Have you all been good little boys and girls, wearing your masks in public and practicing social distancing? Have you kept your businesses closed, waiting for the day the governor would finally give the okay to reopen? Congratulations, it was all for naught. Or so it would seem after the World Health Organization (WHO) — which named the virus COVID-19, called it a pandemic, and then suggested social distancing — has now announced that transfer of the disease by asymptomatic people is “rare.”
Wait, what?
Yep, you read that right. During a news briefing from the U.N. agency’s Geneva headquarters, the head of WHO’s emerging diseases and zoonosis unit, Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, said, “We have a number of reports from countries who are doing very detailed contact tracing. They’re following asymptomatic cases. They’re following contacts. And they’re not finding secondary transmission onward.”
And we are social distancing why? How long have the organization and other health professionals known about this? During the same speech, Van Kerkhove claimed:
“From the data we have, it still seems to be rare that an asymptomatic person actually transmits onward to a secondary individual. It’s very rare.”
“It still seems to be rare.” The “still” suggests that this knowledge is nothing new. Wasn’t the whole reason behind locking down the nation’s businesses and self-isolation so that people without symptoms wouldn’t pass Coronavirus on to others? Isn’t that why everyone’s been wearing masks, hoarding toilet paper, and generally hiding in their homes as if the Zombie Apocalypse was here?
Were health officials aware that a person-to-person transfer isn’t likely from an asymptomatic person when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on April 1:
“These findings also suggest that to control the pandemic, it might not be enough for only persons with symptoms to limit their contact with others because persons without symptoms might transmit infection.”
So what happens now? Will megalomaniac governors, drunk with power over their constituents, continue to keep citizens locked down and businesses closed or with reduced patronage? Or will Democrats make a last-ditch effort to keep the nation under lock and key by debunking WHO’s claim? Let’s face it, it’s not like the health organization has a stellar record, so it shouldn’t be that difficult to cast the blame there.
But then we come to another question: Why now? If it’s all in the timing, what is the purpose behind calming the pandemic panic now? Isn’t it ironic that hundreds of thousands of George Floyd protesters took to the streets these past few days, with Democratic support, without the dire “you’re gonna infect your grandmother” warnings, and now the world’s health experts say it’s “rare” that a person without symptoms can transfer COVID to another individual?
Last week, nearly 1,300 health professionals signed a letter in support of protesting during the pandemic. The letter claimed that racism and white supremacy constitute “a lethal public health issue that predates and contributes to COVID-19,” adding that “as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission.” So, it’s only risky for people to go to work, open their businesses, go fishing, or visit family? “We support [the protesters] as vital to the national public health and to the threatened health specifically of black people in the United States.”
Millions of Americans are out of work; thousands of small businesses are lost. Food and product rationing, panic buying, and denied attendance at loved ones’ funerals persist. Depression, anxiety, and suicide grow during the fear and uncertainty of a situation never before experienced in the United States. Destruction of the economy and ways of life abound. A “new normal,” like it or not, is here. Were these sacrifices worth it? Were they even necessary?
One thing is for sure: It will be interesting to see how the left will try to squirm out of this and place all the blame on the White House in general and specifically President Donald Trump.
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Read more from Kelli Ballard.
