Free Republic

Republican officials are expressing outrage over the Biden administration’s Department of Defense “lack of transparency” after the revelation it hid the fact Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was hospitalized for days, raising serious queries about the maintenance of security during that period. According to GOP members, the Pentagon’s Friday evening announcement that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, 70, was admitted to the intensive care unit four days prior — on New Year’s Day — suggested a violation of the public’s right to information.

The Pentagon did not tell President Joe Biden and other top officials about Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s hospitalization for three days, three U.S. officials said. National security adviser Jake Sullivan and other senior White House aides didn’t know of Austin’s Jan. 1 hospitalization until the Defense Department sent over word Jan. 4, two other U.S. officials said. Sullivan informed Biden shortly after DOD’s Thursday notification. The officials said it was highly unlikely that Austin conveyed word to Biden privately before Sullivan’s briefing. “If Jake didn’t know, no way the president knew,” one of them said. “Who would have told him...

Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III has been in the hospital since Monday, after complications from a recent elective medical procedure, the Pentagon said on Friday. Maj. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder, the Pentagon press secretary, declined to elaborate on the source of Mr. Austin’s medical issues, citing patient privacy. …

The decrease comes after a late summer coronavirus wave, but experts warn more could be ahead.New COVID-19 hospitalizations have declined for the third week in a row following the late summer increase of coronavirus in the U.S. Last week saw more than 18,100 new COVID-19 hospital admissions – a 6% decrease from the week prior – according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. While it's clear that the late summer increase of COVID-19 has passed its peak, health officials warn that the months ahead are likely to bring another wave. According to CDC’s respiratory disease outlook,...

Way to exploit survivors to play the victim, Gisele. Seriously, ACES. Last week, after her husband John Fetterman, was admitted to the hospital for depression (???), Gisele Fetterman tweeted about taking her children to Canada and having fun. Now, a lot of people questioned the timing of her trip and tweets, and with good reason; how many wives take off to another COUNTRY right after their husband has been hospitalized for who knows how long? Welp, after she went on a blocking spree (she blocked this editor even) she played the victim. And equated being dragged for ditching her husband...

The world's largest trial into the effect of multiple interventions for critically ill adults with COVID-19 on longer-term outcomes has released results from the 180-day (six month) follow-up of 4,869 critically ill patients. The study is part of the ongoing Randomized Embedded Multifactorial Adaptive Platform for Community Acquired Pneumonia (REMAP-CAP) trial led by Dr. Lisa Higgins. The study found that among critically ill patients with COVID-19 randomized to receive one or more therapeutic interventions, treatment with an IL-6 receptor antagonist (tocilizumab or sarilumab), led to a greater than 99.9% probability of improved 6-month mortality, while antiplatelet agents had a 95%...

A Florida man downed a cup of bleach in a courtroom moments after hearing the jury read his verdict in which he was found guilty of armed robbery. Jermaine Bell, 38, has spent more than three years in custody for the December 2018 robbery for which he was convicted. He pulled a gun on employees at the Millennium Engine Plating while he was disguised as a courier. Bell was seen drinking the bleach from a white disposable cup before an officer approached him with a trash can and attempted to have the inmate spit up the liquid. But Bell continued...

A three-drug medication known as a "polypill" is effective in preventing secondary adverse cardiovascular events in people who have previously had a heart attack, reducing cardiovascular mortality by 33 percent in this patient population. "The results of the SECURE study show that the polypill, which contains aspirin, ramipril, and atorvastatin, achieves clinically relevant reductions in the recurrent cardiovascular events among people who have recovered from a previous heart attack because of better adherence to this simplified approach with a simple polypill, rather than taking them separately as conventional," says Dr. Fuster. Patients recovering from a heart attack—also known as myocardial...

ICU stays may be associated with a higher risk of developing dementia, according to a study. Researchers found that hospitalization in intensive care units was associated with double the risk of dementia compared with those who did not experience ICU hospitalization. Epidemiologist Bryan James, Ph.D. said that while ICU hospitalization due to critical illness has been linked to subsequent cognitive impairment in older patients, fewer studies have demonstrated a relationship between ICU hospitalization and a long-term risk of developing Alzheimer's or other age-related dementias. "Given the high rate of ICU hospitalization in older persons, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, it...

Hospitalization rates for unvaccinated children ages 5 to 11 were twice as high as among those who were vaccinated during the record COVID-19 surge caused by the omicron variant, according to a U.S. study released on Tuesday.

Grant Dixon has been carefully following the NZ Ministry of Health Covid statistics during the last 15 months. By the start of April the rate per 100,000 of Covid hospitalisations for the boosted overtook the rate of hospitalisations for the unvaccinated. Watch the video, the magnitude of the change is very obvious.Even prior to the pandemic, it was realised that vaccines that allow transmission could drive the evolution of more highly virulent pathogens:The NZ data speaks for itself. It is hardly necessary to comment that government policy has failed to take account of the concerning growth of infections among the...

Most of the severe COVID-19 cases at one of Israel's largest hospital complexes are people who received at least three shots, according to the director of the coronavirus ward.The Middle East nation has one of the world's highest rates of vaccination, about 90%, with many high-risk patients having received a fourth shot.Prof. Yaakov Jerris told Israel's Channel 13 News that "most of our severe cases are vaccinated," Israel National News reported."They had at least three injections. Between 70 and 80 percent of the serious cases are vaccinated," said Jerris, who works for Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center, also known as...

The protection from vaccines against the virus that causes COVID-19 dropped following the emergence of the Omicron virus variant, but held up better against hospitalization, according to a new study.While the Delta variant was still dominant in the United States, COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations among unvaccinated people were 3.8 times and 12.9 times, respectively, those among vaccinated people without a booster, researchers in California found.The gap between unvaccinated and vaccinated people who received a booster was even wider, with unvaccinated people experiencing infections 12.3 times and hospitalizations 83 times the rate of the metrics in the vaccinated and boosted group.However,...

New York has finally released hospital data that breaks out hospitalizations *with* Covid vs. those *from* Covid, finding 57% of cases statewide are “admitted due to Covid or complications from Covid”:New York has its first official breakdown of what share of people are hospitalized for COVID vs. how many are hospitalized with incidental COVID. In NYC it's 49% for COVID, everyone else just happened to test positive. pic.twitter.com/fNUmMK2DM9— Alyssa Katz (@alykatzz) January 7, 2022This follows what we’re seeing in other places, like in Florida:Across the Jackson Health System hospitals, we currently have 327 patients who have tested positive for COVID-19....

86% of people in the hospital are unvaccinnated 96% in the ICU are unvaccinnated 100% of those on ventilators are unvaccinnated Duke Health said the latest figures make it clear that vaccines are the strongest tool in protecting against severe infection

The average proportion of COVID-19 tests in Maryland which are coming back positive, 28.56%, is higher than at any point during the coronavirus pandemic, the state health department reported Wednesday... Hospitals are caring for some 3,118 coronavirus patients, after eclipsing 3,000 Tuesday for the first time throughout the pandemic, according to the health department. Hogan, speaking at the top of the Board of Public Works meeting Wednesday morning, said that data from the University of Maryland Medical System found that 74% of its COVID-19 patients over the last 30 days were not vaccinated, while 24% had completed a two-dose course...

many observers.. have noted that cases are not the correct metric to measure the impact of Covid. We have also questioned hospitalization and death numbers in an environment where every patient who arrives in an emergency room receives a test.. Fauci partially vindicated our assertions. .. finally said that the focus should be on hospitalizations, not cases. ... As you get further on and the infections become less severe, it is much more relevant to focus on the hospitalizations as opposed to the total number of cases,” Fauci told George Stephanopoulos .. In reality, infections were less severe in vast...

As her state experiences increased pressure on the hospital and medical systems, New York Governor Kathy Hochul has issued an order intended to bring more clarity to COVID hospitalization data. The order will require hospitals to report whether a patient has been hospitalized for COVID-related reasons or has simply tested positive for COVID while at the hospital for other treatments.“Someone is in a car accident, and they go to the emergency room and they test positive for COVID while they’re there,” said Hochul, “They’re not being treated for COVID.” A surprising sentiment, particularly to people who have been saying something...

After a period of stability, San Francisco's COVID-19 hospitalization numbers are starting to increase as the omicron variant continues to spread in the city. The weekslong spike in cases has prompted a tightening of the city's indoor mask mandate and proof-of-vaccination laws as well as the cancellation of the city's New Year's Eve fireworks show. ... "For this number of cases, I would expect to see far higher hospitalizations if this was as virulent as prior variants," he wrote in an email to SFGATE. In mid-December, San Francisco posted new daily case totals that exceeded numbers from the summer delta...

For the past 18 months we've reported how a large percentage of those 'hospitalized with Covid' were actually admitted for other ailments, only to test positive after admission during routine screening - meaning 'Covid hospitalizations' for the purposes of policymaking (and fear mongering) were vastly overstated in many (if not most) cases.Public health officials have largely avoided this important distinction, while pushing the false narrative over hospitalizations - until now.In a Thursday appearance on MSNBC, America's top Covid official, Dr. Anthony Fauci, admitted to a distinction between the number of children hospitalized with Covid as opposed to "because of Covid.""And...