Getting back to normal and the leadership needed for it

After more than two weeks, we know much more about Omicron. It is still preliminary and nothing definitive can be said, but what we know is largely encouraging. This piece here gives a good summary of it.

It looks like it spreads much faster than Delta, which is bad news. The good news is it is less severe, at least for those who are vaccinated (I am only counting those who are boosted here) or have had prior infections and gotten two shots. Of the major cases outside of South Africa where people who were vaccinated tested positive, none of them have died or even been that sick. Most had no symptoms or cold-like symptoms at worst.

This is to say that unless someone is very old and frail or unvaccinated, they have nothing to fear. My worry is not even about Omicron. It is about crazy vaccinated people overreacting to it. New York state has just announced it is imposing a statewide mask mandate if an establishment does not require vaccination. I am 100% in favor of vaccine mandates. While businesses can theoretically impose vaccine requirements on customers, that is very hard for stores and other places where customers come and go with frequency to enforce. What this rule is likely going to mean in practice is mask mandates, which I am 100% against.

It is that reaction that has me worried. Between the inevitability of us all being breakthrough cases and this variant looking to be less problematic, those of us who are vaccinated should all hope we get this one. No, I am not saying deliberately go out and get it. What I am saying is do not change any of your plans to avoid it. We could be so lucky to have our hopefully one-time experience with the CCP Virus being just like a cold at worst.

Some inevitabilities

We have to accept some inevitable problems and risks that are going to be with us. If we want to live our normal lives again, there is no way around it. One of those risks is that we get the CCP Virus. As any reader of this blog knows, I am completely accepting of that and am not worried in the least about it. Anyone reading this should feel the same way and go on with their lives.

We have to accept that there will never be 0 cases. We will live with this virus just like we live with colds and the flu. Humanity has made it through much worse pandemics before and we will make it through this one. It would be nice if press coverage of the pandemic would stop emphasizing case numbers. Before vaccines, case numbers were important as they signaled a coming increase in hospitalizations and deaths. That is no longer true. It is hospitalizations that are the important number now and those who are vaccinated are at little to no risk of it.

One infuriating thing we will have to accept is that with a significant minority of people remaining unvaccinated, there will be times in some parts of the country where hospitals are clogged. It will inevitably put in danger those in need of hospital services for other reasons. As maddening as that is, there really is no way around it. Even in states that have done everything to get people vaccinated, there will still be more than enough unvaccinated people to cause problems. Imposing mask mandates is not going to prevent that and only serves to punish vaccinated people.

If the clogging of hospitals continues to be a problem in the years ahead, maybe they will add capacity or more will be built. Hopefully, the CCP Virus will mutate over time to become more transmissible, but less virulent. Omicron looks like it may be that way. I would happily take a virus that spreads easily, but is mild over one that is the opposite.

We have to accept the fact that there will continue to be hundreds, if not more than 1000 deaths a day for some time. It has been sad to see so many people die needlessly. May God have mercy on the souls of all those anti-vaxxers. They are the lowest forms of life. I wish they could be sent back in time before modern medicine was invented so they can see what their vision looks like.

For those of us who have done our part and gotten vaccinated, that is all we can do. It is highly unlikely any of us can sway those who are steadfast against vaccination. That is okay. It is their problem, not ours. We cannot let them dictate what we do. They have made their choice and we should not try to save them from themselves.

Another inevitability is that for us to go back to our normal lives, we have to stop treating the CCP Virus like it is something novel or different. For those of us who are vaccinated, the risks are no different from the flu or colds. For the youngest age groups, even without vaccines, it is less risky than the flu. Any time someone is thinking of not doing something out of fear of getting the CCP Virus, they should ask themselves if they would do that because of the flu or a cold. If the answer is no, then they should proceed with what they were going to do.

Our risk tolerance needs to be rational like it is for everything else we do on a daily basis. I understand taking precautions at nursing homes, where residents are still vulnerable even with vaccinations. I do not understand taking precautions at schools, where students are the least vulnerable and are much more at risk from the effects of precautions than they are from the CCP Virus. There is no justification for requiring masks in schools anymore. If a student or teacher is afraid of getting sick, they are free to wear an N95, but everyone else should not be forced to accommodate them.

The reality is we have the tools we need to live our lives again. The vaccines are absolutely amazing. Almost as good is we have antiviral drugs coming from Pfizer that reduce hospitalizations substantially. Outside of hospitals and a few other places, there is no need for wearing masks. There is definitely no need for restrictions on gatherings or distancing. We beat the CCP Virus. Now we just have to act like it.

The CDC and FDA must be stopped and Biden needs to lead

I would love nothing more than to blame the horrible response of our public health bureaucracy to the pandemic on Trump. It would be so convenient. It would validate everything I dislike about him. Best of all, since he is no longer in charge, it would mean our public health bureaucracy is great again. I wish that was so, but it is not. He made everything worse, but the fact is our public health bureaucracy was bad when he was in charge and is still bad with him gone.

The CDC and FDA have fundamentally sclerotic and rotten cultures that do not change based on who is president. They are dominated by people who live in tiny bubbles and only know people just like them. They have the lowest risk tolerance of any group of people. For the FDA, they are addicted to their precious process. It must be followed no matter what. We know how effective, for example, the Pfizer antiviral drugs are. They worked so well that Pfizer stopped the clinical trial early because it was unethical to continue it because that would make it longer before the drugs became available. Despite that, the FDA is in no rush to approve it.

The FDA has been like that from the beginning of the pandemic. They took forever to approve the vaccines and boosters when everyone knew it was going to happen. There are at-home test kits that are available in other countries that cost almost nothing. One reason for that is they have a greater supply because more kinds of tests have been authorized. Here, the FDA has not approved as many. There is a company that makes cheap test kits that is based in the US, but cannot sell their kits here because the FDA has not approved them even though they have been approved in Europe. There is no reason for any test approved there to not be approved here.

The CDC has basically screwed up everything since the pandemic began. It is an agency that is not up to the task of dealing with a pandemic. Their communications on everything from masks, to vaccines to boosters has been terrible. When the pandemic first hit, the CDC would not allow private companies to make test kits. They only allowed theirs to be used, which did not work.

It is here where Biden’s leadership has been lacking. He is making the opposite mistake of what Trump did. Trump disdained anyone with any expertise and ignored anyone with any knowledge of public health. That is a terrible approach, but the proper response is not go in the opposite direction and defer completely to that crowd. That has its own problems. Biden, for example, pushed for boosters to be authorized for everyone 18 and older in September. The CDC objected and he deferred to them. He did not have to do that. The result is that the US is well behind Europe in getting people boosted because boosters were delayed here by two months.

In the future, Biden should no longer give the CDC deference on any major pandemic issue. They have forfeited that right. That is not to say they should be disdained, but they have lost the right to be automatically deferred to. An agency that cannot even communicate effectively has no business having veto power over life and death decisions.

While Biden cannot force the FDA to authorize treatments, he can publicly hound them to do so. I wish he would pressure them in any way he can, even if that means interfering in ways that in normal times might not be encouraged. We are not in normal times. We have an emergency (albeit not for those who are vaccinated) and the FDA is acting like it is business as usual. Like the CDC, the FDA has lost the right to be deferred to. An agency that dogmatically adheres to a badly flawed process and has zero risk tolerance should not be making life or death decisions affecting the rest of us without any input from anyone else.

It would be great for Biden to call on Congress to authorize any CCP Virus treatment that has been approved in Europe or other developed countries. Remember, the FDA is purely a creation of Congress. It did not create itself nor is it constitutionally protected. It is time for a wholesale rethinking of how it balances costs and benefits. Beyond the pandemic, it would be great to have automatic authorization for any medicine that has been approved in another developed country. Anything to reduce the power of the public health bureaucracy is a win.

At the very least, Biden needs to take charge here. While many of his problems are beyond his control, he is not helpless. His problem is that things were supposed to be normal and they are not. He has to do everything he can to get us there. He cannot do that all by himself, but he can pressure the federal government to get off its ass and move. That includes getting more treatments and tests out there and ignoring the bubble-dwelling public health bureaucracy. It includes advocating for more money for pandemic prevention, which Build Back Better decidedly lacks. It includes an Operation Warp Speed for creating a universal vaccine for every coronavirus strain. It also includes ramping up manufacturing and logistics capabilities so current and future vaccines can be made and deployed quickly.

I would like for Biden to follow the lead of Jared Polis, the governor of Colorado. Colorado is a state that has done everything possible to encourage vaccination. Even though hospitals are getting clogged, he will not reinstate a mask mandate. I recommend reading this transcript of a recent interview with him.

He lays out why he will not reinstate a mask mandate very clearly. With vaccines, we have the tools we need to stay safe. Those who are sick and dying now are almost all unvaccinated and that is their own fault. While there is a very small number of people hospitalized who are vaccinated, almost all of them have underlying conditions that made them vulnerable. If he has the authority to override local mask mandates, I hope he does so. If someone wants to wear a mask, that is up to them, but it is unfair and wrong to make everyone else have to accommodate them.

Biden cannot prevent mask mandates by private businesses or by states, but he can speak out against them. If he did that, other elected officials would follow and so would voters (almost all crazy vaccinated people are liberals). He can encourage people to stop being afraid and to celebrate the huge success that vaccines are. He can emphasize the downsides of trying to avoid the CCP Virus at all costs. He can encourage people to go out and live their lives again. He needs to get it in people’s heads that, aside from the oldest and most frail, for those who are vaccinated, the pandemic is over. That would be great for everyone and is the single best thing he can do to boost his fortunes.