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undersized_post



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 12:10 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

pilight wrote:
Howee wrote:
pilight wrote:
An accidental lab leak has always been a more likely scenario than people eating raw bat meat.


I cannot begin to comprehend how you find that plausible. Possible, yes.
But it's not necessary to EAT the bat: just handling bats, warehoused in cramped, fecal/blood-laden conditions, all in close proximity to a crowded market? FAR more likely, imo, unless you can prove otherwise.


They've been handling bats and such the same way for a very long time without anything like this happening.

I have no trouble at all believing an error by a lab tech or even just a maintenance person who works there could let something they were studying out.


But this has happened before--maybe not with bats, but with other species. (ex: HIV.) Ok so yes, humans have been handling bats the same way for a long time. It's safe...until it isn't. All it takes is one unfortunate mutation (or series of mutation) in the virus's genetic code. Pandemics like this are statistical inevitabilities because of genetic mutations.

Do you think the HIV pandemic and the 1918 pandemic were also due to lab leaks? Assuming your answer is no, what makes this time around any different?


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PostPosted: 04/20/21 1:00 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

jammerbirdi wrote:
Howee wrote:
pilight wrote:
An accidental lab leak has always been a more likely scenario than people eating raw bat meat.


I cannot begin to comprehend how you find that plausible. Possible, yes.
But it's not necessary to EAT the bat: just handling bats, warehoused in cramped, fecal/blood-laden conditions, all in close proximity to a crowded market? FAR more likely, imo, unless you can prove otherwise.

pilight wrote:
The last administration was focused on the wrong question. "How did this happen?" should come after "What are we going to do about this?"


This! 1000X.


I think the last administration, led by Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx and the Surgeon General and the head of the CDC, was exponentially more focused on the ‘what are we going to do about this?’ question than they were thinking about where the virus might have come from. 1000x at least. Rolling Eyes


"The Last Administration" was 45's. Not Fauci's, not Birx's. THEY bucked "The Last Administration". But I'm glad you agree, the doctors were focused appropriately, despite "The Last Administration's" wrong-headedness. Cool



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 2:30 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Howee wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Howee wrote:
pilight wrote:
An accidental lab leak has always been a more likely scenario than people eating raw bat meat.


I cannot begin to comprehend how you find that plausible. Possible, yes.
But it's not necessary to EAT the bat: just handling bats, warehoused in cramped, fecal/blood-laden conditions, all in close proximity to a crowded market? FAR more likely, imo, unless you can prove otherwise.

pilight wrote:
The last administration was focused on the wrong question. "How did this happen?" should come after "What are we going to do about this?"


This! 1000X.


I think the last administration, led by Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx and the Surgeon General and the head of the CDC, was exponentially more focused on the ‘what are we going to do about this?’ question than they were thinking about where the virus might have come from. 1000x at least. Rolling Eyes


"The Last Administration" was 45's. Not Fauci's, not Birx's. THEY bucked "The Last Administration". But I'm glad you agree, the doctors were focused appropriately, despite "The Last Administration's" wrong-headedness. Cool


The last administration had Trump’s name on it. We are all very fortunate that he allowed such eminent figures in the field of communicable diseases to be there at the forefront of the administration’s efforts for as long as he did. At the points where their efforts and guidance became de-emphasized it was because Trump became more focused on getting re-elected or because people like Peter Navarro were tweaking the administration’s efforts according to their own political lunacy and/or instincts for greed and corruption.

But overall, the truth is, and of course this can’t be said publicly or one risks personal destruction, we were very very lucky with the overall response from the Trump administration. After the facts on the ground overcame his initial instinct to downplay the outbreak and his stupidity, there was a period where the effort by the administration ramped up and was on the right track for a very key couple of months. A lot of what turned out to be critically important was set in motion.

I don’t think Trump will ever be credited for Operation Warp Speed nor should he be. Absolutely could not have been his idea. But I don’t think the administration itself was disastrously lagging or following Trump’s complete illiteracy in the areas of public health or disaster response or any of those areas of sound governance in which he was indeed so very illiterate. I tend to think we dodged a bullet there.

Right now half of the country has received at least one vaccine. And I don’t know if you’re noticing but COVID-19 has the remaining billions of unvaccinated humans on this planet squarely in its more more virulent and more deadly than ever before crosshairs as we’re sitting on the brink of a global catastrophe that could rival 1918. But we here in the US will probably only be witnesses to that catastrophe as so many of us will ride out the worst of it fully vaccinated. Credit is due on that front alone if for no other reason.

And before you predictably deploy the world leading US death toll against my assertions here I’m going to say that there are REASONS why the US death toll has been the highest in the world that have absolutely nothing to do with whatever administration was in power when the pandemic struck. But I’m not going to go there.

But of course, Trump. Always, Trump. Rolling Eyes



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undersized_post



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 5:04 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

jammerbirdi wrote:
Howee wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Howee wrote:
pilight wrote:
An accidental lab leak has always been a more likely scenario than people eating raw bat meat.


I cannot begin to comprehend how you find that plausible. Possible, yes.
But it's not necessary to EAT the bat: just handling bats, warehoused in cramped, fecal/blood-laden conditions, all in close proximity to a crowded market? FAR more likely, imo, unless you can prove otherwise.

pilight wrote:
The last administration was focused on the wrong question. "How did this happen?" should come after "What are we going to do about this?"


This! 1000X.


I think the last administration, led by Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx and the Surgeon General and the head of the CDC, was exponentially more focused on the ‘what are we going to do about this?’ question than they were thinking about where the virus might have come from. 1000x at least. Rolling Eyes


"The Last Administration" was 45's. Not Fauci's, not Birx's. THEY bucked "The Last Administration". But I'm glad you agree, the doctors were focused appropriately, despite "The Last Administration's" wrong-headedness. Cool


The last administration had Trump’s name on it. We are all very fortunate that he allowed such eminent figures in the field of communicable diseases to be there at the forefront of the administration’s efforts for as long as he did. At the points where their efforts and guidance became de-emphasized it was because Trump became more focused on getting re-elected or because people like Peter Navarro were tweaking the administration’s efforts according to their own political lunacy and/or instincts for greed and corruption.

But overall, the truth is, and of course this can’t be said publicly or one risks personal destruction, we were very very lucky with the overall response from the Trump administration. After the facts on the ground overcame his initial instinct to downplay the outbreak and his stupidity, there was a period where the effort by the administration ramped up and was on the right track for a very key couple of months. A lot of what turned out to be critically important was set in motion.

I don’t think Trump will ever be credited for Operation Warp Speed nor should he be. Absolutely could not have been his idea. But I don’t think the administration itself was disastrously lagging or following Trump’s complete illiteracy in the areas of public health or disaster response or any of those areas of sound governance in which he was indeed so very illiterate. I tend to think we dodged a bullet there.

Right now half of the country has received at least one vaccine. And I don’t know if you’re noticing but COVID-19 has the remaining billions of unvaccinated humans on this planet squarely in its more more virulent and more deadly than ever before crosshairs as we’re sitting on the brink of a global catastrophe that could rival 1918. But we here in the US will probably only be witnesses to that catastrophe as so many of us will ride out the worst of it fully vaccinated. Credit is due on that front alone if for no other reason.

And before you predictably deploy the world leading US death toll against my assertions here I’m going to say that there are REASONS why the US death toll has been the highest in the world that have absolutely nothing to do with whatever administration was in power when the pandemic struck. But I’m not going to go there.

But of course, Trump. Always, Trump. Rolling Eyes


What a world you have been living in...

The man needlessly and insidiously politicized the virus -- which led and is actively still leading to more deaths than it should have -- and continually lied to the public -- in the hope that it would help win an election -- which he lost -- and also lied about -- which also needlessly and insidiously led to more deaths. See January 6.


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PostPosted: 04/20/21 5:11 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Yeah that’s all relevant to what Fauci and Birx and the CDC were doing on the coronavirus front. Rolling Eyes And we can never forget the role Jan 6th 2021 played in the administration’s coronavirus response last year. Laughing



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 5:15 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

jammerbirdi wrote:
Yeah that’s all relevant to what Fauci and Birx and the CDC were doing on the coronavirus front. Rolling Eyes


But it is relevant. Because it directly interfered with the public's receptiveness to Fauci and Birx and the CDC. (Edit: You can't credit the Trump administration for employing Fauci when Trump himself continually undermined Fauci and worked to destroy Facui's credibility.

You're forgetting the "public" part of public health. It's not just the science. It's PR strategy, messaging, communication, trust building.)


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PostPosted: 04/20/21 5:34 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

undersized_post wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Yeah that’s all relevant to what Fauci and Birx and the CDC were doing on the coronavirus front. Rolling Eyes


But it is relevant. Because it directly interfered with the public's receptiveness to Fauci and Birx and the CDC. (Edit: You can't credit the Trump administration for employing Fauci when Trump himself continually undermined Fauci and worked to destroy Facui's credibility.

You're forgetting the "public" part of public health. It's not just the science. It's PR strategy, messaging, communication, trust building.)


I’ll stipulate to the damage done by Trump’s politicizing the virus and what that did to undermine the best efforts of his own administration. I’m not defending Donald Trump personally. It only SEEMS that I am because you’ve been trained like our immune systems are trained by the vaccines to fight the coronavirus to attack anything that even appears to be presenting nuance in association with the pathogen known as Donald Trump.



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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17
undersized_post



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 5:48 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

jammerbirdi wrote:
undersized_post wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Yeah that’s all relevant to what Fauci and Birx and the CDC were doing on the coronavirus front. Rolling Eyes


But it is relevant. Because it directly interfered with the public's receptiveness to Fauci and Birx and the CDC. (Edit: You can't credit the Trump administration for employing Fauci when Trump himself continually undermined Fauci and worked to destroy Facui's credibility.

You're forgetting the "public" part of public health. It's not just the science. It's PR strategy, messaging, communication, trust building.)


I’ll stipulate to the damage done by Trump’s politicizing the virus and what that did to undermine the best efforts of his own administration. I’m not defending Donald Trump personally. It only SEEMS that I am because you’ve been trained like our immune systems are trained by the vaccines to fight the coronavirus to attack anything that even appears to be presenting nuance in association with the pathogen known as Trump.


For someone so high on your own stances towards things, you do a pretty poor job of explaining them to other people. Rolling Eyes I know nuance and appreciate it. But your argument is not nuanced---it is an irrational distortion of reality that fetishizes playing devil's advocate to win an imagined battle against so-called SJWs.

(Just a warning, I'm not gonna respond to you (or this thread) any longer. So feel free to say whatever about me from this point forward and I'll let it go unchallenged. Smile )


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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:00 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Now, do I think that Trump’s politicizing the virus and not fully supporting mask wearing and the influence he had on his supporters is THE story behind the high number of deaths in the US.

Hell to the NO I don’t. Not saying it had no bearing on the outcomes here but there were and still are much more relevant factors.

I live in Los Angeles. I saw with my own eyes the degree to which people on the westside who could not possibly be Trump supporters or believers comported themselves throughout the last year. I mean all the time. I lived with it. I stressed over it. I dodged it as if my life depended on it.

If I had to blame one demographic I would repeat what I’ve already said here. I blame young people. Initially, observing their behaviors I was convinced they were deliberately trying to kill older people who were then known to be taking the brunt of serious illness and death due to the virus.

But it wasn’t just young people it was the international affluence that also populates the westside. And the Latino population that serves all of us here in in the richest state in America paid the price with their lives. This was the second epicenter in the United States. We witnessed it and lived through it and we know how it happened.

And Donald Trump had nothing to do with it.

But the overarching reason the US death toll is what it is because a very large percentage of our population is significantly overweight. Obesity is the number one factor in predicting the severity of outcomes in COVID-19 cases.



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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17
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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:04 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

undersized_post wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
undersized_post wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Yeah that’s all relevant to what Fauci and Birx and the CDC were doing on the coronavirus front. Rolling Eyes


But it is relevant. Because it directly interfered with the public's receptiveness to Fauci and Birx and the CDC. (Edit: You can't credit the Trump administration for employing Fauci when Trump himself continually undermined Fauci and worked to destroy Facui's credibility.

You're forgetting the "public" part of public health. It's not just the science. It's PR strategy, messaging, communication, trust building.)


I’ll stipulate to the damage done by Trump’s politicizing the virus and what that did to undermine the best efforts of his own administration. I’m not defending Donald Trump personally. It only SEEMS that I am because you’ve been trained like our immune systems are trained by the vaccines to fight the coronavirus to attack anything that even appears to be presenting nuance in association with the pathogen known as Trump.


For someone so high on your own stances towards things, you do a pretty poor job of explaining them to other people. Rolling Eyes I know nuance and appreciate it. But your argument is not nuanced---it is an irrational distortion of reality that fetishizes playing devil's advocate to win an imagined battle against so-called SJWs.

(Just a warning, I'm not gonna respond to you (or this thread) any longer. So feel free to say whatever about me from this point forward and I'll let it go unchallenged. Smile )


Sorry to see you go, actually. I thought we were having fun.



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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17
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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:13 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

But where is the Devil’s advocacy in saying they Fauci and Birx and other officials working within the Trump administration’s federal response had actually done a good job preventing a far worse outcome? I never looked at what was happening with a spreading pandemic and thought God damn that Trump! I saw similar foot dragging and downplaying of the virus from leaders of my own party. I think this caught our country’s leadership off guard. I’ve never been able to blame them for that. Nothing that I ever saw attributed to Trump in those initial weeks surprised me or struck me as outrageous. And his assertions later that he didn’t want to cause panic actually seemed to be exactly in line with what I would expect from political leadership.

Now he is a relative moron and a self-centered cretin and he went off the rails many many times during 2020. And it stirred resistance in his base and certainly people died because of it. But not as many as in New York or LA where the reasons for all those deaths could not be attributed to Donald Trump.



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Luuuc
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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:34 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

jammerbirdi wrote:
Obesity is the number one factor in predicting the severity of outcomes in COVID-19 cases.

Surely not a bigger factor than age?



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:35 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Luuuc wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Obesity is the number one factor in predicting the severity of outcomes in COVID-19 cases.

Surely not a bigger factor than age?


That was the news last week here. Obesity was number one.



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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17
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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:42 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

This is from last month. But there was another news cycle last week in which it was said that obesity was the number one factor. Maybe it was determined to be so just in the United States. Don’t remember exactly because I was undoubtedly talking back to my TV screen in agreement.

https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2021-03-08/obesity-a-big-risk-factor-for-severe-covid-19-study-confirms



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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17
Luuuc
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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:45 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

jammerbirdi wrote:
Luuuc wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Obesity is the number one factor in predicting the severity of outcomes in COVID-19 cases.

Surely not a bigger factor than age?


That was the news last week here. Obesity was number one.

Huh. Well there you go.
It was hard not to draw an anecdotal link between obesity and deadly outcomes in younger people, just because of the photos I was seeing in the news, but I didn't realise it was statistically that big of a factor overall.

[ETA]

jammerbirdi wrote:
This is from last month. But there was another news cycle last week in which it was said that obesity was the number one factor. Maybe it was determined to be so just in the United States. Don’t remember exactly because I was undoubtedly talking back to my TV screen in agreement.

https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2021-03-08/obesity-a-big-risk-factor-for-severe-covid-19-study-confirms

Yeah, that particular article just says it is a significant factor, which we've known since very early on.



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 6:56 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Okay I got this. mrs jammer just reminded me of where we heard this. It may not ultimately be from a legitimate news source. Have to see where Bill Maher got it. Embarassed



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 7:09 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Luuuc wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Luuuc wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Obesity is the number one factor in predicting the severity of outcomes in COVID-19 cases.

Surely not a bigger factor than age?


That was the news last week here. Obesity was number one.

Huh. Well there you go.
It was hard not to draw an anecdotal link between obesity and deadly outcomes in younger people, just because of the photos I was seeing in the news, but I didn't realise it was statistically that big of a factor overall.

[ETA]

jammerbirdi wrote:
This is from last month. But there was another news cycle last week in which it was said that obesity was the number one factor. Maybe it was determined to be so just in the United States. Don’t remember exactly because I was undoubtedly talking back to my TV screen in agreement.

https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2021-03-08/obesity-a-big-risk-factor-for-severe-covid-19-study-confirms

Yeah, that particular article just says it is a significant factor, which we've known since very early on.


Yes but. If it’s a significant factor medically, then iwithin the culture of obesity as it exists in the United States it would have been at or near the top of factors leading to bad outcomes in COVID cases. Forget the disease. Just go through the country and compare what you see here with what you see in Europe or Asia or Africa or anywhere else. If COVID kills obese people significantly more than those who are not obese then the United States was going to take a hit unlike any other country.

I’m going to also suggest that slim elderly people did much better. Anyway. Let me find what I’m referring to and hope it wasn’t just Bill Maher spouting off.



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 7:10 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Luuuc wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Obesity is the number one factor in predicting the severity of outcomes in COVID-19 cases.

Surely not a bigger factor than age?


The US has abundance of both old people and obese people



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 7:13 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

jammerbirdi wrote:
Okay I got this. mrs jammer just reminded me of where we heard this. It may not ultimately be from a legitimate news source. Have to see where Bill Maher got it. Embarassed

Bill's number (78%) basically matches what that article says (28.3% overweight, 50.3% obese, so 79% total)
Though mathematically speaking, I'd personally be wary of drawing too big a conclusion just from those numbers once I took the obvious next step and looked at what percentage of US adults are classified as being overweight, and saw that it was 74%.
So yeah, hopefully there's a study that goes into a bit more depth than that before jumping to such a strong conclusion.



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 7:21 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Luuuc wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Okay I got this. mrs jammer just reminded me of where we heard this. It may not ultimately be from a legitimate news source. Have to see where Bill Maher got it. Embarassed

Bill's number (78%) basically matches what that article says (28.3% overweight, 50.3% obese, so 79% total)
Though mathematically speaking, I'd personally be wary of drawing too big a conclusion just from those numbers once I took the obvious next step and looked at what percentage of US adults are classified as being overweight, and saw that it was 74%.
So yeah, hopefully there's a study that goes into a bit more depth than that before jumping to such a strong conclusion.


This is the same formula that classified Becky Hammon as overweight in her playing days.



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 7:39 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

pilight wrote:
Luuuc wrote:
jammerbirdi wrote:
Okay I got this. mrs jammer just reminded me of where we heard this. It may not ultimately be from a legitimate news source. Have to see where Bill Maher got it. Embarassed

Bill's number (78%) basically matches what that article says (28.3% overweight, 50.3% obese, so 79% total)
Though mathematically speaking, I'd personally be wary of drawing too big a conclusion just from those numbers once I took the obvious next step and looked at what percentage of US adults are classified as being overweight, and saw that it was 74%.
So yeah, hopefully there's a study that goes into a bit more depth than that before jumping to such a strong conclusion.


This is the same formula that classified Becky Hammon as overweight in her playing days.

Ok, so that's another thing to consider for sure.
But as long as the same formula was used by both the study and the CDC then they kinda cancel out anyway.

Considering obesity alone (and not overweight) looks more statistically significant.



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 8:10 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

Okay, just for everyone else and my reputation, as it were Rolling Eyes

Bill Maher shows a headline under a CNBC banner that says:

CDC study finds 78% of people hospitalized for COVID were overweight or obese

To which he adds the following:

"78% of those hospitalized, ventilated, or dead from COVID have been overweight. It is the key piece of the puzzle. By far the most pertinent factor."

So I bought it. And I'm still believing it. I mean, everyone gets old around the world. But we have a culture of obesity in the US that I believe exceeds anything anywhere else in the world outside of possibly Samoa. Oh, excuse me. I meant to say American Samoa. Anyway.



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PostPosted: 04/20/21 9:03 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

I don't really understand the point. Yes, obesity is a factor, not a surprise there and known early on. But are all the people dying in India obese, for example? The biggest risk is just catching the virus. And since we can't get everyone around the world who is overweight to drop the pounds, all they can do is tell people what increases their risk of a bad outcome should they get the virus. I mean what else is there???


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PostPosted: 04/20/21 9:12 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

insidewinder wrote:
I don't really understand the point. Yes, obesity is a factor, not a surprise there and known early on. But are all the people dying in India obese, for example? The biggest risk is just catching the virus. And since we can't get everyone around the world who is overweight to drop the pounds, all they can do is tell people what increases their risk of a bad outcome should they get the virus. I mean what else is there???


Oh no I totally agree. This conversation developed in the context of fixing the blame for the outsized number of deaths recorded in the US compared to other countries.

And there were other factors suggested by studies as well. There’s one that highlighted the prevalence of eating fermented vegetables in cultures outside the US.



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Every woman who has ever been presented with a career/sex quid pro quo in the entertainment industry should come forward and simply say, “Me, too.” - jammer The New York Times 10/10/17
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PostPosted: 04/27/21 6:47 pm    ::: Reply Reply with quote

From Stat:

In Covid's grip, India gasps for air: 'If there is an apocalypse, this has to be one'

MUMBAI — Working hard to keep her composure, Lavanya Sharma tweeted a short video on April 25. “Please please please help,” the teenage girl from New Delhi’s Uttam Nagar neighborhood wrote atop her post as her mother lay gasping for breath and her oximeter blinked a dangerously low reading of 52/100.

Sharma’s frantic calls for help didn’t get an official response until the next day, when an ambulance finally arrived to take her mother to the hospital.
This harrowing tale highlights the plight of millions of Indians who are being pushed to the brink by the country’s ferocious second wave of the pandemic.

I know what Sharma is going through, having seen family members and friends laid low, and even killed, by Covid-19. A neighbor, in his 60s, died while on a ventilator. A political leader who helped me get my first home in Mumbai in 1996 died two days ago from a cardiac arrest that occurred as he was getting treated for Covid-19. Everyone in my sister’s family was sickened by the infection at the same time, but they appear to have recovered. My in-law’s family had it tougher, with two sons ages 28 and 31 needing oxygen in intensive care units for several days. Others, desperately needing treatment, were unable to get into hospitals.

In cities big and small, hospitals are too full to accept new patients and diagnostic centers take up to three days or more to do chest scans of those who might have Covid-19. Doctors and hospital staff are completely exhausted.

Social media is flooded with passionate pleas for oxygen cylinders and concentrators. WhatsApp groups are filled with messages as friends and families scramble to access oxygen, remdesivir, tocilizumab, steroids, and other therapies. In a country where drug regulatory oversight is suspect, indiscriminate sale of fake drugs is a huge problem.

As someone who has covered the pharmaceutical and health care industries for more than two decades, I get calls for help into the wee hours of the night from family members, friends, and even acquaintances. Fake therapies are something I constantly worry about as I try to use my contacts to help people looking for hospital beds, medicines, or oxygen cylinders. Sometimes I’ve been able to help, but the calls are so many and the problems so big that often I cannot.

The merciless spread of Covid-19 is driving families to extreme limits. People with the means to do so are shelling out on the black market as much as 10 times the cost of a single vial of remdesivir. Others, many of whom are being pushed to bankruptcy, resign themselves to destiny.

Television stations routinely dish out painful stories of families who lost loved ones. “I have money, I have everything but I could not save my sister,” says a young person who cried inconsolably in a TV news report.

Hospitals don’t have enough beds for those seeking help, and even if they do, the shortage of oxygen is an agonizing death sentence for patients who can’t get access to it. Video clips are making the rounds showing people dying even as they are hurriedly wheeled on stretchers into hospitals.

Ambulances are being crammed with the dead — as many as 20 bodies at a time — on their way to crematoria and burial grounds. Funeral pyres glowing 24/7 are a constant reminder of the staggering death toll.

If there is an apocalypse, this has to be one.

Covid-19 is spreading at a terrifying pace, now averaging 350,000 new infections and nearly 3,000 deaths a day. As I write this, the official number of deaths is nearly 198,000.

Public health experts, however, suggest that the number of deaths could be several times higher, and possibly in the millions. They point to the glaring mismatch in deaths attributed to Covid-19 in government files and the actual number of deaths registered at crematoria and burial grounds.

The seething rage at the failure of the government and its precipitous public health catastrophe is giving way to an uneasy sense of desolation and helplessness.

India’s early success in nearly flattening the Covid-19 curve in 2020 may be the cause of the current calamity. Despite a rickety and funding-starved health care infrastructure, the country’s ability to manage the first wave of Covid-19 looked laudable as the United States, Canada, and countries in Europe reeled under second and third waves of the pandemic. Then things went awry. The turnaround raised false hopes that the virus had run out of steam in India and the country would be spared a second wave.

Virologists, modeling experts, and prominent epidemiologists appeared on TV shows to suggest that herd immunity may have kicked in, with testing in some cities showing the existence of anti-Covid antibodies in up to half of communities. Some professed that Indians have stronger-than-average immune systems, or they may be spared from Covid-19 by cross protection from other infectious diseases. A few invoked evolutionary biology and said the virus will not kill all its hosts and endanger its own existence.

Then India’s hyper-nationalism took over. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and senior leaders from his Bharatiya Janata Party, who thrive on overwhelming popularity, took no time to claim victory in the fight against the virus. Election rallies attracted soaring crowds. As Modi and Amit Shah, the two top leaders, brazenly took off their masks during their incessant campaigns, those in the crowds followed and dropped theirs.

Further fueling new cases was Kumbh Mela, a gargantuan confluence of Hindu pilgrims who gathered for a holy dip in the Ganges River. As many as 2.5 million people took part, with scant attention to Covid-19 safety protocols. By the time an avalanche of criticism cut short the festival, the virus had infected thousands of pilgrims, who took it home to their neighborhoods and villages.

Efforts to crank up a badly hobbled economy also added to the spread.

Business and manufacturing activities began reopening in May 2020 as ministers projected a V-shaped economic recovery while scientific messaging to keep wearing masks and follow social distancing took a beating. Masks, which had become part of public life in India for most part of 2020, gradually disappeared from faces.

As countries issue advisories suspending flight operations to and from India, the country’s dominance as a global vaccines player is in question. In January 2021, the Indian government authorized two vaccines for emergency use against Covid-19 and committed to help a host of countries vaccinate their residents. The pandemic’s second wave has dealt those plans a hard blow.

The Modi administration has expanded the scope of vaccination, now making the jabs available to anyone over age 18. While this is the right move, it has led to a shortfall of vaccines and slowed the pace of the vaccination drive. While vaccines are seen as the most effective intervention to cut the spread of the virus, there are now serious doubts on how efficiently can India roll out its program.

In 2002, India unveiled “Incredible India,” a high-octane advertising campaign aimed at drawing international tourists to the country of contrasts, cultures, palaces, and forests. Though the campaign remains, it is now overshadowed by the putrid smoke pouring from funeral pyres, the gasps for breath of those afflicted with Covid-19, and the cries of the millions of family members and friends who have lost loved ones to a pandemic wave that could have been prevented.

Unless we get out of this soon, I fear that we will be left with “Incompetent India” — or worse.

Vikas Dandekar is a senior pharmaceutical and health care journalist with ET Prime, an India-based website for analytical and investigative business stories.



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