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A Head Full of Coronavirus Research, Part 100

By February 5, 2021Commentary

Argggghhh, I have to find a new title.  Panic time.  Actually, I am good.  New series soon to be unveiled.  You might think the last of this series would be special, but you would be wrong, just more boring research on the same boring topics!

At the briefing yesterday, we were told not to do anything to enjoy the Super Bowl.  We were told not to travel because it is just so completely dangerous.  We have been told that we have to wear masks and social distance even if we have been infected or vaccinated.  Schools are still not open for a real education.  These Nazis are determined to never let go of control over our lives.  They have that attitude in part because all these measures have been so ineffective that they can’t risk ending them and seeing no difference in cases.  The fascists are already outraged that a state like Florida is doing so well with almost no restrictions, which makes the dictators look bad.  By spring, there is going to be increased conflict around the refusal to lighten up when it is apparent that cases are way down.  Here is my advice, have a big Super Bowl party with as many people as you are comfortable with.  Travel wherever you want as frequently as you want; I am.  And go to Florida if you can, it feels like normal, and miracle of miracles, on a population age-adjusted basis, they have fewer deaths per capita than we do.  How could that possibly occur.

Here is how delusional our supposed public health and scientific experts are.  This article is in Lancet and was written in regard to the Barcelona study on transmission.  (Lancet Article)   Here are the relevant quotes, the implication should be obvious:  ” Although the effectiveness of masks is well established, in the analysis of Marks and colleagues, self-reported mask use surprisingly did not affect the risk of transmission. Similarly, Ng and colleagues did not find an effect of self-reported mask use on risk of COVID-19 transmission in their analysis of contact tracing data from Singapore.  Rather than questioning the usefulness of mask-wearing policies, these results underscore the necessity of a multi-layered comprehensive approach to infection prevention and control.”

Let’s see, could you be any stupider or dense.  They are acknowledging evidence that masks didn’t make a difference in transmission, but lead in by saying it is well-established that they do work.  There is a reason why I call this blog The Healthy Skeptic and why I recommend that everyone adapt a healthily skeptical attitude.  Scientists are as inanely human as the rest of us, and because they think they are smarter, are even more prone to being delusional about what they do and don’t know.  There literally is no reason at this point to take anything any scientist or expert takes at face value.  Figure it out for yourself, you can, trust me.

This study from the British Medical Journal examined the effectiveness of various measures to limit transmission.  (BMJ Article)   Mortality was the primary outcome and 37 countries were included.  Only two factors, out of a huge array of health, demographic, economic and lockdown stringency ones, seemed to have a significant relationship to deaths, one was limiting international travel (hmmm, which President may have done, while being criticized for it by his successor and the preening Governor of New York, the butcher of nursing homes) and the other was tuberculosis vaccination.  Lockdown and other type measures seemed to have no effect.  Gee, who would have thought that.  Lockdowns not only kill, they don’t make a bit of difference.

One strategy for reducing transmission is reduce contacts by limiting people’s mobility; telling people to stay home, work from home and not travel.  This paper examined whether varying restrictions on mobility during the first wave of the epidemic actually made much difference in case levels.  (Medrxiv Paper)  Countries compared were Sweden, France, Columbia and the West Coast of the US, which actually should be considered part of another universe.  Sweden had a 10% mobility reduction, the West Coast 55%, and France and Columbia, 83%.  There was almost no effect on virus transmission of different levels of mobility restriction.  The authors attribute this in part to the virus already being widespread by the time the restrictions went into effect, but I don’t think that made any difference since we see the same phenomenon in the second wave.

This paper covered health care workers in the UK and people who lived with them.  It sought to ascertain whether transmission occurred from the health care workers to people who lived with them.  (Medrxiv Paper)   Antibody, not PCR, testing was used, so should be a little more reliable.  Although people who lived with health care workers who had CV-19 had a much higher risk of transmission, it still occurred in only 44% of the household contacts, at most, and likely a lower percent.  One of the mysteries of the virus, why so few people in very close contact with an infected person become infected themselves.  It must be some form of innate or cross-reactive adaptive immunity.

Antibodies and other immune defenses are found in tissues throughout the body.  This paper found that higher levels of mucosal antibodies (mucus like in your nasal passages) reacting to CV-19 were associated with lower viral loads and less serious disease.  (Medrxiv Paper)   The members of about 50 households were studied and the process and extent of mucosal antibodies.  There was high transmission in the households, including among children, but children tended to have fewer symptoms.

And saving the best for the last of this series, the whole reason I started writing on this was the obvious hysteria, delusional panic, herd mentality coronamonomania that ignored the consequences of our obsession with suppressing CV-19.  Those consequences, I am absolutely convinced, will be far more deadly than the epidemic and last for years.  This study finds evidence in nine countries for significantly reduced standards of living already.  (Science Article)   Nine countries from poorer areas of the world were included and in all the epidemic responses have resulted in a significant decline in income, and a rise in food insecurity and poverty.  This obviously afflicts the poorest most and the toll on children is simply devastating.  I don’t give a crap about what our progressive friends say about caring for people, they are damned liars, who care only about their own precious and pathetic ideologies and nothing for what actually makes a difference in people’s lives.  As long as they can work from home, get their groceries delivered and pay for their children to go to private schools or have tutors, they don’t even want to hear about what is happening to the rest of the world.  May they all rot in hell.

And with that, on to a new series.

Join the discussion 12 Comments

  • Al Gardiner says:

    Adieu old series… looking forward the the new one. Thanks again for all the hard work, Kevin.

  • Joseph Lampe says:

    Your readers may want to get the book:
    THE PRICE OF PANIC, HOW THE TYRANNY OF EXPERTS TURNED A PANDEMIC INTO A CATASTROPHE
    by Douglas Axe, William Briggs and Jay Richards.

  • Chris W says:

    Nice end to that series, Kevin. Continued thanks to you and keep up the excellent work! It is a real encouragement.

  • Cliff Hadley says:

    Congratulations on your 100th edition of “Head Full…” ! Who would have thought this mess would have gone this long? Your writing on the myriad research about, and dismal politics in response to, the virus has been a lifesaver for the many people who, like you, have been skeptical all along. One good thing is that no virus has been more intensely studied, and maybe that will pay off down the road on the medical side. But my greater concern is on the political and social side. Once we trade liberty for the illusion of safety, it will be hard to go back. And that’s truly sickening.

  • Sue mor says:

    Thank you

    You show the craziness of masks and lockdowns.

    Since the beginning I have said there is no proof either masks or lock downs help.

    Do you have a summary of your 100 posts and main evidence and conclusions?

    It would be great to have to share.
    Maybe an ebook?

    • Kevin Roche says:

      every now and then I do a big picture summary of what I think we have learned. The other thing is my presentation I speak from is online at youtube and probably summarizes it pretty well. i have thought about an ebook as well Thank you for reading

  • AesopFan says:

    Thanks so much for your series, but you should tell us what you really think about our elites and road being paved by their “good intentions” – 😉

  • Marcia Sielaff says:

    Time for Democrats to base policy on real science!

  • Alex says:

    May they – and public officials who fuelled the hysteria – indeed rot in hell.

    There’s a physician in York (Toronto) upon hearing about the ‘vARiAnt’ took to Twitter to summon the army of pant shitters to ‘step up their mask game’. And the comments were deliciously troubling. But among the madness stood one lonely, sober voice who said, “You people are all f*****g insane”.

  • Alexander says:

    “Let’s see, could you be any stupider or dense. They are acknowledging evidence that masks didn’t make a difference in transmission, but lead in by saying it is well-established that they do work. “

    Um, no, that’s a misrepresentation of the Lancet article and of the science here. Skeptical readers should read the cited articles themselves and not take this blogger’s word for it.

    Similarly:

    “One strategy for reducing transmission is reduce contacts by limiting people’s mobility; telling people to stay home, work from home and not travel. This paper examined whether varying restrictions on mobility during the first wave of the epidemic actually made much difference in case levels. (Medrxiv Paper) Countries compared were Sweden, France, Columbia and the West Coast of the US, which actually should be considered part of another universe. Sweden had a 10% mobility reduction, the West Coast 55%, and France and Columbia, 83%. There was almost no effect on virus transmission of different levels of mobility restriction. The authors attribute this in part to the virus already being widespread by the time the restrictions went into effect, but I don’t think that made any difference since we see the same phenomenon in the second wave.”

    Again, this blogger misrepresents the article. The point of the article is to argue that the way in which lockdowns are implemented could be done more scientifically. I write this with some chagrin, because I personally believe that while lockdowns do indeed help slow transmission (how could they not?), they do more harm than good. I think we should not have lockdowns, that schools should be open, with caution, and that people should do whatever they can to avoid causing a vulnerable person to catch the virus, including wearing masks in certain crowded situations – and not do so because it’s uncomfortable is selfish. That’s my personal view. But this blogger is misrepresenting the science. .Caveat emptor.

    • Kevin Roche says:

      Okay, it would be better if you would be more specific than just saying something is being misrepresented. Where in the Lancet article does it say something different than what I said. The very first paragraph specifically says that it is established that masks work. the body of the article then goes on to accurately describe the Spanish study as finding that mask wearing was not associated with less transmission; i.e. masks didn’t work if their function is to reduce transmission. I don’t think it could be clearer that the authors were just trying to whitewash the clear finding of the study. Nothing works like confirmation bias. I know masks work, so any study that says they don’t must be wrong. While the Lancet article isn’t quite that clear, that is definitely one reason it was even written. Go read the actual study they were commenting on and tell me how you would come to any conclusion other than that mask wearing was not a factor in reducing transmission. And the authors acknowledged that, just tried to wish it away.

      And again, what specifically are you possibly referring to in the Medrxiv paper, which also very clearly says, there were these different levels of mobility reductions in different places but they were not associated with different case levels. How did I misrepresent that? You may not like my summary of what the article says, you may not like what the article says, but it is in fact pretty clear that I summarized exactly what the articles say.

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