COVIDiocy Victim: Her Co-Morbidity was Belief in Conspiracy Theories

A family grieves after their matriarch has died from COVID. But she didn't have to die. She died because she believed in various conspiracy theories, such as "COVID is a hoax". 

While 75, she is otherwise a healthy individual that have plenty of years left... Her name was Stephanie, and this is her story. 

No doubt, COVID deniers like her will claim that "COVID isn't dangerous to healthy people", and she paid the price while the pundits deny her existence by claiming she had co-morbidities. 

She refused TWO treatments that could have saved her because she heard that the treatments will kill her. 

Her husband, who was infected by her, took all the treatments. He was out of the hospital after just five days. She never left. 

Her co-morbidity is her belief in conspiracy theories. 

The COVIDiot Terrorist: A Train Engineer Who Crashed a Train Believing He's Revealing a Conspiracy

Back in March 2020, the first wave of COVID just hit the US, and things were looking dire. So dire, that US Navy called in its 2 hospital ships, USNS Mercy and USNS Comfort, to Los Angeles and New York respectively, "just in case". Each ship can provide up to 1000 beds for non-COVID patients, leaving the local hospitals to handle COVID. 

USNS Mercy, hospital ship, photo courtesy of MayorOfLA Tweet

USNS Mercy arrived on March 27, 2020, and admitted its first patient on March 29, 2020. It would keep doing so until May 15th, 2020, serving 7 weeks, before returning to its homeport of San Diego, having only treated about 80 patients around Los Angeles. 

But some did not believe the stated mission of the ships. Someone believed the ships have a sinister purpose, either COVID-related or it's some sort of government takeover. That would be Eduardo Moreno, a train engineer for a small port freight line that services the Port of Los Angeles. And he believed if he cause a serious incident, he can bring media attention to reveal the conspiracy. 

On March 31st, 2020, Eduardo Moreno derailed a freight train by intentionally ramming it through the end stops, multiple walls, and a parking lot. He ended up about 250 yards from the ship. When CHP officer confronted him, he freely admitted to the deed. 

The crash caused a diesel spill, in addition to about 700000 in damages done to the locomotive and surrounding structures. There were no injuries. 

So whatever he believed, it's... definitely COVIDiocy. And he's being charged as a terrorist by FBI and the Joint Terrorism Task Force. 

After being put in jail and under further interviews, it was revealed that he was a Qanon believer, and allegedly suffered a psychosis helped by way too much caffeine. He bought into the conspiracy that USNS Mercy is an extermination ship for "open-minded healthy people". After psychiatric treatment, he is believed to have recovered from his COVIDiocy episode, had disavowed Qanon, and is taking medication for his condition. 

Eduardo Moreno was recently sentenced to 3 years in prison and ordered to pay 755880 in restitution. 

Don't be a COVIDiot. 

COVIDiocy Origin: The Nirvana Fallacy

Much of the COVIDiocy and the anti-vax ideology can be traced to the nirvana fallacy or black-and-white-ism. 

The people believing in the nirvana fallacy generally imply that "if it's not perfect I don't want it". This leads to COVID vaccine denial, often with the justification: "it's not a vaccine because it doesn't work 100%!"  (We can get into what's sterilizing vaccine and what's not, but that's a different topic) 

But you can apply ANY justification to their denial. Some of the justifications I've seen include:

• The government lied about the effectiveness of the vaccine! (Relevance? Science can't change?)
• Government can't dictate what I do! (Except for everything else they regulate...)
• COVID is not that serious (despite it killing 1 million Americans?)
• COVID is not that serious to healthy people (you sure about that?)
• I survived COVID just fine! (Are you sure you don't have long COVID and other stuff?)
• There is no long COVID! (whatever floats your boat, dear)
• I'll make up right now something that sounds reasonable! (on why diabetes risks rose after COVID infection... it's because of the lockdown, not COVID!) 
• Vaccine's useless against omicron! (with a booster it works fine)
• Fully vaccinated people get infected anyway! (Are they boosted?)
• My triple-vaxxed "cousin" got infected anyway! (sorry to hear that. Relevance?)
• And I didn't! I'm anti-vax! (so you're lucky. Relevance?) 
• Lockdown did more harm than COVID! (uh, we were talking vaccines?)
• COVID is a con! (next...) 
• With COVID or of COVID?! (great, a COVID denialist)
• Public Health is just a big con by Big Pharma! (okay, that's enough)
• and so on and so forth

But fundamentally, any of these reasons are ad hoc. What they don't really want was the vaccine, and it's a knee-jerk reaction. They are in denial of COVID. Even two years into the pandemic, they refuse to believe it's a lethal disease that had already taken 1 million lives (or almost there). They want to bargain with you (it's only lethal to old people, it's only lethal to those with co-morbidities, it doesn't harm normal people), and from there they claim that all the government had done was for NOTHING, never mind what the government had done so far, yet we still have more COVID deaths than even China. 

Similar thinking exists about masking. That's why the anti-mask-mandate reasons are so ridiculous: 

• Why are you muzzling our kids? (to protect them from airborne pathogen)
• Why are you making it easier for child predators? (what are you saying about school security?)
• Why are you depriving them of oxygen? (mask doesn't do that)
• Why are you forcing them to breathe in their own funk? (that's not harmful) 
• and similar other hilarities. 

The problem with Nirvana fallacy is you won't be able to convince anyone with that sort of attitude toward facts. It's simply NOT reasonable. And it's very easy to see through because the rest of your supposed evidence in support of your reasoning is just as flimsy. 

For some people are just reacting out of fear. 

Vox, back in August 2020, had an article trying to get at the motivation of the anti-mask-ers, and one of them is a grandma who kept visiting anti-vax websites, trying to share them on Facebook, kept getting flagged by other users and got frustrated enough to believe FB was trying to censor her. She is so fearful that she refused to go to the ER after hurting her hand, because...

"...She’s 65 and believes she’d automatically be given a positive Covid-19 test and placed on a ventilator to likely die..."  -- Anti-maskers explain themselves -- Vox Aug 7, 2020

This was the sort of attitude anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers are spreading, telling each other what they want to hear: COVID isn't that serious, protective measures are useless, and public health is not to be trusted.  

That is COVIDiocy. And it is NOT victimless. 

People who caught COVID anyway are told they are weak, they have co-morbidities and not strong enough, or "you'll survive, no big deal". And when they don't, they are to be ignored. Those that survive COVID and suffer from long COVID are told there is no such thing as long COVID. 

While those who survive COVID, seemingly without lingering symptoms are touting their survival as the "proof" that "COVID isn't serious". 

Never mind the survival is greatly enhanced due to vaccines and boosters. 

Even today, two-plus years into the pandemic, there are MANY people still disbelieving the seriousness of COVID, and more clamoring for a "return to normal", even as BA.2 subvariant took over from the Omicron variant and became the dominant strain.