COVID-19 is dying; no evidence of second wave
Link here.
Lots of detailed information, all of which confirm what I have been reporting for the past week or so. This quote however I think says it all:
The COVID-19 virus is on its final legs, and while I have filled this post with graphs to prove everything I just said, this is really the only graph you need to see, it’s the CDC’s data, over time, of deaths from COVID-19 here in the U.S., and the trend line is unmistakable:
[Click to see]
If virologists were driving policy about COVID-19 rather than public health officials, we’d all be Sweden right now, which means life would effectively be back to normal. The only thing our lockdowns have done at this point is prolong the agony a little bit, and encouraged Governors to make up more useless rules.
His graph is a smoothed version of the graph I have posted several times recently, showing the continuing decline in daily deaths nationwide from COVID-19.
The bottom line: The Wuhan flu epidemic is petering out. Almost all of us have nothing to fear from it. We need to reject that fear and go back to life as normal.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
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Link here.
Lots of detailed information, all of which confirm what I have been reporting for the past week or so. This quote however I think says it all:
The COVID-19 virus is on its final legs, and while I have filled this post with graphs to prove everything I just said, this is really the only graph you need to see, it’s the CDC’s data, over time, of deaths from COVID-19 here in the U.S., and the trend line is unmistakable:
[Click to see]
If virologists were driving policy about COVID-19 rather than public health officials, we’d all be Sweden right now, which means life would effectively be back to normal. The only thing our lockdowns have done at this point is prolong the agony a little bit, and encouraged Governors to make up more useless rules.
![[Click to see]](https://off-guardian.org/wp-content/medialibrary/us_weeklycdccoviddead-2-1.png){kind=link}
His graph is a smoothed version of the graph I have posted several times recently, showing the continuing decline in daily deaths nationwide from COVID-19.
The bottom line: The Wuhan flu epidemic is petering out. Almost all of us have nothing to fear from it. We need to reject that fear and go back to life as normal.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Sadly, we have established a new benchmark for reaction to cold and flu season.
Viruses and new aliments tend to always pop up here and there. Be prepared for a new wave of over-reaction and the end is near courtesy of government, media etc.
I used the term “apocalyptic porn” for a reason. Also expect a new wave of movies and direct to video. Some just eat it up!
With suppressed reporting over the holiday weekend, a jump was expected in today’s COVID-19 death report, which we got. 919 today vs. 596 last Tuesday. A better comparison would be that of the 1676 increase in the cumulative count since last Friday of to the corresponding 1706 three day increase of the week before, giving us a slight week-on-week decrease.
Will stories about the US having its highest daily COVID death toll in a month mention the holiday weekend effect?
I finally got around to reading “about the data” on the North Carolina Dept of Health and Human Services Covid website.
In NC, labs are required to report every positive test, but are not required to report negatives.
Also, they just issued an order making it easier to be tested, currently you have to be symptomatic to get tested.
And the media is jumping up and down about positive numbers, without mentioning testing numbers which have doubled or tripled lately, which makes it impossible for raw case numbers to go down.
Repeat a lie often enough, and it becomes the truth.
If virologists were driving policy about COVID-19 rather than public health officials, we’d all be Sweden right now, which means life would effectively be back to normal.
Life isn’t back to normal in Sweden, in fact Sweden maintains the social distancing measures that it’s had for months, life is more nearly back to normal in New Zealand, Finland and Norway, which now have less restrictions than Sweden, and have had a small fraction of the number of deaths.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covid-stringency-index?tab=chart&country=NZL~NOR~SWE~USA~FIN
We can hope that the large uptick in reported cases will not cause a large uptick in reported deaths in the 2-6 weeks it normally takes for the disease to claim most of its victims. But to report now that the disease is dying is way premature. We are still losing over 500 Americans a day to it, and the death rate, while decreasing, is decreasing at a decreasing rate. That is, it’s leveling out at about the 500 per day rate. That’s still a rate of 180,000 Americans per year.
And a note of history. The Spanish flu’s death rate in America died down over the summer in 1918 too and then came back with a vengeance in September. I hope that isn’t the case here. And it may not be, as we have a number of treatment options now that, while not perfect, do seem to be saving lives. Cautious optimism is called for. Celebration is not.
Andrew, not that long ago I was reading that Australia was in the endgame of eradication and plans were in work for eventually opening Australia NZ travel, but now I read of growing cases in Melbourne and closure of the VIC / NSW border. What happened? (I assume they must have been overly optimistic.)
Do you think eradication has a chance in Australia?
Could travel between the two countries open in conditions short of eradication?
Rose, yeah, I think they got too optimistic, thought the battle won and relaxed the containment measures. One advantage of Sweden’s approach I think is that the population has learned to better understand it’s their responsibility as individuals, not just to count on government actions. So when government imposed measure came off in Australia it was seen as a declaration of victory – so most voluntary measures no longer required.
Possibly other Australians will look at Victoria and say, “but for the grace of God . .”, and stick with the measures proven effective. There has been talk of possible state-by-state travel re-connection across the Tasman.
Rose, Andrew,
It really uis the same for Australia.
I’m in Sydney and the Vic positives are from a cluster of areas infected when the BLM protests were held/
But, the death toll here (Australiua wide) i
was staedy for weeks at 104, but has jumped to 106 in the last week, both very elderly people with co-morbidities.
In Sydney(and mostly elsewhere), people are largely back to a bit of normality, although the govt still tries to keep their hand on the scale by limiting businesses to about 20% capacity.
Most people are basically just getting on with it, mostly unmasked.
I’m with mkent.p. Besides the tamer rate of death, only today do I see a hard report from Italy that virulence is declining by a small study of 200 samples from March versus April, fewer virus particles.
We need to see more like this to confirm more anecdotal clinical reports, in order to celebrate. Good, if true. Like Missourians, show me.
I hadn’t visited the IHME COVID-19 Projections site for a while and had though the infection rate in the US was now getting up to similar levels as happened at the first peak, IHME models are pointing to the actual current infection numbers being well below that level, at 80,000 new daily infections which would mean a better than 60% detection rate. I think they’re way too optimistic, but I can believe that it hasn’t gotten back to the 240,000 new daily infections that they (and I) think it got to in late March, early April.
https://covid19.healthdata.org/united-states-of-america
mkent noted: “And a note of history. The Spanish flu’s death rate in America died down over the summer in 1918 too and then came back with a vengeance in September.”
A comparison with the Spanish flu seemed appropriate in the old days (back in February), when the Wuhan flu looked dangerous, but these days we have seen that the death rate is similar to the regular flu, even with the numbers padded with presumed, assumed, and unrelated deaths.
The Spanish flu killed millions in the U.S. and tens of millions worldwide. Wuhan is still trying — and failing — to be a similarly deadly disease.
The link is convincing the the herd immunity threshold is close to being reached. No vaccine necessary.
Robert has noted that despite a lot of new data, these past four months, many people still believe the panicky conclusions of February. https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/essays-and-commentaries/have-you-fallen-in-love-with-your-fear-of-covid-19/
And the other shoe drops…
Now that the public has consented to having their Constitutional rights trampled to treat COVID19 as a public health crisis, the left is starting to make noise about treating systemic racism and gun violence as public health crises…
I was waiting for this, but articles over the last 24 hours from editorial writers inPhilly and St. Louis (they’re behind paywalls) have made the calls. Given that “editorials” in major metro newspapers now are completely astroturf, how long before the rest follow suit?
And what does the Democrat candidate for president say about such things? “Defund the police? Absolutely!”
(This is neither a serious political party nor a serious presidential candidate)
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2020/07/08/joe-biden-says-police-have-become-the-enemy-entertains-defunding-them-n2572130
(And I am once again stating that IMO Joe Biden will never get near being president. The Democrats are hoping that there will be more people that hate Trump and that he has lost some of his base and therefore America will make Biden the symbolic president and will be run by them and they are now run by the extreme Left extortionists within their own party.)
A distraction:
THE BEST VIDEO YOU WILL SEE TODAY
And I have no idea how he got himself launched at that altitude, but there he is.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CCMN_FTKHLu/?utm_source=ig_embed
Cotour—
Changing the subject briefly–
The Mikhaila Peterson Podcast #9
Jordan B. Peterson Family Update
June 30, 2020
https://youtu.be/HLWgVpmo1e0
56:16
This just in—
Our Governor in Michigan, is continuing her fascist-ways.
-She’s (currently, today 11:30am) highly concerned over disparate Chinese-virus impacts on the poor & minorities, therefore all healthcare workers will now be required to take unconscious-bias training, or they won’t get their license’s renewed.
(under the watchful eye of the Racial Disparity Commission, whatever that is…)
-The requirement to wear masks inside all retail locations is extended by executive order, and she’s highly concerned over enforcement of that Order.
(meanwhile– you can riot and loot all you want.)
BAD NEWS:
Professor Helmut Norpoth of Stoney Brook U. who has been correct in predicting presidential races 96 percent of the time with the system that he has developed predicts the 2020 presidential election. And predicts a 91 percent win………for guess who?
https://vosizneias.com/2020/07/09/he-accurately-predicted-96-7-of-the-time-is-he-right/
“Post Election Reasonable Discussion”
Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian election meltdown
[Steven Crowder Parody]
November 22, 2016
https://youtu.be/ATaQ7n1iSy8
3:35
–adult language-
Cenk Uyger is the perfect representation for the Democrat / “Woke” party.
An emotional and out of control extremely minor and none consequential, America hating, media talking head.
And speaking of “Woke”, emotional and none consequential human beings, where has Adam Tondowski gone?
I was expecting the rise in the number of deaths to follow about two weeks behind the rise in diagnosed cases, but it actually happened a few days later, at about 18 days. I think what was happening was that the falling death rate from earlier cases was masking the rising death rate from the second wave for those few days. The same thing happens with the solar activity charts our host likes to reference, the new solar cycle will start before the sunspot count starts to rise if the two cycles overlap.
Election Night 2016
(SNL parody)
https://youtu.be/SHG0ezLiVGc
5:36
Andrew_W: “… at about 18 days.”
I’d say about three weeks (or perhaps even 23 days) from looking at some 7-day average, smoothed graphs. But, yeah, it seems pretty clear we’re climbing. (Though at this point it is still necessary to know when retrospective deaths were added to distinguish this upturn from earlier artifacts.)
I agree with Bob, semantically, that this isn’t a second wave (though in a few weeks it will likely appear as that on total US daily death rate charts), but only because it is instead the first wave rolling into areas which had not previously been heavily hit. Still, I don’t understand the psychology behind his certitude. This post was made on the very last day that a week-on-week decrease could be claimed, but aside from the increasing total raw case reports, it was clear then that cases were growing in specific geographic regions, arguing against attributing it to overall increases in testing rates. Even last week’s CDC surveillance program report — as lagging as it is — was showing a sharp couple-week uptick in COVID-19 associated hospital visits.
As skeptical as I am, I’m still rooting for Bob to be right in the face of contrary evidence, both from the general concern of overall social and economic impact, and from the very personal concern that I may need to cancel my planned trip down Florida to watch the SAOCOM-1B polar orbit launch out of the Cape. I’m not worried so much about the consequences of catching the disease myself as I am of getting caught up in road blocks or quarantines when I head back north.
A better theory as to why the greater lag time between the increase in cases and the rise in the number of deaths:
The observation has been that those that were first infected this time around were the young, for the death rate to rise they had to pass it on to the old, that took a week.