Tag Archives: influenza

medical news

Coronavirus is far deadlier than the flu, correct Mr. POTUS?

Among the many zigs and zags that Donald John Trump has performed in reaction to the coronavirus pandemic, I want to look briefly at one of his acrobatic tricks.

When he was downplaying the significance of the outbreak in its early stages — referring to how it would disappear miraculously from the face of the planet — he compared it to influenza. Trump said the flu kills many more Americans annually than he projected the coronavirus would claim. Do you recall that?

The flu kills 37,000 people each year, Trump said, disparaging the potential impact of the COVID-19 strain of the virus.

OK, that’s all changed now.

Donald Trump his own self said the coronavirus could kill as many as 200,000 Americans before the crisis ends. The implication is that the deaths would occur perhaps before the end of the calendar year.

Why has no one called him out on that?

It’s an example of the idiocy that Trump was spouting early in the crisis, seeking to downplay its significance while also seeking to cover his own (ample) backside while the rest of us began to worry ourselves into near apoplexy.

The worst is yet to arrive in the United States of America.

Leadership from the top of our governmental chain of command requires truth telling at all times. We damn sure weren’t getting it in the beginning of this pandemic. Truth telling remains missing in action now.

medical news, science news

Let’s stop arguing over which ailment is deadlier; it’s Covid-19

I heard him say it with my own two ears, both of which are in good working order.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the world’s leading epidemiologist, told Congress this week that the Covid-19 strain of the coronavirus that the World Health Organization has labeled a pandemic is about 10 times more lethal than influenza.

He said the mortality rate from the flu is less than half of 1 percent; the death rate from Covid-19 is about 3.5 percent.

There. Is that clear? It is to me.

Yet we hear some politicians and other doubters fall back on the raw numbers, the gross number of cases as a defense of their downplaying of the threat that Covid-19 poses to the public. Donald Trump, for one, keeps saying the flu kills more people annually than coronavirus. Yes, that is true. It’s also irrelevant.

Dr. Fauci tells us the pandemic we’re experience is going to worsen before it improves. It could worsen by a lot. Meaning that a lot more human beings are going to succumb to this illness. What’s more, they will do so more frequently than they fall victim to the flu.

I am weary of the argument. Anthony Fauci settled it for me.

Covid-19 presents the type of existential threat to our very lives than the flu ever has done.

Period. Now, let’s get to work trying to control this frightening disease.

International news, medical news, national news

It ain’t the flu; let’s treat this outbreak with seriousness

(Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

Donald J. Trump keeps downplaying the severity of the health crisis that threatens to turn into a global pandemic.

He keeps telling us the flu kills thousands of Americans annually and that the Covid-19 virus has taken only a fraction of that amount.

What’s the problem? he wonders.

Here is the problem as I see it, Mr. President: The strain of coronavirus that is causing near panic in many countries has the potential of being far worse than influenza. It is being transmitted by casual contact, what medical/science experts refer to as “community transmission.”

We need to treat this matter with all due seriousness, not pass it off as some sort of “Democrat hoax,” which Trump has called it. We have to establish clear, concise and coherent lines of communication; the White House cannot tolerate any more contradictions from the president of the medical experts who keep telling us the truth about the threat we face.

I continue to believe Wall Street’s reaction to this crisis is partly a result of the clumsy, stumblebum response we keep hearing from the White House and from the president. Yes, there’s also that oil-price fight being waged by Saudi Arabia and Russia, which has sent the price of petroleum plummeting; it’s good for you and me at the fuel pump, but it’s playing hell with the fossil fuel industry, which — for better or worse — still is a key economic driver in this country.

So, let’s stop with the flu comparisons, shall we? The Covid-19 outbreak has turned into a crisis that needs to be treated as a matter that well could put billions of human beings in dire peril.