FREEHOLD NJ – When the COVID-19 Wuhan Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 Virus (crisis) started to break, like many Americans, I was moved to get as much data as possible.  The earliest resource for information on what was going on in the World and United States crisis related was the Bing COVID Tracker.  Personally I found myself checking and rechecking the numbers several times a day.  The nation was and still is being plagued by the effects of this disease, which we still have a very limited understanding of.

In the weeks proceeding January 15, 2020, the first identified patient zero in The United States, generally, Americans had at least six degrees of separation from someone they knew that was affected by the crisis.  Discussing this nearly a half year later, those degrees of separation have shrunk, and if one has not been personally stricken with this disease, there is a high probability a friend or a family member has or a friend of a friend…Most people know of someone that got this thing.

There are some very important facts that need to be discussed before going forward:

1)  This is a very serious illness.
2)  People are dying from this.

Without digressing into the weeds on the subject, I think we can all embrace those two notions as fact.  My connection to this virus, to date, includes two confirmed instances of positive COVID-19 diagnoses.

One, a family friend in his early 30’s from Staten Island, NY, we’ll call him Tony.  Tony reported having a fever and was sick for over a week or so and eventually became one of the cases on a ventilator.  The full particulars of Tony’s actual experience, I did not get, other than a few quick direct messages and social media updates from his loved ones.  His mother and brother also were stricken with COVID-19, however, their cases were much milder than Tony’s.  Tony did after a short period get off the ventilator after about one week and the last update I got was of him finally being able to return home, walking into his house unassisted.  I tried to give them their space, he recovered, we’ll discuss the details another day.  Who wants to be bombarded by this?  Those cases were confirmed with testing.

Two, a friend in his early 50’s from Monmouth County New Jersey, we’ll call him Mr. Johnson.  I had ended up on a phone call with Johnson’s son back in late March.  While we were chatting, he made the offhand comment of “…well, you know it’s been tough with Dad because of COVID and all that…” just a statement, to which I interjected “Wh-what?  What do you mean?’  and then he went on to explain his father’s symptoms.  Johnson had the same, fever and flu-like symptoms and was in bed, knocked down and out for about two weeks.  He did develop respiratory problems but did not end up hospitalized.  I did eventually talk to Johnson and he told me he was locked up in his room for 23 days through the ordeal and even at that time, a couple of weeks after ending isolation, he was still experiencing some breathing issues, but overall was on the mend.  His case was confirmed via a test.

Over the last two months the public at large has been marinating for the most part in their own homes, in isolation.  The economic impacts and psychological effects are going to be long-lasting and far-reaching.  With not many choices, up until some recent loosening of restrictions, people have turned to the news and internet for information & entertainment.  Speculations and homegrown theories have been running rampant.  There are two science-based theories we are looking at concerning the crisis.  One being there will be a second wave and possibly tertiary, which will occur in the fall/winter, as has been the case with other past pandemics.  The other is that the curve will be completely flattened and this disease will go away.  We have been reliant on what information we are given by MSM, our State Governments, and the US Government.

Back to the Bing COVID tracker.  Bing is an internet search engine owned by Microsoft.  Admittedly, I was glued to the tracker at the onset of this crisis.  However, after obsessively checking it all the time, I just outright stopped.  I distilled my needs, and they did not include needing to know every single case that got added to the count.  Recently I decided to give the old Bing COVID tracker another check and specifically drilled down to The United States, New Jersey, and then Monmouth County.  The most shocking thing I noticed was there is a “-“ for recovered cases of COVID-19 in Monmouth County.  Microsoft, the big computer corporation, that was driving the bus on information gathering and dissemination is telling the world that there are no recovered cases of the virus in the county, is that what a “-“ means?  The who, what, where, and why to that number is pretty much unimportant.  They have a field for the number, it is blank.  If the data is unavailable, that’s exactly what it should say.  Compounding this, even more, there is a “-“ for recovered cases in the entire state of New Jersey.  Are we to believe that there are no confirmed recoveries?  That data is 100% unavailable?

People are getting fed up and tired of this entire situation.  To say this is an emotional rollercoaster would be an understatement.  Many are at their breaking points and the loosening of restrictions could help some problems but compound others.  With that, we are potentially being presented with bogus numbers and information, such as the ones discussed in the NBC news piece: ‘I’m looking for the truth’: States face criticism for COVID-19 data cover-ups.

Further a now-removed article from Politico dated May 19, 2020, New Jersey lowers Covid-19 death toll at long-term care facilities by 1,400, outlines the issues with official counts.  A cached version of the article can be viewed HERE.  The article opened with this statement:

New Jersey on Tuesday lowered the number of reported coronavirus-related deaths at the state’s long-term care facilities by about 1,400, after health officials determined those residents had not received a lab-confirmed diagnosis for Covid-19 before they died.

Also from the same article, we were given Governor Murphy’s statement:

“This will give us our best representation of what is happening within our long-term care facilities in comparison to the statewide number that we report,” Gov. Phil Murphy said during his daily briefing in Trenton. “We were not reporting these, as it turns out, apples to apples.”

Why this article was removed from Politico should cause everyone to call into question who is or is not truthfully reporting…and who may or may not be calling for information to be removed from the public’s eye.  More disturbing allegations about the crisis and truthful reporting have been surfacing, none of which should be ignored (Florida’s scientist was fired for refusing to ‘manipulate’ COVID-19 data).  At best, we are being hit with a lot of really bad information and sloppy record-keeping.  At worst, we are being lied to in a big way.  All of this is for each individual to think about and decide upon.  Do your own research and come to your own conclusions.

What does this all mean for Mr. Johnson, my buddy that was diagnosed with COVID-19 back in late march?  To my understanding, Johnson is a miracle, that’s the only explanation.  Because according to Bing, there is no record of recovered cases of COVID-19 in Monmouth county (or NJ).  So he either has had it for over 10 weeks and is still fighting the good fight, he is the first and only recovered COVID patient in the state and should call Governor Murphy to tell him to report that number, or he has perished and is dead man walking amongst us…either one of the three scenarios is impressive.  Do you know someone that has “recovered” from COVID-19 in Monmouth County or New Jersey?  They too may be a miraculous case of the undead walking amongst the living.