TL;DR:
1. < 45 yo (no problem)
2. > 45 yo (problem)
Moderators: Bookworm, starkruzr, MrFireDragon, PrettyPrincess, Wapsi
There's also a significant concern about heart damage from myocarditis, triggered by the virus's tendency to induce inflammation in the tissues it infects. Apparently myocarditis can be detected even in patients who show few or no obvious symptoms of infection - it's a hidden effect. And, it appears that it's not an age-related risk in the same way that "dying of acute COVID-19" is - it's seen in children, and in athletes in the prime of their career.
What experimental drug would ever be approved if there were so much conflicting evidence of its efficacy and so much solid evidence of its harmful side effects?
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/10/13 ... irus-covidLast week, Sky News found dozens of fake names on the list of medical signatories, including Dr. I.P. Freely, Dr. Person Fakename, and Dr. Johnny Bananas
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/ ... anas-covidAn open letter that made headlines calling for a herd immunity approach to Covid-19 lists a number of apparently fake names among its expert signatories, including “Dr Johnny Bananas” and “Professor Cominic Dummings”.
The Great Barrington declaration, which was said to have been signed by more than 15,000 scientists and medical practitioners around the world, was found by Sky News to contain numerous false names, as well as those of several homeopaths.
Others listed include a resident at the “University of Your Mum” and another supposed specialist whose name was the first verse of the Macarena.
Sky News discovered 18 self-declared homeopaths in the list of expert names and more than 100 therapists whose expertise included massage, hypnotherapy and Mongolian khoomii singing.
Interestingly, the text that immediately follows your quote may shed light on what may have happened there:AnotherFairportfan wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 5:55 amhttps://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/ ... anas-covidAn open letter that made headlines calling for a herd immunity approach to Covid-19 lists a number of apparently fake names among its expert signatories, including “Dr Johnny Bananas” and “Professor Cominic Dummings”.
The Great Barrington declaration, which was said to have been signed by more than 15,000 scientists and medical practitioners around the world, was found by Sky News to contain numerous false names, as well as those of several homeopaths.
Others listed include a resident at the “University of Your Mum” and another supposed specialist whose name was the first verse of the Macarena.
Sky News discovered 18 self-declared homeopaths in the list of expert names and more than 100 therapists whose expertise included massage, hypnotherapy and Mongolian khoomii singing.
(Emphasis mine)Individual academics from the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Stanford, Nottingham, Edinburgh, Exeter, Sussex and York were among experts from around the world who signed the declaration. However, the declaration’s website allows anyone to add their name to the list if they provide an email address, home city, postcode and name.
Signatories also tell the site whether they are medical and public health scientists, medical practitioners or members of the general public – of whom almost 160,000 claim to have signed.
It is not clear how many of the names in the declaration’s list of experts are fake, or when they appeared. However, many scientists have already criticised the letter’s conclusions.
You do bring up a good point. There are many things which are not known, about this virus. But does this justify living in fear, hunking down and ruining people's livelihoods by closing everything down? I think a more balanced approach is needed, rather than this seeming power grab that is going on right now. I mean, seriously? $1500 fines (or more) for breaking social distancing? One guy in Canada was charged with breaking the federal quarantine act, something which carried penalties of up to One Million dollar and a year in jail! (I kid you not!) He is the leader of a movement that encourages people to not wear masks, and to rebel against the draconian laws and application thereof that have been going on in Ontario. Still... One million dollars... How sick (or power-hungry) can you get, to pass a law that carries such penalties???AnotherFairportfan wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 5:55 amNobody knows yet whether COVID is a one-and-done, like chicken pox, or an oh-god-here-it-comes-again disease that can mutate from one year to the next like influenza, so that any immunity gained from having had it may not protect you the next time around {there are already a bunch of documented cases of people who got it a second time}.
AND they're not sure how long any immunity would last.
MORE - https://www.huffpost.com/entry/american ... e76fbb5449A bevy of health organizations has come together to issue a statement speaking out against herd immunity as a means of limiting the spread of COVID-19.
The statement, published on Wednesday on the American Public Health Association (APHA) website, was authored by 17 groups, including the Trust for America’s Health and the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.
It is a direct response to an open letter known as The Great Barrington Declaration, which was released on Oct. 4 and penned by professors at the Harvard Medical School, Stanford University’s Medical School and Oxford University.
The Great Barrington Declaration has been embraced by senior White House officials. It argues that herd immunity - the idea that a population will eventually develop natural antibodies to a disease over time as enough of its members are exposed to it - is the only way to prevent the “devastating effects on short and long-term public health” caused by lockdown measures.
In order to achieve herd immunity, the declaration espouses allowing “those who are at minimal risk of death to live their lives normally to build up immunity to the virus through natural infection, while better protecting those who are at highest risk.”
This recommendation, according to the statement on APHA website, ignores reliable science, would take far too long and would result in needless death.
“There is no evidence that we are even remotely close to herd immunity,” the statement reads. “To the contrary, experts believe that 85-90% of the U.S. population is still at risk of contracting SARS-CoV-2 (the coronavirus that causes COVID-19). Herd immunity is achieved when the virus stops circulating because a large segment of the population has already been infected. Letting Americans get sick, rather than focusing on proven methods to prevent infections, could lead to hundreds of thousands of preventable illnesses and deaths. It would also add greater risk in communities of color, which have already experienced disproportionate impacts of the pandemic.”
The statement highlights Sweden, which attempted a herd immunity response to COVID-19 and has been criticized for a laissez-faire attitude that has resulted in the highest mortality rate of any Nordic country, according to analysis by the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.* {emphasis added}
“COVID-19 carries a much higher risk of severe disease and death than other infections where herd immunity was attempted before a vaccine was available,” the statement says. Critiquing the idea of allowing the coronavirus to spread among younger people, it continues, “This notion is dangerous because it puts the entire population, particularly the most vulnerable, at risk. Young people are not all healthy, and they don’t live in vacuums. They interact with family members, co-workers and neighbors. Inviting increased rates of COVID-19 in young people will lead to increased infection rates among all Americans.”
Yes, it does. Because serious arguments among bioscience researchers are not advanced through internet petitions and chain letters.
Not only that, but if we were to believe the mainstream media, the science is already "settled" on the subject, meaning that dissenting opinions will have difficulty making their voices heard. Taking to the internet with an open letter may just be the only option, in such cases.Atomic wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 8:19 am To whom, then, is such a proclamation delivered? Has no one ever written a open letter to be published in the newspapers?
Leaving it open for additional signatories without careful filtering to remove the goofballs is an error. But, as Ronald Reagan said when he was endorsed by the KKK, "I didn't choose to associate with them. They chose to associate with me."
I'd like to see a graph that would not only includes "cases", but hospitalization, critical care hospitalization, and deaths. But I know that won't happen.Atomic wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 8:19 amMeanwhile, back at the ranch....
The Graphic Truth: Two different pandemics - EU vs US
Note the 3rd graph, which is scaled per population. The first two are bulk numbers.
Just to be clear: I am not endorsing this article. I have actually not finished reading it through, I only read it cursorily, so far. And I agree that some of the arguments are definitely far-fetched, and some are coincidental, at best. But It seemed interesting enough to warrant reading (even if only to get a good laugh), and perhaps raise some comments and opinions.lake_wrangler wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2020 11:49 amAnd on the idea that this is all a concerted power grab:
https://humansarefree.com/2020/09/proof ... order.html
(I'm not too sure about some of them, such as, for instance, the one about the 2012 Olympics, but the article is still interesting and raises many questions.)
True... but, in the absence of a World Government which can mandate and enforce uniform testing and reporting and treatment standards, this sort of irregularity is something we're all going to have to deal with. (I'm not saying that such a world government would be a Good Thing, and since there ain't gonna be one any time soon that really doesn't matter.)Atomic wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 2:31 pm Indeed. The whole situation is suffering a bad case of GIGO: Garbage In, Garbage Out. A lack of actual journalism (who what where why when, etc) is affecting the whole debate.
For example, after the lock down period expired in places, the hospitals filled up. "Oh Dear!" screamed headlines. Not mentioned was that those hospitals were filling up with people who delayed surgeries and other procedures due to the lockdown. Piss poor reporting there, folks.
Another issue is the "Cases Reported" this day/week/etc. The reports often come out in weekly or bi-weekly bulk numbers, so Umpty Thousand Cases Today - eek! may have been two weeks worth. Neither do they break it down into positive tests, symptoms, or hospitilizations, as lake_wrangler points out.
Sure, the attention changed from Italy to elsewhere to the US (and now back to Italy), because the facts on the street are changing over time. Italy got hit very hard, early, and had a terrible time of it. Things then got better there (after some period of lock-down and some improvement in care protocols) while things started getting worse elsewhere, so naturally people started paying attention to the new trouble spots. Italy has been back in the news lately with a "things are getting bad again" (ditto France and Germany), because the situations are changing. This is all happening in real time... pandemics are not, and never have been a stationary sort of thing.Finally, where are the comparisons? What's the running total for (various names/types) of flu seasons/pandemics and their curves for cases per million or whatever so people have a sense of scale? Again, piss poor reporting.
At one point, Italy was Death Central, then it was somebody else, and now look at the numbers for USA! Rabbit! Meanwhile, China apparently isn't reporting squat, but nobody journalistic cares, or bothers to make comparisons.
Don't depend on the filtered summaries you see in the popular media. Don't depend on either the scare stories, or the "oh, it's nothing, it's all going away" stories. Rather, go do your research, dig out the best data-reporting sources you can find, and do your best to correct for the inevitable errors, omissions, and biases in the data.I'm sure you get the point. Large grains of salt are required, but how the hell is anyone supposed to make valid decisions out of this dogs lunch?
You may not see a fully-fleshed-out graph for whole countries or even states/provinces, because not everybody reports complete data like this, and not every location which reports data does so in the same way. So, a "lumped" data display might not be at all meaningful.lake_wrangler wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 9:31 am I'd like to see a graph that would not only includes "cases", but hospitalization, critical care hospitalization, and deaths. But I know that won't happen.