patrick.net

As usual, Tony Heller dissects the numbers and supports Patrick's analysis. His videos are very informative. He has contributed greatly to fight climate change alarmism, and in this video he tears apart Covid media myths.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/vqUwpqjG_jM

CBOEtrader says

Patrick says

The hysteria about "rising cases" is ignoring the fact that more testing means more cases.

I haven't heard a great explanation for why testing positive rates have risen so much in last few weeks. my guess is widespread general asymptotic cases, i.e. steps towards herd immunity.

so... if we have cases exploding, and deaths staying flat (like we have right now in Texas for example), how is this not a good thing? Ive heard that average age of new case in Texas is 30. Shouldnt we expect or even TRY to aggressively spread CV amongst 30 year olds who will largely be fine? Shouldnt we see a spike in CV cases with minimal corresponding deaths as a good thing?

The best thing that could happen is letting it run through the 20s & 30s crowd during the summer. It's not that hard to not visit your grandparents for 2 months. Then, it can run through the kids in the fall. My father in law has had a weakened immune system and heart/blood pressure issues for the past 10 years. We've always made it a priority to not visit with the slightest hint of illness. It's not that hard.

Just to make the link from the video easy to click on:

https://wecantbreathe.news/

theoakman says

The best thing that could happen is letting it run through the 20s & 30s crowd during the summer. It's not that hard to not visit your grandparents for 2 months. Then, it can run through the kids in the fall.

Yep. I think we could be pretty close to herd immunity by Q4 this year provided we open up our schools and colleges this Fall.

Countries like Canada that have had a very low infection rate so far are going to wish more people got it to develop herd immunity when we ramp back up this Fall during Flu Season.

socal2 says

Yep. I think we could be pretty close to herd immunity by Q4 this year provided we open up our schools and colleges this Fall.

Question is does that involve mask wearing? IL is talking about making it a requirement to go back to school. I'm not okay with that. Good luck teaching 20-30 kids in a classroom with a fucking mask on. This whole scheme has been cute so far, but you fuck with my kids, fuck off.

This whole deal is and has gone too far. Where are the god damn grown ups?

WookieMan says

Good luck teaching 20-30 kids in a classroom with a fucking mask on. This whole scheme has been cute so far, but you fuck with my kids, fuck off.

There are no standards being followed for mask use.

Most people just throw them in their pocket or hang them on their mirror when not required. Others wear them constantly even alone outside or in their car. Many masks are meant to be one use. There are protocols for how to wear them and how to dispose of them. Nobody follows them.

Instead you have the "chin strappers" , the "nose exposers" and the people that wear recycled underwear.

Clown show.

This explains whey the death count is lower.

The OPs graph clearly has some kind of weekly cycle. I'm guessing a lot of places report on a weekly basis. Since the battle with the virus often goes for weeks it will be interesting to see the next few weekly cycles.

The places that are blowing up recently are places that opened up early. So it's only raging in pockets of the country.

They're probably way better at treating people when hospitals aren't overwhelmed (although some small number are now), but also just as best (known) practices for treating it are learned.

It would be great if the downtrend of deaths hold. It probably won't though. But even not too much of an uptick would be a good sign.

Look at the past couple weeks of new cases. Sure maybe testing is up, but what percentage of testing is done on people that are sick ? Maybe there are versions out there now that are more contagious and less deadly.

marcus says

The places that are blowing up recently are places that opened up early.

And or had BLM riots.

marcus says

The places that are blowing up recently are places that opened up early. So it's only raging in pockets of the country.

What about California?

We had the earliest lockdown, mandatory masks and still have some of the strictest restrictions in the country.

If you look at the rate of transmission, it started increasing everywhere prior to opening up. You can view the rate graphs from all 50 states here.

https://rt.live/

Florida's rate of transmission actually bottom when shelter was ordered and creeped up showing you that people's congregation behavior was clearly over with by April. Whether they were having house parties, dinners with each other, bbqs, playing basketball together...whatever.

With respect to California, you see something similar around April. The people clearly stopped best practices around mid april and you can see the rate of transmission increasing.

If you look at where I am, in New Jersey, we still have a transmission rate below 1. People basically only started having outside bbqs with about 5 or 6 people 2 weeks ago at best. I'm sure it will get worse here from a rate of transmission perspective.

Good point. Maybe it's this. Which I added as an afterthought.

marcus says

Maybe there are versions out there now that are more contagious and less deadly.

That would be awesome if it were the case. Then maybe we could get up to heard immunity and be done with it for now. Critical to see those death numbers for the next few weeks.

marcus says

Critical to see those death numbers for the next few weeks

Not sure what is going to change in the next few weeks. It would have already needed to be changing at this point. These new cases are generally in younger and healthier people that give zero shits about lock downs. We're done with it.

OMG, US IS SO MUCH WORSE THAN LITERALLY EVERYBODY ELSE!!!

Not sure what is worse.

The gaslighting claim that the US is somehow doing worse than the rest of the civilized world. Or the gaslighting claim that Cuomo and New York are some sort of model governance in the United States based on the COVID results.

socal2 says

Not sure what is worse.

The gaslighting claim that the US is somehow doing worse than the rest of the civilized world. Or the gaslighting claim that Cuomo and New York are some sort of model governance in the United States based on the COVID results.

They are not. It's New Jersey! NY and Cuomo are only second.

Eric Holder says

OMG, US IS SO MUCH WORSE THAN LITERALLY EVERYBODY ELSE!!!

Colds, flus, bacterial pneumonia, alll respiratory deaths are now counted as covid.

Tenpoundbass says

This explains whey the death count is lower.

these people need balls to speak out publicly, or frankly they are part of the problem. these anonymous memes... you believe this? Not the messing with the numbers part, but this specific observation? you think it holds water?

Onvacation says

Colds, flus, bacterial pneumonia, alll respiratory deaths are now counted as covid.

That's why the only reliable number to consider is excess deaths no matter the cause. FT tracks these also.

Eric Holder says

That's why the only reliable number to consider is excess deaths no matter the cause

I generally agree. But as boomers age, the averages are going to spike either way. We're definitely above normal for sure, but what percentage of that is boomers in their prime dying years hitting 70 right now?

WookieMan says

But as boomers age, the averages are going to spike either way.

Not like this:

Eric Holder says

Not like this:

Again, I agree. We're seeing a spike for sure. In the overall history of humans though, this is a nothing burger. This is not some Spanish flu equivalent.

As I've said in other posts, I have no interest in seeing people die. But the reaction has been retarded. Let it kill who it can and let's move on. We're just delaying this at some point. Until someone shows me a hospital overwhelmed because of Covid, I don't really care. We have a demographic that is going to tax hospitals without a virus either way. There's not much we can do without getting more beds anyway in the near future. This was always going to be a problem, virus or not.

Hospitals routinely get overwhelmed in bad flu years, so even that is not necessarily an indicator that this is especially bad.

Eric Holder says

socal2 says

Not sure what is worse.

The gaslighting claim that the US is somehow doing worse than the rest of the civilized world. Or the gaslighting claim that Cuomo and New York are some sort of model governance in the United States based on the COVID results.

They are not. It's New Jersey! NY and Cuomo are only second.

New Jersey has been god awful. We only got outdoor dining approved 2 weeks ago. We were supposed to have indoor dining at 25% capacity but they now cancelled that due to a few shore town bars having too many people at them outdoors. That makes zero sense to take it out on the restaurants statewide. We reported 90 cases today. 90! Satewide.
That's less than one per town.

Moreover, in South Jersey, the counties are reporting approximately an average of 6 cases per day....yet you still can't allow your kids to play on an outdoor playground or go get a bite to eat indoors. You can march 20,000 strong in Newark shoulder to shoulder screaming George Floyd, but I can't take my kids to an empty playground. Even our "pandemic response team" tried to whistleblow stating our governor hasn't asked for their opinion at all on the matter and our local newspapers refused to even run the story.

Here's what they had to say...the media refuses to report this.

The Murphy administration has bungled this pandemic in ways that we never even thought were imaginable. 6000+ nursing home deaths (highest per capita in the country), with countless missteps that explain it. Arbitrary opening dates with an almost completely political calculus behind them. Whistleblower retaliation that has taken countless hours of the administration leadership’s time. Self-absorbed Cabinet members and aides trying to hook friends up with contracts, scarce tests, and patronage jobs. And so much more. We have no political motivation. We all have graduate degrees in public health and related fields. We just want the truth to be clear to New Jersey. We will be releasing evidence of these failures multiple times per week, and it will all make the case clearly that this is the worst leadership team to be taking on the biggest public health crisis in a century. We need better leadership- these are matters of life and death. Follow us for ongoing updates.

At this point even bad doctors probably won't be using hydroxychloroquine which should be a factor helping to prevent the death numbers from surging as much as the new cases are.

Tenpoundbass says

This explains whey the death count is lower.

Yeah, cause, I read it on the internets! Well see.

The best explanation now for the death count not jumping is that there hasn't been time. But that it hasn't surged at all, will soon be a cause for wonder. The surge in new cases started 2 weeks ago. Another week or two and we'll see. Highly highly unlikely that the numbers are simply fake though. How gullible are those people on rightwingtroll.com anyway?

This reminds me of you guys two weeks after Texas opened in early May. Even the next several days should be telling. My prediction is that covid is evolving to be less lethal, which is in the virus' best interest right ? The worse thing for a virus spreading would be the host dying real quickly.

If it is now less lethal that would be great news.

marcus says

At this point even bad doctors probably won't be using ventilators which should be a factor helping to prevent the death numbers from surging as much as the new cases are.

FIFY

I'm way overdue for a doctors visit. Most older folks go at least once a year, get blood work done etc. When I do go, I wonder if I should get tested ?

I guess that would be another explanation.

marcus says

At this point even bad doctors probably won't be using hydroxychloroquine

? You mean the drug that has shown effective in both preventating and treating covid?

LOL dude you crack me up.

marcus says

The best explanation now for the death count not jumping is that there hasn't been time.

Huh? Look at the initial rise of the virus as far as cases and deaths go. Maybe a 7 day lag. That trend is gone. New cases don't matter outside of knowing if someone has had it or not. It burned through who it could kill. It's over.

marcus says

When I do go, I wonder if I should get tested ?

I guess that would be another explanation.

I just read they wont give a CV test without symptoms. Is this true?

marcus you want to do a little forecasting w me? I dont think we will continue to see lower and lower deathrate into higher and higher CV case rate. it appears that we have passed the point where the deaths should show up from these cases and we still dont see them. this is what i would expect from the low deathrates already established within the younger generations who are now catching the virus.

Do you disagree w any of this? if so, whats your projection?

If we all agree that these high cases, low deaths is good, why arent we opening the economy?

CBOEtrader says

I just read they wont give a CV test without symptoms. Is this true?

No. I know for sure that you can go to the drive-thru location and get tested w/o syptoms. The processing will be slower though.

marcus says

At this point even bad doctors probably won't be using hydroxychloroquine which should be a factor helping to prevent the death numbers from surging as much as the new cases are.

https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20200605/lancet-retracts-hydroxychloroquine-study

"June 4, 2020 - The online medical journal The Lancet has apologized to
readers after retracting a study that said the anti-malarial drug
hydroxychloroquine did not help to curb COVID-19 and might cause death
in patients.

The study was withdrawn because the company that provided data would not
provide full access to the information for a third-party peer review,
saying to do so would violate client agreements and confidentiality
requirements, The Lancet said in a statement."

In California, some scraggly hippie with a divining rod waves it over you and declares you Covid positive.

thomasdong1776 says

Will you?

U.S. sets one-day record for COVID-19 cases

Good answer!

Deaths keep falling.

Cases are proportional to testing.

The left is playing this up to try to hurt the economy more.

Patrick says

Good answer!

Deaths keep falling.

Cases are proportional to testing.

The left is playing this up to try to hurt the economy more.

There is a report by a Texan ICU/hospital coordinator or so saying that while cases have risen the average stay in the hospital for severe cases is now 3-5 days only and almost never ICU, which is mostly occupied by other infections or conditions.

It's much worse than that imho. Cases rose in Texas because Texas started deliberately counting anyone who had antibodies as being a "case" even if it was months after they had it.

https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/texas-coronavirus-testing-conflate-antibodies-11912520

And the CDC did the exact same thing nationally, for political reasons. It's mind-boggling.

At least a bunch of prominent honest scientists have called out the CDC on this perfidy. it can't possibly be mere incompetence. They are the CDC for Christ's sake!

I feel like you're making too much out of this.

It's just data. New cases have spiked a lot, and everyone knows (and says maybe is is largely due to increased testing or other factors ). And everyone sees even accounting for the lag, that deaths haven't spiked much yet. If they don't in another week, they will back off on the increased caution.

We're all watching the same movie, and increased concern following the spike in new cases was warranted. As will a decrease in concern as new deaths continue to not spike.

Here. let me join in the political hysteria - making everything political.

If Trump had done a better job of pushing a lot more testing sooner we wouldn't be in this situation.

marcus says

As will a decrease in concern as new deaths continue to not spike.

You are assuming the mob is rational