Thread by @ASlavitt

COVID Update August 14: Right now there are at least 10 things more important than human lives.

Until we make our neighbors’ lives the most important thing we will suffer in many ways. 1/

1. Capitalism: As Tucker Carlson said when 3M was found selling masks overseas only to be sold back to the US at higher profits, all they were guilty of was “capitalism.”

So in a shortage we let the price of N-95s float when S Korea bought them at a low price for everyone.2/

S Korea has had 300 deaths.

But our health care companies have made tens of billions of profits during the pandemic. 3/

One vaccine company’s CEO is selling stock after press releases, setting their own drug price & using tax payer dollars for research.

England’s Oxford is making zero profit and bounding it’s drug company partner to do the same. See it’s a pandemic. 4/

Testing cos aren’t being required to commit to a turnaround time. They have been permitted to charge $100 for a single test. They aren’t buying more PCR machines because when the pandemic ends they will be stuck with them.

More masks, tests & vaccines would save lives. 5/

2. Isolationism: our pro-tariff policies are responsible for our inability to get more masks & supplies from overseas. China is selling supplies we need directly to Europe. Meanwhile we have signficantly greater need.

This posture is more important than saving lives. 6/

3. Politics: Every single life is more important than whether any politician gets to keep their job. Yet Trump & many governors won’t take unpopular actions & put in the hard work. Avoiding accountability seems to be the working political approach. 7/

Acknowledging the losses, visiting hospitals, cemetaries, and focusing on these losses would be to acknowledge failure. So he puts a glossy shine on events and says we’re winning instead of addressing the problems we have straight on. 8/

Sending Remdesivir to select states, approving and promoting unproven drugs, requiring governors to publicly thank you before extending taxpayer resources is all putting political games ahead of our lives. 9/

4. The wishes of anti-mask rights groups: 40,000 lives can be saved with near universal mask wearing. Yet many states are still reluctant to call for it and some even forbid it.

The evidence is overwhelming. 10/

Even after a stay home order flattens the curve, unless there’s a mask order we go right back to where we were.

Yet we fall under the delusion that everyone should be able to decide for themselves. 11/

Who decided society couldn’t make rules? Who decided someone’s right outweighed their responsibility to others.

Where is that written down?

When you were born did someone tell us Americans could live in a society without rules? Who promised you that? 12/

5. Vacation

Trump and McConnell decided an early Labor Day might be nice vs battling through the hard work of supporting Americans. So while people face eviction & lack of income, while states have no funds for school & health care, a leader wouldn’t let that happen. 13/

6. Sports & colleges, except maybe those in bubbles, will keep the spread going. And with the exception of the NBA which participated in producing a low cost test for everyone, most sports & in person colleges take valuable tests Americans need so we can stop the spread. 14/

The temptation is understandable. There’s a lot of money tied up in NCAA sports and in colleges & universities in general.

Here about the colleges question in the interview you can find here. 15/

Smarturl.it/inthebubble

7. Starting schools on time. The continued insistence that schools open on time in person regardless of what local data says has nothing to do with kids or schools.

Teachers & administrators know best & are concerned. It has to do with the economy in entirety. 16/

The interest in whether kids are safe or not, the retrofitting of schools, has been superseded by what Trump wants. The more & more muffled cries from the CDC are drowned out by their Koch Brothers/White House drawn papers. 17/

8. Pride. Why not follow what other countries have shown they can do? Why not learn from other states who have seen prior outbreaks? Why not take tests developed by WHO/overseas?

Because we think we’re smarter. And nothing is going to get in the way of that. 18/

9. Science denial. The FDA & CDC staff don’t get it right all the time. But when unemcumbered by politics they put out the best informatin and adjust along the way.

Listen to what you can trust from the CDC from former director @DrTomFrieden.19/

Smarturl.it/inthebubble

10. Lies. Yes lies. Hiding data in hospitalizations. Altering causes of death. Hiding which states and cities are in the biggest trouble.

AZ, FL, SC and TX have twice as many excess deaths as they report. 20/

States should publicly report outbreaks, contact tracing, hospitalizations. Vaccines distribution & use when we have it must also be reported. All this info would help us fight the spread much more easily.

Here’s a good example from LA.

21/

10 things we are showing to be equally important than human lives at least on many occasions.

My number one lesson from a major crisis is you don’t defeat it until you make it the most important thing. And then you do the best you can with the rest. 22/

Are we more important than political careers, then our economic system, then the “rights” of some, then ego & pride? 23/

The country we’ve been left by our parents or grandparents or the founding fathers, by those that fought for the vote, by those that made this their refuge, that fought in World Wars is one we are supposed to improve and pass to the next generation. 24/

We are supposed to decide who we are and what we value by what we do. By what we show our kids. By the needless suffering we prevent.

We will failing 10x over until we decide not to.

/end