Tina Kotek invents way to whitewash state Covid failure

By Taxpayers Association of Oregon
OregonWatchdog.com

Congrats to the State’s largest newspaper, The Oregonian, to ask direct questions on Covid from the Governor candidates.

Here is Democrat Primary Governor Candidate and former Oregon House Speaker Tina Kotek’s response;

“There are a lot of Oregonians walking around today, alive and well, because Oregonians followed the science, wore a mask and got vaccinated. There was no playbook for how to respond to this crisis, no one had perfect information…”

No playbook?

Really?

When Covid hit, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis went to the experts and asked them what was the playbook and they said (1) protect the vulnerable and (2) try to disrupt life as little as possible.  It helped Florida re-open while protecting their seniors.   A new study ranked Florida in the top 10 pandemic performance states with an A grade, and Oregon received a C grade.

Here is another “playbook” from a Wall Street Journal opinion article showing proof of a solid scientific playbook on how to respond to a pandemic:

“In March 2019 WHO held a conference in Hong Kong to consider NPI measures against pandemic influenza. The WHO team evaluated a quarantine proposal—“home confinement of non-ill contacts of a person with proven or suspected influenza”—less indiscriminate than the Covid lockdowns…. The WHO team declared that large-scale home quarantine was “not recommended because there is no obvious rationale for this measure.”

A September 2019 report from Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Health Security reached a similar conclusion: “In the context of a high-impact respiratory pathogen, quarantine may be the least likely NPI to be effective in controlling the spread due to high transmissibility.” This was especially true of a fast-spreading airborne virus, such as the then-undiscovered SARS-CoV-2.

These studies drew on historical experience. A separate 2006 WHO study concluded that “forced isolation and quarantine are ineffective and impractical,” based on findings from the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918. It pointed to the example of Edmonton, Alberta, where “public meetings were banned; schools, churches, colleges, theaters, and other public gathering places were closed; and business hours were restricted without obvious impact on the epidemic.”

Using data from a 1927 analysis of the Spanish flu in the U.S., the study concluded that lockdowns were “not demonstrably effective in urban areas.” Only in isolated rural areas, “where group contacts are less numerous,” did this strategy become theoretically viable, but the hypothesis wasn’t tested. While the study found some benefits from smaller-scale quarantines of patients and their families during the 2003 SARS outbreak, it concluded that a fast-spreading disease, combined with “the presence of mild cases and possibility of transmission without symptoms,” would make these measures “considerably less successful.”

Medical historian John Barry, who wrote the standard account of the 1918 Spanish flu, concurred about the ineffectiveness of lockdowns. “Historical data clearly demonstrate that quarantine does not work unless it is absolutely rigid and complete,” he wrote in 2009, summarizing the results of a study of influenza outbreaks on U.S. Army bases during World War I. Of 120 training camps that experienced outbreaks, 99 imposed on-base quarantines and 21 didn’t. Case rates between the two categories of camps showed “no statistical difference.” “If a military camp cannot be successfully quarantined in wartime,” Mr. Barry concluded, “it is highly unlikely a civilian community can be quarantined during peacetime.”

A Johns Hopkins team reached similar conclusions in 2006: “No historical observations or scientific studies” could be found to support the effectiveness of large-scale quarantine. The scientists concluded that “the negative consequences of large-scale quarantine are so extreme . . . that this mitigation measure should be eliminated from serious consideration.” They rejected the modeling approach for relying too heavily on its own assumptions—circular reasoning that confuses a model’s predictions with observed reality.”

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Protecting the vulnerable is not what Gov. Kate Brown or then-Speaker Tina Kotek did:

• They vaccinated Oregon prisoners before seniors.  100% of prisoners were vaccinated before 50% of seniors were vaccinated.

• They vaccinated teachers before seniors.  Twenty-year old teachers got their vaccine before many vulnerable at-risk seniors did.

• Oregon blocked releasing the age data of people dying from Covid (later reversed after pressure) which kept hidden from the public on who the actual vulnerable were.

Even when Gov. Brown and then-Speaker Kotek knew what the playbook was, they still didn’t follow the rules.  Below is when they violated their own mask policy

Since we have your attention, below is our recent political ad parody of Tina Kotek:

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