Category: Coronapanic

CDC says that not-tested-for-COVID-19 migrants are a low risk while U.S. citizens who travel are a high risk

by philg

“CDC revokes U.S. authority to expel migrant children” (CBS/Yahoo, 3/12/2022):

The Biden administration announced late Friday it is ending a Trump-era border deportation policy as it pertains to unaccompanied migrant children in response to a court ruling that could’ve forced officials to expel those minors without an asylum screening.

The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which first authorized the migrant expulsions in March 2020, terminated the government’s ability to expel children who enter U.S. border custody without their parents. U.S. border officials can still use Title 42 to expel single adult migrants and families traveling with children to Mexico or their home countries.

Last week, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Pittman said the administration could no longer exempt unaccompanied children from Title 42, arguing that Texas, which challenged the exemption, was financially harmed by the placement of migrant children in the state due to medical and schooling costs.

In a notice Friday, CDC officials said they recognized the “unique vulnerabilities” of unaccompanied minors.

“In the current termination, CDC addresses the court’s concerns and has determined, after considering current public health conditions and recent developments, that expulsion of unaccompanied noncitizen children is not warranted to protect the public health,” the agency said.

(Note the headline. It is the Covidcrats who decide the size and composition of the U.S. population by determining immigration policy.)

The CDC (Science personified) says that an undocumented unmasked unvaccinated untested migrant who says “I am under 18” (by definition there is no way to verify such a claim since he/she/ze/they is undocumented) does not present a risk to public health. But the same agency tells us that U.S. citizens returning from the world’s most vaccinated countries, e.g., Portugal, are such high risks that they can’t legally begin a trip home without first getting a COVID-19 test and wearing a mask in the airports, airliner, Ubers, etc. (except while eating or drinking all of the food and beverages served by the airline, of course!)

Science is truly marvelous!

Speaking of Science, here’s the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s web site captured on 3/12/2022:

They say that they’re “following guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), New York State, and New York City” yet didn’t all of these experts on Science recently say that masks aren’t required? (except for kids in preschool)

How about the Getty in Los Angeles?

Vaccine papers are checked and masks are required because of the Department of Public Health’s Science-informed orders. Yet the referenced Department of Public Health ended its mask order on March 4. See “LA County’s indoor mask mandate ends as COVID metrics improve. Here’s what you need to know” (ABC):

Indoor mask-wearing will no longer be mandatory in Los Angeles County starting Friday thanks to revised data released by federal health officials showing a decreased impact of COVID-19 on the county’s health care system.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday officially moved the county out of its “high” virus activity category and into the “low” category. The CDC updates its county-level data every Thursday.

The CDC designations are based largely on the number of new virus-related hospital admissions and on the percentage of hospital beds being occupied by COVID-positive patients, along with a county’s overall rate of new COVID cases.

County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said that given the CDC revision of the county’s classification, a new Health Officer Order will be issued that removes the county’s long-standing mandate for people to wear masks indoors regardless of vaccination status. That move will put the county in alignment with the state, which dropped its mask mandate on Tuesday.

It is possible to Follow the Science even while doing the opposite of what Science says to do.

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Karen nervously goes to SXSW

by philg

SXSW (like Burning Man, but with better barbecue) starts today. The COVID-19 policy could have been drafted by Andrew Cuomo and his young Science-following friends. Vaccine papers will be checked, including children over the age of 5 (for whom no FDA-approved vaccine exists, only an emergency use authorized medicine). How effective does Texas Karen think that the vaccines are?

Masks will be required in all conference session rooms, exhibitions, registration, and pre-function areas, and as determined by individual venues and client spaces.

Will SXSW accept a home-printed CDC vaccine card? Or a photograph of a home-printed and home-filled-out card? No.

SXSW is using the Clear App Health Pass to verify the vaccination status of credentialed participants.

My standard question applies… if Karen is worried enough to demand vaccine papers and that people wear face rags (cloth masks will, no doubt, meet the mask requirement), why doesn’t he/she/ze/they stay home and avail him/her/zir/theirself of the promised “online viewing and participation options”?

Related:

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Face mask mandates in schools were not associated with lower SARS-CoV-2 incidence or transmission

by philg

New York is following Science by forcing 2-4-year-olds to wear face masks in their preschools (see Adult unvaccinated New Yorkers can go unmasked to the strip club; 3-year-olds must be masked in pre-K). A saliva-soaked rag has been proven “protective” against an aerosol virus according to our most respected media sources, such as the NYT (example from December 2021).

It turns out that there was a natural experiment on face masks in schools over in Spain. Catalonian children 6+ were ordered to wear masks in schools while children through age 5 were allowed to breathe freely. In comparing the 5-year-olds and 6-year-olds, the researchers summarized “[face mask] mandates in schools were not associated with lower SARS-CoV-2 incidence or transmission, suggesting that this intervention was not effective.”

See “Unravelling the Role of the Mandatory Use of Face Covering Masks for the Control of SARS-CoV-2 in Schools: A Quasi-Experimental Study Nested in a Population-Based Cohort in Catalonia (Spain)” (SSRN) for some Science that should not be followed. From the Abstract…

Methods: We performed a retrospective population-based study among 599,314 children aged 3 to 11 years attending preschool (3-5 years, without [face covering masks] FCM mandate) and primary education (6-11 years, with FCM mandate) with the aim of calculating the incidence of SARS-CoV-2, secondary attack rates (SAR) and the effective reproductive number (R*) for each grade during the first trimester of the 2021-2022 academic year, and analysing the differences between 5-year-old, without FCM, and 6 year-old children, with FCM.

Findings: SARS-CoV-2 incidence was significantly lower in preschool than in primary education, and an age-dependent trend was observed. Children aged 3 and 4 showed lower outcomes for all the analysed epidemiological variables, while children aged 11 had the higher values. Six-year-old children showed higher incidence than 5 year-olds (3•54% vs 3•1%; OR: 1•15 [95%CI: 1•08-1•22]) and slightly lower but not statistically significant SAR and R: SAR were 4•36% in 6 year-old children, and 4•59% in 5 year-old (IRR: 0•96 [95%CI: 0•82-1•11]); and R was 0•9 and 0•93 (OR: 0•96 [95%CI: 0•87-1•09]), respectively.

Related:

  • “Oakland school students, teachers must keep wearing masks indoors at least another month” (Mercury News, March 10, 2022): The school district decided this week the masks must stay on at least another month indoors and another two weeks outdoors as an extra precaution against another potential COVID-19 surge. The school board didn’t budge from that position at its meeting Wednesday night despite complaints from some parents who said enough is enough. The district — which includes elementary, middle and high schools — indicated it’ll reassess the indoor mask mandate around April 15 after everyone returns from spring break April 1-8. … “Children across the country have been mask optional for over a year. California has lifted the mandates for adults, for kids and say they’re lifting it for schools across the state,” a mother of three district students told the board. “Stop the craziness, follow the science.”
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Scientists gather to spread mutant SARS-CoV-2

by philg

A friend is heading off to Europe right now for a big academic conference. He’s a(n actual) scientist who lives in a Democrat-governed city and has supported mask orders, vaccine paper checks, school closures, and other Science-based interventions to stop the spread of the respiratory virus that causes COVID-19. Let’s call him “Professor Karen”.

Professor Karen’s family agrees with him regarding the merits of Following the Science. Down visiting an older relative, they came to pick me up at a southwest Florida FBO. The ramp looked like the usual “someone robbed a Gulfstream store” and there were about 60 people in the cavernous building. A sign near the front door reminded everyone that President Biden had ordered everyone at the airport to wear masks. Out of 60ish people there, Professor K’s family members were the only ones in masks.

(I can’t claim a total lack of COVID-19 concern. Afraid of the potential to infect my friend’s older relatives, I took the initiative to burn one of my at-home tests before starting up the plane for the 45-minute trip west.)

I was surprised, therefore, to learn that the good professor was heading off to Europe for a conference pulling together more than 1,000 people in his field from all of the SARS-CoV-2-infested countries of the world. In other words, a perfect environment for mutants to spread and/or form.

If he believed in the Science enough that he didn’t complain when his children’s public schools were closed for 1.5 years, why would he be a willing party to this potentially humanity-destroying event? His explanation was the virtual conferences weren’t effective, especially for poster sessions. But when it is a question of saving lives, so what? Professor Karen has tenure. He doesn’t need a conference publication to ensure a continued paycheck. People can work on better virtual conference technology. For a fraction of the cost of plane tickets to Europe, for example, everyone who was going to attend that conference could be supplied with virtual reality goggles for wandering around a poster session.

If Science tells us that people shouldn’t gather, why are scientists gathering unnecessarily?

Related:

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Boston will end its COVID-19 state of emergency on April Fools’ Day

by philg

Yesterday on boston.gov:

Mayor Michelle Wu and Dr. Bisola Ojikutu, Commissioner of Public Health and Executive Director of the Boston Public Health Commission, today announced Boston’s COVID-19 Public Health Emergency Declaration will end on April 1, 2022. The announcement follows a vote by the Boston Board of Health during their Wednesday meeting following the recommendation of Dr. Ojikutu. The Emergency Declaration has been in place since March 15, 2020.

During their meeting, Boston Public Health Commission officials provided a recommended framework for Boston Public Schools to use in determining when to lift the school masking requirement. Dr. Sarimer Sánchez, from BPHC’s Infectious Diseases Bureau, advised reviewing the school masking policy when the number of positive COVID-19 tests per day in Boston falls below 10 cases per day per 100,000 residents, while considering other COVID-19 metrics. BPHC is also encouraging development of “mask friendly” policies for students and staff, and increasing access to vaccines in school communities. The current COVID-19 daily case incidence is approximately 13 cases per 100,000 residents in Boston. The final decision on revising the school mask policy will be made by Boston Public Schools.

At least for now, the Science-informed emergency continues and children are forced to wear masks. But on April Fools’ Day, Science will say that it is safe to emerge from the bunker.

Related:

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Florida rejects Science regarding COVID-19 vaccines for healthy children

by philg

A hot war rages in Ukraine and Americans have the leisure to argue about the extent to which 5-year-olds should be given an emergency use authorized vaccine against a disease that kills the elderly.

For the past 16 months, friends who are physicians have been saying

  • vaccinate everyone over 50 or 60 (threshold varies by doc)
  • vaccinate no healthy person under 30
  • offer the COVID vaccine to people between 30 and 50/60

(See Is it ethical for a physician to vaccinate a healthy 20-year-old against COVID-19? from January 2021, for example)

Horrifyingly, it seems that a public health bureaucrat agrees with the Deplorable Docs in my social circle… “Florida to recommend against Covid-19 vaccine for healthy children” (CNN):

The CDC recommended that children get vaccinated in November, when the shot became available to most kids. Since then, about 22 million children have become fully vaccinated, including 1.1 million Florida kids.

But Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo said the state is going to issue separate guidance urging parents not to vaccinate their kids. Ladapo did not say when that guidance would become official and provided few additional details.

The Florida chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics was also critical of the decision.

“The COVID-19 vaccine is our best hope for ending the pandemic,” chapter President Dr. Lisa Gwynn said in a statement. “The Surgeon General’s comments today misrepresent the benefits of the vaccine, which has been proven to prevent serious illness, hospitalizations and long-term symptoms from COVID-19 in children and adolescents, including those who are otherwise healthy.

“The evidence is clear that when people are vaccinated, they are significantly less likely to get very sick and need hospital care. There is widespread consensus among medical and public health experts about the life-saving benefits of this vaccine.”

Ordinarily, CNN loves to celebrate immigrant success stories. In the case of the above-cited Science-rejecter, according to Wikipedia, the journey began with five years of unmasked childhood in Nigeria, migration to the U.S., and an education at Harvard Medical School. In addition to his M.D., Dr. Ladapo holds a Ph.D. in health policy from Harvard, yet CNN does not consider this migration journey worth highlighting.

From Friday, a mother and child who narrowly escaped a New York tourist’s attempt to vaccinate them both:

(in front of the electric utility’s (free) manatee lagoon)

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Adult unvaccinated New Yorkers can go unmasked to the strip club; 3-year-olds must be masked in pre-K

by philg

“‘It’s time to reopen our city’: N.Y.C. mayor lifts a school mask mandate and indoor vaccination rules.” (New York Times, 3/4/2022):

Mayor Eric Adams said on Friday that he was officially ending New York City’s mask mandate for public schools and a proof-of-vaccination requirement for indoor dining, gyms and entertainment venues, a significant moment for a city that was once an epicenter of the pandemic.

Mr. Adams made the announcement in Times Square in Manhattan and said it was part of his efforts to reopen New York after a steep drop in coronavirus cases.

In other words, Science says that if you know that an intervention (mask orders and vaccine coercion) works the smartest thing to do is terminate that intervention to let the virus grow exponentially again. Thanks to Science, an adult New Yorker who has refused to accept the Sacrament of Fauci can mingle unmasked in strip clubs (watch for unexpected costs, though!), pack unmasked and unvaccinated into Madison Square Garden with 20,000+ potentially unvaccinated spectators, etc.

How about 3-year-olds? Can they now breathe freely during their DUPLO time? No:

Starting on Monday, students will no longer have to wear masks indoors at public schools. Children under 5 must continue to wear masks because they are not yet eligible for vaccination.

Related:

  • “The best strip clubs in NYC” (TimeOut, with 2016 prices): This 10,000-square-foot club took over the old Scores space, but it’s a much classier affair: … ($400 gets you 30 minutes of alone time) … Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club empire aims to be classy and approachable … Lap dance prices are equivalent to other clubs in the city; massages will run you about $100. … All-you-can-eat sushi served on a naked woman in its private Kabuki room ($250 per person).
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I picked up our free N95 masks

by philg

These events occurred on February 24, but I didn’t want to post then because it is a trivial story compared to what was happening in Ukraine.

Our local CVS had a sign on the door promising “free” (taxpayer-funded) masks from the central planners:

The clerk tried to give me 10. “Don’t you have a large family?” she asked, hopefully. I asked for 3, explaining that I just wanted to brag to friends about having gotten them, and settled for 5. “We have 35 boxes of these in the back,” she added, and then pointed out that the anti-SARS-CoV-2 masks are “not evaluated for antiviral protection.”

Should I feel bad about writing on a non-Ukrainian topic? Here’s today’s email from McKinsey, the world’s leading business consultancy:

How to fix the broken rung on the career ladder for women in tech

Women are promoted at a slower rate than men across all industries and roles. But in technical roles‚ including in engineering and product management‚ the gender gap is even more pronounced: just 52 women for every 100 men are promoted to manager. Diversity is crucial in technical roles because it helps debias the technologies that are an intrinsic part of modern life. Early‐career promotions are critical to success‚ so this broken rung on the leadership ladder means that companies end up preparing fewer women for senior roles. What can leaders do? Don’t miss our article on repairing what’s broken.

The email includes a photo of a person, gender ID unspecified, doing Ph.D.-level soldering (Ph.D. level because his/her/zir/their other hand is not introducing any solder near the iron’s tip):

Ukrainians are suffering right now, but an American still has mental space, apparently, for all of his/her/zir/their pre-war concerns.

Loosely related… Shutterstock shows us another world in which soldering happens without solder:

Note bare fingers on the hot part of the iron. Could this be an example of what Joe Biden was talking about in the State of the Union speech?

We’re the only nation on Earth that has always turned every crisis we’ve faced into an opportunity, the only nation that can be defined by a single word: possibilities.

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COVID-safe restaurant chain idea

by philg

Even as thousands of Americans continue to be felled by SARS-CoV-2, state governors are lifting COVID-related protections. Soon it might be possible for a 5-year-old, for example, to go to a restaurant without anyone checking to see if the 5-year-old has been injected with an experimental use-authorized vaccine against a disease that kills 80-year-olds. Mask requirements are being dropped as well. People will be unmasked as they walk into the restaurant, not just when they’re sitting at tables.

Let’s assume that at least 20 percent of Americans Follow the Science and are extremely concerned about COVID-19, albeit not concerned enough to stay home. That’s a potential market of 67 million people (source for total population) who want a restaurant where they are fully protected against COVID-19 by cloth masks and vaccines that cut risk by a further 97X.

Even in the Florida Free State, there is no law against a restaurant checking vaccine papers (as mine were checked at Art Basel) and requiring masks. The legislature has blocked government agencies from engaging in this kind of behavior, but private companies can do whatever they want (e.g., hassle unvaccinated employees with periodic testing demands).

How about a restaurant chain that voluntarily imposes all of the restrictions that mayors in Washington, D.C., New York, San Francisco, Boston, et al. imposed by force of law? You will need to show a photo ID and vaccine papers to get in. You will need to wear a mask, preferably cloth but N95 is also okay, as you walk from the door to the table. The restaurants will close at 10 pm in honor of the curfews that many European nations imposed to prevent SARS-CoV-2 from spreading during the night hours.

Because obesity is not a significant or newsworthy cause of death compared to COVID-19, the menu will be 100 percent items that people love. Fettuccine Alfredo, potatoes au gratin, crème brûlée, etc. Because cancer is also insignificant next to COVID-19, smoking and vaping will be allowed.

What will the new chain be called? Karen’s.

Before everyone heaps ridicule on the above idea, remember that the U.S. government thought that there would be a significant number of people who would remain concerned about COVID-19 prevention immediately after a nuclear weapon had destroyed one or more cities. From https://www.ready.gov/nuclear-explosion (retrieved 2/28/2022; it was still all about the hand sanitizer!):

When you have reached a safe place, try to maintain a distance of at least six feet between yourself and people who are not part of your household. If possible, wear a mask if you’re sheltering with people who are not a part of your household. Children under two years old, people who have trouble breathing, and those who are unable to remove masks on their own should not wear them. … If you are told by authorities to evacuate to a public shelter, try to bring items that can help protect yourself and your family from COVID-19, such as hand sanitizer that contains at least 60 percent alcohol, cleaning materials, and two masks per person.

The authors of the web page assume that the nuclear weapon(s) did not take out the 9-1-1 and health care systems:

If you are sick or injured, listen for instructions on how and where to get medical attention when authorities tell you it is safe to exit. If you are sick and need medical attention, contact your healthcare provider for instructions. If you are at a public shelter, immediately notify the staff at that facility so they can call a local hospital or clinic. If you are experiencing a medical emergency, call 9-1-1 and let the operator know if you have, or think you might have, COVID-19. If you can, put on a mask before help arrives. … Many people may already feel fear and anxiety about the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19). The threat of a nuclear explosion can add additional stress. Follow CDC guidance for managing stress during a traumatic event and managing stress during COVID-19.

There is a helpful photo:

Anyway, if there are people who want to wear an anti-COVID mask in the fallout shelter after a successful nuclear attack on the U.S., my theory is there are people who will want to have dinner in a fully masked environment (except for all of the customers who are unmasked because it is a restaurant and they’re eating).

Related:

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Did the Deplorable explanation for COVID-19 deaths hold up?

by philg

Back in September 2021, we looked at a New York Times article that explained the #Science of Deplorability leading inevitably to death from COVID-19. States and counties in which people voted for Trump were subject to high death rates. Cities packed with righteousness (Biden voters) were sailing through whatever SARS-CoV-2 could dish out more comfortably than a New York City hospital executive holed up on the Palm Beach waterfont.

In the comments, Steve wrote “Coastal America (blue states) tend to have mild summers, and long dreary wet winters.” I responded with a throwback to pre-coronascience, suggesting a hypothesis to test:

Maybe Vermont would be a good test for your theory. They have the nation’s highest vaccination rate. They have the nation’s lowest cumulative COVID-19 death rate (still higher than India’s, though, which was portrayed as a world-ending disaster by our media). They enthusiastically voted for Joe Biden in 2020 (largest margin on the NYT chart).

Also, California and Maryland. The NYT says that these states are being spared currently because they’re populated by Democrats. Presumably that isn’t going to change and, in fact, they’ll become more solidly Democratic as Deplorables seeking freedom move to Florida, South Dakota, and other comparatively free states.

If we want to be scientific about this, where “scientific” has its pre-Covid definition of put forward a hypothesis first rather than retrospectively providing an explanation for how it is the fault of the unvaccinated or the Republicans, etc., we need a date and an outcome.

How about if the hypothesis is that Vermont suffers a fall/winter Covid wave that kills at least 50 percent as many people, adjusted for population, as the current wave in Wyoming, singled out for Deplorability in the NYT article? We pick March 1 as the “end of winter” (and September 1 for the start of fall?)? And the hypothesis test is discontinued if some dramatically effective medical treatment for COVID-19 becomes available prior to March 1 (i.e., the treatment that I wrongly predicted would be available no later than March 2021; see https://philip.greenspun.com/blog/2020/04/06/best-guess-as-to-when-the-first-successful-covid-19-therapy-will-be-widely-available/ (I give myself credit only for saying “I’m a big believer that viruses are smarter than human beings.”)). Wyoming has such a small population that it might be challenging to say when the current wave is over. The NYT characterizes Wyoming as a place where people are dying left and right. Your horse or pickup will have to navigate around corpses in Jackson. Yet the Google shows a 7-day average death rate currently of 6 people. Not 6 people per 100,000. 6 deaths per day total in WY. The wave can be declared over when this falls to 1?

California and Maryland have already suffered the loss of quite a few residents tagged to COVID-19. They’re thus more similar to West Virginia, also singled out for Deplorability in the NYT article (relatively high death rate right now on top of a medium cumulative death rate; many evil voters who chose Trump). So the hypothesis for those states can be that they have fall/winter waves that kill at least 50 percent as many people, adjusted for population, as the current wave in West Virginia. We look at deaths from September 1 through March 1 in these states. We say that the current “wave” in WV is over once the number of deaths per day comes down to fewer than 6 per day.

Although true coronascience is done by looking at the data and spinning a retrospective hypothesis, let’s look at the above hypothesis from September 2021 and compare to data received since. What do we find? Is whether a person voted for Donald Trump sufficient to predict his/her/zir/their chance of being felled by the mighty coronavirus?

Note that the New York Times didn’t formulate a hypothesis other than “red states bad” but it did a February 18 update:

It looks like the NYT’s hypothesis might be correct. Supporting Biden, and having neighbors who support Biden, protects a person from COVID-19-tagged death. On the other hand, the above chart is not adjusted for median age. Younger people are more likely to vote for Democrats and much less likely to die from/with COVID-19. There are huge state-to-state variations in the percentage of population over 65 (California is very young, for example, which helps it look good in the COVID Olympics; 15% of population over 65 compared to 21% in Florida). Especially when looking at all counties in the U.S., there would have to also be huge variations in the percentage of over-65s in those counties (just comparing all California counties to all Florida counties, for example, would result in a massive disparity in COVID-19 vulnerability). Rural counties were more likely to vote for Trump and they’re also packed with COVID-vulnerable seniors (19 percent of population compared to 15 percent in urban/metro counties (USDA)).

We might also need to adjust for the type of work being done in these counties. A county packed with work-from-home, welfare-from-home, or cash-alimony-and-child-support-checks-from-home Zoom heroes might be more protected from COVID-19 deaths than a county packed with people whose job requires in-person effort (God forbid!).

Jay Bhattacharya’s fall 2021 tweet reminds us that adjusting for demographics gives a different picture than a raw death rate.

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