COVID Tropes, a Summary

2023-01-25 • SEND FEEDBACK |
Related: ethics in medicine, gears of the machine, SARS-CoV-2 aka COVID-19 aka Coronavirus, The Brownstone Institute

re: ethics in medicine
re: COVID

xkcd: Meta Analysis

Good summary of the COVID fear porn “news”. Our local rag vomits out all sorts of variations of the stuff below, every week.

BTW, the FDA now wants you to get an annual COVID booster on top of the influenza vaccine scam. Follow the money.

COVID: The Game Is Over and They Have Lost

2023-01-23, by Robert Blumen. Emphasis added.

The Guardian on Jan 15, 2023 published the most perfect piece of new normal nostalgia that ever was or could be: Coronavirus: ‘People aren’t taking this seriously’: experts say US Covid surge is big risk by Melody Schreiber.

“Fewer precautions, recent holidays and subvariants have driven rise but boosters, masks and other precautions are still effective”

...Nothing could more perfectly demonstrate the inability of the COVID fear porn publishers to let go of the narrative. If the author didn’t have her own website, I would have attributed the piece to an instance of ChatGPT trained on every Guardian and New York Times article from the past three years.

The writer employs every single discredited covid trope at least once. I will list a few of the best, here... I have chosen a tabular form with a quote alongside the trope that it is derived from: 

Quote	Trope
“In the fourth year of the pandemic.”	We are still in a pandemic. It will never end.
“This is one of the greatest surges of Covid cases in the entire pandemic, according to wastewater analyses of the virus.”	The current wave is the worst wave ever.
“Covid-19 is once again spreading across America and being driven by the recent holidays.”	Super-spreader events and family gatherings.
“The Omicron subvariants BQ.1.1 and BQ.1 as well as the quickly expanding XBB.1.5 make up the majority of cases.”	Just when you thought we were over it, a new variant has emerged.
“With XBB, there’s such a significant transmission advantage that exposure is really risky – it’s riskier now than it’s ever been” in terms of transmissibility, Sehgal said.”	The new variant is more dangerous than previous variants.
“And the more the virus spreads, the more opportunities it has to evolve, potentially picking up mutations that make it easier to overcome immunity.”	The variants only get worse over time, never more mild.
“the winter surge, which is once again putting pressure on health systems.”“Williams is worried that hospitals are reaching maximum capacity.”“Health workers have experienced three years of burnout, disability and death, and some have needed to exit the workforce.”	The health care system is under pressure. It will probably collapse. People will be dying in the streets, unable to obtain care.
“Despite the high rates of Covid spread, hospitalizations have not yet reached previous peaks seen earlier in the pandemic, probably due to immunity … but that protection should not be taken for granted, he said, particularly because immunity wanes.”	Natural immunity does not protect you. Even if you are immune, you should still get all the vaccines and boosters.
“The severe cases we are seeing are probably at least somewhat avoidable, if folks make sure that they stay updated on vaccination, because that’s still the safest way to gain immunity.”	Vaccination stops the spread.
“You’re just fighting a lot of misinformation.”	Everything that you have read contrary to this narrative consists of lies by malevolent misinformation spreaders.
When Joe Biden declared the pandemic was “over” in September, he said, it probably stalled public enthusiasm for the new booster.	Happy talk about the end of COVID is dangerous.
“While vaccines are very important…”	All roads lead to vaccination.
“In New Hampshire, nursing homes will not admit those that they feel that they cannot staff to care for, which I think is admirable, but the consequence of that is that the hospitals are jammed up,” he said. Hospitals that might release patients to care facilities for transitional or long-term care will see beds filled for longer.”	The elderly in care homes are at risk.
“The share for children under four roughly doubled in 2022.”	Children are at risk.
“As Ray put it: ‘When we could be wearing a mask, why aren’t we?’”	Masks work to prevent respiratory viral transmission.

My favorite part of the piece is, “Yet because of poor messaging from officials, many people may not even realize the US is experiencing a surge.” I am one of those many people who did not know this. A surge of what? A normal seasonal flu that makes people feel a bit under the weather for a week? A bad cold-vid?

...

WIND: this piece reminds me of the verbal assault I endured 18 months ago over at the Mono Market in Lee Vining where I was not wearing a mask; a wild-eyed long-haired customer verbally assaulted me, including trailing me out the door, telling me I was going to DIE. That kind of nutcase is still around in droves, many still working as writers. Or are they just CIA stooges? Dunno. Of course, The Guardian has less credibility than the National Enquirer, and it lacks the amusement fun factor.

Here in San Mateo County California, psychologically crippled people wearing blue COVID masks can still be seen riding bicycles and hiking, driving in cars alone, etc. For some it seems to have taken on quasi religious overtones, for some a painful cognitive dissonance, and some must live in a separate reality—victims I suppose. Or maybe it’s just ugly people who like hiding their face?

Meanwhile over in New Zealand, the country has been crushed with COVID policies by an espeically evil mutated variant of AOC and Mussolini’s love child.