Looks like there won't be a magic pill for that, at least from Merck

 

Efficacy of Merck's molnupiravir in preventing hospitalization & death from C19 drops to 30% from 48% in October preliminary results after interim results in over 1400 patients reported, mostly because the interim placebo group hospitalization rate narrowed by 31%:

 

Merck & Co said on Friday updated data from its study on its experimental COVID-19 pill showed the drug was less effective in cutting hospitalizations and deaths than previously reported.

The drugmaker said its pill showed a 30% reduction in hospitalizations and deaths, based on data from over 1,400 patients. In October, its data showed a roughly 50% efficacy, based on data from 775 patients. ...

The company filed for a U.S. authorization of the drug molnupiravir on Oct. 11, following the interim data.

Merck said on Friday the data on molnupiravir, developed with Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, had been submitted to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ahead of a meeting of its expert advisers on Tuesday.

The FDA's scientists are expected to publish their briefing documents ahead of the meeting as early as Friday.

The panel is expected to vote whether to recommend that the agency authorize the oral capsules for the treatment of mild-to-moderate COVID-19 in adults who are at risk of severe disease.

A planned interim analysis of the data last month showed that 7.3% of those given molnupiravir twice a day for five days were hospitalized and none had died by 29 days after the treatment. That compared with a hospitalization rate of 14.1% for patients on placebo.

In the updated data, 6.8% of those given molnupiravir were hospitalized and one person died, while the other placebo group had a hospitalization rate of 9.7%.

Reuters.

WaPo finds one sucka in Michigan to say how bad C19 hospitalizations are when 84% of beds statewide are occupied by non-COVID patients

"We don't have a darker color," said Darryl Elmouchi, president of Spectrum Health West Michigan. "So if we're red now, what are we in two weeks?" ...

Spectrum reported more than 370 people hospitalized with covid last week. The system has converted floors and tripled its intensive care unit space, yet there are still patients waiting for beds. Conference space and shared workspaces have been identified for conversion if the surge continues as expected. Elmouchi described the situation as "almost unmanageable."

More. 

The third graph shows 16% of Michigan hospital beds occupied by COVID patients right now.

Who's in the other 84%?

The way you manage a real emergency is to stop filling beds with people getting elective procedures. That they aren't doing this in general tells you they are exaggerating.

COVID patients don't make the hospitals any money. That's the real reason they are complaining. The COVID pandemic cuts into the hospitals' bottom line.

You should see the outpatient eye surgery operation at Grand Rapids Ophthalmology lately. They herd them in and out like cattle, performing cataract surgeries like crazy. The pandemic isn't stopping them one bit.

They've had plenty of time to prepare for this inevitable seasonal wave, but instead they placed their faith in a vaccine which didn't stop the spread. Big Pharma, Big Healthcare, and Big Fauci make suckers of us all:

At this point in the pandemic, months after the shots became widely available, the state's health-care workers expected to see occasional ebbs and flows in case numbers. But not at this level.

"I think all of us had hoped that with relatively reasonable vaccination rates - and a year-plus under our belt - we would not get another surge like this," Elmouchi said.

 

 

Dr. John Campbell is taking the CIRCULATION article about the C19 vaccines increasing Acute Coronary Syndrome risk seriously

 

Currency in Circulation is up over 24% Oct 2019 to Oct 2021 and people wonder why there is inflation

 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CURRCIR

YouTube comments section doesn't want you to be able to link to the Circulation article finding increased risk of Acute Coronary Syndrome from C19 vaccines

 https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/abs/10.1161/circ.144.suppl_1.10712

Idiotic "Governments are considering a fresh round of restrictions, largely against the unvaccinated, to try and curb the spread" when it's the vaccinated who also keep spreading the disease

Scientists in South Africa are studying a recently identified new coronavirus variant that is a cause for serious concern, stoking fears the country may face a potentially severe fourth wave that could spread internationally. ... 

The findings come as several European countries battle a renewed surge in Covid-19 case numbers, with hospitals in some German cities starting to feel the strain. Governments are considering a fresh round of restrictions, largely against the unvaccinated, to try and curb the spread. South Africa is currently on the lowest level of lockdown measures, though the new variant prompted the cabinet and coronavirus council to call a meeting for the weekend.

More. 

The small British protectorate of Gibraltar is closing in on 16k booster doses administered to date since Oct 10 after fully vaccinating the entire island by May 1, but the virus is spreading anyway.

The obvious take-away is that stopping the spread will have to be accomplished by means other than vaccines, IF THAT'S WHAT THEY REALLY WANT.

 

New Coronavirus Variant a ‘Serious Concern’ in

Hillary "vast right wing conspiracy" Clinton is still beating that same old, worn out, authoritarian personality drum she bought at a 1950s vintage store in the 1990s

... there is a plot against the country by people who truly want to turn the clock back. They believe that the progress we’ve made on all kinds of civil rights and human rights, the cultural changes that have taken place, are so deeply threatening that they want to stage a coup.

Now, think about it, because that’s truly what is behind Trump and his enablers and those who invaded and attacked our Capitol. They don’t like the world we’re living in and they have that in common with, you know, autocratic leaders from Russia to Turkey to Hungary to Brazil and so many other places, who are driven by personal power and greed and corruption but who utilize fears about change to try to get people to hate one another and feel insecure and, therefore, be easily manipulated by demagogues and by disinformation.

More.

The projection from the person behind the Steele Dossier is really something. Crackpot, loony-bin level stuff.

 

 

Not even Dan Crenshaw can deny that the plague of George Soros' political activity is responsible for unpunished crime "all over the country"

  And I'll tell you what, I'm not that conspiratorial, but it is pretty obvious that there are people like George Soros funding these far-left radical DAs and prosecutors around the country in the tunes of millions of dollars and you've gotta get out and vote for these local elections because that's how you stop this...They see some people as needing benefits over others. It's a very pathological ideology and it's dangerous.

More.

The mRNA vaccines are dangerous to the human heart at ANY AGE and should be banned immediately

Abstract 10712: Mrna COVID Vaccines Dramatically Increase Endothelial Inflammatory Markers and ACS Risk as Measured by the PULS Cardiac Test: a Warning:

 

Our group has been using the PULS Cardiac Test (GD Biosciences, Inc, Irvine, CA) a clinically validated measurement of multiple protein biomarkers which generates a score predicting the 5 yr risk (percentage chance) of a new Acute Coronary Syndrome (ACS).

The score is based on changes from the norm of multiple protein biomarkers including IL-16, a proinflammatory cytokine, soluble Fas, an inducer of apoptosis, and Hepatocyte Growth Factor (HGF)which serves as a marker for chemotaxis of T-cells into epithelium and cardiac tissue, among other markers.

Elevation above the norm increases the PULS score, while decreases below the norm lowers the PULS score.

The score has been measured every 3-6 months in our patient population for 8 years.

Recently, with the advent of the mRNA COVID 19 vaccines (vac) by Moderna and Pfizer, dramatic changes in the PULS score became apparent in most patients.

This report summarizes those results.

A total of 566 pts, aged 28 to 97, M:F ratio 1:1 seen in a preventive cardiology practice had a new PULS test drawn from 2 to 10 weeks following the 2^nd COVID shot and was compared to the previous PULS score drawn 3 to 5 months previously pre- shot.

Baseline IL-16 increased from 35=/-20 above the norm to 82 =/- 75 above the norm post-vac; sFas increased from 22+/- 15 above the norm to 46=/-24 above the norm post-vac; HGF increased from 42+/-12 above the norm to 86+/-31 above the norm post-vac.

These changes resulted in an increase of the PULS score from 11% 5 yr ACS risk to 25% 5 yr ACS risk.

At the time of this report, these changes persist for at least 2.5 months post second dose of vac.

We conclude that the mRNA vacs dramatically increase inflammation on the endothelium and T cell infiltration of cardiac muscle and may account for the observations of increased thrombosis, cardiomyopathy, and other vascular events following vaccination.

-- CIRCULATION, a journal of the American Heart Association, November 16, 2021
Vol 144, Issue Suppl_1

Color me skeptical: Firewood prices said to be soaring

$67-$83 a face-cord for seasoned mixed hardwoods doesn't sound that high to me, but $158 for hickory would. The former were common many years ago already.

I come up with $612 for the 1776 cord through 2020, a quibble.

 

At Firewood by Jerry in New River, Arizona, a cord of seasoned firewood — roughly 700 pieces or so — goes for US$200 today. That’s up 33 per cent from a year ago. At Zia Firewood in Albuquerque, the price is up 11 per cent since the summer to US$250. And at Standing Rock Farms in Stone Ridge, a bucolic, little town in the Hudson Valley that’s become popular with the Manhattan set, the best hardwoods now fetch US$475 a cord, up 19 per cent from last year. ...

Over the course of American history, there have been any number of booms in the firewood business. One of the earliest episodes came during the British siege of Boston at the outset of the Revolutionary War. That winter, the price of a cord — a centuries-old benchmark measuring 128 cubic feet — soared to US$20, the historian David McCullough documented in his book “1776.” That’s the equivalent of some $635 in today’s dollars ... just about every major spike in energy prices in the past half century has triggered a rush into wood-burning among some segments of the population. These fevers invariably fade as soon as the energy crisis does.

More.

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Australian doctoral candidate: "If you want to know about something, the best way to do it is to look at it"

The final word in epistemology, ladies and gentlemen.

Story.

Weekend crew at KGRR can't even predict the wind speed

Official forecast right now for tonight:

A chance of rain showers before 9pm, then a chance of rain and snow showers between 9pm and 10pm, then a chance of flurries after 10pm. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 26. Blustery, with a northwest wind 14 to 20 mph, with gusts as high as 38 mph. Chance of precipitation is 40%.

 

Current conditions:

 

Wind Speed NW 31 G 47 mph 

Blew the lid right off the Weber.

Facts vs. hysteria: Pandemic year 1 vs. pandemic year 2 to date

If you date the start of the pandemic from the first announced US death on Feb 29, 2020, the first year of the pandemic looks like this:

1402 deaths per day, 78208 cases per day.

 

(There were already 70 cases by 2/29/20, but they have been included in the total anyway.) 

For the 265 days since Feb 28, 2021, the second year of the pandemic to date looks like this:

969 deaths per day, 71838 cases per day.

Deaths are down a whopping 31%, cases a much more modest 8%.

 

The Hill is showcasing the 2021 death toll to date exceeding the 2020 death toll, which is true, and is politically convenient to Joe Biden's opponents, but this completely misses how things are moving in the right direction.

 

Joe Biden famously promised to shut down the virus and not the country. He has not done the former and may in fact do the latter, for which he ought to be held responsible by booting his sorry ass.

 

But that's an entirely different matter.

 

Meanwhile the terrible outcomes predicted by experts from the still dominant India variant, for whatever reasons, are not panning out. At least not yet.

 

 

 

LOL Shaun King: Join BLM, get a free n-word pass

 

Meanwhile in 79% fully vaccinated Spain: Spread of COVID-19 "has raised concerns", lol

European nations are seeing Covid cases explode, with nations bringing in tough new measures and warnings of widespread lockdowns:

While Spain’s vaccination rates are positive – with 79 per cent of the population having both jabs – the Covid rates are rising.

The country has reported 88.6 cases per 100,000 over 14 days, a jump of 67 per cent, according to El Pais.

This is much lower than other badly hit European destinations such as Germany and Belgium, but the spike has raised concerns about the efforts to slow the spread.  

Spain achieved the 79% fully vaccinated threshold on Oct 10. Even that level did not eradicate cases, and now they are rising again.

 

 

 

 

 

The vaccine peddlers like Anthony Fauci insisted multiple times that the 50% level would prevent a surge in cases. Europe is 57% fully vaccinated, yet look at that headline.

Boosters will be the next panacea. And Eric Topol now insists we must have 90-95% vaccinated.

"The science has changed" is simply sanctification of moving the goalposts.

Meanwhile Africa, hardly 7% fully jabbed, is making monkeys of the wizards of smart. 

But no one asks, Why?

Welcome to The Planet of the Apes.

 

The powers that be insist the boosters will stop transmission when the first two jabs have not

Axios:

But boosters dramatically increase protection against infection, which can help reduce the spread of the virus.

Gibraltar, 100% vaccinated with Pfizer since the spring, did not escape the summer outbreak.

And with 35% already given the booster from early October, they are having an even bigger outbreak now.

Three jabs, but the virus still spreads.

The insanity is remarkable.

 

 

 

Pandemic of the jabbed in Gibraltar: Clearest evidence yet that vaccination does not stop the spread, including now with boosters

100% of Gibraltar's ~40k residents were fully vaccinated by May 1, but infections took off again starting around Jul 1, as in many places invaded by the India variant.

The current, larger outbreak than in July coincides almost exactly with the commencement of its booster shot program after Oct 10. Over 14k booster doses have been administered so far.

95% of Gibraltar's 98 deaths to date had occurred already by mid-March, lending support to the idea that vaccination prevents bad outcomes, if not infection and spread.

Gibraltar is using Pfizer.

 

$2.2 trillion Build Back Butter bill Democrats insisted would cost nothing CBO estimates would cost $367 billion over ten years

 

 

 

 

 

 

So-called Democrat moderates in the House voted for it anyway, 220-213, undermining Republican claims their votes could be peeled away once the infrastructure bill had been passed separately.

Between the $250 billion cost of the infrastructure bill and the $367 billion cost of the Build Back Better bill, the optimistic CBO estimated combined ten year costs will dig a $617 billion hole in addition to the $6.8 TRILLION in fiscal year deficits for 2020 and 2021 spent since the onset of the pandemic to alleviate it.

The pandemic spending orgy, which was bipartisan, makes this all seem like a kerfuffle about relatively little.

Already pared back from $3.5 trillion or more in spending, the BBB faces an uncertain future in the Senate. The wild spending dreams of progressives may have been dashed, but anyone who pretends any of this makes any sense is crazy.

The country is currently holding at $28.9 TRILLION in debt, and is set to explode higher pending the raising of the debt ceiling. 

From the story: 

The final outcome wasn't much in doubt after centrist Democrats' deficit concerns largely melted away.

The vote came hours after the Congressional Budget Office issued its official cost estimate of the sweeping legislation, which moderate Democrats eagerly awaited to ease their concerns over the fiscal impact. The Biden administration and Democratic backers of the bill have insisted it would pay for itself and not add to federal deficits.

The nonpartisan CBO, the official scorekeeper, offered a cost estimate with a little wiggle room. It said the measure would increase deficits by $367 billion over 10 years — but that doesn't count additional revenue that could come from increased IRS tax enforcement.

How much new revenue that effort would yield has been hotly debated. The White House has said increased enforcement, aided by an additional $80 billion in IRS funding, would produce $480 billion in new revenue over a decade. The CBO took a more cautious view, saying the effort might produce $207 billion.

LOL Gibraltar, population ~40k, where EVERYONE is fully jabbed and they have already given over 14k boosters on top of that, is having a wee bit of a problem with an outbreak

 

Former California lecturer in "criminal justice" who specialized in "deviant behavior" accused of setting the Cascade, Everitt, Ranch, and Conard Fires in July and August

Can't make it up.

I guess those wildfires weren't exactly wild.

This guy is the exception to the rule that those who can, do, and those who can't, teach.