Fauci: I’ve been lying to you about herd immunity

[mystery-ak]

Fauci: I’ve been lying to you about herd immunity

Allahpundit Posted at 11:26 am on December 24, 2020

I can’t remember the last time I heard a public official, especially a highly influential public official, admit to deceiving the public.

No, wait. Now that I think about it, I do remember.

It was … Anthony Fauci, back in June, admitting that Americans were deliberately given bum advice about masks early on in order to preserve the extant supply for medical professionals.

    So, why weren’t we told to wear masks in the beginning?

    “Well, the reason for that is that we were concerned the public health community, and many people were saying this, were concerned that it was at a time when personal protective equipment, including the N95 masks and the surgical masks, were in very short supply. And we wanted to make sure that the people namely, the health care workers, who were brave enough to put themselves in a harm way, to take care of people who you know were infected with the coronavirus and the danger of them getting infected.”

Recently the Times noticed that his estimate of how much of the population will need to be vaccinated before herd immunity sets in has begun to shift. Early on he said it’d be 60-70 percent. Lately he’s been saying “75, 80, 85 percent” or “75 to 80-plus percent.” Was he just being sloppy before or had something in the science changed since his initial estimate?

There’s been some new data, Fauci said. But also, he’s been lying all along:

    In a telephone interview the next day, Dr. Fauci acknowledged that he had slowly but deliberately been moving the goal posts. He is doing so, he said, partly based on new science, and partly on his gut feeling that the country is finally ready to hear what he really thinks.

    Hard as it may be to hear, he said, he believes that it may take close to 90 percent immunity to bring the virus to a halt — almost as much as is needed to stop a measles outbreak…

    “When polls said only about half of all Americans would take a vaccine, I was saying herd immunity would take 70 to 75 percent,” Dr. Fauci said. “Then, when newer surveys said 60 percent or more would take it, I thought, ‘I can nudge this up a bit,’ so I went to 80, 85.”

more
https://hotair.com/archives/allahpundit/2020/12/24/fauci-ive-lying-herd-immunity/

[rustynail]

It is illegal to say what I am thinking.

[mountaineer]

he believes that it may take close to 90 percent immunity to bring the virus to a halt

The virus will come to a halt by itself, long before that happens. It's just another flu virus. See, e.g., swine flu, Asian flu, avian flu. By the time we're all immune to C-19, we'll be on C-34. And we really don't need to be immune to it, anyway. Did this guy really go to medical school?

[XenaLee]

Gee... he has been lying to us about pretty much everything.   Funny that some folks still believe what this putz has to say.

[GtHawk]

It is illegal to say what I am thinking.

It's illegal to do to him what I'm thinking.

[catfish1957]

I suspected that 95% of his punditry during the pandemic was politically motivated.  This just addionally proves it.

[The_Reader_David]

The percentage of the population needed to attain herd immunity depends very much on how contagious the pathogen is.  Revising upward is not a sign of lying, but a response to the more contagious variants that have arisen (separately) in Britain and South Africa.  On the other hand, the percentage of the population who are immune will, at any given time, be larger than the precentage vaccinated.  Right now about 5.6% of the U.S. population has had an identified case of COVID-19 (and just shy of 1% of the population has died).  Estimates of the number of people immune already by natural transmission, would thus range from 8.3% (if the CDC's estimate of the percentage of 40% of cases going undiagnosed is correct, to 48.8% if the research suggesting 8/9 of cases go undiagnosed is correct -- due to being asymptomatic or having mild symptoms passed off as flu or a cold).  In each case my estimate is arrived at by taking the 5.6%, multiplying it by the relevant factor 5/3 or 8/9, and subtracting the fatalities.

If we assume that being naturally immune and being vaccinated are statistically independent events (a conservative assumption since we already have healthcare workers who already had COVID and recovered passing up vaccination), a 56.3% vaccination would produce a 60% immunity rate if the CDC's low estimate is correct (even ignoring the increase in natural immunity as the pandemic continues to rage), while a 22% vaccination rate would give a 60% immunity rate of the 8/9 estimate is correct. For each 10% increase in the immunity rate needed to extinguish the pandemic by herd immunity, if the CDC is correct an additional 10.9% of the population would need to be vaccinated, while if the higher estimate of already attained natural immunity is correct, an additional  19.3% of the population would need to be vaccinated -- these numbers are higher than 10% because the vaccination program will, necessarily be vaccinating the people who had natural immunity due to prior infection (whether diagnosed or not).  So, we would reach 70% immunity when 67.2% of the population vaccinated if the CDC is correct, or when 41.3% of the population is vaccinated if the 8/9 estimate is correct.

[Smokin Joe]

Either way, I won't need the shot. Thanks. Not getting it.

[mountaineer]

Fusilli Spock  @awstar11
Dr. Fauci and his media worshipers says, don't visit your elderly parents/grandparents.  Meanwhile, here's a whole bunch of people ignoring social distancing to celebrate 80 year old Dr. Fauci's birthday.
We're getting the message.
7:21 PM · Dec 24, 2020


The Hill @thehill
SURPRISE! Dr. Fauci is serenaded as he leaves work on his 80th birthday.

10:48 AM · Dec 24, 2020·

[PeteS in CA]

One of the main effects of the months-long quasi-shutdowns has been slowing of attaining herd immunity.

[jmyrlefuller]

So, basically, once again, he admits that the measures necessary to stop this virus are unattainable and impossible to achieve in the real world. So tell me again, why are we even bothering?

[Smokin Joe]

One of the main effects of the months-long quasi-shutdowns has been slowing of attaining herd immunity.

Yes, but all these cases we hear about on the nooze are simply America acquiring herd immunity, well the 99.8% or so who survive, anyway. I guess with the death rate dropping "Cases" were the causam tumultus of the day, a means to veer the herd once again.

[mystery-ak]

Dr. Fauci justifies lies, saying Americans can’t handle the truth

December 26, 2020
Dr. Fauci justifies lies, saying Americans can’t handle the truth
By Andrea Widburg

In February, President Trump projected optimism about the Wuhan virus. When he acknowledged in September that he had wanted to avert panic about the mostly unknown disease, the media accused him of trying to kill Americans – even though nothing would have changed had he panicked them. That same media now worships Fauci despite his having admitted to lying consistently to Americans about herd immunity. Why? Because he felt they couldn’t handle the truth.

You probably remember the coverage in September when Trump (God alone knows why) told Bob Woodward (an unprincipled man) that, lacking any ability to deal with the mysterious Wuhan virus back in early February, Trump made the decision to downplay the threat lest Americans panic:

more
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/12/dr_fauci_justifies_lies_saying_americans_cant_handle_the_truth.html

[Victoria33]

@Cyber Liberty
@mystery-ak

One side-effect of the vaccine is some are "getting", "having" "Bell's Palsy".  I have had that twice so I may be susceptive to having it again if I take the vaccine.  Sometimes Bell's Palsy is permanent, I don't want half my face not working, food falling out of my mouth.  If you get Bell's Palsy, there is pain until the nerve going between the two bones swells as much as it can, then the pain goes away but that side of your face does not work.  Among other reasons, and this one, I am not going to have the vaccine.

I know a nurse and she has had Bell's Palsy, and won't take the vaccine either due to the Bell's Palsy possibility.

[thackney]

@Cyber Liberty
@mystery-ak

One side-effect of the vaccine is some are "getting", "having" "Bell's Palsy".  I have had that twice so I may be susceptive to having it again if I take the vaccine.  Sometimes Bell's Palsy is permanent, I don't want half my face not working, food falling out of my mouth.  If you get Bell's Palsy, there is pain until the nerve going between the two bones swells as much as it can, then the pain goes away but that side of your face does not work.  Among other reasons, and this one, I am not going to have the vaccine.

I know a nurse and she has had Bell's Palsy, and won't take the vaccine either due to the Bell's Palsy possibility.

Importantly, the rate of Bell’s palsy in the clinical trials is lower than the overall rate in the general population, they wrote. About 35 per 100,000 people get Bell’s palsy in the U.S. each year, according to the National Organization for Rare Disorders, and about 40,000 Americans are diagnosed annually.

https://www.webmd.com/vaccines/covid-19-vaccine/news/20201217/fda-says-vaccine-recipients-should-be-monitored-for-facial-paralysis

Sounds like taking the vaccine is a way to reduce your chance of getting Bell's palsy.

[Knox27]

Importantly, the rate of Bell’s palsy in the clinical trials is lower than the overall rate in the general population, they wrote. About 35 per 100,000 people get Bell’s palsy in the U.S. each year, according to the National Organization for Rare Disorders, and about 40,000 Americans are diagnosed annually.

https://www.webmd.com/vaccines/covid-19-vaccine/news/20201217/fda-says-vaccine-recipients-should-be-monitored-for-facial-paralysis

Sounds like taking the vaccine is a way to reduce your chance of getting Bell's palsy.

Sometimes I really really really wish school systems would put more focus on logic, reading comprehension, and statistics.   I think (hope) there would be a lot less antivaxers.

[PeteS in CA]

Sometimes I really really really wish school systems would put more focus on logic, reading comprehension, and statistics.   I think (hope) there would be a lot less antivaxers.

In ConspiracyTheoryLand facts and logic are part of the conspiracy and one factual response to an unsupported false claim leads deeper into the rabbit hole that is ConspiracyTheoryLand.

[Hoodat]

Sometimes I really really really wish school systems would put more focus on logic, reading comprehension, and statistics.   I think (hope) there would be a lot less antivaxers.

Sometimes, I really really really wish governments would put more focus on individual liberty.  I would hope that anti-antivaxers would mind their own business and stop trying to impose their will on others.

No one is stopping you from getting a vaccine.

[Knox27]

Sometimes, I really really really wish governments would put more focus on individual liberty.  I would hope that anti-antivaxers would mind their own business and stop trying to impose their will on others.

No one is stopping you from getting a vaccine.

The problem people have with antivaxers is not that they stop others from getting the vaccine.  Its that they cause a burden on the Healthcare system with their unnecessarily sick children, but mostly that immunocompromised children are at a risk because their classmates are now potential carriers.

[Hoodat]

The problem people have with antivaxers is not that they stop others from getting the vaccine.  Its that they cause a burden on the Healthcare system with their unnecessarily sick children, but mostly that immunocompromised children are at a risk because their classmates are now potential carriers.

You wrongly assume that antivaxers are irresponsible leeches that refuse to pay their own health care costs.  You also wrongly assume that unvaccinated persons are a threat to those who have already been vaccinated.  For someone professing to be a champion for personal liberty, you sure come across as a complete hypocrite.

[mountaineer]

they cause a burden on the Healthcare system with their unnecessarily sick children

I trust you can support this allegation with evidence.

[Knox27]

I trust you can support this allegation with evidence.

https://www.ajmc.com/view/assessing-the-cost-of-vaccinepreventable-diseases

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanchi/article/PIIS2352-4642(19)30092-6/fulltext

The first article is...well you can tell by the name.  The second article just gives numbers showing how there is indeed a decrease in vaccinations of children.  Here and abroad.

To be fair, the first article does not specifically talk about the costs of children (< 18 y/o) but I think any reasonable person can understand that when a kid gets the measles, or rubella, or anything easily preventable, it costs serious money.  And very few people think its entirely paid for by mom and dad.

So my argument is that if you want your child interacting with other children, and you want to be able to walk into any hospital and get life-saving treatment, I think there is an absolute obligation to vaccinate.

[Knox27]

You wrongly assume that antivaxers are irresponsible leeches that refuse to pay their own health care costs.  You also wrongly assume that unvaccinated persons are a threat to those who have already been vaccinated.  For someone professing to be a champion for personal liberty, you sure come across as a complete hypocrite.

I made very sure to state that unvaccinated person are a threat to immunocompromised folks.  Those that cannot get a vaccine, or those whose immune system cannot produce antibodies from a vaccine.  And frankly to just anyone not vaccinated, for whatever reason.

I have never professed to be a champion for anything, I've merely stated my somewhat informed opinions about various things.