And now, a few science reminders ... this will have to be a thread because there& #39;s a lot going on here. https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1313449844413992961">https://twitter.com/realDonal...
1) Flu deaths seldom top 100,000. Estimated flu deaths are a spread, and there& #39;s only one year they got close to that in the last decade: 2017-2018, when the estimated death spread for this country was between 46,000 and 95,000.

Also at least 200,000 people have died from COVID
2) Now let& #39;s talk about that flu vaccine. Which he neglected to encourage you to get.

Please get your flu vaccine.
Flu vaccines are not 100% effective. They are certainly more effective if you get one than if you don& #39;t. So, you know, there& #39;s that.

Also, we know that even if you get a vaccine and still catch the flu, the vaccine can make your case milder. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/vaccines-work/vaccineeffect.htm">https://www.cdc.gov/flu/vacci...
Why don& #39;t flu vaccines work as well as, say, polio or smallpox vaccines? Because the flu virus is a jerk, basically. It mutates ... A LOT. Quickly. So each year, we need a new vaccine. And each year, there& #39;s more than one strain of the thing circulating.
There& #39;s a whole damn global infrastructure dedicated to tracking it so we can predict what the virus will look like when flu season starts in our hemisphere and have a vaccine ready to fight that particular iteration of flu. Shockingly, this prediction is not always accurate.
Anyway, I think this stuff with how flu changes and why it& #39;s hard to vaccinate against is really interesting. But suffice to say, we aren& #39;t just like "eh, flu." We literally spend millions and employ thousands tracking and vaxxing the thing.
3) Now let& #39;s talk about "learning to live with it". True, we will need to learn to live with COVID-19. It& #39;s not just gonna vanish. But what does that mean? Well, for one thing, it definitely doesn& #39;t mean mocking and dismissing the use of basic precautions like mask wearing.
"Learning to live with it" doesn& #39;t mean "Go back to doing exactly what you did before March 2019". Or, anyway, it shouldn& #39;t.

With no vaccine yet, "living with it" means school closures, mask wearing, lotsa testing, social isolation, etc etc.
Vaccines will not make COVID cases/deaths drop to zero. But they will likely start getting us to a place where these unending comparisons to influenza actually make some sense, rather than being wishful thinking and willful ignorance. Again, 46k-95k =/= 200,000+.
4) Finally, let& #39;s talk about COVID death risk by population demographics. Yup, it does vary a lot. And young, healthy people don& #39;t have a lot of risk of death.

But this is not a situation where the only people at high risk can easily just lock themselves away.
If you& #39;re over 60, you& #39;re in a COVID high risk category. If you& #39;re over 60 and overweight, you are in two COVID high risk categories.

This is millions of Americans. And that& #39;s before we even get into other comorbidities and racial/income disparities.
I am a very low risk category. So are my kids. But we are pretty damn socially isolated and we wear masks. Why? Because we can still spread the virus. I don& #39;t want to give it to the checkout lady at the grocery store. I don& #39;t want to give it my parents.
I& #39;m not hiding under my bed. I& #39;ve got a pod. I see friends outside with masks on. I shop. I work. I order take-out. We go to parks. I will even cop to not 100% perfect mask usage all the time when I& #39;m outside.

But that IS learning to live with it.
Nothing like a good rant to fire up the blood in the morning.
You can follow @maggiekb1.
Tip: mention @twtextapp on a Twitter thread with the keyword “unroll” to get a link to it.

Latest Threads Unrolled: