Citizen Reporters Go to Hospitals and Discover Eerily Quiet Scenes in Contrast to Media "War Zones"

Footage presented as being from NYC Elmhurst Hospital at 1:20



CBS This Morning last week used footage from Italy in a report presented as being from New York to indicate the severity of the coronavirus in the city. The revelation was presented by a Youtube blogger who has compiled video from citizen reporters who are visiting hospitals presented as "war zones" in the media which shows marked absence of frantic activity.

The CBS report from March 25, below, shows an overflowing hospital ward as the "epicenter" to coronavirus medical activity in the US at the moment. But archival research shows the same footage being broadcast by CBS on March 21, a few days earlier, and shows it to be footage from a coronavirus hotspot in Italy.

Next to China, the coronavirus seems to have hit Italy the hardest, with one of the world's oldest population demographics, second in oldest median age only to Japan.

The CBS report on New York City clearly asserts that the footage previously said to be from Italy is in New York, with the narrator cutting away from the footage saying "and across the river from New York, in New Jersey..."

Footage presented as being from NYC Elmhurst Hospital at 1:20



Full video of NYC report from CBS This Morning official site

Previously broadcast footage from Italy at 1:04



Full video of Italy report from CBS This Morning official site

In the same report by the Youtube blogger with 186,000 subscribers, the blogger broadcasts videos taken from recent coronavirus "hotspots" by citizens who live near the hospitals who take it upon themselves to document activity at the hospitals. In each case, the scene that major media alleges are taking place are markedly different from what the citizens record. Hospital waiting rooms and hastily set up triage tents are empty, and officials are seen reluctant to answer questions.

Media reportage of the pandemic has thus far overwhelmingly focused on new cases confirmed by testing. Tests in the US at this point are only given to people showing certain symptoms. The number of deaths attributed to the virus, references to which are almost always preceded by the word "novel," is then divided by the number of confirmed cases to arrive at a mortality rate. But a study by Iceland shows that around 50% of an exposed population may be asymptomatic, or only have shown mild symptoms, and have already developed immunity. Another study by Oxford University places the number of people who are asymptomatic after the incubation period and with immunity at an even higher percentage.

When added to the number of confirmed test cases, these numbers would yield a far lower mortality rate.

Among the hospitals visited by the citizen reporters are Elmhurst in Queens, mentioned by President Donald Trump in a press briefing, as he described media reports he had seen, being unable to visit in person. Also featured are Bellevue Hospital in New York, Phyllis and William Mack Pavilion in Manhattan, an urgent care center in Hawaii, and Cedar Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles.

Around 1200 people die each week die in New York City in ordinary times, or about 170 a day, mostly of natural causes due to age or infirmity. About 7,000 people die each day in the US, about 2.5 million each year.

The deaths of younger people are given great prominence and never placed in their context as statistical outliers, with the effect of frightening a larger spectrum of the public even more. As of March 9, a report from NBC affiliate KXAN in Austin indicates the average age of the coronavirus victim in the US at that time was 77 years old. Bloomberg News reported on March 18 that the average age of the coronavirus victim in Italy was 80, and that all victims under 40 were males with serious co-morbidity factors.

The blogger publishing the Youtube with direct eyewitness footage of hospitals did not deny that there is a health crisis or that vulnerable populations are succumbing, but questioned the sense of panic being fanned constantly by the major media, which is not helpful to the general situation.

The March 25 CBS This Morning report did mention one bright bit of news, that a young woman who was already taking chloroquine, a malaria drug previously mentioned by Trump as showing promise as a treatment, to much ridicule in the media. The woman reported that she was recovering. A paper published at the National Institute of Health also asserts that chloroquine shows promise.

In other coronavirus news, the New York Post reports that doctors in NYC are administering massive doses of vitamin C to coronavirus patients, with positive results.

Also, a controversial US Senate candidate who recently challenged Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts said in an interview that he suspects the coronavirus is the deliberate or accidental result of a US or Chinese bioweapons lab. The primary bioweapons lab in the US is Fort Detrick, Maryland. Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai, who holds four advanced degrees from MIT including a PhD in biological engineering, also believes American immune systems have been weakened by diets of "garbage food" rather than mostly fresh fruits and vegetables, which has contributed to susceptibility to the coronavirus.

Youtube Blogger report

Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai, Candidate for US Senator from Massachusetts