Pennsylvania Ping!
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Posted on 09/03/2020 5:48:13 PM PDT by lightman
Dr. Deborah Birx said nothing of any need to “reopen” restaurants or bars or anything else in Pennsylvania sooner. She wasn’t ambiguous about face masks — she wore one herself during her appearance near Harrisburg and stressed the need for children to wear them.
Rather, Birx, the coronavirus response coordinator for President Donald Trump, had much praise for Pennsylvania’s response to the pandemic. That includes restrictions on bars, restaurants and gatherings initially made in response to an early-summer COVID-19 spike in the Pittsburgh region.
“I never give anyone an A, but I think they’re close to a B-plus, A-minus range, a really terrific job,” she said.
She further expressed approval for the statewide restrictions placed on restaurants and bars by Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration in response to rising cases, and which remain in place.
Asked what science there is to support them, Birx said she worked with about two dozen models and embraced one which stated that if restaurants were limited to 25% of capacity, bars were closed, everyone used face masks in public, and there were no backyard barbecues, the level of infections would shrink rather than grow. Those tactics, she said, would have the same impact as a shelter in place order.
Birx said they have been used successfully to control surges all across the southern United States and provide a way to control the virus without shutting down the economy.
“You have to have a way forward that brings common sense, practical pieces together in a way that the American people can follow,” she said.
Birx on Thursday met with officials including Wolf at the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency headquarters outside Harrisburg.
It was a homecoming for Birx, 64. She grew up in the Lancaster and Carlisle areas, spending her last year of high school at Carlisle High School. In 1973 she was grand champion of the Capital Area Science and Engineering Fair. She got her medical degree from Penn State College of Medicine in Dauphin County.
She noted her parents still live in Cumberland County. However, Birx said she wouldn’t be visiting them because her recent travels put her at risk of COVID-19 exposure and she didn’t want to risk exposing her parents, in their 90s.
Birx also delivered a general warning for Pennsylvania, telling people to be careful over the Labor Day weekend and to wear face masks even at neighborhood gatherings.
“Please don’t have parties where people do not have masks on. Just because they are a neighbor doesn’t mean they couldn’t be infected,” she said.
She urged college students who may have been exposed not to come home over the holiday; otherwise they risk exposing parents and grandparents, she said.
Birx said, “Children need to wear masks, just like adults need to wear a mask, and they need to socially distance.”
Birx was asked about the timetable for a coronavirus vaccine and whether one might be available before the presidential election on Nov. 3. There’s concern political pressure could result in a vaccine being released before it’s fully tested and proven safe.
The Trump administration has asked states to be ready with plans to distribute the vaccine. However, Pennsylvania Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine said earlier Thursday she is against distributing a vaccine that hasn’t completed a Phase 3 trial, which confirms the safety and effectiveness of a drug.
Birx said two vaccines are being tested in large groups of Americans, with some of them reaching the point they would develop immunity by mid-September. Then they would be ready to test whether the vaccine works. However, a big variable centers on the prevalence of COVID-19 in their community, since exposure is needed to know if the vaccine works. Birx, who noted COVID-19 cases have been declining, said that variable makes it impossible to say when a vaccine might be proven effective.
However, she said the determination will be made “by an independent board that’s not part of the federal government.”
aka masks4all
Pennsylvania Ping!
Please ping me with articles of interest.
FReepmail me to be added to the list
Maybe she and Rachel the tranny can share scarves.
Her ass needs to be fired on Nov 4th with thousands of other leftist swamp creatures.
Where is her randomized, double blind study especially wrt CV-2???
Science? She has no Science.
Brix not so much as Fauci but enough.
A day of reckoning is coming and history will not be kind to these passive aggressive monkey wrenchers. They will be held accountable. Can't understand how she could be so stupid because it's looking like the Pennsylvania Covid response was anything but praiseworthy and the truth is coming out.
Even the head of the CDC sees the handwriting on the wall and is smart enough to try to get on the right side of history while he can.
“I never give anyone an A, but I think they’re close to a B-plus, A-minus range, a really terrific job,” she said.
The never satisfied/nothing-is-ever-good-enough type.
The number of cases, the infection rate...she will NEVER be willing to say "back to normal".
I’m not sure about that.
I started out trusting these people, as I’m sure many people did. I’ve reached the point of distrusting Fauci; his obvious ego, and what appear to possibly be ulterior motives - not to mention his willingness to change his advice with the wind, and not even follow it himself - have soured me on him.
I’m not sure about Birx, yet. She seems to put too much reliance upon ‘models’ - and she herself has stated that ‘models are models’, and don’t actually represent the on-the-ground data.
But scientists do that all the time. They’re trained that way, and most suffer under some level of ‘tunnel-vision’.
(I think we’ve seen many ‘models’ of the upcoming election, and none of us believe any of those - after all, they worked so ‘well’ the last time...)
‘Birx, the coronavirus response coordinator for President Donald Trump’
great choice, Mr. President...
Birx and Dr. “Rachel” Levine should team up. I’m sure the public in flyover country would enjoy comparing their outfits and hairstyles.
How about right now.
I realize that DJT “inherited” Birx and FauXi; nevertheless that is where my support wavers...and it wavers a bit on his inability to rein in crazed Commie Governors like Tommie.
But I understand the 10th Amendment...and there is no alternative.
GO TRUMP!
I actually heard one of the Dem Biden radio ads with a soundbite of Birx in it. Reprehensible. Another slimy traitor like little Fauci.
“Asked what science there is to support them, Birx said she worked with about two dozen models and embraced one....”
I would have embraced them all
Baloney!.....I live in PA and they’ve been calling it wrong here since this began!!!
Baloney!.....I live in PA and they’ve been calling it wrong here since this began!!!
Baloney!.....I live in PA and they’ve been calling it wrong here since this began!!!
Roger that!
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3880715/posts
The Nursing Home investigation will bring down several obnoxious state mis-Governors.
In Pennsylvania I expect that Health Secretary Dr. “Rachel” Levine will be the fall GUY.
“Guy” because that she/he/it still has a Y chromosome despite a DIY dickectomy. PM me for details.
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