sick, there's very little chance you are in danger.

On what rational basis can a disease with this profile possibly justify the government and media response worldwide? Are we really approaching a "tipping point" ? Does this sound like a "public health emergency" ?

Why is Italy going into lockdown and granting itself "emergency powers" based on seven deaths from a disease with a mortality rate about the same as severe regular flu ?

Why has the UK government granted itself similar powers based on a disease that has infected only 13 citizens, 8 of whom are already recovered ?

Why are hotels and cruise ships being quarantined?

Some (including US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo ) are claiming the disease is being under-reported by China (and Iran), and the panic is a response to much more alarming but hidden statistics.

Well, that is possible of course. But similar claims were made about SARS, Swine Flu and all the other non-event overhyped 'death bugs' we have been told about in recent times.

At this stage, it might seem more likely that 'new CV' is just another one of these. The latest scare tactic being used to close down rational thinking in the world populace and normalise increased government control.

That the Chinese government might be party to any such idea might seem unthinkable to those who like their geopolitics simple and binary, but can't be rationally excluded.

Time will tell of course. But if – as we consider overwhelmingly likely – this 'new' scare bug turns out to have been as overhyped as all the rest, maybe those panicking in our comments and elsewhere will learn a valuable lesson, and decline to play along with this particular sick little game next time?

[Feb 23, 2020] Intelligence agencies who invested hundred of millions in face recognition technology will not be happy

Feb 23, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Since Foxconn is getting into mask development, we're surprised Apple hasn't released plans for an iMask, or scheming Elon Musk hasn't touted a Cybermask.

To sum up, we could all be wearing masks one day – if you think that's crazy just look at what's happening across Asia. Mask wearing is coming to America – it's only a matter of time.

[Feb 23, 2020] The US Is World Leader In Bio-Weapons Research, Production, Use Against Mankind

This is mostly fear mongering as an affective bioengineered virus will create a pandemic, but the truth is that Anthrax false flag attack after 9/11 was not an accident...
Trump administration beahaves like a completely lawless gang (stealing Syrian oil is one example. Killing Soleimani is another ) , as for its behaviour on international arena, but I do not believe they go that far. Even for for such "ruptured" gangster as Pompeo
Notable quotes:
"... Consider that a deadly virus created by the U.S. and used against another country was found out and verified, and in retaliation, that country or others decided to strike back with other toxic agents against America. Where would this end, and over time, how many billions could be affected in such a scenario? ..."
"... "In vast laboratories in the Ministry of Peace, and in experimental stations, teams of experts are indefatigably at work searching for new and deadlier gases; or for soluble poisons capable of being produced in such quantities as to destroy the vegetation of whole continents; or for breeds of disease germs immunised against all possible antibodies." ..."
"... Additional notes: here , here , here , here , here and here . ..."
Feb 23, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

... ... ...

Interestingly, in the past, U.S. universities and NGOs went to China specifically to do illegal biological experimentation, and this was so egregious to Chinese officials, that forcible removal of these people was the result. Harvard University, one of the major players in this scandal, stole the DNA samples of hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens, left China with those samples, and continued illegal bio-research in the U.S. It is thought that the U.S. military, which puts a completely different spin on the conversation, had commissioned the research in China at the time. This is more than suspicious.

The U.S. has, according to this article at Global Research , had a massive biological warfare program since at least the early 1940s, but has used toxic agents against this country and others since the 1860s . This is no secret, regardless of the propaganda spread by the government and its partners in criminal bio-weapon research and production.

As of 1999, the U.S. government had deployed its Chemical and Biological Weapons (CBW) arsenal against the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Vietnam, China, North Korea, Laos, Cambodia, Cuba, Haitian boat people, and our neighbor Canada according to this article at Counter Punch . Of course, U.S. citizens have been used as guinea pigs many times as well, and exposed to toxic germ agents and deadly chemicals by government.

Keep in mind that this is a short list, as the U.S. is well known for also using proxies to spread its toxic chemicals and germ agents, such as happened in Iraq and Syria. Since 1999 there have been continued incidences of several different viruses, most of which are presumed to be manmade , including the current Coronavirus that is affecting China today.

There is also much evidence of the research and development of race-specific bio-warfare agents. This is very troubling. One would think, given the idiotic race arguments by post-modern Marxists, that this would consume the mainstream news, and any participants in these atrocious race-specific poisons would be outed at every level. That is not happening, but I believe it is due to obvious reasons, including government cover-up, hypocrisy at all levels, and leftist agenda driven objectives that would not gain ground with the exposure of this government-funded anti-race science.

I will say that it is not just the U.S. that is developing and producing bio-warfare agents and viruses, but many developed countries around the globe do so as well. But the United States, as is the case in every area of war and killing, is by far the world leader in its inhuman desire to be able to kill entire populations through biological and chemical warfare means. Because these agents are extremely dangerous and uncontrollable, and can spread wildly, the risk to not only isolated populations, but also the entire world is evident. Consider that a deadly virus created by the U.S. and used against another country was found out and verified, and in retaliation, that country or others decided to strike back with other toxic agents against America. Where would this end, and over time, how many billions could be affected in such a scenario?

All indications point to the fact that the most toxic, poisonous, and deadly viruses ever known are being created in labs around the world. In the U.S. think of Fort Detrick, Maryland, Pine Bluff Arsenal, Arkansas, Horn Island, Mississippi, Dugway Proving Ground, Utah, Vigo Ordinance Plant, Indiana, and many others. Think of the fascist partnerships between this government and the pharmaceutical industry. Think of the U.S. military installations positioned all around the globe. Nothing good can come from this, as it is not about finding cures for disease, or about discovering vaccines, but is done for one reason only, and that is for the purpose of bio-warfare for mass killing.

The drive to find biological weapons that will sicken and kill millions at a time is not only a travesty, but is beyond evil. This power is held by the few, but the potential victims of this madness include everyone on earth. How can such insanity at this level be allowed to continue? If any issue could ever unite the masses, governments participating in biological and germ warfare, race-specific killing, and creating viruses with the potential to affect disease and death worldwide, should cause many to stand together against it. The first step is to expose that governments, the most likely culprit being the U.S. government, are planting these viruses purposely to cause great harm. Once that is proven, the unbelievable risk to all will be known, and then people everywhere should put their divisiveness aside, stand together, and stop this assault on mankind.

"In vast laboratories in the Ministry of Peace, and in experimental stations, teams of experts are indefatigably at work searching for new and deadlier gases; or for soluble poisons capable of being produced in such quantities as to destroy the vegetation of whole continents; or for breeds of disease germs immunised against all possible antibodies." ~ George Orwell – 1984

Additional notes: here , here , here , here , here and here .

[Feb 23, 2020] Amazon.com Wein Minimate AS150MM Air Supply Minimate Personal Air Purifier Home Kitchen

Feb 23, 2020 | www.amazon.com

[Feb 22, 2020] Coronavirus - The Decline Of New Cases Continues - Economic Ripples Begin To Emerge

Looks like coronavirus means the start of economic recession...
Feb 22, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
vk , Feb 21 2020 18:10 utc | 7

... ... ...

It seems that Japan's feared bureaucracy has handled the issue without the advice from any specialist. Cruise ships are perfect to spread diseases. They have central air condition and central septic systems that can spread viruses to every room on board. There are many places on board which are commonly used. The crew is usually housed in less than perfect conditions. Any suspected cases should have been taken off board immediately. But these were simply told to stay in their cabins which they, of course, did not do.

The Japanese military has some troops working on the ship but they are only now taking protective measures which are still less than sufficient :

About 50 staffers from the Self-Defense Forces are working on the vessel to examine the passengers, disinfect cabins and transport patients. The ship was quarantined for two weeks off Yokohama on Feb. 5 to prevent COVID-19 from spreading in Japan.

Those handling medicine are now required to wear masks, gloves, gowns and hair caps, ministry officials said.

At a news conference, Kono admitted that the Defense Ministry applied the standards -- which are higher than those in use by health ministry officials working on the vessel -- after viewing a video from the ship posted by Dr. Kentaro Iwata of Kobe University Hospital, who joined the disaster-relief team as a veteran infectious disease specialist.

On Wednesday 500 Japanese passengers who had tested negative were let go from the ship without further measures. But many of them will carry the virus as more new confirmed cases from the ship still appear daily. These people should have been further isolated. Letting them leave without such measures guarantees that new outbreaks will soon appear throughout Japan.

This situation might have developed due to political pressure. Japan is supposed to hold the summer Olympics later this year and it may have wanted to avoid bad headlines. To me it seems that there will be no Olympics this year and that Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will soon hear some harsh public criticism .

Another big clusters established itself in Daegu, South Korea, where people from a Christian sect infected each other during mass. There are currently some 130 such cases and some 70 more spread elsewhere in South Korea.

Iran has a smaller cluster in Qom with 14 cases. It closed all schools and seminaries and suspended religious gatherings in the city. Other countries report single new cases or small clusters. This will continue as the disease races around the world. Large new outbreaks will appear in those many countries which have less than perfect medical systems or where the authorities want to suppress news of a smaller outbreak.

In the Ukraine rioters had to be brought under control when they protested against quarantining evacuees from China near their villages.

The economic ripple effect of this epidemic and of the enormous quarantine in China will be huge. It will be felt everywhere but especially in highly developed industries :

The impacts on China both intrinsic and psychological are still vastly under estimated. This is the largest containment/effective imprisonment via quarantine of human being in world history. People are assuming no ripples from that.

The biggest factor that's not understood is the non linearity of supply chains. A two week total shut down *does not* mean a two week delay in products to consumer. This is very different from the tariff impacts, where pricing was adjusted.

A single component missing in a 500+ part product means all levels of production are moot. Autos and consumer electronics are obvious examples. We have heard from multiple auto players and Jaguar has publicly stated they have sub 2 weeks of operating inventory.

Just In Time (JIT) production is a form of operational leverage. And like all forms of leverage, there is a non linear downside effect. People are not putting it together that this is a very big deal. It's not a 1 month hit. It's not a 1 quarter hit. It's an annual hit *right now*.

Some large factories which depend on parts from China will soon have to shut down. Then their other suppliers will also have to cease production. The loss of income will be felt throughout the local economies.

The effects of the epidemic may well lead to an end of the globalization of production processes. Companies will go back to buy locally to be as unaffected as possible from similar future incidents. This might well be the most positive long term outcome of this epidemic.

Some large factories which depend on parts from China will soon have to shut down. Then their other suppliers will also have to cease production. The loss of income will be felt throughout the local economies.

The ones who are insured won't be monetarily affected. The uninsured will. This may trigger a bubble burst in the West, though.

The effects of the epidemic may well lead to an end of the globalization of production processes. Companies will go back to buy locally to be as unaffected as possible from similar future incidents. This might well be the most positive long term outcome of this epidemic.

Globalization had already halted after 2008. That was the material base for the so-called "populist" rise in the Western Civilization. Populism is a symptom, not the cause, of the halt of globalization.

That doesn't mean, though, the the western countries are heading towards socialism. This is specially the case with the First World countries, which have powerful armies, and thus can restore (at least in part) their economies through dispossession of the weaker (Third World) countries. The working classes of the First World tend to fascism, not socialism.

That's why China is countering the death of globalization with OBOR. For socialism to rise, there needs to be world prosperity. If the pot is small, fascism will rise again.


c1ue , Feb 21 2020 18:45 utc | 18

Infodemic continuing to spread.
Gullible people continuing to fail to understand that the real issue isn't the coronavirus, it is the fear which the infodemic (and outright agitprop) is feeding - and which many of these people are exacerbating.

China supplies enormous amounts of everything the world uses except energy.

Even food - China doesn't supply as much of the raw, but provides an enormous amount of processing/handling.

And yes, "just in time" combined with the Lunar New Year holiday and a greatly prolonged re-ramp time is going to impact everyone, everywhere.
The only question is how much.

goldhoarder , Feb 21 2020 18:45 utc | 19
The effects of the epidemic may well lead to an end of the globalization of production processes. Companies will go back to buy locally to be as unaffected as possible from similar future incidents. This might well be the most positive long term outcome of this epidemic. I wholeheartedly agree but I have some trouble reconciling this with your support of the EU and the British remainers.
karlof1 , Feb 21 2020 18:46 utc | 20
Pepe Escobar writes about the possibility that the virus is a bioweapon --but produced by whom? He looks at the Outlaw US Empire's Hybrid War against China:

"There's no question coronavirus, so far, has been a Heaven-sent politically useful tool, reaching, with minimum investment, the desired targets of maximized U.S. global power – even if fleetingly, enhanced by a non-stop propaganda offensive – and China relatively isolated with its economy semi paralyzed.

"Yet perspective is in order. The CDC estimated that up to 42.9 million people got sick during the 2018-2019 flu season in the U.S. No less than 647,000 people were hospitalized. And 61,200 died."

As far as I know, the bioweapon hypothesis has yet to be 100% disproven. IMO, it isn't. I know how bacteriums and viruses share their DNA such that as I wrote previously humans must always treat them as their #1 enemy/threat as they're potentially very deadly. It's also a big mistake for the Outlaw US Empire to gloat about China's misfortune as it's not immune whatsoever.

Taffyboy , Feb 21 2020 19:05 utc | 21
karlof1 @20

I read Escobar on your comment. He does have the Chinese and Persian perspective well in hand. I still remember Trump at Mar-a-Lago treating Xi to 'beautiful piece of chocolate cake', and bombing the Syrians.

A threat thrown at Xi and China. That was very telling and the threats, sanctions, have occurred ever since non stop. This virus is all too convenient and once the dust settles we may have some reciprocal action.

carl , Feb 21 2020 19:10 utc | 22
Posted by: Perimetr | Feb 21 2020 18:11 utc | 8

The paper referred to by Perimetr is authored by six scientists affiliated with Los Alamos National Laboratory of the DOE, including four biologists: "The Novel Coronavirus, 2019-nCoV, is Highly Contagious and More Infectious Than Initially Estimated" .

It is also hard to imagine how "first-world" countries will control the virus if it ever does get a foothold, since they are scared of their own shadows and can't possibly compete with the PRC when it comes to ruthlessness (at times there may be advantages to living in a dictatorship ..)

Likklemore , Feb 21 2020 19:20 utc | 25
supply chain and shipping: dominoes falling in global shipping as coronavirus grips

LINK (paywall)


Container shipping from Chinese ports has collapsed since the outbreak of coronavirus and has yet to show any sign of recovery, threatening weeks of chaos for manufacturing supply lines and the broader structure of global trade.

Almost half of the planned sailings on the route from Asia to North Europe have been cancelled over the last four weeks. A parallel drama is unfolding on routes from the Pacific Rim to the US and Latin America.

Lars Jensen from SeaIntelligence in Copenhagen said the loss of traffic is running at 300,000 containers a week. This will cause a logistical crunch in Europe in early March even if the epidemic is brought under control quickly.[.]

Refrigerated ships full of frozen food are unable to enter Chinese ports because berths are full.... cannot tap into electricity. No dockers or drivers.
In Europe Fiat Chrysler has suspended production. Jaguar Land Rover are flying in parts in suitcases from China to UK.....


=========

Not just Europe. It's global. Could tip the world into a deep recession. Shortages abound from everyday essentials,[Walmart, Family Dollar, DollarTree, Home Depot] food, pharmaceuticals and manufacturers.

Food!!? Yes. garlic in the produce area.
You shop at Costco? Cheesecake - loaded with sodium benzoate- with milk being the last ingredient listed on the label.

Good question: As one analyst asked; over the next 3-4 months who will want to open a container from China or buy anything marked "Product of or Made in China?

William Gruff , Feb 21 2020 19:36 utc | 26
I do not think the Chinese will counter-attack for this US bio weapon attack.

Why is it that many people dismiss this event as being biological warfare launched by the US against China? Because it is too horrific. We know that the empire murders by the thousands and millions without the slightest hesitation or guilt, but for some reason we assume that even the empire is not so vile and malevolent as to use biological weapons. We assume that the empire has some sort of conscience that will moderate its behavior, even though we've never seen evidence of it.

These are people who built armies of literal head-choppers... death squads. They gleefully murder respected statesmen on diplomatic missions. If they can do nothing else then they will run you off the road just because they are hatefully psychotic.

This collectively psychotic culture cannot back down from their aggression if they are losing, so they always escalate that aggression as far as they can.

America is losing its trade war with China, but is running out of economic weapons. From within its bubble of psychosis America feels it has no choice but to escalate beyond economic weapons. What other weapons can America possibly use to defeat China at this point other than bio weapons?

There is no question that this is biological warfare.

That said, China is not going to retaliate and try to hurt Americans.

Why not?

Because unlike America they are not a culture of psychopaths.

It really is that simple.

earthling1 , Feb 21 2020 20:33 utc | 30
Lost in this whole scaremongering affair is the CDC estimates that already for this flu season 29 million have contracted the flu and 16,000 have died.
The American Sheeple can be herded anywhere with the MSM sheepdogs being controlled by competent shepherds.
casey , Feb 21 2020 20:45 utc | 31
Mr. Gruff: I am told that bioweapons are not considered, by developed world spooks and military types, to be "useful" as weapons. They are highly unstable, difficult to deploy and tend to have lots of blowback, as in their effects being next to impossible to predict and just as likely to result in non-desired outcomes as desired. Yes, Escobar makes a good point that it sure all looks very, very suspicious, especially given the gigantic Western anti-China info op that was marched out, and that right quick. But bioweapons are said to not be considered serious as weapo0ns systems.
William Gruff , Feb 21 2020 20:54 utc | 32
"...bioweapons are said to not be considered serious as weapons systems." --casey @31

That just makes them all the more attractive to the "Shock Doctrine" CIA gangsters. Agents of chaos love that sort of stuff. Nothing serious, just "bloodying their nose" a little.

Clueless Joe , Feb 21 2020 21:11 utc | 38
A bio-weapon is a dubious hypothesis, or at the very least, it's not exactly destined to kill massess of "enemy" people. The virus kills basically 70/80+ years old people, which isn't exactly a problem for most countries. The heavy load on healthcare system and its cost might be a reason, but there's many other ways of attaining such a goal. A Trump-ian desire to limit globalization perhaps, but doubtful as well.

That said, we can only state that China did its job, but it remains to be seen if other countries are as effective. Japan obviously isn't. I suspect many European countries won't as well - they're repatriating people from China and cruise ships by commercial flights and don't bother with quarantines if people have no symptoms. Then there's Iran; was it some Iranian who came back infected, was it Chinese workers who were let in unquarantined? (if the latter, then it's a minor failure for China not to have screened them, though the bigger failure would probably be Iranian immigration authorities)

B's last paragraph seems spot on. Chinese emissions of greenhouse gases are going down big time, and other countries might learn the virtues of being self-sufficient as much as possible.

Patroklos , Feb 21 2020 21:45 utc | 43
While most of the discussion here centres on supply-chains and manufacturing exports from China, in Australia it's our service sector that will be hit. We rely on at least three relationships with China: education (Chinese fee-paying university students), tourism (AUD$12bn/annum from PRC) and mining exports (iron-ore and coal). The first is the sector I work in and my university is hysterical about the 6000 PRC students stranded in China under the travel ban. Each of those students spends a lot of money here on accom, food, etc. and represent about AUD$100m across the year including tuition fees. As b and others have said, it's the ramifications and delayed unexamined consequences that will bite already over-leveraged sectors. And the MSM are very silent on this aspect of the situation, preferring instead to whip up fear and loathing toward the PRC, which may indeed be the intent in order to prepare populations for a longer-term 'decoupling' from the Chinese economy.
karlof1 , Feb 21 2020 21:46 utc | 44
William Gruff @26--

It's not that the Outlaw US Empire wouldn't deploy a bioweapon--it did in September 2001, anthrax--but as with The Omega Man and The Walking Dead they're too unpredictable and can easily blowback on the users. IMO, chemical weapons that are carcinogens like Agent Orange and glyphosate (Roundup) also ought to be classed as bioweapons since they attack our biological systems in ways different from "classical" chemical agents.

The economic affects have yet to even be felt; and if the virus was a bioweapon, its blowback will severely damage Western economies as they're the most developed and dependent. Otherwise, we have another deadly strain of virus that must be controlled just as with all the other viruses.

Mark2 , Feb 21 2020 21:58 utc | 45
I wish I had the optimism of some here ! Casey @ 31 for instance.
But we live in a real distopyian world, the most powerful country is run by a psychopathic mass murderer whose population has been brain washed! To look for logic and reason in the actions of the insane will never work! Their insane end of story.
So here is the truth it may save a lot of speculation.
Must read. But very long. Solid evidence as to intent, motavation and opportunity

http://armswatch.com/salisbury-attack-reveals-70-million-pentagon-program-at-porton-down/

Sorry about the nightmares and shattered illusions

William Gruff , Feb 21 2020 23:15 utc | 56

Re: bioweapon blowback

What makes you think the ones using the bioweapons (CIA) care? If a million people in poor health, or elderly, or with no insurance die in the US these monsters will put that on the benefit side of the ledger. Less useless eaters leaching the empire's resources (most of the US population are considered useless eaters now that the country has been largely de-industrialized). Blowback doesn't faze them in the slightest. Head-chopping terrorists are rabid dogs... very difficult to control. The CIA's version of James Bond got snuffed in Benghazi by the very same rabid dogs that he was recruiting for the "American Foreign Legion" . Has that blowback slowed the CIA down working with these animals? No, of course not.

Posters are trying to maintain the completely unfounded belief that these people behind the attacks are rational and intelligent. They are not. They are psychopaths, and that is not hyperbole. These psychopaths actually like collateral damage, even when it happens to citizens of the empire. They're laughing about the people dying on the cruise ships. They are joking with each other about how stupid the useless eaters are for getting on planes with infected people. They don't see this as a problem at all, aside perhaps from being disappointed that more people in China are not dying.

Time and again people insist upon fooling themselves into disbelieving how monstrous these psychotic freaks are, despite the fact of their monstrosity being revealed over and over.

Try this: Read up on Jeffrey Dahmer. Maybe you think you know a little about him but most people don't dig too deep because it makes them uncomfortable trying to imagine how another human being could be that messed up.

Once you get a good idea of what I am referring to by "psychopath" , then try to imagine an entire global crime syndicate made up of these types of individuals. If you work at it you may start to get a grasp of what the CIA really is.

karlof1 , Feb 22 2020 0:14 utc | 59

William Gruff @56--

Yeah, I agree with your reasoning and have referred to The Establishment of being wannabe Neros and Caligulas, and elsewhere I've described their philosophy as Libertinism as designed by the Marquis de Sade. Some movies depicting CIA personnel behaviors come close to portraying what you describe, like Mr Joshua and ilk from Lethal Weapon . Not enough people seem to be troubled by the "fictional" Jason Bourne Story. Proven yet again: Absolute Power corrupts absolutely. It's this aspect that's always troubled me when thinking about how to disband the CIA. The fiction's horrid enough, and we know the truth's worse.

Pft , Feb 22 2020 0:50 utc | 60
Different strain a cold virus causing only a fraction of hospitalizations and deaths from pneumonia from other infections, are way overhyped by China and international health organizations. To what end?

Mandatory vaccinations down the road which will cause many adverse effects that will be underreported, conditioning people to allow governments worldwide to lockdown people without protest to keep them safe, etc.

This is all a psy-ops operation for greater pharma profits and government control. China will blame the US for using a biowarfare weapon to gain the peoples nationalist support (fake enemies are wonderful for that purpise). Despite being "attacked" China will continue providing America antibiotics, tech gadgets and API's used for drugs and vaccines and will honor American intellectuals property rights and pay royalties for vaccines they produce using patented vaccine processes. Fake wrestling man.

Anyone notice it was not until China signed the trade agreement that the virus became newsworthy?. Gates Event 201 and his documentary on Netflix shows the this was a preplanned psyops .

For all we know there is not even a new virus. Just a test that detects endogenous viral proteins present in a percentage of people that get tested when sick or exposed to a sick person. How would we even know? But lets assume it is a new virus. Just look at the numbers outside Hubei (numbers not to be trusted), and understand many people had the virus without symptoms and you see the mortality rate not much greater than influenza and affecting mostly elderly or other sick people hardest.

Jen , Feb 22 2020 1:09 utc | 61
From past conversations I've had here at MoA with Clickkid, VK and some others on the COVID-19 virus as a bioweapon, my conclusion is that it cannot be a bioweapon.

It's too contagious and it has too many modes of transmission for it to be easily controllable by the attackers using it to subdue an enemy without risking blowback once the enemy is dead and gone, and the attackers start moving their own people in to mop up and take over cities and steal equipment, factory machines and armaments where the virus may still be lingering. A virus that kills people past the age when they've finished raising families and their own health is in long-term decline? Not ideal - as Clickkid pointed out, a better bioweapon is one that incapacitates people in the prime of their lives, doesn't kill them outright but reduces their productivity, maybe also renders them sterile or infertile.

A vaccine would be a better bioweapon than an actual disease. With the various side effects that have been reported for it, Gardasil (to prevent cervical cancer in women) would be ideal as a bioweapon.

Duncan Idaho , Feb 22 2020 1:20 utc | 63
my conclusion is that it cannot be a bioweapon.
Bingo!
We have a winner.
It is 96% similar to a 2014 coronavirus, of bat origin, a double stranded positive RNA virus.
A bat virus, like SARS and MERS, the other two significant coronavirus.
Peter AU1 , Feb 22 2020 1:28 utc | 64
Jen
China has been in lockdown. Factories closed ect. Major resources diverted to stop the spread. It is a major economic hit to China.
Hygiene is high in China compared to other densely populated parts of Asia. China has been hit now with a number of exotic viruses ect that have been hits to its economy. Ebola kicked off in Africa, but other than that, other countries that eat anything and everything, who's hygiene is often not up to the standard of China do not seem to be experiencing these outbreaks.
As to using bio weapons, any country that would develop and use them would have also developed a vaccine.
Peter AU1 , Feb 22 2020 1:32 utc | 66
As to losing a few pawns in the great game, that is not an issue. Australia and the Netherregions were quite happy to sacrifice the pawns on MH17.
Likklemore , Feb 22 2020 2:08 utc | 69

my comment with LINK @ 25 addressed the just-in-time supply chain, global shipping disruptions.
Now, the CDC has announced "in the eventuality of" they are getting prepared to adopt closures:

U.S. prepares for coronavirus pandemic, school and business closures: health officials

(Reuters) - U.S. health officials on Friday said they are preparing for the possibility of the spread of the new coronavirus through U.S. communities that would force closures of schools and businesses.

The United States has yet to see community spread of the virus that emerged in central China in late December. But health authorities are preparing medical personnel for the risk, Nancy Messonnier, an official with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) told reporters on a conference call.

In coming weeks, if the virus begins to spread through U.S. communities, health authorities want to be ready to adopt school and business closures like those undertaken in Asian countries to contain the disease, Messonnier said.[.]

The CDC is taking steps to ensure frontline U.S. healthcare workers have supplies they need, she added, by working with businesses, hospitals, pharmacies and provisions manufacturers and distributors on what they can do to get ready.[.]

The United States currently has 13 cases of people diagnosed with the virus within the country and 21 cases among Americans repatriated on evacuation flights from Wuhan, China, and from the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan, CDC said.

​Of 329 Americans evacuated from the cruise ship, 18 tested positive for the virus. Eleven of them are at University of Nebraska Medical Center, five are in medical facilities near Travis Air Force Base in California and two are near Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas.[.]

Think: Consequences of Closures?

Peter AU1 , Feb 22 2020 2:08 utc | 70
bulk of the consulting consisting of Downer giving bank acc details for bri.. er consultancy fees to be paid into.
uncle tungsten , Feb 22 2020 2:19 utc | 71
That's the downer that australia experiences after drinking to excess.

He is also the downer that as aus ambassador to UK blew the game with his formal references to Joe Mifsud and the Papadopolus fiasco in Italy and the Englanders homeland. Once he had committed his report and used the diplomatic service to deliver it the game had to follow with a formal presentation to FBI. Then the FISA court evidence and so on.

He also gave $30Mil to the Clinton Foundation for their non work on AIDS in Papua New Guinea or some scam like that.

Can someone prosecute these thieving scum? But then they are useful idiots to both the oligarchy and to us mere observers.

uncle tungsten , Feb 22 2020 2:31 utc | 72
Duncan Idaho #63
It is 96% similar to a 2014 coronavirus, of bat origin, a double stranded positive RNA virus.
A bat virus, like SARS and MERS, the other two significant coronavirus.

To be any sort of winner one would have to go a further furlong and explain some of the anomalies being reported or refute those reports etc. To say a coronavirus of today is closely similar to a (bat derived) coronavirus of yesterday and therefore the source identified is direct really stretches evidence a little.

WTF do you mean %96? What is the %4 comprised of?

If I drink %96 water with %4 arsenic it is not healthy water eh?

How many bats were sold at the FISH market?
Have they been reduced/banned in their popularity following the last outbreak?
Is the coronavirus species specific?

Try some detailed refutation if you will Duncan Idaho and actually negate the proposition that the previous coronavirus could not be fiddled to produce this emergence.

Peter AU1 , Feb 22 2020 3:34 utc | 77
China and Iran are priority targets for Trump US. In both countries, Coronavirus kicked of in a central city or province.

https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/world/iran-says-coronavirus-has-spread-to-several-cities-reports-two-new-deaths/ar-BB10fyi5?li=AAgges1
" The coronavirus has spread to several Iranian cities, a health ministry official said on Friday, as an outbreak that the authorities say began in the holy city of Qom caused two more deaths.

Iran confirmed 13 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total in the country to 18, with four of the total having died."

KTx , Feb 22 2020 5:06 utc | 80
The speed, location and size of this COVID-19 outbreak are not natural and do not fit the online narratives targeting China.

Attacking China with bioweapons is nothing new, Japan did it with Unit 731 and US did it during Korean War in 1950s attacking China with Yellow Fever.

These latest attacks on the sounder of pigs with Swine Flu then followed by COVID-19 carefully timed near Chinese New Year at the central of China for maximum impacts. Followed by the US hypocrisy pretending to help then later lied that China refused the offer.

It has become too obvious the motive of a very well coordinated amount of online disinfo as deflections with "Eating bat soup, eating wild animals, engineered virus escape from Wuhan L-4 lab" to pin the blame China for the outbreak.

The amount of intensive of online trolls attacking China to support the anti-China propaganda narratives above. Have seen these kinds one too many times, like White Helmet making fake video blaming Syrian government gas attack on Syrian people, Saddam Hussein got WMD and he ripped babies out of incubators testimony in UN, no less. Muammar Gaddafi violated human right, et al.

Hong Kong Color revolution, Uighur Islamic Extremist, Tibet Dalai Lama bill, swine flu attack, virus attack on the people, kidnapping Huawei CFO by Canada, .......... amid US-China trade war. All the attacks on China intensified when China launched the Belt and Road Initiative. Can it be more obvious?

Hope , Feb 22 2020 5:15 utc | 82
In Vietnam, fifteen out of the sixteen confirmed COVID-19 patients have been discharged, well, after treatment.
https://vietnamnet.vn/en/society/vietnamese-medical-staff-win-fight-with-covid-19-618358.html

The remaining patient contracted the disease from his daughter, who had travelled along with seven workmates to a training course in Wuhan. The workers who attended the course were all from the province of Vinh Phuc, where currently 73 persons are suspected of having contracted the virus. They, and affected areas in the commune (population 10,000) are under a twenty-day quarantine, due to end on March 3. If anyone tests positive, of course further quarantine and treatment will follow.

Elsewhere in Vietnam, schools are closed, and will stay closed until at least the beginning of March, and large gatherings have been suspended. Masks were in short supply but production is now beginning to meet the demand. The government is attempting to enforce a quarantine for fourteen days for citizens returning from travel to China; non-citizens are not being permitted to enter VN from China. (Unfortunately, some people are attempting to avoid these restrictions by travelling to a third country, and entering Vietnam from there.)

In sum, there is no large outbreak of the virus in Vietnam as yet, public awareness campaigns are in full swing, there is clear awareness of the economic impacts in all sectors, and concentrated nursing care has led to recovery in all cases to date.

Ric G , Feb 22 2020 5:21 utc | 83
To KTx at 80

Pepe is thinking along the same lines

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/escobar-no-weapon-left-behind-american-hybrid-war-china

KTx , Feb 22 2020 5:23 utc | 84
What makes you believe the ZOG can surreptitiously attack China with COVID-19 won't carry out the same attack at home and at the enemies of the ZOG empire?

You are cheering the death of innocent Chinese people, you better think again what makes you so special that you will be spared.

KTx , Feb 22 2020 5:32 utc | 86
@ Posted by: Ric G | Feb 22 2020 5:21 utc | 83

Yes Ric G, I have read it here https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/02/21/no-weapon-left-behind-the-american-hybrid-war-on-china/

I stopped reading ZeroHedge as it's the most anti China disinfo portal. They publish anti China propaganda from Falun Gong, EpochTime, Gatestone, NED, Propaganda outlets from India, et al.

Also ZeroHedge banned several times for questioning their narratives. But my other account bashing China, Iran, North Korea, ........ is still alive after more than 10 years.

KTx , Feb 22 2020 5:46 utc | 87
@ Posted by: Peter AU1 | Feb 22 2020 5:29 utc | 85

Agreed, the amount of global disinfo to attack China as deflections can't be more apparent to the naked eyes.

Also the intensive psyop targeting China is not only seen in Ukraine but globally.

This is only one example:

https://www.rt.com/news/481392-buzzfeed-ukraine-riots-email/

Fake email 'from outside the country' made Ukrainians throw stones at Wuhan evacuees, BuzzFeed report implies

KTx , Feb 22 2020 6:03 utc | 90
@ Posted by: Peter AU1 | Feb 22 2020 5:56 utc | 88

Pepe described it best: No Weapon Left Behind: The American Hybrid War on China

Branding BRI as a "pandemic"

As the usual suspects fret over the "stability" of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Xi Jinping administration, the fact is the Beijing leadership has had to deal with an accumulation of extremely severe issues: a swine-flu epidemic killing half the stock; the Trump-concocted trade war; Huawei accused of racketeering and about to be prevented from buying U.S. made chips; bird flu; coronavirus virtually shutting down half of China.

Add to it the incessant United States government Hybrid War propaganda barrage, trespassed by acute Sinophobia; everyone from sociopathic "officials" to self-titled councilors are either advising corporate businesses to divert global supply chains out of China or concocting outright calls for regime change – with every possible demonization in between.

There are no holds barred in the all-out offensive to kick the Chinese government while it's down.

A Pentagon cipher at the Munich Security Conference once again declares China as the greatest threat, economically and militarily, to the U.S. – and by extension the West, forcing a wobbly EU already subordinated to NATO to be subservient to Washington on this remixed Cold War 2.0.

The whole U.S. corporate media complex repeats to exhaustion that Beijing is "lying" and losing control. Descending to sub-gutter, racist levels, hacks even accuse BRI itself of being a pandemic, with China "impossible to quarantine".

All that is quite rich, to say the least, oozing from lavishly rewarded slaves of an unscrupulous, monopolistic, extractive, destructive, depraved, lawless oligarchy which uses debt offensively to boost their unlimited wealth and power while the lowly U.S. and global masses use debt defensively to barely survive. As Thomas Piketty has conclusively shown, inequality always relies on ideology.

We're deep into a vicious intel war. From the point of view of Chinese intelligence, the current toxic cocktail simply cannot be attributed to just a random series of coincidences. Beijing has serial motives to piece this extraordinary chain of events as part of a coordinated Hybrid War, Full Spectrum Dominance attack on China.

Enter the Dragon Killer working hypothesis: a bio-weapon attack capable of causing immense economic damage but protected by plausible deniability. The only possible move by the "indispensable nation" on the New Great Game chessboard, considering that the U.S. cannot win a conventional war on China, and cannot win a nuclear war on China.

A biological warfare weapon?

On the surface, coronavirus is a dream bio-weapon for those fixated on wreaking havoc across China and praying for regime change.

Yet it's complicated. This report is a decent effort trying to track the origins of coronavirus. Now compare it with the insights by Dr. Francis Boyle, international law professor at the University of Illinois and author, among others, of Biowarfare and Terrorism. He's the man who drafted the U.S. Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989 signed into law by George H. W. Bush.

Dr. Boyle is convinced coronavirus is an

"offensive biological warfare weapon" that leaped out of the Wuhan BSL-4 laboratory, although he's "not saying it was done deliberately."

Dr. Boyle adds, "all these BSL-4 labs by United States, Europe, Russia, China, Israel are all there to research, develop, test biological warfare agents. There's really no legitimate scientific reason to have BSL-4 labs." His own research led to a whopping $100 billion, by 2015, spent by the United States government on bio-warfare research: "We have well over 13,000 alleged life science scientists testing biological weapons here in the United States. Actually this goes back and it even precedes 9/11."

Dr. Boyle directly accuses "the Chinese government under Xi and his comrades" of a cover up "from the get-go. The first reported case was December 1, so they'd been sitting on this until they couldn't anymore. And everything they're telling you is a lie. It's propaganda."

The World Health Organization (WHO), for Dr. Boyle, is also on it: "They've approved many of these BSL-4 labs ( ) Can't trust anything the WHO says because they're all bought and paid for by Big Pharma and they work in cahoots with the CDC, which is the United States government, they work in cahoots with Fort Detrick." Fort Detrick, now a cutting-edge bio-warfare lab, previously was a notorious CIA den of mind control "experiments".

Relying on decades of research in bio-warfare, the U.S. Deep State is totally familiar with all bio-weapon overtones. From Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki to Korea, Vietnam and Fallujah, the historical record shows the United States government does not blink when it comes to unleashing weapons of mass destruction on innocent civilians.

For its part, the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) has spent a fortune researching bats, coronaviruses and gene-editing bio-weapons. Now, conveniently – as if this was a form of divine intervention – DARPA's "strategic allies" have been chosen to develop a genetic vaccine.

The 1996 neocon Bible, the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), unambiguously stated, "advanced forms of biological warfare that can "target" specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."

There's no question coronavirus, so far, has been a Heaven-sent politically useful tool, reaching, with minimum investment, the desired targets of maximized U.S. global power – even if fleetingly, enhanced by a non-stop propaganda offensive – and China relatively isolated with its economy semi paralyzed.

Yet perspective is in order. The CDC estimated that up to 42.9 million people got sick during the 2018-2019 flu season in the U.S. No less than 647,000 people were hospitalized. And 61,200 died.

This report details the Chinese "people's war" against coronavirus.

It's up to Chinese virologists to decode its arguably synthetic origin. How China reacts, depending on the findings, will have earth-shattering consequences – literally.

Setting the stage for the Raging Twenties

After managing to reroute trade supply chains across Eurasia to its own advantage and hollow out the Heartland, American – and subordinated Western – elites are now staring into a void. And the void is staring back. A "West" ruled by the U.S. is now faced with irrelevance. BRI is in the process of reversing at least two centuries of Western dominance.

There's no way the West and especially the "system leader" U.S. will allow it. It all started with dirty ops stirring trouble across the periphery of Eurasia – from Ukraine to Syria to Myanmar.

Now it's when the going really gets tough. The targeted assassination of Maj. Gen. Soleimani plus coronavirus – the Wuhan flu – have really set up the stage for the Raging Twenties. The designation of choice should actually be WARS – Wuhan Acute Respiratory Syndrome. That would instantly give the game away as a War against Humanity – irrespective of where it came from.

milomilo , Feb 22 2020 6:06 utc | 91
Thanks @ktx for your posts

Theres been massive media and of course covert pressure to make china submit to US diktat.. Hongkong riots is one of a mess , indoctrinationg HK young people into rabid terrorist who rejoice on chinese coronavirus debacle.

now this is funny , these HKers are also chinese descent no matter what their delusional mind feeds them.. Corona virus practically next door and without chinese effort to contain it , HK will get wiped out.. yet they are still acting like useful idiots ..

the world knew about these morons and their names , i doubt they are welcome to other countries even australia banned them entry

karlof1 , Feb 22 2020 6:28 utc | 93
Global Times OP/ED tangentially about virus and more about China/Outlaw US Empire deteriorating relation. Some meat:

"No matter how you look at it, there will be no winner in this hypothetical cold war, and the US will not be able to continue its march to greatness unscathed. In a word, the time has changed, and Sino-US relations are very different from the US-Soviet relations 70 years ago.

"First of all, although the development paths of the two countries are different, China holds the correct course. For more than 40 years, China has always adhered to the path of reform and opening up, firmly integrated into and safeguarded the current international system, and committed itself to a fair and reasonable reform direction. In contrast, the foreign policy of the present US administration is not only disorderly, but also increasingly assertive. The US presents itself to the world as a destroyer and subversive of the international order, which makes it mired in a moral deficit."

A "moral deficit" indeed! In that connection, it ought to be noted that the Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy because of the numerous lawsuits targeting its pedophile scoutmasters for which it's liable.

Neil S , Feb 22 2020 6:58 utc | 94
A very deep "recession" aka depression was already expected by those paying attention. How do the financial elites hide blame for it? Launch a bio-weapon in a nation that is the world's factory, grinding the world economy to a crawl, and blame the depression on that. The CIA exists primarily to advance the interests of Wall Street. The timing of this is just too coincidental.

[Feb 21, 2020] Bad Bets and the Corona Virus Epidemic

Feb 21, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

As I said, I'm not sure enormous viral outbreaks are blacks swans; I think a little research would show plenty of Cassandras. That said, it certainly looks like skimping on public health was a very bad bet (besides the suffering and death, a recession in China, or even a global recession, permanent reconfiguration of the supply chain, loss of soft power by China, etc.).

Finally, our globalizing, neoliberal elites. This is a whole post, and probably a whole book. Simplifying absurdly, our neoliberal elites destroyed manufacturing in this country and moved it to China. (And yes, a great swath of the American working class in flyover was destroyed, but there were downsides, too!) Save for the profits they accrued, most of their working assumptions for this policy proved false. China, for example, did not become a liberal democracy; as it turns out, liberal democracy does not automagically happen because there are markets, or capitalism. Nor did China become a happy member of "the rules-based international order." Rather -- and who could blame them -- they decided to write their own rules. Finally, a highly optimized supply chain system so complex as to be unmanageable developed to ship consumer goods from China to the world, and to ship raw materials from the world into China. As we have seen in the last few weeks, the supply chain is extremely fragile, and its failure may mean a loss of truly essential commodities to the United States, like pharmaceuticals (although the wealthy will be able to get what they need, so no problem there). And what bad bet did our globalizing, neoliberal elites make? The same as the bureaucrats running Wuhan: That public health doesn't matter. (An absurdly bad bet, after H1N1, SARS, and swine fever in China, an animal epidemic running concurrently with the human.)

Clearly, a less fragile, more robust system of global public health is needed; one that can take precautionary measures, instead of just reacting to outbreaks as they occur. How to get to that point, however, is little beyond me. We might start from the premise that human life is the most important thing. That may be difficult for our elites to accept. But they might be making a bad bet if they don't.

ambrit February 19, 2020 at 5:35 pm

Thinking back to when my seventh past life was young, I tried to imagine how an elite of that age differs from the elites of today. The main thing that I, with my limited cognition abilities, could come up with was: The sources of wealth for the elites.
Today, wealth itself has been financialized. Olde guarde elites could retreat to their rustic abodes, hence the English colloquialism for being sent home from college, rustication. There, said elites could weather the storm in relative safety. Distance itself from centres of population, and hence, centres of contagion, was a buffer.
Today, the wealthy are constantly mingling with the hoi-polloi, out of sheer random contacts related to the heightened mobility of all classes. As the spread of the latest contagions shows, air travel has effectively eliminated the buffering function of geographical distance. The new elites do not rely on manses and demesnes for power or sustenance. They are basically reliant on the exact same supply chains that the "rest of us" are. Paradoxically, "free trade" is a "great leveler."
We live in interesting times.

Nat February 19, 2020 at 5:56 pm

Actually the super rich have been very busy buying and prepping bolt holes all over the world in the last decade.

its almost as if they know their actions will destroy the world and they need to be ready to once again leave someone(s) else with the bill of their recklessness.

[Feb 21, 2020] Private Equity's War to Preserve Surprise Billing

Notable quotes:
"... If you want proof that private equity is predatory, you need go not further than its concerted efforts to extend and intensify the devastating practice of surprise billing. ..."
"... Physicians' groups, it turns out, can opt out of a contract with insurers even if the hospital has such a contract. The doctors are then free to charge patients, who desperately need care, however much they want. ..."
"... This has made physicians' practices in specialties such as emergency care, neonatal intensive care and anesthesiology attractive takeover targets for private equity firms . ..."
"... Emergency rooms, neonatal intensive care units and anesthesiologists' practices do not operate like an ordinary marketplace. Physicians' practices in these specialties do not need to worry that they will lose patients because their prices are too high. ..."
"... It's not only patients that are victimized by unscrupulous physicians' groups. These doctors' groups are able to coerce health insurance companies into agreeing to pay them very high fees in order to have them in their networks. ..."
"... and it needs to be annual ..."
Feb 21, 2020 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

If you want proof that private equity is predatory, you need go not further than its concerted efforts to extend and intensify the devastating practice of surprise billing.

Bad enough that patients develop afflictions or have accidents that land them in the hospital. Recovering physically is hard enough. But to then have the stress and financial damage of large and unexpected bills, which are exercises in rent extraction, is the sort of thing that creates Madame DeFarges.

Private equity experts Eileen Appelbaum and Rosemary Batt did the sleuthing to document how private equity has greatly extended and profited from this abuse. What most people do not realize is the degree to which hospitals have outsourced what most people would assume were core functions provided by doctors on the hospital's payroll, such as emergency room doctors. With many large nominally not-for-profit hospital groups run by MBAs out to justify higher pay packages for themselves, many practice areas are in fact outsourced. Private equity has hoovered up these groups. They, and not the hospital, provide the personnel for a particular case, and they make sure to get some out of network practitioners on the team to pad the bills.

One metric: a Stanford study determined that the odds of getting a surprise bill had increased from 32% in 2010 to 43% in 2016, and the average amount had risen over that time period from $220 to $628. A new study in Health Affairs found that this out of network billing raises health care costs by $40 billion per year .

Appelbaum gave a high-level overview in a op-ed in The Hill last May :

Physicians' groups, it turns out, can opt out of a contract with insurers even if the hospital has such a contract. The doctors are then free to charge patients, who desperately need care, however much they want.

This has made physicians' practices in specialties such as emergency care, neonatal intensive care and anesthesiology attractive takeover targets for private equity firms .

Emergency rooms, neonatal intensive care units and anesthesiologists' practices do not operate like an ordinary marketplace. Physicians' practices in these specialties do not need to worry that they will lose patients because their prices are too high.

Patients can go to a hospital in their network, but if they have an emergency, have a baby in the neonatal intensive care unit or have surgery scheduled with an in-network surgeon, they are stuck with the out-of-network doctors the hospital has outsourced these services to .

It's not only patients that are victimized by unscrupulous physicians' groups. These doctors' groups are able to coerce health insurance companies into agreeing to pay them very high fees in order to have them in their networks.

They do this by threatening to charge high out-of-network bills to the insurers' covered patients if they don't go along with these demands. High payments to these unethical doctors raise hospitals' costs and everyone's insurance premiums.

Appelbaum cited Yale economists who'd examined what happened when hospitals outsourced their emergency room staffing to the two biggest players, EmCare, which has been traded among several private equity firms and is now owned by KKR and TeamHealth, held by Blackstone:

.after EmCare took over the management of emergency services at hospitals with previously low out-of-network rates, they raised out-of-network rates by over 81 percentage points. In addition, the firm raised its charges by 96 percent relative to the charges billed by the physician groups they succeeded.

The study also described how TeamHealth extorted insurers by threatening them with high out-of-network charges for "must have" services:

in most instances, several months after going out-of-network, TeamHealth physicians rejoined the network and received in-network payment rates that were 68 percent higher than previous in-network rates.

California and the Federal government tried to pass legislation to curb surprise billing. As we noted, the California bill was yanked suddenly and no one felt compelled to offer an explanation. The bi-partisan Federal effort also failed.

Appelbaum and Batt, in a new article at CEPR, explain how private equity has been throwing money at astroturf group to keep its scam going :

Early in the summer of 2019, Congress appeared poised to protect consumers from surprise medical bills and to hold insured patients financially harmless in situations where they were unable to choose their doctor .

Two solutions, both of which take surprise charges to patients out of the equation, have been put forward. Employers, patient advocates, and insurance companies favor paying out-of-network doctors a rate "benchmarked" to rates negotiated with in-network doctors to hold down health costs. Not surprisingly, this solution is opposed by large physician staffing companies and specialist physician practices that want to continue to charge prices higher than the in-network fees. These doctors' practices, some backed by private equity firms, have been lobbying intensively for a second option that would allow doctors dissatisfied with a negotiated rate to seek a higher fee via an arbitration process that they believe will ensure higher physician pay and higher company revenues and profits.

The campaign by Physicians for Fair Coverage, a private equity-backed group lobbying on behalf of large physician staffing firms, launched a $1.2 million national ad campaign in July to push for this second approach.8 The lobbying campaign bore fruit. In July, [sponsors of the House bill] Pallone and Walden accepted an amendment to allow arbitration, but only in special cases, and it required the arbitrator to use negotiated rates instead of provider charges when deciding on disputes over payment.9 But the private equity-owned physician staffing companies were not satisfied. In late July, a mysterious group called Doctor Patient Unity launched a $28 million ad and lobbying campaign (now up to nearly $54 million) aimed at keeping any legislation to protect patients from surprise medical bills from passing. In mid-September, a representative for Doctor Patient Unity finally revealed what many observers already suspected -- that PE-owned doctor staffing firms Envision Healthcare and TeamHealth were behind the campaign

Agreement on a joint House and Senate bipartisan bill by Senators Alexander and Murray and Congressmen Pallone and Walden nearly made it into the omnibus continuing resolution that passed in December 2019. It was stymied when Massachusetts Congressman Richard Neal, Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, offered a last-minute alternative. The Neal bill protects consumers from surprise medical bills but requires disputes between providers and insurance companies to be resolved through arbitration. This, of course, is what the PE-owned staffing firms and the doctors' practices they own lobbied for. Lack of support from the Democratic leadership in the Senate and the House delayed passage of the legislation. In his September 2019 fundraising report, Neal reported receipt of $29,000 from Blackstone, owner of TeamHealth.

The entire article is very much worth reading , since it offers more detail on how the private equity firms tightened their grip on these chokepoints. And the threat of legal curbs has had an impact. As the piece also explains, the value of the debt on Envision, the parent of EmCare, and TeamHealth both fell into junk terrain and rebounded a bit when the bills were sidelined for 2019, but remains distressed:

Appelbaum and Batt are pessimistic that anything will get done in 2020:

In the current legislative session, Congress is again working to pass legislation to protect patients from surprise medical bills. But the disagreements in Congress remain unresolved Chances of a compromise bill emerging in this session of Congress do not look good as of this writing (mid-February 2020), and relief for insured patients from unexpected medical bills does not appear to be on the horizon.

However, bond investors clearly think there's still a risk of legislation with some teeth, although the earliest possibility is 2021. Keep your fingers crossed.


jackiebass February 21, 2020 at 6:31 am

Where I live the emergency room doctors are contracted out to a private group. This has been the practice for over a decade. Recently the local hospital got rid of their dialysis services by selling it to a private company. When a person is sick they don't think about asking if the provider is in their network. They simply want treatment to help recover.Another problem is in many areas there isn't a choice. Expensive services can have only one or no providers. That means you have to go out of you area and probably your network. I'm on medicare and chose to be on traditional medicare. You aren't locked into a small network of providers. My supplemental is through my former employer. Unfortunately it's network plan. Occasionally I have services not paid because they are out of network, even though medicare covers 80%. The deductible for out of network is so high that I end up with paying the 20%. I believe there is only one reason for network heart care. It's to increase profits and has little to do with reducing costs.

Shiloh1 February 21, 2020 at 8:02 am

If Al Capone was around today he would be in this criminal enterprise.

Criminal prosecution is the solution. Not "single payer for racketeering" or "mob protection for all".

Best government money can buy.

human February 21, 2020 at 1:05 pm

Capone famously once answered a reporter that, "Capitalism is the legitimate racket of the ruling class."

flora February 21, 2020 at 4:11 pm

I was thinking of Al Capone and his almost untouchable Chicago 'enterprise'. He was untouchable in Chicago because his racket paid off the judges, prosecutors, aldermen, and politicians. It took the feds stepping in to shut Capone down.

How many more people will go bankrupt, or avoid going to the doctor or hospital for fear of bankruptcy because of this PE surprise billing racket? Several state leges are passing or trying to pass legislation to block surprise billing.

Thanks for this post.

hoonose February 21, 2020 at 9:51 am

I hope that you've been negotiating your out of network billings! A third or half off may not be unreasonable. Heck, the hospital only collects about 25% of its total billings!

flora February 21, 2020 at 4:24 pm

This is one reason we need traditional M4A. Traditional Medicare has payment limits that the provider has to accept if they bill Medicare. (Medicare fraud is a problem, but it is tracked and prosecuted.)

Note: Medicare Advantage plans do not have this surprise billing limits protection. see:
https://pnhp.org/news/kathleen-sebelius-and-bill-frist-digging-for-the-medicare-advantage-gold/

John Anthony La Pietra February 21, 2020 at 6:34 am

Maybe I'm missing something, but offhand I don't see how this can even be a thing under a single-payer health-care system. If someone knows better otherwise, please enlighten me.

If I've got that much right, could this be another part of the motivation against M4A?

human February 21, 2020 at 7:35 am

Of course it is. A single-payer system will have massive leverage to achieve fair pricing and compensation.

hoonose February 21, 2020 at 11:34 am

Of course providers are all worried that compensations will be too meager and oppressive. For instance if the docs' income expectations go unmet, then they will certainly buck!

Yves Smith Post author February 21, 2020 at 4:58 pm

But the "providers," as in the MDs, are not the beneficiaries, or at least not much. It's the companies that own the practices .which are owned by PE funds.

Cripes February 21, 2020 at 7:05 am

This reminds me of the TV ad running lately featuring a nice young couple opening their cable bill and declaring "Its a ransom note!" as if its the height of comedy that we are living in a kleptocracy where everyone is constantly subject to "your money or your life" banditry we pretend were left behind in central park muggings of the 1970s.

I have recently had multiple occasions that I needed to write on patient responsibility forms that out of network and balance billing is refused, followed with letters citing applicable state laws and CMS contracts barring conduct in my state. It's insane.
Still I have stacks of collection notices I must beat back and win every time. They only need to win once to destroy someone. Have we no prisons?

The rapine and dispossession of late-stage American crapitalism (can we finally get to End Stage?) always exceeds our worst expectations.
Crime-infested swamp of a country.

Dare we hope a movement can coalesce and endure after a decent man in his waning years is thrust into an historical opportunity to move this train wreck from disaster?

He's the community organizer Obama never was and the new dealer FDR never quite was.

In the flatness of our current political terrain, Bernie's grandfatherly menscheism makes him a moral colossus next to the sniveling careerists and the nefarious old crassus.

1776, 1860, 1932, 1968. What will we make of this year?

On to Milwaukee

John Anthony La Pietra February 21, 2020 at 7:29 am

Can you put the rebuttal into your own easily reproducible form? Either a neat page to staple thoroughly to the bills (copied/printed in needed quantities) or a big rubber stamp with blanks to fill in if applicable?

Yves Smith Post author February 21, 2020 at 5:01 pm

Yes, if you can provide it, I would make it a post. Your version with your state's language and how to find similar language in other states. This is VERY important.

Note I have heard one reader say that their doctors said they wouldn't schedule the surgery if she made an issue out of out of network MDs, that she needed to go elsewhere. So those doctors were completely on board with this practice.

DHG February 21, 2020 at 7:22 am

Anyone who has not made themselves judgment proof really is the fool. No assets, nothing for them to get.

floyd February 21, 2020 at 8:23 am

Disagree -as Chris Hedges says, those people have value as prisoners where they can generate $40K+/yr for some private prison.

flora February 21, 2020 at 5:35 pm

Yep.

"You wouldn't think you'd go to jail over medical bills": County in rural Kansas is jailing people over unpaid medical debt

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coffeyville-kansas-medical-debt-county-in-rural-kansas-is-jailing-people-over-unpaid-medical-debt/

fnx February 21, 2020 at 1:48 pm

Doesn't mean that can't get a judgment against you! Then you spend the rest of your life trying to avoid having people send money via Paypal or other services direct to your bank account since they can take it. Or winning the lottery or buying a new car the list is endless.

TG February 21, 2020 at 12:14 pm

I am currently visiting some old colleagues in Denmark. I told them about the new practice in the United States of "surprise medical billing."

They were shocked. "Sure that's something Trump would do, but surely the Democrats would stop it?"

Hahahaha.

Susan the other February 21, 2020 at 12:48 pm

As in "Privatize Sovereignty, Socialize Property" by David Cieplay, Blackstone and its ilk have this very business model. In this case they are buying up emergency room doctors' practices – with the promise they will make more money – and passing the cost on to insurance companies (poetic justice) and the state and federal gov. Because we have no laws against this sort of corporate privateering (heaven forbid congress should suddenly remember how and why to legislate), all the costs of health care are socialized and because the PE funds are untouchable they have effectively privatized sovereignty. When we all realize their useful function in this scam is one big nothing burger, congress will have to act. It's just another testament to how venal, immoral, lazy and rotten congress is. I can smell it from here.

Howard February 21, 2020 at 1:37 pm

Besides PE, it also makes sense that the real estate sector in general would be opposed to anything that reduces financial burden (particularly anything that would lessen medical debt) on middle- and lower-middle-income households, because foreclosures and desperation fire sales would then dry up.

TimH February 21, 2020 at 1:59 pm

Here's the California situation, from https://www.dmhc.ca.gov/Portals/0/HealthCareInCalifornia/FactSheets/fsab72.pdf

The law protects consumers from surprise medical bills when:
An enrollee goes to an in-network facility such as a hospital, lab or imaging center, but services are provided by an out-of-network health provider.

An enrollee receives emergency services from a doctor or hospital that is not contracted with the patient's health plan or medical group.

JCC February 21, 2020 at 4:13 pm

Yet another anecdote

I've been a relatively healthy individual and so rarely use my insurance. I used it for the first time in 20 years for a full yearly physical (just because it was "that time", not for any health problems). The annual full checkup is, supposedly, fully covered, and I chose a local clinic in my network.

The various clinics involved ended up billing me directly, so far, for over $3500.00, and that was before the colonoscopy bill which still hasn't arrived. I checked my Insurance Portal and, sure enough, the supposed covered charges were listed as "Denied".

So, considering all these costs were supposed to be covered, I took a full day off work (6 solid hours on various phone calls) to get it straightened out. While going through all these bills and working through each charge I discovered 1 bill for a clinic appt (a subsidiary of CVS) that never happened and 1 very high bill for standard blood tests (Quest) that never happened due to a screwup initiated by the CVS-owned clinic. We'll see what happens.

But while talking with one of the Insurance Co. reps she told me a classic surprise billing horror story that happened to her. She gets occasional nosebleeds and one day got a serious one while on the highway before her exit. A CHP officer pulled up behind her after she pulled over to take care of the situation and refused to let her continue on without going to the nearest Emergency Room, so she went.

Her visit lasted 1/2 hour. She was handed a bucket of clean water and a towel. After cleaning up, she waited around for awhile, gave up waiting, washed the towel out, cleaned the bucket out and left. She went on to tell me that 30 days later she recieved a bill from the Emergency Services group at the hospital for $45,000.00. For a towel and a bucket of water.

It took her two days of unpaid time off to get it straightened out and the bill removed.

She then told me she's voting for Sanders, too.

So I've learned three lessons from this; 1) even with insurance things go wrong far too often when it comes to billing issues, and 2) Surprise Billing is far more common than I was led to believe, and 3) Health Insurance/care in this country is riddled with fraud and outright criminality.

Yves Smith Post author February 21, 2020 at 5:07 pm

Hate to tell you, but with a colonoscopy, the exam is covered by Obamacare, but any snipping of polyps is not, and that can easily run to $1000.

The US Is the only advanced economy where colonoscopies are recommended for everyone over 50. In other countries, they are recommended only for people in high risk groups.

If you get an annual ( and it needs to be annual ) fecal occult blood test (easy and cheap, MD puts gloved finger in you, wipes test panel, and tells you right there), the results in terms of detection are on par with colonoscopies.

[Feb 20, 2020] Covid-19: Summing Up The FUD by Amarynth

Feb 19, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Authored by 'Amarynth' via The Saker blog, drawing together a braintrust from The Movable Feast Cafe,

We set up a 'brain trust' in the Cafe in order to write a combined sitrep for The Saker Blog about the Coronavirus. The new name in the taxonomy is COVID-19 but let's stick to Novel Coronavirus for now. It is of course too early to come to any conclusions, but we can start isolating the discernible high level trends and perhaps get an early glimpse as to what effect the outbreak may have geopolitically and economically, although it is very early days.

We will not attempt to look at the technical picture here – the numbers of recoveries, the death rates and the infection rates, rates of transmission, life of virus on surfaces and so on because the technical picture is not yet clear and all data is in a state of flux with opposing and inconsistent reports from all sides. One cannot expect otherwise as the world is still shooting at a rapidly moving target in terms of statistical ground and epidemiological analysis.

In addition, we have professional organizations like the WHO and the CDC not really in lockstep and giving different pronouncements on a professional level. It is too early to draw conclusions.

What people are saying:

Let us look for a moment as to what 'people are saying'.

(If you want to end up deeply into conspiracies, I would suggest you go to subReddits /r/Coronavirus and /r/China_Flu )

What 'people are saying' runs the gamut from messages received in meditation, prayer, even channeling, and this information is being put out there as valid for everyone else in the face of no definitive information you can hang your hat on.

[Feb 19, 2020] Fatality rates from COVID-19 by age catagory

Feb 19, 2020 | www.quora.com

Mitchell Tsai

Mitchell Tsai Beach Rollerblader (1990-2020) Works at Retirement 2007-present Studied at Harvard University Lives in Marina Del Rey, CA 3m content views 109.4k this month Active in 28 Spaces Mitchell Tsai , Virus researcher at Harvard Medical School in 1980s Updated Feb 18, 2020 · Author has 58 answers and 1.7m answer views

COVID-19 is very infectious (Each person infects 1.4–6.77 others), but rarely fatal (0.6–2.5%).

19% of China cases in severe/critical condition (16%) or dead (2.6%)
5% of non-China cases in severe/critical condition (4.0%) or dead (0.6%)

Maybe most infected people show no symptoms (possibly 10–70%).
Non-China: 4% detected while showing no symptoms (16/447).
Cruiseship: 70% detected show no symptoms.

Kill more men (64%) than women (36%), and people with high blood pressure, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, and cerebrovascular disease.

People under 50 have little danger of dying (<1%).
Chil...

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COVID-19 is very infectious (Each person infects 1.4–6.77 others), but rarely fatal (0.6–2.5%).

19% of China cases in severe/critical condition (16%) or dead (2.6%)
5% of non-China cases in severe/critical condition (4.0%) or dead (0.6%)

Maybe most infected people show no symptoms (possibly 10–70%).
Non-China: 4% detected while showing no symptoms (16/447).
Cruiseship: 70% detected show no symptoms.

Kill more men (64%) than women (36%), and people with high blood pressure, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, and cerebrovascular disease.

People under 50 have little danger of dying (<1%).
Children may have light/no symptoms (as with SARS & MERS).

Case-Fatality Rates (CFR) China 2/11/20:
Age
80+ 14.8%
70-79 8.0%
60-69 3.6%
50-59 1.3%

Effects of COVID-19 are similar to OC43 (one of four other mild coronaviruses probably responsible for 1/4 of all "common colds", 15% severe, 0.2% death).

China: 1,870 (2.6%) dead, 12,682 (17%) recovered, 11,741 (16%) severe/critical, 72,530 confirmed, 6.242 suspected, 141,552 under observation

Outside China: 5 (0.6%) dead, 158 (18%) recovered, 36 (4.0%) severe/critical, 897 cases
- Tue 2/18 1:04 pm Beijing Time (Mon 9:04 pm PT)


Update (2/17/20): I highly recommend reading Tirumalai Kamala's answer to What is the big deal about the new coronavirus, COVID-19?

Case-Fatality Rates (CFR) China 2/11/20:
First reports I've read about deaths of teens (1) and 20s (7).

Overall 2.3% (1,023/44,672)
Male 2.8% (64%, 653)
Female 1.7% (36%, 370)

Age
80+ 14.8%
70-79 8.0%
60-69 3.6%
50-59 1.3%
40-49 .4%
30-39 .24% (18/7,600)
20-29 .19% (7/3,619)
10-19 .02% (1/549)
0-9 0 (0/416)

[Feb 19, 2020] Japan Releases First 500 'Diamond Princess' Passengers As 14-Day Quarantine Ends

Feb 19, 2020 | www.zerohedge.com

Japan has completed tests for all passengers and crew aboard the ship as of Monday, but the results for the last batch of tests aren't expected until Wednesday, the day that the quarantine is slated to end. So far, results are back for 2,404 passengers and crew, out of the 3,711 who were on board the ship when the quarantine began on Feb. 5.

Since we haven't reported a full breakdown of cases in a while, here's a complete list and breakdown of infections by country and territory, courtesy of the AP :

Mainland China: 1,868 deaths among 72,436 cases, chiefly in Hubei
Hong Kong: 58 cases, 1 death
Macao: 10
Japan: 607 cases, including 542 from a cruise ship docked in Yokohama, 1 death
Singapore: 77 cases
Thailand: 35
South Korea: 31
Malaysia: 22
Taiwan: 22 cases, 1 death
Vietnam: 16 cases
Germany: 16
United States: 15 cases; separately, 1 US citizen died in China
Australia: 14 cases
France: 12 cases, 1 death
United Kingdom: 9 cases
United Arab Emirates: 9
Canada: 8
Philippines: 3 cases, 1 death
India: 3 cases
Italy: 3
Russia: 2
Spain: 2
Belgium: 1
Nepal: 1
Sri Lanka: 1
Sweden: 1
Cambodia: 1
Finland: 1
Egypt: 1

In a recent study, China's CCDC found that the virus's fatality rate - 14.8% - is for people aged 80 or older with co-occurring medical conditions. Young and healthy people, meanwhile, typically experience much more mild symptoms, according to the BBC . Along those same lines, the WHO confirmed on Tuesday that the virus manifests as only a minor infection in four out of five people who contract it, according to the Guardian.

[Feb 19, 2020] Suprise Billing To Be Resolved in February 2020 to be Enacted in 2022 by run75441

Feb 18, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

Suprise Billing To Be Resolved in February 2020 to be Enacted in 2022

run75441 | February 18, 2020 11:40 am

Healthcare I had wondered why the Senate (Schumer) had backed off on legislation controlling surprise billing. It turns out there is a House bill also and I am sure they are going back and forth on this. Recently, two bills have emerged in the House and one from the Senate. Medscape , "House Committees Advance Bills to Address Surprise Billing."

Of course if Congress's butt was on the line, a solution would have been found quickly and enacted in 2020. At the end, see which one I would back.

The House Ways and Means Committee bill passed by a voice vote bipartisan bill. It seeks to establish more use of third-party negotiators ( arbitration) for settling certain disputes about payment for out-of-network care. This bill has the support of the American Hospital Association and the American College of Emergency Physicians. The American Medical Association also praised the committee's reliance on mediation for disputes on bills.

The House Education and Labor Committee advanced a hybrid proposal seeking to use established prices in local markets to resolve many disputes about out-of-network bills. Key to this bill is the use of arbitration above a certain cost. Bills greater than $750 or in the case of air ambulance services $25,000; clinicians and insurers could turn to arbitration for an independent dispute resolution. House Education and Labor passed this bill in a 32-13 mixed vote with some Republicans and Democrats opposing and in favor.

The latest Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee of legislative proposals also addresses surprise medical billing. The HELP bill called for mandating that insurers reimburse out-of-network costs on the basis of their own median rates for in-network providers.

The Education and Labor Committee bill is estimated to save $24 billion, the Senate HELPS bill is estimated to save $25 billion, and the Ways and Means' bill would save almost $18 billion all over 10 years. It is suggested the greater use of arbitration in the Ways and Means' bill will result in less savings.

Read on about the private equity involved and providers.

Outside Opponents of Legislation

The American Hospital Association : "Setting a rate in statute gives insurers few incentives to develop robust networks with hospitals and physicians, and paying for emergency care at the median in-network rate would surely underpay for these services and create an incentive for insurers to avoid paying fair reimbursement for these services. This approach is an obvious windfall for the insurance industry without any assurance that health plans will pass these savings on to consumers through lower premiums."

Other physician organizations have joined the fight to make balance billing appropriate; the American College of Emergency Physicians, Envision Healthcare, US Acute Care Solutions and US Anesthesia Partners -- gave roughly $1.1 million in 2019 to members of Congress, according to a Kaiser Health News analysis of Federal Election Commission records.

Doctor Patient Unity : "We support a federal solution to surprise medical bills that makes insurance companies pay their fair share and supports patients' right to quality medical care."
"We oppose insurance-industry-backed proposals for government rate setting that will lead to doctor shortages, hospital closures and loss of access to medical care, particularly in rural and underserved communities."

Early on in 2019, Doctor Patient Unity spent more than $28 million on ads opposing legislation without disclosing its staff or its funders. It was later revealed its largest financial backers are two private equity backed firms Team Health and Envision Healthcare. Together they own physician practices and staff emergency rooms around the country according to spokesperson Greg Blair. Blackstone Group owns Team Health and KKR owns Envision Healthcare

As is typical of political ads being run to influence people, they do not tell the whole story and omit references to surprise bills. Instead, they warn of "government rate setting" harming patient care and doctor/patient relationships.

The Direct Providers

ER doctors, anesthesiologists, radiologists and other specialists who typically charge out-of-network prices are among the highest-compensated practitioners. I have found this to be true during my hospital visits. Doctors, 3rd party contracting companies, and hospitals complain Healthcare Insurance Companies have the upper hand due to size and can pay the increased costs of out-of-network pricing.

The argument by doctors, the 3rd party contracting companies, and hospitals has been made the healthcare insurance companies control the market and are able to secure better pricing from providers which is not passed along to the insured. In markets where both providers and insurers are highly concentrated, insurers have bargaining power to reduce prices for hospital admissions and visits to certain physician specialists. The Market Concentration chart for insurers and providers reveals the concentration (concentration chart) for providers is greater than it is for insurers overall. Furthermore and if we are talking about ACA policies, additional moneys gained must be used for treatment or the excess beyond 15 and 20% overhead and profit is refundable. It can be said also, when the total cost goes up, the portion (15 or 20%) of the total price increases in real dollars.

ER doctors, anesthesiologists, radiologists and other specialists who typically charge out-of-network prices are among the highest-compensated practitioners. I have found this to be true during my hospital visits. If the insurance company can not convince them to take a lesser rate, you are stuck will the bill. I have been tempted to ask at the time of need whether they are all in network and employees of the facility I am visiting that day. Countering the argument by insurance, doctors, and hospitals complain healthcare insurance companies have the upper hand due to size and market control and can pay the increased costs of out-of-network pricing. As shown chart 1, their claims are not precisely true and the market for healthcare has become less competitive as hospitals and ACOs buy up the competition.

"Providers are more concentrated than insurers in almost 60 percent of US metro areas . Health plans hold an edge in only 6 percent of local markets. National and state level studies reveal a steady rise in concentration among specialist physicians, primary care providers, and hospitals alike. As Brent D. Fulton notes, concentration of insurers fell slightly from 2010 to 2016, while concentration rose for both specialist physicians and hospitals. The evidence suggests provider organizations will retain significant bargaining leverage even after out-of-network billing reform, leaving little scope or incentive or capability for insurers to push prices down sharply. "

Meanwhile, the naysayers are battling constructive resolution with $millions in countering ads and intense lobbying of Congress to delay and/or deny resolution of overpriced surprised billing of patients of which had no choice, many more are still being hit with bills there is little explanation for except greed. We do need Single Payer. Nough said . . .

Congress has till February 22nd to resolve the deadlock before the current temporary bill expires. I would take the Education and Labor approach, which is also backed by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and the Senate Health Committee. It would set the payment rate based on the median amount paid for that service in the geographic area with the option of going to arbitration for some higher-cost bills. It result in greater savings.

steve , February 18, 2020 5:25 pm

We (anesthesiology) are par with everything that our network accepts. I am not a fan of surprise billing, but I dont think you grasp all of the issues here. Medicare reimburses at much lower rates than does private insurance in my specialty. If you work in a place with a high percentage of Medicare (or Medicaid which is worse) like we do, you cannot come close to earning market salaries. So we, many years ago, ended up working 95th percentile or worse hours (over 70 per week) while earning in the 15th-20th percentile in income. We lost a lot of staff. The hospital had to make up the difference so that we could hire and retain people. We were fortunate that our hospital had the resources to do that.

Up north of us another hospital faced a similar situation, but they didn't have the resources to subsidize their staff. So they fired a good team and brought in another. Told them it was OK to not bill in accordance with what the hospital accepted, like the prior group did. That let the new group earn enough, for a while, to hire and retain people. Hospital eventually failed anyway and had to be bought out.

I think most of the groups that I know are surprise billing are pretty greedy and sleazy, so I stay away from them. However, there are other cases where groups are in a tough situation and pretty desperate. Especially smaller rural hospitals that have trouble finding staff to begin with.

Steve

[Feb 19, 2020] Bats, Gene Editing and Bioweapons Recent Darpa Experiments Raise Concerns Amid Coronavirus Outbreak, by Whitney Webb

Feb 19, 2020 | www.unz.com

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Examining the Recent Wuhan-Bioweapon Narrative

As the coronavirus outbreak has come to dominate headlines in recent weeks, several media outlets have promoted claims that the reported epicenter of the outbreak in Wuhan, China was also the site of laboratories allegedly linked to a Chinese government biowarfare program.

However, upon further examination of the sourcing for this serious claim, these supposed links between the outbreak and an alleged Chinese bioweapons program have come from two highly dubious sources.

Link Bookmark For instance, the first outlet to report on this claim was Radio Free Asia , the U.S.-government funded media outlet targeting Asian audiences that used to be run covertly by the CIA and named by the New York Times as a key part in the agency's " worldwide propaganda network ." Though it is no longer run directly by the CIA, it is now managed by the government-funded Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which answers directly to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who was CIA director immediately prior to his current post at the head of the State Department.

In other words, Radio Free Asia and other BBG-managed media outlets are legal outlets for U.S. government propaganda. Notably, the long-standing ban on the domestic use of U.S. government propaganda on U.S. citizens was lifted in 2013 , with the official justification of allowing the government to "effectively communicate in a credible way" and to better combat "al-Qaeda's and other violent extremists' influence."

Returning to the subject at hand, Radio Free Asia 's recent report on the alleged origins of the outbreak being linked to a Chinese state-linked virology center cited only Ren Ruihong, the former head of the medical assistance department at the Chinese Red Cross, for that claim. Ruihong has been cited as an expert in several Radio Free Asia reports on disease outbreaks in China, but has not been cited as an expert by any other English-language media outlet.

Ruihong told Radio Free Asia that:

"It's a new type of mutant coronavirus.They haven't made public the genetic sequence, because it is highly contagious Genetic engineering technology has gotten to such a point now, and Wuhan is home to a viral research center that is under the aegis of the China Academy of Sciences, which is the highest level of research facility in China."

Though Ruihong did not directly say that the Chinese government was making a bioweapon at the Wuhan facility, she did imply that genetic experiments at the facility may have resulted in the creation of this new "mutant coronavirus" at the center of the outbreak.

With Radio Free Asia and its single source having speculated about Chinese government links to the creation of the new coronavirus, the Washington Times soon took it much farther in a report titled " Virus-hit Wuhan has two laboratories linked to Chinese bio-warfare program ." That article, much like Radio Free Asia 's earlier report, cites a single source for that claim, former Israeli military intelligence biowarfare specialist Dany Shoham.

Yet, upon reading the article, Shoham does not even directly make the claim cited in the article's headline, as he only told the Washington Times that: "Certain laboratories in the [Wuhan] institute have probably been engaged, in terms of research and development, in Chinese [biological weapons], at least collaterally , yet not as a principal facility of the Chinese BW alignment (emphasis added)."

While Shoham's claims are clearly speculative, it is telling that the Washington Times would bother to cite him at all, especially given the key role he played in promoting false claims that the 2001 Anthrax attacks was the work of Iraq's Saddam Hussein . Shoham's assertions about Iraq's government and weaponized Anthrax, which were used to bolster the case for the 2003 invasion of Iraq , have since been proven completely false, as Iraq was found to have neither the chemical or biological "weapons of mass destruction" that "experts" like Shoham had claimed.

Beyond Shoham's own history of making suspect claims, it is also worth noting that Shoham's previous employer, Israeli military intelligence, has a troubling past with bioweapons. For instance, in the late 1990s, it was reported by several outlets that Israel was in the process of developing a genetic bioweapon that would target Arabs, specifically Iraqis, but leave Israeli Jews unaffected.

Given the dubious past of Shoham and the clearly speculative nature of both his claims and those made in the Radio Free Asia report, one passage in the Washington Times article is particularly telling about why these claims have recently surfaced:

"One ominous sign, said a U.S. official, is that the false rumors since the outbreak began several weeks ago have begun circulating on the Chinese Internet claiming the virus is part of a U.S. conspiracy to spread germ weapons . That could indicate China is preparing propaganda outlets to counter future charges the new virus escaped from one of Wuhan's civilian or defense research laboratories (emphasis added)."

However, as seen in that very article, accusations that the coronavirus escaped from a Chinese-state-linked laboratory is hardly a future charge as both the Washington Times and Radio Free Asia have already been making that claim. Instead, what this passage suggests is that the reports in both Radio Free Asia and the Washington Times were responses to the claims circulating within China that the outbreak is linked to a "U.S. conspiracy to spread germ weapons."

Though most English-language media outlets to date have not examined such a possibility, there is considerable supporting evidence that deserves to be examined. For instance, not only was the U.S. military, including its controversial research arm -- the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), recently funding studies in and near China that discovered new, mutant coronaviruses originating from bats, but the Pentagon also became recently concerned about the potential use of bats as bioweapons.

Bats as Bioweapons

As the ongoing coronavirus outbreak centered in China has spread to other countries and been blamed for a growing number of deaths, a consensus has emerged that this particular virus, currently classified as a "novel [i.e. new] coronavirus," is believed to have originated in bats and was transmitted to humans in Wuhan, China via a seafood market that also traded exotic animals . So-called "wet" markets, like the one in Wuhan, were previously blamed for past deadly coronavirus outbreaks in China, such as the 2003 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).

In addition, one preliminary study on the coronavirus responsible for the current outbreak found that the receptor, Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), is not only the same as that used by the SARS coronavirus, but that East Asians present a much higher ratio of lung cells that express that receptor than the other ethnicities (Caucasian and African-American) included in the study. However, such findings are preliminary and the sample size is too small to draw any definitive conclusions from that preliminary data.

Two years ago, media reports began discussing the Pentagon's sudden concern that bats could be used as biological weapons, particularly in spreading coronaviruses and other deadly diseases. The Washington Post asserted that the Pentagon's interest in investigating the potential use of bats to spread weaponized and deadly diseases was because of alleged Russian efforts to do the same. However, those claims regarding this Russian interest in using bats as bioweapons date back to the 1980s when the Soviet Union engaged in covert research involving the Marburg virus, research that did not even involve bats and which ended with the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991.

Like much of the Pentagon's controversial research programs, the bats as bioweapons research has been framed as defensive , despite the fact that no imminent threat involving bat-propagated bioweapons has been acknowledged. However, independent scientists have recently accused the Pentagon, particularly its research arm DARPA, of claiming to be engaged in research it says is "defensive" but is actually "offensive."

The most recent example of this involved DARPA's "Insect Allies" program , which officially "aims to protect the U.S. agricultural food supply by delivering protective genes to plants via insects, which are responsible for the transmission of most plant viruses" and to ensure "food security in the event of a major threat," according to both DARPA and media reports .

However, a group of well-respected, independent scientists revealed in a scathing analysis of the program that, far from a "defensive" research project, the Insect Allies program was aimed at creating and delivering "new class of biological weapon." The scientists, writing in the journal Science and led by Richard Guy Reeves, from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Germany, warned that DARPA's program -- which uses insects as the vehicle for as horizontal environmental genetic alteration agents (HEGAAS) -- revealed "an intention to develop a means of delivery of HEGAAs for offensive purposes (emphasis added)."

Whatever the real motivation behind the Pentagon's sudden and recent concern about bats being used as a vehicle for bioweapons, the U.S. military has spent millions of dollars over the past several years funding research on bats, the deadly viruses they can harbor -- including coronaviruses -- and how those viruses are transmitted from bats to humans.

For instance, DARPA spent $10 million on one project in 2018 "to unravel the complex causes of bat-borne viruses that have recently made the jump to humans, causing concern among global health officials." Another research project backed by both DARPA and NIH saw researchers at Colorado State University examine the coronavirus that causes Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) in bats and camels "to understand the role of these hosts in transmitting disease to humans." Other U.S. military-funded studies, discussed in detail later in this report, discovered several new strains of novel coronaviruses carried by bats, both within China and in countries bordering China.

Many of these recent research projects are related to DARPA's Preventing Emerging Pathogenic Threats, or PREEMPT program , which was officially announced in April 2018. PREEMPT focuses specifically on animal reservoirs of disease, specifically bats, and DARPA even noted in its press release in the program that it "is aware of biosafety and biosecurity sensitivities that could arise" due to the nature of the research.

DARPA's announcement for PREEMPT came just a few months after the U.S. government decided to controversially end a moratorium on so-called "gain-of-function" studies involving dangerous pathogens. VICE News explained "gain-of-function" studies as follows:

"Known as 'gain-of-function' studies, this type of research is ostensibly about trying to stay one step ahead of nature. By making super-viruses that are more pathogenic and easily transmissibl e, scientists are able to study the way these viruses may evolve and how genetic changes affect the way a virus interacts with its host. Using this information, the scientists can try to pre-empt the natural emergence of these traits by developing antiviral medications that are capable of staving off a pandemic (emphasis added)."

In addition, while both DARPA's PREEMPT program and the Pentagon's open interest in bats as bioweapons were announced in 2018, the U.S. military -- specifically the Department of Defense's Cooperative Threat Reduction Program -- began funding research involving bats and deadly pathogens , including the coronaviruses MERS and SARS, a year prior in 2017. One of those studies focused on "Bat-Borne Zoonotic Disease Emergence in Western Asia" and involved the Lugar Center in Georgia, identified by former Georgian government officials , the Russian government and independent, investigative journalist Dilyana Gaytandzhieva as a covert U.S. bioweapons lab.

It is also important to point out the fact that the U.S. military's key laboratories involving the study of deadly pathogens, including coronaviruses, Ebola and others, was suddenly shut down last July after the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) identified major "biosafety lapses" at the facility .

The U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) facility at Fort Detrick, Maryland -- the U.S. military's lead laboratory for "biological defense" research since the late 1960s -- was forced to halt all research it was conducting with a series of deadly pathogens after the CDC found that it lacked "sufficient systems in place to decontaminate wastewater" from its highest-security labs and failure of staff to follow safety procedures, among other lapses. The facility contains both level 3 and level 4 biosafety labs. While it is unknown if experiments involving coronaviruses were ongoing at the time, USAMRIID has recently been involved in research borne out of the Pentagon's recent concern about the use of bats as bioweapons.

The decision to shut down USAMRIID garnered surprisingly little media coverage, as did the CDC's surprising decision to allow the troubled facility to "partially resume" research late last November even though the facility was and is still not at "full operational capability ." The USAMRIID's problematic record of safety at such facilities is of particular concern in light of the recent coronavirus outbreak in China. As this report will soon reveal, this is because USAMRIID has a decades-old and close partnership with the University of Wuhan's Institute of Medical Virology, which is located in the epicenter of the current outbreak.

The Pentagon in Wuhan?

Beyond the U.S. military's recent expenditures on and interest in the use of bats of bioweapons, it is also worth examining the recent studies the military has funded regarding bats and "novel coronaviruses," such as that behind the recent outbreak, that have taken place within or in close proximity to China.

For instance, one study conducted in Southern China in 2018 resulted in the discovery of 89 new "novel bat coronavirus" strains that use the same receptor as the coronavirus known as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS). That study was jointly funded by the Chinese government's Ministry of Science and Technology, USAID -- an organization long alleged to be a front for U.S. intelligence , and the U.S. National Institute of Health -- which has collaborated with both the CIA and the Pentagon on infectious disease and bioweapons research.

The authors of the study also sequenced the complete genomes for two of those strains and also noted that existing MERS vaccines would be ineffective in targeting these viruses, leading them to suggest that one should be developed in advance. This did not occur.

Another U.S. government-funded study that discovered still more new strains of "novel bat coronavirus" was published just last year. Titled " Discovery and Characterization of Novel Bat Coronavirus Lineages from Kazakhstan ," focused on "the bat fauna of central Asia, which link China to eastern Europe" and the novel bat coronavirus lineages discovered during the study were found to be "closely related to bat coronaviruses from China, France, Spain, and South Africa, suggesting that co-circulation of coronaviruses is common in multiple bat species with overlapping geographical distributions." In other words, the coronaviruses discovered in this study were identified in bat populations that migrate between China and Kazakhstan, among other countries, and is closely related to bat coronaviruses in several countries, including China.

The study was entirely funded by the U.S. Department of Defense, specifically the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) as part of a project investigating coronaviruses similar to MERS, such as the aforementioned 2018 study. Yet, beyond the funding of this 2019 study, the institutions involved in conducting this study are also worth noting given their own close ties to the U.S. military and government.

The study's authors are affiliated with either the Kazakhstan-based Research Institute for Biological Safety Problems and/or Duke University. The Research Institute for Biological Safety Problems, though officially a part of Kazakhstan's National Center for Biotechnology, has received millions from the U.S. government, most of it coming from the Pentagon's Cooperative Threat Reduction Program . It is the Kazakhstan government's official depository of "highly dangerous animal and bird infections, with a collection of 278 pathogenic strains of 46 infectious diseases." It is part of a network of Pentagon-funded "bioweapons labs" throughout the Central Asian country, which borders both of the U.S.' top rival states -- China and Russia.

Duke University's involvement with this study is also interesting given that Duke is a key partner of DARPA's Pandemic Prevention Platform (P3) program , which officially aims "to dramatically accelerate discovery, integration, pre-clinical testing, and manufacturing of medical countermeasures against infectious diseases." The first step of the Duke/DARPA program involves the discovery of potentially threatening viruses and " develop[ing] methods to support viral propagation , so that virus can be used for downstream studies."

Duke University is also jointly partnered with China's Wuhan University, which is based in the city where the current coronavirus outbreak began, which resulted in the opening of the China-based Duke Kunshan University (DKU) in 2018. Notably, China's Wuhan University -- in addition to its partnership with Duke -- also includes a multi-lab Institute of Medical Virology that has worked closely with the US Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases since the 1980s, according to its website . As previously noted, the USAMRIID facility in the U.S. was shut down last July for failures to abide by biosafety and proper waste disposal procedures, but was allowed to partially resume some experiments late last November.

The Pentagon's Dark History of Germ Warfare

The U.S. military has a troubling past of having used disease as a weapon during times of war. One example involved the U.S.' use of germ warfare during the Korean War, when it targeted both North Korea and China by dropping diseased insects and voles carrying a variety of pathogens -- including bubonic plague and hemorrhagic fever -- from planes in the middle of the night. Despite the mountain of evidence and the testimony of U.S. soldiers involved in that program, the U.S. government and military denied the claims and ordered the destruction of relevant documentation.

In the post World War II era, other examples of U.S. research aimed at developing biological weapons have emerged, some of which have recently received media attention. One such example occurred this past July, when the U.S. House of Representatives demanded information from the U.S. military on its past efforts to weaponize insects and Lyme disease between 1950 and 1975.

The U.S. has claimed that it has not pursued offensive biological weapons since 1969 and this has been further supported by the U.S.' ratification of the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), which went into effect in 1975. However, there is extensive evidence that the U.S. has continued to covertly research and develop such weapons in the years since, much of it conducted abroad and outsourced to private companies, yet still funded by the U.S. military. Several investigators, including Dilyana Gaytandzhieva, have documented how the U.S. produces deadly viruses, bacteria and other toxins at facilities outside of the U.S. -- many of them in Eastern Europe, Africa and South Asia -- in clear violation of the BWC.

Aside from the military's own research, the controversial neoconservative think tank, the now defunct Project for a New American Century (PNAC), openly promoted the use of a race-specific genetically modified bioweapon as a "politically useful tool." In what is arguably the think tank's most controversial document, titled " Rebuilding America's Defenses ," there are a few passages that openly discuss the utility of bioweapons, including the following sentences:

" combat likely will take place in new dimensions: in space, "cyber-space," and perhaps the world of microbes advanced forms of biological warfare that can "target" specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."

Though numerous members of PNAC were prominent in the George W. Bush administration, many of its more controversial members have again risen to political prominence in the Trump administration.

Several years after "Rebuilding America's Defenses" was published, the U.S. Air Force published a document entitled " Biotechnology: Genetically Engineered Pathogens ," which contains the following passage:

"The JASON group, composed of academic scientists, served as technical advisers to the U. S. government. Their study generated six broad classes of genetically engineered pathogens that could pose serious threats to society. These include but are not limited to binary biological weapons, designer genes, gene therapy as a weapon, stealth viruses, host-swapping diseases, and designer diseases (emphasis added)."

Concerns about Pentagon experiments with biological weapons have garnered renewed media attention, particularly after it was revealed in 2017 that DARPA was the top funder of the controversial "gene drive" technology, which has the power to permanently alter the genetics of entire populations while targeting others for extinction. At least two of DARPA's studies using this controversial technology were classified and "focused on the potential military application of gene drive technology and use of gene drives in agriculture," according to media reports .

The revelation came after an organization called the ETC Group obtained over 1,000 emails on the military's interest in the technology as part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. Co-director of the ETC Group Jim Thomas said that this technology may be used as a biological weapon:

"Gene drives are a powerful and dangerous new technology and potential biological weapons could have disastrous impacts on peace, food security and the environment, especially if misused, The fact that gene drive development is now being primarily funded and structured by the US military raises alarming questions about this entire field."

Though the exact motivation behind the military's interest in such technology is unknown, the Pentagon has been open about the fact that it is devoting much of its resources towards the containment of what it considers the two greatest threats to U.S. military hegemony: Russia and China. China has been cited as the greatest threat of the two by several Pentagon officials, including John Rood, the Pentagon's top adviser for defense policy, who described China as the greatest threat to "our way of life in the United States" at the Aspen Security Forum last July.

Since the Pentagon began " redesigning " its policies and research towards a " long war " with Russia and China, the Russian military has accused the U.S. military of harvesting DNA from Russians as part of a covert bioweapon program, a charge that the Pentagon has adamantly denied. Major General Igor Kirillov, the head of the Russian military's radiation, chemical and biological protection unit who made these claims, also asserted that the U.S. was developing such weapons in close proximity to Russian and Chinese borders.

China has also accused the U.S. military of harvesting DNA from Chinese citizens with ill intentions, such as when 200,000 Chinese farmers were used in 12 genetic experiments without informed consent. Those experiments had been conducted by Harvard researchers as part of a U.S. government-funded project.

Darpa and Its Partners Chosen to Develop Coronavirus Vaccine

Last Thursday, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) announced that it would fund three separate programs in order to promote the development of a vaccine for the new coronavirus responsible for the current outbreak.

CEPI -- which describes itself as "a partnership of public, private, philanthropic and civil organizations that will finance and co-ordinate the development of vaccines against high priority public health threats" -- was founded in 2017 by the governments of Norway and India along with the World Economic Forum and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Its massive funding and close connections to public, private and non-profit organizations have positioned it to be able to finance the rapid creation of vaccines and widely distribute them.

CEPI's recent announcement revealed that it would fund two pharmaceutical companies -- Inovio Pharmaceuticals and Moderna Inc. -- as well as Australia's University of Queensland, which became a partner of CEPI early last year. Notably, the two pharmaceutical companies chosen have close ties to and/or strategic partnerships with DARPA and are developing vaccines that controversially involve genetic material and/or gene editing. The University of Queensland also has ties to DARPA, but those ties are not related to the university's biotechnology research, but instead engineering and missile development .

For instance, the top funders of Inovio Pharmaceuticals include both DARPA and the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) and the company has received millions in dollars in grants from DARPA, including a $45 million grant to develop a vaccine for Ebola. Inovio specializes in the creation of DNA immunotherapies and DNA vaccines, which contain genetically engineered DNA that causes the cells of the recipient to produce an antigen and can permanently alter a person's DNA. Inovio previously developed a DNA vaccine for the Zika virus, but -- to date -- no DNA vaccine has been approved for use in humans in the United States. Inovio was also recently awarded over $8 million from the U.S. military to develop a small, portable intradermal device for delivering DNA vaccines jointly developed by Inovio and USAMRIID.

However, the CEPI grant to combat coronavirus may change that, as it specifically funds Inovio's efforts to continue developing its DNA vaccine for the coronavirus that causes MERS. Inovio's MERS vaccine program began in 2018 in partnership with CEPI in a deal worth $56 million. The vaccine currently under development uses "Inovio's DNA Medicines platform to deliver optimized synthetic antigenic genes into cells, where they are translated into protein antigens that activate an individual's immune system" and the program is partnered with U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) and the NIH, among others. That program is currently undergoing testing in the Middle East.

Inovio's collaboration with the U.S. military in regards to DNA vaccines is nothing new, as their past efforts to develop a DNA vaccine for both Ebola and Marburg virus were also part of what Inovio's CEO Dr. Joseph Kim called its "active biodefense program" that has "garnered multiple grants from the Department of Defense, Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), and other government agencies."

CEPI's interest in increasing its support to this MERS-specific program seems at odds with its claim that doing so will combat the current coronavirus outbreak, since MERS and the novel coronavirus in question are not analogous and treatments for certain coronaviruses have been shown to be ineffective against other strains.

It is also worth noting that Inovio Pharmaceuticals was the only company selected by CEPI with direct access to the Chinese pharmaceutical market through its partnership with China's ApolloBio Corp. , which currently has an exclusive license to sell Inovio-made DNA immunotherapy products to Chinese customers.

The second pharmaceutical company that was selected by CEPI to develop a vaccine for the new coronavirus is Moderna Inc., which will develop a vaccine for the novel coronavirus of concern in collaboration with the U.S. NIH and which will be funded entirely by CEPI. The vaccine in question, as opposed to Inovio's DNA vaccine, will be a messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine. Though different than a DNA vaccine, mRNA vaccines still use genetic material "to direct the body's cells to produce intracellular, membrane or secreted proteins."

Moderna's mRNA treatments, including its mRNA vaccines, were largely developed using a $25 million grant from DARPA and it often touts is strategic alliance with DARPA in press releases . Moderna's past and ongoing research efforts have included developing mRNA vaccines tailored to an individual's unique DNA as well as an unsuccessful effort to create a mRNA vaccine for the Zika Virus, which was funded by the U.S. government.

Both DNA and mRNA vaccines involve the introduction of foreign and engineered genetic material into a person's cells and past studies have found that such vaccines "possess significant unpredictability and a number of inherent harmful potential hazards" and that "there is inadequate knowledge to define either the probability of unintended events or the consequences of genetic modifications." Nonetheless, the climate of fear surrounding the coronavirus outbreak could be enough for the public and private sector to develop and distribute such controversial treatments due to fear about the epidemic potential of the current outbreak.

However, the therapies being developed by Inovio, Modern and the University of Queensland are in alignment with DARPA's objectives regarding gene editing and vaccine technology. For instance, in 2015, DARPA geneticist Col. Daniel Wattendorf described how the agency was investigating a "new method of vaccine production [that] would involve giving the body instructions for making certain antibodies. Because the body would be its own bioreactor, the vaccine could be produced much faster than traditional methods and the result would be a higher level of protection."

According to media reports on Wattendorf's statements at the time, the vaccine would be developed as follows:

"Scientists would harvest viral antibodies from someone who has recovered from a disease such as flu or Ebola. After testing the antibodies' ability to neutralize viruses in a petri dish, they would isolate the most effective one, determine the genes needed to make that antibody, and then encode many copies of those genes into a circular snippet of genetic material -- either DNA or RNA, that the person's body would then use as a cookbook to assemble the antibody."

Though Wattendorf asserted that the effects of those vaccines wouldn't be permanent, DARPA has since been promoting permanent gene modifications as a means of protecting U.S. troops from biological weapons and infectious disease. "Why is DARPA doing this? [To] protect a soldier on the battlefield from chemical weapons and biological weapons by controlling their genome -- having the genome produce proteins that would automatically protect the soldier from the inside out," then-DARPA director Steve Walker (now with Lockheed Martin) said this past September of the project, known as " Safe Genes ."

Conclusion

Research conducted by the Pentagon, and DARPA specifically, has continually raised concerns, not just in the field of bioweapons and biotechnology, but also in the fields of nanotechnology, robotics and several others. DARPA, for instance, has been developing a series of unsettling research projects that ranges from microchips that can create and delete memories from the human brain to voting machine software that is rife with problems.

Now, as fear regarding the current coronavirus outbreak begins to peak, companies with direct ties to DARPA have been tasked with developing its vaccine, the long-term human and environmental impacts of which are unknown and will remain unknown by the time the vaccine is expected to go to market in a few weeks time.

Furthermore, DARPA and the Pentagon's past history with bioweapons and their more recent experiments on genetic alteration and extinction technologies as well as bats and coronaviruses in proximity to China have been largely left out of the narrative, despite the information being publicly available. Also left out of the media narrative have been the direct ties of both the USAMRIID and DARPA-partnered Duke University to the city of Wuhan, including its Institute of Medical Virology.

Though much about the origins of the coronavirus outbreak remains unknown, the U.S. military's ties to the aforementioned research studies and research institutions are worth detailing as such research -- while justified in the name of "national security" -- has the frightening potential to result in unintended, yet world-altering consequences. The lack of transparency about this research, such as DARPA's decision to classify its controversial genetic extinction research and the technology's use as a weapon of war, compounds these concerns. While it is important to avoid reckless speculation as much as possible, it is the opinion of this author that the information in this report is in the public interest and that readers should use this information to reach their own conclusions about the topics discussed herein.


Kiwi 1 , says: Show Comment February 3, 2020 at 6:59 am GMT

Interesting and thought provoking article. Queensland University is in Brisbane, the capital city of Queensland. Also in Brisbane is the suburb of Hendra, where the Hendra virus was first identified. It too appears to be transmitted by bats to animals and humans.

https://www.who.int/health-topics/hendra-virus-disease#tab=tab_1

Kiwi 1 , says: Show Comment February 3, 2020 at 7:45 am GMT
Israel has a long and well documented record of using bio-weapons against the British, Syrians, Egyptians and of course the Palestinian civilian population in 1947 and 1948, see Traces of Poison,

https://electronicintifada.net/content/traces-poison/4588

Chet Roman , says: Show Comment February 3, 2020 at 9:15 am GMT
Another great article by Whitney Webb, thank you. After reading the article I am now more inclined to believe some of the rumors suggesting that the Wuhan Coronavirus was possibly leaked from a biological research lab in Wuhan. Especially after reading about the direct ties of USAMRIID and DARPA-partnered Duke University to the Institute of Medical Virology in Wuhan.

Also, I read that patient zero was diagnosed on Dec. 1 long before the Chinese official statements of Dec. 31 and the fact that patient zero had no contact with the wet market that was supposed to be the origin of the virus. Of course it's still early and a great deal of confusion but as someone famously said" "All governments lie".

[Feb 16, 2020] Doctor Surprise Billing: this is the same price inflation dynamic that we observe in body shops and car insurance companies. Kind of evil symbiosis that develops

Feb 16, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

likbez , February 16, 2020 11:48 am

run75441,

Thank you for this post. This is an important topic that needs to be discussed.

Again Dr. ZDogg: "Guess what's going to happen to her insurance premiums next year? They're going to go up by 10%, 15%, 20 percent. And what will happen at employers around the country who are paying most of the bill? They're going to drop or keep wages flat (happening today). Healthcare becomes a financial albatross with collusion between healthcare providers charging a bunch of money and insurance companies paying it, hospitals overbuilding, overcharging, and doing stuff we don't even need. The results of these money games are a minority of people getting rich and everybody else's wages staying stagnant. 1 in 5 Americans have collection agencies coming after them for medical bills that are inflated and unnecessary.

BTW this is the same price inflation dynamic that we observe in body shops and car insurance companies. Kind of evil symbiosis that develops. So this is a more general phenomenon than just healthcare.

See also: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2020/02/what-the-heck-happened-to-surprise-billing-legislation-or-its-never-too-late-for-the-lobbyists-to-win.html

[Feb 15, 2020] A strong argument against "bioweapon origin of Coronavirus"

Feb 15, 2020 | www.unz.com

Old and grumpy , says: Show Comment February 15, 2020 at 2:35 pm GMT

Is the American deep state that good in being a perfectly timed evil? Wasn't the deep state designed to assist multinational corporations in stealing foreign resources? Yet the corporate supply chain is being interrupted in what will be devastating for the bottom line. The stock market is about all Trump has. The scenario outlined above just quite doesn't add up, despite its plausibility. Unless it is not about China, but purging Trump .maybe?

[Feb 15, 2020] If the mortality rate is 1% and Coronavirus infects 20% of global population, something like 16 million people will die. Let's hope the virus doesn't mutate to a more lethal form.

Feb 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Perimetr , Feb 13 2020 23:10 utc | 27

CDC, the Center for Disinformation Control

If the mortality rate is 1% and Coronavirus infects 20% of global population, something like 16 million people will die. Let's hope the virus doesn't mutate to a more lethal form.

The supply chains from China are now toast. Will be interesting to see how long the Fed can create enough digital currency to prop up the markets while things fall apart.

be happy, don't worry lol

PavewayIV , Feb 14 2020 20:38 utc | 84

The Center for Disease Control in the U.S. does not and never did have any kind of definitive count of flu deaths here. They estimate the number from mathematical modeling based on (U.S. numbers, 2020 Weeks 1-5):

1) total deaths - 240,000

2) pneumonia deaths - 15,700

3) primary cause/lab confirmed flu deaths 1,723

I don't think the CDC even publishes their model estimate of weekly deaths caused by the flu . They only publish the % of total deaths (5-7%) as flu deaths, but that number seems to be just the confirmed flu + pneumonia deaths.

Just for illustration, if the same 330 million U.S. 'regular' seasonal flu CDC numbers were applied to the population of Hubei for weeks 1-5, you would get:

43,000 total deaths
2,800 pneumonia deaths
310 confirmed flu deaths

The CDC equivalent U.S. numbers would translate to 3,100 deaths from seasonal flu in Hubei the first five weeks of this year.

What we really want to know is how many excess deaths coronavirus has really caused in Hubei. Expecting either the CPC, WHO or the U.S. government to cough up that number with any kind of accuracy without being told the number of 'regular' flu cases is pointless.

[Feb 15, 2020] Jon Rappoport's blog questioning suppositions about the corona virus is a good one to read

Feb 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

gepay , Feb 14 2020 22:03 utc | 85

Jon Rappoport's blog questioning suppositions about the corona virus is a good one to read.

https://blog.nomorefakenews.com/2020/02/10/china-epidemic-cases-with-no-coronavirus-what/


There is scare propaganda everywhere - especially on Zero Hedge. There are speculations that it is a bioweapon made in a semi secret Chinese bioweapons laboratory placed oddly in the very large city of Wuhan where it escaped. Since this is somewhat suggested by US government types it gives rise to the thought that this is indeed a bioweapon but made by the US. US laboratory weaponized anthrax was used shortly after 9/11.

Most of us have heard about the Tuskeegee experiments on blacks and recently exposed about experiments using Guatemalans. I have even read Vanderbilt Medical School gave irradiated iron to pregnant white women in the 50s. (They were, of course, poor white trash and only one of the resulting babies got cancer.)

It is pretty well confirmed that the US introduced swine fever to Cuba and later a foreign strain of dengue fever so as to cause hemorrhagic dengue fever in people who had previously had the local Caribbean variety.

I forget where the US used screw worms (was it Nicaraugua. It is well known that the US tried to use biowarfare utilizing anthrax against N Korean and China during that war - not only from captured USA pilot sources.

So with the present antagonism of the US and China it doesn't seem unlikely to me. On one hand it is the flu season. On the other there is the timing of the Chinese New Year. And the timing of that corona virus pandemic presentation associated with Bill Gates and the pentagon people just a month before the outbreak arouses my suspicians. There is a large number of pigs in China and China is crowded but it has been devastating for a people that eat mainly pork as meat. And how many avian flu epidemics there in the last few years? And SARS. There are the recent revelations of a Pentagon sponsored animal pathogen lab in Georgia (bordering Russia). Less seriously I mention the series, the Americans, with them investigating a plot of the Americans to destroy the wheat crop in Russia. A country whose military is lately only good for turning cities and countries into rubble I wouldn't put it past them to initiate biowarfare on a perceived opponent.

[Feb 15, 2020] Corona virus is simply a very severe cold virus, which will almost assuredly burn itself out by mid to late spring, as corona viruses don't replicate well in warmer, wetter environs, but flourish in cold dry circumstances,

Feb 15, 2020 | www.unz.com

Mustapha Mond , says: Show Comment February 15, 2020 at 2:24 pm GMT

"On October 18th the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, in conjunction with the World Economic Forum and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, brought together "15 leaders of business, government, and public health" to simulate a scenario in which a coronavirus pandemic was ravaging the planet. Major participants were American military leadership, and certain neocon political figures.

"The Chinese were not invited. This is unusual, as almost all the major viral outbreaks for the last decade occurred inside of China and Africa."

This is patently untrue, as my post #15 to Godfree Roberts' January 28th article here on Unz made abundantly clear:
-- -- -- -- –
Godfree Roberts writes:

"On October 18th, 2019, the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, in conjunction with the World Economic Forum assembled "15 leaders of business, government, and public health" to simulate a scenario in which a coronavirus pandemic was ravaging the planet. Major participants were American military leadership, and certain neocon political figures. The Chinese were not invited."

This appears to be incorrect. Dr George F. Gao, head of China's CDC was not only invited, but was openly listed as a major player at this conference, one of the very "15 leaders" cited by Mr Roberts (see here: http://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/event201/players/index.html )

That Dr. George F. Gao is the head of China's CDC, and one of China's top virologists, if not the top virologist, is found here, in Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_F._Gao
-- -- -- -- -

Also, please note the following: apparently one of the world's greatest experts on Corona viruses has (allegedly) informed an investor group that the novel corona virus is simply a very severe cold virus, which will almost assuredly burn itself out by mid to late spring, as corona viruses don't replicate well in warmer, wetter environs, but flourish in cold dry circumstances, and that the corona virus will likely not become endemic, but will be a simple flash-in-the-pan: https://www.sott.net/article/429100-Coronavirus-Expert-in-Leaked-Analysis-This-is-Just-a-Severe-Localized-Common-Cold

Of course, Dr Nicholls could be lying as part of another Western conspiracy, trying to make the east asian authorities let down their collective guards against a well-planned bio-weapons assault, but somehow I doubt a world-renowned Corona virus expert would take such a gambit in the context of his leaked comments, i.e., to a bunch of wealthy investors seeking advise on the subject at hand. Not impossible, just unlikely.

However, the ease of transmission certainly IS something which should give us pause, and coupled with the fact it apparently targets east asians of Chinese descent, should also give rise to reasonable suspicions about its origin.

But the Chinese government has been, and will likely continue to insist that any and all such 'conspiracy theories' are ridiculous, as the Chinese, even if they knew otherwise, would also know such claims would be met with 'hails of derisive laughter' (to quote from the famous "Bruces" Monty Python sketch), and FAR more importantly, know all too well that revenge in such circumstances is a dish served very, very cold

[Feb 15, 2020] Rumors that the virus was bio engineered are fed by the history of the USA bioweapons efforts

Feb 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

gepay , Feb 14 2020 22:03 utc | 85

Jon Rappoport's blog questioning suppositions about the corona virus is a good one to read. https://blog.nomorefakenews.com/2020/02/10/china-epidemic-cases-with-no-coronavirus-what/
There is scare propaganda everywhere - especially on Zero Hedge. There are speculations that it is a bioweapon made in a semi secret Chinese bioweapons laboratory placed oddly in the very large city of Wuhan where it escaped. Since this is somewhat suggested by US government types it gives rise to the thought that this is indeed a bioweapon but made by the US. US laboratory weaponized anthrax was used shortly after 9/11. Most of us have heard about the Tuskeegee experiments on blacks and recently exposed about experiments using Guatemalans. I have even read Vanderbilt Medical School gave irradiated iron to pregnant white women in the 50s. (They were, of course, poor white trash and only one of the resulting babies got cancer.) It is pretty well confirmed that the US introduced swine fever to Cuba and later a foreign strain of dengue fever so as to cause hemorrhagic dengue fever in people who had previously had the local Caribbean variety. I forget where the US used screw worms (was it Nicaraugua. It is well known that the US tried to use biowarfare utilizing anthrax against N Korean and China during that war - not only from captured USA pilot sources. So with the present antagonism of the US and China it doesn't seem unlikely to me. On one hand it is the flu season. On the other there is the timing of the Chinese New Year. And the timing of that corona virus pandemic presentation associated with Bill Gates and the pentagon people just a month before the outbreak arouses my suspicians. There is a large number of pigs in China and China is crowded but it has been devastating for a people that eat mainly pork as meat. And how many avian flu epidemics there in the last few years? And SARS. There are the recent revelations of a Pentagon sponsored animal pathogen lab in Georgia (bordering Russia). Less seriously I mention the series, the Americans, with them investigating a plot of the Americans to destroy the wheat crop in Russia. A country whose military is lately only good for turning cities and countries into rubble I wouldn't put it past them to initiate biowarfare on a perceived opponent.

uncle tungsten , Feb 15 2020 1:41 utc | 92

Alexander P #89
I personally do not believe in the bat to human transmission story at all.

Bat to human viral transmission is well known. See Hendra Virus which is a mighty deadly little bundle.

I too am sceptical in this case as there are some strong stories of this coronavirus being expertly fiddled and reconfigured for a deadlier impact. Some versions of this story have been debunked but I have not followed the storyline intently as in forensically. More information on the Canadian Lab and its inventory of pathogens might help but not much chance of that.

I consider it probable that China has been attacked by another nation. The African swine flu and the army worm outbreaks seem highly suspicious.

dltravers , Feb 15 2020 4:56 utc | 97
People believe it because our beloved government has an extensive record of doing it. Not anyone's fault for their mind to run that direction....
Unethical human experimentation in the United States
Sunny Runny Burger , Feb 15 2020 6:52 utc | 98
Dltravers: Sure but the US has a similar long track record of psychological warfare and the "US did it" opinions are being twisted FUD-style into support for the narrative which attacks China and the WHO and everyone who works with them as being clueless, useless, liars and so on.
Ken , Feb 15 2020 15:31 utc | 108
I know you don't believe the Coronavirus could be a man-made bio weapon, but here's an article that argues otherwise. Any thoughts?

https://www.unz.com/article/was-the-2020-wuhan-coronavirus-an-engineered-biological-attack-on-china-by-america-for-geopolitical-advantage/

[Feb 15, 2020] In a normal flu season in China 80,000 to 90,000 will die. In a bad flu season double that. It is simply nonsense that China would turn itself upside down for a novel flu that had claimed only 1300 additional lives.

Feb 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

oldhippie , Feb 14 2020 16:05 utc | 69

In a normal flu season in China 80,000 to 90,000 will die. In a bad flu season double that. It is simply nonsense that China would turn itself upside down for a novel flu that had claimed only 1300 additional lives. Oh, this began to be reported as a pandemic when the numbers were a couple hundred. Local doctors would notice if there were a flu that was conspicuously different, there would not be a national and a global response.

This does not mean the doom porn is believable. Particular warning against Epoch Times which has been extremely active and widely cited/reposted. They are Falun Gong and will libel China any way they can. All are advised to apply the epistemological question continuously. At the moment there is no such thing as a credible source, only credulous consumers of information.

c1ue , Feb 14 2020 16:11 utc | 70

The single study that has been misinterpreted as meaningful regarding Asians being more susceptible to nCOV - cited ACE2 receptors as the cause.
The problem is - smoking is known to cause the abnormal development of ACE2 receptors. The single Asian in the study was a smoker; only 1 of the other 5 was a smoker and the relative level of smoking aren't documented.

However, from my personal experiences in China - Chinese men are heavy smokers - much more so than women.

There may be a link between ACE2 and nCOV vulnerability - but if so, it is much more likely due to smoking than it is due to ethnicity. That's why studies with higher n matter - it is far easier to understand potential secondary lines of investigation from a large sample set, plus high n means less likelihood of random shit skewing results.

This study notes there is *no* difference in ACE2 expression between different races, people of different ages, etc - but there is a difference between smokers and non-smokers ACE2 study

Recently, studies found that 2019-nCov and SARS-nCov share the same receptor, ACE2. In this study, we analyzed four large-scale datasets of normal lung tissue to investigate the disparities related to race, age, gender and smoking status in ACE2 gene expression. No significant disparities in ACE2 gene expression were found between racial groups (Asian vs Caucasian), age groups (>60 vs <60) or gender groups (male vs female). However, we observed significantly higher ACE2 gene expression in smoker samples compared to non-smoker samples.

This indicates the smokers may be more susceptible to 2019-nCov and thus smoking history should be considered in identifying susceptible population and standardizing treatment regimen.

There is not a note about air pollution - that is another possible factor. The air pollution level in Wuhan actually worse than Beijing: Relative air pollution Beijing vs. Wuhan

[Feb 15, 2020] SARS conspiracy theory

Feb 15, 2020 | en.wikipedia.org

The SARS conspiracy theory began to emerge during the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak in China in the spring of 2003, when Sergei Kolesnikov , [1] a Russian scientist and a member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, first publicized his claim that the SARS coronavirus is a synthesis of measles and mumps . According to Kolesnikov, this combination cannot be formed in the natural world and thus the SARS virus must have been produced under laboratory conditions. Another Russian scientist, Nikolai Filatov , head of Moscow 's epidemiological services, had earlier commented that the SARS virus was probably man-made. [2] However, independent labs concluded these claims to be premature since the SARS virus is a coronavirus , [3] [4] [5] whereas measles and mumps are paramyxoviruses . [6] [7] The primary differences between a coronavirus and a paramyxovirus are in their structures and method of infection, thus making it implausible for a coronavirus to have been created from two paramyxoviruses. Overview [ edit ]

The widespread reporting of claims by Kolesnokov and Filatov caused controversy in many Chinese internet discussion boards and chat rooms. Many Chinese believed that the SARS virus could be a biological weapon manufactured by the United States, which perceived China as a potential threat. [8] The failure to find the source of the SARS virus further convinced these people and many more that SARS was artificially synthesised and spread by some individuals and even governments. Circumstantial evidence suggests that the SARS virus crossed over to humans from Asian palm civets ("civet cats"), a type of animal that is often killed and eaten in Guangdong , where SARS was first discovered. [9] [10]

Supporters of the conspiracy theory suggest that SARS caused the most serious harm in mainland China, Hong Kong , Taiwan and Singapore , regions where most Chinese reside, while the United States, Europe and Japan were not affected as much. However, the highest mortality from SARS outside of China occurred in Canada where 43 died. [11] [12] Conspiracists further point out that SARS has an average mortality rate of around 10% around the world, but no one died in the United States from SARS, despite the fact that there were 8 confirmed cases out of 27 probable cases (10% of 8 people is less than 1 person). [11] [13] [14] Regarding reasons why SARS patients in the United States experienced a relatively mild illness, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control has explained that anybody with fever and a respiratory symptom who had traveled to an affected area was included as a SARS patient in the U.S., even though many of these were found to have had other respiratory illnesses. [14] [15]

In October 2003, Tong Zeng, a Chinese lawyer and a volunteer in a 1998 Chinese-American medical cooperation program, published a book [16] that again speculated that SARS could be a biological weapon developed by the United States against China. In the book, Tong disclosed that in the 1990s, many American research groups collected thousands of blood and DNA samples and specimens of mainland Chinese (including 5,000 DNA samples from twins ) through numerous joint research projects carried out in China. These samples were then sent back to the United States for further research, and could be used in developing biological weapons targeting Chinese. These samples came from 22 provinces in China, all of which were hit by SARS in 2003. Only provinces like Yunnan , Guizhou , Hainan , Tibet , and Xinjiang were left out, and all these provinces suffered less severely during the SARS outbreak. The author suspects that Japan is also involved, as many Japanese factories in Guangdong in the 1990s made it compulsory for all workers to have blood tests in the factory annually, rather than asking workers to go to local hospitals for blood tests and a proper physical examination. However, Tong Zeng admits that these are only speculations, and he does not have any concrete proof from the study of the virus's genetic sequence . [17]

The two scientists named above expressed the possibility that the SARS virus was man-made. [18] The SARS coronavirus has been fully gene sequenced and that the genome has been made globally available. [3] There has been no evidence found of genetic engineering in the genome. The SARS coronavirus is novel, but this only implies it has mutated or was previously undiscovered, not that it is genetically engineered.

Coronaviruses similar to SARS have been found in bats in China, suggesting they may be their natural reservoir. [19]

[Feb 15, 2020] The hysteria aimed at China is 100% political in a Psyop sense and not based on reality whatsoever

Feb 15, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

karlof1 , Feb 13 2020 20:57 utc | 8

Thanks for providing the CDC stats, b! They're all that's need to prove the hysteria aimed at China is 100% political in a Psyop sense and not based on reality whatsoever. Indeed, the Chinese have commented about that as soon as it began, and has now reached a point where Chinese patience is wearing out as seen in this article :

"The novel coronavirus outbreak has given us a clearer understanding of US strategic direction toward China. Although China is working hard to promote the relationship between the two countries toward healthy and stable development, the recent strategic moves of the US showed that a strong force in the US is pushing the ties toward a hostile path, which is obviously making the future of Sino-US relations more unstable....

"The epidemic could become a chance for the two countries to cooperate and enhance mutual trust, yet as China is all in to fight the virus, the death of Li is being exploited and politicalized by some US politicians. This once again shows that attacking China's political system has become part of the US' China strategy. It must realize that this is one of the main causes of turbulence in China-US relations....

"China does not want to be a US rival, but if the US continues following this strategy, it is making itself an enemy ." [My Emphasis]

Given the woeful state of healthcare within the Outlaw US Empire, many tens of thousands would die if a similar outbreak occurred here. When that happens, I hope the DC Jingos are the ones to die first.



dennis , Feb 13 2020 21:32 utc | 16

I must admit it's been so hard to sift wheat from chaff on the sheer scale of reports coming out form across the spectrum. From doom porn end of days stuff to it's just an Asian flu thing.

Imperial College is a well respected institute in UK, this faculty guy has been saying a few useful things:

https://www.imperial.ac.uk/people/neil.ferguson

Basically he feels we're seeing the first tip of something much larger, but he's also careful to say we don't know much about it yet and it may well weaken over time. There-s an older interview 5th Feb on YT and some more recent stuff on BBC Radio4:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALQTdCYGISw
https://twitter.com/BBCr4today/status/1227519551983771648

The comments on the metaculus site have some useful content:
https://www.metaculus.com/questions/3529/how-many-human-infections-of-the-2019-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov-will-be-estimated-to-have-occurred-before-2021-question-two/

ZH continues with the cataclysmic end of the world view.

My 5 cents for what its worth is it will diminish in Asia in the next month and a half, may rear its head for a while in Europe to an extent to be determined by the spring climate. Either way its those in marginal health, exhaustion, overworked and fragile who should take most care.

el gallinazo , Feb 13 2020 21:46 utc | 17
Things to think about. First on the list is that all these numbers that are being thrown at us are, one way or another, derivatives of the antibody test for this specific virus which was developed in less than a month. Considering that we are at about 40 years and counting for a AIDS vaccine, purportedly against another RNA virus, this one though a retrovirus, this is certainly quick (and hopefully not dirty) work. Trying to get some details for this miracle I came across this excerpt

https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/02/how-does-one-test-for-coronavirus-anyway/

=========
The first challenge of sequencing a coronavirus genome is that it's made of RNA rather than DNA. Most of our tools for working with nucleic acids are specific to DNA. Fortunately, we've discovered an enzyme called "" that takes RNA and makes a DNA copy of it -- transcription is the copying of DNA into RNA; this enzyme does the opposite, hence the name. (Reverse transcriptase was first identified in other RNA viruses that need to be copied into DNA as part of infection.) Using reverse transcriptase, researchers were able to make DNA copies of parts of 2019-nCoV as a first step to studying its genome.

But reverse transcription of samples from infected individuals would simply create a mess of DNA fragments from everything present: the patient's own cells, harmless bacteria, and so on. Fortunately, DNA sequencing and analysis techniques have become so advanced that it's now possible to just sequence the whole mess, irrelevant stuff and all, and let computers sort out what's present. Software is able to take what we know about the average coronavirus genome and identify all of the fragments of sequence that look like they came from a coronavirus. Other software can determine how all these fragments overlap and then stitch them together, producing a near-complete coronavirus genome.
=====================

Sort of reminds me of the dictum to shoot everyone and let God sort them out.

Hopefully the RNA reverse transcriptase does a better job than Google Translate going from Mandarin to English.

Since the antibody test was developed by a complex computer program based on a generic sampling of the vast complex of various corona viruses (most of them either harmless or slightly harmful to humans), there are very few people on the planet that could evaluate its value and accuracy. Furthermore, it is based on a translation of the RNA into DNA via an enzyme. Evaluators would need to be experts in both stereo computer programing and virology and be allowed access to the source code.

I guess we will just have to trust our Overlords.

Piotr Berman , Feb 13 2020 21:52 utc | 18
My grandfather died of pneumonia at the age of 82. This is not rare at all, and the new classification that may falsely diagnose pneumonia cases may be practical. Basically, the new drug cocktail cannot be given to all pneumonia cases in China, there are limits on increase of production and imports, but in Hubei they will be considered the new corona virus.

The course of the epidemic is hard to predict, finding therapies etc. is as paramount as slowing the spread.

Cambodia gave berth to corona virus ship. There is a talk about depression in cruise industry. Given that, I would recommend a cruise to North Pole. Not crowded, great unique views, few viruses up there, nice weather: "normal Moscow winter clothing should be sufficient" (around Summer solstice).

Likklemore , Feb 13 2020 21:59 utc | 19
@ Bill 15

increase vs. number of deaths.

It's the reclassification by Cat scans (CT) scans. Modeling.

Spike in China virus cases doesn't show big shift in epidemic: WHO

GENEVA (Reuters) - The spike in cases reported from China reflects reclassifying a backlog of suspect cases using patients' chest images and not necessarily the "tip of an iceberg" of a wider epidemic, a top World Health Organization official said on Thursday.

"Crucially we understand that most of these cases relate to a period going back over days and weeks and are retrospectively reported as cases, sometimes back to the beginning of the outbreak itself," he told a news conference at WHO headquarters.


"We've seen this spike in the number of cases reported in China, but this does not represent a significant change in the trajectory of the outbreak," he said.
[.]

No significant shifts in mortality or severity patterns had been detected, Ryan said.[.]


More

Ric G , Feb 13 2020 22:19 utc | 20
The truth is probably somewhere between Zerohedges sensationalism and B's 'nothing to see, move along, have another joint approach'!

However, the cure may be worse than the disease. If China continues to lock down a third or so of the nation, then the Chinese economy will collapse and the supply chains to the world are going to evaporate.

Welcome to 'unintended consequences'.

It is this economic collapse which may be the true contagion!


Trailer Trash , Feb 13 2020 22:26 utc | 21
I would like to know how Chinese workers in the affected zones will survive financially. It sounds like they won't have medical bankruptcies, but how will they pay rent and buy food? Even if regular employers still pay wages, I assume there are many workers who are day laborers, self-employed, casual work, etc. Will they end up living on the street? That's certainly what happens in Uncle Sam Land.
Likklemore , Feb 13 2020 22:27 utc | 22
Meanwhile, the critique of China borders on hysteria. Can't trust the numbers they release.

And CDC does a recall?

CDC: Defective Coronavirus Testing Kits Shipped Across US


The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has announced that flaws have been identified in testing kits meant to confirm or deny an individual's COVID-19 coronavirus diagnosis on the spot.

Americans experiencing coronavirus symptoms may have to wait longer to receive a diagnosis from state health officials after the CDC revealed Wednesday that the 200 COVID-19 testing kits issued across the country last week may return inconclusive - neither positive nor negative - results.

Some of the states identified some inconclusive laboratory results," Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said during the February 12 news conference, speaking on the states' own quality control protocols regarding the kits.

Passer by , Feb 13 2020 22:59 utc | 23
Sorry b, but China would not fire its top provincial officials and Xi would not call it a "grave situation" , if it wasn't a grave situation.

There are too many virus epidemics in China hitting people and wiping out animals (if you haven't noticed) and that is a problem of chinese culture.

Many people overestimate China, forgetting that the country is still significantly poorer than even Russia on per capita basis, and technologically has many problem areas - such as being incapable of creating a good submarine, or putting a nuclear reactor on large surface ship, or creating good aircraft, especially aircraft engines, or creating good radar surveliance network (it needed help from Russia for many of those things), or creating good air defense (had to buy S-400), etc.

While there are some areas where it the took the lead, there are also many areas where it is lacking.

China will be on par with the US by 2030 as great power, but it is not right now, and it is still relatively poor country on per capita basis, with many areas where it is lacking. Not surprisingly it got bullied into buying 200 billion $ more in US goods, with half of US tarrifs still not removed.

daffyDuct , Feb 14 2020 0:25 utc | 34
Excellent article at Counterpunch on NYT/CFR propaganda efforts.

"Instead of voicing support or encouraging solidarity–"We are Wuhan" -- western corporate media have chosen to go all out to criticize and demonize China, sparing no effort to recycle and rekindle ugly, racist, orientalist, and dehumanizing tropes, using any perceived misstep, pretext, and shortcoming to tar China and the Chinese. One virulent narrative is that this is deliberate Chinese bioweapon to reduce population, another narrative, no less toxic and virulent, alleges that the Chinese leadership, out of a "fear of political embarrassment", suppressed free speech and silenced the flow of information "at critical moments", "allowing the virus to gain a tenacious hold", thus creating the conditions for a lethal epidemic that has led to the deaths of hundreds and the infection of thousands.

The NY Times takes the [yellow] cake for sowing this toxic, racist disinformation, alleging in numerous articles and opinion pieces of a "cover up": that "China's old habits put secrecy and order ahead of openly confronting the crisis"; that "they played down dangers to the public, leaving the city's 11 million residents unaware that they should protect themselves", and presenting this as proof dispositive that the Chinese system is fatally flawed. All this while reveling in and boosting on its website, unseemly schadenfreude that suppression of information and free speech has led to condign and expected catastrophe.

The most recent iteration of this propaganda concerns a Dr Li Wenliang..."


https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/02/11/how-to-yellow-cake-a-tragedy-the-ny-times-spreads-the-virus-of-hatred-again/

daffyDuct , Feb 14 2020 0:31 utc | 35
From the article I cited above - the following would be considered a "mission accomplished" scenario of the CIA:

"c) Panicked, mass hysterical responses are not uncommon, and themselves can constitute a public health hazard. Either of these effects, caused by premature or careless disclosure could have resulted in:

i) People thinking themselves sick

ii) People crowding hospitals, stretching resources, while spreading the infection faster, as well as preventing genuinely sick people from getting care (all at a time when public services are winding down)

iii) Mass exodus, spreading the infection outside of Wuhan much faster

iv) Hoarding & scarcity of masks and other supplies, vigilante quarantines, and other hysterical, dangerous, and unproductive behavior."

vk , Feb 14 2020 0:38 utc | 37
@ Posted by: Bruce | Feb 13 2020 23:19 utc | 31

Hong Kong is not considered an area of geopolitical vulnerability by the Chinese Armed Forces.

The two regions the PLA considers to be China's greatest vulnerability points, in order of greatest and second greatest are: 1) Xinjiang and 2) Tibet. That, of course, from the outside (i.e. an American attack).

Obviously, an internal rebellion in Wuhan (central China, the heart of Chinese communism) would far surpass any military threat any of those regions could give to the CCP. Hence, of course, the COVID-19 being a greater threat to the CCP than the latte-sipping liberals from Hong Kong and the wannabe Americans from Taiwan could ever be.

Grieved , Feb 14 2020 0:46 utc | 38
One used to hear the Brits talk of the "Dunkirk Spirit". Similarly, one used to hear of the American "can do" spirit.

Only in very recent years have I come to get a feel for the Chinese Spirit, and this 30-second news clip exemplifies it for me.

A Wuhan doctor has quarantined herself from her family, staying in a hotel while she treats the outbreak. As she walks to work in the evening, her husband drives slowly behind her to light the way. When she returns to the hotel, he has prepared a hot meal for her.

Wuhan doctor quarantines herself from family, husband lights her way to work each night

r , Feb 14 2020 2:44 utc | 46
Posted by: Perimetr | Feb 13 2020 23:10 utc | 28

"CDC, the Center for Disinformation Control"

i was afraid of that.

"something like 16 million people"

yesterday someone compared the death toll to be TENS OF MILLIONS while comparing nCov-19 to the 1918 pandemic ... but times have changed ... new technology, improved sanitary science, and governments that have bullets .


Posted by: Barovsky | Feb 14 2020 0:04 utc | 34

that's what WaPo is also telling but i can't find numbers/graphs


Posted by: Pft | Feb 14 2020 0:36 utc | 37

i want what you're smoking ... wanna try dangerous things at least once in my life


Posted by: frances | Feb 14 2020 1:17 utc | 43

nothing in local JP TV, papers yet


something that caught my eye ...

"The United States is "deeply concerned" about the possible impact of a coronavirus outbreak in North Korea and is prepared to help U.S. and international organizations contain the spread of the virus, the State Department said on Thursday."


William Gruff , Feb 14 2020 12:07 utc | 61
"...since then he appears resigned to the reality that all spooks are low life types capable of any dastardly act." --A User @50

B has not yet given in to the level of cynicism necessary to fully acknowledge the true depths of villainy of these spook gangs. We are talking gangs composed of the kinds of people who as children torture small animals to death, but grow up to need larger victims to satisfy their perverse lusts. Who is so naive as to believe that the CIA runs secret torture facilities because they really think they can get useful information that way? Those facilities are vacation resorts for staff who have served the gang well. They also serve as initiation/training facilities for staff who might still be a little squeamish about spilling the blood of helpless innocents.

Consider that these gangs of literal psychopaths are supplied with the almost limitless cash that is raised by controlling global trade in drugs, slaves, and black market weapons. Consider that they have free use of America's ridiculously extensive consular networks and military bases. Consider that they can easily travel anywhere on diplomatic documents forged by the US government itself, and you can start to see how these bloodthirsty monsters can get away with what they do.

But wait! There's more!

They have "recruiters" , both formal and informal; covert and overt, on every major college campus in the US. They make contacts with the choicest up-and-coming talent that looks to go places in business and government. They volunteer "favors" for these kids, building webs of obligation. They observe fraternity hazings to identify fellow sadists, or where the opportunity arises push the fraternity hazing over the edge to collect blackmail material for future use while simultaneously building out their web of obligation by offering to help covering up grave transgressions against human decency. Commit an unforgivable act in the presence of these CIA "recruiters" and they own you for life. Students "vetted" in this manner are then treated as "trustworthy" by the oligarchy and get rapid promotions in the capitalist power structures. Think of it as more than just CIA recruiting, but also pre-employment screening for the oligarchy. After all, the oligarchy will want insurance that their tools don't go all Howard Beale on them and use one of capitalism's enormous soapboxes to blurt out the truth to all of the vegetative mass media consumers sitting slack-jawed on their couches in front of their Plato's Cave screens.

They killed millions in southeast Asia. They torture and murder all across Latin America. They assassinate presidents, both inside and outside the empire. They lie as naturally as breathing. They kill even when the empire has no need of it. They kill their own loyal tools, like Nemtsov, if it suits their amusement of the day. They killed highly respected statesmen on a diplomatic missions. When trying to determine if they are likely to be behind some horrific incident, you only need to consider if it is feasible and if it serves the empire's or their own internal needs. Never waste your time trying to ponder if the CIA and their subsidiaries could stoop so low as to commit the very most horrendous crimes imaginable because they have already done it again and again. These CIA monsters make ISIS head-choppers look like choir boys in comparison.

Would the CIA go around a crowded city spraying a horrible virus into the air? If they had such a virus they would do it for fun. You only need ask if they could get their hands on such a virus, not if they could be so evil as to use it, because that last is a forgone conclusion.

And, yes, the CIA can easily get their hands on such a virus.

ak74 , Feb 14 2020 17:15 utc | 73
@ Barovsky

"Moreover, some of the Russian sources are far-right, Russian nationalists that have their own axe to grind."

Many American opinions on this issue are from far-right, centrist, or "progressive" American nationalists who have their own axe to grind and are peddling opinions without proof.

One of the Russians cited in those articles is Igor Nikulin, a former member of the UN Commission on Biological and Chemical Weapons. I think he is more credible than most Americans pushing their views on this topic.

The MK.ru article can be easily translated from Russian into English, using an online translator of your choice.

The expert saw signs of American bioterrorism in the spread of coronavirus
https://www.mk.ru/science/2020/01/27/ekspert-uvidel-priznaki-amerikanskogo-bioterrorizma-v-rasprostranenii-koronavirusa.html

Dmitry Orlov also weighs in on the "convenient" Coronavirus, and after reviewing various factors, suggests that the most likely scenario is an American bioweapon.

A Most Convenient Virus
http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2020/02/a-most-convenient-virus.html#more

Also, it is not a secret that the Americans have been trying to collect Chinese and Russian DNA material for years... to what end?

Humanitarian medical studies?

Give me a break.

The Pentagon Bio-weapons
http://dilyana.bg/the-pentagon-bio-weapons/

And to be frank, it's obvious that America is manipulating the Coronavirus Issue itself (beyond the health issues involved) as a hybrid war weapon against China.

The America agenda is economic disruption, political destabilization, and infowar propaganda against one of its major "New Cold War" opponents.

karlof1 , Feb 14 2020 17:57 utc | 77
William Gruff @61--

Some nations like China are aware of that other antagonist you describe so well that must be defended against. The Outlaw US Empire's public's been brainwashed via media shows like Mission: Impossible and books like Tom Clancy's series starring Jack Ryan to view the CIA as needed and a force for good. Combatting that are the Jason Bourne books and movies, but they're not nearly enough. Then there're the many dozens of TV-cop shows through the years since Dragnet , the Untouchables and The FBI Story depicting police as a force for good. If TV technology had arrived sooner, there'd be shows in the South extolling the KKK as a force for good showing real lynching's on TV--the racism present in Oaters only ended with the rise of the Civil Rights Movement and Ladybird Johnson's use of a Native American to symbolize her campaign to beautify America (Do ya'll remember that?). But there's never been any movie about the CIA's Death Squads, although the Terrorist Foreign Legion's now getting Oscars for the propaganda films extolling their exploits--which I think's an excellent marker for just how deeply immoral the Outlaw US Empire's Establishment's become.

Does the above fit into the nihilism The Saker gets into at the end of this recent essay , or is it closer to the Libertinism of de Sade which justifies its criminal controlling as the product of a superior over inferiors--Exceptionalists over the non-exceptional. What lurks in the minds of those US Senators who were the cause behind the Global Times editorial I linked @8? Then we have Pompeo, who appears to liken himself as a reborn Nero or Caligula. Or are they merely continuing what the Pilgrims began in Plymouth--the buried part of that history never taught in schools: the place where American Death Squads began.

[Feb 15, 2020] Doctor Surprise Billing

Highly recommended!
This is the same spiral of cost inflation that we observe in dealing with repair shops and car insurance companies. They form symbiosis that prosper by mutual inflation of costs.
Notable quotes:
"... The Insurance company must apply 80% of healthcare insurance premiums to actual care. and 20% to Overhead and Profit. Dr. ZDogg states most of the tests were not needed such as a Pan-Viral test when a rapid-strep swab would do. Dr. ZDogg contends this was a virus and the most one should do is the swab the throat or just wait to see what develops . . . this sounds familiar to me as a patient too. ..."
"... The hypothetical? Lets say at the most, what was done should be about $1000 or $800 to actual care and $200 to Overhead and Profit. Multiple this by 26 and see what it amounts to. In Dr. ZDogg's words: "What if we make the pie bigger and 3% of a bigger pie is more money? What if we actually let people overcharge for procedures they don't need? Then all we have to do next year is raise the premiums to cover the actual medical cost, which is now higher, and then we make a higher amount of profit." That was the untoward side effect of the government policy on this, which, by the way, happens with many policies that are top-down. You can't predict what happens and then it happens. " ..."
Feb 15, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

Going to her PCP located in Manhattan, a woman complains of a sore throat. Forget the Manhattan part of this as various versions (surprise billing) of this situation are happening everywhere. The doctor swabbed the throat, sent it off to the lab, ordered some tests, and then gave her a prescription for antibiotics. She took her meds and went on vacation feeling better.

The tests came back negative. She later received a bill for ~$26,000.

The lab was out of network which usually results with insurance only paying a portion of the bill and the patient the balance unless the insurance negotiates a lesser charge (hospital 3rd party employees) which they will pay. This is another version of Surprise Billing, not in a hospital setting, which we have heard so much about, and the patient gets screwed with the balance of the Surprise Billing.

More Information

The lab was out of network but it was a part of the employer the PCP worked for also. Usually doctors use the hospital they are affiliated with to run tests or do lab work which are also in network (today). I suspect more hospitals will relegate lab work to 3rd parties to cut costs and improve profits.

There was a time when I had catastrophic insurance which only paid 50% of costs. I had pneumonia and really could not afford to go to my PCP at $150 (then) as I was out of work. My PCP was not sympathetic and wrote me script to take to the hospital for imaging and another test. I called the U 0f M hospital and talked to a clerk there about cost. He finally told me to go to Quest (outside lab) and they would be half the cost in doing imaging, etc. U of M has some major Overhead to pay for today.

By the way, Blue Cross Blue Shield paid almost all of the bill for this lady with the sore throat.

Even More Information and a Hypothetical

The Insurance company must apply 80% of healthcare insurance premiums to actual care. and 20% to Overhead and Profit. Dr. ZDogg states most of the tests were not needed such as a Pan-Viral test when a rapid-strep swab would do. Dr. ZDogg contends this was a virus and the most one should do is the swab the throat or just wait to see what develops . . . this sounds familiar to me as a patient too.

The hypothetical? Lets say at the most, what was done should be about $1000 or $800 to actual care and $200 to Overhead and Profit. Multiple this by 26 and see what it amounts to. In Dr. ZDogg's words: "What if we make the pie bigger and 3% of a bigger pie is more money? What if we actually let people overcharge for procedures they don't need? Then all we have to do next year is raise the premiums to cover the actual medical cost, which is now higher, and then we make a higher amount of profit." That was the untoward side effect of the government policy on this, which, by the way, happens with many policies that are top-down. You can't predict what happens and then it happens. "

I would like to think doctors, hospitals, and healthcare insurance companies are not prone to this. Yet we have record of numerous surprise billing instances by hospitals, this one is an example of one by a doctor. Medicare Advantage plans are over billing CMS for treatments running totals up to $10 billion per year. And what about Commercial Healthcare Insurance? I have not heard of insurance pushing back on over charges. Usually, they reject a bill or a portion of it and the patient pays the balance.

And what Happens as a Result?

Again Dr. ZDogg: "Guess what's going to happen to her insurance premiums next year? They're going to go up by 10%, 15%, 20 percent. And what will happen at employers around the country who are paying most of the bill? They're going to drop or keep wages flat (happening today). Healthcare becomes a financial albatross with collusion between healthcare providers charging a bunch of money and insurance companies paying it, hospitals overbuilding, overcharging, and doing stuff we don't even need. The results of these money games are a minority of people getting rich and everybody else's wages staying stagnant. 1 in 5 Americans have collection agencies coming after them for medical bills that are inflated and unnecessary.

Dr. ZDogg recommended exposure to sunlight might cure the problem.

The patient; "I made it very clear [to the doctor's office] that I was unhappy about it." And told them I would report the doctor to New York state's Office of Professional Medical Conduct. She also reached out to "Bill of the Month," a joint project of NPR and Kaiser Health News. After a reporter started asking questions about the bill, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota stopped payment on the check it issued and is now investigating.

The bottom line to this is, it should have never got this far or even happen.

Recently it was disclosed Michigan No Fault Accident Coverage was paying an ~289% of Medicare rates to hospitals and clinics to care for patient injuries suffered from automobile accidents. No Fault coverage will die in a few years as the new legislation sponsored by Quicken Loans Dan Gilbert and Michigan Repubs have allowed people to opt out or take lesser coverage which will now pay hospitals and clinics 220% of Medicare rates. No Fault would not disclose what it was paying caregivers. Another surprise which should have never happened . . .

This story is from December 2019 and was in NPR For Her Head Cold , Insurer Coughed Up $25,865, NPR, Richard Harris.

Paperwork: Manhattan Specialty Care
$26,000 for a Throat Swab?! , ZDoggMD, MedPage Today, February 6, 2020
The Doctors Who Bill You While You're Unconscious , The Atlantic, Olga Khazan, February 11, 2020


Chris, February 14, 2020 1:19 pm

The solution is to have one network and a single payer. Simple.

run75441 , February 14, 2020 7:49 pm

Chris:

You remind of someone else who insists it is that simple. It is not unless you have 60% of Congress inline. And if you do make the change, look forward to much of the Senate and the House being replaced as the population likes their Employer sponsored commercial healthcare insurance in spite of being screwed over by commercial healthcare, healthcare, and the pols who kiss the industries butt. What you and others are insisting on as being so simple is not so simple to enact.

davebarnes , February 14, 2020 1:39 pm

I have Kaiser Medicare Advantage and am happy.
Colon cancer fix cost me $2500 for surgery + chemo.
Perianal abscess cost me $300. Three surgeries.

EMichael , February 14, 2020 2:49 pm

Chris,

The solution is indeed simple. Getting to the solution is a huge task.

Meanwhile, It would be very simple legislation to stop this criminal treatment by providers. Person has insurance and is treated by someone out of network without giving specific orders to go out of network, is only liable for the in network charges.

Hard to vote against that, but we all know how many will, and who they are.

[Feb 14, 2020] Do not ever trust a government to communicate truthful information to you if they have something to gain by lying

Feb 14, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

Don Wills , Feb 13 2020 3:11 utc | 110

Oops. b's article of Feb 8 about how the coronavirus is under control was way off base. Zerohedge reports that Hubei Province has come clean and reported a huge increase in infections using the previous statistical gathering rules. Hopefully it will be less severe than the 1918 flu pandemic that caused the death of TENS OF MILLIONS.

Do not ever trust a government to communicate truthful information to you if they have something to gain by lying. It doesn't matter if it is your home country or an adversary country - they all lie when it is to their advantage. Truth is a very elusive commodity today.


psychohistorian , Feb 13 2020 5:27 utc | 121

Below are quotes from two different postings at Xinhuanet that I think are related

"
WUHAN, Feb. 13 (Xinhua) -- China's Hubei Province, center of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, reported 14,840 new confirmed cases and 242 new deaths on Wednesday, the highest daily increases so far, local health authorities said Thursday.

The Hubei Provincial Health Commission said the number of new cases included 13,332 clinically diagnosed cases, which have been seen as confirmed cases from Thursday.

It brought the total confirmed cases in the hard-hit province to 48,206. The province had a total of 1,310 deaths as of Wednesday.

Clinically diagnosed cases are unique to Hubei statistically. The inclusion of those cases drives the surge in the number of new confirmed cases.
.........
"

"
BEIJING, Feb. 13 (Xinhua) -- Ying Yong has been appointed secretary of the Hubei Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), replacing Jiang Chaoliang, according to a decision by the CPC Central Committee.
"

Perimetr , Feb 13 2020 7:02 utc | 127
Interviewee: Professor Neil Ferguson, Director of MRC GIDA, J-IDEA, School of Public Health
Interviewer and Associate Producer: Sabine van Elsland, MRC GIDA, J-IDEA, School of Public Health

Feb 8 interview

Professor Neil Ferguson on the current 2019-nCoV coronavirus outbreak

Infectious disease scientist Neil Ferguson estimates coronavirus could be infecting 50,000 people a day. For over a week, China has consistently reported about 3,000 new infections per day. The number has stayed suspiciously constant over the last ten days. A steady rate of 3,000 diagnoses per day points to the upper limit of detection kits that are available to the health workers.

China reportedly has quarantined hundreds of millions of people at this point. Not a response you would expect for something that is innocuous.

Russ , Feb 13 2020 7:16 utc | 130
Posted by: Perimetr | Feb 13 2020 7:02 utc | 126

"China reportedly has quarantined hundreds of millions of people at this point. Not a response you would expect for something that is innocuous."

It's weird how many people here hold the schizoid position that, on one hand the epidemic is mild and nothing to panic about, but at the same time China's extreme measures have comprised an heroic campaign against an horrific danger.

Of course if the virus is not a great threat then China's actions themselves would constitute a form of panic, if not something more sinister. But if it is such a threat that the big lockdown is warranted, then whence comes the "it's not a big deal" rhetoric?

Sounds to me like these people are on the verge of panic themselves and are trying to calm themselves down, in no matter how incoherent a fashion.

(Not all that different from those who politically say or imply the US is in great existential crisis yet who assure themselves and everyone else that the sufficient, even necessary solution can be found within the Democratic Party.)

uncle tungsten , Feb 13 2020 8:35 utc | 139
Perimetr #126
China reportedly has quarantined hundreds of millions of people at this point. Not a response you would expect for something that is innocuous.


Thank you for that observation and if the coronavirus is anything like constructed from a mix of elements from other forms (deliberately or naturally) then it IS a serious threat. It appears that it is infectious BEFORE a person shows symptoms and so the threat is magnified immensely unless it is easily attenuated in open air. That is not likely from what I have read.

China has responded rationally and rapidly to date. Its response will certainly generate ill feeling and antagonism but people behave irrationally and are driven by self interest beyond the caring for the community when faced with these lethal unseen predators.

If/when this level of quarantine were to break out in the hysterical USA, could you imagine the response? The freedom brigades would be barricading streets, commandeering trains to escape and break quarantine. Hysterics like Rachel Maddow would weeping inanities on MSNBC every night. Chris Mathews would crapping his pants about it being a public execution virus ... russia russia russia.....

vk , Feb 13 2020 11:51 utc | 149
China reshuffles top officials in coronavirus epicenter Hubei Province
Faced with the sudden CODIV-19 outbreak, problems such as sloppiness and poor management of work have been exposed among Wuhan and Hubei authorities, reflecting severe loopholes in local governance. The appointment of new officials will not only enhance prevention and control measures against the outbreak but also aim to highlight the urgency of improving crisis-handling capability among officials, analysts said.

The new appointed official was responsible for containing the epidemic to Shanghai:

In his effort in combating the virus in Shanghai, Ying, also head of Shanghai's leading group for virus containment, emphasized grass-roots level units' strength in fighting the battle. He also conducted detailed and thorough discussion with people working in residential communities, hearing their opinions concerning the containment work.

He also underlined the role that science plays in this battle. Ying suggested Shanghai use its edge as a "scientific highland" to support the prevention and control of the virus. Speaking at a conference on Tuesday, Ying suggested scientific achievements should race against time, against virus, to gain initiative of fighting the coronavirus.

An anonymous Shanghai-based expert praised Shanghai's virus containment work. He told the Global Times that Shanghai, home to millions of migrant workers, could be the next epidemic center for the coronavirus.

However, with effective and scientific measures, which do not disturb people's normal life, Shanghai has managed to keep the infection at a moderate level compared with other provinces and municipalities. The city reported 311 confirmed cases of the CODIV-19 infection.

This is very far from the dictatorial and brutal scenario the western MSM is describing. To fight an epidemic from spreading without disrupting the economy, you need more - not less - democracy. And that's what the CCP is doing.

Also pay attention to the emphasis the new official gives to science as opposed to religion (i.e. superstition). This is not only a teaching moment for the Chinese people, but also an indirect jibe at Chinese paganism. The COVID-19 will be defeated with science (i.e. communism), not with religion (i.e. Chines paganism, or even Christianism or Islamism, depending on the province you go in China).

The Guardian described this reshuffling as a "purge". It continues to descend more and more to a pro-capitalist (liberal) pamphlet.

--//--

@ Posted by: Russ | Feb 13 2020 7:16 utc | 129

What is most amazing is how many commenters here completely ignore Chinese media.

Xi Jinping literally made a speech where he stated the COVID-19 was a grave danger and crisis, that the battle against the virus would be very difficult, but that he had confidence the Chinese people was capable of fighting it off.

Before his speech, many editorials and other articles were published in the Chinese official and extraofficial media, all of them making extremely clear the crisis was grave, and that in no way the virus was a non-issue. It also highlighted the failures of the Chinese local governance and healthcare system, as well as its deficiencies in R&D in the medicine area. The Chinese media never downplayed the COVID-19 and its shortcomings.

It is only in the world of the Western MSM that the CCP is hiding the crisis from its own people, is falsifying the number of infected and dead, is brutally crushing a rebellion for free speech in Wuhan etc. etc.

The story of the millions of bodies cremated in Wuhan is even more bizarre, since it makes it clear commenters here do not research on Chinese media. There are inumerous videos on TikTok (Chinese Instagram) of people living in Wuhan documenting how their lives are going amid the quarantine. There's no rebellion there; people are compreensive of the graveness of the situation, and understand it is a necessary evil. They are not cut off from the internet or any other kind of media. Sure, the situation is shitty, and many non-infected people in Wuhan are pissed off with the situation (as is in the nature of any human being) - but that's far from being a rebellion to topple the CCP.

Wuhan was the birthplace of Chinese communism. In the 1920s, it was the first attempt to install a socialist republic in practice. It was brutally crushed by the Han supremacist forces of Chiang Kaishek - who personally ordered the massacre of all the communists there once he entered the city believed to be peacefully. It would take another 20 years for communism to recover from that episode. The people of Wuhan know their history, and they know they can trust the CCP.

vk , Feb 13 2020 12:03 utc | 150
44 more on Diamond Princess cruise ship test positive for COVID-19

Of course the number of infected is rising - the Japanese cruise ship is moored since February 3rd!

The test kits come out with the results in 24 hours. Why is the damn ship isolated for ten days and counting?

The article states the passengers are kept in their own cabins, with masks. How is the Japanese government so shure this will keep the non-infected from being infected, if rumors from the media claim it can be transmitted even from contact with a piece of metal? Why isn't the westerm MSM publicly denouncing this potential death trap set up by the Japanese government?

The article also states that the people who are already tested negative are being freed from the ship. That means the Japanese simply don't have the means, that is, the human and material resources, to test all the passengers at once (that is, in 24 hours). A declaration by health minister Katsunobu Kato implies they can only test 200 people simutaneously. Why isn't the Japanese people angry with such inneficiency? Why isn't such government inneficiency not being publicly denounced by the western MSM?

Japanese ineptitude will cost dozens of lives in that ship.

murgen23 , Feb 13 2020 12:46 utc | 151
"Why isn't the westerm MSM publicly denouncing this potential death trap"

I bet nobody has an idea how to deal with COVID-19. If you have an idea we are eager to read you..

snake , Feb 13 2020 14:25 utc | 160
Japanese ineptitude will cost dozens of lives in that ship. by: vk @ 150

I can't see why anyone would be released until the entire ship tests free for at least 14 days of the virus.. If the whole damn ship comes down with the disease, it provides the masses needed to study the disease and to develop antibodies. The ship is a laboratory crucible of the kind that cannot be assembled anywhere else.. There may be a few deaths, but not likely, more than will occur by releasing those falsely testing negative into the whole world, only to have them distribute the disease and incubate it in places it might not otherwise reach.

Perimetr , Feb 13 2020 15:20 utc | 173
Re snake @ 160 and vk @ 170

Notice that one of the employees from the Japanese Health Ministry tested positive for the Coronavirus after surveying the passengers being held under quarantine on the cruise ship . And the employee was wearing a full body protective suit (!!). No, not very infectious at all.

Bruce , Feb 13 2020 18:25 utc | 198
PRESS RELEASE 5 MINUTE READ FEB | 11 | 2020

Mass General Hospital researchers identify new "universal" target for antiviral treatment
Key Takeaways
Mass General researchers have uncovered a novel potential antiviral drug target that could lead to treatments protecting against a host of infectious diseases – creating a universal treatment
Their work suggests that the protein Argonaute 4 (AGO4) is an "Achilles heel" for viruses.
Researchers suggest that boosting levels of AGO4 could shore up the immune system to protect against multiple viruses
https://www.massgeneral.org/news/press-release/Mass-general-hospital-researchers-identify-new-universal-target-for-antiviral-treatment

That it is a protein is in itself intriguing.

[Feb 13, 2020] Update on the situation in Hubey province as of Feb. 13, 2020

Feb 13, 2020 | www.quora.com

I woke up today and saw a 15000 increase of cases in Hubei province. I actually feel happy to see this update, because it is a result of more transparent reporting, which added many overlooked cases in Wuhan city. This number increase has pushed Hubei's province's case number account to over 81% of all cases. The other parts of China have seen steady decrease in case growth. Guangzhou, a heavily affected city only had 4 new cases over the past day. It is an encouraging sign, and shows China has managed the situation except for Wuhan. I have relatives near Wuhan, and their life besides been grounded at home, isn't very bad. They also confirmed with that Wuhan is in a horrible position still.

[Feb 10, 2020] How serious is the 2019 20 Wuhan coronavirus

Feb 10, 2020 | www.quora.com

Original Answer:

My wife and I live in Guangzhou, in the southern Canton province where at this very moment has nearly 1000 cases confirmed. We just travelled to and came back from my in-laws' home in Jiangxi, where it is a little closer to Wuhan, but less affected by the outbreak.

The entire country is literally on quarantine. This is what we experienced during our drive back to Guangzhou. When entering the provincial border, emergency crew checked every single passenger's temperature.

Nearly everything on the street is closed in every city. I have basically stayed home for two weeks now, except for necessary grocery run. Below are my personal understandings developed during this viral outbreak:

  1. Panic is the worst enemy. Though many are saying that the situation is worse than govt reports, which I agree, I hope people can have more faith in the official numbers and reports. The govt is already taking very drastic measures, and I understand well why they only report optimistic news. What else can they do? Tell 1.4 billion people that the country is doomed? Blame the Wuhan local govt for their inefficiency in handling the initial outbreak, but stand with the Chinese government for it is pulling incredible work at this moment.
  2. The disease is highly contagious. Short unprotected exposure to carriers of the virus can lead to infection . However, with medical treatment, the fatality rate is VERY LOW. A majority of the cases confirmed are in Hubei province, the epicentre. Outside of that province, out of over 8000 confirmed cases, only 16 people have died, mostly elderly and with prior medical complications. This is a very low fatality rate. Guangzhou has nearly 300 confirmed cases, but put in mind this is a city of roughly 10 million people.
  3. Wuhan is in hell now. Lack of medical resources and the spread of virus in highly populated urban area has lead to a fatality rate 30 times higher than other parts of China. Many patients are advised to stay home, without timely medical help. Some eventually go into critical condition and even die before even getting confirmed. Sad.
  4. This point is not confirmed, but I feel that except for Hubei province, the outbreak is getting more and more contained. In Guangdong and Zhejiang, both have reported nearly 1000 confirmed cases, NO DEATH is reported. The spread is mainly developing fast in the epicentre, which is now effectively sealed off.
  5. I notice that discrimination is growing at all levels. Globally, some media outposts are labeling the virus as China virus (include my home media in BC, Canada), linking viral outbreak with Chinese or Asian ethnicity. Regionally, Wuhan and Hubei province are being labeled as the source of the contagion I suppose this is our human nature, the dark part of it.

My feelings:

This outbreak made my 1st tier city middle class bubble burst. For a long time, I have lived in relative privilege.

The first tier Chinese cities have provided so much that made me feel like living in a futuristic and developed country.

This outbreak slaps me hard, and it woke me up. In many areas China is still poor and decades behind the developed world. There is much to be done, and as someone working in education, I have a good field to start with.

Sitting in my apartment in the centre of Guangzhou, the world outside is so quiet. The country has slowed down, but now it is a tranquil moment for me to think about life and maybe for this country to reflect on itself too.

[Feb 09, 2020] This is a classic case of panic-mongering and hysteria-inducing journalism

Notable quotes:
"... the predominant demographic of nCOV deaths so far are 60+ year old men with severe health problems; I'd not be surprised that these types of people don't travel much, if at all. ..."
Feb 09, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
vk , Feb 9 2020 13:49 utc | 139
Key Diagnostic Test Might Be Missing Many Coronavirus Cases

This is a classic case of panic-mongering and hysteria-inducing journalism.

Every test has its percentage of false negatives. Of course there are patients infected with the new coronavirus that were dismissed by the hospitals. But this is a calculated risk, with its given margin of error.

If we were to publish in the MSM the number of deaths due to misdiagnosed cancer in the First World, there would be mass hysteria and a spike in demand for cancer screening. That doesn't happen because the western MSM is not interested in causing chaos in their home court.


c1ue , Feb 9 2020 14:31 utc | 144
Here's an interesting point about nCOV which hasn't been talked about much: fecal-oral transmission.
Some of the news articles note that bodies are being treated as contagious, reinforcing this author's point about there being multiple ways nCOV can be transmitted: Wim Rost talking about nCOV at WuWT

No idea if his view is correct or supported: he's saying that nCOV infection via fecal-oral is less dangerous because the victim has more time to build up defenses vs. infection via aerial transmission directly into the lungs.

He does have a good precedent/point about the ability of nCOV to transfer from digestive system to rest of the body, if true: bubonic plague is transmitted by fleas on rats - going from bloodstream to rest of body, but it got really bad when the bacterium got into the lungs. At that point, transmissibility became aerial.
I'm not 100% convinced of the digestive system route though. Shaking hands = virus to other people, but it is just as likely the transmission is occurring when these people touch their eyes or nose as because they eat food without washing their hands first.

The conclusion is also not strong concerning deaths outside of China: the predominant demographic of nCOV deaths so far are 60+ year old men with severe health problems; I'd not be surprised that these types of people don't travel much, if at all.

Sasha , Feb 9 2020 15:05 utc | 148
@Posted by: Ric G | Feb 9 2020 13:42 utc | 139

... ... ...

Not to mention that it has been only the US who is using its shameful schadenfreude to try to profit from the outbreak of the Coronavirus epidemic, debunking some commenters´ here theory on that it is the "West" who is using this on the grounds of information warfare.

No European country has made such thing, as the statements from the Chinese authorities have clearly showed, calling only on the US to stop using this infection as informational weapon.

The king of Spain moves his support to China for the outbreak of the coronavirus

Queen Elizabeth II moves her solidarity and blessings to China in her fight against epidemic

More leaders from foreign countries and heads of international organizations have recently expressed their support for the battle of #China against the outbreak of the new #coronavirus and praised China's measures to prevent and control the epidemic.

https://twitter.com/XHespanol/status/1225851001036591105

"We all live in a global village and we must fight together against disasters." Leaders of foreign political parties have expressed their support for #China's efforts in the battle against the outbreak of the new #coronavirus in messages addressed to the CCP.

https://twitter.com/XHespanol/status/1225849156088090626

NemesisCalling , Feb 9 2020 15:47 utc | 150
Was the swine flu from Mexico in the 2000s a bioweapon? How many did that help to kill in the U.S.? 10,000?

Those dirty Ruskies! Gimme a break, you guys.

Sasha , Feb 9 2020 15:47 utc | 151
On how this has been clearly used by the US against China, in spite of the recent and missleading Twitts and phone calls by the Donald ( surely provoked by the absolute isolation amongst the international community on his and his admnistration use of this event for profit ):

COLD WAR 2.0 AND THE RETURN OF THE "YELLOW DANGER": The "Wuhan coronavirus" or how to name a virus in a racist way

Related, and what nobody tells you in the pro-Trump media praising economic results by his presidency....

Pyrric Victory: One of the "collateral damage" of the US trade war against China has been causing the collapse of sales of the US chip industry, which has fallen to levels below those of the dotcom crisis

[Feb 08, 2020] How lethal is the Wuhan virus by Jeff Pao

Notable quotes:
"... "a correct comparison is not SARS or Mers but a severe cold. Basically this is a severe form of the cold." ..."
"... However, a breakdown of the figures in cities in Hubei paints a different picture. In Wuhan, the center of the outbreak with a population of 11 million, the fatality rate was 4.09% with 10,117 people infected and 414 deaths. In Huanggang, the second-largest city in Hubei, with a population of 6.29 million, the fatality rate was 1.6% with 29 people out of 1,807 infected patients having died. ..."
"... On January 24, Yuen Kwok-yung , chair of Infectious Diseases at the University of Hong Kong's Department of Microbiology, and his team wrote in an article published in The Lancet, one of the world's leading medical journals, that the Wuhan coronavirus could be more infectious than SARS as its attack rate was 83%, based on the fact that six out of seven people in a Shenzhen family were infected. ..."
"... the coronavirus could survive on a stainless steel surface for 36 hours, but sunlight could shorten its half-life from 13-20 minutes in the dark to just to 2.5 minutes. ..."
"... Fukuda, a former special representative for antimicrobial resistance for the Director-General of the World Health Organization, said it was too early to predict that the Wuhan virus would be contained in April and May, as it has proved contagious in tropical places such as Singapore and Bangkok. ..."
Feb 08, 2020 | www.asiatimes.com

No worse than a 'bad cold' say some experts, but others fear it could kill 14,000 people in Hong Kong alone

Pathologists, microbiologists and public health experts from the University of Hong Kong have expressed different views about the lethality of the Wuhan coronavirus in a bid to help governments shape their strategies against the epidemic.

Based on different scientific evidence and viewpoints, some said the mortality or fatality rate, which indicates the lethality of the Wuhan coronavirus could be as low as 0.6% and that it may go down further if more minor cases are recorded.

Others said even if the mortality rate was between 1-2%, compared with 7% of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), the Wuhan virus could kill tens of thousands of people due to it being highly contagious.

The fatality rate of the Wuhan disease in mainland China was between 2.2% and 2.4% but the percentage outside mainland China was 0.6%, given that only two people had died from 321 confirmed cases, John Nicholls , a Clinical Professor in Pathology at the University of Hong Kong, told Asia Times in an email.

"Whether this difference reflects a delay in disease progression, different criteria in reporting or other treatment factors requires further investigation, but whichever figure you choose, there is certainly a reduced mortality compared with Sars or Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (Mers)," Nicholls said.

In an unpublished transcript from a February 6 conference call with personnel at Hong Kong's CLSA investment group , which has been widely circulated on the internet, Prof Nicholls is quoted as saying that "a correct comparison is not SARS or Mers but a severe cold. Basically this is a severe form of the cold."

(Note: Asia Times takes no responsibility for the accuracy of the transcript).

According to China's National Health Commission, the number of people infected with the Wuhan coronavirus amounted to 31,774 as of Friday, with the death toll at 722. The fatality rate, or the ratio of the number of deaths to infections, is 2.27%. The figure has remained at around 2.2% since late January.

As of Wednesday, the number of infections in Hubei province totalled 19,665, 70% of the total number on the mainland. The death toll in the central China province amounted to 549 – about 97.5% of all deaths reported in the country to date. The fatality rate in the province was 2.79%.

However, a breakdown of the figures in cities in Hubei paints a different picture. In Wuhan, the center of the outbreak with a population of 11 million, the fatality rate was 4.09% with 10,117 people infected and 414 deaths. In Huanggang, the second-largest city in Hubei, with a population of 6.29 million, the fatality rate was 1.6% with 29 people out of 1,807 infected patients having died.

In Tianmen, with a population of 1.73 million, the percentage reached 7.25% as 10 people out of 138 patients died. In Ezhou, with a population of 1.08 million, the percentage was 4.26% as 18 out of 423 people who had the disease died.

It would be useful to track whether there was a significant difference in mortality and morbidity within the major outbreak cities in mainland China, Nicholls said, as that may give an indication on how severe the Wuhan disease is.

It was important not to look at the mortality rate in Wuhan solely but also the figures outside Wuhan, as Hubei province was overwhelmed by a lot of milder cases because people were not admitted to hospital, Nicholls is quoted as saying in the transcript above. "It's important not [only] to look at the mortality rate in Wuhan but to look at the mortality rate in Shanghai or Shenzhen" where it was much less deadly, he said.

Meanwhile, some other scientists warned that it could be too early to conclude the fatality rate because "it takes time to die from the coronavirus."

Epidemic in Hong Kong

As of 8pm on Friday, the number of infections in Hong Kong was 26. One person died from the disease on February 4. The fatality rate was 3.8% but based on very small numbers.

On January 24, Yuen Kwok-yung , chair of Infectious Diseases at the University of Hong Kong's Department of Microbiology, and his team wrote in an article published in The Lancet, one of the world's leading medical journals, that the Wuhan coronavirus could be more infectious than SARS as its attack rate was 83%, based on the fact that six out of seven people in a Shenzhen family were infected.

The attack rate for SARS virus ranged from 10.3% to 60%, according to a previous research study.

On February 1, Yuen said in a radio program that if the Hong Kong government did not take any measures, the number of people infected with the Wuhan disease could reach 1.4 million people – about 20% of the city's population.

He said 14,000 people could be killed by the virus in Hong Kong if an estimated fatality rate of 1%, instead of the current 2%, was used for calculation.

In an article published by Stand News on Friday, a Hong Kong-based columnist explained how Yuen made the estimation.

Yuen cited data from Hong Kong's Centre for Health Protection that about 17.6 to 25.4% of patients with flu symptoms were diagnosed with seasonal influenza in emergency rooms at peak flu season, it said. He also used the reported fatality rate of 2% on the mainland – but halved it to reduce public panic.

The article said 2,618 out of 1.4 million people would die if the mortality rate of flu-related diseases (0.187%) between 2009 and 2016 in Hong Kong was used instead. And 14 people would die if the global mortality rate of the 2009 H1N1 or swine influenza (0.001 to 0.007%) was used.

In fact, 356 deaths were recorded in Hong Kong during the influenza season between December 30, 2018 and April 6, 2019, according to the Centre for Health Protection.

Sunlight, temperature and humidity

Apart from the fatality rate, the thermal tolerance – the temperature range at which the Wuhan virus can survive – was also another hot debate topic among scientists.

There were articles published on temperature and humidity linked to coronaviruses and SARS, from an outbreak of the latter disease in 2003, Nicholls told Asia Times.

He told CNN on Thursday that the Wuhan virus would be like SARS – as "the world is going to get basically a very bad cold for about five months."

He also said elsewhere that the coronavirus could survive on a stainless steel surface for 36 hours, but sunlight could shorten its half-life from 13-20 minutes in the dark to just to 2.5 minutes.

The virus could remain intact at 4-10° Celsius for a longer period of time, he said, so Australia and the southern hemisphere would not see any great infections, as they are now in the middle of summer. And, the virus did not like high humidity.

But, Keiji Fukuda , director and Clinical Professor at the University of Hong Kong's Division of Community Medicine and Public Health Practice, said in an interview with Sing Tao Daily on Friday the Wuhan disease may not necessarily disappear in summer.

Fukuda, a former special representative for antimicrobial resistance for the Director-General of the World Health Organization, said it was too early to predict that the Wuhan virus would be contained in April and May, as it has proved contagious in tropical places such as Singapore and Bangkok.

The value of that observation is at least questionable as most cases of infection in Thailand and Singapore were brought in by Chinese travellers, with no evidence of significant community transmission initially.

[Feb 08, 2020] The Epidemic Recedes - Number Of New Coronavirus Cases In Decline

Feb 08, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

james , Feb 8 2020 17:25 utc | 1

The novel Coronavirus (nCoV19) epidemic is a receding danger but its effects will stay with us for some time. Here is an update on the current situation.

Caixin reports (machine translation):

In general, with the increase in isolation and treatment work, the number of new suspected cases nationwide has decreased, and the number of new confirmed cases outside Hubei has fallen for 4 consecutive days . The situation of the new coronavirus epidemic situation may have improved. On the 7th, the first confirmed case appeared in only one city, and the number of newly cured cases exceeded the number of new deaths for 9 consecutive days, indicating that the epidemic was under control.

The graphic below shows the newly suspected cases per day (yellow) and the number of newly confirmed cases per day (red).


Source: Dxy - bigger

Newly suspected cases get tested and it takes about a day until they are 'converted' to confirmed cases or removed from the count. It makes therefore sense to combine those numbers and to show a total of new cases per day.


Data source: National Health Commission of China
bigger

The new cases number in China is now stabilizing at around 8,000 per day and the trend seems to be downwards.

Cont. reading: The Epidemic Recedes - Number Of New Coronavirus Cases In Decline

Posted by b at 17:18 UTC | Comments (58) thanks for this b.... your quote "The Chinese authorities will soon have to balance public safety with the necessity of economic activities. They are likely to stay cautious. They will want to make sure that the epidemic is under total control before allowing a return to normal life." it reminds me of how messed up the world is where economic activities are always interfering with our priorities... i was just saying this on the boeing thread - when money is an important priority - people make wrong decisions..


Jackrabbit , Feb 8 2020 18:02 utc | 2

China's economy is severely effected by the epidemic.

China wisely decided to take extraordinary measures at an early stage. If they hadn't done so, the impact on the people and the economy would've ultimately been much much greater.

!!

Bere Rabbit , Feb 8 2020 18:19 utc | 3
Isn't that interesting. We just happen to have an epidemic when economic activity comes to a halt anyway.
occupatio , Feb 8 2020 18:19 utc | 4
"This will likely speed up the 'decoupling' from China which the U.S. under Trump promotes."

The whole talking-point about 'decoupling' borders on fantasy. China is the supply-chain capital of the world; while US manufacturing has been gutted and will not return without ginormous initiative for industrial planning by the US govt, which is highly unlikely given the current political ideology.

The only meaningful area we can speak of 'decoupling' is in military manufacturing, such as US attempts to sever dual-use drones purchases from Chinese DJI; and to move semi-conductor production back to the US, for example by trying to pressure TSMC to re-locate to the US. The purpose of such military decoupling is to minimize disruption in the case of a US-China hot war.

In the larger economic picture, there is no meaningful way to de-couple from China, for the US or any major economic power such as Germany for that matter, not just because China manufactures so much but also because it is the biggest purchaser of goods and services; indeed is the largest trading partner for most countries in the world.

Vasco da Gama , Feb 8 2020 18:21 utc | 5
Undoubtedly JR, but I can't help but notice how the extraordinary measures taken by China were described as both "draconian" and "late" at the same time.

China is not facing a deadly outbreak of a corona virus alone, the world is facing an also deadly outbreak of rumour induced stupidity the viral cause being lead by "social" networks.

Likklemore , Feb 8 2020 18:44 utc | 6
Thanks b.

we are wading through Incredible hyper-reporting. One news site in Olso, Norway has a "professor" reporting 50,000 infections per day. Bet he does not read, speak Mandarin or Cantonese.

We are seeing disruptions in supply chain - the just-in-time delivery on which global economy relies will be more pronounced in another month. [household goods to chemical, medical products] A walk down the isle or factory floor reads "Product of China" : "Made in China"

By Industry Sector at link


Production disruptions would largely affect household goods, hi-tech goods and textile industries where China plays a core role in the global supply chain. Production disruptions in these industries would have an adverse effect on the global supply chain as companies would struggle to find alternative suppliers.[.]

AB , Feb 8 2020 19:30 utc | 11
All that stuff reminds me so much of the "climate change" (we're guilty off of course) thing. The target here was the chinese, I feel chinese these days.
Mr Peter Wright , Feb 8 2020 19:31 utc | 12
Concerns expressed about what happens if the disease gets into Africa on any scale -

http://www.golemxiv.co.uk/2020/02/3225/

Notsure , Feb 8 2020 19:52 utc | 16
From WSJ:

"Japan also said on Saturday that one of its citizens had died in a Wuhan hospital from a suspected case of the coronavirus. But the Japanese Foreign Ministry said that based on information it received from the Chinese authorities, it could not confirm whether the man, who was in his 60s, had been infected with the new virus. The ministry called the cause of death viral pneumonia."

Nope cornonavirus cases are going down, but "viral pneumonia" cases are through the roof..s/

Likklemore , Feb 8 2020 20:03 utc | 20
Robert @ 8;

Do you rely on the BLS - Bureau of Labor Statistics?

droje @10;

Professor N.Ferguson, Imperial College of London, went on record February 3rd stating that the real rate of infection is now 50,000/day.

did you read his was a computer modelling? Garbage in; garbage out. The guy is guessing and fear mongering.
"My best guess now is" said he.


"My best guess now is perhaps 100,000 cases right now," Neil Ferguson, a public health expert at Imperial College in London who's been estimating the disease's spread for the World Health Organization, told the Guardian. He thinks the actual number could be anywhere between 30,000 and 200,000. [.]

He thinks! That is quite a range? But let's run with the higher number.

Garbage in, garbage out.

there was a time when westerners thought China was all rice paddies and bowl hats. No factories, no technology, no industries. 1992.
Fast Forward China is now our warehouse.
China is at the forefront of:
medical research: Check the link @ 6
technology: supercomputers 5 G left west trailing to catch up.

Jen , Feb 8 2020 20:07 utc | 22
"Guangzhou, the capital of China's southwestern Guangdong Province and the country's fifth largest city with nearly 15 million residents, has just joined the ranks of cities imposing a mandatory lockdown on all citizens, effectively trapping residents inside their homes, with only limited permission to venture into the outside world to buy essential supplies.

The decision means 3 provinces, 60 cities and 400 million people are now facing China's most-strict level of lockdown as Beijing struggles to contain the coronavirus outbreak as the virus has already spread to more than 2 dozen countries."

400 million quarantined, but yeah, nothing to see Occupatio @ 15:

I looked up Dr N Ferguson whom Dorje refers to @ 10 and discovered at the RMS blog @ www.rms.com that Dr Neil Ferguson obtained his PhD in theoretical physics at Oxford University and specialises in infectious disease modelling using sparse observational data at Imperial College in London under WHO auspices.

Clio Blue , Feb 8 2020 20:12 utc | 23
@Robert @dorje

Lancet article "Nowcasting and forecasting the potential domestic and international spread of the 2019-nCoV outbreak..." supports your position. Respected medical journal maintaining a series of resource articles on nCoV. Also see Epidemiological and clinical characteristics of 99 cases of nCoV. Note that recently confirmed as pandemic by WHO.
Anecdotal reporting indicates that Dr. Fauci, US virologist with CDC is currently in China, WHO is sending in teams. Would anticipate perhaps better epidemiological info in upcoming weeks, with better detailed methodology, particularly as regards missing data which in this situation is crucial.

b , Feb 8 2020 20:17 utc | 24
@dorje and others.

Epidemics is a numbers game.

I see no reason to doubt the Chinese government numbers as it is in THEIR best interest to get this thing under control. They have no way to benefit from hiding any higher numbers. It would not work as the epidemic would continue to spread. How would China's government profit from that?

People in Wuhan have been left to die at home. The government went around dragging people into the quarantine camps where, so far, their is no medical care let alone proper sanitation. They don't have enough testing, supplies, masks, etc.

In fact there are police and others working door to door to take peoples' temperature. Those who have significant symptoms will have to see a doctor and may get quarantined. Those places where that happens are large sports or conference centers which have sanitations for mass events. Medical personal has been deployed and is available where needed.

Test kits are now available. The WHO alone distributed at least a quarter million. China produces them en mass. There might be still be a lack in qualified laboratory personal and laboratory space.

It took some time to recognize the danger of this outbreak. The local doctors (see recommended piece) were pretty fast in getting it. It took some time for that to filter upward through the bureaucracy. China is country of 1.4 billion people. A sudden local increase of pneumonia death of some 20 or 50 people takes time to be recognized at the top level.


After that happened China did all the right things. Identified the virus, alarmed the global public, isolated the epidemic, moved all possible resources to the response.

The H1N1 broke out in the U.S. and Mexico in April 2009. It took President Obama until October 2009 to declare it a national emergency. By that time it had already spread worldwide and in the end killed some 17,000 people. What do you think would have happened if nCoV19 would have emerged in the U.S.?


Headhunter , Feb 8 2020 20:26 utc | 25
https://www.darpa.mil/work-with-us/opportunities
clickkid , Feb 8 2020 20:27 utc | 26
All this talk of 50000 new cases per day is nonsense.


The numbers for Hong Kong and Macao are compiled independently from the Chinese government. These figures are currently 26 for HK and 10 for Macao.


These figures are completely in line with the official Chinese figues on a province by province basis, where Guangdong, for example, now has 1095 infections according to official figures.

All of These exaggerated numbers are either hysteria, clickbait or propaganda.

Jackrabbit , Feb 8 2020 21:04 utc | 30 Michael , Feb 8 2020 21:09 utc | 31
Thanks b! Asia Times has an article with some interesting facts on fatality rates, virus longevity in different environment (it likes cold temps), etc. Their bottom line was it was like a severe cold, but lasted longer.

https://www.asiatimes.com/2020/02/article/how-lethal-is-the-wuhan-virus/

Jen , Feb 8 2020 21:16 utc | 32
B @ 24, Jackrabbit @ 30:

If you go over to www.cdc.gov, you will see that over a 4-month period from 1 October 2019 to 1 February 2020, at least 22 million Americans caught influenza and at least 12,000 have died from it.That works out to 3,000 deaths per month. And these are conservative estimates.

That sure puts the Wuhan-origin coronavirus infection scare into some perspective.

Siotu , Feb 8 2020 21:20 utc | 33
This c-virus itself is a nothing-burger then? (It would still be good to hear from that research scientist and that lab in Wuhan though. What were they up to? What are they researching and was there an "accident"?)

Does the media hysteria, travel bans and the like fulfill a bigger purpose? It all does make for diversion of attention from other developments. And, of course, we have yet to experience the secondary consequences and fall out.

Michael Droy , Feb 8 2020 21:25 utc | 34
Compare H1N1, estimates of 28,000 dead, sloppy attempts to isolate carriers, started in US and went around the world.
Or for that matter the current year's flu in US, 22-31 million flu illnesses, 12-30,000 deaths
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-estimates.htm
Theophrastus , Feb 8 2020 21:45 utc | 35
Robert @27 and Dorje The Indomitable can have their opinions, yet B's empirical analysis makes far more sense than the statements they have posted. Why indeed would the Chinese gov't lie about the numbers of infections if the infection rates were as high as R and D have claimed? Such high numbers would quickly expose the lie, and the Chinese gov't would then be completely discredited, and hence the reason to lie in this case is vastly reduced, as our host has pointed out.

As for Prof Ferguson's epidemiological model: I have an MSc degree in Mathematics, and I've worked with plenty of epidemiologists, trying to implement their often vague ideas into valid mathematical models. Such models can only be back-validated (and climate models suffer from the same problem), meaning their various parameters and so-called "fudge factors" (that is really the term!) must be adjusted so that their predictions agree with data from past epidemics. Since every epidemic is different from every other in often quite subtle ways, epidemiologists "specialise" in fudging a model's parameters (hence the term "fudge factor") so that the model now agrees with historical data. Yet why would current epidemics always behave like past epidemics? No epidemiologist I have asked was ever able to answer this question with the hard empirical reasoning that is science's only guarantee, and hence the predictions are really not all that trustworthy.

Trisha , Feb 8 2020 21:51 utc | 36
Model this: as of today there were 343 2019-nCoV cases reported OUTSIDE China. There is exactly ONE death recorded OUTSIDE China in the Phillipines, or a fatality rate of .3%.

Now, I'm including HK as part of China, but if you disagree then there are exactly TWO fatal cases, or a rate of .6%. Hardly apocalyptic.

Considering that U.S. patients were identified over two weeks ago, according to hysterical nutcases we should be seeing an explosion of new patients from cross-infection. Where are they?

Crickets ...

Deltaeus , Feb 8 2020 21:55 utc | 37
Dorje, Robert, et al
Your point of view is noted.
It is 9 February. Let's review on 1st April and see how things are then.
If there is pandemic, then everyone will need to apologise to you for not listening.
If the epidemic has been controlled and the infection rate has dropped to low levels, then I guess you'll admit that you got it wrong.
Sound fair?
Winston , Feb 8 2020 21:58 utc | 38
Siotu -perhaps part of a long-term effort to "other" and vilify the Chinese, in the eventuality of a hot war where you will be required to die fighting them.
Parisian Guy , Feb 8 2020 22:00 utc | 39
I see no reason to doubt the Chinese government numbers as it is in THEIR best interest to get this thing under control. They have no way to benefit from hiding any higher numbers. It would not work as the epidemic would continue to spread. How would China's government profit from that?

That's a non sequitur.
It fails to demonstrate that the government needs to tell the true numbers. It only demonstrates the obvious: govt needs to know the correct numbers in order to be able to act accordingly and effectively.

Furthermore, no govt action would work if there is panic or social trouble. For that reason, lying on the numbers may be a necessary tool for the victory against the epidemic.

On the other side I don't believe the Tencent numbers. Do somebody knows the source of that story? From my quick and dirty search, it looks like it was a Taiwanese newspaper which is regularly smearing China.

On the other side of the other side, I give some credit to the Lancet article. Some commentators went away with it by saying: "It's simulation, and you know that garbage in - garbage out ". Did he notice there was no garbage in the input data? They were 1) numbers of cases outside China and 2)numbers of travelers who went outside China.
Let's say 200 repatriated from Wuhan to France, one week ago. According to the Lancet paper, one would have expected one contaminated amongst the repatriated. And we got exactly what was expected. On the next batch of 250 repatriated there was no cases.

To conclude:
- the thesis of the correctness of officially released Chinese data has no strong argument for it.
- the Lancet is probably overestimating, maybe 2 times. The reality would still be several times above official numbers.

By the way, one key witness of the skripal-like story of a Chinese spy stealing the virus in Canada will not be able to help. Dr. Frank Plummer just died unexpectedly...

Likklemore , Feb 8 2020 22:15 utc | 40
Posted by: Theophrastus | Feb 8 2020 21:45 utc | 35


[.] "Since every epidemic is different from every other in often quite subtle ways, epidemiologists "specialise" in fudging a model's parameters (hence the term "fudge factor") so that the model now agrees with historical data. Yet why would current epidemics always behave like past epidemics? No epidemiologist I have asked was ever able to answer this question with the hard empirical reasoning that is science's only guarantee, and hence the predictions are really not all that trustworthy."

Kudos. Thank you.
In grabbing "numbers" what has been overlooked by most is the fact that the Prof Ferguson said he was "estimating" "guessing'

And there is that bit of anti-China seeping through.

b reminded us of the 2009 swine flu. Fear mongering went with that one too. Governments bought millions of doses of vaccines, months after some 4.7 million vaccines were destroyed. It's only money.

Nicucino , Feb 8 2020 22:23 utc | 41
If nCoV is indeed a bio weapon, a Frankenstein entity bioengineered by man:
http://stateofthenation.co/?p=6103
And if this came from outside of China, then, I suspect the Chinese gov are indeed lying.

It is like in a war. The enemy fires some heavy duty weapons at you and you try hide the effect of it. Not to mention that revealing the true situation could get the gov toppled. This could be to big of a loss for them to remain on top.

bevin , Feb 8 2020 22:39 utc | 44
'What do you think would have happened if nCoV19 would have emerged in the U.S.?" b@24
That is the big question: the US is totally oriented towards maximising profits for the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. There are large areas in which half or more of the population is uninsured and thus beyond the purview of doctors and other practitioners. All infrastructure including those vital to public health are in an unprecedented state of disrepair and collapse.
Jen @32 goes some way to answering the question. Relying on a compliant propaganda apparatus masquerading as news media the authorities would lie, there would be massive migrations towards 'safer areas.' And then the killing would start.... Among the first victims would independent sources of information.
Patroklos , Feb 8 2020 22:42 utc | 47
The economic blowback will be the same regardless of the true scale of the epidemic. It will take as long to ratchet up production lines again as they have been down. That means that the supply-chain issues are only going to get worse even if the scale of the epidemic is decreasing. Countries like mine (Australia) will feel it both ways (lower demand for commodities, more expensive parts/supply), and then some: Australia's economy is baked into China's, especially in the service sector -- $34b/annum tertiary education sector, 25% of tourist market, with the added effect that Chinese tourists outspend the next highest spenders (those from the US) by 3 to 1. At the university I work at, 6000 Chinese students cannot return to Australia to commence the first semester of the year (beginning Feb 24). One can only imagine the loss of fees, accomodation spending, per diem spending in local businesses, etc. Australia will not lift the travel ban until they are absolutely sure -- and if there is such uncertainty about the true scale of the epidemic or the reliability of the CCP reporting, then the travel ban will last longer than is necessary. There are fears here that this will finally tip Australia into recession.

Which raises a further question, linked to scale: Is the exaggerated response a calculated pretext for decoupling? I wonder whether our government is using the opportunity to precipitate an economic crisis for which it would be otherwise blamed. The collateral damage is going to be extensive. Universities in Australia, who have lost almost half their public funding in the last 25 years, and who are utterly dependent on Chinese patronage, are soiling themselves as we speak. It won't matter in the end whether it was a real or fake epidemic, the 'contagion' (as they say in financial doublespeak) has already begun.

gkbw , Feb 8 2020 23:01 utc | 50
All reports and remarks about a Case Fatality Rate of 2% or less are nonsense.
After infection diagnosis, median time to death (if death occurs) was reported to be around two weeks, and might even be longer.

Implication: you have to compare accumulated deaths as of today with total infections two weeks ago. Prof. Ferguson mentioned this as well. Kindly ask B and others to consider this methodical approach. It seems to be very important to get a more realistic feeling for the CFR. This virus is very dangerous.

Do the math, numbers here: Coronavirus Update (Live)

Penelope , Feb 9 2020 0:54 utc | 66
pft @62:
Yes, the coronavirus "incident" has the feel of a rehearsal to me. I know it's difficult, but I think we ought to struggle to keep alive our skepticism. We are taking the media on faith. We do not in fact actually know if there is an epidemic, let alone if it is severe.

Once again I call everyone's attention to the preparatory work:

"Event 201, the pandemic simulation staged by Johns Hopkins University in conjunction with the World Economic Forum, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Johnson & Johnson, and other ruling-class heavy hitters in October."
https://www.globalresearch.ca/all-sectors-us-establishment-lock-step-deep-states-latest-bio-war/5702773

Even if this were not real, but only a hoax, I don't know how it wd look any different. Fact is-- we are endlessly manipulated by Big Media and know nothing. We're in Plato's cave.


"decade-old simulation titled "Lock Step" devised by the Rockefeller Foundation in conjunction with the Global Business Network. The scenario, one of four included in a publication called "Scenarios for the Future of Technology and International Development" in 2010, describes a coronavirus-like pandemic that becomes the trigger for the imposition of police-state controls on movement, economy, and other areas of society."


[Feb 03, 2020] Coronavirus Epidemic WHO Declares a Fake Global Public Health Emergency - Global ResearchGlobal Research - Centre for Resear

Jan 31, 2020 | www.globalresearch.ca

Region: Asia Theme: Media Disinformation , Science and Medicine

In the course of the last two weeks, the World Health Organization (WHO) had already pointed to a possible Global Public Health crisis in relation to China's novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) categorized as a viral pneumonia. The virus outbreak is centred in the city of Wuhan, a city in Eastern China with a population in excess of 11 million.

On 22 January, the members of the WHO Emergency Committee "expressed divergent views on whether this event constitutes a PHEIC or not".

On January 30, The Committee reconvened and declared the coronavirus epidemic as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).

(for details on the Committee meetings scroll down to ANNEX)

What justified this far-reaching decision by the WHO Director General?

About 9,600 corona virus (pneumonia) confirmed cases (Jan 30). And 213 deaths recorded in China on Jan 30, which has a population of almost 1.4 billion.

No deaths have been reported out of Mainland China.

Out of 9600 confirmed cases, approximately 150 cases of infection have been recorded outside China. Moreover, (based on the above data, Jan 30), the 2019 nCoV has a low mortality rate (2.1%) compared to the Seasonal flu.

CBS Screen scan, Jan 30, 2020

The above CBS quotation is misleading.

Based on January 30 data, what should be emphasized is the following

In contrast, in the US, the Centers of Disease Control estimate that so far for the 2019-20 season, at least 15 million flu virus illnesses , 140,000 hospitalizations and 8,200 deaths in the U.S, which has population of 330 million, about a quarter that of China.

And there was virtually no coverage or concern regarding the Seasonal Flu, which in 2017 resulted globally in 650,000 deaths.

Source CDC

The media has gone into hight gear: The Wuhan coronavirus is portrayed as a global threat.

The latter is not corroborated by the recorded cases of infection and death.

Only 150 cases outside of China Mainland (Jan 30). No deaths recorded outside China.

Ironically, WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in a press conference confirmed that:

"The main reason for this declaration is not because of what is happening in China, but because of what is happening in other countries. Our greatest concern is the potential for the virus to spread to countries with weaker health systems, and which are ill-prepared to deal with it."

What was happening "in other countries" (aka approximately 150 cases of infection and no recorded deaths in 23 countries and 2 territories (Macau and Hong Kong) (Jan 30)) does not justify the launching of a WHO sponsored Worldwide Public Health Emergency. (See below for distribution by country).

Coronavirus cases of infection: by country

Source Al Jazeera quoting official sources, January 31, 2020

Coronavirus Outbreak, a Global Public Health Emergency? TOTAL 152 (without China)

My question to the Director General of the WHO.

Do these numbers justify the launching of a Worldwide Public Health Emergency?

6 in the US, 2 in Canada, 16 in Japan, 2 in the UK, 7 in Germany, etc. (Jan 30)

No deaths outside China recorded (Jan 30). And expert opinion under the helm of the World Health Organization (WHO) has endorsed a Worldwide health emergency, which is creating havoc. What is required is routine WHO support to China and countries which have recorded virus infections.

The decision of the Director-General of the WHO is dramatic and unnecessary. It has triggered an atmosphere of fear and intimidation.

Fake Emergency? Can we Trust the WHO?

In turn, the corporate media serves as an instrument of disinformation. The public has been misled.

About 150 infections Worldwide (excluding China). The World population is 7.7 billion, China's population is 1.4 billion.

A rash Committee decision adopted at WHO headquarters in Geneva.

Déjà Vu: Flashback to 2009. The H1N1 swine flu pandemic

There are precedents: In 2009, based on incomplete and scanty data, the WHO predicted ("with authority") that the H1N1 swine flu virus would result in :

" as many as 2 billion people could become infected over the next two years -- nearly one-third of the world population. " (World Health Organization as reported by the Western media, July 2009).

It turned out to be a multibillion bonanza for Big Pharma supported by the WHO's Director-General Margaret Chan.

In June 2009, Margaret Chan made the following statement:

"On the basis of expert assessments of the evidence, the scientific criteria for an influenza pandemic have been met. I have therefore decided to raise the level of influenza pandemic alert from Phase 5 to Phase 6. The world is now at the start of the 2009 influenza pandemic. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO), Press Briefing 11 June 2009)

What "expert assessments"?

In a subsequent statement she confirmed that:

"Vaccine makers could produce 4.9 billion pandemic flu shots per year in the best-case scenario", Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO) , quoted by Reuters, 21 July 2009)

A financial windfall for Big Pharma Vaccine Producers including GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Merck & Co., Sanofi, Pfizer. et al.

Swine Flu Fake News, Fake Statistics, Lies at the Highest Levels of Government

The media went into overdrive. (without a shred of evidence). Fear and Uncertainty. Public opinion was deliberately misled

" Swine flu could strike up to 40 percent of Americans over the next two years and as many as several hundred thousand could die if a vaccine campaign and other measures aren't successful." (Official Statement of Obama Administration, Associated Press, 24 July 2009).

"The U.S. expects to have 160 million doses of swine flu vaccine available sometime in October", ( Associated Press, 23 July 2009)

But the pandemic never happened.

There was no pandemic affecting 2 billion people

Millions of doses of swine flu vaccine had been ordered by national governments from Big Pharma. In the meantime the H1N1 virus had mutated. Millions of doses were subsequently destroyed: a financial bonanza for Big Pharma, an expenditure crisis for national governments.

There was no investigation into who was behind this multibillion fraud.

Several critics said that the H1N1 Pandemic was "Fake" .

Reported by Forbes:

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), a human rights watchdog, is publicly investigating the WHO's motives in declaring a pandemic. Indeed, the chairman of its influential health committee, epidemiologist Wolfgang Wodarg, has declared that the "false pandemic" is "one of the greatest medicine scandals of the century." ( Forbes , February 10, 2010, emphasis added)

For more details on the 2009 H1NI pandemic see:

Remember the 2009 H1N1 Swine Flu Pandemic: Manipulating the Data to Justify a Worldwide Public Health Emergency

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky , January 25, 2020

Important Lessons from the 2009 H1N1 Pandemic:

Can we trust the Western media?

Can we trust the World Health Organization (WHO) and Western governments including the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), all of which are serving the interests of Big Pharma (at tax payers' expense)?

What are the stakes, why the media propaganda?


ANNEX

This annex provides details on the January 3oth WHO Decision to identify the Wuhan coronavirus epidemic as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).

The read the full Statement of the second meeting of the International Health Regulations (2005) Emergency Committee regarding the outbreak of novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), click here The second meeting of the Emergency Committee convened by the WHO Director-General took place on Thursday, 30 January 2020, from 13:30 to 18:35 Geneva time (CEST).The Committee's role was "to give advice to the Director-General, who makes the final decision on the determination of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)".That decision was taken by the Director-General after a three hour meeting.

Below are relevant excerpts

Members and advisors of the Emergency Committee were convened by teleconference

The Director-General welcomed the Committee and thanked them for their support. He turned the meeting over to the Chair, Professor Didier Houssin.

.

Representatives of the Ministry of Health of the People's Republic of China reported on the current situation and the public health measures being taken. There are now 7711 confirmed and 12167 suspected cases throughout the country. Of the confirmed cases, 1370 are severe and 170 people have died. 124 people have recovered and been discharged from hospital.

The WHO Secretariat provided an overview of the situation in other countries. There are now 83 cases in 18 countries. Of these, only 7 had no history of travel in China. There has been human-to-human transmission in 3 countries outside China. One of these cases is severe and there have been no deaths.

At its first meeting, the Committee expressed divergent views on whether this event constitutes a PHEIC or not. At that time, the advice was that the event did not constitute a PHEIC, but the Committee members agreed on the urgency of the situation and suggested that the Committee should continue its meeting on the next day, when it reached the same conclusion.

This second meeting takes place in view of significant increases in numbers of cases and additional countries reporting confirmed cases.

The Committee welcomed the leadership and political commitment of the very highest levels of Chinese government, their commitment to transparency, and the efforts made to investigate and contain the current outbreak. China quickly identified the virus and shared its sequence, so that other countries could diagnose it quickly and protect themselves, which has resulted in the rapid development of diagnostic tools.

The very strong measures the country has taken include daily contact with WHO and comprehensive multi-sectoral approaches to prevent further spread. It has also taken public health measures in other cities and provinces; is conducting studies on the severity and transmissibility of the virus, and sharing data and biological material. The country has also agreed to work with other countries who need their support. The measures China has taken are good not only for that country but also for the rest of the world.

The Committee welcomed a forthcoming WHO multidisciplinary technical mission to China, ..

The Committee wished to re-emphasize the importance of studying the possible source, to rule out hidden transmission and to inform risk management measures

The Committee also emphasized the need for enhanced surveillance in regions outside Hubei, including pathogen genomic sequencing, to understand whether local cycles of transmission are occurring.

WHO should continue to use its networks of technical experts to assess how best this outbreak can be contained globally.

WHO should provide intensified support for preparation and response, especially in vulnerable countries and regions.

Measures to ensure rapid development and access to potential vaccines, diagnostics, antiviral medicines and other therapeutics for low- and middle-income countries should be developed.

WHO should continue to provide all necessary technical and operational support to respond to this outbreak, including with its extensive networks of partners and collaborating institutions, to implement a comprehensive risk communication strategy, and to allow for the advancement of research and scientific developments in relation to this novel coronavirus.

WHO should continue to explore the advisability of creating an intermediate level of alert between the binary possibilities of PHEIC or no PHEIC, in a way that does not require reopening negotiations on the text of the IHR (2005).

WHO should timely review the situation with transparency and update its evidence-based recommendations.

The Committee does not recommend any travel or trade restriction based on the current information available.

The Director-General declared that the outbreak of 2019-nCoV constitutes a PHEIC and accepted the Committee's advice and issued this advice as Temporary Recommendations under the IHR.

The Emergency Committee will be reconvened within three months or earlier, at the discretion of the Director-General.

The Director-General thanked the Committee for its work.

The original source of this article is Global Research Copyright © Prof Michel Chossudovsky , Global Research, 2020

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[Feb 03, 2020] Numerical illiteracy of the modern world

The Western MSM is relentlessly trying to sell this coronavirus epidemic as a China failure
Feb 03, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org
Jeff Harrison , Feb 2 2020 17:24 utc | 9
This corona virus panic is interesting. RT has an interesting piece that points out that corona virus has been officially recognized in some 8,000 odd people and 200 odd people have died from it, we need a sense of perspective. World wide seasonal flu, kills between 350,000 and 600,000 people each year. Tuberculosis kills over 1,000,000 people each year. Malaria kills a similar number. AIDS killed over 500,000 last year. And we're panicking about 200 or so?

TJ , Feb 2 2020 19:11 utc | 23

Just had an email from a company I deal with in China, the relevant passages-

2. The company has been following instructions from the Chinese government to postpone the Spring Festival holiday to Feb. 9th, 2020 if not any further postpone. But, we believe most of our services should be provided as usual since then.

5. We also would like your attention that there's yet no evidence or cases to support the transmission of the novel coronavirus through packages or imported goods. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of the US, because of poor survivability of these coronaviruses on surfaces, there is likely very low risk of spread from products or packaging that are shipped over a period of days or weeks at ambient temperatures. The National Health Commission of the People's Republic of China advises that coronavirus is spread most often by respiratory droplets from one person to another, regular packages from Wuhan can be received as usual. Reference links are attached as the footnote below for your references.[1]
6. The Company will take proactive measures like ultraviolet light to ensure a safe and healthy environment of its warehouse. Disinfection work will be conducted before each delivery.

[Feb 02, 2020] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7951293/Bill-Gates-Predicted-Coronavirus-Like-Outbreak-2019-Netflix-Documentary.html

Feb 02, 2020 | dailymail.co.uk

The 2020 Coronavirus Scare: Better Than Any Horror Movie
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2020/02/bill-sardi/the-2020-coronavirus-scare-better-than-any-horror-movie/

Here are links to antiviral treatments using natural ingredients that are effective against all the other cold and flu virus outbreaks that happen every year. As "B" points out the vast majority of cases are just run of the mill virus outbreaks that happen every year.

Effective inhibition of MERS-CoV infection by resveratrol.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28193191

The effect of Allium sativum (Garlic) extract on infectious bronchitis virus in specific pathogen free embryonic egg.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=coronavirus+garlic

Modulation of the Immune Response to Respiratory Viruses by Vitamin D
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4488782/

Vaccinations, Vitamin C, Politics, and the Law
http://orthomolecular.activehosted.com/index.php?action=social&chash=1afa34a7f984eeabdbb0a7d494132ee5.135&s=94f5f3d95a612fc2839da21cc12081c9

Zn(2+) inhibits coronavirus and arterivirus RNA polymerase activity in vitro and zinc ionophores block the replication of these viruses in cell culture.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21079686

Posted by: krollchem | Feb 2 2020 18:42 utc | 17 napper 19 minutes ago ( Edited ) remove Share link Copy Propaganda op to stoke panic & fear.

https://www.moonofalabama.org/images9/corona1.jpg

https://www.moonofalabama.org/images9/corona2.jpg

[Jan 31, 2020] blood pressure is not the Holy Grail, and a lot of the push to get certain numbers is, like almost everything in the US, a sales tactic to get people onto (as is always the case even if it's dirt-cheap to make) expensive medicine in the US.

Jan 31, 2020 | www.unz.com

alex in San Jose AKA Digital Detroit , says: Show Comment January 31, 2020 at 6:46 am GMT

@Wielgus High blood pressure is weird. I'm one of those low-carb diet kooks, except that my particular kooky diet seems to work. It seems to result in weight loss, healthier "numbers" from A1C to blood pressure, but there's also a number of related "gurus" (because in the US, diet and many scientific things can't be talked about objectively, but must be discussed using words like "belief", "gurus" etc.) who say that blood pressure is not the Holy Grail, and a lot of the push to get certain numbers is, like almost everything in the US, a sales tactic to get people onto (as is always the case even if it's dirt-cheap to make) expensive medicine in the US.

I have a "suburbian" family as close friends so I get to see the internals of suburbian life, and a lot of it revolves around medicines. They start and end their day with handfuls of pills, and the husband is particularly successful as he's graduated from relative health to oral diabetes medicine to multiple injections of (expensive) insulin a day.

The standard American diet is exactly what you'd want to feed Wagyu cattle on, fatten 'em up with plenty of marbling and slaughter 'em young to harvest that lovely marbled meat. So Americans are started from young childhood on a breakfast of carbs and sugar to lots of white bread and "healthy grains" (it means they're dyed brown) and if they're doing it right they're "on the (insulin) needle" by their 60s.

I have no doubt Trump has one or more pet doctors who follow him around, like Hitler's Dr. Morell, dosing him up on all kinds of stuff and the latest cutting edge stuff too. But he doesn't look like a high blood pressure case. I've never seen him with a "florid" (red) complexion, even when he's worked up like at a rally. In anything, the orange spray tan seems to be intended to conceal what would otherwise be an unhealthy pallor.

Considering how long Dick Chaney hung on (is it still alive, in Texas somewhere, venturing out at night to feed on young children?) modern medicine can keep one of these walking corpses going for a long time. Trump may even be getting human growth hormone. It was taken off of the market because AIDS got into the supply, but in his case he'd get it harvested from thoroughly vetted victims, freshly harvested from the immigrant camps perhaps. (More probably from gulags in N. Korea or some such place.)

Human growth hormone would explain the portly figure, as it makes everything grow, including internal organs. This is why a lot of modern bodybuilders are described as "looking like they swallowed a turtle" their 6-pack abs bulging out due to the larger organs underneath. Trump's too old to develop the characteristic facial features, like a gap between the front teeth, but it would also explain the thick fingers.

The trouble is, if they couldn't keep Steve Jobs going, they probably can't keep Trump going, or coherent, forever.

[Jan 29, 2020] China's New Coronavirus An Examination of the Facts - Global ResearchGlobal Research - Centre for Research on Globalization

Jan 29, 2020 | www.globalresearch.ca

The initial symptoms were mild, which permitted many people to travel before stronger symptoms were detected. The first occurrences in December thus appeared to be of minor concern. The incubation period has not been definitively stated but, once infections began, the spread was surprisingly rapid after the first case was confirmed on December 31: on January 3, 44 cases; January 21, 225 cases, January 24, 830 cases. Local medical authorities have said the true extent of the Wuhan coronavirus is unclear, and the early official figures may have been an underestimation since the mild symptoms and delayed onset meant infections may have been undetected.

All the evidence suggests the Chinese authorities acted effectively as soon as they realised the danger they might be facing. Medical authorities immediately declared the outbreak, and within a week they had identified the pathogen and also determined and shared the genome sequence with the WHO and other parties, a sufficiently speedy response that earned praise from the WHO and scientists around the world.

Remembering the SARS troubles, they did much more. In most large centers in the country, all sports venues, theaters, museums, tourist attractions, all locations that attract crowds, have been closed, as have all schools. All group tours have been cancelled. Not only the city of Wuhan but virtually the entire province of Hubei has been locked down, with all trains, aircraft, buses, subways, ferries, grounded and all major highways and toll booths closed. Thousands of flights and train trips have been cancelled until further notice. Some cities like Shanghai and Beijing are conducting temperature tests on all roadways leading into the cities. In addition, Wuhan is building (in five days) a portable hospital of 25,000 square meters to deal with the infected patients. As well, Wuhan has asked citizens to neither leave nor enter the city without a compelling reason, and all are wearing face masks.

The scale of the challenge of implementing such a blockade is immense, comparable to closing down all transport links for a city 5 times the size of Toronto or Chicago, two days before Christmas. These decisions are unprecedented, but testify to the determination of the authorities to limit the spread and damage of this new pathogen. They not only address the gravity of the situation but also the seriousness of consideration for the public health, unfortunate and difficult decisions since the holiday is being destroyed for hundreds of millions of people. Most public entertainment has been cancelled, as have tours, and many weddings as well. The damage to the economy during this most festive of all periods, will also be enormous. Hong Kong will suffer severely in addition to all its other troubles, since visits from Mainland Chinese typically support much of its retail economy during this period.

The Chinese New Year is the most important festival for Chinese. Saturday, January 25, is the first day of the Lunar New Year, a festive period that typically sees the largest mass-movement of people on the planet as Chinese flock back to their hometowns to be with relatives. No health authority has ever tackled the challenge currently faced by China, as the country grapples with a new coronavirus just as hundreds of millions prepare to travel.

And of course the Western media had a field day of schadenfreude . CNN published a report – a bit too gleefully, I thought – on the potential damage to China's economy: (1)

"China's economy is slumping and the country is still suffering the effects of the trade war with America. An outbreak of a new and deadly virus is the last thing it needs. The Wuhan coronavirus has already roiled Chinese markets and thrown plans for the upcoming Lunar New Year holiday into chaos for millions of people. The world's second biggest economy grew at its slowest pace in nearly three decades last year as it contended with rising debt, cooling domestic demand and US tariffs, many of which remain in place despite a recent truce. Beijing is worried about unemployment, too, and has announced a wave of stimulus measures in recent weeks aimed at preventing mass layoffs. . . The Wuhan coronavirus outbreak could spark widespread fear and spur people to hunker down and avoid going outside. That kind of behavior would deal a huge blow to the service sector, which now accounts for about 52% of the Chinese economy." [And so on . . .]

The Western media have already staked out their claim to the fundamentals, all media sources claiming the virus was transferred to humans from animals or seafood. The media have added fuel to the fire by claiming the virus emerged from "illegally traded wildlife" in a market "where offerings reportedly include wild animals that can carry viruses dangerous to humans", and that this virus "jumped into the human population from an infected animal". Chinese officials stated that the virus appears to have originated at a seafood market in Wuhan, though the actual origin has not been determined nor stated by the authorities, and is still an open question perhaps primarily since viruses seldom jump species barriers without human assistance.

While there is no evidence of biowarfare, a virus outbreak in the city of Wuhan immediately prior to the Chinese New Year migration could potentially have dramatic social and economic repercussions. Wuhan, with a population of about 12 million, is a major transport hub in Central China, particularly for the high-speed train network, and with more than 60 air routes with direct flights to most of the world's major cities, as well as more than 100 internal flights to major Chinese cities. When we add this to the Spring Festival travel rush during which many hundreds of millions of people travel across the country to be with their families, the potential consequences for the entire country are far-reaching.

Comparison with SARS

This is a novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), an entirely new strain related to the MERS (MERS-CoV) and the SARS (SARS-CoV) viruses, though early evidence suggests it is not as dangerous.

SARS was proven to be caused by a strain of the coronavirus, a large family of mostly harmless viruses also responsible for the common cold, but SARS exhibited characteristics never before observed in any animal or human virus, did not by any means fully match the animal viruses mentioned above, and contained genetic material that still remains unidentified – similar to this new corona virus in 2019.

Virologist Dr. Alan Cantwell wrote at the time that "the mysterious SARS virus is a new virus never before seen by virologists. This is an entirely new illness with devastating effects on the immune system, and there is no known treatment." Dr. Cantwell also noted that the genetic engineering of coronaviruses has been occurring in both medical and military labs for decades. He wrote that when he searched in PubMed for the phrase "coronavirus genetic engineering", he was referred to 107 scientific experiments dating back to 1987. To quote Dr. Cantwell:

"I quickly confirmed scientists have been genetically engineering animal and human coronaviruses to make disease-producing mutant and recombinant viruses for over a decade. No wonder WHO scientists identified the SARS/coronavirus so quickly. Never emphasised by medical news writers is the fact that for over forty years scientists have been "jumping species" with all sorts of animal and human viruses and creating chimera viruses (viruses composed from viruses of two different species). This unsupervised research produces dangerous man-made viruses, many of which have potential as bioweapons. Certainly SARS has the hallmarks of a bioweapon. After all, aren't new biological warfare agents designed to produce a new disease with a new infectious agent? As in prior military experiments, all it might take to spread SARS is an aerosol can . . ." (2) (3) (4)

Almost immediately upon receiving the genome sequence, several Russian scientists suggested a link between SARS and biowarfare. Sergei Kolesnikov , a member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, said the propagation of the SARS virus might well have been caused by leaking a combat virus grown in bacteriological weapons labs. According to a number of news reports, Kolesnikov claimed that the virus of atypical pneumonia (SARS) was a synthesis of two viruses (of measles and infectious parotiditis or mumps), the natural compound of which was impossible, that this mix could never appear in nature, stating, "This can be done only in a laboratory." (5) And Nikolai Filatov, the head of Moscow's epidemiological services, was quoted in the Gazeta daily as stating he believed SARS was man-made because "there is no vaccine for this virus, its make-up is unclear, it has not been very widespread and the population is not immune to it." (6) (7)

It wasn't widely reported, but it seems the final conclusion of the Chinese biochemists was the same, that the SARS virus was man-made. This conclusion wasn't a secret, but neither was it promoted to the international media since they would simply have used the claim to heap scorn on China, dismissing this as a paranoid conspiracy theory. The Western media totally ignored this aspect, except for ABC news who reported that the SARS "Mystery Virus" was possibly "a Chinese bio-weapon that accidentally escaped the laboratory". Nice of ABC to notice, but their story, if true, would be the first example of a nation creating and releasing a race-specific biological weapon designed to attack exclusively itself.

Notable is that while SARS spread to about 40 countries, the infections in most countries were few and deaths almost zero, and it was exclusively (or almost exclusively) Chinese who were infected, those in Hong Kong most seriously, with Mainland China suffering little by comparison.

This appears to be precisely the case with this new virus, in that most of the infected persons (sofar) are Chinese. News reports speak of infections appearing in Thailand or the US, but those (at least to date of writing) were all Chinese who had been to Wuhan. There have been no cases so far of infected Caucasians.

As with SARS, this new virus appears to be tightly-focused to Chinese. At this stage it is too early to draw specific conclusions.

We might in other circumstances pass this off as an unfortunate coincidence but for some major circumstantial events that serve to alter our focus. One of these is the history of American universities and NGOs having come into China in recent years to conduct biological experiments that were so illegal as to leave the Chinese authorities enraged. This was particularly true when it became known that Harvard University had surreptitiously proceeded with experiments in China that had been forbidden by the authorities years earlier, where they collected many hundreds of thousands of Chinese DNA samples and then left the country. (8) (9) (10) (11) (12)

The Chinese were furious to learn that Americans were collecting Chinese DNA. The government intervened and prohibited the further export of any of the data. The conclusion at the time was that the 'research' had been commissioned by the US military with the DNA samples destined for race-specific bio-weapons research.

In a thesis on Biological Weapons, Leonard Horowitz and Zygmunt Dembek stated that one clear sign of a genetically-engineered bio-warfare agent was a disease caused by an uncommon (unusual, rare, or unique) agent, with lack of an epidemiological explanation. I.e. no clear idea of source. They also mentioned an "unusual manifestation and/or geographic distribution", of which race-specificity would be one. (13)

Recent disease outbreaks that would seem to possibly qualify as potential bio-warfare agents are AIDS, SARS, MERS, Bird Flu, Swine Flu, Hantavirus, Lyme Disease, West Nile Virus, Ebola, Polio (Syria), Foot and Mouth Disease, the Gulf War Syndrome and ZIKA. And in fact thousands of prominent scientists, physicians, virologists and epidemiologists on many continents have concurred that all these viruses were lab-created and their release deliberate. The recent swine flu epidemic in China has the hallmarks as well, with circumstantial evidence of the outbreak raising only questions.

There was another curiosity in this case, in that additional to the usual criticisms of China being inactive or secretive, several US media replicated accusations from "a senior US State Department official" claiming Washington was "still concerned" about transparency in the Chinese government on the Wuhan coronavirus. Other articles claimed the US CDC was "concerned that Chinese health officials have still not released basic epidemiological data about the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, making it more difficult to contain the outbreak." There is no substantial reason that officials at any level of the US State Department should concern themselves with a virus outbreak in a foreign country.

Their criticisms were surprisingly detailed, demanding specifics on the number of infections directly from contact with the Wuhan market, the number of person-to-person infections, the precise incubation period from exposure to the onset of symptoms, the point at which persons become contagious. The questions were presented in benevolent terms of helping the Chinese medical authorities deal with the virus, though it was already self-evident China had no need to be lectured on such basics.

As of the date of writing, details are still too scarce to form definitive conclusions but, in every such case, once the smoke clears there are many unanswered questions that challenge the official Western narrative, but it's old news and the media have already staked out their ground so the matter dies in the Western public mind, but not in China.

*

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Larry Romanoff is a retired management consultant and businessman. He has held senior executive positions in international consulting firms, and owned an international import-export business. He has been a visiting professor at Shanghai's Fudan University, presenting case studies in international affairs to senior EMBA classes. Mr. Romanoff lives in Shanghai and is currently writing a series of ten books generally related to China and the West. He can be contacted at: [email protected] . He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

[Jan 25, 2020] Drugs May Be Killing Twice as Many Americans Than Previously Thought

Jan 25, 2020 | www.healthline.com

Government records may be severely underreporting how many Americans die from drug use, according to a new study by researchers from the University of Pennsylvania and Georgetown University.

Researchers analyzed more than 44 million death certificates issued nationwide over an 18-year period to identify nearly 670,000 deaths that coded as drug-related.

Their models showed these drug-coded deaths, which included drug overdoses and mental health and behavioral conditions related to drug use, only accounted for about half of all drug-associated deaths.

The study was published Trusted Source in PLOS One.

Drug epidemic more serious than previously thought

According to the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), the reported Trusted Source rate of drug-related deaths among 15- to 64-year-olds was 9 percent in 2016. This is already a significant rise from about 4 percent 7 years earlier, when the NCHS classified 63,000 deaths as drug-related.

However, that estimate didn't include deaths that aren't related to overdose but can still involve drug use, such as HIV, suicide, and blood vessel damage.

Including these factors, researchers estimate the actual figure is more than double the NCHS figures, at 142,000 people dead due to drug use in 2016.

"These findings should be accentuating the wakeup call that has already been announced year after year, as the drug overdose deaths are revealed by the National Center [for] Health Statistics. The fact is that, apparently, the drug epidemic is twice as serious as indicated by those analyses," Samuel Preston , PhD, professor of sociology at the University of Pennsylvania and one of the study authors, told Healthline.

In 2017, more than 70,000 Americans died from drug overdoses, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

'Deaths of despair,' infectious disease, and heart disease

According to Preston's findings:

Also, drugs were the likely cause of death from mental health or behavioral causes, like suicide.

Suicide is included with drug and alcohol overdoses as " deaths of despair ," something that affects rural areas Trusted Source of Middle America in particular.

Preston admits he wasn't surprised by the findings.

"I think we believed that there would be residual effects of drug use that were not showing up in overdose deaths, and that's what we found. We didn't know what the multiplier would be exactly, but I think two [double the NCHS number] is not an unreasonable, unexpected outcome," he said.

Reasons why unknown

While this study reveals the magnitude of a disturbing trend, researchers say it doesn't establish the reasons why. However, there are two prevailing theories:

"It's not just about the supply of drugs, but that there's something else behind all of it that causes people to either use drugs or alcohol or commit suicide because they've lost interest in their life," co-study author Dana Glei, senior research investigator at Georgetown University, explained in a statement .

Impact varies by state

Researchers found the drug epidemic seems to have had little impact on the Plains states like Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas, and the Dakotas.

However, the regions experiencing higher drug death rates are dispersed across the country. They include the Appalachian states, parts of New England, and most of the Southwest, including Utah.

"Among deaths at ages 15–64 in 2016, the drug-associated fraction is highest in West Virginia at 39% for men and 27% for women and lowest in Nebraska," the study authors wrote Trusted Source .

The study also finds that drug use decreases life expectancy after age 15 by 1.4 years for men and by just under 1 year for women, on average.

However, the researchers found the figures are more than twice as high in West Virginia, one of the states hit hardest by the opioid crisis.

Preston points out that Pennsylvania is another state especially affected by the current drug crisis.

The study found that in 2016, Pennsylvania deaths attributable to drugs were 34 percent in males and almost 25 percent in women, between ages 15 and 64 years.

"It's saying something fairly deep about what's going on in this country, isn't it?" Preston concluded.

Not all experts agree

"It's an interesting analysis. But my initial reaction is that drug-related is highly complex and vague. There are so many drugs, from prescription to illegal drugs, and drug-related is nebulous," said Eric Feigl-Ding , a health economist, epidemiologist, and nutrition scientist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and an expert adviser to the World Health Organization (WHO).

"It includes not just opioids but also HIV-fighting drugs, chronic disease drugs, and others. Also, this analysis covers so many diseases too. It's hard to interpret, and hard to use to inform the drug crisis," he said.

Feigl-Ding adds it's very tricky to interpret data between states because, as researchers noted in the study's limitations, "the practice of identifying, or capacity to determine, intent for drug poisonings varies across states."

Feigl-Ding also specifies this study is ecologic, and it uses another approximation method that has many assumptions in indirect modeling.

Feigl-Ding clarifies that "ecologic means the analysis is done at the generic state level and not county (better) or individual level (best)."

He emphasizes the study authors used drug deaths as a proxy of other nondrug deaths that are likely drug-related, and that makes the results very difficult to interpret.

"This method is not used at all by major U.S. Burden of Disease expert groups or WHO-supported Global Burden of Disease groups," Feigl-Ding said.

"For example, 'alcohol and drug use' are lumped together, and percent mortality in the U.S. is presented here," he said.

The bottom line

As the opioid epidemic continues to affect Americans, recent research finds that official government figures may be underestimating drug deaths by half.

Researchers included drug deaths due to infectious or cardiovascular disease and "deaths of despair," like suicide, in their estimate.

Although deaths due to drug use are increasing nationwide, West Virginia and Pennsylvania are among the states most severely affected.

However, not all experts agree with the research method that was used to produce these findings.

[Jan 25, 2020] The Coronavirus - No Need To Panic

Notable quotes:
"... The novel coronavirus is likely a variant of some animal virus that crossed over to a human host. This probably happens way more often than we recognize. ..."
Jan 25, 2020 | www.moonofalabama.org

fundas , Jan 25 2020 18:01 utc | 5

The current 4% case-fatality rate of the coronavirus (which still may increase) is also not especially high. The Spanish Flu pandemic, which began in the U.S. , had a fatality rate of about 10%. It was unusual in that it killed mostly young adults. The novel coronavirus seems to be quite usual in that it mostly kills people who are already weakened by other circumstances. The infection is then often the 'last drop in the bucket' that kills a person who already had a medical condition.

... ... ..

The novel coronavirus is likely a variant of some animal virus that crossed over to a human host. This probably happens way more often than we recognize.

Posted by b on January 25, 2020 at 17:30 UTC | Permalink I wonder what role timing (Chinese New Year) plays. Person-to-person contact and travel are enhanced during CNY. Is CNY the worst time to fight the spread?


Duncan Idaho , Jan 25 2020 18:02 utc | 6

More info for the interested:
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2759815

Piotr Berman , Jan 25 2020 18:13 utc | 8

But if it is not a misspelling, I do not understand completely who coefficient larger than 1 lead to an end of an epidemic. Perhaps the coefficient reflects the number of contacts of an infected person with the susceptible part of the population, small coefficient tells that this subpopulation is not so big. Once enough of the susceptible people go through the disease and build antibodies (or succumb in a minority of cases), the coefficient drops below 1.

Asian habit to wear masks can also decrease the number of infections produced by a person who is infectious and asymptomatic.

Tom Verso , Jan 25 2020 18:17 utc | 9
Thanks for this balanced presentation. I have been looking for one.

Just my 'back of the envelope' (so to speak) calculations were not justifying the hysterical headlines.

I was surprise to see even Zerohedge, as balanced a web site as there is, was pushing the hysteria. This is not to imply that the virus is not a very important issue. Rather, to say that it is so important that it must be presented with factual (quantitative) analysis and valid logical inferences.

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[Jan 24, 2020] REALITY CHECK: Coronavirus fear porn

getpocket.com
Jan 24, 2020 | off-guardian.org

The Telegraph morbidly warns that it's "highly likely" coronavirus is already in the UK , whilst CNET tells us the deathtoll is spiking .

It all sounds very scary.

The reality is that 26 people have died.

For comparison's sake, 80,000 people died of flu in 2018 in the United States alone. (at least, according to the CDC ).

Coronavirus – or rather, this particular strain of coronavirus, as they are very common and mostly harmless – has had 800 reported cases to go along with those 26 reported deaths. That's a mortality rate of just over three per cent.

Further, we don't even know the details of those 26 unfortunate patients, it's entirely possible the 26 deaths are accounted for by the very old, the very young, or the immuno-compromised. But even if they're not 3 per cent mortality is not high.

The death rate of bacterial meningitis, for example, stands at about 10%. Meningitis is an unfortunate fact of life, but it's not a public health scare.

SARS, of course, was a public health scare – totally unjustifiably, as it turns out. Most of you will remember the SARS outbreak of 2002/2003 being similarly apocalyptically covered in the media.

In the end, over the course of just about a year 9000 cases resulted in 800 people losing their lives. These numbers are rough because, as a syndrome rather than a disease, SARS is difficultly to clearly diagnose. Assuming the stats are correct, that's a mortality rate of about 9% or three times this "terrifying" coronavirus.

The simple reality is that this new virus strain is currently affecting a group of people the size of a small primary school, and has killed fewer than a bad traffic pile-up or a medium-sized drone strike.

So why the lockdown? Why the fear?

Usually, that means at least one agenda. Maybe more than one.

The Ebola outbreak of 2015/16 resulted in large numbers of NATO-backed doctors descending on Western Africa to "assist". As a result, ebola vaccines that had been awaiting approval for years got a 2 year field study, before being approved .

During the 2009 "Swine Flu" panic , a German MEP accused the World Health Organisation of "creating a panic" in order to sell vaccines. Though the WHO vehemently denied this, an independent report later found that several of the "independent flu experts" that WHO consulted had financial ties to vaccine manufacturers .

Three years ago, the Zika virus had Floridians BEGGING to be sprayed with pesticides and had millions of genetically modified mosquitoes released into the wild. Considering Zika has never been scientifically proven to do anything by cause cold symptoms , that was a nice result.

If you're agenda-spotting in this case, be on the lookout for a "new" medicine getting rushed through patent offices. This anti-coronavirus drug will then be bought-up in huge amounts by hospitals and health services the world over.

Whichever of the handful of pharmagiants owns the patent will get a huge profit boom, plus the soaring stock prices that go along with owning the miracle cure to the scary disease du jour .

Longer-term, there is vaccination to consider. Medicine you have to take even if you're not sick is a goldmine for pharmaceutical companies, and if the government makes them mandatory (always an issue simmering on the back-burner) well, then that's even better. Not only does it mean they don't really have to work (I mean, how much work do you put into a product literally everyone is legally obliged to use?), but the opportunities for large-scale genetic research (and corruption) are endless.

Generally speaking, fear is always useful. If you can frighten people they do whatever you say. A fact known to leaders and propagandists for centuries.

Following the Boston bombing, despite the manhunt being for just two alleged bombers, the entire city of Boston was put on lockdown. The national guard rolled tanks down the street, and nobody said a word.

Right now, despite fewer than 30 deaths, millions of Chinese people are under a "lockdown". Public gatherings are being halted. That's power you can't buy.

It never hurts to normalise the idea of martial law. After all, you don't know when you might need it for real.

I know there is a temptation, in alt-media circles, to see China as a good guy just because they oppose US imperialism, but they have corruption and authoritarianism there too. Their officials are just as power-hungry as ours. There's no reason to think they wouldn't take advantage of a crisis (or even create one), in order to increase their control.

Hell, maybe there is no clear agenda at all. Maybe that's just the psychology of power. Maybe scaring people feels good, and maybe controlling them feels better. Maybe there's no point in doing terrible things to get into power if you're not going to use it for its own sake.

Is it possible there's more to this story? Some fundamental dishonesty most people never think to question? As always with the mainstream media, it's difficult to take anything for granted.

We don't know the casualty numbers are accurate, China could be downplaying the threat to minimise panic.

We don't know that the "lockdown" is as extensive as our media report, the press could be exaggerating to paint China as hysterical or autocratic.

We don't even know for sure the disease exists at all , when you think about it.

As usual, absolute scepticism is required. It's hard to say exactly what's happening yet, but when 26 deaths makes international news that means something is going on.

Stay tuned.


Petra Liverani ,

Kit, when are you going to acknowledge that the Boston bombing was a staged event? They couldn't make it more obvious. A man who has just had both legs blown off would not be whizzed along in a wheelchair.

https://wideshut.co.uk/review-of-jeff-bauman-legless-man-boston-bombing-conspiracy-theory-graphic-images/

Petra Liverani ,

Fear porn

Is it possible there's more to this story? Some fundamental dishonesty most people never think to question? As always with the mainstream media, it's difficult to take anything for granted.

Oh yes.

Wikipedia says:

Coronaviruses are a group of viruses that cause diseases in mammals and birds that include diarrhea in cows and pigs, and upper respiratory disease in chickens. In humans, the virus causes respiratory infections, which are often mild, but in rare cases are potentially lethal.

However, further down it says:

The virus was suspected to have originated in snakes,[12] but many leading researchers disagree with this conclusion [13]

Footnote 12 link takes us to this:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/jmv.25683
Journal of Medical Virology
Global Health Concern Stirred by Emerging Viral Infections (January 22, 2020)
Abstract of Commentary

Emerging viral infections continue to pose a major threat to global public health. In 1997, a highly pathogenic avian influenza A (H5N1) virus was found to directly spread from poultry to humans unlike previously reported transmission routs of human‐to‐human and livestock‐to‐human, stirring a grave concern for a possible influenza pandemic.

Authors:
Guangxiang (George) Luo: Above article only article published in journal
Shou‐Jiang Gao: A number of articles co-authored

We are told:
This article has been accepted for publication and undergone full peer review but has not been through the copyediting, typesetting, pagination and proofreading process, which may lead to differences between this version and the Version of Record. Please cite this article as doi: 10.1002/jmv.25683

No mention of snakes in abstract and you wonder why that is.

The link to footnote 13 where the snakes theory is rubbished is found here.
https://www.wired.com/story/wuhan-coronavirus-snake-flu-theory/

"It's complete garbage," says Edward Holmes, a zoologist at the University of Sydney's Institute for Infectious Diseases and Biosecurity, who specializes in emerging RNA viruses, a class that includes coronaviruses like 2019-nCoV. Holmes, who also holds appointments at the Chinese CDC and Fudan University in Shanghai, is among a number of scientists who are pointing out -- in virology forums, science Slacks, and on Twitter -- what they deem to be major flaws in the paper, and calling on the journal to have it retracted. "It's great that viral sequence data is getting shared openly in real time," says Holmes. "The downside is then you get people using that data to make conclusions they really shouldn't. The result is just a really unhelpful distraction that smacks of opportunism."

Preliminary analyses of the genetic data released by Chinese authorities suggest that 2019-nCoV is most closely related to a group of coronaviruses that typically infect bats. But for a variety of reasons -- including that it's winter and bats are hibernating -- many scientists suspect that some other animal moved the virus from bats to humans.

Wei's team compared the codons preferred by 2019-nCoV to those preferred by a handful of potential hosts: humans, bats, chickens, hedgehogs, pangolins, and two species of snakes.

They reported finding the most overlap in codon bias between 2019-nCoV and those two kinds of snakes -- the Chinese cobra and the many-banded krait. Taken together, these results "suggest for the first time that snake is the most probable wildlife animal reservoir for the 2019-nCoV," the authors wrote. "New information obtained from our evolutionary analysis is highly significant for effective control of the outbreak caused by the 2019-nCoV-induced pneumonia."

Editors of the Journal of Medical Virology told WIRED they stand by the publication, which they say went through a formal peer-review process that found the authors' methods were solid. That process was expedited -- the reviewers were given 24 hours to comment and the authors had three days to respond. But given the need for public health information, they believe the speed-up was appropriate. "With this serious situation, with people dying, holding this paper up in review would be criminal," says Shou-Jian Gao, the journal's editor-in-chief. "This is intended to just open the scientific dialogue."

"It's complete garbage", "it's winter and bats are hibernating", "codons preferred by 2019-nCoV to those preferred by a handful of potential hosts: humans, bats, chickens, hedgehogs, pangolins, and two species of snake [the Chinese cobra and the many-banded krait.]"

"With this serious situation, with people dying, holding this paper up in review would be criminal," says Shou-Jian Gao, the journal's editor-in-chief. "This is intended to just open the scientific dialogue."

If this is science, I don't want it.

Dungroanin ,

Somethings ARE going on – THEY don't want us to know.

1. Brexit bs in 7 days – not the hard brexit THEY want, because they cornered themselves with a deal that keeps us IN for the next 12 months requiring compliance ha ha ha.

2. The Syrian escapade is OVER.
The Iran invasion is NOT going to happen. Iraq has a million citizens on the streets PEACEFULLY confirming to the 2003 invaders to really fuck the fuck off. (And out of the EU, they will not have us pushing them into ME meddling).

3. Russian bogeymaning is OVER. Russiagate is over. Ukrainegate is fucked because Biden & Son won't risk being questioned. Trump will not want anymore casualties because he proved that his military and MIC trillions can't stop the missiles turning the deep bunkers at their bases from being turned into giant acoustic brain soup drums.

But hey lets look over there – dem chinese have a flu and are taking precautions when most of them would be in transit for their new year and spread it faster than usual

The Empire is dead and no amount of Integrity Iniative bollocks and media management by the brass or Royal soap opera can hide the end of the grand game as losers.

Watch as the stolen election victory turns to ashes on their tongues – Corbyn may still notch up another PM before April.

Gall ,

Here's Jon Rappoport's take;

https://blog.nomorefakenews.com/2020/01/23/china-virus-epidemic-the-gong-show-on-roller-skates/

I tend to agree.

Richard Le Sarc ,

The whole thing is just another exercise in deeply racist and hate-driven Sinophobia. The Western MSM presstitute scum are virtually gloating over this affair, and, in the Guardian, of course, their resident compradore (beep) 'Lily' Kuo, in Beijing, has turned the whole thing into a great threat to Chinese stability, CCP rule and ' Emperor' Xi, of course, in an exercise in hate-driven hysteria that will surely get her a pat on the head from her White Masters.
The death-toll seems less than that in a typical 'flu season, mostly the old and previously unwell, as usual, but is inflated with pure malice and barely disguised satisfaction. The admirable Chinese efforts to curtail the spread of the disease are compared to so-called 'repression' of 'dissidents', and our ABC resident presstitute, Birtles, almost twitches with delight and animus as he relays his agit-prop. The Chinese are about to build a 1000 bed hospital, possibly in a weekend, while the UK NHS crumbles in the shite that is UK ' society', but now I recall that was euthanised by Thatcher decades ago. You can see why Western supremacists so hate China. And I would vouch that this disease, so conveniently ' emerging' right at New Year, possibly came via Fort Detrick.

Dee ,

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30185-9/fulltext

Willem ,

Many words for basically same thing as above

C: they also don't know what this is about (but don't want to admit)

I like scientific journals, more then newspapers as the scientific journals show the conflict of interest of authors. Guess what

' FGH reports personal fees from University of Alabama Antiviral Drug Discovery and Development Consortium, and is a non-compensated consultant for Gilead Sciences, Regeneron, and SAB Biotherapeutics, which have investigational therapeutics for coronavirus infections.'

Probably of 'no' relevance

RobG ,

The Spanish flu outbreak in 1919 killed way more people than those who were slaughtered in World War One (and that was a huge number of people).

I agree with Kit's premise here; RE: 'disease propaganda' and all the rest of it.

However, I also have to point out the obvious: unprecedented numbers of people are now dying from cancer. Here's a jolly Guardian piece from 2014

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/feb/03/worldwide-cancer-cases-soar-next-20-years

We're looking at more people now dying from cancer, on a yearly basis, than all the wars in human history put together. A greater percentage of people dying from cancer than ever died from the bubonic plague.

Cancer is a relatively simple one to sort out (and a lot of it comes down to diet -cancers feed on sugar, although very few oncologists will tell you that).

I would venture that our current tidal wave of cancer is largely due to psychopathy and its endemic corruption: Big Pharma doesn't want you to die, but neither does it want you well. Big Pharma wants you somewhere inbetween, where you are constantly ill and having to pay for their 'cures'.

As an aside, can anyone name me a single member of the UK royal family (and there's an awful lot of them) who's ever been diagnosed with cancer?

Sam ,

There's been a few of them, according to this article:
https://www.cheatsheet.com/health-fitness/how-many-members-of-the-royal-family-have-had-cancer.html/

John Deehan ,

Elizabeth's father died of lung cancer.

Robbobbobin ,

As an aside, can anyone name me a single member of the UK royal family (and there's an awful lot of them) who's ever been diagnosed with cancer?

There seem to be quite a lot of people who think the UK Royal Family are a cancer. Does that count?

Einstein ,

Public health panics are ideal for enforcing more controls on an already fearful and submissive public.
The Wuhan "corona" (crown) virus is about as deadly as 'flu, which we weather without note every year.
But health bureaucrats have noted how much "terror" panics can swell the budgets of the military and police. "Epidemics" of "dangerous" bugs offer the ideal opportunity for the builders of public health empires to follow suit.

Willem ,

3 per cent mortality for a transmittable disease, like corana virus (or common cold) is very high. Earth has 7.5 billion inhabitants, so if all of them get infected, and 3% die, then 225 million people will die from corona virus.

But then the numbers are, as usual, probably at least partially bogus:

the nominator: 26 deaths are probably not all caused by corona virus, but only correlated with corona virus. My guess (ad good as anyone's guess) is that of these 26 at most 10 died.

The denominator: who let's himself get tested for the common cold (corona virus). Probably only the most severe cases. My guess, this virus is for 95% very mild for which no doctor is visited, and then of the 5% who visit the doctor with common cold symptoms at most 1% is tested positive for corona, which are the 800 cases. Which makes the denominator not 800, but 800:0,01:0,05:0,95=a very large number.

Now if you divide 10 over a very number, your death rate will be close to 0, similar as the death rate is due to normal common cold.

Binra ,

The 'medical' sector has long been empowered by those who want their fears salved rather than question the narratives that are fed and used to gain power or possession of others.

However, as with switching to 'non-violence' – a habitual identification isn't something to be turned on or off when a crisis comes – but as a way of living.

Weaponised and marketised science gravitated to germ theory rather than the terrain theory of pleomorphism (of biota).
Closed system thinking posits external 'evils' and 'avengers' for hidden sins and secret fears, projecting 'cause' OUT THERE and diverting (sacrificing) energy and identity to defence such that the guardians become guards that lock into fear, frailty and dependency as the condition for NEEDING Powers that demand sacrifice of freedom and joy in life for a perpetual threat-managed existence.

Mainstream science is generally the narrative that suits the Establishment – not just of the 'powers of the day' – but the collective fear seeking protection and reassurance.

Toxic exposures generate the terrain for a need to clear out or neutralise the toxic environment – this results in 'inflammations and infections' which of course CAN be fatal or result in degradation of health and cognition. Our 'Rockefeller medicine' has focused on interventions that suppress or block symptoms to ward the idea of losing the realm and skills of relational nursing and clinical doctoring to pharma-technicians – who interpret most anything as a basis to intensify or increase the level and degree of interventions.

Fear is contagious – and hidden or masked fears are simply secretly active.

Immunity is not a matter of 'antibodies' but firstly of cellular health and function.
This principle can be transferred to our social political culture.

Hugo ,

The Chinese government faced a lot of international criticism for its perceived tardiness in handling the 2003 SARS crisis. The heavy-handedness at locking down Wuhan might be to do with not wishing to face international criticism again.

[Jan 14, 2020] I also think that if I call 911 and need emergency assistance, it should be provided by the city or county, not a private company

Jan 14, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

Angry Bear " Preventing Surprise Medical Bills ,

Mike B. , January 13, 2020 10:15 am

The only surprise medical bills I have received is for claims that were denied by my insurance company. Then the provider does not just demand what they would have received if the claim had been approved, but the full billed amount, which is generally 2 to 10 times the insurance amount. Providers should have to charge everyone the same price for the same thing. Now they have an incentive to order dubious tests or procedures, because if a claim is denied, they can bill for more money. I assume people without insurance are also billed for the full amount, and they can least afford it.

I also think that if I call 911 and need emergency assistance, it should be provided by the city or county, not a private company. That's true if police or fire engines are needed, and likewise it should be for EMTs or ambulances.

[Jan 12, 2020] "High-Deductible Plans Jeopardize Financial Health Of Patients And Rural Hospitals"

Jan 12, 2020 | khn.org

"Plans with annual deductibles of $3,000, $5,000 or even $10,000 have become commonplace since the implementation of the Affordable Care Act as insurers look for ways to keep monthly premiums to a minimum.

But in rural areas, where high-deductible plans are even more prevalent and incomes tend to be lower than in urban areas, patients often struggle to pay those deductibles.

That has hit patients like Flowers hard as they grapple with medical debt when emergencies happen -- but small rural hospitals like Lincoln Community are suffering, too. These facilities often stabilize critically ill patients and then transfer them to larger regional or urban hospitals for more definitive care. But when the hospitals submit their claims, bills from the first site of care generally get applied to a patient's deductible.

And if patients can't afford to cover that amount, those hospitals often don't get paid, even as the larger urban hospitals where patients were transferred get close to full payment from the health plan. 'As soon as we send them to the city, those things start being paid by the insurance company,' said Kevin Stansbury, CEO of Lincoln Community, 'while we're still chasing the patient around for collections.'"

[Jan 12, 2020] Preventing Surprise Medical Bills by run75441

Notable quotes:
"... If you are on Medicare, do not stay for observation unless you have a Plan G or Plan F. If you are on Plan N Supplemental to Medicare or lower, the plan will NOT pay 100% for Observation. You have to be admitted. You can go anywhere with Medicare for treatment. ..."
"... Medicare Advantage? You had better be in network or have some type of alternative program within your plan. ..."
Jan 11, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

The idea I have is not to be surprised. I am a careful patient who asks a lot of questions and also advocate for myself. I have refused treatment when they use drugs which may threaten my health further (Heparin). I am also not well liked by the bloodsuckers who come in to draw blood and stab me through the vein for two weeks and destroyed my left arm in the process. Ask them questions and do not be so willing to accept treatment (if cognizant) until they answer your questions and then get their name. Take names and dates. It is ok to be a forceful advocate for yourself. When all is said and done, the bill will come to you alone.

If you are on Medicare, do not stay for observation unless you have a Plan G or Plan F. If you are on Plan N Supplemental to Medicare or lower, the plan will NOT pay 100% for Observation. You have to be admitted. You can go anywhere with Medicare for treatment.

Medicare Advantage? You had better be in network or have some type of alternative program within your plan.

There are good points to this article which is why I C and P-ed it here per their request.

As taken from Preventing Debt from Surprise Medical Bills , Bankrate, Madison Blancaflor. July 19, 2019

The cost of healthcare has become a hot topic in American politics in recent years, and with good reason. A recent survey found that 22 percent of Americans are losing sleep over healthcare or insurance costs, up from 13 percent just one year ago.

One aspect in particular has even gained attention from both Congress and the President within the past two months: surprise medical bills.

Congress has proposed bi-partisan legislation that sets up consumer protections against surprise billing in certain situations. President Trump also issued an executive order in June that calls for hospitals to be more transparent upfront about prices for common tests and procedures, a measure that should go into effect later this year. ( While the House took out the 10 year exclusivities for Biologic drugs, it ended up in the Budget bill giving exclusivity for 12 years on new biologics. As I have pointed out repeatedly, risk adjusted R & D costs are recouped in a median period of 3- 5 years. It is another give-away to pharma. )

Past the leap, causes and prevention of Surprise Billing.

The cause of surprise billing

Unexpected medical bills, often outrageously expensive, can catch patients by surprise if they see a doctor who is not within their insurance network. It's a common issue, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that an estimated 51 percent of ambulance rides, 22 percent of ER visits and 9 percent of elective cases lead to surprise medical costs.

What often happens is that while the hospital or clinic might be considered in-network, a specific doctor might not be in-network (or vise versa). The legislation proposed by the Senate includes cost protections for situations such as these, plus scenarios where patients receive emergency care or follow-up care at an out-of-network facility due to travel restrictions.

While the new legislation and executive action may help patients and their families, surprise billing will persist in situations outside the purview of these new protections. ( The proposed prevention of surprise billing did not make it through the Senate this time for reasons I am not aware of today. More later .)

Preventing surprise healthcare bills

The best way to combat surprise billing is to prevent it whenever possible. This requires staying up-to-date on your insurance policies and looking at your options when scheduling appointments.

Know the details of your insurance policy

The first step is understanding your specific insurance policy. Check with your provider for a list of in-network hospitals, specialists and primary care physicians in your area so you can know ahead of time where you'll have coverage. If you have an upcoming appointment, it's worth calling your provider to double-check whether the facility and doctor you're seeing are in-network and covered.

Your provider may also require prior authorization before an appointment in order to cover some healthcare services or prescriptions, especially when visiting specialists.

Ask about costs upfront

Whether you're visiting a new primary care physician, seeing a specialist or have a planned procedure coming up, call ahead to see what out-of-pocket costs you will be responsible for paying. If you find that the facility or physician is out-of-network, you can request a referral to a facility or physician that is in-network.

For planned visits, you can also ask about the billing codes for the tests or procedures you'll be having so that you can confirm that your insurer will cover them. While many standard preventative procedures like a basic cardiac stress test or mammogram are covered by insurance policies, more advanced screenings such as a 3D mammogram may be billed under a different code that is not covered by your insurance.

Make an emergency plan

While it's impossible to predict when emergencies will happen, you can make a plan to help you prepare. If you know which emergency care providers are covered by your insurance plan, you can have an idea of where to go. While it requires some research on the front-end, you can save some stress and a lot of money in the long-run.

Understand your rights

In addition to new federal protections, many states have additional regulations regarding "balance billing," when patients are billed for out-of-network providers at an in-network facility. Don't be afraid to negotiate with hospital billing managers or doctors who billed you when you are balance billed, and keep your insurance company in the loop on the situation. Knowing your state's specific protections can help you get fees waived or lowered in these cases.

Combating debt from surprise medical bills

Unfortunately, it's impossible to entirely prevent surprise medical bills -- especially in the case of emergency services. In an emergency room, you have little to no control over which physicians you see and what tests are run. You also don't always have time to call ahead to check prices or request transfers to in-network facilities.

While it might not be possible to prevent some surprise healthcare costs, there are still steps you can take to combat debt in these cases.

1. Double check itemized medical bills.

Mistakes happen. Sometimes patients are billed for tests, procedures or medications that they didn't actually receive. Ask for an itemized bill, and ensure that you are only being charged for services received. If you find a mistake in your bill, talk to the hospital's billing department and the service provider.

In the case that a procedure or service on your bill should have been covered by your insurance provider, ask about the specific billing code the hospital used. It's possible that while the insurance provider covers a basic or general service, the billing code used may not fall under the billing code your insurance company lists as covered. Talk with both the hospital billing department and your insurance provider to see what can be done.

2. Avoid using credit cards whenever possible

Credit cards average around a 17 percent interest rate, meaning they are less-than-ideal for covering high medical costs . There are medical credit cards out there that offer short and long term financing plans to cover medical expenses with minimal interest, which is an option for those who can realistically pay off the debt within the specified time period.

When using a credit card is unavoidable, consider a credit card that offers a long intro period to help you save on interest charges, such as well known Platinum Visa Card might offer. If you end up with bills spread across multiple credit cards, a balance transfer credit card can also help you eliminate debt and save money on interest charges.

Just keep in mind that for all of these credit options, it's imperative that you can pay off the debt within the 0% interest offer period. Otherwise, you'll be subject to high interest rates that can cause even more financial stress.

For larger medical bills or debts, consider a personal loan (which offer lower, fixed interest rates) to help cover the cost.

3. Protect your credit score

If for any reason you are unable to pay your medical bills on time, it's important to take steps to protect your credit score. When you go more than 90-180 days without paying a medical debt, it could become an unpaid collection account, which can show up on your credit report and negatively affect your score. Luckily, newer credit score models such as the VantageScore 4.0 and FICO Score 9 often reduce the impact of these types of collection accounts.

If you know you'll be unable to pay medical bills, be open and honest with the hospital or provider. You might be able to set up a plan that better fits your budget. At the very least, you can explain the situation, pay as much as you can at the moment and potentially prevent them from writing off your debt as a loss and selling it to a collection agency.

4. Open a savings account for unplanned medical costs

While you can't predict unplanned medical costs, you can prepare for them by saving money for a rainy day. One option is contributing to a Healthcare Savings Account (HSA), which allows you to add pre-tax/tax-deductible money into a savings account that you can use for approved healthcare costs.

You can also set up a savings account with any bank to be used for healthcare costs. While these accounts may not be tax-exempt, you can often get a better interest rate and avoid regulations on what medical expenses you can and can't cover with the account.

Even if you only contribute $20 a month, it will add up over time and can help offset costs to make medical expenses more affordable.

The Bottom Line

While it's promising that both Congress and the President are making strides towards eliminating surprise medical bills and helping lower overall healthcare costs, sometimes surprise billing is unavoidable. These tips can help you prevent these charges or combat excessive debt that can often result from unplanned medical expenses.


davebarnes , January 11, 2020 9:28 pm

Kaiser Medicare Advantage.
Have NEVER has a strange nor bogus charge.

My colon cancer surgery + chemo was $2500 which I consider reasonable.
My 3 surgeries for a perianal abscess (trust me, you don't want one) was a few hundred bucks.

4.5 miles to the hospital/medical center/pharmacy.

run75441 , January 11, 2020 11:42 pm

That is nice. Your time will come when they will charge more for those operations. You are there forever and can not come back to Medicare. What do you think is happening with commercial healthcare today for a majority of the people who have commercial healthcare?

likbez , January 12, 2020 12:09 am

Great post on a very important in the USA topic. Thank you run75441!

I would add the danger of calling ambulance from home in non-critical cases. Taxi to the hospital is approx. 100 times cheaper and most cases is as effective :-).

In case the case is critical (like a real heart attack) be ready to pay out of network changes ($5K-$15K) for the ride in states that do not provide protection against surprise billing. Less then a half of the USA states some minimal (really minimal) protection against those sharks.

Ambulances in the USA are overtaken by private equity and venture capital firms.criminals. They are real Mafiosi. Or even worse because they profit of human sufferings. Private equity sharks circle around and if they smell blood they will devour the victim without any merci. I sometimes wonder why among around 40K of gun violence victims (39,773 in 2018) in the USA per year this category is so underrepresented 😉 .

The core of the problem is that ambulances and private insurance companies do not agree on a fair price, so the ambulance service doesn't join the insurance network. That leaves patients stuck in the middle with out-of-network charges..

See for example:

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/taken-ride-ambulances-stick-patients-surprise-bills-n824141

One patient got a $3,660 bill for a 4-mile ride. Another was charged $8,460 for a trip from one hospital that could not handle his case to another that could.

Still another found herself marooned at an out-of-network hospital, where she'd been taken by ambulance without her consent.

These patients all took ambulances in emergencies and got slammed with unexpected bills. Public outrage has erupted over surprise medical bills -- generally out-of-network charges that a patient did not expect or could not control -- prompting 21 states to pass laws protecting consumers in some situations.

But these laws largely ignore ground ambulance rides, which can leave patients stuck with hundreds or even thousands of dollars in bills, with few options for recourse, finds a Kaiser Health News review of 350 consumer complaints in 32 states.

Patients usually choose to go to the doctor, but they are vulnerable when they call 911 -- or get into an ambulance. The dispatcher picks the ambulance crew, which, in turn, often picks the hospital. Moreover, many ambulances are not summoned by patients. Instead, the crew arrives at the scene having heard about an accident on a scanner, or because police or a bystander called 911.

Betsy Imholz, special projects director at the Consumers Union, which has collected over 700 patient stories about surprise medical bills, said at least a quarter concern ambulances.

"It's a huge problem," she said.

Continued

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