Recently in Medicine and Health Category

From Portland, OR station KPTV:

CDC test finds Oregon's youngest reported COVID-19 victim didn't have the virus
State health leaders listed him as the youngest Oregonian to die from COVID-19, but it turns out 26-year-old Matthew Irvin of Yamhill County didn’t have the virus when he died in July.

Family members of Irvin told FOX 12 they’ve been fighting for answers since their son died in his home.

New testing conducted by the CDC confirmed Irvin did not have the coronavirus when he died, according to his parents.

The family said back in July, Irvin became very sick and went to the hospital, where he was told he might have COVID-19. A test was administered to find out and he was sent home.

They are doing it to gather power, to keep us submissive and for money. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Of course, there were some underlying conditions - from The Detroit News:

Michigan infant with COVID died from serious birth defect
The immediate cause of death for a 2-month-old the state's top medical doctor said died because of COVID-19 was a birth defect called gastroschisis, a condition in which a baby is born with intestines located outside the body, according to the Milwaukee County Medical Examiner.

Necrotizing enterocolitis and COVID-19 also were listed as other conditions on Hudson King's death certificate, according to a medical examiner report obtained by The Detroit News.

Hudson was announced, but not named by the state, as Michigan's youngest victim of COVID-19 Wednesday, but no details were given as to the infant's gender, hometown or any underlying conditions.

"I was so saddened to hear this week of a 2-month-old baby in Michigan who died because of COVID-19," Chief Medical Executive Joneigh Khaldun announced at the press conference.

The M.E. is politicizing this - following the narrative that COVID is fatal to a wide swath of the population and that we need to shut down the economy to combat it. This guy is causing needless panic and fear and really needs to be held accountable for his words.

Being born with gastroschisis is survivable these days but Hudson's intestines had already started to rot - the necrotizing enterocolitis. From Infogalactic: "and is the second most common cause of morbidity in premature infants"

It is also worthy to note the following: "There is an increased incidence [...of gastroschisis...] when the mother has a history of cigarette smoking, use of recreational drugs, alcohol consumption, low body mass index, or increased frequency of genitourinary infection."

A very tragic event but not due to the Wuhan Flu. Hudson's mom is not taking this well:

Hudson's mother, Brooke Granquist, declined to comment when reached by The News on Friday. But in a Facebook post that has since been removed, Granquist expressed her anger over the state attributing her child's death to COVID-19.

“I am angry. I am so ANGRY. If you heard the state of Michigan report on COVID this morning, you may have heard a 2 month old baby died of COVID. I need everyone to know that Hudson did NOT die of COVID," she wrote.

"According to the autopsy (which has been told to me via phone but not yet by mail), Hudson suffered a bowel perforation and an infection because of it... this is directly related to his gastroschisis. I am so angry. I am angry at the government for skewing numbers and making my baby a statistic to try and benefit their agenda while my family is suffering."

Glad that she is standing up to the deep state. This needs to get to a wider audience.

Governor Inslee owns this - he needs to be voted out of office this November. From The Seattle Times:

As we near 6 months in Washington’s stay-home order, mental health experts warn that things may get worse
You think it’s been bad so far, right?

You’ve been self-isolating, working in your pajamas and ordering everything online. Every trip to the grocery store is a white-knuckle adventure through a claustrophobic hellscape, recently under “Blade Runner” skies, and it’s hard to carry on normal, everyday conversations with … anybody.

You think it can’t get any worse as we approach and pass 200,000 COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. Well, we’re here with some bad news: just wait. We’re about to hit rock bottom.

Sept. 23 will mark exactly six months since Gov. Jay Inslee first issued the stay-home order to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic. Since then, economic woes, the stress of social justice protests against police brutality, divisive national politics, and now devastating wildfires that have killed dozens and fouled our air have piled up, deepening the strain on every one of us.

The stress is tremendous.

“Nobody is immune from this,” said Kira Mauseth, one of Washington state’s top behavioral health officials. “Nobody.”

Throw in the start of the new school year, the coming election, the usual onset of seasonal affective disorder and what surely will be an unusually stressful holiday season, and we have a unique set of circumstances swirling together just as we are about to hit a communal low emotionally, says Mauseth, a practicing clinical psychologist and Seattle University instructor who is co-lead of the state Department of Health’s (DOH) Behavioral Health Strike Team.

That’s because, as the six-month mark of the stay-home order approaches, we’ve already begun the transition from the “honeymoon” phase of our emotional response to the pandemic and are rapidly moving toward “disillusionment.” This is the fight-or-flight stage and, emotionally speaking, we’re constantly scanning the horizon for danger. Next up, a potential second wave of the virus when cold weather returns.

For Washingtonians, the timing couldn’t be worse. The state says as many as 3 million state residents will experience “clinically significant” behavioral health symptoms.

None of this was ever needed. It is all about controling the population and getting the Orange Man out of the White House. Countries like Sweden did nothing and the infection rates are droping now that everyone has immunity. It is a bad flu - nothing more, nothing less.

From My Penseive:

Good question - from My Penseive:

China lost face when the Wuhan Flu escaped the lab. They do not want to have the nation of China associated with the SARS-CoV-2 virus despite a long-standing tradition of naming diseases after the places they were first identified. Think Spanish Flu, German Measles, Legionnaire’s Disease, Ebola, Zika Fever, Lassa Fever, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), Lyme Disease, West Nile Virus, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, etc...
I could go on but you get the general idea.

Now this - from Zero Hedge:

Twitter Suspends Account Of Chinese Scientist Who Published Paper Alleging Covid Was Created In Wuhan Lab
On Sunday afternoon we asked how long before the twitter account of the "rogue" Chinese virologist, Dr. Li-Meng Yan, who yesterday "shocked" the world of establishment scientists and other China sycophants, by publishing a "smoking gun" scientific paper demonstrating that the Covid-19 virus was manmade, is "silenced."

We now have the answer: less than two days. A cursory check of Dr Yan's twitter page reveals that the account has been suspended as of this moment.

The suspension took place shortly after Dr Yan had accumulated roughly 60,000 followers in less than 48 hours. The snapshot below was taken earlier in the day precisely in anticipation of this suspension.

It was not immediately clear what justification Twitter had to suspend the scientist who, to the best of our knowledge, had just 4 tweets as of Tuesday morning none of which violated any stated Twitter policies, with the only relevant tweet being a link to her scientific paper co-written with three other Chinese scientists titled "Unusual Features of the SARS-CoV-2 Genome Suggesting Sophisticated Laboratory Modification Rather Than Natural Evolution and Delineation of Its Probable Synthetic Route" which laid out why the Wuhan Institute of Virology had created the covid-19 virus.

While we appreciate that Twitter may have experienced pressure from either China, or the established scientist community, to silence Dr Yan for proposing a theory that flies in the face of everything that has been accepted as undisputed gospel - after all Twitter did just that to us - we are confident that by suspending her account, Jack Dorsey has only added more fuel to the fire of speculations that the covid virus was indeed manmade (not to mention countless other tangential conspiracy theories).

If Yan was wrong, why not just let other scientists respond in the open to the all too valid arguments presented in Dr. Yan's paper? Isn't that what "science" is all about? Why just shut her up?

The Streisand Effect in full play. The paper can be found here: Unusual Features of SARS-CoV-2 Genome Sugesting...

From the University of Pittsburgh:

Pitt Scientists Discover Tiny Antibody Component That is Highly Effective in Preventing and Treating SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Animal Models
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine scientists have isolated the smallest biological molecule to date that completely and specifically neutralizes the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which is the cause of COVID-19. This antibody component, which is 10 times smaller than a full-sized antibody, has been used to construct a drug—known as Ab8—for potential use as a therapeutic and prophylactic against SARS-CoV-2.

The researchers report today in the journal Cell that Ab8 is highly effective in preventing and treating SARS-CoV-2 infection in mice and hamsters. Its tiny size not only increases its potential for diffusion in tissues to better neutralize the virus, but also makes it possible to administer the drug by alternative routes, including inhalation. Importantly, it does not bind to human cells—a good sign that it won’t have negative side-effects in people.

Very cool - all of these crash research programs will have wonderful spin-off's for other diseases.

Not being reported by most media of course. From FOX News:

Trump signs executive order to lower drug prices in fight against Big Pharma
President Trump signed an executive order Sunday to lower the cost of prescription drugs, he revealed on Twitter.

Trump announced that the aim of the order is to reduce prices to give America “the same low price Big Pharma gives to other countries.”

From his twitter account - the announcement:

President Obama could have done this just as easily with his pen and his phone. Didn't though...

From Disrn:

Massive study finds 50% increase in autism among children whose mothers used marijuana while pregnant
A recent analysis of more than 500,000 Canadian mothers and their children revealed a 50% increase in the risk of autism in kids whose mothers had used marijuana while pregnant, according to a report published Monday in Nature Medicine.

Daniel Corsi, the study's lead author and adjunct professor at the University of Ottawa, and his colleagues parsed data from all Ontario births occurring from 2007 to 2012.

The 503,065 children analyzed — 3,148 of whom had mothers that had used cannabis while pregnant — were followed for an average of seven years. Exactly 7,125 were diagnosed with varying levels of autism.

Researchers found that the rate of autism diagnoses among children with in utero cannabis exposure was 2.2%. Of those whose mothers did not use the drug during pregnancy, only 1.4% were diagnosed with autism.

Really good sample size so there should be no question. Pot is not benign - it is a powerful drug. Tip of the hat to Peter Grant for the link.

It seems that there are not very many cases of the Wuhan Flu in Africa. Hmmm. From NOQ Report:

Dr. Simone Gold has a simple explanation for Africa’s mild coronavirus toll
When the COVID-19 pandemic started spreading across the world, many scientists were most concerned about developing countries like India and Brazil as well as the entire continent of Africa. Projections indicated these areas would be hit hardest because of high population density in poor areas preventing social distancing. Their predictions came true for India and Brazil, but Africa has remained conspicuously lightly affected by the disease.

Every bit of speculation reported from scientists in a recent NY Post article was tempered with notes of speculation. They had some ideas, but none of them made complete sense and often contradicted other factors. In short, nobody seems to know why Africa has apparently dodged the coronavirus bullet for the most part. Nobody, that is, other than Dr. Simone Gold. Her answer was simple, but it’s easy to see why politically motivated scientists would have missed the possible reason altogether.

Makes a lot of sense to me.

A perfect example of the sloppiness behind the promotion of the Wuhan Flu as a political tool.
From Cleveland, OH station WKYC:

Tennessee woman who passed away 6 months ago gets letter saying she is COVID-19 positive
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A Shelby County man questions what is going on at the Shelby County Health Department.

His mother died six months ago, but the health department just sent her a letter saying she is COVID-19 positive.

Troy Whittington said he was surprised when he opened the letter this week from the Shelby County Health Department. He knew what was in that letter was false.

"I'm just having a hard time understanding how they can say someone has COVID-19 when they are not even alive," said Whittington.

Not only that, she will be voting a straight Democrat ticket in November.

The stuff works, has been around for a long time and is cheap. Big Pharma hate this. The people promoting the Wuhan Flu shutdown hate this.
Looking at who hates this should give you an idea of who needs to be removed from power.
Here is a chart that shows the results of eary use by nation:

From American Thinker:

Charts compare COVID deaths in countries that used hydroxychloroquine early and those that didn't
Monday, the Family Foundation of Virginia reported that the State health commissioner, Dr. Norman Oliver, intends to use his emergency powers to force every Virginian to receive a COVID-19 vaccine when one becomes available. 

Virginia's Gov. Northam (survivor of his infamous blackface scandal) has taken no official policy position so far.  However, the Democrat-controlled Legislature has killed at least three Republican bills that would have offered a way for someone with a sincere religious objection to be exempt from any COVID-19 vaccine mandate.  The most recent casualty, H.B. 5082, "would've ensured that Virginia didn't mandate a COVID-19 vaccine if it is derived from human fetal tissue, changes the RNA or DNA of a person, or was not first tested on laboratory animals before being tested on humans."  These actions triggered a "March against Mandates" in Richmond on September 2 by Virginia Freedom Keepers.

But wait — there's more politics brewing.  Yesterday's Richmond Times-Dispatch published a letter from a former FDA medical officer.  He agrees that using convalescent blood plasma from patients who developed antibodies works, and he cited its many successes dating back to the 1918 flu pandemic.  However, he claims that the number of people tested this time was "far out of proportion to the number needed for safety analyses."   He also objects that authorities in the FDA and Donald Trump made overly optimistic claims that it could result in a 35% reduction in mortality and said this type of politics undermines the FDA's credibility. 

Meanwhile, the left's successful war against hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) rages on.  The subject was brought up repeatedly by highly respected Yale epidemiology professor Dr. Harvey Risch, this time when interviewed by Mark Levin on Fox News a couple of Sundays ago.  Dr. Risch is adamant that HCQ can significantly reduce mortality if administered early to prevent the potentially deadly inflammation reaction that is especially common in older patients and those with comorbidities.  Thousands could have been saved.  PragerU posted similar claims by several frontline doctors here.  The left's cancel culture got some of these same doctors fired. 

It has been my personal quest to find some hard proof that compares countries that have widely used HCQ early in the pandemic with those who did not.  Some key data finally emerged from a site devoted to climate change in a 23 August article by Leo Goldstein titled "Hydroxychloroquine in COVID-19 Treatment, Actual Usage in the USA."  The needed comparisons were found in one of the author's references, titled Early treatment with hydroxychloroquine: a country-based analysis.

Much more at the site - nice to see the data in one place. This is really serious and shows the deep state in its true colors.

Truth.

An example from My Penseive:

From the New York Times no less:

Your Coronavirus Test Is Positive. Maybe It Shouldn’t Be
Some of the nation’s leading public health experts are raising a new concern in the endless debate over coronavirus testing in the United States: The standard tests are diagnosing huge numbers of people who may be carrying relatively insignificant amounts of the virus.

Most of these people are not likely to be contagious, and identifying them may contribute to bottlenecks that prevent those who are contagious from being found in time.

Hmmm... But then, being the chief narrative-slinger for the progressive left they go on:

But researchers say the solution is not to test less, or to skip testing people without symptoms, as recently suggested by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Instead, new data underscore the need for more widespread use of rapid tests, even if they are less sensitive.

We need the numbers to be high - even if they are false positives. A bit more on how this all works:

The PCR test amplifies genetic matter from the virus in cycles; the fewer cycles required, the greater the amount of virus, or viral load, in the sample. The greater the viral load, the more likely the patient is to be contagious.

This number of amplification cycles needed to find the virus, called the cycle threshold, is never included in the results sent to doctors and coronavirus patients, although it could tell them how infectious the patients are.

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.

On Thursday, the United States recorded 45,604 new coronavirus cases, according to a database maintained by The Times. If the rates of contagiousness in Massachusetts and New York were to apply nationwide, then perhaps only 4,500 of those people may actually need to isolate and submit to contact tracing.

The guy who invented PCR is a lot of fun - his autobiography: Dancing Naked in the Mind Field
Website here: Dr. Kary Banks Mullis
He was working on a fascinating idea:  Altermune - Chemically Programmable Immunity
Sadly, he passed away at 74 last year.

The Wuhan flu is going to kill us all. There was a motorcycle rally at Sturgis a few weeks ago. Looks like a lot of fun. About 500,000 people. Half a million. All the media were saying that this would be an optimal opertunity for COVID to be spread. It was. CNN has the facts:

Experts feared the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally could be a superspreading event. More than 70 coronavirus cases are already linked to it
More than 70 Covid-19 cases have now been linked to an event that drew thousands of tourists to a small South Dakota city earlier this month, CNN surveys of state health departments show.

The annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is a 10-day event that usually brings about 500,000 people to the city. This year, the rally attracted attendees on more than 460,000 vehicles, according to the state's transportation department.

Experts feared the rally, which drew people from all over the United States -- including coronavirus hotspots -- had the potential to become to become a spreading event, not just in the state but across the country.

500,000 and 70? We are looking at 0.00139%

Granny lock the door and bar the windows. We got ourselves an epidemic on our hands. (snoring sounds)

An excellent analysis of the fatalities from the Wuhan flu - Sweden was right. New York State was wrong.
From the Mises Institute:

Why Americans Should Adopt the Sweden Model on Covid-19
Figure 1 illustrates the daily mortality attributed to covid-19 in Sweden, New York, Illinois, and Texas. The figure plots the daily number of deaths per million population. This figure illustrates the rise and fall of deaths from covid-19 in four different policy environments. The data were obtained from Worldometer.

Sweden: The Control Group
Sweden (blue dots) has served as a control group to compare policies intended to decrease deaths from covid-19. Sweden has been unfairly criticized for its policy despite having an outcome more favorable than places with authoritarian lockdown policies. Sweden did not close its schools. Other than stopping gatherings of more than fifty people, the Swedish government left decisions of closing businesses, using masks, and social distancing to the Swedish people. The government encouraged the use of masks and social distancing, but there were no requirements and there were no penalties for those who declined to follow the advice. Mortality attributed to covid-19 hit a peak value of 11.38 deaths per day per million population on April 8, 2020. This mortality was matched on April 15, and mortality has decreased since then. Daily mortality has been less than one death per day per million population for the previous eighteen days. Cases are very low. For all practical purposes, the covid-19 epidemic is over in Sweden. Almost certainly herd immunity has been achieved in Sweden irrespective of any antibody test results. Testing is usually only for IgG antibody and the herd can become immune via IgA antibody or cellular mechanisms that are not detected by the usual testing. Whether covid-19 will reappear this next fall or winter remains to be seen.

New York: Locking the Barn Door Shut after the Horse Has Already Left
New York (brown dots) has been a catastrophe. On March 20, 2020, a full lockdown was implemented. Nonessential businesses were ordered to close. Workers in nonessential businesses were ordered to work only from home. Pharmacies, grocery stores, liquor stores, and wine stores were deemed to be essential and allowed to remain open. Restaurants and bars could only deliver to homes. In addition to the lockdown, nursing homes were ordered on March 25, 2020, to accept patients positive for the covid-19 virus in transfer from hospitals. On May 10, this order was changed such that patients had to test negative for the virus before being transferred to nursing homes, but the damage had already been done. By April 7, 2020, within three weeks of the nursing home order, a daily mortality of over fifty deaths per day per million population had been reached. This daily mortality rate was almost five times the peak rate observed in Sweden, where no lockdown was implemented.

Much more at the site - about the author:

Gilbert Berdine, MD is an associate professor of medicine at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center and an affiliate of the Free Market Institute at Texas Tech University.

New York failed. The Swedish model was dead nuts on.

Paper from April 22nd, 2015 in Science Daily:

Cloth masks: Dangerous to your health?
The widespread use of cloth masks by healthcare workers may actually put them at increased risk of respiratory illness and viral infections and their global use should be discouraged, according to a UNSW study.

The results of the first randomized clinical trial (RCT) to study the efficacy of cloth masks were published in the journal BMJ Open.

The trial saw 1607 hospital healthcare workers across 14 hospitals in the Vietnamese capital, Hanoi, split into three groups: those wearing medical masks, those wearing cloth masks and a control group based on usual practice, which included mask wearing.

Workers used the mask on every shift for four consecutive weeks.

The study found respiratory infection was much higher among healthcare workers wearing cloth masks.

1607 is a solid sample size - good p-value. Makes a lot of sense - bacteria like thrive in a warm moist environment and here you go keeping God's own petri dish a few millimetres from your nostrils taking in an aerosolized dose with every breath.

From America's Newspaper of Record - The Babylon Bee:

Study Finds Most Americans Trust Dr Pepper Over Dr. Fauci
A new study has found that far more Americans would trust Dr Pepper than Dr. Fauci.

While Dr. Fauci has made some questionable claims over the past few months, Dr Pepper hasn't made any erroneous predictions about the virus or recommendations when it comes to masks and other protective measures. So the soft drink has rocketed up the charts as the most-trusted medical professional in America.

"Dr Pepper has 23 delicious flavors that combine into a cool, refreshing taste that's just right," said Texan man Greg Bolar. "Dr. Fauci has none of these things. He can't even give you diabetes, for crying out loud."

"Dr Pepper has never let me down." He then cracked open a cold, thirst-quenching Dr Pepper and chugged it in one gulp. "Ahh -- that's good stuff -- and it has none of that nasty deep state aftertaste left by competing brands like Dr. Fauci."

Of course. Fauci is a hack. He has been a political critter for the last 50 years. Did good work at the outset of the AIDS epidemic 40 years ago but he has been coasting ever since.

Being that it is still 2020, I am not surprised.

United Press International:

New Mexico man in his 20s dies of septicemic plague
A New Mexico man in his 20s has died from septicemic plague, health authorities say. It is the first human plague death in New Mexico this year and the second case this year in the state.

According to the New Mexico Department of Health, the man lived in Rio Arriba County and died after being hospitalized.

And, of course, our bestest friend and trading partner - from the Express:

China bubonic plague spreads: Beijing orders second lockdown after new horror death
Sadly, a man died in the region's city of Bayannur from multiple organ failure after contracting the deadly disease that caused the Black Death. Authorities tracked the man's movements back to his village and sealed it off. This is the second village to be placed in quarantine within the past few weeks.

And:

Last Thursday another person died from the bubonic plague.

This was in the adjacent city of Baotou.

Not a good thing.

I can get behind this 100% - from My Pensieve:

They are grasping at straws - from the Alachua, Florida  Alachua Chronicle:

Local COVID-19 death certificates all show multiple co-morbidities
Alachua Chronicle has received information from Medical Examiner District 8 about 17 of the 20 deaths that have been attributed to COVID-19 in our county.

Quite the shopping list follows - a few examples:

One woman had already been in hospice for “management of her senile degeneration of the brain” and was admitted to the hospital for “evaluation of altered mental state and a fever” and “acute kidney injury that was likely due to sepsis.” She was transferred back to hospice 11 days later “for continuing end of life care and management of her COVID-19” and died 5 days after the transfer.

And this classic:

Another case at Shands, a 35-year-old male, was listed as a Dade County death from COVID-19: “[The decedent] was working on the roof of a home in Middleburg on 5/28. It started to rain and the decedent and his coworkers stopped working. Bystanders in the neighborhood and the workers on the roof observed a flash of lighting and heard a loud explosion, and several workers were thrown off of the roof. Immediately following the lighting strike, a worker on the roof observed the decedent collapse, fall off of the roof, and land facedown on grass. The decedent’s muscles were reported to be contracted and shaking, and caused the decedent’s body to roll over onto his backside. It was also reported by the workers that the decedent’s eyeballs were rolled back into his skull. Bystanders in the neighborhood observed the decedent on the ground, called 911, and started CPR until EMS arrived on scene. Following the lightning strike, the workers observed a large hole on the roof that appeared burnt. According to medical records, the decedent was transported via EMS to Orange Park Medical Center and was found to have spinal fractures with spinal cord transection, a skull base fracture, and pulmonary contusions. He was transferred on the same day to UF Health Shands Hospital for further management and was admitted to the surgical intensive care unit on mechanical ventilation.

He tested positive for COVID so the cause of death was listed as COVID. They want to keep us locked down until November and this is how they are justifying it. Nothing more than a political power play done by a party that has nothing else to offer.

Makes perfect sense to me...

And not for our best interests:

Interesting that this is coming from the Centers for Disease Control - horse's mouth and all that. From Breitbart:

CDC Chief Agrees There’s ‘Perverse’ Economic ‘Incentive’ for Hospitals to Inflate Coronavirus Deaths
United States hospitals have a “perverse” monetary “incentive” to increase their count of coronavirus fatalities, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)’s director Robert Redfield indicated under questioning from a Republican lawmaker during a House panel hearing on Friday.

Asked to comment on what Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO) described as the “perverse incentive” during a hearing by the House Oversight and Reform Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis, Dr. Redfield responded:

I think you’re correct in that we’ve seen this in other disease processes too, really in the HIV epidemic, somebody may have a heart attack, but also have HIV — the hospital would prefer the [classification] for HIV because there’s greater reimbursement.

So I do think there’s some reality to that. When it comes to death reporting, though, ultimately, it’s how the physician defines it in the death certificate and … we review all of those death certificates.

So I think, probably it is less operable in the cause of death, although I won’t say there are not some cases. I do think though [that] when it comes to hospital reimbursement issues or individuals that get discharged, there could be some play in that for sure.

According to Congressman Luetkemeyer, Adm. Brett Giroir from the U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Department has conceded that there is an economic incentive for hospitals to inflate their coronavirus fatalities.

Giroir “acknowledged that the statistics he is getting from the states are over-inflated,” the Republican lawmakers said.

Follow the money - people (and bureaucracies) will do amazingly evil things for money. Of all of the professions, I would think that Medical Care would require complete honesty. Guess not...

Some numbers for WA State - minor really:

Another proof that the Chinese Flu is actually a pretty minor problem - from Townhall:

CDC Director Compares Rate of Suicides to COVID-19 Deaths
Center for Disease Control Director Robert Redfield said in a Buck Institute webinar that suicides and drug overdoses have surpassed the death rate for COVID-19 among high school students. Redfield argued that lockdowns and lack of public schooling constituted a disproportionally negative impact on young peoples’ mental health.

"But there has been another cost that we’ve seen, particularly in high schools," Redfield said. "We’re seeing, sadly, far greater suicides now than we are deaths from COVID. We’re seeing far greater deaths from drug overdose that are above excess that we had as background than we are seeing the deaths from COVID. So this is why I keep coming back for the overall social being of individuals, is let’s all work together and find out how we can find common ground to get these schools open in a way that people are comfortable and their safe."

Roughly 146,000 people have died from COVID or COVID-related causes in the U.S., according to CDC data.

Only 146K deaths? About 0.05% of the population. You still have more to go to match the 2009 Swine Flu pandemic. Remember the lockdowns then? Remember the masks? Neither do I. This is even though the World Health Organization issued its first-ever Public Health Emergency of International Concern in April of 2009. Remember all of the criticism on how President Obama handled the crisis.

From The History Blog:

Anglo-Saxon eyesalve cuts swath through bacterial biofilms
One of my all-time favorite stories has an update. In 2015, microbiologists at the University of Nottingham collaborated with an Anglo-Saxon expert from the university’s English department to recreate a 10th century recipe for a salve purported to treat eye infections. The combination of onion, garlic, wine and bovine bile steeped together in a bronze or brass vessel was then tested on flourishing cultures of Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and found to be a MRSA-killing machine. The individual ingredients did nothing; the control batch minus the vegetable ingredients did nothing. The full salve obliterated 999 Staphylococcus cells in 1,000, both for in vitro cultures and in vivo on infected mice. Even a diluted version of the salve was a powerful weapon. It couldn’t kill MRSA, but it blocked the bacterial cell-cell communication it needs to damage tissue.

The results were exciting but the research was in its infancy five years ago. Now the team has published a new paper on the use of Bald’s eyesalve on a range of pathogens in biofilms, communities of bacteria that form a protective shield that is to all intents and purposes impossible to destroy no matter how many antimicrobials you launch at it. Most pharmacological studies of plant ingredients focus on isolating active compounds and using them against planktonic (free-living) bacteria cells which are easier to kill than biofilms. This study explored the antimicrobial properties of the mixture

This is major and the chemicals involved (bovine bile) are available as standard reagents from a chemical supply house (Sigma Aldrich - $50 for 25 grams) Links to the two papers (as well as the original 10th century source) are in the post and the first two are very readable and give the proceedure for making the salve. Interesting. I can see an order to Aldrich in the offing - something to keep in the prepper's arsenal.

Not good at all - he is not the saviour of the world. Not by a long shot.

From CD Media:

“The Next One”: A Truly Creepy Bill Gates Moment
Everyone’s favorite non-scientist is back in a new interview. Bill Gates, the cutthroat businessman who magically turned into a nice guy philanthropist, has something on his mind. Yes, the man whose many investments in pharmaceutical companies that are somehow all related to COVID-19 has spoken.

The interview is from June 28th, 2020. Gates and his handsome wife Melinda spoke to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, and in a long-ranging interview, shared their thoughts about pandemic preparation, what we’ve learned, and what to expect.

“We’ll have to prepare for the next one,” Gates says as he fails to fight off a coy smirk, “That, you know, I’d say is, will get attention this time.”

Gates has dismissed the “conspiracy theories” surrounding his overnight rise to the role of vaccine specialist, despite not having a medical degree or even a PhD in virology (like his friend Tedros Ghebreyesus of the WHO). But these are trivial concerns to Gates.

In the accompanying clip from the video above, Stephen Colbert interviews Gates, who floats a vision of a bio-terror attack. He then says, “Most the work we’re going to do to be ready for Pandemic Two–I, I call this Pandemic One…”

Wait, what? So the man who stands to profit greatly from a vaccine that he has been instrumental in developing, the man who gave presentations last year on how a coronavirus might affect the globe…is now predicting a bio-terror attack that he has already named?

 Must have read The Foundation Trilogy as a kid and nobody told him it was science-FICTION

From CNS News:

Trump’s Executive Order Will Drop the Price of Insulin Down to Pennies a Day
President Donald Trump signed four executive orders on Friday aimed at lowering the cost of prescription drugs, the first of which will lead to the cost of insulin dropping to “just pennies a day.”

“The four orders I’m signing today will be on the prescription drug market in terms of pricing and everything else to make these medications affordable and accessible for all Americans.

In a rational world, this would be headline news at the NY Times; CNN would have it on their chyron all through prime time; etc. etc. etc.

They keep on doing it - from West Palm Beach, Florida CBS affiliate:

I-Team: Deaths incorrectly attributed to COVID-19 in Palm Beach County
A 60-year-old man who died from a gun shot wound to the head.

A 90-year-old man who fell and died from complications of a hip fracture.

A 77-year-old woman who died of Parkinson's disease.

These are some of the deaths in Palm Beach County recently, and incorrectly, attributed to COVID-19 in medical examiner records.

The CBS12 News I-Team uncovered several examples in Medical Examiner reports of people counted as a COVID death who did not die of COVID.

We requested a list of all COVID-19 deaths in Palm Beach County from the Medical Examiner's office and received a spread sheet of 581 cases.

They were carrying the COVID virus but their death was caused by very specific other means. Still, a COVID death. Got to have those numbers to justify taking over the populace. They can't panic the proles if they don't have the numbers.

From Newsday:

Dozens of Long Island residents tested for coronavirus got false positives
Seventy-four Long Island residents tested for COVID-19 over a five-day period earlier this month received false positive results, according to Nassau and Suffolk counties.

Sunrise Medical Laboratories in Hicksville said in a statement that the “isolated incident does not impact any patients who received a negative result during that time or testing performed at any other time or by any other facility.”

The impacted patients were tested between July 9 and July 14, according to the lab, which added that about 1.5% of patients tested in that period were affected. Sunrise did not say which doctors or urgent care centers use their labs. It added that there was a "possible COVID-19 specimen contamination issue."

Sunrise didn’t disclose how many tests it runs in week, or how many tests in total were impacted by the false positives.

The Dems need high numbers so they can keep the lockdown going and crash the economy. Must get rid of Orange Man this November.

As with everything else, they have nothing to offer so they have to cheat.

I had posted before how COVID test results were bogus (100% tested / 100% infected) - now this from Sarasota, FL station WWSB:

Concerns arise as some receive positive COVID-19 results but never got tested
Coronavirus continues to spread quickly across the state. Plus, now, on the Suncoast, although testing has been made more available, many say there are some problems in really getting a handle on how much the virus is in our community.

It has nothing to do with being able to get tested, but instead the results. The quickest turnaround is about 48 hours, and the majority of the time, it can take about a week of finding out if you’re infected our not. However, the most recent issue is getting back results that aren’t even yours.

“I got a call asking for me, and they told me that I had tested positive. I was like, ‘Positive for what?” Then, the lady said for COVID, and I said, ‘That’s impossible. I never got tested, Ma’am,’” Mindy Clark said.

Clark had gone to the drive thru testing sight at Manatee Rural Health, but before she was able to get swabbed, she left the line because she realized it was for people with symptoms only.

“I told them they needed to take this off my record, and they said I had to prove it to them that I wasn’t positive,” Clark continued.

She tested negative just two days later, and also tested negative for the antibodies. Plus, according to many of our viewers, this hasn’t only happened to her.

Clark says if she and many others have been incorrectly identified as positive in the state’s system so easily, how accurate are the numbers that are released daily?

Yeah - the deep state needs high numbers if they want to perpetuate this scam. Lots of useful idiots out there in state government.

When the left goes so far, even the radicals are fed up:

I posted an infographic about building your immune system yesterday. Here is another option - been there, done that:

Tip of the hat to Daily Timewaster

This should make things perfectly clear:

So so true - the people who obsess about cleanliness and sanitation are the ones who are always coming down with something. Never fails. Going through college and starting up several businesses, I worked in food service (usually cooking) at night. There are some basic practices that are iron-clad. Beyond that, too many people fall into the trap of neurosis and obsession - a compulsive disorder and it is not making them safer, quite the opposite. The fact that they are always marginally ill with one thing or another does not wake them up, it drives them deeper.

Tip of the hat to Vern's Stories

Two days ago I posted this: Keep an eye out - playing with the numbers - COVID

Today, we have this from the Orlando, Florida FOX affiliate:

FOX 35 INVESTIGATES: Hospitals confirm mistakes in Florida’s COVID-19 report
The Florida Department of Health released its daily coronavirus testing report showing a statewide positivity rate of 11 percent, but FOX 35 News investigated and quickly noticed some shocking positivity rates.

Countless labs have reported a 100 percent positivity rate, which means every single person tested was positive. Other labs had very high positivity rates. FOX 35 found that testing sites like Centra Care reported that 83 people were tested and all tested positive. Then, NCF Diagnostics in Alachua reported 88 percent of tests were positive.

How could that be? FOX 35 News investigated these astronomical numbers, contacting every local location mentioned in the report.

The report showed that Orlando Health had a 98 percent positivity rate. However, when FOX 35 News contacted the hospital, they confirmed errors in the report. Orlando Health's positivity rate is only 9.4 percent, not 98 percent as in the report.

Much more at the site - there is also a 2:30 video with additional reporting.

The numbers do not fit the narrative so do they change the narrative? No, they change the numbers.

Take all COVID reporting with a grain of salt.

Interesting - from FOX News:

Chinese virologist accuses Beijing of coronavirus cover-up, flees Hong Kong: 'I know how they treat whistleblowers'
Li-Meng Yan told Fox News that she believes China knew about the coronavirus well before it claimed it did. She says her supervisors also ignored research she was doing that she believes could have saved lives.

Hours before she boarded an April 28 Cathay Pacific flight to the United States, the respected doctor who specialized in virology and immunology at the Hong Kong School of Public Health had plotted her escape, packing her bag and sneaking past the censors and video cameras on campus.

She had her passport and her purse and was about to leave all of her loved ones behind. If she was caught, she knew she could be thrown in jail -- or, worse, rendered one of the "disappeared."

Yan told Fox News in an exclusive interview that she believes the Chinese government knew about the novel coronavirus well before it claimed it did. She says her supervisors, renowned as some of the top experts in the field, also ignored research she was doing at the onset of the pandemic that she believes could have saved lives.

Lots more at the site - a good timeline as well as a telling story of how totalitarian states operate when things to not play out according to the narrative. An object lesson for us here at home.