Long thread on Vivek at X link for more…
Pedro L. Gonzalez
@emeriticus
Exclusive: Vivek Ramaswamy Supported COVID Segregation
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“Could we tolerate a national system in which certain people on the basis of a biomarker are segregated?”
That sounds like an excerpt from a science fiction novel about a medical dystopia. But it’s a quote from Vivek Ramaswamy, the biopharma entrepreneur and Republican presidential candidate.
In April 2020, as the U.S. went into lockdown, Ramaswamy said he would be open to that kind of system to determine who could “go back to normal life.” He described it as an “inequity,” but concluded that “everyone stands to benefit from it.” Ramaswamy made the comments during an episode of Rockefeller Client Insights, the podcast of Rockefeller Capital Management.
A concept like that is sharply at odds with the image of the civil libertarian he has cultivated during the primary. It also raises questions about his anti-establishment bona fides.
During the podcast, Ramaswamy talked about different aspects of the coronavirus outbreak with Gregory J. Fleming, the president and CEO of Rockefeller Capital Management. Fleming asked him what a “path to normalcy” might look like, given what he described as a “potentially extended timeline” for the rollout of vaccines and treatments. The country was then more than 15 days into “15 days to slow the spread.”
“One path to normalcy and a path that I’d like to see further progress made on is broad rollout of our antibody tests,” Ramaswamy said. He corrected himself and continued:
“It’s not our company; I’m saying, as a society, rolling out the antibody tests such that we actually get our arms around what portion of the population is already immune through exposures that they may not have even known that they had. It might be 10 percent, it might be 20 percent, we might discover that it is some higher number. Those people are gonna be able to get back to work pretty quickly, get back to normal life because effectively they have the immunity badge, they have a badge in the form of their antibodies that protect them best we know from reinfection.
On the flip side, you then have the people who don’t have immunity, and the question is those who are negative on the antibody tests, what happens with them? Now, this has been—I’ve had discussions in the last few days with policymakers, a couple of people in Congress, one U.S. Senator, and I think this is not lost on folks. But I think one early topic that’s come up is, could we tolerate a national system in which certain people on the basis of a biomarker are segregated? To say you can’t go back to normal life, where certain people get a head start. Is that an inequity we would tolerate? I personally think that it is better than the status quo if we can send 10 or 20 percent of the people back on the basis of having immunity that’s proven on the basis of a lab-based result that’s now available. That’s a good thing, and everyone stands to benefit from it.”
A draft for discussion obtained by Contra shows Ramaswamy pitched this strategy to policymakers.
“After its apex of COVID-19 cases, each state should start to administer universal antibody testing to determine which individuals have immunity to SARS-Cov-2 and which individuals do not,” he wrote. “Individuals with immunity can return to normal life, be released from social distancing practices, and help restart the economy.”
“States should also have a well-designed plan for who should be released from social distancing norms to help revive the economy in advance of the availability of a COVID-19 vaccine,” he added.
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12:21 PM · Nov 29, 2023
https://twitter.com/emeriticus/status/1729913580466626893