COVID-19 overtook the world in 2020-21, and the fear & lack of proper action was the worst part of it.  Many people & our leaders failed to take the proper actions to combat it.  Yes, it’s a real virus & is a pandemic. much more than the flu, but there is a lot of misinformation about it, and those rumors are spreading like wildfire due to the internet.

The biggest reason it’s happening is because people nowadays love to try & make people think they are superior & smarter than others, especially if they’re in power, so they spout erroneous factoids to prop up their own persona, and their social circles & others repeat these false mantras.  Misinformation & under-information is the backbone of a panic.

A significant portion of America (and its leaders) believed that everyone should be quarantined, but not only did that not work once the virus got into the population of each country, it’s unnecessary & the worst thing we could do to our economy & our lives.  Only elderly people who have serious preexisting conditions (and a few people from 45 to 65 who have the same problems before they got it) are at risk of dying.  That’s who should have been quarantined, and leave the economy & all businesses alone.  Quarantining won’t3 work once it gets into the population of a country as a new batch of variants of the virus will come back every year just like the flu.

Quarantining & testing works best when it’s done at the point of entry of a country.  When a virus is identified, our world response should be to shutdown travel to or from that region until the virus is contained and a vaccine found & administered to that area.  If Wuhan had been shut down with no travel in or out, millions of lives would have been saved and we never would have experienced what we did.

I did virtually all of my research on COVID-19 & Influenza at 2 super-reliable places — the US Government’s Center for Disease Control (the CDC), and The World Health Organization (WHO).  I also used a couple of sites that had taken the time to look through some stats and boil them down to summaries.  If you don’t believe them simply because they’re wings of gov’t and like all gov’t agencies, somewhat susceptible to political pressure & red tape, then you’ve got a screw loose or you’re really pissed at the gov’t for some reason; either way, you’ve let your emotions cloud your judgment.  The gov’t isn’t the same from agency to agency any more than all people are the same.  The CDC is much more reliable for information than virtually any gov’t agency out there, and although there is political pressure on them at times, there isn’t as much political influence on their findings.

Before researching the Coronavirus COVID-19, I first examined the traditional influenza, “the flu”, which are Influenza viruses in the A, B & C categories.  I didn’t look into the “D” flu because it only affects animals.   The “A” Flu is the worst and is found in 75% of infections, and it affects both humans & animals (think Swine flu), and “B” flu affects only humans, but is not as prevalent as the “A” flu, and the “C” affects most humans and only some animals, and it’s even less prevalent than the “B” flu and usually only gets serious in kids. Note that the “A” flu has a lot of different subtypes called “HxNx”, with the “x” being a different number for each strain, e.g., H1N1 (that was the 1970’s Swine flu & was the 1918 Spanish flu & the Bird flu we’ve seen lately, though they were all different substrains of H1N1), H3N2, H5H1, etc., but the “B” has no subtypes.  The typical flu vaccine provides protection against H1N1 & H3N2 of the “A” flu, and also the “B” flu.  The “A” flu could potentially have 198 different subtypes, but only 131 have been detected in nature this far, and each subtype mutates into other variations, so there can be hundreds of variations of the flu each year.

The reason why the flu shot doesn’t provide 100% protection is because the vaccine is tailored to fight the specific mutations of the subtypes that researchers believe will be the predominant strains.  However, the viruses mutate as the season progresses to avoid & overcome the vaccine, and sometimes the guess as to which strain will be predominant can be totally wrong, but the vaccine typically makes the flu less serious if you do get any strain of it, i.e., you’ll get sick, but it’s way less likely to kill you if you got the shot.

The flu shot uses genetically-deactivated viruses, so you can’t get the flu from the shot, and you can’t get autism or anything else from it, though a few people may experience very mild flu symptoms, like 1% to 2%, and serious allergic reactions to the flu shot are very rare and typically happen within a few minutes of getting it, which is why I recommend getting it only at a doctor’s office.  Note that it goes in the muscle in your upper arm, not in your vein, and it saves millions more lives than the rare 1 or 2 it takes due to an allergic reaction.

A typical flu season in the USA infects 1 in 10 people.  The USA has appx 330 million people as of May 2021, so appx 33 million people get the flu each year.  Of course that’s an average.  Also note that for purposes of this article, I’m referring to everyone within our borders as “Americans”, even though we know that’s not the case, and the CDC says that the flu affects minorities in greater percentages than white Americans and they also get the flu shot in lower percentages.  We also know that minorities are less likely to take off work or seek treatment due to lack of insurance or money or fear of losing their job or being deported, which can lead to worse outcomes when fighting the flu & can spread the flu in minority groups/populations easier.

Of those 33 million who get sick from the flu, appx 330,000 of them end up in the hospital, which is 1 in 100 of the sick Americans, and 1 in 1,000 of all Americans.

Of the 330,000 of those who end up in the hospital from the flu, appx 33,000 of them die each year, which is 1 in 10 of those in the hospital, 1 of 1,000 of the sick Americans, and 1 in 10,000 of all Americans.

Of the Americans who die from the flu, 75% of them are age 65+, and many of them suffered from an underlying condition as well, especially those who are younger.  It’s not like generally-healthy people 65+ are dying from it in droves.  Appx 2% are people under 18, whose immune systems haven’t matured enough to fight the flu.  That means 23% of the people who die are between 18 & 65, which is the vast majority of Americans’ ages, and we know that minorities get the flu in higher percentages.  We also know that most people from 18 to 65 who die from the flu usually always have an underlying condition that contributed to the death, such as a chronic illness like asthma or COPD, or a weak immune system caused by genetics, disease or a medication that treats a problem, but also weakens the immune system.  Certain internally-taken antifungal meds can do that.  Also, cancer & heart patients in that age range are more susceptible to flu-related death than the general population.

In other words, if you’re 18 to 65 & in reasonably good health, you have greater than a 1 in a million chance of dying from the flu, like hitting most lotteries, and you never win those, right?  It multiplies tremendously in your favor if you don’t go to crowded places like schools and events, and even more if you don’t have kids who live with you or visit your home, and even more if you simply wash your hands before you touch any part of your face’s orifices and before you eat.  If all 3 apply to you, you’re more likely to die from space debris or a meteor falling on you.

Now that we have things in perspective, let’s examine Coronavirus COVID-19.  COVID-19 is a variation of Coronavirus, and it’s the one we’re dealing with at the moment.  There are a number of Coronaviruses, and the common cold is one of them.  When referring to this virus, we should refer to it simply as COVID-19.  We know from the current reports on COVID-19 that its death rate is much higher than the flu, but that’s mainly due to deaths of those age 65+ or who are sickly to begin with.  Of those who have been confirmed positive with COVID-19 in the USA & died, 82% of them were age 65+, and those younger had underlying conditions that exacerbated the death as did most of the elderly.

We also found that the number of people getting diagnosed rose, but that didn’t necessarily mean more people were getting infected, it just meant that more people were getting confirmed with it due to more testing being done.

There was a lack of tests & vaccines & a lack of people getting them when available, so it took longer to determine how many people had been infected & it’s taking longer to corral it because people won’t get the vaccine out of fear & misinformation

We believed that, like other viruses, COVID-19 was everywhere, and that you were very susceptible to getting it just by touching surfaces & introducing the virus into your eyes, nose or mouth, but that turned out to be mostly misinformation.  We were also told to stay 6 feet apart and to wear masks when outdoors.  We later found out that the primary method of infection (we’re talking 99%+ of infections) was airborne, and we also found out that if you were indoors, it didn’t matter how far apart you were, as the ventilation systems could carry the virus 60 feet to infect you, much less within 6 feet, but outdoors, the virus is not a factor unless you are within a few feet of someone and you don’t have a mask on.

We saw many wild figures used by those in charge who didn’t have a clue, which was not only erroneous, it was reckless behavior to make wild assumptions with little to no facts, and especially to broadcast them and create mass fear and panic when not warranted simply to look like you’re superior & powerful.

We also found out that the vaccine is not only safe, it works incredible well.  Most vaccines have an efficacy rate of 50% to 75%, but some of these vaccines worked at 95% against infection or symptoms, and virtually 100% against hospitalization & death.  Yet there are still people who are ignorant to the facts that refuse the vaccine, and the virus is currently running rampant among unvaccinated people worldwide.

The economic damage caused by the panic from the virus far exceeded the death toll.  The news media constantly stoked fears for ratings and power, and people who had no reason to panic did so.  I’m talking healthy people in their 20s to 50’s who lost their minds over this for no good reason.  Leaders of our state & federal governments capitalized on the virus for political purposes and to wield power for no good reason.

We had millions of Americans who couldn’t afford to stay home from their jobs & businesses for even a day, much less weeks.  As the businesses failed & buyers stayed away in droves & prices rose beyond belief simply because there were enough workers to make the products.

To counteract the unemployment, the Feds instituted an insane compensation package to all people who alleged that they had no work by giving them more money than they earned when working, even though their expenses were way less not working.  Why would anybody choose to work when they can make the same or more than they were when working.  Now we have many industries who can’t produce or distribute their products due to lack of labor.

Another major government screw-up was enacting a rent moratorium.  The government was paying people to stay home, so they had money, and no reason to not pay their rent.  Most real estate investors are those who rely on rents to make their own payments, and the fallout from that will mean more foreclosures and financial ruin to people who are the backbone of our economy — enterprenuers who risk their money & credit to succeed financially & help grow our economy.

So what’s the bottom line?  Appx 1 in 50,000 white Americans between the ages of 18 & 65 will die from the typical flu, which is 1 in 10,000 of all Americans.  COVID-19 deaths have been 20 times higher, but it was heavily those 65 & over, plus those younger who were in poor health to begin with, just like the flu.  Considering that white Americans between 18 & 65 are the group of people who are the most scared of the COVID-19, I’m directing this message toward them . . .

You have a way greater chance of dying from an accident, but you drive a car every day.  You have a way greater chance of dying from heart disease, stroke & diabetes, but you continue to eat improperly & not exercise & engage in behavior that causes these diseases, like smoking & eating a lot of fast food.  You have a greater chance of dying in gun violence, but you have to go where you have to go & do what you have to do and you also must own a gun to protect your family, so that doesn’t change your lifestyle.  You have a way greater chance of dying from an opioid overdose, but you pop too many pills not only when needed, but just for fun.

Only the elderly who have a serious condition should have been quarantined, which essentially means nursing & retirement homes, and no businesses should have been shuttered, and no one should have been receiving goverment money.  The only hope is for Americans and their leaders is to realize the mistakes they made and get back to business as usual, and seal off these hot spots as soon as a virus is found untl a vaccine can be made & introduced to the then-affected population.