BIG CLAIM: Harvard Epidemiologist Says An Inexpensive Solution Could Stop The Spread Of COVID In A Month

Written by K. Walker on December 23, 2020

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Here’s something that you won’t see on CNN…

Dr. Michael Mina, an immunologist and epidemiologist at Harvard has repeatedly made the shocking claim that the COVID-19 pandemic could be stopped in about a month, and it wouldn’t actually be that difficult or expensive.

Dr. Mina has been saying the same thing since at least July — that we need to shift our focus on COVID away from lockdowns and toward widespread rapid testing.

His theory is that if people can test themselves at home and find that they are infectious, the vast majority of people will self-isolate and take precautions to not spread the virus.

Here is his piece in the New York Times dated July 3, 2020:

A Cheap, Simple Way to Control the Coronavirus

Here’s an article about his claims in August:

How to stop the COVID-19 pandemic? Harvard doc says cheap tests are the answer.

Last month, he wrote an article in Time that said basically the same thing:

How We Can Stop the Spread of COVID-19 By Christmas

Last month, Dr. Mina posted a lengthy thread on Twitter with his criticism of the approach so far and that we need “bold leadership” to tread a new path since we tried lockdowns months ago and it hasn’t been all that successful.

Interestingly, he tags Joe Biden, longtime Democrat operative David Axelrod, and Elon Musk in the thread.

So, why hasn’t Dr. Mina’s theory received more attention? Because it’s not the news that “The News” wants us to hear. It’s getting buried by people droning on about masks and “social distancing” and the efficacy of lockdowns. Yeah, how’s that working out for you? It isn’t, and yet, officials keep pushing them.

Dr. Mina was recently on a podcast with Lex Fridman and he explained yet again that allowing for rapid testing would put the onus on the individual to make decisions for themselves. He admits that the approach isn’t perfect, but it sure does seem more scientific than having uninfected people wear a fabric mask that doesn’t really do all that much in preventing the spread of a virus.

Dr. Mina said of rapid testing, “it’s empowering people to know that they are infected and giving them the opportunity to not spread it to their loved ones and their friends and neighbors and whoever else.”

We could have done this months ago, but we can start now. We just need to make more tests and get them out there. And they’re just simple, paper tests.

“We can get these out to everyone’s homes build these — make 10 million, 20 million, 30 million of them a day,” he said. “You know we make more bottles of Dasani water every day, we can make these little paper strip tests.”

“If we do that and we get these into people’s homes that they can use them twice a week then we can know if we’re infectious you know,” he continued, “Is it perfect? Absolutely not, but is it near perfect? Absolutely.”

These rapid tests are much better than the PCR tests that you have to wait days for the results and are often so sensitive that they’re picking up dead virus. This is why Florida has recently mandated that COVID tests must also report the cycle threshold values.

Dr. Mina said on the podcast that the problem with COVID is that the virus spreads so quickly.

He said, “Every 100 people that get infected right now, they go on to infect maybe 130 additional people and that’s exponential growth. So, 100 becomes 130. A [of] couple days later, that 130 becomes another 165 people. And you know, go over three weeks and 100 people become 500 people infected.”

“Now, it doesn’t take much to have those hundred people not infect 130, but infect 90. All we have to do is remove say 30 40 of new infections from continuing their spread and then instead of exponential growth, you have exponential decay. So this doesn’t need to be perfect,” Dr. Minas explained, “we don’t have to go from 100 to zero, we just have to go and have those hundred people infect 90, and those 90 people infect, you know, 82 — whatever it might be. And you do that for a few weeks, and boom, you have now gone instead of 100 to 500 you’ve gone from 100 to 20. Yes, it’s not very hard and so the way to do that is to let people know that they’re infectious.”

The embed code of the podcast has been removed, but you can click on this link cued up to the relevant portion of the conversation.

Look at that! A medical expert that wants to treat us like adults!

The Media(D) would never allow that to happen on the cusp of a “Nanny State” Biden administration, right?

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K. Walker
ClashDaily's Associate Editor since August 2016. Self-described political junkie, anti-Third Wave Feminist, and a nightmare to the 'intersectional' crowd. Mrs. Walker has taken a stand against 'white privilege' education in public schools. She's also an amateur Playwright, former Drama teacher, and staunch defender of the Oxford comma. Follow her humble musings on Twitter: @TheMrsKnowItAll
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