RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://amgreatness.com/2020/03/31/hockey-sticks-changing-goal-posts-and-hysteria/

There’s still time to find a balance between public health and the economy: Trump must find it before April 30.

Last year, Glacier National Park in Montana began removing signs that warned visitors the park’s gigantic glaciers would start melting away by 2020 due to global warming. Park officials altered other climate change flair such as brochures and displays to postpone the threat to sometime in “future generations.”

Like so many claims about the catastrophic consequences of anthropogenic global warming, predictions about disappearing glaciers were quickly memory-holed. And, as usual, the experts behind the flawed science that misled millions of people to believe their actions would cause the destruction of one of nature’s most awesome sights didn’t apologize. No scientist or government official even had the guts to stand up and say, “Oops, my bad.”

Quite to the contrary—prophets of nonexistent doom are often cheered as heroes no matter how many times they’ve been wrong.

Take Dr. Michael Mann, for example. The Pennsylvania State University author of the infamous “hockey stick” graph is still considered a god among the international climate change set; his graph launched the modern-day climate movement even though his work has been widely refuted by scientists and hacked emails showed how he and his fellow researchers manipulated data to “prove” their theory.

Now, we have the latest version of the hockey stick graph and it is related to COVID-19. The alarming visual indicates a huge spike in estimated deaths and hospitalizations in the United States from coronavirus infections over the next few weeks. Last week, a researcher at the University of Washington released a study that appears to serve as the scientific justification to extend the CDCs social distancing guidelines until at least April 30.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/04/virus-crisis-no-good-choices-just-bad-and-worse-bruce-thornton/

President Trump’s suggestions about getting some regions of the country back to work has provoked the usual hysterical hyperbole from the Trump-hating media. One assumes by now that squeals like Chuck Todd’s “blood on his hands” have become white noise for half the country, and so aren’t damaging Trump, whose handling of the virus 60% of Americans approve.

But beneath the usual partisan desperation and bitterness lies a common fallacy: That every political and social problem has a right solution known to “experts,” and only the willful ignorance and superstitions of “anti-science” conservatives prevents them from making the correct choice. The solution, as Barack Obama said, is “science-based policies” created by “experts.”

Take the policy of “self-quarantining” or extreme “social distancing,” which has shut down the American economy and put 3.8 million workers on unemployment. This policy gained traction when epidemiologist Neil Ferguson of Oxford said as many as 2.2 million Americans and 500,000 Britons would die because of the virus. In all fairness, he also said such an outcome was “unlikely.” But the sensationalist media, eager for bad news with which to tar the president, reported the number as though it were a scientific fact rather than an educated estimate thick with caveats. As U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams has complained, the media are too eager to publicize estimates “based on worst-case scenarios.”

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/03/political_furor_over_drugs_that_might_help_fight_against_covid19.html

Why would anyone mock a drug that shows promise?

Here’s what we’re dealing with:

“No U.S. city will be spared”
Fauci: Up to 200,000 Americans could die
NYC: Dead bodies being loaded on refrigerated trucks
Nurses die, doctors fall sick as panic rises on front lines
Trump extends social distancing through end of April

Why would anyone mock a drug that shows promise?  Chloroquine and its less toxic derivative, hydroxychloroquine, are existing antimalarial drugs thought to be effective in treating coronavirus.

Dr. Steve Kassapidis is a COVID-19 critical care physician in New York City.  During a recent interview on Fox News, Dr. Kassapidis told Tucker Carlson that he’s taking Plaquenil (hydroxychloroquine) as a prophylaxis.  Many other doctors in the U.S., Europe, and elsewhere are taking the antimalarial drugs in hopes of protecting themselves from COVID-19 and are prescribing the off-label medications to patients infected with the disease.

In a March 21 interview on Philadelphia’s AM 990, Dr. Anthony Fauci said, “Of course, I would try chloroquine on coronavirus patients.”  But despite the potential of antimalarial drugs to mitigate COVID-19, politically driven journalists are pooh-poohing them as ineffective treatments touted by a recklessly incompetent president.  Desperately hoping hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine will be a flop, mainstream journalists are ridiculing President Trump over his advocacy of their potential in the fight against the coronavirus.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/04/how_george_soross_marijuana_advocacy_makes_the_covid19_panic_worse.html

George Soros’s first major effort to reshape America was undertaking the legitimization of illegal drug use, especially marijuana.  Soros initially said his overarching goal was to promote informed discussion of drug policy.  But debate and discussion are not his style and were not his objects.  Instead, he used his resources to fund think-tanks, foundations, and public policy action groups that successfully muddled public opinion enough to change public laws, making illegal drug use legal.

In the early 1990s, the notion of legalizing marijuana in the U.S. was unthinkable and unacceptable.  The voices to legalize drugs were marginal and not in sync.  This changed in 1993, when Soros, who claimed that prohibitionist drug policies are wrong because they contradict his vision of the “Open Society,” launched a $15-million pro–drug legalization propaganda campaign that has made him the new darling of the media left.  Soros and his acolytes have garnered enormous press attention through a barrage of magazine articles, op-ed pieces, and television appearances.  By 1996, the slogans of “medicalization” and “compassion” joined “legalization” and “decriminalization,” as well as “nonviolent drug offender.”  All of these were shaping the vocabulary of the public dialogue.  Soros’s sponsorship provided the credibility theretofore lacking in the movement to legalize drugs.

https://pjmedia.com/trending/trump-destroys-connecticut-governors-claim-the-strategic-national-stockpile-has-been-emptied/

Ned Lamont, the Democrat governor of Connecticut, claimed on Tuesday that the U.S. Strategic National Stockpile of medical supplies is now empty and alleged that the state is now on its own in securing ventilators and masks to fight the coronavirus pandemic without the help of the federal government.

“It was disturbing today to find out that the national strategic stockpile is now empty. We did get 50 ventilators, for which I am very thankful,” Governor Lamont said. “For now we are on our own. For now, we are doing the best to scour the globe for PPE (personal protective equipment) as best we can.”

This, it turns out, was not true. President Trump was asked about Lamont’s claim during the Coronavirus Task Force press briefing, and he explained what’s really happening.

“It’s not emptied, let me explain something. What we’re doing […] rather than having it brought into the stockpile, where appropriate […] we’re trying to have supplies sent directly to the states,” Trump explained. “Because we don’t want medical supplies coming into warehouses all over the place and then we take them from there and bring them to another warehouse. So we’re having them brought, ideally, from the manufacturer directly to the hospital or the state where it’s going.”

https://thefederalist.com/2020/03/30/its-not-the-federal-governments-fault-new-york-doesnt-have-more-ventilators-its-andrew-cuomos/

While New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo blames the president and the federal government for the lack of beds and ventilators in his state, the power to determine the number of these critical medical supplies in New York hospitals falls squarely upon the shoulders of the governor.

During a Tuesday press conference, Cuomo lashed out at the federal government for not sending enough ventilators as the Wuhan coronavirus continues to rattle the state. “Four hundred ventilators? I need 30,000 ventilators,” Cuomo said. “You want a pat on the back for sending 400 ventilators?” The state is projecting it will need approximately 140,000 beds in 14 to 21 days, which is higher than its previous estimation of 110,000 beds by early to mid-May.

However, New York, along with 35 other states and the District of Columbia, have in place what are known as certificate-of-need (CON) laws. According to Reason, “Their stated purpose is to keep hospitals from overspending, and thus from having to charge higher prices to make up for unnecessary outlays of capital costs. But in practice, they mean hospitals must get a state agency’s permission before offering new services or installing a new medical technology. Depending on the state, everything from the number of hospital beds to the installation of a new MRI machine could be subject to CON review.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-shows-off-new-rapid-coronavirus-test-kit-in-rose-garden-as-hhs-says-1-million-americans-tested/ar-BB11VVeG

President Trump announced on Monday that the United States has tested over 1 million people for the coronavirus as he unveiled a new rapid test kit for the contagion that is supposed to give results within five minutes.

Speaking from the White House’s Rose Garden, Trump said that reaching 1 million tests is “a milestone in our war against the coronavirus.”

Trump’s announcement on the new rapid test kit from Abbott Laboratories comes just days after the company said that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration had given them emergency clearance to produce its cartridge-based test. The company says that its test delivers a negative result in 13 minutes when the virus is not detected.

Also during the press conference, Trump also announced that Ford is repurposing an auto parts factory west of Detroit to start building simple ventilators to treat coronavirus patients.

The automaker says that starting the week of April 20, it expects to produce 50,000 ventilators in 100 days. The plant in Ypsilanti Township, Michigan, would have the ability to build 30,000 per month after that. Ford also is working with GE Healthcare to quickly double production of a more sophisticated ventilator at a factory in Madison, Wisconsin.

Trump reiterated the need to practice socially distancing on Monday as experts warned that the peak number deaths from the virus is likely to occur sometime next month.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/us-covid-19-deaths-soar-past-3000-as-new-york-issues-appeal-for-medical-volunteers_3291978.html

More than 3,000 people have died from the CCP virus in the United States while over 164,539 cases have been confirmed, according to the latest data collated by Johns Hopkins University, which is tracking the global pandemic.

As of March 30, a reported 3,164 have died from the COVID-19 disease, with 914 of those deaths occurring in New York City, which has become the epicenter of the outbreak in the United States.

On Monday, New York’s Gov. Andrew Cuomo issued an urgent nationwide appeal for medical volunteers to join what he called the “front lines” as he and health officials warned that the crisis unfolding in the state is just a preview of what other U.S. communities could soon face, adding that the virus “doesn’t discriminate” and that no American is immune to the disease.

“We need to recruit more healthcare workers,” he told a briefing at a makeshift hospital at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in Manhattan. “We need to share healthcare professionals within this state and within this country. As governor of New York, I am asking healthcare professionals across the country, if you don’t have a healthcare crisis in your community, please come help us in New York now.”

“I don’t care if you live in Kansas. I don’t care if you live in Texas. There is no American that is immune … what is happening to New York is not an anomaly. There is nothing about a New Yorker’s immune system that is any different from any other American’s immune system. So in many ways, New York is just a canary in a coal mine.”