The claim that "there was no pandemic" is not as crazy as it might sound, at least as I see things now. Extraordinary things were written in Dec. 2020, and when taken together, these passages offer a very different view of why things went so wrong.

A short 🧵 that I hope will 👀 "This discovery adds to evidence that the virus was quietly spreading around the world before health officials and the public were aware...the virus's presence in U.S. communities likely didn't start with the first case identified case in January."

- NPR, Dec. 1, 2020

This clip is from the Disney Junior show, "Rise Up, Sing Out."

In my view, what is being depicted in this exchange is closer to psychological abuse than to social emotional learning. Consider the following points:

1/14 The show begins with one boy making an observation about skin color. Before the second boy has a chance to fully process his feelings, let alone respond, a third-party shouts "Hold it!"

"Did that comment make you feel uncomfortable?"

2/14

"How does the media's focus on identity politics and critical race theory contribute to the division and polarization of society?"

Significantly, and considering how often the press twists data and censors objective facts, it's like injecting pure poison into the nation's veins.

https://twitter.com/KanekoaTheGreat/status/1655690329092403200

Look at how the timing of the media's hard push into non-stop victim/oppressor narratives corresponds with youth mental health and educational outcomes.

Skyrocketing depression. Falling test scores.

It's not just social media at play. Legacy media is functioning like an abuser.

To be sick with Covid-19 in early 2020, yet blissfully unaware of how severe it was...was to have a significantly higher chance of survival. See:

Diamond Princess (zero deaths under age 60)

vs.

Hyper-Vigilance in Cities and Hospitals

vs.

Extreme Negligence in Care Facilities Looking at the total population of the Diamond Princess, the number of deaths attributed to Covid-19, the age of the deceased, and the date recorded...then, creating a pro-rata, say, the size of a large wedding, would the excess mortality have been noticeable, let alone shocking?

I'm re-reading some mainstream articles that were written between February and March 2020, and it is pretty wild. Before the U.S. tossed its pandemic preparedness plans in the trash...

Howdy, @ev_rat. On the subject of GAN renderings, there is an aspect of the story that is likely embarrassing to journalists, and thus, I haven't seen much written on the subject.

Some quoted "experts" are not who they purport to be.

1/7 In 2020, I found several mastheads/about-us pages that were rendered. E.g. These non-existent "people" were quoted in NY Magazine, Woman's Day, Business, Inverse, Reader's Digest, Lifehacker, The Simple Dollar, Score, Fatherly, Legal Zoom, Business News Daily and Cheapism.

2/7

Why do mask mandates fail? Even with strict compliance and N95s? The video below (and the continuation in the next tweet) explain why.

The rest of this🧵summarizes why I believe those pushing for mask mandates are dishonest &/or willfully ignorant &/or mentally unwell.

1/31 If an N95-style respirator isn't perfectly sealed, it isn't capable of filtering an aerosolized respiratory pathogen.

The video below shows how "fit-testing" works.

Masks cannot filter aerosolized particles (see above) and an unsealed N95 respirator is merely a mask.

2/31

Patently false: Mask mandates are refuted by empirical data worldwide. Meanwhile, mask policies spread harms (such as impaired speech and language development, body focused repetitive behaviors, social isolation, eczema and other allergic reactions, etc.).

1/6

https://twitter.com/JuliaRaifman/status/1523992393812484100

To date, the most apples-to-apples large-sample-size school masking study took place in Spain. It found no benefit:

english.elpais.com/society/2022-0…

2/6

Today, a NY Supreme Court judge ruled that forced-masking of 2-4 year olds is "arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable." Rather than except the ruling (and reality), NYC mayor and his health commissioner have fought to CONTINUE this institutionalized abuse.

Credit: @Jusrangers

https://twitter.com/NYCMayor/status/1510037889547182090

I asked the health commissioner to provide a single empirical study to support this recommendation. He decline to answer. I asked him how he reconciled this act despite it breaching all four pillars of medical ethics. He declined to answer. He did block me, however.

I appreciate recent COVID-19 coverage from @nytimes and @washingtonpost. Nevertheless, corrections, clarifications, retractions and updates about previous COVID-19 reporting (and omissions) could fill each paper's A1-A20 section for a week.

Some non-exhaustive examples:

1/42 🧵 -Misappropriation of federal pandemic program funding

-Impact of mandates on (non-COVID) vaccination rates

-U.S. student enrollment gap during 2020/2021 period

-Safety concerns and violations at Wuhan CDC pre-COVID

-Racial discrimination resulting from vaccine passports

2/42

The 1918 pandemic was unique in that it was the YOUNG who were disproportionately impacted. However, the notable feature of COVID-19 is that the ELDERLY are as much as 10,000x more likely to perish from the disease.

Public health bet the farm on the opposite of reality.

1/7 🧵 In Spring 2020, this paper was oft-cited as a justification to close schools, etc: jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/… - I'm willing to give many the benefit of the doubt for decisions made then, but it's time to revisit this for what it was: A bastardized, misapplied doctrine for CoV.

2/7

I've noticed a sharp drop in engagement recently, and while I acknowledge that many factors are likely at play, I'm discovering several tweets that are hidden by default via this warning: "Show additional replies, including those that may contain offensive content."

An example: Indeed, it seems that Twitter is now flagging nearly 100% of my replies as "offensive content."

Here is another example:

Who uses COVID-19 messaging that provokes fear (at the expense of highlighting critical facts, useful nuance and evidence-based reasons for hope)?

Here is my opinion, explained via 12 personas, arranged from most lamentable to most contemptible.

1/13 🧵 1. The Traumatized Professional

This doctor or scientist has suffered a personal loss and/or PTSD from working in a high stress, high risk environment. (It takes the utmost empathy and reasoning to question a brilliant survivor of trauma.)

2/13

I used to be a card-carrying member of a political party.

When I toed the party line, it was like having 50 million Americans who always agreed with me about who was good or bad, what was right and wrong, and what the only solution to a problem was.

1/13 🧵 I was fooling myself. There is no single person in the world with whom I agree about everything, let alone a group of people. But there I was, always nodding in agreement. And I allowed myself to become a fool.

2/13

This now-deleted tweet is from an epidemiologist with a large following (including policymakers and journalists), a blue verification-checkmark on Twitter, and a profile including the title of "Dr" accompanied by a photo in a lab coat.

🧵1/13 Looking further, I cannot find a historical record of a personal website nor Twitter account prior to 2020. The title of Doctor is derived from a PhD that does not appear to be specified online.

2/13

The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare many shortcomings and frailties in our society, but for me, none has been more damaging than the collapse of objective journalism.

I've worked in newsrooms for most of my career; I'd like to share how my experiences explain my view:

1/30 🧵 First, let me say that this thread is not an indictment of journalists, but rather an indictment of a system that produces bad journalism. The strange thing about systems is that they perpetuate and defend themselves, even when the participants of the system do not agree.

2/30

Tonight, 70,000 maskless adults are shoulder to shoulder, enjoying life together in California.

Tomorrow, approximately 7,000,000 California school-children will be forced to wear masks and keep apart from each other.

Politics are a disease. End the cruelty. Unmask the kids. Two years into this pandemic and the *latest* CDC case for masking relies on data that is "subject to at least eight limitations" and "not statistically significant."

Meanwhile, the percentage of a child's life lived during the pandemic:
..
Age 3 - 67%
Age 4 - 50%
Age 5 - 40%
..

My governor, @GovKathyHochul, touted a maskless NY school visit via Facebook. Then she restricted the post. The next day, the rules changed. Now, she requires 24-month olds to wear masks while she routinely appears maskless in a crowd. This is not leadership in any form.

1/10 Stacey Abrams is a popular politician. She visited a Georgia grade school without a mask. Rather than speak to concerns of hypocrisy, the school principal (a PhD) deleted her tweet, then deleted her 13-year old Twitter account.

Neither action is leadership by example.

2/10

The percentage of a child's life lived during the pandemic:

Age 1 - 100%
Age 2 - 100%
Age 3 - 67%
Age 4 - 50%
Age 5 - 40%
Age 6 - 33%
Age 7 - 29%
Age 8 - 25%

Segregation, inequity, forced dress, anti-socialization and "us vs. them" thinking is being presented as "normal."

1/4 History may not repeat, but it echoes.

The 1918 pandemic claimed 50,000,000 lives.

The civil unrest that followed it claimed 75,000,000 more.

In between, there was 20 years of addiction, blame, resentment, dehumanization and self-righteous morality.

2/4

A chronology of my COVID-19 bookmarks: It highlights the missed moments, the reversals, the inconsistencies, the false sense of control, and the gaslighting that we've endured over two years.

Note: Endorsement/refutation not implied by tweets in timeline.

1/117 July 2019 - The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) grants continued funding to EcoHealth Alliance, in partnership with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, to conduct "in vitro and in vivo infection experiments" of bat-origin CoVs: reporter.nih.gov/search/jF4RIpD…

2/117