Category Archives: Corona Virus

Independent Newsmedia

The Arizona Department of Health Services on Sept. 21 reported the number of coronavirus cases in Apache Junction, east Mesa, Gold Canyon and Queen Valley is 20,043 in ZIP codes 85118, 85119 and 85120.

That is an increase of 40 from a week ago when cases stood at 20,003.

More than 90% of cases were mapped to the address of the patients residence. If the patients address was unknown the case was mapped to the address of the provider followed by the address of the reporting facility, according to the ADHS.

85118 ZIP code:

85119 ZIP code:

85120 ZIP code:

Common symptoms of COVID-19 include fever, cough, breathing trouble, sore throat, muscle pain and loss of taste or smell. Most people develop only mild symptoms. But some people, usually those with other medical complications, develop more severe symptoms, including pneumonia.

Medicare Part B (Medical Insurance) covers FDA-authorized COVID-19 diagnostic tests. Go to medicare.gov/coverage/coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19-diagnostic-tests.

To see full numbers across the state, click here.

See more stories at yourvalley.net/covid-19.

More:

40 coronavirus cases reported in a week in Apache Junction, Gold Canyon area - Daily Independent

Under a tentative deal Washington state employees would get $1,000 bonuses for receiving a COVID-19 booster shot.

The agreement between the state and the Washington Federation of State Employees also includes 4% pay raises in 2023, 3% pay raises in 2024 and a $1,000 retention bonus, The Seattle Times reported.

Gov. Jay Inslee announced this month that all pandemic emergency orders will end by Oct. 31, including state vaccine mandates for health care and education workers. But he has said a vaccine mandate will continue to be in effect for workers at most state agencies.

Most employees were required to have their initial series of vaccination by October of last year or be fired. New state employees have had to be vaccinated before their official start date.

We want to have healthy people so people dont miss work, Inslee said earlier this month. The vaccine still remains a very important thing.

The Washington Federation of State Employees represents nearly 47,000 workers with roughly 35,000 state employees impacted by the tentative deal. The union said it would help address widespread staffing shortages and workplace safety issues.

The union called the deal, which still must be approved by both sides, the highest compensation package in the unions history.

Inslees office declined to speak to the specifics of the tentative agreement announced by the union.

Offering incentives for boosters reflects the feedback and recommendations we heard from employees and labor partners, Jaime Smith, an Inslee spokesperson, said.

See the article here:

$1k bonus for getting COVID-19 booster? Thats the proposed deal - OregonLive

Introduction

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease that first appeared in Wuhan, China in late December 2019. It is caused by the virus called severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), a highly transmissible virus.1,2 The disease has spread all over the world, considered a pandemic by the WHO since March 11, 2020.3 As of August 30, 2022, the world has 599,071,265 confirmed cases and 6,467,023 deaths.4 The clinical forms can be asymptomatic, mild, moderate, severe, and critical.5 Although pulmonary manifestations are common, the disease can affect several organs of the body.6

The main symptoms of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) are fever, cough, and dyspnea.7 Some patients present with dyspnea in the setting of severe respiratory distress with a drop in oxygen saturation or oxygen partial pressure.8 Despite the absence of dyspnea, some patients with COVID-19 may have a markedly reduced oxygen saturation as measured by pulse oximetry. This phenomenon is referred to as silent hypoxia or happy hypoxia.9 Each time there has been a major wave of COVID-19, medical facilities have been overwhelmed, resulting in a rapid increase in the number of patients receiving home treatment. As a result, several deaths were recorded among patients treated at home, which became a social problem. Happy hypoxia has been one of the causes of death in COVID-19 patients receiving home care, as the absence of respiratory difficulty despite the presence of hypoxemia delays the seeking of medical care.10

The prevalence of COVID-19 patients with happy hypoxia was variable depending on the definitions of happy hypoxia used, the age of the patients, comorbidities, and the regions where the studies were conducted.11 The prevalence ranged from 31.9 to 65% in Europe11,12 and from 4.8 to 21. 5% in Asia.10,13,14 The prevalence was 4.8 in one American country15 and 6% in one African country.16 A systematic review would be beneficial in aggregating these disparities in prevalence. In addition, some studies have shown that patients with both COVID-19 and happy hypoxia are known to have poor outcomes.11,16 Therefore, hypoxemia in patients with COVID-19 without dyspnea should be identified and monitored carefully.

It is important to identify risk factors for hypoxemia in patients with COVID-19 without dyspnea. No worldwide prevalence survey of this phenomenon has been conducted. This review aimed to summarize information on the prevalence, risk factors, and outcomes of patients with happy hypoxia in order to improve their management.

Relevant studies will be identified through a search of MEDLINE, Europe PMC, and the Cochrane Library. The following will be the primary search terms in MEDLINE: ((COVID-19 [Title/Abstract]) OR (SARS-CoV-2 [Title/Abstract]) OR (coronavirus [Title/Abstract]), which will be cross-referenced to the terms (happy hypoxia [Title/Abstract]) OR (silent hypoxia [Title/Abstract]) The search will be in the English language. The search period runs from December 1st, 2019 to April 1st, 2022. The site preprints.org will search for preprints using the terms COVID-19 or Coronavirus. Official reports from medical societies, governmental institutes, and registries will also be manually searched and included if they match the inclusion criteria. The protocol was recorded on PROSPERO CRD42022293727.

Design

All observational studies report the prevalence, risk factors, and outcomes of happy hypoxia in COVID-19.

Study setting

Worldwide.

Population

All hospitalized patients infected with COVID-19

Publication status

All published and unpublished articles.

Language

Only studies reported using the English language.

Publication date

Published from the December 1st, 2019 to April 30, 2022

Patients who had received oxygen prior to hospitalization.

Two independent investigators assessed the results of the initial search for the title and abstract relevancy. The whole text was checked to see if it met the eligibility criteria. Duplicate articles, reviews, editorials, case reports, family studies, and publications that exclusively report on pediatric cases will be eliminated. Clinical studies that did not explicitly state death as a possible outcome will be ruled out. Furthermore, if a single author published two or more studies on the same patient sample, only the highest-quality publication was considered. Authors, year of publication, nation, study design, study location (number of study sites), sample size, age, sex, outcome, the definition of happy hypoxia, and proportion of happy hypoxia will be all included on data extraction forms. Two investigators (researchers with a masters degree in medicine or the humanities and clinical research experience) independently obtained this information. A third investigator double-checked the list of papers and data to make sure there were no duplicates and to rule out any inconsistencies.

The NewcastleOttawa Scale (NOS) was used to evaluate the quality of the included retrospective cohort studies based on three primary components: study patient selection which is worth up to 4 points, and adjustment for potential confounding variables which are worth up to 2 points, and outcome measurement which is worth up to 3 points.17 Each study can receive a maximum of nine points based on this scale. Articles with a NOS score of 5 were deemed high-quality publications in this study. The quality assessment was conducted by two reviewers. Disagreements were handled by discussion among reviewers, with the assistance of a third party if necessary to reach a consensus.

We will extract the authors, year of publication, nation, study design, study location (number of study sites), sample size, age, sex, the definition of happy hypoxia and proportion of happy hypoxia, gender (male/female), patient comorbidities, and outcome. We performed a meta-analysis of proportions (and 95% CI) for the prevalence of COVID-19 patients with happy hypoxia. The statistical heterogeneity among the included studies will be measured by the Cochrans Q with the p-value, and the extent of heterogeneity attributable to heterogeneity will be measured by the I2 statistic. The descriptive analyses will be performed using Stata version 14.

Through electronic database searches and registries, a total of 70 records were collected, with 25 records being eliminated before screening owing to duplication. Then, out of the 45 articles found, 20 were eliminated due to irrelevant titles, abstracts, or texts. A total of 25 papers were chosen for the full-text review, with 18 being deleted due to the lack of a result of interest, repeat data, or insufficient sample size. Finally, the research looked at seven studies (Figure 1).

Figure 1 Prisma Flow chart of study selection.

The methodological quality was high and the risk of bias was low, with a median Newcastle-Ottawa scale score of 77% (extreme values 7788%). The detailed quality assessment of all included studies can be found in Appendix A.

In total, 7 studies1016 were included in the review. The time period for the studies was 20202021. All studies were published between 2020 and 2021. The studies had sample sizes ranging from 141 to 21,544. One study was conducted in Africa (DRC);16 two studies in Europe, France, and Italy,11,12 three studies in Asia (Japan, India, and Saudi Arabia);10,13,14 and one study in the Americas (Mexico).15 In addition, only one study was prospective,15 and the rest were retrospective cohorts. Six studies took place in a single hospital, while one study in Japan involved Japanese national registries.10 Two studies defined happy hypoxia with an oxygen saturation threshold < 90%, two studies with a threshold < 94%, one study with a threshold< 95% also combining Pa O2 and PCO2, one study used the saturation threshold < 80%, one used the PaO2/Fi02 ratio < 300 mm Hg (Table 1)

Table 1 Study Characteristics of COVID-19 Patients with Happy Hypoxia

All studies reported the prevalence of happy hypoxia (Table 2). The prevalence varied from 4.8 to 65% for all definitions. In a 2020 study, Brouqui et al used an oxygen saturation of 93% as a definition. et al reported in the 2nd largest cohort a very high prevalence of 65% of happy hypoxia situations (Table 2). The pooled prevalence of the 7 studies is 6% (Figure 2).

Table 2 Prevalence of Happy Hypoxia in COVID-19

Figure 2 Pooled Prevalence of happy hypoxia in COVID-19 patients.

Brouqui et al11 discovered risk factors for poor clinical outcomes during follow-up (death/transfer to ICU) in patients without dyspnea. Hypoxemia/hypocapnia syndrome (yellow dots) was clustered with death/ICU, elevated NEWS score, age, male, and elevated D-dimers. Hypoxia/hypocapnia was linked to aging, maleness, and chronic heart disease but not to type 2 diabetes. Death/ICU was strongly associated with hypoxemia/hypocapnia syndrome (OR 95% CI: 4.37; 2.129.03) (p= 0.0001), as were elevated D-dimers > 2.5 mg/l (OR 95% CI: 6.26; 1.9919.75) (p = 0.002). Sirohiya et al14 found that multivariable logistic regression models were fitted to calculate the odds of death with silent hypoxia as the explanatory variable and other clinical, laboratory, and treatment parameters as covariates. We found that though these models showed a higher odds of death among patients with silent hypoxia, none of them were statistically significant. Akiyama et al10 found that hypoxemia without dyspnea was associated with age > 65 years (95% CI: 2.9204.350, p < 0.001), male sex (95% CI: 1.0701.600, p = 0.0087), BMI > 25 kg/m2 (95% CI: 1.1601.500, p = 0.036), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (95% CI: 1.3003.100, p = 0.002), other chronic lung disease (95% CI: 1.0603.400, p = 0.031), and diabetes mellitus (CI: 1.2401.850, p < 0.001). The hypoxemia without dyspnea group had a greater median respiratory rate (RR) than the control group (31/min vs 18/min, p=0.001).

All studies revealed mortality rates among patients with happy hypoxia. Mortality ranged from 1 to 45.4%. The study with a mortality of 45.4% used SpO2 < 94% as a criterion (Table 3). The pooled mortality rate of the studies was 2% (Figure 3).

Table 3 Mortality of Patients with Happy Hypoxia

Figure 3 Pooled mortality rate of patients with happy hypoxia.

Five studies reported other outcomes.1013,15 Four studies reported admission to ICU.11-13,15 According to studies by Alhusain et al, patients with dyspnea were admitted to ICU more frequently than those with happy hypoxia (107 (64%) versus 9 (36%), p = 0.007); and Brouqui et al (31(5.1%) versus 16 (1.4%), p=0.001). For the other 3 studies, the difference was not significant.5,8 Alhusain et al13 reported that the length of stay in the ICU did not differ between dyspnea and happy hypoxia on admission. Patients with dyspnea had a longer length of stay, though the difference was not statistically significant (2 (22%) vs 37 (35%), p=0.783). One study reported the need for ECMO.10 ECMO was used more frequently in patients with happy hypoxia in Japan, 57 (5.1%) vs 221 (1%) (Akiyama et al). (Table 4).

Table 4 Other Outcomes of Patients with Happy Hypoxia

To our knowledge, this was the first large-scale systematic review on the prevalence and outcome of COVID-19 patients with happy hypoxia. This is an understudied topic, with only eight studies specifically reporting the prevalence, risk factors, and outcome of COVID-19 patients with happy hypoxia. Of these, by far the largest cohort was from Japan.

The prevalence of happy hypoxia depends on the definition of happy hypoxia used. Considering all the definitions used, the prevalence of happy hypoxia ranged from 4.8% to 65%. The pooled prevalence was 6%. The highest prevalence of 65% was reported in the study in France, where oxygen saturation of less than 95% was considered in the definition of happy hypoxia. In the same study, in the subset of patients with at least one blood gas analysis (n = 161) who did not have dyspnea on admission, 28.1% had hypoxemia/hypocapnia syndrome, defining asymptomatic hypoxia.11 This value is still higher than the pooled prevalence in this systematic review. There were 2 studies reporting a low prevalence of 4.8%.10,15 One of these studies from Japan had happy definitions of hypoxia with a value of less than 94% while the other study from Mexico had a threshold of less than 80%, which could also explain the low prevalence. Compared with the results of a recent systematic review and meta-analysis on hypoxia in children infected with COVID-19 in low and moderate resource settings, considering the definition of hypoxia with saturation below 90%, the pooled prevalence was 31%.18 When compared to patients with hypoxia and dyspnea who were intubated, the prevalence of patients with hypoxia who were intubated was 28% (95% CI 20%-38%, I 2 = 63%). with a mortality rate of 14% (95% CI 7.424.4%) among these patients.19

Early intubation in COVID-19 has not shown many benefits. The literature does not find significant differences in mortality between the early intubation group and never intubated patients.20

Akiyama et al found that hypoxemia without dyspnea was associated with age > 65 years, male sex, BMI > 25 kg/m2, smoking history, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), another chronic lung disease, and diabetes mellitus.10 These same factors are associated with severe forms and mortality related to COVID-19. Patients with COVID-19 with any of these characteristics may have hypoxemia and remain non-dyspneic. Thus, close monitoring of these patients is necessary. Specifically, they should be provided with transcutaneous oximeters so that they can monitor their own SpO2 regularly. Brouqui et al also found that patients with happy hypoxemia were elderly and chronically ill. Diabetic patients were 1.8 times more likely to have poor respiratory perception than non-diabetic controls and therefore had the lowest scores.11 It is well recognized that chronic conditions like diabetes and aging can desensitize the respiratory center, which can lead to happy hypoxia.21

The hypoxemia without dyspnea group had a greater median respiratory rate (RR) than the control group (31/min vs 18/min, p= 0.001). This finding implies that tachypnoea is an important indicator of hypoxemia, even in the absence of dyspnea. Furthermore, RR is an indicator of severe dysfunction in many-body systems, not just the respiratory system.22 It is therefore important that COVID-19 patients and their families know how to predict hypoxemia, even without transcutaneous oximetry, to ensure prompt medical management before the disease becomes severe.10 Brouqui et al found that factors associated with poor clinical outcomes during follow-up (death/transfer to ICU) among patients without dyspnea Hypoxemia/hypocapnia syndrome were clustered with death/ICU, elevated NEWS score, age, male, and elevated D-dimers.11 Hypoxemia and elevated D-dimers strongly suggest that the resulting lung damage is due in part to arterial microemboli and might explain the severity of clinical presentation and the subsequent death. These findings reinforce the recommendation to apply thrombosis prophylaxis in these patients.23

Anticoagulants are crucial for treating microvascular and microvascular thrombosis and inflammation in COVID-19 patients.2426 They also prevent the development of DIC,27 and they help to reduce mortality.28,29 The 28-day mortality was consistently lower in those who got anticoagulation compared to those who did not use.30,31

All studies showed mortality rates among patients with happy hypoxia. Mortality ranged from 1 to 45.4%. The study with a mortality of 45.4% used SpO2 < 94% as a criterion. The pooled mortality of the studies was 2%. A high mortality of 45.4% was found in the Sirohoya study in India.14 Similarly, a study in the UK reported room air oxygen saturation as a significant predictor of patient outcome and mortality.32 This is also confirmed by a Peruvian study reporting that oxygen saturation below 90% on admission was a significant predictor of in-hospital mortality in patients with COVID-19.33 Another study concluded that low oxygen levels on admission were strongly associated with more critical illness and mortality.34 The mortality rate for COVID-19 patients with severe disease can reach 61%.35,36 The primary factor is progressive hypoxia, which damages multiple associated organs, including the lungs.7 The use of standard mechanical ventilation in COVID-19 patients can result in mortality of up to 86%, in contrast to usual ARDS.3739 Before the advanced stage of COVID-19, when edema and shunt develop, High flow nasal oxygen (HFNO) should be taken into account as a superior option for early oxygen therapy. Supraglottic jet oxygenation and ventilation (SJOV) is an option, but more research is required to substantiate it.40

Four studies reported admission to the ICU.1113,15 According to studies by Alhusain et al (107 (64%) versus 9 (36%), p = 0.007) and Brouqui et al (31(5.1%) versus 16 (1.4%), p=0.001),11,13 patients with dyspnea were admitted to ICU more frequently than those with happy hypoxia. For the other 3 studies, the difference was not significant. According to Alhusain et al, the length of stay in the intensive care unit did not differ between dyspnea and happy hypoxia on admission. Patients with dyspnea had a longer length of stay, though the difference was not statistically significant (2 (22%) versus 37 (35%), p= 0.783). Two studies reported the need for ECMO.4,7 In Japan, ECMO was used more often in patients with happy hypoxia. 57(5.1) vs 221(1).10 The use of ECMO in severe COVID-19 patients seems to be the same as it is in ARDS patients that are not COVID-19.

The length of ECMO seems to be longer than in non-COVID-19 ARDS, and older age is a determinant in death.41

This lack of breathlessness deserves medical attention and should not be taken as a good sign of well-being. We suggest that for these patients with mild clinical presentation, it is particularly important to routinely achieve oxygen saturation by full pulse oximetry with blood gas analysis, if necessary, to allow early diagnosis of asymptomatic hypoxia and more appropriate management to reduce the poor outcome.11

Our systematic review had several limitations. First, we only included studies written in English. Secondly, another limitation in assessing prevalence is that the definition of happy hypoxia was inconsistent as there is not yet a standardized and validated definition. Some studies used different values of saturation, others used either PaO2 or the PaO2/FiO2 ratio. Finally, because the articles included are limited to a few nations, the global figure may not be accurate.

The pooled prevalence and mortality of patients with happy hypoxia were not very high. Happy hypoxia was associated with advanced age and comorbidities. Some patients were admitted to the intensive care unit, although fewer than dyspneic patients. Its early detection and management should improve the prognosis.

COVID-19, Coronavirus Disease 1; ECMO, extracorporeal membrane oxygenation; ICU, intensive care unit; COPD, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; NEWS, National Early Warning Score; BMI, body mass index; NOS, NewcastleOttawa Scale; CI, confidence interval; OR, odds ratio.

All authors made a significant contribution to the work reported, whether that is in the conception, study design, execution, acquisition of data, analysis, and interpretation; took part in drafting, revising, or critically reviewing the article; gave final approval of the version to be published; have agreed on the journal to which the article has been submitted, and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work.

The authors report no competing interests in this work.

1. Livingston E, Bucher K. Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Italy. JAMA. 2020;323(14):1335. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.4344

2. Gable L, Courtney B, Gatter R, et al. Global public health legal responses to H1N1. J Law Med Ethics. 2011;39(Suppl1):4650. doi:10.1111/j.1748-720X.2011.00565.x

3. Ucinotta D, Vanelli M. WHO declares COVID19 a pandemic. Acta Bio Med Atenei Parmensis. 2020;91(1):157160.

4. World Health Organization. Coronavirus (COVID-19) Dashboard. Available from: https://covid19.who.int/. Accessed August 30, 2022.

5. Guan WJ, Ni ZY, Hu Y, et al. Clinical characteristics of coronavirus disease 2019 in China. N Engl J Med. 2020;382(18):17081720. PMID: 32109013; PMCID: PMC7092819. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa2002032

6. Johnson KD, Harris C, Cain JK, Hummer C, Goyal H, Perisetti A. Pulmonary and extra-pulmonary clinical manifestations of COVID-19. Front Med. 2020;7:526. PMID: 32903492; PMCID: PMC7438449. doi:10.3389/fmed.2020.00526

7. Goyal P, Choi JJ, Pinheiro LC, et al. Clinical characteristics of Covid-19 in New York City. N Engl J Med. 2020;382(24):23722374. doi:10.1056/NEJMc2010419

8. Gallo Marin B, Aghagoli G, Lavine K, et al. Predictors of COVID-19 severity: a literature review. Rev Med Virol. 2021;31(1):110. doi:10.1002/rmv.2146

9. Levitan R. The infection Thats silently killing coronavirus patients; 2010. Available from: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/opinion/sunday/coronavirus-testing-pneumonia.html/. Accessed April 12, 2022.

10. Akiyama Y, Morioka S, Asai Y, et al. Risk factors associated with asymptomatic hypoxemia among COVID-19 patients: a retrospective study using the nationwide Japanese registry, COVIREGI-JP. J Infect Public Health. 2022;15(3):312314. doi:10.1016/j.jiph.2022.01.014

11. Brouqui P, Amrane S, Million M, et al. Asymptomatic hypoxia in COVID-19 is associated with poor outcome. Int J Infect Dis. 2021;102:233238. doi:10.1016/j.ijid.2020.10.067

12. Busana M, Gasperetti A, Giosa L, et al. Prevalence and outcome of silent hypoxemia in COVID-19. Minerva Anestesiol. 2021;87(3):325333. doi:10.23736/S0375-9393.21.15245-9

13. Alhusain F, Alromaih A, Alhajress G, et al. Predictors and clinical outcomes of silent hypoxia in COVID-19 patients, a single-center retrospective cohort study. J Infect Public Health. 2021;14(11):15951599. doi:10.1016/j.jiph.2021.09.007

14. Sirohiya P, Elavarasi A, Sagiraju HKR, et al. Silent Hypoxia in Coronavirus disease-2019: is it more dangerous? -A retrospective cohort study. medRxiv preprint. 2021. doi:10.1101/2021.08.26.21262668

15. Garca-Grimshaw M, Flores-Silva FD, Chiquete E, et al. Characteristics and predictors for silent hypoxemia in a cohort of hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Auton Neurosci. 2021;235:102855. doi:10.1016/j.autneu.2021.102855

16. Bepouka B, Situakibanza H, Odio O, et al. Happy Hypoxia in COVID-19 patients at Kinshasa University Hospital (the Democratic Republic of the Congo): frequency and vital outcome. J Biosci Med. 2021;9:1220. doi:10.4236/jbm.2021.92002

17. Stang A. Critical evaluation of the Newcastle-Ottawa scale for the assessment of the quality of nonrandomized studies in meta-analyses. Eur J Epidemiol. 2010;25:603605. doi:10.1007/s10654-010-9491-z

18. Rahman AE, Hossain AT, Nair H, et al. Prevalence of hypoxemia in children with pneumonia in low-income and middle-income countries: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Lancet Glob Health. 2022;10(3):e348e359. doi:10.1016/S2214-109X(21)00586-6

19. Cardona S, Downing J, Alfalasi R, et al. Intubation rate of patients with hypoxia due to COVID-19 treated with awake proning: a meta-analysis. Am J Emerg Med. 2021;43:8896. doi:10.1016/j.ajem.2021.01.058

20. Mohammadi M, Khafaee Pour Khamseh A, Varpaei HA. Invasive Airway Intubation in COVID-19 patients; statistics, causes, and recommendations: a review article. Anesth Pain Med. 2021;11(3):e115868. PMID: 34540642; PMCID: PMC8438719. doi:10.5812/aapm.115868

21. ODonnell CR, Friedman LS, Russomanno JH, Rose RM. Diminished perception of inspiratory-resistive loads in insulin-dependent diabetics. N Engl J Med. 1988;319(November(21)):13691373. doi:10.1056/NEJM198811243192102

22. Cretikos MA, Bellomo R, Hillman K, Chen J, Finfer S, Flabouris A. Respiratory rate: the neglected vital sign. Med J Aust. 2008;188(11):657659. doi:10.5694/j.1326-5377.2008.tb01825.x

23. Klok FA, Kruip MJHA, van der Meer NJM, et al. Confirmation of the high cumulative incidence of thrombotic complications in critically ill ICU patients with COVID-19: an updated analysis. Thromb Res. 2020;191:148150. doi:10.1016/j.thromres.2020.04.041

24. Iba T, Gando S, Thachil J. Anticoagulant therapy for sepsis-associated disseminated intravascular coagulation: the view from Japan. J Thromb Haemost. 2014;12:10101019. doi:10.1111/jth.12596

25. Mousavi S, Moradi M, Khorshidahmad T, Motamedi M. Anti-inflammatory effects of heparin and its derivatives: a systematic review. Adv Pharmacol Sci. 2015;2015:507151. doi:10.1155/2015/507151

26. Hoppensteadt D, Fareed J, Klein AL, Jasper SE, Apperson-Hansen C, Lieber EA. Comparison of anticoagulant and anti-inflammatory responses using enoxaparin versus unfractionated heparin for transesophageal echocardiography-guided cardioversion of atrial fibrillation. Am J Cardiol. 2008;102:842846. doi:10.1016/j.amjcard.2008.05.025

27. Ranucci M, Ballotta A, Di Dedda U, Bayshnikova E, Dei Poli M, Resta M. The procoagulant pattern of patients with COVID-19 acute respiratory distress syndrome. J Thromb Haemost. 2020;18:17471751. doi:10.1111/jth.14854

28. Tang N, Bai H, Chen X, Gong J, Li D, Sun Z. Anticoagulant treatment is associated with decreased mortality in severe coronavirus disease 2019 patients with coagulopathy. J Thromb Haemost. 2020;18:10941099. doi:10.1111/jth.14817

29. Iba T, Nisio MD, Levy JH, Kitamura N, Thachil J. New criteria for sepsis-induced coagulopathy (SIC) following the revised sepsis definition: a retrospective analysis of a nationwide survey. BMJ Open. 2017;7:e017046. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2017-017046

30. Cui S, Chen S, Li X, Liu S, Wang F. Prevalence of venous thromboembolism in patients with severe novel coronavirus pneumonia. J Thromb Haemost. 2020;18:14211424. doi:10.1111/jth.14830

31. Hadid T, Kafri Z, Al-Katib A. Coagulation and anticoagulation in COVID-19. Blood Rev. 2021;47:100761. PMID: 33067035; PMCID: PMC7543932. doi:10.1016/j.blre.2020.100761

32. Gupta RK, Marks M, Samuels THA, et al. Systematic evaluation and external validation of 22 prognostic models among hospitalised adults with COVID-19: an observational cohort study. Eur Respir J. 2020;56:2003498. doi:10.1183/13993003.03498-2020

33. Meja F, Medina C, Cornejo E, et al. Oxygen saturation as a predictor of mortality in hospitalized adult patients with COVID-19 in a public hospital in Lima, Peru. PLoS One. 2020;15:e0244171. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0244171

34. Petrilli CM, Jones SA, Yang J, et al. Factors associated with hospital admission and critical illness among 5279 people with coronavirus disease 2019 in New York City: prospective cohort study. BMJ. 2020;369. doi:10.1136/bmj.m1966

35. Zhou F, Yu T, Du R, et al. Clinical course and risk factors for mortality of adult in-patients with COVID-19 in Wuhan, China: a retrospective cohort study. Lancet. 2020;395:10541062. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30566-3

36. Wang D, Hu B, Hu C. Clinical characteristics of 138 hospitalized patients with 2019 novel coronavirus-infected pneumonia in Wuhan, China. JAMA. 2020;323:10611069. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.1585

37. Gattinoni L, Chiumello D, Caironi P, et al. COVID-19 pneumonia: different respiratory treatments for different phenotypes? Intensive Care Med. 2020;46:10991102. doi:10.1007/s00134-020-06033-2

38. Yang X, Yu Y, Xu J, et al. Clinical course and outcomes of critically ill patients with SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia in Wuhan, China: a single-centered, retrospective, observational study. Lancet Respir Med. 2020;8:475481. doi:10.1016/S2213-2600(20)30079-5

39. Gattinoni L, Coppola S, Cressoni M, Busana M, Rossi S, Chiumello D. Covid-19 does not lead to a typical acute respiratory distress syndrome. Am J Respir Crit Care Med. 2020;201:12991300. doi:10.1164/rccm.202003-0817LE

40. Jiang B, Wei H. Oxygen therapy strategies and techniques to treat hypoxia in COVID-19 patients. Eur Rev Med Pharmacol Sci. 2020;24(19):1023910246. PMID: 33090435; PMCID: PMC9377789. doi:10.26355/eurrev_202010_23248

41. Ramanathan K, Shekar K, Ling RR, et al. Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation for COVID-19: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Crit Care. 2021;25(1):211. PMID: 34127027; PMCID: PMC8201440. doi:10.1186/s13054-021-03634-1

Continued here:

Prevalence and Outcomes of COVID 19 Patients with Happy Hypoxia | IDR - Dove Medical Press

Chief Covid nag Dr. Leana Wen is back to lecture about the spread of a contagious virus, which can only mean one thing: Ignore her and every other expert because she likely has nothing helpful to say.

Writing in the Washington Post on Tuesday, Wen declared that containing the relatively harmless monkeypox virus thats going around must be a top priority for the Biden administration. In case you didnt get the message, Wen wrote later in the same column, Preventing this virus from taking hold and spreading broadly must be a top focus.

I think thats about enough from Wen and the experts. The last time they told us what we must do, we voluntarily wrecked the economy, retarded the development of an entire generation by keeping them out of school, and turned half the country into scared and miserable mask mongers.

Im not sure how even the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is supposed to ever regain its credibility. Right now the CDCs website describes monkeypox, another flu-like illness that comes with a bonus rash, in a way that suggests almost everyone will be infected at one point or another.

According to the CDC, monkeypox can transmit via body fluids, touching an infected persons rash, prolonged, face-to-face contact, and even by handling objects that made contact with someone who has the virus.

By my calculation, that means about 100 percent of the countrys population should have the new gorilla AIDS by now. And yet there have only been, according to the CDC, a total of 3,500 confirmed cases. Thats .001 percent of the U.S. population.

How can that be? Well, because the agency is apparently run by a bunch of Anthony Faucis who either lie or make stuff up in order to sound like they know what theyre doing when they really dont.

A study published last week in the New England Journal of Medicine concluded that the vast majority close to 100 percent of infections are occurring among men having non-monogamous gay sex. Epidemiologist Jennifer Brown, an author of the study, said the data suggest that infections are so far almost exclusively occurring among men who have sex with men.

Aside from a little cartoon depicting two men lying in a bed together, the CDC makes no mention of that helpful bit of information. Instead, you get statements like this: Monkeypox can spread to anyone. Instead, you get statements from Fauci like this: Get rid of anything that even smacks a little bit of stigma.

If you didnt learn it from the Covid hysteria, you had better learn it now. Dont expect anything productive or useful from our experts. And definitely dont do what they say must be done to stop a virus that passes through nearly everyone without incident.

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

More here:

Monkeypox Is The Left's 'Don't Say Gay' - The Federalist

A St. Louis man was recently found guilty of murdering David Dorn, a retired police captain, during the riots and looting that broke out in the summer of 2020. But that doesnt mean the wounds this country endured during that summer are healing. In fact, many on the left are actively working on gaslighting the American public about the nature of these riots and redefining the role that race riots play in our collective history.

The latest effort may be found in Elizabeth Hintons book, America on Fire. Hinton says the African American riots of the 1960s were really political protests. In fact, she goes much further and claims that all of the predominantly black disturbances since the 60s were revolts against racial injustice. The so-called urban riots from the 1960s to the present, she says, can only be properly understood as rebellions.

This claim has won approval from the leftist media, and it might resonate with those who are intuitively sympathetic to the long black struggle for equal treatment, but it simply does not square with the facts.

Some of the more significant mass violence events were anguished cries in response to shocking events. The assassination of Martin Luther King in April 1968, which touched off a spasm of violence, was one such event. In that same category are the fatal police beating of a black businessman in Miami in 1980 and the brutal police assault on Rodney King in Los Angeles in 1992. One can debate whether the behaviors during the ensuing mass violence in Miami and Los Angeles should be called riots. However, the assault on innocents and the wanton destruction of property give credence to the designation.

It is nonetheless true that perceived racial injustices triggered these events. The same could be said about the violent events following the death of George Floyd in 2020. But going back to the events of the late 1960s, most disturbances had no clear cause or the incidents that triggered them were utterly banal and the responses totally disproportionate.

In one of the worst disturbances in 1967 in Detroit, where 43 people died in four nightmarish days of turmoil, the trigger was a police raid on a club serving alcohol after 2 a.m. in violation of state law. The club was located in a dingy second-floor apartment in a rundown black area of the city and had been raided several times before without incident. But it was unusually hot and crowded on the Saturday night when the violence began, and the raid ended in a melee. Crowds quickly formed outside as the arrestees were removed and two black youths urged the onlookers to violence. By 6 a.m., 30 windows had been broken, and looting had begun. The first store victimized was the black-owned Hardys Drug Store. By 8 a.m., the mob had swelled to 3,000, and the outnumbered police did nothing to stop the spreading window breaking and theft. Ultimately, 2,500 stores were looted, burned, or destroyed. Subsequent charges of police brutality during the raid never were substantiated.

Was this a rebellion? Clearly not. Whatever the initial resentment of the police raid, the subsequent behavior, mostly stealing and burning, was unquestionably a riot or a rampage without any political message. And there were hundreds more just like it in this period. A careful quantitative analysis by Susan Olzak and Suzanne Shanahan found that 60 percent of these events had no clear-cut target or symbol, and only 27 percent were in response to some police incident. Furthermore, another quantitative study found that economic conditions bore no relation to the disturbances. In his classic study of disorders in 673 cities between 1961 and 1968, Seymour Spilerman found that no deprivation factors were positively or strongly related to the violence.

The looting and burning of shops were not unusual behaviors in many of the areas where these violent events occurred. In Detroit, two-thirds of all arrests were for theft. In Newark, more than $8 million in inventory was lost due to stealing and damage to stock.

A quantitative study of shopkeepers in riot areas found that the rioters were selective, targeting the better quality stores. The quality of the merchandise had more salience in explaining the choice of targets than any other factor, including retaliation for perceived abuse by the merchant or sheer proximity to the civil disorder. Setting shops ablaze was common during the riots. In 1967 and 1968 alone, there were over 10,600 arson incidents. Even black store ownership afforded no protection. Approximately 27 percent of the stores destroyed in Detroit were owned by African Americans.

The 1960s were a period of great ferment when the youth of the day (the same Baby Boomers who are now passing from the scene) dominated both demographically and culturally. There were countless protests against the Vietnam War and overt Jim Crow racism. This rebellious atmosphere surely had something to do with urban violence.

But for African Americans, it also was a period of tremendous progress in terms of rights and economic benefits. Black family income had doubled since 1940. By 1970, black unemployment had fallen to a mere 4.2 percent, and poverty levels had sunk to 34 percent of the population. The Kennedy and Johnson administrations fully supported civil rights laws and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 dealt a mortal blow to Jim Crow. Congress then passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, ensuring African American influence in the political system. Johnson also got Congress to adopt his War on Poverty legislation which was intended to primarily benefit low-income African Americans. What a strange time for a rebellion If there was a broader underlying cause, raised expectations of immediate material gain is the most likely candidate.

Young black radicals espousing revolution provided a rationalization for the disturbances. H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael, and the Black Panthers reaped great media attention with their inflammatory remarks. But they did not gain much traction with the average African American. When Carmichael spoke at Detroits Cobo Arena one year before the riot, 500-600 people heard him denounce moderate civil rights groups. Only a month earlier, Dr. King had preached nonviolence in the same 12,000-seat hall to a standing-room-only crowd. And in a 1968 poll of more than 5,000 people in 15 big cities found that only 15 percent of black respondents favored violence to gain rights, whereas 39 percent preferred laws and persuasion, and 38 percent favored nonviolent protest. Moreover, 90 percent of African Americans did not think that police brutality caused riots.

Its understandable that the black public didnt endorse violence. They paid a terrible price for the disorders. One careful analysis of the period 1964 through 1971 counted an extraordinary 752 riots, resulting in 228 deaths, 12,741 injuries, 69,099 arrests, and 15,835 incidents of arson. And this does not address the enormous monetary loss: the total destruction of businesses, mostly small shops; the concomitant loss of jobs; the millions expended by all levels of government in attempts to control the mayhem; and the millions more lost in tax revenues. Cities like Detroit and Newark took decades to recover; some say they never really recovered.

When the facts of mass violence are studied without ideological assumptions, the complexities become apparent. No one cause fits all, and the claim that they are all rebellions for racial justice is belied by the historical details. Mass looting for personal gain and aimless destruction are riots, not rebellions.

Barry Latzer is professor emeritus at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY. His latest book is The Myth of Overpunishment: A Defense of the American Justice System and a Proposal to Reduce Incarceration While Protecting the Public (Republic Books).

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

More here:

Leftists Are Trying To Redefine Race Riots As Righteous Rebellions - The Federalist

Americans should start paying closer attention to theongoing farmer protests in the Netherlands, which this week transformed long swaths of Dutch highways into what looked like a post-apocalyptic warzone: roadside fires raging out of control, manure and farming detritus heaped across highways, traffic stalled for miles, and massive protests across the country in support of the farmers.

Why is the Netherlands, of all places, experiencing such unrest? Americans need to understand whats happening over there because the ruinous climate policies that triggered these protests are precisely what President Joe Biden and the Democrats have in mind for the United States.

Specifically, Dutch farmers are protesting a government plan to cut fertilizer use and reduce livestock numbers so drastically that it will force many farms out of business. Earlier this month, farmers used tractors and trucks to block highways and entrances to food distribution centers across the country, saying their livelihood and way of life are being targeted by the government.

And they more or less are. The ruling coalition government claims its radical plan, pushed by Prime Minister Mark Rutte, who branded the protests unacceptable, is part of an unavoidable transition to improve air, land, and water quality. The goal is to reduce emissions of nitrogen oxide and ammonia, which are produced by livestock but which the government is labeling pollutants, by 50 percent nationwide by the year 2030.

The only way to do that, many Dutch farmers say, is to slaughter the vast majority of their livestock and shutter their farms. The government knows this and admitted as much earlier this year, saying in a statement, The honest message is that not all farmers can continue their business, and that farmers have three options: Becoming more sustainable, relocating or ending their business.

The genesis of the scheme was a court ruling from 2019 that said the Dutch governments plan for reducing nitrogen emissions violated EU laws protecting itsNatura 2000network of supposedly vulnerable and endangered plant and animal habitats basically a bunch of EU-governed wildlife preserves. These sites span the EU, covering 18 percent of the blocs land area and 8 percent of its marine territory.

To protect these wildlife preserves, Dutch farmers are being told they must submit to their governments ruinous emissions plan.

But the Natura 2000 preserves are only part of the story. European leaders such as Rutte are environmental ideologues who want to transform global food production and eliminate private land ownership, and he sees an opportunity in this court order to reshape agriculture and land use in the Netherlands.

Indeed, Rutte a walking embodiment ofthe Davos Manif there ever was one is a big proponent of the United Nations Agenda 2030 and its Sustainable Development Goals, which aim to squeeze farmers and ranchers around the world in order to reduce emissions. The policies that flow from these goals, such as drastically reducing the use of fertilizer, contributed to the recent economic collapse of Sri Lanka, which triggered mass protests that toppled Sri Lankas government and ousted its president earlier this month.

Last year, Ruttespoke to the World Economic Forumabout transforming food systems and land use at Davos Agenda Week, announcing that the Netherlands would host something called the Global Coordinating Secretariat of the World Economic Food Innovation Hubs, whose job would be to connect all other food innovation hubs.

In Davos-speak, that means agricultural production and the supply of food will be centrally controlled by intra-governmental bodies and stakeholders consisting mainly of the worlds largest food corporations and international NGOs. Private farms and independent farmers will be a thing of the past, supplanted by global bodies making decisions about how much and what kinds of food are produced. The private sector and the independent farmers will have no place in the future that the UN and the WEF are planning.

Dutch farmers understand this. They know Rutte and his ministers want above all to eradicate their farms and way of life. But theyre not going down without a fight.

All of which brings us back to the U.S. This week news broke that congressional Democrats had finally reached a deal on thelargest piece of climate legislation in American history. The bill is a tax-and-spend cornucopia of some $369 billion for wind, solar, geothermal, battery, and other industries over the next decade, along with generous subsidies for electric vehicles and incentives to keep nuclear plants open and capture emissions from industrial plants.

After pretending to oppose Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumers climate legislation, West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin relented this week, clearing the way for the bill to proceed. Senate Democrats say the bill will allow the U.S. to cut greenhouse emissions by 40 percent below 2005 levels by 2030 matching up nicely with the UNs Agenda 2030.

Understand that the Senate bill isnt the end, its the beginning. Climate activists and ideologues are working at the highest levels to transform not just the global food supply, but the nature of private property and property rights, all in the name of saving the planet. What Rutte and his government are doing to Dutch farmers, Schumer and Biden are planning to do to American farmers and American industries.

So pay attention to the roadside fires and blocked highways and mass civic unrest in places like the Netherlands and Sri Lanka. America is next.

John Daniel Davidson is a senior editor at The Federalist. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Claremont Review of Books, The New York Post, and elsewhere. Follow him on Twitter, @johnddavidson.

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

More:

Pay Attention To The Dutch Farmer Protests. America Is Next - The Federalist

If you think that Democrats tax-and-spending bill wouldnt expand government, have I got news for you. Believe it or not, the Build Back Better legislation would more than double the size of the IRS.

Thats one of the hidden details in the agreement that Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.V., cut with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., behind closed doors. And of course, Democrats want to ram it through Congress within a matter of days. As House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., once said about another big-government scheme, we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.

The draft bill contains an $80 billion investment in the Internal Revenue Service. Of that amount, more than half, or over $45.6 billion, will go towards enforcement activities.

Even as it doles out such vast sums for the IRS, the bill contains only a few short pages of text explaining the provisions. In other words, the IRS will have a relatively wide berth to spend the new funding as it likes.

But last May, the Treasury Department released its tax compliance agenda, showing where it would like to spend that money. And on page 17 of that document, it helpfully included a chart demonstrating the IRS agents it would hire with that additional cash. All told, the Biden Administration wants to hire 86,852 agents, expressed in this chart as FTEs, or full-time equivalent employees:

By comparison, the most recent version of the IRS Data Book shows that in the fiscal year that ended last September 30, the agency had a total of 78,661 full-time equivalent employees. (See Table 32 on page 87 here.) In other words, hiring an additional 86,852 agents would more than double the size of the IRS.

Language on page 39 of the bill states that nothing in this subsectionthat is, the portion of the bill appropriating the $80 billion for the IRSis intended to increase taxes on any taxpayer with a taxable income below $400,000. A one-page fact sheet summarizing the tax provisions makes the same claim.

But, as previously noted, the Biden Administration intends to use the funding in the bill to hire over 86,000 new employees. Does anyone really believe that more than doubling the IRS the same agency that spent years harassing conservative groups, and still hasnt explained the public leak of confidential tax return information to the liberal website ProPublica means that all those new employees will exclusively focus on the rich, and wont spend some or all of their time targeting middle-class and working Americans?

Admittedly, the Treasury Department claimed in its compliance agenda last May that audit rates will not rise relative to recent years for those with less than $400,000 in actual income. But the bill itself includes no statutory prohibition on the IRS harassing middle-class taxpayers. It merely says the bill intends not to increase their tax burden. It doesnt prohibit the legislation from having that effect in practice, and it doesnt prohibit the IRS from burying struggling families in a mountain of new audits and paperwork.

All this focus on IRS enforcement comes with a profound irony: Many tax experts, including one from the liberal Tax Policy Center, believe that Joe Biden himself cheated on his 2017 and 2018 taxes, paying himself an absurdly low salary (while using a loophole that his Administration now wants to close) to avoid paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in Medicare and Obamacare taxes.

In what will come as a shock to absolutely no one who understands how Washington works, the Democrats who claim to support giving more power to the IRS to audit the rich have said precious little about Bidens tax shenanigans. Of course, if they really believed in the accountability they claim to support, they would be sending letters to the IRS demanding that the Service audit Bidens 2017 and 2018 returns.

Instead, the principle of audits for thee, but not for me rules the Democratic roost. All of which suggests that the 86,852 new IRS agents the Biden Administration wants to hire will end up making life miserable not for the rich, but for ordinary Americans, for years to come.

Mr. Jacobs is Founder and CEO of Juniper Research Group and the author of the book The Case Against Single Payer. He is on Twitter: @chrisjacobsHC.

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

Read the original here:

'Build Back Better' Bill Would Double IRS Agent Army By 86000 - The Federalist

One day after the U.S. officially entered a recession, something the White House has repeatedly denied, the partisan cheerleaders at Politico shamelessly declared that Joe Biden is back in the game.

After enduring a brutal year, Biden is suddenly on the verge of a turnaround that, the White House believes, could salvage his summer and alter the trajectory of his presidency, Politico authors Adam Cancryn, Jonathan Lemire, and Christopher Cadelago wrote.

Despite Politicos insistence that the tides are turning for the commander in chief, President Biden was never in the game. Unless, of course, the game was hurting Americans, their liberties, and their pocketbooks from day one.

Even Politicos tone-deaf puff piece admits that Bidens term is tainted by economic angst, legislative setbacks and sinking approval ratings, which the corporate media outlet pegged at just 37 percent this week. Thats in addition to a growing border crisis, disastrous foreign policy including the fatal Afghanistan withdrawal, rampant inflation, a formula shortage, forced Covid-19 jabs, abortion radicalism that contradicts most Americans feelings about life in the womb, energy dependence, a war on parents concerned about indoctrination in schools, and a shady family business thats under federal investigation.

Nothing marks success like an administration marred with endless catastrophes, right?

That doesnt seem to matter to Politico, however, which argued thatthe reconciliationbill agreed upon by DemocratSens. Joe Manchin and Chuck Schumer on Wednesday could be the saving grace for Biden and his party. This expensive legislation will only exacerbate inflation and aggravate voters already frustrated with rapidly rising costs, yet Politico hailed it as the agreement the White House needed to play a more significant role in convincing a handful of remaining Democrats to take the victory thats in front of them.

How convenient to suggest that mere months before the upcoming midterms, Biden can magically save the Democrats national agenda from the ashes of his failed administration.

Polling says Americans arent buying what the Always Be Closing president and his cronies in the corrupt press are selling. According to the latest AP-NORC survey, 85 percent of American adults think the country is headed in the wrong direction. Even 78 percent of Democrats, Bidens base, say they are dissatisfied with the direction of the nation.

Biden is a benchwarmer who will be the face of the regime until he isnt useful for the Democrats and the corporate media who installed him anymore. For now, Biden is protected by media lapdogs such as Politico and the promise of a legislative deal.

But he was never in the game and after one and a half years of catastrophes at home and abroad including a recession, its safe to say he wont get into it anytime soon.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

Read the original here:

No, Politico, Joe Biden Was Never In The Game - The Federalist

In preparation for the close of the years second economic quarter, the White House Council of Economic Advisers has already started the spin: Were not in a recession if we just redefine what a recession is.

While some maintain that two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP constitute a recession, that is neither the official definition nor the way economists evaluate the state of the business cycle, the supposedly nonpartisan group said in a blog post on Thursday.

Its doubtful the verbal smoke and mirrors will persuade the average Americans whose grocery bills keep growing as fast as their gas tanks empty. A recession is a sustained downturn in economic activity, and many Americans can feel it without knowing what the Q2 numbers are. But its far from the first concept the left has simply redefined to deflect the consequences of their failed policies and ideas.

One of their favorite words to redefine, apparently as full and unchallenged political control, is democracy. When actual democratic processes are at work such as when an elected majority votes not to pass a pet piece of legislation, or when issues such as abortion law are left to elected representatives of the people at the state level leftists scream their favorite catchphrase and call it a threat to democracy. Theyve levied that smear at everything from our bicameral legislature to the Supreme Court to the other party in our two-party system. Its obvious theyre not really talking about democracy in any honest sense of the word. When democracy is a threat to their power, it simply gets redefined.

Another word thats undergone a 180-degree redefinition is racism. No longer is it considered racist to treat someone differently based on his or her skin color, and not racist to value all human beings equally. Instead, if youre not promoting theories that remedy past discrimination [with] present discrimination, as critical race theorist Ibram X. Kendi suggests, you are clearly a racist according to the lefts new dictionary. Do you believe in meritocracy? Racist. Think people are responsible for their own choices, and its neither possible nor beneficial for the government to dole out equivalent outcomes to everyone by force? Doubly racist. The new liturgy says that true equality lies in teaching some children that theyre part of a hopelessly oppressive system and other children that theyre hopelessly oppressed.

On the subject of pitting people against each other, the term vaccine has been ridiculously redefined to cover for the incompetence of the people who profit from them. After the shot that was promised to protect people from Covid transmission and infection failed to ward off either, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention simply changed the definition of vaccine to fit the narrative. A product that stimulates a persons immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease was quietly altered to a preparation that is used to stimulate the bodys immune response against diseases. Barely a week later, Merriam-Webster followed suit by changing the definition of anti-vaxxer from someone who opposes vaccines to someone who doesnt believe the government should mandate Covid shots.

Just last week, as part of the trans-crazed campaign to redefine what a woman is, Merriam-Webster added having a gender identity that is the opposite of male to its definition of female. Categories such as men and women that are based in biological reality dont suit the agenda that seeks to abolish those realities from minds and bodies. So rather than advocate their agenda within the bounds of reality, the left simply attempts to redefine reality itself. Its apparent in the push to call women by the objectifying terms pregnant persons, menstruating people, etc. We saw it when then-Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson told Congress she couldnt define what a woman is, and its obvious in the attempts to put confused men in womens prisons, shelters, and bathrooms. The reality of womanhood is in the way, so its being redefined out of existence.

And while abortion advocates lately have been willing to defend the act of killing a baby in the womb even with the understanding that it takes a human life, for years theyve pushed their agenda by redefining an unborn baby as a clump of cells or some other dehumanizing description.

On any of those topics and more, leftists and their allies in Big Tech also persistently redefine any dissenting opinions or perspectives as disinformation, using that disingenuous label to erase opposition from channels of discourse.

Of course, many people who hear them prattle about disinformation, birthing persons, anti-racism, threats to democracy, and their host of other buzzwords know those words are nonsense. We can tell, as George Orwell wrote in 1946, that political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable.

But, as he noted, the worst thing one can do with words is to surrender them. The danger is in allowing these redefinitions of reality to be said, unchallenged, until enough people forget they could ever be challenged at all.

Elle Reynolds is an assistant editor at The Federalist, and received her B.A. in government from Patrick Henry College with a minor in journalism. You can follow her work on Twitter at @_etreynolds.

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

See the original post here:

The Left's Response To Failure Is To Redefine It As Success - The Federalist

Nothing captures just how bizarre and unearthly Democrats have become than when they get to talking about police and law enforcement. (Their fixation with gender bending is a close second.)

It would honestly do them a lot of good to just stop discussing the issue altogether. You can see it on their faces how hard it is to articulate simple concepts like, criminals should be in jail, or, police deserve respect.

They would rather complicate the issue by talking about the history of slavery, disadvantaged communities, and my favorite systemic oppression.

All the data show that across the board, regardless of race, the overwhelming majority of police and civilian interactions are fine; that minorities call on cops for help at a far higher rate than whites; and that the chance of an unarmed black man being killed by police is next to nonexistent (and when such an incident does occur, its because he was resisting arrest or attempting to flee in a life-threatening, high-speed chase).

But liberals refuse to leave it alone, instead writhing in pain as they try to find some existential problem with our law enforcement.

To wit, New York Times columnist-in-training Charles Blow wrote Wednesday that former president Trump and his voters arent genuine supporters of the policeokay, whatever you say. But Blow couldnt make the point without first offering a winding, tedious lecture on the theory of policing.

In a system of accountability and consequences, there must be first points of contact, people who are charged with preventing and stopping the rule breaking, he prattled. In our society, those people are police officers. Their role, in the abstract, is essential. However, the way that we have constructed it is problematic.

Recall Missouri Democrat Rep. Cori Bush, a champion of zeroing out police budgets, last year attempting to explain why she spends hundreds of thousands of dollars on private, armed security. I have private security because my body is worth being on this planet right now, she said, somehow, without laughing. I have private security because they, the white supremacist, racist narrative that they drive into this country the fact that they dont care that this black woman that has put her life on the line they cant match my energy, first of all. This black woman who puts her life on the line. They dont care that I could be taken out of here. They actually are probably okay with that. But this is the thing, I wont let them get that off. You cant get that off.

That is a direct transcript of what she said on national television.

Listening to Democrats talk about law enforcement is like watching that In Living Color skit with the Oswald Bates character, a prisoner who confidently uses a slew of multisyllabic words that ultimately mean nothing, but he thinks hes smart for using them anyway. (First of all, we must internalize the flatulation of the matter by transmitting the effervescent of the Indonesian proximity in order to further segregate the crux of my venereal infection.)

Free tip for Democrats: Really just shut up. Youve turned all of our big cities into war zones where theft and vandalism continue with impunity in no small part because a fentanyl addict died in a freak accident. No matter how you cut it, no matter how complicated you try to make it, law enforcement is not your issue and youre scaring everyone.

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

Excerpt from:

The Creepy Weirdness Of Democrats Is Best Understood When They Talk About Law Enforcement - The Federalist