Let's say you were a famous Hollywood actor and you wanted to thumb your nose at the President in an election year pandemic and show the first-to-caucus state how it's done so you hooked up with a bunch of tech bros and created a Covid-19 test and took it straight to Iowa and said Gaze Upon My Works, Ye Mighty, And Despair! and then it didn't work quite so well and the Daily Beast even called it

The Fyre Fest of Coronavirus Testing

Would your PR folks recommend returning your part of the $27 million no-bid contract bucks you grifted from the citizens?

How come Gog's machine ain't linking? On a desktop, greater-than and less-than are shift-comma and shift period.

So all on one line, with no spaces:

Less-than sign

a href="https://lite.cnn.com/"

Greater-than sign

Text to linkify

Less-than sign

/a

Greater-than sign

Text to linkify

The argument against letting people choose to decide whether to take the risk is that their illness becomes your burden in taxes and insurance premiums. What happens if a lot of people with your insurance company gets sick with Covid-19? Your rates go up.

If you're willing to insist that everyone has the right to decide for themselves if they want to risk getting sick, then you're willing to let your insurance rates go up.

The guys at the gym may not be the only things getting jacked.

We still don't know just how easy it is for the virus to be transmitted multiple times until it goes from you to a stranger who never goes outdoors - and who deserves better protection, but clearly can't do any more.

From commentator Terry del Fuego:

...One of the first things that came into my head with the recent virus is the completely different attitude of the public. When AIDS hit, The Stupid People were absolutely convinced that it spread through casual contact despite the complete lack of even the slightest evidence. So there was occasional talk of quarantine camps (e.g., LaRouche) and just general fear.

Now we've got something that spreads through contact that doesn't even rise to the mere level of "casual", has killed tens of thousands in just months, has "preferences" but still routinely kills the young and healthy...and the reaction in a lot of places is a shrug or "But what about my freedom to kill my parents?" (Not, of course, that it's ever phrased that honestly.)...

Btw, between May 7 and May 14, there were 10,000 U.S. deaths due to the virus. The number has been dropping by 2,000 every week, since April 16 or so. Therefore, in theory, there should be NO deaths by the end of June.

If, that is, everyone keeps taking the virus seriously and maybe tightens their personal habits even more. If people don't, of course the whole thing will start all over again.

I don't see how we can prevent the awful scenario predicted for the winter unless we manage to find and isolate every COVID patient.

And just in case anyone needs reminding - it isn't "just" people over 60 who are vulnerable; we also have grandparents in their 50s and older, raising their grandchildren, diabetic parents in their 30s, children with cancer, and people of all ages with asthma. Etc.

Whatever happened to the conservative social principle that it's better to be a little too strict than a little too lenient? I, for one, have very little objection to that.

Patrick: The argument against letting people choose to decide whether to take the risk is that their illness becomes your burden in taxes and insurance premiums. What happens if a lot of people with your insurance company gets sick with Covid-19? Your rates go up.

How is that different from every other disease?

The problem is, then the gym guys go to the grocery store and infect a whole bunch of people there. And people have to go grocery shopping... there isn't enough delivery for everyone.

When AIDS hit, The Stupid People were absolutely convinced that it spread through casual contact despite the complete lack of even the slightest evidence.

I remember the widespread fear of AIDS in the early 1980's. And I remember all the daily and nightly sensationalistic, sky-is-falling, doomsday reporting by the media quoting scientists and experts, exaggerating everything about HIV/AIDS way out of proportion, and spreading fear. There were sad stories of dying victims. Just like now with covid-19. The media spent almost as much time generating fear of AIDS as they did of Reagan. I remember the same nonsense with swine flu, hantavirus, SARS, mad cow disease and bird flu.

Is anyone naive enough to think that all the stuff they read and hear in the media about covid-19 isn't greatly exaggerated? You know that it is.

Does anyone think the official numbers aren't also inflated?

Here are the official, CDC approved clinical criteria for diagnosing covid-19 (no test required):

- At least two of the following symptoms: fever (measured or subjective), chills, rigors, myalgia, headache, sore throat, new olfactory and taste disorder(s); -OR-
-At least one of the following symptoms: cough, shortness of breath, or difficulty breathing -OR-
-Severe respiratory illness with at least one of the following: •Clinical or radiographic evidence of pneumonia, or •Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS).
-AND- No alternative more likely diagnosis

If you shut down 60% of a hospital's most profitable business, so that it's seriously in danger of going bankrupt, so that a large part of the little business it has left is covid-19 patients, and then pay them a premium for treating those patients - is anyone naive enough to think they won't pad those numbers? Does anyone think hospitals don't pad bills during normal times?

Around 8-12% of covid-19 lab tests are positive. If a hospital can count a case as covid-19 without doing a test, and collect a premium for treating that patient, does anyone think they won't just skip the test and diagnose covid-19 based on clinical criteria, and not take the 90% chance of the test being negative?

If the amount of aid money from the federal government to state and county public health agencies is influenced by the severity of the problem they're dealing with, does anyone think they won't exaggerate the severity? (Remember, "I need 40,000 ventilators now!"?)

A few days ago Dr. Deborah Birx said she felt stats like mortality rate and case count were inflated by as much as 25%. A few weeks ago she said that in the USA, unlike other countries, a death is counted if the patient had covid-19 when they died, even if the death was caused by another condition.

A couple weeks ago Pennsylvania health officials removed more than 200 from their official death toll. And a few days ago Colorado lowered its official death toll by 24%.

A couple of weeks ago a 35-year-old man who had covid-19 died of alcohol poisoning, and covid-19 was listed as the cause of death. The Colorado Department of Public Health said, "We classify a death as confirmed when there was a case who had a positive SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) laboratory test and then died." The coroner objected to saying covid-19 was the cause of death. The health department didn't say they were going to change it.

Some areas separate confirmed cases (positive test) from probable cases (no test) when they report stats. In New York City about 30% of deaths are probable covid-19; and 62% of covid-19 deaths in nursing homes and 79% of deaths at home are probable.

What number of human deaths prevented would be worth giving up freedom for? Or put another way, how many deaths should we be willing to let happen before we give up our civil rights and freedom to prevent them?

Back in the early 1860's, more than 360,000 Americans died to gain the freedom of about 4-million others. Was the freedom of those 4-million worth the deaths of 360,000 people? Would it have been better for the 4-million to give up their hope of freedom to prevent the deaths of 360,000 people? (Another 350,000 died, mostly Democrats, fighting to prevent the freedom of the 4-million)

More than 400,000 Americans were killed in World War 2 to defeat the German National Socialists and imperialist Japan. Would it have been better for Americans to give up freedom to prevent those 400,000 American deaths? .

More Americans have been killed fighting the 18 year long war against terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan than have been killed by terrorism in the last 50 years. Should we submit to the demands of terrorists to avoid the deaths of the people who fight against terrorism?

It's hard to believe that so many Americans are willing to give up their freedom for so much less than was sacrificed by the people who won it for them. They try to pass it off as compassion. But it looks more like irrational fear. Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Each person knows their own risks and vulnerabilities; and each person should have the right to choose how much risk they're willing to accept, and the freedom to take whatever measures they feel are necessary to lower their risk to whatever is acceptable to them, and make themselves feel as safe as they need to feel. And every person should be free to do as much as they freely choose for the sake of other people's well being.

But no American should ever be so selfish as to demand that millions of other people give up their freedom, livelihoods, futures and dreams - their homes, their livings, their businesses, their educations, their healthcare, the safety and security of their families, and for tens of thousands of people even their lives - to involuntarily inflict that much life destroying poverty, misery and grief on millions of others, to make themselves feel safer.

During the time I've been alive on this earth there have been other deadly diseases that have taken lives by the tens and hundreds of thousands, and never did Americans shut down the country, surrender their God given freedom and rights that were won with the sacrifice of more American lives than will ever be lost to this coronavirus, and cower in fear while socialist/fascist politicians become their dictators. We're going to end up with a country that's a lot less happy for our kids and grandkids than it's been for us.

This disease does not routinely kill the young and the healthy. For example, I read Power Line blog, created by several attorneys in Minnesota. One of the bloggers makes a daily post about the daily Covid briefing by authorities for the state. The median age of fatalities is 83. About 80% of all fatalities have occurred in long-term care facilities. No fatalities at all until a small number in the 30-39 age range. Here's what's perhaps the most important: 99% of all fatalities to date have occurred in either long-term care facilities, OR in persons with serious underlying medical conditions. The state has found such conditions to include obesity (over 40 BMI, which is grossly overweight), moderate to severe asthma, immuno-comprimised, heart disease. I think these statistics are incredibly encouraging and yet the local reporting omits them.

Ken R: How is that different from every other disease?

When did I say it was different from any other disease?

That is the standard argument against any unhealthy condition. "It's my right to be fat/smoke/drink excessively."

Your rights increase my financial burden.

Unlike what Benjamin Franklin referred to, we are NOT talking about "temporary safety" here, we're talking about how to prevent the disease from coming back, fiercely, every winter. Again, there is no shortage of young people with serious health problems - and nowadays, athsma is clearly more serious than it used to be. You don't see politicians saying that children should be doing the patriotic thing and dying for THEIR country.

We didn't tolerate "polio clusters"; we eradicated it. Yes, of course this problem is going to be harder than that was. Or not. After all, polio had been crippling people for decades, and the doctors had to work on the problem for decades. So, in a way, one could argue that enforcing the lockdown is in fact the shortcut to eradicating the disease and getting back to normal.

And:

If I remember my history correctly, Lincoln never had any intention of going to war to end slavery (he thought, as many did, that slavery would die out naturally) and the only reason he did declare war was that when he took the oath of office, he had no choice but to defend the Union. So it's not as though he thought sending hundreds of thousands of people to their deaths was "worth it," since declaring war wasn't his fault anyway.

I should have known - that's "asthma."

"one could argue that enforcing the lockdown is in fact the shortcut to eradicating the disease and getting back to normal."

We are not going to eradicate this disease by locking down, period. No one wants to talk about this, least of all government authorities who don't want to be blamed for bad news.

"we're talking about how to prevent the disease from coming back, fiercely, every winter." ~Lenona

After the disease left Wuhan that was no longer an option. It can't be done.

"We didn't tolerate "polio clusters"; we eradicated it." ~Lenona

Prior to the polio vaccine we did. It was only possible to eliminate the polio disease after the creation of the vaccine.

You are just flat wrong on this issue Lenona. You cannot condemn millions to starvation. By continuing the lockdowns that is what you are choosing to do. The US may be one of the richest nations on the planet. But we aren't rich enough to afford this. Two months is all that we could afford. At this point we are out of money.

Like it or not states are starting to reopen and that trend will not stop. All for the simple reason the people living there can't afford to stay closed any longer.

Patrick: Your rights increase my financial burden.

Is my financial burden increased by any of your rights that you're willing to give up for my sake?

Lenona: we're talking about how to prevent the disease from coming back, fiercely, every winter... in a way, one could argue that enforcing the lockdown is in fact the shortcut to eradicating the disease and getting back to normal.

You think a virus as contagious and widespread as covid-19 can be eradicated by a lockdown? Not in our lifetime. Your right that one could argue that point, but one would not be reasonable in doing so. Covid-19 is a highly contagious respiratory disease, some say more contagious than influenza, and it's already widespread - tens of millions of people have been infected. It's not going to go away. It's going to come back, and come back again and again; even if there's an inexpensive, 95% effective vaccine it would take decades to eradicate it.

It's not going to be eradicated by any lock down. That isn't realistic thinking. Last week in New York City, according to Governor Cuomo, 84% of new cases were in people who were unemployed or retired - people who were on home detention - i.e. lockdown. Contagious respiratory diseases thrive and spread like crazy indoors, especially indoors where multiple people spend a lot of time in proximity to one another.

If the goal of the lockdown was to slow the spread of the virus, to "flatten the curve", and keep the healthcare system from being overwhelmed, then mission accomplished (although I question whether the lockdown had much to do with it). Now it's time to get back to business before the lockdown itself does more damage to what's left of the healthcare system than an unflattened curve would have done... because with more than 1.5 million healthcare workers laid off and every healthcare organization in the country facing the possibility of bankruptcy, the complete failure of the healthcare system is a real possibility.

If the goal of the lockdown was to prevent avoidable deaths, then it failed, and is causing more death than it's preventing. When unemployment and poverty increase, the death from all diseases goes up.

The CEO of a nonprofit healthcare organization in this area that operates seven acute care hospitals and a couple dozen clinics said they diagnosed 60% fewer cancers in March and April than before the shutdown. Nationwide it is estimated that 90,000 fewer cancers have been diagnosed during the lockdown. That doesn't mean there are 90,000 fewer people with cancer; it means 90,000 that exist haven't been detected. Without the lockdown some of those would have been caught early enough to be cured, and might still be. For others it would have been too late anyway. For thousands catching and treating it in March or April instead of June or July would have made the difference between a cure or death, or might have bought a few more months or years of life.

Being an RN, MHP working in mental health, I could type pages on the increase in stress-related anxiety, depression, PTSD symptoms, psychotic disorder and suicide attempts (I can't speak first hand about suicides because the kids I take care didn't die, though some came damn close; I don't see the ones who killed themselves); the increase in stress related to loss of jobs, loss of homes and other possessions, loss of financial security, loss of relationships; the increase in domestic violence and child abuse (big issues on my unit), and the life threatening shame that goes with those things. My unit is full and the admissions people are declining more than we're admitting.

The WHO and other international health organizations estimate that there will be 1.5 million more cases of TB and 350,000 more deaths from TB this year because of the lockdown.

Food is the USA's biggest export. Somewhere out there beyond the farthest reaches of the food supply people starve. When you go to the supermarket here in the USA and see empty spaces in the produce or meat sections, or they're stacking items on shelves one or two deep instead of eight or ten, then you can know that the food supply chain isn't reaching as far out as it was before and more people are starving.

The WHO and other relief organizations are saying the lockdown will cause 150 million more people to starve. The collapse in oil prices threatens the lives of tens of millions. Maybe they're exaggerating, so divide by ten if you want and it's still millions.

Anyway, I'm going on and on. Now, why is it that we're still locked down?

Having to stay home a few weeks is hardly comparable to slavery.

That said, yes, governments need to weigh the risks of Covid vs future starvation, deaths due to lack of funds for healthcare, etc.

Ken R. Is my financial burden increased by any of your rights that you're willing to give up for my sake?

I can't think of any examples. Help me out.

I pay to support schools, even though I don't have kids. But then again, even if I don't have kids, I still have a vested interest in the existence of kids. Without getting into the whole "social-security-is-evil-Socialism-and-won't-be-solvent-when-I-retire" debate, someone has to work to give me social security when I retire.

So, even though I'm paying taxes to put someone else's kids through school, it's still in my best interest that your kids get an education.

NicoleK: Having to stay home a few weeks is hardly comparable to slavery.

Don't be so dismissive. We have people who own businesses who are forced to shut them down. In some cases, for months. So, while they are being told they cannot earn money, they still have to maintain the space they keep their business in. So, they are being forced into debt and being robbed of the means to pay it.

For a few weeks? And just how long can a business owner survive this untenable situation? Just how long will it take them to get back on top?

Still not comparable to slavery.

"And just how long can a business owner survive this untenable situation?" ~Patrick

Roughly 30% of businesses have over 2 months of cash reserves. So approximately 70% don't. In a similar vein roughly 60% of Americans have effectively zero savings.

Hence why you are seeing the massed layoffs and such strong pressure to reopen businesses. We can't afford to stay closed. Food banks are already seeing record numbers of 'customers'. Due to eviction laws you probably won't see homelessness spike for about 6 months. But one to two more months closed and you will start seeing deaths due to starvation. That 'future' starvation isn't that far off.

The shortest estimates on a vaccine being available is one year or longer. A more realistic estimate is 5 years or longer.

As for social security going unsolvent, using any honest form of accounting that already happened. The program probably isn't going anywhere. Instead you just won't get as much as you were promised.