# Herd Immunity by April



## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

*"Experts should level with the public about the good news...*" exclaims Makary (who is likely on the verge of getting canceled), as he cites the* "miracle" 77% drop in cases over the past 6 weeks* and that testing likely only captured about 10% - 25% of infections; he extrapolates that to saying 55% of Americans have natural immunity (and add to that the *15% of Americans that have been vaccinated*). Additionally, he cites Scott Gottlieb, former FDA commissioner, who believes that 250mm doses of the vaccine will have be delivered to 150mm people by the end of March.​​


> *"There is reason to think the country is racing toward an extremely low level of infection.* As more people have been infected, most of whom have mild or no symptoms, there are fewer Americans left to be infected.​





> *At the current trajectory, I expect Covid will be mostly gone by April, allowing Americans to resume normal life*." zerohedge "​


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

"*At the current trajectory, I expect Covid will be mostly gone by April, allowing Americans to resume normal life*." zerohedge " "

I think I have heard that before.


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## Danaus29 (Sep 12, 2005)

Oh good. It will be over before they get around to my vaccine.


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## PaLady (Oct 24, 2006)

The WHO changed the sensitivity rate for detection...that's why the numbers have drastically dropped. Amazing how that works once the election is over.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

PaLady said:


> The WHO changed the sensitivity rate for detection...that's why the numbers have drastically dropped. Amazing how that works once the election is over.


While that's true, that doesn't explain the decline in deaths or the steep decline in hospitalizations.


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## georger (Sep 15, 2003)

PaLady said:


> The WHO changed the sensitivity rate for detection...that's why the numbers have drastically dropped. Amazing how that works once the election is over.


I was thinking that exact same thing. I don’t believe in coincidences.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

MoonRiver said:


> While that's true, that doesn't explain the decline in deaths or the steep decline in hospitalizations.


Don't you think the death of the most vulnerable has run its course?


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> While that's true, that doesn't explain the decline in deaths or the steep decline in hospitalizations.


If the revised testing does not show the patient to have covid then they patient is hospitalized for something other than covid. Or they have died from something other than covid. Thus the decline your talking about. Also by now, those most of those likely to be seriously affected by covid have been exposed and dealt with. So naturally a decline. Most likely the incentive for high numbers of positive cases has gone away and new incentives for less cases and deaths is now in process.


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## muleskinner2 (Oct 7, 2007)

And the experiment continues. Next, they will tell us it didn't come from China, and that it is a plot by conservatives and the ultra right.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Any talk of herd immunity is a joke because they alternate news stories about it with stories of how we WON'T have herd immunity due to the virus mutations.

Geez.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> If the revised testing does not show the patient to have covid then they patient is hospitalized for something other than covid. Or they have died from something other than covid. Thus the decline your talking about. Also by now, those most of those likely to be seriously affected by covid have been exposed and dealt with. So naturally a decline. Most likely the incentive for high numbers of positive cases has gone away and new incentives for less cases and deaths is now in process.


The change in testing should eliminate false positives, so it should have little to do with hospitalizations.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

HDRider said:


> Don't you think the death of the most vulnerable has run its course?


No. There are always new people moving into nursing homes or other senior facilities.


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## GTX63 (Dec 13, 2016)

The good news is they have cured the flu.


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## CKelly78z (Jul 16, 2017)

PaLady said:


> The WHO changed the sensitivity rate for detection...that's why the numbers have drastically dropped. Amazing how that works once the election is over.


The CDC did that one hour after the inauguration....imagine the timing coincidence !


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## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

Likely a lot of reasons. Lower level testing and fewer tests being done and I think a lot of areas near herd immunity. Our county statistics show 14% of the population has been infected but the 'experts' say actual infections are between 4 and 8 times that due to asymptomatic cases and people who never got sick enough to seek medical care. Even at 4 times, our infection number would be 56% and we have vaccinated 14%. That's getting to about 70% but some of those vaccinated may have been infected too, but we are still getting into herd immunity territory. Probably why our county new cases are now near zero. Same with the county across the river in Indiana. Over 30,000 people and cases there have dropped from 15 or 20 per day to zero to 3.


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## barnbilder (Jul 1, 2005)

As soon as antibody tests were available, they should have done some sample grabs, and they could have come up with a baseline that determined where we were at in the pandemic. Everywhere that was done the results were buried pretty quick. It was never about science. It was about politics the whole time.


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## barnbilder (Jul 1, 2005)

In reality we probably could have seen herd immunity last April, but we probably had some bumps on the graph from the ridiculous lockdown measures drawing out the curve. There probably some bumps on the graph from new strains, we probably haven't identified a tenth of the variants, and won't. There will be bumps on the graph next fall, and every fall thereafter, until the end of time. Everybody is going to die, but that's good news because it means nothing has changed.


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## gilberte (Sep 25, 2004)

People will probably start dying from heart failure, cancer, and old age again.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

I always get a kick out of the news guys who says everyday "Stock prices were down today on news of a thunder storm in Lower Slobovia," as if all the little old ladies who own most of the stocks sit around all day listening to their short wave radios for weather reports from around the world, then quickly phone their brokers to make trades....Nonesense. The news guy is trying to find some coincidental explanation for the stock prices after the prices change on their own.

So it is for all the "explanations" they're coming up with on how & why CoViD numbers are changing. The truth is, it's all in the numbers- the "built in" characteristics of the CoV & Human biology.

Leopards have spots. Tigers have stripes. Epidemics exhibit waves & hot spots in time & space. It's all the same math (Laplacian Diffusion Equation) and nothing we do will change it. (Cf- similar numbers for CA & FL or Sweden vs GB, despite markedly different regs)

BTW- it looks like new positives are occurring at a rate of about 10% per week, so. If that rate found on all those presenting for tests can be extrapolated to the general population ,ie- including those not getting tested, then after 10 weeks, everyone should have been exposed . We may well be at the point of herd immunity now and the new cases just represent the endemic rate of infection (like, say, TB- there's always some new cases. It can't go away completely.)...Had we never "closed down": this all would be ancient history by now.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Excellent post, doc.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> The change in testing should eliminate false positives, so it should have little to do with hospitalizations.



Testing positive has had little to do with actual number of people getting hospitalized. The PERCENTAGE OF THE POPULATION that ends up in the hospital will probably remain the same, or perhaps decrease as those more likely to die are removed from the population and herd immunity takes affect. The percentage of those tested that get hospitalized is actually likely to go up as the test are allowed to become more accurate. Of course the covid variants might influence this.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Redlands Okie said:


> Testing positive has had little to do with actual number of people getting hospitalized. The PERCENTAGE OF THE POPULATION that ends up in the hospital will probably remain the same, or perhaps decrease as those more likely to die are removed from the population and herd immunity takes affect. The percentage of those tested that get hospitalized is actually likely to go up as the test are allowed to become more accurate. Of course the covid variants might influence this.


That was your point, not mine. The hospitalization rate should be directly proportional to the number of people that get Covid-19. Since both the number of deaths and the number of hospitalizations are going down, that implies the infection rate is also going down, which is what the graph in the OP shows.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

There is at least one other thing that might be in play - Ivermectin. NIH changed its position on Ivermectin on Jan 14 to not for or against. An article in the Buffalo News dated Feb 2, 2021, discusses the successful use of Ivermectin to treat patients in skilled care facilities in W NY. Could it be that enough people are being treated with Ivermectin to make some difference in cases, hospitalizations, and deaths?



https://buffalonews.com/news/local/unapproved-by-fda-ivermectin-useful-as-covid-19-treatment-local-doctors-say/article_8ee56f1a-625d-11eb-b771-b76fa82cbedb.html


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## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

MoonRiver said:


> That was your point, not mine. The hospitalization rate should be directly proportional to the number of people that get Covid-19. Since both the number of deaths and the number of hospitalizations are going down, that implies the infection rate is also going down, which is what the graph in the OP shows.


But that would depend on what the person was hospitalized for. The policy was that if you went into the hospital with any health issue at all and tested positive for COVID, that was automatically a COVID hospitalization even though you may have had no symptoms of the virus and only had a heart attack. You may have only tested positive for COVID because they were running too high a cycle rate on the COVID test. IOW, you may have been a false positive. COVID hospitalizations could well be dropping because the change made on the day Biden took office to lower the testing cycles which meant fewer false positives. The hospital admission rate they use is only the COVID admission rate. We don't know how many people are admitted every day for every other malady. I'd wager that number is up. Same number going in the hospital, just counted differently now.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

poppy said:


> But that would depend on what the person was hospitalized for. The policy was that if you went into the hospital with any health issue at all and tested positive for COVID, that was automatically a COVID hospitalization even though you may have had no symptoms of the virus and only had a heart attack. You may have only tested positive for COVID because they were running too high a cycle rate on the COVID test. IOW, you may have been a false positive. COVID hospitalizations could well be dropping because the change made on the day Biden took office to lower the testing cycles which meant fewer false positives. The hospital admission rate they use is only the COVID admission rate. We don't know how many people are admitted every day for every other malady. I'd wager that number is up. Same number going in the hospital, just counted differently now.


Try explaining the graph with that logic.


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## melli (May 7, 2016)

PaLady said:


> The WHO changed the sensitivity rate for detection...that's why the numbers have drastically dropped. Amazing how that works once the election is over.











Fact check: WHO released guidance on proper use of tests; it did not admit PCR tests showed inflated infection numbers


Social media users have been sharing screenshots purporting that the World Health Organization (WHO) released guidance to laboratories and incorrectly saying this was to reduce the positive test result count in PCR (polymerase chain reaction) COVID-19 tests. The social media...




www.reuters.com







CKelly78z said:


> The CDC did that one hour after the inauguration....imagine the timing coincidence !


Really? Like to see the proof on that assertion.

Labs do run verification checks on their work. They do not process thousands of tests on a wing and prayer. And the cycle threshold has little bearing on test results. A positive case is usually detected well before cycle limit.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

melli said:


> Fact check: WHO released guidance on proper use of tests; it did not admit PCR tests showed inflated infection numbers
> 
> 
> Social media users have been sharing screenshots purporting that the World Health Organization (WHO) released guidance to laboratories and incorrectly saying this was to reduce the positive test result count in PCR (polymerase chain reaction) COVID-19 tests. The social media...
> ...


Not a positive case but a true positive case. A cycle threshold that is too high will have a higher number of false positive results.


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## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

melli said:


> Fact check: WHO released guidance on proper use of tests; it did not admit PCR tests showed inflated infection numbers
> 
> 
> Social media users have been sharing screenshots purporting that the World Health Organization (WHO) released guidance to laboratories and incorrectly saying this was to reduce the positive test result count in PCR (polymerase chain reaction) COVID-19 tests. The social media...
> ...



You are wrong. Different labs run the tests to different levels. Each cycle looks closer at the specimen seeking ever smaller evidence of the virus, therefore they look for increasingly smaller sections of the virus's DNA. Fauci and others said early on that running a test beyond 30 cycles for any virus gives questionable results and beyond 35 cycles the results are useless because most viruses commonly share some strands of DNA and the small section looked at in that level of testing could well be a small fragment of some dead virus you had in a head cold or other viral infection months ago that is still in your blood. Some labs were running the tests to over v40 cycles. I think it was Kansas that required 42 cycles on all tests, well beyond the max.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> That was your point, not mine. The hospitalization rate should be directly proportional to the number of people that get Covid-19. Since both the number of deaths and the number of hospitalizations are going down, that implies the infection rate is also going down, which is what the graph in the OP shows.


If only we had been and were currently able to get accurate percentages of the population infection rates. Instead we have somewhat accurate numbers of total population, and what seems to be inaccurate numbers claimed to be caused by covid deaths


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## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

MoonRiver said:


> Try explaining the graph with that logic.


The graph only shows the COVID hospital admissions. It does not show the numbers of people being admitted for things like pneumonia, flu, or other things. We have no idea how many of those previously admitted as COVID admissions came to the ER with pneumonia, heart disease, flu, etc. and were wrongly diagnosed as COVID due to false positive tests. In many states a test wasn't even required. A doctor could simply 'assume' it was COVID.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

One thing that does catch my eye about the chart in the OP. The death rate seems to be relative consistent when compared to the extreme fluctuations of the hospitalization and positive test on the charts.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Redlands Okie said:


> One thing that does catch my eye about the chart in the OP. The death rate seems to be relative consistent when compared to the extreme fluctuations of the hospitalization and positive test on the charts.


You are right. I thought Moon said deaths were dropping


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

HDRider said:


> You are right. I thought Moon said deaths were dropping


That's what it means when the line goes down instead of up. I think I said it was a steep drop in cases and hospitalizations, but I didn't say the decline in deaths was steep, although in this graph it is rather steep declining from over 3,000 deaths per day to about 2,000.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

poppy said:


> The graph only shows the COVID hospital admissions. It does not show the numbers of people being admitted for things like pneumonia, flu, or other things. We have no idea how many of those previously admitted as COVID admissions came to the ER with pneumonia, heart disease, flu, etc. and were wrongly diagnosed as COVID due to false positive tests. In many states a test wasn't even required. A doctor could simply 'assume' it was COVID.


As Occam said - given 2 explanations, the simpler one is usually the correct one.


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## melli (May 7, 2016)

poppy said:


> You are wrong. Different labs run the tests to different levels. Each cycle looks closer at the specimen seeking ever smaller evidence of the virus, therefore they look for increasingly smaller sections of the virus's DNA. Fauci and others said early on that running a test beyond 30 cycles for any virus gives questionable results and beyond 35 cycles the results are useless because most viruses commonly share some strands of DNA and the small section looked at in that level of testing could well be a small fragment of some dead virus you had in a head cold or other viral infection months ago that is still in your blood. Some labs were running the tests to over v40 cycles. I think it was Kansas that required 42 cycles on all tests, well beyond the max.


The 42 cycle number you throw out is just that, a number. The PCR test stops if it hits a positive. They are trying to figure out a way to discern viral load from number of cycles. Make the test more informative.


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## PaLady (Oct 24, 2006)

melli said:


> Fact check: WHO released guidance on proper use of tests; it did not admit PCR tests showed inflated infection numbers
> 
> 
> Social media users have been sharing screenshots purporting that the World Health Organization (WHO) released guidance to laboratories and incorrectly saying this was to reduce the positive test result count in PCR (polymerase chain reaction) COVID-19 tests. The social media...
> ...


Our facility received verification of the change in sensitivity guidelines from our local laboratory two weeks ago. As a result, the numbers in our state have dramatically dropped and when we are cleared by the CDC to return to "normal" surveillance testing, it will be changed to once per month...for the last 11 months, we have been mandated to test every 7 days....that's a dramatic drop in surveillance testing in addition to the sensitivity rate changes.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

PaLady said:


> Our facility received verification of the change in sensitivity guidelines from our local laboratory two weeks ago. As a result, the numbers in our state have dramatically dropped and when we are cleared by the CDC to return to "normal" surveillance testing, it will be changed to once per month...for the last 11 months, we have been mandated to test every 7 days....that's a dramatic drop in surveillance testing in addition to the sensitivity rate changes.


How do people get confused about this, or how do the "fact checkers" dispute it? 

It seems very straight forward.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

MoonRiver said:


> That's what it means when the line goes down instead of up. I think I said it was a steep drop in cases and hospitalizations, but I didn't say the decline in deaths was steep, although in this graph it is rather steep declining from over 3,000 deaths per day to about 2,000.
> 
> View attachment 94030


Well hopefully that good news will continue.


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## Wolf mom (Mar 8, 2005)

So, after we get to the "herd immunity" stage, what happens then? 
Do we continue wearing masks, wash hands frequently and social distance, making that the new norm? Or do we become 'free at last' until the next cycle of Covid-19?

It's my understanding that no one knows just how long this immunity will last.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

Wolf mom said:


> do we become 'free at last'


I fear we may never be able to say that again in the foreseeable future


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

From my observations, what happens next is somewhat location and circumstance driven.

I have traveled recently to two small towns within an hour of Austin. Based on what I saw in the feed store, a major chain grocery store, a convenience store, and a privately owned restaurant/bar, masks are optional. Social distancing is evident only in two small vacant tables in the center of the restaurant.

When the Covid numbers fall from their CDC manipulated heights, compliance with mandates will cease. (At least in rural Texas)


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Wolf mom said:


> So, after we get to the "herd immunity" stage, what happens then?
> Do we continue wearing masks, wash hands frequently and social distance, making that the new norm? Or do we become 'free at last' until the next cycle of Covid-19?
> 
> It's my understanding that no one knows just how long this immunity will last.


My guess is there will be isolated flareups, especially indoors with poor air circulation.


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## poppy (Feb 21, 2008)

Alice In TX/MO said:


> From my observations, what happens next is somewhat location and circumstance driven.
> 
> I have traveled recently to two small towns within an hour of Austin. Based on what I saw in the feed store, a major chain grocery store, a convenience store, and a privately owned restaurant/bar, masks are optional. Social distancing is evident only in two small vacant tables in the center of the restaurant.
> 
> *When the Covid numbers fall from their CDC manipulated heights, compliance with mandates will cease. (At least in rural Texas)*


You are right. No matter what government tells people to do, when the burden of government becomes overbearing and people see the foolishness they will just ignore them. Mandate compliance mostly ended around here about 2 months ago. Probably 90% of the people in Walmart used to wear masks but now it is way less half. Most do still keep some sort of distance just like they do every flu season but I do see more and more people stopping to chat in the aisles with friends. Local restaurants are now open with few wearing masks but despite all this abandonment of masks and bottles of disinfectant inside the doors of businesses or employees frantically wiping down every table between customers, our COVID infections have dropped like a rock to near zero. That tells me either the government required precautions weren't accomplishing much or we are nearing herd immunity.


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## Danaus29 (Sep 12, 2005)

Here businesses can be shut down if customers don't wear masks. So the business employees have been designated to be mask police. It probably won't end until we have no cases. All our counties are still considered high spread by the CDC.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

It’s like that IN Austin.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

As usual, our experts are acting stupidly...It doesn't really matter if a person tests + or - for the virus. It's the presence or absence of antibodies that counts....Each of us is carrying about 8% viral DNA. As long as it's not causing illness, BFD. Evolutionary surprise: Eight percent of human genetic material comes from a virus -- ScienceDaily They should be testing for antibodies, not virus, but that's harder/more costly to do. ...If + virus tests are running 10%, then those 90% of -'s have an unknown antibody status-- It could be that runs at a very high + rate and we're safer than we think.

edit--Just did a quick search- data on first responders from last May/Jun Early Release - Prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies in First Responders and Public Safety Personnel, New York City, New York, USA, May–July 2020 - Volume 27, Number 3—March 2021 - Emerging Infectious Diseases journal - CDC 22% had + Ab for CoV, and, BTW- no dif in rates according to PPE use (actually slightly higher for glove users)...Only big dif was 4x higher rate in those with household contact + for CoV. (Surprise Surprise, Barney.)


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

The US has 4.23% of the world's population, yet claims a full 20% of WORLDWIDE Covid fatalities. 

We are being played BIG time.

This in a country with the best medical care in the world and an overall Covid survival rate above 90%.

COVID-19 SURVIVAL RATES (per CDC): 
Ages 0-19: 99.997% 
Ages 20-49: 99.98% 
Ages 50-69: 99.5% 
Ages 70+: 94.6% 

If you are still buying into the always has been BS bureaucratic constitutional rights grab/infringement that Covid has always been about, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn I'd like to sell you. 

Keep on drinkin' the Kool-Aid sheeple.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Doc, is that Barney Rubble or Barney Fife?


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Tom Horn, you are correct.


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## Danaus29 (Sep 12, 2005)

Just my opinion but when the govt offers hospitals money to care for covid patients that the hospitals don't get for other patients, the hospital is going to have a lot of covid patients. Especially after the hospitals started losing money and laying off staff because they weren't performing other necessary medical proceedures.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

Alice In TX/MO said:


> Doc, is that Barney Rubble or Barney Fife?


That was Gomer Pile talking to Barney Fife.

Some info (look it up if anyone doubts me)--
US pop-330,000,000 EU pop - 500,000,000
US nursing home pop- 1.5 million EU nursing home pop- 600,000
US CoViD deaths-de 500,000 US CoViD deaths in NH pts- 125,000

If we assume NH death rate is similar in US vs EU, then, if NH beds in EU were increased to US rate, that would add 75,000 to the EU deaths, and the rates in the US vs EU would be very similar...

.As others have said, our numbers of CoViD deaths may well be grossly exaggerated here. There's no reason to think our medical care is inferior to anybody. Our population also contains many more members of groups with genetics that seem to be risk factors in CoViD....You can't really compare our situation to any other country....I don't feel like running the numbers right now, but if you examine the US white, ambulatory population (75% of us) vs the EU white, ambulatory population (essentially 100% of them) I'd bet we're doing way better than them.


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

doc- said:


> That was Gomer Pile talking to Barney Fife.


Actually Doc, not to nit-pick, but a proper quote from Gomer would be "Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!" He always said it three times.

Other memorable Gomerisms: "Gawl-oh-oll-ee!" You've got to roll it off of your tongue just right.

And who can forget, "Shazam!"

You're welcome.

Probably Gomer's best scene on Andy Griffith



:


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## GTX63 (Dec 13, 2016)

I don't recall the name, but there was a Jerry Lewis movie in the 60s in which an old lady is sitting in her living room watching tv commercials. The woman picks up her cup of coffee as the advertiser hawks that particular brand, then a cigarette as the next commercial touts her brand of smokes.
There will be people wearing masks in public from now on. Some will do it for sincere health reasons; the majority of the others will do so because they believe they are doing their part.
It has just become a part of the culture.


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

GTX63 said:


> There will be people wearing masks in public from now on. Some will do it for sincere health reasons; the majority of the others will do so because they believe they are doing their part.
> It has just become a part of the culture.


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## PaLady (Oct 24, 2006)

HDRider said:


> How do people get confused about this, or how do the "fact checkers" dispute it?
> 
> It seems very straight forward.


The "rules" have changed so rapidly over the last year, it does get hard to keep up with the changes. It is beyond ridiculous.


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## Max Overhead (Feb 22, 2021)

Saw a headline on the newspaper at the grocery today. Said that "some parents are upset" because children are required to eat their lunches on the floor, all facing the same direction, and none of them are allowed to talk. It is criminal child abuse. PaLady is right, and so is Tom Horn. This game we've been playing for almost a year now is called "moving the goal posts". Remember, three weeks to slow the spread.. Social engineering on a massive scale for something less deadly than the common flu. All of the precautions we are told to take demonstrably effect our health negatively. It was never about our health, ever. Times like this I'm grateful not to have children: Children Of The Great Reset


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## Danaus29 (Sep 12, 2005)

I found a couple links to kids eating lunch on the floor that were very recent but both are pay to read sites. It gave the name of Wake bit I don't know if it's a county or school district.

Found this site;









Some Wake parents are upset that COVID rules mean students sit on the floor to eat lunch - NewsDeal


Some Wake County students are consuming their meals whereas sitting on the classroom floor to assist preserve social distancing.



newsdeal.in





I would take my kids out of school if this was happening.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

I would take my children out of the school that the author of the article attended. That is the worst writing that I have seen in a while.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

They are not public schools--They are govt indoctrination camps.


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## Redlands Okie (Nov 28, 2017)

Apparently some of the classrooms are at 45 degree or cooler due to open windows. 

Seems a state guideline recommended the seating arrangement. 











Wake County parents report incidents of harassment, abuse as some students return full-time


The reintroduction this week of children to full-time instruction at school has been met with reports of alleged mental, emotional, and physical abuse in Wake County Public Schools by staff and tea…




ladyliberty1885.com


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

I talked to a man today

I talked with a man today, an 80plus-year-old man. I asked him if there was anything I could get him while this Coronavirus scare was gripping America.

He simply smiled, looked away and said:

"Let me tell you what I need! I need to believe, at some point, this is the country my generation fought for... I need to believe this is the nation we handed safely to our children and their children... I need to know this generation will quit being a bunch of sissies...that they respect what they've been given...that they deserve what others sacrificed for."

I wasn't sure where the conversation was going or if it was going anywhere at all. So, I sat there, quietly listening.

"You know, I was a little boy during WWII. Those were scary days. We didn't know if we were going to be speaking English, German or Japanese at the end of the war. There was no certainty, no guarantees like Americans enjoy today.

And no home went without sacrifice or loss. Every house, up and down every street, had someone in harm's way. Maybe their Daddy was a soldier, maybe their son was a sailor, maybe it was an uncle. Sometimes it was the whole damn family...fathers, sons, uncles...

Having someone, you love, sent off to war...it wasn't less frightening than it is today. It was scary as Hell. If anything, it was more frightening. We didn't have battlefront news. We didn't have email or cellphones. You sent them away and you hoped...you prayed. You may not hear from them for months, if ever. Sometimes a mother was getting her son's letters the same day Dad was comforting her over their child's death.

And we sacrificed. You couldn't buy things. Everything was rationed. You were only allowed so much milk per month, only so much bread, toilet paper. EVERYTHING was restricted for the war effort. And what you weren't using, what you didn't need, things you threw away, they were saved and sorted for the war effort. My generation was the original recycling movement in America.

And we had viruses back then...serious viruses. Things like polio, measles, and such. It was nothing to walk to school and pass a house or two that was quarantined. We didn't shut down our schools. We didn't shut down our cities. We carried on, without masks, without hand sanitizer. And do you know what? We persevered. We overcame. We didn't attack our President, we came together. We rallied around the flag for the war. Thick or thin, we were in it to win. And we would lose more boys in an hour of combat than we lose in entire wars today."

He slowly looked away again. Maybe I saw a small tear in the corner of his eye. Then he continued:

"Today's kids don't know sacrifice. They think sacrifice is not having coverage on their phone while they freely drive across the country. Today's kids are selfish and spoiled. In my generation, we looked out for our elders. We helped out with single moms whose husbands were either at war or dead from war. Today's kids rush to the store, buying everything they can...no concern for anyone but themselves. It's shameful the way Americans behave these days. None of them are worthy of the sacrifices their granddads made.

So, no I don't need anything. I appreciate your offer but, I know I've been through worse things than this virus. But maybe I should be asking you, what can I do to help you? Do you have enough soda-pop to get through this, enough steak? Will you be able to survive with 113 channels on your tv?"

I smiled, fighting back a tear of my own...now humbled by a man in his 80's. All I could do was thank him for the history lesson, leave my number for emergency and leave with my ego firmly tucked in my rear.

I talked to a man today. A real man. An American man from an era long gone and forgotten. We will never understand the sacrifices. We will never fully earn their sacrifices. But we should work harder to learn about them, learn from them...to respect them.


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

doc- said:


> They are not public schools--They are govt indoctrination camps.


One of the worst mistakes the American people ever made was giving government control of education.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)




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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

I really like the meme.

It dovetails nicely with, "Them that can't... Teach."


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Those of us who can teach and had the financial ability to leave the education system left. It was a no win situation years ago.


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## GTX63 (Dec 13, 2016)

Hiro said:


> View attachment 94096


The ignorant aren't the ones who designed it, but the ones who dutifully implement it.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

What purpose is served in looking back? Fire them all and look ahead.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

Tom Horn said:


> One of the worst mistakes the American people ever made was giving government control of education.


Govt "guidelines" in any area, meant originally as minimal standards quickly devolve into maximum standards with no incentive to exceed.



Alice In TX/MO said:


> Those of us who can teach and had the financial ability to leave the education system left. It was a no win situation years ago.


Back before teachers' unions, wages were for educators was paltry. No one went into teaching for the money. If you became a teacher, it was because you really wanted to teach. Now it's one of the easiest degrees in college to achieve and one of the best paying jobs available, particularly given the part time hours and full time salary and benefits.

edit-- In regards your excellent post about your 80y/o friend-- you weren't here a yr ago when I made the comment that it should be the patriotic duty of the under 55y/o crowd to go out and contact CoV in order to quickly establish herd immunity. The death rate from CoViD in that demographic is well under 1%...I said that was a reasonable risk, considering our young patriots flocked to enlist in the services in 1941/42 at a time when war casualties would prove to be in the range of 20%.....But, then, that was before political correctness and the wimpification of the country.


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## Max Overhead (Feb 22, 2021)

John Taylor Gatto said it all about what the government schools are really about. His books are the best resource I've found on the subject. I believe when the first public schooling started in America, either the military or the national guard (I forget which) was necessary to get the parents to comply. Back then they knew better. 
doc, I had the exact same thought when a friend "tested positive." Since then, I've gotten a better understanding of what's really going on, and don't think I could get covid if I tried. The real virus is on TV and radio, and that's something I won't expose myself to.


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

GTX63 said:


> The ignorant aren't the ones who designed it, but the ones who dutifully implement it.


There is a story about a man who was watching his wife fix the evening meal. She was preparing a roast for the oven and she took a knife and cut a portion off the roast before she placed it in the pan bound for the oven. 

The husband was curious and asked her why she first cut the piece off of the roast. She responded with, "That's the way my mother always did it." 

Well, Mom had moved into a room into the back bedroom of the house, so they went and asked her why she cut the piece off of the roast prior to roasting. She replied, "That's the way that my mother always did it."

Now grandma was living in the old folk's home, so the next time they visited they asked her why. She replied, "That was the only way that I could get the roast to fit into my pan."

It's a very old problem:

*Mark 7:6-13-The Message*

6-8 Jesus answered, “Isaiah was right about frauds like you, hit the bull’s-eye in fact:
These people make a big show of saying the right thing,
but their heart isn’t in it.
They act like they are worshiping me,
but they don’t mean it.
They just use me as a cover
for teaching whatever suits their fancy,
Ditching God’s command
and taking up the latest fads.”
9-13 He went on, “Well, good for you. You get rid of God’s command so you won’t be inconvenienced in following the religious fashions! Moses said, ‘Respect your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone denouncing father or mother should be killed.’ But you weasel out of that by saying that it’s perfectly acceptable to say to father or mother, ‘Gift! What I owed you I’ve given as a gift to God,’ thus relieving yourselves of obligation to father or mother. You scratch out God’s Word and scrawl a whim in its place. You do a lot of things like this.”

And let us not forget what Uncle Ronnie said:












Ignorance I am very tolerant of, as it indicates a lack of learning and/or experience, proper education will remedy that. 

Willful ignorance I despise, as there is no cure due to the "sufferer" reveling in their condition.


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Wale County is Raleigh, NC and surrounding area. Panther Creek High School is in Cary, a rich town just outside of Raleigh,


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## MoonRiver (Sep 2, 2007)

Tom Horn said:


> One of the worst mistakes the American people ever made was giving government control of education.


Allowing the federal government to take it over was the biggest mistake.


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## po boy (Jul 12, 2010)

Cherokee County Ga. annual school revenue is about 490 million and Federal Revenue is only 24 million or about 5% of total revenues. That lousy 5% gives the Feds control. Shools should refuse the funds!


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## Danaus29 (Sep 12, 2005)

MoonRiver said:


> Wale County is Raleigh, NC and surrounding area. Panther Creek High School is in Cary, a rich town just outside of Raleigh,


Thank you. 

Proper news reporting would give information including the location of where a story takes place. Without that information readers are left to guess. Surprising how many wannabe journalists and editors missed that part of their education.


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## sharkerbaby (Jan 15, 2016)

Danaus29 said:


> Thank you.
> 
> Proper news reporting would give information including the location of where a story takes place. Without that information readers are left to guess. Surprising how many wannabe journalists and editors missed that part of their education.


To be fair, the source is a *local* news outlet so the assumption is the readers are local and familiar with the area. It could be argued that because there is an online presence the potential reach is global, regardless I think most journalists write for their *primary* audience rather than their *potential* audience, and I personally feel that is the appropriate approach.


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## Danaus29 (Sep 12, 2005)

Local or not, it is a basic part of journalism. There is a name for the date and location information but the class was so long ago and I misplaced my mental notes and cannot remember what it's called. In some areas local papers can cover a huge area.


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## sharkerbaby (Jan 15, 2016)

Well then the Chicago Tribune, Sun-Times, Daily Herald, News Sun, and Pioneer Press have been doing it wrong for at least three decades. They all cover the greater Chicagoland area, arguably a "huge area" and rarely if ever include location identifying information especially when naming a school, a school district, neighborhood, etc.

How do I know this? Because despite living here since the 80's, it is not uncommon for me to have to look up the city, town, or neighborhood that a given story revolves around whether they be talking school board controversy, shopping mall event, crime, hot topic local ordinances, etc.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

sharkerbaby said:


> Well then the Chicago Tribune, Sun-Times, Daily Herald, News Sun, and Pioneer Press have been doing it wrong for at least three decades. ...


Well, we at least agree on something.


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## sharkerbaby (Jan 15, 2016)

doc- said:


> Well, we at least agree on something.


I think we agree on more than one thing... at least I agree with you on most things although that doesn't necessarily mean you agree with me 😉😏 I'm like a fish out of water here in Chicagoland but I'm making the best of it for the time being.


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## HDRider (Jul 21, 2011)

I wish we would implement a voucher system that gave parents an option on schools. 

If wishes were horses we would all ride.


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## Danaus29 (Sep 12, 2005)

sharkerbaby said:


> Well then the Chicago Tribune, Sun-Times, Daily Herald, News Sun, and Pioneer Press have been doing it wrong for at least three decades. They all cover the greater Chicagoland area, arguably a "huge area" and rarely if ever include location identifying information especially when naming a school, a school district, neighborhood, etc.
> 
> How do I know this? Because despite living here since the 80's, it is not uncommon for me to have to look up the city, town, or neighborhood that a given story revolves around whether they be talking school board controversy, shopping mall event, crime, hot topic local ordinances, etc.


Yes, they have been doing it wrong. A resident having to look up the places they write about is the first clue. 

I finally remembered, the rule of 5 w's; who, what, *where*, when and why. How is a later addition but just as important.


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## sharkerbaby (Jan 15, 2016)

eh, different perspectives and opinions. The "where" is provided it is the granularity of the "where" that is the crux of the question - my opinion especially from a local news source it doesn't have to be finely defined, your opinion is different - I love that we don't all have to conform to the same mindset!


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

Yes I am a wag.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

sharkerbaby said:


> eh, different perspectives and opinions. The "where" is provided it is the granularity of the "where" that is the crux of the question - my opinion especially from a local news source it doesn't have to be finely defined, your opinion is different - I love that we don't all have to conform to the same mindset!


Chicago, for those not aware, euphemistically calls itself "The City of Neighborhoods"-- in other words, territories severely demarcated according to ethnicity....To report exact locations would be to tattle tale in a racist way and expose emphatically the correlation between race and crime for all to see (as if we don't already know).


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)




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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)




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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

Tom-- you obviously have too much time on your hands...Do you work for the govt?


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

doc- said:


> Tom-- you obviously have too much time on your hands...Do you work for the govt?


Actually yes, for the CIA and I have a trace on your IP address.

Are you a real doctor?


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

You should already know that, Tom.


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

Alice In TX/MO said:


> You should already know that, Tom.


Know what?

I'm the FNG remember. I haven't learned the secret identities of the Homesteading Today superheroes yet.

Is there an application for the HT inner circle? A potential invite to join the HT Justice League? Avengers? X-Men?

When I was a kid, I so wanted to be one of Sgt. Fury's Howling Commandos. Tell me that there's a commando conclave. Please, please, please


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## sharkerbaby (Jan 15, 2016)

I think she was having fun and going along with your CIA cover and having traced doc's IP


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

You should know that doc is a doctor if you are CIA. Turn in your credentials. 

I am chagrined that I had to look up FNG. You would think, with the number of military folks in my family, that I should have known that.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

Tom Horn said:


> Actually yes, for the CIA and I have a trace on your IP address.
> 
> Are you a real doctor?


I was, but now I'm serving a stretch at Leavenworth-- The Feds caught me removing one of those tags from a throw pillow.


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

doc- said:


> I was, but now I'm serving a stretch at Leavenworth-- The Feds caught me removing one of those tags from a throw pillow.


Is this you?


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

I forgot about that scene--and it's my favorite movie.....PeeWee and I are old buddies--we used to hang out together at movie houses.


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## Alice In TX/MO (May 10, 2002)

Popcorn, doc?


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## Tom Horn (Feb 10, 2021)

doc- said:


> I forgot about that scene--and it's my favorite movie.....PeeWee and I are old buddies--we used to hang out together at movie houses.



You are quite the rebel. Cutting tags off of mattresses and engaging in behavior that could lead to blindness.


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## doc- (Jun 26, 2015)

Tom Horn said:


> You are quite the rebel. Cutting tags off of mattresses and engaging in behavior that could lead to blindness.


I stopped when I started to need glasses.


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## Hiro (Feb 14, 2016)

doc- said:


> I stopped when I started to need glasses.


Don't let your need for refraction keep you from watching movies at the cinema. Well, if they are open in your current state of whoever the governor is and his/her current diktat.


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