Trump still saying - today! - that "cases will go down rapidly."

Having an obese slug for President like Trump no doubt encouraged many to follow his example of gluttony and sloth contributing to US health problems. His predecessor was a trim fit guy who played Basketball, exercised regularly and ate healthy food. Biden is also fit for a man his age.

 

So Trump is saying cases are going to go down rapidly, and we all know how accurate his predictions have been.

 

America became chronically sick, obese, and elderly in less that 4 years. Not because we consume too much fast food, sugar, salt and the large Baby Boomer generation are mostly senior citizens who are reaching average life expectancy now.

Trump did all that. That's your final answer? He must be a god!!!! LOL

 

Thanks. The five days data may have come from the horse’s mouth. Hard to tell.

 

It has nothing to do with Trump.
All we care is how many people will die.
Virus is not as deadly as it was initially, because it mutates to adapt to human immune system.
We have to live with this virus for many many years like we live with other common cold viruses.
Just stop fear mongering.

 

Well what SHOULD we be doing, just let people die?

Or are you trying to argue that people are not really dying, that hospitals are not being overwhelmed, and temporary morgues are not again necessary?

They're all actors, right?

 

Deadly cases are going down.

People are still dying but at much slower pace.
We will have about 3 millions of total deaths in United States.
It is about 9.06 per 1000, the number is bigger then average 8.6 - 8.7.
But we are in mortality uptrend. In next couple of years 10 per 1000 will be a new normal due to dis-proportioned percentage of older baby boomers.
No reason to spread fears around.

 

Huh?

 

And smoked ciggarettes in the WH....great example!

 

I’ll take a cigarette smoker over a fat slug any day.

 

This is a good point. But it is one that indicates MORE prudence and not the idiotic herd immunity strategy that Scott Atlas and Trump seem to be favoring, precisely because we have too many vulnerable people.

No, it couldn't be, as shown by the Excess Deaths stats. These people would NOT be dying of "something" in 2020.

No, it couldn't be, because we are NOT doing that!!! I've explained over and over how real Covid-19 death certificates are issued, and all the safeguards that prevent fraudulent behavior, claiming a fake cause of death. This is hearsay anecdote that is absolutely NOT happening in any significant numbers (I won't exclude an error or two by inexperienced young doctors, but it's definitely not the rule). Thanks for posting this conspiracy theory, but it belongs in the Conspiracy Theory subforum.

You're one for three.

I wouldn't go that far, like the other poster's take; I don't think Trump is a murderer and definitely there are no grounds for taking him to trial for that, so I share your LOL on this. But Trump's behavior and statements did influence half the nation not taking this dangerous virus seriously so indirectly he did contribute to our high death toll. But yes, it's not all bad. The Warp Speed Initiative is good.

 

Definitely. Warp Speed does a large number of things, and not even just in vaccine R&D, but also support for Regeneron's and Lilly's monoclonal antibodies, glass vials, distribution, etc. And yes, large purchase orders help the companies. I've listed in another thread the four vaccine makers that got direct funding, the two that got indirect funding, and the two that got purchase orders from Warp Speed.

My one point, though, is that in the specific case of Pfizer, a giant with a market value of 210 billion dollars and annual sales of 54 billion dollars, they could afford their independent development and even though I'm sure they are pretty happy that we placed an order worth 1.9 billion dollars, they absolutely would have had other takers if we hadn't reserved our doses. They have many other contracts with other countries.

There is a point to be made that Pfizer would have developed their Covid-19 vaccine with the exact same speed, if Warp Speed had never existed (speed for them is money, by jumping ahead of the competition). So, Warp Speed's help for Pfizer is marginal and not determinant of the company's actions. Without it, they would just sell to someone else. Their entire 2021 production capacity is already spoken for, and they are now only taking orders for 2022, from several desperate countries that would be more than happy if the orders could be fulfilled in 2021. It wouldn't have made the smallest dent in their bottom line, if we hadn't placed the 1.9 billion dollars order.

But smaller companies like Moderna and Novavax? Absolutely. They would go nowhere without Warp Speed. Both companies had never successfully placed a vaccine in the market. Moderna didn't even have phase III expertise (Novavax did try an Ebola vaccine and an RSV vaccine but both failed, and the company almost went bankrupt, downsizing 30% of their workforce. They were worth 90 million dollars. Then Warp Speed came along and now they are worth 5.9 billion dollars. A huge success story). Same for Moderna.

I've always sustained here that Warp Speed is great. It doesn't make it any less true, though, that Pfizer can afford to pass or to only marginally participate (through purchase orders) and that's exactly what they did do.

 

I don't know if cases will drop significantly anytime soon. The most important factor is acceptance of the vaccine. I doubt that more than half of the population will want it, unfortunately. By April we should have the vaccine for anybody who wants it. How many people will want it, remains to be seen. Meanwhile we have four more months ahead of us, and revised projections are now talking about 450,000 deaths by March 1st. The virus currently is completely out of control. If we surpass hospital capacity, then all hell breaks lose, both in deaths by Covid-19 and deaths by other causes (collateral damage) because when other sick people seek treatment, the hospitals will be clogged up with Covid-19. This number, 450,000, projects only true Covid-19 deaths. I think that real death toll, including collateral damage, will be higher than that. Then, we'll need to deal for years to come with the long-term consequences of organ damage for those who survived serious cases of Covid-19, and in certain cases, even those who survived moderate or mild cases. So if in five years someone prematurely dies of heart failure due to Covid-19 myocarditis experienced in 2020, that's ultimately also a death caused by Covid-19. Like I've been saying repeatedly, this is not over yet. We should have learned the lessons of History. The second and third waves of the 1918-19 Spanish Flu were much worse than the first wave.

Sure, help is around the corner with the vaccines, but it's NOT the time to CONTINUE to dismiss the danger like Trump continues to do because there will be four difficult months ahead and getting the people to accept the vaccine is an uphill battle.

 

Good points. I do believe the “unnatural” competition created by funding competitors to Phizer motivated Phizer to some extent. Probably can’t prove it either way, but competition almost always drives innovation and reduces time to market.

I’m pretty critical of government spending but this initiative is probably one of the most palatable expenditures of money we don’t have I can remember. Beats “too big to fail” and “cash for clunkers” hands down. Having a bunch of companies ramped up and amped up on vaccine research and therapeutics is going to revolutionize cancer therapeutic vaccines etc. for years to come.

 

Agreed, and good point. If Pfizer didn't have Moderna and AstraZeneca and Novavax and Johnson and Johnson in hot pursuit, they wouldn't have acted that fast, presumably. So indirectly the Warp Speed initiative did expedite the Pfizer product too. That's an excellent point I hadn't thought of, before. We can always count on you for insightful and original takes on things. I'm happy to have you around.