As written about in the 4 October Trends Journal, The Great Barrington Declaration, signed by thousands of physicians and health professionals, called for the end of lockdowns, which are “producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health.”
As of last Monday, the Declaration has been endorsed by over 12,000 international medical and public health scientists and over 34,000 medical practitioners. Despite the fact that so many in the health profession signed the Declaration, it is ignored by the mainstream media.
As we had noted, those who question and/or protest the COVID War are dismissed as conspiracy theorists, right wingers… and, as the BBC wrote this past April, “From students to politicians, many smart people have fallen for dangerous lies spread about the new coronavirus. Why? And how can you protect yourself from misinformation?”
So, in other words, if you don’t swallow BBC bullshit, you are misinformed.
Just the Facts
One of the Declaration’s lead authors, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, Professor of Medicine at Stanford, engaged in a debate last week with a pro-lockdown medical researcher. In the debate, Dr. Bhattacharya, while agreeing COVID-19 is a deadly threat to the elderly and those with some chronic medical conditions, pointed out that even for those aged 70 and older, there is a 95 percent chance of recovery. He also noted for those under 70 who are relatively healthy, there is a 99.95 percent rate of survival.
Dr. Bhattacharya stated,
“For people who are under 60, the lockdown harms, mentally and physically, are worse than COVID. Lockdowns have absolutely catastrophic effects on physical and mental populations both domestically and internationally…. For children, the flu is worse. We’ve had more flu deaths of children this year than COVID deaths. For children, COVID is less of a risk than the lockdowns. Opening schools is absolutely vital.”
The response by Dr. Marc Lipsitch, Professor of Epidemiology at Harvard, brought in to debate Dr. Bhattacharya, was that the U.S. does not have the tools to fully protect the elderly and vulnerable. Therefore, until the overall transmission of the virus is lowered, the vulnerable are at risk. But Dr. Lipsitch did agree children and young adults should be back in school. He said,
“My personal view is that schools should remain open in almost all circumstances for many of the same reasons Jay just mentioned, but that’s also because they are not focus of transmission.”
When the moderator of the debate asked Dr. Bhattacharya to respond to Dr. Lipsitz’s claim that the U.S. doesn’t have the tools to protect the vulnerable and, other than schools, levels of lockdown are still required, Dr. Bhattacharya’s response was:
“Lockdowns themselves have created intermixing between the vulnerable and the non-vulnerable. They’ve essentially caused economic dislocations where young people have moved back in with parents. They’ve closed universities, sent young people to live back home, and created situations where this kind of mixing where vulnerable people would be exposed has occurred.”
Dr. Bhattacharya added,
“Can we protect the vulnerable? I think the answer is, yes. If we try. We have relied on this crutch of reducing community spread (through lockdowns) as a way to protect the vulnerable, and that’s clearly failed, right?
You cited really sad facts about this epidemic and we’ve essentially had a lockdown policy… what the lockdowns do is, they delay when the cases occur. They actually don’t eradicate the disease or eliminate the disease. And while they’re in, they cause absolutely catastrophic harms to people who are relatively low risk from the disease.”
TRENDPOST: The motto of the Trends Journal is “Think for Yourself.” We publish the facts and data and provide trend analysis and forecasts. We do not provide financial advice or tell you what to believe.
Click here to watch the debate between these two doctors.
Click here to read the transcript of the full debate.