In dealing with the COVID crisis, the public health experts have failed the nation, betrayed their mission, and spread confusion. So many outrages have been committed in the name of “science” that people are rightfully distrustful. Science should be a voice of certainty, not chaos. 

Such an evaluation may seem harsh, but it corresponds to reality. People are bewildered by the contradictory reports, warnings, and directives that come from public health experts. The public is left grasping for survival. 

Spreading Confusion

The health experts come from those prestigious institutions and government bodies that are part of the nation’s massive research and treatment infrastructure. They are best represented in this crisis by Dr. Anthony Fauci and the World Health Organization bureaucrats. These experts are influenced by the political debate on health issues, which leans leftward. They should not be confused with the healthcare professionals found on the frontlines treating the virus.

Public health officials should apply the scientific method to crises to deliver certainty in the face of the unknown. The scientific method calls for raising several hypotheses and arriving at likely conclusions. Science can then provide society with the elements to deal with reality, danger, and risk. It should do everything possible to reinforce what is known and explore new and promising possibilities.

In addressing the coronavirus crisis, the public health experts, supported by the media, have shamelessly abandoned the scientific method and retreated into preconceived liberal ideas that often reinforce failure. They seem more dedicated to telling people what they don’t know about the virus than what they do.

A Set Narrative that Does Not Change

From the beginning, public health experts have followed a narrative that has changed little. In the name of science, government authorities mandated arbitrary measures, recommending limits and business shutdowns. Places of worship were needlessly shuttered.

These measures did more harm than good. Countless experts have spoken out that the radical lockdowns are not solutions to the spread of the virus. They do more harm than good in the fields of health, mental well-being, and economy. Moreover, locked-down areas often suffer the same if not more cases of COVID than non-locked down regions.

Instead of lives being saved, death rates increased, yet officials double down on their mistakes by implementing the same failed policies during the second round of lockdowns.

What Is Known About the Virus

It does not take a scientist to understand what is now known about the virus. Everyone knows that COVID is highly contagious. It does not affect children. Those with serious conditions and the elderly are particularly vulnerable. Most healthy people can navigate carefully inside the risks that COVID presents without the danger of death.

Such observations should form the framework for commonsense policies that would mitigate the effects of COVID upon the general population, allowing the economy and society to function normally.  

Instead, public health experts implement measures that border on the absurd and unscientific. There is no reason why huge churches that can hold thousands should be limited to dozens of people or that all services should be limited to outdoor locations. No scientific explanation or study has justified the closing of all dining or gatherings. There is no demonstrable benefit from masking between bites during a meal.

Schools are closed despite all evidence that the children are the least endangered. Nursing homes were deemed places of treatment of COVID sufferers despite their residents’ extreme vulnerability. There was no need to cancel Thanksgiving or Christmas. Indeed, the so-called Thanksgiving surge of COVID cases did not materialize despite constant reports that said it would.

Moreover, some public health experts insist that their policies will be in effect for many more months and even years -- despite the dismal results and the vaccine.

A Refusal to Innovate

Public health experts have failed America further by not being open to new or innovative solutions. Throughout the crisis, isolated voices have proposed solutions that proved successful in their practices.  However, the public health experts immediately condemned any dissenters from the official position even when these opinions came from highly qualified individuals or peer-reviewed studies. They insisted that everyone follow the same diktat measures without allowing for other solutions. Everyone must be on the same page, which was often tied to leftist political agendas.

A characteristic of the scientific method is an openness to daring new hypotheses that challenge preconceived notions. The bolder the propositions, the more dazzling can be the success.

However, in COVID treatment, public health experts display serious cowardice. They refuse to dare. Their only reaction to increased cases seems to be, reverting to their default positions of more masking, quarantines, mass testing and locking down. There is no will to try new things.

A Refreshing Proposal

A refreshing change from the same old thing is the Great Barrington Declaration, written by three of the world’s preeminent epidemiologists and signed by 13,000 public health scientists and nearly 40,000 general practitioners. The public health establishment looked upon this statement with scorn and disdain. The group dared to propose focusing on society’s most vulnerable elements while opening all schools and churches and allowing the majority of the population to return with care to full normality.

Such a proposition corresponds precisely to what is now known about the virus. It would target each group with the level of care needed rather than the one-size-fits-all lockdown procedures that destroy society and economies.    

The time has come to discard socialistic, inflexible preconceived policies. The public health experts must admit their colossal mistakes, abandon their agendas and re-establish public trust.  As things stand, there is no scientific method to their madness.

Image: Wellcome Trust