Herd immunity.
We hear a lot about that these days … unless it’s from an ‘expert’ like Fauci, although even he has said it’s safe to vote in person.
COVID data has started painting a very different picture, one that shows America likely has herd immunity already and this should all be just another annoying AF political nightmare come September. Except of course it’s an election year and a certain party needs us to remain miserable and hopeless so Trump doesn’t win.
Seriously, this thread is definitely worth a read.
one of the big questions on covid right now is “did we hit herd immunity or is this just seasonality?”
i think we have, in most places, hit herd immunity and i think i found an interesting way to test it.
louisiana provides a great test case because their COV came out of season pic.twitter.com/CL0iE1e6zP
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
in the chart above, you can see the clear US seasonality. the northeast spiked in april, the south in july. this is generally in line with hope-simpson predictions.
but louisiana bucked the trend.
as you can see here, their covid curve looks like the northeast, not the south. pic.twitter.com/gYlTje8HSC
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
this was mardis gras. 1.5 million people descended upon a state of 4.7mm for about a week around feb 25th which was right at the start of peak contagion. this appears to have pulled louisiana into the northeast biome.
you can see how little it looked like the south. pic.twitter.com/aIPy0VqZg4
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
So a large gathering caused a spike.
Sort of like those protests?
Just guessin’.
but here’s where it gets interesting: LA clearly still exhibited some southern seasonality. they got a spike in season as well, albeit one far lower than the last one & lower than most other southern states, esp on a demographically weighted basis for race, income, and obesity.
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
that alone cannot really tell us much, but the data by parish (louisiana counties are called parishes) CAN.
look at orleans and jefferson parishes.
they were the big spike in april. then look at july. they had no spike/ barely any deaths despite the season.
that’s HIT. pic.twitter.com/Yx8fCNtTq2
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
you can see the same thing in lafourche and st tammany.
to the extent that you had a big, out of season spike in april, you did not get one when seasonally predicted in july.
but then look at rapides, calcasieu, and ouachita. no april spike, so they got the seasonal one.
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
this lines up well and seems to indicate herd immunity is created by one significant spike
this never had anything at all to do with “opening” it’s just seasonality unless something massive disrupted it
the lack of correlation between opening and hospitals in MA is conspicuous pic.twitter.com/VFgVOMj8f1
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
One significant spike.
Meaning lockdowns were backasswards stupid.
all in all, this means that the US has likely seen the worst of this already.
most of the july “casedemic” was statistical illusion and media fear-mongering that mistook more testing for more disease.
when you adjust for testing levels, july was not 40% of april. pic.twitter.com/FogGydU04u
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
Ding ding ding.
and when you look at deaths, by FAR the better indicator (though still vastly definitionally inflated by using “with” vs “of”) the july peak was minor.
it had 1/3 the deaths of april (per CDC data which is actual week of death) pic.twitter.com/ScfQuHFXGx
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
For being a ‘pandemic’ people do seem to be surviving in rather large numbers.
it is now in clear retreat. cases/hospitalization are dropping like a rock in TX, AZ, FL, CA
you hit 15-25% and you hit herd immunity
yes, there will be more cases & more deaths, but this will not and cannot (barring large mutation) explode again
that’s not how disease works.
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
real HIT is far lower than the idealized 1-(1/R0) equation predicts because many people were resistant already and because social graphs are not uniform, so super spreaders “explode” in percolation models early, then become “super resistors”.https://t.co/bGjFHFZw76
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
lockdowns do not work. masks do not work. school closures do not work.
many make it flat out worse by preventing the rapid generation of herd immunity among the strong that makes it easier to protect the vulnerable.
and this was all known.https://t.co/sFdUYqxO80
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
Winner winner chicken dinner.
this current game of “lockdown” is ill conceived and damaging.
it’s painfully obvious that everyplace that had its season has developed herd immunity. that’s what you get with a virus that has high pre-existing resistance and an R0 of 2.5-3.
you get 2 bad months and it’s over
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
Ill-conceived, damaging, AND POLITICAL.
we’re blundering around trying to ascribe causality to whatever we happened to be doing when the epidemic broke in our area.
but none of it is doing anything except taking liberty, inflicting economic damage, and costing lives from deprivation.https://t.co/EehOvAs6UU
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
hawaii, japan, the phillipines are all getting spikes now despite being locked down and/or masked.
they had attributed their success to these things.
but it was coincidence, not causality.
the dry season came and the rain dances were shown to be of no actual import.
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
the media has cheer led this because crisis sells newspapers.
the government has enabled it, because crisis is how you grab power and funding.
and we, the citizens have become “subjects” under this presumption of capricious prerogative.
we’ve been lied to and disenfranchised.
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
If it bleeds it leads.
Yup.
but it’s pretty much over. cases and deaths and hospitalization will drop.
they’ll try to keep this story going because it benefits them and admitting they got this wrong is political suicide.
they will lie to you.
so get the facts for yourself.
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
you don’t have to agree with me, just do not take the media or the government at their word.
they are NOT on your side.
develop a real opinion. it’s vital.
then use it to vote.
get your liberty and lives back.
if not you, then who? pic.twitter.com/KkzfDqGKmB
— el gato malo (@boriquagato) August 18, 2020
They are not on anybody’s side.
In other words, politicians and the media are milking COVID for political gain, and it’s hurting Americans.
***
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