Covid Newsletter 1
Is COVID-19 really the killer in the U.S. or is it a failed strategy of respirators and aggressive counting measures? Let’s take a closer look.
COVID-19 became a reality about this time last year and there was a great deal of uncertainty. It was known to be highly, highly contagious and there was fear that it would be like a plague. Aggressive precautions were taken to “stop the spread”, including shut downs of large parts of the American economy. The stock market tanked and later hit a record high. The government leader and spokesman, 80 year old Dr. Anthony Faucci of NIH spoke of the questionable need for masks and spoke and spoke and spoke and continues to speak granting endless interviews yet providing little factual information, science, or direction and failing to reveal his ties/conflicts of interest with many facets of the COVID ecosystem, including China and Moderna.
In his role at NIH, Dr. Faucci is essentially Santa Claus, in that he gives out large, very large grants of taxpayer money with little oversight. The NIH invests about $41.7 billion annually in medical research for the American people. Funding has been provided to China and other countries for various projects prior to COVID-19, and Dr. Faucci has met with the Gates Foundation founder Bill Gates and has endowed grants of taxpayer money to Moderna, whose vaccine he took on national television. Bill Gates and his foundation have a myopic view of vaccines and have pushed vaccines on many underdeveloped countries in Africa and elsewhere with peril and has been immune from consequences due to the 1986 Federal Law that precludes vaccine manufacturers from being sued. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has an active stake in Moderna, as noted on the Moderna website. Bill Gates is not a scientist, nor is he a humanitarian. He is simply a wealthy philanthropist with myopic views and a historic penchant for industry concentration/monopolization at a global level. Microsoft products are subpar and many annoying bugs and ill thought-out updates are part of the burden we as a society all deal with on a daily basis.
As time went on, COVID showed itself to be contagious but benign, as say compared to an aggressive cancer or the plague. The COVID mortality rate is 1-2%, including an aggressive manner of counting COVID deaths, whereby a death that occurs if someone tests positive for COVID is counted as a COVID death, whether or not it is the cause. In general, especially in the beginning deaths were most commonly co-morbid with other factors such as renal disease and most highly concentrated among the elderly. JustFactsdaily.com has an excellent summary Is the Official Covid-19 Death Toll Accurate By James D. Agresti, Sept. 15, 2020.
Social distancing, hand washing, and wearing masks did and do indeed flatten the curve and hasten the spread. They are an effective means of prevention.
Most people who test positive for COVID readily recover. Many never even have symptoms. A few have complications. Some need treatment. For most cases, cough syrup and bed rest suffice.
In situations where the virus lingers or turns into pneumonia, more care is needed. Early strategies included malaria drugs, including Hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine which were authorized by the FDA. Remdesivir (Veklury) (a series of shot treatments)was also emergency approved for COVID-19 as well as Baricinitnib (a pill) was also approved for addressing inflammation and most frequently used as a supplement to Remdesivir. Despite observed cases of recovery with these treatments, many “experts”, including those in government positions, challenged the “data” and “effectiveness of these treatments. Some treatments were banned.
Early on a push was made for ventilators. The push so aggressive that General Motors, an automobile manufacturer was ordered by the President to produce ventilators. Ventilators were made and distributed throughout the country.
The ventilator strategy was faulty, wrong, problematic and deadly.
A 2011 study available at NIH, titled "Prediction of Outcomes and Prognosis of Patients on Mechanical Ventilation" using body mass index, SOFA score, C-Reactive protein, and serum albumin” finds that ventilators are only appropriate under certain conditions, otherwise death is likely. An April 21,2020 STAT article “ Analysis Recommends Less Reliance on Ventilators to Treat Coronavirus Patients by Sharon Begeley shared that using ventilators more sparingly on Covid-19 patients, physicians could reduce the more-than-50% death rate for those put on the machines, according to an analysis published Tuesday in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.
Historic/precovid studies have largely shown that for a given scenario/illness, the chances of death are greater if a patient is placed on a respirator than if not, especially when conditions are less than ideal.
At the end of December 2020, flying home from a Christmas visit to Florida, I met a flight attendant named Diane. Diane informed me that she had Covid two months prior and that she stayed home for two weeks but it turned into pneumonia so she went to the hospital. They suggested putting her on a respirator. She said “no, respirators are for old people. I want oxygen. “ This strategy likely saved her life. A paradigm shift was made by the hospital personnel whereby she was told that it is important to sit up at times and move around when you have pneumonia, which wouldn’t be possible on a respirator. She was given Remdesivir and took it for two days- it is a five day treatment most typically. She said “Wow” that really woke me up. She soon after went home.
This woke me up! This motivated this newsletter.
It is commonly known among medical professionals that supplemental oxygen is useful in helping people breath when they have pneumonia, a common complication from the virus. In many hospitals, there is now a shortage of oxygen.
Remdesivir:
According to Wikepedia, “Remdesivir, sold under the brand name Veklury,[8][9] is a broad-spectrum antiviral medication developed by the biopharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences.[10] It is administered via injection into a vein.[11][12] During the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, remdesivir was approved or authorized for emergency use to treat COVID‑19 in around 50 countries.[13] Updated guidelines from the World Health Organization in November 2020 include a conditional recommendation against the use of remdesivir for the treatment of COVID-19.[14]
The most common side effect in healthy volunteers is raised blood levels of liver enzymes (a sign of liver problems).[8] The most common side effects in people with COVID‑19 is nausea.[8] Side effects may include liver inflammation and an infusion-related reaction with nausea, low blood pressure, and sweating.[15]
Remdesivir is a prodrug that is intended to allow intracellular delivery of GS-441524 monophosphate and subsequent biotransformation into GS-441524 triphosphate, a ribonucleotide analogue inhibitor of viral RNA polymerase.[16]The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) considers it to be a first-in-class medication.[17]”
Compassionate use
On 20 March 2020, United States President Donald Trump announced that remdesivir was available for “compassionate use” for people with COVID‑19; FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn confirmed the statement at the same press conference.[23] It was later revealed that Gilead had been providing remdesivir in response to compassionate use requests since 25 January.[24][25] On 23 March 2020, Gilead voluntarily suspended access for compassionate use (excepting cases of critically ill children and pregnant women), for reasons related to supply, citing the need to continue to provide the agent for testing in clinical trials.[26][27]
Pricing
On 29 June 2020, Gilead announced that it had set the price of remdesivir at US$390 per vial for the governments of developed countries, including the United States, and US$520 for US private health insurance companies.[28] The expected course of treatment is six vials over five days for a total cost of US$2,340.[28] Being a repurposed drug, the minimum production cost for remdesivir is estimated at US$0.93 per day of treatment.[29]
Secondary manufacture and distribution
On 12 May 2020, Gilead announced that it had granted non-exclusive voluntary licenses to five generic drug companies in India and Pakistan to manufacture remdesivir for distribution to 127 countries.[30][31][32] The agreements were structured so that the licensees can set their own prices and will not have to pay royalties to Gilead until the WHO declares an end to the COVID‑19 emergency or another medicine or vaccine is approved for COVID‑19, whichever comes first.[30] On 23 June 2020, India granted emergency marketing approval of generic remdesivir manufactured by two Gilead licensees, Cipla and Hetero Drugs.[33]
On 1 May 2020, the US Food and Drug Administration granted Gilead emergency use authorization (EUA) for remdesivir to be distributed and used by licensed health care providers to treat adults and children hospitalized with severe COVID‐19.[55][22] Severe COVID‐19 is defined as patients with an oxygen saturation (SpO2) ≤ 94% on room air or requiring supplemental oxygen or requiring mechanical ventilation or requiring extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), a heart–lung bypass machine.[56][22][57][58] Distribution of remdesivir under the EUA will be controlled by the US government for use consistent with the terms and conditions of the EUA.[22] Gilead will supply remdesivir to authorized distributors, or directly to a US government agency, who will distribute to hospitals and other healthcare facilities as directed by the US government, in collaboration with state and local government authorities, as needed.[22] Gilead stated they were donating 1.5 million vials for emergency use[57] and estimated, as of April 2020, they had enough remdesivir for 140,000 treatment courses and expect to have 500,000 courses by October 2020, and one million courses by the end of 2020.[59][60]
The initial distribution of the drug in the US was tripped up by seemingly capricious decision-making and finger-pointing, resulting in over a week of confusion and frustration among health care providers and patients alike.[61][62][63] On 9 May 2020, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) explained in a statement that it would be distributing remdesivir vials to state health departments, then would allow each department to redistribute vials to hospitals in their respective states based upon each department’s insight into “community-level needs.”[64] HHS also clarified that only 607,000 vials of Gilead’s promised donation of 1.5 million vials would be going to American patients.[64] However, HHS did not explain why several states with some of the highest caseloads had been omitted from the first two distribution rounds, including California, Florida, and Pennsylvania.[64] In May 2020, Gilead indicated they would increase the number of doses donated to the US from 607,000 to around 940,000.[65][63] Some of the initial distribution was sent to the wrong hospitals, to hospitals with no intensive care units, and to facilities without the needed refrigeration to store it.[63]
So here we have it, the treatment that the President of the United States was given with great success, has a substantial mark up, though safer than, cheaper than and more effective than ventilators, yet ventilators are the default strategy for COVID in many if not most hospitals. Deadly.
An excellent, STAT article “The story of mRNA: From a loose idea to a tool that may help curb Covid”, parlays that the technology is old discarded technology not initially intended for vaccines and that was problematic in its activation and also the potential for damage was/is unknown. A Harvard MD managed to solve the activation problem and shared it with a friend “genius”/lot’s of patents, at MIT, who’s initial reaction was “what a fabulous business opportunity” and hence, pre-Covid Moderna was born. This technology is also used by Pfizer,who working in a joint venture with German Scientists, did not take government money like Moderna, but rather “bet big” on developing a vaccine.
A reliable source has told me that in England, they are utilizing the Oxford vaccine, which is cheaper, more conventional, and easier to administer and the people have been told that this will now be an annual vaccine, like the flu vaccine.
We are given little information about the vaccines- no links to NIHs collection of research studies, and Dr. Faucci even shared on the news to comfort a child that he personally went to the North Pole and vaccinated Santa so we could all have a nice Christmas.
Referential power and Fairy Tales have no place in health care, not even for children. That seems to be all Dr. Faucci has to give. It is insufficient, costly and deadly. It is un American. It is killing Americans.
Maybe we need an anti-respirator vaccine or a vaccine against those that researched, developed and promoted this deadly strategy.
|
Country |
Deaths per million (total) |
Coronavirus (COVID-19) deaths worldwide per one million population as of January 31, 2021, by country Source Statistica |
|
|
Belgium |
1,836.63 |
||
|
Slovenia |
1,677.73 |
||
|
United Kingdom¹ |
1,585.25 |
||
|
Czechia |
1,528.44 |
||
|
Italy |
1,467.99 |
||
|
Bosnia and Herzegovina |
1,417.45 |
||
|
North Macedonia |
1,370.32 |
||
|
USA¹ |
1,338.47 |
||
|
Bulgaria |
1,296.63 |
||
|
Benin |
4.41 |
||
|
China |
3.45 |
||
|
Eritrea |
2 |
||
|
Thailand |
1.11 |
||
|
Papua New Guinea |
1.03 |
||
|
Mongolia |
0.62 |
||
|
Vietnam |
0.36 |
||
|
Tanzania |
0.36 |
||
|
Burundi |
0.17 |
||
About New Life Health Ventures
Under the Umbrella of Civilitiville USA’s American Humanitarian Efforts, New Life Health Ventures is a thought and action leader in healthcare reform in the U.S. We advocate reform that focuses on: the Human Person/human dignity, privacy and choice, Truth, Building a body of Knowledge, and Reverence for God’s creation. Healthcare needs to have the morality right, the science sound and the money fair. An ecosystem consistent with the Catholic Social teachings of Human Dignity/Human Life, Subsidiarity, Solidarity, and The Greater Good will provide our greatest hope. This is our first news brief. It is on COVID. 2/1/21