Yes, it was handled very badly, here and worldwide.
There is much disagreement on Covid deaths. Whatever, the case fatality rate at the beginning was supposedly 0.9%, way higher than flu’s typical 0.1%. Now, Omicron numbers are still argued, with some claiming it’s as high as 0.6% while others say it’s about like the flu at 0.1%.
It was initially predicted to be much higher — remember the scramble for ventilators? The gurneys lined up in hospital hallways with the patients lying on them dying of Covid?
Recall how at first Trump was criticized for travel bans, called racist? How Pelosi encouraged people to join the crowds celebrating Chinese New Year? Then Trump was criticized for not placing earlier and stricter travel bans? This thing was so politicized from the get-go. And it’s only got worse.
It turned out the hospitalization and fatality rates were not as high as predicted, but our hospitals were still strained, and many died. Patients in nursing homes were dying in alarming numbers.
I can’t really fault those in charge at the very, very beginning, other than those who sent Covid patients to nursing homes. This was a new disease, the news out of China was horrifying, no vaccine, no cure.
Once it became apparent that Covid was very dangerous for the elderly, the obese, those with diabetes, etc., but only somewhat worse than flu for young healthy people, yes, policies should have changed and the lockdowns should have ended. Absolutely.
So why didn’t they? The majority of Americans wanted them. Blame Fauci and Birx and the media, sure, but that was the reality. This was true worldwide, too. Yes, bureaucrats and politicians seized an opportunity to become more powerful, but at the same it was popular.
Had our leaders been brave enough to go against popular opinion and ended the lockdowns very soon, yes, we would be far better off. We would still have supply chain problems because China and the rest of the world locked down, however.
It looks like the extended lockdowns caused more deaths than had they been stopped much earlier. People not visiting their doctors, their chronic diseases not being properly monitored, new diseases including cancer going undiagnosed until it was too late, cancer treatments and surgeries delayed, and on and on. There is still a backlog for needed surgeries, cancer screenings, etc. The left does not want to talk about this, and don’t. The most vocal on the right blame every illness and death on the “€lot $hots”, never the outrageous lockdowns and policies.
So, are we doing a rational “lessons learned” assessment of how it all went wrong? Nope.
Here on FR, there is much sound and fury over imaginary ingredients in the vaccines (itty bitty razor blades, parasites, snake venom, etc.) and people who supposedly “died suddenly” (even if the person died after a terrible fall on slippery rocks or overdosed on fentanyl). No one is interested in the real scandals.
The extended lock downs and the harm they caused should be more discussed here and in our media, but ... not happening. Not even conservative media.
Things we really need to change are rarely brought up. For example, our reliance on China for essential goods including pharmaceuticals and PPE. No one seems interested. Even here on FR. I posted repeatedly about the shortage of blood vials (not enough to go around for needed blood tests) this year, but no one was interested. They are only interested in the “bio weapon vax”.
No one seems interested in stopping gain of function research or banning outsourcing of dicey research to countries like China. No one seems interested in stopping our sharing of dual-use research and technology with China and other questionable countries.
So, here we are. Everything has become totally politicized. The left is nuts. So is much of the right, who would rather rail about imaginary ingredients in vaccines (vaccines hardly anyone is getting any longer anyway) than the very real dangers and problems we could and should do something about.
It’s all nuts.
I post below that which I posted to another thread after another article this day. It allies equally to our discussion.
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--- "More than 300 people are still dying each day on average from covid-19, most of them 65 or older, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention...roughly two to three times the rate at which people die of the flu... Today, nearly 9 in 10 covid deaths are in people 65 or older — the highest rate ever, according to a Washington Post analysis of CDC data." A little simple arithmetic to place the prose into a manageable frame:
( "300 people are still dying each day" x 365 days in a year ) = 109,500 as a year's estimate per the CDC and Washington Post.
Worldometer tallies the US population at 335,665,703 as of today. About one percent per year die as is easily observed. ( 1.027 percent according to the CDC.)
Source: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm
( 335,665,703 US population x .01027 ) = 3,447,287 deaths per year in the US. Naturally, so to speak, from all causes. Placing the CDC/WaPo prose into the larger frame, then:
( 109,500 mostly elderly "Covid" deaths / 3,447,287 all-cause deaths ) x 100 = 3.18 percent Covid deaths estimated through "official" data and reporting.
Note the verbiage. "Plague of the elderly." Given the inadequacy of the tests, the reporting and the factors of rating co-morbidities, the larger picture suggests that some gaslighting is going on.
If 3.18 percent is a "plague," what is the remaining 96.82 percent? A mere mention in the article? Actually NO mention at all.
Given that "% of Population receiving at least 1 dose - 81.18%," then "the plague of the elderly" is likely ALSO a plague of the elderly who are injected with mRNA experimental therapies.
Source: https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/region/united-states
Therefore, the "plague of the elderly" must include about four out of five who have been injected with a "safe and effective" experimental mRNA therapy, making the "plague of the elderly" about 80 percent "safe and effective."
Effective at what, exactly?
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CatHerd, as a PS to this, I add that there has NEVER been "informed consent" throughout this event, and none seems in the offing. As you said most aptly, "It's all nuts."