21 August 2020
The Covid19 Virus, or as it is otherwise known, the Chinese Wuhan Virus or just Coronavirus, has been a nasty bug, leaving a lot of dead Americans in its wake, but it has also been put to good use by anyone with a political agenda, especially those on the Left, who have parlayed it into a society-crushing crisis. Don’t get me wrong, because anyone in a high-risk group should take prudent safeguards during any epidemic. In this case, the most at-risk group was older Americans, at least in terms of deaths from the virus plus the complications that always come with old age. In Pennsylvania 93% of Covid 19 deaths were people over 60, almost all of whom had comorbidities, or complicating factors. In this sense, Covid19 was nowhere near as serious as the “Spanish Flu” epidemic of 1917-1918, which killed somewhere between 17-50 million out of 500 million people infected with a world population of about 1.5 billion people. In other words, about 33% of the world’s population became infected with Spanish Flu and about 3% perished. Today’s Covid19 numbers are not even close, with a total of 23 million worldwide cases and 800,000 deaths out of a global population of 7.8 Billion people. That means that 0.3% of the world population got sick and 0.013% have died. A tragedy, but not one warranting our overreaction. The Spanish Flu also took young and old, with victims often succumbing within a day or two of showing the first symptoms.
Closer to home, here in Franklin County, the worst effects of the virus are almost gone. A total of 1448 Franklin County residents have contracted Covid19 since the epidemic took hold in early March, or about 0.9% of the population. Of that number, 46 have died, or .03% of the population. The disease had two peaks, one on May 8, 2020, and one on July 22, 2020, so if your looking for a second wave, you may be disappointed because we may have had it already. Time will tell. County deaths peaked on May 15, 2020, and there have been no county deaths from Covid19 since July 3, 2020, or about 50 days ago. Keep in mind that the date of death is when it is reported to the database, so it may have been longer than 50 days. Local healthcare providers are now reporting new daily case rates in the single digits for the last week. Not saying it is over, but we can see the end from here.
Of course, none of the facts explain the continued media and leftwing hysteria. Just the other day, a local media outlet displayed a cumulative Covid19 case chart,and that always looks scary, especially to those too lazy to read the chart labels, because it shows that line going steadily upward, reflecting the number of total cases, and for some reason, the line is never to scale, which would actually show a pronounced flattening (see the below illustration). These charts are meant to scare you, folks, because the numbers aren’t that scary..
So, who benefits from this continued whipping up of hysteria? Obviously, the number one beneficiary is Governor Wolf and his cronies who are hell-bent on stealing the election for Joe Biden. The more people he can frighten into staying home on election day and mailing in their votes, the bigger the chance of his monkeying with the election by allowing the stuffing of ballot boxes in Democrat-controlled counties with fraudulent mail-in ballots in the chaos. In fact, he has already set the process in motion, as explained in this Chambersburg Public Opinion column.
Aside from stealing the election, the Democrats are using Covid19 to put the brakes on the roaring economy that unless abated, would render Joe Biden’s chances of election to two possibilities: slim or none. It has had some effect, but despite everything, indicators are showing that economic conditions are steadily coming back.
Finally, the leftists who run our schools and colleges are using fear to keep the teachers from going back to work, and who can blame them? Having extra months tacked on to and already excessively-long paid summer vacation is every teacher’s dream. Going back to school for them would be like the rest of us having to go back to work after a three-day holiday weekend!
I’m not saying we should all go out and start hugging every stranger we see, but it clearly looks like we might be seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. The trouble is that there are too many people who are trying to block that light.
The Franklin County Journal 