Early on in the pandemic, the media warned the public people could potentially catch Covid-19 twice and our federal health agencies assured the public they were closely monitoring for potential reinfections.
ICAN wanted to check if this was true. Were they really carefully monitoring for reinfections? So, in November 2021, our attorneys sent a Freedom of Information Act request to the CDC asking how many people in the U.S. had been re-infected with Covid-19 – meaning those who were infected, recovered, and later became infected again. Nearly four months later, the CDC’s Emergency Operations Center responded with less than a single page of results covering the period up to February 10, 2022.
What the CDC provided showed data for only four jurisdictions: New York City, and the states of Arizona, Pennsylvania, and Utah. If that were not bad enough, these jurisdictions were not even consistent among themselves in their methods of identifying and validating reinfections. Worse yet, the CDC did not even examine the data it collected, let alone check it or analyze it. Furthermore, it told our attorneys, “Counts are provisional and subject to change.”
Meaning, our health agencies have apparently not lived up to their promise to monitor for reinfections. Like so many of the statements “health” agencies make, when one asks to actually see the proof supporting the statements, such proof does not appear to exist.
Official policies declared in the era of Covid-19 have caused enormous upheaval and damage to our society. That those policies rest on flimsy evidence and a dearth of scientific rigor adds insult to injury for the American people. ICAN will continue to demand better.
