Spring will cure COVID but not COVID Politics
On November 19th I discussed this graph about PCR testing accuracy.
The graph clearly shows that beyond about 27 cycles most of the positives are false positives. Every cycle doubles the “magnification”. If you run enough cycles, you can find very small amounts of anything. For this reason, the inventor of the PCR Technique was adamant that it should not be used as a diagnostic test. It is meaningless to find out you do not have enough virus to make you sick.
Most Countries use 35 to 45 cycles and just report positive or negative. They do not disclose how many cycles it took to get a positive so it is not possible to judge how many of these positives could be false positive. Some researchers used a freedom of information request to get that data from the Rhode Island government. They just published what they found in this article.
These authors used 28 cycles as a cut off anything beyond 28 cycles was likely false (maybe infectious). Anything beyond 32 cycles is false (Not infectious). The results are interesting and are presented below.
58% of all positives in Rhode Island were likely false. It got even more interesting when they looked at seasonality.
In Mid-April False positives start to show up. By May, all positives were false positives.
This is very normal for a seasonal virus. We are entering April within 2 to 4 weeks cases and hospitalizations will start falling. That is precisely why we do not need to worry about the recent small increase in cases in Alberta.
British Columbia is in the same boat as Alberta. Not many people have been infected (AB 3%, BC 2%) and cases are trending up. Spring is going to arrive soon in BC just as it will in Alberta. Cases will trend down to near zero. Infectious cases will go to zero. Yet BC just closed businesses again.
https://www.citynews1130.com/2021/03/29/bc-covid-19-whistler-dining/
It is possible that John Horgan is too stupid to understand seasons change. Every Canadian Politician ranks so high on the evil-stupidity scale it is hard to tell if they are morons or evil geniuses. I doubt that everyone in the BC government is unaware of spring, so my bet is that John Horgan has been advised that cases will soon start falling on their own. Horgan knows that if he does nothing, he will not be able to take credit for saving people from the virus. If he closes businesses now, he can take credit for what would have happened without his intervention. Never let a seasonal virus go to waste.
Normally I would be worried that the evil Troll would also take the opportunity to close businesses again. It pleases his dominatrix Denna when he punishes others for no good reason. This time I think we might be safe. A private group just published a poll. 42,000 Albertans took part. 70% wanted lockdowns lifted immediately. The same percentage was unhappy with the evil Troll and his dominatrix. Fear for his political life might just cause Jason Kenney to do the right thing for once. Even the Evil Troll can do the right thing when it is politically expedient. Too bad that does not happen more often.
