When those pleading to follow the science are the science-deniers…

We have reached a condition in this country where clearly the powers and the media want to retain their influence over the populace amid the growing great news of the progress with the pandemic. As the death rate and infections are plummeting, there is an insistence that the country stay cloistered, residents remain scared, and we need to ignore the good reports. We have reached the point where the so-called experts who long-insisted we adhere to science are now denying science in order to maintain control of the narrative.

Of course, this springs off the current lightning rod in the media, Florida’s Ron DeSantis. Last month, the governor held a panel discussion with health experts to discuss what the state should do moving forward. The policy forum was videotaped and began to be shared across social media, including news outlets. The video has since been taken down by YouTube, due to the video outlet’s standards of misinformation.

That ’’misinformation’’ is clearly less about scientific or medical accuracy than it is in preserving the overriding Covid-response narrative. YouTube initially took down the video when it became labeled as problematic not by a series of doctors, but by the video platform’s internal standards officers. This means we have platforms now overriding the words and advice of medical professionals, all in the name of maintaining a consistent narrative. Scientists and physicians debating merits to arrive at informed decisions is now problematic and something to be censored.

One of the issues in dispute was a discussion — among the medical professionals — about children wearing masks. The video has been taken down from content posted by the American Institute for Economic Research, as well as some local news stations, including one NBC affiliate in Tampa. Said the YouTube spokesperson: “We removed AIER’s video because it included content that contradicts the consensus of local and global health authorities regarding the efficacy of masks to prevent the spread of Covid-19.” 

That AIER recently published a study on kids wearing masks being a detriment is lost on the YouTube ‘’experts’’. That piece, citing numerous problems and issues with the practice, was also written by no less than four trained medical experts. But YouTube knows better. And so, too, apparently, does NBC News. In the piece written by Corky Siemaszko, which is laced with clear condemnation for DeSantis and how Florida has handled the pandemic, there is a rather glaring conflict of data on the matter.

Siemaszko states that The Center for Disease Control (which itself has had trouble maintaining a clear Covid narrative) declares that those above the age of 2 years old should wear masks in public. But then he then goes on to show that the World Health organization has a differing standard, stating that the threshold should be for those 12 years, and older. That alone should illustrate to the YouTube experts that there is not a clear ’’consensus of local and global health authorities’’. With a discrepancy of a decade in that mask standard, how can it be improper for healthcare officials and epidemiologists to discuss these parameters in regards to a state’s policies? How are they violating a consensus when this article in support of YouTube’s actions illustrates that one does not even exist on the very subject they justified for their judgment?

Said the YouTube spokesperson — “Our policies apply to everyone and focus on content regardless of the speaker or channel.’’ That alone explains it all. The narrative is what is important, and listening to medical experts is no longer the priority, as has been previously claimed. Interesting how last year anyone taking this particular position was scalded for being a ‘’science denier’’. 

Now it is all about contradicting the consensus; interesting that those declaring what that consensus is are not themselves medically-trained scientific experts.