Those who criticise the mainstream will get bad reports from factchecker sites. Can we please dispense with factchecker sites' opinions and just stick to the actual material?
Well, there's "criticism of the mainstream," and then there's
unproven conspiracy theories, false information, propaganda, and poor sourcing. You are entitled to your own opinions, but not to your own facts.
In this short video Kary Mullis says: "PCR doesn't tell you that you're sick and it doesn't tell you that the thing you ended up with will hurt you ..."
https://odysee.com/@yellowgenius:0/...y-Mullis--It-doesn't-tell-you-you're-sick-.:4
I think from this quote we can infer he doesn't believe it is a diagnostic test but, in any case,
on the packets of PCR tests they say things such as "For Use Under an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) Only" "
not for diagnostic purposes", "aid in diagnosis" so even the producers of the tests themselves don't regard it as a proper diagnostic tool. So right there is a problem, isn't there?
You'll need to back up this assertion with a reference of some sort.
I listened to the video and transcribed it as best I can. Unfortunately my hearing isn't very good and there were parts I couldn't get:
Kary Mullis said:
“I think "misuse PCR" is not quite ... I don't think it's [misusing] PCR. The result, the interpretation of it ... if you—if you can say, if there were—if they could find this virus in you at all, in the PCR, if you do it well you could find almost anything in anybody, and it starts to get you to believe in some kind of Buddhist notion, where everything is contained there and everything in between. Right, I mean, if you can amplify one single molecule up to something that you can really measure, which PCR can do, then there's just very few molecules that you don't have any one single one of them in your body, okay, so that can be thought of as a misuse [unintelligible] claim that it's meaningful.
[cut: video was edited at this point.]
“There's very little of what they call HIV in what's been brought out here by [personal name I can't identify] and [name] already. The measurement for it is not, it's not exact at all; it's not as good as our measurement for things like apples. An apple is an apple. You know, you can get something that's kinda like—if you got enough things that look kind of like an apple and you stick them altogether, you might think it was an apple. And HIV is like that. It's because they're all based on things that are invisible—and they are—the results are inferred in a sense. PCR is separate from that; it's just a process that's used to make a whole lot of something out of something. It doesn't tell you that you're sick and it doesn't tell you that the thing you ended up with really was going to hurt you and—” [video cuts out.]
The video was from the time Kary Mullis was denying HIV causes AIDS, a stance he held to the end of his life. Unfortunately for him he was a biochemist and not an immunologist, so he was operating outside the area of his expertise.
Now, he was absolutely correct in saying PCR could not tell if someone was sick; all it does it amplify molecules. Kary's claim is that if you throw enough molecules into a PCR you'll get something out that looks like what you're looking for. In computers we have the saying, "Garbage in, garbage out," and I believe that's what he was trying to say there.
But is that always the case? In the years since that video was made, we've made a lot of progress in understanding how PCR works. Further, it's the
interpretation of results obtained using PCR that determines if a particular agent it present.
Because cases are based purely on a test result, they are not considered in combination with a clinical diagnosis from a doctor, even though the test clearly isn't a diagnostic test.
Again, you'll need to give me a recent citation that tests done using PCR techniques are not considered diagnostic.
No, in the case of covid they're not being used to amplify DNA sequences, they're being used to test for infection by an alleged RNA virus.
Doh! Yes, it's rather difficult to multiply DNA molecules from something that doesn't have DNA! Ergo, I should have said, "They're an established technology being used for the purpose for which they were invented: amplifying molecular sequences." (RNA is a molecule as well.)
I'd take that with a grain of salt.
Well, you could read the paper. However, my claim, my burden of proof.
Dr. Jessica Watson said:
How accurate are test results?
No test gives a 100% accurate result; tests need to be evaluated to determine their sensitivity and specificity, ideally by comparison with a “gold standard.” The lack of such a clear-cut “gold-standard” for covid-19 testing makes evaluation of test accuracy challenging.
A systematic review of the accuracy of covid-19 tests reported false negative rates of between 2% and 29% (equating to sensitivity of 71-98%), based on negative RT-PCR tests which were positive on repeat testing.6 The use of repeat RT-PCR testing as gold standard is likely to underestimate the true rate of false negatives, as not all patients in the included studies received repeat testing and those with clinically diagnosed covid-19 were not considered as actually having covid-19.6
Accuracy of viral RNA swabs in clinical practice varies depending on the site and quality of sampling. In one study, sensitivity of RT-PCR in 205 patients varied, at 93% for broncho-alveolar lavage, 72% for sputum, 63% for nasal swabs, and only 32% for throat swabs.7 Accuracy is also likely to vary depending on stage of disease8 and degree of viral multiplication or clearance.9 Higher sensitivities are reported depending on which gene targets are used, and whether multiple gene tests are used in combination.310 Reported accuracies are much higher for in vitro studies, which measure performance of primers using coronavirus cell culture in carefully controlled conditions.2
The lack of a clear-cut “gold-standard” is a challenge for evaluating covid-19 tests; pragmatically, clinical adjudication may be the best available “gold standard,” based on repeat swabs, history, and contact with patients known to have covid-19, chest radiographs, and computed tomography scans. Inevitably this introduces some incorporation bias, where the test being evaluated forms part of the reference standard, and this would tend to inflate the measured sensitivity of these tests.11 Disease prevalence can also affect estimates of accuracy: tests developed and evaluated in populations with high prevalence (eg, secondary care) may have lower sensitivity when applied in a lower prevalence setting (eg, primary care).11
One community based study of 4653 close contacts of patients with covid-19 tested RT-PCR throat swabs every 48 hours during a 14 day quarantine period. Of 129 eventually diagnosed with covid-19 by RT-PCR, 92 (71.3%) had a positive test on the first throat swab, equating to a sensitivity of 71% in this lower prevalence, community setting.12
Further evidence and independent validation of covid-19 tests are needed.13 As current studies show marked variation and are likely to overestimate sensitivity, we will use the lower end of current estimates from systematic reviews,6 with the approximate numbers of 70% for sensitivity and 95% for specificity for illustrative purposes.
Source
[MODS: Sorry for the big snip, but I feel it's necessary to address Petra's concerns.]
The claim of genomic sequencing is disputed (see below). Let's say there now is a gold standard. Are you OK with the fact that there wasn't all this time, that a test that wasn't a gold standard was being used by itself to "diagnose" a condition. Surely, if the test was admitted not to be a gold standard a covid case should surely have been determined not by the test alone but in combination with a diagnosis by a doctor.
Who's saying the diagnosis was made solely on the results of the PCR test itself and not by a doctor? Of course, the doctor would probably trust the test result, but he(she) also has a sick patient displaying symptoms that are common to people with COVID. The test is useful to rule out influenza as the sickness.
You will not find disputation of the genomic sequence in a reputable peer-reviewed journal, you will find it places that fact-checkers label "pseudoscience" and "conspiracy theory" or completely ignore. That is a given. If you venture out of the mainstream bubble that is where you are obliged to stick your nose.
In this paper you'll find a section critiquing the science used to create the genome sequence.
https://drsambailey.com/covid-19/the-covid-19-fraud-war-on-humanity/
Therein lies the problem. The sites you're quoting are going against a
vast amount of scientific literature that's been gathered in the now 26 months since news reports first started coming out of China. A search on PubMed for "Sars-Cov-2" returns over 14,000 papers; "COVID-19" returns over 22,500 (there's probably some overlap.) It's not a matter of "Johnny says Suzie started it and Suzy says Johnny started it," it's "Johnny says Suzie started it, and Albert, Brad, Charlene, Donna, Ethan, Fred, George, Harry, Inga, Jim, Kyle, Leona, Mary, Nancy, Oscar, Quentin, Randy, Sarah, Tommy, Ursula, Vickie, Ward, Xander, and Zita all say Johnny stated it. And Johnny's been known to tell whoppers in the past."
If sars-2 exists or if it doesn't, just as if there is a genuine pandemic or not, there will be evidence from a number of angles, not all of them in the scientific realm. What we see are problems in the narrative at every single turn. The suspicion of a new virus in the first place is not based on a scientific foundation. So the narrative starts with fraudulent science! Why would we expect it to right itself?
You started from the get-go with the assumption that the pandemic is a hoax, and it's causing you to remember the hits in your web searches and ignore the misses. Are you aware the pandemic has been covered by pretty much every single media organization on Earth? That scientists the world over are studying this virus? That's over 230 countries with a very diverse set of governments that often don't agree with each other. Yet somehow they all agree there's something out there called COVID-19 and it's killing people. At some point most of us have concluded that there is indeed a fire where all that smoke's coming from.
It's
only the fringe sites that are talking about "plandemic" and COVID hoaxes. And, no, it's not a circular definition where sites are labelled "fringe" because they deny COVID. By and large these sites deny a lot of other things that are accepted by science and the world at large, and they also publish things that are
demonstrably wrong.
I've asked a couple of times on this thread for someone to argue against the claim that the suspicion of a new virus has no scientific foundation. No one has replied yet.
1. UNSCIENTIFIC: SUSPICION OF NEW VIRUS
Suspicion of a "novel" virus is based on an alleged "cluster" of 44 cases of pneumonia of "unknown origin" in the highly-polluted city of Wuhan.
44 cases doesn't make a cluster and pneumonia has many causes - "unknown origin" makes no sense.
Then, if indeed these 44 cases of pneumonia were caused by a novel virus why is the association between pneumonia and the novel virus now completely lost?
https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news/item/2020-DON229
My quick reply: Are you being serious?
That item is from January 5, 2020, days after the first reports came out of China. In fact, at the time China hadn't even notified the WHO about the outbreak, so the organization was operating on very limited information.
Perhaps you should look at this statement from
March 11, 2020: WHO Director-General's opening remarks at the media briefing on COVID-19 - 11 March 2020
WHO Director-General said:
Good afternoon.
In the past two weeks, the number of cases of COVID-19 outside China has increased 13-fold, and the number of affected countries has tripled.
There are now more than 118,000 cases in 114 countries, and 4,291 people have lost their lives.
Thousands more are fighting for their lives in hospitals.
In the days and weeks ahead, we expect to see the number of cases, the number of deaths, and the number of affected countries climb even higher.
WHO has been assessing this outbreak around the clock and we are deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity, and by the alarming levels of inaction.
We have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic.
(Bolding mine)
