Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to wikay Up Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody, recording from the Brooklyn Bunker, Folks.
Speaker 1: In my conversation today with doctor Jonathan Metzel, our regular
Speaker 1: Wednesday conversation, we're going to once again be talking about
Speaker 1: COVID right because while America seems to have wanted to
Speaker 1: turn the page, burn the book, forget that COVID exists
Speaker 1: and is happening. We had doctor Fauci on a couple
Speaker 1: of weeks ago who said, you know, it's drizzling right now,
Speaker 1: so we don't need the same type of protections that
Speaker 1: we had at the height of surges, and that we
Speaker 1: can assume some level of normal. I want to read
Speaker 1: you this thread that came out from NPR Politics yesterday
Speaker 1: that should be setting off alarm bells and I kind
Speaker 1: of want to dig into. So here it is from
Speaker 1: NPR Politics. They're thread from yesterday. The White House is
Speaker 1: warning it will have to wind down a program that
Speaker 1: pays to test, treat, and vaccinate unensured people for COVID
Speaker 1: nineteen because the administration has run out of money for
Speaker 1: the program, which Congress fail to include in funding legislation.
Speaker 1: Second tweet. Another immediate impact will be an end to
Speaker 1: federal funding for monoclonal antibodies, a treatment that had been
Speaker 1: provided free of charge, Starting next week. The White House
Speaker 1: said it will cut allocations to states by more than
Speaker 1: thirty percent to try and stretch its existing applies. Number
Speaker 1: three tweet. The government cannot buy more oral anti viral
Speaker 1: treatments like packs void beyond the twenty million treatments already
Speaker 1: secured and needs to scale back plan purchases of preventative
Speaker 1: treatments for immuno and compromised people. The White House said,
Speaker 1: excuse me, immunocompromise people. Number four. Research into next generation
Speaker 1: COVID vaccines will be curbed, and some surveillance for new
Speaker 1: variants will also be stopped, the White House said. The
Speaker 1: administration said it also will need to limit its pushed
Speaker 1: to help poorer countries vaccinate people. Number five. The White
Speaker 1: House had asked for twenty two point five billion in
Speaker 1: funding for these items and more, but was denied as
Speaker 1: a part of a broader funding package. Democrats are expected
Speaker 1: to proceed with the standalone OW COVID funding bill, which
Speaker 1: is expected to pass the House but unlikely to pass
Speaker 1: the Senate. Folks, what the fuck right? So I want
Speaker 1: us to be very clear, right that the government has
Speaker 1: more money than it actually knows what to do with,
Speaker 1: more of our money than it knows what to do with,
Speaker 1: so much so that it just released, oh, I don't know,
Speaker 1: over thirteen billion dollars to aid Ukraine to fight back
Speaker 1: against the Russian insurrection, right, the Russian invasion. So we
Speaker 1: have over thirteen billion dollars to be able to give
Speaker 1: to the Ukraine so that they can fight against authoritarian rule,
Speaker 1: But we don't have twenty two billion dollars to be
Speaker 1: able to allocate for people in this country to ensure
Speaker 1: that the spike which we know is coming, which I
Speaker 1: will talk about shortly, to ensure that both immuno and
Speaker 1: compromise people people who are uninsured, that you're receiving the
Speaker 1: care that you need, that your states are able to
Speaker 1: provide for you the care that you need, because we
Speaker 1: are in what a global fucking health pandemic. So how
Speaker 1: is it that you can stand up at the State
Speaker 1: of the fucking Union, spend half the time talking about
Speaker 1: the Ukraine, not mention the insurrection, barely talk about fucking COVID,
Speaker 1: and then turn around and then say so basically, I'll
Speaker 1: let them eat COVID, right, because we don't have the resources.
Speaker 1: It is bullshit, and it's the continual fucking lie that
Speaker 1: I am so exhausted by when I tell you how
Speaker 1: fucking done I am these days with this current administration,
Speaker 1: and I'll tell you why, because you see, I didn't
Speaker 1: expect shit from Donald Trump, Right. I didn't expect anything
Speaker 1: because we knew exactly where we stood with the Trump
Speaker 1: administration as it pertained to public health, as it pertained
Speaker 1: to public safety, so long as they are funding police
Speaker 1: so that they can beat the shit out of regular citizens, right, Like,
Speaker 1: I had no expectations. But when you come in as
Speaker 1: a Biden Harris administration and tell us that we need
Speaker 1: to vote for you so that adults are back in
Speaker 1: the room and that adults are back in charge, right,
Speaker 1: and that we're going to have vaccines and roll them
Speaker 1: out and we're going to take care of these issues,
Speaker 1: and that you're telling me that how you stand next
Speaker 1: to the other guy is a very clear distinction of
Speaker 1: I am due for the people. And then you want
Speaker 1: to turn around now after a shitty fucking vaccine rollout, Right,
Speaker 1: It had a lot of bumps folks before vaccines actually
Speaker 1: got to where they needed to go. Right And again,
Speaker 1: this administration was given a lot of room because we
Speaker 1: knew what they were walking into. But explain to me
Speaker 1: how you can dip into a pocket to provide money
Speaker 1: for the Ukraine to defend itself, but you don't have
Speaker 1: the same ability to have America defend itself from a
Speaker 1: virus that is killed close to a million people that
Speaker 1: now you want to tell us is all but done
Speaker 1: so everyone can go back to work. Oh just in
Speaker 1: time for gas to be through the fucking roof, and
Speaker 1: oh just in time as cities around China are fucking
Speaker 1: closing down again, as the Netherlands and Germany and the
Speaker 1: UK all who rolled back mask mandates and indoor masking
Speaker 1: and all social distancing and all of these things that
Speaker 1: they have gotten rid of because you know, the world
Speaker 1: was over. COVID are now back into a zone where
Speaker 1: they are surging in places in China are surging above
Speaker 1: twenty twenty levels. And that the new variant BA point two,
Speaker 1: which is the subvariant of omicron, spreads thirty percent faster
Speaker 1: than omicron, which took over delta in a matter of
Speaker 1: fucking weeks there were reports coming out right, particularly here
Speaker 1: in New York, which he uses the sewage system to
Speaker 1: be able to see or anticipate when another surge is coming.
Speaker 1: And guess what the sewage system is showing us, Oh,
Speaker 1: the numbers of people getting COVID in New York City
Speaker 1: are on the rise. Again. It's as if we're standing
Speaker 1: on the tracks we think that the light ahead is
Speaker 1: the tunnel the exit on the other side, and not
Speaker 1: realizing that it's an oncoming train. And I'm just wondering,
Speaker 1: how many times do we have to walk down the
Speaker 1: same dark tunnel for us to realize that the light
Speaker 1: that we are seeing is not the light at the
Speaker 1: end of the tunnel, it is the next fucking COVID search.
Speaker 1: So now we have a situation where those that are
Speaker 1: uninsured are not going to be able to access treatment,
Speaker 1: right because in New York City, regardless of your insurance status,
Speaker 1: you were able to get tested, you were able to
Speaker 1: get boosted and get vaccinated in all of these things.
Speaker 1: And so what this NPR tweet thread and report is
Speaker 1: is like, oh, well, the United States has run out
Speaker 1: of money, We've run out of resources, so pretty much
Speaker 1: you're on your fucking own. And if you don't have
Speaker 1: the ability to test yourself at home, and you don't
Speaker 1: have the ability to remote learn, and you don't have
Speaker 1: the ability to do these things for yourself, you are
Speaker 1: essentially going to be fucked because this administration does not
Speaker 1: have the bandwidth, nor the resources, or the strategy to
Speaker 1: deal with the oncoming train that we know is coming
Speaker 1: in a few weeks. The conversation that I will have
Speaker 1: with Jonathan will outline how the United States is different
Speaker 1: than China, why China is experiencing the kind of surge
Speaker 1: that they are, but how the countries that we are
Speaker 1: actually more demographically aligned with, meaning that with the last
Speaker 1: wave of omicron infected forty five percent of the US population,
Speaker 1: damn near half those people, according to the late reports,
Speaker 1: will be better set up with antibodies to help them
Speaker 1: navigate a potential surge of BA point two. What has
Speaker 1: happened in China is that because they have had a
Speaker 1: zero COVID policy, meaning that they are quick to shut
Speaker 1: things down, they are quick to put people back in
Speaker 1: their homes, they are quick to go back to essential businesses.
Speaker 1: Only in operation, they don't have the same level of
Speaker 1: quote unquote herd immunity that we have gotten in other
Speaker 1: countries have gotten. But get this, what we are seeing
Speaker 1: is that there are people who are vaccinated who are
Speaker 1: still getting reinfected. And so now we're setting up a
Speaker 1: situation where not only can folks get reinfected, because we
Speaker 1: know that what the vaccines and the boosters do is
Speaker 1: stop certain death and hospitalization, it does not stop the
Speaker 1: spread of COVID. I don't know how many times that
Speaker 1: that needs to be said, because I still receive stupid
Speaker 1: fucking tweets from people that are like, oh, you know,
Speaker 1: Fauci was wrong and Biden is dumb and vaccines don't work. No,
Speaker 1: you're not dead. So the fact that by virtue you're
Speaker 1: able to tweet me back some stupid hot shit means
Speaker 1: that the vaccine, if you in fact got it, worked
Speaker 1: But this, folks, this what is being outlined here. But
Speaker 1: then we want to turn around and again our tax
Speaker 1: dollars to go to help the people of Ukraine, but
Speaker 1: our tax dollars not being used to help people in
Speaker 1: this country. We're first of all, we're not using our
Speaker 1: tax dollars to secure our own fucking democracy. We're not
Speaker 1: using it to create guardrails against what we know will
Speaker 1: be consistent surges of COVID nineteen because unlike the fantasy
Speaker 1: world that Republicans are living in, no, it is not
Speaker 1: going to be endemic any fucking time soon. Because the
Speaker 1: more virus that is in the air, the more infected
Speaker 1: people become, the more avenues it has to continue to mutate,
Speaker 1: and the more variants that will come through. And what
Speaker 1: the last three variants have shown us from Alpha is
Speaker 1: that with each turn at the fucking wheel, COVID nineteen
Speaker 1: becomes more and more contagious. So for those people who
Speaker 1: are unvaccinated, unboosted, you will most likely end up in
Speaker 1: the hospital and or dead. The Fiser CEO recently came
Speaker 1: out and again this was a blip on everybody's radar
Speaker 1: when he said, yeah, so your booster shots pretty much Wayne,
Speaker 1: if not just drop at five months, definitely at six
Speaker 1: and that everyone is going to need a fourth shot. Well,
Speaker 1: how is everybody going to receive a fourth shot? If
Speaker 1: the US government, if the Biden administration is telling us
Speaker 1: they don't got no more our money for it, So
Speaker 1: then what is that going to look like? How much
Speaker 1: is it going to cost us to be able to
Speaker 1: walk into, said CBS Duane read whatever place to get
Speaker 1: your shot, and now because the government is no longer
Speaker 1: going to be funding that, but everyone is saying that
Speaker 1: we need it. What is that going to look like?
Speaker 1: And if it sounds to you like it sounds to me,
Speaker 1: which is an incredible money making scheme by big pharma
Speaker 1: that is no longer going to be supported by the
Speaker 1: US government. And you can't force private companies, you know,
Speaker 1: to do the right thing, and we know that they
Speaker 1: sure as fuck do not. Sounds to me like we
Speaker 1: are screwed. And I'm just like, I'm at a point
Speaker 1: with this administration and with the Democrats in general, that
Speaker 1: it is no longer enough for you to tell me
Speaker 1: who you are not instead of telling me who you are.
Speaker 1: It is not enough to want to finger wag and say, well,
Speaker 1: if you don't vote for me, you're going to be
Speaker 1: stuck with DeSantis or Trump or whomever. When again, I'm
Speaker 1: stuck with you right now, and I can't tell you
Speaker 1: what has been passed in my favor. So the Senate
Speaker 1: just passed what daylight savings this week so that we
Speaker 1: don't have to continue to fall back or spring ahead.
Speaker 1: Wonderful oh, you passed legislation that finally made lynching a
Speaker 1: fucking hate crime after multiple decades of unarmed black people
Speaker 1: being lynched, right, the most recent being Ahmad Aubrey and
Speaker 1: fucking George Floyd. Folks. I'm just like, it is really
Speaker 1: difficult to continue to tell people to have faith and
Speaker 1: hope when every day I'm staring this administration in the
Speaker 1: face and I'm like, oh, you all are not only
Speaker 1: going to lose midterms, right, which was inevitable because of
Speaker 1: how America votes, but you are damn sure setting up
Speaker 1: a fucking loss in twenty twenty four. Because I just
Speaker 1: don't know what this administration is going to point to
Speaker 1: as their success because if COVID continues to rage, which
Speaker 1: it will, because now we have lost money and the
Speaker 1: ability to test and to treat and to vaccinate all people,
Speaker 1: right then what do we think is going to happen? Folks?
Speaker 1: Coming up next, my conversation with our friend, our in
Speaker 1: house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel, to go on a deeper
Speaker 1: dive into where China stands right now and what we
Speaker 1: are hearing about outbreaks in Israel, the Netherlands and Germany,
Speaker 1: and what it is that we all need to be
Speaker 1: paying attention to that is coming up next. Friends, you
Speaker 1: know that when it is a Wednesday, I am always
Speaker 1: so happy an honor to be joined by our in
Speaker 1: house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel. Jonathan, it seems like it's
Speaker 1: been sometime since we have done a deep dive into COVID,
Speaker 1: and frankly, I feel like we may be the only
Speaker 1: ones left right now in the United States that are
Speaker 1: interested in doing anybody's deep dive into COVID, because there
Speaker 1: has been seemingly a concerted effort by the CDC, the
Speaker 1: Biden administration, Network Television to just move on and go
Speaker 1: back to normal and pretend as if the last two
Speaker 1: years have not happened. But I woke up at four
Speaker 1: am because of daylight savings that has hit me later
Speaker 1: and started going through articles, an array of them about China,
Speaker 1: about the net lens, about Germany, and be a point two,
Speaker 1: which is the omicron subvariant. Jonathan, what's happening globally right
Speaker 1: now with regard to COVID and where the rest of
Speaker 1: the world is versus where you see us in the
Speaker 1: United States right now? COVID the name sounds from sounds familiar. Yeah, Okay,
Speaker 1: it's somebody from the nineties, right from Back to the
Speaker 1: Future or something like that. You know, it's funny because
Speaker 1: I'm here in Tennessee, and believe it or not, people
Speaker 1: are wearing a lot of masks here in Tennessee, At
Speaker 1: least in my world right now, I think there's a
Speaker 1: fair bit of nervousness in the air. I think for
Speaker 1: the most part, people feel like, oh my gosh, we're
Speaker 1: over it. And also the weather's getting nicer. We can
Speaker 1: be outside all these kind of things. But there's some
Speaker 1: pretty serious shit happening in the rest of the world
Speaker 1: right now that I think we want to pay attention to,
Speaker 1: and not that the United States. I mean, the good
Speaker 1: thing about the United States, if the is an omicron subvariant,
Speaker 1: which it is, is that we don't exactly know what's
Speaker 1: going to happen in the United States because we rushed
Speaker 1: out and embraced omicron the first time there is concerning data.
Speaker 1: Germany is in a kind of crisis situation as of
Speaker 1: this morning. Israel, which is kind of the canary in
Speaker 1: the coal mine for us a lot of times, is
Speaker 1: seeing a pretty big spike also, and that's a place
Speaker 1: where a lot of people are vaccinated and a lot
Speaker 1: of people got omicron. And I also have heard, you know,
Speaker 1: I've been reading all this stuff also that there are
Speaker 1: studies in southern California where they're seeing in plant water
Speaker 1: and things like that that there's rise in this subvariant also,
Speaker 1: and so there's a probably another wave that's got about
Speaker 1: to happen in the United States, to be honest, I mean,
Speaker 1: and the thing is, people are worried because this BA
Speaker 1: two sounds a little bit more severe, a little bit
Speaker 1: more harsh than the first omicron that came through, and
Speaker 1: it's also thirty percent more infectious. And so, believe it
Speaker 1: or not, if we just could take politics out of this,
Speaker 1: which we can't, right we would say we would say,
Speaker 1: everybody play it safe right now, because you know that
Speaker 1: a time when a spike is about to happen is
Speaker 1: the time where, if you can help it, you don't
Speaker 1: want to get sick because there's going to be a
Speaker 1: lot of other people's sick at that time. So, believe
Speaker 1: it or not, we're in a moment right now which
Speaker 1: is kind of a calm before the storm kind of moment.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I can't get my relatives
Speaker 1: to take this stuff seriously. I can't get most people.
Speaker 1: I'm playing in a faculty basketball game after we speak today,
Speaker 1: and I'm the only dude in the game who wears
Speaker 1: a mask, and so I just, you know, I think
Speaker 1: that people feel like they're over it. But as we've seen,
Speaker 1: the virus sets the narrative, and so a lot of
Speaker 1: places that also also thought they were over it. The
Speaker 1: minute people start getting sick, all of a sudden, they
Speaker 1: change their tune. And so I just think the long
Speaker 1: and the short of it is, don't throw away your masks,
Speaker 1: play it safe for the next couple weeks at least
Speaker 1: to see how this thing plays out in the United States.
Speaker 1: And I don't know. I mean, it's hard. Everybody's so exhausted,
Speaker 1: and honestly, yeah, go ahead. No. I was going to say,
Speaker 1: so a couple of things. One in New York City,
Speaker 1: as I'm assuming in a lot of other cities and places,
Speaker 1: the way that they have been tracking whether or not
Speaker 1: we're headed towards another surge has been in the sewage.
Speaker 1: Right you mentioned the plant water in southern California. I
Speaker 1: read a report about, you know, how we predict what
Speaker 1: is happening in New York and it's based on the
Speaker 1: sewage and the fact that what they are seeing right
Speaker 1: now is that there is a spike in the BA
Speaker 1: point to sub variant, which was first discovered in I
Speaker 1: think it was November of twenty twenty one, and that
Speaker 1: this is an early indicator of where we will be
Speaker 1: right now. There are several cities within China that because
Speaker 1: China has a zero COVID policy, so as soon as
Speaker 1: things start to ramp up there in any type of way,
Speaker 1: they shut shit down. They have gone back to remote
Speaker 1: learning in a number of cities. They have they're only
Speaker 1: having essential businesses open in a number of cities, which
Speaker 1: is really affecting our tech creation right and product development
Speaker 1: in this country because we use factories in China. So
Speaker 1: Apple's products opened down at the beginning of this week
Speaker 1: because of the news coming out of China, and they
Speaker 1: are saying that they haven't seen a surge like the
Speaker 1: one that they are currently experiencing since the beginning of
Speaker 1: the pandemic of March twenty twenty. We are seeing the
Speaker 1: same thing happen in Germany. The Netherlands numbers are super
Speaker 1: high as well. What's being said, Jonathan is that forty
Speaker 1: five percent of the United States population got omicron right like,
Speaker 1: And that why we are seeing this spread so fast
Speaker 1: around China is because there isn't built in immunity in
Speaker 1: the way that there is some built in immunity here,
Speaker 1: because forty five almost half of the population got omicron
Speaker 1: at the you know, in the winter of twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1: Can you speak to that and what like? You talk
Speaker 1: about Israel as the canary in the coal mine, but
Speaker 1: in many ways, most of Europe has been the canary
Speaker 1: in the coal mine. We have been lagging, I would
Speaker 1: say over the past two years, roughly three weeks to
Speaker 1: six weeks behind where things are in Europe. So can
Speaker 1: you speak to the differences that you are seeing with
Speaker 1: regard to China and there's zero COVID policy versus the
Speaker 1: United States, and then again with Europe in the countries
Speaker 1: I mentioned and with the US right now. I mean,
Speaker 1: the main issue with China is that it's an older population.
Speaker 1: Very often, who are the people who are getting getting it?
Speaker 1: They've they've been so super safe that a lot of
Speaker 1: people haven't had any exposure to COVID. And the other part,
Speaker 1: of course is that they've got the Sputnik vaccine a
Speaker 1: lot of people. The Russian vaccine are different, I mean
Speaker 1: the vaccine. They're using our different technology often for a
Speaker 1: lot of people than the technology we have here, and
Speaker 1: those vaccines just don't work quite as well. And so
Speaker 1: there's a couple of reasons why China is more vulnerable
Speaker 1: right now. But I also think that this is kind
Speaker 1: of what we do when things start to ramp up again,
Speaker 1: is that we tell our human narrative like, oh, it
Speaker 1: must be Italy because they only write organic pasta, and
Speaker 1: it must be whatever, like we you know, every time
Speaker 1: this happens, we tell some story that makes it makes sense. Oh,
Speaker 1: that's why that is, and that's why they're at risk.
Speaker 1: But we're not at risk. But the honest answer is,
Speaker 1: if anybody tells you that we're not at risk, they
Speaker 1: don't know what they're talking about. We don't know for
Speaker 1: at risk right now. And I would say that there's
Speaker 1: some there's some concerning warning signs of places that have
Speaker 1: comparable and China is not super comparable to us. But
Speaker 1: think about the irony of that, right, China, in many ways,
Speaker 1: they did everything right, like a total public health state,
Speaker 1: and it's making them more vulnerable now, whereas for us
Speaker 1: or you know, theoretically we could be more protected because
Speaker 1: of all these honkeys who went out and got it,
Speaker 1: you know, and so and so and so. You know,
Speaker 1: who knows who knows that what's going to happen. I'm
Speaker 1: not advocating for. I mean, the folly of herd immunity
Speaker 1: is that the virus keeps changing and people I mean
Speaker 1: I know people who have gotten it like five times already,
Speaker 1: and so and so. We don't know, But I would
Speaker 1: say that China is a warning sign of a bad vaccine,
Speaker 1: but also of a complete lockdown without encourage encountering any pathogens.
Speaker 1: Now that being said, I know a lot of people
Speaker 1: in New York. I was on the phone before this
Speaker 1: with a friend of mine in Israel, and they're getting
Speaker 1: it and they've been super safe all along, So there's
Speaker 1: something going on now. The other thing in Israel is
Speaker 1: they've had a polio outbreak, which is freaking everybody the
Speaker 1: hell out because polio is unheard of. But people are
Speaker 1: not getting vaccines, like kids aren't going to the doctor
Speaker 1: and stuff like that, And so COVID is not our
Speaker 1: only issue right now in terms of the infectious disease front.
Speaker 1: It's also all these people not getting vaccines for other stuff,
Speaker 1: and so it's a it's a moment. I mean, I
Speaker 1: would say, if you're at home and you want to
Speaker 1: know what to do just to feel safe, take drugs,
Speaker 1: pat shut up or the words. But how but how
Speaker 1: are we so if China, because of their different vaccine
Speaker 1: roll out, their different protocols, is not quite a parallel
Speaker 1: or a model, what can we learn right now from
Speaker 1: Germany for instance, from Germany and the UK that are
Speaker 1: experiencing Again, folks are saying at least being reported higher
Speaker 1: numbers right now in twenty twenty two then in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty when this originated. Yeah, it's it's Germany and UK
Speaker 1: are really scary because they're relatively comparable to US. I
Speaker 1: mean UK. It was basically like we're done with the virus,
Speaker 1: which we always say we're done with the virus, right.
Speaker 1: I love that. You know, we need somebody working with
Speaker 1: the virus who would say that they're done with us,
Speaker 1: and that's not happening. So so yeah, again, this is
Speaker 1: a time where a lot of people who were I mean,
Speaker 1: the minute President Obama gets it, I'm paying attention because
Speaker 1: I'm like, man, something is something. People who are being careful,
Speaker 1: we're all letting our guard down. I went into a
Speaker 1: restaurant without a ask in Brooklyn the other day and
Speaker 1: it was weird, but I thought, oh, this is what
Speaker 1: I do. I go into a restaurant night dinner. And
Speaker 1: then I looked out the window. I was in the restaurant.
Speaker 1: It was kind of a cool night over the weekend,
Speaker 1: and there was an outdoor dining area and there was
Speaker 1: one poor guy on a date and they were outside aiding,
Speaker 1: and I thought, those poor suckers, you know, like, look
Speaker 1: at me inside or something. So the minute you kind
Speaker 1: of switch over to the other side, it's kind of
Speaker 1: it's kind of hard to go back, right, And so
Speaker 1: I think what Germany is seeing is that in UK also,
Speaker 1: they had basically said the pandemic is over for us,
Speaker 1: and so putting that genie back in the bottle is
Speaker 1: pretty hard for societies. And you understand that just from
Speaker 1: psychological terms also, So are they right now? Then? In
Speaker 1: your I mean again, I don't understand, Jonathan, And I
Speaker 1: know that you're saying it's human nature and it's the
Speaker 1: narratives that we tell ourselves. But I don't understand how
Speaker 1: we continue to say we're done with COVID and then
Speaker 1: every time that we do that, And I would say
Speaker 1: that this round in the United States, with the rollback
Speaker 1: of pretty much every single mandate that was put in place,
Speaker 1: um with them now all being erased, and we're watching
Speaker 1: what is happening in Europe, how is it not? How
Speaker 1: how is it that we're locked into this belief still
Speaker 1: that it's not going to affect us like we have
Speaker 1: we've stopped. I mean, I you know, tried to not
Speaker 1: watch as much cable news as I used to. I like, I,
Speaker 1: you know, for my own sanity and emotional protection, I
Speaker 1: try to just dip in for like a little bit.
Speaker 1: But I have noticed and my mother, you know, I
Speaker 1: was home with her over the weekend, and my parents
Speaker 1: and they're like, nobody talks about COVID anymore, like at all,
Speaker 1: you know, not the numbers, not the infection rates, not
Speaker 1: the deaths, nothing, And so like, how is it that
Speaker 1: we're back into this place of believing that we can
Speaker 1: will this virus away and it's showing up aggressively again
Speaker 1: in another place that we know we're behind three to
Speaker 1: six weeks. Yeah, I mean again, the three, the three
Speaker 1: main points to pay attention to right now. Number one,
Speaker 1: cases are spiking seriously in places that have been precursors
Speaker 1: to the United States and have demographically and infectiously similar
Speaker 1: profiles in a way, And so number one, it's happening
Speaker 1: other places. Number Two, there's a new variant, and we
Speaker 1: don't know how bad it is, right we haven't done
Speaker 1: the data yet. Again, I keep waiting for happy COVID
Speaker 1: that grows hair on your head, gives you a four
Speaker 1: hour erection, but it hasn't happened yet. But so we
Speaker 1: don't know how bad this thing is. And honestly, it
Speaker 1: could be bad. We honestly don't know. I will say
Speaker 1: that in a lot of other places they're they're building
Speaker 1: overflow intensive care units and things like that. So a
Speaker 1: lot of other places think it's bad. And number three,
Speaker 1: we're not paying attention. So that's that's a luxury we
Speaker 1: have at this moment. The question is two three weeks
Speaker 1: from now, how are we going to feel about that?
Speaker 1: And I honestly don't know. I don't know the answer.
Speaker 1: So um, you know, it could be it could be
Speaker 1: that it's not a big deal. But I'm I mean
Speaker 1: The hard part is I'm going to try to keep
Speaker 1: playing it safe, especially for the next two weeks. I'm
Speaker 1: going to think about think about, you know, when was
Speaker 1: my last booster, and think about maybe thinking about another booster.
Speaker 1: If I'm at the six month mark or the five
Speaker 1: month mark, I'm going to figure out, you know, just
Speaker 1: kind of put it in my mind, because it's I
Speaker 1: don't know, we don't we don't know where we're going
Speaker 1: to be in two weeks. And of course we're all
Speaker 1: distracted by the rest of the world imploding and Chernobyl
Speaker 1: and everything. We're just living. We're living like we're honestly,
Speaker 1: we're living the eighties all over again, with like Chernobyl
Speaker 1: and Van Drago and everything like that and so um
Speaker 1: and so there's a lot going on right now. But
Speaker 1: I would say that two weeks from now, if this
Speaker 1: thing turns out to be as bad here as it
Speaker 1: is in other places, people are gonna want to wit.
Speaker 1: People are gonna wish that they that they took this
Speaker 1: thing a little bit more seriously now. So I say
Speaker 1: now is the time to be cautious, which, of course,
Speaker 1: of course it's hard to do whenever when it's freezing outside,
Speaker 1: and everybody's eating inside. I thought, fuck it, I'm eating inside,
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, I mean I'm gonna I'm I have
Speaker 1: done the same thing, right, like I have. I have
Speaker 1: done the same thing. The thing that I am most
Speaker 1: nervous about, and I want to get your thoughts on, is,
Speaker 1: to date, I have not tested positive for COVID either.
Speaker 1: But I'm really now concerned because in one of the
Speaker 1: articles that I was reading, it's saying, well, for for
Speaker 1: half the population that got omicron that they're going to
Speaker 1: be better off with this sub variant, then the rest
Speaker 1: of us who are boosted vaccinated but didn't get it,
Speaker 1: and so and then and here's the other thing too,
Speaker 1: because you just brought it up my booster, right. So
Speaker 1: the third shot was in November, Viser CEO came out
Speaker 1: and again I found this like just a little thread
Speaker 1: in the Twitter because once again was not being talked
Speaker 1: about on cable news. Visor CEO came out and said,
Speaker 1: so pretty sure y'all need a fourth shot, right, He's like,
Speaker 1: he's like, you need a fourth shot. We're working on
Speaker 1: a long term vaccine that will you know, be be
Speaker 1: working for at least a year, but we're not there.
Speaker 1: So if you're if you are waning to that side,
Speaker 1: like I am five months, six months, you need to
Speaker 1: get a fourth shot. And I'm like, are we even
Speaker 1: allowed to get fourth shots right now? Is that is
Speaker 1: that a thing? Yeah? Well then I'm going to get one. Yeah, yeah, don't.
Speaker 1: I mean there's a great strategy for doing that. It's
Speaker 1: called lying um and and I recommend you do it.
Speaker 1: I mean, the problem is the formulation of the vaccine
Speaker 1: that's still out there is still the delta formulation. There
Speaker 1: is an omicron specific vaccine that they've been testing, and
Speaker 1: I don't see why they're not like rolling that thing
Speaker 1: out like yesterday. Um. So it's still the older formulation
Speaker 1: of the vaccine. So it's it's good you want to
Speaker 1: have high antibodies at a time like this. Um. But yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I would just say, lyeing, go get this shot. I
Speaker 1: mean I think that that's that that that that's one
Speaker 1: reasonable strategy. UM. Don't don't quote me on that, don't
Speaker 1: put me on television about that or anything like that.
Speaker 1: But um but um, but no, I think that right
Speaker 1: now is the time to right now is the time
Speaker 1: to um to be a little defensive. And I do
Speaker 1: I think you're right that if it's it's an overcron subvariant.
Speaker 1: People who did I mean I didn't. I haven't gotten
Speaker 1: it either, And so I asked my friend this morning,
Speaker 1: is there a place I can rush out and get
Speaker 1: the old omicron? You know? But you know, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think you're still better off having not had it,
Speaker 1: because there are plenty people who are having long COVID
Speaker 1: symptoms now from right, which again you know again people
Speaker 1: are not and by people, I mean the administration, I
Speaker 1: mean the CDC, I mean folks that have been going
Speaker 1: on television for the past two years to talk about
Speaker 1: COVID are not talking about long COVID and what I'm
Speaker 1: hearing And there was a report in the New York Times, Oh,
Speaker 1: we think that long COVID really affects your brain, right,
Speaker 1: like that it's not just people having to work back
Speaker 1: up to the respiratory levels that they had pre COVID,
Speaker 1: but that they're having brain issues, right, They're having memory loss,
Speaker 1: they're having focus issues, they're having migrains and all of
Speaker 1: these things. Jonathan, do you think that this administration is
Speaker 1: going to be caught flat footed in the next couple
Speaker 1: of weeks because of the push to go back to work,
Speaker 1: go back to normal, go back to the way that
Speaker 1: things were. This is what has been coming out of
Speaker 1: this administration for the last three weeks. We had doctor
Speaker 1: Fauci on a couple of weeks ago who said, you know,
Speaker 1: when it's pouring, you wear galoshes in a raincoat. It's
Speaker 1: drizzling now, so you can take off, you know, you
Speaker 1: can take off some layers. What's happening in China and
Speaker 1: Europe and Israel is actually stating otherwise that it's it's
Speaker 1: not drizzling actually right, that the storm is in a
Speaker 1: different location right now, but it is actually you can
Speaker 1: see it in the horizon. Yeah, I mean, I think
Speaker 1: I think that's right. The hard thing from my perspective
Speaker 1: right now is that it's not like they are very
Speaker 1: smart scientists and public health researchers in the administration. It's
Speaker 1: just the the pandemic became political for everyone, right. It
Speaker 1: became an untenable political response for the Democrats to be
Speaker 1: saying we need to stay cautious. That was actually that
Speaker 1: was going to cost them the midterms. It was going
Speaker 1: to cost them everything, and so health became political for
Speaker 1: the Democrats. Also, is a reaction to it becoming so
Speaker 1: political for the Republicans. And so it's not like the
Speaker 1: Democrats are being driven by sound science right now. They're
Speaker 1: trying to basically say, oh, mandates, no, no, that that's
Speaker 1: that's you know, that's somebody must be somebody else mandates,
Speaker 1: that's not us. And so in a way, nobody's making
Speaker 1: decisions that are about health right now. And it's true
Speaker 1: on both sides. I mean, Eric Adams, you know, it's
Speaker 1: easy to become mayor of New York two months ago,
Speaker 1: when the cases are falling and everybody's vaccinated, you can say,
Speaker 1: you know whatever, go everybody go to a strip club,
Speaker 1: you know whatever. M But but but in a month
Speaker 1: when things are going crazy, what's the Eric Adams position
Speaker 1: to be. I mean, that's when things get hard. Like
Speaker 1: he can be all chummy with Kyrie Irving now, but
Speaker 1: if things start to get serious again, is he is
Speaker 1: he can be able to turn the corner and say, look,
Speaker 1: we got to take this seriously again. That's that's really
Speaker 1: the hard question, because you know, nobody I think I
Speaker 1: just think they realized that from a population science level,
Speaker 1: that it became unmanageable. And and again it's it's hard
Speaker 1: because I mean there's so much anger, frustration, beer in
Speaker 1: the world, and then the weather starts getting nice and
Speaker 1: the many you take off your mask for the first time.
Speaker 1: I mean I totally understand that. For me, I thought, man,
Speaker 1: I can go back to my life of just waking
Speaker 1: up in a different hotel room every morning and not
Speaker 1: knowing where I am or how I got that's the
Speaker 1: life you had, good doctor, Yeah, who is Like who
Speaker 1: is who is this person? And how did I get here?
Speaker 1: And sneaking out with my clothes and like I missed
Speaker 1: that life that you missed that life, but like clearly
Speaker 1: the nineteen seventy Yeah, but but but and so it's
Speaker 1: hard because like the minute you have a touch of
Speaker 1: normal normalcy, you recognize kind of oh we lost that's
Speaker 1: what we lost. Um but but but but again, you
Speaker 1: know again it's just resilience. Unfortunately, I don't know. It's
Speaker 1: like all these things I was thinking the other day,
Speaker 1: like COVID and putin are exactly the same, Like this
Speaker 1: thing you kind of stopped paying attention to and then
Speaker 1: they come back and show you like with a vengeance.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, So you know the last question that
Speaker 1: I have for you, Jonathan today, is we have seen
Speaker 1: these spikes happen at different seasons, right like we have
Speaker 1: We have noticed notably, you know, the late fall winter
Speaker 1: has been really bad in the United States. Spring and summer. However,
Speaker 1: even though Delta was this covered in the summer of
Speaker 1: what twenty twenty or twenty twenty one, I don't remember.
Speaker 1: Is it better if there is a surge that happens,
Speaker 1: that it happens for us in the springtime because we're
Speaker 1: able to be outside, because you're not going to be
Speaker 1: lowered into you know, the indoor dining or indoor things,
Speaker 1: and there is such a desire particularly here, you know,
Speaker 1: on the East Coast, that things start to get warmer.
Speaker 1: Is that is that a better scenario for us rather
Speaker 1: than a fall a late fall winter? I mean absolutely.
Speaker 1: If it's an airborne virus, you want to be outside,
Speaker 1: and that's always going to be true. The thing is,
Speaker 1: we had never seen a virus during the pandemic spread
Speaker 1: as quickly as the Big Oh last December, and we thought,
Speaker 1: oh my god, how could it spread that fast? And
Speaker 1: now this new variant spreads thirty times faster than that,
Speaker 1: and so the virus is always going to try to
Speaker 1: find our patterns and then subvert right the whole goal
Speaker 1: of the of the viruses to be more infectious than
Speaker 1: the one that came before. And so this new variant
Speaker 1: is going to have some new rules and and and
Speaker 1: the other thing we haven't even spoken about is we're
Speaker 1: defunding COVID research right now in a pretty significant way.
Speaker 1: And so there are real implications for just our health apparatus,
Speaker 1: our healthcare, all these kind of things. And so we're
Speaker 1: you know, the risk is a knowledge vacuum in a
Speaker 1: particular way. Well, Jonathan, we here at least unwoke af
Speaker 1: We'll continue to keep our eyes open and have conversations
Speaker 1: about COVID even if the mainstream and the rest of
Speaker 1: the world has moved on. I wouldn't say the rest
Speaker 1: of the world. I'll say the United States has moved
Speaker 1: on and think that we're past it. I'll tell folks
Speaker 1: that are listening to stay vigilant, to read up on
Speaker 1: what is what is happening, because you're not going to
Speaker 1: see it on cable news until it gets to a
Speaker 1: fever pitch. And we don't need things to reach yet
Speaker 1: another fever pitch when we know exactly what it is
Speaker 1: that we need to do, which is wear masks and
Speaker 1: be really thoughtful about how we gather and where we gather. So, folks,
Speaker 1: this is your first warning as we learn more about
Speaker 1: the omicron subvariant. Jonathan, as always, thank you so much
Speaker 1: for making the time to walk us through the latest.
Speaker 1: That is it for me, dear friends today on woke
Speaker 1: a app. As always, Power to the people and to
Speaker 1: all the people power, get woke and stay woke as fuck.