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The response to COVID should be thoroughly investigated, but this page just seems like a partisan hackjob. The framing is clearly intended to get maximum partis

The response to COVID should be thoroughly investigated, but this page just seems like a partisan hackjob. The framing is clearly intended to get maximum partisan impact, not to find the truth.

Jimmc414 2y ago
> but this page just seems like a partisan hackjob. Please explain. This page is a link to the actual testimony.
- apsec112 2y ago
  This page is a summary of the testimony which is clearly trying to pick quotes and/or frame things to make Fauci and Democrats look bad. FWIW I agree that eg. children shouldn't have been required to wear masks in school, but I don't trust whoever wrote this to write a neutral or fair summary from the full set of facts we know (which no one will read directly because it would be thousands of pages).
  - Retric 2y ago
    > children shouldn't have been required to wear masks in school Historically children were required to get vaccinated before attending public schools. Having large groups in close proximity for long periods is a serious disease transmission risk. With COVID the children themselves had minimal risk but the community was at risk from them. ~1,220,000 people died with the precautions we took. That doesn’t mean 1,220,000 people would have died with fewer precautions or that more couldn’t dramatically lower that number. Public heath is complicated, but we traded roughly a million American lives for freedom. Suggesting we should have done less is a difficult stance for me to support even as doing dramatically more would have been extremely painful.
    - apsec112 2y ago
      Prior to vaccines, there was no difference in COVID death rates between red and blue states https://www.natesilver.net/p/the-2-key-facts-about-us-covid-policy https://www.natesilver.net/p/the-2-key-facts-about-us-covid-...
      - Retric 2y ago
        Red states are more rural which slowed spread initially, but overall you see a higher death monthly rates in Red states after the first wave ~July 2020 not just after vaccination became available. It’s not just state policies. The first wave in 2020 hit most densely populated and thus Blue counties hardest, but the second wave in 2020 and every wave after that hit the least populated and most Republican areas hardest. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2022/03/03/the-changing-political-geography-of-covid-19-over-the-last-two-years/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2022/03/03/the-changing... https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10684792/#:~:text=Red%20states%20had%20higher%20COVID,2021%20compared%20to%20blue%20states.&text=Red%20states%20implemented%20fewer%20political,COVID%2D19%20than%20blue%20states.&text=Biological%20factors%20such%20as%20age,deaths%20only%20in%20red%20states.&text=Vaccination%20rates%20predicted%20fewer%20deaths%20in%20blue%20states https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10684792/#:~:te...
      - piva00 2y ago
        Cross-checking the list with population density figures per state gives a very different outlook. I went through a very cursory look and skipping the "purple" states I got: New Jersey is #1 after DC, Mississippi is #33. New York is #8, South Dakota is #46. Massachusetts is #3, Louisiana is #26. Connecticut is #4, North Dakota is #47. Illinois is #12, Arkansas is #35. Only getting to New Mexico it breaks down since Alabama has a higher pop. density but Albuquerque has 2x the pop. of Huntsville and pretty much 3x the pop. density.
    - infotapeworm 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - dsabanin 2y ago
        Hindsight is 20/20.
      - Retric 2y ago
        To be clear I’m glad we don’t live in the kind of totalitarian state that would have been required for such extreme measures, but … Keeping deaths to ~1/4 million would have been theoretically possible from extreme social distancing until total mandatory vaccination of the population was achieved. I’m rather glad we didn’t go down that route, but it’s worth remembering when we opened things up it was with full knowledge that people would die from those choices.
        brnaftr361 2y ago
        This isn't a math problem, it's not a stats problem. Realizing this abstraction of numbers is an error of reification. What's really worthy of consideration is the holistic picture which as of yet can not be resolved due to the ineradicable complexities of the evolving circumstances. The protocol to which we were subjected wrought untold damage and it's unclear in the long run whether the effects which evolved will have ultimately saved any lives. For instance the current geopolitical regime is certainly informed, in part, by the economic and political effects which originated as a consequence of and during COVID and shutdown mandates. And these economic effects have also affected policy and personal behaviors. It's a whole Pandora's box, and we won't be able to measure it with any meaningful resolution for... Probably decades... And even then there will be conflation because attributing overdose deaths to economic issues emanating from shutdown policies five years after the fact isn't a trivial argument to make, but nonetheless isn't an impossibility when considering actual human circumstances. And then considering what may have occurred on the obverse, where actually minimal intervention was taken, is also impossible to surmise. But I don't think it's unrealistic to have a meaningful boon. It may be the case that in spite of all the intervening circumstances that mortality would have ultimately been comparable due to the half-hearted nature which may have just been a collosal disruption. e.g. we hit a saturation point which lead to peak mortality and policy failed to modify the consequent mortality in the range beneath it. And yet another where minimal, targeted interventions a la the Great Barrington Declaration were deployed. And since nobody acts in isolation in a globalist society it will be yet more difficult to ascertain. So bandying about mortality numbers, I think, is insufficient when there have been so many consequences which have evolved from COVID policies, many of which are qualitative and difficult to quantify but have considerable meaning outside the silly abstractions we conjecture carry so much meaning.
- throwaway5959 2y ago
  Have you even read it? “Dr. Fauci repeatedly played semantics with the definition of “gain-of-function” research in an effort to avoid conceding that the NIH’s funded this dangerous research in China” There is so much BS editorializing here. Also is there any research that shows that masking actually impaired learning? I didn’t see any listed, just claims that there were studies.
  - b0sk 2y ago
    This feels like Rand Paul wrote it.
    - fieryscribe 2y ago
      He's been right this entire time and caught a lot of flack for it.
  - Jimmc414 2y ago
    Yes, I have, throwaway5959. That's exactly what happened if you read his previous testimony. This has nothing to do with politics.
    - throwaway5959 2y ago
      My quote wasn’t in the testimony, Jimmc414. As I said; there was plenty of editorializing in this joke of a report.
      - Jimmc414 2y ago
        Did you hear or read Fauci’s original testimony where he suggested there are different meanings of GoF?

The response to COVID should be thoroughly investigated, but this page just seems like a partisan hackjob. The framing is clearly intended to get maximum partisan impact, not to find the truth.

Jimmc414 2y ago

> but this page just seems like a partisan hackjob. Please explain. This page is a link to the actual testimony.

apsec112 2y ago
This page is a summary of the testimony which is clearly trying to pick quotes and/or frame things to make Fauci and Democrats look bad. FWIW I agree that eg. children shouldn't have been required to wear masks in school, but I don't trust whoever wrote this to write a neutral or fair summary from the full set of facts we know (which no one will read directly because it would be thousands of pages).
- Retric 2y ago
  > children shouldn't have been required to wear masks in school Historically children were required to get vaccinated before attending public schools. Having large groups in close proximity for long periods is a serious disease transmission risk. With COVID the children themselves had minimal risk but the community was at risk from them. ~1,220,000 people died with the precautions we took. That doesn’t mean 1,220,000 people would have died with fewer precautions or that more couldn’t dramatically lower that number. Public heath is complicated, but we traded roughly a million American lives for freedom. Suggesting we should have done less is a difficult stance for me to support even as doing dramatically more would have been extremely painful.
  - apsec112 2y ago
    Prior to vaccines, there was no difference in COVID death rates between red and blue states https://www.natesilver.net/p/the-2-key-facts-about-us-covid-policy https://www.natesilver.net/p/the-2-key-facts-about-us-covid-...
    - Retric 2y ago
      Red states are more rural which slowed spread initially, but overall you see a higher death monthly rates in Red states after the first wave ~July 2020 not just after vaccination became available. It’s not just state policies. The first wave in 2020 hit most densely populated and thus Blue counties hardest, but the second wave in 2020 and every wave after that hit the least populated and most Republican areas hardest. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2022/03/03/the-changing-political-geography-of-covid-19-over-the-last-two-years/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2022/03/03/the-changing... https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10684792/#:~:text=Red%20states%20had%20higher%20COVID,2021%20compared%20to%20blue%20states.&text=Red%20states%20implemented%20fewer%20political,COVID%2D19%20than%20blue%20states.&text=Biological%20factors%20such%20as%20age,deaths%20only%20in%20red%20states.&text=Vaccination%20rates%20predicted%20fewer%20deaths%20in%20blue%20states https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10684792/#:~:te...
    - piva00 2y ago
      Cross-checking the list with population density figures per state gives a very different outlook. I went through a very cursory look and skipping the "purple" states I got: New Jersey is #1 after DC, Mississippi is #33. New York is #8, South Dakota is #46. Massachusetts is #3, Louisiana is #26. Connecticut is #4, North Dakota is #47. Illinois is #12, Arkansas is #35. Only getting to New Mexico it breaks down since Alabama has a higher pop. density but Albuquerque has 2x the pop. of Huntsville and pretty much 3x the pop. density.
  - infotapeworm 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - dsabanin 2y ago
      Hindsight is 20/20.
    - Retric 2y ago
      To be clear I’m glad we don’t live in the kind of totalitarian state that would have been required for such extreme measures, but … Keeping deaths to ~1/4 million would have been theoretically possible from extreme social distancing until total mandatory vaccination of the population was achieved. I’m rather glad we didn’t go down that route, but it’s worth remembering when we opened things up it was with full knowledge that people would die from those choices.
      - brnaftr361 2y ago
        This isn't a math problem, it's not a stats problem. Realizing this abstraction of numbers is an error of reification. What's really worthy of consideration is the holistic picture which as of yet can not be resolved due to the ineradicable complexities of the evolving circumstances. The protocol to which we were subjected wrought untold damage and it's unclear in the long run whether the effects which evolved will have ultimately saved any lives. For instance the current geopolitical regime is certainly informed, in part, by the economic and political effects which originated as a consequence of and during COVID and shutdown mandates. And these economic effects have also affected policy and personal behaviors. It's a whole Pandora's box, and we won't be able to measure it with any meaningful resolution for... Probably decades... And even then there will be conflation because attributing overdose deaths to economic issues emanating from shutdown policies five years after the fact isn't a trivial argument to make, but nonetheless isn't an impossibility when considering actual human circumstances. And then considering what may have occurred on the obverse, where actually minimal intervention was taken, is also impossible to surmise. But I don't think it's unrealistic to have a meaningful boon. It may be the case that in spite of all the intervening circumstances that mortality would have ultimately been comparable due to the half-hearted nature which may have just been a collosal disruption. e.g. we hit a saturation point which lead to peak mortality and policy failed to modify the consequent mortality in the range beneath it. And yet another where minimal, targeted interventions a la the Great Barrington Declaration were deployed. And since nobody acts in isolation in a globalist society it will be yet more difficult to ascertain. So bandying about mortality numbers, I think, is insufficient when there have been so many consequences which have evolved from COVID policies, many of which are qualitative and difficult to quantify but have considerable meaning outside the silly abstractions we conjecture carry so much meaning.
throwaway5959 2y ago
Have you even read it? “Dr. Fauci repeatedly played semantics with the definition of “gain-of-function” research in an effort to avoid conceding that the NIH’s funded this dangerous research in China” There is so much BS editorializing here. Also is there any research that shows that masking actually impaired learning? I didn’t see any listed, just claims that there were studies.
- b0sk 2y ago
  This feels like Rand Paul wrote it.
  - fieryscribe 2y ago
    He's been right this entire time and caught a lot of flack for it.
- Jimmc414 2y ago
  Yes, I have, throwaway5959. That's exactly what happened if you read his previous testimony. This has nothing to do with politics.
  - throwaway5959 2y ago
    My quote wasn’t in the testimony, Jimmc414. As I said; there was plenty of editorializing in this joke of a report.
    - Jimmc414 2y ago
      Did you hear or read Fauci’s original testimony where he suggested there are different meanings of GoF?