Column #241

Social distancing works. The difference it can make in the spread of a contagious virus can be staggering. With a 75% reduction in social exposure an infected person will infect 2.5 people in 30 days. With a 50% reduction in social exposure an infected person will infect 75 people in 30 days. With no social distancing an infected person will infect 450 people in 30 days. For this reason everyone must do their best to practice social distancing.¹

The reason social distancing is so important today is that it’s buying time for our unprepared healthcare system. Exponentially more protective gear, ventilators, and tests will be available two to three weeks from now than today. We’ll also be a little closer to a vaccine and maybe we’ll know by then if the antimalarial drugs (hydroxychloroquine sulfate and chloroquine phosphate) safely kill the virus in critically ill COVID-19 patients. Scientists are already saying that "What used to take years we’re doing in weeks.” Obviously it’s a constantly changing situation regarding the virus.

But the shutdowns are pushing the limits elsewhere. The financial and psychological strain caused by shuttered businesses may soon be far worse than the disease itself. Every day that the shutdowns continue the financial and psychological strain becomes more dire. America has to get back to work relatively soon.

Regarding the virus threat, there is a growing body of thoughtful people questioning the shutdown decisions. One concern is that the shutdowns will only slow down the spread, they won’t stop the spread. COVID-19 is already everywhere just like the flu and it will have to run its course. They also ask, “Has the world been stampeded toward self-destruction with irrational fear generated by partial data and alarming stories?” The answers are not “blowin' in the wind” forever in time. The consequences of shutdowns will show up before we know it and could even extend for an entire generation.

When the recovery starts, I expect it to be very snappy initially. But what happens after that burst of activity is most important. Our national and state debts have mushroomed higher. Interest expense was already a major budgetary item for many States and certainly the Federal government. Now their interest expenses are higher. Many laid-off, hard-working consumers are seeing their debts increase too. In addition to more debt, we must add our concern for all the small businesses that will not start back up because the “help” didn’t reach them and/or the owners gave up on their dreams. Many employees may not return to their former jobs because they got new jobs. Training new hires will be another burden for many stressed-out businesses. And it won’t be long before we see that printing money was not a cure-all because it comes at a cost.

Other than buying time for healthcare preparedness, data supporting the reasons for restarting the economy are growing more numerous compared to the reasons for the shutdowns. Information is surfacing that strongly indicates that COVID-19 is not the killer it has been made out to be by our hysterical media and various groups that are yelling “fire in a crowded theater.” Yes, some of the hysteria is political posturing.²

Recently two professors of medicine at Stanford University made some very interesting points in a “Wall Street Journal” article. They said that “Current estimates about the Covid-19 fatality rate may be too high by orders of magnitude.” The fear-based 2% to 4% fatality rate of Covid-19 is based on deaths compared to confirmed Covid-19 cases. Based on that logic if 100 million Americans ultimately get the disease, two million to four million will die. That estimate is deeply flawed because the actual fatality rate is the portion of all of those infected who die not just deaths compared to identified positive cases.

The CDC has already warned us that as many as 25% of the people infected with COVID-19 may not show any symptoms. Without having tested every citizen, we have no idea if we have 40 million cases right now or one million. In no way is it only 250,000 cases as advertised. If only 2% of the population is currently positive, that’s 7.4 million cases which we should compare with the known 6,200 deaths. As this is written, the entire world’s “official” total for COVID-19 cases is about 1.1 million. Obviously, there has to be many more people who have gotten it than that.³

The Stanford professors say flat out that the number of infections is an order of magnitude greater than confirmed cases. “First, the test used to identify cases doesn’t catch people who were infected and recovered. Second, testing rates were woefully low for a long time and typically reserved for the severely ill. Together, these facts imply that the confirmed cases are likely orders of magnitude less than the true number of infections. Epidemiological modelers haven’t adequately adapted their estimates to account for these factors.”

Obviously, if the epidemic is not as deadly as forecasted, then preventive measures should focus on protecting the more vulnerable citizens, hospitals, and rest homes—not the entire population. “A universal quarantine may not be worth the costs it imposes on the economy, community and individual mental and physical health. We should undertake immediate steps to evaluate the empirical basis of the current lockdowns.”⁴

For an understanding of cost, divide the $2 trillion stimulus bill by the “worst-case” projected 200,000 deaths. It’s $10 million per death. The stock market lost $10 trillion in value which if there are 200,000 deaths, that’s $50 million per death. The GNP has contracted by trillions of dollars. So the cost being placed on the American society for this virus is quite expensive.

“Estimates of the Severity of Coronavirus Disease 2019: a Model-Based Analysis” was published March 30, 2020, in The Lancet, a peer-reviewed journal. Its findings can be summarized in a couple of sentences. “Our estimated overall infection fatality ratio for China was 0.66% (0.39–1.33), with an increasing profile with age. Similarly, estimates of the proportion of infected individuals likely to be hospitalized increased with age up to a maximum of 18.4% (11.0–7.6) in those aged 80 years or older.” Those numbers for the overall death rate are way lower than the fear-based 2% to 4% fatality rate that’s bandied about.⁵

Italy is on everyone’s mind because their elderly death rate has been frighteningly high. But on March 31, 2020, “Bloomberg News” published an article by Giovanni Salzano and Vernon Silver titled “Italy’s Mild Flu Season May Give Clues to Virus Deaths.” It states that Italy’s low flu deaths this flu season increased the pool of those vulnerable in the COVID-19 epidemic. The elderly and those with chronic diseases who were spared death by the flu then became an outsized target for COVID-19 in February and March.

A chart from Italy’s report shows that deaths among the 65-plus population during the coronavirus outbreak through March 17 had reached the levels of the previous two flu seasons yet was still below the overall death total from 2016-2017.⁶

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These perspectives dovetail with American data. Every year about 160 million Americans get the flu and 40,000 die. That means nearly one of every two Americans gets the flu in spite of vaccinations and the death rate is 2.5 deaths in 10,000 people. That may sound like a lot but it’s hardly measurable in the big picture. If 2020 is a normal year for deaths, 87.7 out of 10,000 Americans will die and that includes flu deaths. If a wildly inflated 200,000 Americans eventually die of COVID-19, that’s 5.4 in 10,000 and we don’t know how many of those people would have also died of the flu. If we assume no overlap between flu and COVID-19, then the inflated total increases the death rate from 87.7/10,000 to 93.1/10,000 which is just a 6.25% increase in deaths for 2020.⁷

I do not mean to sound insensitive to people dying, but statically we must get a handle on the threat. We know that of the COVID-19 deaths in Italy, 99.2% involved patients with a major illness, pathology, or comorbidity like heart disease, diabetes, a history of cancer, or asthma. The average age of those who died in Italy is 79.5 with only a small fraction under the age of 50. Life expectancy in the United States is 78.6 years.

Is it worth sacrificing the future financial well-being of the entire nation for that? For certain there are many sectors of the population who will profit greatly off the incredibly huge “pork-laden” emergency programs. But most Americans will be very lucky if they come out even. We may never know how many people committed suicide, were psychologically damaged, prematurely left school, lost their dreams, and in other ways had their lives negatively altered by the shutdowns. This is why we must ask questions and be proactive on more fronts rather than just stay put in our homes hoping to survive.

Most of the people making the decisions about shutting down businesses are not making personal financial sacrifices. Politicians, federal, state, and county government employees, teachers, newscasters, elitists, and many others in similar type circumstances are being paid in full just like always. They do not feel the same pain as those who are forced out of work without pay (other than receiving unemployment) and those who are seeing their businesses shuttered which is wiping out their net worth. Talk about dividing the country!

I do see one possible “loop hole” for America that could make a huge positive difference for decades to come. Our nation must turn away for relying on foreign entities.

We can’t afford the 70-year-old tactic of buying the cheapest stuff from whomever offers it around the world. That form of commerce makes our country dependent rather than self sufficient and independent.

Our reliance on foreigners to make products for us is obviously our Achilles’ heel. Yes, their goods are cheaper. But manufacturing is a form of wealth creation that’s equivalent to farming, ranching, and resource extraction. So when we gut our own manufacturing industries in favor of buying foreign we destroy wealth creating jobs in our country. We also end up depending on foreigners, some of whom may not always remain friendly, while we lose the leverage in regulating the quality of goods they sell us.

The COVID-19 pandemic is certainly pointing out some serious flaws for outsourcing our technology to make products other than in the USA. Many of our nation’s medical supplies come from China. Many high tech products are made in China that go into our military hardware. The USA even imports many food products, clothing, and civilian high tech hardware from China.

Top 10 imported goods from China:
1 – Electrical machinery and equipment
2 – Power generation equipment
3 – Toys, games, and sports equipment
4 – Furniture
5 – Footwear & parts thereof
6 – Apparel, knitted or crocheted
7 – Apparel, not knitted or crocheted
8 – Plastics & articles thereof
9 – Iron, steel
10 – Vehicles, excluding rail⁸

We can’t, and do not want to, buck the system. But let’s keep our cool during these stressful times and stay informed. In addition, make sure your voices are heard in your community. As for food, it’s always good to work on improving your immunity because your quality of life depends on it. Make sure your diet balances the Omega-6 and Omega-3 essential fatty acids. That’s a critical starting point for better health.⁹

To your health.

Ted Slanker

Ted Slanker has been reporting on the fundamentals of nutritional research in publications, television and radio appearances, and at conferences since 1999. He condenses complex studies into the basics required for health and well-being. His eBook, The Real Diet of Man, is available online.

Don’t miss these links for additional reading:

1. The Math Behind Social Distancing by Marcus Lu from Visual Capitalist

2. Florida Gov. Ron Desantis Orders Statewide Shutdown after Insisting the White House Hadn't Advised Him to Take Bold Action by Eliza Relman from Business Insider

3. San Miguel County CO First Results of COVID-19 Blood Tests Announced

4. by Eran Bendavid and Jay Bhattacharya from The Wall Street Journal

5. by Robert Verity, et al. from The Lancet a peer-reviewed journal

6. Italy’s Mild Flu Season May Give Clues to Virus Deaths by Giovanni Salzano and Vernon Silver

7. Deaths and Mortality from CDC

8. Top 10 Import Goods from China with Pics by Raymond Rau from Universal Cargo

9. The Importance of the Omega-6/Omega-3 Fatty Acid Ratio in Cardiovascular Disease and Other Chronic Diseases by A. P. Simopoulos, PhD

Coronavirus Cases from WorldOMeter

New Food Analysis Tables by Ted Slanker

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Ted Slanker’s Omega-3 Blood Test