Lockdowns, Mask, and Vaccine Mandates: Coming Soon

 

We knew this was coming: a new rise in Covid-19 and a new variant has sent people into a panic. The medical establishment is putting out warnings, the government is likely going to fund a new vaccine, and people are becoming anxious and fearful that a new pandemic is around the corner. There has even been evidence that mild Covid causes brain damage, according to Dr. Clarissa Yasuda:

‘Our findings are concerning, as even people with a mild case of COVID-19 are showing changes in their brains months later. More studies are needed to hopefully identify treatments to prevent any long-term effects on people’s quality of life,’ she added.

To understand this, the researchers studied 254 people who had a mild COVID-19 infection. On average, the patients were 41 years old and had COVID-19 three months earlier.

She added the following observations:

‘Our results suggest a severe pattern of changes in how the brain communicates as well as its structure, mainly in people with anxiety and depression with long COVID syndrome, which affects so many people,’ Yasuda said in a news release from the American Academy of Neurology. ‘The magnitude of these changes suggests that they could lead to problems with memory and thinking skills, so we need to be exploring holistic treatments even for people mildly affected by COVID-19.’

Do you think people will notice that this second statement refers to long Covid syndrome, or will they simply become alarmed that anyone who contracts Covid could get “brain damage?”

Despite the evidence that masks provide very little protection, even the medical professionals are jumping on the bandwagon:

Government doctors in Seattle recently demanded that masks be mandatory in nursing settings again, in an op-ed posted by the American College of Physicians (ACP). Despite much debate about mask efficacy following the official end of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, these public health officials are insisting that the vulnerable population of places of medicine such as hospitals and nursing homes would benefit from any act that may reduce ‘risk for Covid contracted in the hospital among patients and health care workers.’

Other organizations are already in panic mode with mask mandates. Kaiser Permanente in California, Rutgers University, and Morris Brown College (Georgia) have instituted mask mandates. The film company Lionsgate in Hollywood has reinstituted a mask mandate.

What are the actual facts? The new variant is called Pirola and is derived from the Omicron variant. To date, few people (seven) have contracted Pirola, and those who have experienced mild symptoms. Eris (EG.5) is another variation that appeared before Pirola and has spread more widely; it appears more transmissible but hasn’t raised concerns about severity. This re-emergence is not unexpected, given that Covid-19, like the flu, will have its seasons, coming and going.

*     *     *    *

No one should be surprised at the reactions of organizations and the medical field to new variants of Covid-19. It’s difficult to nail down the motivations of those pressing for mask mandates and predicting vaccine mandates. Liability issues? Their own personal fears? Their desire to control the public reaction? To portray themselves as the rescuers of mankind?

Will there ever come a day when we all say we need to treat Covid as we treat influenza? They are not the same, but the patterns of transmission and treatment are similar enough that we should learn from our experience with the flu and take practical steps that we are comfortable with to deal with the potential of infection.

You may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned lockdowns in this piece; to my knowledge, no one has instituted them — yet. So much damage to people’s health and the economy was done with the previous lockdowns that new excuses and justifications to institute lockdowns will need to be created.

Watch for them.

Published in Healthcare
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  1. Old Bathos Member
    Old Bathos
    @OldBathos

    A questionable study about a questionable condition (long COVID) to justify demonstrably failed measures that actually did cause mental and physical damage is the perfect summation of our expert class. 

    • #1
  2. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Old Bathos (View Comment):

    A questionable study about a questionable condition (long COVID) to justify demonstrably failed measures that actually did cause mental and physical damage is the perfect summation of our expert class.

    Indeed. You mean, you’re not impressed? [sarc off]

    • #2
  3. Fritz Coolidge
    Fritz
    @Fritz

    Somewhere I read the official shorthand name for this new variant is “BS 24/7”.

    Sounds about right.

    • #3
  4. Tex929rr Coolidge
    Tex929rr
    @Tex929rr

    At the EMS staff meeting this past Friday our medical director stated flatly that he cannot legally  mandate masks.   This is true state wide.  So I figure some local government or school district will try to ignore state law and mandate masks.  I expect the state to come down on them hard and fast.  I’m almost looking forward to it.

    Sooner or later it will be a fed/state showdown. Again, I’m looking forward to it.

    This one issue could easily decide the 24 election at multiple levels.  (Barring the absentee/mail cheating we saw last time.  Big caveat.)

    • #4
  5. Scott Wilmot Member
    Scott Wilmot
    @ScottWilmot

    Susan Quinn: It’s difficult to nail down the motivations of those who are pressing for mask mandates and predicting vaccine mandates

    I think it is pretty clear: ignorance, power, and control.

    • #5
  6. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Tex929rr (View Comment):

    Sooner or later it will be a fed/state showdown. Again, I’m looking forward to it.

    This one issue could easily decide the 24 election at multiple levels.  (Barring the absentee/mail cheating we saw last time.  Big caveat.)

    Bring on the popcorn! Some people are saying that serious steps won’t be taken until after the election. That will be interesting to see!

    • #6
  7. Blondie Thatcher
    Blondie
    @Blondie

    Tex929rr (View Comment):
    (Barring the absentee/mail cheating we saw last time.  Big caveat.)

    It is their cover (pun intended) for the cheating, just like the last time. 

    • #7
  8. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Scott Wilmot (View Comment):

    Susan Quinn: It’s difficult to nail down the motivations of those who are pressing for mask mandates and predicting vaccine mandates

    I think it is pretty clear: ignorance, power, and control.

    Wouldn’t it be refreshing, Scott, to hear them own up to their motives? I know, I know, dream on…

    • #8
  9. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    From the Daily Mail :

    Mask study published by NIH suggests N95 Covid masks may expose wearers to dangerous level of toxic compounds linked to seizures and cancer

    • #9
  10. Chuck Coolidge
    Chuck
    @Chuckles

    Not hugs – but drugs.

    • #10
  11. Chris O Coolidge
    Chris O
    @ChrisO

    Covid-19 is now listed as a side effect on some drugs. A virus is a side effect? No, they (probably) mean what used to be called “flu-like symptoms,” which is one of the ways the body attempts to remove toxicity.

    It’s all bunk; fear porn to assure submission.

    I will not comply.

    • #11
  12. kedavis Coolidge
    kedavis
    @kedavis

    I don’t know why they’re so worried about Covid, from their own “research” it seems to create a lot of Democrat voters.

    • #12
  13. Stina Inactive
    Stina
    @CM

    Do you think people will notice that this second statement refers to long Covid syndrome, or will they simply become alarmed that anyone who contracts Covid could get “brain damage”?

    I love how uncritical you are about the assertion that COVID (the illness) caused severe anxiety and depression and not the government response to it.

    Long COVID or not, the disease isn’t the cause of the mental neuroticism growing in our population. The increase in that was trending way before COVID and was exacerbated by the isolation policies enacted by government, many of which were unnecessary.

    Don’t just swallow their reporting without criticism.

    • #13
  14. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Stina (View Comment):
    Don’t just swallow their reporting without criticism.

    I didn’t. My post wasn’t addressing past response. You’re welcome to write about it, though.

    • #14
  15. Rodin Member
    Rodin
    @Rodin

    Push back. Hard. 

    • #15
  16. Full Size Tabby Member
    Full Size Tabby
    @FullSizeTabby

    Susan Quinn: It’s difficult to nail down the motivations of those who are pressing for mask mandates and predicting vaccine mandates: liability issues? Their own personal fears? Their desire to control the public reaction? To portray themselves as the rescuers of mankind?

    I have become really aware only recently (sometimes I’m a slow learner) that there seem to be a lot of people who believe that because they have an issue with something, the entire rest of the world has to change behavior. This has become most conspicuous in the pronoun wars (“Because I want to think of myself as something other than physical reality, everyone else in the world has to alter their language to accommodate my belief.”) But once I started noticing it there, I found it many other places. “Because I have a fear of guns, no one should be able to own a gun.” “Because I am afraid to ride a motorcycle, no one should be allowed to ride a motorcycle.” “Because I fear contracting a disease, everyone else has to focus all their energy on keeping me safe from that disease.”

    I have been somewhat surprised at the extent to which this type of person believes he (or she) is entitled to impose his beliefs and fears onto everyone else. 

    • #16
  17. Stina Inactive
    Stina
    @CM

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    Stina (View Comment):
    Don’t just swallow their reporting without criticism.

    I didn’t. My post wasn’t addressing past response. You’re welcome to write about it, though.

    You didn’t need to accept the premise that COVID causes brain damage to further your argument. You trying to limit it to long COVID demonstrates you are just accepting that any COVID causes brain damage.

    It isn’t true.

    • #17
  18. Jim McConnell Member
    Jim McConnell
    @JimMcConnell

    Maybe we could just send money to the pharmaceutical companies, and avoid the mandates this time?

    • #18
  19. Full Size Tabby Member
    Full Size Tabby
    @FullSizeTabby

    Susan Quinn:

    In spite of the evidence that masks provide very little protection, even the medical professionals are jumping on the bandwagon :

    Government doctors in Seattle recently demanded that masks be mandatory in nursing settings again, in an op-ed posted by the American College of Physicians (ACP). Despite much debate about mask efficacy following the official end of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, these public health officials are insisting that the vulnerable population of places of medicine such as hospitals and nursing homes would benefit from any act that may reduce ‘risk for Covid contracted in the hospital among patients and health care workers.’

    Other organizations are already in panic mode with mask mandates. Kaiser Permanente in California, Rutgers University and Morris Brown College (Georgia) have instituted mask mandates. The film company Lionsgate in Hollywood has reinstituted a mask mandate.

     

    Generating this fear though is likely to re-create many of the problems that came up in 2020 – the magnitude of which we are only now beginning to see: Learning loss in children kept out of school because of fear (either on the part of the school or of the parent); Learning loss in children unable to see faces for speech and language development; Children and young adults unable to communicate with others because isolation (voluntary or involuntary), and masks and other barriers to communication (like requiring all communication to be through electronic devices) prevented them from learning how to communicate with real people in a real world; Depression because masks, mask mandates, and other restrictions tell people “You really should not be here”; People skipping medical care and routine check-ups for fear of the medical facility, resulting in more serious later conditions; People not engaging in mentally beneficial social activities (church, concerts, theater, sporting events, communal meals, museums, travel, etc.).

    As to the medical people generating such fears, I see the problem of rule by experts. Experts tend to focus only on their area of expertise, and ignore or downplay what to them are “collateral” issues. A medical entity or person focused on “disease” is likely to consider any cost to avoid “disease” is acceptable. All other issues (learning, social development, mental well-being, happiness, community development, etc.) are of little or no importance to the person focused on disease. 

    Dr. Fauci is an expert on communicable diseases. So (in a charitable view) it was natural for him to consider any cost worthwhile in a quest to minimize the transmission of a communicable disease. He even called all the learning, mental health, other medical issues, and other negative consequences, “collateral” issues and implied that they were unimportant to his mono-focus on a single communicable disease. 

    It is unfortunate that so many have obviously failed to learn from the 2020-23 (and continuing) experience that the personal, social, and societal costs of a singular focus on one communicable disease has significant negative long-term consequences. 

    • #19
  20. CarolJoy, Not So Easy To Kill Coolidge
    CarolJoy, Not So Easy To Kill
    @CarolJoy

    The vaccine industry came for older people, but now they come for our children down to the age of 6 months.

    The graphic is  based on statements and research offered  by  the late European graphene hydroxide scientist, Dr Andreas Noack.

    Noack was the foremost graphene oxide researcher in the Western World:

     

    • #20
  21. Casey73 Coolidge
    Casey73
    @Casey73

    Chuck (View Comment):

    Not hugs – but drugs.

    First thought I had when I saw that meme.

    • #21
  22. Saint Augustine Member
    Saint Augustine
    @SaintAugustine

    Susan Quinn:

    The new variant is called Pirola and is derived from the Omicron variant.

    That tells me everything I need to know.

    It’s the new booster, and it’s better than Pfizer.

    And it’s free.  And probably involves less Tylenol to deal with the symptoms.

    • #22
  23. iWe Coolidge
    iWe
    @iWe

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    From the Daily Mail :

    Mask study published by NIH suggests N95 Covid masks may expose wearers to dangerous level of toxic compounds linked to seizures and cancer

    And as I posted before, high CO2 levels (from masks) lead to reduced intelligence and higher fear and anxiety levels. Masks provide a positive feedback for more mask-wearing.

    • #23
  24. Red Herring Coolidge
    Red Herring
    @EHerring

    If they honestly believed this, Fauci would have a mugshot and not Trump and we would have cut off all trade with China.

    • #24
  25. The Reticulator Member
    The Reticulator
    @TheReticulator

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    From the Daily Mail :

    Mask study published by NIH suggests N95 Covid masks may expose wearers to dangerous level of toxic compounds linked to seizures and cancer

    Oh, no! Not the dreaded “linkedtos”!

    • #25
  26. The Reticulator Member
    The Reticulator
    @TheReticulator

    I wish somebody cared about putting some limits on governmental emergency powers.

     

    • #26
  27. kidCoder Member
    kidCoder
    @kidCoder

    Attempts at mask mandates would help prevent a Donald Trump presidency. One would need only point to his record of supporting such things the first time.

    • #27
  28. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    I’ll see you all in the anti-vaccine work camps . . .

    • #28
  29. Susan Quinn Contributor
    Susan Quinn
    @SusanQuinn

    Stad (View Comment):

    I’ll see you all in the anti-vaccine work camps . . .

    …and you and I will head the revolt from inside!

    • #29
  30. GlennAmurgis Coolidge
    GlennAmurgis
    @GlennAmurgis

    Just say no 

    • #30
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