GOP lawmakers: Fauci may be doing more harm than good
BY J. EDWARD MORENO - 04/11/20 03:31 PM EDT

Republican Reps. Andy Biggs (Ariz.) and Ken Buck (Colo.) criticized Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, for the impact of his social distancing recommendations, claiming that the stay-at-home policies informed by those recommendations have forced businesses, workers and corporations into economic turmoil.

“For Fauci, is it merely a societal or economic inconvenience that about 17 million workers are unemployed because of the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, with many more to come in the weeks and months ahead? The economic calamity lies largely with the origination of policies resulting from Fauci's recommendations,” the lawmakers wrote in an op-ed in the Washington Examiner published Saturday.

Read more here:

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/49...-than-good

Fauci is the medical version of a late night TV preacher. I dont trust him, he enjoys it too much.

(04-11-2020 09:46 PM)shere khan Wrote:  Fauci is the medical version of a late night TV preacher. I dont trust him, he enjoys it too much.

Yeah, to be in charge of decision making for a pandemic is a medical bureaucrat's wet dream.

I would like to get a checkup, and my teeth cleaned this year, especially since I turned the big 4-0 last November and have a family history of cancer. Is that too much to ask, Dr. Fauci?

I think Fauci means well, but he views things from way too narrow a perspective (minimize the virus' impact).

Hopefully The President and others are thinking more big-picture.

(04-11-2020 11:32 PM)Nittany_Bearcat Wrote:  I think Fauci means well, but he views things from way too narrow a perspective (minimize the virus' impact).

Hopefully The President and others are thinking more big-picture.

I guarantee Trump is. He wants people back to work yesterday. But he has to walk a fine line here because if he moves too soon he’ll be piled on from all sides. People are going to die regardless. He just can’t look reckless in his timing.

(04-11-2020 10:01 PM)TripleA Wrote:  

(04-11-2020 09:46 PM)shere khan Wrote:  Fauci is the medical version of a late night TV preacher. I dont trust him, he enjoys it too much.

Yeah, to be in charge of decision making for a pandemic is a medical bureaucrat's wet dream.

Remember, we didn't elect Fauci, we elected President Trump. I think Fauci's opinions and advice should only be one of several weighed by the President, and certainly Fauci's ideas and opinions should not be the end-all be-all.

LAWA: Let America Work Again

As Trump as said, this will be the hardest and biggest decision of his life.

I would continue the lock down advisory on people over 70 or with conditions, give a more lightly worded advisory to those over 60, and tell everyone else to maintain good practices to the highest extent possible, but get back to work. I would try that for 3 weeks while heavily tracking the data with an emphasis not so much on new cases, but strictly on hospitalizations and deaths. I would allow restaraunts to open but with 1/2 capacity and keep theaters closed for now. Let states decide on schools, but I would open them back up with voluntary attendance policies.

As long as the numbers stay manageable I would extend those guidelines on a two week basis. That would at least start a herd immunity and get a little GDP flowing while protecting the most vulnerable.

Look guys I'm more conservative than most on this board and at least as conservative as the vast majority of posters who are conservatives. I have a dear friend who is inside Big Pharma in a big way and that person is more conservative than I am.

You don't want to end the social distancing until they have a treatment that can force this virus into seclusion. I say that because there are more than a few reports now that the virus is returning in patients who thought they were over it and cleared to return home. What makes this matter concerning is that nobody is sure if they are still contagious.

It has successfully passed from humans to dogs and cats, and at least 1 tiger at the New York zoo. But again nobody is sure if the animals can transmit it back. We know both dogs and cats which are in close proximity to a positive patient with in home quarantine can pass it to other family members who rub the fur that the patient rubbed. But as far as the animal breathing and transmitting the virus nobody knows yet and my wife does work for veterinary facilities in the lab.

Everyone's best bet for staying healthy is quarantine. For those of us past the critical age, and with other issues doing so is critical. And for the society as a whole if we want to avoid a reemergence of the virus in as deadly of a way as its first round the best bet is isolation.

The nations that have practiced it do better than those who don't.

But here's the rub, if the virus remerges without another exposure it means that it may be able to hide behind the membrane protecting the brain. Heretofore Herpes Zoster and HIV are two examples of viruses able to do this. If this is the case we will have to develop treatments that keep the virus in hiding in the brain because no anti-viral can penetrate that membrane to kill it. This means without suppression it may reemerge as often as it can.

With the Herpes Zoster virus, or Simplex 1 which causes fever blisters instead of Shingles, the medications seek make the virus run its cycle quickly since neither is deadly.

With the HIV treatments the goal is to keep the virus hiding and inactive, but there is no cure. And the reason there is no cure is that if you have something that can enter the brain the anti-viral would likely be as lethal as the virus, or more so.

This isn't the damned flu. It is fundamentally different. So right now even though I lost well over 140,000 in stock values, I can't disagree with the recommendations.

Germany is about to go back to work. Let's watch them and see how it goes about 3 weeks after they return. Maybe then we'll have some hard data with which to make a solid recommendation and for Trump some political cover. That puts us back to work a month earlier than the July 4th date being tossed around, but does so with some quantifiable information coming out of Deutschland.

I have a good friend that I talked to last evening. His wife is one the top infectious disease control experts in Central Virginia. I bluntly asked if the early high death-toll estimates were more a function of people like Fauci, who have spent their lives in this stuff versus real empirically-based estimates. Similar to the meteorologist that when a bug hurricane or winter storm approaches, predicts the worst case scenario every time. He mentioned that his wife feels the social distancing is working better than the model predicted, as nobody thought we'd be as compliant as we have been. Probably also explains the states with their religious gathering mandates. Either way, if I have to delay a week or two more to start the engine again, I'll abide. But this schit is getting old, and we need to be back at the earliest moment there is confidence that we have the means to deal with the second wave.

(04-12-2020 01:19 AM)ODUsmitty Wrote:  I have a good friend that I talked to last evening. His wife is one the top infectious disease control experts in Central Virginia. I bluntly asked if the early high death-toll estimates were more a function of people like Fauci, who have spent their lives in this stuff versus real empirically-based estimates. Similar to the meteorologist that when a bug hurricane or winter storm approaches, predicts the worst case scenario every time. He mentioned that his wife feels the social distancing is working better than the model predicted, as nobody thought we'd be as compliant as we have been. Probably also explains the states with their religious gathering mandates. Either way, if I have to delay a week or two more to start the engine again, I'll abide. But this schit is getting old, and we need to be back at the earliest moment there is confidence that we have the means to deal with the second wave.

My dad would have said that this whole thing was going to make him guilty of a Misdemeanor. "The more I miss the stuff I like de meaner I get!"

You guys are actually discounting one of the top infectious doctors in the world because he doesn’t say what you want. Quite embarrassing

(04-12-2020 03:08 AM)gobluebigjon Wrote:  You guys are actually discounting one of the top infectious doctors in the world because he doesn’t say what you want. Quite embarrassing

No, we are doing what most do when getting advise from a doctor; seeking a second opinion. More over we are strangely concerned about about CV-19 deaths yet haven’t batted an eye at the 3 million that normally die in the US a year. Nor does anyone seem to care about the suicide and domestic abuse rates that are going to occur because of the stay at home order. Dr. Fauci’s job is pandemic response and his recommendations are valuable. But he is myopic in his concern.

Nonsense. It’s an ongoing conversation. You think in a country of 350mm people a one size fits all “model” is even possible? It’s not. And it’s silly talk to even think so.

It’s more closely aligned to chaos. Why isn’t LA, with all its clear and present dangers, tracking the same or closer to NYC? Same big population numbers, right?

Why doesn’t Lubbock look like NO’s? Similar climes, right?

Mother of Presidents, The good commonwealth of Virginia has 130 deaths thus far, why don’t we look more like NJ? Only a toll road or two apart.

No one, least not I, is “dismissing” anything Fauci or to me the even more impressive Birx is saying.

Just that what works in Omaha should be allowed to work, while what clearly hasn’t worked in NYC, Joisey, Conn, or Detroit, NO etc should be on their own lock down and travel restriction.

Big Asss country out there, throwing a huge wet blanket over ALL of it is sheer nonsense. These bureacrathoritarians are threatening to arrest people trying to “shelter” in their own more rural, separated get-aways rather than staying in the infected areas of dense populations.

Great. Let the infectious disease folks have their Jim Cantore on the beach moments, they all serve a purpose. But the folks in Albuquerque likely don’t need to hide from the next East coast hurricane.

(04-12-2020 05:28 AM)vandiver49 Wrote:  

(04-12-2020 03:08 AM)gobluebigjon Wrote:  You guys are actually discounting one of the top infectious doctors in the world because he doesn’t say what you want. Quite embarrassing

No, we are doing what most do when getting advise from a doctor; seeking a second opinion. More over we are strangely concerned about about CV-19 deaths yet haven’t batted an eye at the 3 million that normally die in the US a year. Nor does anyone seem to care about the suicide and domestic abuse rates that are going to occur because of the stay at home order. Dr. Fauci’s job is pandemic response and I would his recommendations are valuable. But he is myopic in his concern.

w/o having the value of corrective lenses....

how this debacle has been handled easily reminds me of my corpshite 'murica days when standard purchased custom mfg. and tried to 'integrate' sales/software systems...."I can help achieve 95% what you're looking for, but 100% seamless ain' happening, pal. You're still going to have to have someone in sales with a clue in support for the remaining 5%.....might I suggest a centralized 'war room' with a handful of competent engineers so the widget sales fellers in the field have a resource to tap into?!"

(04-12-2020 05:33 AM)JMUDunk Wrote:  Nonsense. It’s an ongoing conversation. You think in a country of 350mm people a one size fits all “model” is even possible? It’s not. And it’s silly talk to even think so.

It’s more closely aligned to chaos. Why isn’t LA, with all its clear and present dangers, tracking the same or closer to NYC? Same big population numbers, right?

Why doesn’t Lubbock look like NO’s? Similar climes, right?

Mother of Presidents, The good commonwealth of Virginia has 130 deaths thus far, why don’t we look more like NJ? Only a toll road or two apart.

No one, least not I, is “dismissing” anything Fauci or to me the even more impressive Birx is saying.

Just that what works in Omaha should be allowed to work, while what clearly hasn’t worked in NYC, Joisey, Conn, or Detroit, NO etc should be on their own lock down and travel restriction.

Big Asss country out there, throwing a huge wet blanket over ALL of it is sheer nonsense. These bureacrathoritarians are threatening to arrest people trying to “shelter” in their own more rural, separated get-aways rather than staying in the infected areas of dense populations.

Great. Let the infectious disease folks have their Jim Cantore on the beach moments, they all serve a purpose. But the folks in Albuquerque likely don’t need to hide from the next East coast hurricane.

XACLY!

this entire thingy has been a bureaucratic ruse from the get go....

the virus is real....the handling, handlers, and mislabeling of 'deaths due to' is complete bs....

if I could've chose worst method two mos. ago, how it's been handled to date would be it....oh yeah, I mentioned something about that...

(04-12-2020 12:19 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  

(04-11-2020 10:01 PM)TripleA Wrote:  

(04-11-2020 09:46 PM)shere khan Wrote:  Fauci is the medical version of a late night TV preacher. I dont trust him, he enjoys it too much.

Yeah, to be in charge of decision making for a pandemic is a medical bureaucrat's wet dream.

Remember, we didn't elect Fauci, we elected President Trump. I think Fauci's opinions and advice should only be one of several weighed by the President, and certainly Fauci's ideas and opinions should not be the end-all be-all.

LAWA: Let America Work Again

That's easy to say when you are suddenly confronted by a global pandemic, and first thing your medical advisers tell you is you could lose 2.2 million people in 2 months.

It's going to be a high wire balancing act never before seen, and his fate will be determined by how he handles it. Too many can't die, and too many can't be out of work. Helluva situation.

(04-12-2020 12:19 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  

(04-11-2020 10:01 PM)TripleA Wrote:  

(04-11-2020 09:46 PM)shere khan Wrote:  Fauci is the medical version of a late night TV preacher. I dont trust him, he enjoys it too much.

Yeah, to be in charge of decision making for a pandemic is a medical bureaucrat's wet dream.

Remember, we didn't elect Fauci, we elected President Trump. I think Fauci's opinions and advice should only be one of several weighed by the President, and certainly Fauci's ideas and opinions should not be the end-all be-all.

LAWA: Let America Work Again

Remember, we're not doctors and neither is Trump.

(04-12-2020 12:47 AM)JRsec Wrote:  Look guys I'm more conservative than most on this board and at least as conservative as the vast majority of posters who are conservatives. I have a dear friend who is inside Big Pharma in a big way and that person is more conservative than I am.

You don't want to end the social distancing until they have a treatment that can force this virus into seclusion. I say that because there are more than a few reports now that the virus is returning in patients who thought they were over it and cleared to return home. What makes this matter concerning is that nobody is sure if they are still contagious.

It has successfully passed from humans to dogs and cats, and at least 1 tiger at the New York zoo. But again nobody is sure if the animals can transmit it back. We know both dogs and cats which are in close proximity to a positive patient with in home quarantine can pass it to other family members who rub the fur that the patient rubbed. But as far as the animal breathing and transmitting the virus nobody knows yet and my wife does work for veterinary facilities in the lab.

Everyone's best bet for staying healthy is quarantine. For those of us past the critical age, and with other issues doing so is critical. And for the society as a whole if we want to avoid a reemergence of the virus in as deadly of a way as its first round the best bet is isolation.

The nations that have practiced it do better than those who don't.

But here's the rub, if the virus remerges without another exposure it means that it may be able to hide behind the membrane protecting the brain. Heretofore Herpes Zoster and HIV are two examples of viruses able to do this. If this is the case we will have to develop treatments that keep the virus in hiding in the brain because no anti-viral can penetrate that membrane to kill it. This means without suppression it may reemerge as often as it can.

With the Herpes Zoster virus, or Simplex 1 which causes fever blisters instead of Shingles, the medications seek make the virus run its cycle quickly since neither is deadly.

With the HIV treatments the goal is to keep the virus hiding and inactive, but there is no cure. And the reason there is no cure is that if you have something that can enter the brain the anti-viral would likely be as lethal as the virus, or more so.

This isn't the damned flu. It is fundamentally different. So right now even though I lost well over 140,000 in stock values, I can't disagree with the recommendations.

Germany is about to go back to work. Let's watch them and see how it goes about 3 weeks after they return. Maybe then we'll have some hard data with which to make a solid recommendation and for Trump some political cover. That puts us back to work a month earlier than the July 4th date being tossed around, but does so with some quantifiable information coming out of Deutschland.

We're in shutdown for 18 more days, at least, so it's not like people are jumping back in the pool yet. I agree with the shutdown, but soon, we have to figure out how to start back smartly, in phases.

Something Fauci said last night struck me. He said his job is to prevent even one person from dying. The economy is collateral damage. Sorry, that can't work for much longer. We have to be smarter, and balance the two. Where we have flareups, tighten up, but right now, we are headed to Great Depression territory. Fast.

As for cats and dogs, 4 tigers and 3 lions were infected at the Bronx zoo (I saw a TV documentary just published by the Bronx Zoo), the first tiger by a human, the others by the first tiger.

He said, and confirmed by another vet epidemiologist, that only the big cats caught it, and they are all recovering. He says the lab work they did shows it can't be transmitted back to humans.

He said as far as dogs and cats, they are likely fine, and there is no evidence you can make them sick, but it doesn't hurt to take precautions (like don't lick their tongues, lol). He said as far as they can tell for now, it really isn't an issue.

(04-12-2020 07:51 AM)Ohio Poly Wrote:  

(04-12-2020 12:19 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  

(04-11-2020 10:01 PM)TripleA Wrote:  

(04-11-2020 09:46 PM)shere khan Wrote:  Fauci is the medical version of a late night TV preacher. I dont trust him, he enjoys it too much.

Yeah, to be in charge of decision making for a pandemic is a medical bureaucrat's wet dream.

Remember, we didn't elect Fauci, we elected President Trump. I think Fauci's opinions and advice should only be one of several weighed by the President, and certainly Fauci's ideas and opinions should not be the end-all be-all.

LAWA: Let America Work Again

Remember, we're not doctors and neither is Trump.

Yeah, and the docs aren't economists, either. There has to be a balance soon.

Fauci admitted last night his job is to save lives and let others worry about the economy, which he called collateral damage. He has said previously that the best thing to do is shut down until we get a vaccine.

You want to follow that advice?