I saw this on twitter yesterday, and Cosmos posted it in another thread:
If you haven't been following very closely and don't understand why this is political, here is why:
As with every other respiratory virus, it hits regions in waves. The south is on the tail end of its big yearly wave, and as you probably know, the left made political hay at the expense of the mostly-R governors of those southern states (and namely, President DeSantis and Governor Abbot) - blaming them for the high metrics associated with the disease.
Now that their celebration is winding down, they're suddenly realizing, "oh shit -- our wave in the north is next. And it's most likely going to be even bigger."
They have been mostly hammering President DeSantis and Gov. Abbot for opposing mask mandates (note: Not for opposing masks, but opposing mask mandates). They don't want to have to mandate masks themselves, and they know that masks don't do sh*t for slowing the macro-level seasonal spread, and so if they do mandate masks, when their case wave is likely even larger than the one in the south, it will expose their ignorance. With their attacks of President DeSantis and Gov. Abbot over the past two months, they are in a tough spot with this freight train coming right down the tracks at them.
The fact is, as President DeSantis and Gov. Abbot know (because they're actually putting in the effort to understand science rather than playing politics with this virus), there's really nothing any politician can reasonably do to have any material effect on these case waves.
There are only two levers available to make the case wave appear smaller in the north, and the CDC (and much of "public health") is pulling out all the stops to help.
1. Third dose "booster" shots in as many arms as possible. If enough people get this third dose booster, it could actually lessen the case wave, but this is a temporary shield - another shot will likely prevent individuals from being able to contract Covid for about 4-6 months - and it likely creates a higher risk situation down the road for a large number of people. CDC got the FDA to authorize such boosters for very high risk (this is appropriate IMO) and immunocompromised (probably appropriate as well), but so far the FDA has (correctly) not authorized a third dose booster to the general public. That hasn't stopped the CDC and politicians from dropping hints, with a wink, to people that they can go get a third-dose "booster." This is despicable politics, as it's going to kill people. But thus is our politically-charged CDC, public health, and Democratic party.
My Democratic governor threw a hissy fit on Monday directed at the FDA for not approving third-dose booster shots for all, then essentially winked and told everyone we have enough for everyone. He doesn't care that this will kill people.
2. Figure out ways to count less. And that is what we see here in this tweet from the CDC. While the logic in the tweet is sound, this has been known for over 100 years -- Yet, they never messaged this before or during the south's wave. Suddenly though, scrambling for ideas to protect the north (politically), they remembered that if you've recently recovered from the infection from a respiratory virus, there is virtually no way you can get the same infection within the next few months. It's very common for those who have a known infection to go get tested once they feel better because they want to see a negative test result for themselves. And given the sensitivity of our PCR tests, it's common for the test to report back positive even after the infection is cleared. So, it's not uncommon for one single infection to get counted as four cases. This didn't bother the CDC during the south's summer wave, but suddenly of course they had a "come to Jesus" moment on this and are messaging that there's no need to get tested in the months after recovering. Less residual positives will make the comparison between the south's and the north's case waves even less apples-to-apples (in favor of the north).
The way the left has turned this mess into one massive political football game for their own benefit, at the expense of so many innocent lives, has been one truly despicable spectacle to watch. The only good thing is that it has backfired on them - but since they keep doubling down, more innocent people keep keep paying the price for their politics.
If you haven't been following very closely and don't understand why this is political, here is why:
As with every other respiratory virus, it hits regions in waves. The south is on the tail end of its big yearly wave, and as you probably know, the left made political hay at the expense of the mostly-R governors of those southern states (and namely, President DeSantis and Governor Abbot) - blaming them for the high metrics associated with the disease.
Now that their celebration is winding down, they're suddenly realizing, "oh shit -- our wave in the north is next. And it's most likely going to be even bigger."
They have been mostly hammering President DeSantis and Gov. Abbot for opposing mask mandates (note: Not for opposing masks, but opposing mask mandates). They don't want to have to mandate masks themselves, and they know that masks don't do sh*t for slowing the macro-level seasonal spread, and so if they do mandate masks, when their case wave is likely even larger than the one in the south, it will expose their ignorance. With their attacks of President DeSantis and Gov. Abbot over the past two months, they are in a tough spot with this freight train coming right down the tracks at them.
The fact is, as President DeSantis and Gov. Abbot know (because they're actually putting in the effort to understand science rather than playing politics with this virus), there's really nothing any politician can reasonably do to have any material effect on these case waves.
There are only two levers available to make the case wave appear smaller in the north, and the CDC (and much of "public health") is pulling out all the stops to help.
1. Third dose "booster" shots in as many arms as possible. If enough people get this third dose booster, it could actually lessen the case wave, but this is a temporary shield - another shot will likely prevent individuals from being able to contract Covid for about 4-6 months - and it likely creates a higher risk situation down the road for a large number of people. CDC got the FDA to authorize such boosters for very high risk (this is appropriate IMO) and immunocompromised (probably appropriate as well), but so far the FDA has (correctly) not authorized a third dose booster to the general public. That hasn't stopped the CDC and politicians from dropping hints, with a wink, to people that they can go get a third-dose "booster." This is despicable politics, as it's going to kill people. But thus is our politically-charged CDC, public health, and Democratic party.
My Democratic governor threw a hissy fit on Monday directed at the FDA for not approving third-dose booster shots for all, then essentially winked and told everyone we have enough for everyone. He doesn't care that this will kill people.
2. Figure out ways to count less. And that is what we see here in this tweet from the CDC. While the logic in the tweet is sound, this has been known for over 100 years -- Yet, they never messaged this before or during the south's wave. Suddenly though, scrambling for ideas to protect the north (politically), they remembered that if you've recently recovered from the infection from a respiratory virus, there is virtually no way you can get the same infection within the next few months. It's very common for those who have a known infection to go get tested once they feel better because they want to see a negative test result for themselves. And given the sensitivity of our PCR tests, it's common for the test to report back positive even after the infection is cleared. So, it's not uncommon for one single infection to get counted as four cases. This didn't bother the CDC during the south's summer wave, but suddenly of course they had a "come to Jesus" moment on this and are messaging that there's no need to get tested in the months after recovering. Less residual positives will make the comparison between the south's and the north's case waves even less apples-to-apples (in favor of the north).
The way the left has turned this mess into one massive political football game for their own benefit, at the expense of so many innocent lives, has been one truly despicable spectacle to watch. The only good thing is that it has backfired on them - but since they keep doubling down, more innocent people keep keep paying the price for their politics.
