Libertarian

The Unbiased Texas COVID-19 Tracker: October 22, 2020

Posted on by Dave Cox

This Week’s Update for Texas:

To reset things for anyone who is new to reading this, the chart above is something that I created months ago and I update it weekly. I work with statistics in my profession on a daily basis and saw the need to track numbers that are not being presented in the media or government in any kind of unbiased fashion. While I always include my own commentary below, I urge you to take a look and reach your own conclusions.

I am particularly frustrated today, so the commentary is probably going to be more blunt than usual. My frustration was spiked by watching the local news in Dallas last night and this morning (and every morning, so this has been building). I bet 40% of the entire newscast was about the positivity rate increasing, subtle jabs at the bars that have been able to re-open, and warnings of spikes in hospitalizations. It is sensationalism, plain and simple, just as much of this has been for months. Then, there’s the little asides from the local news anchors that add to the panic. I’m fed up with it. Hospitalizations have increased a little in the last week or so. Fine. There is a somewhat arbitrary number of keeping hospitalizations below 15% for this issue. We are currently at about half of that, plus surge capacity is significantly higher. Back in MARCH, we were told to hunker down to “flatten the curve.” That curve flattening was to allow for hospitals to prepare, for therapeutics to be investigated and introduced, equipment to be mobilized, etc.. All of that happened very successfully, yet we’re still here in mid-October, panicking about blips on the chart.

That leads me to this week’s questions to ponder. This time, however, I am writing it as an FAQ section. Feel free to chime in.

1. If we just hide for the next week/month/year/decade, won’t the virus just go away? No, it won’t. That’s not how viruses work and you know that.

2. If we can’t just hide from it, and the curve flattening was successful, why are we still crippling big chunks of our economy and our passions, such as bars, music venues, sporting events, and even family gatherings in some places? EXACTLY.

3. The survival rate per population is 99.942% and even higher among younger and healthier folks, can’t we just take great precautions to protect the most vulnerable, such as older people and those with high risk comorbidities? Absolutely. I am not advocating for putting high risk individuals in danger. I am suggesting that the vast majority of us are able to go about our business with minimal risk. Let’s target any relief funds and programs to those at the highest risk so we can get back to our lives and livelihoods.

4. What about the vaccine? Shouldn’t we just wait for that? Short answer: No. Longer answer: How has that worked out for the flu? There’s likely a very good reason that nobody has ever developed a coronavirus (general term) vaccine. These things morph, change and adapt. A vaccine might help down the road, but if you’re waiting for a vaccine to make you feel 100% safe, you’re going to be very disappointed.

5. What about long term medical issues that might be caused by this that we’re not fully aware of yet? See: Answer to #1. Exercise, get some sun, don’t eat fast food 7 times a week, take vitamins (especially zinc, Vitamin D and Vitamin C). Get yourself as far away from being a high risk individual as possible.

6. Shouldn’t we just listen to the experts and do whatever they say? No. Which experts? Virologists look at this strictly from a medical standpoint. Their vision is extremely narrow because that’s their job. This is much more complex. As our society feels the incredible strain of being shut down for almost 8 months, we also must include experts in psychology, economics, sociology, etc., in order to look at this holistically. For example, if we keep everyone home to hide from the virus, but the suicide rate skyrockets, and the domestic violence rate increases, and more people are forced onto social services due to being out of work, what is the net gain from the lockdowns? We’re just playing a shell game with the numbers by moving them into a different column. Don’t accept any kind of “new normal” without being fully informed. Real information reduces anxiety created by fear of the unknown.

I’ll leave you with this:

The best way to fight this virus is by gathering accurate information and making decisions based on facts – not feelings. When done correctly, that is an active process. Sitting back and waiting for CNN, Fox, or any other media outlet to tell you what to think is lazy. Research from as many sources as possible. Read studies that you disagree with, look at how it is being handled in different places. Would you take on any other major life issue by waiting for someone to tell you what you should think or would you try to become as informed as possible? Sadly, this issue seems to have fallen into a couple of different echo chambers and folks are only listening to what confirms their pre-existing bias. That’s not research. That’s irresponsible.

And, as always, don’t be a dick.

The Unbiased Texas COVID-19 Tracker: October 7, 2020

Posted on by Dave Cox

It’s that time of the week again, where tens of people review my latest Texas update. If you saw last week’s update, the big theme was that things were flattening out pretty dramatically. That trend is definitely continuing this week in every key category. The Positivity Rate (Total) dropped again. This marks 7 consecutive weeks where this has dropped, which is excellent news. It has dropped almost a full percentage point just in the last week. Another important aspect of this is that this was a particularly bad week in terms of backlog dumping by the state. More than 20 counties dumped significantly late positive results amounting to over 1,000 cases that didn’t actually happen in the last week. The quickest visual indicators in this chart are the 3 rows that shoe the per 100K numbers for Total, >65, and <65. They flattened significantly last week and even more this week. The 7-Day change in the Total category is almost half of what it was last week, the >65 category is changed by 70% less than the prior week and the <65 change remains very flat again.


So, what does all of this mean? Week to week comparisons are a great way to see how we’re trending in real time. What did the 7-Day Changes look like back on August 25 when things were still peaking?

  • Positivity Rate 7-Day Change was more than 200% higher on 8/25
  • Deaths (total) 7-Day Change was almost 500% higher on 8/25
  • Deaths (>65) 7-Day Change was more than 500% higher on 8/25
  • Deaths (<65) 7-Day Change was nearly 400% higher on 8/25
  • Check this one out: The positive rate for people tested was 14.213% on 8/25 and it’s 5.747% this week. Think about that for a second. This is the positive rate for people being tested. So today, 94.253% of the people BEING TESTED are coming back negative. Most people are being tested because they are symptomatic or were in contact with someone who was sick and STILL 94.253% of those people test negative.

Another note: The 2019-20 Flu Report just came out so that column is now complete. The survival rate if you got the flu in the 2019-20 season was 99.962%. The survival rate for this disease is currently 99.946%.

As always, interpret any of this however you choose. My opinion, based on the data, is that it is time to responsibly move on from this. We need to continue to protect the people in high risk categories AND people who are high risk or still concerned need to make the right decisions for themselves and their families. Treatments are significantly better now and there are several very successful options. We’re not throwing everyone on a ventilator anymore and very few people need hospitalization at all. This is really the most important piece of the puzzle. Remember back in March and April, the constant theme was “flatten the curve”? The reason for that was to ensure that hospitals weren’t overwhelmed and to allow time to develop treatments. We’ve done all of that very successfully and the stats support that quite clearly. It wasn’t intended to make us hide from a virus until it went away because that’s simply not possible. Now folks are already warning about a “spike” in the winter and there probably will be. Just looks at flu season – it’s consistently worse in cold climates and in the winter. Colds? Same thing and this is a version of a cold. So, even if things spike in the coming months, the truths remain – we have a much better understanding of treatment and even prevention, there are additional treatments reaching the end of their Stage 3 Clinical trials, and multiple vaccines are nearing completion of there Stage 3 Clinical Trials (if you’re planning on going that route). With the flu season, we have Tamaflu and an entire pharmacy aisle of symptom treatments. For most people, that’s what this is about as well – managing the symptoms.

A while back, I think I said something about trying to keep these updates as neutral as possible so each person can decide for themselves. I still feel that way to a degree, because it’s important for people to reach their own conclusions without bias. That being said, in future updates, you might wanna skip the last paragraph if you don’t want my opinion about it.

And, as always, don’t be a dick.

Health Care and Free Markets

Posted on by Dave Cox

I was reading an article earlier about health care in the USA as compared to single payer health care in Canada. The gist of the article was that single payer is ineffective in Canada as evidenced by long waitlists for procedures, high taxes and 65,000 people a year coming to the USA for surgeries. In the comments section, several Canadians said that there are rarely wait times for necessary surgeries (Who decides what is necessary? That's a different rant altogether). In their experience, everyone they knew that came to the USA for surgery came for elective surgeries because the surgeons in Canada were slammed with "necessary" surgeries, thus no time for profit generating elective procedures.

Here's my takeaway from that:
1. The Canadian system is flawed for a multitude of reasons, including; single payer essentially conscripts medical practitioners by forcing them to provide a service, it's expensive (via taxes), and providers are too overloaded with mandatory work to perform elective procedures.
This is socialism. Socialism doesn't work.

2. The USA system is flawed for a multitude of reasons. Currently, government meddling has made the structure so incredibly convoluted that it is unaffordable for many many people. Another major issue is the insurance lobby. Let's face it, insurance companies have been able to buy favorable legislation for a very long time. This is corporatism. Corporatism doesn't work.

Analysis
So, in a socialist single payer system, physicians are overburdened with mandatory surgeries and don't have time for elective procedures. In a hybrid system that contains some socialist elements along with rampant corporatism, premium costs and actual procedure/facility costs are completely out of control.

The one system that seems to work the most effectively is elective surgeries in the USA. Why? Because the government doesn't have their hands in it (for the most part) and insurance companies aren't involved at all. You also know all of your costs up front through a menu of set fees. That way you can shop for the pricing and quality that you want. It's the closest to an actual market economy out of the whole bunch.

End corporatism.
End socialism.

A free market serves its customers every time.

Clearing the Air

Posted on by Dave Cox

There are probably 4 or 5 “flavors” of Democrats (or left leaning folks, in general). You have moderates, socialists, “democratic socialists” (not gonna lie, that term gives me a headache), old school Southern Democrats, Wall Street Democrats, and so on. I doubt a moderate Democrat would be too stoked about being called a Marxist or a socialist, right? 

Well, I’m a Republican. I’m not a corporatist Republican nor a religious right Republican nor a Tea Party Republican (whatever that means now) nor a Wall Street Republican. I’m a libertarian leaning Republican. I believe that every individual has the right to pursue their own happiness, whether they are straight, gay, green, blue or purple. I believe that the government needs to leave people alone from a social standpoint, spend as little of our money as possible (and as defined by the Constitution), and stay out of the business of using religion to drive public policy. Believe it or not, most of the younger Republicans I run into feel the same way. Before you say that makes me a Libertarian (with a capital L), it doesn’t. The reality of this country is that we currently have the best chance of advancing an ideology within one of the two major parties. I think my energy is best spent advancing liberty in a similar manner as Rand Paul and the rest of the liberty caucus Republicans. I don’t even align 100% with those guys. I probably don’t align 100% with ANYONE and that’s okay. Note: I was a dues paying Libertarian for almost a year until I realized that’s an entirely different can of worms and it’s not for me. Power to the folks who fight that fight, though. 

The GOP is a hot mess right now. To be fair, the Democrat Party is almost an equal sized dumpster fire, too. That doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed. The old guard needs to go and that’s going to take a long time. We need to survive the Trump Administration and start putting more libertarian minded Republicans in office. This will be a long and slow process, but our government is designed to move slowly in order to avoid the whims of the masses. 

I see all this shit talking and friendships being torn apart because of political affiliation and it’s, quite frankly, stupid. Hell, if I avoided everyone with different views than my own, I’d have an extremely short list of Christmas cards to send out. And if I shunned all the bands that didn’t align with my political beliefs, I’d probably be stuck listening to Nashville country and Michale Graves. I prefer to think that I’m adult enough to hear something I disagree with, process it, and file it away without having a toddler sized tantrum.  

So, with all of that , I’m not going to hide my opinions and I’m not going to be vague about my affiliations any longer, simply because of the mess that the GOP is in right now. I wouldn’t expect you to hide because the Democrat Party is woefully out of touch, arrogant and fractured, either. 
So next time you get all high and mighty about people you “hate” – remember that it’s probably a guy you’ve played in a band with, or watched perform on stage, or turned wrenches with on a hot rod, or stood beside at a punk rock show (and, years ago, crashed into in a pit) or just had a beer with and talked about nothing and laughed a little bit.

So, you can hate and purge your social media accounts all day and that’s perfectly fine with me. I’m gonna have a beer, hang out with my wife, work on my hot rod, and lose what’s left of my hearing at a punk rock show. You might even see me letting my freak flag fly. If you do, feel free to wave yours, too, even if it looks different than mine.