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At length, perhaps some future historian will need to find the “convulsive ergot” theory of 2020 to explain the Covid-Hysteria because the explanation will not be found in the “science” embedded in what will be a tiny blip in the green line of the chart above.[i] But to do so, they might well be advised to look due westward in the state of Massachusetts from Salem in the east and site of the original hysteria, through Camp Devon in the middle, where the worst of the Spanish Flu breakouts occurred, to Great Barrington on the western edge of the state, where a ray of enlightenment finally burst upon the scene in October 2020.

The Great Barrington Declaration was penned by three fearless world leading epidemiologists—Dr. Martin Kulldorff of Harvard, Dr. Sunetra Gupta of Oxford University and Dr. Jay Bhattacharya of Sanford—and was a powerful antidote to the Evil Hand theory then raging through the MSM and political class of almost every stripe.

At essence, it said the real science was that America was not being attacked by a Grim Reaper visiting death upon one and all regardless of age, health status or physical circumstances, but, instead, was a highly selective respiratory disease variant that honed-in tightly on the immunity-impaired aged and co-morbid. Accordingly, the one-size-fits all Lockdown policy was dead wrong, and what was needed was highly targeted help, protections and treatments for the smallish minority of the vulnerable, which policy would presently lead to the attainment of “herd immunity” and the ultimate extinguishment of the pandemic in the normal way.

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Keeping these (across-the-board lockdown) measures in place until a vaccine is available will cause irreparable damage, with the underprivileged disproportionately harmed.

Fortunately, our understanding of the virus is growing. We know that vulnerability to death from COVID-19 is more than a thousand-fold higher in the old and infirm than the young. Indeed, for children, COVID-19 is less dangerous than many other harms, including influenza.

As immunity builds in the population, the risk of infection to all – including the vulnerable – falls. We know that all populations will eventually reach herd immunity – i.e. the point at which the rate of new infections is stable – and that this can be assisted by (but is not dependent upon) a vaccine. Our goal should therefore be to minimize mortality and social harm until we reach herd immunity.

The most compassionate approach that balances the risks and benefits of reaching herd immunity, is to allow those who are at minimal risk of death to live their lives normally to build up immunity to the virus through natural infection, while better protecting those who are at highest risk. We call this Focused Protection.

Adopting measures to protect the vulnerable should be the central aim of public health responses to COVID-19. By way of example, nursing homes should use staff with acquired immunity and perform frequent testing of other staff and all visitors. Staff rotation should be minimized. Retired people living at home should have groceries and other essentials delivered to their home. When possible, they should meet family members outside rather than inside. A comprehensive and detailed list of measures, including approaches to multi-generational households, can be implemented, and is well within the scope and capability of public health professionals.

Those who are not vulnerable should immediately be allowed to resume life as normal. Simple hygiene measures, such as hand washing and staying home when sick should be practiced by everyone to reduce the herd immunity threshold. Schools and universities should be open for in-person teaching. Extracurricular activities, such as sports, should be resumed. Young low-risk adults should work normally, rather than from home. Restaurants and other businesses should open. Arts, music, sport and other cultural activities should resume. People who are more at risk may participate if they wish, while society as a whole enjoys the protection conferred upon the vulnerable by those who have built up herd immunity.

On October 4, 2020, this declaration was authored and sighed………..

The authors of the Great Barrington Declaration at the American Institute for Economic Research. (L–R) Martin Kulldorff, Sunetra Gupta, Jay Bhattacharya

Among the many virtues of this lucid framing of the matter was that it sharply and diametrically differentiated the Covid-19 from the Spanish Flu which had devastated nearby Camp Devon during the Spanish Flu, as well as much of America and the world.

Thus, subsequent studies of the US have estimated a wide band for the infected population, ranging from about 4 million to upwards of 28 million. That would put the Spanish Flu IFR (infection fatality rate) somewhere between 2.5% and 16.5% against the firmer figure of 675,000 deaths.

But either way, those risk ratios are in a wholly different zip-code than today’s more careful and current estimates from the CDC itself. A few months back it estimated that as of May 19, 2021 about 120 million Americans had been infected by the virus, of which only about 6% had been hospitalized.

At the time the death count stood at about 590,000—so the implied IFR was about 0.5% or only one-fifth to one-thirtieth of the 1918 rate. And, of course, this 0.5% risk of death ratio is based on the expansive WITH Covid counting system stood up by the CDC in March 2020.[ii]

Even more importantly, the current CDC figures validate in spades the fundamental thesis of the Great Barrington Declaration in contrast to what is known about age and health status based risks of the Spanish Flu. Startlingly, it is estimated that 50% of the 1918-1919 deaths were among the healthiest 20-40 age population, many of them actually soldiers in training camps like Fort Devon.

By contrast, as of October 2021 only 2% of the WITH Covid mortalities had occurred among the prime 20-40 age population. The mortality curve was the exact inverse of the far more lethal Spanish Flu.

Indeed, the CDC’s own figures leave nothing to the imagination. One size fits all was a horrid mistake because the IFRs tell the very opposite story—the one embedded in the Great Barrington Declaration and its recommended strategy.

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