Nails in the Coffin of COVID Denial
How to Debate False Information on COVID-19
During the four days I was researching and writing this article, six people died of COVID-19 in South Korea while more than 2,500 died of COVID-19 in the U.S. What on earth happened to cause this extraordinary difference? The virus was the same in both countries. One country created policies to more successfully control it; the other, even after seeing this success, didn’t. Why?
Overall, the United States has a death toll from COVID-19 that is 7,700 per cent higher than that of South Korea. The virus is the same; the governments of the two countries instituted different policies.
Despite the enormity of this statistic, U.S. Covid-deniers wriggle to avoid this devastating truth. Rummaging around in diverse bags of information, they find a quote, an out-of-context statistic, an unproven theory, an emotional plea, some biased “expert” advice, some finger-pointing blame, or an outright lie that exonerates the U.S. government from its part in a large and unnecessary death toll. How do you answer them? How do you help the public sort fact from fiction?
Same Virus, Different Policies
It may be tempting to call Covid-deniers names. But that only increases the denial. Attack creates defense. Anger creates anger back. The best chance you have of changing a denier’s mind, or to be effective in political debate, is to answer with facts. This also is honoring of the many millions of folks who are genuinely confused by all the stories and counter-stories they’ve been told by media and politicians.
Following are some common statements of the deniers (in italics), and some strong and factual ways of answering them (in bold).
It’s all China’s fault. China created the virus to hurt us.
COVID-19 started in China but there is zero evidence that it was deliberately started. On the contrary, the genome sequence of the virus clearly shows it is not human-made. Also, China relies on world trade perhaps more than any other country — it would never have been in China’s interest to create a world-wide recession.
But China delayed admitting the epidemic.
Yes, China delayed publicizing and acting on what was happening for three weeks. Is it possible that without this delay, the virus might have been contained in China? It’s possible, though we will never know. What we do know is that once the virus had spread outside China, some countries had few casualties while other countries had tens or hundreds of thousands, depending on their policies for containment. What we also know is that President Trump delayed far longer than China, and refused to mandate effective action within the United States, claiming that the virus would just “go away,” that is was a hoax, and that is was nothing worse than the flu. Wherever the virus started, whatever China did or didn’t do, every country has to deal with the same virus and some have been much more successful at handling the pandemic than others.
But President Trump did ban travel from China early on.
President Trump restricted travel from China on February 2, 2020. He never banned it. In the 3 months after the restriction some 8,000 Chinese (and foreign nationals based in China) entered the U.S.
But this was a good step in the right direction.
Yes, and also an inadequate step. Any one of those 8,000 people could have initiated spreading infections in the U.S. Besides, Covid-19 had already spread outside China. Even a total ban of travel from China would not have been effective. On March 11, President Trump also restricted travel from Europe, but the virus was already spreading within the United States.
Still, a step in the right direction.
Closing the borders after the infection is already spreading in your country is like closing the doors of the chicken coup when the fox is already inside.
There have been some differences between the US and other countries but the US has done OK comparatively.
As of this writing, there have been 220,517 deaths in the U.S. from COVID-19. This is more than 20% of worldwide deaths from COVID-19, even though the U.S. makes up just 4% of the world’s population. 220,517 COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. compares with a total of 447 deaths in South Korea.
Well, for a start, South Korea is a much smaller country.
Yes. Allowing for the fact that the U.S. has a population 6.4 x as large as the population of South Korea, that means that the death toll per population in the U.S. is 77 times higher than that in South Korea (220,517 ÷ 447 ÷ 6.4 = 77.08). In percentage terms, the U.S. has a death-toll-per-million 7,700 per cent higher than that of South Korea.
How do we know that South Korea didn’t fake their results?
The South Korean government gave the medical and scientific authorities full reign in collecting and publicizing the data. This is unlike in the U.S. where the data on COVID-19 goes to the White House before release to the public. According to the CDC, the U.S. official figures are considerably underestimated.
I heard that this is completely wrong, that the CDC actually admitted that the death rate from COVID-19 in the U.S. is only 6% of the official figure.
Even if that were true, the U.S. would still have a death rate much larger than South Korea. But it is not true. When this rumor was started, the CDC (whom the rumor credits with creating this story) denied it in no uncertain terms. President Trump has admitted to the death toll from COVID-19 in the U.S. being over 200,000.
Well the reason South Korea did better than us is that they had much more experience of dealing with these kinds of pandemics.
Yes, this is true. They had much more experience, as did many countries in the East. Given that fact, why didn’t the U.S. follow their example? Wouldn’t that have been a sensible thing to do?
Yeah, but how could the U.S. have known that the South Korean methods would be better?
Because South Korea pulled off such a remarkable recovery from the pandemic. They were, in March 2020, the country with the most recorded COVID-19 infections worldwide. By April they had already largely recovered. They were the leading example of how to control a pandemic that had gone out of control. You’d think that every country in the world would want to follow what they had discovered. But even though the information from South Korea was available to anyone who wanted to listen, the U.S. chose not to.
Well, many other countries didn’t follow them either.
That’s like saying: “Well we weren’t the only ones. There were other countries that messed up too!”
It’s not just a few countries, it’s a lot. The U.S. hasn’t done so badly compared to many other places.
It’s true that some countries have done even worse than the United States. To be exact, out of 150 countries for which we have statistics, just eight countries have worse results than the U.S. in terms of deaths per million of population. Of those eight countries, six of them are not rich, industrialized countries and do not have the resources to combat COVID-19 effectively. As of this writing, only two industrialized countries have worse results than the U.S. — Spain and Belgium.
That’s because the U.S. is bold and is going for herd immunity. Protect the older people and allow the younger people to catch the virus. Makes sense.
The Swedish government took that approach. They changed their minds. Why? Because both the COVID-19 death rate and the toll on the Swedish economy were far worse than in neighboring Nordic countries that followed epidemiological advice. Herd immunity requires a minimum of 65% of the population to have been infected. If the U.S. government takes this approach (which it is effectively moving toward by not taking substantive action), this would cause over 1.3 million deaths in the U.S.
But herd immunity has been hinted at by Dr. Scott Atlas, President Trump’s advisor on COVID-19. Dr. Atlas doesn’t think we should mandate the kinds of controls that South Korea and other countries have taken.
Dr. Atlas is a radiologist. He has no training or experience in epidemiology.
So why is he the White House advisor on COVID-19?
It is President Trump’s prerogative to hire whom he wants. He stopped following the advice of Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birx , two medical experts who do have epidemiological training and expertise in communicable diseases.
Well, it’s a very complicated matter stopping the spread of this virus and there are a lot of opinions.
No, it’s not complicated at all. There are only four public health measures required. These can be gleaned not only from South Korea’s success, but from every nation that has successfully combatted the spread of the virus — for example, Taiwan, Singapore, Iceland, New Zealand, Australia, Japan. All you need to do is ask the question: what did the successful countries/states/provinces do?
It’s not that easy.
It’s not necessarily easy to execute, but what to do is simple and proven. Here are the four items: 1. Early testing (so you can know where the infections are). 2. Well-organized tracing systems, combined with two-week quarantines for all contacts that have been traced. 3. Well-planned social distancing (including wearing masks in designated public areas). 4. Hygiene: washing hands and surfaces that might be contaminated. That’s it.
Well, the U.S. government has done a great deal of testing.
It’s early testing that is required. Though late testing is better than no testing. Successful countries tested early and then traced energetically. The U.S. did not do this, even though several countries, including South Korea, had proved it worked.
I’ve heard there’s a lot of debate about the effectiveness of masks.
Up to March, there was some debate among medical experts in the West, but not in those countries in the East more experienced with respiratory pandemics. In the last six months, there has been agreement amongst epidemiologists and medical authorities worldwide that masks help prevent the spread of the disease. The countries that were most effective at preventing the spread of COVID-19 all mandated the wearing of masks in some public situations. The President of the U.S. not only refused to mandate mask-wearing, but sided with factions that rebelled against mask-wearing.
Well yes. Because telling someone to wear a mask goes against the freedom of the individual. Maybe some countries don’t care about that, but in the U.S.A., we do!
All countries have to balance the freedom of the individual with the good of society. Laws against murder are against the freedom of the individual to kill others. Do you think there should be laws against murder and manslaughter?
Of course. But I should have the choice whether to protect myself from the virus.
That’s not the main use of the mask. The most important function of the mask is preventing you or me from inadvertently hurting or killing others through spreading the virus that we might be carrying.
Yeah, so then I should have the freedom not to wear a mask when I’m not sick.
You cannot tell if you are a carrier of COVID-19 or not. Many carriers have no symptoms at all.
There’s some debate about that.
Yes, there’s some debate about that in countries with high COVID-19 death rates, like the U.S. There’s no debate amongst epidemiologists worldwide. This was demonstrated as long ago as February 2020, right here in the U.S. Seventy of the first 92 diagnoses of COVID-19 in Massachusetts were tied to one corporate meeting of Biogen employees in Boston in February. Executives from this meetings also unwittingly seeded infections in Indiana, North Carolina, and Tennessee. None of the attendees at this meeting felt ill. (And none wore masks, since, at that time, few knew that COVID-19 was already spreading through the U.S.)
I’m confused because right wing and left wing political parties seem to be saying different things.
The virus has no wings, left or right. It is a round, lethal entity. Countries that have been successful at combatting the virus may be left or right wing in orientation. For example, the governments in Australia (right) and New Zealand (left) have both been highly successful. The governments in Sweden (left) and the U.S. (right) have been far less successful. The main difference between Sweden and the U.S. is that the Swedish government recognized its mistake and changed course. It’s not political orientation that correlates with success, it is simply the willingness to follow scientifically verified protocols.
But look, acting strongly, stopping people from meeting and from going to school (which means many parents can’t work) is harmful to the economy. We have to protect our economy and for that, there may need to be some sacrifice. If we don’t keep businesses running, then there will be other kinds of suffering. We are presented with a battle of values: “Do we fight for the economy and allow more spread of the virus (and, unfortunately, death), or do we fight the virus and let the economy go to ruin?”
The evidence from many different countries shows that this either-or battle-cry is false. Of course it is true that the pandemic has done tremendous damage to economies. This is why controlling the pandemic is the best option for limiting economic damage. Countries that acted fast and quelled the virus quickly have suffered far less economically —for example, South Korea, Singapore, China, Iceland, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand. Conversely those countries that avoided taking action through fear of hurting the economy (or other reasons) have fared far worse economically — for example, the U.K., the U.S., Sweden. This evidence has been freely available for months now: the best business decision, the best way to improve the economy, is to stop the transmission of the virus as quickly as possible. And then open up gradually when transmission rates are going down — and be ready to respond aggressively to any inevitable spikes in transmission.
The great COVID-19 myth: we have to choose between fighting the virus and protecting our economy.
The truth: taking strong early measures to decrease the transmission of the virus is the best long term measure to protect the economy.
But I’ve heard about this difficult choice between the economy and controlling the virus from both Democrats and Republicans.
Whoever you’ve heard it from, it’s a myth. Going back to the comparison between the U.S. and South Korea, the death rate per million in the U.S. is 7,700 per cent higher than that in South Korea because South Korea fought the virus with stringent and effective public health measures, while the U.S. didn’t. According to the myth, South Korea should have suffered more economically than the U.S. One measure of the economic effects of the virus is unemployment. The U.S. had an unemployment rate of 3.8% in February 2020. By April, this figure had risen to a maximum of 14.4%. Last month it was 7.9%. In South Korea, the maximum unemployment rate so far at any time during COVID-19 has been 4.5%. It is not that South Korea did nor suffer economic effects, but undoubtedly, they have been less than those in the U.S. China’s economy has been on the rise all summer. Why? Because the Chinese quelled the pandemic in China quickly by mandating the four measures that work: early testing; tracing and quarantining; social distancing (including mask-wearing); and hygiene.
Still, it is really tough on people to have to do all these things — the mask-wearing, social distancing, avoiding indoor meetings, having to home-school your children, losing your job, increasing poverty. The list goes on. It’s natural that people rebel against this.
Yes, it is tough. I don’t know anyone who likes these things. And there have been some people who rebelled even in the successful countries like South Korea. It is understandable that people get tired of such restrictions. In the successful countries there is less reason to rebel because the hardship has been more short-term. People in New Zealand can enjoy each other’s company again because their public health measures worked. Schools and offices in New Zealand have now been reopened. Iceland was so effective in controlling the pandemic early (through testing, contact tracing and quarantines) that a lock-down was never even required.
It’s hard for leaders in democratic countries to mandate these measures because the measures will make them less popular and they may not get re-elected.
South Korea and Japan are democracies that mandated strong public health measures. In South Korea, President Moon Jae-in had an approval rating that went as low as 30% in 2019. Now he and his government are lauded in South Korea (and worldwide) for their effective handling of the virus — which mostly involved getting out of the way and following epidemiological advice. In New Zealand (where there are currently no known COVID-19 infections at all), the prime minister Jacinda Ardern followed epidemiological protocol, and then went out of her way to tell the New Zealand people that the public health measures would be tough, but that they were necessary for the protection of the people and the economy. She has just got re-elected by a landslide. People seem to appreciate tough measures when they are explained well and when they are effective. By contrast, President Trump’s handling of the pandemic has probably been a significant factor in the current lowering of his popularity.
I still think it’s unfair to compare the U.S. with South Korea, not only because of South Korea’s former experience with respiratory pandemics, but also because they had better systems for handling pandemics already in place.
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, President Trump dismantled the pandemic-systems in the U.S. that were initiated by President George W. Bush in 2005. You also have to take into account that the U.S., even with dismantled systems, still had the option of copying South Korea’s successful public health measures (as New Zealand did). If the U.S. government had been as successful as the South Korean government, at least 200,000 lives would have been saved in the U.S. If you think that is an unfair comparison because of South Korea’s undoubted previous experience, then another option is to compare the U.S. with Canada. If the U.S. had the same death toll per million as Canada — a country on the same continent with a similar land area, similar culture, and similar inexperience with pandemics — then at least 100,000 lives would have been saved in the U.S. These are huge figures. While the virus is of course not political, death tolls have been contingent on political decisions and the U.S. public is now faced with a political choice.
Dr. Richard Gillett, received his medical degree from Cambridge University and is a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. He lives in upstate New York and is the author of the recently published #1 bestseller, IT’S A FREAKIN’ MESS: How to Thrive in Divisive Times. Available for purchase via itsafreakinmess.com
