Hopefully the virus won't be spreading in these "gatherings" over the killing of George Floyd.Too many of these people are not not wearing masks or physical distancing. Would make things much worse if we have outbreaks and more deaths because of this...

The latest Centers for Disease Control data show that the COVID-19 fatality rate is 0.26% -- four times higher than the worst rate for the seasonal flu over the past decade. That is dramatically lower than the World Health Organization’s estimate of 3.4% and Dr. Anthony Fauci’s initial guess of about 2%.

When the CDC projected 1.7 million deaths back in March, it used an estimated death rate of 0.8%. Imperial College’s estimate of 2.2 million deaths assumed a rate of 0.9%. The fear generated by the projections drives the public policy debate. The Washington Post headline, “As deaths mount, Trump tries to convince Americans it’s safe to inch back to normal,” were part of a steady diet of such fare. When Georgia opened up over a month ago, the Post warned: “Georgia leads the race to become America’s No. 1 Death Destination.”

The CDC currently puts the number of confirmed deaths at about 100,000. But even the “best estimate” 0.26% fatality rate is a significant overestimate because of how the CDC is counting deaths. The actual rate is fairly close to a recent bad year for the seasonal flu. And though public health officials have been transparent about how they are counting coronavirus deaths, the implications for calculating the infection fatality rate are not appreciated.

“The case definition is very simplistic,” Dr. Ngozi Ezike, director of Illinois Department of Public Health, explains. “It means, at the time of death, it was a COVID positive diagnosis. That means, that if you were in hospice and had already been given a few weeks to live, and then you also were found to have COVID, that would be counted as a COVID death. It means, technically even if you died of [a] clear alternative cause, but you had COVID at the same time, it’s still listed as a COVID death.”

Medical examiners from Colorado to Michigan use the same definition. In Macomb and Oakland counties in Michigan, where most of the deaths in that state occurred, medical examiners classify any death as a coronavirus death when the postmortem test is positive. Even people who died in suicides and automobile accidents meet that definition.

Such expansive definitions are not due to rogue public health officials. The rules direct them to do this. “If someone dies with COVID-19, we are counting that as a COVID-19 death,” White House coronavirus response coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx recently noted.

Beyond including people with the virus who clearly didn’t die from it, the numbers are inflated by counting people who don’t even have the virus. New York has classified many cases as coronavirus deaths even when postmortem tests have been negative. The diagnosis can be based on symptoms, even though the symptoms are often similar to those of the seasonal flu.

The Centers for Disease Control guidance explicitly acknowledges the uncertainty that doctors can face when identifying the cause of death. When coronavirus cases are “suspected,” the agency counsels doctors that “it is acceptable to report COVID-19 on a death certificate.” This advice has produced a predictable inflation in the numbers. When New York City’s death toll rose above 10,000 on April 21, the New York Times reported that the city included “3,700 additional people who were presumed to have died of the coronavirus but had never tested positive” – more than a 50% increase in the number of cases.

Nor can this be explained by false-negative results in the tests. For the five most commonly used tests, the least reliable test still scored a 96% accuracy rate in laboratory settings. Some doctors report feeling pressure from hospitals to list deaths as being due to the coronavirus, even when the doctors don’t believe that is the case “to make it look a little bit worse than it is.” That is pressure they say they never previously faced in reporting deaths from the seasonal flu.

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May 30, 2020
Hydroxychloroquine, Me, and the Great Divide
By Richard Moss, MD
I took hydroxychloroquine for two years. A long time ago as a visiting cancer surgeon in Asia, in Thailand, Nepal, India, and Bangladesh. From 1987 to 1990. Malaria is rife there. I took it for prophylaxis, 400 milligrams once a week for two years. Never had any trouble. It was inexpensive and effective. I started it two weeks before and was supposed to continue it through my stay and four weeks after returning. But I stopped it after two years. I was worried about potential side effects of which there are many, as with all drugs right down to Tylenol and aspirin. These, however, are rare. At a certain point, I was prepared to take my chances with mosquitoes and plasmodium, and so I stopped.

Chloroquine, the precursor of HCQ, was invented by Bayer in 1934. Hydroxychloroquine was developed during World War II as a safer, synthetic alternative and approved for medical use in the U.S. in 1955. The World Health Organization considers it an essential medicine, among the safest and most effective medicines, a staple of any healthcare system. In 2017, US doctors prescribed it 5 million times, the 128th most commonly prescribed drug in the country. There have been hundreds of millions of prescriptions worldwide since its inception. It is one of the cheapest and best drugs in the world and has saved millions of lives. Doctors also prescribe it for Lupus and Rheumatoid arthritis patients who may consume it for their lifetimes with few or no ill effects.

Then something happened to this wonder drug. From savior of the multitudes, redeemer and benefactor of hundreds of millions, it transformed into something else: a purveyor of doom, despair, and unspeakable carnage. It began when President Trump discussed it as a possible treatment for COVID-19 on March 19, 2020. The gates of hell burst forth on May 18 when Trump casually announced that he was taking it, prescribed by his physician. Attacks on Trump and this otherwise harmless little molecule poured in. The heretofore respected, commonly used, and highly effective medicinal became a major threat to life, a nefarious and wicked chemical that could alter critical heart rhythms, resulting in sudden cataclysmic death for unsuspecting innocents. Trump, more than irresponsible, was evil incarnate for daring to even mention it. While at it, the salivating media trotted out the canard about Trump’s nonrecommendation for injecting Clorox and Lysol or drinking fish-tank cleaner to combat COVID. It was Charlottesville all over again.

Before a nation of non-cardiologists, the media agonized over, of all things, the prolongation of the now infamous “QT interval,” and the risk of sudden cardiac death. The FDA and NIH piled on, piously demanding randomized, controlled, double-blind studies before physicians prescribed HCQ. No one mentioned that the risk of cardiac arrest was far higher from watching the Superbowl. Nor did the media declare that HCQ and chloroquine have been used throughout the world for half a century, making them among the most widely prescribed drugs in history with not a single reported case of “arrhythmic death” according to the sainted WHO and the American College of Cardiology. Or that physicians in the field, on the frontlines, so to speak, based on empirical evidence, have found benefit in treating patients with a variety of agents including HCQ, Zinc, Azithromycin, Quercetin, Elderberry supplements, Vitamins D and C with few if any complications. Or that while such regimens may not cure, they may help and carry little or no risk.

And so, the world was aflame once again with a nonstory driven by the COVID media.