For those who think that COVID-19 is just a typical flu, in the 30 days since March 16, 2020 when DHEC reported the first COVID-19 death, 105 South Carolinians have died from COVID-19. Compare the last 30 days to the annual death rate due to flu complications over the last decade. The below table was generated from DHEC’s website.
| Death Statistics for Residents of South Carolina | |
| Cause of Death | |
| Influenza | |
| Year | Number |
| 2009 | 36 |
| 2010 | 6 |
| 2011 | 25 |
| 2012 | 31 |
| 2013 | 56 |
| 2014 | 81 |
| 2015 | 114 |
| 2016 | 55 |
| 2017 | 110 |
| 2018 | 222 |
| 2009-2018 | 736 |
Fact: the virus has killed people.
We don’t know the mortality rate or prevalence or all of the risk factors. China has underreported. NYC has over reported.
We don’t know what actions are necessary to reduce its effects to a reasonable level, mainly because we don’t understand or don’t agree on what reasonable means. And yet we have stopped work — work that generates wealth and health and raises the standard of living of all the people of this planet. We have done so out of fear. We have shot first — at healthy people. We have disabled the engine that in two hundred years has lifted more people out of poverty than in all the rest of recorded history.
We have two generations of Americans who have become risk averse, whose life goals (if they even have any) are physical pleasure, comfort, a 401K, buying a beach house, and preserving their lives. They don’t believe in liberty or God or country. They sure don’t believe there is anything worth dying for. Their response to any threat is “better safe than sorry”, while assiduously ignoring safety’s cost. They would rather be wrong with the herd today than engage in critical thinking. They are willing to pay a great amount to avoid risk. They assume this is someone else’s money because it always has been. They are the dead wood and the “story” of the virus is the lightning. The world they were given is going up in flames while they watch Netflix.
The media’s incentives are all on the side of it being a plague. The politicians’ incentives are to avoid showing up in an October ad saying that the virus is a non-threat. It’s not that they are (with some notable exceptions) hysterical. Rather it is the fact that no one is willing to say that the emperor’s new virus isn’t a lot different from the old one.
I just finished reading the report in yesterday’s State newspaper about the six people who attended a funeral in Kershaw County who are now dead from COVID-19. I’m not a physician but it seems to me that COVID-19 is a lot different from the old one – the common cold, H1N1, SARS, MERS, EBOLA (you can’t say that we weren’t warned). It looks like the emperor’s new virus comes with a death shroud. I also remember that the politicians “shot” at the request of the healthcare system – not at those who are healthy. They may have shot from the hip but it was an attempt to give our healthcare system time to prepare for the anticipated spike in cases and to protect those who are seriously vulnerable to the virus. The medias’ incentive is to make the worst out of every story – both in stories about the virus and about the economy.
General thanks:
Tommy Stringer provides thoughtful ideas via this forum. Not many people and even fewer politicians do so anymore. Reading his posts and those of others enriches me. I thank them.
Specific comment:
(I lack Representative Stringer’s clarity of message.. He is more accurate with less ammunition than am I. Please bear with me.)
My objections to the Covid Virus policies are several but have a common stem — our ignorance. We don’t know the prevalence of the virus. We don’t know how many people have already had it and recovered.. We don’t know the mortality rate. We don’t know what precautions are necessary, are useless, or are not stringent enough. We don’t know why Sweden’s policies seem to be working as well as ours with less disruption. We don’t know if a longer flatter curve of infectivity will result in fewer deaths. We don’t even know if ventilators (the feared shortage of which being the primary reason for sequestration) are the answer.
We have relied on experts whose own opinions and recommendations have undergone great changes over the last three months. We have acted (under- or over- time will NOT tell) with limited information and even less consideration of the devastation that our actions may cause. If we’re tallying warnings, here’s one — long-term trumps short-term when it comes to damage..
More specific comment:
Humans like stories. Anecdotes move us.. Numbers do not. We will remember specific stories, such as the one about the funeral in Kershaw County that led to six deaths. We rightly consider this a tragedy. But let us move forward a year. Suppose a report tells us that the economic reversals stemming from the containment policies ended up causing the deaths of a million people in sub-Saharan Africa (no trade = no money = no medicine or food). Will we weigh the tragedy as being 166,667 times greater than the one in Kershaw? I doubt it.
To weigh out and compare misery seems heartless. And yet that’s what we should have done — weigh; measure; and above all, think long-term. What we should not have done is close down our country and our state based on insufficient information. We’re good at fear, not so good at statistics.
Lets get back to work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Facts from the CDC:
Cases requiring hospitalizations from the flu:
2018: 810,000
2019: 490,000
2020: Covid cases requiring hospitalizations: 62,000. Hospitals could handle 810,000 but not this?
False positive tests. Deaths attributed to Covid that were actually other causes: reported as such by new CDC rule to inflate numbers. Flu, pneumonia, heart disease cases mysteriously precipitously dropped.
Isolation of the general healthy public is NOT the answer. Herd immunity is. Vaccines are NOT the answer. They are part of the problem. Chances of contracting Covid exceedingly small. Chances of dying even if you do get it is about 1-2%, and that is overwhelmingly for people with underlying issues. We do NOT isolate a healthy population to prevent this. Nor do we destroy the lives and economy of the general population. See Dr. Suzanne Humphries excellent work on the subject .
BTW, why are abortion clinics still open and considered essential business??? Disgusting. Hypocrites that claim to be concerned with life.