State Sen. Kristin Corrado (R-40) has introduced legislation that calls for an end to weekly testing for New Jersey public school teachers, support staff, and bus drivers who did not receive the COVID-19 vaccine.
Corrado offered that case counts, hospitalizations, and deaths have plummeted in recent months in the Garden State, leading to the state having the lowest level of risk where no restrictions are necessary as per CDC guidance.
“New Jersey’s public health emergency supposedly ended on March 4 and yet public schools are still testing teachers, staff, bus drivers, and other K-12 school employees for COVID-19 on a weekly basis,” said the Passaic County lawmaker on April 6. “Not only does such a policy impose restrictions and undue burdens on educators, it undermines the guidelines of the CDC itself. There is just no rational explanation for this policy whatsoever.”
Murphy Reminder
But Gov. Phil Murphy, in his first public appearance since testing positive for the coronavirus last week, urged people to remember COVID-19 is still a concern.
“Allow my experience to be a reminder that even though we may be past the worst of COVID, we are not entirely past COVID,” Murphy said at the beginning of his address in Jersey City for St. Peter’s University’s 150th Anniversary Founders’ Week Celebration. He had been isolated at his home for five days prior. “Allow me to be your proof that the virus is still among us and please use me as your example of the need to continue to be smart and safe, and continue to use common sense and common courtesy.”
COVID Requirements Remaining
Murphy added he was planning to get his second booster—recommended for people over 50 years old—around the time he tested positive for the virus and credited being vaccinated and boosted for being “able to make it through COVID with nothing more than mild symptoms.”
The COVID-19 public health emergency was lifted on March 4 with the school mask mandate just days later. But still in effect are the mandates for workers to be vaccinated or submit to weekly testing, including teachers, healthcare workers and correctional officers.
But Corrado believes the executive order should have never been enacted in the first place.
“Executive order 253 contains so many blatant errors that it should have been revoked shortly after it was signed,” added Corrado. “The order itself justifies mandated testing of those who did not receive the vaccine on the grounds that the vaccine can ‘Prevent individuals from getting and spreading the virus.’ This is a fallacious claim, and yet, it remains the sole justification for the weekly testing of all education staff.”
Follow the Science
Additionally, Corrado opined that the evolution of the coronavirus itself is another reason to cease all testing mandates. Data released in early March showed the omicron variant was the most dominant variant by far in the United States and the more serious variants, such as alpha, beta, and delta, have all but disappeared.
“As we have seen with omicron, COVID has become a relatively mild illness for most people, with symptoms similar to the common cold. This is true even for individuals who did not receive the vaccine,” said Corrado. “It is time for Gov. Murphy to follow the science and lift the testing requirement for teachers and staff immediately.”
“We should trust people to take the precautions that are right for their individual situations without government mandates.”
Corrado is absolutely crazy. Right now, case numbers (even accounting for fewer PCR tests and recording of cases) have more than doubled in the past week alone. Deaths have tripled in the past week, and R0 (rate of transmission) is at 1.12, meaning explosive exponential increase of transmission. Requiring tests is the LEAST we could do to mitigate and monitor current conditions.
The vaccine DOES actually reduce risk of infection, though it is short term reduction since Omicron. But it also helps to prevent infected people from incubating mutations of the virus, which can result in new variants. It also reduces the risk of long covid. Most of all, it prevents people from being hospitalized and dying. All of these benefits save money for taxpayers, as well as reducing suffering.
Testing of healthy asymptomatic people in the community at large was NEVER needed. There was never any reason to test healthy otherwise asymptomatic people unless they were directly caring for or exposing themselves to at risk people. Howardfredcrics above has NO idea what he is talking about. The test that was used for covid (the PCR) test was a diagnostic test that was intended to confirm a clinical diagnosis when a person presented with symptomatic covid illness. So if someone presented with an actual sickenss and a doctor thought they might have covid, then a test could confirm the clinical suspicion. In the absence of symptoms it is entirely inappropriate to use a DIAGNOSTIC test as a screening test.
The PCR was used as a screening test and there weere huge numbers of false positives. If there is a low disease prevalence in a community and one uses a very sensitive test in this population that is not meant for this purpose, one will get huge numbers of false positives.
up to HALF of all the positive covid tests could have been false positives.
A “case” is not a positive test. A case is person who is sick.
Almost none of this endless testing of asymptomatic people was useful.
The vaccine DOES NOT stop infection or spread.
When you vaccinate large numbers of asymptomatic healthy not at risk people people in the middle of an active pandemic with an ineffective non -sterilizing vaccine, you end up selecting for escape variants. The new variants EVADE the immune protection of the vaccine.
THE VACCINE CAMPAIGN ITSELF IS CREATING THE VARIANTS.
With omicron we got lucky b/c omicron is MILD in 99.9 percent of those who get it.
but all it would take would be mutation driven by the vaccines into something that could kill thousands of people.
Mr. Fredrics above is utterly tragically ignorant about the basic science of virology and covid transmission.
Continued vaccination could cause a mass casualty event.
If an at risk person wants the vaccine, fine they could get it and it will reduce the severity of the illness.
But for 99.8 percent of the population it is not needed. and there is NO reason to mandate it for anyone
Wishing covid would go away doesn’t make covid go away. What is it about Republicans and Public Health? Public Health should not be politics.
“More Than 400 [Scientific] Studies on the Failure of Compulsory Covid Interventions”
https://www.theepochtimes.com/more-than-400-studies-on-the-failure-of-compulsory-covid-interventions_4354144.html?utm_source=ai&utm_medium=search
But let’s keep doubling down on useless interventions because…SCIENCE!
Quoting articles in a publication put out by the Falun Gong, a far right religious group, is really smart, James. Thanks for the GREAT info. LOL.
“The Epoch Times is a far-right international multi-language newspaper and media company affiliated with the Falun Gong new religious movement.”
So your only response to FOUR HUNDRED independent scientific studies that question the propriety of your incessant Covid fear mongering is to smear the people who compiled the list? While conveniently ignoring the 400 studies themselves, which have NO connection whatsoever to the Epoch Times itself? Ad hominem much?
Those studies are all bogus. That’s why they were listed on a far-right website, which lends them zero credibility.
When reading any source, one must always consider such things as extreme political agenda of the publisher. They will tend to cherry pick disreputable “scientific” studies in order to push their agenda.
It’s the same sort of nonsense as the person who “invented” the mRNA vaccine, but who is now disavowing its efficacy and safety. He actually lied about inventing the vaccine, and other more reputable scientific journals are now exposing his lies.
Case counts are increasing in NJ.
In the NYC cases are up 60%.
In Washington DC, case have doubled since several weeks ago.
Voters now have another reason to FIRE State Sen. Kristin Corrado — an out-of-touch politician deep in Trumpism fantasies.
“Cases” do not indicate disease or active infection. Since there is ZERO evidence of asymptomatic spread, “cases” alone are MEANINGLESS as a public health policy tool. (But they were great for frightening the uninformed to justify the liberty-stealing measures taken in blue states.) Why is that so hard to understand?
Most of the sane world has moved on from Covid theatre. Time to give it up.
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.20.21268130v2
James, there are study after study after study that shows that Omicron is extremely contagious among asymptomatic patients. Much more so than earlier strains.
So please stop spreading false information, and more importantly, stop spreading Omicron (assuming that you’re probably asymptomatically infected, and therefore working on behalf of the virus). 😀
To say “those studies are all bogus” is the height of arrogance–or of someone who is losing an argument. A quick list of the publishers of those “bogus” articles includes the American Institute for Economic Research, the National Institutes of Health, the Heritage Foundation, the Lancet, the National Bureau of Economic Research, and the New England Journal of Medicine, to name just a few.
The extreme measures carried out by blue state governments was a colossal public policy failure that will haunt this country for years, if not decades. The developmental damage, especially to children who were/are at ZERO risk from Covid, may be incalculable.
If you really want to start a war of the studies, I will be happy to start posting hundreds of studies that say exactly the opposite of what you’re suggesting.
Shall we start here:
https://www.nichd.nih.gov/newsroom/news/031022-school-masking-policies#:~:text=These%20data%20also%20show%20that,to%20districts%20with%20optional%20masking.
So much for your cockamamie theories about “natural immunity” from prior infection:
https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/98125?xid=nl_mpt_DHE_2022-04-08&eun=g1477275d0r&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Daily%20Headlines%20Evening%202022-04-08&utm_term=NL_Daily_DHE_dual-gmail-definition