Trump Refuses California’s Request For Fire Disaster Assistance

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/10/15/politics/trump-california-fire-disaster-assistance/index.html?__twitter_impression=true

After $229 million in infrastructure damages caused by devastating wildfires, the Trump administration has rejected California’s request for a disaster declaration. 

The US Has The Highest COVID-19 Death Rate In The Developed World

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-12/u-s-trails-other-developed-nations-in-curbing-virus-deaths?utm_campaign=news&utm_medium=bd&utm_source=applenews

A new study shows that the United States has the highest mortality rate for COVID-19 among developed countries. More than 100K less Americans would have died if our mortality rate was comparable to that of the Netherlands. 

The Mental Health Toll Of The Pandemic

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/10/14/923672884/sleepless-nights-hair-loss-and-cracked-teeth-pandemic-stress-takes-its-toll?utm_term=nprnews&utm_campaign=npr&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social

Chronic stress caused by the pandemic is starting to manifest itself in tangible symptoms such as headaches, hair loss and stomach aches. 

75,000 More People Died From COVID Than Reported In The Spring And Summer

https://amp.usatoday.com/amp/5935813002?__twitter_impression=true

A new study found that the already jarring death count of 220K is underreported. The study found that roughly 75K more Americans died from COVID-19 during last spring and summer. 

California GOP Admits To Planting Fake Ballot Boxes

https://www.vice.com/amp/en/article/ep4jkp/california-gop-admits-to-admits-to-planting-fake-ballot-boxes-and-refuses-to-remove-them?__twitter_impression=true

The California GOP has planted fake drop boxes across the state to attempt to illegally harvest ballots. After the Secretary of State issued a cease and desist to the California GOP, they’re still refusing to remove the boxes.

The damage caused by COVID-19 is often quantified by the number of infections, hospitalizations and deaths. While those numbers are jarring, they don’t give a full picture of the fallout caused by this virus.

A study from JAMA Cardiology shows 78 out of 100 patients that recovered from COVID-19 had some form of heart abnormality. 60 out of the 100 had inflammation of the heart muscle, with none of the patients having these conditions prior to COVID-19. In addition to cardiovascular issues, the coronavirus makes you more likely to form clots, making you more likely to have a stroke. A study shows that even young people, often unafraid of the virus, are 7 times more likely to have a stroke from COVID-19 versus the regular seasonal flu.

The increased risk of blood clots is leading to an increase in amputations. One study shows that patients with leg ischemia, an obstruction of the arteries, were more likely to die if they had COVID-19. The stories speak for themselves. Most well-known was Broadway actor Nick Cordero who had his leg amputated and later died due to complications from COVID-19. This isn’t an isolated occurrence. A man in San Antonio had his fingers and toes amputated, another woman who contracted COVID-19, recovered and then ended up in the hospital with sepsis, resulting in a quadruple amputation.

The United States is not equipped to deal with the fallout of hundreds of thousands of people living with either pre-existing conditions or newfound disabilities. While the United States passed the Americans With Disabilities’ Act in 1990 to make daily life more accessible, there has been difficulty ensuring compliance with the act. The financial burden is going to be huge for both those with disabilities and looming health conditions. Prior to the pandemic, cardiovascular disease cost the US government more than $500 billion annually and that number is expected to skyrocket as millions of Americans live with the aftermath of COVID-19.

Other survivors of COVID-19 have continued to experience lingering symptoms. These people have become known as COVID-19 long haulers. Long haulers experience a range of symptoms such as fatigue, chills, body aches and brain fog. A study out of the UK estimates that 10% of people who have had COVID-19 experienced prolonged symptoms. Months after their initial diagnosis, some people aren’t getting better. Brain fog, one of the most mysterious symptoms long haulers experience, has left survivors disoriented and forgetful to a point where it impedes their ability to function.

The United States has had nearly 8 million cases of COVID-19 and there are likely hundreds of thousands of recovered COVID-19 patients suffering from prolonged symptoms and underlying conditions that we don’t know of yet.

It is during this time that the current administration is trying repeal the Affordable Care Act and strip coverage from millions (and counting) of Americans with pre-existing conditions. This cannot happen. Not only is it morally bankrupt, but it will be horribly damaging to the economy and severely impact working class American’s prospects.

The coronavirus is still relatively new–8 months into this pandemic and we’re still learning new information everyday about the virus and its long-term effects. As the science evolves, it is crucial to remember that the deaths are only a fraction of the consequence caused by contracting COVID-19 and that still 215,000 lives lost is 215,000 too many.

Antibodies, originally thought to be our only form of immunity against the coronavirus have proven to be fleeting and unreliable. People who have contracted the coronavirus haven’t always tested positive for antibodies, and even if they do, the antibodies may only last a few months.

As faith in antibodies dwindle T-cells have become the new hope for lasting immunity to the coronavirus. So, what is aT-cell? T- cells are a type of white blood cell that help our bodies fight off viruses by memorizing information about the virus and using that to attack it. T- cells also inform other cells, known as B-cells, to create antibodies.

A new study from the journal of Science shows that 20%-50% of people have a “cross reactive T-cell memory”. Essentially, our bodies T-cells are using information they have memorized from similar viruses, like SARS, to fight the coronavirus. Another similar study found that 15 out of 18 patients hospitalized with COVID19 had T-cells that were able to target proteins in the coronavirus. This means that the T-cells are arming themselves with genetic information about the coronavirus so they can fight it if reinfection occurs. Having the information to fight off the coronavirus doesn’t necessarily mean you’re immune to it or won’t get sick, a lot of the time a robust T-cell reaction just means you’ll suffer a less severe case of COVID-19 if you get reinfected.

While the research is promising, scientists are quick to warn this doesn’t mean the pandemic is ending anytime soon. The positive research results have been spun by Dr. Scott Atlas, a member of the Coronavirus Task Force, as the path to herd immunity in the absence of lasting antibodies. In August Atlas claimed the pandemic could be over byOctober due to T-cell immunity but scientists and public health experts said that was not correct and time has proven them right. A week into October and the pandemic is still ravaging through the country, the White House and is on an alarming upwards trend across many states, especially in the Midwest.

What Atlas’s evaluation fails to understand is that T-cells don’t necessarily provide immunity, but rather allow the body to fight the virus off more efficiently if infected. That means someone might have mild symptoms because their T-cells are attacking the virus. However, that person could potentially spread the virus to someone with a compromised immune system, and in the United States it is estimated that 37.6% of the population, or 92.6 million people, are over the age of 65 and/or have underlying conditions that would make COVID-19 potentially deadly.

Shane Crotty, an immunologist at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, warned against being overly optimistic over the T-cell findings saying “The most likely effect would be not a prevention of SARS-CoV-2 infections. Instead, the cross-reactive T cell memory would reduce the disease severity, such that fewer people would become severely ill or die from COVID-19.”. So while the T-cells are not our path to herd immunity they still provide some level of protection against the virus.

The goal of herd immunity is to let a portion of the population become infected so they become immune to the virus, making it harder for the virus to spread. If we took this approach, the death count would increase drastically and unnecessarily. And even if it were possible to achieve herd immunity this way, the truth is that infection rates, case counts, and death counts fail to paint the bigger picture. COVID-19 has been found to cause lasting and serious complications, even after a patient has “recovered.”

A new study shows that COVID-19 patients, even if they suffered from a mild case, are having long term problems months after recovering. 78% of patients showed structural changes to the heart, 78% had a biomarker signaling cardiac injury typically found after a heart attack and 60% showed signs of inflammation. In addition, according to another study in Arizona, roughly half of asymptomatic adults who tested positive had significantly reduced lung capacity. While T-cells may allow us to fight off the virus and have milder symptoms, they provide no protections over the lasting implications of COVID-19, and as this is a novel virus we are still learning about, there could be side effects we are not yet aware of.

The notion that T-cells could provide us with herd immunity is a narrative being pushed by the current administration in an attempt to reopen the nation at the expense of American lives. Atlas denies that the administration is pushing a herd immunity approach but the rhetoric says otherwise. Atlas and the administration have advocated for states, schools and businesses to reopen before the virus has been properly contained or a safe and effective vaccine has been approved. President Trump himself asked Dr. Fauci on March 14th “Why don’t we let this wash over the country?“, insinuating that natural herd immunity and the unnecessary deaths that result from it as a viable strategy to tackle the pandemic.

Herd immunity is an inoperable strategy to take during a pandemic. The United States has already lost 210K lives to the virus. Herd immunity endangers the most vulnerable amongst us and quite simply doesn’t work. The T-cell research is promising, but it won’t end the pandemic, and the rhetoric suggesting that it will is dangerous and confusing to the American people.

Even if the data supported natural herd immunity, without a vaccine, over 200 million Americans would have to get infected before we reach this threshold. Put another way, even if the current pace of the COVID-19 pandemic continues in the United States, we wouldn’t reach herd immunity in 2021.

We need a safe and effective vaccine and measures put in place to contain the virus.  Some experts say that even with a vaccine, COVID-19 is here to stay, much like the seasonal flu.  Contained but not banished.  The sooner leadership in Washington DC adopts policies prioritizing the health of the nation, the sooner we can get to a semblance of normalcy and dig ourselves out of the pandemic inspired recession.  Unfortunately, such leadership has been lacking to the detriment of our economy and American lives.

Hydroxychloroquine has been at the center of extensive disinformation campaigns. It is a drug used to treat a number of medical conditions, most commonly malaria, rheumatoid arthritis, and lupus. It has both anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial effects. Since the pandemic, it has been relentlessly pushed by bots, trolls, bad faith actors and the current administration as an effective treatment for COVID-19. It is not.

On September 1, a study found that taking HCQ with azithromycin, a drug that Trump has also recommended to fight COVID-19, increased coronavirus mortality rates by 27%. Earlier studies of the drugs being used together also found that they increased the chance of heart attacks. In a tweet on March 21, Trump said: “HYDROXYCHLOROQUINE & AZITHROMYCIN, taken together, have a real chance to be one of the biggest game changers in the history of medicine.”

In August 2020, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel found that 293 people had died from taking HCQ in 2020 and that over half of these people were taking the drug to combat COVID-19. In 2019, 75 people died from HCQ over the same period.

On April 24, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cautioned against using HCQ outside of a hospital or clinical trial after finding that the drug was associated with serious heart rhythm problems that occasionally led to death in the patients. On June 15, the FDA revoked the emergency use authorization (EUA) for HCQ, after finding that “these medicines showed no benefit for decreasing the likelihood of death or speeding recovery.”

None of this has stopped the trolls or the Trump administration from continuing to hawk it to people desperate for a cure and as a way to discredit the institutions working to protect the American people from false information and harmful treatments. It is worth noting that while President Trump has been hospitalized after his positive COVID-19 diagnosis, none of his treatments have included hydroxychloroquine.

Since March 1, there have been more than 8 million retweets of HCL disinformation, almost 5 million from bots.

Since June, more than 14 billion impressions have been generated by retweeted disinformation.

Disinformation is dangerous for many reasons, especially during a public health crisis. The campaign to promote hydroxychloroquine is only one example.  Don’t take/ingest anything without your doctor’s approval. Before believing information going viral on the internet, research the sources and the motivation behind what you’re being sold.

Yours in Strength,

The Take Back Control Team