Black Dog

Agree with him about what? He's made a few big mistakes in this. First he said this was not going to be a problem for us in the US, remember that? Then he said we shouldn't wear masks because they would make things worse. Now he thinks everyone should wear a mask. Then they asked him when we should re-open to which he said when there are no new cases. Really? None? When is that going to happen? Then he said that we could lift the shutdown when we have a vaccine. I was reading about the '17-'18 Flu season and I saw an interesting number. CDC says that around 60,000 people died from Flu that year. They estimated that around 5000 lives were saved by the Flu vaccine. That's not very impressive. The point is everyone keeps talking about the vaccine that we don't have, that we don't know effectiveness of, that's going to save us all. He's obviously a smart guy but disaster preparedness is apparently not his thing. Him, Redfield (CDC), et al, were caught flat footed on this. Why did we have no PPE stockpile? Why didn't we have a plan in advance for a respiratory virus pandemic? Everyone knew we would have one, I mean another one. NIH, CDC and FEMA should have had all that worked out in advance instead of the Keystone Cop approach. Other than that I agree with him completely.

Actually, herd immunity is proven science. All this lock down stuff is not. It's never been done before. The last numbers I've seen for the US were that the number of people less than 25 years age who have died from this virus is less than 100. The number of people less than 45 that have died is less than 1000. It starts to go up after 60. And the vast majority of them had significant underlying health conditions. It is absolutely not a "lie" that young healthy people don't get very sick from this. It's a fact.

I thought he pulled it off pretty good too. I like his style too. No fuss, just business. If you walked into a joint and saw him you might think he's the bouncer.

Wow! What a timely coincidence. I just heard it reported in the news that the "repeat infections" were due to false positive tests. Who was it that said that? Newsweek? Is that any good? https://www.newsweek.com/south-korea-experts-say-recovered-coronavirus-patients-retested-positive-because-dead-virus-parts-1500998

When did I say it was a study? Go chase your tail some more. Then when you get tired you can take a nap. or pee on the floor.

First of all, many of the tests that were developed in a hurried fashion, especially those outside the US, had high false positives and false negatives. We even had a lot of that here in the US. So when someone has a test result you don't always know what it means. Second, just because there may be SOME people who's exposure and infection did not result in immunity DOES NOT mean that everyone else has no immunity. You know absolutely nothing.

How about Yahoo? Are they like Fox too? Before you comment at least read it (all of it) and try to understand it. https://www.yahoo.com/news/lockdown-critics-may-valid-points-152936053.html

You are like a little puppy, chasing it's tail and other shadows. You wander around on the internet chasing this or that or the other thing. That is the fog of war. Nobody knows what any of it means. You don't get through it by panic. The way you get through it is by following the science of what you know.

I never said plan. I said approach. So maybe there is a misunderstanding of what I'm talking about here. In the context of this virus (not polio or smallpox or anything else), what we're talking about is a virus that causes a very, very mild illness in healthy young people. If we develop a plan to shield the vulnerable (which can easily be done), and let the young healthy people get it, then they will protect and shield the vulnerable with their immunity. It's the exact opposite of killing the old, or anyone else for that matter. It has nothing to do with cows. One more thing. You seem to question my fitness for my profession. I graduated medical school in 1997. Since then I've seen over 150,000 patients. I've never even tried to keep track of the number of lives I've personally saved. If I would have done it, It would be a very large number. I still do it every time I go to work, Covid-19 or not.

You aren't paying attention. What I'm pointing out is that the overall US plan of mass quarantine/shelter in place is resulting in MORE DEATHS. The approach I'm advocating is resulting in LESS DEATHS.

I can't wait.

So, if you look at every single east coast state in the US, I get a total population of around 112 million. Total deaths for all those states is 42 thousand. That's 37.5 per 100,000. Sweden is 25 per 100,000. That includes coastal every state from Maine to Florida.

The other thing people forget about the Swedish plan is that they may have somewhat higher numbers of cases and deaths initially, but in the long run they will do the same or better because they will get to herd immunity faster. But still, just 2500 dead since this started? That's a low number in absolute terms or per capita, whichever you like. Pennsylvania has a population of 12.8 million. They have a full shelter in place order. They have 2400 deaths from Covid-19. Sweden population 10 million with mild restrictions 2500 deaths. And it's not summer in Pennsylvania right now. You can go back and forth on this all day long. If you want to keep your blinders on go ahead.

That's completely false. Just because it's death per million stat doesn't mean they are apples to apples. You have to compare areas of similar size, population and demographics. There's never going to be a perfect comparison but you can't include a country with the vast interior of the US to a country like Sweden.

You can't compare Sweden as a whole to the US as a whole. Sweden to NY is a much more appropriate comparison.

What's the weather like in Sweden right now?

Deaths per 100,000 population: NY - 120 Sweden - 25 Florida - 5.7 You say it can't be done any other way when it's happening right before your eyes. That's not Fox. Those are just the numbers.

Rather than say that, why don't you read the article and point out to me what is false? Can you do that? Compare the data between Sweden and NY. Is that false?

Look at Florida vs NY. https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/coronavirus-response-florida-new-york-results-compare-william-bennett-seth-leibsohn

And exactly who is caring for those people now? Are the caregivers quarantined? No, they use PPE. It is actually a very realistic plan. Much more so than a complete shutdown that does not show better results when compared to less drastic measures. That's a fact. There is no perfect answer. But there are better alternatives.

This has been one of the dumbest things we've ever done as a country. There were many things we could have done to protect the vulnerable without shutting down the entire economy. Have them shelter at home. Have food and supplies delivered. Give them financial aid. Lots of things. It would have been more effective, less expensive and done way less harm. We have cancer patients around the country that are not getting their chemotherapy. Are they not vulnerable? How long should they go without it? Until they're dead? That's just one example. there are countless others.

Forget the scientists. Just follow the stock market. That'll show you where we're going.

Fauci just announced a new study on Remdesivir. It's a better study, double blind placebo controlled. That's good. It showed a mortality reduction from 11% down to 8%. Not exactly a game changer but better than nothing. But, it reminds me of Oseltamivir and Zanamivir, both Influenza drugs. When they came out the manufacturers had all this great data that was not reproduced when we actually used them. We'll see.

I didn't forget anything. It says right in the story what the wife's claim was. It also says that the police are investigating it as a homicide. You can go sooth yourself by watching anti-trump videos on youtube.

The Remdesivir study is poor. It was only 397 patients but more importantly it was not randomized and there was no control group. Not very impressive.