Thus far, Latah County has been spared from COVID-19. We have had 1,555 survivals out of 1,556 infections — a survival rate of 99.94 percent. Latah’s single death was an individual in their 70s with age-related health problems.
Latah’s survival rate is even higher if you consider 80 percent of people who get COVID-19 have mild to no symptoms, and many who think they have it choose not to pay $130 for someone to cram a stick up their nose and twirl it around for 15 seconds to confirm that news.
Another thing that I’m grateful for is how Moscow’s assisted living communities and nursing homes have not been hit the way that Pullman’s Bishop Place Senior Living was. I cannot praise the doctors, nurses and nursing staff that assist Moscow’s elderly highly enough. They are definitely doing something right to keep our elderly residents safe. But fortunately, even among those 70 and older, the survival rate from coronavirus is 95 percent. Getting COVID-19 isn’t the kiss of death.
Idaho has an overall survival rate of 99.95 percent. Clearly, the current coronavirus is not as deadly as past pandemics. The septicemic plague had a 100-percent mortality rate, the bubonic plague overall 40-60 percent, Ebola (25-90 percent), SARS (9 percent) and even the 1919 Spanish flu (3-5 percent).
With its current survival rate, COVID-19 does not scare me. I am much more likely to die in a car accident than from the virus. And politicians seem to agree.
On Nov. 6, Calif. Gov. Gavin Newson was partying indoors at the swank French Laundry restaurant in Napa Valley. Photos show 12 individuals sitting maskless around a crowded indoor table including Newsom, his wife and two high-level members of the California Medical Association. One-hundred politicians and lobbyists from California and Washington just flew to the Fairmont Kea Lani in Maui for a four-day legislative conference despite the pandemic and travel warnings. Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf was caught on a hot mic chuckling about the political theater of wearing face masks on camera for the sake of public image.
According to many, wearing a mask is a sign of faith in science, but there is no evidence base for their effectiveness. Rather, last week the results of a randomized controlled trial on the real-world efficacy of face masks against coronavirus infection were published in the well-regarded, top-tier journal, Annals of Internal Medicine. The study used “high-quality surgical masks with a filtration rate of 98 percent.” The study found no statistically significant benefit of wearing even a high-quality surgical mask. Yet we’re to believe that cloth masks are effective?
Coronavirus aerosols spread for about 100 feet before landing. Since the aerosols in a vape are similar in size to the coronavirus, Dr. Theodore Noel demonstrated the effectiveness of masks by using a vape. He took numerous masks (surgical, cup, cloth, guard mask with high efficiency filter, and an N-95 respirator with a valve) and demonstrated the inability of each to protect from the virus.
Furthermore, scientists have been charting mask mandates versus coronavirus infections across various countries and U.S. states. The findings show that mask mandates have done nothing to stop the coronavirus spread. And how could they? Anyone who wears glasses knows that they fog up every time you exhale with a mask on. Masks merely redirect your breathing, not filter it.
Coronavirus infection is spread through mucous membranes in the eyes, nose and mouth. One way to prevent respiratory infections is to avoid touching your eyes, nose and mouth. Guess what adjusting your mask every 30 seconds means? Sweden acknowledges the science and is still without a virtue-signaling mask mandate.
Instead, we have politicians playing medicine, with power-hungry people using COVID-19 as an excuse to gain greater power. Taking a burn-it-to-the-ground approach, they have closed businesses and schools; canceled weddings and funerals; increased suicides, domestic violence, alcohol and drug abuse; made family members die alone in hospitals; and thrown the working poor out of the workforce by labeling them “nonessential.”
One local congregation has had 1,100-plus in live attendance every Sunday since May. No masks. No hospitalizations. No deaths. So also, a local private school. Both living illustrations that the narrative of COVID is a lie.
Dale Courtney served 20 years in nuclear engineering aboard submarines and 15 years as a graduate school instructor. He now spends his spare time chasing his grandchildren around the Palouse.
