It (still) seems a lot less uncertain since 2021M01, even without an ad hoc measure for the pandemic.
Baseline results, using EPU (all items) and Covid deaths per thousands, with all dummies for presidential administrations, and recessions.
Figure 1: Economic Policy Uncertainty Index (blue), and average value with presidential dummies, log of (1+covid death rate per 1000), presidential and recession dummies (tan). NBER defined peak-to-trough recession dates shaded gray. Source: policyuncertainty.com, CDC, NBER, and author’s calculations.
Robustness Tests: Using an alternative covid dummy.
Reader Econned castigates me for a sloppy empirical analysis. I have repeated the analysis, by (1) testing for unit roots, (2) estimating including all presidential dummies, (3) proxying a covid effect with per capita covid deaths, and (4) including a recession dummy.
Re: (1), the full EPU series rejects a unit root using ADF test (constant, trend, 1 lag) at the 0.0000 level. It rejects the Elliott-Rothenberg-Stock point optimal test (trend, intercept) at the 1% msl. It also rejects trend stationarity at 5% msl, using the Kwiatkowski Phillips Schmidt Shin (KPSS) test. I’ll proceed assuming I(0) series.
Figure 2: Covid deaths rates per thousand population (CDPM, blue, left scale), and ln(1+CDPM) (tan, right scale). NBER defined peak-to-trough recession dates shaded gray. Source: CDC, population from FRED, and author’s calculations.
Estimating using OLS on the baseline EPU, I obtain.
EPU = 119.9 + 411.7ln(1+CDPM) + 36.0recession – 15.7GWBush – 34.4Clinton – 30.6GWBush + 11.2Obama + 21.4Trump + 2.7Biden
Adj-R2 = 0.48, SER = 28.7, DW = 0.73, NObs = 464. Bold indicates significance at 10% msl using HAC robust standard errors.
A F-test for equality of the Trump and Biden coefficients rejects with a p-value of 0.32.
The Trump administration is characterized by 21.4 point higher EPU than under Reagan. Adding in a dummy variable (covid20m02-22m02) for the Covid period as suggested by reader Econned (2020M02-2022M02) would reduce the estimated coefficient on the Trump dummy to 20.4 (statistically significant at 5% msl), while the Biden coefficient (6.9) is not statistically significant.
EPU = 118.5 + 57.4covid20m02-22m02 + 33.2recession – 13.7GWBush – 32.9Clinton – 28.6GWBush + 12.8Obama + 20.4Trump + 6.9Biden
Adj-R2 = 0.49, SER = 28.4, DW = 0.72, NObs = 464. Bold indicates significance at 10% msl using HAC robust standard errors.
An F-test for equality of Trump and Biden coefficients would fail to reject at conventional levels (p-value of 0.5).
Personally, I am inclined more towards using a continuous series (deaths per thousands), or a dummy with minimal judgment imposed (dummy for covid from 2020M02 onward) as opposed to an arbitrarily chosen one (2020M02-2022M02).
Uncertainty Indicator: News or World Uncertainty Index
Figure 3: US EPU (all items) (blue, left scale), EPU (news only) (tan, left scale), Ahir-Bloom-Furceri WUI (green, right scale). NBER defined peak-to-trough recession dates shaded gray.Source: NBER, policyuncertainty.com.
There is a question of whether to use the full EPU (including policy changes), or just the EPU using news items. Using the latter, and using Econned dummy for the Covid pandemic, I obtain.
EPUNEWS = 107.5 + 106.9covid20m02-22m02 + 52.5recession – 5.6GWBush – 23.1Clinton – 24.4GWBush + 6.3Obama + 15.5Trump – 16.2Biden
Adj-R2 = 0.35, SER = 45.2, DW = 0.57, NObs = 464. Bold indicates significance at 10% msl using HAC robust standard errors.
An F-test for equality of Trump and Biden coefficients strongly rejects at the 0.005.
In order to cross check these results, I also used the Ahir-Bloom-Furceri World Uncertainty Index (based on Economist Intelligence Unit reports) over this same sample period. This index is available on a quarterly basis, so I aggregate monthly data to quarterly, and run the regression to obtain:
WUI = 0.103 + 0.024covid20m02-22m02 + 0.078recession – 0.053GWBush – 0.033Clinton + 0.065GWBush + 0.127Obama + 0.224Trump + 0.091Biden
Adj-R2 = 0.30, SER = 0.135, DW = 1.12, NObs = 154. Bold indicates significance at 10% msl using HAC robust standard errors.
An F-test for equality of Trump and Biden coefficients rejects at the 0.33 level. An equality test for Trump vs. Obama coefficients rejects at the 0.10 level.
Conclusion: Uncertainty under Biden is lower than that under Trump.
Addendum, 10/1/2023, 5:20pm:
Reader Econned is exercised by my assertion that his 2020M02-2022M02 covid dummy is arbitrary. As he writes:
nothing was ‘arbitrary’ regarding the specification of the COVID dummy. I clearly stated why it was used.
2c) you suggest that “using your arbitrarily selected Covid dummy — uncertainty under Biden was lower than that under Trump. And significantly so in a couple cases.” No sh*T Sherlock… I literally posted the coefficient estimates. Why are you so bad at reading comprehension? You’re an ‘academic’ – isn’t 50% of your career based on reading?!?!
The point is that varying the covid dummy arbitrarily chosen can make the gap between Trump and Biden coefficients larger or smaller. Is covid with us. I still where a mask — and some people at the airport do now too. Did the situation normalize somewhat after 2020M02? Well sure, but I would use 2022M05 (I think with greater justification) than 2022M02. Consider this redraw of Figure 2.
Figure 4: Covid deaths rates per thousand population (CDPM, blue, left scale), and ln(1+CDPM) (tan, right scale). Period proposed by Econned for covid dummy (with implied “leveling off” at 2022M03. Source: CDC, population from FRED, and author’s calculations.
Remember Econned wrote
“Instead, I ran a model specifying COVID as 2020M02-2022M02. These dates were selected by analyzing CDC’s statistics of US monthly COVID deaths. This series show 2022M03 as the month when a noticeable leveling off occurred followed by a sustained period of relatively low deaths (not to diminish any level of deaths). Given the vaccines, etc I think it’s incorrect to keep COVID dummy as “1” in perpetuity which is what you seemingly decided as appropriate.
Just to be clear, in 2022M03, covid deaths narrowly defined by CDC were running at 16,070 per month, and broadly (covid primary or comorbidity) at 26,608. That is, covid deaths per capita were at that time of “leveling off” equal to mid-2021 death rates.
Using a dummy=1 2020M02-2022M05, as deaths per capita hit a local minimum at 2022M05. Then the Trump coefficient (19.6) is significant at the 5% msl, the Biden coefficient (-0.2) is not. F-test for equality of coefficients rejects at 35% msl.
It appears we can now clear Professor Chinn as having ethics parallel to Sam Bankman-Fried. Whew!!!! That was a close one.
Kevin Drum covers the change in real pay for wages and for profits since late 2019 in a way that JohnH never does – honest and informative:
Raw data: Inflation hasn’t hurt most people
https://jabberwocking.com/raw-data-inflation-hasnt-hurt-most-people/
If you cherry pick and don’t account for wage growth, you can make anything look terrible. In reality, overall prices have increased 18.4% since the end of 2019¹ while overall wages have increased 19-23%. That’s no great shakes for American workers, but for most people the relative cost of things has barely changed at all over the past four years.
Check out his interesting graph. CEO pay and the profits from nonfinancial corporations have increase considerably but the notion that real wages have plummeted is not consistent with the data. Then again everyone knows Jonny boy is both dishonest and quite incompetent.
You have to love the spin!!! Democratic partisan hacks’ response to the question “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”
“That’s no great shakes for American workers, but for most people the relative cost of things has barely changed at all over the past four years.” IOW–“Don’t believe your lying eyes, things are not as bad as they seem.” I can’t wait form Democrats advertising to emerge from the spin–“It’s not as bad as you think! Vote for Biden!” Yeah, that’ll convince ’em.
Kevin Drum’s sources? “various.” IOW unidentified. Exactly the kind of data Peppa Pgl loves.
But if you look at reliably sourced data from official sources, you get the real picture–real median earnings and real average wages have risen by less than 1% since before the pandemic. And this meager, virtually imperceptible gain has occurred in the midst of an extraordinarily tight labor market…exactly the kind of labor market that according to economists was supposed to result in very nice gains in real wages. And the gains are so marginal that they could well be erased as a result of rising energy prices.
https://fredblog.stlouisfed.org/2018/02/are-wages-increasing-or-decreasing/
Go partisan hacks! Keep spinning instead of addressing real problems. It’s the Peppa Pgl answer to what ails Democrats!
My God – you have turned into a Reagan fan boy. Oh wait – you always was a Reagan and then Trump fan boy.
BTW I challenged you a while back to make a comment over at Kevin’s place. I see you remain too much of a little coward to do so.
“if you look at reliably sourced data from official sources”
Such as BEA’s NIPA table 10.1. Yea little Jonny boy still has no effing clue how factor incomes have been evolving of late. Come on Jonny boy – you do not need to remind us you are the most incompetent clown ever. Everyone knows that.
“Reader Econned castigates me for a sloppy empirical analysis.”
Your first post was FAR better than anything ever “analyzed”. And yet this worthless troll will find something else to bitch about. After he wrote his dissertation on how to be annoying.
Menzie Chinn,
Say your prior ’analysis’ was, as I stated, “sloppy, partisan, and inadequate” without saying your prior ‘analysis’ was “sloppy, partisan, and inadequate”.
Let’s be clear that
1) your “conclusion” here was never the issue
2) your assertion of my COVID dummy being “an arbitrarily chosen one (2020M02-2022M02)” is an absolute bullsh*t assertion
In any case, I do appreciate the (tacit) back-peddling. Cheers to you for acknowledging your ‘analysis’ was trash. Hopefully in future ‘analyses’, it will not require someone calling out your lack of basic rigor for you to attempt to respect the extreme gullibility of your readers.
Econned: (1) Wait – I’ve just confirmed that uncertainty was lower under Biden. That was my conclusion. So, what you are saying is that you agreed with my conclusion before, but you wanted to highlight that despite my allegedly sloppy analysis, I was correct? OK.
(2) What have I backpedalled on? I never wrote my analysis is “trash”. On the other hand, I’ve just demonstrated that — using your arbitrarily selected Covid dummy — uncertainty under Biden was lower than that under Trump. And significantly so in a couple cases.
As to whether your Covid dummy is so patently superior, let me quote your reasoning:
If I recall correctly, vaccines were available as of 2021M01. What justifies the additional year you lumped in? The “leveling off”. How did you define leveling off? I prefer 2020M02-2022M05, when deaths per capita hit a local minimum. Then the Trump coefficient (19.6) is significant at the 5% msl, the Biden coefficient (-0.2) is not. F-test for equality of coefficients rejects at 35% msl.
Try again.
Menzie Chinn,
1a) i never once suggested that your analysis didn’t show “uncertainy was lower under Biden”
1b) I never once disputed that “uncertainy was lower under Biden”
2a) you backpedaled via acknowledging a complete revision of your prior analysis was needed to show what it was you were suggesting. You backpedaled again in your reply – see 3) below.
2b) nothing was ‘arbitrary’ regarding the specification of the COVID dummy. I clearly stated why it was used.
2c) you suggest that “using your arbitrarily selected Covid dummy — uncertainty under Biden was lower than that under Trump. And significantly so in a couple cases.” No sh*T Sherlock… I literally posted the coefficient estimates. Why are you so bad at reading comprehension? You’re an ‘academic’ – isn’t 50% of your career based on reading?!?!
3) to look at the data and you’ll clearly see the leaving off. It’s all there for you free of charge. If you “prefer 2020M02-2022M04, when deaths per capita hit a local minimum” – then why didn’t you use that in your initial ‘analysis’???? So, here’s another example of your backpedaling.
Try again.
Econned: Huh? What does this comment mean?
Would you please just stop posting/digging a hole?
Menzie Chinn,
I’m not sure which part(s) you’re confused about.
1) Your original ‘analysis’ used a COVID dummy for 2020M02-present. Now you’re saying that you “prefer 2020M02-2022M04”. Do you not realize 2022M04 was over a year ago? You’re backpedaling.
2) your original model specification (with the perpetual COVID dummy and no recession dummy) expanded to control for all administrations has a coefficient estimate of -61 for Biden (you conveniently omitted the sentence which shows the estimated coefficients). I think that any results showing Biden that far from the pack shows issues with the modeling. And none of these new models show this. So your original specification was poor.
You’re terribly bad at this – please update your calendars & stop embarrassing yourself.
Menzie Chinn,
I think it’s foolish that your initial ‘analysis’ suggested 2023 as no different than 2020 or 2021 as it relates to COVID’s impact on uncertainty when measured using newspaper writings. You seem to be confusing the (supposed) purpose of this analysis which is about economic uncertainty with a large portion of the index driven by words in newspaper articles. Regarding my decision of 2022M03 being a good place to mark a change in uncertainty as related to COVID is that is the 1st month when we experience deaths below 20k and that has sustained to the present (interestingly it’s also the month with the largest %decline in m/m deaths). You need to be aware of the fact that Econometrica isn’t among the publications being used in the index here – it’s newspapers.
Please include practical significance along with statistical significance in your lectures.
@ Menzie
I wonder if Econned has half a clue what the proportion of the EPUIs that are based on frequency count of newspaper articles about policy related uncertainty is?? Does Econned have any clue what the proportion of Indexes is in that niche that use that particular barometer?? And if we asked him (as if we cared to know), what would Econned suggest would be the better barometer of uncertainty?? I suspect, as is often the case when Econned is asked these direct questions, he would be short on answers.
econned, this display of professional jealousy on your part is astounding. your griping here is unfounded. you are nitpicking at commas and trying to say prof. chinn’s work is nonsense. that is simply foolish on your part. stop the professional jealousy. all of your complaining on this site simply reinforces what we know, that you are basically a professional pariah whose goal is to try to tear down others in order to make yourself feel better. you have reached a level of unsavoriness that is even beyond dick striker, which is quite an achievement on your part. you are becoming incoherent in the same way that corev does when his blood pressure spikes too high.
I had to just stop reading his sniping. The man is a total waste of time, not particularly bright, but quick to criticize others for failing to do basic things that he fails to do all the time.
” I do appreciate the (tacit) back-peddling.”
Ahhh – little Econned is getting attention. Yawn!
Let’s be clear – most anybody can trump up a critique of analysis and make it sound damaging to non-specialists, even if the trumped-up critique is utter nonsense. I say most anybody, because Johnny fails pretty regularly. Remember this?:
https://econbrowser.com/archives/2022/05/worst-statistical-analysis-i-have-ever-seen-linked-to-by-mr-bruce-hall
Menzie is the host, so his “worst ever” takes precedence, but other commenterz have linked to some doozies. And the more pretentious members of the troll choir have even tried to pass off some of their own. Just write “unit root” and toss around accusations like “biased” or “unprofessional” and you can raise doubts among non-specialists. It’s cheap tricks.
On the other hand, take the effort by New Deal Democrat to argue for an impending recession. No tricks. Real analysis. Two of our initials people, rjs and AS, do actual economic analysis, right before our eyes. How cool is that? And let’s not forget the professionals, guest authors who make a huge contribution each time they write.
How’s a non-specialist to tell the difference? I’m fairly confident that unbiased readers can tell pretty easily who’s a scoundrel and who’s got a chip on their shoulder. Even non-specialists in economics are specialist in their native language. When the bile starts to drip from Econned’s jaws, when Biden is accused of engaging in a “war on fossil fuels”, when a flaming liberal like pgl is accused of being in league with crony capitalists and I’m accused of being an affluent financier (Woo Hoo!), you don’t need a degree in economics to know you’re being lied to.
I confess to being liberal but flaming? OK!
Reading Econned comments is kind of like looking at transcripts of the Nixon tapes. Irrational fears and irrational hate and embittered castigations. Yet entertaining on some kind of weird level. Like that bad car wreck on the interstate that people have to slow down and look at. Everyone hates the plodding pace of traffic, but they still have to stretch their neck hard as they go by.
Re posts by Econned and a JohnH (with apologies to WS): they’re tales told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
Menzie Chinn,
I love the inclusion on personal anecdotes in your addendum. Science at its most Trump-like.
Try again.
Econned – don’t you have a job you need to get to? Who’s going to drive the garbage truck if you don’t show up?
I see Econned as more the used car salesman type. You honor him by listing him under blue-collar real work kind of job. Insurance salesman possibly?? Think of things that have cash flow but add very little value to society. Imagine your life without the garbage man. That’s actually something of high utility. With Econned you want to think of jobs that if they weren’t performed no one would notice. Soda pop marketer. etc. In fact anything related to marketing would be something Econned was drawn to. Arguably marketing adds zero value and sucks off resources from society. So that’s a prime candidate of careers for Econned,
Maybe Econned can help sell those MyPillow version 2.0 and the accompanying house slippers. Econned’s politics certainly line with that of the owner of the company.
Oil consultant?? Any consultant??
if econned left the world, would anybody notice? my guess is, no. although by subtraction, the world would become a slightly better place. if your life can be described in this way, it means you were a failure while here on earth.
Feinstein’s replacement will be Laphonza Butler:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/california-governor-names-laphonza-butler-former-kamala-harris-adviser-to-feinstein-senate-seat/ar-AA1hxPOh#image=AA1haMmF|1
Her association with Copmala Harris doesn’t give me a good feeling about this choice. I am attempting to remain open-minded.
It will be a short tenure as the race to serve the next term is already heating up.
Matt “buy me a 17 year old prostitute” Gaetz is angry at Speaker McCarthy for working with Democrats. Gaetz noted the Hastert “majority of majority” rule which now would mean only 112 MAGA types could block something supported by over 76% of the House. Yes we have 213 Dems and 222 Reps in the House right now so the Hastert rule could block say a bill that would continue aid to Ukraine even if all Dems and 110 Reps support it. Adhering to this rule is crazier than the Senate filibuster nonsense.
If Gaetz tries to end McCarthy’s speakership, the Dems could insist on Jeffries replace him. Now if that does not work – demand that the new Speaker put the Hastert rule in the waste basket.
When you use Rohypnol in the volume that Gaetz does, far-right fundraising is a must, or your date rape funds run dry.
I saw one of 3 “human cashiers” at my Wal Mart today wearing a mask. Late 20’s-something white lady. She was “chubby” and diabetes I think is more common among low-educated whites than I think people are aware of. Maybe that was her reason to wear the mask at that age?? Or maybe she is like me and has a low-immunity person in her residence. I noticed that Asian Americans in general (OK not scientific, my own anecdotal observations in a large metro area with a large cross-section of ethnicities over roughly 3 years) are much better about wearing masks than other groups. And I would say I have seen more masks….. my ability to reference time is not as good as when I was younger, but I wanna say I have seen more people wearing masks markedly in the last 6 weeks.
My hope is that Asian Americans are wearing masks only because their high level of intelligence, and not because they feel pressured by American society to wear them because negative stereotypes about issues on food or hygiene (I eat Chinese takeout probably 3 times a week, unless they give me reason otherwise I trust Asian Americans inherently on cleanliness issues). Hell, I trust Asians more than the typical white teenage brat working fastfood drive-thrus. I’ll take my gamble on Asians having higher hand washing frequencies on that one.
I am debating wearing a mask now in places with high people traffic, because I have a high-risk person in my home. I have to confess I have been too lazy (and maybe a mild amount of self-consciousness) to wear a mask recently. Even though this high risk person who resides with me received the first two Covid shots and one booster, I am thinking more and more I need to put a mask on. As I have typed here before, I have enough things in my life to feel guilt/shame about, I don’t need to add on anyone’s deaths to my shames list.
The value of Maro Logo is????
https://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/story/business/real-estate/2022/10/03/how-much-trumps-mar-lago-worth-depends-who-youre-asking/8121654001/
Trump’s sons tell the bank it is worth $1 billion. Trump told the tax man it is worth less than $28 million. So many answers, so little time.
The Orange Abomination believes in “the rule of law”, except when the Orange Abomination breaks the law itself, then the rule of law becomes “jackbooted thugs”.
I think that term “jackbooted thugs” originated when Kopits and CoRev were watching closed-circuit TV in a Chick-fil-A and Kopits gasped out in horror “Oh my Gawd!!! They have brown people at the FBI now!!!!! This is where they’re hiding all the fake dead brown people from Hurricane Maria!!! They’re hiding in the FBI!!! Oh My Gawd!!! Jackbooted brown thugs infesting our nation!!!!!! Come on CoRev, Wonder Twin powers activate!!!! Shape of…. a senile consultant!!!!! Form of…… illiterate white trash!!!!!”
Since you brought up COVID deaths, I thought this might be relevant to the assessment of personal risk:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1191568/reported-deaths-from-covid-by-age-us/
There has been debate whether or not COVID-caused deaths are overstated by ignoring other severe health conditions on the death certificates when a person dies while infected with COVID. If other health problems were not a problem one might reasonably expect the death rate from COVID to vary slightly because of diminished immune systems as people get older. But the differences are so dramatic that it seems unreasonable to attribute all of those deaths among the older population to COVID simply because those people had a COVID infection. Perhaps some of the policy uncertainty during the initial COVID epidemic was due to the poor quality of data/analysis and the one-size fits all approach reaction by the government. We’ve returned to more normal conditions where COVID has dropped into the background of the public mind and people understand the risks for their own situations better.
If you are going to wear a mask, the CDC recommends non-surgical N95 (as opposed to lesser capable KN95) masks; however, these are difficult to fit properly and must fit tightly all the way around its perimeter to ensure proper filtration. The blue “surgical masks” fall into the category of “better than nothing” while cloth mask fall into the category of “not much better than nothing”.
@ Bruce Hall
I just hope now and into your senior years you don’t wear a mask. You could consider yourself a low-cost loss to society in the furtherance of research. Why not trust your own contentions Bruce?? In your case the risk is definitely worth the example to others who flout science and public health experts’ advice. Just think of all the thousands of MAGA dumb-asses you could save. Could be enough to tilt Arizona presidential elections back to red. Isn’t it worth it to disprove the efficacy of masks so “Karen” can breath at the Dollar General??
And the old people breathing in air near you and “Karen” that could cause thousands of deaths as the respiratory virus spreads exponentially??? You didn’t care if they died before, why start caring about others’ deaths now?? It’s worth it so you don’t feel bothered and put out for the 10 seconds it takes to put on a mask Bruce. The deaths are totally worth it so you don’t have to be inconvenienced Bruce.
Gee, Moses, I give you some information that should be useful, but y ou let your biases knock the intelligence out of your head. But I still have hope for you.
Did you know that a large portion of the COVID deaths, according to a Northwestern University study, were not directly from the virus, but from bacterial pneumonia which is often a complication of viral infections? Of course you didn’t. But did you know that early in the epidemic there were physicians who recommended the prophylactic uses of azithromycin for people who had COVID? Of course you didn’t. But did you know that azithromycin is considered a front-line treatment for bacterial pneumonia? Of course you didn’t. But did you know that the government said that azithromycin was not effective against COVID? Of oourse you did… because it fit the bias that you had that only the vaccine could stop COVID… which it didn’t. But what you didn’t read in the government’s position was that it only said azithromycin was not effective against the virus itself … because it is not an anti-viral. The government claim was based on a study that didn’t acknowledge or perhaps even understand that bacterial pneumonia was a major culprit in “COVID-related” deaths.
Let me help you out here:
Azithromycin has become famous in the last two years, not for its main antimicrobial effect, but for its potential use as a therapeutic agent for COVID-19 infection. Initially, there were some promising results that supported its use, but it has become clear that scientific results are insufficient to support such a positive assessment. In this review we will present all the literature data concerning the activity of azithromycin as an antimicrobial, an anti-inflammatory, or an antivirus agent. Our aim is to conclude whether its selection should remain as a valuable antivirus agent or if its use simply has an indirect therapeutic contribution due to its antimicrobial and/or immunomodulatory activity, and therefore, if its further use for COVID-19 treatment should be interrupted. This halt will prevent further antibiotic resistance expansion and will keep azithromycin as a valuable anti-infective therapeutic agent.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9404997
Secondary bacterial infection of the lung (pneumonia) was extremely common in patients with COVID-19, affecting almost half the patients who required support from mechanical ventilation. By applying machine learning to medical record data, scientists at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine have found that secondary bacterial pneumonia that does not resolve was a key driver of death in patients with COVID-19, results published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
Bacterial infections may even exceed death rates from the viral infection itself, according to the findings. The scientists also found evidence that COVID-19 does not cause a “cytokine storm,” so often believed to cause death.
https://news.feinberg.northwestern.edu/2023/05/05/secondary-bacterial-pneumonia-drove-many-covid-19-deaths/
Azithromycin is used to treat certain bacterial infections, such as bronchitis; pneumonia; sexually transmitted diseases (STD); and infections of the ears, lungs, sinuses, skin, throat, and reproductive organs. Azithromycin also is used to treat or prevent disseminated Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC) infection [a type of lung infection that often affects people with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)]. Azithromycin is in a class of medications called macrolide antibiotics. It works by stopping the growth of bacteria.
Antibiotics such as azithromycin will not work for colds, flu, or other viral infections. Using antibiotics when they are not needed increases your risk of getting an infection later that resists antibiotic treatment.
Now I offer you this information in the hope that, if you should get a nasty case of COVID, you will consider taking azithromycin (and possibly amoxicillin) to forestall the possibility of getting a severe and possibly fatal case of bacterial pneumonia. Stay well.
@ Brucie “Functionally Illiterate” Hall
I am going to give you the same treatment I gave Barkley Rosser when he was quoting a study on Native American “admixture” in whites that Professor Rosser himself had failed to read before quoting it, and then grasped for straws by saying minuscule differences (hundredths of a percent) between states/regions meant that the data was, in Rosser’s words (the authors of the paper specifically stated it was not) “skewed”. I am going to quote back to you the very same paper you have cited. No less than the Closing Remarks portion of the paper:
“To summarize, there is no scientific justification for the use of azithromycin in the treatment of COVID-19 up to now, and the only way to keep this antibiotic relevant in the future as a useful tool for combating pathogenic infections is to use it wisely, only after careful consideration and high expectations.”
And farther upward in the body of the paper you quote:
“Furthermore, according to Oldenburg et al., there was no significant difference in self-reported symptom absence 14 days after enrollment among patients assigned to azithromycin versus a placebo in their randomized controlled trial of single-dose oral azithromycin for outpatient COVID-19 [11]. This last finding supports earlier randomized clinical trials of azithromycin for COVID-19 in both outpatient and inpatient settings, none of which found azithromycin to be effective in treating COVID-19.”
“Given that azithromycin consumption during the pandemic was increased up to 3 times compared to the pre COVID period [91,92,93], it is important to reduce useless consumption, as it is an extremely dangerous practice, to avoid increasing antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) develops when bacteria, fungi, or viruses are exposed to antibiotics, antifungals, or antivirals leading to the development of a resistance to one or more antimicrobial drugs. As a result, the antimicrobials become ineffective and infections may persist. AMR is considered a serious and persistent therapeutic problem today being an economic and health burden. It is conservatively estimated that, in the US and Europe, 2.5 million people are affected by such infections each year and approximately 50,000 people die because of these infections [94]. The discovery of novel antibiotics has nearly halted over the past 30 years leading to the exhaustion of the pipeline reserve. The resistance of pathogens to antibiotics can be addressed with a rapid development of new effective and safe antibiotics [1,95]. Several studies have revealed a significant increase in drug resistance to azithromycin in some strains of gonococci [96]. Drug resistance to azithromycin is also increasing in E. coli [95].”
Brucie, when you applied to work at Ford Motors, was literacy not even a prerequisite??
Moses, I keep trying to educate you, but you refuse.
I provided three links and you refer to the first one which stated that azithromycin was not effective as a treatment for COVID. Yes, indeed. That is correct.
But then you stop there. The second link from Northwestern University went on to explain that while azithromycin was not effect against viruses, it was a first-line treatment against bacterial pneumonia which is a serious complication from COVID and from which people infected with COVID die rather than the virus itself.
So, in effect, the conclusions from the first study led to the deaths of many because doctors were dissuaded from administering azithromycin on a timely basis to those with severe COVID symptoms… mainly the elderly with less robust immune systems.
By the way, pgl loves to denigrate Dr. Vladimir “Zev” Zelenko — who promoted the use of the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine, combined with azithromycin and zinc sulfate. While the hydroxychloroquine portion of his protocol may not have been effective, the azithromycin and zinc (which helps medication enter cells) was effective in preventing the bacterial pneumonia deaths. pgl loves to find the flaw in everything… like the fact that COVID vaccines don’t actually prevent COVID. Oh, wait….
“Moses, I keep trying to educate you, but you refuse.”
Come on Bruce. You got caught LYING here just like you got caught LYING the other day. Oh wait – you were teaching us how to suck up to Kelly Anne Alternative Facts Conway. Got it.
“I give you some information that should be useful”
I had to stop there. Kelly Anne’s Alternative Facts are useful only for MAGA hat wearing morons like you. Now to check out your fake studies.
What – I was wrong to trash this Brooklyn snake oil sales person according to Bruce Hall?
“On March 23, 2020, Zelenko published an open letter to U.S. president Donald Trump where he claimed to have successfully treated hundreds of COVID-19 patients with a five-day course of his protocol. Zelenko’s treatment protocol quickly gained notoriety, with several right-wing media figures and various Trump administration officials promoting it, including Rudy Giuliani and then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, despite cautionary messages from health experts.”
Wikipedia which provides all sorts of links noting how my neighbor is a fraud. Brucie’s kind of dude!
Brucie needs to stop promoting this garbage as the MyPillow guy wants to hire him as his chief sales and marketing person.
pgl,
sorry you can’t see anything except that which you want to see.
• azithromycin does not stop COVID (study I cited)
• Northwestern University study shows majority of deaths from severe COVID are caused by secondary bacterial pneumonia (study I cited)
• azithromycin is a front-line antibiotic used to counter bacterial pneumonia infections (medical website I cited)
• the Brooklyn doctor who touted hydroxychloroquine used it in conjunction with azithromycin and zinc. While the hydroxychloroquine did not prevent COVID deaths, he inadvertently had success keeping his patients from dying because he gave them azithromycin which prevented deaths from secondary bacterial pneumonia. (link I provided)
Your take:
• when Donald Trump said to take the COVID vaccine, he was a snake oil salesman
• when Joe Biden said to take the COVID vaccine because you wouldn’t get COVID, he was God’s promised politician
https://www.newsweek.com/joe-biden-2021-video-saying-vaccinations-prevent-covid-resurfaces-1726900
• when Northwestern University published their study that said more deaths from COVID infected patients were due to secondary bacterial pneumonia infection, you discounted that as a hack study because Bruce Hall cited it
So, forgive me if I don’t take you seriously. Just go back with economists to explaining why everyone who says their economic situation has worsened under Biden is a MAGA hat wearing moron (which include a significant number of Democrats according to the CNN article last month).
https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/07/business/us-economy-biden-approval/index.html
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/09/abc-nbc-polls-show-the-economy-hurts-biden-more-than-age.html
(1) The paper was about a single treatment – Azithromycin. That this treatment was not the cure all does not support your serial lies.
(2) And OK Covid brings up other issues. Your logic might get a murderer off as his pulling the trigger did not kill his victims as the bullets did.
Come on Bruce – you can pull out all the fake studies and you can misrepresent what the others have said. Your heartless BS is not going to cause Trump to have won 2020. So get out there as sell those
MyPillows.
“Also, a little learning is a dangerous thing. Knowing a little about something tempts one to overestimate one’s abilities. For example, I know you’ve assembled furniture, but that doesn’t mean you can build an entire wall system; remember, a little knowledge. This maxim, originally a line from Alexander Pope’s An Essay on Criticism (1709), has been repeated with slight variations ever since. It is still heard, although less frequently, and sometimes shortened, as in the example.”
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/a-little-knowledge-is-a-dangerous-thing
Maybe this is a timely moment for Brucie Baby to read some Alexander Pope?? This definitely is one of the problems the internet age has brought upon our society. It seems just reading short snippets like the one I just gave in this comment and “getting the gist” of things is not Brucie’s strong point. Maybe Brucie’s small world will widen if he tries reading something from start to finish.
pgl, we all know there is no “cure” for COVID, only treatments for symptoms or complications.
Secondary bacterial infection of the lung (pneumonia) was extremely common in patients with COVID-19, affecting almost half the patients who required support from mechanical ventilation. By applying machine learning to medical record data, scientists at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine have found that secondary bacterial pneumonia that does not resolve was a key driver of death in patients with COVID-19, results published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
Bacterial infections may even exceed death rates from the viral infection itself, according to the findings. The scientists also found evidence that COVID-19 does not cause a “cytokine storm,” so often believed to cause death.
https://news.feinberg.northwestern.edu/2023/05/05/secondary-bacterial-pneumonia-drove-many-covid-19-deaths/
So quit trying to be an ass and admit that, like Newsom, you don’t really have all (any) of the answers.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/newsom-repeals-ca-law-censored-120050878.html
@ Brucie “Functionally Illiterate” Hall
I’m going to give you a super toughie question here Brucie. Are you ready?? Have you taken all your vitamins today Brucie?? Did you notice one very common trait or characteristic shared by 190 of those who had gotten pneumonia in your Northwestern quoted paper?? There was a certain respiratory virus 190 patients had acquired before they got the severe pneumonia, or VAP, do you know what respiratory virus that was?? And which vaccine/vaccines are well known to be effective in avoiding getting that said respiratory virus?? Do your Mom proud now Brucie and think extra super hard here.
Also, in your Northwestern Medicine quoted paper Brucie, did you notice they NEVER mentioned treating patients with Azithromycin or Amoxicillin??? They are both antibiotics. Azithromycin does NOTHING to lower mortality rates of those with Covid 19. In fact CDC has shown using antibiotics in the treatment of Covid 19 most likely increases the overall number of deaths of the general population:
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2022/s0712-Antimicrobial-Resistance.html
You know the people who didn’t have to resort to antibiotics that didn’t lower mortality of Covid 19 patients Brucie?? People who ran out and got the efficacious vaccine/vaccines as soon as they could, and wore a mask long enough for the vaccine to do its job.
I thought you might like this, Moses.
https://twitter.com/_PrinceCarlton_/status/1706692967195402342
The COVID “vaccines” don’t exactly do the job that MMR, polio, or even shingles vaccines do. You still get it and you still spread it to those dear little old ladies in the assisted living homes who then get pneumonia and die. Such a shame.
@ Brucie
I’ll let your own words reflect, pretty accurately, your intelligence level.
There’s a Led Zeppelin song, called “Wearing and Tearing” (the best version is the live Knebworth version after the group disbanded). One of the lyrics goes “Who cares for medication, when you’ve thrown away the cure”. But Brucie Hall asks the deep philosophical question: “Who cares for the cure, when you can take medication?”
Three drop dead devastations of the BS from Brucie. Clearly you spent more time reading that paper than Brucie did. Now I only skimmed it and I bet I understand it more than Brucie does. But what’s new?
So solid of a rebuttal I’m outsourcing these tasks to your thorough efforts. Well done!
Brucie as always comes back with some fake study or a study that has not a damn thing with his lying. Didn’t we have this debate as to whether COVID disinformation trolls get banned from this blog? Dr. Chinn has take the other route – putting up factual posts that mock trolls like Brucie boy. I’m hoping he does this with Brucie’s latest.
Oooo, “fake” study from Northwestern University. Well, I guess I’ll have to listen to a self-described economist as opposed to doctors at Northwestern University.
“But the differences are so dramatic that it seems unreasonable to attribute all of those deaths among the older population to COVID simply because those people had a COVID infection.”
There it is again. Old people would have died anyway? Or is it that old people do not matter? Bruce Hall peddling junk science because he has to kiss up to Trump 24/7 and the hell with the people who died. You are a very disgusting little twerp.
Ah, pgl. Once again you never fail to impress with your stupidity. So you are saying that it is “junk science” coming out of Northwestern University. Come on, man! One can see from the data which age groups are at risk and that other mechanisms than a virus are at play.
But ze government, ze government! Zay hafen’t approved! Ve haf ze rules! Okay, wear your little blue mask in the shower.
Moses is right – you are illiterate. I did not say their study was junk science. What I said little moron was that you gross misrepresented what it meant. But Moses did a better job of exposing your attempts to mislead.
Now I will say the trash from your Dr. Vladimir “Zev” Zelenko is junk science.
Keep it coming Brucie – JohnH has a big lead for 2023 troll of the year but we have confidence that you can close the distance.
pgl,
Sure you meant it was junk science because I cited it. You read the first sentence of what I write and jump to conclusions as make an ass out of yourself. You and Newsom make quite the pair.
• https://www.politico.com/news/2023/09/10/newsom-covid-california-00114888
• https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/gavin-newsom-signs-repeal-of-california-s-covid-19-medical-censorship-law/ar-AA1hBE3Y
At least one of you can admit he was wrong.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=19yXV
January 15, 2018
Economic Policy Uncertainty for United States, 1985-2023
(Indexed to 1985)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=19z2A
January 15, 2018
Trade Policy Uncertainty for United States, 1985-2023
(Indexed to 1985)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=19BuJ
January 15, 2018
Economic Policy Uncertainty and Trade Policy Uncertainty for United States, 1985-2022
(Indexed to 1985)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=19zub
January 15, 2018
Interest Rate on 10-Year Treasury Bond and Economic Policy Uncertainty for United States, 1985-2023
(Indexed to 1985)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=19yYv
January 15, 2018
Real Narrow Effective Exchange Rate and Trade Policy Uncertainty for United States, 1985-2023
(Indexed to 1985)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=15a9v
January 15, 2018
Life Expectancy at Birth for United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy, 2017-2021
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=15a9P
January 30, 2018
Infant Mortality Rate for United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy, 2017-2021
A related societal health matter, which I do not understand, has to do with increasing levels of disability:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=17Gay
January 4, 2020
Labor Force and Population with a disability, * 2010-2023
* Age 16 and over
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=17ENT
January 4, 2020
Labor Force men and women with a disability, * 2010-2023
* Age 16 to 64
(Indexed to 2010)
“There has been debate” between people who know what they are talking about and liars like you. And yea – we still remember how you tried to foist that discredited study by a right wing loon dressed up as a John Hopkins analysis.
Brucie, Brucie, Brucie – we all remember how you have spent the last 3 years spreading MAGA lies. Give it a rest and nothing you say is worth the space you unfortunately take up.
LOL pgl,
You can’t get past the idea that medicine is not your area of “expertise”. Your faith in President Blabbering and the FDA is so noble.
https://twitter.com/ClayTravis/status/1550134269993009152
btw, did you know that Ivermectin may be a very inexpensive treatment for various cancers… pennies? Of course not. It wasn’t approved for that by the FDA.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7205794/
Of course that would be “economically” terrible for your buddies at big Pharma who get off on selling their cancer treatments for $100K a pop.
So, now you have a problem treating people with COVID who also have bacterial pneumonia? Come on, man! If we waited for the “approved” research for every disease, we’d all be broke or dead. Ah, but pgl will say, “Ve hav ze rules.”
I never pretended to be a doctor. But I do know a lying moron when I see one. Look in the mirror troll – you will see him too.
OutKick, originally OutKick the Coverage, is an American right-wing and conservative sports news website founded by Clay Travis in 2011 as an alternative to mainstream sports media which he described as serving the “elite, left-leaning minority.”
I am supposed to take medical advice from a right wing sports jock? Come on Brucie – how much do you really want to embarrass your kids?
Brucie once again cannot read his own links:
‘Oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC), the most common form of oesophageal malignancies in the Asia‐Pacific region, remains a major clinical challenge. In this study, we found that ivermectin, an effective antiparasitic drug that has been approved for patients to orally treat onchocerciasis for over 30 years, displayed potent antitumour activity against ESCC cells in vitro and in nude mice.’
ESCC is not the same thing as COVID19. But I guess if one enjoys watching nude mice having sex one would also think ivermectin is a cure for COVID19. Yea Bruce Hall’s feeble brain has shrunk since he donned that MAGA hat.
Where does this fit under “EPU”??
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/10/04/biden-administration-waives-26-federal-laws-to-allow-border-wall-construction-in-south-texas-00120045
Not saying this is necessarily a bad decision, but it seems like a drastic U-turn. Would have loved to have been a fly on the wall during that White House discussion that made it a final decision. Frankly, I’d love to hear/read Professor Chinn’s thoughts (objective and subjective) on this White House decision. What did Professor Chinn say Paul Ryan called it during his UW-Madison discussion?? Data-derived??