Thanks to BLM demonstrations lockdown measures are now just guidelines...

Worried about meeting up with your brother and sister for a backyard BBQ?  Afraid of getting a ticket for joining up with friends at a park and not staying two metres apart?  In my non-expert legal opinion, don't be.  

Fight it. 

If its okay for tens of thousands of people to ignore public ordinances put in place due to the mostly benign coronavirus in order to demonstrate against racism, then that simply proves these laws were always toothless to begin with in my opinion. 

And its time to start rescuing everyone who's been thrown under the Coronavirus Bus.  I'm talking about the 3+ million Canadians who've lost jobs and businesses.  The kids who've had their schools closed, some facing the terror of substance abusing out of work parents.  The mentally ill and other vulnerable groups who had life saving support systems ripped away.  And all the patients who are dying because vital procedures like cardiac surgeries have been indefinitely delayed.  

I'm not saying that everything is going back to normal, that will take time, a long time, but I expect it to happen eventually.  

For those still terrified of contracting Covid-19, of course you can continue to hunker in your bunker, ordering groceries on-line and wearing full PPE when venturing out of doors, Canada is a free country.  But no more gestapo tactics of calling the authorities on your neighbours for having a back yard birthday party for their ten year old. 

For elderly health compromised people, vigilance is smart.  But again, this is a country with laws and a constitution that must be followed.  Canada is a country that respects the rule of law, we can all be thankful for that because there are many people who don't live in societies that respect individual rights and freedoms.  

I have a high school friend who messaged me recently.  She's conflicted because her elderly parents are angry about not seeing her and her brother.  The thing is her elderly step-dad has multiple health conditions that put him at extreme risk of Covid-19 being serious and possibly fatal.  But he doesn't care, he and his wife don't want to spend what is left of their time on this earth losing contact with friends and family.  They're also Christians who believe that we human beings don't have lordship over our lives.  The Bible teaches that there is nothing we can do to add or subtract to the number of days on this side of the veil.  In this country one is free to have that belief, it's not a crime.

What are we going to do in a liberalized democratic country?  Are we going to tell those who are vulnerable that they have to isolate and that their only interactions can take place with proper PPE in place?  Are we going to strip them of their individual rights and freedoms?  Do they no longer have the freedom to choose?  

Obviously we can't, and this is not something without precedent.  There are all kinds of risky and deadly behvaviours that health professionals advise against, but that are completely legal.  Smoking is the most obvious.  A Confernce Board of Canada study determined that 45,000 deaths per year can be directly linked to smoking, at a cost of around $6 billion to our underfunded and overwhelmed health care system.  

Freedom is freedom after all, and those who don't like it.....well maybe they should think about moving to China or North Korea or some other country where personal rights and liberties are not valued.  

Big drop in Covid patients shows Ontario needs to move faster in opening...

How many times have you seen posts on social media talking about "Covidiots" and saying things like: "Get ready for the second wave"!!! 

I know I've seen lots.  Every time there was a lockdown protest at Queen's Park, or when people gathered at Trinity Bellwood park, and again now with all the BLM protests.  Back seat epidemiologists and self styled experts on infectious diseases have been saying for the past two plus months that all these happenings would lead to a surge in Covid patients overwhelming the health care system.  

But it hasn't happened?  Why not?  

Why are the number of patients being treated for Covid-19 down to just 673 in Ontario, a province of about 14.5 million people?  That's a huge drop from May 25th when I started tracking the numbers.  On that day the Ontario Hopital Association reported 878 patients were being treated.  

I'm not an epidemiologist, nor an expert on infectious diseases either, but I am literate enough to read through all the data and science that's been reported.  And what that science and data says is that the "deadly coronavirus" everyone keeps talking about should more aptly be called the "mostly benign coronavirus".  

Now, I don't wish to be unkind.  For some the cornavirus is absolutely deadly.    For older individuals with underlying health issues like diabetes, cardiovascular and kidney diseases, to name just three, then Covid-19 is anything but benign, it is a major health issue.  We've known this since at least the middle of March when reports first started coming out of Italy.  For a small percentage of the population Covid-19 can attack the body in a number of different ways, and it can kill.  

Many of the younger set knew this back during Reading Weeks and March Break.  That's why they flocked to beaches in sunny destinations and partied like generations before them.  They dubbed the coronavirus the "Boomer Remover".  While that isn't strictly accurate for students of demographics, euphemistically it's pretty much on the mark.  

What the data and the activities we've seen reported is telling me is that people have gotten the message, they know who's at risk.  The large Victoria Day gathering at Trinity Bellwood was overwhelmingly younger people, same with the lockdown protests and now with the BLM movement.  I'm not seeing very many older people out and about.  Which is as it should be.  And those who are putting themselves at risk of getting infected, even though Covid is overwhelmingly benign for them, they must be staying away from the compromised and vulnerable by and large.

Well done.  

It might seem an over the top comparison, but for me it's not that much different from peanut allergies.  To protect those who are vulnerable schools have pretty much completely banned any products with nuts in them, to keep the vulnerable safe.  But we didn't shut down the entire selling of peanuts, those who aren't allergic can still get peanut butter, peanut brittle and any other peanut products, just don't put them in your child's lunch bag.

As a society do we really need for everyone to isolate themselves? 

Do we need to toss millions of people out of work and onto goverment welfare, eliminate life saving support networks, close schools, churches and other activities for everyone?  Why are we heaping so much pain on misery on so many people for a disease that is only serious for a tiny fraction of the entire population?

Can't we rescue people from the agony and despair of job loss and removing so many of society's safety networks while at the same time isolating and protecting those individuals for whom Covid-19 is serious?  I think we can, and at a fraction of the cost we're paying in a futile effort to keep everyone from getting infected.

The kids who went down to Fort Lauderdale and Daytona, to lockdown protests and Trinity Bellwood, and now to BLM demonstrations....they've gotten the message.  Its time for our governments to get it as well.  

BLM protests provide another litmus test on the effectiveness of social distancing....

"Because you're out, we're staying in"

That's a sign in some windows, supporting front line health care workers by doing what medical experts have been advocating, social distancing to prevent our health care systems from being overwhelmed with Covid-19 patients.  

But does it work?  

Based on what's been happening in Ontario's hospitals ever since the Victoria Day long weekend it sure doesn't look like it.  After the massive gathering in Toronto's Trinity Bellwood Park, an estimated 10,000 people, mostly younger, not social distancing and not wearing masks, we were told to expect a surge in patients needing treatment for Covid.  

But it didn't happen.  I started tracking Ontario's number of Covid patients put out by the Ontario Hospital Association on the Monday after that long weekened. On Monday May 25th Ontario's roughly 500 hospitals had 878 patients being treated for Covid-19.  Here we are, long past the estimated 5 day period to the onset of first symptoms, and the number has dropped to 749.  

We're being told the same thing again because of all the BLM protests happening across the province and country.  In a CBC article a healthcare worker is quoted as saying:  

"Coronavirus has not gone away," he said. "It may not dominate the news anymore, but it's still there. It's still alive. It's still active.  He added if these rallies expand and cases breakout, it could overwhelm healthcare workers.

Yes, once again the message is that our health care system is at risk of being overwhelmed.  In fairness the quote uses the word "could", so that equally means it "could not".  Basically everyone is guessing, this isn't evidence based science.  We've all seen the pictures, lots of people packed tightly together, many not wearing masks.  

The number of patients being treated for Covid has been going steadily down, here's hoping the science is wrong again and that the BLM protests don't trigger a surge of people needing treatment.  It would also lend further evidence that social distancing isn't the panacea its being presented as and should open the window to more easing of tragic and devastating lockdown measures.  

749 Covid patients in Ontario - This is a crisis?

Ontario's population is approximately 14.5 million, and there are about 500 hospitals scattered across the province.  When lockdown and social distancing measures were introduced back in mid March of this year the reason was clear, our underfunded and overburdened hosptials would not be able to handle the number of Covid patients that computer modeling suggested were going to happen.  

The computer modeling was wrong.  There are currently only 749 patients being treated for Covid-19 in this entire province.  

https://www.oha.com/news/updates-on-the-novel-coronavirus

Even with social distancing and all the rest (so called Non-Pharmeceutical Interventions or NPIs for short) critical care space was supposed to be exceeded about eight times over.  The reason the modeling was wrong is that it was predicated on a mortality rate of about 4.5%, meaning that for every 100 people getting infected with the novel coronavirus 4 to 5 would be dying. 

There is no credible science suggesting the mortality rate is that high, not even close.  The CDC, Johns Hopkins, Stanford, USC and Oxford are all now citing figures of less than 1%, some as low as just .1 or .2%.   

Now, just to be clear, I'm talking about patients, not cases.  

An old English Lit professor of mine was a stickler for "defining terms".  So I feel compelled to provide the defintition for the word "patient".  The Oxford dictionary defines a patient as: A person who is receiving medical treatment. Merriam Webster says it's:  An individual awaiting or under medical care or treatment.  

So it's accurate to say that every Covid patient is a case, but not every Covid case is a patient.  Someone isolating at home with mild or zero symptoms is no more a patient than someone staying home with a cold.  For ~99% of the population, the immune system is able to deal with Covid and no treatment is needed.  

749 patients is not a crisis.  If it is then we have a crisis every flu season.  In 2018 StatsCan reports 8,511 Canadians died of the flu, including many children.  Yet we've never done anything close to what's being done now.  I guess the lives of young children have never mattered.  

I realize that many are still terrified because of all the media messaging about the "deadly coronavirus".  It reminds me of the way people were scared into supporting George Bush's Persian Gulf war because of the threat from Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction, or WMD for short.  

Just like that disastorous war and all the casulaties it brought, this war against the mostly benign coronavirus has lots of casualites.  And big winners too, let's not forget those that are profitting.  Haliburton made out incredibly well from that Persian Gulf war, and the Amazons, Wal-Marts and Loblaws of the world are raking it in now thanks to emergency measures shutting down their small independent competitors.   

Our response is devastating the very people that the progressive left used to advocate for:  I'm talking about children, the poor and marginalized, those with mental health and dependency issues.  We made Haliburton shareholders rich because as a society we were scared beyond the capacity for rationale thought in the run up to the Persian Gulf War.  And the same thing has happened again with the mostly benign coronavirus, we're making the rich richer and the poor ever poorer.  

Time to correct the mistake, past time.