In his last days, Trump gives us five profound gifts: The first, the defeat of COVID, with three 95% effective COVID vaccines, which we hope will be delivered to millions of people worldwide before he leaves office., and also new highly effective treatments which he took himself and now have been released to the general public. Second is election reform in progress . Due to his legal challenges, I think we can anticipate a trackable, unhackable election process without computers, and with certificate by both parties every step of the way. Thank you, President Trump, for all that you’ve given us, but mostly we’ve seen that, given the chance, the American economy can still thrive (third gift), something Obama said was impossible. Obama also said ISIS could not be defeated (fourth gift); you proved that wrong too. And lastly, energy independence, which Biden already promises to undo.
Before we get into the bleakness of current COVID events, let’s look just a few weeks into the future, and praise Donald Trump for Operation Warp Speed, which seems likely to provide us with not one, but two, 95% effective vaccines within the next three weeks (I am assuming that in this crisis, the FDA will not diddle around, but we must remember that they are a governmental body). Democrat faithful no longer need to cloister in their darkened basements; President Trump’s mobilization of true scientists will soon set them free. Once the vaccines are approved by the FDA, they will immediately be distributed, strategically to the elderly living in group settings first, followed by first responders and other elderly. This will very quickly bring the virus death rate to near zero, negating any legitimacy of future mask mandates and lock downs. It seems that at the end of his presidency, Trump has given the American people the best gift of all, the ability to be a free and prosperous people again.
Back to the present:
With the rising number of COVID cases in the US, governors have slipped into panic mode and have ordered lock downs. WHO has spoken out against lock downs except in regions where the local hospitals ICUs have become overrun with patients (COVID or otherwise). My first thought is why haven’t Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook frozen the accounts of these governors since they are going against the recommendations of WHO?
Toss in this interesting fact: Deaths of elderly, the group most likely to die from COVID, die not differ statistically significantly from 2019, when there was no COVID, to 2020, during the COVID epidemic, so says a John Hopkins report.
In any case, we have seen time and again that lock downs temporarily inhibit the spread of COVID, but long term lock downs do NOTHING to stop it. Indeed, it might be wise to view a lockdown to be similar to delaying the taxes you must pay. In the end, you’ll pay with interest. This is well demonstrated in country after country that locked down over the summer, but in turn had massive virus spread this fall. Lock downs destroy economies and destroy people’s lives, but only delay the spread of the virus. As WHO said, lock downs only make sense when hospitals are impacted. I suggested before, and repeat now, the COVID response should not be national, multinational, state, nor county, but by local regional hospitals. When the governing board of the local hospital sees their intensive care beds drawing near capacity, they should declare a two week lockdown for their region. In two weeks, they can extend or end depending on what they are experiencing in their hospital. One size fits all, even for a political unit as small as a county, doesn’t work.
Look at the graphs below, taken from Tony Heller’s post “Science Based Targets. After studying them, you have to ask, “Are Democratic governors incapable of thought and rational decision making?”
The seasonal spread of COVID type viruses. Taken from Tony Heller’s Science Based Targets You can see that during the summer COVID spread diminishes.
COVID cases in the UK. Note they basically follow the curve of historical COVID viruses (the above colored graph) with spring high, summer low, and fall high. Here, the spring cases are much lower than the fall, probably because of the intense lock down in the spring. But that lock down only delayed the virus. The question is whether the current fall lock down will only do the same, or will the Trump vaccine arrive in time to actually build the herd immunity and put an end to it all?
The French curve is similar to the UK but with a higher fall peak. Again will the Trump vaccine arrive in time to prevent a recurrence? Will it arrive soon enough to spare the French economy?
Sweden never locked down and had an extended spring peak ending in June/July, then the summer dormant period for COVID viruses began. Sweden’s fall COVID peak lagged behind the rest of the EU, suggesting that it had developed some herd resistance, if not immunity. Then Sweden’s COVID count caught up with the rest of Europe at a peak approximately 3.5 times its June peak. However now its daily case number is regressing along with the rest of Europe, but without lock downs. Have they now reached herd immunity? Would the rest of Europe experience daily infection drop offs, although slighter, without the lock downs? In any case, Sweden’s death rate peaked at 33/day on Nov. 9th and has returned to single digits. France’s death rate peaked at 1219 on Nov 17th, and the UK peaked at 600/day about the same time. On a population basis, 250 deaths/day in the UK or France would be comparable to Sweden. Regarding deaths, it appears Sweden has been doing the right thing.
Another favorite decree of Democratic governors and EU leaders is mandatory mask wearing whenever outside your home, even if driving alone in a car or standing alone on a beach. Why is it that most of us can understand that when you are well socially distanced there is no reason to breathe through a germ infested mask, yet many of our elected leaders do not understand that?
Tony Heller has shown graph after graph that mask mandates do not prevent the spread of COVID. Place after place that instituted mask mandates have had exponential COVID case growth when the fall arrived. You can go to Tony’s website at this link . Here are some of his graphs showing that mask mandates have failed to stop the spread of the virus.
The following series of graphs from Tony Heller, show that mask mandates have not stopped the explosion of COVID cases. Indeed, as Dr. Fauci said early on, masks can give a unfounded sense of security.
Cases in Montana, with a mask mandate, vs Wyoming, without a mask mandate.
Daily cases in the UK vs a mask mandate. A summer low, typical of COVID virus dormancy, then a rise in the fall despite masks. All of these graphs come from Tony Heller’s site.
Over the last nine months there has been little public information on masks, as to type, proper wearing, when and where they are affective, if at all. As a professional engineer, I am disappointed that university and standards agency labs have not taken these issues on and published the results to the general public. Indeed, this is an appalling breach of professional responsibility, in my opinion. The same thing is true regarding the study and adoption of standards regarding air circulation for enclosed public spaces. Intuitively without formal study, it seems clear that air replacement (with fresh outside air) multiple times per hour would decrease the spread of the virus in interior spaces. Advanced filtration of return air seems should also be a requirement, or ultraviolet light exposure that would kill the virus before the air is recirculated. Engineers, specifically mechanical engineers, are best equipped to limit the spread of the virus, outside of medical solutions such as therapies and vaccines. But where have they been? Where are the university reports, the standard agency reports, the association reports? As far as I know they have been absent. They certainly have not been praised or cited by our news media; who seem to be busy mouthing the word “science” like a mantra, as if somehow their faith will invoke blessings from the Hidden Scientist.
The best I can suggest about masks is to use common sense. In crowded places with poor circulation where people are taking their masks off to eat or drink is going to be a risky situation. If someone coughs, sneezes, or shouts in your face, then the mask will probably help, but you should get out of there and put on a clean mask quickly. If someone near you coughs, spits, sneezes, or laughs, you should probably get out of that area quickly, and maybe you don’t need to get a new mask. In short, what I’m saying that until we have detailed experimental evidence regarding the efficacy of masks you must use common sense and not think that you are protected by impenetrable armor.
The answer is and always has been, to protect the most vulnerable, while letting the others get along with their lives. Being that our government officials cannot bring themselves to think rationally (scientifically you might call it), the next best thing is to get those vaccines out there asap. Get them to the most vulnerable, old folks in group settings, and then whoever you think is next in line to be at risk. A week or two after the first round of vaccines have been administered, I expect the death rate to drop to very small numbers.
The threat of death will be over, but continue to vaccine until roughly 77% of the population has been either vaccinated, or has recovered from the disease. About then we’ll have herd immunity, and we can only hope that Joe Biden will have enough sense the keep Trump’s infrastructure in place and a sharp eye on China, the most likely origin of the next pandemic.
So ending on a positive note, I will step it up a notch. Trump has not just saved the US, but he has also saved the world. Many other countries have orders for millions of doses of the two, soon to be approved, vaccines. I’m sure the youth of the world will soon be in the streets shouting out the name of their benefactor, the restorer of their personal freedoms who parted the seas of despair, depression and recession: “Trump!” “Trump!” “Trump!” the enlightened youth will shout out joyously. But to assume they’ll actually figure out that capitalism has saved them is a bit of a stretch.
Still, I don’t know if we should call it the anti-COVID vaccine, or the anti totalitarianism vaccine.