Pro Lockdown Politicians Remain Stuck in March

Photo Credit: Dr. Kelly Victory https://twitter.com/drkellyvictory?lang=en

I believe the extended coronavirus lockdowns to be the single biggest public policy mistake made in our lifetime, if not ever, whose negative effects will be with us for years to come and in many ways we haven’t yet realized. So, yes, bear with me on yet another Covid post and the idiocy of politicians whose pandemic response has been little more than an exercise in raw power grabbing and political expediency.

It’s quite apparent, at least in blue states like mine, that controlling people and not the virus has become the driving force of those in charge and that any hope for responsible leadership has gone the way of the way of the dodo bird. Literally, as a bunch of dodos who you wouldn’t trust to bathe your dog are making enormous public policy decisions that negatively effect nearly every area of our lives.

Take California Governor Gavin Newsom, who likes to fancy himself as a follower of science and who recently moved the goalposts yet again released new county opening up guidelines, complete with pretty, colored coded charts so even us dumb subjects citizens can follow along.

Yes, you are reading the chart correctly. In order for a county to move in to yellow which is the most free stage, there must be less than 1 daily new case per 100k residents. The false positive rate of PCR testing alone will make impossible.

Two observations:

1. The governor is still using meaningless data on positive case counts to determine which stage counties are in 

2. California will not effectively be free until after a working vaccine is produced and distributed throughout the country which could be several years out, IF this even happens and IF our economy has not completely collapsed by then.

What the heck happened to using hospital capacity and deaths as the metric? No, really, I would like to know why the major shift on this? This is not not just moving goalposts, this is getting rid of them all together and replacing them with basketball nets.

And given that the majority of people testing positive will either be asymptomatic or suffer light-moderate flu like symptoms, why on earth is Governor Newsom using positive case counts as a means to drive policy?

On top of that, many PCR tests are just too sensitive and picking up small amounts of viral load that show a “positive” Covid result in people who are neither sick nor contagious. As this New York Times article states:

“In three sets of testing data that include cycle thresholds, compiled by officials in Massachusetts, New York and Nevada, up to 90 percent of people testing positive carried barely any virus, a review by The Times found.“

It’s clear that policy decisions about shutting down businesses should not be based on positive Covid case counts, yet it’s the central focus of Governor Newsom’s so called science based re-opening plan.

And this continued sledgehammer approach of assuming everyone faces the same dire risk from Covid is absurd. So much needless fear mongering and suffering over a virus whose survival rate for most people is well above 99%.

In fact we know so much more about the virus than we did 5 months ago, such as:

• The bulk of people now testing positive are younger, healthy people who face a very small chance of dying from the virus.
• In fact if you are younger 70 and are not suffering from other underlying diseases, the threat from Covid is still minimal.
• Our T cells may be bringing us much closer to developing herd immunity than originally thought, both via new Covid infections and by past exposure to any coronavirus, including the common cold. Scientists also suspect this may answer why the virus affects some people very differently than others.
• There are good treatments available for severe such as Hydroxychloroquine, steroids, antibody blood plasma and antiviral drugs like Remdesivir.

Knowing all of this why are Governor Newsom and other pro lockdown politicians acting as if it’s still March? And why does the media keep spreading fear and panic?

The catastrophic effect of keeping economies suppressed are so well known that one cannot help but be cynical and assume Governor Newsom and others are purposely looking for ways to keep their states shut down for reasons that have nothing to do with the virus.

Could it be to make their state economies so horrible that federal monetary bailouts become inevitable which they can then use to paper over years of fiscal mismanagement? Or is it to make Trump look bad because the country will never truly recover economically without states like California and New York operating at full steam?

I honestly don’t know, except to say that I agree with Dennis Prager when he says The Lockdown Has Gone From a Mistake to a Crime. As per the article:

“I live in California, a state governed by that most dangerous of leaders: a fool with unlimited power. Despite the fact that California ranks 28th among the 50 states in deaths per million, Gov. Gavin Newsom has destroyed and continues to destroy tens of thousands of small businesses and untold numbers of livelihoods. His continuing to forbid — a half-year after the onset of the pandemic — indoor dining in restaurants is leading to a projected permanent closure of approximately 1 in every 3 restaurants in the state.“

Indeed. Most states are looking for ways to open up their economies while recognizing the delicate balance between public safety and keeping civil liberties intact. Gavin Newsom seems to be doing the opposite; keeping California shut down while tightening the screws of oppression on small business and remaining obtuse to the suffering of citizens.