Posted on 07/02/2020 12:47:12 PM PDT by Red Badger
In a recent interview, Dr. John Ioannidis had a harsh assessment of modelers who predicted as many as 40 million people would die and the US healthcare system would be overrun because of COVID-19.
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Dr. John Ioannidis became a world-leading scientist by exposing bad science. But the COVID-19 pandemic could prove to be his biggest challenge yet.
Ioannidis, the C.F. Rehnborg Chair in Disease Prevention at Stanford University, has come under fire in recent months for his opposition to state-ordered lockdowns, which he says could cause social harms well beyond their presumed benefits. But he doesn’t appear to be backing down.
In a wide-ranging interview with Greek Reporter published over the weekend, Ioannidis said emerging data support his prediction that lockdowns would have wide-ranging social consequences and that the mathematical models on which the lockdowns were based were horribly flawed.
Ioannidis also said a comprehensive review of the medical literature suggests that COVID-19 is far more widespread than most people realize.
“There are already more than 50 studies that have presented results on how many people in different countries and locations have developed antibodies to the virus,” Ioannidis, a Greek-American physician, told Greek Reporter. “Of course none of these studies are perfect, but cumulatively they provide useful composite evidence. A very crude estimate might suggest that about 150-300 million or more people have already been infected around the world, far more than the 10 million documented cases.”
Ioannidis said medical data suggest the fatality risk is far lower than earlier estimates had led policymakers to believe and “is almost 0%” for individuals under 45 years old. The median fatality rate is roughly 0.25 percent, however, because the risk “escalates substantially” for individuals over 85 and can be as high as 25 percent for debilitated people in nursing homes.
“The death rate in a given country depends a lot on the age-structure, who are the people infected, and how they are managed,” Ioannidis said. “For people younger than 45, the infection fatality rate is almost 0%. For 45 to 70, it is probably about 0.05-0.3%. For those above 70, it escalates substantially…”
Because of this, Ioannidis sees mass lockdowns of entire populations as a mistake, though he says they may have made sense when experts believed the fatality rate of COVID-19 was as high as 3-5 percent.
In March, in a widely read STAT article, Ioannidis said it was uncertain how long lockdowns could be maintained without serious consequences.
“One of the bottom lines is that we don’t know how long social distancing measures and lockdowns can be maintained without major consequences to the economy, society, and mental health,” Ioannidis wrote. "Unpredictable evolutions may ensue, including financial crisis, unrest, civil strife, war, and a meltdown of the social fabric.”
Nearly three months after that interview, the world has seen unemployment levels unseen since the Great Depression, mass business closures, spikes in suicide and drug overdose, and social unrest on a scale not seen in the US since the 1960s.
“I feel extremely sad that my predictions were verified,” Ioannidis said. He continued:
“Major consequences on the economy, society and mental health” have already occurred. I hope they are reversible, and this depends to a large extent on whether we can avoid prolonging the draconian lockdowns and manage to deal with COVID-19 in a smart, precision-risk targeted approach, rather than blindly shutting down everything. Similarly, we have already started to see the consequences of “financial crisis, unrest, and civil strife.” I hope it is not followed by “war and meltdown of the social fabric.” Globally, the lockdown measures have increased the number of people at risk of starvation to 1.1 billion, and they are putting at risk millions of lives, with the potential resurgence of tuberculosis, childhood diseases like measles where vaccination programs are disrupted, and malaria. I hope that policymakers look at the big picture of all the potential problems and not only on the very important, but relatively thin slice of evidence that is COVID-19.”
Ioannidis did not spare modelers who predicted as many as 40 million people would die, or those who claimed the US healthcare system would be overrun.
“The predictions of most mathematical models in terms of how many beds and how many ICU beds would be required were astronomically wrong,” Ioannidis said. “Indeed, the health system was not overrun in any location in the USA, although several hospitals were stressed.”
Conversely, he added, these actions had detrimental effects on the US health care system, which was “severely damaged” because of measures taken.
Only time will tell if Ioannidis is proven correct in his assessments. But if he’s even half right, it would suggest that the experts did indeed fail again.
There’s little question that the lockdowns have caused widespread economic, social, and emotional carnage. Evidence that US states that locked down fared better than states that did not is hard to find.
Though not yet certain, the COVID-19 pandemic may well turn out to be another example of central planning gone wrong.
As I previously noted, it’s a sad irony that many of the greatest disasters in modern history—from Stalin’s "kolkhoz" collective farming system to Mao’s Great Leap Forward and beyond—are the result of central planners trying to improve the lot of humanity through coercive action.
During the coronavirus pandemic, experts may have unintentionally brought about one of the most serious human disasters in modern history by removing choice from individuals with superior local knowledge.
“This is not a dispute about whether planning is to be done or not,” Hayek wrote in The Use of Knowledge in Society. “It is a dispute as to whether planning is to be done centrally, by one authority for the whole economic system, or is to be divided among many individuals.”
“...the COVID-19 pandemic [will] turn out to be another example of central planning gone wrong.”
Fixed! :)
But, by all means, keep voting for the Central Planners! (Socialist Democrat Party Members)
*Rolleyes*
The lock-down is also responsible for the spread, making people stay confined with others who may have the virus and not know it.
But the climate models aren’t wrong, and don’t you dare say that they might be!
Models are always wrong. That’s why they’re called models.
I would say he at least went four for five, so it wasn't unpredictable at all. And the jury is still out on war.
This physicist makes comments about the Covid models, comparing them with flat-Earther’s view of the world. The model gives you what you are looking for rather than making a prediction you can test. In other words, it is not “scientific.” She makes a good case. (And you’ll learn about quantum measurement which is the real thrust of her talk. She is excellent.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plktON9yAGs
I’m guessing the controllers will try to shut this guy down, discredit him, ruin him. Happens every time. Even when someone tried to tell folks the world was not flat.
Yeah. Gee, let’s see...the Dallas County “Judge” (big word for county supervisor) stood up and predicted something like 1M deaths in Dallas county alone if he didn’t lock down. Had a nice well meaning Chinese Doc doing pantomime along with him. Real gong show.
They were completely, utterly, and totally WRONG.
Like orders of magnitude wrong. Like predicting the death count for their COUNTY being higher then what the current NATIONAL total is.
But hey, you can get through law school being innumerate. It’s an asset there.
nonsense...those were planned and ready to go.
Closing down college campuses and sending healthy 20 year olds home to share it with Grandma definitely was the wrong call.
bttt
It's an even bigger asset when you're the 'Rat Party's presidential candidate!
They were not wrong, they used the virus for political purposes and it worked, so they are back to doing it again.
Gotta go with what works...................
The models did not reflect how contagious COVID-19 would turn out to be. How could they do that? Some people never had their infection recorded when they stayed home and fought the infection themselves. Some states fudged the numbers for whatever motivation they had for it. Models did not predict how people would behave in the mitigation efforts. Stubborn, self-centered people caused the contagion to advance. Just as the cases began to drop, the George Floyd demonstrations began, causing to cases to spike up. Those same stubborn, self-centered people, in their refusal to wear masks, will keep the contagion advancing. This will, of course, all be blamed on President Trump and jeopardize his reelection.
bkmk
I think the cadres that instigated the riots had a plan, but it was a plan to take advantage of the opportunity presented by the lockdowns. I don’t think that plan was made before the lockdowns, nor would they have been successful without the lockdowns. There’s no way they could have gotten nearly as many dupes to go along with it without the social disruption and economic damage caused by the lockdowns.
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