Jorge Soler, Aaron Rodgers, and California Football: More Foolish Examples of Widespread COVID-19 Testing

Simply put, virtually no healthy person—vaccinated or unvaccinated—should be tested for the Wuhan Virus. To a large extent, Wuhan Virus testing has become like the masks: a weapon with which to harass those who refuse to bow to their vaccine overlords. In places like California, widespread Wuhan Virus testing is a reminder that Democrats do not intend to give up easily their “emergency” powers over everyday citizens.

As you are probably already aware, the Atlanta Braves won the 2021 World Series. Slugger Jorge Soler—who hit the mammoth Series-deciding homerun in Game 6—was the World Series MVP. You may not be aware that, due to Wuhan Virus testing, Soler was kept off of the Braves roster for most of the National League Championship Series (NLCS).

Soler was actually removed from the Braves’ team in Game 4 of the National League Division Series against the Milwaukee Brewers. He did not play at all in the NLCS until the final game (Game 6). MLB.com’s reporting on the matter is telling:

Having been on the COVID-19 injured list for the decisive game of the National League Division Series and a majority of the NL Championship Series, Jorge Soler wishes he had been vaccinated.

“I feel way different now,” Soler said with Braves special representative Eddie Perez serving as his interpreter. “I feel bad about it, and I'm going to get a shot as soon as I can.”

Because Soler wasn’t vaccinated, he was still subject to regular testing, even when he was not showing any symptoms. This led to him testing positive on Oct. 12, a few hours before the Braves played the decisive Game 4 of their NLDS against the Brewers.

Soler had to leave the stadium immediately and remain away from the team for at least 10 days. The veteran outfielder remained asymptomatic throughout this stretch and was added back to Atlanta’s roster on Thursday, when he was cleared by MLB’s Joint Committee to return from the COVID-19-related injured list.

In other words, like so many other organizations that have partnered with—or at least sold out to—the COVID tyrants, MLB’s vaccine authoritarianism worked on Jorge Soler. In addition, no doubt a message was sent to what few vaccine holdouts remain in MLB—that message being, “If you don’t tow our vaccine line, we’ll keep you from playing in even the biggest of games.”

This could’ve proven disastrous for the Atlanta Braves. As a lifelong fan of the Braves, I’m thankful it didn’t. Note also that Soler—like countless others who’ve “tested positive”—was never actually sick. What’s more, even if he had been actually sick, at an extremely healthy 29 years old, Soler is in virtually zero danger from the Wuhan Virus.

Though a bit older (37), the latter conclusion also applies to NFL quarterback Aaron Rodgers. It seems Rodgers did get somewhat sick as a result of contracting the Wuhan Virus, but it appears he was never seriously ill. It sounds like Rodgers will be back on the field sooner rather than later. There’s no way anyone with a serious illness would be back playing in the physically rigorous games of the NFL only days after their recovery. And notice that we saw a lot more of Rodgers during his illness than we did of California Gov. Gavin Newsom after he received his COVID booster.

Foolish COVID-19 testing policies were likely the cause of an embarrassing loss for the University of California football team. On November 7, Cal lost 10-3 to the University of Arizona, who, prior to this victory had lost 20 straight. Cal had to play the game without 24 players and five assistant coaches. The LA Times reported,

[Cal] Coach Justin Wilcox was visibly frustrated during his postgame news conference addressing the impact his limited roster had on his team’s chance of beating Arizona. Quarterback Chase Garbers, who missed the game, posted a message on Twitter on Monday complaining about testing that was conducted by the city and university even though no local ordinances mandated such enforcement for fully vaccinated players showing no COVID symptoms.

Their frustration continues as the California football team has had to postpone this week’s game with USC because of “COVID-19 cases.” More accurately, they cancelled because now 44 players have “tested positive” for the Wuhan Virus. Again, it seems that almost no one is actually sick.

What’s more, Cal’s football team has a “99 % vaccination rate among players.” Thus, the vast majority of Cal’s players who “tested positive” for the Wuhan Virus were vaccinated against it! University of California disease expert, Dr. Monica Gandhi, says that “the big fail” here is that vaccinated, asymptomatic players were ever tested at all. She told the CBS affiliate in San Francisco,

I have zero panic whatsoever as a public health person, as an infectious disease doctor, of 44 healthy people who are fully vaccinated who may have a little virus in their nose on a highly sensitive test,” Gandhi told KPIX 5 Wednesday. “It is not an outbreak, it does not mean they got sick, and it does not mean the vaccines don’t work. It means that our public health strategy in this case was off and they were doing mass testing of people who didn’t need it.

Of course, the real “big fail” here is the idea that the young and healthy need widespread vaccination, testing, or masking. Another “big fail” is the left’s complete lack of acknowledgement of natural immunity when it comes to the Wuhan Virus. (With his natural immunity, Aaron Rodgers is now more protected than any vaccinated athlete.) Over two months ago I warned the college football world against the widespread Wuhan Virus testing—and subsequent “contact tracing”—of healthy collegiate athletes. The only reasons to continue widespread testing for the Wuhan Virus are to punish the unvaccinated and to perpetuate the false notion that COVID-19 is still a serious threat to America.

(See this column at American Thinker.) 

Copyright 2021, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

Wuhan Virus Numbers: Some Much Needed Context

Before I again get into Wuhan virus numbers, let me say that I understand well the sudden and tragic loss that many Americans are experiencing during these difficult times. Almost exactly five years ago, we tragically lost my father-in-law in a hit-and-run homicide. He was riding his bicycle when he was hit by an intoxicated driver. He died instantly. There were no last goodbyes, no farewell hugs. One minute he was here, and the next he was gone.

David left behind a wife, four children, their spouses, and 11 grandchildren. As President Trump himself highlighted yesterday, it was the hardest thing we’ve ever dealt with, and this Wuhan virus has brought such sorrow to many American homes. However, our response to the Wuhan virus has brought a different kind of suffering to countless other Americans. As we continue this fight, we must recognize that we can protect those vulnerable to this dangerous virus while reopening our nation for business.

As the Wuhan virus continues to dominate the news, and most of America remains in some form of foolish “shutdown,” it’s time many Americans got some much needed information on the context of the many Wuhan virus numbers with which we’ve been inundated. I suspect your mainstream media is much the same as is mine in Northeast Georgia. I can’t look at a news website without being forced to read the (supposed) latest Wuhan virus death numbers and the new and the total number infected with the Wuhan virus.

First, let’s deal with the number of infections, or as the largest newspaper in Georgia, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC) has been putting it, “confirmed cases.” As the previous link reveals, since very early in March the AJC has been keeping a daily tally of Wuhan virus deaths and cases in Georgia. Almost certainly, every U.S. state has a newspaper doing the same. However, when it comes to Wuhan virus infections, readers of the AJC are only getting total number of cases in Georgia, while other valuable and informative data is missing.

In other words, from one of the major news organizations in the state, Georgia citizens are not getting much needed “context” to the number of Wuhan virus cases. For example, as AJC readers scan the daily numbers, it is almost never stated that Georgia’s number of Wuhan virus infections is increasing because testing is on the rise. For weeks now, we’ve been hearing that we need more testing—and foolishly, many politicians and like-minded pundits are declaring that the un-sheltering and reopening of America largely hinges on the frequency and availability of Wuhan virus testing—thus it should come as little surprise that we now see a rise in those positive for the Wuhan virus across the U.S.

Though, I agree with John Hinderaker when it comes to testing:

The more tests we do, the more people we will find who have, or have had, the virus. So what? Epidemiologists say that the virus will continue to spread until a critical mass of us have had it and are immune, a number that probably lies between 40% and 70%. The virus will then more or less die out. I fail to understand how doing millions of tests on apparently well people is going to guide policy in any significant way.

What’s more, readers of the AJC do not see the number of Georgians who have completely recovered from the Wuhan virus. This is quite misleading, as the vast majority who contract the Wuhan virus recover within a two-week period, if they even have symptoms in the first place. As of this writing, the latest AJC headline on the Wuhan virus numbers blared that the “number of confirmed cases in Georgia increased by another 999,” and went on to note that “at least 28,133 residents have tested positive for the disease.”

As one looks day by day, because those who have recovered are never removed from the count, the number of Wuhan virus cases in Georgia continues to rise. Of course, this will happen as long as the AJC continues to count cases in such a way. Additionally, many who test positive for the Wuhan virus have very mild symptoms, if they have symptoms at all. That leads us to another important missing number when it comes to Wuhan virus cases: the asymptomatic.

Along with cruise ships, U.S. prisons have provided some valuable Wuhan virus data. A contagious virus will spread through a prison faster than fake news travels the mainstream media. One recent study on federal prisoners showed that more than 70% tested positive for the Wuhan virus. However, another recent study on prisoners revealed that, of those infected with the Wuhan virus, 96% were asymptomatic.

Additionally, as Jonathan Geach, M.D., Ankur J. Patel, M.D., Lacy Windham, M.D., OB/GYN, Ashkan Attaran, M.D., and Jason Friday, M.D. recently noted in The American Spectator,

Every study that has tested for COVID-19 in healthy individuals has found the disease’s prevalence to be surprisingly high, especially that of asymptomatic cases. These studies looked for the actual virus from a mouth or nasal swab using a technique called polymerase chain reaction (PCR). One of these was a study done at Columbia University, which tested every woman presenting for labor for COVID-19 for almost a month. Researchers found a 15 percent positive rate, and 88 percent were completely asymptomatic. Another study at a Boston homeless shelter tested nearly 400 guests, 146 of which tested positive. All were asymptomatic. Yet another study on the USS Theodore Roosevelt tested 94 percent of the crew for the virus, with 678 of 4,069 sailors testing positive. Sixty percent of these 678 have been asymptomatic.

So, of the over 28,000 Georgians who’ve tested positive for the Wuhan virus, how many of them have recovered or have mild or no symptoms? This is important—and potentially comforting and calming—information. Yet, we’re almost never told such things by the mainstream media. Because they are devoted to the removal of President Trump from office at almost any cost, the mainstream media has used print, television, and the internet to further the shutdown narrative.

Also, along with the number infected, we daily get the number of those killed by the Wuhan virus. Or do we? We do know that there is a definite financial incentive for hospitals to attribute as many deaths as possible to the Wuhan virus. We also know from the doctors themselves that there is pressure to count every death possible as a Wuhan virus death. And we know from state Public Health Directors that there is reason to suspect that the total number of reported deaths from the Wuhan virus is high.

As Dr. Ngozi Ezike, Illinois Department of Public Health Director, recently put it,

I just want to be clear in terms of the definition of people dying of COVID. So, the case definition is very simplistic. It means that at the time of death it was a COVID-positive diagnosis. So that means if you were in hospice and had already been given, you know, a few weeks to live and then you were also found to have COVID, that would be counted as a COVID death. It means that if, technically, even if you died of a clear alternate cause but you had COVID at the same time it’s still listed as a COVID death. So, everyone that’s listed as a COVID death doesn’t mean that that was the cause of the death, but they had COVID at the time of death. I hope that’s helpful.

Yeah, that is indeed “helpful,” but it’s something else the media virtually ignores as they report Wuhan virus numbers. Furthermore, we’re almost never told who’s dying. It’s surprisingly difficult (try it) to even get an internet search to reveal the average age of a U.S. Wuhan virus death. As Selwyn Duke noted recently, the average age of an Italian who’s died from the Wuhan virus is 79.5, with more than 99% of those having comorbidities.

In Georgia, the average age of a Wuhan virus death is 73.4, with only 4.5% having no known comorbidities (listed as a “chronic condition” on the Georgia Department of Public Health COVID-19 Daily Status Report). Of the Georgians who’ve died from the Wuhan virus with no (yet) known “chronic condition,” 15 of them were under the age of 65. Again, Georgia’s media virtually ignores such things when reporting their Wuhan virus numbers.

In addition, the total number of Wuhan virus deaths for the U.S. seems awry. Currently, the number being reported across the U.S. shows that we are coming up on 70,000 total Wuhan virus deaths. Though they do indicate that their numbers lag, the CDC site shows the total number of Wuhan virus deaths far smaller (almost half) than what is reported in the media. In addition, the CDC distinguishes between “COVID-19 Deaths” and “Deaths with Pneumonia and COVID-19.” Almost certainly the total number of Wuhan virus deaths the media reports includes the latter category (currently over 16,000), without ever including a similar distinction.

I’ll let the doctors from The American Spectator piece mentioned above summarize for me,

[I]t is clear that COVID-19 is more prevalent and less deadly than previous testing has shown. In addition, it has become clear that the disease progression is generally mild in those under 65 with limited co-morbidities and even less of a threat to children. Knowing how low the risk is for the vast majority of Americans, which is rapidly approaching the mortality rate of the flu, we can safely reopen most of the country’s economy while continuing to protect those who are most at risk from COVID-19. Once shelter-in-place orders have been lifted, those who remain fearful are free to continue to shelter in place for as long as they so choose. There is more than enough information available at this time to reopen America.

Copyright 2020, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com