Ist chuckle of the day.
First, foremost, and finally. We donât have a health care industry, we have a medical services industry where any aspect of societal benefit is purely coincidental.
We have a system whereby a broken leg can lead to bankruptcy and loss of oneâs home. We pay more individually and socially than we would with a âsingle payerâ health care system but have millions of people (the ones most vulnerable to the impact of the industry) who will fight any and all attempts to institute a system that puts health care above profit for a few.
The American âhealth careâ industry is a lot like congress, a good idea that has been so corrupted by mutual greed and profiteering that both are crumbling under the pressure they were intended to withstand.
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11 posts were merged into an existing topic: Information, Misinformation, Disinformation
A post was merged into an existing topic: Information, Misinformation, Disinformation
From NYT today (edited atâŚ)
The White House will wind down the coronavirus task force in the weeks to come.
President Trump said on Tuesday that the White Houseâs coronavirus task force would be shut down and replaced with âsomething in a different formâ as the country moved into what he called Phase 2 of a response to a pandemic that has killed nearly 70,000 AmericansâŚâI think we are looking at Phase 2, and weâre looking at other phases,â Mr. Trump said after he was asked whether it was a good idea to shut down the task force while the virus was still spreading through the country. He said that Dr. Deborah L. Birx, the virus response coordinator for the task force, and other top public officials would still be involved in the efforts to address the pandemic after the task force disbanded.
âThey will be, and so will other doctors, and so will other experts in the field,â he said, adding, âWe are bringing our country back.â
Administration officials have been telling staff members of the task force that the White House plans to wind down the operation in the weeks to come, despite growing evidence that the crisis is still raging.
The news that the White House was planning to end the task force came as the rate of new infections and deaths was falling in New York but was continuing to rise in much of the rest of the country. A number of projections suggest that deaths will remain at elevated levels for months and are likely to increase as states ease their stay-at-home ordersâŚ
Alrighty then, all squared away and Bristol fashion.
Could a Llama named Winter hold the key to a vaccine against the Novel Corona virus, or a cure for Covid-19?:
PS> Watch if Trump starts to hold Llamas on the White House lawn-
Hereâs a good story to illustrate why you canât let âOpen it upâ and let the âfree marketsâ âhandleâ this problem.
â Nearly half of the employees of a Utah County business tested positive for COVID-19 after the business instructed employees to not follow quarantine guidelines and required staff who had tested positive to report to work, according to a written statement from county executives.â
The free market open it up and let the consumers decide should of course recognize that this business should not get your patronage. Weâll ignore if itâs the only place you can get something within range of your lifestyle or where you are employed and focus on the bigger problem for consumers who would want to rightly avoidâ-you have no idea what business it is!
â⌠the Health Department would not release the names of the businesses or information about the nature of the services they provide due to privacy concerns.â
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Now I see why Sen. McConnell wants to make all businesses immune from lawsuits during this Covid-19 pandemic.
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Government action to limit liability of owners.
Thatâs government intervention, so not âfree marketâ. Yet the free marketers wonât likely mind a little compromise on their principles.
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Trump says popularity of coronavirus task force persuaded him to keep it
(WAPO 5/6/20. Edited atâŚ)
President Trump said Wednesday that the White House coronavirus task force will continue âindefinitely,â reversing course from a day earlier when he and Vice President Pence signaled that the panel would wrap up its work this month.
âI thought we could wind it down sooner, but I had no idea how popular the task force is until actually yesterday when I started talking about winding down,â Trump told reporters at the White House after signing a proclamation in the Oval Office honoring nurses. âIt is appreciated by the public.ââŚ
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(END)
Nice to know these vital decisions have been made on a scientific basis, and vetted by the best minds availableâŚthen reversed the next day.
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Itâs not surprising, the Administration floats a balloon, gauges reaction and then chooses the popular or least hated option. Thatâs a condition unique to this situation and there are other examples.
But generally, the Administration has to deal with a public utterance coming out of an interview or other setting where, instead of having options, they have to defend and otherwise make real what the President said.
Overall, itâs a lesson for White House reporters. And how they can avoid being used.
They likely wonât let him in front of the cameras for another task force briefing. Keeping the task force going is different so they will try to thread that needle. They know his performance at the briefings hurts his numbers.
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The story below would be a scandal with any other POTUS, With this one, itâs just Wednesday. Itâs a great example of why leaders shouldnât go around promoting unproven cures in the middle of an pandemic. Not only do you give false hope to people, you invite corruption, stock market manipulation, and cronyism.
Chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine were suggested by POTUS45 early-on as âgame changersâ. These drugs may prove useful. Tests are still ongoing. But they arenât game changers. Trials done in the U.S. have shown no startling beneficial results. More testing will be done, which is good. But they are not miracle cures
However, when POTUS45 and his cronies, such as Laura Ingraham and Rudy Giuliani, irresponsibly pushed these drugs in the media, they set up a situation ripe for corruption. A tenet of medical care is, First, donât make the patient worse. One of the tenets for crisis control is, First, donât make the situation worse.
Dr. Bright, a national leader in vaccine development, was pressured to buy drugs for the nationâs stockpile of emergency medical equipment from companies that were linked politically to the administration.This is the definition of corruption.
Because of POTUS45 parroting a news-bite he swallowed on Fox or elsewhere, and his cronies then backing him up and whipping up pubic sentiment based on false hopes, Dr. Rick Bright, a national leader in vaccines, was forced to make a whistleblower complaint. Yes, forced, because honesty and good governance are still standards by which many people choose to live.
Dr. Bright is now used less effectively than he could be, in the fight against the pandemic, and Congress now must take time to investigate corruption. A waste of talent and energy. Thatâs why POTUSâs shouldnât be announcing âgame changersâ. When youâre in a crisis the first thing is, Donât make things worse.
Ousted vaccine official alleges he was demoted for prioritizing âscience and safetyâ
(WAPO 5/5/20. Edited atâŚ)
A former top vaccine official [Dr. Rick Bright] removed from his post last month alleged in a whistleblower complaint on Tuesday that he was reassigned to a less prestigious role because he tried to âprioritize science and safety over political expediencyâ and raised health concerns over a drug repeatedly pushed by President Trump as a possible cure for coronavirusâŚ
âŚHe also notes that he clashed with his boss, assistant secretary for preparedness and response at HHS Robert Kadlec, for at least two years. Bright alleges in the complaint that Kadlec and others pressured him to buy drugs and medical products for the nationâs stockpile of emergency medical equipment from companies that were linked politically to the administration and that he resisted such effortsâŚ
⌠On a call with reporters earlier on Tuesday, Brightâs lawyers, Debra Katz and Lisa Banks, said Bright came under pressure from Kadlec to award contracts âbased on political connections and cronyism.ââŚ
âDr. Brightâs removal from BARDA was retaliation, plain and simple,â Katz said. Brightâs lawyers are requesting that HHS reinstate him as BARDA director while his complaint is investigated.
âŚBright asserts in the complaint that he resisted pressure from HHS political leadership to make âpotentially harmful drugs widely available,â including chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, which Trump has repeatedly heralded, and urged people to take both from his Twitter account and the White House podium. The presidentâs associates, including Fox host Laura Ingraham and Trumpâs personal attorney Rudolph W. Giuliani have also pushed the drug as a treatment for covid-19âŚ
Nothing unusual. Sweetheart contract deals are payback to the supporters of political campaigns that get their candidate elected.
Hereâs a late breaking story:
If this goes on until the âherdâ is immune (60-80% of the pop. & will be higher in the young) GOOD LUCK on recruiting!!
âCovid-19 partiesâ organised so that people can deliberately mingle with an infected person in the hope of getting their own illness out of the way.
Nothing in your post has any relationship to the facts of what happened. I think youâre smart enough to recognize that if you stop eagerly hunting out outrage propaganda and regurgitating it on Gcaptain. If you need me to direct you to where and why I can.
Virologist Lia van der Hoek (55) is conducting extensive research into an antiviral against Covid-19 - a race against the clock. Pale bright spot: âExtremely aggressive viruses die out quickly.â
You are a kind of explorer.
, I immediately switched back to the coronaviruses, of course, that is the only thing that virologists have to deal with now. Before cases were known anywhere in Europe, the virus was started to be synthetically imitated. That synthetic virus is located in Switzerland, but every virologist in Europe can have something tested. We share everything we learn. That is also necessary, international cooperation is urgently needed. In other times, as a scientist you can keep something to yourself that might give you an edge. Nobody does that now, it is all shoulders down. â
What do you notice about this virus?
âIt spreads remarkably quickly and if you grow it in a laboratory it is very aggressive to work with. The cells you release it on will be dead in two or three days. You can easily grow it. Not surprising, because it behaves quite promiscuous and not at all selective: it comes from bats, is just in an animal market, easily passes from person to person, the tigers of a New York zoo are already infected ⌠While the cold coronaviruses are not at all be easy to grow. You should almost beg them to do something with a cell. â
Can it disappear completely?
I do think it will lose its aggressiveness because almost everyone will come into contact with it in the coming years and we have our memory immunity. Partly because of this, it may become as mild as the four common cold coronaviruses we already know.
What can be gained from the confidence that it will go like this?
âMost confidence can be gained from the theory of evolution, Darwinâs survival of the fittest. Extremely aggressive viruses that kill people quickly are not the fittest, because they die out quickly. The strongest viruses are those that treat their host so mildly that it can continue to roam and spread. Under pressure from Darwinâs teaching, Sars-Cov-2 is likely to become a cold virus. I consider that much more plausible than that it develops into something very aggressive. â
Sars-Cov-2 is the name of the virus, Covid-19 is the disease!