Facts That Provide Perspective and Hope in the Face of COVID-19

To most people, the danger of COVID-19 is determined by the media and government.
 
The media prospers from sensationalism. Their constant highlighting of escalating death numbers and dramatic images lead us to believe the end of the world is at hand. Images of freezer trucks being loaded with bodies outside hospitals in New York brings to mind carts pulled through cities in the Middle Ages being loaded with Black Death bodies.
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Politicians, who take their responsibilities seriously, or are worried about securing their positions, are closing society down. In the face of an unknown threat that might kill millions and with the public insisting that something is done, and right NOW, they simply close doors. This creates more fear, panic, and unintended consequences for society.
 
COVID-19 is highly contagious. It may also be the product of a bioweapons laboratory in China. This creates a sinister picture ripe for conspiratorial interpretations and further paranoia.
 
Historical pandemics, like the Bubonic Plague in the 1300s killing 75-200 million and the Spanish flu of 1918 killing 50 million makes us wonder whether it is now our time. Particularly since the population today is far more mobile and congested and thus conducive to disease transmission.
 
The reaction to the disease is creating damage to economies, society, and freedoms that will linger far into the future, long after COVID-19 joins the class of common influenzas we live with. People who are politically and historically alert fear that the government will overreach and use the pandemic as an excuse to grow their power and dissolve freedoms.
 
The pandemic and the Pandora's box of societal repercussions are unclear. Predictions are speculative as are courses of action by the powers that be. The full truth will only be known in retrospect as events unfold, not just over days, but years.
 
This creates uncertainty, unrest, anxiety, depression, and fear. But no crisis will be solved by emotion. Reason and facts must prevail in order to have perspective and to see our way safely through the crisis. To that end, and with the understanding we are faced with moving targets that can affect conclusions almost daily, these are facts that appear certain as of 4-1-20:

• The vast majority of COVID-19 infections do not cause death. They are asymptomatic or result in mild symptoms. This tells us the immune system is the best foe to the virus.
  
  
• Children have a near-zero chance of becoming ill. This also tells us a young healthy immune system is the best foe to the virus.
  
  
• 93-95% of people with symptoms characteristic of COVID-19 test negative for it. Clinically it is nearly impossible to differentiate it from colds, flu, and other respiratory infections.
  
  
• It is uncertain whether shutting borders and blanket stay-at-home orders are the best approach. Time will tell whether that approach, as opposed to more selective isolation measures without shutting society down, such as in Sweden and Japan, was wisest.

 

• It is certain that shutting down society and attempting to prop it up with free printed money will have long-term disastrous effects.
  
  
• So far, COVID-19 has not proven to be nearly the threat to health and life as other common diseases and threats to life that have been tolerated for centuries without closing down society. See: https://www.asifthinkingmatters.com/blog/will-the-government-be-the-solution-to-covid-19
  
  
• See this interesting world clock that tabulates deaths in real-time from many other causes: https://www.worldometers.info. On the day of this writing, so far this year the clock shows 3,179,820 died of communicable diseases, 119,084 died of seasonal flu, 240, 268 of malaria . . . On the one day I found this clock, 22,477 died of starvation.
  
  We always worry most about the wolf at the door and ignore the termites in the rafters.
  
  
• There has never been a human intervention that can prevent a respiratory pathogen from inevitably spreading. Yes, washing hands, masks, and isolation may help, but the minuscule size and ubiquity of viruses make it impossible. There are 3,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 viruses wandering around in the biosphere. That's about a trillion viruses for each person in the world. Not all of them are virulent for humans, but this gives perspective on trying to get rid of them. Our hope lies in our own immunological defenses.
  
  
• Viral diseases naturally decline. This is due to rising natural immunity in the population, the predominance of the less-lethal forms of the virus as the more lethal forms die with their hosts, and other factors not yet understood.
  
  
• No vaccine or chemotherapeutic has ever been proven to be the cause of the decline of an infectious disease. Yet that is what the world is told is the only hope. On the other hand, natural therapies, such as oral and intravenous vitamin C, vitamin D, and other nutrients (ignored by a media supported by pharmaceutical interests) have already been proven to be effective preventatives and therapies against COVIF-19. See: https://www.asifthinkingmatters.com/blog/will-the-government-be-the-solution-to-covid-19.
  
  
• Since September (2019), common flu has infected 38 million Americans, resulting in 17 million medical visits, 390,000 hospitalizations, and 23,000 deaths.
  
  
• The fatality rate of COVID-19 in people with underlying health conditions is essentially identical to the rate with people who get the flu and have underlying health conditions.
  
  
• The lethality of any disease requires knowledge of the total number of infections. This would require that all people in the world be accurately tested. Current tests are not of known accuracy. Moreover, the test only measures the presence of the virus. To know the true infection rate would require an antibody test which would determine contact with the virus irrespective of its current presence in the body. That test is not yet available.
  
  
• All people in the world have not been tested for antibodies against the virus. Thus, we do not know the total number of past or present infections. Without knowing that, no conclusions can be made about the lethality of the virus: Lethality = number of deaths attributable to the virus alone/total number of people who have been infected. The numerator has been inflated and sensationalized; the denominator is not known and is underreported.
  
  
• The best measure of the lethality of an infective agent is how it affects the total deaths in a population. If a new lethal disease is introduced in a given location, we would expect the total deaths to increase over a certain time compared to the total deaths over the same time in the past. But there is no statistical evidence yet that this has occurred anywhere in the world since the beginning of the pandemic. This could be taken to mean that deaths attributed to COVID-19 are deaths that were imminent anyway. This is in keeping with the ill and the elderly being the most vulnerable, and especially to respiratory infections. COVID-19's presence at death may or may not have put them over the edge. In such cases, it is not known if the presence of the virus at death means it was the cause.
  
  
• When fatalities are reported, insufficient information is given as to factors that made the victim vulnerable. Reported is also italicized because people who die from other causes and are positive for COVID-19 are often incorrectly put in the COVID-19 fatalities column. This results in an excess mortality rate.
  
  
• In this chart tracking daily COVID-19 deaths related to underlying conditions, only Diabetes, Lung Disease, Cancer, Immunodeficiency, Heart Disease, Hypertension, Asthma, Kidney Disease, and GI/Liver Disease are considered as contributing factors. Notice that on the day of the report, only 13 out of 776 deaths had no underlying condition contributing to or actually causing death. https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-daily-data-summary-deaths.pdf

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The tally does not take into account dozens of other factors that compromise the immune system and make people susceptible to disease and death, such as smoking tobacco and marijuana, vaping, obesity, deficiency in vitamin D, C, and other nutrients, side-effect laden prescription drugs, street drugs, environmental toxins, stress, and other diseases exhausting the immune system. If these were taken into consideration the column heading, "No Underlying Conditions," would likely be zero.
 
Therein lies the key to hope. Underlying conditions that make us vulnerable to disease and death are by and large under our control. Waiting for a vaccine or pharmaceutical, as if we are passive victims, is not the wise approach. Taking control of our personal health is.
 
For principles to achieve health and robust immunity, see: https://www.asifthinkingmatters.com/living-life/4-our-owners-manual
 
Here are things that can be done to try to eliminate or lessen the "underlying conditions" and strengthen the immune system:
 
Drink lots of purified water, not in bisphenol-leaching plastic bottles. Even a gallon a day when ill. Add lemon juice, apple cider vinegar, and a pinch of baking soda to alkalinize the body and create an unfavorable environment for pathogens.
 
Eat foods as close to nature as possible, emphasizing grass-fed and wild animal products, organic vegetables, fruits, and tree nuts.
 
Minimize processed sugar and starches (which turn into sugar in the body). Sugar feeds excess weight, pathogens, cancer. and oxidative stress.
 
Don't eat for 14 hours each day, including sleep-time (called intermittent fasting). Encourages autophagy and other recuperative and restorative processes that boost immunity.
 
Get outside in nature, in the sun (the best source of vitamin D).
 
Take supplemental vitamin C, at least 2000 mg/day, vitamin D (2000 IU) if no daily sun, multivitamins and minerals, and immune boosters (search the internet). Insist on IV vitamin C if hospitalized. https://www.asifthinkingmatters.com/blog/coronavirus
 
Exercise daily like you mean it. Lifts mood, stimulates immunity, and benefits all health parameters.
 
Get plenty of sleep. Sleep quells hormones that suppress the immune system
 
Stay warm and don't fight fevers. Heat is the enemy of pathogens.
 
I would add, get to a healthy weight, but I don't need to. If you do the above things it will come automatically.

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Words of Wisdom:
The pampered child that is hurt or lost is at the mercy of pain and loneliness. Fear intensifies his sufferings. His training has taught him to look to others for help and he has no clue to his own resources. His devoted friends and relatives, in trying to protect him from ordinary discomforts have left him defenseless and exposed to greater trouble and danger.