another epic fauci fail
Suggesting immunity passes ‘have some merit’ a terrible idea
Immunity passes that tell whether a person has the antibodies for coronavirus are an idea whose time should never come.
The corona-passes or “passports” would allow a special class of citizens to travel freely, dine at trendy restaurants and enjoy all the perks of being corona-free. It’s the ultimate hall pass. Soon we’ll truly be the haves and have-nots — those who have the coronavirus antibody and those that haven’t yet gotten the virus.
If issued passes or ID cards or special apps, the haves will be given privileges that the have-nots can only dream of — like going into Starbucks, getting out of airplanes first, going to concerts and more importantly, getting a chance to hug their loved ones.
Don’t you hate those people already?
This country is divided enough — we don’t need a new reason to resent our neighbors and friends.
But it’s already happening.
Other countries are exploring the idea of immunity passports and a tech company based in England has come out with a “CoronaPass” app that could be scanned to verify the user’s antibody status.
Dr. Anthony Fauci said last month that immunity cards for U.S. citizens are “being discussed” and on the table.
“You know, that’s possible,” Fauci said of the possibility of citizens carrying cards giving their immunity status. “I mean, it’s one of those things that we talk about when we want to make sure that we know who the vulnerable people are and not. I think it might actually have some merit, under certain circumstances.”
Terrible idea.
And there are a lot of reasons why we shouldn’t be handing out immunity passes — from a scientific standpoint.
Number one is, scientists still don’t know whether the presence of coronavirus antibodies in a human guarantees that person won’t contract the virus.
So there’s really no way of conferring immunity status on anyone and ensuring that they won’t contract the coronavirus. That’s a huge hole in the immunity card system.
And the antibody tests themselves aren’t 100% accurate. About six in 100 tests give a false positive, meaning that people could be walking around with their scarlet “C” and still be vulnerable to infection. That’s not good enough. There’s no question that antibody tests can be effective at weeding out those who’ve been exposed to the virus, and may, repeat may, be immune. But giving them an immunity pass? No way. It sets a dangerous precedent and infers second class status on a huge percentage of our citizens, including the elderly and frail.
Let’s hope President Trump resists this bad idea.