1/
More than a year into the pandemic, we can start to evaluate the overall efficacy of our COVID responses. The U.S. provides a unique opportunity to evaluate different policy responses.

TL DR: Heavy-handed approaches don't look good.

Source data: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
2/
The graphic below ranks states by their overall COVID policy score: This score takes into account COVID deaths/million, access to education, and increased unemployment ABOVE Feb 2020. All numbers are over the course of the entire year.

Source data: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
3/
In order not to overly penalize or reward “outliers,” the score is based on rank relative to other states. Raw data is linked below, to create your own scorecard.

No matter how you slice it, doesn't look good for heavy-handed approaches

Source:
docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
4/
If we take masking and mask compliance as being emblematic of heavy-handed approaches, we can see that there is a strong correlation between high levels of masking, and poor results.

docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
5/
Looking at masking relative to individual measures, the same is true. It is not associated with lower levels of deaths—but is tightly linked with extremely low access to in-person learning, and high unemployment.

6/
The inefficacy of masks and other “non-pharmaceutical interventions” has been excused, because they are ostensibly no-cost interventions. Indeed, the opposite appears to be true.

wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26…
7/
The last year has been a global experiment in the efficacy of these “non-pharmaceutical interventions.”To gain from the experiment, we must look at results. Unfortunately, the results appear to be so bad, that there is virtually a moratorium on even asking the question.
8/
That this was the “pandemic of the century” has been repeatedly invoked. This is simply not true. Based on the CDC’s current disease burden estimate, the U.S. IFR is around 0.48%. This is with MANY deaths that were with COVID, not from--ultimately, it will likely be lower.
9/
In a late March NEJM article, Dr. Fauci mentions that in a worst case scenario, this might be like the 1957 of 1967 flus—with an IFR of 0.5%. We are lower than that, and possibly considerably lower.

nejm.org/doi/full/10.10…
documentcloud.org/documents/2079…
10/
However, had we had the same age structure we had now, as in ’57 and ’68, the IFR would have been far worse for those flus. What’s even worse though, is our NPIs, appear to have driven the virus to the most vulnerable—increasing mortality.

11/
Nor was this unexpected, in fact, it is why these kinds of interventions WERE NOT recommended.

As with everything, these were things we knew, things that informed our policies, and which were jettisoned.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…
12/
What’s more, this is not NEW information. This was known as early as May of 2020, based on the early seroprevalence work in NY. There, the IFR was 0.5%, and vanishingly small for those without co-morbidites. And there were MANY, MANY mistakes made.

thepragmatist.co/post/nearly-60…
13/
But rather than learning from these mistakes, understanding the magnitude of the mistakes, the scientific community, running interference for politicians, is trying to memory-hole all of this data, and everything we knew before 2020. This can’t happen
1/a (Correction)

Typo on the original graph--This is indeed, March 2020 - May 2021.

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More from @Emily_Burns_V

16 Jun
1/
FL parents send 6 masks to a lab...
- 100% of masks contaminated.
- 50% w/pathogens, including multiple strains of pneumonia- and meningitis-causing bacteria.
- 1/3 with antibiotic-resistant pathogens.
- 2 masks w/more than 70 strains of bacteria.

rationalground.com/dangerous-path…
2/
"Masks work" has become such a powerful mantra for public health, it has stifled not only research showing it doesn't, but also the ability to even question if it might cause harm.
3/
This is a testament to the power of children's immune systems. Every one of these pathogens is SIGNIFICANTLY more dangerous to children than SARS-CoV2. Yet they have been exposed over, and over, and over again.

(note, no SARS-CoV2 was found on the mask, because... )
Read 9 tweets
11 Jun
1/
In today’s installment of “how to lie with science” a nature article purporting to show that even w/gaps, surgical masks 70%+ effective.

Let’s take it apart.

First, look at the experimental set-up & how the air would actually flow (cigarette smoke)

nature.com/articles/s4159…
2/
Comparing the jets of cigarette smoke, in truth, the exhalation would be rocketing past the apparatus. This is reflected in the incredibly low particle numbers—10/sec @ max. The actual # is 1000 - 10K particles/sec--which excludes <0.5 micron.
pnas.org/content/117/22…
3/
The study notes that it does not include particles under 0.5 microns—the vast majority of aerosols, as seen below. Though it is clear from the measured particles/second, that the apparatus is missing 99.9% to 99.99% of the particles emitted.
Read 10 tweets
3 Jun
1/
OSHA is working at both federal & state levels to CONTINUE mask reqs. Over the last 2 days, I have been on 2 OSHA calls.

@ Federal level they give NO information, you CAN'T ASK QUESTIONS--just talk at them and hope to "influence".
reginfo.gov/public/do/eo/n… RIN is 1218-AD36
2/
The Cal OSHA one is going on now--link to join below.

CA is proposing (even after 7/31) that employers offer ALL un-vaxed fitted N-95s. If they choose not to wear the N-95, ALL other employees have to wear masks.

You can imagine how this is going...

dir.ca.gov/oshsb/document…
3/
This is an abject disaster. The unions are super for it (not sure if they've checked with their members).
Read 4 tweets
2 Jun
Woo hoo! Citizen science! Concerned citizen succeeds in swaying decades of aerosol science and the great Fauci! #FauciEmails
Reminder of what the science actually said back then, though even Dr. Fauci appears not to have taken the time to read up on the growing understanding that respiratory aerosols (0.1-1.0 micron, med 0.28) were the driver of flu & other respiratory viruses
If this email doesn't show how badly Dr. Fauci misunderstands the behavior and volume of aerosols, and research on flu for the prior 12 years, don't know what does. No wonder he recommended cloth masks.
Read 7 tweets
27 May
1/
It's now acknowledged that COVID-19 is primarily transmitted by tiny aerosols generated through NORMAL breathing—not coughing, or flying spit globules.
Based on what we already KNEW about these respiratory aerosols, this should have meant MASKS OUT.

thesmileproject.global/post/airborne-… Image
2/
This is because we know that these aerosols are nearly identical in size to cigarette smoke (see last tweet). Cigarette smoke, and by extension, the respiratory aerosols carrying COVID are NOT STOPPED by masks, or caught. They are redirected—see video.
3/
And yet, we have this kind of dishonesty from people like Bill Nye. He talks about “stopping the flow of air.” Yet he, just as everyone else who has worn a mask, must have felt the air escaping out the top of the mask--fluttering his eye lashes--during this demonstration.
Read 60 tweets
5 May
1/
Mass. is terrorizing its children. In TWO COVID seasons, there were 293 TOTAL pediatric HOSPITALIZATIONS—
<1/3 the usual number for ONE flu season.
In 2 seasons, 13 TOTAL deaths ~= to 1 flu season. The pediatric CASE fatality rate, in MA is 0.006% = to the ped IFR for flu.
2/
The CDC recently released an updated disease burden for COVID-19. While they did not include deaths, those are easy to append. There, too, we see the infection fatality rate for children for COVID is MUCH lower than flu.
3/
This is certainly an overestimate due to attribution of deaths as COVID deaths, simply based on a prior positive test for COVID, regardless of whether it was a contributing factor—the Director of the Illinois DPH explains below
Read 12 tweets

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