Who's Going to Pay the Bills?: Purpose-Driven Coronavirus Business Shutdowns Cause Economic Catastrophe

[Erikaspirit16]

Taiwan: As the JAMA article cited earlier states, in 2004 Taiwan established the National Health Command Center. And they created a PLAN (!!!) of what to do if an epidemic struck. So they didn’t sit around and wonder what to do. They acted.

So what did they do? Well, actually the first anyone outside of China had an idea of what was going on was a blogger (in the US, I think) who tracked outbreaks of disease as a hobby. He realized something weird was going on in Wuhan. In the next day or two, Taiwan realized it too. Dec. 31 the WHO was notified of some strange events in Wuhan. Now the Taiwanese had a choice: They could sit back and see what happened. Or they could take action. They took action–they sent two doctors to Wuhan to see what was going on. The doctors returned and said it looked bad. Taiwan began implementing their plan.

Now if you didn’t see the PBS story on two Taiwanese students returning home, one from Australia and one from London, take a couple minutes and watch it. It’s illuminating.
It’s a shining example of how to do this right.

Taiwan: Taiwan’s aggressive efforts are paying off in fight against COVID-19 | PBS NewsHour

As you can see, they do not screw around.

Now beyond their plan, they also passed a law (probably around 2004) saying that every hospital had to have at least 30 days supply of everything. Imagine that.

So no, Taiwan has not had a lockdown. It hasn’t needed one (I’ll get to that below). But guess what? After two days of no new cases at all, it held a simulation of a lockdown with all interested parties taking part. This was April 20. Why? Because they are rational–they know that the virus is not “just going to go away.” Taiwan contained Covid-19, but simulated a lockdown anyway — Quartz

Sweden. A modified lockdown. Rush Limbaugh wanted to compare it to Michigan. Commenters above want to compare it to the UK, Italy, and Spain. But of course (!) that’s nonsense. You need to compare it to its neighbors, Norway, Denmark, and Finland–all of which had lockdowns. I’m using numbers from April 22 when I researched this:

Sweden – pop. 10.33 million, 16,004 cases, 1,937 deaths (1,549 cases per million population; 187.5 deaths per million)

Finland – pop. 5.5 million, 4,129 cases, 149 deaths (750.7 cases per million; 27.1 deaths per million)

Norway – pop. 5.4 million, 7,275 cases, 186 deaths (1,347 cases per million; 34.4 deaths per million)

Denmark – pop. 5.82 million, 8,108 cases, 384 deaths (1,393 cases per million 65.98 deaths per million)

Sweden has at least 156 more cases per million compared to the next closest country (Denmark) and more than twice as many cases as Finland per million. As for death rates, it’s much, much worse: 2.8 times worse than the next country, Denmark, and almost 7 times the best country (Finland). Does locking the country down have an effect? Absolutely–look at the numbers above. If you could cut the death rate by 2.8-7 times, wouldn’t you do it? (Think: There are now about 90,000 deaths in the US…what if that was 2.8 times as high–252,000? How about 630,000 deaths? Acceptable? Worth getting a haircut?)

 

[Erikaspirit16]

Now turn to the US (and the UK, France, Spain, Italy…). As we are finding out, the virus was active in the US and Europe back in Feb., and possibly January, weeks before we knew about it. How do we know? Testing people for anti-bodies.

Now the US has been operating under several self-imposed handicaps:

1. a lot of people with no health insurance–unlikely to go to a doctor or emergency room.
2. This was Feb.-March. Almost everyone WITH health insurance (including Medicare) has deductibles and co-pays still due at the beginning of the year. If you have aches and pains and a headache, are you going to pay $100-200 to have the doctor say “Take an aspirin.” No. You stay at home.
3. Undocumented workers. As we all know, ICE has been extremely aggressive. Are you going to sign in at a public hospital? Probably not.
4. Even after tests were declared “free,” the treatments were not. They are in every other developed country. Again, even if you had insurance, you were going to end up paying something.

So with all those handicaps, it should be no surprise that covid-19 spread undetected. We still have no idea what percentage of the population has been infected.

Now what we sometimes forget is the purpose of the lockdowns. Is it to eliminate the virus? No. We can’t do that without a vaccine. It’s to “flatten the curve” so that 5 million sick people don’t all go to the emergency rooms in the same week. All the simulations show that when the lockdowns end, the virus picks up again. The lockdowns are meant as a temporary measure to slow the infection so we can prepare–more intensive care beds, ventilators, PPE, tests, etc.

So is the US better off now in terms of supplies, tests, etc. than it was in early March? Of course. Are there shortages of PPE? Yes. Does the US have enough tests to do what the successful countries have done–test at the BEGINNING of the disease NOT the END? Not even close. For example, New Zealand, where Jacinda said “Get a test even if you have a sniffle.” And this was a couple days ago, after NZ had no new cases in a while. And yes, NZ has excess testing capacity. Of course it does. They planned. Jacinda for president. https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...f43f46-950e-11ea-87a3-22d324235636_story.html

Does the US lockdown make sense? Yes and no. Clearly it’s a case of shutting the barn door after the horse has escaped. If we shut down in late Jan. or early Feb., we’d probably be up and running again, just like China. Now the experts have been predicting pandemics for 50+ years. They have run simulations. They ran them again using covid-19 data from China (and not just in the US, in developed countries all over the world). Yes, the simulations disagreed in details. But they ALL agreed that if we just did nothing, the US alone would be looking at deaths in the millions (some said tens of millions). So has the lockdown been successful? Yes, in the sense the health system has not been completely overwhelmed. Has it “ended” the virus? No–but none of the experts expected it to.

 

[Erikaspirit16]

Why didn’t the US shut down for the Hong Kong flu in 1968-69? I heard this from an irate caller on a right-wing radio show. In 2014 the CDC created a “Pandemic Severity Assessment Network.” They rated pandemics on two main scales: transmissibility (1-5) and severity (1-7). Hong Kong flu rated 4 and 3. Covid-19 and the 1918-20 pandemic both rate at the top of the scale: 5 for transmissibility and 7 for severity.

Let’s translate that into numbers. The death rate for the Hong Kong flu was <0.5%. So 5 (or fewer) people died out of 1,000 who were infected. Should we shut down everything for <5 out of 1,000? No. Now the current death rate from covid-19 in the US is 6.1%. So 61 people out of 1,000 cases. At least 12 TIMES the death rate of the HK flu. Should we shut down? Of course. Now you can quibble about the death rates forever. But clearly covid-19 is far, far deadlier than any previous flu except for 1918-20.

 

[Poet]

JoeFreedom:

People who die of a heart attack with covid are being counted as a covid death not a heart attack death. This is a complete break from any other statistic. Prior to covid if you got a cold and died from an underlying immunological disorder call death would be recorded as the disorder and not the cold.

I don’t believe your description of how the medical community reports cause of death is accurate. In each case, the degree of responsibility of each factor is evaluated. If the heart attack was not brought on by covid-19, I don’t think it would be counted on a a cover-19 death.

Dr. Birx was quite clear in saying they’re being very ‘liberal’ (I think was her word) and said straight up that if you die WITH covid, you are counted ‘as a covid death.’

There have been plenty of stories of people saying their loved ones did NOT die of covid as listed in their obituary, cases of people being pressured by nurses to say their deceased had symptoms of covid, the word of doctors that they have been told by AMA to look for symptoms and classify deaths as covid sometimes even without verification (they had a headache and fever when they died? Count it as covid) and even one case of a man announced dead of covid who saw the notice and had to announce that he’s not even dead!

We also know now that hospitals are being paid money per patient labeled covid. They have a financial incentive to say people have this virus.

 

[Erikaspirit16]

Yes, I agree, different jurisdictions are counting different ways. Locally we had an old woman who died in a nursing home. She had all the symptoms of covid-19 but had not been tested. They offered to test her after she died, but the family refused, saying the tests would be better used on the living. So was she counted as a covid-19 death? No. But clearly she was.

We also know now that hospitals are being paid money per patient labeled covid. They have a financial incentive to say people have this virus.

If I had a dime for every time I’ve heard this, I’d probably have $1 by now. Guess what? Hospitals GET PAID!!! It’s true!!! Whether it’s by the insurance company, Medicare, Medicaid, Tricare, you name it, they get paid. And how do they submit their claims for payment? By using ICD-10, CPT, etc. codes. And yes, to some extent the doctors and hospitals game the system. Do you ever wonder why your doctor wants to replace knees one at a time? There is no medical reason to do it that way. But the doctors get paid more if they replace one at a time. So yes, if possible, they code to maximize payment. But falsifying codes is fraud

Now this nonsense about hospitals fudging the numbers comes originally from a doctor in Minnesota who was on the Laura Ingraham show. He mentioned the above coding. He also said THERE WAS NO EVIDENCE that hospitals were falsifying claims. However, that statement seems to have gotten lost in the transmission.

I’ve noticed a couple things in the last few years: One is a new meaning of the word “proof.” It’s no longer used in the sense of evidence that a rational person would use to draw a conclusion. It’s used in the mathematical sense of “proof.” Something 100% certain. In other words, you can’t prove anything.

Second, “it’s possible…” Sure. Anything’s possible. Could the world end tomorrow? It’s possible. Could covid-19 just disappear overnight? It’s possible. Could I really be a space alien in disguise? It’s possible. Could hospitals be trying systematically to defraud everyone? It’s possible.

 

[Socrates92]

Do they get more for a Covid death or not, though? If they do, human nature would say to me that the onus of proof is on showing that they don’t mislabel. The stats are inherently suspect if the incentive exists.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

Dr. Birx was quite clear… and said straight up that if you die WITH covid, you are counted ‘as a covid death.’

I think you are taking words out of context. I am certain the doctor did not mean that. What is true and proper is that if in the judgement of the medical professionals the person’s death was enabled by covid-19 then the death should be counted as a covid-19 death. Obviously if someone dies by being run over by a steam rollers, as in the tasteless comic going around, that person’s death is not counted as covid-19.

 

[Erikaspirit16]

Do they get more for a Covid death or not, though? If they do, human nature would say to me that the onus of proof is on showing that they don’t mislabel. The stats are inherently suspect if the incentive exists.

You live in a dark world. Let’s say that I know Mr. Smith carries around a lot of cash. I could kill him and rob him. To me (!) human nature says I won’t do that because it’s wrong. If Mr. Smith is killed and robbed, it’s not my responsibility to “prove” (there’s that word again) that I’m innocent. I trust hospitals and doctors to be honest. On the other hand, yes, I would definitely check their claims. That’s why every insurance company (including the gov.) has a fraud department. But the onus of proof is on the insurance company or the gov. to prove that fraud has been committed.

Having said that, it’s necessary for management not to give incentives to do the wrong thing–for example, Wells Fargo giving rewards for opening new accounts without checking the authenticity of the accounts!

 

[Socrates92]

You live in a dark world. Let’s say that I know Mr. Smith carries around a lot of cash. I could kill him and rob him. To me (!) human nature says I won’t do that because it’s wrong. If Mr. Smith is killed and robbed, it’s not my responsibility to “prove” (there’s that word again) that I’m innocent. I trust hospitals and doctors to be honest. On the other hand, yes, I would definitely check their claims. That’s why every insurance company (including the gov.) has a fraud department. But the onus of proof is on the insurance company or the gov. to prove that fraud has been committed.

we weren’t talking about murder. We were talking about labelling a death that has already occurred. There doesnt even have to be ill intent. If you pay me more to certify one thing over another I might have trouble being totally objective.

I also wasn’t talking about criminality. Just about suspicion, which is something that precedes proof of guilt. Information can be essentially useless if it isn’t trustworthy. Once trust in the data has been damaged the onus of proof is indeed on those responsible for the data to show why it is still reliable. If they can’t, they won’t be locked up for a crime; they just lose credibilty.

 

[Socrates92]

Having said that, it’s necessary for management not to give incentives to do the wrong thing–for example, Wells Fargo giving rewards for opening new accounts without checking the authenticity of the accounts!

So, you do agree with my point? Given that there is such an incentive in the labelling of covid deaths?

 

[Erikaspirit16]

So, you do agree with my point? Given that there is such an incentive in the labelling of covid deaths?

No, I don’t agree. Most emphatically not. What kind of world would it be if you couldn’t trust anyone? Is this the world you live in? If so, I’m sorry for you. It would be unbearable.

And no, we’re not talking about murder–but I am free to make my own analogies, right? But we are talking about fraud, which is a crime. Intentionally mis-labelling a death for financial gain is fraud, pure and simple. I used to work in health insurance. Trust me, it’s fraud.

Should you never audit anyone? Of course not. That doesn’t mean you think they’re all crooks. Some people are crooks. And to catch those crooks, you have to do some checking. But it’s quite a leap from that to suspect that (pick a number here–All? A lot? Some?) doctors and hospitals are committing fraud. With—as with most right-wing accusations–no evidence. To my knowledge, no one has been charged with a crime. Believe me, even as I write this fraud departments are checking. If they turn up something, it will be in the news.

This also goes back to a point I made earlier: the tendency nowadays to say “It’s possible…” As I said earlier, it’s possible I’m an alien from outer space. Everything is “possible.” That doesn’t mean it’s at all likely.

 

[Poet]

I think you are taking words out of context. I am certain the doctor did not mean that

Out of context? I’ve watched her statement several times IN CONTEXT. If you’re certain she didn’t mean what she said…well, bully for you. I believe words mean what words mean. I’ve watched her say it. If someone dies with covid it’s counted as a covid death. Words mean things. If you choose to believe that a man saying, “I’m going to shoot you between the eyes” as he points a gun at you doesn’t actually mean he’s going to shoot you between the eyes, well, that’s your decision.

And my decision to believe that people mean what they say is my decision to make as well.

Let’s not forget that people have stepped forward to say their loved ones were falsely marked as having died OF corona when they died WITH corona not of it; that other families have been pressured to say their deceased had symptoms of corona (so maybe they really died OF it although there’s no actual proof they even had it let alone died OF it.)

Let’s not forget the man reporting as having died OF covid…who wasn’t even dead.

Believe as you please. But don’t tell me I must accept your belief when I see plenty of evidence to the contrary. If the sky is green and the wind is wild and the trees are thrashing, I’m going to believe a tornado is coming no matter how much you tell me the sky is blue and it’s a perfect day for a picnic.

 

[Anrakyr]

“DO NOT wear masks, we are the scientists!” and so people believed them to be right. Now they tell us “MASKS have to be worn at ALL times”. If they wrong the first time, why can’t they be wrong now? Why can’t they be wrong about anything else.

Masks only help people who are sick avoid getting others sick. Since supplies are an issue the hope was people would social distance correctly and they wouldn’t need them.
The problem is people can’t be trusted too follow the guidelines so it’s easier to just mask everyone because Joe can’t be asked to wash his hands and not breath on others.

Don’t confuse the two. They weren’t wrong that masks weren’t needed they were wrong to trust the public.

This is just false. Taiwan was successful because it did not have a lockdown, proving that lockdowns do not work. Taiwan did other things as you said:

You are overlooking the cultural mindset. Taiwans citizens didn’t have a problem following instructions to contain the virus.

Taiwan with no lockdown: 7 deaths from corona virus.
USA with lockdown: 90,000 deaths from corona virus.
Which is better?

The country not trending #scamdemic

But did Taiwan have a lockdown? Yes or No?

Do you still beat your wife?

Unlike yourself, I am bringing forth studies showing that lockdowns and social distancing methods do not have an impact on the Covid-19 epidemic.

Being told not to touch a hot stove isn’t less effective because an unruly child insisted. Nor is the effort to ensure they are never alone in a kitchen. However a persistent child can and will break rules.

Sadly in this case everyone is a lawnchair pandemic expert.

 

[Socrates92]

What kind of world would it be if you couldn’t trust anyone? Is this the world you live in? If so, I’m sorry for you. It would be unbearable.

I’m not sure. That would be unbearable. As it is, I do trust many people. The official reporting on the Covid death rates, not so much. I also distrust many other official stats, such as the CPI, GDP, and unemployment measurements, so it’s not purely an ax to grind against this Covid/lockdown situation.

And no, we’re not talking about murder–but I am free to make my own analogies, right?

Yup. And I’m free to criticize them. Smoking marijuana used to be a crime in Canada less than a year ago. My ballpark educated guess would still be that at least 20% of the population, at least in my age range (maybe closer to 30%) did it. If there’s low probability of being caught (say, because your action has been endorsed by the CDC), and there is a financial incentive to do it, I just don’t buy the argument that most docs would refrain from biased reporting just because the legality might be fuzzy.

Intentionally mis-labelling a death for financial gain is fraud

Sure, but now address my other point where the professional has to make a judgement call what to write as cause of death, and is being paid to favour one cause over another. When you worked in health insurance did you have orders from the CDC to label “deaths with”, as “deaths from”, such as has happened with Covid? To me that would be a borderline fraud too, but I’m not a lawyer, and many doctors have admitted that those are their official marching orders, so I’m not 100% sure about the legality. I am pretty sure about the impact that would have on the data though.

This also goes back to a point I made earlier: the tendency nowadays to say “It’s possible…” As I said earlier, it’s possible I’m an alien from outer space. Everything is “possible.”

I was actually arguing that it was probable (not the alien part )

Continued

 

[Socrates92]

Continued

Should you never audit anyone? Of course not.

When someone is under audit or investigation, but has not yet been charged with anything, do you take the stats that they put forward at face value? I wouldn’t. The data has become useless until their name is cleared. Again, this has nothing to do with criminality, as guilt hasn’t been proven. If they did commit fraud, and it was proven in court, than at that point they would be criminal AND the data would be useless. Until then, nobody’s guilty until proven so, but the data is still less than useful, as is the case in the Covid death reports. Somewhere before the point of being audited, there is a point where someone decides that the data is worthy of auditing. Ie: it’s not 100% trustworthy. I am definitely at that point, and would love to see an exhaustive audit. I don’t think this means that I “don’t trust anyone”.

With—as with most right-wing accusations–no evidence.

Woah, where did that come from? I never brought up the left/right thing. Is it necessary to politicize everything?

 

[Socrates92]

I think you are taking words out of context. I am certain the doctor did not mean that.

What do you think the doctor meant?

 

[Anrakyr]

Woah, where did that come from? I never brought up the left/right thing. Is it necessary to politicize everything?

It’s a hobby on this forum. Right is good, left is bad and everything leads back to it.
Despite the fact it’s government types that boil down too taste.
But I digress.

 

[Erikaspirit16]

Is it necessary to politicize everything?

Yes. Because everything is political. Or religious, if you like. Our little discussion in essence goes back to “Man is inherently good” vs. “Man is inherently evil.” And whatever position you take on that would in turn influence what you think about whatever individual situation that comes up.

You seem like a reasonable person, so we’ve each had our say. Let’s leave it. In the end, I think we have to do what a Russian doctor said on TV last night–after it’s all over, you’ll have to go back and count ALL the deaths and compare them to ALL the deaths in the same month in previous years. That will give you a good estimate of the number of deaths caused by covid-19. (And as for the Russian doctor–I’ll just mention in passing that three (3!) Russian doctors who criticized the government have “fallen out of windows” in the last few weeks. At least we haven’t reached that level yet.)

 

[Erikaspirit16]

I’ll jump into the Birx “died with covid” vs. “died of covid.” There is a good article that discusses this (written by a doctor–bonus!) https://www.medpagetoday.com/blogs/working-stiff/85925

The article cites the National Vital Statistics System (NVSS). I’ll quote some of the article: "A death certificate has two sections where the doctor who investigated the case will write the cause of death. Part I is the underlying disease or injury that starts the lethal sequence of events. Part II is for any other underlying conditions that the decedent had that made the death more likely.

The NVSS guidelines state, “If COVID-19 played a role in the death, this condition should be specified on the death certificate. In many cases, it is likely that it will be the underlying cause of death, as it can lead to various life-threatening conditions, such as pneumonia and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). In some cases, survival from COVID-19 can be complicated by pre-existing chronic conditions, especially those that result in diminished lung capacity, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or asthma. These medical conditions do not cause COVID-19, but can increase the risk of contracting a respiratory infection and death, so these conditions should be reported in Part II and not in Part I.”

So, pathologists don’t certify deaths as due to COVID-19 based solely on a positive nasopharyngeal swab. We get a clinical history of shortness of breath, chest pain, fever, cough. Yes, it is possible that someone could be an asymptomatic carrier and die of heart disease – but in those cases we would certify the cause of death as heart disease and document the COVID-19 infection as a significant contributing condition, for several reasons."

Now of course someone could have covid-19 and be hit by a truck, but I don’t think any of us are thinking about that.

I really don’t understand why some people keep questioning the number of cases and deaths. I don’t know of anyone who thinks they are 100% accurate. On the one hand, clearly people were dying of covid-19 before tests were available or they died and were never tested, and therefore weren’t counted. On the other hand the death rate is exaggerated because the deaths are divided by the number of confirmed cases, which doesn’t include huge numbers of people who have covid-19 but haven’t ever been tested. There is no way to be 100% accurate. But I don’t believe in conspiracy theories. I think everyone is acting in good faith and recording deaths as best they can and following the rules. It’s hard to just dismiss 1.5 million cases and 90,000 deaths. Would it matter if there were 1.4 million cases? 2 million cases (don’t worry, we’ll get there)? And if there were 120,000 deaths? or 70,000 deaths? No matter how you cut it, this has been a total catastrophe–but not for all countries, which simply shows that gov. policy matters.

 

[JoeFreedom]

They weren’t wrong that masks weren’t needed they were wrong to trust the public.

That’s nonsense. The public is smart enough to realize when they are being duped. And if you want me to go find the video evidence of the CDC explicitly stating that wearing a mask is bad for you and more dangerous, I will, because the Surgeon General aired commercials nationally and was on news programs day in and day out telling people exactly that. And now they are telling people that masks are essential and everyone should be required.

The people know that the potential of surviving is 99.5+%, so they know this push by the CDC and the Whoooo? to be totally safe just a bunch of bullpop.

There is a great article by Denis Prager here: Some Thoughts About Being Safe by Dennis Prager

Some excerpts:

1. Until it’s safe’ means 'never.
2. The pursuit of “safe” over virtually all other considerations is life-suppressing.
3. We’re going crazy on the safe issue. It is making police states. That’s my worry: In the name of safety, many Americans are dropping all other considerations.