In February of 2022, after much consideration, gnashing of teeth, and soul-searching (that’s sarcasm), the State of New York imposed a draconian quarantine rule upon the people of the Empire State, ‘cuz COVID! Try not to act surprised. It is unconstitutional.
“Involuntary detention is a severe deprivation of individual liberty, far more egregious than other health safety measures, such as requiring mask wearing at certain venues. Involuntary quarantine may have far-reaching consequences such as loss of income (or employment) and isolation from family,” Ploetz wrote. … [and]
“Respondents offered no scientific data or expert testimony why Rule 2.13 was a necessary response to combat COVID-19, but instead contend only that it would provide a quick and nimble approach to combating the pandemic,” wrote the judge.
Rule 2.13, as written, says that “whenever appropriate to control the spread of a highly contagious communicable disease, the State Commissioner of Health may issue and/or may direct the local health authority to issue isolation and/or quarantine orders, consistent with due process of law, to all such persons as the State Commissioner of Health shall determine appropriate.”
We can agree that COVID was contagious and communicable, but that’s not all. It was also never dangerous to but a sliver of the general population. Getting genuinely sick from the flu sucks but is rare and not as bad as having your government destroy your job, business, or life. And there’s no reason for any of that.
Here in New Hampshire, the average recovery rate for all ages never dropped below 98%, even after the vaccines started killing people from COVID. And some reports pointed out that the average age of death from COVID was above the average life expectancy for US citizens.
I’ll grant you that New York is not New Hampshire or most of America. And finding a state that mishandled COVID as badly as NY is challenging. But a rule authorizing indefinite detention?
It’s a very blue state, so maybe that reaction makes sense, but at least one judge wanted to see some evidence. Where’s the proof that this is not just necessary but that it works? They didn’t have any: no upside and a lot of downsides.
“While this meta-analysis concludes that lockdowns have had little to no public health effects, they have imposed enormous economic and social cost,” the study concluded. “In consequence, lockdown policies are ill-founded and should be rejected as a pandemic policy instrument.”
COVID restrictions prevent or delay care leading to lower quality of life, more hospitalizations, and death. COVID-policy interventions were followed by record-setting all-cause mortality in working-age Americans. Impacts from education loss to mandates will plague us for decades. And all of that results from unscientific demands for compliance with known-failed policies that caused more harm than good.
Mass masking never stopped a virus and never will. Distancing was a goofy tweener school science project. And lockdowns have never had any of the benefits advertised.
New York State prohibited access to health care, restricted family members from access to dying relatives, enforced a policy that killed thousands in Nursing homes, denied children their so-called right to education, and a thousand other shocks.
Placed side by side, the Democrat party, is a far greater threat to the people than COVID. The problem of long COVID is political, not epidemiological. And the only cure for that is elections in a state where the real public health threat is voters who can’t shake the progressive virus to save their lives.
