AntiScience COVIDiocy: How to Pretend to Care About Science While Spewing Anti-Science Misinformation

One of the ways antivaxxers catch the attention of sheeple is pretending to care, and one of the ways they pretend to care is by portraying their antivax attitude as "concerns about vaccine safety". Indeed, if you ask RFK jr, he would say he's not antivax, he's pro vax safety. 

And one of the most frequent sources antivaxxers like to cite is VAERS, or Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System. They love to "dumpster dive" into VAERS data and claim VAERS numbers are proof that vaccine caused injuries or even deaths, even though VAERS itself CLEARLY states that VAERS does NOT establish "cause-and-effect" relationship between the vaccine and the reported adverse event. 

Here's an example of an adverse event reported to VAERS. Patient had Pfizer COVID shot on Jan 9, 2021. Patient had a single car accident on Jan 23rd, 2021. She spun out into a snowbank. She was transported to ER, treated, and released. She was found unresponsive on Feb 1, 2021 and pronounced dead. An autopsy revealed she had a brain bleed. 

Yes, that's a genuine VAERS entry, 1004811-1, of which a screenshot is included below. I can't link it because VAERS doesn't allow direct linking. You will have to zoom in the see the details. 

The death and the vaccination are clearly unrelated, but as per proper procedure, it's included in VAERS, and the report was submitted on Feb 5th, 2021. In fact, CDC instructions to health care providers were to include the data in VAERS, "regardless if the reporter thinks the vaccine caused the AE (adverse event)". The reason is simple: CDC needs a way to know if there's a side effect they never considered or expected, and the only way to know is to report EVERYTHING, so the data can be mined later for commonalities. 

So if you search for "COVID vaccine" and "death", you would probably end up counting this one, and probably dozens, hundreds, perhaps thousands like it, where if you look at the details, there's just no way they could be linked. 

Not that it stopped antivaxxers and pundits like Tucker Carlson from claiming "vaccines killed thousands" when the data they cited does NOT indicate such a thing, and organizations across the country had to put out FAQs debunking such fearmongering. 

When confronted, most antivaxxers will reply with "but I just want a safe vaccine" or variations thereof, often with emphasis "but even one adverse event is one too many". 

Some antivaxxers will then trot out the "COVID isn't that dangerous" trope, esp. with the "children tend to have milder symptoms" bit. 

So you remind them "so you are comparing a KNOWN risk of COVID such as death, long COVID, and MIS-C, vs a POTENTIAL unknown risk of vaccine adverse reaction that has so far not been observed?"

Some may be smart enough to admit defeat, but some will segue into VAERS dumpster diving. 

That's when you remind them that they're processing garbage data and drawing bogus conclusions, as we had discussed above. 

And what's when they block you because they can't beat you with the truth. 

Sad COVIDiocy: Triple World Champion Kickboxer Frederick "The Undertaker" Sinistra, and antivaxxer, has died from COVID

We are sad but not surprised to report that Frederick Sinistra has died of COVID. He was 41. 

Triple World Champion Kick Boxer Frederick Sinistra, Anti-Science, Anti-Mask, Anti-Vax, dead from Covidiot infection. pic.twitter.com/AVKrvCE3qp

— John O'Connell (@jdpoc) December 21, 2021

What's tragic was Fred was in TOTAL denial over COVID. Months ago he discharged himself from the hospital, claiming to be treating the disease himself at home. He called COVID "the hair flu" and railed against the Belgian government's attempt to control it. Belgium has a 90+% vaccination rate. 

In November, when he got worse, his coach finally got him to go back to the hospital. Fred posted the picture included in the Tweet above, with him hooked up to oxygen. But he posted on social media that "little virus" will not stop him. 

He apparently went home later and was posted as late as December 13th that he's doing fine at home. 

The three-time world champion died on December 15th, before the government added the latest lockdown procedure in order to slow the spread of omicron variant. 

It is a common misconception of antivaxxers who believe their "natural immunity" will save them. But as we have seen many times before, including triathlete John Ayers, when COVID comes for you, it does not care who you are or how fit you are. The best chance of NOT catching COVID is with the COVID vaccines, now supplemented by boosters. 

Don't be a COVIDiot. 

Bonus: Madison Cawthorn explains how he met his soon-to-be-ex wife through a Russian connection

We previously covered Madison Cawthorn, North Carolina's US Congressman. Back in 2020, he shared a story with a right-wing website: Daily Caller. Basically he made a trip to Russia with some friends, met a US Army captain at a casino in St. Petersburg, Russia. This army captain later got him to a faux Crossfit competition, where he met his later (and now soon-to-be-ex) wife, Cristina. 

No, I don't think Cawthorn is a deep-cover Russian agent, or his soon-to-be-ex wife was a Russian honeypot operation. I think Cawthorn got sorry storytelling skills and got his timeline mixed up a bit leading people to see what's not really there. 

No, I don't think he planned this as a verbal trap to embarrass his critics. 

He's got way too much ego for that. 

Political COVIDiocy: Why the Republican Party is full of Freedumb Anti-Intellectuals

Recently, it's clear that the Republican Party, is full of anti-intellectuals who goes against the public good for "freedom". But how did it all get to this point? 

We may have to go back to some disturbing trends of the Republican party on how they portray what they consider to be American values. 

Let's take a look at a freshman congressman, Madison Cawthron, North Carolina 11th District, Republican, wheelchair user, soon to be divorced. What's notable about him? He was one of those that addressed the January 6th crowed. He blamed democrats for subverting the crowd, and was one of the last to admit there was no voting fraud that elected Biden. He's antimask and antivaccine, claiming that a proposed plan to send people door to door to convince you to vax will lead to g-men to "take your guns" and "take your Bibles". Don't believe me? This is all verified. He just made news announcing to a mostly college age crowd that they should drop out of college unless they want to become doctor or lawyer or engineer. He dropped out of college to work for a politician Mark Meadows, who later told him to run for his own seat, and he won. He considers himself the new face of the Republican Party. 

Cawthron is still an athlete and supposedly trained for wheelchair racing. He still goes to shooting range regularly. This was a relatively recent photo:

Guns are a very sensitive subject around conservative Republicans, because white masculinity is intertwined with gun ownership in the US, even though there is no legal barrier for anyone else to own guns. It is believed that white men use guns as a phallic symbol to reclaim their social status.  

Now, also keep in mind that Cawthorn just declared to a crowd of fellow young conservatives to abandon higher education like he did, at "Americafest" hosted by Turning Point USA. 

No higher education means you're probably stuck at a menial job, and you probably need a gun to make yourself feel like a man. 

But what's really disturbing is the following 14 signs. I won't explain where they come from yet, but I'll just list them, and see how many of them you see in the current Republican party:

1. Tradition
2. Rejection of science and reason
3. Just do it, don't think
4. Disagreement is treason
5. Fear of difference, xenophobia
6. Appeal to social frustration
7. Obsession with a plot
8. Enemy is both weak thus defeatable, yet strong enough to be feared
9. Pacifism is consorting with the enemy
10. Contempt for the weak
11. Everyone can be a hero
12. Machismo and weaponry
13. Selective populism, influencer look as if they represent the everymen
14. Newspeak

How many of these signs did you see? I see a lot of 2 (antivax), 3 (Jan 6th), 4 (polarization), 6 (anti mandate!), 7 (Qanon!), 11 (Lionizing Rittenhouse), and 12 ("Don't tread on me"). I guess Cawthorn himself can be a bit of 13.  

The 14 signs I listed are "14 typical elements of Ur-fascism" by Umberto Eco, originally published in New York Review of Books in an essay. 

Yes, I am stating that IMHO, the US Republican Party is moving toward fascism. And this is VERY disturbing. 

And it's even more disturbing with a new tweet from Rand Paul

How to steal an election: “Seeding an area heavy with potential Democratic votes with as many absentee ballots as possible, targeting and convincing potential voters to complete them in a legally valid way, and then harvesting and counting the results.”https://t.co/LwE3MdeWeG

— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) December 27, 2021

This is quite disturbing, because what Rand Paul has described is absolutely legal, and indeed, is the proper way to get your constituents to get out and vote (or absentee vote). He even called it "legally valid way". So why is it "steal an election"? 

It's clear that the Republican party has gone onto "newspeak"... they will randomly redefine a word to fit their own mindset instead of using the true definition of the word. And that's sign #14 above. They are redefining the word "stealing" to denigrade something they failed to do. 

And it is VERY worrying for the future of the Republican party. 

COVIDiocy Conspiracy: Are the Antivaxxers Bankrolled by Koch Network?

The Daily Post just dropped a new article: "How the Koch Network Hijacked the War on COVID". It is quite long, but it can be summed up as... Koch Industries, one of the largest privately held fossil fuel company in the world, saw the lockdown as draining its profits (due to sharp drop in fuel use due to lockdown and supply chain problems), so it is using its reserves to push for re-opening at all fronts, from businesses lobbying, to medical professionals declaring, to social media blitzing, and more, directly contravening public health policies, and this is leading to millions of American casualties. 

One of the fronts was the so-called Great Barrington Declaration, where it calls for re-opening and targeted vaccination of the essential. The WHO outright called it "unethical", and other scientists called it cold-hearted, as it essentially sacrifices part of the population. The conference where GBD was signed was at American Institute for Economic Research, at Great Barrington, Massachusetts. What people may not have noticed is AIER derived a bit portion of its budget from Koch or foundations linked with Koch. 

It can be said that both Florida and Texas, with Republican governors, simply followed Trump as Trump liked the GBD, and even welcomed some of the signatories to the White House. At this point, it's worth noting that Trump's COVID advisor, Scott Atlas, is an MD, but has no background in epidemiology or public health. He had publicly stated that masks do not help curb infection, and called the idea of vaccinating children "denial of science". Both have been proven wrong. Trump's response to COVID was basically "let it run", which jives with GBD's approach to COVID... let it run and hope it achieves herd immunity. In fact, Trump said so in an interview, except he actually said "herd mentality". And Trump lost (and tried to cover that up by alleging voter fraud, but that's not relevant here). 

The Biden administration had already publicly stated that lockdown are off the table, even as omicron swept the country and is already deep into the US now. And Florida and Texas are opposed to various public health measures, with several other states following suit as well, mainly based on COVID misinformation spread by so-called think-tanks directly or indirectly funded by Koch or alumni from such think-tanks. 

My thoughts on this... 

This is about as close as the Illuminati being the Black Hand behind everything. And it fits a little TOO well. I doubt there is an active thought to mess with public health, but even unconscious bias has huge consequences when it involves billions of dollars. It's more like "where do I find some experts who agree with what I need?"

But at a deeper level, it is very... cold and calculating. And as a result, very disturbing. 

And it also explains the linkup between antivaxxers and conservatives. They sought each other. 

And the result is more American casualties as collateral damage for ideological gains. 

That's fascist, not American. 

Common COVIDiocy: Data Proves that COVID Deaths are PRIMARILY among the Unvaxxed

AP did an article back in June about May 2021 data from CDC, and shows that virtually ALL reported deaths of COVID are from the unvaxxed. 

Only 150 of the 18000 COVID deaths in May are fully vaccinated. 0.8%

And the number of COVID hospitalizations that are fully vaccinated: 107K, or 1.1%. 

Do keep in mind that not all states record breakthrough infections or sought accurate reports, so the numbers are likely underreported, but unlike to sway the numbers by a large quantity.

And the numbers are going to be even WORSE for the unvaxxed soon, with omicron variant, because several of the monoclonal antibody treatment such as Regeneron shows little to no effect on omicron. So far, in lab tests only 3 antibodies treatment are effective against omicron, and only one of the three is based in the US. 

Given that Ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine are placebos at best, the only thing they WOULD accept and are actually effective are these monoclonal antibodies. And now that most of them are worthless against omicron, the unvaxxed basically has little to no choice: get vaxxed now, or wait for COVID to catch them and pray it doesn't kill them, while clogging up ICU beds and whatnot. All in the name of "freedom". 

Religious COVIDiocy: Televangelist Marcus Lamb died of COVID after sharing conspiracy theories about COVID

Marcus Lamb was CEO of Daystar TV Network, one of the largest Christian broadcasters in the US. He died on November 30th, after being diagnosed of COVID on November 12th. 

Lamb was well known for his homophobic and transphobic views as well as his endorsement of "gay conversion therapy" where homosexuals are subjected to brainwashing and other abuses attempting to "convert" them back to heterosexuals, a practice that was denounced by the UN. 

Lamb was also caught buying a private jet with the Trump Administration COVID business loan called "paycheck protection program", which as the name suggests, was meant to be used to keep people employed. He ended up paying that back almost immediately. 

During COVID times, Lamb featured an antivax panel featuring antivax misinformation superspreaders such as RFK jr ("I am pro safety!"), Sherry Tenpenny ("vaccines makes you magnetic!"), and Ryan Cole (IVM will cure you!). 

It is believed that Lamb treated himself with IVM, HQL, and more. It clearly didn't work. 

His son blamed everything on "the enemy", which is Daystar's euphemism for "the Devil". 

Strange COVIDiocy: the "Fauci lied" narrative

Recently ran into an antivaxxers who asserted repeatedly that Dr. Fauci lied and is a criminal and variations thereof, among his various antivax viewpoints. 

So I asked him what exactly did Fauci lied about. 

He gave only one answer: early in the pandemic, Fauci asked people not to mask up. He later changed his stance on that. According to this anti-vaxxer, this constitutes lying, and since he's a public official, this constitutes deceiving the public and should be arrested and charged with... something. 

Let's get a little context on this. 

Back on March 8 2020, Fauci did say "there's no reason to be walking around with a mask". This was only a few months after the discovery of COVID and nobody has any idea how bad the pandemic would spread. At that point, even WHO believed COVID to NOT be airborne. No one knew how bad the asymptomatic spread would be, and there was a genuine fear that health facilities may run out of masks due to panic buying by the public. 

CDC changed its stance on masks on April 3, 2020, recommending people mask up in public settings, esp. when social distancing will be difficult, and they recommended cloth masks, not the genuine 3M medical masks that people sought. Even since, Fauci have repeatedly stated in public that people should mask up, and even wore a mask to a July 2020 Senate hearing. 

Not to mention asymptomatic spread is a serious problem, much more serious than we ever suspected. It's believed that 30-40% of COVID spread is from asymptomatic people, and the way to stop spread is to ask everyone to wear a mask since one does not know if one has any symptoms. 

So I pointed out to the antivaxxers that he's being unreasonable. He expects government officials to NEVER admit their mistake if they made one. Isn't that even MORE dangerous than lying? Basically double-down and make the problem worse? 

"All men make mistakes, but only wise men learn from their mistakes." -- Winston Churchill

He's not backing down though, kept calling Fauci an incompetent fool and a lying SOB, as we as being old and senile. 

Guess he won't be learning from his own mistakes any time soon. 

Public COVIDiocy: Missouri Attorney General is Dismantling Missouri Public Health All By Himself

Missouri's Attorney General Schmitt has taken upon himself to dismantle the entire public health apparatus in the entire state of Missouri by issuing advisories to all jurisdictions that he considers mask and vaccines mandates for anyone, including school to children, to be illegal. 

Schmitt issued the state-wide advisory on December 7th 2021, following a Cole County Court judge ruling weeks earlier that local health authorities are not authorized to issue public health orders because state health department is not allowed to delegate rule-making authority to non-elected officials in local health departments. 

However, some school districts stated that they will NOT be following Schmitt's advisory, because they don't consider themselves bind by the decision, as their powers are delegated from locally elected school boards or the city council, not from the state. 

Many local health departments, however, are halting their entire COVID response plans (including contact tracing, outreach, or even immunization) due to the December 7th letter from Schmitt. Others were thrown into confusion and seeking guidance from the state health department.  

Many people believe that Schmitt, who is also campaigning for a seat on the Senate, is basically using his attorney general powers to court conservative votes and potentially harming the state in return. 

Schmitt dismissed the criticism, claiming he's only enforcing the law. 

COVID Update: 4-year old Texas Girl's Death now ruled as Undetermined

 Previously we reported the death of Kali Cook in Texas as a COVID death, as that was what the initial report says. However, now that a full autopsy had been performed in November, the cause of death was changed to "undetermined", because while COVID virus was found in her system, there seems to be not enough damage that could cause her to stop living. 

Antivax COVIDiocy: How Antivaxxers Argue By Bullshitting with Disinformation

The way antivaxxers argue is by flooding you with disinformation trying to convince you are wrong or you don't know what you're talking about. Don't be fooled. Here's my recent engagement with one such. 

I was replying to The Real Truther who was commenting on some idiotic tweet by Daniel Kotzin about how to get out of the pandemic is to surrender and refuse vaccines. I said it will flood the hospitals like the earliest days of COVID where Wuhan, China ended up a ghost city. 

Then comes Farmer J who claimed natural immunity will be fine, and vaccines are too stupid to handle variants. Which is simply not true, at least not completely true. (Pfizer said 2 shots + booster will handle Omicron, while Moderna said they need another shot)  So I clapped back with facts and logic. 

Farmer J isn't receptive to the truth though, as he replied with irrelevant mentions and derision, continuing to claim "natural immunity" is superior to vaccines. He also claimed some wild time-traveling stuff about Moderna had worked on Omicron for MONTHS when it was discovered in late November (only a few weeks ago)  I replied with facts and citation vaccine immunity is STRONGER than disease-derived immunity. Actual studies say so. 

His reply was somewhat surprising... He claims the study was discredited. Not that he produced any evidence of such. But he goofed, as he just revealed that he is not backed by any facts. He actually used debunked misinformation... that PCR test was ending. It's not. So I called him out on it with proof. 

He had not continued any response to this tweet chain in the past 24 hours. 

From what I can tell, he seems to reside north of the border. Guess he got tired of commenting on snow and such so he replied to stuff he didn't like with lies, backed by even more lies, and just act haughty "lol" every tweet pretending to know more than he does. 

He had used multiple tactics of top bullshitters. He acted arrogantly confident, pointed at his supposed successes ("my natural immunity"), and claimed esoteric knowledge ("this one is mocked") , hoping we wouldn't challenge him. 

It's basically one antivax talking point after another. And if you are not versed in this sort of tactics, and/or be quick on Google and/or understand science, you may be snookered by all that disinformation. 

Don't be a COVIDiot and believe antivaxxer bullshit. 

Congressional COVIDiocy: MTG is wondering why are we lamenting over COVID deaths when cancer kills 600K a year...

Rep Majorie Taylor Greene, one of the looniest people in congress, is tweeting her craziness trying to justify her views via cherry-picking evidence. This is her most recent:

MTG: 600K people die from cancer every year,
but no shutdown. No school closing. 

Uh, because cancer is not contagious, you ignorant congresswoman! COVID is contagious! If you think the two are comparable, you are out of your mind! 

And the death rate for COVID is much higher than cancer! According to John Hopkins University, US death rate for COVID is 240 per 100000. According to National Cancer Institute (cancer.gov), US death rate for all cancer is 158 per 100000. COVID is 52% more lethal than cancer!

And that's DESPITE all we have done to control it, because people keep thinking they have the right to do whatever they want, and the public can go **** themselves. 

Oh, but wait, MTG has a couple more dumb points she wants to make I'm not going to screen cap everything, just the text highlights. 

MTG Tweet 2
More died from COVID in 2021 than in 2020
in spite of vaccines and masking

MTG Tweet 3
It is time to change the approach
COVID targets obese and older people
Shutdown, masks and vaccines are not stopping COVID
Ivermectin, monoclonal antibodies and treatments are saving lives

It's clear where MTG gets her alternative facts from: not our reality. 

Ivermectin does not work. It's proven by science over and over, but she doesn't care. 

The antibodies cost like a grand per infusion, and you need like eight of them, but it does seem to work. But why get sick? Why not get vaccinated and minimize the chance of getting sick in the first place? 

As for "COVID targets obese and older people", that's bull****. COVID targets UNVACCINATED people, first, THEN obese and elderly. Now that those people have gotten their vaccinations, it's the young and younger unvaccinated that are getting sick. This is outdated information from 2020. 

But wait, it gets crazier. 

MTG Tweet 4
Our response to COVID should be about ending obesity
promote COVID treatment that's proven to work
and stop the politically driven mass hysteria
and allow people to choose natural immunity or vaccines

Does MTG know what's an optimal weight loss plan, and how long it takes to work? Does she have a plan to reverse aging too? Since Ivermectin is proven NOT to work (except in MTG's head), what do people do in the meanwhile? Die?  

Oh, but there's one more.

MTG Tweet 5

The Gov #COVID19 response hasn’t stopped covid & isn’t about saving lives,
it’s about control. If the hypocrites in charge wanted to save lives,
they would destroy all Gov funded bio weapons &
fund covid treatments like Ivermectin.

Again the ivermectin. It doesn't work. At best it's placebo. And why talk about bioweapons and whatnot? It's just a distracting point. 

Then she cheekily included a link to Cancer.gov about viruses that causes cancer as "FYI". 

Oh, but wait, we have a vaccine for that! 

MTG is clearly not attached to our reality, and if she really believes everything she tweeted, she's only getting information from her own reality bubble. 

The reason this country continues to see COVID death is due to people not vaccinating. Most of the deaths now are from unvaccinated. And most of the unvaccinated are Republicans because antivaxxers decided to court conservative Republicans to get their message out. And seasoned political operatives are choosing to make the government attempt to control the disease a wedge issue between Republicans and democrats, all for short term votes, but as a result, killing Republicans in the long-run. 

If you elected MTG to congress, you may want to reconsider whether that's REALLY who you want representing you. Or perhaps you share her reality bubble? That you're more worried about government control than saving yourselves? 

If you didn't, did you vote for someone like her, such as Boebert? 

MAGA COVIDiocy: Pro-Trump Counties Have Far Higher COVID Death Rates

New NPR analysis shows that since May 2021, counties that voted for Trump have a COVID death rate TWICE AS HIGH as counties that voted for Biden on the average. The "most red" counties have a death rate 5.5 times higher than the "most blue" counties. This was a reversal from a year ago, before we have the vaccine, that Democratic counties were hit harder. 

The data is irrefutable: in 2021, Republicans are killing themselves because they rather have "freedom" than treat COVID seriously. 

The trend is also interesting. Early in the pandemic, certain demographics such as African Americans, rural Americans, and younger Americans are vaccine-hesitant, but as the pandemic continued, those groups have started to vaccinate, while Republicans that vaccinate have stalled. According to Kaiser Foundation, 91% of Democrats have been vaccinated against COVID, compared to 59% of Republicans. The polls also revealed that Republicans STILL believe that COVID seriousness was exaggerated, vaccination should be a personal choice, and are NOT worried about getting sick from COVID.

Indeed, antivaxxers are getting DIRECT support from Republican well-knowns... such as Eric Trump, one of Donny's sons, who spoke at such a convention in October. The convention also featured speakers who claimed drinking one's own urine is just as good as a COVID vaccine. Another claimed COVID vaccine will put "another kind of nervous system inside you" and turn you into a cyborg. No, I'm not making this up. It's looney bin stuff. 

Then there are grifters such as Del Bigtree, one of the current top antivaxxers, who find the Dems unreceptive to his antiscience, so he courted the Republicans instead, by his own admission, "Clearly I was shocked as a lifelong liberal progressive that I was hugging and hanging out and having a great time with a bunch of extremely conservative mothers and grandmothers." 

Then there are political manipulators like Roger Stone, convicted felon of lying to Congress about 2016 Trump's campaign contacts with Russia. Stone had been working for Republican candidates for decades, having worked with the Nixon campaign back in 1972. Stone was pardoned by Trump. Stone ALSO spoke at the antivax conference, using the vaccine mandate as a wedge issue, trying to motivate the conservatives to vote in the midterm elections. 

Public health, something to the benefit of all public, is now a political decision to a good portion of the population, who decided not to participate, and this is a truly huge monkeywrench for public health officials who now needs to protect the public from a good portion of the public. 

To put it more succinctly, Republicans are so desperate to win, they are politicizing mask and vaccine mandate, killing their own side by the thousands daily, AND slowing the country's recovery, just to gain some political ground in the short term. 

And even lifelong Republicans are getting alarmed. How did something that benefits all Americans got turned into a Red vs Blue polarization issue? 

The answer is simple: Short-sightedness compounded by grifters and political manipulators who only care about the next election and their own gains. 

There is a real risk that this unholy alliance will DESTROY the Republican party down the road. 

But the antivaxxers will go on. They'll just find some other group to ally with.  

Sad COVIDiocy: The story of John Eyers, Triathlete, Fitness Fanatic, COVID casualty

John Eyers was the epitome of fitness. He ran triathlons. He is a bodybuilder and a mountain climber. He's got a six-pack and much more. But not even his family can change his mind about "no COVID vaccine for me". And he died of COVID in July 2021. 

In June 2021 he met with his family to celebrate his nephew's 10th birthday (son of his twin sister Jenny McCann) and he started spouting some nonsense about "people are getting COVID jab to get free McDonald's" or "it's got formaldehyde". Naturally, his family fact-checked him, but he won't change his mind. He kept saying "I won't be a guinea pig."  The subject was eventually dropped. Later they went to a health club, and John refused to put his mask on, but eventually did. And the weekend ended with no other incident. 

It was to be the last time they ever see each other. 

John tested positive for COVID on June 29th. By July 3rd he's so sick his girlfriend had to force him to call for paramedics to transport him to the hospital. Next day, he was vomiting blood. A week later he's on a ventilator, unable to breath himself. COVID first attacked his lungs, causing blood clots, as his body's immune system started attacking the lung tissues AND COVID. Doctors tried to put him on ventilator and use steroids to control the immune response, but that caused other illnesses to take hold, such as a lung infection, which cascaded to other organs. Doctors helped with dialysis, but lungs are not recovering. His body used all its reserves, fighting the virus and the complications. It was not enough. 

On July 27th, he lost the battle with COVID before his family can don PPE to spend the final moments with him. He was 42, in prime physical condition before COVID got him. 

John told the doctors before he was put on the ventilator, that he regretted not getting the vaccine. 

John's funeral was August 16, 2021. His family chose to share his story... John was a COVIDiot, and they don't want anyone else to share John's fate... or their fate of losing one of their own to something that could have been easily prevented. 

Don't be a COVIDiot like John, or one of the dozens all over the world like John. COVID can come for you no matter how healthy you are. And if you are not doing everything to prevent it, such as masks and vaccines, you are a part of the problem.