Remember last summer? When Dr. Anthony Fauci and public health experts told us that nationwide protests and riots were required because systemic racism was a more significant public health threat than COVID-19? However, if you protested lockdown orders because it was killing your small business or you attended a Trump rally, you were killing grandma? So much science.
To this day, the media tells us that the protests and riots with thousands of people in the streets were not a source of transmission for COVID-19. Then everyone freaked out over the annual Sturgis motorcycle rally in South Dakota. Governor Kristi Noem and Meade County allowed the event to proceed. It attracted 462,000 participants from 61% of the counties in the United States.
Related: Public Health Experts Issue Racist Guidelines In Support of Ongoing Riots
The CDC did not have the data to confirm genome sequencing on any cases attributed to the rally but said it had the features of a “superspreader event.” This statement would lead you to assume there were thousands of cases. However, including secondary attack rates, a total of 649 cases were tied to the event through testing. To put that in perspective, 0.14% of attendees tested positive for COVID-19 after the rally. Of the 463 major cases, 3.7% were hospitalized, and one died.
Yet here is Dr. Fauci chastising Sturgis attendees in 2021 as the rally starts:
Dr. Fauci chastises those attending the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally: You’re going to get to do that in the future, but let's get this pandemic under control before we start acting like nothing is going on." pic.twitter.com/ifb6tVdMgg
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) August 8, 2021
Chuck Todd’s assertion that there was a massive outbreak is just wrong. One study extrapolated “asymptomatic cases” without any evidence and asserted there were 140 cases per 100,000 participants. This number is an estimate without support in the testing regimes of the 39 state departments of health contacted by the researchers. South Dakota’s COVID-19 case rate started to increase at the end of August, as did most states in the north as we moved into the fall, and people spent more time indoors.
Last year’s rally was also before vaccines were available. According to South Dakota’s dashboard, nearly 60% of the population has at least one dose of the vaccine. South Dakota also reports 122,885 recovered COVID-19 patients. Using the CDC estimates of disease burden, 516,117 total cases occurred in the state generating a significant level of natural immunity. Currently, 35 people are hospitalized with COVID-19 statewide. Nationwide, the CDC reports that 70% of adults have had at least one dose.
Recommended: Memes Make It Clear: New York City’s Vaccine Passport Is the Real Jim Crow 2.0
While Fauci is once again “very concerned” that we will see another surge related to the rally, he provides zero evidence there was one last year, and the data does not support his contention. Once again, he is saying we have to get the pandemic under control before people can return to normal activities.
It’s just more messaging that reduces confidence in vaccines from the man who is the face of the pandemic response. If the vaccines effectively prevent severe illness and death, attendees have had adequate time to receive one. Those who have chosen not to are making their own risk assessment. Fauci’s continued insistence that the government has a role in managing people’s behavior with vaccines available to everyone is getting absurd. Zero COVID-19 is no longer a rational goal, and it is long past time for Fauci to admit it.
However, if Fauci wants to get preachy, what does he have to say about President Obama’s 60th birthday party? One might wonder why Todd did show him the photos of maskless Obama and a crowded dance floor and ask for a comment. Just kidding, we all know why. If you are a Democrat or protesting for a left-wing cause, you are immune to COVID-19. It is just you darn white right-wingers who are capable of creating a super spreader event.
Fauci also remained silent on the cases of COVID-19 flowing through our open border. The Biden administration dropped 1,500 COVID-positive illegal immigrants in McAllen, Texas, last week. Contractors have confirmed over 7,000 cases therein across the previous five months as the administration transports illegal immigrants to cities in Texas without being tested at the border. Those who test positive are told to quarantine for two days and then released to go God knows where.
Over 1 million illegals have entered the country in the last six months from countries globally, bringing known and unknown variants. Hospitals in Texas have reported cases of the Lambda variant, which originated in South America. Fauci has never said a word about the risk this presents or offered the unmitigated migration as a cause for rising cases in Texas and Louisiana, where migrants are being dropped off all over the states. He has also never been asked about it by the media.
Gatherings are a risk, or they aren’t. Vaccinated individuals are broadly protected from severe illness with COVID-19, or they aren’t. The threat from new variants is serious, or it isn’t. If Fauci would like people to take him seriously, consistency would be great. Instead, he chooses to politicize public health with his selective outrage and protect his political allies by remaining mum.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member