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Tuesday, October 06, 2020

Overtesting and useless masks work in mysterious ways

​The media has overlooked the most important lesson in President Donald John Trump's defeat of covid 19. Early detection.

He learned of it on Thursday. He had a second test to confirm it. he went to the hospital on Friday, received treatment, and was home on Monday.

Upon his return to the White House, President Trump said, "I just left Walter Reed Medical Center and it's really something very special, the doctors, the nurses, the first responders, and I learned so much about corona virus.

"And one thing that's for certain: Don't let it dominate you. Don't be afraid of it. You're gonna beat it. We have the best medical equipment. We have the best medicines, all developed recently."

One of the tools we have -- besides some new drugs and employing old ones in new ways -- is testing, which saves lives because we can catch the virus before it settles in, gets comfy, and starts killing its host. Viruses ain't too bright. 

Of course, I am no doctor. I am at best a disengaged layman. This is a political blog run by a retired newspaperman in the boonies. But I do notice things.

The USA has the best breast cancer survival rate in the world because so many women have annual mammograms.

Another thing I have noticed is these masks may actually be getting the job done in a manner we did not expect.

Cloth masks won't stop covid and there is doubt about surgical masks. If masks worked, why would we need social distancing? Then again, there is no proof social distancing works.

But that does not matter. Wearing the masks and socially distancing have gotten a media-panicked public to venture outside again. That is a good thing because it helps develop the one thing that we know has worked against viruses for centuries: herd immunity.

The Mayo Clinic said, "Herd immunity occurs when a large portion of a community (the herd) becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. As a result, the whole community becomes protected — not just those who are immune.

"Often, a percentage of the population must be capable of getting a disease in order for it to spread. This is called a threshold proportion. If the proportion of the population that is immune to the disease is greater than this threshold, the spread of the disease will decline. This is known as the herd immunity threshold."

Well, if everyone stays indoors, you will never develop a herd immunity. And as long as people are too afraid to venture outside, everyone will stay indoors.

Ah, but useless masks and unproved social distancing give people confidence. Regular testing will prevent people from becoming too sick.

Like him or not, the president is correct. Covid 19 should not dominate our lives.

13 comments:

  1. I love all these "I play a doctor on TV" "experts" now wanting to de-fund Walter Reed.

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    1. My dad always wanted me to be a doctor. Also, I loved Ben Casey and was going to be a neurosurgeon until the C- in Chem 1. I think that is enough for me to venture a medical opinion.

      I'd go with the patient thoughts on the matter.

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    2. The math did me in on that aspiration!

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  2. I live in florida, we dont wear them outside. Or in pubs. We all had it in december.

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  3. The West coast was exposed early, we've had ups and downs but testing has show a lot more exposure than was forecast-and alot less sickness. our area has gone for 10 days without infection we had an influx of collegestudents. 2-4 a day after registration.Also the odd BLM protest.
    No Blacks just soy poisoned, puberty delayed basketweaving feminist studies majors. Two deaths. One fellow who was 85 back in march, and a local rancher who caught it a big gathering tha infected 300= people.
    He smoked with COPD. That was it.

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    1. Our county is in top four of fewest cases and tied for first in fewest deaths. Farmers, ranchers, construction, Outdoorsmen. No industry. Few people. Per capita we are still near the bottom.

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  4. The hole in that theory is a lot of people still aren't going out. Up where I am, restaurants are half empty at best.

    The real lesson Trump can teach is it won't kill you unless you live in a Democrat state nursing home where the gauleiter wants you dead.

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  5. The White House uses a 15-minute test that is 97.5% accurate for Positive and 98.5% for Negative. Each person that enters is tested with the same 97.5% chance. After 47 people have been tested there is a 50% chance that at least 1 person in that group has the coronavirus. After 300+ people there is a 99% chance that at least 1 person with coronavirus in that group.

    The fact that the President has gone this long without being infected is somewhat astonishing.

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    1. Yes indeed! The fact that so few of the entire government has gone this long without being infected is very astonishing. I wondered why for months.
      If as virulent as predicted it could have shut the whole thing down.

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  6. The U.S. House of Representatives still has no Covid testing procedure in place thanks to Nurse Nancy Ratched.

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  7. I was chatting with a cashier at Cracker Barrel two days ago. She told me that her 94 year old insulin dependent grandmother survived a hospital stay for covid despite not being given her insulin. I remarked that if she'd died from not receiving her insulin it would have been blamed on the covid. She nodded along as I said that and agreed.

    If Trump did nothing the leftists were going to hang every death around his neck.
    Having followed the government scientists advice they still do their best to hang every death on him.
    And in the end it's pretty much just a very bad flu season.
    Leftists aren't misguided. They are evil.

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  8. The shutdown has blocked herd immunity which is achieved by enough people getting the virus and or vaccines. Once we knew who was at risk we should have opened up. At risk persons should use methods to avoid getting it. We don’t panic over annual influenza nor should we. But we don’t test for it like Covid. I took the last nine years of flu case estimates from CDC and they range from a low of 9million to a high of 44million in the US. An average of about 80,000 new cases a day every day of the year or 160,000 for the six months of flu season. Now Fauci says we need to get below 10,000 cases per day before life can return to normal. Photos of Americans during 1918 pandemic show masks being used. But we have not experienced that again till now. So many masks being designed and being sold. I’m 74 , a retired pediatrician. ang I’m ready for vaccine when I can get it and ready to ditch the mask!

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