Archive for the 'Medical' Category

So says the experts.

LONDON (Reuters) – Keeping at least one metre apart and wearing face masks and eye protection are the best ways to cut the risk of COVID-19 infection, according to the largest review to date of studies on coronavirus disease transmission.

In a review that pooled evidence from 172 studies in 16 countries, researchers found frequent handwashing and good hygiene are also critical – though even all those measures combined can not give full protection.

The findings, published in The Lancet journal on Monday, will help guide governments and health agencies, some of whom have given conflicting advice on measures, largely because of limited information about COVID-19.

“Our findings are the first to synthesise all direct information on COVID-19, SARS, and MERS, and provide the currently best available evidence on the optimum use of these common and simple interventions to help ‘flatten the curve’”, said Holger Schünemann from McMaster University in Canada, who co-led the research.

Current evidence suggests COVID-19 is most commonly spread by droplets, especially when people cough, and infects by entering through the eyes, nose and mouth, either directly or via contaminated surfaces.

For this analysis, an international research team conducted a systematic review of 172 studies assessing distance measures, face masks and eye protection to prevent transmission of three diseases caused by coronaviruses – COVID-19, SARS and MERS.

The researchers noted that the findings, while comprehensive, have some limitations for the current pandemic since most of the evidence came from studies of SARS and MERS.

Ooo … I’m askeerd, hold me Uncle Bob!

Since I’ve gone on record saying that I don’t believe them without certain studies being performed in a certain manner with certain credentialed professionals, am I now so beaten down by the academic bureaucrats that I retract my position?

Then there’s this.

They found, however, that physical distancing of at least 1 metre lowers risk of COVID-19 transmission, and that a distance of 2 metres could be more effective. Masks and protective eye coverings may also add protective benefits, though the evidence for that was less clear cut, they added.

Yea, it’s less clear cut because not a damn thing has been done to prove it.

I repeat myself.

I won’t believe any of your models or data until [at least] the following has been done.  Assemble an interdisciplinary team of experts, in fields such as industrial hygiene, air filtration engineering, physics, chemistry, and medicine.  Formulate hypotheses on the distribution of particle sizes (there isn’t one particle size, there is a distribution, and it may be a normal distribution, or it may not, it may be a right skewed distribution, or it may be a left skewed distribution); back up your hypothesis with experimental data; assemble a panel of experts to test filters of various types, from cotton, to N95, to HEPA filters, on those particle sizes; report the results; next, do the same with the [possibly] polar composition of viruses and their travelling companion water molecules or other particles, and report results; results shall at least include and consider (a) trajectory, (b) evaporation, (c) re-evolution of particles and viruses into the air stream, (d) and where the collection of particles occurs.

Determine, based on this team’s judgment, whether there is an unhealthy buildup of viruses on the masks you have tested, both for the patient and the worker (or any passerby).  Include in this analysis not only SARS-CoV-2 viruses, but other pathogens as well.  Specifically include in your analysis the buildup and concentration of Legionella bacteria, what we found to be so problematic at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel when the HVAC engineers directed intake air flow over the top of the condensate discharge from the evaporator units.  Masks collect moisture.

Considering the whole of the findings of this investigation, perform a probabilistic risk analysis for various populations wearing masks under various conditions (including people who have a low oxygen saturation level anyway).  After coming to agreement between the entirety of the committee of experts, prepare a formal report under the authority of a professional engineer’s seal and signature.  Publish all mathematical models, data and test results for peer review.  I want this seal because the researchers have nothing to lose if the contents are wrong.  A professional engineer has his reputation and livelihood to lose.

Only then are you doing science.  Only then will I believe anything you have to say.

Nothing has changed, and no one to date has done anything even remotely approaching real science on this matter.  Everything thus far has been fake.  I do science.  I know fake science when I see it.

PopSci.

Of those who say they wouldn’t get a coronavirus vaccine, more than 40 percent said they would be concerned about getting COVID-19 from the vaccine itself, which is scientifically not a possibility. Modern vaccines don’t contain live viruses that are able to infect humans, and there’s no reason to think that a coronavirus vaccine would be any different. Nearly a third of people said they just didn’t think vaccines worked very well. It’s true that some vaccines do not work very well—the flu vaccine is a great example. Often it has around a 40 percent efficacy rate, and the influenza virus mutates so quickly that we have to make a new vaccine every year. But even setting aside the fact that the vast majority of other vaccines work extremely well—to the point that we’ve used vaccines to eradicate one disease (smallpox) and nearly eradicate another (polio)—we have to remember that even relatively ineffective vaccines help us combat a virus. People who get the flu vaccine are less likely to get seriously ill from the flu, even if they still get some symptoms. The same may be true for a COVID-19 vaccine.

Oh bull.  There are many different types of vaccines, dead viruses, live but attenuated viruses, etc.  An idiot wrote this article.

But how about the best reason not to get a Covid vaccine.  It will have been sent through the brains of mice about 35 times to attenuate to a non-lethal form for most people, thereby reducing its effectiveness, and picking up hundreds of other retroviruses along the way, with the Covid virus as the carrier for it all.  Thus it will introduce your body to hundreds of other viruses that lay dormant until the one virus you get weakens your body enough to cause these other viruses to attack your body, inducing a cytokine storm in your immune system.

How’s that?  Did I do okay?

Annals of Internal Medicine.

Background: During respiratory viral infection, face masks are thought to prevent transmission (1). Whether face masks worn by patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) prevent contamination of the environment is uncertain. A previous study reported that surgical masks and N95 masks were equally effective in preventing the dissemination of influenza virus, so surgical masks might help prevent transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome–coronavirus 2 (SARS–CoV-2). However, the SARS–CoV-2 pandemic has contributed to shortages of both N95 and surgical masks, and cotton masks have gained interest as a substitute.

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of surgical and cotton masks in filtering SARS–CoV-2.

Methods and Findings: The institutional review boards of 2 hospitals in Seoul, South Korea, approved the protocol, and we invited patients with COVID-19 to participate. After providing informed consent, patients were admitted to negative pressure isolation rooms. We compared disposable surgical masks (180 mm × 90 mm, 3 layers [inner surface mixed with polypropylene and polyethylene, polypropylene filter, and polypropylene outer surface], pleated, bulk packaged in cardboard; KM Dental Mask, KM Healthcare Corp) with reusable 100% cotton masks (160 mm × 135 mm, 2 layers, individually packaged in plastic; Seoulsa).

A petri dish (90 mm × 15 mm) containing 1 mL of viral transport media (sterile phosphate-buffered saline with bovine serum albumin, 0.1%; penicillin, 10 000 U/mL; streptomycin, 10 mg; and amphotericin B, 25 µg) was placed approximately 20 cm from the patients’ mouths. Patients were instructed to cough 5 times each onto a petri dish while wearing the following sequence of masks: no mask, surgical mask, cotton mask, and again with no mask. A separate petri dish was used for each of the 5 coughing episodes. Mask surfaces were swabbed with aseptic Dacron swabs in the following sequence: outer surface of surgical mask, inner surface of surgical mask, outer surface of cotton mask, and inner surface of cotton mask.

The median viral loads of nasopharyngeal and saliva samples from the 4 participants were 5.66 log copies/mL and 4.00 log copies/mL, respectively. The median viral loads after coughs without a mask, with a surgical mask, and with a cotton mask were 2.56 log copies/mL, 2.42 log copies/mL, and 1.85 log copies/mL, respectively. All swabs from the outer mask surfaces of the masks were positive for SARS–CoV-2, whereas most swabs from the inner mask surfaces were negative.

Discussion: Neither surgical nor cotton masks effectively filtered SARS–CoV-2 during coughs by infected patients. Prior evidence that surgical masks effectively filtered influenza virus (1) informed recommendations that patients with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 should wear face masks to prevent transmission (2). However, the size and concentrations of SARS–CoV-2 in aerosols generated during coughing are unknown. Oberg and Brousseau (3) demonstrated that surgical masks did not exhibit adequate filter performance against aerosols measuring 0.9, 2.0, and 3.1 μm in diameter. Lee and colleagues (4) showed that particles 0.04 to 0.2 μm can penetrate surgical masks. The size of the SARS–CoV particle from the 2002–2004 outbreak was estimated as 0.08 to 0.14 μm (5); assuming that SARS-CoV-2 has a similar size, surgical masks are unlikely to effectively filter this virus.

Of note, we found greater contamination on the outer than the inner mask surfaces. Although it is possible that virus particles may cross from the inner to the outer surface because of the physical pressure of swabbing, we swabbed the outer surface before the inner surface. The consistent finding of virus on the outer mask surface is unlikely to have been caused by experimental error or artifact. The mask’s aerodynamic features may explain this finding. A turbulent jet due to air leakage around the mask edge could contaminate the outer surface. Alternatively, the small aerosols of SARS–CoV-2 generated during a high-velocity cough might penetrate the masks. However, this hypothesis may only be valid if the coughing patients did not exhale any large-sized particles, which would be expected to be deposited on the inner surface despite high velocity. These observations support the importance of hand hygiene after touching the outer surface of masks.

This experiment did not include N95 masks and does not reflect the actual transmission of infection from patients with COVID-19 wearing different types of masks. We do not know whether masks shorten the travel distance of droplets during coughing. Further study is needed to recommend whether face masks decrease transmission of virus from asymptomatic individuals or those with suspected COVID-19 who are not coughing.

In conclusion, both surgical and cotton masks seem to be ineffective in preventing the dissemination of SARS–CoV-2 from the coughs of patients with COVID-19 to the environment and external mask surface.

This paper was retracted and one of the comments was: “This is likely to aggravate ongoing controversy regarding personal protective equipment (PPE).”  There is also this comment.

According to included table, when coughing onto a Petri dish without a barrier, the 4 patients release detectable viral load. When coughing through a cotton mask, in 2 cases the viral load is not detectable (ND), and in the other 2 it is reduced more than 10 times. Yet, according to the average (the authors use the word “median”, while they actually compute averages) viral loads presented by the authors as main results, the viral load is reduced only 5 times. This is apparently because in the computations, the averages are taken over whole rows of the table with the ND instances ignored. This is a serious methodological error. If the virus was not detected in 3 patients instead of 2, the average could have been even higher.

They need more data.  They need to properly assess that data.

If you’d like some background on what I’ve previously said about nuclear grade HEPA filters, this reference will be sufficient for now.  There are many more.

I’ll provide a link at the bottom of this page with prior posts, but let’s review what I’ve said so far.

1. First, the SARS-CoV-2 virus is 80 nm in diameter.
2. HEPA filters remove particles down to 0.3 µm in size.
3. This means that a SARS-CoV-2 virus is 80E-9 / 0.3E-6 = 0.27 the minimum size necessary for even the most expensive nuclear grade HEPA filters to remove it from an air stream.
4. Even with N95 masks, the bulk of air flow to the breather goes over the top of and under the bottom of the mask.
5. To get efficient filtration of air, a fitted full face respirator must be worn, leak tested and verified.
6. That FFR must have a charcoal filter in order to remove viruses of this diameter.
7. The necessity of charcoal is because charcoal will remove organics, including particles with a charge (especially charcoal impregnated with TEDA).  Viruses are weakly charged, water is polar.  Therefore, charcoal filters will remove water as well as other contaminates, paint fumes among them.  Water and paint fumes can actually decrease the efficiency of charcoal filters, which is why nuclear air filtration systems have air pre-heaters to reduce relative humidity.
8. Cotton rags are completely ineffective at removing particles of this size.
9. N95 masks are not leak tested and fitted.
10. Surgical masks are little better than cotton rags at removing particulate matter.

I said other things, but this is a good primer for where we start.

This should be sufficient to do away with the fairy tale notions of the use of rags and N95 masks for removing free floating viruses in the air.  As one commenter previously said, use of masks is like trying to stop a mosquito with a chain link fence.  But what about viruses attached to water molecules?

A water molecule is 2.75 Angstroms in diameter.  This is not sufficient to create a large enough particle for interception by a HEPA filter.  But what about a virus being attached to spittle?  In this case, a mask of some sort might be effective at catching the spittle on a temporary basis, but there is re-evolution of the virus into the air, evaporation of the water, and buildup of the virus on the mask to consider.

We have pointed out that asymptomatic carriers are not contagious.  Their spittle will not be a concern.  If someone is symptomatic and coughing, he should stay home.

Now, Dr. Paul W Leu of the University of Pittsburgh doesn’t like the study.

The conclusions of this study by Bae et. al are not only erroneous but misleading. 1. The main result of this study is that higher concentrations of SARS-CoV-2 were found on the outside of masks that were coughed into as opposed to the inside. The fact that the virus was determined to be present on the outside of the mask is unsurprising. Surgical and cotton masks are fabrics which will simply absorb any droplets they come into contact with. The higher concentrations found on the outside of the masks may be due to their swabbing the outside of the masks first (which may remove some of the virus) as opposed to the inside. Results should be compared with swabbing the inside first and then the outside. 2. The presence of SARS-CoV-2 on the outside of masks of infected people is of very limited concern for transmission. Most people put on and remove their own masks and do not touch each other’s masks. 3. The results of this study do NOT show that masks are “ineffective in preventing the dissemination of SARS–CoV-2 from the coughs of patients with COVID-19 to the environment.” As the authors acknowledge, their study does NOT evaluate the ability of the masks to shorten the trajectory of droplets emitted during coughing. The function of the mask is to reduce how far aerosol droplets travel during breathing, speaking, singing, sneezing, or coughing. This is the same reason one should cover one’s mouth or nose with your forearm, inside of your elbow, or tissue when sneezing. CDC guidelines advise the wearing of face coverings to “slow the spread of the virus and help people who may have the virus and do not know it from transmitting it to others.”

I consider this comment to be a misdirect on a number of levels.  First of all, no one has told medical workers not to wear masks.  Medical workers wear masks for all sorts of reasons, most particularly, to prevent blood borne pathogens from entering their mouths (as my daughter, an NP, does in the ER and OR).  Further, a face shield should be worn for the very same reasons, i.e., to intercept airborne particles in their trajectory.  I wouldn’t trust a surgical mask to do that.

The researchers have focused a great deal of attention on demonstrating whether masks are effective at removal of viruses.  If one claims that masks are effective, the burden is on him to prove the point, not detractors from proving theirs.  That’s how science is done.

I do find it odd and tiring that people think that they are the first to consider these things and that no research has been done to date on air filtration engineering, industrial hygiene, and reduction of contaminates and toxicants in the air.  This science has been going on for decades, and focuses on real data and mathematical modeling, not well wishes or suppositions.  Considering what the air filtration engineers have accomplished in the nuclear industry would be a good place for people to start.

I do find it interesting that the researchers found that the previously published SARS-CoV virus diameter is 0.08 to 0.14 μm, whereas my source gives 80 nm.  This is fairly close correspondence in data, but also note that there is a range of diameters.  This leads me to my challenge problem for Paul W Leu and other researchers.

I do not believe any of your challenges to the findings of this report.  I barely believe this report.

I won’t believe any of your models or data until [at least] the following has been done.  Assemble an interdisciplinary team of experts, in fields such as industrial hygiene, air filtration engineering, physics, chemistry, and medicine.  Formulate hypotheses on the distribution of particle sizes (there isn’t one particle size, there is a distribution, and it may be a normal distribution, or it may not, it may be a right skewed distribution, or it may be a left skewed distribution); back up your hypothesis with experimental data; assemble a panel of experts to test filters of various types, from cotton, to N95, to HEPA filters, on those particle sizes; report the results; next, do the same with the [possibly] polar composition of viruses and their travelling companion water molecules or other particles, and report results; results shall at least include and consider (a) trajectory, (b) evaporation, (c) re-evolution of particles and viruses into the air stream, (d) and where the collection of particles occurs.

Determine, based on this team’s judgment, whether there is an unhealthy buildup of viruses on the masks you have tested, both for the patient and the worker (or any passerby).  Include in this analysis not only SARS-CoV-2 viruses, but other pathogens as well.  Specifically include in your analysis the buildup and concentration of Legionella bacteria, what we found to be so problematic at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel when the HVAC engineers directed intake air flow over the top of the condensate discharge from the evaporator units.  Masks collect moisture.

Considering the whole of the findings of this investigation, perform a probabilistic risk analysis for various populations wearing masks under various conditions (including people who have a low oxygen saturation level anyway).  After coming to agreement between the entirety of the committee of experts, prepare a formal report under the authority of a professional engineer’s seal and signature.  Publish all mathematical models, data and test results for peer review.  I want this seal because the researchers have nothing to lose if the contents are wrong.  A professional engineer has his reputation and livelihood to lose.

Only then are you doing science.  Only then will I believe anything you have to say.

Prior:

New England Journal of Medicine on What Masks Can’t Do Regarding SARS-CoV-2

Concerning the Effectiveness of Masks to Filter SARS-CoV-2

Asymptomatic Carriers of SARS-CoV-2 Are Not Very Contagious

News from the dark side.

Published last week in The Lancet, the large-scale study suggested the malaria drugs could be dangerous to people with severe cases of Covid-19, increasing the risk of abnormal heart rhythms and even death.

Now, scientists across the world are asking the research team, led by Harvard professor Dr Mandeep Mehra, to release its data for further analysis and independent academic review.

In an open letter, they’ve asked the journal to provide details about the massive hospital database – consisting of 96,000 Covid-19 patients across six continents – which was the basis for the observational study.

So far the authors have declined to release their underlying data, which scientists worry carries several inconsistencies.

Among them are concerns the average daily doses of hydroxychloroquine, which is cheap and easy to administer, used were higher than the recommended amounts – and that data from Australian patients does not match data from the Australian government.

Just like trials done without the administration of Zinc along with Hydroxychloroquine, or the administration of the drug too late to do any real good.

After having done this for a lifetime, I can confidently say the following.  When an analyst refuses to release the data or math models for independent review and verification, he’s lying.

Period.  End of discussion.

Edit: More.  And more.

SARS-CoV-2 remains a troublesome virus for some small fraction of patients, mostly the elderly and those with co-morbidity.

I’ve followed this channel for a long time.  The elderly are especially at risk.  This means that Cuomo and Whitmer did all the wrong things by forcing nursing homes and assisted living centers to accept Covid patients.  But we knew that already.

For those who are interested.  Doctors are still learning treatment protocols for this disease.  You can thank Fort Detrick, Anthony Fauci, gain-of-function research and the Wuhan virology lab for all of this.

Do you recall that I said this?

Next up, the wearing of masks.  I have some experience in air filtration engineering from my early career testing and balancing HEPA filters and charcoal adsorbers.  HEPA filters (of concern here) work by particle interception due to electrostatic force.  Surgical masks, cloths, handkerchiefs, and other manner of cotton material (cotton is cellulose) do not have that.

My daughter wears one in surgery and the ER to prevent potential blood-borne pathogens from entering her mouth, not to prevent SARS-CoV-2, flu or the common cold (which is also a Coronavirus).  N95 masks are just that, 95% efficient for particles down to a given size.  Moreover, when a nuclear or chemical worker wears a full face respirator, if the wearer is a male and has a beard, he must shave.  Workers have tried to create work-arounds for this by glazing their face with Vaseline, but the seal never works.  The bulk of breathing air goes around the filtration media if there is no testable seal, not through it.  This is true of full face respirators, and it is true in the superlative for these silly little masks half of America is wearing.

When you put an N95 mask on, the bulk of your breathing air is going under and over the top of the mask, not through it.  Furthermore, every decontamination technique eventually destroys the electrostatic charge on the fibers, thus rendering the mask useless.  It’s designed to be worn and then thrown away.  It’s actually worse than useless, because we are now learning that there is a heavy viral and pathogenic loading on both the outside and the inside of the filter media, and we also now know that the degree to which a patient suffers from this disease is a function – at least partially – of the amount of inoculate that you breath.

Then I got a little more detailed and discussed particle sizes.

HEPA filters will remove particles down to 0.3 µm in size (to usually 99.95% efficiency, depending upon the filter – here I have used data for nuclear grade filters).  The SARS-CoV-2 virus is 80 nm in diameter.  A few viruses out of a million might be intercepted by electrostatic force, but that’s essentially zero.

If the particle you’re trying to intercept is spittle, stay away from coughing people anyway.  But those particles drop by sedimentation, diffusiophoresis, etc.

0.3 µm versus 80 nm.  A nanometer is 1E-9 meters, and 1 µm is 1E-6 meters.  This means that a SARS-CoV-2 virus is 80E-9 / 0.3E-6 = 0.27 the minimum size necessary for even the most expensive nuclear grade HEPA filters to remove it from an air stream.

I need to caveat these statements and observe that because of the serpentine flow of air through a HEPA filter, it’s possible that there is some removal efficiency due to electrostatic force (i.e., that it’s not zero), assuming a charge on the shell of the virus.  But it’s still low.  While I’m not perfect, I won’t mislead readers.  And while there is some small probability that there will be some small effect, any very small particulate eventually re-evolves into the air stream.

One of my major gripes with how America has turned to the medical bureaucracy during this pandemic is treating medical doctors like experts in every field of science.  They’re not.  A doctor isn’t an air flow and filtration engineer.  A doctor isn’t an industrial hygienist.  A doctor isn’t a physicist.

But it’s still nice to see that eventually they conform to the truth of what science tells us.  This is straight from the New England Journal of Medicine (nejmp2006372).

We know that wearing a mask outside health care facilities offers little, if any, protection from infection. Public health authorities define a significant exposure to Covid-19 as face-to-face contact within 6 feet with a patient with symptomatic Covid-19 that is sustained for at least a few minutes (and some say more than 10 minutes or even 30 minutes). The chance of catching Covid-19 from a passing interaction in a public space is therefore minimal. In many cases, the desire for widespread masking is a reflexive reaction to anxiety over the pandemic.

You can read the rest for yourself.  They eventually dive into a discussion concerning the use of masks by medical workers, and I think over-state their case (I still believe, along with my daughter, an NP, that she wears a mask for purposes of protecting herself from blood-borne diseases and spittle in the OR and ER).

However, nits here and there shouldn’t obfuscate the fact that at least they are being honest about this.  Anxiety is the root of the problem, and reflexive fealty to the priesthood of the medical profession is a symptom of real problems in America concerning the lack of STEM education and knowledge.

Remember that I said this to you?

Next up, the wearing of masks.  I have some experience in air filtration engineering from my early career testing and balancing HEPA filters and charcoal adsorbers.  HEPA filters (of concern here) work by particle interception due to electrostatic force.  Surgical masks, cloths, handkerchiefs, and other manner of cotton material (cotton is cellulose) do not have that.

My daughter wears one in surgery and the ER to prevent potential blood-borne pathogens from entering her mouth, not to prevent SARS-CoV-2, flu or the common cold (which is also a Coronavirus).  N95 masks are just that, 95% efficient for particles down to a given size.  Moreover, when a nuclear or chemical worker wears a full face respirator, if the wearer is a male and has a beard, he must shave.  Workers have tried to create work-arounds for this by glazing their face with Vaseline, but the seal never works.  The bulk of breathing air goes around the filtration media if there is no testable seal, not through it.  This is true of full face respirators, and it is true in the superlative for these silly little masks half of America is wearing.

When you put an N95 mask on, the bulk of your breathing air is going under and over the top of the mask, not through it.  Furthermore, every decontamination technique eventually destroys the electrostatic charge on the fibers, thus rendering the mask useless.  It’s designed to be worn and then thrown away.  It’s actually worse than useless, because we are now learning that there is a heavy viral and pathogenic loading on both the outside and the inside of the filter media, and we also now know that the degree to which a patient suffers from this disease is a function – at least partially – of the amount of inoculate that you breath.

I’m certainly not perfect, but I won’t mislead you.  I stumbled upon this video and thought it might be enlightening that someone else thinks the same way.

This information is true because: HEPA filters will remove particles down to 0.3 µm in size (to usually 99.95% efficiency, depending upon the filter – here I have used data for nuclear grade filters).  The SARS-CoV-2 virus is 80 nm in diameter.  A few viruses out of a million might be intercepted by electrostatic force, but that’s essentially zero.

If the particle you’re trying to intercept is spittle, stay away from coughing people anyway.  But those particles drop by sedimentation, diffusiophoresis, etc.

You’ll have to forward to about five minutes in the video to get past the rambling. I think some inspired readers could add to all of this by linking video or citing URLs where Fauci now claims that the wearing of masks is merely a sign of respect.

I’ve had some requests to address the detractors to this woman and her claims from readers, and I’ve seen them myself.

It would be highly involved for me to address each and every accusation against Ms. Mikovits, since I have a lot of observations to make, from the silliness of some of the peer review I have actually experienced myself in professional publications, to the character attacks (this is called the genetic fallacy [or it could be characterized as ad homineim attacks], and it’s a formal logical fallacy), to completely ignoring the substance of her arguments, to trying to criticize from the perspective of not really understanding what epidemiological studies are all about and how they’re conducted (there is a gargantuan difference between an epidemiological study for, say, worker exposure to Benzene or Isocyanates, and something like SARS-CoV-2). Before quitting, I’ll also say that there is a huge difference between trying to get points across in a 30 minute video intended for the non-scientific masses, and a more detailed conversation like this. I understand the difference. Some people are too stupid to do that. Some of my own readers complain when I write two-minute reads, some complain when I write one-hour long prose. I can’t write a book every time I write (and supply every caveat and qualification) and you can’t please everybody.

Perhaps I’ll catalog all of my responses at some point, but in the interest of allowing her to answer her critics herself, here it is.  It’s long (some 2.5 hours).  But if you hear any detractors in the future, ask them one single question.  Did they listen to this entire video and do they have an answer for everything she said, in order, one by one, in detail?  If not, you should summarily dismiss their criticism.

Telegraph.

The Covid-19 modelling that sent Britain into lockdown, shutting the economy and leaving millions unemployed, has been slammed by a series of experts.

Professor Neil Ferguson’s computer coding was derided as “totally unreliable” by leading figures, who warned it was “something you wouldn’t stake your life on”.

The model, credited with forcing the Government to make a U-turn and introduce a nationwide lockdown, is a “buggy mess that looks more like a bowl of angel hair pasta than a finely tuned piece of programming”, says David Richards, co-founder of British data technology company WANdisco.

“In our commercial reality, we would fire anyone for developing code like this and any business that relied on it to produce software for sale would likely go bust.”

More.  “The code on which they based their predictions would not pass a cursory review by a Ph.D. committee in computational epidemiology.”

You had one job and couldn’t do it because you suck.  I don’t suck at my job.

Word is getting out.  I told you this from the beginning, and if you believed me, you believed the truth from the beginning.  You can blame this mess on Anthony Fauci, Big Pharma, the NIH, the NIAID, Bill Gates, and Fort Detrick (among others).

As for the rampant desire to control others, that finds its basis in Genesis Chapter 3. The desire to control others is the signal pathology of the wicked.