Give credit to Vito and Yianna for not jumping ship during Covid!

[Offthemat]

1 minute ago, ionel said:

Covid bees buzzing around the White House lawn.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Could bee, could bee. 

[scourge165]

2 hours ago, BigRedFan said:

When appropriate, ass-clown.

It's hilarious how concerned people are with OTHER people now wearing a mask.

My Aunt has been in and out of the Hospital...she's dying. Congestive heart failure and she's got a compromised immune system. Picked her up from the Hospital, took her into a Walgreens to pick up a couple items and there were a couple idiots snickering at her.

Why do people care? And then this "I see people in cars wearing masks." I mean...first, how closely are you watching the people riding in or driving other cars? Second, this really just feels like a loooong tired talking point. 

[goheels1812]

10 minutes ago, scourge165 said:

It's hilarious how concerned people are with OTHER people now wearing a mask.

My Aunt has been in and out of the Hospital...she's dying. Congestive heart failure and she's got a compromised immune system. Picked her up from the Hospital, took her into a Walgreens to pick up a couple items and there were a couple idiots snickering at her.

Why do people care? And then this "I see people in cars wearing masks." I mean...first, how closely are you watching the people riding in or driving other cars? Second, this really just feels like a loooong tired talking point. 

It’s funny to me the large contingent of “my body, my freedom, I’ll never wear a mask” folks that try to shame others for making their own personal choices. It’s hypocrisy. 
 

I’ve been wearing a mask on planes since about 2016. I had to start flying a lot for work and noticed that almost every single time I flew I got a head cold. Nothing serious or anything, but enough to be annoying. I popped on an N95 to fly and rarely got sick anymore. I still fly regularly for work and throw on a mask. I’ve had my fair share of snickers and comments about being a brainwashed libural, how I’m scared of a fake virus made up by the media, etc while all I’m doing is trying to avoid colds like I’ve done for almost a decade lol. 

[GreatWhiteNorth]

10 hours ago, Interviewed_at_Weehawken said:

Yep.  For some reason, some people want to drop this subject whenever it arises...

The reason being that most have moved on. If, as a country, we did too much - some will feel the need to point fingers. If we did too little - more finger pointing. It simply wasn't possible to make all the decisions to make everyone happy. All of the bickering is as relevant as the stink in the cow yard. We can all point fingers all day long and it won't accomplish anything.

It happened, we dealt with it, none of our leadership did it well, it was a cluster, and now we can finally stop bitching. Which I'm honestly thankful for.

By all means, continue to bicker. I doubt that my post will change anyone's mind. Just leave me out of that stink.

[GreatWhiteNorth]

3 hours ago, ionel said:

I still see folks driving around town in their car by themselves wearing a mask.  All I can figure is they've got a Covid pocket trapped in their car.  Maybe open the windows and let it escape.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I know a lot of people that have done this. They got so accustomed to wearing the mask all day that they sometimes forgot to take it off when they got in the car. Some places (ex: hospitals) still require masks. We're all creatures of habit, and it's easily been long enough to develop the habit.

I've done it on my motorcycle... but only on cold days. I liked the way the neoprene mask kept my face warm. I imagine some people who saw me thought I was crazy to think I needed to wear a mask riding, maybe even had a laugh at it.

Amazing how judgmental people can be when they haven't taken the time or effort to try to understand first. I imagine that's the product of the "us vs them" caveman mentality. Covid is finally receding, but that caveman mentality is going strong as ever.

 

[BigRedFan]

1 hour ago, Offthemat said:

I knew it, not a microbiologist.

COVID is a virus, not a microbe.  FFS.  Better do some more YouTube research.

[Theo Brixton]

8 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

It happened, we dealt with it, none of our leadership did it well, it was a cluster, and now we can finally stop bitching. Which I'm honestly thankful for.

Don't mean to pick on you in particular GWN but there were people who got it right, more or less. Sweden's response was the right approach. So was the approach of Ron DeSantis. Proponents of the Great Barrington Declaration were also correct, more or less, regardless of the pathetic hit pieces Fauci and Collins commissioned (that BigRedFan cited). And it took serious courage to stand up for these correct (from both a scientific and moral perspective) but immensely unpopular beliefs (as determined by MSM and a small group of technocrats). 

The response to covid will have long-lasting negative consequences to American society. Many of them were predicted and predictable. Maybe we should listen to people who got it right? At the very least, we should be wary of any technocrat eager to make sweeping changes to society that impinge on the basic rights of its citizens. 

What I find amazing is that so many people went along with it all and some are still defending the government's actions during covid. And those same people are content to "just move on".

One smart, cancelled guy summed up where we are headed pretty well: 

“The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall.”

 

[Theo Brixton]

2 minutes ago, BigRedFan said:

COVID is a virus, not a microbe.  FFS.  Better do some more YouTube research.

While some people are under the impression that Microbiology is restricted to the domain of cellular organisms, it also includes the study of viruses. 

[GreatWhiteNorth]

8 minutes ago, Theo Brixton said:

Don't mean to pick on you in particular GWN but there were people who got it right, more or less. Sweden's response was the right approach. So was the approach of Ron DeSantis. Proponents of the Great Barrington Declaration were also correct, more or less, regardless of the pathetic hit pieces Fauci and Collins commissioned (that BigRedFan cited). And it took serious courage to stand up for these correct (from both a scientific and moral perspective) but immensely unpopular beliefs (as determined by MSM and a small group of technocrats). 

The response to covid will have long-lasting negative consequences to American society. Many of them were predicted and predictable. Maybe we should listen to people who got it right? At the very least, we should be wary of any technocrat eager to make sweeping changes to society that impinge on the basic rights of its citizens. 

What I find amazing is that so many people went along with it all and some are still defending the government's actions during covid. And those same people are content to "just move on".

One smart, cancelled guy summed up where we are headed pretty well: 

“The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall.”

 

I'm sure you believe that those you listed "got it right, more or less" - I just don't agree with you. IMO, DeSantis was no more correct than Fauci - and it would be easily argued that he was less correct. Which I wouldn't argue, because IMO, none of them got it right and they were all just flawed humans who got it wrong to different degrees. This was a zero-win scenario.

What you said about "correct (from both a scientific and moral perspective)" doesn't sit well with me. We all have our own versions of morality - which is fine, and to be expected. But to somehow claim those that agree with our personal morality were correct - while those that didn't agree were incorrect... isn't logical.

Earlier Covid conversations on themat.com were helpful in that they allowed us to exchange perspectives and learn as we tried to figure out how to deal with something none of us had ever seen before. It was valuable, personally I learned a great deal. 

But what we're seeing from various posters now is mostly politically based, finger pointing garbage that serves no useful purpose. Like I said earlier, better to let sleeping dogs lie. But that's just me.

 

 

[Theo Brixton]

2 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

I'm sure you believe that those you listed "got it right, more or less" - I just don't agree with you. IMO, DeSantis was no more correct than Fauci - and it would be easily argued that he was less correct. Which I wouldn't argue, because IMO, none of them got it right and they were all just flawed humans who got it wrong to different degrees. This was a zero-win scenario.

Strongly disagree. Sweden, for example, has lower excess mortality than much of the rest of Europe (and certainly no worse). They avoided destroying their economy, a sad, obvious and predictable consequence of a broad-scale shut down of society. They kept children in school. The loss in learning due to extended school closures in the United States will have consequences that will reverberate for years. 

6 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

What you said about "correct (from both a scientific and moral perspective)" doesn't sit well with me. We all have our own versions of morality - which is fine, and to be expected. But to somehow claim those that agree with our personal morality were correct - while those that didn't agree were incorrect... isn't logical.

There was a  wide-scale shut down of society where the individual rights of the citizenry were restricted. When authorities knew those restrictions were never going to result in the purported goals (just look at the WHO pandemic response plans prior to 2020) justifying their implementation, it most certainly is an issue of morality. I don't know about you, but keeping poor, inner-city minorities out of school for ~2 years, basically ensuring years of educational loss thereby ruining any potential for meritocratic upward mobility while simultaneously ensuring lower life-expectancy sounds like moral issue to me. 

 

[GreatWhiteNorth]

6 minutes ago, Theo Brixton said:

Strongly disagree. Sweden, for example, has lower excess mortality than much of the rest of Europe (and certainly no worse). They avoided destroying their economy, a sad, obvious and predictable consequence of a broad-scale shut down of society. They kept children in school. The loss in learning due to extended school closures in the United States will have consequences that will reverberate for years. 

I don't disagree that Sweden did better. When there are no concrete answers at hand, we soldier on as best we can. When faced with a zero-win situation like Covid, some will do better while some will do worse. Not because anyone has answers or got it correct. If it wasn't Sweden, it would have been some other country that did better. Sweden had no crystal ball, they suffered just like everyone else - just not as badly. That's not a win as much as it's not as bad a loss.

11 minutes ago, Theo Brixton said:

There was a  wide-scale shut down of society where the individual rights of the citizenry were restricted. When authorities knew those restrictions were never going to result in the purported goals (just look at the WHO pandemic response plans prior to 2020) justifying their implementation, it most certainly is an issue of morality. I don't know about you, but keeping poor, inner-city minorities out of school for ~2 years, basically ensuring years of educational loss thereby ruining any potential for meritocratic upward mobility while simultaneously ensuring lower life-expectancy sounds like moral issue to me. 

I agree - there were certainly serious moral issues involved. And even more moral issues than either of us has yet posted.

But that wasn't my point, I was specifically addressing the "correct from... a moral perspective." I don't agree with labelling anything correct or incorrect because it agrees or disagrees with my personal moral position. Going down that path leads to, at best, nothing good.

[Le duke]

Are we arguing for socialized medicine and a literal transformation of our incredibly overweight society?

Because Sweden is not the US. Our obesity rate is almost 7x theirs and their general healthcare outlook and outcomes are a wee bit different.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Theo Brixton]

3 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

I don't disagree that Sweden did better. When there are no concrete answers at hand, we soldier on as best we can. When faced with a zero-win situation like Covid, some will do better while some will do worse. Not because anyone has answers or got it correct. If it wasn't Sweden, it would have been some other country that did better. Sweden had no crystal ball, they suffered just like everyone else - just not as badly. That's not a win as much as it's not as bad a loss.

I disagree with your assertion that Sweden's success was not predictable. This is the whole point. All "experts" knew that it was futile/impossible to prevent the spread of highly infectious respiratory viruses, hence the WHO pandemic policy prior to 2020. This was obvious to anyone with domain expertise. The restrictions prevent none of the harm of the virus while ensuring all of the adverse collateral damage associated with the response. This should be intuitive to any thinking person once they understand how highly contagious respiratory viruses capable of cross-species transmission spread.

23 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

 I don't agree with labelling anything correct or incorrect because it agrees or disagrees with my personal moral position. Going down that path leads to, at best, nothing good.

Sorry, but this is a preposterous statement. You can do better than this.

If protecting (or at least not sacrificing) the vulnerable isn't part of your moral code, then perhaps some introspection is in order. 

[Theo Brixton]

33 minutes ago, Le duke said:

Are we arguing for socialized medicine and a literal transformation of our incredibly overweight society?

Because Sweden is not the US. Our obesity rate is almost 7x theirs and their general healthcare outlook and outcomes are a wee bit different.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Of course you completely miss the point. I wouldn't expect any less...

[GreatWhiteNorth]

Just now, Theo Brixton said:

I disagree with your assertion that Sweden's success was not predictable.

I didn't assert that. But I can see where you may have misunderstood what I posted. When it comes to guesswork, there are more than a few countries that could have been predicted to have done better than us. But that's merely guesswork. So much we didn't know about Covid at the time. It's easy to claim otherwise in hindsight.

9 minutes ago, Theo Brixton said:

If protecting (or at least not sacrificing) the vulnerable isn't part of your moral code, then perhaps some introspection is in order. 

As I've said, we all have our own personal morality - as it should be. We're all very different people, with different perspectives. We are all relevant and important. How you've warped that into you judging my morality isn't particularly good.

I'm being as calm and as reasonable as possible. I don't get it - what axe do you have to grind with me?

 

 

 

[scourge165]

18 minutes ago, Le duke said:

Are we arguing for socialized medicine and a literal transformation of our incredibly overweight society?

Because Sweden is not the US. Our obesity rate is almost 7x theirs and their general healthcare outlook and outcomes are a wee bit different.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

They also have 10 million people. The United States is more akin to the governing Europe as a whole, not one Country the size of a state here. You're dealing with vastly different cultures, different population density, different...ideologies. Not just one state that is half the size of the largest metro-area in the US, and FAR healthier with far better access to health care. 

Also;

Quote

 

In a survey by Sweden’s Public Health Agency from the spring of 2020, more than 80% of Swedes reported they had adjusted their behaviour, for example by practising social distancing, avoiding crowds and public transport, and working from home. Aggregated mobile data confirmed that Swedes reduced their travel and mobility during the pandemic.

Swedes were not forced to take action against the spread of the virus, but they did so anyway. This voluntary approach might not have worked everywhere, but Sweden has a history of high trust in authorities, and people tend to comply with public health recommendations.

 

 

[Theo Brixton]

2 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

I didn't assert that. But I can see where you may have misunderstood what I posted. When it comes to guesswork, there are more than a few countries that could have been predicted to have done better than us. But that's merely guesswork. So much we didn't know about Covid at the time. It's easy to claim otherwise in hindsight.

As I've said, we all have our own personal morality - as it should be. We're all very different people, with different perspectives. We are all relevant and important. How you've warped that into you judging my morality isn't particularly good.

I'm being as calm and as reasonable as possible. I don't get it - what axe do you have to grind with me?

 

No axe to grind with you at all. You seem like a decent dude.

I just feel very strongly that sweeping the mistakes of covid under the rug is unacceptable and that the correct approach to dealing with it was known a priori. And that approach was not the heavy-handed one that was almost universally taken. The level of groupthink that occurred during the pandemic should make everyone take pause and reflect on its implications.

[Offthemat]

It’s not that there was a lot that wasn’t known about covid, a lot was known about respiratory viruses, and how they act.  The WHO plans that Theo alludes to specifies that lockdowns are not to be imposed because they have been tried before and only made things worse.  It’s also well known among epidemiologists that you can’t vaccinate your way out of a pandemic.  For some reason, governments worldwide stood this knowledge on its head for this debacle.  The fact that U.S. dollars paid to design and create this virus, and China’s responsibility for spreading it, may hold the answer for why.  
 

The “vaccine” didn’t keep you catching the virus, it didn’t keep you from spreading the virus, there is some evidence that it diminished the severity of symptoms if infection fell within a small window post injection, at the risk of a compromised immune system.  And the virus did what viruses do, it mutated to a point where it is still dangerous to some, but not many.  Kinda like the flu.  Which brings us full circle, because the very similar attempts at controlling a virus in about 1916 taught doctors what worked and what didn’t.  But the ones associated with government tried to force something else on us for this one.  
 

My wife’s 75 y/o sister has had covid three times, once prior to being vaccinated and twice after, is still active.  Their oldest sister, who was somewhat compromised, died.  Our next door neighbor, a 66 y/o nurse who refused to be vaccinated, has had it twice and is fine.  I saw a 20 something elite NFL athlete die on live tv.  They say he died twice and was brought back, he’s still having trouble.  He won’t play in the NFL again.  That’s another one of those things people don’t talk about in mixed company.  

[GreatWhiteNorth]

20 minutes ago, Offthemat said:

 I saw a 20 something elite NFL athlete die on live tv.  They say he died twice and was brought back, he’s still having trouble.  He won’t play in the NFL again.  That’s another one of those things people don’t talk about in mixed company.  

That is complete and utter bullshit.

If I could check your IP Address - I'd guess you're posting from Russia. ***duck duck goose** Russian's and the constant lying.

[GreatWhiteNorth]

1 hour ago, Theo Brixton said:

No axe to grind with you at all. You seem like a decent dude.

I just feel very strongly that sweeping the mistakes of covid under the rug is unacceptable and that the correct approach to dealing with it was known a priori. And that approach was not the heavy-handed one that was almost universally taken. The level of groupthink that occurred during the pandemic should make everyone take pause and reflect on its implications.

I don't believe anyone swept covid "under the rug" - it may not get much press, but our medical system is still fully invested in Covid research. 

I agree we need to think independently. Speaking of that...

Who's this OffTheMat dude? He's describing the vaccine like nobody ever heard of it before? WTF? You support this clown?

 

[Offthemat]

14 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

That is complete and utter bullshit.

If I could check your IP Address - I'd guess you're posting from Russia. ***duck duck goose** Russian's and the constant lying.

Same response.  If that’s the best you can do, then that’s the best you can do.  

[Theo Brixton]

10 minutes ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

I don't believe anyone swept covid "under the rug" - it may not get much press, but our medical system is still fully invested in Covid research. 

Sweeping the mistakes of covid policy under the rug has nothing to do with most of covid research. This is what I mean: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/10/covid-response-forgiveness/671879/.

Articles like are abundant and an insult to any thinking person.

And to your question about vaccines: I am a biochemist who makes his living (trying) to design medicines based on elements of the immune system in order to manipulate the immune system itself. I don't work on vaccine design directly but know enough about factors at play and personally know people who did design covid vaccines that reached clinical development to have an informed opinion.

Adaptive immunity (the type that vaccines try to elicit) can be "local" in nature. It is very difficult to create a vaccine that is administered by injection in the arm that provides sterilizing immunity for respiratory viruses. There are multiple reasons for this and that doesn't even include the challenges associated with rapidly mutating viruses. This was widely accepted by most experts in the field (and a recent review by Fauci acknowledges this). It was apparent quite early on that the ability of the mRNA vaccines to prevent infection was relatively short-lived. Furthermore, some cohorts (young males) were obviously having unique adverse events to the mRNA vaccine (myocarditis). This was also known very early on. It is not uncommon for vaccines to induce significant adverse events in some populations. What was new was the gaslighting associated with obvious, albeit infrequent problems.

So what do I think? I think it is clear some of the vaccines had the capacity to significantly reduce all-cause mortality. The meta-analysis of the clinical trial data make it clear the viral-based vectors (JNJ, AstraZeneca) worked particularly well in this regard. It is also clear there are adverse events. This means a careful cost-benefit analysis should be done by public health officials to prioritize whether and how one should be vaccinated. Those at risk for severe disease and death should get vaccinated, no question. Young, healthy people probably didn't need to get vaccinated and there is clear evidence to suggest the mRNA vaccine was a net harm, however small, for young men. I am vaccinated but feel strongly that this vaccines should not have been compulsory, especially for young men or others not at meaningful risk. The exclusion of people from society for refusing the vaccine was a disgrace and did much to erode trust in public health. It was obvious there was a political bent to this policy. Also, to not acknowledge that prior infection was sufficient to provide meaningful immunity goes against basic immunology of respiratory viruses.

Obviously, there are some vaccines that are essential and now many people skeptical of the covid vaccines will conflate their (somewhat justified) reluctance with vaccines in general. This is a problem that never needed to exist and will be part of the legacy of covid-era public health technocrats.

[Southend]

Theo, thanks for the link. And  Prior to 2020 , the rest of what you state here , is how this would have been handled. Not the political volley ball that it blew up onto. 

[scourge165]

1 hour ago, GreatWhiteNorth said:

That is complete and utter bullshit.

If I could check your IP Address - I'd guess you're posting from Russia. ***duck duck goose** Russian's and the constant lying.

Yeah, it is(it IS better than the significant number of crazies who believe that this was long planned and that Hamlins family was in on it and that they're using a body double, a popular new conspiracy that's particularly stupid). 

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/damar-hamlin-will-play-football-nfl-players-union-doctor-says-rcna69806

I'm also not sure why people think this is something that's never happened before, tragic as it was.

But he's working out with plans to play again per his Doctor.

Edited March 28, 2023 by scourge165

[scourge165]

1 hour ago, Offthemat said:

Same response.  If that’s the best you can do, then that’s the best you can do.  

Well...when you make shit up...what are you supposed to do?