'The Idea of Herd Immunity Is Surging Again, and It's Just As Dangerous As Ever'
The idea of 'herd immunity' is surging again, & it's just as dangerous as ever. By Mark Sumner, Daily Kos, Sept. 29, 2020. - Excerpts:
- Dr. Scott Atlas joins Trump in spreading lies that will absolutely cause more people to die. WH News Conf. Sept. 16.
..The most horrible thing about this pandemic is not how many people have died, but how many people have died unnecessarily because of decisions made by Donald Trump. What may be even worse is that Trump is still making these decisions. He knows that if there was a national mask mandate, implemented right now, in a period of about six weeks the number of new cases would be so reduced that it might actually be possible to have kids return to school safely. Masks combined with rapid tests that should finally reach the market in quantity over that same period should make it possible for many sporting events to resume, for businesses to return to something close to normal, and for families to gather at Thanksgiving.
But for that to happen with anything approaching safety it has to start now, and Trump is not going to do that. He is utterly wedded to decisions he made explicitly because he thought they would result in more deaths in blue states.
Instead, Trump has found himself an “expert” in the form of Scott Atlas, a retired radiologist with absolutely no experience or expertise in infectious disease. Now, after having discarded NIH director Dr. Anthony Fauci, undermined Dr. Robert Redfield who Trump appointed to head the CDC, and sidelined even White House loyalist Dr. Deborah Birx, Trump is going to ride Atlas all the way down. And he may generate as many American deaths in the next three months as in the whole year up to now, because this thing is not over. As NBC News is reporting, a phone call between Dr. Robert Redfield and a colleague at the CDC made it clear just how the director of that agency feels about Atlas and the advice he’s been providing on COVID-19.
"Everything he says is false," said Redfield, and when discussing Atlas’ claims that the pandemic was all but over, the CDC director made it clear. “We're nowhere near the end.”
On CNN, Dr. Anthony Fauci made it clear that he was concerned, because the things Atlas says are “really taken either out of context or actually incorrect.” While Fauci said that he was willing to sit down with Atlas to talk through areas of concern, he made it clear that on the subject of masks —which Atlas has repeatedly disparaged—his position is firm..“Masks are critically important in preventing the transmission and acquisition of SARS coronavirus 2."
The reports come just days after Deborah Birx was reportedly distressed over the way that Atlas has taken over the coronavirus task force meetings and, with Trump’s support, shouldered everyone else aside. "The President has found somebody who matches what he wants to believe," said a source close to Birx. Birx is said to be upset that Atlas is telling Trump what he wants to hear about masks and social distancing, even if it’s all lies.
..But until a safe and effective vaccine becomes available, and even after, wearing a mask, maintaining social distancing, and the use of widespread testing is essential. The difference between having COVID-19 as a regular, endemic disease and having COVID-19 as a rare occurrence that doesn’t regularly spread across the population isn’t going to be through vaccination alone..Even as Atlas is bringing back the terrifying idea of “herd immunity,” new test results have shown that less than 10% of Americans have been exposed to COVID-19. That means that 90% of the population is still vulnerable to the disease. The rate of hospitalizations, heart attacks, strokes, nerve damage, heart damage, kidney damage, lung damage, and deaths from COVID-19 could all be nine times higher than they have been to date...
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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/9/29/1981786/-The-idea-of-herd-immunity-is-surging-again-and-it-s-just-as-dangerous-as-ever
Also, https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/09/29/1981524/-BREAKING-DOWN-A-TRUMP-CLAIM