Formerly DT: COVID-19 - Featuring Lots of Politics, now CR because political talk not going away

[BradInATX 9208]

This is like the 4th anecdote CHIEF has shared about people getting positive test results in the mail without even taking the test. He either has the unluckiest group of acquaintances on Earth or he's full of shit.

[justhookit 4191]

haha yeah. I mean CDC is already admitting we are way, way way undercounting total cases, but these guys think we are manufacturing positive results and overcounting.

[Enchubben 5512]

5 minutes ago, justhookit said:

haha yeah. I mean CDC is already admitting we are way, way way undercounting total cases, but these guys think we are manufacturing positive results and overcounting.

Not the point I was making. I was pointing out that giving people a false negative would seem to be bad, to very bad. 

[XYZ 2154]

1 hour ago, MNLonghornFUKM said:

Bwahaha.

WTF, dude? That sounds like an evil laugh.

[justhookit 4191]

26 minutes ago, Enchubben said:

Not the point I was making. I was pointing out that giving people a false negative would seem to be bad, to very bad. 

I knew what you were saying and yes. It was the other posters I was referring to.

[Judge Roybeanbag 11821]

At least Austin has a pretty efficient drive thru testing system going, from my experience.  Bar code and ID, and if you don’t follow the rules they send your ass packing.  

[achooloco 1086]

Queens report, need to look up the recent cases/hospitalization trends but after 2 big bars got shut down, the last week or so has been relatively calm. Sheriffs are out again in force and even the eastern euros are trying to be less rowdy. Looks like Stein-AMi got shutdown. ... at least as of 930pm 

[MNLonghornFUKM 8823]

WTF, dude? That sounds like an evil laugh.

Muahahaha sounds eviler

[Sawbonz 27662]

On 7/23/2020 at 7:42 PM, Beau Vine said:

1234

Edited July 25, 2020 by Sawbonz

[Trey3216 15379]

Perhaps schools should call football games anti-“insert rival” protests and allow fans into the games.  Can’t be more dangerous than shit like this...

 

 

[bolverk 29738]

1 hour ago, Trey3216 said:

Perhaps schools should call football games anti-“insert rival” protests and allow fans into the games.  Can’t be more dangerous than shit like this...

 

 

Fancy that. Here we have one of the most vocal "no politics!" posters quoting a tweet from a conservative political commentator known for lying about the coronavirus and who hosts a show on the most right wing cable news network, OANN, where she is lying about not being able to attend mass in her place of residence, San Diego.

https://www.10news.com/news/local-news/churches-hold-sunday-services-outdoors

Edit: Trey, an avid fan of Texas football, is also implying that fans won't be allowed into football games when it was recently announced they will but at reduced capacity.

Why would he make such a comment about people exercising their First Amendment rights at a political protest by quoting a political commentator who is lying about not being able to excercise her First Amendment rights? 

What could possibly be the motivation?

Edited July 25, 2020 by bolverk

[Trey3216 15379]

3 hours ago, bolverk said:

Fancy that. Here we have one of the most vocal "no politics!" posters quoting a tweet from a conservative political commentator known for lying about the coronavirus and who hosts a show on the most right wing cable news network, OANN, where she is lying about not being able to attend mass in her place of residence, San Diego.

https://www.10news.com/news/local-news/churches-hold-sunday-services-outdoors

Edit: Trey, an avid fan of Texas football, is also implying that fans won't be allowed into football games when it was recently announced they will but at reduced capacity.

Why would he make such a comment about people exercising their First Amendment rights at a political protest by quoting a political commentator who is lying about not being able to excercise her First Amendment rights? 

What could possibly be the motivation?

Just funny how some things are ok, and some things aren’t.  Fuck you.   I don’t care about the twitter poster, don’t even know who it is.  But the fact that some things are encouraged and others shunned is an absolute abomination of critical thinking.  Apparently you are lacking such as well.  
 

I was not making a political statement, I was making a reality statement.  
 

Why is it ok for people to gather en masse like that but not go sit on a patio at a brewery, or drive on the beach, or...?   
 

be safe and conscious of others, I know I am following the rules and doing so.   
 

 

[bolverk 29738]

27 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

Just funny how some things are ok, and some things aren’t.  Fuck you.   I don’t care about the twitter poster, don’t even know who it is.  But the fact that some things are encouraged and others shunned is an absolute abomination of critical thinking.  Apparently you are lacking such as well.  
 

I was not making a political statement, I was making a reality statement.  
 

Why is it ok for people to gather en masse like that but not go sit on a patio at a brewery, or drive on the beach, or...?   
 

be safe and conscious of others, I know I am following the rules and doing so.   
 

 

[dcar00 14382]

5 hours ago, Trey3216 said:

Perhaps schools should call football games anti-“insert rival” protests and allow fans into the games.  Can’t be more dangerous than shit like this...

 

 

Did that actually happen recently?  I have to believe that video has to be before March right?  holy shit.

[atomheartbevo 89858]

Get ready for a new influx of stupid shit you see on Facebook.

Sinclair networks are airing a show giving a nutter a platform to push Qanon-levels of regardery - that Dr. Fauci is responsible for covid.  The host and a doctor talk about it later on, that it's probably not true, but they run that fucking chyron over the segment with the qanon nutter.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/24/media/sinclair-fauci-conspiracy-bolling/index.html

Quote

Local television stations owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group are set to air a conspiracy theory over the weekend that suggests Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top expert on infectious diseases, was responsible for the creation of the coronavirus.

The baseless conspiracy theory is set to air on stations across the country in a segment during the program "America This Week" hosted by Eric Bolling. The show, which is posted online before it is broadcast over the weekend, is distributed to Sinclair Broadcast Group's network of local television stations, one of the largest in the country.

Quote

A survey by Pew Research Groupearlier this year showed that local news was a vital source of information on the coronavirus for many Americans, and more trusted than the media overall.

Quote

In this week's episode of the show, Bolling spoke with Judy Mikovits, the medical researcher featured in the discredited "Plandemic" video that went viral earlier this year and which was banned from platforms such as Facebook and YouTube. Throughout the segment, the on-screen graphic read, "DID DR. FAUCI CREATE COVID-19?"

• Abilene - KTXS/KTES - ABC (airs Sunday afternoon)
• Amarillo - KVII - ABC
• Austin - KEYE - CBS (airs at 10:35pm)
• Beaumont/Port A - KBTV/KFBM - CBS / Fox
• Corpus Christi - KSCC - Fox
• El Paso - KDBC - CBS (airs tomorrow) 
• Harlingen/RGV - KGBT - Indie
• San Angelo - KTXE - ABC (airs tonight)
• San Antonio - KMYS / KABB / WOAI - CW / Fox / NBC (tomorrow night at 10pm after the news on KABB)

Looked at 5 stations, all 5 are airing it.  And the official description on these sites is all the same (they are pulling from the same feed obviously):   A mix of fact-based journalism and analysis of world events. Host Eric Bolling.

So fucking lovely, a shitload of (older) Texans are about to watch this.  And they'll just be asking questions on FB.  

 

[dcar00 14382]

4 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Get ready for a new influx of stupid shit you see on Facebook.

Sinclair networks are airing a show giving a nutter a platform to push Qanon-levels of regardery - that Dr. Fauci is responsible for covid.  The host and a doctor talk about it later on, that it's probably not true, but they run that fucking chyron over the segment with the qanon nutter.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/24/media/sinclair-fauci-conspiracy-bolling/index.html

• Abilene - KTXS/KTES - ABC (airs Sunday afternoon)
• Amarillo - KVII - ABC
• Austin - KEYE - CBS (airs at 10:35pm)
• Beaumont/Port A - KBTV/KFBM - CBS / Fox
• Corpus Christi - KSCC - Fox
• El Paso - KDBC - CBS (airs tomorrow) 
• Harlingen/RGV - KGBT - Indie
• San Angelo - KTXE - ABC (airs tonight)
• San Antonio - KMYS / KABB / WOAI - CW / Fox / NBC (tomorrow night at 10pm after the news on KABB)

Looked at 5 stations, all 5 are airing it.  And the official description on these sites is all the same (they are pulling from the same feed obviously):   A mix of fact-based journalism and analysis of world events. Host Eric Bolling.

So fucking lovely, a shitload of (older) Texans are about to watch this.  And they'll just be asking questions on FB.  

 

of course thats stupid but why do you care what happens on FB?

[Guest Lobo]

Because the dumb shit people read on Facebook and hear on Sinclair-owned tv stations ends up effecting their behavior.  Which, during a viral pandemic that is now community spread, severely impacts my life and that of my family's.  

Just as local news broadcasts were gaining some respect again for relaying important, factual information about how the virus was spreading in/around communities...this shit has to happen.  You wanna see another flare up in this country?  Watch what happens 10-15 days from now in those Sinclair markets.  Marked spikes in at least half of them.  

It's like we taught my sister:  Mask.  Distance.  Home.  Soap.  Safe. 

She can repeat the five simple steps long after I repeated them to her.  Not bad for a mentally retarded person with Down's Syndrome.  

Every time I think we can't handle this thing any worse, some science-denying shitbag comes along, picks up a Sinclair microphone and says, "Hold my Mask."  

 

 

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

49 minutes ago, dcar00 said:

of course thats stupid but why do you care what happens on FB?

Uhhh, because we’re fighting a public health crisis while simultaneously dealing with a big segment of the population that believes this type of bullshit? The latter is just as big of a problem as the former.

[Js1 85635]

1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:

Get ready for a new influx of stupid shit you see on Facebook.

Sinclair networks are airing a show giving a nutter a platform to push Qanon-levels of regardery - that Dr. Fauci is responsible for covid.  The host and a doctor talk about it later on, that it's probably not true, but they run that fucking chyron over the segment with the qanon nutter.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/24/media/sinclair-fauci-conspiracy-bolling/index.html

• Abilene - KTXS/KTES - ABC (airs Sunday afternoon)
• Amarillo - KVII - ABC
• Austin - KEYE - CBS (airs at 10:35pm)
• Beaumont/Port A - KBTV/KFBM - CBS / Fox
• Corpus Christi - KSCC - Fox
• El Paso - KDBC - CBS (airs tomorrow) 
• Harlingen/RGV - KGBT - Indie
• San Angelo - KTXE - ABC (airs tonight)
• San Antonio - KMYS / KABB / WOAI - CW / Fox / NBC (tomorrow night at 10pm after the news on KABB)

Looked at 5 stations, all 5 are airing it.  And the official description on these sites is all the same (they are pulling from the same feed obviously):   A mix of fact-based journalism and analysis of world events. Host Eric Bolling.

So fucking lovely, a shitload of (older) Texans are about to watch this.  And they'll just be asking questions on FB.  

 

Eric Bolling who got fired from Fox News for sending dick pics to colleagues? 😂

[dcar00 14382]

27 minutes ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

Uhhh, because we’re fighting a public health crisis while simultaneously dealing with a big segment of the population that believes this type of bullshit? The latter is just as big of a problem as the former.

uh, again, who gives a shit what happens on facebook? anyone on facebook is an idiot.

[atomheartbevo 89858]

1 hour ago, dcar00 said:

of course thats stupid but why do you care what happens on FB?

22 minutes ago, dcar00 said:

uh, again, who gives a shit what happens on facebook? anyone on facebook is an idiot.

It's already been answered, but yeah, there are too many folks who get their news from FB, or from local stations - that's not necessarily bad - a lot of times local stations will run much better coverage that's actually useful.  But in this case, these aren't local stations deciding, this a nation-wide syndicate that wants this shit out there.  There was a thread on the old site covering it, don't remember if it was in DT/CR.

And when I looked at just a few of those stations' schedules, almost all of them were running after the local news.    Who watches local news at night?  The olds.

So Aunt Edna is going to run with that story.  And will spread it on FB to her friends.  

 

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

23 minutes ago, dcar00 said:

uh, again, who gives a shit what happens on facebook? anyone on facebook is an idiot.

The idiots on Facebook are the problem. Where did we lose you here?

[dcar00 14382]

28 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

It's already been answered, but yeah, there are too many folks who get their news from FB, or from local stations - that's not necessarily bad - a lot of times local stations will run much better coverage that's actually useful.  But in this case, these aren't local stations deciding, this a nation-wide syndicate that wants this shit out there.  There was a thread on the old site covering it, don't remember if it was in DT/CR.

And when I looked at just a few of those stations' schedules, almost all of them were running after the local news.    Who watches local news at night?  The olds.

So Aunt Edna is going to run with that story.  And will spread it on FB to her friends.  

 

so old people on facebook are the problem?

[Js1 85635]

38 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

It's already been answered, but yeah, there are too many folks who get their news from FB, or from local stations - that's not necessarily bad - a lot of times local stations will run much better coverage that's actually useful.  But in this case, these aren't local stations deciding, this a nation-wide syndicate that wants this shit out there.  There was a thread on the old site covering it, don't remember if it was in DT/CR.

And when I looked at just a few of those stations' schedules, almost all of them were running after the local news.    Who watches local news at night?  The olds.

So Aunt Edna is going to run with that story.  And will spread it on FB to her friends.  

 

They cancelled it. 

 

[atomheartbevo 89858]

30 minutes ago, Js1 said:

They cancelled it. 

 

I'm surprised they backed down.

Although they are just delaying it.

Instead of just removing the fucking chyron.

[Telegraph_it 3360]

This is ballgame.

 

 

[Trey3216 15379]

6 hours ago, bolverk said:

You could go back to the first few pages of this shitfuck of a thread and know that I was one of the people reading shit about this dumbass virus and warning about it, and about how the market was gonna be fucked from it (until brrrrrrrrtttttttt of course).  I’ve eaten at restaurants a few times this summer, but not that often.   I’ve seen my parents twice in 6 months.  I’ve met my nephew 1 time since fucking march.  My wife is 7 months pregnant and I’ve done all the shopping for our family, for her mom, and her grandfather since this shit has started.  I’ve spent about 6-8 hours/wk helping transport food to my church and from the church to needy families.  I don’t give a shit what you believe right now. 

[bolverk 29738]

17 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

You could go back to the first few pages of this shitfuck of a thread and know that I was one of the people reading shit about this dumbass virus and warning about it, and about how the market was gonna be fucked from it (until brrrrrrrrtttttttt of course).  I’ve eaten at restaurants a few times this summer, but not that often.   I’ve seen my parents twice in 6 months.  I’ve met my nephew 1 time since fucking march.  My wife is 7 months pregnant and I’ve done all the shopping for our family, for her mom, and her grandfather since this shit has started.  I’ve spent about 6-8 hours/wk helping transport food to my church and from the church to needy families.  I don’t give a shit what you believe right now. 

Never took you for a denier and good on you for taking care of your family. Seriously.

I was specifically calling you out for posting a political tweet from an extremely biased and unreliable commentator, whose glib remark within that tweet was an outright lie.

You'd have to be extremely naive or a moron to not realize that tweet was making a political point. Going by your standards, it's okay to start posting shit by Maddow and other liberal commentators on divisive political issues and how they relate to Covid, including any lies they might tell.

Sorry that I hurt your feelings so bad you felt compelled to neg me for casting shade on your source and doubting your motivations.

[Sawbonz 27662]

1 hour ago, Telegraph_it said:

This is ballgame.

 

 

RIP

[Trey3216 15379]

2 minutes ago, bolverk said:

Never took you for a denier and good on you for taking care of your family. Seriously.

I was specifically calling you out for posting a political tweet from an extremely biased and unreliable commentator, whose glib remark within that tweet was an outright lie.

You'd have to be extremely naive or a moron to not realize that tweet was making a political point. Going by your standards, it's okay to start posting shit by Maddow and other liberal commentators on divisive political issues and how they relate to Covid, including any lies they might tell.

Sorry that I hurt your feelings so bad you felt compelled to neg me for casting shade on your source and doubting your motivations.

I honestly have no idea who that person was, I posted it solely for the video content, which goes against everything many here fight about.  Yet, it’s rarely shunned because of what it’s about, rather than what is going on.  That was my argument

[dcar00 14382]

16 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

I honestly have no idea who that person was, I posted it solely for the video content, which goes against everything many here fight about.  Yet, it’s rarely shunned because of what it’s about, rather than what is going on.  That was my argument

some large groups of people closely congregating, yelling and singing, with no masks are OK, some are not.  its just the way it is.

[BradInATX 9208]

5 minutes ago, dcar00 said:

some large groups of people closely congregating, yelling and singing, with no masks are OK, some are not.  its just the way it is.

If you don't like Facebook why are you trying to turn this thread into it?

[B00M 6491]

12 hours ago, bolverk said:

Never took you for a denier and good on you for taking care of your family. Seriously.

I was specifically calling you out for posting a political tweet from an extremely biased and unreliable commentator, whose glib remark within that tweet was an outright lie.

You'd have to be extremely naive or a moron to not realize that tweet was making a political point. Going by your standards, it's okay to start posting shit by Maddow and other liberal commentators on divisive political issues and how they relate to Covid, including any lies they might tell.

Sorry that I hurt your feelings so bad you felt compelled to neg me for casting shade on your source and doubting your motivations.

 

While many of us would love to hate fuck Liz, it's also very believable that most of us have no fucking clue who she is

[bolverk 29738]

8 minutes ago, B00M said:

 

While many of us would love to hate fuck Liz, it's also very believable that most of us have no fucking clue who she is

I didn't either beforehand but I like to fact check and look up sources, especially for political gotcha shit.

[Skipper 6210]

Welp, the fact MLB is having to cancel games after 1 f'n weekend doesn't bode well for college football.

[bolverk 29738]

Wasn't sure whether to put this in the medical thread but decided to put it here for a wider audience.

There are six different ‘types’ of COVID-19, researchers say
The discovery could help doctors predict earlier on which patients are most at-risk
Researchers have determined that there are six different “types” of COVID-19, all that have varying degrees of symptoms and severity, according to a study from King’s College London.

Although the discovery may seem daunting, the study’s findings could actually help doctors predict earlier on which patients are most at-risk and likely to be hospitalized, compared to others who may not suffer from severe symptoms.

Typically, the three key symptoms of the coronavirus include cough, fever and loss of smell, according to a report from CBS News.

However, data from the study indicates that COVID-19 symptoms can also range from headaches, muscle pains, fatigue, diarrhea, confusion, loss of appetite, shortness of breathe, and more.

“These findings have important implications for care and monitoring of people who are most vulnerable to severe COVID-19,” said Dr Claire Steves from King’s College London in a statement. “If you can predict who these people are at day five, you have time to give them support and early interventions such as monitoring blood oxygen and sugar levels, and ensuring they are properly hydrated - simple care that could be given at home, preventing hospitalizations and saving lives.”

According to the study, researchers have identified six different groupings of COVID-19 symptoms, as listed below.

1. ‘Flu-like’ with no fever: Headache, loss of smell, muscle pains, cough, sore throat, chest pain, no fever.
2. ‘Flu-like’ with fever: Headache, loss of smell, cough, sore throat, hoarseness, fever, loss of appetite.
3. Gastrointestinal: Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, diarrhea, sore throat, chest pain, no cough.
4. Severe level one, fatigue: Headache, loss of smell, cough, fever, hoarseness, chest pain, fatigue.
5. Severe level two, confusion: Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, cough, fever, hoarseness, sore throat, chest pain, fatigue, confusion, muscle pain.
6. Severe level three, abdominal and respiratory: Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, cough, fever, hoarseness, sore throat, chest pain, fatigue, confusion, muscle pain, shortness of breath, diarrhea, abdominal pain.

The discovery of these six different sets of COVID-19 symptoms was developed after researchers used a machine learning algorithm to analyze data they received from an estimated 1,600 users in the United Kingdom and the United States with confirmed COVID-19.

Each of the users regularly logged their symptoms using the app in March and April, according to the study.

Researchers said only 1.5% of patients with cluster 1, 4.4% of people with cluster 2 and 3.3% of people with cluster 3 required breathing support. Whereas, 8.6%, 9.9% and 19.8% for clusters 4, 5, and 6 were reported, respectively.

Nearly half of the patients in cluster 6 ended up in the hospital, compared to just 16% in cluster 1, according to the study.

To read the full study, click here.

[Hate 20149]

I didn't either beforehand but I like to fact check and look up sources, especially for political gotcha shit.

Did the event occur? Is it worthy of condemnation during a pandemic? Is it any different than posts about people gathering at lakes, tubing on rivers, or enjoying water parks?

[bolverk 29738]

22 minutes ago, Hate said:

Did the event occur? Is it worthy of condemnation during a pandemic? Is it any different than posts about people gathering at lakes, tubing on rivers, or enjoying water parks?

I never disputed the stupidity of people dancing around in close quarters with masks pulled down around their necks. My complaint was about quoting the tweeter twat making gotcha political commentary about the protests in the "no politics" thread and pointed out that she was lying about not being able to attend mass in San Diego as part of that effort.

I probably wouldn't have made a post about it, but I first wanted to know where in the US people were not allowed to go to church so I googled who she was and saw that she was a political commentator on OAN who had already been called out several times for lying. Then, I found on her linkedin that she lived in San Diego, where OAN is headquartered, and googled CHURCH + MASS + SAN DIEGO and found the recent news story about services were being held outdoors.

I questioned his motives for posting the tweet because how the "fuck do you come across that tweet?" unless you are either a) following her account or b) found it through another presumably conservative source who had retweeted it?

The fact is that she was lying about not being able to attend mass in San Diego to score a political point and Trey repeated it here to either naively, or intentionally, spread misinformation with the motivation to mock political protesters in Portland. I certainly have never seen him post anything to make fun of the mask protesting Covidiots or entitled Karens/Kevins freaking out at stores.

Edited July 27, 2020 by bolverk

[Cheeseweasel 26438]

On 7/25/2020 at 6:57 PM, Telegraph_it said:

This is ballgame.

 

 

Good think Kim is immune. Not having a butthole has it's advantages.

[Hate 20149]

And those are all good points. Thank you for the explanation. Sometimes logic gets lost in all of the shout downs here. I have no idea who the “tweeter” is or what their history is. I don’t watch OAN, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, etc so I have no idea who these “reporters” are or what their agendas may be. I usually try to react based on the video I witnessed rather than who posted it and why.

[Hank Scorpio 17731]

 

 

[bolverk 29738]

33 minutes ago, Hate said:

And those are all good points. Thank you for the explanation. Sometimes logic gets lost in all of the shout downs here. I have no idea who the “tweeter” is or what their history is. I don’t watch OAN, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, etc so I have no idea who these “reporters” are or what their agendas may be. I usually try to react based on the video I witnessed rather than who posted it and why.

I cut the cord over ten years ago and am also often at a loss on reporters, which likely explains why I'm pretty compulsive about looking up sources. The only time I ever catch any cable news is at a hotel when on the road or at my parents' place. 

[PenelopeWitherspoon 19171]

This is fun.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/27/science/coronavirus-retracted-studies-data.html?action=click&module=Top Stories&pgtype=Homepage

[MNLonghornFUKM 8823]

This is fun.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/27/science/coronavirus-retracted-studies-data.html?action=click&module=Top Stories&pgtype=Homepage

This is stupid

[Incredulity 11684]

32 minutes ago, PenelopeWitherspoon said:

This is fun.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/27/science/coronavirus-retracted-studies-data.html?action=click&module=Top Stories&pgtype=Homepage

this is paywall

 

can you paste?

[clapclapclap 9000]

 

[justhookit 4191]

That’s probably taking your job title a little too seriously.

Edited July 27, 2020 by justhookit

[Brisketexan 105465]

7 minutes ago, justhookit said:

That’s probably taking your job a little too seriously.

We should just be grateful they don't have a Domestic Violence Compliance Official on staff.  Shit woulda happened that would make Ike Turner blush.

[gyroprotagonist 2595]

41 minutes ago, clapclapclap said:

 

I want the "making sure players don't rent a yacht with strippers and blow" control officer job.  Shirley that's a thing for the Vikings, right?

[PenelopeWitherspoon 19171]

1 hour ago, Incredulity said:

this is paywall

 

can you paste?

The Doctor Behind the Disputed Covid Data

Dr. Sapan Desai, who supplied the data for two prominent and later retracted studies, is said to have a history of cutting corners and misrepresenting information in pursuit of his ambitions.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Desai during a 2015 training simulation at the Memorial Center for Learning and Innovation in Springfield, Ill.Credit...Rich Saal/The State Journal-Register, via USA TODAY NETWORK

By Ellen Gabler and Roni Caryn Rabin

• July 27, 2020Updated 12:39 p.m. ET
• •  
  •  
  •  
  • 257

A college degree at 19. A medical school graduate with a Ph.D. at 27.

By the time he completed training in vascular surgery in 2014, Dr. Sapan Desai had cast himself as an ambitious physician, an entrepreneur with an M.B.A. and a prolific researcher published in medical journals.

Then the novel coronavirus hit and Dr. Desai seized the moment. With a Harvard professor, he produced two studies in May that almost instantly disrupted multiple clinical trials amid the pandemic.

One study’s findings were particularly dramatic, reporting that anti-malaria drugs like hydroxychloroquine, which President Trump promoted, were linked to increased deaths of Covid-19 patients. But that study and another were retracted in June by the renowned journals that had published them, weeks after researchers around the world suggested the data was dubious. Dr. Desai, who declined to share the raw information even with his co-authors, claimed it was culled from a massive trove acquired by Surgisphere, a business he started during his residency.

The now-tainted studies helped sow confusion and erode public confidence in scientific guidance when the nation was already deeply divided over how to respond to the pandemic. And the anti-malaria drugs cited in the papers have continued to generate controversy, as new research prompted some scientists to petition for expanding their use against the coronavirus, despite Food and Drug Administration warnings against them.

 

ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

 

While the journal debacle has shaken the broader scientific community, many people who have known Dr. Desai, 41, described him as a man in a hurry, a former whiz kid willing to cut corners, misrepresent information or embellish his credentials as he pursued his ambitions.

In interviews, more than a dozen doctors who worked with him during training and residency said they had often found him to be an unreliable physician, who seemed less interested in patient care than in the medical journal he founded and his company, branded early on as a medical publishing business.

“You couldn’t trust what he said,” said Dr. Vanessa Olcese, a former chief resident who worked with Dr. Desai at Duke University Medical Center. “You would verify everything that he did and take everything he did with a grain of salt.”

His performance there and during a later fellowship at the University of Texas Health Science Center raised questions about whether he would be permitted to move to the next level of training. In both instances, he was.

 

 

 

Image

 

Dr. Sapan Desai.Credit... 

More recently, in February, Dr. Desai left his job at a community hospital in a Chicago suburb where he had worked as a surgeon since 2016. He was named as a defendant in three medical malpractice lawsuits last year, court records show. His spokeswoman said he “deems any lawsuit naming him to be unfounded.”

Editors’ Picks

The Great Climate Migration Has Begun

He’s 83, She’s 84, and They Model Other People’s Forgotten Laundry

Overlooked No More: Nancy Green, the ‘Real Aunt Jemima’

Continue reading the main story

 

ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

 

The New York Times interviewed more than two dozen people who have known Dr. Desai over the past two decades.

Dr. Desai, who declined to be interviewed for this article and did not respond to repeated requests for comment, has defended his company’s data. In an interview in late May, he said it was his “life’s work” to build a company that could provide lifesaving clinical insights to make “the world a better place.”

“We did this because it was an opportunity to help. We’re not making any money from this,” he said. “This is why I went into medicine.”

Latest Updates: Global Coronavirus Outbreak

 

Updated 16m ago

• Republicans seek to slash expiring jobless payments by two-thirds as part of $1 trillion recovery bill.
• Trump’s national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, tested positive.
• A late-stage trial of a potential vaccine will enroll people at 89 sites around the United States.

See more updates

More live coverage: Markets

‘A Giant Roadblock’

Dr. Desai was always a striver. During high school in the Chicago suburbs, he took 13 Advanced Placement classes, according to an article in The Daily Herald, a local newspaper. He acquired enough college credits to graduate from the University of Illinois at Chicago at 19.

“His goal was to be the first person at U.I.C. that ever graduated college in one year,” said Peter Okkema, a biology professor in whose lab the young undergraduate worked. He seemed eager to impress people, the professor recalled, but never sought advice or guidance.

He entered a joint M.D.-Ph.D. program at the university; his doctoral adviser, Prof. Anna Lysakowski, remembers him as “very bright, very quick.” She also said he told her he was enrolled at John Marshall Law School. (The school has no record of him, a spokeswoman said, and the degree is not on his résumé.) Several doctors who knew Dr. Desai after he moved to Duke for his residency in 2006 recalled his saying he had a law degree and described his license plate listing his supposed credentials: M.D., J.D. and Ph.D.

 

ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

 

Over the next five years, his performance and a pattern of behavior at the North Carolina hospital worried colleagues, according to physicians who worked with him there.

In interviews, Drs. Olcese, Mani Daneshmand, Dawn Elfenbein and 10 others — who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media or feared retribution from their employers or Duke — said there were broad concerns inside the surgery department about Dr. Desai.

 

 

 

 

Image

Several physicians who worked with Dr. Desai during his residency at Duke University Medical Center said it became standard practice to double check anything he said about a patient.Credit...Pete Kiehart for The New York Times

The doctors, many of whom were also residents, said they could not trust information he provided about patients’ medical conditions or test results. Several doctors said it became standard practice to double check anything Dr. Desai said about a patient, such as how the person had fared overnight or whether a test had been ordered.

Several former colleagues said that often he did not follow through on directives about treating patients, and that when he was questioned about it, he sometimes passed blame or offered implausible explanations.

In one instance, Dr. Desai did not respond to pages from nurses during an overnight shift while on call, recalled Dr. Olcese. When she asked about the missed pages, he said he had been resuscitating an infant by performing a rare, complicated procedure — an incident the charge nurse said never occurred, according to Dr. Olcese and another doctor present for Dr. Desai’s explanation.

“He was essentially a giant roadblock that you had to work around,” said Dr. Olcese, now a neurocritical care doctor at Wexner Medical Center in Columbus, Ohio. “You didn’t want him to bring you down with him.”

 

ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

 

In 2008 or early 2009, Dr. Olcese and another chief resident shared concerns about Dr. Desai with their supervisors — senior physicians and faculty at Duke — during discussions about whether to promote him to the next year of residency. It is unclear what the faculty members discussed during their private deliberations, but ultimately, Dr. Desai was moved up. A Duke spokeswoman would confirm only his time there.

After his residency, Dr. Desai obtained an M.B.A. in three months from Western Governors University, an online university based in Salt Lake City, the school confirmed. Then, after starting a vascular surgery fellowship at the University of Texas at Houston, he ran into trouble. He had so antagonized some supervisors that they asked the department chairman to expel him, said Dr. Hazim Safi, who was then in that role.

“Some of the attending staff didn’t like his behavior, and didn’t want him to graduate,” Dr. Safi said in an interview.

While Dr. Safi said that Dr. Desai could be abrasive, he had worked on papers with the younger physician and was convinced the complaints were driven by personality differences and professional jealousy, not substantive deficiencies in surgical skill or patient care. Instead of failing him, he said, he gave Dr. Desai an opportunity to work on his professionalism and interpersonal skills.

“I intervened and he graduated,” the former chairman said.

At Dr. Desai’s most recent post at Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights, Ill., he became involved in at least four medical malpractice cases that are still pending, including three filed in 2019.

Those suits include a claim that he failed to properly perform surgery to restore circulation to an accident victim’s leg, which later required partial amputation. Another alleges that negligent treatment by Dr. Desai and other doctors resulted in the removal of a substantial portion of a patient’s bowel.

The Coronavirus Outbreak ›

Frequently Asked Questions

Updated July 27, 2020

• Should I refinance my mortgage?

  • It could be a good idea, because mortgage rates have never been lower. Refinancing requests have pushed mortgage applications to some of the highest levels since 2008, so be prepared to get in line. But defaults are also up, so if you’re thinking about buying a home, be aware that some lenders have tightened their standards.

• What is school going to look like in September?

  • It is unlikely that many schools will return to a normal schedule this fall, requiring the grind of online learning, makeshift child care and stunted workdays to continue. California’s two largest public school districts — Los Angeles and San Diego — said on July 13, that instruction will be remote-only in the fall, citing concerns that surging coronavirus infections in their areas pose too dire a risk for students and teachers. Together, the two districts enroll some 825,000 students. They are the largest in the country so far to abandon plans for even a partial physical return to classrooms when they reopen in August. For other districts, the solution won’t be an all-or-nothing approach. Many systems, including the nation’s largest, New York City, are devising hybrid plans that involve spending some days in classrooms and other days online. There’s no national policy on this yet, so check with your municipal school system regularly to see what is happening in your community.

• Is the coronavirus airborne?

  • The coronavirus can stay aloft for hours in tiny droplets in stagnant air, infecting people as they inhale, mounting scientific evidence suggests. This risk is highest in crowded indoor spaces with poor ventilation, and may help explain super-spreading events reported in meatpacking plants, churches and restaurants. It’s unclear how often the virus is spread via these tiny droplets, or aerosols, compared with larger droplets that are expelled when a sick person coughs or sneezes, or transmitted through contact with contaminated surfaces, said Linsey Marr, an aerosol expert at Virginia Tech. Aerosols are released even when a person without symptoms exhales, talks or sings, according to Dr. Marr and more than 200 other experts, who have outlined the evidence in an open letter to the World Health Organization.

• What are the symptoms of coronavirus?

  • Common symptoms include fever, a dry cough, fatigue and difficulty breathing or shortness of breath. Some of these symptoms overlap with those of the flu, making detection difficult, but runny noses and stuffy sinuses are less common. The C.D.C. has also added chills, muscle pain, sore throat, headache and a new loss of the sense of taste or smell as symptoms to look out for. Most people fall ill five to seven days after exposure, but symptoms may appear in as few as two days or as many as 14 days.

• Does asymptomatic transmission of Covid-19 happen?

  • So far, the evidence seems to show it does. A widely cited paper published in April suggests that people are most infectious about two days before the onset of coronavirus symptoms and estimated that 44 percent of new infections were a result of transmission from people who were not yet showing symptoms. Recently, a top expert at the World Health Organization stated that transmission of the coronavirus by people who did not have symptoms was “very rare,” but she later walked back that statement.

 

 

The earlier case against the hospital contends that Dr. Desai performed surgery in 2016 to remove plaque buildup from a 60-year-old man’s carotid artery, then failed to come to the hospital after he developed swelling in his neck that caused difficulty swallowing and breathing. The patient later died.

 

ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

 

Big Data, Big Dreams

By the time Dr. Desai left the hospital earlier this year — a hospital spokeswoman said he voluntarily resigned for personal reasons — the novel coronavirus was raging in China and spreading to other countries.

For Dr. Desai, whose entrepreneurial projects had grown to include a health data analytics company, the crisis was an opportunity to fulfill his dream of using big data to study outcomes and improve care. The public’s appetite for information was insatiable and journals were publishing studies faster than ever.

 

 

 

 

Image

 

A screenshot of the Surgisphere website, which has been taken down.Credit... 

Over the years, Surgisphere had developed a product called QuartzClinical that offered health centers a platform using data analytics to improve outcomes. Dr. Desai said the product had enabled Surgisphere to amass a giant registry with anonymized electronic health records from more than 1,200 hospitals and health centers, with data about more than 240 million patient encounters in 45 countries.

While the existence of the database has not been confirmed — Dr. Desai cited contractual obligations to keep confidential the identities of participating hospitals — he said he had been building it for a decade with fewer than a dozen employees. Few people were needed, he said, because hospitals could easily input anonymized patient data from disparate electronic health record systems, translating the information into a single, homogenized registry without technical assistance.

One former Surgisphere employee, Ariane Anderson, was surprised by Dr. Desai’s assertion, given the difficulties of combining information from disparate institutions with various electronic records systems. Ms. Anderson, who was hired to market QuartzClinical to hospitals and other health centers in 2019, said in an interview that generating interest in the company had been an uphill battle, and that entering data into Surgisphere’s system was laborious. When one hospital wanted to try out the system last July, she said, she spent two days there extracting data from a sampling of 200 patients to put into a spreadsheet.

By the end of 2019, Ms. Anderson said, she knew of only one hospital that had signed a contract with QuartzClinical, declining to identify it.

 

ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

 

The new coronavirus put the company on the map. One of Dr. Desai’s projects early this year was to develop a Covid-19 severity scoring tool using data he said came from tens of thousands of registry patients. He offered the tool free to a nonprofit based in Cape Town, South Africa, saying it could identify high-risk patients and help allocate scarce medical resources in remote areas. (The group, the African Federation for Emergency Medicine, rescinded its endorsement of the tool after the studies were retracted.)

Dr. Desai also teamed up with Dr. Mandeep Mehra, a Harvard Medical School professor, and several others to turn out papers about Covid-19 that were ostensibly based on the patient registry. In May, he won the equivalent of academic medicine’s jackpot: publication in two of the world’s most prestigious journals.

The first paper, citing data from 8,910 Covid patients at 169 hospitals in Asia, North America and Europe, reported that cardiovascular disease increased the risk of bad outcomes, but put to rest concerns that blood pressure medications were harmful (it even seemed to suggest a benefit). It was published May 1 in The New England Journal of Medicine.

 

 

 

 

Image

 

One of the retracted studies was on anti-malaria drugs like hydroxychloroquine.Credit...George Frey/Reuters

The next paper, published May 22 in The Lancet, evaluated anti-malaria drugs that Mr. Trump has promoted as antidotes to the coronavirus. The researchers claimed to have analyzed the outcomes of nearly 100,000 Covid-19 patients from 671 hospitals on six continents. The results were sensational: Patients treated with chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine were up to five times as likely to have abnormal heart rhythms as other patients — and were at higher risk of dying.

Though it was an observational study, considered to provide relatively weak scientific evidence, the paper’s impact was felt around the world. A physician commenting on CNN called it “the mother of all studies,” and investigators including the World Health Organization halted clinical trials of the drugs. (Some have since resumed.)

The paper soon drew scrutiny from scientists who demanded to know more about the data and began questioning the New England Journal study too. Dr. Desai’s co-authors, conceding they had never seen the raw data, called for an independent review, but Dr. Desai balked, invoking confidentiality agreements. On June 4, both journals retracted the studies.

Surgisphere’s flashy website has been dismantled. Dr. Desai, who gave several interviews before the studies were retracted, has gone silent.

Research was contributed by Susan C. Beachy, Alain Delaquérière, Jack Begg and Sheelagh McNeill.

 

 

Ellen Gabler is an investigative reporter for The New York Times. @egabler