They are Lying with Statistics

By Don Rosenberg – 6/30/2020

One of the least popular classes in high school is statistics. But we subconsciously use statistics when we make almost any decision. If I jump off this balcony will I land in the swimming pool, or the concrete? If I land in the pool, will Suzie finally go out with me?

Modern day statistics is extremely complicated. You have to believe what “the experts” say. The more complex the problem, the easier it is to manipulate the data. This is what is happening with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Decisions about grocery shopping, restaurants or mask usage become life and death matters.

And what should government policy be? Our leaders need to know…

• What are someone’s chances of getting COVID-19?
• How many cases show no symptoms?
• If someone shows no symptoms, are they still infectious?
• How many people have died from COVID-19?
• What are the mortality rates?
• How many new COVID-19 hospital cases are there in the country and in different regions?
• Are state lockdowns a good idea?

Each question involves the collection of data and the forming of conclusions that affect millions of lives…

 

What are someone’s chances of getting COVID-19?

A recent study by Dr. Rajiv Bhatia, clinical assistant professor of primary care and population health at Stanford, looked at data in the 100 largest U.S. counties as states began to reopen.

They found a person in a typical U.S. county who has a single random contact with another person has a 1 in 3,836 chance of being infected without social distancing, hand-washing or mask-wearing, and a 50-64-year-old person has a 1 in 852,000 chance of being hospitalized or a 1 in 19.1 million chance of dying based on rates as of the last week of May.

“We were surprised how low the relative risk was,” Klausner said.

Yet we are told that we are in grave danger.

 

How many cases show no symptoms?

A Santa Clara County study suggests that the large majority of people who contract COVID-19 recover without ever knowing they were infected. If undetected infections are that widespread, then the death rate in the county could be less than 0.2%, making the virus far less lethal than “experts” have claimed.

 

If someone shows no symptoms, are they still infectious?

This has been one of our biggest fears. How many people are walking around, spreading the virus who don’t know it or look sick?

One recent study says that up to 45% of infections may be asymptomatic.

There are more studies being done, but if someone has no symptoms that means they have no fever, and aren’t coughing or sneezing. There is likely little or no “viral load” in their lungs to cough out.

 

How many people have died from COVID-19?

We have gotten numerous reports of deaths in nursing homes, but when numbers were checked from one major CMMS report, in many cases there were more fatalities than actual residents, sometimes by a factor of ten.

Is this being done on purpose?

As of April 14, 2020, CDC death counts across the country were changed to include both confirmed and probable cases and deaths. How “probable” is defined is left to the doctor signing the death certificate. This is quite an unusual standard.

Another unusual change has been to classify people dying with COVID-19 as dying from COVID-19. CDC data for 2017 shows 2,813,503 deaths in the U.S. If the asymptomatic rate is just 20%, then they could conceivably add another 562,700 deaths to their tally.

The good news is that the CDC reports weekly deaths “involving” COVID-19 declining steadily, despite all the panic from the media. Our worst week was 4/18 with 16,357 deaths; the week of 6/20 it was 906.

Why are we not hearing about this fantastic news?

What are the mortality rates?

Original projections about COVID-19 were wildly inaccurate, predicting as many as 2 million deaths with a mortality rate of 3-5%. That was the justification for the nationwide lockdown. As we learn that millions have already had the disease with little or no symptoms, the CDC now reports the likely death rate is .026%, similar to the flu. Not 30 times more, or ten times more – about the same as the flu!

 

How many new COVID-19 hospital cases are there in the country and in different regions?

We have seen an alarming number of new “hospitalizations” reported for COVID-19 over the last few weeks, causing a new clamor for states to shut back down. Why is this?

Turns out, all new patients are being tested. If they are in for knee surgery or a mammogram, and asymptomatic, but test positive, that’s a “new case.” If 20-45% of Americans show no symptoms, many are going to test positive and end up in the statistics.

We are also hearing reports of people being tested multiple times until they get a positive result. Also, when someone contracted COVID-19 and feels better, in order to go back to work, they need to show they are cured. They might be tested several times a day over 3-5 days before they show as negative. Every one of those positive tests is counted as another case!

Finally, we are hearing that some of the private labs are only reporting positive tests, since there are so many negative ones. That skews the numbers to show higher infection rates.

 

Are state lockdowns a good idea?

Dr. John P. A. Ioannidis “is a Greek-American physician-scientist and writer who has made contributions to evidence-based medicine, epidemiology, and clinical research. Ioannidis studies scientific research itself, primarily in clinical medicine and the social sciences.”

He concludes…

“Lockdowns were desperate, defendable choices when we knew little about covid-19. But, now that we know more, we should avoid exaggeration. We should carefully and gradually remove lockdown measures, with data driven feedback on bed capacity and prevalence/incidence indicators. Otherwise, prolonged lockdowns may become mass suicide.”

In an article back in March, he calls the science on COVID-19 “a once-in-a-century evidence fiasco” that “creates tremendous uncertainty about the risk of dying from Covid-19. Reported case fatality rates, like the official 3.4% rate from the World Health Organization, cause horror — and are meaningless.”

 

So why is there such a problem with the data about COVID-19? If the errors were just honest mistakes, half would indicate a more severe problem and half would indicate less. But all of these “errors” are serving to inflate the panic, support the lockdowns, and increase government control.

My article from May explains that the opponents of our president will do or say anything to keep him from winning in November. They have accused him of everything from colluding with Russians, to bribery and extortion. Now their only option is to cheat in the November elections.

Democrats feel they can advance the idea of voting by mail by scaring Americans into hiding in their homes. Several states are already mailing ballots to everyone on the voter rolls, regardless of whether they’re active or inactive, at the same or a different address, alive or dead. These unclaimed ballots will be gathered from mailboxes by the tens of thousands and cast for the opposition.

When you know what the other side is up to, you can understand why you’re being manipulated.