980 replies to this topic

[Hip]

There is some data indicating a reduction in the mortality rate, 

 

Fake news understatement of the year. There is around a 20-fold reduction of death with vaccines, which numerous studies have shown.

[Hip]

Masks are a seductive idea and work in well-controlled (lab) settings, but have routinely failed in past real-world settings and previous RCT trials. 

 

Only because lots of the general public are too uneducated to use masks properly, and use the right masks. That does not mean there is anything wrong with masks, it just means the public need to be better educated with TV commercials etc showing how to wear a mask properly. And it just means that proper respiratory masks need to be bought, not just wearing a handkerchief over your mouth.

[Daniel Cooper]

Only because lots of the general public are too uneducated to use masks properly, and use the right masks. That does not mean there is anything wrong with masks, it just means the public need to be better educated with TV commercials etc showing how to wear a mask properly. And it just means that proper respiratory masks need to be bought, not just wearing a handkerchief over your mouth.

 

This is a common refrain you hear on the tail end of a failed government program. "If only we'd done it more earnestly, with more feeling and enthusiasm, and spent more money ..... then Sonny Jim you'd really have seen results!

 

You certainly can't disprove a statement like this. But one has suspicions. 

[Hip]

This is a common refrain you hear on the tail end of a failed government program. "If only we'd done it more earnestly, with more feeling and enthusiasm, and spent more money ..... then Sonny Jim you'd really have seen results!

 

You certainly can't disprove a statement like this. But one has suspicions. 

 

Maybe it's not the government's fault, but the general public's. With the average IQ being only around 100, you can't expect the general public to understand complex concepts, like the fact that if you wear a surgical mask, which by it's nature does not seal to the face properly so that air gets in around the edges, this is not going to block all viruses. Whereas a respirator mask which seals to the face blocks viruses with high efficiently.

 

Concepts of air slipping through the side of the mask are too difficult for the general public to understand. It's quite incredible that this should be so hard to understand, but I have spoken even to people with PhDs (in the liberal arts) who have no grasp of this concept.

 

Most men don't know that if you are unshaved, the stubble on your face prevents a good air seal, so then even a respirator can fail to protect you, because the air gets in via the stubble. I bet if you questioned males in the street about this important fact, not even 1 in 1000 would know this.

 

The human race only evolved from apes 6 million years ago, and we have yet to evolve into a smart race.

 

 

It's true that respirator masks are not so pleasant to wear for time periods longer than about an hour or so. Thus this can be a point of resistance to wearing. However, at the very least, judicial use of respirator masks for high risk situations, like going to the supermarket, traveling in public transport, or in large company meetings would be very helpful.

Edited by Hip, 17 March 2022 - 11:48 PM.

[Florin]

People should have switched to reusable respirators ASAP and kept wearing them until stuff that reduced risk enough (not to use them) become available such as rapid tests, supplements, vaccines, and antivirals. Unfortunately, cloth and surgical masks (effective for less contagious flu/covid but ineffective for more contagious covid strains) became so entrenched that this switch didn't happen. And that's why millions died, and millions more may have become disabled due long covid.

 

While the vaccines might not be a panacea, they seem more effective than most flu vaccines and seem fairly safe, especially for higher-risk people.

[Daniel Cooper]

Maybe it's not the government's fault, but the general public's. With the average IQ being only around 100, you can't expect the general public to understand complex concepts, like the fact that if you wear a surgical mask, which by it's nature does not seal to the face properly so that air gets in around the edges, this is not going to block all viruses. Whereas a respirator mask which seals to the face blocks viruses with high efficiently.

 

Concepts of air slipping through the side of the mask are too difficult for the general public to understand. It's quite incredible that this should be so hard to understand, but I have spoken even to people with PhDs (in the liberal arts) who have no grasp of this concept.

 

Most men don't know that if you are unshaved, the stubble on your face prevents a good air seal, so then even a respirator can fail to protect you, because the air gets in via the stubble. I bet if you questioned males in the street about this important fact, not even 1 in 1000 would know this.

 

The human race only evolved from apes 6 million years ago, and we have yet to evolve into a smart race.

 

 

It's true that respirator masks are not so pleasant to wear for time periods longer than about an hour or so. Thus this can be a point of resistance to wearing. However, at the very least, judicial use of respirator masks for high risk situations, like going to the supermarket, traveling in public transport, or in large company meetings would be very helpful.

 

See, this is exactly the attitude I'm talking about.

 

The fact that the empirical evidence shows that these masks didn't work all that well is never taken as evidence that these sorts of masks don't work all that well, it is only taken as evidence that people are too stupid to have followed this otherwise brilliant plan correctly or were insufficiently committed to it's implementation.

 

Does it not occur to you that sometimes the obvious answer is correct, namely that cloth and surgical mask simply aren't that effective at filtering out viruses? By your line of thinking, no government plan can ever be said to be a failure, because one can always argue "Well, our plan would have succeeded if only you poor saps hadn't been too stupid to implement it or if it had been give more resources". Also I'd be remiss if I did not point out that this is not science because one can never really falsify an assertion using this logic.

 

I also note that you seem to show a pretty consistent disdain for the public at large/humanity in general, which I suppose goes hand in hand with thinking that the human race needs a class of elites making all the decisions for the poor dumb masses. Which is why you don't really believe in free speech but want public speech regulated (by whom else but the government?) to approved sources, presumably smart people such as yourself, not to mention criminal prosecution for utterances of wrongthink.  I note this trait in every person I have ever met that invokes the old "we're just barely evolved apes" trope.  Because what is unsaid but definitely implied in this statement is "we're just barely evolved apes, excepting of course enlightened people such as myself who can see so clearly how stupid the rest of you are".

 

 

 

 

[Hip]

The fact that the empirical evidence shows that these masks didn't work all that well is never taken as evidence that these sorts of masks don't work all that well, it is only taken as evidence that people are too stupid to have followed this otherwise brilliant plan correctly or were insufficiently committed to it's implementation.

 

Are you not aware that in COVID hospital wards, were there are rooms full of COVD patients coughing and spluttering over the doctors and nurses treating them, a properly worn respirator prevents those medical staff from getting COVID? 

 

Why do you think these medical staff wear respirators?

 

Of course these staff have proper training on how to wear the masks, and how to adjust the straps and positioning so that the masks work properly. In fact, in the UK these staff are regularly tested every 6 months to ensure their respirators are fitting properly (this was a protocol even before the pandemic). It's important to have the right tension in the straps, and for the mask to fit properly on the nose.

 

There is no question whatsoever that a respirator mask properly worn will stop viral transmission even when you are tending to COVID patients at their bedside.

 

 

Given these facts, the only questions that remains are:

 

(1) why the general public were too lazy to learn how to correctly wear a respirator mask (that may be to do with being only recently descended from apes!);

 

(2) why governments did not spend more money educating the public on this matter.

 

The government record is not good on masks: if you remember, in the early pandemic, governments told white lies about masks being not effective for the general public. This was to preserve the limited supply of masks so that frontline hospital staff could have them. Only later when the supply of masks became more abundant did the government change its policy, and state that people should wear masks. But governments failed to implement a suitable education program. 

Edited by Hip, 18 March 2022 - 01:17 AM.

[Florin]

Given these facts, the only questions that remains are:
 
(1) why the general public were too lazy to learn how to correctly wear a respirator mask (that may be to do with being only recently descended from apes!);
 
(2) why governments did not spend more money educating the public on this matter.

 
Most of the public didn't/doesn't wear respirators because it was mislead by the experts on the effectiveness of cloth and surgical masks and because vaccines/masks are perceived to be effective enough.
 
Another factor to consider was that the public was just not motivated enough (due to the relatively mild nature of this pandemic) to figure out that the experts were wrong.
 

The government record is not good on masks: if you remember, in the early pandemic, governments told white lies about masks being not effective for the general public. This was to preserve the limited supply of masks so that frontline hospital staff could have them. Only later when the supply of masks became more abundant did the government change its policy, and state that people should wear masks. But governments failed to implement a suitable education program.

There were no lies, just a bunch of incompetence. Most experts thought respiratory diseases that can cause fast-spreading pandemics were transmitted mostly by fomites and droplets rather than by airborne aerosols. So, even if direct transmission by droplets was blocked by wearing a mask, you'd could still indirectly infect yourself via fomites that would be deposited on your mask or on surfaces such as door handles. The lack of strong evidence for mask effectiveness in past studies seemed to reinforce this idea. But it turns out that the fomite-and-droplet transmission idea is completely wrong; covid seems to be transmitted almost exclusively by aerosols, and this is probably true for all fast-spreading pandemics.

 

But if the fomite-and-droplet transmission idea was so popular, you might wonder why respirators were worn in hospitals to protect against covid but not recommended for use by the public. The primary reason was that respirators were used to prevent transmission via aerosols only when patients underwent procedures that were known to produce aerosols such as intubation. Otherwise, respirators weren't used (except for surgery or in TB wards) or at least they were not recommended in most circumstances such as when caring for covid patients. Even today, some hospitals require non-infected patients and visitors to use a surgical mask rather than a respirator.

 

The most interesting question for me is why respirators weren't recommended even after it became clear that covid was airborne and masks were starting to become ineffective.

 

Another curious fact is that the people that were loudly complaining about the lack of vaccine distribution to developing countries were conspicuously silent about distributing respirators to those countries, even though respirators could be rapidly deployed and be just as (or more) effective than vaccines.

 

https://lessonsfromt...-probably-wasnt

https://doi.org/10.1...science.abd9149
https://www.wired.co...ped-covid-kill/
https://www.politico...-covid-00017556

Edited by Florin, 18 March 2022 - 03:09 AM.

[pamojja]

Most men don't know that if you are unshaved, the stubble on your face prevents a good air seal, so then even a respirator can fail to protect you, because the air gets in via the stubble. I bet if you questioned males in the street about this important fact, not even 1 in 1000 would know this.

In my country until today we were from the beginning required to wear FFP2 respirators. We were also the first country which wanted to implement a vaccine-mandate to the whole adult population by beginning of this February (now post-phoned to be evaluated in 3 months again). - The end-result has been about equal mortality compared to Sweden, which had the least of any such meassures.

The problem with such assumptions is, that not even a full beard helps getting infected. It just doesn't.

After 2 years of this 'pandemic' I still personally know no one hospitalized or dying from it. At my working-place, a homeless shelter, all social-workers in the councelling department, all wearing FFP2 mask and in 1-to-1 councelling setting with proper distance only, all got covid with symptoms already in 2020 (but no hospitalization), with or without beard. All of them got vaccinated, and all of them got it twice in 2021 again.

All my co-workers in the proper homeless shelter, where we had to wear FPP2 at all times - but clients were of course exempted for eating, smoking and sleeping - none got covid until this spring-wave of omicron (except me), all asymptomatic too.

None of our homeless clients (up to 12 at any time in our small shelter without single-rooms), never wearing a FPP2 masks when not forced to, got symptomatic covid.

Since I didn't wanted to get vaccinated with an experimental, not proven long-term-safe mRNA injection - I decided to grow a full-beard from the very begining with the tiny hope for thereby acquiring natural immunity. Only finally worked out for me last October, with asymptomatic covid acquiring a half-year certificate for natural immunity, expiring now in exact 5 days.

Only now this Omikron-spring one-after-the-other of all my co-workers in the propper shelter finally got asymptomatically infected too (except me). Even the plenty of aerosols in our shelter took years to come to fruition.

One has to ask why none of our mostly unprodected clients never got symptomatic covid - while everone of the prodected social workers of our concelling department even symptomatic, and after vaccination even a second time?

Additionally at demonstrations against our mandatary-vaccine I met countless people trying to get the 'natural immunity certificate', by intentionally having tried to get infected (which is of course, really gross). Not one where it ever worked.

Am I the only one not surprised? - Since no study ever conclusively proved that asymptomatic spread even exists?

Edited by pamojja, 18 March 2022 - 10:51 AM.

[Mind]

The masks failed in the REAL world for many reasons, which I have detailed before.

 

It is impossible to get N100 respirators, goggles, helmets, biohazard suits, etc... to everyone in the population.

 

It is impossible to monitor everyone all the time to make sure they are wearing a respirator all the time.

 

The very young and the very old and mentally challenged will never be able to be constantly monitored to make sure they are wearing their respirator, biohazard suit, etc... all the time.

 

People have to eat, drink, sleep, etc....

 

Parents need to tend to their kids.

 

A small percentage of people will never wear a mask if it is mandated - on philosophical grounds.

 

If there is no other data to show the utter failure of masking, it is South Korea. They have been heralded for their conspicuous, proper mask wearing everywhere in public all the time (the vast majority are vaccinated and they have very sophisticated contract tracing), and yet the have an explosion of COVID cases, hospitalizations, and deaths right now. Same thing in Japan.

 

The bizarre attempt to try and prevent human beings from ever contacting a virus ever for the rest of their lives by isolating them, forcing them to wear face protection all the time, and sterilizing them, reminds me of the attempt to release a gazillion genetically modified mosquitos to control malaria.

 

Instead of finding treatments for malaria, reckless corporations think they can change the environment.

 

Instead on working for treatments and cures for respiratory diseases, for which there would be widespread support, public health bureaucrats would rather try to do the impossible - force people to wear masks and isolate for the rest of their lives - in the hopes that they will never encounter a virus ever again.

 

Viruses are everywhere in the air, water, and soil - by the trillions. We breathe in viruses with every breath every day of our lives. Every surface we touch every day has viruses. Nearly everything we eat has viruses. Viruses are on us and in us every day of our lives - even part of our DNA. I think all of the extreme mask advocates live alone, never go out, don't realize that people have families, that people NEED interaction to be healthy, and have no understanding of microbial/viral ecology.

Edited by Mind, 18 March 2022 - 09:59 PM.

[Florin]

The minimum amount of protection for covid, absent panaceas, should be elastomeric, reusable respirators. Any sort of disposable face coverings including FFP2s (which aren't respirators) and even N95 respirators (to a lesser extent) will suffer from poor face seals. If everyone wore ventess N95s, seals might not matter that much, but that's unlikely to happen in this pandemic. So, the only option for real protection is elastomerics (and maybe DIY PAPRs but they're not that easy to DIY). This has already been discussed in the mask thread and in other comments.

 

In the REAL world, masks seemed to have worked early in the pandemic, and they continue to work for the flu and maybe for other respiratory diseases. But sure, they're not effective if a pathogen is contagious enough like the covid variants. That's why respirators should have been used instead of masks.

 

If respirators were used, there would have been no need for most mandates and lockdowns. The only reason that mandates were used is because it was thought that if masks were worn by only high-risk people, mask wearing would be a lot less effective.

 

Respirators are easy to distribute, just like surgical masks.

 

Respirators would be worn only until a high-risk person felt that the risk was low enough not to merit wearing it. Even if you think a covid panacea exists today or that covid-is-just-the-flu, a lot of people want to be safe-than-sorry.

 

Respirators wouldn't need to be worn at home or outdoors.

 

Kids don't seem to spread covid that much probably due to (in part) lower lung capacity, but if a kid needs further protection for whatever reason, they could wear a DIY respirator or PAPR or be homeschooled.

 

As I mentioned last year, if SK and the other Asian countries rest of their lauralls and don't switch to respirators, they're probably going to be overrun sooner or later. This is starting to happen.

 

Treatments and cures are nice but so is prevention.

 

While most viruses are harmless, the coronavirus isn't harmless. That's why a lot of people want to remain healthy and avoid it. And one way to do that is to wear a respirator. This should be no-brainer, especially for so-called immortalists.

[Mind]

 

 

While most viruses are harmless, the coronavirus isn't harmless. That's why a lot of people want to remain healthy and avoid it. And one way to do that is to wear a respirator. This should be no-brainer, especially for so-called immortalists.

 

The point of living forever is to live free forever. If I am forced to wear a mask for the rest of my life, forced to take government-approved medication for the rest of my life, forced to be silent for the rest of my life, forced into isolation for the rest of my life, then I don't want to live forever. What a horrific life.

 

 

[Mind]

Add New Zealand to the list of countries that are now experiencing a massive wave of COVID infections, as well as their highest rate of hospitalizations and deaths since the "pandemic" began while at the same time removing almost all COVID restrictions.

 

Recall that just 5 cases prompted the leader (some would say dictator) of New Zealand to lock down the entire country and suspend most normal human rights. Now they are getting 20,000 cases per day and removing all restrictions.

 

Their stated reason for crushing the "normal life" of citizens was to prevent any and all death from COVID. If that was still their goal, they would not be removing all of the restrictions.

 

They are experiencing a massive wave of infections, even though 95% of the country is injected.

[Hebbeh]

Appears the restrictions totally worked 100% until they removed them.

[Oakman]

Add New Zealand to the list of countries that are now experiencing a massive wave of COVID infections, as well as their highest rate of hospitalizations and deaths since the "pandemic" began while at the same time removing almost all COVID restrictions.

 

Recall that just 5 cases prompted the leader (some would say dictator) of New Zealand to lock down the entire country and suspend most normal human rights. Now they are getting 20,000 cases per day and removing all restrictions.

 

Their stated reason for crushing the "normal life" of citizens was to prevent any and all death from COVID. If that was still their goal, they would not be removing all of the restrictions.

 

They are experiencing a massive wave of infections, even though 95% of the country is injected.

 

You are faulting governments for trying to do the best to help protect their citizens. How can you fault that? Calling the government a dictator. Really? How would any body fully understand how destructive over time this virus would be? Just because it may not have been the best advice for the long haul, it absolutely was for a while - no one or few got sick nor died in NZ until recently. 

 

Not to mention that we have come to realize that vaccinations for COVID only last a relatively short amount of time, not forever, even compared to other vaccinations. If there had been a COVID pandemic before, we would have had a heads up. But we didn't. So awful that people are trying to do the best they can.

 

You sound like you would prefer that anyone and everyone just get sick, some die, some not, depending.  Yeah, that would have been sweet, and certainly, "crushing the "normal life" of citizens ". I thought that, "Longecity is a community where like minded people interested in life extension can come together." Apparently not.

[Mind]

Appears the restrictions totally worked 100% until they removed them.

 

This is an interesting point, but the question remains, why "let it rip" now? If their goal was to prevent COVID deaths, they would not be removing all COVID restrictions in the middle of an outbreak. Some people suggest it is all about politics, and not health.

 

My argument is that the restrictions didn't work as...evidenced by so many countries now giving up on the restrictions as they are experiencing massive waves of infections. Iceland, South Korea, New Zealand, and many others.

Edited by Mind, 24 March 2022 - 09:07 PM.

[Mind]

You are faulting governments for trying to do the best to help protect their citizens. How can you fault that? Calling the government a dictator. Really? How would any body fully understand how destructive over time this virus would be? Just because it may not have been the best advice for the long haul, it absolutely was for a while - no one or few got sick nor died in NZ until recently. 

 

Not to mention that we have come to realize that vaccinations for COVID only last a relatively short amount of time, not forever, even compared to other vaccinations. If there had been a COVID pandemic before, we would have had a heads up. But we didn't. So awful that people are trying to do the best they can.

 

You sound like you would prefer that anyone and everyone just get sick, some die, some not, depending.  Yeah, that would have been sweet, and certainly, "crushing the "normal life" of citizens ". I thought that, "Longecity is a community where like minded people interested in life extension can come together." Apparently not.

 

Yes, I am faulting governments, because they didn't do the best they could.

 

Anyone can see with their own eyes that countries all around the world experienced wave after wave after wave of infections and deaths, no matter the restrictions. The restrictions caused massive disruptions of normal life, much suffering, and did not stop the pandemic - FOR MORE THAN TWO YEARS!

 

Masking didn't stop the spread. Social distancing didn't stop the spread. Physical barriers didn't stop the spread. The COVID injections didn't stop the spread. Sterilizing everything did not stop the spread.

 

Yet governments kept doing these things that were not working AND people died. People suffered. Kids committed suicide at a record rate. Drug abuse and depression rose dramatically. People lost their businesses.

 

Meanwhile, early treatment with beneficial immune supplements and cheap, safe, beneficial treatments (proven) were literally banned. Doctors who tried to implement a better modality for this pandemic were harassed, fired, jailed, etc... For much of the time governments were actively DISCOURAGING people from improving their health through other options.

 

That is the destruction wrought by government "health" policy. I have been advocating for better, more effective, and compassionate options since the beginning. Don't tell me I am not for the health, well-being, and longer lives of the population at large.

[Hebbeh]

But according to your source, the charts and graphs show the restrictions were 100% effective UNTIL they relaxed the restrictions recently.  The relaxed restrictions is what is causing the omicron outbreak wave (not the other way around according to your source) and PROVES the restrictions had the intended effect.  It's my understanding the restrictions were never meant to be permanent but to control the infectious spread and flatten the curve (couldn't of been any flatter in NZ) until either a miracle cure was found (and ivermectin isn't it) or the virus ran it's course by mutating into less lethal forms (omicron is it).  It would seem their plan hit it out of the park.

 

This is an interesting point, but the question remains, why "let it rip" now? If their goal was to prevent COVID deaths, they would not be removing all COVID restrictions in the middle of an outbreak. Some people suggest it is all about politics, and not health.

 

My argument is that the restrictions didn't work as...evidenced by so many countries now giving up on the restrictions as they are experiencing massive waves of infections. Iceland, South Korea, New Zealand, and many others.

 

[Dorian Grey]

Attention armchair scientists, the world needs your help with a bizarre phenomenon going on in malaria (hydroxychloroquine) and strongyloidiasis and onchocerciasis (ivermectin) country, specifically, Africa.  

 

https://www.yahoo.co...-120615901.html

 

Trying to Solve a COVID Mystery: Africa's Low Death Rates

 

It seems despite very low vaccination rates (4-14% or so), almost no one seems to be dying of COVID!  Some speculate it is due to the relatively young average age of the population, yet the rates are so low it is difficult to chalk it up completely to this.  Others say the deaths are simply not being recorded, but it is noted that a massive die-off could not have occurred without notice.  

 

"KAMAKWIE, Sierra Leone — There are no COVID fears here.

 

The district’s COVID-19 response center has registered just 11 cases since the start of the pandemic, and no deaths. At the regional hospital, the wards are packed — with malaria patients. The door to the COVID isolation ward is bolted shut and overgrown with weeds. People cram together for weddings, soccer matches, concerts, with no masks in sight."

"Sierra Leone, a nation of 8 million on the coast of Western Africa, feels like a land inexplicably spared as a plague passed overhead. What has happened — or hasn’t happened — here and in much of sub-Saharan Africa is a great mystery of the pandemic."

"Studies that tested blood samples for antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, the official name for the virus that causes COVID, show that about two-thirds of the population in most sub-Saharan countries do indeed have those antibodies. Since only 14% of the population has received any kind of COVID vaccination, the antibodies are overwhelmingly from infection"

"It’s not possible that hundreds of thousands or even millions of COVID deaths could have gone unnoticed, they say.

“We have not seen massive burials in Africa. If that had happened, we’d have seen it,” 

"A new WHO-led analysis, not yet peer-reviewed, synthesized surveys from across the continent and found that 65% of Africans had been infected by the third quarter of 2021, higher than the rate in many parts of the world. Just 4% of Africans had been vaccinated when these data were gathered."

[Mind]

But according to your source, the charts and graphs show the restrictions were 100% effective UNTIL they relaxed the restrictions recently.  The relaxed restrictions is what is causing the omicron outbreak wave (not the other way around according to your source) and PROVES the restrictions had the intended effect.  It's my understanding the restrictions were never meant to be permanent but to control the infectious spread and flatten the curve (couldn't of been any flatter in NZ) until either a miracle cure was found (and ivermectin isn't it) or the virus ran it's course by mutating into less lethal forms (omicron is it).  It would seem their plan hit it out of the park.

 

New Zealand is planning to remove all restrictions over the next couple of weeks. 

 

The outbreak started a month ago. So with all of their restrictions in place, they had their biggest wave of the entire pandemic, which is still ongoing. A year ago, they were tyrannical about a single case, locking down the entire country (doing this multiple times over the last two years).

 

So once again, it doesn't make sense for them to ditch it all and "let it rip" through the population. Something changed and it doesn't seem to be based upon "the science". If the restrictions were working so awesome and their goal was to prevent COVID deaths, they would keep it all in place, and no one would die. The major outbreak over the last month was the writing on the wall.

 

I think they just threw in the towel, even though the leaders won't admit it publicly.

Edited by Mind, 26 March 2022 - 06:18 PM.

[Mind]

There are quite a few people less forgiving than me about the failed pandemic policies.

 

 

There is the appalling and still on-going campaign to suppress Covid early treatment off-label drugs such as ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, fluvoxamine, et cetera, though the protocols have been proven highly effective in clinical practice as well as scores of internationally peer-reviewed studies. Hundreds of thousands of Americans died because these drugs were maliciously outlawed. In many states, doctors can be punished with loss of medical licenses for using these safe and effective drugs, or even talking them up.

Who exactly in public health was responsible for this suppression? Who gave the orders for it?  Or did it just happen? Was it Francis Collins, recently retired director of the National Institutes for Health (NIH)? He must have at least approved the policy. Stephen M. Hahn, MD, who was Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration from Dec. 2019 to Jan. 2021, the heart of the Covid event time-line? Janet Woodcock, who was Acting Commissioner from Jan 2021 to Feb 2022 — and was previously the longtime chief of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. Or the current chief of that outfit, one Patrizia Cavvazoni, MD? Or Jaqueline A. O’Shaughnessy, PhD, the FDA’s Acting Chief Scientist? Was outlawing early treatment in their purviews? Did they even know about it? How could they not?

 

Edited by Mind, 26 March 2022 - 06:22 PM.

[Dorian Grey]

Gilead saw $5.6B in remdesivir sales last year...  Pfizer has projected sales of its COVID-19 vaccine Comirnaty and oral antiviral Paxlovid will total $54 billion in 2022...  

 

Perhaps a half million lives sacrificed in the USA.  God only knows the global total. 

 

 

MONEY TALKS!  

[Dorian Grey]

The most important half hour you may spend if you truly are seeking the truth about where we stand today in healthcare:

 

 

The illusion of evidence based medicine

 

https://www.bmj.com/...nt/376/bmj.o702

 

Modern medicine has been captured.  Big Pharma has won the future. 

 

Their trials can and are being manipulated to fit whatever narrative they seek.  

[Mind]

Alcohol-related deaths increased a whopping 25% between 2019 and 2020 - an increase of nearly 22,000 deaths!!! This was due to pandemic policy. It was a deadly failure. They were advised that isolation, fear, and depression would negatively impact the population. As far as I can tell, they completely ignored the problem. Many will remember that a better policy was suggested - early treatment and focused protection. Fauci and Collins actually conspired to "crush" the suggestion of early treatment and focused protection.

 

“There needs to be a quick and devastating published take down of its premises.” (ie, focused protection)

 

 

Recently, the CDC director recommended "protecting people at high risk (focused protection)", two years too late. The damage is done. The pandemic policies were a near utter failure. The government did a poor job.

[Mind]

Doctor Malone opines that our science and health bureaucracies have been corrupted by politics and that led the the failures of the COVID pandemic policies.

 

The absolute public destruction of anyone (credentialed or not) who offered alternative approaches, was one of the worst aspects of the COVID pandemic. This might have led to hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths and might be contributing to another problem, possible underreporting of deaths and injuries from the COVID injections. There might be more negative effects than is being admitted to publicly because the CDC, FDA, NIH, major media, Google/Facebook/Twitter/Snopes, continue their scorched-earth policy preventing most rational open discussion. Doctors and health professionals might be afraid to speak out for fear of their lives being destroyed.

[Mind]

The deliberate fear-based strategy to scare people into compliance with COVID restrictions was a bad idea by health bureaucrats.

 

Most directly, fear and stress lowers immune response, making the population more vulnerable.

 

To this day, surveys of Americans show that they think 50% of people who catch COVID end up in the hospital and 10% of people who catch COVID die. These numbers are wildly out of proportion to the true risk and were created by the fear strategy. 

[Florin]

The point of living forever is to live free forever. If I am forced to wear a mask for the rest of my life, forced to take government-approved medication for the rest of my life, forced to be silent for the rest of my life, forced into isolation for the rest of my life, then I don't want to live forever. What a horrific life.

 

You don't need to wear a respirator forever; you'd wear it until the risk was low enough to not need to wear it. It's like wearing a gas mask: you'd wear it when you're being gassed to death, and then you'd stop wearing it after the poison gas had dissipated.

 

Some might say that wearing a respirator isn't necessary because the risk for them is low, but what if a new pandemic (or new wave of the current one) starts to kill 10% or more of everyone, regardless of age or health status? The obvious choice for any rational immortalist would be to wear a respirator for a long as necessary (but not forever, since all pandemics end).

Edited by Florin, 03 April 2022 - 09:16 PM.

[Mind]

You don't need to wear a respirator forever; you'd wear it until the risk was low enough to not need to wear it. It's like wearing a gas mask: you'd wear it when you're being gassed to death, and then you'd stop wearing it after the poison gas had dissipated.

 

Some might say that wearing a respirator isn't necessary because the risk for them is low, but what if a new pandemic (or new wave of the current one) starts to kill 10% or more of everyone, regardless of age or health status? The obvious choice for any rational immortalist would be to wear a respirator for a long as necessary (but not forever, since all pandemics end).

 

The problem is that almost all viruses have lethal potential, depending upon the health of the individual.

 

As we see from the COVID variants, the mortality rate is a small fraction of one percent, and health bureaucrats used this mortality rate to suspend nearly all human rights. If common people did not push back, we would all still be wearing masks (nearly useless), isolating from everyone (detrimental to health), getting injected every couple of months (nearly useless), and various other nearly useless measures. 

 

Many "health leaders" have suggested harsh COVID-type restrictions every time there is an outbreak of the flu - which would mean masks forever, isolation forever, testing and injections forever.

[Florin]

The problem is that almost all viruses have lethal potential, depending upon the health of the individual.

 

As we see from the COVID variants, the mortality rate is a small fraction of one percent, and health bureaucrats used this mortality rate to suspend nearly all human rights. If common people did not push back, we would all still be wearing masks (nearly useless), isolating from everyone (detrimental to health), getting injected every couple of months (nearly useless), and various other nearly useless measures. 

 

Many "health leaders" have suggested harsh COVID-type restrictions every time there is an outbreak of the flu - which would mean masks forever, isolation forever, testing and injections forever.

 

Depending on age and health status, the covid mortality rate was over 1% before vaccines and other interventions were developed.

 

No virus kills 10% or more of everyone today, but what if it did? Wouldn't you want to voluntarily wear a respirator until some intervention was developed to reduce that mortality rate?

 

I doubt anything will be mandated just for the flu, regardless what a few experts think, and since respirators are readily available, there's almost no reason to mandate anything ever again. Possible exceptions might be if you're in a place where you couldn't use a respirator such as if you're a nursing home resident or dental office patient.

[joesixpack]

I wear a n95 mask when I go to the grocery store.  I am 70, and this is my choice. I don't think everyone needs to wear this mask, but I think it helps me.

 

I don't think we need a mandate for anyone to wear this mask.

 

It is a choice. And always should be.