False Positive ft. Steve Deace

Summary

Podcast Summary: "False Positive" featuring Steve Deace

Podcast Information:

• Title: The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson
• Host/Author: Premiere Networks
• Episode: False Positive ft. Steve Deace
• Release Date: September 7, 2020
• Description: Hosted by Ben Ferguson, The 47 Morning Update delves into the latest news and political headlines, emphasizing the President's administration, policies, and agenda. This episode features an in-depth discussion with Steve Deace from The Blaze, focusing on the COVID-19 pandemic, testing metrics, and public policy implications.

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Introduction and Guest Introduction

[00:00 - 01:37]

The episode kicks off with Michael Knowles welcoming listeners to Verdict with Ted Cruz, introducing Senator Ted Cruz and special guest Steve Deace from The Blaze. Michael emphasizes Steve's expertise and passion in conservative circles, particularly his deep dive into pandemic-related statistics and policies.

Key Quote:

Ted Cruz: "Steve is brilliant. He is a passionate conservative. [...] he's been diving in from the beginning of this pandemic to the numbers."

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Understanding the Current State of the Pandemic

[01:37 - 02:40]

Michael expresses confusion over the conflicting statistics surrounding COVID-19, highlighting the difficulty in discerning the truth amid varying data interpretations. Steve responds by emphasizing the importance of focusing on testing metrics and how they impact public policy.

Key Quote:

Michael Knowles: "I try to keep my head into it. I can't really make heads or tails of it. I don't know what to believe."

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Decoding R-Values and Testing Metrics

[02:40 - 05:58]

Steve delves into the concept of R-values (R2, R3) which indicate the rate at which the virus spreads. He critiques the PCR testing methodology, especially the cycle threshold (CT) settings used by institutions like the CDC. Steve references Didier Raoult's work, arguing that high CT values (37-40) lead to a significant number of false positives—ranging from 40% to 90%. He discusses how these false positives skew public perception and policy, causing unnecessary panic and lockdowns.

Key Quotes:

Steve Dase: "If your state is at a 37 or at a 40, anywhere from 40 to 90% of our positive tests are false positives."

Michael Knowles: "The way it was reported in the New York Times seemed to be this kind of stunning revelation that you could have up to 90% of people who are not contagious."

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The Impact of Testing Policies on Public Health Decisions

[05:58 - 10:49]

The conversation shifts to how testing policies influenced lockdown measures and reopening strategies. Steve points out discrepancies in case numbers and hospitalization rates, using data from universities and states to argue that excessive testing doesn't correlate with higher danger. He criticizes the focus on broad testing metrics instead of targeting contagious individuals, suggesting that policies were misaligned with actual threats.

Key Quote:

Steve Dase: "We went hunting with mice with an elephant gun. We made this huge investment in locking everyone down over the canard of asymptomatic spread."

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Evaluating Reopening Criteria and Logical Inconsistencies

[10:49 - 17:50]

Michael highlights California's stringent reopening criteria, which require a positive test rate below 2%. Steve counters by presenting data showing decreasing hospitalization rates and low Emergency Room (ER) visits for COVID-like symptoms, questioning why reopening criteria remain rigid despite positive trends. The discussion underscores the tension between public health data and governmental reopening policies.

Key Quote:

Steve Dase: "Without not a therapeutic. A meaningful vaccine. [...] how do we do better than less than 2% of ER visits for Covid?"

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Critique of New York's COVID-19 Management and Leadership

[17:50 - 21:56]

Ted Cruz and Steve critique New York Governor Andrew Cuomo's handling of the pandemic, particularly the decision to reintegrate COVID-positive patients into nursing homes. They argue that this policy led to a disproportionate number of deaths in long-term care facilities. Comparative analysis with Florida's handling under Governor Ron DeSantis is presented, highlighting lower case fatality rates despite different policy approaches.

Key Quotes:

Steve Dase: "New York does not even come close... it would still be the 6th worst country in the world for COVID-19 death."

Ted Cruz: "The public policy of the New York state government [...] lions at the DNC, than his policies of sending people into nursing homes [...]"

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Academic and Institutional Responses to COVID-19 Data

[21:56 - 23:16]

Steve discusses the resistance faced by researchers like John Ioannidis and Tony Katz, who challenged prevailing COVID-19 models and testing strategies. He emphasizes the politicization of scientific discourse, noting that esteemed institutions and experts have begun to voice skepticism over initial pandemic responses and data interpretations.

Key Quote:

Steve Dase: "I would urge people to go back... John Ioannidis at Stanford University [...] he was considered a quack, but he's turned out to be exactly right."

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Policy Implications and Moving Forward

[23:16 - 24:01]

The dialogue returns to the implications of testing policies on public health strategies. Steve stresses the need for targeted measures focusing on contagious individuals rather than blanket lockdowns. He criticizes mask mandates and lockdowns in isolated regions like Hawaii and the Philippines, arguing that such measures are ineffective in stopping virus spread but still contribute to economic and social disruption.

Key Quote:

Steve Dase: "The question is, can we stop it from getting to the people that it's most going to hurt? That is the question."

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Conclusion and Final Thoughts

[24:01 - End]

Michael and Ted wrap up the discussion by reinforcing the importance of accurate data interpretation and sensible public health policies. They urge listeners to stay informed and critically evaluate the information presented by mainstream media and governmental bodies.

Key Quote:

Steve Dase: "The policy that we have done of attacking mice with elephant guns."

Ted Cruz: "This is a very vicious virus. I don't want to understate that whatsoever, but there's a very targeted demo that it goes after."

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• [00:41] Ted Cruz: "Steve is brilliant. He is a passionate conservative."
• [04:15] Steve Dase: "If your state is at a 37 or at a 40, anywhere from 40 to 90% of our positive tests are false positives."
• [07:31] Steve Dase: "Why we have continued to do this now for five, for six months."
• [13:02] Steve Dase: "We didn't lock down the vulnerable because we put in this incredible effort to lock everybody else down."
• [17:54] Steve Dase: "What New York did wrong is there... they brought a bomb into their nursing homes."
• [21:19] Ted Cruz: "It's gonna be like a climate change debate. It's going to be Steve Days, Breitbart, Michael Knowles, against academia."
• [24:14] Steve Dase: "It is a very vicious virus. I don't want to understate that whatsoever, but there's a very targeted demo that it goes after."

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Conclusion:

In the "False Positive" episode of The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson, Steve Deace provides a critical examination of COVID-19 testing metrics, policy decisions, and their implications on public health. The discussion highlights concerns over false positives due to high CT values in PCR tests, the effectiveness of lockdowns, and the politicization of scientific data. By comparing different state responses and emphasizing targeted public health strategies, the episode encourages listeners to question mainstream narratives and advocate for data-driven policies.

Transcript

[Michael Knowles]

It has been 170 days since 15 days to slow the spread. So it seems like good a time as any to take stock where we are now, how the coronavirus pandemic stands, and most importantly, when we will be able to reopen our country. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz. Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz. I'm Michael Knowles, joined as as ever by the Senator and a very special guest, Steve Dase of the Steve Dase show over at the Blaze. I'm sure you've seen him everywhere. And he's a longtime friend, not just of the show, but of Senator Cruz as well.

[Ted Cruz]

Steve, welcome. It's good to have you. You know, Steve and I have spent thousands of hours together on the road, traveling. I gotta tell you, Steve is brilliant. He is a passionate conservative. But I gotta tell you also, there may be no one in the country who has lit my phone up with more texts during this whole pandemic than Steve at every stage, because he has been diving in from the beginning of this pandemic to the numbers, to what the numbers mean, to what the testing tells us, to what the antibody numbers tell us, to what the impacts of the shutdown tell us. And so Steve and I have talked about many, many issues at great length. But I think this pod in particular, it's valuable to get in to what's going on with the pandemic and the country right now.

[Michael Knowles]

So I know that there are lies, damned lies, and statistics, and everybody seems to have their own statistics on this pandemic. And even I, I try to keep my head into it. I can't really make heads or tails of it. I don't know what to believe.

[Ted Cruz]

So.

[Michael Knowles]

So, Steve, where do we stand on the coronavirus?

[Steve Dase]

I think if I could choose one point for us to center the conversation on, it would really come down to what we've learned about our testing metric, guys, because it goes to the heart of why we, you know, none of us are epidemiologists, we're all fairly intelligent guys, but it's not our field of expertise. And so I like to keep the conversation where it impacts public policy as much as possible, because that is each of our areas of expertise. And if you look at the number one concern for why we did these shutdowns across the country, it's because we were concerned about masses of asymptomatic spread, that all kinds of people who were otherwise healthy would get the virus, go home, infect grandma, grandpa, or have these mass spreader events and then go home. And then we get to an R2 R3 situation.

[Ted Cruz]

Now, let me stop you right there and just ask for folks listening, what is an R2 R3? What does that mean?

[Steve Dase]

It means the rate of who's infected or how many people you infect based on who's infected. Right? So does for. Does two people get infected for every person that's infected, three people, etc. The goal in a pandemic is to get to R1 and then hopefully to R0. Okay? And so if you go way back to March 26, there's a guy that we used to think was brilliant named Didier Rault. He was considered the leading infectious disease expert in the world until March 12th. And that's when he had the unfortunate circumstance of having President Trump cite positively and affirmatively his research on hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for COVID 19. So all over the world. Well, it was for him at the time, all over the world. We were beginning to use hydroxychloroquine until it was Orange man bad. And now suddenly we could not. Right. Well, on March 26, he issued a piece on PCR testing for COVID 19. And if you go back to the first SARS, the World Health organ was very concerned about the amount of false positives with PCR testing because of how sensitive they were, and they wanted two positives before they would report.

[Ted Cruz]

And so a PCR test is the test that's used most frequently. It's the one where they stick the thing way up your nose and it feels like it's in the back of your brain. And it takes often a couple of days or even a week or two in some circumstances to get the result back correct.

[Steve Dase]

It's a great testing module. They're very sensitive, they're very accurate. But like any other algorithm, it comes down to what do you program it for the setting that you want. And so back on March 26, Raoult put out a paper in France saying, hey, what we're finding is when we get beyond 30 CTs, all right, which is cycle thresholds, all right, Meaning how many times they have to zero in on a sample before they detect a virus. Like when you're zooming in on something on your. On your phone or your computer, okay? When we have to zoom beyond 30 times, these people are not. They're not contagious. They're probably not infected.

[Ted Cruz]

He.

[Steve Dase]

Even in his paper, he refers to them as, quote, viral artifacts. And we all know what an artifact is. It's something that's long since gone. It's a remnant of something that's long since dead. Right? And so he recommended that no one set their PCR tests above a cycle threshold or a CT of 33 and recommended 30 for whatever reasons. And we don't know the answer to this. And Ted, this is probably where it becomes your job as a senator to help us find out. Our cdc, and cdc, like institutions across the world, decided to set their sensitivity levels anywhere from 35 to 40. In our country, it's 37 to 40. And so what the New York Times found when they did this survey across the country is that if your state is at a 37 or at a 40, anywhere from 40 to 90% of our positive tests are false positives. Because these people are either asymptomatic to the point they're not contagious, they're not contagious at all, or it's a viral artifact we're picking up, a remnant of an exposure that just is no longer any kind of a live culture. Well, I can't begin to express what that means from a public policy.

[Ted Cruz]

Steve, Steve, let me stop you. Let me stop you for a second. Cause I wanna underscore something that you mentioned there, but that a lot of folks listening and watching may not know. It would be easy for some skeptics perhaps to dismiss the three of us as crazy right wingers. But you mentioned the New York Times, which I think it's fair to say whether or not we're crazy right wingers. The New York Times is not a crazy right wing institution. I don't think that's going too far out on a limb to say that. And the New York Times wrote a stunning article just a few days ago that lays out exactly what you're saying. So if you're skeptical of what you're hearing right now, I'm gonna say something I have never said before and probably will never say again. Go look up the New York Times. Go read the article from the New York Times. And by the way, if the New York Times and Steve Dase and Cruz and Knowles are all agreeing, that may actually be in the book of Revelations a sign of the end times?

[Michael Knowles]

I think so. And by the way, the way it was reported in the New York Times seemed to be this kind of stunning revelation that you could have up to 90% of people who are not contagious. And I think that's how a lot of people took it. It's how I took it. But Steve, it seems to me what you're saying is this was built into the testing from the Beginning that by making the tests so hypersensitive beyond what would be the usual convention that you were setting yourself up for this kind of scenario.

[Steve Dase]

Now, this is where, from a public policy standpoint, we have to get into what was the motivation for this. And if you want to give everyone the maximum benefit of the doubt back in March, it is a novel coronavirus. Now, it's not a novel virus. We have been studying coronaviruses for 70 years. The common cold is one of the coronaviruses, for example. But it was the first time we had seen one of these mutate from animal to animal to animal to human and behave like this. And we also understood that we couldn't trust China's data. So if we all went into this saying, let's be hyper cautious, we're still in the cold flu season anyway, there's not a lot going on in this country in March anyway, except for spring breakers. So let's be hypersensitive about this. Fine, but why we have continued to do this now for five, for six months. You know, there was an interesting. There's an interesting situation happening at the University of Alabama as we speak. Last I heard, they have reported 1200 positive cases since the students returned. But Newsweek went and did a survey of these cases and found almost all of them were asymptomatic and there were zero hospitalizations. LSU and Clemson, the top two teams in college football last year. When they brought the student athletes back to campus in June and started testing, they had 54 combined positives, almost all asymptomatic, zero hospitalizations. So that actually dovetails with the New York Times report, meaning that because we have this case demic going on right now in which we're creating so many cases, it's not we're doing too much testing. I love the fact we're doing too much testing because it shows that the virus is actually not as strong or as lethal as we originally feared back in March. But there's a difference between too much testing and too many cases. We had 60 million cases of H1N1 guys. When the Obama administration finally decided to cut off the testing because it wasn't going anywhere. This is what we're doing now, and we've got to realize what is our ultimate metric to reopen the country. When deaths plummeted around Memorial Day weekend, we were told, yeah, but then the cases were too high. Well, now we've had six straight weeks of cases going down, and we're being told, well, now it's. Now it's about deaths we need a defined metric of what it is that actually says we're beating this thing. And I'll leave one more. Go ahead.

[Michael Knowles]

Well, Steve, you know, I'm here in Los Angeles and in California, the new metric for reopening to be almost fully reopened is that you've got to get down to a 2% rate of positive tests. So if we have this issue of the tests that you're describing and that the New York Times is describing, then you're in a situation where it looks like we're never gonna reopen.

[Steve Dase]

I know. Last week, Los Angeles county was at its lowest rate for hospitalizations since April 2 nationwide, for Covid symptoms. We are at the lowest rate of hospitalization since March 21. Nationwide. We are below 2% of ER visits are for Covid like symptoms. Now, guys, I ask you, without not a therapeutic. A meaningful vaccine. Without a meaningful vaccine. And since we. Since now, apparently the natural herd immunity that saved human civilization from plagues for 6,000 years is now suddenly voodoo. So without herd immunity and without a meaningful vaccine in a nation of 331 million, how do we do better than less than 2% of ER visits for Covid? When are the numbers low enough? I think that's the question.

[Ted Cruz]

And let me drill down a little bit in the testing information you're talking about and what's in this New York Times article, which is we're not saying that Covid isn't real, that it isn't serious. And if you're very elderly, if you've got serious other health conditions, Covid can be lethal. But for a great many people who are not elderly, a great many people who don't have other serious health ailments, the fatality rate for Covid is much, much, much lower. And the point you're emphasizing here, and it's actually something, as you read the New York Times article that was really stunning, is the testing is producing a massive number of false positives, over 90%. And these false positives are people you know. It's worth drilling down a little bit at what it means if the test is set at 37 or at 40. That's. And I like the analogy of sort of zooming in, zooming in, zooming in. So that's super zoomed in. So it detects a little bit of virus in you, but not much. Not enough virus, typically, to make you sick. And interestingly and really importantly, not enough virus, probably, although we're still learning how this operates, but not enough virus, very possibly, let me put it that way, not Enough virus, very possibly to be contagious. And this insight is important because if you wanna stop a pandemic, what you wanna focus on is people who are contagious. You want to stop someone, even if they're healthy, from giving it to someone else who's very vulnerable. And if the vast majority of these false positives are not having symptoms and not contagious, it means we're focusing our energy the wrong place rather than directly on the people that actually have a significant amount of virus, a significant viral load in their body, where they could well be symptomatic and getting sick, and they could well be contagious. Am I characterizing that fairly, Steve?

[Steve Dase]

You nailed it. You nailed it, Senator. And this goes back to the beginning of the lockdowns where we didn't secure America's nursing homes. Up until about the end of July, something like 45% of all COVID deaths in America had taken place in a long term care facility. Gentlemen, only 0.6% of Americans live in a long term healthcare facility. So we didn't lock down the vulnerable because we put in this incredible effort to lock everybody else down. And it was over. This fear of asymptomatic spread. The largest contact tracing study that was done in this world so far was about two weeks ago. Over 3,500 cases. 8% of them they could trace back to some form of asymptomatic spread. 8% out of over 3,000 cases. So we made this huge investment. We went, essentially, we went out. We're like we went hunting with mice with an elephant gun. We made this huge investment in locking everyone down over the canard of asymptomatic spread and didn't protect the most vulnerable among us. If I'm elderly in Alabama, why are we testing all these students at Alabama? What are we, why are we protecting?

[Ted Cruz]

Well, and Steve, you know, you know, it's interesting that I can tell you firsthand. I've seen how the understanding of doctors and scientists and epidemiologists about this disease has changed and been uncertain. Which, as Michael and I were observing earlier today, that it was back in March, actually on the Verdict podcast, where we did a podcast from the stage at CPAC with Ronna McDaniel, the head of the RNC, and we did it live. It was a fun episode at cpac. And you'll recall, at cpac, Michael and I both encountered an individual who subsequently tested positive and was symptomatic. He got ill. And in the wake of that, that's when I decided initially to Self quarantine. This is right at the beginning of when Covid was starting to become a meaningful issue in the US and the physicians all told me, if you're asymptomatic and if the person was not actively sick when you encountered him, you don't have a concern, you don't need to quarantine, you're fine. And I ended up deciding I'm gonna stay home to protect everyone else around. But what's interesting is having seen the months that have gone on, I have seen the experts at CDC say categorically asymptomatic people cannot transmit it, which is what they told me in March, categorically to. There was a period of time where they were focused on, okay, the whole worry is asymptomatic. And I have to admit, that felt a little weird. A weird focus. And then we seem to be moving back into an area of a greater common sense that we need to focus on who's actually seriously contagious. And as you were talking about nursing homes, here's a question for you, Steve. Can you think of a more catastrophically damaging public health decision than the public policy of the New York state government and Governor Cuomo, who was just lionized at the dnc, than his policies of sending people into nursing homes who were. Who were sick with COVID and were contagious? And the incredible death toll that resulted.

[Steve Dase]

From that, I cannot. And, Ted, I gotta tell you, I'm pretty cynical, as you well know. This is the worst gaslighting I've ever seen. I mean, this is the retconning of Cuomo's record where this is concerned. I mean, we're sitting here early September, and right now, if New York was its own country, it would still be the 6th worst country in the world for COVID 19 death like the 7th worst country in the world for Covid. Cases per 1 million. Still, about 1 out of every 5 deaths in America from COVID occurred in New York or New Jersey. And so the way that this has been retconned and we've been gaslighted, that he's some kind of hero. And you look at a guy like Ron DeSantis in Florida, for example, where he's got a larger population, he's got a larger elderly population, and his CFR is lower than the country's a case fatality rate, which is easy to divide, which is just simply the amount of cases divided by the amount of people who. Who sadly died. And it's 1.9% in Florida below the national average. And the one in New York is 7.1%. So he's almost seven times lower than the one in New York with the second largest elderly population per capita in the country. And he gets ripped as some kind of a grim reaper and Cuomo gets elevated.

[Ted Cruz]

So what did New York do wrong and what did New Jersey do wrong?

[Steve Dase]

What New York did wrong is there. And there is a debate about whether this came from the feds. There is a bureau that did recommend that nursing homes, because they were concerned coming off the Imperial College and especially the IHME surveys, that we were gonna overload the hospitals. There was a memo that suggested that states take a look. Some minor bureaucracy you've probably never heard of did put out a memo suggesting that states take a look at the possibility of reinserting COVID infected patients back into nursing homes if they weren't immediately in danger of perishing because they were concerned about ICU overload. All right, and so six states took the lead on this. Five of them were governed by Democrats. And then there was Massachusetts, which has a Republican governor who's basically a Democrat. All right, New York did was the one that took the lead out of these six states. And if you look at the death rate in these six states that made this. Made this decision compared to the rest of the country, it's. It's really just not even close. And what they did is they brought a bomb into their nursing homes. And if nursing homes are anything, they are. They are pockets of autoimmune deficiencies. You're talking about the elderly, obviously. And so they brought them in and re. Exposed them to Covid with these reinsertions of these COVID patients. And there are some estimates. Phil Kirpin's a phenomenal researcher out there. He estimates that it could be 20,000 people in New York died in New York nursing homes. The AP has been. Has pointed out on numerous occasions that the numbers that Cuomo and his state are putting out are false and inaccurate. And the other day, Cuomo said, well, you know, it's probably going to take till around November 5 or so for us to get an accurate count. Gee, I wonder why we might take until November 5th. Anybody know why that's a magic date. What's going on on November 3rd?

[Michael Knowles]

It's just a coincidence, I would say, Steve. Well, I think this is the. You put it so well. It's this gaslighting. It's some of the greatest gaslighting we've ever seen. And that isn't even coming from the scientists or people looking at the data that is coming from the politicians.

[Ted Cruz]

Actually, Mike, I wanna ask him two questions. Number one, for people listening, if you wanna understand more about the numbers, if you wanna dig down more deeply, are there names, are there people, are there scientists, are there researchers that folks ought to look for and read what they're saying?

[Steve Dase]

I would urge people to go back, Ted, to John Ioannidis at Stanford University. His very first white paper on March 17, which all he did. He's the head of their public health department at Stanford, which is a top five medical school in the country. All he did was break down the IFR and the CFR from our original guinea pig, the Diamond Princess cruise ship, and project out what that would be for our American population. And he nailed those numbers back on March 17th. Exactly. He was considered a quack, but he's turned out to be exactly right. Oxford University, the number one university in the world. Numerous epidemiologists at Oxford have been calling BS on this all along. So, I mean, I would look at a. Dr. Tony Katz @ Yale University is another one. I mean, there's a long list. That's what's been fascinating about this, guys, from the very beginning. When I started poking at the Imperial college model and realized that their math did not add up, I was like, you know, this is going to be like a climate change debate. It's going to be Steve Days, Breitbart, Michael Knowles, against academia. Right. What blew me away is how much of academia all over the world has been pushing back on the.

[Ted Cruz]

It's. Steve, let me, let me ask you. I mean, look, the institutions you mentioned, Stanford, Oxford, Yale, I mean, those are not fly by night institutions. Okay? Yale is, but. But the other two are not.

[Michael Knowles]

I knew that was coming.

[Ted Cruz]

Yeah. You can't give me a hanging curveball like that and not expect me to swing. But how do you get researchers and physicians and doctors at the most esteemed academic institutions on the face of the planet? How do you get them dismissed over and over again as quacks? That seems an odd dynamic. What's going on?

[Steve Dase]

I wish I knew. Now, I will tell you this. You mentioned the whole thing that you were told at CPAC about asymptomatic spread. Guys, when somebody in your office come in and says, you know, my kid at home I think has the flu, if they have no fever, no cough, no symptoms, do you make them go home? No, nobody does that. Right. Okay, so why did we do that with this? You know, Dr. Scott Atlas was on my show on April 27th and he said, something very interesting, which is we have suspended the natural laws of biology, immunology and virology. We've acted like we have. We don't have hundreds of years and decades of established science on this, and I can't figure out why. Thankfully, he was brought into the White House Coronavirus Task Force about a month ago, and I think you'll notice that the difference in messaging from the White House since he was brought in. He gave a fantastic press conference a couple of days ago with Governor DeSantis down in Florida. Because I don't think this is about science. The question that you asked, Ted, I think that we've gotten into the politics of this, and I think that's what's really sad is it's made it so that suddenly a drug that's been FDA approved for 60 years is not healthy, despite all the studies around the world that show that it has at least some marked success early on as a treatment. The level of politicization of this is just frankly despicable, given the human lives that are at stake.

[Ted Cruz]

College football. You have strong thoughts on this. Share your thoughts on college football.

[Steve Dase]

Well, according to CDC, those 15 to 24, right in the age of playing high school and college football are 12.9% of the population. And yet there's 0.2% of people who have died with COVID Only 1.5% of deaths since March of those in that age group have been with COVID There's not a single recorded case that we can point to around the world of a student giving a teacher Covid why we're not playing football when comorbidities are the number one cause of death. With COVID 94% of the deaths have been with comorbidities because the number one thing this virus does is weaken your immune system. So if you're.

[Michael Knowles]

Well, Steve, I have to ask because I noticed you're using very specific language. You're saying dying with COVID which I think ties into this 94%, 6% number that has been going around. What does that mean? I mean, what's the distinction here? And what are we talking about with.

[Steve Dase]

The through August 15, CD says 6% of deaths were people who walked in who were otherwise healthy, got COVID 19 and died. The other 94% were people who had an average of 2.1 comorbidities, meaning that this, this virus weakened their already weakened immune systems. It does not mean that 94% of deaths are fake news. That's not what it means. What it means, though, is the way that this virus attacks the human body is it specifically targets those who already have an immune deficiency. So somebody, you guys well know that I work with Glenn Beck at the Blaze. He has autoimmune disease. He would not normally have to self quarantine during a typical flu season. Right. But because this virus specifically goes after weakened immune systems, Glenn did self quarantine from our studios for about two to three months. And so it is a very vicious virus. I don't want to understate that whatsoever, but there's a very targeted demo that it goes after. And that's why this policy that we have done of attacking mice with elephant guns. Guys, I'll leave you with this. I mean, look at Hawaii. Hawaii has had some form of a mask mandate since April 24th. They're 2,000 miles away from the next closest civilization. They've seen a 700% increase in cases there. Hong Kong, where they've been masking up since they're on their third wave of lockdowns in Hong Kong. Now the Philippines on their second wave of lockdowns where again, these are isolated places. The Philippines, Hawaii, high mask use. And yet in the end, the virus makes its way through. So we're not gonna stop it from getting through. The question is, can we stop it from getting to the people that it's most going to hurt? That is the question.

[Ted Cruz]

And Steve, to be clear, I'm not sure you can refer to California as civilization.

[Michael Knowles]

Also. A very true point. You might even say that's a scientific point. Gentlemen, that's time. We have. Steve, thank you so much for being here. You can always go, and I would highly recommend you go check out the Steve Dase show over at the Blaze. And Senator Cruz, I will see you in just a little while for our next episode. In the meantime, I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz.

[Steve Dase]

This episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz is being brought to you by Jobs, Freedom and Security pac, a political action committee dedicated to supporting conservative causes, organizations and candidates across the country. In 2022, jobs, freedom and Security PAC plans to donate to conservative candidates running for Congress and help the Republican Party across the nation.