We have all the tools we need to deal with a wildfire!

Posted on by Thor

Tools to fight COVID-19 have been abandoned or are being phased out. Treatments available earlier in the pandemic are becoming useless with the rapidly evolving new variants of the virus. Monoclonal anti-body treatments are no longer effective. “The big problem is that monoclonal antibodies bind to a very small piece of the virus. As the virus changes, we are now in a position in which we lost them all because they don’t bind to the virus anymore,” Johns Hopkins School of Medicine professor Arturo Casadevall, MD, PhD, told NBC News.

In May of 2022 the White House said it would have to wind down it’s COVID relief program since Congress cut  $22.5 billion in COVID relief funding. There will be no more free vaccinations, tests and treatment to the immunocompromised. If more COVID-19 variants emerge, different boosters may be developed to fight them. Without additional funding, the government will not be able to purchase enough boosters for Americans. U.S. doctors will stop accepting claims from uninsured people.

U.S. will no longer be able to invest in more oral antiviral pills or any new promising antiviral treatment. They will also dial back on research into a “next-generation” COVID-19 vaccine that would protect against a wide range of variants. The country “blindsided” to emerging variants. Researchers won’t be able to properly assess any new variants of COVID-19 that could possibly emerge.

You may have a wildfire and you may have water. The water is useless unless you have a way to get the water to the fire.

Wen Misinformation Genie

Posted on by Thor

The pandemic is not over. Yet certain talking heads are placating the public and pretending it is over. Almost 4,000 Americans continue to die every week, about 1,000 more that the number of people who died on 9-11. The death numbers are rising. July 4th of last year president Biden claimed the pandemic was over, and a year later despite all the needless death inbetween, he once again proclaimed the same.

Leana Wen is a research professor of health policy and management. She has been a favored host on CNN. At one point in 2021 she said that people should not be allowed out in public unless they are vaccinated. Far right anti-vaxers were furious. Lately however she seems to be on the far right anti-vax pay roll.

Wen claimed that getting infected should be perceived as the new normal going forward. So 4,000 deaths a week is “the new normal.” In a recent column in the Washington Post, Wen claimed, “We are over counting COVID deaths and hospitalizations.” She didn’t reference any research or data to back up her claim but she did talk to several friends.  The anecdotal opinions of these two friends seemed to be the entire basis for her crazy headline. One said that of the patients he treats in Massachusetts,  just 30% are treated with a steroid for patients suffering from low oxygen. He went on to state that he felt hospitalizations are over counted. Strangely, Wen referenced the 30% number and attributed it to deaths rather than hospitalizations, or treatments with steroids which she earlier referenced. Does she not know the difference between death and hospitalization? The article is misleading at best.

Dr. Jeremy Faust, an emergency physician at Bringham and Women’s Hospital, who teaches at Harvard, and consults with the White House. He said on Twitter, “I can’t say for sure if we are over counting hospitalizations, it is certainly possible, although it is not black and white. But I can say with confidence that we are not over counting COVID deaths right now, including Massachusetts, the state highlighted in the Post, because this is literally what I study.”

Excess deaths (orange) in America follow the same trajectory as COVID deaths (black), with excess deaths often being rather higher. These deaths are compared to what would have been expected given the five year averages of deaths prior to the pandemic. If anything, this makes it seem that COVID deaths are likely being under counted. Dr. Faust went on to say, “If we were truly over counting COVID deaths, an important piece of evidence to support that would be if COVID deaths…were exceeding all cause deaths.” So to state the obvious, simply, COVID deaths are not being over counted. It is very likely that COVID deaths are being under counted.

The misinformation Wen is now peddling is dangerous because it ignited the conspiratorial far right anti-vax, Q-Anon crowd. In the early days of the pandemic I used to respect Wen’s opinions and guidance but now she is quite simply encouraging death and denying the facts all around her as the pandemic continues to rage. Wen’s stance is offensive to all the millions of families who lost a love one because of COVID.

Can someone please cork the bottle of this genie of death.

You just need to catch fire and you will stop worrying!

Posted on by Thor

According to recently published data from experts at the Dornsife School of Public Health, closing indoor dining during the first two waves of the COVID pandemic was associated with a 61% decline in new COVID-19 cases over a six-week span, preventing an estimated 142 daily cases per city, compared with cities that reopened indoor dining during that period. The team looked at data from March to October 2020 in 11 U.S. cities, including Philadelphia, Atlanta and Dallas. The results were published last month in the journal Epidemiology.

At first researchers believed that  recovering from COVID-19 meant the chances of getting the virus again so soon were low. Scientists thought we were protected for at least six months after the initial infection. This as it turns out is not true. You can be er-infected much sooner. The much raster re-infections are due to relaxed safety precautions such as masking and social distancing, as well as declining antibody levels and additional viral mutations, which can result in immune escape by omicron sub-variants.

Re-infections are common. The antibodies you generate in the face of one infection don’t necessarily protect you against other sub-variants for long.

I’m done with wildfires!

Posted on by Thor

Groundhog Day, derives from the Pennsylvania Dutch superstition that if a groundhog emerges from its burrows on this day and sees its shadow due to clear weather, it will retreat to its den and winter will go on for six more weeks; if it does not see its shadow because of cloudiness, spring will arrive early. This year, Canadian Groundhog, Fred la Marmotte, did not exit his borrow. That is because Fred died while in hibernation.

A dead groundhog is the harbinger of only one this, that the pandemic is not over. It also indicated that the pandemic will continue for much more than 6 weeks. The groundhog day master of ceremonies, Roberto Blondin said, “In life, the only thing that’s certain is that nothing is certain, Well, this year it’s true. It’s sadly true. I announce to you that Fred is dead.”

H5N1  or Avian Flu has killed 58,200,536 birds in the United States since January 2022. 47 states have been affected. Last fall in Spain, an outbreak of bird flu at a mink farm resulted in the death or culling of the entire group of 50,000 minks. This may be the first case of mammal to mammal transmission of the virus. Humans are mammals.

COVID-19 has a mortality rate of about 1%. Bird flu has a mortality rate of over 50%. If the virus begins to spread among humans, there is little chance that a targeted response to stop the outbreak would happen. Bird flu would indeed make the COVID pandemic seem like it was a minor inconvenience.

On the Caspian Sea there was a mass mortality event of Bird Flu that killed 700 seals. This is again evidence that mammals are passing the virus to each other. The virus is found the the droppings and saliva of birds. If a mammal consumes a dead bird, or is exposed to droppings, that is one way to contract the virus.

Human infections with bird flu viruses can happen when virus gets into a person’s eyes, nose or mouth, or is inhaled. The first case of an avian influenza A (H5N1) virus in a person in the U.S. was reported on April 28, 2022. Researchers at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology report that H5N1 Bird Flu closely  resembles the 1918 Spanish Flu virus.  The 1918 virus was an avian strain that managed to adapt to humans without first acquiring any genes from existing human flu viruses. Further, the researchers found that several of the same mutations found in the H5N1 virus are found in the 1918 Spanish Flu virus.

57 seals were found dead in Maine having also died from H5N1. In Montana, three grizzly bears wandered, disoriented and blinded and were found to be infected by H5N1. All three bears died.

Since 2003, there have been 868 cases of human infection with H5N1 reported, of which 457 were fatal—a 53 percent case fatality rate. Ecuador reported its first case on January 9, 2023, in a 9-year-old girl who had contact with backyard poultry. So far, human to human transmission has not been reported. The 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic started when a bird infected a pig who then gave the virus to a farmer who then spread the virus at Camp Funston in Kansas as troops trained for WW I. Infected troops then spread the virus throughout Europe.

Also infected have been foxes, polecats, badgers and foxes. So did the groundhog die of a virus? No cause of death has been noted.

This wildfire series is inspired by @1goodtern on Twitter. Since the media has gone silent on pandemic coverage, I have turned to Twitter to stay informed.

Wildfires only burn vulnerable trees.

Posted on by Thor

COVID -19 has become the eighth most common cause of death among children in the United States. Covid-19 has been the third leading cause of death in the broader population. Since Covid is the most severe in the elderly and immunocompromised, parents have decided it is a good idea to have their children get infected multiple times in poorly ventilated classrooms. They have been told multiple times that children do not get infected and do not die from COVID.

Researchers’ analysis of data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that there were 821 Covid-19 deaths in children between the ages of 0 to 19, during a 12-month period from August 2021 to July 2022. That death rate – about 1 for every 100,000 children – ranks eighth compared with the 2019 data. It ranks fifth among adolescents ages 15 to 19. Children are less vaccinated against Covid-19 than any other age group in the US. Less than 10% of eligible children have gotten their updated booster shot, and more than 90% of children under 5 are completely unvaccinated.

A CDC survey of blood samples suggest that more than 90% of children have already had Covid-19 at least once.

COVID-19 deaths in America as of January 4, 2023 are as follows.

0-17                                   1,414 dead

18-29                               6,749 dead

30-39                             19,255 dead

40-49                            45,092 dead

50-64                           197,247 dead

65-74                           246,021 dead

75-84                           282,430 dead

85 years and older,   288,990 dead.

Total American deaths due to COVID as of Jan 4, 2023 … One million eighty seven thousand, one hundred ninety eight.

On February 2, 2023 that number rose to 1,134,259.

World wide there have been well over 6 million deaths.

This wildfire series is inspired by @1goodtern on Twitter. Since the media has gone silent on pandemic coverage, I have turned to Twitter to stay informed.

Firefighting equipment makes no difference!

Posted on by Thor

If your town hired firefighters who sprayed gasoline on the fire, your town would have to hire new firefighters. That is of course if the town were still standing after the blaze. We got to watch clowns in countries around the world pour gasoline on the pandemic blaze.

If those same firefighters said they could not put out the blaze and you should accept that we will all be burnt, you would hire new firefighters. Perhaps they might advise you that only 1% of the houses might burn. Hire new firefighters.

When the 2016 American presidential election rolled around I voted to remove the 45th president precisely because he did nothing to put out the fire. The 46th president unfortunately isn’t any better. He chooses to ignore the conflagration. He and his wife both tested positive for COVID twice and so they are “done: with the pandemic.

Someone shared a magnificent video that outlines the 4 stage strategy for COVID Pandemic response.

In stage 1 Politicians say, “Nothing is going to happen.”

In stage 2 They say, “Something may be about to happen, but we should do nothing about it.”

In stage 3, They say, “Maybe there is something we should do about it, but there is nothing we CAN do.”

In stage 4, They say, “Perhaps there is something we could have done, but it is too late now.”

This wildfire series is inspired by @1goodtern on Twitter. Since the media has gone silent on pandemic coverage, I have turned to Twitter to stay informed.

The wildfire won’t get us, its burning on the other side of the valley!

Posted on by Thor

In its selfish isolationist wisdom, the United States has hoarded vaccines allowing the virus to burn through other societies around the world. What politicians don’t think to understand is that if the virus is allowed to burn anywhere in the world, it will burn everywhere in the world. All it takes is one plane flight with an infected passenger for the wildfire to ignite in another country.

January 24, 2020 the 45th president said, “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China. We have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.”

January 30, 2020, “We think we have it very well under control. We have very little problem in this country at this moment — five — and those people are all recuperating successfully. But we’re working very closely with China and other countries, and we think it’s going to have a very good ending for us … that I can assure you,”

February 9, 2020,  “The flu, in our country, kills from 25,000 people to 69,000 people a year,” suggesting that it dwarfed the 15 cases of COVID-19 that had been reported in the U.S. at the time. He then predicted, the number would soon be near “zero.”

February 10, 2020, “By April or during the month of April, the heat, generally speaking, kills this kind of virus,”

February 27, 2020, “It’s going to disappear. One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear,”

March 10, 2020, “Well, this was unexpected. This was something that came out of China, and it hit us and many other countries. You look at the numbers; I see the numbers with just by watching you folks. I see it — it’s over 100 different countries. And it hit the world. And we’re prepared, and we’re doing a great job with it. And it will go away. Just stay calm. It will go away,”

March 11, 2020, “To keep new cases from entering our shores, we will be suspending all travel from Europe to the United States for the next 30 days. The new rules will go into effect Friday at midnight. These restrictions will be adjusted subject to conditions on the ground.”

Containing the virus in China was the one chance to eradicate the world widespread of the virus. That chance was lost in the first months. By the time any travel restriction took effect the virus had already spread world wide. All it takes is one infected passenger to step off a plane and a new wildfire will ignite in another country.

This wildfire series is inspired by @1goodtern on Twitter. Since the media has gone silent on pandemic coverage, I have turned to Twitter to stay informed.

Wildfires won’t get us, we’ve splashed ourselves with water!

Posted on by Thor

COVID-19 vaccines do NOT contain ingredients like preservatives, tissues (like aborted fetal cells), antibiotics, food proteins, medicines, latex, or metals.

Getting a COVID-19 vaccination IS a safer and more dependable way to build immunity to COVID-19 than getting sick with COVID-19. Neither will stop a re-infection.

COVID-19 vaccines do NOT create or cause variants of the virus that causes COVID-19. Instead, COVID-19 vaccines can help prevent new variants from emerging.

mRNA vaccines, such as Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, work differently than other types of vaccines, but they still trigger an immune response inside your body. Immunity wanes over time.

COVID-19 vaccines do NOT contain microchips. Vaccines are developed to fight against disease and are not administered to track your movement.

COVID-19 vaccines do NOT change or interact with your DNA in any way.

Because none of the authorized COVID-19 vaccines in the United States contain the live virus that causes COVID-19, the vaccine CANNOT make you sick with COVID-19.

Immunity only lasts for the COVID variant of the day. Variants are mutating monthly and daily.

Thought America has hoarded a biblical excess of vaccines they are not going into many arms. COVID re-infections are common and they are not harmless.

This is the start of the wildfire series inspired by @1goodtern on Twitter. Since the media has gone silent on pandemic coverage, I have turned to Twitter to stay informed.

I slept with COVID

Posted on by Thor

I slept with COVID-19. On the morning of January 25, 2023 I woke up and as I got dressed, I was surprised that Pam was sleeping in. She usually gets up before me. I got my day started by working on a painting. Later in the morning I got a call from Pam letting me know that she had tested positive for COVID-19. Before our call was over I already had my N-95 mask on. I don’t wear a mask to bed however, so I had to have been exposed.

My plan is to self isolate for 10 days. Unfortunately that means staying isolated from Pam as well. Since the bedroom was already exposed to the virus she would stay in that room. I would make each meal and leave hers in a bathroom where she would pick it up. She ordered some easy to make foods which I have been preparing for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

The first evening after the positive test I had to decide where to sleep. There was a guest bedroom right across from where Pam was sleeping but I had read an article about a quarantine hotel where the person across the hall had managed to become exposed just from the opening and closing of doors as food was delivered. I decided instead to sleep on a couch which is down a long hallway.

Pam and I had just recently ordered N-95 masks and a HEPA air filter. I moved the HEPA filter to my studio while I painted and kept my N-95 on all day. The N-95 is amazingly breathable, I honestly often forget I have it on. When I went to bed I moved the HEPA filter next to the couch. The dogs curled up next to me.

The first night was horrible for Pam, she had a fever, body aches, soar throat, chills, hot sweats, fatigue, headache, congestion and a runny nose. She said it was the sickest she has ever been. I could hear her cough from down the hall. She has had every vaccine shot and the booster. Several times she considered the idea of having me bring her to the hospital but I only found this out later. At one point she sent me a zombie emoji.

She thinks she probably got infected at one of the Weddings or Bat Mitzvahs that she played hostess at. She was the only person among the several hundred at these events who was masked. She complained about her eye lids feeling like magma the first evening she had symptoms. This leads me to think she may have been infected through her eyes. Since the N–95 is just 95% effective, she may have also breathed in the virus at the event. We will never know for sure. Contact tracing is a thing of the past. Another of her co-workers was also infected.

After several days her symptoms trailed off. She made a rather quick recovery. All the while she kept working from home, doing spreadsheets, grants, and summer camp plans. Right now she is having a zoom meeting on the back porch. She probably got more work done while in isolation since there were no interruptions except for my occasional text to see if she was hungry or needed anything.

On the morning of January 30, 2023 I woke up with a horrible sour throat that made my ears ache. I hadn’t felt that painful of a soar throat since I had my tonsils out when I was 9 years old. Naturally my thought was that I had COVID. I had made one tactical mistake in trying to avoid the airborne virus. I couldn’t sleep with my N-95 mask on. I took it off an hoped the HEPA filter would be enough to remove any virus before I breathed it in. I kept the HEPA as close to my head as I could.

We have several COVID at home tests in the closet. Any time the government makes them available, I let Pam know, and she orders some. I took a test, and the ten minute wait was agonizing. I tested negative. Now I wonder if I pressed the swab up my nose far enough. I tickled my brain enough so that I had to sneeze repeatedly.

We are now on day 6 of our lockdown. Pam seems good as new and my soar throat only lasted the one morning. I have not developed any other symptoms. We have remained separated and communicate through a long thread of texts. We started watching movies by setting up a zoom meeting. I would sit in the living room and she would watch the TV from her bedroom on zoom. I had to put a dining room chair on the coffee table to raise the computer camera high enough for her to see the TV. The jury rigged system worked pretty good. We could talk to each other as the program played.

I will take another test at the end of the isolation period just to be sure, but the only symptom was a short lived soar throat. Amazingly I may have dodged the bullet again.

Return to Normal

Posted on by Thor

The pandemic is not over. We need to stop buying into the denial that we are “back to normal.” The Aztec culture of human sacrifice used to be considered brutal and horrific. However it does not compare to the over 500 deaths a day as officials placate the public to help them feel that it is fine to go back to everyday life with no face masks, social distancing or any improved ventilation of indoor spaces. The elite keep themselves safe and convince the lower classes to return to normal, and infect one another. 

COVID kills ten times more people than the flu. COVID kills more people than car accidents, strokes, respiratory disease, diabetes, pneumonia and Alzheimer’s. Nine  months ago when the public was told that Covid-19 patients retain elevated risk of infection for at least nine months after being infected, now that risk assessment was extended to 18 months. Getting infected does not build up you immune system, it destroys it.

In 2022 there was a 30% increase in heart attacks among 25-44 year olds. Excess deaths have been on the rise since the start of the pandemic and many of these are likely due to prior COVID infections. This number will keep rising with repeat COVID infections. Each month, more than a million people have called out sick for the past three years. About 7% of Americans currently have long Covid, which can affect productivity and ability to work, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

White House COVID Czar, “Ashish Jha almost gleefully explained that vaccines, tests, and treatments for Covid are heading to the private sector, “My hope is that in 2023, you’re going to see the commercialization of almost all of these products.” Cha-ching! Big money to be made on palatine remedies that do not stop the spread of the virus. Soon drug store shelves will be jam packed. But pharmacists at CVS and Walgreens are dropping off like flies, so pharmacy hours are being cut back. Testing centers are a thing of the past as people test at home. All those at home tests go unrecorded so who knows how much virus is actually out there.