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Featured below: "Sincerely Held Religious Objection" to wearing masks & "social distancing"

     This article was started by Dave Leach R-IA Bible Lover-musician-grandpa (talk) 20:00, 14 March 2020 (UTC).
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Three (3) Verses

Psalm 41:1 To the [music] director: A song of David. Those who help the poor succeed will get many blessings. When trouble comes, the LORD will save them. 2 The LORD will protect them and save their lives. He will bless them in this land. He will not let their enemies harm them. 3 When they are sick in bed, the LORD will give them strength and make them well! (ERV translation)

Psalm 91:1 Live under the protection of God Most High and stay in the shadow of God All-Powerful. 2 Then you will say to the LORD, "You are my fortress, my place of safety; you are my God, and I trust you." 3 The Lord will keep you safe from secret traps and deadly diseases. 4 He will spread his wings over you and keep you secure. His faithfulness is like a shield or a city wall. 5 You won't need to worry about dangers at night or arrows during the day. 6 And you won't fear diseases that strike in the dark or sudden disaster at noon. 7 A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee. (CEV, KJV translation)

Luke 6:34 And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again. 35 But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. 36 Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. 37 Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven: 38 Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

[printed and distributed by Family Music Center, 4110 SW 9th St, Des Moines IA 50315, 244-3711 www.Saltshaker.US]

Summary of this article

Summary:
     Saying "I don't believe the Bible" or "I don't have time to read all this evidence" doesn't shield you from the natural consequences of banging your head against reality. The fact that Christians generally live longer and are more immune to disease is not just the claim of dozens of Bible verses, but is the finding of over a century of peer-reviewed scientific research summarized here.
     Not that every prayer is answered; every Christian remembers a request that was denied, just as every child does, even by the most loving parents.
     But generally, even though there are many varieties and degrees of being "Christian", and much theological misunderstanding among Christians about how to pray or how much to trust, the evidence is clear enough to be scientifically measured that living by the Bible reduces heart disease, cancer, weakened immunity, stroke, and dying young. It is separately clear that contributors to disease like stress, fear, boiling anger, unhealthy substances, risky sex, and negative social relationships are prime targets of the Bible, which addresses them as effectively as we will allow. Not by merely emptying our minds of negativity and desire, the goal of Eastern meditation, but by softening our hearts with love, forgiveness, and becoming a blessing to others.
     We can all have absolute faith that God will give us all the time and health we need to complete God's goals for us, which are also the most satisfying goals for ourselves, and we can constantly pray that God will save us from hurting others very much while helping others a lot. Our faith in God doesn't reduce our responsibility to be careful, but it is a huge mistake to just "be careful" while we forget God. We hear constantly "we will get through this", in a context stripped of any thought of God. That is not a very smart approach to how to "get through this". ("Be careful, but serve, and trust", below, acknowledges the death of a pastor from coronavirus after he had held a church service in defiance of "social distancing" guidelines, claiming that "God is a healer". Indeed, our faith in God doesn't reduce our responsibility to be careful.)
     God does not only help by having created a universe in which "a merry heart doeth good like medicine", with hygiene rules which, if we follow them, will generally improve our health and lifespan. God helps us daily through a constant stream of miracles of protection from physical, financial, and social ruin. Not that no one ever gets hurt, but we are all shaken from time to time by a narrow escape from devastation, which God uses to motivate us, if we will heed the warning, to be more careful. It is part of our human resistance to reality that tempts us to not acknowledge these helps, just as the Israelites in the desert, facing each new challenge, forgot how dramatically God had brought them through the last one. They never entered God's "rest", in the words of Hebrews 3 and 4. They were constantly stressing and accusing.
     God also opens doors for us to doing great things, overcoming great evils, despite great obstacles. Jesus not only promises that these "mountains" will fall if we have "enough" faith, meaning, presumably enough to not give up, but God actively helps, making it possible, but only if we really stretch ourselves which is just as important to God.
     Life is so much more than food, clothing, money, good health, and long life. Compared with much of the rest of the world, the United States are indeed a haven of Christian faith. But to "get through this" - all that life is - we have to, as a culture, not just as isolated individuals, face reality, take time for evidence as needed to get us back in touch with reality, and settle back into the loving arms of God.

"Sincerely Held Religious Objection" to mask-wearing and "social distancing"

Des Moines, IA Mayor Frank Cownie has a new (August 25, 2020) illegal (according to Iowa's Democrat Attorney General), unenforceable Mask "Mandate". Masks for everyone in any building, and outside where "social distancing" cannot be done. There are several exceptions: people in a coma, jogging, difficulty breathing, and anyone with a "sincerely held religious objection". Here's mine:

I have a sincerely held religious objection to wearing a mask - one of Mayor Cownie's official exceptions to his mandate. Although it is not based directly on my amateurish grasp of the science of masks, my explanation must begin there.

Masks don't stop aerosols. From the beginning of the "pandemic", there has been uncertainty how much of the virus is carried on "droplets" compared with how much is "aerosols". Virus riding on microscopic moisture "droplets" in our breath float only a few feet before they drop to the ground. They are large enough that masks can stop them. But "aerosols" - virus that is not riding on any moisture at all but is floating freely in the air - is so microscopic compared with the huge gaps between the threats of a mask that masks block them as effectively as a chain link fence blocks a swarm of gnats. Early in the "pandemic" the scant evidence on the subject leaned in favor of primary transmission carried on droplets. The evidence has been inconclusive because measuring virus in the air has been complicated. But a recent study below developed a new way to do that, and placed a sensor about 6 feet and at about 16 feet from covid patients in a hospital where the room air is filtered and changed frequently and great masks are worn, and found both sensors picking it up.

Oxygen Reduction. Other studies reported below document the harm to mask wearers - the longer they are worn, the greater the likelihood of harm - from reduced oxygen intake. As with any burden to physical health, the effect is greater with the eldest and the less healthy. This reality is confirmed by the exceptions included in many mask mandates for people with breathing problems.

Hydroxycloroquine and Zinc in low doses. Which word do you think best describes smackdowns of this cure: [] vigorous, or [] persuasive? Certainly it is not the kind of "persuasion" of addressing the 100 or so studies of it, most of which indicate positive results. But there is considerable "persuasiveness" in seeing everyone around you nodding to conclusions made as if none of those studies ever existed.

No emergency anyway. Finally, on August 31, the news was that the CDC has finally distinguished deaths caused solely by covid from deaths caused maybe partly by covid but by also several other things. Now, finally, officially, the CDC acknowledges that of the 300,000+ deaths previously attributed to covid by counting deaths with cumulative causes, only 9,000 died from covid alone. I understand that even for someone almost dead from diabetes and cancer, it still stinks to have covid on top of that. But the new perspective, finally permitted, puts covid back with flu in its terror potential. Not that flu is harmless. But no one ever thought of shutting down businesses and making everyone dress like bank robbers to stop it.

In short, much science - though not conclusive science - indicates masks don't stop covid, masks cause other problems by reducing our oxygen, there is a simple cheap cure, and covid is not especially serious. In the mind of anyone who hears about it and notices mass media never seriously addresses and refutes it but only vaporizes it on sight, the science is enough to raise doubts about the effectiveness of masks, the safety of wearing them, the absence of an effective cure, and the seriousness of the "pandemic".

How Hell Operates. I am no scientist, and do not base my "religious objection" upon my personal grasp of the science. It is the treatment of evidence that alarms me. Censorship of expert testimony and persecution of expert witnesses is the operation of Hell. It is opposite of how to establish facts.

"Suppression of the evidence is the strongest evidence" is the principle, from the 1735 trial of John Peter Zenger for lampooning the king-appointed governor of New York, that established Freedom of the Press in America. Now we have Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Bill Gates, with their zero medical credentials, deciding which doctors to censor and drive from the field of medicine. They are joined by newspapers and TV networks, whose reporters and editors are very seldom doctors.

Maybe the studies I note are disproven by mounds of other evidence, but I would like to see them clearly refuted, not just vaporized on sight. Suppression of those studies is brutal, stripping doctors of authority and jobs just for stating their professional analysis of the data. Who is Facebook, Twitter, and Google to pick winners and losers in the field of medical research?

The Devil's way to handle challenges is to censor, as brutally and decisively as possible, up through and including torturing to death in most centuries and many nations.

Discussion, truth, and confronting error is God's way. God answers people's sincerely asked questions. God doesn't even censor the Devil, but quotes him frequently, in order to clarify the truth. Proverbs 15:22 Without counsel purposes are disappointed: but in the multitude of counsellors they are established. 1 Peter 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear: (For more Scriptures, see my book, God's Relationship Primer. See www.Saltshaker.us, right column, for links to a free PDF or to order a paperback. Of to interact with it, see God's Relationship Primer.)

But responsibility for giving lies the force of law only ends with social media and the government officials who quote only the "official, approved" opinions and talk as if counter evidence doesn't exist. It begins with churches, as churches have become in this generation in America.

Imagine churches operating today the way they did according to 1 Corinthians 14, the model followed by the Pilgrims from 1620 to 1695, in which meetings were more like legislatures - forums open to everyone on Biblical and community topics, where the actions taken together were preceded by discussions of the facts. (Legislatures today don't want to hear from God's Word, but they used to welcome it.)

How simple it would be for a group meeting in the Name of Jesus, which typically includes a doctor or nurse, to review the facts together, weed out the nonsense, and then form a lobbying group to pressure their elected officials, in their public pronouncements, to return to reality.

Such a group, committed to helping "the least of these My brothers" as Matthew 25 puts it, would provide the robust forum for addressing error and "shining light in the darkness outside" that I read about in the Bible.

But the Devil keeps the Light, of what God says about abominations, boxed up in the Matthew 5 "bushel" by two devices.

First, he persuades churches to leave the Darkness dark by calling it "politics" which is "controversial", which makes anyone "divisive" who would trouble the church about healing it.

Second, he persuades Christian activists, driven from their churches to "put feet to" occasional sermons identifying the Darkness, to leave their "swords" back in their pews; one must not tell the public the real reason for one's "political" positions, when the real reason is specific Bible verses, because one should retain his "credibility".

In this resulting unchallenged Darkness, a worldwide inoculation mandate is promised by Dr. Fauci and Bill Gates to be the ticket to taking off our masks and getting back to normal. Gates' vision is to give everyone who takes the shots a kind of skin marking that will permit them to take off their masks and live normally. This is ominously like the worldwide human tracking system which Revelation 13 prophesies will be instituted by the Mark of the Beast in the Last Days.

They lead us to expect a vaccine within a year, even though no vaccine before has ever been developed in less than seven, and no vaccine has yet been developed for any variety of coronavirus. But there is no risk for vaccine makers from rolling out a vaccine whose testing is peppered with shortcuts: legislation exempting them from liability was signed by President Reagan.

What should we logically expect from a vaccine mandated all over the world that hasn't been well tested, whose manufacturers are exempt from liability?

Ulcers are the least of the problems we should expect. Ulcers are what Revelation 16:2 prophesies will be suffered by the people who accept the Mark of the Beast described in Chapter 13. (Revelation 16:2 And the first went, and poured out his vial upon the earth; and there fell a noisome and grievous sore [ulcers, the Greek seems to indicate] upon the men which had the mark of the beast, and upon them which worshipped his image.)

All this could be averted, or at least vastly mitigated, if Christian meetings were organized according to guidelines, as I explore in my book, God's Relationship Primer. Not that I have given up, but after thousands of conversations with Christians, both laymen and pastors, about these verses, I find nearly zero interest in any Scriptures which point to meetings different than it is assumed Christians have conducted for centuries. I still trust God to bring down this "Mountain" of resistance, so that the Beast will have people to fight, but my experience leads me to appreciate what a miracle from Him it will be.

Meanwhile, like persecuted Christians throughout history who meet in secret while avoiding public confrontation of their persecutors, I do wear my mask where required to get what I need.

My conclusion is not that I am immune from harm from the virus. But that masks appear to be part of a far greater threat than the virus. Not the masks themselves, but the spirit of censorship which shields them from scrutiny, which in turn is legitimized by mass mask-wearing.

My concern about masks and "social distancing" would vaporize if I could find a robust forum where doctors on all sides interacted with one another in language I could understand, rather than dismissing and ignoring each other, in which I could learn that masks really do work, hydroxychloroquine really doesn't, the slight oxygen reduction is harmless, and the virus really is a far more serious threat than the flu.

My concern would remain about Christian unwillingness to let their meetings become places where critical information like this, threatening to take us like heedless lemmings all the way to the Mark of the Beast, can be processed and acted upon.

I don't want to take God's protection for granted, but I pray for His mercy, and maybe a bit of indulgence. until evidence indicates to me otherwise, my trust in the protective capacity of masks is rather law, forcing my trust in God to rise.

Iowa Law

This review of Iowa Law regarding the lack of authority of city mayors to enforce Covid restrictions is from the August 31 newsletter of State Representative Sandy Salmon:

Several Iowa cities have announced citywide face mask mandates, among them Waterloo, Iowa City, and Des Moines. Below is a Q&A on what the current law says about mask requirements and the rights of the state, municipalities and citizens:

Can municipalities (cities, counties, etc.) require masks and impose a penalty for noncompliance? No, according to Attorney General Tom Miller. Iowa is under a public health disaster, as proclaimed by the Governor in consultation with the Iowa Department of Public Health (IDPH). Because of this declaration the Governor and IDPH have broad legal authority. The Governor can delegate powers to local authorities to address the current public health emergency, but the Governor can also choose not to delegate the authority. In this case, Governor Reynolds has not given local governments the authority to regulate mask wearing, and therefore they cannot require citizens to wear masks in the community. However, municipalities can require masks on their property and in their buildings. Examples could include: city council meetings, city office buildings, or a public library.

Can public schools require face masks be worn? Yes, public schools can require students to wear masks, even though the state Department of Education does not require it. Schools are given the choice to regulate face masks by teachers and students and to set standards for masks. The Department of Education has a list of concerns regarding health and safety, legal and training issues schools should be prepared to address if face masks are required.

Can private business mandate face masks? Yes, a private business can require persons entering the business wear a face mask and can also require employees to wear them. A person who refuses to wear a mask can be denied entry to the business and can face legal action if they refuse to leave when asked.

The Debate: Do face masks help reduce the spread of COVID-19 in a non-hospital or non-nursing home setting? Evidence exists on both sides of that debate, some demonstrating it is beneficial and other showing it makes no difference or is even harmful. It’s too long to discuss in this newsletter.

Conclusion: This is why at this point it is important to allow freedom for each person to decide this issue based on his own health and risk aversion. The state is not requiring it and local governments should not either. Mask mandates are both illegal (according to the Attorney General) and unenforceable. An unenforceable mandate like this breeds disrespect for the law. We seem to have some cities in Iowa with a positive case of “totalitarian fever”, anxious to regulate more of the lives of their citizens. This is the wrong direction. It breeds fear and distrust between people. It is what citizens hate from our governments. We should have more liberty, not less.

This is not to say government should not make recommendations based on what the science is showing. And it is also not saying people should not look out for and care for the health and safety of others and be encouraged to do so. But liberty means each person should be able to consider all these factors and decide this issue for themselves.

Even though there is a spike at this point in time of positive COVID cases in certain locales, we must keep in mind the big picture:

Remember our original goal under the public health disaster emergency proclamation was to keep our hospitals from being overwhelmed and we have achieved that.

Now that the virus has been introduced, it will always be with us. We will not be able to stop it.

It will work its way through the population, mask or no mask, and eventually we will achieve herd immunity.

Even though each death is very sad, we must remember that deaths from COVID are a small fraction of 1% of Iowa’s population.

Serious and deadly contagious diseases have been with us a very long time and we have never sought to mandate face masks for healthy people as a response. And we should not do so now

Updates: Important Questions (raised mostly by Doctors)

Plandemic Pt 2

Plandemic Part 2 This video says the United States CDC, Centers for Disease Prevention, patented the Coronovirus in 2007. How is that possible? It is illegal to patent some natural life form that is not man-made. So either the patent is illegal, or Coronavirus is man-made. What the video did not address, that I could tell, was that what existed then was a slightly different strain than from what has emerged this year. Still - . The video alleges that at some point the CDC decided its involvement in the project was unethical. Solution? Continue research in the Chinese lab. Of course if all this is true, then it really is partly true, as the Chinese said, that it was produced by the U.S. Army. The video alleges involvement all along this shady work by Bill Gates and Dr. Fauci.

Late in May 2020, media producer Mikki Willis released the first part of his documentary “Plandemic,” featuring Judy Mikovits, Ph.D., a cellular and molecular biologist1 whose research revealed many vaccines are contaminated with gammaretroviruses, due to the viruses being grown in contaminated animal cell lines. The 26-minute film was banned on every social media platform after going viral.2 August 18, 2020, Part 2, titled “Plandemic — Indoctornation,” was released.

Press Conference by a Dozen Doctors

Press Conference by a Dozen Doctors: Transcript July 29, 2020 The censorship is getting out of hand! When a press conference on the U.S. Capitol Steps, hosted by a Congressman, of over a dozen very qualified doctors, is censored in turn by Facebook, Youtube, Vimeo, and Bitchute - not refuted, not addressed, just censored without a sensible explanation - the enemies of wisdom, evidence, information, and intelligence have taken a few more steps out of their "closet".

Watch video.

Snopes checkup on Press Conference by Several Doctors July 30, 2020 Snopes apparently made the censored video permanently available at archive.org! (You have to open an account there, apparently free.) Snopes discovered as I did that the website address given by the doctors has "expired". Snopes read at Breitbart News that their server, Squarespace, took it down. Snopes begins by saying the doctors' "claimed credentials and affiliations could not be confirmed, and [they made] questionable and outright dangerous claims regarding an unproven “cure” and preventative treatment for COVID-19."

But not one word of Snopes' report even tried to address and disprove the doctors' "claims" or to back up Snopes' claim that the hydroxycloroquine cure is "unproven". The report focused on efforts to document the doctors' medical credentials. Snopes' treatment of the video host, Dr. Simone Gold, was to notice that another video of her was filmed in front of a California hospital, which Snopes contacted in order to learn that Gold was not on their staff. Snopes' implication was that Gold lied, leading the world to think that standing outside a hospital proves you work there, but it doesn't. Interesting logic. The video conference of a dozen doctors was filmed on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court. Why didn't Snope whine that Gold was filmed there even though she is not a Supreme Court judge? Snopes said nothing more about any search for credentials of her. Snopes cites the home page of the archived website that was taken down; Snopes could therefore have clicked on the [Speakers: https://web.archive.org/web/20200727215021/https://www.americasfrontlinedoctors.com/speakers speakers] tab and learned that she is also a lawyer, has worked for the Surgeon General, serves Native Americans as well as many others, and does legal work, yet nowhere does she claim to be on the staff of the California hospital.

Snopes confirmed that Dr. Hamilton is a real pediatrician. As for Dr. James Todaro, he "includes a 'not medical advice' caveat on his Twitter profile" (implying that somehow undermines his medical credentials, yet any doctor or lawyer must put that caveat on published articles to avoid liability; Snopes adds, "and who has no known experience treating COVID-19." Huh? Snopes does not refute, but chooses not to bring up this statement on the doctors' archived website: "He continues to lead investigative research in COVID-19 on a global scale. He wrote the first widely read paper on chloroquine in treatment of COVID-19 in An Effective Treatment for Coronavirus (COVID-19), and most recently the first detailed exposé on Surgisphere in A Study Out of Thin Air. His early discovery of the fraudulent data investigation led to what is now referred to as #LancetGate - the stunning once-in-a-generation retraction of the now infamous The Lancet study that had led to the European Union and the WHO halting studies of HCQ."

What does Snopes find wrong with Dr. Lapado? Well, maybe he is a real doctor, but he "said that he was speaking for himself." Huh? Is that supposed to somehow undermine his medical credentials, or imply that he does not agree with the rest of the doctors present? The rest of his sentence: "I’m a physician at UCLA and I’m a clinical researcher also. And I’m speaking for myself and not on behalf of UCLA." All he was saying was that he does not have UCLA's endorsement of his testimony that day.

As for Dr. Erickson, Snopes found that he is part owner of "Accelerated Urgent Care", but Snopes is skeptical: "We have yet to confirm the background, license or specialty of Erickson." Which is another way of saying "We have yet to disprove that Erickson is any less qualified than he says, but we won't give up trying!"

As for the most dramatic witness, Dr. Stella Immanuel, Snopes confirmed her medical credentials but wants everyone to know she is also a preacher, believes in demons and witches, and believes them the cause of some conditions. Snopes says "We found no evidence to suggest Immanuel has treated “hundreds” of COVID-19 patients — including herself, staff, and “many doctors” — nor that her alleged treatments were successful." But Snopes mentions no evidence that she didn't treat that many Covid patients successfully.

Snopes ignores the dramatic claim of the doctors that a published study alleging hydroxycloroquine doesn't work was retracted after one of the doctors who spoke exposed its gross errors, including administering the drug at toxic dosages.

Other archived copies of AmericasFrontlineDoctors.com: their Home page, their Media page (a couple of videos), and their References page.

Hydroxychloroquine Works but does that matter?

Yale epidemiology professor Harvey Risch July 27, 2020 says “In the future, I believe this misbegotten episode regarding hydroxychloroquine will be studied by sociologists of medicine as a classic example of how extra-scientific factors overrode clear-cut medical evidence. But for now, reality demands a clear, scientific eye on the evidence and where it points.” -- “When this inexpensive oral medication is given very early in the course of illness, before the virus has had time to multiply beyond control, it has shown to be highly effective,

Among the successful treatment experiments, he writes, are “an additional 400 high-risk patients treated by Dr. Vladimir Zelenko, with zero deaths; four studies totaling almost 500 high-risk patients treated in nursing homes and clinics across the U.S., with no deaths; a controlled trial of more than 700 high-risk patients in Brazil, with significantly reduced risk of hospitalization and two deaths among 334 patients treated with hydroxychloroquine; and another study of 398 matched patients in France, also with significantly reduced hospitalization risk.” Risch says the drug is most effective “when given very early in the course of illness, before the virus has had time to multiply beyond control.”

Federal Exceptions to Masks

A Batesville, Arkansas Gun Shop Sign July 26, 2020 reads: "THOSE IN OUR LOVELY GOVERNMENT HAVE RESOLVED THAT ALL PERSONS ENTERING INDOOR FACILITIES SHOULD WEAR A MASK. IF YOU HAVE A MEDICAL CONDITION THAT PREVENTS YOU FROM WEARING A MASK, YOU ARE EXEMPT FROM THIS. DUE TO HIPAA AND THE 4TH AMENDMENT, WE CANNOT LEGALLY ASK YOU ABOUT YOUR MEDICAL CONDITION. THEREFORE, IF WE SEE YOU WITHOUT A MASK, WE WILL ASSUME YOU HAVE A MEDICAL CONDITION AND WE WILL WELCOME YOU INSIDE TO SUPPORT OUR BUSINESS." There are also federal exceptions for very young children. Children under 6, and in some areas under 10, are exempt.

Correspondence with Dr. Robert Leach, a famous chiropractor, website admins brother

Dr. Leach: Mercola's studies questioning masks are old; relying on them is dangerous

July 19, 2020, 11:14 pm - I am VERY concerned about Dr Mercola’s information that you forwarded to me, primarily because it may affect your (and my brother’s) decision to wear a mask when around others during the present pandemic. While as you know I’m not a medical doctor, I do have a graduate degree in health education (which means one of the things I study is how to differentiate strong science from poor science, and how to translate complicated research into easy to understand knowledge for health care consumers and patients), am a certified health education specialist, have written 4 books on chiropractic theory, teach health education at Mississippi State University, and am currently involved in COVID-19 survey research with another scientist at MSU re steps taken by bodywork specialists (chiropractors and licensed massage therapists) to limit exposure to covid in their practices. Because of the research we are involved in I happen to have been keeping up on the current debate on masking and thought I might share a few comments with you. While this is not detailed I am happy to refer you to specific studies for further reading if you are interested.

ARGUMENTS AGAINST MASKING: First, several points made by Dr Mercola and those he cited that are supported by current science: a) masks will not TOTALLY protect you or others from Covid transmission, and for example that air coming in and out of our masks could not possibly stop all droplet transmission, b) main viral spread is probably airborne, as the virus (500,000 RNA strands from a typical cough ejected from a few to 15-20 feet), hangs in droplets/aerosolized so that they may be around for upwards of 50 seconds after a cough, and c) we suspect that like other viruses humidity affects so that with increasing humidity droplets do not stay airborne as long, making it safer to be outdoors, and transmission through air conditioning systems may be possible, and d) a few small and older randomized control group trials (considered gold standard for establishing causation regarding any medical issue) on prior viruses did not verify that masking was effective, other than surgical masking and face shields.

Some of the above information, in fact, is why the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was so slow to endorse masking, and to my recollection did not actively support masking until early March of this year, (although the World Health Organization may have been advocating for masking prior to the CDC). Here’s why. In contrast with Dr Mercola’s arguments, there is now very strong epidemiological research (areas that mask and socially distance versus those that don’t) coming from around the world, lab research showing dose of RNA strands released collecting on face masks (both inside and out) on mannequins placed at various distances from release of the COVID while being blown by a fan, and even research suggesting the importance of dose regarding the severity of the disease.

HOW MASKING AND SOCIAL DISTANCING HELPS: Let me try to explain a few of these points in plain English. While masking and socially distancing cannot possibly stop all transmission of this virus, here’s how they help. When known amounts of virus material (RNA strands) are ejected in a lab setting onto mannequins wearing various types of masks, some virus strands in droplet form collect on the outside of even the simple cloth mask you can make at home. The further away the mannequins from the material ejected, the less RNA penetrates the mask. Another study showed that even cloth masks limited droplet transmission of the virus as effectively as social distancing to about 1.8 meters (~6 feet). Hence, when wearing a cloth or simple mask sig droplet transmission decreases to a distance of about 30 cm (a little over a foot). So in plain English, if you are within a few feet of someone and wearing a mask, odds of transmission goes down, it goes down further when the other person wears a mask, and it REALLY goes down when both are wearing a mask at a distance of 6 feet. FURTHER, scientists now believe that the DOSE of the Covid you are exposed to matters. DOSE MAY MATTER A LOT. So for example, if you are 6 feet from your friend talking while both are wearing masks, and one has asymptomatic COVID and you are exposed to a very small dose, you may come down with only very mild or no symptoms at all; indeed, your immune system might even be primed for months to years so that subsequent exposure does not make you (as) sick. On the other hand, in the same scenario had neither of you worn masks and the conversation occurred at a two foot distance, especially if you are older and especially if immunocompromised or with other comorbidities like hypertension, COPD or diabetes, you might instead have serious, even life threatening infection. Hence, even though not all masks are created equal, and none save the PPE used by high exposure physicians/nurses and first responders can totally protect you (and even then mistakes in use can prove fatal), you are better off using some mask and distancing than none.

IS COVID A LEGITIMATE PANDEMIC? Finally, Dr Mercola points out that there was a spike in COVID-19 transmission everywhere in the world right after a Pandemic was declared in that particular area, as if WHO and government advice to mask and socially distance could somehow be spreading the virus instead of stopping it. This argument is so preposterous as to be outrageous. Here he wants his cake and to eat it as well. In the first place he argues overall all cause mortality has not increased in the world, so the pandemic isn’t affecting overall death rates. Then he argues there’s a spike in COVID deaths everywhere governments ask people to wear masks after declaring a pandemic. REALLY? And if Dr Mercola were right, shouldn’t countries where masking is mandatory have HIGH Covid rates? A few simple searches expose his fallacies. First, all-cause mortality is most certainly elevated around the world and it has been devastating here in the U.S. since the onset of this Pandemic. Indeed, in just 3 months this spring (March-April-May), we had over 105,000 deaths in the U.S. from Covid-19, that’s more than all the boys that died in the Vietnam War (68,000 from 1961-1975) in addition to all the opioid deaths in America last year, combined! In those three months more than 10 times as many Americans died from Covid-19, as normally would die in a whole year from the flu! Second, epidemiologists are finding the opposite is true, and that where masking is mandatory Covid rates are low to non-existent. For example, Taiwan (and many other countries epidemiologists are looking at) immediately and continuously called for masking and had excellent compliance with it (a lot of Asians already mask because of pollution, so they aren’t as against it generally as are middle Americans); out of a population of 23.78 million, even after a half year of the pandemic, Taiwan has had only 455 cases and 7 deaths. That’s less than 1 death per million people, and only 15 deaths per 1,000 infected persons! That last point goes to the heart of the masking question, and for Covid-19 after 3 million infections around the world the death rate stands at 44 per 1,000 infected persons, and in the US the death rate is 42 per 1,000 infected persons (by contrast, the rate of death for the flu is typically 2 per 1,000). It supports the idea that in Taiwan and other countries that mask, fewer people die per 1,000 infected, perhaps because they get a lower dose when they are exposed.

Please allow me to make perhaps the most important argument for being skeptical of Dr Mercola. He is selling products, and proposes that we NOT listen to the CDC and WHO and all the tens of thousands of doctors/nurses and scientists on the front lines literally risking their lives to help us, who with one accord are telling us to take this pandemic seriously by masking and social distancing, but instead that we should listen to him, and purchase his vitamins and herbs. Don’t ask me as a Christian what I feel about that. Christ taught what would happen to those who hurt his children, and scripture teaches that we should have mercy on the poor, not take advantage of them for our own financial interests.

I’m sorry if I’ve stepped on any toes, and purposely am sending this unsolicited information to you only and not the group you sent your email to. I’ve shared my knowledge only because I care for you and Dave, and am praying for your safety. Whether you share any or all of this with your friends is your business. You guys are family and my brother and sister so you are mine.

Love, Rob

Dave Leach answers Dr. Rob Leach, raising other questions

July 20, 2020 - 4 am I couldn't sleep, after Dorothy and I woke at the same time briefly and she summarized your letter. I was especially alarmed at the idea of you stepping on my toes, since my foot isn't completely healed from slicing it with a chain saw. If we visit again this side of glory, maybe I better be sure to wear my new steel toed boots.

As for the spikes Mercola alleged correlating with government mask requirements, I thought it seemed weird when I read it, although I didn't go back over it and read it more carefully to see if it really was as weird as the first impression indicated. He seemed to say there were sharp peaks coinciding with exactly when governments took action. Hmmm. Without clarifying whether the peaks occurred AFTER governments took action or AS they took action, it would seem that if the peak was the moment they took action, then it was the action which caused cases to drop - which is what happens on the other side of a "peak". Maybe the hour and 20 minute video which the article summarizes, which I don't feel like watching this early in the morning, clarifies that detail. Thank you for going over it again for me.

The article also alleges "We're talking many really [high-]quality trials." But not one is named. Studies you have summarized are not mentioned in anything I have read, so thank you very much for your summary. Maybe someday I will need a list of them.

I see that the link Dorothy sent you is to Mercola's article posted July 19, that's the day of your response. Are you really that much on top of his stuff to have read the same post, or has Mercola said similar stuff earlier to which you are responding?

Yesterday's Mercola post was of an interview with Dennis Rancourt, a Canadian researcher with the Ontario Civil Liberties Union. His focus was whether to challenge the Canadian government for reliance on bad science.

The article touched very lightly on a great concern that Dorothy and I share: "We’ve already mentioned that certain masks can increase your likelihood of headaches. Others believe masks can cause lower partial pressure of oxygen, which could cause serious health problems. In the video above, Peggy Hall with TheHealthyAmerican.org claims certain masks can result in low oxygen levels, thus violating OSHA rules on oxygen requirements." That was as much as the article said, although the linked video is 13 minutes. Maybe tomorrow. (uh, technically, after I get back to sleep and then wake up, that will be "today".)

Another article by perhaps an equally favorite doctor of yours, Dr. Blaylock, goes into much more frightening detail about this. He lists several studies by name, even. I wonder if you have reviewed it? It was posted May 16.

He says even surgeons, wearing masks, find their own oxygen levels reduced over time, and CO2 levels increased. With people suffering precarious oxygen levels already, that can be dangerous. Although I am healthy enough to not feel effects from things like heat, humidity, mold, stuff like that, and when I wear a mask it feels like breathing into a paper sack at first but if I have my computer to distract me pretty soon I forget it's on, Dorothy very quickly feels difficulty breathing; she relates palpably to the description of oxygen suppression from mask wearing, and it seriously concerns her.

Blaylock makes the same claims Mercola does about the lack of studies showing mask effectiveness; he certainly does not address the studies you summarize. But can you address Blaylock's claims about the dangers of oxygen reduction? I've been posting relevant articles at http://savetheworld.saltshaker.us/wiki/God's_Coronavirus_Cure_in_3_Verses. I've added your post to me, and this answer of mine to you. It would be real swell if you would come on my site and interact directly. At the very least you can see my cool coronavirus animation. My article started out, as the title indicates, as a Bible study. Three verses are especially encouraging about God's protection from pandemics, but the whole article addresses numerous other passages, along with interesting research showing Christians in general have better health than others, as if God's promises aren't TOTALLY ridiculous. It also acknowledges God's warnings to be responsible, not leave your safety all up to angels scrambling to keep you alive; for example, the preacher who died of Covid shortly after assuring his congregation that God would protect them.

The Blaylock article is posted there; the website is a wiki so that you are able to add your analysis of it right where you spot an offending claim.

Blaylock also claims that oxygen suppression encourages cancer growth; Dorothy just yesterday got back a report on a test with indications that need checking, although the day before her doctor, who must have had the report, said nothing about it; we need to get clarification Monday. Anyway, we don't want anything that will encourage cancer. Oxygen suppression also depresses immunity in general, Blaylock claims. Another thing about masks he claims is that if you have covid, and wear a mask, droplets are caught in the inside of the mask causing you to suffer that high concentration of covid which you point out can be fatal. We sure look forward to your reply! Last week I think it was about 300 people drove around the Governor's Mansion to underline their demand that Reynolds require everyone in the state to wear a mask whenever they leave home.

You must have heard of the letter to President Trump signed by thousands of doctors, not opposing masks or social distancing but opposing business shutdowns and delays of "elective" checkups and surgeries, and dental work, because of the thousands of lives they have already cost. I wonder what you think of those concerns? That letter is also posted with my "updates" section.

One great frustration of mine is that when Trump and Governor Reynolds had their daily press conferences, and had their anointed physicians there backing up their orders, there was virtually no acknowledgment of alternative evidence. No discussion. No interaction. Here were doctors making dramatic claims on Youtube, raising other concerns deserving to be balanced against the anointed consensus, and were they refuted? Did anyone bother to point out any errors in their posts? Not that I could find. After millions of views in some cases, Youtube censored them, end of discussion!

This of course is why we have some people like me leery of the dangers of masks, wearing only when required, while mask wearers look at me like I am a murderer and they are in my line of fire. Way too little experience in our society of people looking at each other's information and interacting about it. Which is what makes your letter very, very special.

Out of concern for that, I have made proposed changes in Emergency Powers laws that would require the governor to create a public record where the governor's own facts could be part of a forum where other experts could submit their evidence, and where experts could hopefully interact.

Dave, senior sibling

Dr. Rob Leach response

Just a quick follow up,

You’re so right no citations are provided, although the problem is not so much what studies and information he cited, for the most part it’s the studies he left out that are problematic, since they reach polar opposite conclusions from his own.

In contrast with his lack of citations, I don’t make many promises but will promise to provide you with several several references within the coming few months in the form of rough drafts of the introduction to our research which we will begin writing soon.

As far as the date, I went ahead and read his stuff before responding to Dorothy.

As for lack of oxygen and carbon dioxide build up triggering headaches—or even worse affecting renal and liver function as some suspect….I find this to be another great “cake and eat it too” argument. If masks do nothing at all and viruses and air flow go right through them unaffected, as Mercola seemingly argues, then why worry about oxygen? However, if indeed SOME air flow (and possibly droplet transmission with it) is restricted by masks, then they may be effective to some degree and now we can move on to the next argument about oxygen to our lungs, having been satisfied that Mercola was WRONG about air flow. Here I have sympathy for anti-maskers because I do agree it’s harder to breath—especially in Mississippi when the humidity is high—while wearing a mask. In fact, I hate them. I do however, wear them even outdoors at my grandson’s ballgame when people start getting close to me to talk. The rest of the time when I’m outdoors and away from people I can promise you the mask is hanging off one ear it it’s on at all. Bottom line, if your circulation is compromised in any way, you have COPD or liver/renal or diabetes, you should limit mask wear to when you have to wear one, and basically just try to stay away from people unless you can be 6’ or more away from them. And PLEASE try to avoid exercise while wearing a mask for those same reasons. Again, in my own office, when I am away from patients at my desk, my mask comes off.

While I haven’t seen studies about oxygen deprivation and cancer it wouldn’t surprise me. Again however, does that mean if we briefly wear a mask when we go to Wal Mart to lessen the likelihood of getting Covid, that we’re going to immediately get cancer? Not sure I follow that and pretty sure there are no data to support that argument to make it worth proceeding.

Anyway, I’ve got a number of other fires burning now or would chat longer, but at least I’ve said (most) of my peace😊

Love you guys, be safe, and I would tell you above all else continue you prayers for our Christian brothers and sisters to show the love of Christ every day, but then I’m sure you guys already do that,

Dave Leach response

No one, of course, says a little exposure to ANYTHING will certainly give you cancer, short of an atomic bomb going off over your head. When people talk about cancer risk, and write warning labels about it on products, or make you sign waivers when you take an x-ray, it's like maybe you slightly more likely to get cancer from minimal exposure and maybe 50% more likely with max exposure but even with max exposure it's still a small fraction per 1,000 people.

And yet the low risk still concerns most people.

Neither Blaylock's article nor my summary of it said masks give you cancer; only that "oxygen suppression encourages cancer growth". Nothing was said about how much suppression, or how much encouragement. However, since Dorothy has had cancer, she is peculiarly particular about avoiding anything with scary warnings. Also she has just gone over her past blood work reports and noticed that CO2 levels are a bit high, and she puts that together with the fact that even mask wearing a short time makes her feel like she is struggling to breathe. The mother of one of my students is a nurse with 12 hour shifts, during which she must wear a mask without an office to go into where she can take it off, and she suffers headaches and a nose rash.

I agree with you that the articles in question talk about the inability of masks to stop "aerosol" forms of covid, without addressing the value of stopping the droplets. I remain curious about the point that if you have it, and wear a mask, wouldn't that indeed cause a buildup of droplets inside the mask, causing you to acquire a much more serious case of it? Of course it would be better for others.

I suppose this is a great time to have a business into which half a dozen customers wander in on a good day.

That will be exciting, to get to see drafts of your research conclusions!

I don't know if you got to Blaylock's article, which focuses on the dangers of masks. He states at one point, "As for the scientific support for the use of face mask, a recent careful examination of the literature, in which 17 of the best studies were analyzed, concluded that, 'None of the studies established a conclusive relationship between mask/respirator use and protection against influenza infection.'”1 Curious how recent "recent" was, I looked down at his footnote which was to a study from 2012! However, the rest of his footnotes, documenting the harms of masks, are appropriately recent.

As for Mercola's cake which you want to eat too, looking again I see his reasoning for discounting all but the aerosol virus is “The large droplets drop to the floor immediately and are not breathed in. So, they're not part of the transmission mechanism." Apparently the studies you are talking about indicate that "immediately" is just shy of 6 feet. Anyway, I don't see that you disagree that masks don't stop the aerosol form - although I am not certain there is a definite boundary between the two forms - but he also makes the point that most of the air passes around the masks, not through them. So of course oxygen comes around the masks too; and if you take a big deep breath, then of course the CO2 held close to your nose by the mask would be negligible compared to the incoming volume of air, but when not breathing heavily surely the proportion of CO2, of the air coming in, would increase and add up after time.

I'm tired. Does it show?

Thousands of Doctor Warn that Shutdowns Kill (July)

Thousands of doctors Oppose Deadly Lockdowns A letter signed by over 500 doctors in May, see below, has now been signed by thousands of doctors:

President Donald J. Trump

The White House1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, D.C. 20500May 19, 2020Dear Mr. President:Thousands of physicians in all specialties and from all States would like to expressour gratitude for your leadership.

We write to you today to express our alarm over theexponentially growing negative health consequences of the national shutdown.In medical terms, the shutdown was a mass casualty incident.

During a mass casualty incident, victims are immediately triaged to black, red,yellow, or green. The first group, triage level black, includes those who require too manyresources to save during a mass crisis. The red group has severe injuries that aresurvivable with treatment, the yellow group has serious injuries that are not immediately life threatening, and the green group has minor injuries.

The red group receives highest priority. The next priority is to ensure that the other two groups do not deteriorate a level. Decades of research have shown that by strictly following this algorithm, we save the maximum number of lives.

Millions of Americans are already at triage level red. These include 150,000 Americans per month who would have had a new cancer detected through routine screening that hasn’t happened, millions who have missed routine dental care to fix problems strongly linked to heart disease/death, and preventable cases of stroke, heart attack, and child abuse.

Suicide hotline phone calls have increased 600%.

Tens of millions are at triage level yellow. Liquor sales have increased 300-600%, cigarettes sales have increased, rent has gone unpaid, family relationships have become frayed, and millions of well-child check-ups have been missed.

Hundreds of millions are at triage level green. These are people who currently are solvent, but at risk should economic conditions worsen. Poverty and financial uncertainty is closely linked to poor health.

A continued shutdown means hundreds of millions of Americans will downgrade a level. The following are real examples from our practices.

Patient E.S. is a mother with two children whose office job was reduced to part-time and whose husband was furloughed. The father is drinking more, the mother isdepressed and not managing her diabetes well, and the children are barely doing anyschoolwork.

Patient A.F. has chronic but previously stable health conditions. Her elective hip replacement was delayed, which caused her to become nearly sedentary, resulting in a pulmonary embolism in April.

Patient R.T. is an elderly nursing home patient, who had a small stroke in early March but was expected to make a nearly complete recovery. Since the shutdown, he has had no physical or speech therapy, and no visitors. He has lost weight, and is deteriorating rather than making progress.

Patient S.O. is a college freshman who cannot return to normal life, school, and friendships. He risks depression, alcohol abuse, drug abuse, trauma, and future financial uncertainty.

We are alarmed at what appears to be the lack of consideration for the future health of our patients. The downstream health effects of deteriorating a level are being massively under-estimated and under-reported. This is an order of magnitude error.

It is impossible to overstate the short, medium, and long-term harm to people’s health with a continued shutdown. Losing a job is one of life’s most stressful events, and the effect on a person’s health is not lessened because it also has happened to 30 million other people. Keeping schools and universities closed is incalculably detrimental for children, teenagers, and young adults for decades to come.

The millions of casualties of a continued shutdown will be hiding in plain sight, but they will be called alcoholism, homelessness, suicide, heart attack, stroke, or kidney failure. In youths it will be called financial instability, unemployment, despair, drug addiction, unplanned pregnancies, poverty, and abuse.

Because the harm is diffuse, there are those who hold that it does not exist. We,the undersigned, know otherwise.

Please let us know if we may be of assistance.

Respectfully,Simone Gold, M.D., J.D. & >500 physicians (attached)

Covid-19 losing official epidemic status (July)

CDC: COVID-19 is close to losing its epidemic status in the U.S. Coronavirus deaths in the country have nearly reached a level where the virus will cease to qualify as an epidemic under Centers for Disease Control and Prevention rules, the federal agency reported on Friday. The CDC qualifies a disease outbreak as an “epidemic” if the number of deaths attributable to the disease exceeds a certain percentage of total deaths per week. 5.9% is the current threshold. Covid deaths have been dropping for the past 10 weeks.

Understanding "Herd Immunity" (June 25)

COVID-19 ‘herd immunity’ without vaccination? Teaching modern vaccine dogma old tricks Dr: Andrew Bostom · June 25, 2020 Vaccine enthusiast Fauci and the more sober Bell each conveniently ignore unsuccessful vaccine experiences with other coronaviruses over the past two decades:...experimental non-human (animal model) evaluations of four SARS-Cov1 candidate vaccine types, revealed that despite conferring some protection against infection with SARS-Cov1, each also caused serious lung injury, caused by an overreaction of the immune system, upon viral challenge....Although the term “herd immunity” was first coined in 1923, it only became broadly used, stimulated by increased vaccine use over the past five decades, when discussing disease eradication. Contrary to the vaccination paradigm of “eradicating” disease, herd immunity, including its mathematical underpinnings (a 1927 theorem still applied by vaccine modelers),...The epidemic continues to increase so long as the density of the unaffected population is greater than the threshold density [the threshold of “herd immunity” or “herd immunity threshold”], but when this critical point is approximately reached the epidemic begins to wane, and ultimately to die out. ...Naturally acquired herd immunity to COVID-19 combined with earnest protection of the vulnerable elderly — especially nursing home and assisted living facility residents — is an eminently reasonable and practical alternative to the dubious panacea of mass compulsory vaccination against the virus. This strategy was successfully implemented in Malmo, Sweden, which had few COVID-19 deaths by assiduously protecting its elder care homes, while “schools remained open, residents carried on drinking in bars and cafes, and the doors of hairdressers and gyms were open throughout.” (This is a very technical article with several mathematical formulas.)

Andrew Bostom, M.D., M.S., is an associate professor of family medicine (research) at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. Dr. Bostom is a trained clinician, epidemiologist, and clinical trialist.

Wearing Masks Endangers Healthy People: Dr. Blaylock (May 11)

Wearing masks endangers healthy people May 11, 2020 Dr. Russell Blaylock, MD reports that wearing masks may actually harm you.

"As for the scientific support for the use of face mask, a recent careful examination of the literature, in which 17 of the best studies were analyzed, concluded that, “ None of the studies established a conclusive relationship between mask/respirator use and protection against influenza infection.”1 Keep in mind, no studies have been done to demonstrate that either a cloth mask or the N95 mask has any effect on transmission of the COVID-19 virus. Any recommendations, therefore, have to be based on studies of influenza virus transmission. And, as you have seen, there is no conclusive evidence of their efficiency in controlling flu virus transmission.

"It is also instructive to know that until recently, the CDC did not recommend wearing a face mask or covering of any kind, unless a person was known to be infected, that is, until recently. Non-infected people need not wear a mask. When a person has TB we have them wear a mask, not the entire community of non-infected. The recommendations by the CDC and the WHO are not based on any studies of this virus and have never been used to contain any other virus pandemic or epidemic in history.

"Now that we have established that there is no scientific evidence necessitating the wearing of a face mask for prevention, are there dangers to wearing a face mask, especially for long periods? Several studies have indeed found significant problems with wearing such a mask. This can vary from headaches, to increased airway resistance, carbon dioxide accumulation, to hypoxia, all the way to serious life-threatening complications.

There is a difference between the N95 respirator mask and the surgical mask (cloth or paper mask) in terms of side effects. The N95 mask, which filters out 95% of particles with a median diameter >0.3 µm2 , because it impairs respiratory exchange (breathing) to a greater degree than a soft mask, and is more often associated with headaches. In one such study, researchers surveyed 212 healthcare workers (47 males and 165 females) asking about presence of headaches with N95 mask use, duration of the headaches, type of headaches and if the person had preexisting headaches.2

They found that about a third of the workers developed headaches with use of the mask, most had preexisting headaches that were worsened by the mask wearing, and 60% required pain medications for relief. As to the cause of the headaches, while straps and pressure from the mask could be causative, the bulk of the evidence points toward hypoxia and/or hypercapnia as the cause. That is, a reduction in blood oxygenation (hypoxia) or an elevation in blood C02 (hypercapnia). It is known that the N95 mask, if worn for hours, can reduce blood oxygenation as much as 20%, which can lead to a loss of consciousness, as happened to the hapless fellow driving around alone in his car wearing an N95 mask, causing him to pass out, and to crash his car and sustain injuries. I am sure that we have several cases of elderly individuals or any person with poor lung function passing out, hitting their head. This, of course, can lead to death.

A more recent study involving 159 healthcare workers aged 21 to 35 years of age found that 81% developed headaches from wearing a face mask.3 Some had pre-existing headaches that were precipitated by the masks. All felt like the headaches affected their work performance.

Unfortunately, no one is telling the frail elderly and those with lung diseases, such as COPD, emphysema or pulmonary fibrosis, of these dangers when wearing a facial mask of any kind—which can cause a severe worsening of lung function. This also includes lung cancer patients and people having had lung surgery, especially with partial resection or even the removal of a whole lung.

While most agree that the N95 mask can cause significant hypoxia and hypercapnia, another study of surgical masks found significant reductions in blood oxygen as well. In this study, researchers examined the blood oxygen levels in 53 surgeons using an oximeter. They measured blood oxygenation before surgery as well as at the end of surgeries.4 The researchers found that the mask reduced the blood oxygen levels (pa02) significantly. The longer the duration of wearing the mask, the greater the fall in blood oxygen levels.

The importance of these findings is that a drop in oxygen levels (hypoxia) is associated with an impairment in immunity. Studies have shown that hypoxia can inhibit the type of main immune cells used to fight viral infections called the CD4+ T-lymphocyte. This occurs because the hypoxia increases the level of a compound called hypoxia inducible factor-1 (HIF-1), which inhibits T-lymphocytes and stimulates a powerful immune inhibitor cell called the Tregs. . This sets the stage for contracting any infection, including COVID-19 and making the consequences of that infection much graver. In essence, your mask may very well put you at an increased risk of infections and if so, having a much worse outcome.5,6,7

People with cancer, especially if the cancer has spread, will be at a further risk from prolonged hypoxia as the cancer grows best in a microenvironment that is low in oxygen. Low oxygen also promotes inflammation which can promote the growth, invasion and spread of cancers.8,9 Repeated episodes of hypoxia has been proposed as a significant factor in atherosclerosis and hence increases all cardiovascular (heart attacks) and cerebrovascular (strokes) diseases.10

There is another danger to wearing these masks on a daily basis, especially if worn for several hours. When a person is infected with a respiratory virus, they will expel some of the virus with each breath. If they are wearing a mask, especially an N95 mask or other tightly fitting mask, they will be constantly rebreathing the viruses, raising the concentration of the virus in the lungs and the nasal passages. We know that people who have the worst reactions to the coronavirus have the highest concentrations of the virus early on. And this leads to the deadly cytokine storm in a selected number.

It gets even more frightening. Newer evidence suggests that in some cases the virus can enter the brain.11,12 In most instances it enters the brain by way of the olfactory nerves (smell nerves), which connect directly with the area of the brain dealing with recent memory and memory consolidation. By wearing a mask, the exhaled viruses will not be able to escape and will concentrate in the nasal passages, enter the olfactory nerves and travel into the brain.13

It is evident from this review that there is insufficient evidence that wearing a mask of any kind can have a significant impact in preventing the spread of this virus. The fact that this virus is a relatively benign infection for the vast majority of the population and that most of the at-risk group also survive, from an infectious disease and epidemiological standpoint, by letting the virus spread through the healthier population we will reach a herd immunity level rather quickly that will end this pandemic quickly and prevent a return next winter. During this time, we need to protect the at-risk population by avoiding close contact, boosting their immunity with compounds that boost cellular immunity and in general, care for them.

One should not attack and insult those who have chosen not to wear a mask, as these studies suggest that is the wise choice to make.

References

1. bin-Reza F et al. The use of mask and respirators to prevent transmission of influenza: A systematic review of the scientific evidence. Resp Viruses 2012;6(4):257-67.

2. Zhu JH et al. Effects of long-duration wearing of N95 respirator and surgical facemask: a pilot study. J Lung Pulm Resp Res 2014:4:97-100.

3. Ong JJY et al. Headaches associated with personal protective equipment- A cross-sectional study among frontline healthcare workers during COVID-19. Headache 2020;60(5):864-877.

4. Bader A et al. Preliminary report on surgical mask induced deoxygenation during major surgery. Neurocirugia 2008;19:12-126.

5. Shehade H et al. Cutting edge: Hypoxia-Inducible Factor-1 negatively regulates Th1 function. J Immunol 2015;195:1372-1376.

6. Westendorf AM et al. Hypoxia enhances immunosuppression by inhibiting CD4+ effector T cell function and promoting Treg activity. Cell Physiol Biochem 2017;41:1271-84.

7. Sceneay J et al. Hypoxia-driven immunosuppression contributes to the pre-metastatic niche. Oncoimmunology 2013;2:1 e22355.

8. Blaylock RL. Immunoexcitatory mechanisms in glioma proliferation, invasion and occasional metastasis. Surg Neurol Inter 2013;4:15.

9. Aggarwal BB. Nucler factor-kappaB: The enemy within. Cancer Cell 2004;6:203-208.

10. Savransky V et al. Chronic intermittent hypoxia induces atherosclerosis. Am J Resp Crit Care Med 2007;175:1290-1297.

11. Baig AM et al. Evidence of the COVID-19 virus targeting the CNS: Tissue distribution, host-virus interaction, and proposed neurotropic mechanisms. ACS Chem Neurosci 2020;11:7:995-998.

12. Wu Y et al. Nervous system involvement after infection with COVID-19 and other coronaviruses. Brain Behavior, and Immunity, In press.

13. Perlman S et al. Spread of a neurotropic murine coronavirus into the CNS via the trigeminal and olfactory nerves. Virology 1989;170:556-560.

Hospitals created, then closed without serving a patient (May 23)

Another hospital closes that never served a patient May 23, Western Journal: A $20.8 million emergency field hospital built to serve coronavirus patients has closed without ever serving a single person. Ditto for a Seattle emergency hospital and a $17 million Houston hospital. However, the $19.8 million facility at New York City's tennis center did serve 79 patients before it closed. The $40 million bill will be passed to American taxpayers through FEMA.

CDC Downgrades Fatality Rate (May 25)

CDC revises covid fatality rate to 0.25% May 25 That's still twice the rate for colds, but a tenth of what was originally reported, which was the basis for government action. Republicans are more aware of updated mortality data than Democrats. May 26 The Just the News poll found that only half the nation (48%) knows that the fatality rate from the coronavirus is lower than originally thought. Twenty-five percent (25%) believe it’s not true while 27% are not sure. Among Democrats, awareness was evenly divided between those who thought, correctly, it was true (34%) that the fatality rate was lower than originally thought and those who thought it was false (35%). Seventy percent (70%) of Republicans are aware of the good news about survivability. That falls to 43% among Independents (of who 26% believe it is false). That is why Republicans are more alarmed by the economic harm of shutdowns, while Democrats are more alarmed at the termination of shutdowns. Why the two groups have different understanding of the facts is not clear.

Mob drives out customer not wearing mask (May 26)

Mob Chases Person Out of Grocery Store in New York for Not Wearing a Mask May 26. A video, links to the debate whether masks even help, or whether rather they expose wearers, & the lack of clear scientific evidence that they help. If you are coughing or sneezing, then of course if you wear a mask that will protect others.

Doctors from 30 countries support hydroxychloroquine (May 26)

Doctors from 30 countries agree hydroxychloroquine works May 26 Red Right Daily, from the New York Post: Of 2,171 physicians surveyed, 37% of them said that hydroxychloroquine is the “most effective therapy” for combating the virus. 32% of doctors, however, said "nothing" is effective. 6,227 physicians were questioned about at least 15 treatments used for COVID-19. Only 2,171 of them were asked which drug is most effective. But in the U.S., only 23% of doctors have prescribed the drug - only in severe cases - far less than in other countries, where it is often prescribed in all cases.

38% of Americans are delaying medical treatment (May 24)

38% of Americans are delaying medical treatment May 24, Breitbart The Census Bureau is tabulating how many Americans are delaying medical treatment - 38%, and how many are jobless - 47%.

Travel restrictions did NOT stop covid spread (May 7)

Travel restrictions did NOT delay virus spread May 7, Cato Institute: an analysis of data showing that cutting off travel from China did NOT delay virus spread; or if it did, it did by, at most, 15 days.

Shutdowns spread cancer (May 24)

How shutdowns etc. to reduce Covid have increased cancer May 24, Breitbart: "Potential ‘Massive Wave’ of Cancer from Avoiding Routine Medical Care" Even though hospitals are now permitted to resume normal care, many people are afraid to come in for regular checkups. “Many patients are concerned about coming to visit us, to be screened for cancer, to be surveilled for their previous cancers we’ve taken out,” DiPerna explained.

Judge overturns governor's lockdown (May 21)=

Judge overturns another governor's lockdown May 21 The judge followed Oregon's emergency powers law which requires the legislature's approval before the governor can exercise those powers beyond 4 weeks. (Iowa's emergency powers law has the same limit.) The reporter adds, presumably, to the judge's reasoning: "For months, everyone has been told that staying home is designed to flatten the curve of coronavirus. ...The curve has flattened. ...The original goals of flattening the COVID-19 infection curve and not overwhelming hospitals have been met; as a matter of fact, the coronavirus curve is so flat that hospitals are laying off healthcare people because there isn’t enough work for them."

Covid Lies (May 18)

6 Lies about Covid that make all the difference May 18 Lie #1: deliberate inflation of death toll by counting everyone who died WITH Covid (but dying FROM something more serious) as if they died FROM Covid. So far only Colorado has been ordered by courts to be more honest. #2: Lockdowns save lives? States with lockdowns suffer MORE Covid deaths, plus CAUSING many other deaths, especially dying at home for fear of going to a hospital for other problems. #3: There is danger outside nursing homes? Not! Chance of death of those testing positive, age 0-30, 0.003%. Age 60-64, 0.99%. #4: It's worse than the flu? Outside lockdown New York which sends Covid patients to stay in nursing homes and has nurses on Youtube crying over atrocious medical care, its the same as flu, and much lower than influenza. #6: Social distancing was invented by scientists? No: by a high school kid for a term paper. Doctors ridiculed it when President Bush talked about it.

Covid does NOT spread easily from touching surfaces (May 21)

Little need for wiping down things May 21 The CDC revised its web page to say there is no evidence the virus will transmit easily from hard surfaces. Theoretically MAYBE you can get it from touching a hard surface with the virus on it, and then sucking your thumb. The CDC still thinks "social distancing" and masks are needed, though.

Social Distancing Prolongs Threat (May 18)

We could open up again (and forget we ever closed) May 18 Dr. Knut M. Wittkowski, who holds two doctorates in computer science and medical biometry, former head of biostatistics, epidemiology and research design at Rockefeller University, is a ferocious critic of the nation’s current steps to fight the coronavirus. He has derided social distancing, saying it only prolongs the virus’ existence. He has attacked the current lockdown as mostly unnecessary. He believes the coronavirus should be allowed to achieve “herd immunity,” and that short of a vaccine the pandemic will only end after it has sufficiently spread through the population. “With all respiratory diseases, the only thing that stops the disease is herd immunity. About 80% of the people need to have had contact with the virus, and the majority of them won’t even have recognized that they were infected,” he says in the now-deleted Youtube video which had racked up more than 1.3 million views.. He says he has no idea why Youtube deleted it. “They don’t tell you. They just say it violates our community standards. There’s no explanation for what those standards are or what standards it violated.” The footage was produced by the British film company Journeyman Pictures.

Reopening causes no spike (May 17)

NO SPIKE in coronavirus in places reopening, U.S. health secretary says May 17 Reuters: U.S. health secretary Alex Azar said on CNN’s “State of the Union” program on Sunday: “We are seeing that in places that are opening, we’re not seeing this spike in cases. We still see spikes in some areas that are in fact close to very localized situations [still closed].”

Open states: no more cases than closed states (May 14)

States That Reopened Do Not Have More COVID-19 Infections Than Ones That Stayed Closed By: Kim Coulter, The National File, May 14, 2020 - Many governors, including Governor Brian Kemp (R,GA) who started reopening their states have not seen dramatic increases in coronavirus deaths as critics suggested. According to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation report from May 12, the rates of infection would dramatically spike from hundreds of new cases a day up into the thousands by June and well into August of this year. Now that Georgia has had shelter-in-place lifted for 14 days and they are a month into the reopening of the state, new IHME predictions fall dramatically short of prior predictions. Media outlets that criticized Governor Kemp as well as the other governors who reopened their states earlier have not retracted or corrected their original stories suggesting massive death tolls and overwhelmed hospitals.

Fauci Flipflops (May 17)

Fauci flipflops as needed to keep us shut down May 17 Dr. Fauci claims to want to reopen the economy and move to get life back to normal as quickly as possible. But at every turn Dr. Fauci moves the goal posts – even it means contradicting positions he took just two weeks ago – to extend the disastrous lockdown until a vaccine is available even if it means the end of the American economy. (Examples are given.)

Florida welcomes pro football games from closed states (May)

FLA GOV Ron DeSantis Encourages Football Teams To Play In Florida If Their Home States Won’t Allow Games 😉 When an NFL team is not allowed by its own state to play in its own stadium, there are a couple of Florida stadiums which the Florida governor will happily make available. College football teams would also be welcome, but would have more bureaucrats in the way of permission to come.

The purpose for mitigation, not overwhelming hospitals, was served (May 15)

Mainstream acknowledgment that "mitigation" has served its purpose and should end: Iowa State Senator Zach Whiting writes, May 15, in "Whiting's Writings": "While the closures may have been necessary at the beginning, the point of them was not to overwhelm the health care system. They cannot be a long-term solution to the virus. If the state were to continue prohibiting these places from opening, many more businesses may be forced to close forever. Unemployment across the country has skyrocketed, with hundreds of thousands in Iowa filing for unemployment in the last several weeks. Extending closures would drive more Iowans into poverty, making it difficult to afford food, a place to live, and pay bills that continue to show up, whether the state is closed or not. Besides those consequences, the impact to mental health and the emotional hardships people experience when facing all these difficulties cannot be ignored." The Patriot Post May 15 remembers the original reason for mitigation similarly: "The original stated goal of the coronavirus lockdown was to "flatten the curve" of infections so as to keep hospitals from being overwhelmed. The goal was not to reduce COVID-19 deaths to zero. (Last we checked, preventing death entirely was above humans' pay grade.) The corollary is something we've been among the few clearly stating: Reopening will likely yield more infections and deaths, but it's something we must do to prevent worse consequences." [Comment: The original rationale didn't envision reducing deaths AT ALL, did it? And even now, there are voices saying if we stay shut down a year, by then we will have a vaccine and shutting down until the vaccine will save lots of lives, but is the expectation of a vaccine anything we can bank on? Because the shutdown is closing a lot of personal banks!]

The "curve" was "flattened"; time now to open (May 14)

Portnoy's Points May 14 Dave Portnoy, founder of Barstool Sports: "Originally, the nation instituted lockdowns to “flatten the curve” to keep hospitals from being overrun with coronavirus cases. But, suddenly, the sports blog operator said, the policies have morphed into becoming some sort of permanent lockdown until a “cure” for coronavirus is found. ...when the crisis first started the medical advisers said that we needed to make sure there were hospital beds for a possible influx of patients. But “we are there” and that goal has been met...We’re doing what you asked...but now you’re changing the rules." “Dr. Fauci… gets in front of the Senate, he’s like ‘we re-open the country too quick, everybody’s dead.’ Where did that come from? And the L.A. Mayor, ‘we’re not opening the city until we find a cure’? What? Find a cure? Who says we’re going to find a cure?”

Fauci Conspiracy video (May 8)

Fauci's former employee threatened, jailed, never charged May 8: Dr. Judy Mikovits tells what Fauci did to keep HIV cures from HIV victims for a whole generation, what he did to her to keep her mouth shut including court gag order, how he is suppressing Covid cures today. Judy Mikovits, PhD, spent twenty years at the National Cancer Institute, working with Dr. Frank Ruscetti, one of the founding fathers of human retrovirology, and has coauthored more than forty scientific papers. For five years she was the research director of the Whittemore-Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease. BUT maybe the whole video is a fraud. See NPR

No science for closing schools (May 6)

No science for closing schools May 6, Dr. Scott Aglas: “We know it’s factually true and proven all over the world that people under 18 have very little, if any, risk of a serious illness and essentially no risk of dying. We understand they [children] interact with elderly people. We understand, though, how to protect the elderly relatives that they interact with.” - Former Chief of Neuroradiology at Stanford University: “There’s ‘no scientific evidence’ to keep schools closed”"

The "Curve" is "Flat" (May 6)

Doctor Mandrola points out a few facts May 6, John Mandrola, MD. The legitimate purpose of "distancing", lockdowns, masks etc was NOT to save lives or reduce the total number of infections but to spread them out - to "flatten the curve" - so the fast-spreading virus would not overwhelm hospitals. That has been achieved. Fact #1: It is way too late to "contain" the virus. #2: hospitals will NOT be overwhelmed; in fact closing "nonessential" medical services has placed many hospitals near ruin. #3: Covid tests are not accurate, but other public health surveillance has improved. Various apps, for example. #4: No really effective treatments, tests, or vaccines are on the horizon. Not hydroxychloroquine, not Remdesivir. ("Even if you believe its ≈ 3% reduction of death was not due to chance (p = 0.06), the death rate in the remdesivir arm in that trial was 8%. Remdesivir is no game-changer.") (Since fewer than 1% of those infected die - in other words, fewer than 100 in 10,000, a 3% reduction of the death rate would reduce the 100 deaths per 10,000 infections to 97 deaths per 10,000 infections. But even a drop to 94 deaths per 10,000 could be accounted for by chance.) #5: Mortality was at first feared to be 3%. Now most estimates place it at 0.1% to 0.5%, which, it is said, is about the mortality of flu. Actually flu is probably much lower than 0.1%, and a 0.1% rate is still serious. #6: There is a strong association of lower income and lower survival. The rich get to still work from home. #7: We make this virus worse by avoiding hard discussions on tradeoffs, the limits of modern medicine and risk.

Patients dying in NY hospitals (May 4)

Another Nurse Speaks May 4: A Nevada nurse who travelled to New York to help treat COVID-19 patients has posted a tearful Facebook Live video claiming that patients are not dying from the virus, but are being “murdered” by “gross negligence and complete medical mismanagement.”

Masking the Economy kills too

Professor Says What We All Fear About The Coronavirus And It’s Impact On The Economy; This Is Why We Must Reopen Sweden, which imposed no lockdown, has about the same rate of infection as UK, which did impose a lockdown. "Deaths from COVID-19 will be far less than the deaths caused by societal lockdown when the economy is ruined,” said Nilsson. “Sweden could reach heard immunity earlier than other countries which means that the spread of the virus and the number of deaths will decrease since a majority of the population will be immune,” said Rostila. “Other countries that start to reopen now may experience a second wave of the virus. So it might be that they have just postponed a severe outbreak.” A consortium of data analysts from South Africa has found that the economic consequences of these lockdowns will result in 29 times more folks dying than from the coronavirus itself. [Comment: is this the ONLY estimate of deaths expected from a collapsed economy? Is anyone else even acknowledging the need for that perspective?]

Shutting down hospitals won't help (May 3)

Unless Health Care Workers Return to Work ASAP, More Hospitals Could Close May 3, Daily Signal: Coronavirus policy has closed down hospitals! How is that helping us stay alive?!

Social Distancing doesn't help (April 24)

The Illusion of Social Distancing April 24, Freedom Health News. Isolating a virus is good for Bubonic Plague or Ebola, which kill quickly and often, leaving no time to develop immunity. At first we tested only serious cases, and worried the coronavirus death rate was 5%. Now we know it is about 0.1%. We know that countries without any lockdowns or "social distancing" had the same rate as countries with both. With what we know now, we know the best defense against the virus is to let our immune systems do their job, which they do magnificently.

Sweden's Experience (April 17)

Is Sweden’s COVID-19 Approach the Right One? What 1 Expert Thinks Excerpt: "The spread of COVID-19 has created a serious public health challenge for governments throughout the world, but several countries have responded differently....It will certainly take some time for the international data to definitively say which approach is best, but it seems that very few people want to have a healthy debate over the costs and benefits of those approaches. In the U.S., criticism of social distancing and shutdowns is often misconstrued as advocating for tens or even hundreds of thousands of deaths....one of the world’s leading epidemiologists, Johan Giesecke, gave a very blunt assessment of why he thinks Sweden’s approach is the right way to attack the COVID-19 problem." (April 17 the interview was given; May 2 it was posted at DailySignal.)

Social Distancing: the problem, not the answer (April 30)

‘Social distancing’ is not the answer; it’s the problem overview of the political power grab facilitated by masks, "social distancing", lockdowns, the threat of future lockdowns when there is a "new wave" of covid, etc.

Analyzing the Statistics (April)

Did mitigation save two million lives? Evidence that the initial projection of coronavirus deaths if nothing were done was a wild overestimate and should no longer be repeated.

Let's not copy dictators (April 17)

When It Comes to Fighting COVID-19, Let’s Not Emulate China’s Totalitarianism by John Stossel, April 17. Excerpt: "Chinese police have even welded people into their homes to keep them inside. They’ve tied people to posts for not wearing face masks. China spies on every citizen, using more than 200 million cameras and social media tracking. Electronic eavesdropping lets them analyze every person’s political leanings and social interactions. They use that to give everyone a “trust” score. Your “trust” score drops if you criticize the government—or the “trust” score system. You lose points if you do things like play “too many” video games, watch porn, or have friends with low scores."

Conspiracy video: Bill Gates (April 17)

Robert F Kennedy Jr. Reveals the Extent of Vaccine Carnage and Corruption Caused by Bill Gates April 17, published by Big League Politics: accusations of human experiments conducted in Africa by Bill Gates' vaccine empire. (here is an article attacking Kennedy's allegations. here an attorney explains why vaccine manufacturers are exempt from liability.)

Another doctor: Reopen! (April)

ANOTHER PROMINENT NYC ER DOCTOR on frontline of Corona battle: America should REOPEN IMMEDIATELY Medical and statistical evidence that although we didn't know much about covid before, now we know it's no more deadly than flu, which makes the measures we have created the cause of more deaths from reduction of medical care in other areas.

Shutdowns making us sick: Emergency Room doctors (April)

WATCH: Whistleblowing ER Docs Urge “Open Up Society Now” Because “Lockdowns Are Weakening Our Immune Systems” Actually, we NEED to be exposed to each other to keep our immune systems on high alert. Isolation weakens us. PLUS people are dying from not going to hospitals for other maladies, for fear of catching coronavirus. (here we read that the video of these two doctors was scrubbed by Youtube.)

God Understands Coronovirus

Back a number of years ago, they did a survey. And they went around the different college campuses asking students if they thought God understood radar. You cannot imagine how many of them said, "Well, of course not. We invented radar". No. The principal came from watching a bat. He's blind. But he don't miss. Huh? Does God understand radar? Come on, man. Does God understand faith? -Kenneth Copeland

I found that statement by googling "does God understand radar" because I remember from the late '50's a newsletter from the Billy Graham Crusade describing that survey. As I recall, the survey was in England, either during World War II during which radar was first put to use, or shortly afterward. I couldn't find a link to a more detailed record of that survey.

Were that survey taken today, most people would probably answer that radar has been around long enough that God probably understands it by now. Today the comparable survey question would be "Do you think God understands coronavirus?"

My guess is that most people, asked that question out of the blue, would dismiss that as a stupid question. Of course God understands. But if a surveyor first read the three verses above and then asked the question, I would expect less confidence in God's intelligence. And if you ask people if they are willing to live as if those three verses are true, I would expect still less. After all,

Why would God promise protection from disease for those who deliberately expose themselves to disease by helping the diseased? Does God simply not understand disease?

     Scriptures addressed below indicate that when our choice is between (1) exposing ourselves to disease by helping the diseased, (as carefully as we can), and (2) staying safe by staying away from the diseased, serving those in need is actually safer.
     The discussion below is about whether such advice has any conceivable support from modern medical science, or can only be true to the extent God miraculously overturns medical facts.
     This discussion is also about whether faith itself actually does have physical power to heal, as Jesus stated a few times, and how important it is what our faith is in: is trust in our own safety measures as safe as trust in Jesus? Also: can we trust too much - will our trust in Jesus save us even if we recklessly disregard hygiene basics in our service to others?

Should we trust the promises of protection in the three verses above, and in many similar verses? Is that actually what God thinks? Does God really not understand how dangerous coronavirus is?

America tested by God

Coronavirus tests our national faith in God. This article is a call to trust God.

Children must be careful to grow up safely into a successful adult, but it would be pretty stupid for a child to think just being very careful will keep him so safe and make him so smart that he has no further need of the guidance and support of his parents!

God's help denied by New York governor

As coronavirus infections started back down, New York governor Cuomo said "we" did it - certainly not God!

“The number is down because we brought the number down,” he told reporters Monday. “God did not do that. Faith did not do that. Destiny did not do that. A lot of pain and suffering did that. That’s how it works. It’s math. And if you don’t continue to do that, you’re going to see that number go back up. And that will be a tragedy if that number goes back up.”

It is equally stupid for adults to think they can get through this or any other crisis by their own efforts - even if they are very, very careful, without the guidance and support of God!

("Stupid" is the condition of being in a "stupor", in which one's intelligence has been temporarily shoved out of the way.)

It is particularly stupid for a whole nation, whose elected leaders are mostly Christians, to limit mention of God to a single day during which only three verses are consulted, and for even that scant acknowledgment to be blasted as a "distraction" from handling this crisis by ourselves, and as "unconstitutional", and moreover, "obscene"!

God's power denied by Mother Jones magazine

Those charges are part of a "Mother Jones" article: "A National Day of Prayer During a Mishandled Pandemic Is a National Day of Distraction - It’s unconstitutional, too." By Daniel King, editor. March 16, 2020, the day after the National Day of Prayer called by President Trump.

King says prayer literally kills: "This president recites prayerful words as if spraying perfume on preventably dead bodies." Even though trusting God includes trusting His advice to be careful, King can't imagine how people can be careful, and trust God, both, so trusting God, in his mind, can only exist at the expense of being careful: therefore, trusting God literally kills!

King writes, "The cost of this unconstitutional practice is amplified right now, when there’s lethal harm—not just in terms of being ill-prepared for a pandemic, but in the erosion of confidence in our institutions. Some of this harm is exacerbated because we continue to collapse church and state and (unconstitutionally) substitute federal faith for the full deployment and funding of scientific research."

What I take for the faintest traces of acknowledgment of God, King takes for being not "just unconstitutional" but "obscene...at a time when millions of lives are on the line". He reminds me of how little virtue it takes to enrage an atheist, and encourages me with reminders that there are at least traces of Christianity in our nation's capitol:

"{Trump's administration is) an administration that bows before evangelical voters who are proving to be the president’s most loyal supporters. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has linked his religious beliefs to foreign policy, and delivered a state-sponsored speech on “Being a Christian Leader” in his official capacity. Vice President Mike Pence is a walking billboard for government’s religious claims. Attorney General William Barr invokes God as the legal, moral, and political precept for government whenever he can. The good doctor Ben Carson, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, named God as the groundwork for government action in addressing the coronavirus. ... this administration has been blatant about it. Consider Barr’s boast to the law school at Notre Dame: 'Judeo-Christian moral standards reflect the rules that are best for man,' he told students in October. 'They are like God’s instruction manual for the best running of man and human society.'"

Mother Jones's was hardly the only attack on trusting God that week. Which reminds me of a favorite Psalm:

Psalm 2:1 Why are the nations so angry? Why are the people making such foolish plans? 2 Their kings and leaders join together to fight against the LORD and his chosen king. 3 They say, "Let's rebel against them. Let's break free from them!" 4 But the one who rules in heaven laughs at them. The Lord makes fun of them. Psa 2:5 He speaks to them in anger, and it fills them with fear. 6 He says, "I have chosen this man to be king, and he will rule on Zion, my holy mountain." 7 Let me tell you about the LORD'S agreement: He said to me, "Today I have become your father, and you are my son. 8 If you ask, I will give you the nations. Everyone on earth will be yours. 9 You will rule over them with great power. You will scatter your enemies like broken pieces of pottery!" 10 So, kings and rulers, be smart and learn this lesson. 11 Serve the LORD with fear and trembling. 12 Show that you are loyal to his son, or the Lord will be angry and destroy you. He is almost angry enough to do that now, but those who go to him for protection will be blessed. (ERV translation)

Church attacked by Kentucky mayor, defended by federal judge

This_Judge_ruled_like_a_Christian_Historian reprints the entire ruling of Federal District Judge Justin R. Walker, ruling against the mayor of Louisville, Kentucky who had ordered $500 fines for everyone attending a drive-in Easter service where cars would park 6 feet from each other and keep the windows rolled at least half way up. In addition to fines, the mayor ordered police to write down license numbers and ordered the health department to go to members' homes afterwards and impose a 14-day quarantine. Here are excerpts:

Four days ago, defendant Mayor of Louisville Greg Fischer said it was “with a heavy heart” that he was banning religious services, even if congregants remain in their cars during the service.(36) He asserted, “It’s not really practical or safe to accommodate drive-up services taking place in our community.”(37) Drive-through restaurants and liquor stores are still open.(38) Two days ago, on Holy Thursday, the Mayor threatened church members and pastors if they hold a drive-in Easter service....

There is no doubt that society has the strongest of interests in curbing the growth of a deadly disease, which is the interest Mayor Fischer and Metro Louisville (together, “Louisville”) has asserted when ordering churches and churchgoers to stay home on Easter. “When faced with a society-threatening epidemic, a state may implement emergency measures that curtail constitutional rights so long as the measures have at least some ‘real or substantial relation’ to the public health crisis and are not ‘beyond all question, a plain, palpable invasion of rights secured by the fundamental law.’”

The Court does not mean to impugn the perfectly legal business of selling alcohol, nor the legal and widely enjoyed activity of drinking it. But if beer is “essential,” so is Easter.

Religion is not “some purely personal avocation that can be indulged entirely in secret, like pornography, in the privacy of one’s room. For most believers, it is not that, and has never been.”(67) Instead, just as many religions reinforce their faith and their bonds with the faithful through religious assemblies, many Christians take comfort and draw strength from Christ’s promise that “where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them.”(68) Indeed, as On Fire points out, “the Greek word translated ‘church’ in our English versions of the Christian scriptures is the word ‘ekklesia,’ which literally means ‘assembly.’”(69)

It is true that On Fire’s church members could believe in everything Easter teaches them from their homes on Sunday. So too could the Pilgrims before they left Europe. But the Pilgrims demanded more than that. And so too does the Free Exercise Clause. It “guarantees the free exercise of religion, not just the right to inward belief.”(70) That promise is as important for the minister as for those ministered to, as vital to the shepherd as to the sheep. And it is as necessary now as when the Mayflower met Plymouth Rock. Nor is there any evidence that churches are less essential than every other business that is currently allowed to be open – liquor stores among them.

You do not have to share On Fire’s faith to believe that celebrating that faith – while gathered together in praise of the One they believe healed the sick and conquered death – will bring hope to many in need of hope this Holy Week.

God praised by President Trump

On Friday the 13th, the President had declared a national emergency; it is in that connection that, the following day, he called for a Day of Prayer on the 15th, on Sunday. Although limiting national prayer and repentance to a single day is tragically dangerous, especially in a nation that lets its aborticide dungeons remain open for their bloody business even in violation of voluntary shutdowns, still, a presidential acknowledgment of God even on one day, in a nation so far from God, is a refreshing move of the Holy Spirit.

Here is the text of President Trump's proclamation:

Proclamation on the National Day of Prayer for all Americans Affected by the Coronavirus Pandemic and for our National Response Efforts Issued on: March 14, 2020

In our times of greatest need, Americans have always turned to prayer to help guide us through trials and periods of uncertainty. As we continue to face the unique challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic, millions of Americans are unable to gather in their churches, temples, synagogues, mosques, and other houses of worship. But in this time we must not cease asking God for added wisdom, comfort, and strength, and we must especially pray for those who have suffered harm or who have lost loved ones. I ask you to join me in a day of prayer for all people who have been affected by the coronavirus pandemic and to pray for God’s healing hand to be placed on the people of our Nation.

As your President, I ask you to pray for the health and well-being of your fellow Americans and to remember that no problem is too big for God to handle. We should all take to heart the holy words found in 1 Peter 5:7: “Casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you.” Let us pray that all those affected by the virus will feel the presence of our Lord’s protection and love during this time. With God’s help, we will overcome this threat.

On Friday, I declared a national emergency and took other bold actions to help deploy the full power of the Federal Government to assist with efforts to combat the coronavirus pandemic. I now encourage all Americans to pray for those on the front lines of the response, especially our Nation’s outstanding medical professionals and public health officials who are working tirelessly to protect all of us from the coronavirus and treat patients who are infected; all of our courageous first responders, National Guard, and dedicated individuals who are working to ensure the health and safety of our communities; and our Federal, State, and local leaders. We are confident that He will provide them with the wisdom they need to make difficult decisions and take decisive actions to protect Americans all across the country. As we come to our Father in prayer, we remember the words found in Psalm 91: “He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust.”

As we unite in prayer, we are reminded that there is no burden too heavy for God to lift or for this country to bear with His help. Luke 1:37 promises that “For with God nothing shall be impossible,” and those words are just as true today as they have ever been. As one Nation under God, we are greater than the hardships we face, and through prayer and acts of compassion and love, we will rise to this challenge and emerge stronger and more united than ever before. May God bless each of you, and may God bless the United States of America.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, DONALD J. TRUMP, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim March 15, 2020, as a National Day of Prayer for All Americans Affected by the Coronavirus Pandemic and for our National Response Efforts. I urge Americans of all faiths and religious traditions and backgrounds to offer prayers for all those affected, including people who have suffered harm or lost loved ones.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this fourteenth day of March, in the year of our Lord two thousand twenty, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-fourth. DONALD J. TRUMP

God not only UNDERSTANDS coronavirus, and knows how to HEAL it, but USES it

Acknowledgement of God as robust as the President's is rare in America, and acknowledgment of our national sins whose national consequences include many serious physical threats, which God refrains from miraculously mitigating as needed to get us to be more spiritually careful. I must personally confess that I also, when I originally posted this article, forgot about this spiritual dimension of plagues, and did not include it until I was reminded of it by Bill Whatcott.

Canadian anti-sodomite and antiabortion activist Bill Whatcott lays out a few Scriptures about that. After reviewing some of the wild conspiracy theories he has heard, and showing a picture of police not practicing the "social distancing" they impose on others - police who arrested leaders of an outdoor church meeting with people standing 10' apart, he writes:

Ultimately, I believe God has allowed this pandemic to come upon us and chastise us for our sin and rebellion against His Law and the rejection of His redeeming Gospel.....

"And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil." John 3:19

Here is a Biblical account of Elijah the prophet bringing a warning of a plague to a wicked King in Israel who reminds me of Justin Trudeau, who happens to "admire China's basic communist dictatorship:"

" The Lord will strike your people with a serious affliction—your children, your wives, and all your possessions; and you will become very sick with a disease of your intestines, until your intestines come out by reason of the sickness, day by day." 2 Chronicles 21:14, 15

Here is a Biblical account of Moses warning the Pharoah of great plagues that were about to befall Egypt:

"At this time I will send all My plagues to your very heart, and on your servants and on your people, that you may know that there is none like Me in all the earth." Exodus 9:24

While Scripture is clear that God can send plagues, pestilence, and poverty onto a land that rebels and rejects His Holy standard, it is also clear when a people repents and turns to Him, He will relent and forgive their sin and heal their land.

"When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land." 2 Chronicles 7:13-15

From where I sit, as I refect on how Canada has embraced sexual perversion (homosexuality, polyamory, pornography, etc...), the murder of the unborn (abortion), the murder of the elderly and disabled (euthanasia), and is now persecuting truth tellers such as, David Lynn, Mary Wagner, Linda Gibbons, Stefan Jetchick, etc..... I believe we are a nation that has become hardened and arrogant and we are ripe for judgment.

As much as I hate to see Canadians confined to their homes, people sick and dying in our hospitals and long term care homes, out of control deficit spending and our economy deteriorating rapidly to the point that the threat of food insecurity (unheard of in Canada for nearly a century) is looming; I think God has had to send us this wake up call.

So far I am not sure Canadians are getting the message. Our politicians and media have decided we need our internet porn, and cannabis and liquor stores to remain open so we can cope with the government imposed unemployment and isolation. Interestingly, these same politicians and the talking heads in our media are unaminous that under no circumstance can religious services be held during this pandemic. Having taken three semesters of church history, I am not aware of any other point in history where so many churches have been closed in so many countries and more amazingly it seems the vast majority of clergy have chosen to close with no actual attempt to challenge these extreme, indefinate, orders or offer the authorities constructive alternatives.

Moses' Hygiene Rules Prove the Bible came from God

Another preacher who remembered the "Does God understand radar?" survey was Joe McKeever. His article is a great overview of Moses' hygiene laws, of what practical advice they were for a primitive culture that had never seen a germ, of the contrast those sensible laws were with the disease-breeding practices of all other nations of that time, and of resistance until recently of doctors to the most powerful evidence of the need for Moses-level hygiene. Here is part of his summary of Moses' hygiene laws:

–“And he placed the laver between the tent of meeting and the altar and put water in it for washing. And from it Moses and Aaron and his sons washed their hands and their feet. When they entered the tent of meeting, and when they approached the altar, they washed, just as the Lord had commanded Moses” (Exodus 40:30-32).

–The bodies of sacrificial beasts were often burned “outside the camp.” See Leviticus 4:12,21, and 8:17 for starters. (Also, in reference to that, see Hebrews 13:10-14.)

–Leviticus 11 lists foods which were unclean (and thus forbidden) to God’s people. We know now that those animals were most susceptible to disease and thus food from them would pose the biggest threat to Israel.

–Leviticus 12 has laws for the purification of the mother after childbirth. Blood issues were a major concern, and for good reason.

–Leviticus 13 has tests for leprosy and provisions for quarantining those with communicable diseases. Some consisted of a mere seven days, but in the case of all-out leprosy, “all the days during which he has the infection; he is unclean. He shall live alone; his dwelling shall be outside the camp” (13:46). The book referenced below–“None of These Diseases” by S. I. McMillen–says it was the discovery of the quarantine from Scripture that stopped the Black Plague in its tracks.

–Leviticus 14-15 contain provisions for cleansing unhealthy places. It might involve tearing down a house altogether, burning one’s contaminated clothing, or simply waiting a period of time.

Other texts…

–“And the Lord will remove from you all sickness, and He will not put on you any of the harmful diseases of Egypt which you have known…” (Deuteronomy 7:15). This reminds us of Exodus 15:26, “If you will give earnest heed to the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in His sight, and give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have put on the Egyptians; for I, the Lord, am your healer.” (“None of These Diseases” is the title of the best-seller from missionary physician S. I. McMillen, which first introduced many of us to the amazing provisions of God to the Israelites for their health, far in advance of the discoveries of modern medical science.)

–And this most practical text: “You shall also have a place outside the camp and go out there, and you shall have a spade among your tools, and it shall be when you sit down outside, you shall dig with it and shall turn to cover up your excrement” (Deuteronomy 23:12-13). God even provided for the sanitary disposal of human sewage!

"Common Sense" might cause our first impression to be "of course staying away from sick people is safest", which is the opposite of what these Scriptures indicate, which in turn will lead Christians to question whether they should be interpreted the way they seem to mean.

And yet the practice of modern medicine is in harmony with God's promises: doctors and nurses serve the sickest all the time, yet we are used to them being among the healthiest Americans. How can this be?

Can God be right? Can it be that God actually understands coronavirus, and that the safest response to it for humans really is to serve others?

As for what God understands, consider a bit of the context McKeever points out in which God gave Moses such medically advanced knowledge:

Dr. McMillen, in None of These Diseases, pointed out that 1500 years B.C., God had told Israel that after touching a dead body, they were to be unclean for a period of time, were to burn their clothing, and to wash themselves, but not in a basin of stagnant water. Scripture called for running water!

Some might insist, said McMillen, that Moses had learned all these things from growing up living in Egypt. McMillen dismisses this. The current practice in Egypt at that time called for dung to be applied to wounds and holes to be drilled in skulls to cure headaches!

Moses said he got this wisdom from God on Sinai. It was such a remarkable advance in medical science, that we should believe him.

In other words, the fact that way before modern medical tools existed, modern medical wisdom was published in the Bible, distilled into succinct, practical, and effective rules able to be followed in a primitive technology. This intelligence, available nowhere else in that superstitious time, and impossible for humans who had never seen a germ to imagine, proves this intelligence was superhuman. It proves that the Bible contains the wisdom of God.

Modern scientific backing for God's promises of protection

What keeps doctors and nurses healthy?

Three natural explanations of how ministering to the sick keeps doctors and nurses healthy: (1) by ministering to the sick their whole lives, doctors and nurses learn much more about sickness than the rest of us; (2) by learning how to cure patients, they learn how to cure themselves; and (3) by exposing themselves to pathogens in carefully controlled conditions, they build up immunity.

Anxiety makes us dumb

A fourth natural explanation is that avoiding human needs, like the priest and the Levite in the Good Samaritan story, shows fear, and anxiety makes us dumb.

Anxiety about danger, as opposed to the courage and sense of purpose that inspires heroes to overcome danger, makes us dumb. "The cognitive deficit of being preoccupied with money problems was equivalent to a loss of 13 IQ points, losing an entire night's sleep or being a chronic alcoholic, according to the study....The state of worrying where your next meal is going to come from – you have uncertain income or you have more expenses than you can manage and you have to juggle all these things and constantly being pre-occupied about putting out these fires – takes up so much of your mental bandwidth, that you have less in terms of cognitive capacity to deal with things which may not be as urgent as your immediate emergency, but which are, nevertheless, important for your benefit in the medium or longer term." "We can lose 13–20 IQ points in a moment of anxiety." "As the coronavirus crisis gets worse, some people’s behavior seems to be getting more and more irrational. There is a scientific reason why. Science shows that under pressure and stress we lose the equivalent of 10-15 IQ points."

Luke 10:30 And Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32 And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side. 33 But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him, 34 And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 And on the morrow when he departed, he took out two pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again, I will repay thee. 36 Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves? 37 And he said, He that shewed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise.

Why did the priest and the Levite cross on the other side of the street to avoid the injured man? Well, partly because they didn't want the duty of helping him, which would have been personally costly. Also because they feared spending any longer on that robber-infested highway than necessary; they didn't want to become victims themselves. During the Spanish Flue pandemic of 1918, people were so fearful of coming close to flu victims, that many died of starvation just because no one would help them.

Anxiety makes us dumb, says the above research. The priest and the Levite, and the folks in 1918 who wouldn't help, made themselves dumb. Making yourself dumb is not a smart way to escape the danger of a pandemic.

(On the other hand, maybe we shouldn't take research too seriously, because "those with anxiety disorder tended to have higher IQ scores than healthy people"! while among healthy people, "those with high IQ scores tended to have low levels of worry, and those with low IQ scores tended to have high levels of worry". And people say we should trust science over the Bible because it is the Bible which contradicts itself!)

Anxiety makes us sick; Faith makes us well

Fear is a main reason people during the 1918 Spanish Flue pandemic wouldn't help those in desperate need, and it is a main reason many people would not think of helping today.

Fear is bad for your health. That is common knowledge. It is intuitive. But the connection has also been measured. This is by no means a comprehensive report on the evidence, but is only what turned up after a few minutes of googling:

Placebos and Nocebos: the Physical Effects of Hope v. Fear

The Mayo Clinic: [Many of the "symptoms" of anxiety ARE health problems:] Common anxiety signs and symptoms include: Feeling nervous, restless or tense; Having a sense of impending danger, panic or doom; Having an increased heart rate; Breathing rapidly (hyperventilation); Sweating; Trembling; Feeling weak or tired; Trouble concentrating or thinking about anything other than the present worry; Having trouble sleeping; Experiencing gastrointestinal (GI) problems; Having difficulty controlling worry; Having the urge to avoid things that trigger anxiety

"The causes of anxiety disorders aren't fully understood." [My comment: Well duh, that's because the people trusted to understand it have developed a fantasy therapy from which the wisdom of God is excluded. To the extent we actually believe the promises of Jesus, how is anxiety even possible?!]

Examples of medical problems that can be linked to anxiety include: Heart disease; Diabetes; Thyroid problems, such as hyperthyroidism; Respiratory disorders, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma; Drug misuse or withdrawal; Withdrawal from alcohol, anti-anxiety medications (benzodiazepines) or other medications; Chronic pain or irritable bowel syndrome; Rare tumors that produce certain fight-or-flight hormones.

Very Well Mind: What research has clearly shown is that those who have physical health problems complicated by anxiety tend to have worse symptoms, respond less well to treatment, and are more likely to have fatal illnesses.

"...students with social phobia scored lower on measures of general health and vitality...." "...those with chronic respiratory disease such as asthma or COPD have been shown to have higher rates of anxiety...." "Higher rates of anxiety have been linked to the development of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) in those diagnosed with gastroenteritis." "A connection has been shown between phobic anxiety and sudden cardiac death. People with hypertension, thyroid disease, and cancer have been shown to have higher rates of anxiety. A study of 4,181 individuals found that most people with both anxiety and physical health problems reported developing anxiety first."

Power of Positivity: Professor Ted Kaptchuk of Harvard Medical School tested 270 patients seeking relief from arm pain. Half were given acupuncture; the other half were given pain relief pills. Except that the pills were just corn starch, and the acupuncture needles retracted so they never pierced the skin. Most reported relief from their pain; but a few who had been told there might be side effects, reported those side effects! The study documented the effects on our health of what we believe.

Other studies have shown that the belief that one has been treated has produced measurable physical improvements, "including positive changes in blood pressure, a decrease in depression and fatigue. It proves successful in improving chemical activity in the brain and some symptoms of Parkinson’s....In general, when we think we are healthy, we tend to be healthier. And when we think we are sick, we tend to exhibit symptoms in line with our thoughts."

A study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences links positive thinking with improved health and brain activity from negative thoughts with a weakened immune system. Brain activity was studied in a group asked to remember a joyful event; others were asked to remember a fearful event. Then they were given the standard flu vaccine, and the levels of antibodies in each group was measured - for six months! Those who developed the strongest immunity to flu were those with the most brain activity in the part of their brain associated with happy thoughts!

Barbara Frederickson showed positive films to some and negative films to others, and then asked them to write down, for a variety of situations, how they would respond. Those who had just been uplifted by positive films proved the more creative problem solvers.

Fabrizio Benedetti "at the University of Turin Medical School took 100 students up into the Italian Alps. A few days before the trip he told one person in the group that the thin air in the Alpine altitude could cause migraines. On the day of the trip, the rumor spread to about ¼ of the group. Furthermore, those that heard the rumor experienced the worst headaches. And a saliva test showed symptoms of low oxygen conditions. (BBC adds, "a study of their saliva showed an exaggerated response to the low oxygen conditions, including a proliferation of the enzymes that are associated with altitude headache.") Benedetti's conclusion: “The brain biochemistry changed in the ‘socially infected’ individuals. Negative expectations can be communicated to your friends, neighbors, and the like, and they spread very quickly, producing social nocebo effects in a large population of subjects.”

BBC, 2015: Erich Menninger von Lerchenthal, an 18th century Viennese doctor, told of a deadly prank. Students jumped an unpopular assistant and told him he would be decapitated. They blindfolded him, put his head on a chopping block, and instead of a steel blade, dropped a wet cloth on his neck. Apparently because he thought the cloth was a steel blade and that his head was severed, he instantly died.

Every clinical trial of a new drug gives "placebos" (inert pills such as sugar or corn starch) to half the people in the trial. To pass the trial, the people receiving the actual drug being tested must improve at a significantly higher rate than those receiving the placebo, because many improve who receive the placebo just from thinking they are being helped. That is called the placebo effect. (Latin for "I will please".) But there are also negative "side effects" which are disclosed to both groups; and even the group receiving the placebo reports those side effects, again just from thinking the drug is making them sick. That is called the nocebo effect. (Latin for "I will harm".) “'It’s a consistent phenomenon, but medicine has never really dealt with it,' says Ted Kaptchuk at Harvard Medical School."

By reviewing medical research, Dimos Mitsikostas, from Athens Naval Hospital in Greece, has documented strong nocebo effects in treatments for headaches, depression, Multiple Sclerosis, and Parkinson's. 65% of Parkinson's patients report negative effects from their placebo, and one in 10 drop out of those trials! “'It’s unbelievable – they are taking sugar pills and when you measure liver enzymes, they are elevated,' says Mitsikostas." Yet the pain is real, physical, and measurable. "measures of nerve activity following nocebo treatment have shown that the spinal cord begins responding to heightened pain before conscious deliberation would even be possible.

Roy Reeves, MD, reported in 2007 a patient suffering from depression who swallowed a whole bottle of pills, but quickly regretted it and rushed himself to ER where he collapsed. "his blood pressure had plummeted, and he was hyperventilating; he was immediately given intravenous fluids. Yet blood tests could find no trace of the drug in his system." Four hours later another doctor arrived and informed the man that the pills he "overdosed" on were sugar pills given him as part of a clinical trial. Relieved, the man quickly recovered!

In the late 1800's, many people thought their newfangled telephones were causing "giddiness and wracking pain". "Electro-sensitivity" is "an allergic reaction to mobile phone signals and wi-fi", but many experiments have produced the same symptoms when people are exposed to a "sham transmitter that doesn’t actually emit any electromagnetic waves." People in clinical trials get sick from an inert vaccine. " In 2013, Rubin found that simply showing a short video on electro-sensitivity was enough to trigger later symptoms – and the evidence seems to show that outbreaks of “wind turbine syndrome” follow local media reports." James Rubin at King’s College London."In 2013, found that simply showing a short video on electro-sensitivity was enough to trigger later symptoms – and the evidence seems to show that outbreaks of “wind turbine syndrome” follow local media reports."

Mitsikostas concludes, "For millennia, medicine was basically placebo – by using expectation, magicians used the will to heal. It is not enough to overcome disease – but it is indispensable."

Faith - "expectation" - "is not enough to overcome disease", meaning "real" disease, the doctor concludes. Which is a reasonable conclusion in light of the fact that in clinical trials, "real" drugs outperform placebos.

But placebos/nocebos are “a consistent phenomenon, but medicine has never really dealt with it", according to Ted Kaptchuk at Harvard Medical School. Because modern medicine "has never really dealt with" the healing power of faith, it is premature to conclude that Jesus was wrong in saying rather categorically that faith "is not enough to overcome disease".

Of course, it matters what your faith is in. Absolute faith in a lie will not make it true. We need a lot more truth. But we are limited in how much we will ever get, while we dismiss what Jesus told us about healing as not even worth talking about.

Evidence that Christian Faith Heals

The Huffington Post, a liberal news source not given to praising God, carried the report of Candy Gunther Brown, Ph.D, author of "Healing Gods" and "Testing Prayer". Her article reports several reports of medically inexplicable cures coinciding with intercessory prayer with direct human contact - that is, someone nearby praying, talking, discussing, perhaps "laying hands", as opposed to studies where people are asked to pray for people remotely who do not know they are being prayed for.

Dr. Kathryn Butler, in 2018, was drawn closer to God by a patient's miraculous cure, but she warns that focusing on not dying only, when we all must die, "When we ignore God’s work in suffering, and cleave breathlessly only to our hope for a cure, we forsake opportunities for closure, fellowship, and spiritual preparation at the end of life....are more likely to pursue aggressive measures at the end of life, and more likely to die in an ICU....we need not fear death. Christ has overcome, and through his resurrection death has lost its sting (1 Corinthians 15:55–57)....we may chase after treatments that not only fail to save us, but which also rob us of our capacities to think, communicate, and pray in our final days....And if cure does not come, a single-minded focus on healing strands ourselves and those we love with unsettling doubts about the validity of our faith."

"Gill" writes about her recovery from cancer in 2013. She had surgery, but at several points describes the surprise of doctors that the tumor was smaller than expected, cancer had not spread, she recovered rapidly, and the peace she displayed from the moment she was diagnosed. Perhaps most helpful to the rest of us from her report are the Scriptures that gave her peace:

“For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love and of a sound mind.” (2 TIMOTHY 1:7)

“The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?” (PSALM 27:1)

“Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.” (1 PETER 5:7)

“… let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” (JOHN 14:27)

“Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.” (JEREMIAH 17:14)

“But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.” (ISAIAH 53:5)

A Century of Research

In 2012 an analysis was published of all the medical and psychiatric research done between 1872 and 2010! It was published by Harold G. Koenig of Duke University, in ISRN Psychiatry, US National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health.

The research technically did not distinguish between the effects of Biblical faith and of other faiths, but only the difference that "religion/spirituality" made. The link above is to a very long, detailed report, of which the following is a very brief summary. But the following quote from the analysis is a clue that most of the research was about the benefits of Judeo-Christian faith. This quote lists qualities which are not at all present in all religions, but are exclusive to Christianity, and to subcategories of other religions to the extent they are influenced by Christianity.

...most religions emphasize love of others, compassion, and altruistic acts as well as encourage meeting together during religious social events. These prosocial behaviors have many consequences that buffer stress and lead to human support when support is needed during difficult times. Because religion encourages the helping of others and emphasizes a focus outside of the self, engagement in other-helping activities may increase positive emotions and serve to distract from one's own problems. Religion also promotes human virtues such as honesty, forgiveness, gratefulness, patience, and dependability, which help to maintain and enhance social relationships.

Islam has no concept of love that reaches even to enemies. Hinduism finds honesty a challenging concept because Hinduism teaches that there is no truth, but only "illusion". Islam dehumanizes unbelievers as "apes and pigs"; Hinduism dehumanizes its large poor population as "untouchables". Islam violently suppresses any true statements which any imam thinks "insults Mohammed"; Hinduism not only has disinterest in true statements, but its goal, attempted through its meditation, is to empty one's mind of any thinking, or desires (goals) at all.

By confusing all religions for each other, the author blames all religions equally, too: "Religion may also be used to justify hatred, aggression, prejudice, and the exclusion of others; gain power and control over vulnerable individuals (as seen in cults); foster rigid thinking and obsessive practices; lead to anxiety, fear, and excessive guilt over minor infractions (and even self-mutilation in some cases); produce psychosocial strains due to failure to live up to high religious standards; lead to escape from dealing with family problems (through excessive involvement in religious or spiritual activities)...."

Of course all believers of all religions experience all these errors to varying degrees. They are "sins", and "there is none righteous". But cultures inspired primarily by Scriptures honoring service and love are very different than cultures that reverence greatness through murder and rage.

Because of the fact that the author links these uniquely Christian qualities to the health benefits of "religion/spirituality", we should presume that the "religions" dominating these studies was the one which exudes these qualities: namely, Christianity. With this caveat: some of the studies are about the effectiveness of yoga in reducing things like stress. Stress is a bit less defined, objective, and measurable than things like heart attacks; my summary of the study focuses on more objective things.

Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) is less among the religious, according to 9 of 13 studies; one reported more heart disease. 11 of 16 studies found better heart health in several other areas among the religious; none found worse health.

Stroke: four of nine studies found lower risk among the religious. (Cerebrovascular disease, hypertension and other risk factors.) One study found more carotid artery thickening, creating a higher risk, but 30% of that group was African American, a group known to be both highly religious and at high risk of stroke.

Alzheimer's, Dementia: 8 of 14 studies found stronger cognitive function among the religious; 3 studies found weaker function. Part of the incidence of weaker function is accounted for by the fact that the religions live longer, so they are more likely to reach older ages where cognition tends to decline.

Immune Function: 15 of 27 studies found that the religious have stronger immune systems. One found a negative effect. Of the 14 studies with the highest quality ratings, 10 reported stronger immunity; none reported less immunity.

Infections, HIV: 8 of 12 studies found stronger resistance among the religious. None found weaker resistance.

Cancer: 16 of 29 studies found lower cancer rates among the religious; 2 found a worse prognosis. Of the 20 most carefully done studies, 12 found lower cancer rates among the religious; none found otherwise. Better health among religious is accounted for partly by better health behaviors - less smoking, drinking, drugs, etc, less stress, and higher social support.

Long life: 82 of 121 studies reported significantly longer life for the religious; 5 reported shorter lifespans. Of the 63 most carefully done studies, 47 reported longer lives; 3 reported shorter. Frequency of church attendance is a strong predictor of longer life. The significance of the effect of religion is equivalent to the effects of cholesterol lowering drugs or exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation.

Psychological health: religion helps people cope. It imbues negative events with meaning and purpose. It lowers depression, stress, anxiety, and raises positive emotions. Several randomized clinical trials show that religion improves mental health, while poor mental health worsens physical health and shortens lives.

Social health: the religious have better social support, more stable marriages, less crime, more "social capital". Religion encourage honesty, courage, dependability, altruism, generosity, forgiveness, self-discipline, patience, humility, and other characteristics that promote social relationships. Religious involvement not only provides opportunities for altruism but increases the flow of health information. By enhancing social interactions, community trust, and involvement, religion increases mental health, which improves physical health.

Health Behaviors: religion discourages smoking, drinking, risky sex, and drugs; encourages exercise, better diet, completely safe sex. A CNN report January 3, 2009, described Gertrude Baines, born to former slaves in 1894, as “spry,” “cheerful,” and “talkative.” When she was 112 years old, Ms. Baines was asked by a CNN correspondent to explain why she thought she had lived so long. Her reply: “God. Ask Him. I took good care of myself, the way he wanted me to.” Brief and to the point. She was a year short of the 115 year record in the Guinness Book of World Records.

The analysis of a century of research concludes: "Religious beliefs provide satisfying answers to existential questions, such as 'where did we come from,' 'why are we here,' and 'where are we going,' and the answers apply to both this life and the next life, thus reducing existential angst. These beliefs also help to normalize loss and change and provide role models of persons suffering with the same or similar problems (often illustrated in religious scriptures). Thus, religious beliefs have the potential to influence the cognitive appraisal of negative life events in a way that makes them less distressing. For people with medical illness, these beliefs are particularly useful because they are not lost or impaired with physical disability—unlike many other coping resources that are dependent on health (hobbies, relationships, and jobs/finances).

Personal Testimony

When I was young, in school, I was an anxious, depressed mess. I wanted to be "worth" something, to be better than others, but my achievements couldn't keep up with my evolving standards. All of that leveled off as a young married adult. Life was comfortable. I was content. Until tragedy struck: I was divorced.

The Bible had profoundly engaged my mind before, but tragedy brought the Bible into my heart, my feelings, and my goals. I studied what made divorce courts such a magnet, and became political. But through the intense human interaction of lobbying, doorknocking, and running for office, I met people suffering different tragedies than my own. I wanted to help. I researched solutions, but then learned how much human resistance there is to solutions. Not only in the very people must devastated by tragedy, but in the organizations created to help them.

Thus my goals vastly outgrew my capacity, my resources, or any logical vision of how to reach them. Except that Jesus promised I actually could, if I don't give up. Except that for the first time in my life, the problems that most concerned me weren't my problems. They were other people's problems. My own problems became much less important to me, and to the extent they troubled me at all, I had learned to trust Jesus' promises in places like Luke 12 not to be anxious about them. I stopped even thinking very hard or long or often about them; I found that indeed, my personal needs were always met, very often just in time, just enough, and by means I never could have planned.

Yet my goals remained, and remain, far beyond the reach of my eyes or my logic. Ecclesiastes 1 says in much wisdom is much grief, and I must have a lot of wisdom, because I feel a lot of grief about so many people suffering so much while I am offer solutions which are stifled by a wall of human mental inertia.

But this grief is different than anxiety. My grief is not for myself; my personal needs are met to my satisfaction. It is not a grief which debilitates my body, but which energizes it, giving me purpose and meaning. In fact, any time the weight of sky high goals becomes heavy, all I have to do is think of Jesus' promises, and remember that I am not doing this for myself, and the weight goes away and I feel like I just plugged myself into a Holy Spirit wall outlet. And after a little more prayer and pleading, understanding of a next step before me comes, and I get busy taking it, during which despair has too little time to fester before hope kills it.

John 15:13 says "Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." My personal experience is that love, focused on the needs of others to the exclusion of my own, to the extent of even being somewhat bored by my own, lifts the weights that used to be on my heart. It rejuvenates my body. It removes the anxiety that makes bodies sick and old. It removes the despair of not understanding one's purpose in life.

In short, just one natural consequence of Biblical love is a body prepared to resist disease, even before taking into account any miraculous, supernatural protection from God.

I conclude that God isn't the one that's stupid. It's the rest of us. God understands coronavirus. He understands what our bodies need to resist it. He provides a general outline of basic hygiene practices, and then tells us about Love, which our bodies need beyond basic hygiene.

Therefore, the safest thing for our bodies as well as for our souls, hearts, and minds, is to serve others at every opportunity; carefully, responsibly, but sacrificially. Putting the needs of others way behind "keeping ol' #1 safe" is like shooting your foot. It's like kicking roses barefoot. It's dumb. It's not safe.

Other relevant passages

Jesus' Hygiene

Luke 11:37 After Jesus had finished speaking, a Pharisee asked Jesus to eat with him. So he went and took a place at the table. 38 But the Pharisee was surprised when he saw that Jesus did not wash his hands first before the meal. 39 The Lord said to him, "The washing you Pharisees do is like cleaning only the outside of a cup or a dish. But what is inside you? You want only to cheat and hurt people. 40 You are foolish! The same one who made what is outside also made what is inside. 41 So pay attention to what is inside. Give to the people who need help. Then you will be fully clean.

Does this say Jesus didn't believe in germs?

God gave hygiene laws through Moses. He told us what meats are safe to eat, told us how to clean ourselves after contact with dead animals, how to deal with mold in the walls of a house, and all God's rules make sense in light of today's knowledge of germs; they were practical rules that kept technologically primitive people safe.

But God never told anyone to wash their hands before meals. That was a law invented by the Pharisees, not one of whom owned a microscope so he could even see a germ. And indeed today, in our medically advanced culture, people do not have a handwashing station at the entrances to restaurants. So apparently Jesus' answer to the Pharisees is an answer that any doctor today might have given them, had he sufficient courage.

While Jesus' challenge was in harmony with today's medical best practices, it was a startling challenge to today's political status quo. Because were Christians today to follow His example, they would challenge today's health requirements that are supported neither by the Bible nor by sound science.

Be Careful, but Serve, and Trust

Matthew 4:6 He [Satan] said to Jesus, "If you are the Son of God, jump off, because the Scriptures say, 'God will command his angels to help you, and their hands will catch you, so that you will not hit your foot on a rock.'" 7 Jesus answered, "The Scriptures also say, 'You must not test the Lord your God.'"

Yes, Psalm 91 really did say those who trust in God will be protected by God's angels from even tripping over a rock. Yet Jesus says jumping off a cliff deliberately just to feel angel hands is "testing God". God wants us to partner with Him in keeping ourselves safe; just as parents protect their children from all kinds of dangers they are too immature to understand, yet expect their children to partner with them in growing up wise and safe, God expects adults to grow wiser, ever more mature, and increasingly able to master all the challenges of reality, yet God remains ever ready to save us from utter disaster, yet while prodding us to maturity with enough painful natural consequences to snap us out of our apathy.

To the incredible list of dangers which Psalm 91 tells us God will deliver us, Jesus adds, in the closing verses of Mark, that those who believe will drink poisons and handle deadly snakes, without harm. But in the context of Matthew 4:7, we are to understand Mark doesn't mean we should go out and buy a jug of lye and chug it down in front of a TV camera to show how God will protect us, while sitting in a rattlesnake pit. Jesus' protection is for when we couldn't avoid the poisons. And Jesus didn't say there would be no harm in each and every case.

A current example of trust in God's protection from coronavirus that did not turn out well was Bishop Gerald Glenn of The New Deliverance Evangelistic Church in Virginia who died of the disease after holding a full church service in defiance of Virginia's order to shut down meetings of over 10 people. The official church announcement video of his passing states that even on his way to the "operating room", he said "God is a healer". The New York Times reported, "At the time, the bishop was quoted by local media outlets as saying that 'I firmly believe that God is larger than this dreaded virus.' Local media reported that Bishop Glenn said that he would keep preaching 'unless I’m in jail or the hospital.'”

The virus is serious; it can kill, just like jumping off a cliff. But as dangerous as it is to assume that God will always protect us when duty seems to call us off the cliff, it is just as dangerous to dismiss God's general promises of protection and live as if God will never miraculously deliver us from the dangers in the places He calls us to serve. Let us not rush into danger carelessly, but with all the wisdom and care we can muster, let us not hold back from serving.

A memorable example from millions of such miraculous protection is when John the Evangelist was executed by being dipped in boiling oil. He came back up unharmed. Unable to kill the man, his enemies then exiled him to the Isle of Patmos, where he wrote Revelation. A similar modern example is when Nora Lam was executed by a Communist Chinese firing squad. She was not only unharmed, but was immediately able to flee. "China Cry" is the modern movie made about her life, including that event.

Not everyone agrees with me that these verses won't protect us if we chug a jug of lye while sitting in a snake pit. There are still a few churches which handle snakes as part of their test of their faith, even after ministers and children have died from bites. See Snake Handling in Religion.

They rely on these verses:

And these signs shall follow them that believe: In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues. They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. (Mark 16:17-18)

Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you. (Luke 10:19)

And when they were escaped, then they knew that the island was called Melita. And the barbarous people shewed us no little kindness: for they kindled a fire, and received us every one, because of the present rain, and because of the cold. And when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks, and laid them on the fire, there came a viper out of the heat, and fastened on his hand. And when the barbarians saw the venomous beast hang on his hand, they said among themselves, No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he hath escaped the sea, yet vengeance suffereth not to live. And he shook off the beast into the fire, and felt no harm. Howbeit they looked when he should have swollen, or fallen down dead suddenly: but after they had looked a great while, and saw no harm come to him, they changed their minds, and said that he was a god. (Acts 28:1-6)

Unnoticed by the remaining snake handling Christians, apparently, is that Paul didn't actually reach into the fire in order to grab that viper, so he could hold it up and say "Watch this! This is really neat!"

So how should we apply these verses to our response to Coronavirus?

The 3 verses that open this article tell us God will protect those who help and protect others, so really, the very safest response to a pandemic is to serve those suffering from it. There was a terrible plague in Rome when the Christian church was young. It was so bad that people fled their homes, leaving cities empty - and leaving behind their sick family members. Christians stepped in, ministering to them. That demonstration of love caused considerable growth to the Church. Today, Samaritan's Purse, managed by Franklin Graham, has set up tent hospitals in Italy to help, as Coronavirus cases exceed Italian hospital capacity.

But as we help, we can be as careful as we can. Not only as partners with God in mastering all the challenges of reality, but to avoid hurting the very people we are trying to help, along with ourselves. There is another consideration: even when the particular measures advocated by media and government seem baseless, we can follow them to a reasonable extent, just for the sake of not terrifying people so much that they won't let us get close enough to help them.

Fragments from Emails

I respect the measures recommended, up until the point where they would restrict me from serving others; at that point, it is pulling back from opportunities to serve that would make me most fearful of losing God's protection. March 20

From a friend: We felt terrible that we could not ask you in, but the truth is, you are both our age and you are at risk to get the WuFlu as well as us. We don't want to spread it or get it. Last night X had chills overnight and I doubt it is anything, but the point is, we never know and from what I have read, this is not a nice way to die.

Also, they are telling us that the more that get infected, the more risk that the hospitals are overwhelmed and chaos ensues. So we feel it best to have no contact for a while. I have been writing the President and senators to ask them to simply sequester all older persons or those who have health issues which put them in a high-risk category and let the rest of America go back to work. I believe if he doesn't do this, society will break down soon and it will be bad. If he sunk just a tiny portion of the money he is throwing at this issue into separating out older people safely and voluntarily, we would be fine and the rest of the city would be able to go about their business, knowing that there is little risk to them, plus hospitals could handle it. Don't you think this makes more sense than destroying the economy and civil society?

We would have loved to sit with you both and talk for a while and had some dessert or something. But this is where we are and we believe it is long-overdue judgment and is mixed with extreme kindness, considering how it is actually rolling out. Please accept my apology that we could not have you in. Please take this seriously and don't get sick and stress the hospital system and risk infecting others. It is a temporary inconvenience and hits our pocketbooks, but we may be able to weather it with God's graceful help if he wills. We love you both. (Received March 22)

My response March 22: As for letting the young people go, they are getting infected at nearly the rate of oldsies; the difference being the mortality rate, which is 10 times higher after 70. Still only 2%. But obviously if all the youngsies mix as usual, their .1% mortality rate will still be horrible, besides the impossibility then of protecting the oldsies.

As for quarantining all the oldsies, a hit to the pocketbook is an optimistic view of driving old people out of their homes into the streets where they will be more vulnerable. That is, people who need to work to pay those sky high property taxes, which so far are not being delayed.

As for ourselves, our business has always been lucky to see half a dozen people a day, so it is about like staying home. Trump's guidelines are for oldsies to stay home, but there is no definition beyond that general principle; so oldsies still shop as needed. Work? Property taxes are due the end of this month. Something like $5,000 for us here in Polk County. We are still a few hundred dollars short. We have a reverse mortgage on the house and a contract on the store building; our contracts require property taxes to be promptly paid. At some point the calculation needs to be made: the deaths at risk from the virus vs the lives at risk from suspending the economy. I appreciate that federal tax deadlines are delayed 3 months, although we didn't make enough to owe any; but Polk County property taxes are collected by a Democrat-run board of supervisors, which has not announced any relief.

Not that my fear of the virus is simply overshadowed by my fear of financial ruin. My fear of either is simply overshadowed by my trust in God.

If you would like to visit safely, come interact with me at savetheworld.saltshaker.us. Or call. Or call with questions about how to interact at savetheworld.saltshaker.us.

X didn't SAY we couldn't come in and visit; but I assumed that was your wish. After we left there, we drove over to Steve and Kay Stroh's place and visited for an hour - not that I expected it. Their living room is too piled high with debris for us to be able to crawl through, but they came right out to our car. I asked Steve if he washes his hands every 5 minutes; he said, every 5 days. He said he had been working that day in the basement to get debris off the floor so it doesn't rot when it floods, which is only when it rains. He said he must have worked 35 minutes doing that, and cleared an area at least two feet square.

I read at Heritage.org that Iran may have 2 million infections; a dozen top leaders, plus many clerics, have died, and mass graves are being dug for commoners. China is their biggest trading partner, so many Chinese workers are in construction in Iran. They have millions of pilgrims visiting their "unholy sites", which they don't want to close and lose that money. Worshipers video themselves licking shrines to show their faith in the curative powers of the devil.

I don't take long life for granted. God has already been very generous with time for me and Dorothy. There remains much good for others I want to do, so I do lean on God's promises that these mountains will finally fall, and that I will see at least some of it. I understand that God wants our partnership in keeping ourselves safe by reasonable means; for example, Matthew 4, jumping off a cliff and expecting protection would be "tempting God". But where keeping myself safe conflicts with serving others, Scripture points to our greater safety being in the latter, and greater danger in the former.

Responses from others

Hey Dave, Thanks for emailing me this. We are praying constantly for the safety of our state and country. I appreciate you reaching out to me during these hectic times. Our verse for the day is Mathew 6:26 - 27. - State Representative Matthew Gurtler, Georgia

Thanks. Stay safe and focus on GOD. - State Representative Gerald Greene, Georgia

We are all in God's hands. - Jay Lawrence, Arizona legislature

Mr. Leach, Thank you very much for sending these vital verses and information. I appreciate it very much. I am sending this to some of my friends and former co-workers. Thank you again. - Dave Struck, Norwood, Pennsylvania

Thanks. - State Representative Lana J. Greenfield, South Dakota

Thanks Dave for your encouragement. I do trust. I trust fully in God! - State Representative Austen Schauer, North Dakota

Dave, I don't have any tildes so I can't follow your typing system. I have already had coronavirus in late Feb to early March, and it was like a minor cold with a touch of sore throat and a touch of fevers that came and went for a few days. Not enough to keep anybody in bed, and only minor symptoms that came and went. Big deal. It's probably all the genes I have from Neanderthal ancestors that kept me going. Hope you are all doing well. - Randy Crawford, near Iowa City, Iowa

Dave Leach response: It is very nice to hear from you! I miss our long conversations.

Thanks for alerting me to the fact that smartphones require an extra step to get a tilde. (On a qwerty keyboard, the tilde is the upper case character to the left of "1". )

On the "numbers" screen, there is a "symbol" symbol that is three characters squeezed into as much space as is elsewhere occupied by a single character . On my phone it is #\=. On other phones it is #+= Press this, and you get lots of weird symbols.

Actually I don't think my software stops working if you don't sign with four tildes. As I explain in "begin!" and FAQ's, the reason I want to stop anonymous posts is because anonymity invites hit-and-run personal attacks which do not contribute to the subject at all and which as often or not make no pretense of addressing the subject of the articles. Just as in a face to face conversation it helps you know how to respond to someone if you know who it is rather than talking to someone wearing a mask and a voice distorter, my dream is real conversations with real people online, who don't always agree but who are willing to reason with each other respectfully. Unfortunately, so far I have failed to interest people in the concept. Dave

Hi Dave, As one who is trying to recover from Covid-19 (because I was volunteering in ICU where the sickest of the sick go), I can empathize with your friends in wanting to isolate. It is a small sacrifice to ask others to stay away unless a visit is absolutely necessary. This is because C-19 is present before one realizes they have it. This is allergy season for many who dismiss initial symptoms and go about their routines until they suddenly become quite symptomatic.

Like everyone else on the planet, I've had the flu several times over the years. But this flu is particularly vicious. Most won't die from it, but for a while that seems to be a good option to escape the unceasing headache, cough and congestion that threatens to overtake one's respiratory system. I started being symptomatic on Sunday but thought it was a sinus infection. On Monday I knew it was more, but I thought it might be a bad cold. On Tuesday and Wednesday the respiratory issues became rather severe and the headache that was mild on Monday became a constant inescapable pain that did not subside in the least until Thursday when it became bearable again.

The coughing and congestion, which I managed aggressively to keep it from going into my lungs, began subsiding yesterday, but not before I coughed so hard I herniated a small area under my right rib cage. Now, though I do not cough as much, it is extra painful to cough as the spasms jerk through that sensitive area.

Today I do not feel any better than yesterday and my legs are so weak I hurried through a morning shower so as not to risk falling in the shower.

Is God judging me? Or is God giving me greater empathy toward others who might become sick later?

When the heavens turn to brass and God withholds rain from a land, Dave, the righteous and the unrighteous often suffer together. It is what we do with our suffering that matters more than the fact that we suffer.

My advice is to stay away from your friends who are fearful and recognize that God is able to give them a degree of wisdom as well.

If you can find it, I recommend reading the November 2017 issue of Smithsonian Magazine in which they describe the influenza pandemic of 1918-19 . The article highlight is about how they took scrapings of that virus and resurrected the DNA from lung tissue to study it. It began as a rather harsh but usual flu virus, but that particular virus, they found, was able to mutate so rapidly and came back as a particularly deadly, more aggressive and more lethal virus. Thus the pandemic spread itself out over a very long "season" of time.

I do not know if Covid-19 is that virus, or not. But I do know we can all set aside the usual social and even work-related routines of life in order to protect others. I do not plan on letting people into my house, nor will I travel about, until I am a week out from having any symptoms. I have Clorox wipes that I intend to use to wipe every surface in my house, once I feel strong enough to take on the task of sanitizing. I consider this to be my best way of protecting others.

God is good, whether we get sick, or not. And as with the man born blind, He can afflict in ways that enhance His glory, even if that means He makes use of any one of us in the process.

Warmly in Christ, Cathy from Oregon; Catherine Ramey "Justice and only justice shall you do."

Dave Leach response: ...At the risk of too simplistic a summary of God's advice, my conclusion as applied to you is that by volunteering, you were doing exactly the safest thing, even for yourself, and God will bless you for it. But we still need to be careful, as you are: even though God promises protection, Jesus tells us not to jump off cliffs....

God's Coronavirus Cure in 3 Verses

Contents