Chris Cuomo – Analog Artist Digital World

Storm troopers entered the home of Rebekah Jones to seize her computers and tech. They didn’t take the router or other tech in the home, just the computer she uses to keep Floridians informed about the daily death toll of COVID-19. They also took her cell phone which has all the contacts who have helped her in the quest to keep Floridains informed.

On Twitter she posted home surveillance video of the raid as officers entered her home with guns drawn. She answered the door and was pushed outside. She was asked who was inside and she told them her husband and two children were upstairs. An unmasked officer stepped around a child’s ball in the hallway and shouted up the steps for the husband to come down. As guns were pointed up the steps Rebekah shouted for them to stop pointing their guns at her children.

Quoting Jones from her tweet, “There will be no update today. At 8:30 am this morning, state police came into my house and took all my hardware and tech. They were serving a warrant on my computer after DOH filed a complaint. They pointed a gun in my face. They pointed guns at my kids.” She went on to say, “This is what happens to scientists who do their job honestly. This is what happens to people who speak truth to power.”

A search warrant had been issued based on a complaint from DeSantis’s Florida Department of Health (DOH) regarding an investigation claiming Jones sent an alert to the DOH emergency alert system. She denied the claims in that charge. In a December 9, 2020 tweet Rebekah reported, “The judge who signed the search order of my house was appointed by Governor Desantis and sworn in less than a month before he signed that warrant. In civil court. He’s not even a criminal court judge. It was one of his first actions as judge.” Rebekah could face 5 years in prison if convicted of cyber crime.

Rebekah Jones worked for DOH and she designed and built their COVID-19 data dashboard which was praised by members of the White House corona virus task force at the time. Six months ago she was fired when she refused to alter data to downplay the seriousness of the COVID-19 pandemic as Florida Ron DeathSantis wanted to fully re-open up the state. Jones created her own version of the dashboard with more accurate data. It is the source of information I turn to when seeking honest numbers about the outbreak in Florida.

In an interview on CNN with Chris Cuomo, Rebekah stated, “I have not had access to any systems at DOH for over 6 months. I am not a hacker. This is just a very thinly veiled attempt of the governor to intimidate scientists, and get back at me while trying to get to my sources. DeSantis needs to worry less about what I am writing about, and worry more about the people who are sick and dying in his state. And doing this to me will not stop me from reporting the data, ever. She started a Go Fund Me and plans to get a new computer so she can get immediately back to work. Data on Rebekah’s Florida Community Dashboard is now being updated.

DeSantis has been strong arming a Blue Sky campaign that ignores the pandemic and paints a rosy picture of his handling of all the death and agony. The Sun Sentinel reported that Governor DeSantis in the weeks leading up to the November election ordered health officials to not talk about COVID-19 with the public.

Ron Filipkowski, the commissioner and vice-chair for the 12th Circuit Judicial Nominating Commission tendered his letter of resignation in response to the treatment of Rebekah Jones. Lets hope more politicians, lawmakers and civil servants stand up to this abuse of power by the Florida Governor. In response, Rebekah tweeted, “I continue to be amazed not by the depravity of our leaders, but by the strength of our community.“

CNN News Anchor Chris Cuomo has been diagnosed with Covid-19 and he continues to broadcast from home. He has been very open about his fevers, chills and shortness of breath as well a phantasmagorical visions. In one of his broadcasts he said doctors are referring to the virus as “The Beast” and he said that April will be the Cruelest month. Indeed the hospitals in New York City are being overrun with patients infected with the virus. Refrigeration trucks are being set up outside hospitals to be used as temporary morgues since the morgues are already over run.

Cuomo’s reference to the Covid-19 virus at “The Beast” reminded me of a painting I studied as an art student by Rubens called “Daniel in the Lion’s Den.” I imagined those lions representing the virus as they pace in the cramped hospital room. I have seen so may picture of doctors exhausted emotionally and physically to the point that they just collapse on the floor or under a table. A photo of a nurse whose face was scarred by her surgical mask went viral.

Healthcare workers at Mount Sinai Hospital held photos
of sick colleagues at a protest demanding more personal protective equipment (PPE) in New York on April
3, 2020. Hospital staff were not able to get tests even after a nurse contracted the virus and died. The death of Kious Jordan Kelly, 48, was confirmed by Mount Sinai
Hospital. It comes amid an escalating crisis in New York in which
hospitals are faced with surging numbers of Covid-19 patients and
shortages of crucial medical equipment and protective gear for staffers. Senior Vice President Vicki R.
LoPachin announced that starting on Tuesday, April 7, Mount Sinai staff who develop symptoms consistent with Covid-19, will be tested for this viral infection within a few days of the onset of symptoms.

On March 13, 2020 one nurse developed symptoms after treating a patient. Symptoms included shortness of breath, fever, and an unrelenting, dry cough. She was told to manager her symptoms at home because she could not be tested. She instead turned to her primary care physician who told her to call the Covid hotline. She waited two hours online and eventually was sent to another hospital to get tested. She tested positive. After seven days of managing symptoms at home and not improving, a
primary care doctor prescribed new treatment medication:
hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin, and zinc.

Doctors and nurses are referring to the hospitals as war zones. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Hospital staff said nurses were told to reuse gowns, ration N-95 masks, and
wear surgical masks, which do not offer the same level of protection
against the virus. Some nurses in England have had to resort to wearing garbage bags since there is such a shortage of scrubs. Nursing staff are pulling together and doing what they can to rise above this disaster. One of the horrible aspects of this virus is that it forces patients to suffer alone.

Fourteen white tents have been set up in Central Park to handle the overflow of patients from the hospitals. The 68-bed facility is run by Mt. Sinai Hospital, which is located
directly across the street from the tents in Central Park. Other locations hosting medical pop-ups include the Javits Convention Center and the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal. The USNS Comfort Hospital Ship docked at pier 19 to assist in the pandemic. AS of April 4, 2020 the ship accepted “less than five” patients who were infected. Initial screenings prior to patients boarding the ship did not reveal that they had contracted the virus. The CDC screenings consist only of a temperature check and “a series of
questions addressing member’s recent health and contact history.” A ship can be a highly deadly breading ground for a deadly virus. The Comfort, which can hold up to 1,000 hospital beds, has treated fewer than 30 patients since arriving in New York on Monday March 30, 2020.

Data Raid

April is the Cruelist Month