Day: April 20, 2020

The grip slips

benfell

Pandemic

Pennsylvania governor Tom Wolf has set a target end date for the lockdown: May 8.[1] Is such a date consistent with his previously declared criteria?[2] Of course not. We don’t have the testing, let alone a cure or a vaccine. I can’t blame him, but this is a political decision, not one based on medical science. It is what he does because people are blowing off the order anyway and he knows his grip is slipping. On paper, it’s a very limited reopening,[3] but I’m guessing this’ll be a time when the slippery slope is not a fallacy and the capitalist god will get its human sacrifices.[4] Let’s hope I’m wrong.

Andy Sheehan, “Coronavirus In Pennsylvania: Gov. Tom Wolf Says State Will Start Gradually Reopening On May 8,” KDKA, April 20, 2020, https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2020/04/20/gov-tom-wolf-reopens-pennsylvania-may-8/

Israel

Marcy Oster, “Netanyahu and Gantz sign agreement for ‘national emergency government’ that keeps Netanyahu as prime minister for now,” Jewish Telegraphic Agency, April 20, 2020, https://www.jta.org/quick-reads/netanyahu-and-gantz-sign-agreement-for-national-emergency-government-that-keeps-netanyahu-as-prime-minister-for-now

Times of Israel, “After more than yearlong impasse, Netanyahu and Gantz agree to form a government,” April 20, 2020, https://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-gantz-reach-agreement-to-form-national-emergency-government/

  1. [1]Andy Sheehan, “Coronavirus In Pennsylvania: Gov. Tom Wolf Says State Will Start Gradually Reopening On May 8,” KDKA, April 20, 2020, https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2020/04/20/gov-tom-wolf-reopens-pennsylvania-may-8/↩
  2. [2]Natasha Lindstrom, “Gov. Wolf: No specific date for ending covid-19 shutdown, getting ‘back to life as we once knew it,’” TribLive, April 16, 2020, https://triblive.com/news/pennsylvania/gov-wolf-no-specific-date-for-ending-covid-19-shutdown-getting-back-to-life-as-we-once-knew-it/↩
  3. [3]Andy Sheehan, “Coronavirus In Pennsylvania: Gov. Tom Wolf Says State Will Start Gradually Reopening On May 8,” KDKA, April 20, 2020, https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2020/04/20/gov-tom-wolf-reopens-pennsylvania-may-8/↩
  4. [4]David Benfell, “An impatient capitalist god demands human sacrifice. Now,” Not Housebroken, April 17, 2020, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/04/15/an-impatient-capitalist-god-demands-human-sacrifice-now/↩

We are not getting out of this pandemic fast

benfell

Pandemic

Antibody tests, which only might show some immunity to COVID-19,[1] were rushed into production and distribution. Many are unreliable.[2] And I’m guessing it’s going to be real hard to know if you’ve got a reliable one or an unreliable one.

Here the problem is with false positives, where a person is reported to possess antibodies to the novel coronavirus when, in fact, they do not.[3] The problem with the swab test is with false negatives, reporting a person to be clear of COVID-19, when they are not.[4]

This likely directly undermines[5] the study reported by the Guardian that suggested that COVID-19 had infected more people than previously believed.[6]

There’s a real rush here to achieve twin goals of Donald Trump’s reelection[7] and of limiting the number of human sacrifices to the capitalist god.[8] But what we’re seeing is that there are reasons science is often slow and that, to all appearances at least right now, we aren’t getting out of this crisis fast.

Steve Eder, Megan Twohey, and Apoorva Mandavilli, “Antibody Test, Seen as Key to Reopening Country, Does Not Yet Deliver,” New York Times, April 19, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/19/us/coronavirus-antibody-tests.html

  1. [1]Christie Aschwanden, “Sorry, Immunity to Covid-19 Won’t Be Like a Superpower,” Wired, April 16, 2020, https://www.wired.com/story/sorry-immunity-to-covid-19-wont-be-like-a-superpower/↩
  2. [2]Steve Eder, Megan Twohey, and Apoorva Mandavilli, “Antibody Test, Seen as Key to Reopening Country, Does Not Yet Deliver,” New York Times, April 19, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/19/us/coronavirus-antibody-tests.html↩
  3. [3]Steve Eder, Megan Twohey, and Apoorva Mandavilli, “Antibody Test, Seen as Key to Reopening Country, Does Not Yet Deliver,” New York Times, April 19, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/19/us/coronavirus-antibody-tests.html↩
  4. [4]Christopher Weaver, “Questions About Accuracy of Coronavirus Tests Sow Worry,” Wall Street Journal, April 2, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/questions-about-accuracy-of-coronavirus-tests-sow-worry-11585836001↩
  5. [5]Steve Eder, Megan Twohey, and Apoorva Mandavilli, “Antibody Test, Seen as Key to Reopening Country, Does Not Yet Deliver,” New York Times, April 19, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/19/us/coronavirus-antibody-tests.html↩
  6. [6]Kari Paul, “Antibody study suggests coronavirus is far more widespread than previously thought,” Guardian, April 17, 2020, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/17/antibody-study-suggests-coronavirus-is-far-more-widespread-than-previously-thought↩
  7. [7]Aaron Blake, “The timeline of Trump’s coronavirus response is increasingly damning,” Washington Post, April 7, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/04/07/timeline-trumps-coronavirus-response-is-increasingly-damning/; Adam Cancryn and Nancy Cook, “Health officials want Trump to ‘double down, not lighten up’ restrictions,” Politico, March 23, 2020, https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/23/coronavirus-economy-trump-restart-145222; Matt Zapotosky et al., “Trump administration pushing to reopen much of the U.S. next month,” Washington Post, April 9, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/trump-reopen-us-economy/2020/04/09/10d42b4a-7a7b-11ea-9bee-c5bf9d2e3288_story.html↩
  8. [8]David Benfell, “The capitalist death cult,” Not Housebroken, March 27, 2020, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/03/27/the-capitalist-death-cult/; David Benfell, “An impatient capitalist god demands human sacrifice. Now,” Not Housebroken, April 17, 2020, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/04/15/an-impatient-capitalist-god-demands-human-sacrifice-now/↩