Fauci’s Fraudulent Fearmongering

Research on flu a- and pre-symptomatic transmission seems to say that it is not a large part of transmission (10% of cases are asymptomatic, and they shed less and less days). See references inside ref (1). Of course, if we were to decrease symptomatic cases by SD, then remaining flu threat will be largely asymptomatic…

Time from infection to symptoms is 1 to 4 days for flu and 2 to 14 days for COVID, so pre-symptomatic periods differs also.

R0 before public health measures for flue is between 1 and 2, for COVID 2 to 3 or even more

(1) Patrozou, E., & Mermel, L. A. (2009). Does influenza transmission occur from asymptomatic infection or prior to symptom onset?. Public health reports (Washington, D.C. : 1974), 124(2), 193–196.

link removed (surprise)

You don’t have a right to endanger others as you cannot scream fire in a crowded theater, so you have a responsibility to listen to the CDC to protect others.

@MadeAliyah The “default position” flew out the window when there was something called a “global pandemic” and “millions literally dying”. At that point the “default position” became “whatever experts said that would help mitigate the situation”. The experts were near-unanimously saying that if most people wear masks, the deaths would drop significantly. So to contradict that, you would need a very VERY good reason.

You keep getting back to the flu and I keep having to explain myself again. I actually did a lot of thinking back when your first made your comparison and looked up some details and statistics. You’re right, there’s no good number for “acceptable losses”. Especially when something as simple as wearing a mask can prevent it.

But, and I repeat myself, according to the experts, (unless there’s a flu epidemic going around) wearing a mask is just overkill. You can prevent people from dying from the flu by just using some seichel. Like don’t go to the supermarket when you’re running a fever. Or don’t bring your sniffling sneezing kids to visit Saba at the nursing home.

So we’re getting back to our speed limit analogy. Experts have determined safe speeds on the streets. That will not prevent all vehicle deaths, because bad mazal will still happen. Changing the speed limit to 5 KPH (nimshol: wearing masks for the flu) everywhere won’t stop people from ramming their bikes into buses, or falling under a car wheel. So we have safe speed limits and I think we are both in agreement that those are there for a reason and it’s a darned good one. But then we get to your logic of “personal liberties” (a concept completely foreign to Yiddishkeit) which sounds like taking Libertarianism to the extreme (Randism?). The concept of a society that cannot prevent people from doing things that is a danger to others is just broken and wrong. So Israel, the US, and almost every non-Somalian country in the world saying that people have to drive the speed limit (nimshol: wear masks during the worst pandemic in a century) is the right thing to do.

What I don’t get is this. Rabbonim and Rebbetzins have been standing up in front of their kehal for generations and telling people how to dress. Especially women. Often that way of dress is extremely difficult and uncomfortable. So why when it came to telling kehillos to wear masks did a lot of people balk and say “You can’t tell me what to do!”.

wait long enough and, sure, the masks will not be needed

They were never needed for the vaccinated.

DY >wait long enough and, sure, the masks will not be needed
> They were never needed for the vaccinated.

As far as we understand now (and with less understanding before) – vaccine reduces risks by a factor of 10 to 20. If you are in an area with high prevalence of COVID and you do not take other measures esp. prolonged contact without ventilation, your risk is high, and mask and SD would help. So, do not plan a visit to Indian ashram just yet.

As I mentioned above, it seems that antibody tests will soon be used to indicate whether you have even higher (or lower) level of vaccine protection, i.e. instead of having 200 mln people with 95% protection, we will be divided into 180 mln with 99+% and 20 mln with maybe 50% protection.

Dear Made Aliya,

I found it, thanks! I apologize to you. I see you made it into a clear cut question. Namely, can a person be forced to wear a mask against his/her will in order to save lives. The answer is yes. But only when there is a compelling reason. The difference why there was mandatory mask mandates last year and there hopefully will not be any mandates next year, was the epidemic nature of the virus. Normally, the body has so many defenses against viruses and bacteria that the enhanced protections do little to prevent infection. Thus there is no compelling reason to always mandate masks.

However, there are many compelling instances to require masks. During an invasive surgery the skin is open. That negates the body’s best defense against infection. Cancer patients are susceptible to infection and have suppressed immunity. Food preparation in certain conditions require extreme precautions. People living in remote areas without access to proper health care. Sick patients in close quarters. Labs handling live samples. And epidemic diseases that are growing out of control.

Not wearing marks does not pose any danger. I have not worn a mask many times, and was not ever in danger from not having a mask. It is a health measure. Unhealthy does not equal dangerous. But I would not classify speeding in a residential zone as clear and present danger either. So maybe you mean something, but are not explaining it well.

Not masking in the face of an epidemic disease is also not a danger. It is merely not invoking another tool to control the spread. In some instances, masking is irrelevant to how the disease spreads. [HIV] In others, masks are insufficient. [marburg]

On the original question, it depends who is doing the forcing. Online posters cannot force any issue. Yet we keep on trying. Governments in the Far East can force a whole lot. In the western world, it’s a bit murky. Generally, the executive branch gets to make the call in times of crisis.

I am not putting other people’s health at risk as nobody is around me.

Which health departments?

Thirty MPH is speeding in a residential zone.

I am not sure if you are aware of this, but your stance has been repeatedly questioned. Now I wonder if you have a real position on the matter.

@n0mesorah I think a better question would be which health department did not insist on masks. The US national DOH and all fifty states mandated masks as did the Misrad HaBriyut in Israel. If you’re going to say that you don’t need to wear a mask when around other people during a pandemic, you have to have some form of massive amounts of documentation to defend your position.

My point about the speeding moshol was to counter the idea that the government cannot mandate something against “personal liberties” (a concept I have issue with within itself). The government can and does mandate things like that all the time, especially when your expression of your “personal liberties” puts others at risk.

I am not sure if you are aware of this, but your stance has been repeatedly questioned. Now I wonder if you have a real position on the matter.

By whom? Three or four members of the CR? A couple nutters on YouTube? Some retired holistic medicine doctor dredged up from the depths of wherever? Like I’ve said before, the overwhelming vast majority of people who know what they are talking about have said that during a COVID-19 pandemic in an unvaccinated population, masks must be worn when around other people.

-Deep breath-

Dear Yserbius,

I do not recall saying anything against wearing marks during a pandemic.

All Health Departments were for it. There is still a large degree personal autonomy.

I suspect that you have no position on how to go about wearing masks. You only question others who try to advance some sense into the discussion. I looked through a lot of posts, and I found nothing from your end.

@MadeAliyah That’s a lot of words for addresses nothing about my main point. You keep trying to derail the topic by pretending that my concern about COVID is hypocritical because I’m not equally concerned about the flu, when I’ve already made myself clear that the two are not comparable.

You keep repeating “the burden of proof is on you” over and over again like it’s some massive shtuch and completely ignoring the fact that the proof is out there in what the CDC and Misrad HaBriyut have been saying. So the burden has shifted to you to prove them wrong.

Your main issue is that you don’t feel like the government (or my “power grab” whatever that means) has a right to mandate that you wear a mask, even if it does a lot to protect people. You have yet to address what, exactly, is the issue here since the government mandates things like that all the time, such as speed limits.

@MadeAliyah There should be limits to government control but the government also has a right to excessive control when there is a clear and present danger. The COVID-19 pandemic was a case of clear and present danger. Speeding is a case of clear and present danger. The regular flu season is not. Driving 25 down a residential street is not. Simple as that.

@MadeAliyah I asked first. I gave you answers to all of your questions, and repeated several of them. I’m not answering again until you answer these two:

1. Why are speed limits different than mandatory masking?
2. Why are the near-unanimous expert opinions of epidemiologists and doctors not enough proof that you should wear a mask during a global pandemic?

Good Shabbos!

@n0mesorah Yeah yeah, you can nitpick the differences, but the moshol still works. The government has a right to tell you that you can’t do 80mph down a one-lane residential side-street.

Dear Yserbius,

“The Government has a right to tell you that you can’t do 80 mph down a one lane residential side street.”

That line really muddles everything.

The government does not say do not drive recklessly. Bedfore driving was regulated, safety was being said. It does not take legal recognition to state common sense advice.

However, the government can arrest you for reckless driving. As well as fines, community service, impound you car, press charges in court, and send you to jail. The difference between the government and the people, is the deterrent and the consequences.

So, if masks make sense without the government mandating it, then we can have a discussion about how the government could enforce it. Now the question is, in your opinion how should we go about wearing masks in this current pandemic?

I give up on asking you why we should wear masks.

No one needs to defend their breathing normally without being muzzled. Baruch Hashem in our community we understood that after the pandemic raging in March, April, may, June and perhaps July as well, I can’t remember exactly, of 2020, there was no further need of wearing masks. Everyone is always in danger of contracting and spreading viruses but we don’t control the world and it’s stupid to wear masks indefinitely at this point. Hashem controls the world, not us.

@n0mesorah If I understand your comment correctly (and please excuse me if I don’t, I’m feeling stupider than usual today) you’re saying that the government has no need to regulate safety for things that are common sense? I pashut don’t get that reasoning. Governments regulates common sense safety measures all the time to stop people who don’t use common sense.

Yserbius: government has no need to regulate safety for things that are common sense? I pashut don’t get that reasoning.

First, American libertarian thought is that government should not regulate something that only hurts themselves.

2nd, this may depend on how well society follows common sense and level of intrusion required to regulate. Why not, for example, have government sponsored/required physical training as Nazis and Soviets had to ensure that men are ready for the Army? With government-subsidized helathcare, this may become an item.

3rd, carrots and tricks seem to be working in modern society better than sticks. Signing up employees automatically for 401k with an option to switch it off works way better than giving people an option to enroll.

An example where intrusion prevents good regulation in Gemora: when there are several farmers along the river, we let the first one to take as much water as he wants instead of putting an inspector. L’derech shalom. (some could argue opposite: that shalom requires dividing everything equitable )

Happy to oblige. It is known that being a לץ יושב קרנות and עאכו”כ a כסיל and can be depressing and need reinforcement for that עבודה סיזיפית.

So whenever being a לץ is not supplying the goods of התנשאות I’m here to tell you not to give up because
Klal yisroel desperately needs your cynicism

@n0mesorah You didn’t explain your original comment at all! And your points are absolutely not mutually exclusive.

I think you mistake in reasoning is the same one a lot of your crowd has been making. No one said that masks will “avert the threat” completely. Rather, masks are simply a major part of an equation that also includes social distancing, testing, and handwashing. So to combine your two statements into one that applied to the situation in 2020:

The threat of coronavirus in the past year to the wearer and those around him, is significantly more than other viruses. And masks helped avert the threat. Since it was a pandemic, a public health emergency, all lines of safety measures should be invoked to slow the disease as much as possible, and to prevent the collapse of societal structures. Therefore masks and other health and social distancing mandates were necessary.

Dear Yserbius,

1. You are correct. I did not explain my earlier post.

2. Who is my crowd?

3. To make your argument (If I followed your posts faithfully. You make many, many, points. And I just cannot tell which one is the cause that you are trying to back up with other points.) comprehensible, ‘significantly more than other viruses’ could use some depth. There are a lot of variables involved. A dry statistic would not convince me that a threat is real.

4. You are correct again. Those two lines can be put together. As well as many other theories. But there is only one way to discuss an intrusion on normality. Are mask mandates valid because of personal safety, or public health? Both ideas can be good and even true. But a mandate that is implemented for personal safety will have very different guidelines than one that is implemented for public health. If we try to cover both, we will get neither.

5. You write about the pandemic as if it is in the past.

6. It is the job description of public health officials to make themselves understood. I have no reason to think that anybody on this thread is interested in what Dr. Fauci says. Why would I assume that Made Aliyah made any attempt to understand what was being said?

7. If you bothered to look at his credentials, or even just listened to him speak in the early days of the pandemic, it would be obvious to you that Dr. Fauci is not being cautious, or covering up for the future. He does everything he can not to make assumptions without data.

@n0mesorah It seems that there’s a large and significant portion of the frum oilom that during 2020 were very quick to deride public officials, and ignore restrictions with all sorts of cheshboinois and svarahs while thousands died from COVID. Lifi aniyas da’ati, that’s your crowd.

I have only making one point in this thread. The government has a right to mandate that people wear masks when around others. It’s not difficult and it’s not confusing.

What is “an intrusion on normality”? Last I checked, COVID-19 was a massive intrusion on normality. In 2020 there was no more normal. So being mandated to wear a mask when out in public in order to protect people around you was as normal as you’re going to get.

The pandemic is, unfortunately, still with us. But I am referring to last year when it was far worse and we didn’t have a vaccine. Now, Baruch Hashem, when you have communities where 90% of the klal were vaccinated there isn’t the same danger so it’s a completely different discussion.

This entire thread is about something Dr. Fauci said. Why would I think anyone commenting here would not try to understand what he said? He’s a public official trying his best. Sometimes his best involves acting before there’s data just in case the data shows his assumptions to be wrong.