COVID 19 May Be Less Deadly Than Flu Study Finds

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

22 hours ago, ralfy said:

"‘It’s something I have never seen’: How the Covid-19 virus hijacks cells"
 

Quote

 

“It’s something I have never seen in my 20 years of” studying viruses, said virologist Benjamin tenOever of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, referring to how SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, hijacks cells’ genomes.

The “something” he and his colleagues saw is how SARS-CoV-2 blocks one virus-fighting set of genes but allows another set to launch, a pattern never seen with other viruses. Influenza and the original SARS virus (in the early 2000s), for instance, interfere with both arms of the body’s immune response — what tenOever dubs “call to arms” genes and “call for reinforcement” genes.

This explains the phenomena which we see with COVID patients.

And it also explains why a variety of alternative integrative medicine techniques have been so extremely effective in the recovery of thousands of COVID patients, while many other thousands of patients have died who went to the hospital.

[Yoshiro Kamamura + 274]

As the number of US victim nears 100 000 in only three months, I would say this thread aged extremely poorly. 

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

Just now, Yoshiro Kamamura said:

As the number of US victim falsely attributed to this virus 100 000 in only three months, I would say this thread aged extremely poorly. 

Take away the false death certificates and the number is likely around 10,000 or not even a mediocre flu season. 

I just got back from a "wake" for a friend's wife, now deceased. She had suffered for years from Pleurisy. She died and even though she failed the Covid 19 tests 3 times, her doctor still put her death down as Covid19. Her husband argued and the attending physician said, "if you don't agree, Medicare won't cover her treatment" a bald faced lie. But, in fact the hospital makes considerably more revenue from a Covid case than mere pleurisy. 

Those stats are garbage.

[0R0 + 6,251]

1 hour ago, Yoshiro Kamamura said:

As the number of US victim nears 100 000 in only three months, I would say this thread aged extremely poorly. 

I will add that cause of death accounting of the deaths in Italy bring the actual deaths from CV19 to 12% of those reported under the "died while having CV19 positive" reporting regime. It was adopted to assure rapid reporting and provide upper bound figures for epidemiological calculations. 

 

[0R0 + 6,251]

4 hours ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

BUT, in order to understand the full magnitude of the problem, you absolutely must couple this with the fact that 83% of the precursors of the medications supplied to the U.S. (and likely as high to the UK and Europe) are . . . made in China. It is so pathetic that if you went to get penicillin in the U.S. and absolutely insisted on taking penicillin made entirely in the U.S., you'd be up the creek. But hey, it gets worse: Over 90% of all the testing kits and reagents that we use in the U.S. are also made in China. Let's see: virus, test, drug. All made in China.

Yet the pharma companies are not happy to reproduce production in the US. They don't want to fall into the same trap they were in before, being a punching bag to the EPA and FDA inspectors generating fines for nothing other than their own ignorance. And paying extra high taxes for the privilege in the process. So they do need a regulatory relief package, and a subsidy for a carrot and a solid threat that imports of such goods containing Chinese sourced or processed chemicals or components will be banned entirely on date certain fairly soon.

Europe is far more capable since Germany hung on to manufacturing and moved the stuff in danger of attack by greens into Poland etc...

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

3 hours ago, Ward Smith said:

Take away the false death certificates and the number is likely around 10,000 or not even a mediocre flu season. 

I just got back from a "wake" for a friend's wife, now deceased. She had suffered for years from Pleurisy. She died and even though she failed the Covid 19 tests 3 times, her doctor still put her death down as Covid19. Her husband argued and the attending physician said, "if you don't agree, Medicare won't cover her treatment" a bald faced lie. But, in fact the hospital makes considerably more revenue from a Covid case than mere pleurisy. 

Those stats are garbage.

Odd that they put that as the cause without a positive test.  Do you know the cause of the pleurisy?   Most causes of pleurisy do not kill, and if severe the fluid can be drained.  If she was living with that for years why die now?   Condolences.

 

I wouldn't say the numbers are garbage, possibly bloated but certainly not off by a factor of 10. Compare fatality rates across countries and they are very similar. Canadians do not pay out of pocket for health care, and payments to doctors are far more regulated, which weakens the financial gain argument. Germany is a mix of public and private care.

 

USA:  98,683 deaths / 1,666,828 cases = 0.0592

Canada: 6355 deaths / 83,621 cases = 0.0760

Germany: 8,366 death / 179,986 cases = 0.0465

 

China #'s are probably garbage but still fit 4,634 / 82,971 = 0.0559.  If anything they are under-reporting and it comes out about the same ratio.

 

Hospitals would make more money treating an ongoing chronic condition than pronouncing a false cause of death once. 

Edited May 24, 2020 by Enthalpic

[Jim Profit + 46]

"The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command."
- George Orwell, "1984"

[Jim Profit + 46]

5 hours ago, Yoshiro Kamamura said:

As the number of US victim nears 100 000 in only three months, I would say this thread aged extremely poorly. 

That's way worse than that: the thread is about 2 days old.. 

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

The CDC Just Gave Us the Biggest Reason to End the Coronavirus Lockdowns

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) nows estimates that 35 percent of coronavirus infections are asymptomatic.

But that’s not even the most important part of their latest estimates. It’s the CDC’s new “best estimate” for the case fatality rate amongst symptomatic patients.

But, before I got to that, I should note that back in March, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated a 3.4 percent fatality rate and Dr. Anthony Fauci estimated that the fatality rate of the coronavirus was about 2 percent.

President Trump was skeptical of both those numbers, particularly the WHO’s estimate: “Well, I think the 3.4 percent is really a false number,” Trump told Sean Hannity. “Now, and this is just my hunch, and — but based on a lot of conversations with a lot of people that do this. Because a lot of people will have this and it’s very mild. They’ll get better very rapidly. They don’t even see a doctor. They don’t even call a doctor. I think that that number is very high. I think the number, personally, I would say the number is way under 1 percent.”

Several studies have suggested that Trump was right. But, now here’s what the CDC is saying about the fatality rate the coronavirus:

• 0-49 years old:  0.05%
• 50-64 years old:  0.2%
• 65+ years old:  1.3%
• Overall ages:  0.4%

According to the CDC’s current best estimate, the case fatality rate of the coronavirus is 0.4 percent. And that’s just amongst symptomatic cases, which, the CDC estimates, is 65 percent of all cases. This means the CDC estimates that the fatality rate for all infections across all age groups, symptomatic as well as asymptomatic, is approximately 0.26 percent.

The CDC does caution that the numbers are likely to change with new data, but considering we’ve gone from 3.4 percent to 2.0 percent to now 0.26 percent. The more data we get, the lower the numbers get. So, I’m thinking it might get even lower.

But, the bigger takeaway from this is that the early doomsday predictions about the coronavirus were all wrong. Everything that justified the lockdowns and the shutting down of our economy was wrong. We need to open this country back up.

 

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

New CDC Figures Show Fauci’s Dishonest COVID-19 Projections Were Garbage

This madness has to end now.

Every single lockdown order inflicted on the American people these past few months needs to be rescinded immediately.

Once that’s done, Fauci has to be investigated to find out why on earth he pushed these catastrophic measures on us using projections he knew to be false. He also needs to be indicted for peddling his lies before Congress and held criminally accountable for all the death and devastation he’s caused as well.

In case you hadn’t heard, Matt Margolis over at PJ Media is reporting that the CDC now estimates the case fatality rate (CFR) of COVID-19 to be only .4 percent. As Margolis points out, that’s much lower than the numbers used to frighten us into these lockdowns. But there are a few factors he doesn’t mention that demonstratively show we were unspeakably deceived rather than merely the victims of some disastrous but ultimately honest mistake.

The CFR is the death rate restricted to just those cases in which someone with symptoms had a test confirming they were infected. Since it factors in neither asymptomatic cases nor unconfirmed symptomatic ones, it’s going to substantially overstate the infection fatality rate (IFR), which is the rate among the totality of all those infected.

And, of course, it’s the IFR which represents the odds a random person who contracts the virus has of dying. The CFR, on the other hand, isn’t really of any interest at all if you’re just a normal person trying to understand how dire a threat we’re facing. It gets massively skewed by the over-representation of serious cases among those who get tested and because it doesn’t factor in asymptomatic infections at all.

Moreover, the skewing isn’t even uniform. Its extent depends upon the availability of tests and the polices in place concerning when they’re to be given. Both of which vary between different localities and even in the same one at different times.

The CDC is also now estimating that only 65% of those who contract the COVID-19 virus actually wind up with any symptoms. That means the IFR will be at most 65% of the CFR since the latter is only counting symptomatic cases. That puts COVID-19’s fatality rate at below .26%. But, given that testing has been relatively rare even among those who show symptoms, it’s bound to be substantially lower.

Margolis says that IFR will actually be .26%. But that calculation depends on assuming that everyone who caught the virus and developed symptoms was tested, which is clearly not even close to true. The .26% figure he cites is, at best, an upper limit on the IFR, which is actually bound to be at least several times lower.

As Margolis points out, initially, we were told that COVID-19’s CFR was 3.4%, which is 8.5 times higher than the current CDC estimate of .4%. But he doesn’t note that those pushing this – as it’s turned out –vastly inflated number didn’t distinguish between the CFR and IFR. Instead the 3.4% figure was sold to us as COVID-19’s unqualified “death” or “mortality” rate.

We were subjected to hundreds of stories like this one from CNBC headlined, ‘WHO Says Coronavirus Death Rate Is 3.4% Globally, Higher Than Previously Thought.’ CNBC also cites the 3.4% figure as COVID-19’s unqualified “mortality rate” in their lead sentence. Since anyone reading these claims would immediately assume they represented his or her chances of dying upon contracting the virus, the percentages we were bombarded with would have been despicably deceptive even if COVID-19’s CFR really had been 3.4%.

Moreover, throughout March, Fauci himself issued dire warnings that COVID-19 was “at least 10 times more lethal than the flu.” He swore to it while testifying to Congress on March 11, generating a blizzard of scare-mongering headlines hammering the frightening numerical comparison into our heads. And he repeated the bogus numbers in a March 27 appearance on Comedy Central.

The flu’s IFR is estimated to be around .1%. As we noted above, the CDC is now saying that even COVID-19’s CFR is only .4%. And they’re now citing a percentage for asymptomatic cases which implies that the virus’s actual lethality is several times lower than .26%. Moreover, as Margolis pointed out in a decidedly useful earlier column, at least 3 major research studies have concluded that COVID-19 has around the same IFR as the flu.

None of this even factors in the preponderance of reasons guaranteeing that COVID-19’s U.S. death tally is itself being massively inflated. The bottom line is that Fauci’s claim that COVID-19 is “10 times more lethal” than the flu was total garbage.

But the worst part is that we’ve known for a while, with absolute certainty, that he never believed a word of it himself. In case you hadn’t heard, he made sure to let his peers know he wasn’t dumb enough to believe the garbage he was about to start peddling to us beforehand.

As first reported by Sharyl Attkisson, Fauci published an article addressed to his fellow researchers at the esteemed New England Journal of Medicine’s website on February 28. And, it not only contained a quite different take on the threat COVID-19 posed than the one he would soon start pushing on the American public. He even explained exactly why the stats he would go on to spend the next month terrorizing us with were bogus!

[Fauci’s article is dated March 26, which is the date cited by Attkisson. But archived copies reveal that sometime on April 3rd after around 10:30 am, which was a few days after her piece appeared, a note was added saying it was initially published on the journal’s website February 28. So presumably March 26 represents when it first appeared in the print edition.]

Fauci notes that the frighteningly high fatality numbers we were hearing for COVID-19 were sure to be grossly inflated because “the number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic cases is several times as high as the number of reported cases.”

Hence, Fauci explained to his fellow experts:

" The overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a case fatality rate of approximately 0.1%). "

 

Choosing a more brazen liar to lead the nation’s response to COVID-19 would have probably been impossible.

It’s long past time these suicidal measures Fauci has gaslit the nation into adopting were ended. But it’s also time that we faced the ugly truth that the deception was intentional.

Fauci pushed the entire country into an economic shutdown and got most of us confined to our homes by blatantly lying about COVID-19’s deadliness. He didn’t believe a word of the scare-mongering BS he peddled to us. And he didn’t dare try to palm it off on his peers. It’s right there in black-and-white in the pages of the New England Journal of Medicine.

So, if you’re still inclined to defend the man who terrorized America into accepting a suicidal abridgment of our most basic rights with his lies, your problem isn’t COVID-19.

It’s Stockholm Syndrome.

 

[Jim Profit + 46]

Try to explain to New-Yorkers that covid-19 is less lethal than flu..

Preliminay estimate of excess death in New-York City between  March 11 and May 2, 2020

24,172

Annual death toll of flu in New-York City

about 2,000

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6919e5.htm

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

According to John Hopkins University, 97k + death so far in the US.

Usual flu death toll. 40k...

 

Some artlcie about the topic of COVID-19 death count.. 

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/05/what-we-need-to-find-true-coronavirus-death-toll/

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-covid-19-deaths-are-counted1/

 

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

5 hours ago, Jim Profit said:

Try to explain to New-Yorkers that covid-19 is less lethal than flu..

Preliminay estimate of excess death in New-York City between  March 11 and May 2, 2020

24,172

Annual death toll of flu in New-York City

about 2,000

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6919e5.htm

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

According to John Hopkins University, 97k + death so far in the US.

Usual flu death toll. 40k...

 

Some artlcie about the topic of COVID-19 death count.. 

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/05/what-we-need-to-find-true-coronavirus-death-toll/

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-covid-19-deaths-are-counted1/

 

False COD (Cause of Death) reporting as proven from the Italian numbers means you can give the 100k deaths number an almost 90% haircut. Yes people died, from the usual disorders, cancer, heart disease, diabetes and the usual comorbidities associated with obesity. 

But keep posting Frank, you've got to pay the rent somehow. 

[UNC12345 + 171]

90 percent of the deaths reported are not COVID related?  You're just so disrespectful, it's embarrassing.

[Jim Profit + 46]

When one personally attacks his contradictors, one only emphasyses the weakness of his argumentation.

[Jim Profit + 46]

46 minutes ago, UNC12345 said:

90 percent of the deaths reported are not COVID related?  You're just so disrespectful, it's embarrassing.

In french we would say "Il nous prend pour des cons."

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

6 hours ago, Ward Smith said:

False COD (Cause of Death) reporting as proven from the Italian numbers means you can give the 100k deaths number an almost 90% haircut. Yes people died, from the usual disorders, cancer, heart disease, diabetes and the usual comorbidities associated with obesity. 

But keep posting Frank, you've got to pay the rent somehow. 

"proven" my ass. 

When the numbers don't fit the theory, change the numbers...

Edited May 24, 2020 by Enthalpic

[El Nikko + 2,145]

16 hours ago, Ward Smith said:

Take away the false death certificates and the number is likely around 10,000 or not even a mediocre flu season. 

I just got back from a "wake" for a friend's wife, now deceased. She had suffered for years from Pleurisy. She died and even though she failed the Covid 19 tests 3 times, her doctor still put her death down as Covid19. Her husband argued and the attending physician said, "if you don't agree, Medicare won't cover her treatment" a bald faced lie. But, in fact the hospital makes considerably more revenue from a Covid case than mere pleurisy. 

Those stats are garbage.

The grandmother of a friend of mine (96 years old) became ill but not really with covid symptoms (upset stomach etc) was tested 3 times all negative and on the 4th test she tested positive so they chucked her in the covid ward. Apparently she is doing well but how can anyone be sure she even has it?

My nephew is a doctor and working for the NHS and told us that 25% of test results are wrong either false positives or false negatives.

 

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

6 minutes ago, El Nikko said:

The grandmother of a friend of mine (96 years old) became ill but not really with covid symptoms (upset stomach etc) was tested 3 times all negative and on the 4th test she tested positive so they chucked her in the covid ward. Apparently she is doing well but how can anyone be sure she even has it?

My nephew is a doctor and working for the NHS and told us that 25% of test results are wrong either false positives or false negatives.

 

Chest x-ray shows bilateral ground glass opacities.

Some of the test kits were garbage, but if it is 25% error both ways that would average out haha.

[WaytoPeace + 62]

Just look at what the countries have done who have had far less impacts: South Korea, New Zealand, Taiwan, Greece, Australia, and even Germany.  Compare that with what has happened in counties which either initially downplayed the seriousness of Covid-19, and/or continue to do so at their peril: US, UK, Sweden and the worst of all, Brazil.  The problem is that we waited too long, and responded so haphazardly, not that we finally had to shut so much down because things had become so bad due to the lack of preparation, understanding, and leadership from the Trump administration, and certain state governments.  Now, people are understandably anxious to put this all behind them.  Had we all taken appropriate steps early on, we could have made it through this months ago.  Unfortunately, we allowed the virus to spread too much, and so it will take more testing, isolating, contact tracing, social distancing and mask wearing, probably for at least two more months.  Hopefully, we will not need to do through this all again in November.  The last thing our country needs is folks downplaying the seriousness of the virus, and the importance of taking all the steps that have proven to be effective in other countries. 

[El Nikko + 2,145]

11 minutes ago, WaytoPeace said:

Just look at what the countries have done who have had far less impacts: South Korea, New Zealand, Taiwan, Greece, Australia, and even Germany.  Compare that with what has happened in counties which either initially downplayed the seriousness of Covid-19, and/or continue to do so at their peril: US, UK, Sweden and the worst of all, Brazil.  The problem is that we waited too long, and responded so haphazardly, not that we finally had to shut so much down because things had become so bad due to the lack of preparation, understanding, and leadership from the Trump administration, and certain state governments.  Now, people are understandably anxious to put this all behind them.  Had we all taken appropriate steps early on, we could have made it through this months ago.  Unfortunately, we allowed the virus to spread too much, and so it will take more testing, isolating, contact tracing, social distancing and mask wearing, probably for at least two more months.  Hopefully, we will not need to do through this all again in November.  The last thing our country needs is folks downplaying the seriousness of the virus, and the importance of taking all the steps that have proven to be effective in other countries. 

The reason the UK did badly was because our government ordered the health service to clear 30,000 beds half of which ended up in care homes and it spread like wildfire through them. 30-40% of covid deaths had come from there and a big chunk of the rest probably got it in hospital. It seems to me like people have short memories, have we forgotten the scandal of hospital born 'super bugs'?

The British government have killed thousands of people based on faulty modelling from Neil Ferguson. The ICU beds were never close to being overwhelmed and in fact during the peak their occupancy was down 20-25% on previous years.

We took appropriate steps with the advice to wash hands etc, the lockdown hasn't really saved any significant number of lives because the virus has already peaked beforelockdown was implimented and since so many people appear to be able to carry it without showing symptoms it is impossible to stop it spreading in hospitals.

The smart thing would have been to let people carry on as normal but to stop flights into the UK and protect the vulnerable. Maybe if we had testing we could have had care workers and nurses live in the homes they were working at for a few weeks and pay them overtime.

Fact is the UK did everything it could to end up as the worst country in the 2020 Covid-league championship.

Now...about those millions of people who are going to lose their livelyhoods

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

42 minutes ago, El Nikko said:

Fact is the UK did everything it could to end up as the worst country in the 2020 Covid-league championship.

 

We are just entering the playoffs.

Edited May 24, 2020 by Enthalpic

[ronwagn + 6,290]

16 hours ago, Tom Kirkman said:

The CDC Just Gave Us the Biggest Reason to End the Coronavirus Lockdowns

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) nows estimates that 35 percent of coronavirus infections are asymptomatic.

But that’s not even the most important part of their latest estimates. It’s the CDC’s new “best estimate” for the case fatality rate amongst symptomatic patients.

But, before I got to that, I should note that back in March, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated a 3.4 percent fatality rate and Dr. Anthony Fauci estimated that the fatality rate of the coronavirus was about 2 percent.

President Trump was skeptical of both those numbers, particularly the WHO’s estimate: “Well, I think the 3.4 percent is really a false number,” Trump told Sean Hannity. “Now, and this is just my hunch, and — but based on a lot of conversations with a lot of people that do this. Because a lot of people will have this and it’s very mild. They’ll get better very rapidly. They don’t even see a doctor. They don’t even call a doctor. I think that that number is very high. I think the number, personally, I would say the number is way under 1 percent.”

Several studies have suggested that Trump was right. But, now here’s what the CDC is saying about the fatality rate the coronavirus:

• 0-49 years old:  0.05%
• 50-64 years old:  0.2%
• 65+ years old:  1.3%
• Overall ages:  0.4%

According to the CDC’s current best estimate, the case fatality rate of the coronavirus is 0.4 percent. And that’s just amongst symptomatic cases, which, the CDC estimates, is 65 percent of all cases. This means the CDC estimates that the fatality rate for all infections across all age groups, symptomatic as well as asymptomatic, is approximately 0.26 percent.

The CDC does caution that the numbers are likely to change with new data, but considering we’ve gone from 3.4 percent to 2.0 percent to now 0.26 percent. The more data we get, the lower the numbers get. So, I’m thinking it might get even lower.

But, the bigger takeaway from this is that the early doomsday predictions about the coronavirus were all wrong. Everything that justified the lockdowns and the shutting down of our economy was wrong. We need to open this country back up.

 

Several weeks ago I estimated 0.5% and that included asymptomatic individuals who tested positive. That is what makes sense to me. The scenarios being pushed were at least ten times higher mortality! 

My guess is that the climate change experts are similarly off base, and we might even see global cooling. We sure have had a very cool spring in the Midwest. When, and if, we get global warming ocean levels will rise. That is what to watch. Just keep an eye on Obama's new home off Cape Cod.

It is very telling that over half of American deaths took place in the narrow corridor from Boston to Washington D.C. The Bluest of Blue areas. Then we had Detroit and Chicagoland. All big Blue areas. 

Edited May 25, 2020 by ronwagn
addition

[nsdp + 449]

15 hours ago, Tom Kirkman said:

New CDC Figures Show Fauci’s Dishonest COVID-19 Projections Were Garbage

This madness has to end now.

Every single lockdown order inflicted on the American people these past few months needs to be rescinded immediately.

Once that’s done, Fauci has to be investigated to find out why on earth he pushed these catastrophic measures on us using projections he knew to be false. He also needs to be indicted for peddling his lies before Congress and held criminally accountable for all the death and devastation he’s caused as well.

In case you hadn’t heard, Matt Margolis over at PJ Media is reporting that the CDC now estimates the case fatality rate (CFR) of COVID-19 to be only .4 percent. As Margolis points out, that’s much lower than the numbers used to frighten us into these lockdowns. But there are a few factors he doesn’t mention that demonstratively show we were unspeakably deceived rather than merely the victims of some disastrous but ultimately honest mistake.

The CFR is the death rate restricted to just those cases in which someone with symptoms had a test confirming they were infected. Since it factors in neither asymptomatic cases nor unconfirmed symptomatic ones, it’s going to substantially overstate the infection fatality rate (IFR), which is the rate among the totality of all those infected.

And, of course, it’s the IFR which represents the odds a random person who contracts the virus has of dying. The CFR, on the other hand, isn’t really of any interest at all if you’re just a normal person trying to understand how dire a threat we’re facing. It gets massively skewed by the over-representation of serious cases among those who get tested and because it doesn’t factor in asymptomatic infections at all.

Moreover, the skewing isn’t even uniform. Its extent depends upon the availability of tests and the polices in place concerning when they’re to be given. Both of which vary between different localities and even in the same one at different times.

The CDC is also now estimating that only 65% of those who contract the COVID-19 virus actually wind up with any symptoms. That means the IFR will be at most 65% of the CFR since the latter is only counting symptomatic cases. That puts COVID-19’s fatality rate at below .26%. But, given that testing has been relatively rare even among those who show symptoms, it’s bound to be substantially lower.

Margolis says that IFR will actually be .26%. But that calculation depends on assuming that everyone who caught the virus and developed symptoms was tested, which is clearly not even close to true. The .26% figure he cites is, at best, an upper limit on the IFR, which is actually bound to be at least several times lower.

As Margolis points out, initially, we were told that COVID-19’s CFR was 3.4%, which is 8.5 times higher than the current CDC estimate of .4%. But he doesn’t note that those pushing this – as it’s turned out –vastly inflated number didn’t distinguish between the CFR and IFR. Instead the 3.4% figure was sold to us as COVID-19’s unqualified “death” or “mortality” rate.

We were subjected to hundreds of stories like this one from CNBC headlined, ‘WHO Says Coronavirus Death Rate Is 3.4% Globally, Higher Than Previously Thought.’ CNBC also cites the 3.4% figure as COVID-19’s unqualified “mortality rate” in their lead sentence. Since anyone reading these claims would immediately assume they represented his or her chances of dying upon contracting the virus, the percentages we were bombarded with would have been despicably deceptive even if COVID-19’s CFR really had been 3.4%.

Moreover, throughout March, Fauci himself issued dire warnings that COVID-19 was “at least 10 times more lethal than the flu.” He swore to it while testifying to Congress on March 11, generating a blizzard of scare-mongering headlines hammering the frightening numerical comparison into our heads. And he repeated the bogus numbers in a March 27 appearance on Comedy Central.

The flu’s IFR is estimated to be around .1%. As we noted above, the CDC is now saying that even COVID-19’s CFR is only .4%. And they’re now citing a percentage for asymptomatic cases which implies that the virus’s actual lethality is several times lower than .26%. Moreover, as Margolis pointed out in a decidedly useful earlier column, at least 3 major research studies have concluded that COVID-19 has around the same IFR as the flu.

None of this even factors in the preponderance of reasons guaranteeing that COVID-19’s U.S. death tally is itself being massively inflated. The bottom line is that Fauci’s claim that COVID-19 is “10 times more lethal” than the flu was total garbage.

But the worst part is that we’ve known for a while, with absolute certainty, that he never believed a word of it himself. In case you hadn’t heard, he made sure to let his peers know he wasn’t dumb enough to believe the garbage he was about to start peddling to us beforehand.

As first reported by Sharyl Attkisson, Fauci published an article addressed to his fellow researchers at the esteemed New England Journal of Medicine’s website on February 28. And, it not only contained a quite different take on the threat COVID-19 posed than the one he would soon start pushing on the American public. He even explained exactly why the stats he would go on to spend the next month terrorizing us with were bogus!

[Fauci’s article is dated March 26, which is the date cited by Attkisson. But archived copies reveal that sometime on April 3rd after around 10:30 am, which was a few days after her piece appeared, a note was added saying it was initially published on the journal’s website February 28. So presumably March 26 represents when it first appeared in the print edition.]

Fauci notes that the frighteningly high fatality numbers we were hearing for COVID-19 were sure to be grossly inflated because “the number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic cases is several times as high as the number of reported cases.”

Hence, Fauci explained to his fellow experts:

" The overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a case fatality rate of approximately 0.1%). "

 

Choosing a more brazen liar to lead the nation’s response to COVID-19 would have probably been impossible.

It’s long past time these suicidal measures Fauci has gaslit the nation into adopting were ended. But it’s also time that we faced the ugly truth that the deception was intentional.

Fauci pushed the entire country into an economic shutdown and got most of us confined to our homes by blatantly lying about COVID-19’s deadliness. He didn’t believe a word of the scare-mongering BS he peddled to us. And he didn’t dare try to palm it off on his peers. It’s right there in black-and-white in the pages of the New England Journal of Medicine.

So, if you’re still inclined to defend the man who terrorized America into accepting a suicidal abridgment of our most basic rights with his lies, your problem isn’t COVID-19.

It’s Stockholm Syndrome.

 

Tom. I believe that the more applicable illness is the Dunn -Kruger Syndrome where people imagine that they have greater intelligence than they actually possess.  Mr. Richard Epstein a Fellow of the Hoover Institution(premier conservative think thank in the US) at Standford has retracted his paper fo March 6,2020  which is tr. Epstein as the other staffers at the Hoover Institution pointed out his errors in mathematics and methodology:

Coronavirus Perspective—Revised

by Richard A. Epstein

Monday, April 6, 2020

In the earlier, March 16, 2020 version, of this essay, I made the single largest unforced intellectual error in my entire academic career, when I included numerical estimates about the possible impact of the coronavirus in terms of life and death. Those estimates were obviously ridiculously too low. Those mistakes brought on a torrent of criticism, pointing out the magnitude of those errors. Unfortunately, those responses detracted from the main purpose of that initial essay, which was to question some of th30 days e basic assumptions of the standard model. I regret those mistakes, and of course, I retract them.https://www.hoover.org/research/coronavirus-perspective-revised 

He does try to obfuscate by saying his errors were not fundamental to his premise.  A retraction forced by the publishing  in institution belies his disingenuous argument that his errors and those who followed him are not fundamental.  Given the magnitude of the original error , I find it amusing and amazing the tenacity that writers display in face of the retraction.   this is reminiscent of the blind faith of the Fuhrer in his Vergeltungswaffe.  Since this discussion continues despite errors in the first estimate of 500 deaths within a week of publishing; second,the erroneous estimate  of 5,000 deaths by the March 16th partial retraction  https://www.hoover.org/research/coronavirus-pandemic, within four days,  and final estimate of 50 thousand deaths by the end of April.  What scintilla of valid evidence is there to support the original post that has not been destroyed by the modification of March 16 and the retraction of April 6?    Dr, Fauci's high prediction of 200,0000 by Labor day seems imminent as the Commander in Chief plays golf as we reach 100,000 dead..  Dr Birx' 50,000 has been destroyed on April 30. 

I suggest every one read this paper. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/about/covid-19/  Texas where I live now has the highest rate of new infections in the US during the last 7 days. Pages 8 and 9. It is 2.5 times the rate where there is no increase in new cases. We opened up two weeks ago. At the current rate we will surpass New York by August 15.

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11 hours ago, Jim Profit said:

When one personally attacks his contradictors, one only emphasizes the weakness of his argumentation.

The trump cult is starting to ignore me now because they are so weak.

Real data annoys them - they thrive on conspiracy theories.  

They claim some people on here are paid by China to spam this site; but Tom, the pro-trump meme spam generator, is copacetic. 

No rebuttal means you lost; take your ball and go home.

Edited May 25, 2020 by Enthalpic

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2 hours ago, ronwagn said:

Several weeks ago I estimated 0.5% and that included asymptomatic individuals who tested positive. That is what makes sense to me. The scenarios being pushed were at least ten times higher mortality!

This is no longer modelling or forecasting - the data is showing us that that the fatality rate is similar across the globe.

Zero chance the experts are off by an order of magnitude and your estimations are right. 

Trump wants people to go to church and pray... because buildings full of people prevent the spread - not.  The bible says you can pray at home...

 

Trump:

Feb. 26: “I think every aspect of our society should be prepared. I don’t think it’s going to come to that, especially with the fact that we’re going down, not up. We’re going very substantially down, not up.” — Trump at a press conference, when asked if “U.S. schools should be preparing for a coronavirus spreading.”

Feb. 27: “It’s going to disappear. One day — it’s like a miracle — it will disappear.” — Trump at a White House meeting with African American leaders.

Edited May 25, 2020 by Enthalpic