Why Did a California County Just Reduce Its COVID Death Toll by 25%?
Welcome to Insanity Wrap, your daily dose of the best of the worst. How many really died from COVID? is todays big crazy. Before we get to the sordid details, a quick preview of todays Wrap. Steely Dan was prophetic  CNNs Brian Stelter asks Jen Psaki how he could serve as a better toady  You can get those Fauci emails on your Kindle  for now  And so much more. This Is Not a Sane World, Exhibit #1,000,006  Brian Stelter to @PressSec: "What does the press get wrong when covering Biden's agenda What do you think we get wrong?" pic.twitter.com/h44JCb6WZB  Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) June 6, 2021  Journalism.  Insanity Wrap started our first Bloody Mary early this morning. Just kidding. We sure did finish it in record time, though. Bidens 70s Show  Insanity Wrap is old enough to remember when crime exploded in the 70s. It was so bad that it would take 20 years to start bringing rates down again. But at least the last time around, you could generally depend on the police to show up when called. It wasnt policy back then for the police to shrug their shoulders at little things like theft and trespassing. But that is exactly the policy now in at least one city:  The police department in one of Americas fastest-growing cities is facing staff shortages so severe that it will not respond to certain 911 calls, including complaints of burglaries, theft, property damage, identity theft, or trespassing. The Asheville, North Carolina Police Department said that it has lost 84 officers since January 1, 2020. APD Police Chief David Zack says the attrition rate, which has accelerated since protests against law enforcement became widespread in the wake of George Floyds death in May of last year, has reached crisis proportions. Insanity Wraps initial thought was that, just like the 70s, things are going to get worse before they get better. But then we thought of Steely Dans Blues Beach, (embedded above) and one particular line from the song. Previously On Insanity Wrap: The Paranoid Were Right All Along About Fauci (And More)  The Craziest Person in the World (Today)  The Amazon driver told the elderly woman to check her white privilege and she said no, so she beat her up. Nope. Nobody is that crazy, so todays craziest person is nobody. The problem is that for the progressive Left, violent hatred is a feature rather than a bug. The old woman in the video is just one of those eggs in need of breaking. Or as Insanity Wrap likes to remind people about socialism: 100 million broken eggs, yet not a single omelet. Your Daily Dose of Mostly Peaceful Protest  For the third or maybe fourth time ever, Insanity Wrap is pleased to present a totally peaceful protest. You can join in yourself, gentle reader. All of celebrity medical spokesmodel Anthony Doctor Faucis FOIA emails can be yours (on Kindle) for the low, low price of just $2.99. We just bought a copy, but you might want to act sooner rather than later. Amazon has already flagged the ebook with Item Under Review, so Insanity Wrap figures theyll pull it just as soon as they realize what it is. CORRECTION: We had thought wed bought the book, but no.  it will be. And Now For a Brief Moment of Sanity  I wasn't aware how much I needed to see people gathered together and having fun until I saw a crow of people hanging around the Toyota Music Center in Dallas this weekend to watch live music. I couldn't get over how nice it felt and wanted to join in. Another Damn Thing We Have to Be Concerned About  Insanity Wrap thought wed gone genuinely crazy last year, when we found ourselves having to explain the difference between died from COVID and died with COVID.  Died from meant the victim died from a particularly nasty respiratory bug that compelling evidence indicates escaped (or was released) from (after having been enhanced by) the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Communist China. Died with meant you could have died from anything  up to and including getting in a motorcycle crash  while having a Wuhan infection of any severity, even asymptomatic. Statistically, in most places, both from and with were counted as COVID fatalities, due in large part to financial incentives from Uncle Sugar. We all knew about this a year ago, but what no one could know was what the percentage was of with to from.  It might have been high. As high as 25%:  The change is a result of Alameda Countys alignment with state guidelines, the county news release on June 4 stated. It said that the county previously included in its total virus toll any person who was positive for COVID-19 at the time of their death. This broader system was implemented prior to the states implementation of guidelines for reporting COVID-19 deaths. Now, it will only include those who died as a direct result of COVID-19, with COVID-19 as a contributing cause of death, or in whom death caused by COVID-19 could not be ruled out, as per the state guidelines. Reading that last bit again, Insanity Wrap realizes that the false-positive figure could be even higher than 25%. The real tell for the severity of the pandemic is the excess mortality rate for 2020 (it was high, 384,000) and 2021 (well know in early 2022). But even that 384k figure is a bit misleading. Well never know how many of those excess deaths were actually due to the Wuhan Flu, and how many were due to our hamfisted response to it. People died because they couldnt get treatment for other conditions. People died because they were too frightened to go to the ER. People died because they turned to drugs during the lockdown. People died because they just gave up and killed themselves. But even if we knew that ghastly total, the excess deaths figure would still be misleading. The typical died from Wuhan victim had an average of 2.4 comorbidities and/or was quite elderly. What that means is that in 2022 and maybe even 2023-24, we might enjoy a mortality deficit. That is, fewer people will die than expected. Wuhan Flu is a picky eater, and it almost exclusively kills people who, if Insanity Wrap could be morbidly frank about it, were going to have their number come up in the next year or three, regardless. It isnt at all like the Spanish Flu of 1918 that killed mostly young adults in the prime of life, and whose early deaths wouldnt show up as a deficit for decades. So while we will never know how many people actually died of the Wuhan Flu, there is one thing we can say for certain: Our response to it at the state level in Democrat-run places like California, New York, and Michigan was politically motivated, economically ruinous, authoritarian, and murderous. Insanity Wrap made a third Bloody Mary while writing this section and wholeheartedly recommends you do the same. Yes, even if you are at work. One More Thing  Thats a Wrap for today. Come back tomorrow for another Insanity Wrap  assuming we make it that long.