Imagine if it was an accidental lab leak from U.S. funded research?
The worst things to come out of Covid, not in order: 1) 1+ million dead Americans and God knows how many worldwide 2) The often month-long overwhelm of hospitals in multiple waves over two years, and the...
...downstream effects of delaying surgeries, routine care, exposing vulnerable patients in emergency rooms, and effect on nursing labor pool 3) Uncertainty of emerging pandemic leading to public and private shutdowns of life, schooling, economic activity 4) fiscal policy...
Feb 9, 2023 • 15 tweets • 4 min read
PBMs are the worst players in healthcare. Monopolistic, value-subtracting, a non-progressive tax on working people. Why do their medical leaders all come from Harvard, and how do those leaders sleep at night?
When the history is written, the U.S. state by state partial lockdowns —school & restaurant closures, remote work except for essential businesses, part voluntary/part public health police power— ended here.
When influential early proponents of pronounced mitigation measures championed became instant hypocrites Memorial Day, 2020, it was the end of public opinion support.
Oct 8, 2022 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Controversial prediction: DEI, “anti-racism,” “color blind is ‘white supremacy’” movement is in part going to ultimately lead to the end of racial preferences/affirmative action regime of the last 50 yrs. There will be accusations of racism in equal treatment & much lamentation.
Institutions will resist, but ultimately compliance attorneys are conservative — and racial incentives under a legal system that is predicated on due process, equal treatment won’t persist in a mixed multiethnic state.
@PeterHotez Speaking of science and politics: Any second thoughts about signing this letter last year that appears to have successfully pressured Pfizer to change their planned vaccine study endpoint & delay releasing their data until after the election? aboutblaw.com/TnB@PeterHotez See, e.g. this non-NY Post reporting: statnews.com/2020/11/09/cov…
Nov 16, 2020 • 18 tweets • 3 min read
Impossible to quantify the harm done by the questioning of vaccines by Biden/Harris ("I won't take a Trump vaccine, but I'll listen to scientists" [done with skeptical visage, regardless of the phrasing]) & physicians scientists like the often wrong, but never in doubt @erictopol
Trump is bad enough on his own. Why do this?
Trump in 2016 expressed skepticism about vaccine schedules, doses, etc.
Nov 16, 2020 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Lockdowns became impossible after this. As a practical matter, we don’t have the political will nor the necessary near-unanimous public opinion necessary. Appeals to private behavior is all we’ve had as a public health tool since Memorial Day.
From memory, in an essay on education, Leo Strauss gives the "rule of thumb" on being a good teacher (paraphrasing here): always imagine there is someone in the back of the lecture hall who knows more of the subject than you do.
What a wonderful idea for Twitter.
Nov 15, 2020 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Let me commend to you this Economist obituary for Sean Connery, in which we learn the tidbit that he at one time earned a pound french polishing coffins. economist.com/obituary/2020/…
For some reason, British obituary writers set the standard.
Jan 29, 2020 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
This may seem cryptic. But I flesh out the thought...
