Illinois Unconcerned As Communication and ‘Science’ Behind COVID Policy Slip Toward Chaos – Wirepoints

By: Mark Glennon*

The Illinois Department of Public health took no time at all deciding last week to say it “fully aligns” with new masking guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control, including universal masking in schools, regardless of vaccination status. IDHP’s announcement came only hours after the CDC announcement on Tuesday.

If you think that means the “science” behind the changes must be settled or clear, you haven’t been paying attention. Contradictions, confusion and unanswered questions from national health experts and media followed the CDC announcement, none of which is apparently of concern to IDPH.

This time, the criticism outside of Illinois isn’t coming just from the right. Sources ordinarily friendly to the Biden Administration and national public health officials had already started to call them out on dishonesty. Left-leaning Slate earlier in the week detailed four instances of what it thought at best have been white lies coming out of the federal government. Bret Stephens of the New York Times had done much of the same earlier in the week in a column headlined, “COVID misinformation comes from the top, too.”

But things really heated up after the new CDC guidelines were announced and objections mounted over the failure of the CDC to explain the science behind them. The Washington Post published a leaked internal CDC document that apparently informed the CDC’s guidelines but raised extensive doubt and confusion on a number of issues.

Liberal Axios summarized things this way on Saturday.

The Biden administration’s handling of the Delta surge has left Americans confused and frustrated, fueling media overreaction and political manipulation. The past year and a half have left Americans cynical about the government’s COVID response, and — in many cases — misinformed or uninformed. We’re getting fog and reversals when steady, clear-eyed, factual information is needed more than ever.

What caused all the dispute and confusion over the past week?

Most of the reported problem has focused on what to make of a cluster of 882 COVID cases in Provincetown, Massachusetts in which 74% of the infected people were fully vaccinated. That chapter is described in the leaked CDC document as well as a report the CDC later published.

Three-fourths of the victims were fully vaccinated? That triggered concerns about vaccine efficacy. To what extent it should have, however, is questionable.

Look at that published report with any empirical skepticism, and you will scratch your head. It’s anecdotal, and certainly not consistent with broader data. There was huge selection bias in the cases studied and it’s unclear how many other infections occurred in the area and whether they were vaccinated.

Second, the report contains data on particularly high viral loads in the infected, vaccinated group, indicating that the vaccinated may be far more likely to be contagious than previously thought.

Alarming headlines then appeared in much of the media, including the New York Times and Washington Post.

What followed is something you certainly don’t see every day. The White House communications guy on COVID matters openly criticized both of those papers, which are ordinarily White House BFFs, for going too far. Here are his Tweets to them:

Apparently, the White House wanted to scare people enough to get vaccinated, but not so much as to cause them to question the vaccine. It didn’t work.

It sure would have been fun to see the discussions among the censors in social media over how to deal with those accusations against the NYT and Washington Post — sources the censors routinely favor. Just this past week Twitter suspended a science writer merely for posting the results of a Pfizer clinical test. Acute cognitive dissonance surely has overtaken the censors.

The most fundamental problem, however, arose from silence – silence from both the CDC and Biden Administration on the increasingly frequent requests for them to produce the science behind masks.* Many health and communication experts are frustrated.

“The mistake is releasing the guidance without explanation,” said Vish Viswanath, a professor of health communication at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health,“ quoted in the Wall Street Journal. “One of the most important principles in communicating risk in such situations is complete transparency.” Similar criticisms are collected here.

What is the science about masks that the CDC is relying on? We indeed don’t know. Studies conflict, and I’m not about to try to sort out that conflict. The point, instead, is that the CDC and the White House should. They should be presenting a full analysis of how they interpret the conflicting studies. They haven’t done so, leaving harsher critics like Dr. Marc Siegel to say on Fox that there “is no science” behind mask mandates. In Illinois, the matter likewise goes unanswered.

Two further, important matters haven’t gotten much media attention.

First, many recent headlines, like this on CNN, say the CDC concluded that the new, prevalent Delta variant of the virus causes “more severe” infections than the original virus. That’s a big claim because the widespread reporting earlier had only said that Delta is more contagious, which it clearly is, but not more severe, which is presumably why deaths have not spiked up along with infections.

What’s the evidence that Delta is “more severe”? The headlines are based only on vague information in the leaked CDC document to that effect.

Interestingly, an initial sub-headline in a New York Times column made the claim, too, but they changed the sub-headline and still haven’t noted the change. That’s bad journalism. The initial sub-headline on the article said, “Infections in vaccinated Americans also may be as transmissible as those in unvaccinated people, the document said, and lead more often to severe illness.”

But the body of the article claimed nothing to that effect. Whether there’s any basis for the other widespread headlines claiming “more severe” infections obviously needs discussion, which is absent so far.

Second, there’s a real doozy in that leaked CDC document that nobody else has noticed as far as I can see.

Their model is based on the assumption, it says, that 50% of all cases are reported. In other words, two actual cases occur for every reported case.

What? The CDC’s own website currently says that there are 4.2 actual cases for every reported case.

This is hugely important because it tells us how many Americans were already infected and therefore have natural immunity, which studies now consistently say is at least as robust as being vaccinated. If natural immunity is high, then we might be heading for a quick drop-off in cases just as has happened recently in the United Kingdom.

It’s a topic that the establishment has been suppressing consistently, as we have written about often. We’ve been criticizing IDHP and the Pritzker administration on that since April 2020. It’s one of the topics that Slate says Anthony Fauci has been fibbing about.

We’ve followed this matter closely and nobody has ever suggested that the ratio of actual to confirmed cases is as low as 2:1, as the CDC document assumes. Last November, the CDC said the ratio was 11:1, which it backed off of with no good explanation. We know that many politicians and much of the media ignore the topic of natural immunity, but is the CDC blind to it as well?

None of these questions appears to be of importance in Illinois, so the IDHP sheepishly followed right along with the CDC’s new guidelines. New mask guidelines, that largely function as mandates, are now in place, and tougher restrictions apparently may be coming.

Science, right?

*Mark Glennon is founder of Wirepoints.

*Update 8/2/21: A comment on a republication of this column disputes the claim that the CDC has not published its basis for confidence in masks, citing the CDC page linked here.

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Jane
2 years ago

I hope you morons are proud you’re going to kill kids. Great job repubs.

debtsor
2 years ago
Reply to  Jane

FoLLow tHe ScIeNcE…..

Doly Garcia
2 years ago

“Studies conflict, and I’m not about to try to sort out that conflict. The point, instead, is that the CDC and the White House should. They should be presenting a full analysis of how they interpret the conflicting studies.” Easy. Some studies are well done, some aren’t. If the USA was the sort of country with the level of education that warrants explaining the finer points of how you tell if a scientific study is well done or not, I imagine the CDC would be happy to engage in that activity. However, the USA is the sort of country where… Read more »

heyjude
2 years ago
Reply to  Doly Garcia

Is it too much to ask a public health system to clearly communicate the information, and support it with studies that have been properly done? The CDC and White House cannot do that because they are spending too much time babysitting us idiots?

Sorry but I don’t find your explanation convincing.

Last edited 2 years ago by heyjude
Wilmette
2 years ago

What I cannot get over is the complete opposition of two simple developments happening right now: 1) vaccine mandates vs 2) the FACT that the “vaccine” doesn’t prevent transmission AND we are now finding out that the vaxxed are carrying as much if not more viral load than the unvaxxed (which many knew or suspected would happen all along — myself included — because I’ve actually done my homework unlike 99% of the American public). So what is the purpose of mandating something that does not even benefit others (which is the garbage logic being used by those pushing it)?… Read more »

Rick
2 years ago

Politicians are lawyers not scientists, they don’t have comfort in the way science explains something because they want the “answer” to be absolute, “settled”. Whereas a scientist will give you possibly probabilities as the closest thing to an absolute. In science everything is a compromise of dozens, even hundreds of variables. Will I get Covid? The scientists answer will definitely not be yes or no, it will be a book-long analysis of your health, living pattern, movements, people at work, at home, what parties you go to, how you have sex, masks, what kind of mask, age, vaccine, your neighborhood,… Read more »

Gemini
2 years ago

If everyone in America took “vitamin I” (Ivermectin), covid would be gone in 60 days. Just look at what happened in Mexico and parts of India.

LandOfCrooks
2 years ago

JB, put up your evidence – put up or shut up. Either you have it or you’re full of it…

Truth Seeker
2 years ago
Reply to  LandOfCrooks

They have no evidence.

JimBob
2 years ago

When I recollect that COVID arose during the Trump impeachment and put this pandemic in that context, I fault both the left and the right for politicizing the entire saga during the ensuing election year. I particularly fault the medical establishment for its failure to remain objective. The media had already chosen up sides in the politics and the urban riots made the public unreceptive to calm voices of any sort. These sorts of issues (novel virus, medical uncertainty) don’t lend themselves to succinct and pat answers and the economic dislocations together with the cancel culture made everybody cranky and… Read more »

Truth Seeker
2 years ago
Reply to  JimBob

Agree with you. The UNIPARTY is responsible. We need to stop playing Dems against R’s. They are all cut from the same dirty cloth.

SDK
2 years ago

77 July deaths in Cook County due to “ccp virus.” 110 homicides in Chicago. Helluva dangerous variant.

Lyn P
2 years ago

It’s a SUPER MESS on many levels, but it’s also SUPER EASY to understand. When your first premise is a full-on LIE (“the plandemic”), the continued pushing of the LIE requires ever-more inane TALES by super incompetent and malfeasant idiots.

Only full-on Sheeple believe a word of it anymore.

Ex Illini
2 years ago

The so called experts contradict themselves every day. Fauci is the master of double speak and is giving Joe a run for his money in the dementia race. While were at it, why are the vaccines being used all developed before Joe was elected. He has brought nothing new to the table in terms of dealing with the virus. All the vaccines used in the US were the result of Trump’s efforts. C’mon Joe, stop whispering in little girls ears and do something.

Rick
2 years ago

I think its just precious how when lawyers talk science they use the word “settled”, how cute, deserves a giggle. That word has no place at all in any scientific method.

Let’s go RED in 2022
2 years ago

What’s new? Illinois has never paid attention to reality before.

nixit
2 years ago

Pritzker’s administration has done nothing but parrot other left-leaning sources. I can’t think of an administration that has been more of a blind follower of group-think than his. No creative thinking, no innovation, no nothing. JB seems to be more concerned of what liberal sources think of him than doing what makes sense. He just can’t shake his youth as the chubby rich kid inviting all the cool kids to his birthday party, begging them to watch him on the diving board while they otherwise ignore him and scarf down all the crab legs.

debtsor
2 years ago
Reply to  nixit

He signs every bill that gets in front of his desk.

Illinois Entrepreneur
2 years ago
Reply to  nixit

The imagery here is perfect. Don’t forget to add in the juggler, the clown, the petting zoo and the cowboys and indians staged battle on real horses.

Harlow Monroe
2 years ago
Reply to  nixit

except his family weren’t spoiled rich, or even well off, really.

Illinois Entrepreneur
2 years ago

This has become a real mess. Lots of things going on here below the substrate. First, I would guess that the overall fear by the White House is driven by their mad claim that “everyone died because of Trump.” They blame Covid and the resulting crisis on Trump’s “mismanagement.” This narrative was readily embraced by the media and Twitterati during the campaign, and has been routinely cited by Progressives and Liberals for why the Biden administration is superior. So any feeling that things are going “backwards” is very, very bad for this administration, because they have no one else to… Read more »

Last edited 2 years ago by Illinois Entrepreneur
Danny
2 years ago

That’s the problem with our federal government that no matter who is sitting at the White House, the swamp is still running the show. I told people this in 2016 when Trump got elected. The president gets the authority to pick a couple hundred people to implement his agenda. That agenda still has to be implemented using the two million employees of the government and the main goal of a good chunk of those is to collect a paycheck. Another chunk means good, but lack the skills. Finally, you get about 10% that are motivated and have the skills though… Read more »

Illinois Entrepreneur
2 years ago
Reply to  Danny

As I’ve grown older I get the increasing feeling that the Presidency is more of a figurehead office designed to satisfy the People that “someone” is in charge. It’s not even a secret anymore that the staff is pushing the buttons and pulling all the levers, regardless of what the President really intends. I wouldn’t be surprised if Biden has looked around numerous times and asked, “who decided this policy?” This seems true with both Trump and Biden. They like campaigning, but not the granular details of governing. And the bureaucracy very much wants to keep it that way. The… Read more »

Illinois Entrepreneur
2 years ago
Reply to  Mark Glennon

I ordered a copy; thank you for posting this. I’m looking forward to reading it!

Truth Seeker
2 years ago
Reply to  Mark Glennon

Wonky isn’t always bad. Sometimes we need more Wonky it offsets the non-wonky.

Truth Seeker
2 years ago
Reply to  Mark Glennon

Thanks for all you have done. Appreciate it.

Truth Seeker
2 years ago

Americans should come to realize that Presidents are not elected they are selected. You do not get on that ticket unless you have been approved by the powers that be. I would bet the same holds true for Congress and Governors. We have only had the illusion of choice. It has been tough waking up to this reality, but the truth will set you free.

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