It has been several days since I last looked at the coronavirus world map put up by the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Here’s the screen capture I took at 7:07 this morning (here in Oregon, USA).
I do not for a bit believe those numbers out of China and Iran. Come on, folks, really? Especially those China figures. Right. Since when do totalitarian regimes dispense negative information freely, transparently, and fully?
Twenty years ago China reportedly already had one billion more people than the US. What about now? Well, the US certainly hasn’t made up lost ground. Check out what the CIA says for population in the US and China. If you don’t trust the CIA within your social distancing zone, go with Wikipedia then.
Done with the Hopkins site, I skipped around a few news sites, eyeballing headlines (and rolling my eyeballs a few times). Then I saw one that provoked my click. Here’s the screen capture I took at 7:19 (still this morning, still here in Oregon):
Look, I know that Dr. Anthony Fauci has got street cred and house cred. He’s got ped cred and he’s got med cred. He’s got big government cred and big pharma cred. (I don’t know about big oil cred.)
I also know it’s the AP reporting. (And I ain’t gullible or naive.)
But let’s assume the AP’s reporting here is fair and balanced (now that FOX gave up that slogan) as well as true, accurate, and unspun. What’s with the number, Dr. Fauci?!
“Hang on, Mark. He said ‘could’ and ‘some’!” No, no — we don’t know that if we go by the above graphic. Those qualifiers are in the AP’s headline. The first paragraph has the AP reporting that Dr. Fauci says the US will certainly have more than 100,000 deaths. And in the next paragraph, the AP reports that the esteemed doctor predicts up to 200,000 deaths.
Let’s stick our necks out on a limb and believe the AP is reporting accurately. Where and how did Dr. Fauci come up with those numbers and that certitude?
Is Dr. Fauci wanting to further feed the panic amidst the pandemonium of the pandemic? Surely not. Maybe he’s just trying to brace the nation for a worst-case outcome. Or maybe he’s just trying to frighten the…ah…social distancing into the careless and reinforce it in the rest.
I hope he isn’t giving further fodder to the power-hungry power grabbers and a bigger fig leaf for totalitarian impulses.
Whatever the case, ponder my two screen captures as a unit. The US, with one billion less people than China, could have 100,000 coronavirus deaths…but their outbreak is dying down and they have only how many deaths?
Now you know how to collate and interrelate the news. 🙂
And remember to do your part to break the flow and flatten the Covid-19 curve:
I invite you to read a couple of other posts of mine that feature the graphic below these links:
And when I am afraid, I will trust in God!
In closing, two audio messages I highly recommend:
- Is Anything Too Hard for the Lord? (Adrian Rogers)
- The Bait of Offenses (Mervin Graber)