Posted on 03/29/2020 3:25:42 PM PDT by FreedomNotSafety
Charles Mackay wrote not of pandemics but “moral epidemics” 179 years ago in Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.
“We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object,” he observed, “and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it, [until] their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first.”
Mackay wrote of hopes overriding reason in the public’s manias for tulips and alchemy and so much else. Now, our fears override our reason. The Moscow boogeyman seizing our democracy this winter yielded to the Wuhan boogeyman stealing our health this spring, which, presumably, yields to another specter this summer (sharks?).
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
My favorite part:
“The flu has a mortality rate of 0.1 percent,” Fauci told the House Oversight and Reform Committee two weeks ago. “This has a mortality rate of 10 times that. That’s the reason I want to emphasize we have to stay ahead of the game in preventing this.”
"Fauci “knew” something unknowable. Given the paucity of tests, let alone actual testing, how could he know the mortality rate? As testing becomes more widely administered, we see a ballooning of cases — some of which do not appear debilitating — vis-à-vis deaths. The emerging numbers expose earlier predictions as exaggerations. Fauci tacitly acknowledged as much two weeks ago when he conceded that the World Health Organization ignored the many untested cases in theorizing a death rate 30 times greater than the flu — and three times greater than his own estimate. So many of the official claims, sensationalized in a media speculating on millions of fatalities, emitted a weapons-of-mass-destruction stench in that their issuers cared less about the truth than scaring people into mobilizing for a cause they believed served the greater good."
Now, they’re trying to avoid the fiasco of being wrong. Wow, what a mess.
Given that there are 7.53 billion (2017) in the world TODAY that doesn't SEEM like a "world-wide pandemic" to me. Does it to you?
The Bubonic plague killed 27 MILLION in about five years just in Europe in the 13th and 14th centuries.
Google
Nearly 36,600 people died on U.S. roadways last year, a decrease of 2.4 percent from 2017.
Now THAT statistic is APPALLING! And that is just the USA.
That is exactly what is happening IF there is ONE damn death after opening the country can you even imagine what the hell would happen!!! The MSM is absolutely gleeful that peoples lives have been destroyed I HATE THE MEDIA, my blood is boiling these peop,e are disgusting!!!
Flu 2018, 62,000 died of complications from the flu!!!
2018 flu, 647 thousand hospitalized and 49 million cases!!! We don’t have accurate numbers for 2019 because of this virus all numbers are being combined of course!!!
I have heard SO MANY different numbers from so many different sources I don't know what to believe.
People over 60 years are, apparently more susceptible. Also those oldsters with existing respiratory problems.
I would think that the MOST vulnerable would get those complications--older people who health is already compromised. I did hear on the news that the first BABY died from the flu. THAT is a catastrophe.
Also, I wonder where those 62,000 people who died from complications were from? China maybe?
The news is loud, insistent but not consistent. Who do YOU believe or where do YOU get your daily news? Just curious. Don't mean to be nosy.
Ditto!
Hubris?
Ioannidis is the epitome of a humble scientist.
spend an hour watching this and ask: why is this man not a regular - or even an irregular - on FakeNewsMSM?
AUDIO: 1hr2m46: 25 Mar: Youtube: Perspectives on the Pandemic with Dr. John Ioannidis
(recorded 23 March interview by John Kirby, The Press and The Public Interest)
In this extended interview, Dr. John Ioannidis of Stanford University cautions that we do not have reliable data to make long-term decisions about COVID-19, and that an extended lockdown might have far graver effects than the disease itself.
Use this index to jump to points of interest; though we do recommend taking the time to watch the full interview:
00:50-Dr. Ioannidis summarizes his article titled “A fiasco in the making? As the coronavirus pandemic takes hold, we are making decisions without reliable data” (linked below)
03:47-The truth about COVID-19’s death rate ETC
from the comments:
Discussion of Itay’s high fatality rate, starting 16:48 - This needs 1 billion views.
Too bad this will never run on MSM. Their panic bubble would burst pretty quickly.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEr4rmjwd0g
Ioannidis properly refers mostly to SARS CoV2, which is the original name of COVID-19. I call it SARS 2.0. the original SARS resulted in 744 deaths worldwide. if SARS 2.0 ends with 10,000 or less US deaths, Ioannidis admits it might have been lost in the “bin” of the seasonal flu figures, except for the media.
he says there’s a media halo over much of this adventure. Google showing 9 billion results for coronavirus and 100 million results for influenza.
(paraphrasing) I think we really have a pandemic of news stories and news clips and anecdotes about COVID-19. I don’t want to diminish its importance, but we need to get solid evidence, at a minimum.
ends on how to avoid the public seeing the next such occurrence as being a scam, if proclamations about 50m will die turn out to be wrong. must not lose the confidence of the public. hopes shelter-in-place can be ended in a few weeks, if data becomes available. says it is inadmissible data won’t be available within 3 weeks (from date of recording).
#3. I would call this a “pandemic” based on the word breakdown re “pan” meaning essential “across” (an area, region, etc).
It is also an “epidemic” because the way it is spread.
I would call it, at the moment, “A Lesser Pandemic” than the Influenza of 1917/18, SARS, EBOLA, MERS epidemics.
However, it has not reached its “finality” in most places, and is only beginning in others.
If we come back in a month (4 weeks, 14 days plus another 15-20), we should have a generally good basic idea of the scope of the epidemic spread (geographically, by age, and by health of victims), its illness to death ratios, etc.
This is bad. Our family seems to have it in my daughter and her husband, and my niece is still hospitalized with it, but the other family members, esp. the children of all ages, don’t have it (they have had colds, allergies, perhaps the flu, as I have) but not the key markers of the virus, high temperatures, major lung and chest pains, etc.
We may find out later that a lot more people have had some DEGREE of the Coronavirus but due to several potentially key medical factors (blood type, previous immunities from other viruses which lessen the effects of COVID 19, ethnic genetic defenses, and better general health conditions/medical services/medicines) all play a part in how the body addresses this virus.
Only time will tell but common sense is an important part of our defense for now.
All true!
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