73% of Inmates at an Ohio Prison Have Tested Positive for COVID-19
A prison in Ohio is accounting for the majority of coronavirus cases in Marion County, which has the leading number of coronavirus cases in Ohio. Officials are attributing the large number of cases to mass testing. Everyone, both staff and inmates have been tested for coronavirus. No COVID-19 deaths have been reported, however, more than 100 staff members and 2,000 inmates have tested positive for the virus.
“Because we are testing everyone — including those who are not showing symptoms — we are getting positive test results on individuals who otherwise would have never been tested because they were asymptomatic.”
Although California, Florida, Georgia, and Texas all have larger prison populations than Ohio, no one has reported case numbers as large as Marion County. Michigan has also reported a high number of inmates testing positive for coronavirus with 572 inmates testing positive out of 889 inmates tested. Michigan has some of the highest case numbers in the country. New York, who also has extremely high case numbers is only testing inmates who show symptoms and has only reported around 1,000 cases within the prison system.
In the midst of the pandemic, the Ohio governor recommended 300 out of 49,000 inmates be released early. Ohio is not the only state to release prisoners early, however, the governor has stated that he is not planning a “Wholesale release” where every prisoner in certain categories is released.
Scientist Explains Why Isolation was Not the Best Way to Flatten the Curve
In a recent article by Collective Evolution, Arjun Walia talked with Dr. Knut M. Wittkowski, a Senior Research Associate Rockefeller University, and discussed how social distancing may not be the most effective measure for flattening the curve. Dr. Wittkowski pointed out in a recent study that social distancing, isolation, and the closure of businesses and schools occurred after the peak in COVID-19 cases. This means, according to Wittkowski, that isolation did not actually have anHow to Eliminate IBS, IBD, Leaky Gut effect on the spread of the virus, and that the decline in cases should be credited to herd immunity rather than social distancing measures.
COVID-19 is not as dangerous as media and government is making it out to be, and therefore schools and businesses should be open so we can create herd immunity and kill this virus, while the elderly and immune-compromised individuals should be quarantined and practicing social distancing measures.”
While allowing schools and businesses to operate normally, society is able to build herd immunity. Through herd immunity, we can eliminate the virus and decrease the risk of infection for those who are elderly or immune-compromised. This is according to Wittowski’s data.
There is nothing to be scared about, this is a flu epidemic like every other flu, maybe a bit more severe, but nothing that is fundamentally different from the flus that we’ve seen in other years.”
Hello! Im a doctor in Sweden. I want to correct a few assumptions in this video that is erroneous. First of all, Sweden is working under one very simple presumption: Whether you like it or not, this virus will spread. Lockdowns are only useful if your healthcare service cannot cope with the influx, other than that you are simply just pushing the problem ahead of yourself. When you have a wide spread around the world, there is no point in a lockdown – even if you completely eliminate the virus from your country at some point you will have to reopen your borders. With that being said, the statistics in Sweden are skewed to have a higher mortality rate because we only test people who are admitted into the hospital or high risk patients. We dont test people with mild to medium symptoms.
In Sweden we have extended so that you can have up to 3 weeks of “sick leave” from work(WITHOUT A DOCTORS NOTE!) – and the money will be paid from the government. We have also made so that people can work only 20% of their time and still get 80% of their salary through subsidies from the government(to save small businesses). Alot of more have been done, and all this so that people who even have the mildest symptoms will voluntarily stay home. I think this is much better than holding a gun to someones head and forcing them to stay home. We have to also keep in mind other things:
1) In sweden, the public health ministry is calling the shot. They are a group of doctors, epidemiologists and statisticspeople. This is due to a law from hundreds of years ago that says that politicians cannot interfere with these ministries. Thus there is no political agendas to “look good” infront of the people. Denmark closed the primary schools AGAINST THE RECCOMENDATIONS of their public health ministry.
2) You have to keep in mind all of public health and not get tunnel vision entirely on the virus. Lockdowns skyrocket rate of suicides and domestic abuse. Depression, alcohol abuse, you name it.
3) Everybody who has a positive PCR test and die gets counted to the death toll. So for example: If someone gets posivite PCR test and then dies from a myocardial infarction it will still count as a COVID-19 death.
4) Just to finish this rant off: It is unfair to say that Sweden is doing an experiment. Technically speaking EVERY COUNTRY is doing an experiment right now, because this has never been done before so we dont know what is the “best way”.
New Antibody Tests Show Coronavirus Mortality Rate May Be Much Lower
According to antibody tests conducted in New York, more than 13.9% of the population may have been infected with COVID-19. 3,000 people were tested randomly to determine what percent of the population may have coronavirus antibodies. Tests were conducted throughout 19 different counties and 40 different grocery stores. Based on the results conducted, it’s likely nearly 2.7 million New Yorkers have been infected at some point.
On Sunday, Cuomo said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the state’s antibody test that will provide the “first true snapshot” of how many people have been infected with Covid-19 in New York. State officials don’t know the true number of infections because they haven’t been able to conduct diagnostic coronavirus testing on a large scale”
Results vary among different counties with New York City showing positive antibodies in 21% of the population, 16.7% in Long Island, and 11.7% in Westchester and Rockland county. Mortality rates in New York were originally reported at around 7.4%, but testing indicated that the mortality rate is likely less than 1%.
In America, USC and Stanford have released preliminary studies that show that between 1-2 million people who may have been infected with COVID-19, in California (around 2-4 percent of the population). Despite these findings, California has reported around 33,200 cases, making the mortality rate more than 3%. However, based on the findings reported by preliminary studies, the death rate in California would be closer to .04%, the overall death rate is likely closer to 1%.
In Gangelt Germany, test results show that nearly 14% of the population was infected, this dropped their mortality rate to 0.36%. In Robbio Italy, it’s likely more than 22% of the population may have been infected lowering the mortality rate to 0.7%. In Finland, they’ve reported 4,000 official cases but tests show it is likely closer to 80,000-100,000, lowering their death rate to 0.1%. Some places are reporting flu-like death rates while other states are reporting more than double flu-like rate mortality. This is likely due to the age of people in communities with higher death rates.
Hospital Layoffs and Pay Cuts Are Happening During the Pandemic
The United States healthcare system could be facing a bigger crisis than CoVID-19. While New York Governor Andrew Cuomo begs for healthcare volunteers to combat coronavirus, hospitals throughout the country are furloughing or laying off employees at the highest rate since 1990.
On April 6th, the West Virginia University Health System announced that some of their employees will see temporary 25% pay cuts during the pandemic. As the hospital system is seeing less clinical volume, WVU Health is moving people to new roles, and those who are not matched to a new role will be sent home with a 75% salary guarantee. This new policy will be reevaluated in mid-May.
The WVU Health System hospitals are only one example of the grim reality facing many healthcare workers. According to Altarum, a nonprofit research and consulting firm…
Health care has traditionally cushioned the blow of non-health sector job losses during and immediately following economic downturns…This time, health care looks to be contributing to instead of counterbalancing an accelerating economic calamity. Health care lost 43,000 jobs this month, by far the largest monthly drop in our data series going back to 1990.”
In the case of West Virginia, the state has seen relatively few coronavirus cases during the pandemic, with the number of total reported cases in the state less than 1000. In additional cost-cutting measures, the WVU Health System will institute a hiring freeze, suspend employer match to all employee’s 403(b) for the remainder of 2020, and the health system CEO, hospital CEOs, and certain senior executives will see a 10% percent salary reduction for the next six months.
WVU Medicine employees are lucky. Workers who are sent home will still be making a significant portion of their salary. It’s likely that the employees sent home by the hospital administration will be in lower levels positions or less busy areas of the hospitals.
According to Indeed.com, people in administrative assistant and registered nurse positions at WVU Medicine make $30,000 and $51,000, respectively. Twenty-five percent of these salaries represent a significant chunk of income. Yet health system CEO, hospital CEOs, and certain senior executives are only receiving 10% pay cuts. The average CEO salary in West Virginia is $720,000. If the CEOs of the eleven hospitals in the WVU Health System make that average salary were made to take the same temporary 25% pay cut as hospital nurses and administrators, the hospital system could potentially save $1.98 million. Why are hospital workers on the front lines of our healthcare system being asked to sacrifice further when there are those in much better positions to step up financially?
Coronavirus Could Be Devastating for the Navajo Nation
The Navajo Nation, the largest Native American reservation in the U.S., saw its first case of COVID-19 on March 27th, and since then has seen over 1,300 positive tests for the virus. Most people in the Navajo Nation live in rural areas, which should limit the spread of the virus, but the tribe is facing several challenges in dealing with the Coronavirus.
Many natives have high rates of illnesses that make the community vulnerable to COVID-19 like asthma, diabetes, and heart disease. A history of mining, especially uranium mining, on the reservation has resulted in higher rates of reproductive cancers. In addition, one in 2,000 Navajos are born with severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID), a genetic disorder where a child is basically born without an immune system, although mandatory screening of Navajo children at birth enables the tribe to treat the condition.
In addition to these health challenges, the Navajo Nation is extremely poor. The United States has an official poverty rate of 12.6 percent. The rate of poverty in the Navajo Nation for families is 46.5 percent, with 14.9 percent of people living in extreme poverty.
Amenities that Americans take for granted, like plumbing, electricity, and paved roads, are not a guarantee on the reservation. One in ten Navajos doesn’t have electricity. In Apache county Arizona where the capital of the Navajo Nation, Window Rock, is located, Native American households are 13 times more likely to lack complete plumbing. Forty percent of the Native nation does not have indoor plumbing. The CDC handwashing guidelines are incompatible with life under these conditions.
A Poor People Pandemic
The Navajo Nation government has taken steps to stop the spread of COVID-19, with President Jonathan Nez declaring a weekend curfew on April 12th, and the Navajo Department of Health mandating the use of masks outside the home on April 19th. Even with these measures, the Navajo Nation will see higher COVID-19 infection rates and deaths, much like other poor and systematically disadvantaged communities across the country.
Coronavirus Cleaning Leads to Increased Calls to Poison Centers
A new study from the Centers for Disease Control reported a 20% increase in the number of calls to Poison Control since the start of the coronavirus pandemic in January. The National Poison Data System (NPDS), CDC, and the American Association of Poison Control Centers looked at data from calls concerning cleaner and disinfectant exposure for the last three years. There were 45,550 chemical exposure calls from January to March, up 20.4% from 2019 and 16.4% from 2018.
Bleaches accounted for the largest increase of calls among chemical cleaners, while nonalcohol disinfectants and hand sanitizers were responsible for the largest increase in disinfectant calls. Reasons for the calls included people improperly mixing bleach with other cleaners and toddlers swallowing sanitizer. Studies have linked the chemical with an increased chance of developing respiratory problems, leaving those who use the bleach more vulnerable to COVID-19.
Economic Recession Will Likely Kill More Children Than Total Coronavirus Death Toll
The pandemic is real, but the puppet masters of the world are using this situation for abhorrent and frightening power grabs, leaving people seemingly helpless to do anything about it while we are told to “shelter in place” as our rights get stripped away. It’s very convenient for those in power, and it’s frightening what they’re getting away with.
We are addressing this pandemic all wrong.
People with compromised immune systems should be taking precautions while the rest of the world builds immunity. The government should be pushing for the population to make healthier, safer lifestyle choices and this should be a huge reminder to us all that both how we take care of our environment and how we talk care of our bodies is paramount. And on that note, as necessary as they may be in some situations, wearing a face mask for long periods of time really isn’t good for you. This whole face-mask obsession could end up causing a lot of illness as well as environmental problems. I’m not recommending wearing face masks. I’m not recommending not to wear them. It’s complicated.
On the other hand, it’s fascinating to see what’s happening, and there’s lots of good news resulting from the way we are “sheltering in place.” The environment is showing signs of remarkable resiliency, people are generally eating much better (restaurant food is really bad for you), homeschooling is the new normal, we’re finally taking a serious look at how we’ve set up “capitalism” and what it means for us in such dire times, and it’s really just a fascinating experiment at a time when we need to look hard at these issues.
But this perspective comes from a place of immense privilege. All across the world business and schools and daycares are closed, incomes have stopped, people are hungry, family members are stuck with abusive family members at such incredibly stressful times, and so much more. The reaction to the pandemic is ruining a lot of lives right now. Even if everything were to get better from today on and just go back to normal, the reverberations would still last a very long time. And this is mostly due to how poorly the U.S. and many other governments are handling the situation.
Hundreds of thousands of children could die this year due to the global economic downturn sparked by the coronavirus pandemic and tens of millions more could fall into extreme poverty as a result of the crisis, the United Nations warned on Thursday.”
It’s likely that more people will die from the economic collapse of our financial system than from the virus itself. That’s not to say that the measures taken are pointless. It’s hard to know for sure, but it’s possible that if we had gone about business-as-usual we likely would have endured far more deaths and economic destruction than we’re dealing with now. Also, you never know how seriously a novel pathogen can impact us until it does. So it’s pretty hard to justify lax measures.
The estimate could be low. The risk report included that nearly 369 million children who normally rely on school meals for daily nutrition no longer have this as an option. According to the UN, malnutrition is still the leading cause of death in the world today. The foreseen is being considered, but there’s also going to be a heck of a lot of unforeseen in this very novel, globally-connected situation we’re in now.
The potential losses that may accrue in learning for today’s young generation, and for the development of their human capital, are hard to fathom. More than two-thirds of countries have introduced a national distance learning platform, but among low-income countries, the share is only 30 percent.
We’re radically underestimating the number of coronavirus cases but with that, we’re also radically underestimating the numbers of people who have gotten the virus, recovered, and developed antibodies.
A coronavirus vaccine is not going to work any better than the flu vaccine works, which is to say it will make pharmaceutical companies a lot of money only to damage a lot of people. There are multiple reports of people getting the virus more than once and we now know the virus has mutated at least twice. Whether or not the virus was made in a lab or is a result of environmental destruction, more is sure to come. We need a totally different approach for the economy, the environment, and our health. Allopathic medicine, our profit-driven pharmaceutical system, and our economic system are showing everyone around the world that there needs to be a better way, for our health and the environment.
Under the current system, if I ruled the world, but if I only had a conventional understanding of health, I would implement free healthcare to everyone, a UBI of 80% of everyone’s income up to 100,000 a year, paid weekly via direct deposit or debit card or cash (no restrictions that disproportionately affect poor or minorities).
Small businesses should be able to apply for loans and grants should be available for the ones that are trying to do the work that most needs to be done (like medical and environmental for instance).
Big businesses should be left to file for bankruptcy and have to restructure and get more component CEOs who like to save money for such instances instead of continually relying on government bailouts.
We should be making sure everyone has access to raw, fresh, healthy, organic produce. People should start growing as much of their own food as they can, and the government should be helping to facilitate this as well as helping get the food we currently have to the people who need it.
There should be educational campaigns about how people should take care of themselves.
But none of this would really be necessary if we already knew how to take care of ourselves. The virus is rarely if ever killing healthy people. If it did, it would exhaust it’s host supply too quickly and be far less likely to be an epidemic. Ideally, the immunocompromised would be told to shelter in place, wear masks for short periods of time if they must go out, wash their hands obsessively while out, etc. Grocery stores would know how to reduce transmission and would be disinfecting properly. Then we wouldn’t need an economic shutdown.
We really shouldn’t even worry so much about “germs.” We should be taking better care of ourselves and doing what Sweden is doing to build up herd immunity.
What Am I doing?
My family and I are fortunate, so far, due to the nature of the businesses we are involved in, and the fact that we were already growing our own food and homeschooling our kids.
We have started an urban farm, both to feed us and for the whole neighborhood.
We have to take certain sanitization measures with our businesses, with which we are using a spray of 65% alcohol and 35% industrial strength vinegar. But other than that, we’re doing our normal thing of eating salads and drinking cranberry lemonade every day. We are sure to have on stock Echinacea, Shillington’s Blood Detox, reishi mushroom, and our favorite root cider. If we were to feel a tickle in the through or a snuffy sinus we’d take them all until symptoms are gone, but we haven’t had any such issues. Our gut health is as good as it gets, and this is absolutely paramount when it comes to staying healthy. For more on supplements for coronavirus, click here.