Interpreting current events in any and all news providers is incredibly hard. One would claim “Common Sense”, but when Trump appropriates that term it looses meaning.
If you look at the news channels over a VPN and a clean browser, you get “both sides of the conversation”. Let’s take hydrochloroquine, a drug that works on malaria. Here’s an article that says it’s effective:
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2020/04/06/here-are-five-doctors-whose-patients-have-seen-recovery-with-hydroxy-chloroquine-n2566409
Now here’s an article that says it’s bullshit that kills more people than it helps:
https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/04/more-reason-for-caution-with-malaria-drugs-as-covid-19-treatment
People can’t even look at the math, the numbers keep changing based on where you look. It’s not hard to find articles that blow off COVID-19:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/05/trump-coronavirus-who-global-death-rate-false-number
https://www.foxnews.com/media/physician-blasts-cdc-coronavirus-death-count-guidelines
https://www.ccn.com/relax-coronavirus-is-less-dangerous-than-the-flu-says-epidemic-expert/
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/03/its-in-the-data-the-common-flu-had-12-times-more-hospitalizations-than-covid-19-yet-no-media-hysteria/
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2020/04/17/cnns_gupta_and_cooper_on_march_4_the_flu_right_now_is_far_deadlier_than_coronavirus.html
Obviously, it’s easier to find articles that say it’s quite dangerous and worth shutting down world economies over. Here’s one that says it’s 10 times worse than H1N1 Swine Flu:
https://www.nydailynews.com/coronavirus/ny-coronavirus-10-times-deadlier-than-swine-flu-who-tedros-20200413-ugldgezpzzar5pxsb5ve45cutq-story.html
Therefore, we have to look at things through a different lens. Let’s take social distancing and nationwide shutdown – is it ruining our economies neediessly?
- First, it’s all about probability, there are no certainties.
- No matter where it came from, a Chinese lab or innocent market, it’s novel: no humans on the planet have natural resistance
- This means everyone will get it.
- Now it’s a matter of odds – when you get it, will you notice, REALLY notice, get severely sick but recover, or will you die?
- Comparing COVID-19 to a highway, some people say it’s like a highway with LOTS of cars. Some say it’s more like any other street in America – just plain old traffic. What are the odds of getting hit by a car if you play in the street? What are the odds if you stay home?
- How pissed are you going to be if your mother, father, sister and brother all die because of COVID-19 and the government did not enforce social distancing? What if it’s “only” your wife or husband, but the rest survived? Is that worth your Big Mac?
This is what it’s all about: how many people will die versus the impact to the economy. If 50,000 people die, is it “worth” it? If you loose your job but your family doesn’t die because you stayed at home for many months, is it better or worse than being forced to go to work?
There is a single fact: if everyone in the US gets it at the same time, there aren’t enough hospital beds. People will die.
I don’t know what the odds are , exactly, and neither do you. Are you going to go play in traffic and take your chances? That’s your decision. People in the government however know exactly how many hospital beds there are in the state and what the rate of infection is, and we have pictures of hospitals getting overwhelmed so we know it’s not good. It’s not hard to say the odds are better if you stay home and businesses stay closed through the worst of it.
Because if people die while “America is open for business”, those deaths are on the government’s hands, and on yours if you vote for representatives foolish enough to put money before life.
If you look at it that way – which is pretty incontrovertable – it doesn’t matter who has the “right” numbers anymore, does it?
Now, let’s look at what the maps mean.
Here’s the current map from Johns Hopkins as of 4/25/30.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
If you zoom in on the map above, you see California. Just a few red specks, isn’t that nice?
I have a friend who works in university near Berkely. His school was shut down and appropriated by the National Guard into an overflow hospital.
What does that tell you about the seriousness of those red specks now? How about where the rest of the country is solid red?
Consider the following article regarding a Walmart in Aurora, Colorado being shut down due to COVID-19 deaths in that store alone:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medical/tri-county-health-closes-aurora-walmart-due-to-coronavirus-outbreak-3-deaths-reported/ar-BB137cds
The article says that “Colorado has been hit especially hard by COVID-19” – here is a map of Colorado including Aurora (bottom-right) at the same time as the pictures above – again, barely a speck.
What does this tell you?
- The United States has a serious problem with metrics, because the size of the “dot” doesn’t scale with eyewitness severity (New York state knows all about that!)
- The government clearly has a bias towards businesses because the fine for Walmart violating every order and taking inappropriate chances with their people only cost them a $5,000 fine. Obviously, when the state shuts down all non-essential businesses, it’s against their own interests and not to be taken lightly.
- Regardless of numbers, the staff in the Aurora store were contagious and stocking the shelves. Every Aurora Walmart shopper has been exposed for many weeks now, and the infection rate is demonstrable (see the whitepaper in previous articles).
It tells you the business owners believed Trump and Fox News and now people are dead. It tells you the situation is very serious because people can’t believe how serious it is and are failing to act, even rioting for the “freedom” to be ignorant.
Look at the size of Aurora’s dot again in two weeks, which is right before Colorado and many other states are expected to lift the “shelter in place” order.
Never mind the news, who’s “right” or “biased”: what decisions are you going to make? Staying home isn’t a cure, it slows the spread so that when it’s your turn, IF you need a hospital, there will be a bed waiting for you and it improves the chance you won’t die. This is the sad truth of it that you’re not reading in any paper: that this is the extent of what our nation can do, and it won’t be enough. Very many more people will die, and how many people stay home only shapes when that happens and to what scale.