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Coronavirus News Articles Commentaries

February 2022

By Gary F. Zeolla

These Commentaries are continued from Coronavirus News Articles Commentaries: January 2022.

Grim 900,000 Covid Deaths Milestone

      Around 900,000 deaths have been linked to the pandemic in the United States, and about 2,600 continue to be reported every day, the most since last winter. Daily death reports are up about 30 percent in the last two weeks (NYT. Coronavirus. on 2/5/22).

      The exact numbers at 9:08 am on Saturday, February 5, 2022 were Cases: 76,234,897. Deaths: 900,141. Those case and death numbers work out to a 1.18% case fatality rate (CFR). I previously reported the CFR was at 1.8% in March of 2021. It fell to 1.6% in October of 2021. It fell some more to 1.33% in early January of this year (2022). And again, now it has fallen some more to 1.18%.

      That steady drop could be due to changes in the virus as it mutates, becoming a bit less lethal with each new variant. Or it could be due to the Covid vaccines still being very effective at preventing death but not no longer being as effective at preventing infection. Or it could be because therapeutics are finally be used at a somewhat higher rate, though still nowhere near as timely and as commonly as they should be. Probably it is a combination of all three.

      But this does not mean we are out of the woods. In fact, given the high contagious rate of Omicron, Americans are dying at a faster pace now than under Delta:

      “The people that don’t get vaccinated — you tell them that almost 900,000 have died, and they say, ‘They’d have died anyway,’” Mr. [Patrick] Tracy said. “We have very little consideration for our fellow man.”

      The pace of deaths across the country has accelerated throughout the fall and winter. When the United States reached 800,000 deaths in mid-December, the most recent 100,000 deaths had occurred in less than 11 weeks. This time, the latest 100,000 deaths — many from the Omicron variant — have been reported in just over seven weeks.

      That the 900,000-death milestone comes more than a year after vaccines were first authorized added to the pain, said Dr. Letitia Dzirasa, the Baltimore health commissioner. Federal data shows that a vast majority of deaths have been unvaccinated people.

      “As a public health professional, it is unbelievably sad, because I think so many of the deaths were likely preventable,” Dr. Dzirasa said. She said her agency continued to organize vaccination clinics each week, but that some of them were “barely attended” (NYT. U.S. Covid).

      Yes, those deaths were preventable. That is the point of my recent two-part article Needless Covid Deaths and Hospitalizations and Other Updates. The following verifies a couple of other points I’ve made recently.

      Throughout the coronavirus pandemic, increases in deaths have lagged behind spikes in infections because patients are often sick for weeks before dying and because it can take several days to report those deaths. The Omicron variant, though still potentially deadly, tends to cause severe illness less often than previous forms of the virus. But because of the sheer number of cases — more than three times as many a day at the recent peak than in any previous surge — hospitalizations still rose to record levels (NYT. U.S. Covid).

      Again, all very sad and all very unnecessary.

      The milestone comes more than 13 months into a vaccination drive that has been beset by misinformation and political and legal strife, though the shots have proved safe and highly effective at preventing serious illness and death.

      “It is an astronomically high number. If you had told most Americans two years ago as this pandemic was getting going that 900,000 Americans would die over the next few years, I think most people would not have believed it,” said Dr. Ashish K. Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health….

      Just 64% of the population is fully vaccinated, or about 212 million Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

      “We have underestimated our enemy here, and we have under-prepared to protect ourselves,” said Dr. Joshua M. Sharfstein, a public health professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “We’ve learned a tremendous amount of humility in the face of a lethal and contagious respiratory virus.”

      Nor is COVID-19 finished with the United States. Dr. Andrew Noymer, a professor of public health at the University of California at Irvine, predicted the U.S. will hit 1 million deaths by March 1 (WTAE/ AP/ US death).

       I knew we would hit this 900k number almost two years ago. In fact, I predicted that soon to be reached one million Covid deaths number back in May 2022 (see Revised Coronavirus Numbers). And yes, Covid misinformation is the number one reason for all of these needless deaths, followed by mistakes by the authorities, as I have been detailing throughout my Coronavirus writings.

      Despite its wealth and its world-class medical institutions, the U.S. has the highest reported toll of any country, and even then, the real number of lives lost directly or indirectly to the coronavirus is thought to be significantly higher.

      Experts believe some COVID-19 deaths have been misattributed to other conditions. And some Americans are thought to have died of chronic illnesses such as heart disease and diabetes because they were unable or unwilling to obtain treatment during the crisis (WTAE/ AP/ US death).

      The first paragraph above is important, as many Covid-deniers claim the death numbers are inflated. That would lower the CFR. But in fact, they might be underestimated. That would elevate the CFR. But then, many cases go underreported, especially now with more home testing. Thus, the two probably even out, as I have said before.

      The last sentence of the second paragraph is due to fear-mongering on the left, leading to additional needless deaths, again, as I have said before.

      COVID-19 has become one of the top three causes of death in America, behind the big two — heart disease and cancer. Noymer said if the mortality rate from COVID-19 continues, it will shave up to two years off U.S. life expectancy (WTAE/ AP/ US death).

      I predicted this would be the case in my Revised Numbers article.

References:

      NYT. Coronavirus in the U.S.

      NYT. U.S. Covid Death Toll Surpasses 900,000 as Omicron’s Spread Slows.

      WTAE/ AP. US death toll from COVID-19 hits 900,000, accelerated by omicron.

2/5/22

    The approach of this book is to study different foods and food groups, with a chapter devoted to each major classification of foods. First the Biblical evidence is considered, then the modern-day scientific research is reviewed. Foods are then classified as “God-given foods” and “non-God-given foods.” The main point will be a healthy eating plan is composed of a variety of God-given foods and avoids non-God-given foods.

These commentaries are continued at: Coronavirus News Articles Commentaries: April 2022.

February 2021 Coronavirus Commentaries. Copyright © 2022 By Gary F. Zeolla.

The above commentaries were posted in February 2022.