Champion golfer Phil Mickelson sparked a firestorm on social media late last week after asking a question about the Omicron variant of COVID-19 that goes against the COVID narrative.
What are the details?
Building on data that the Omicron variant is “infectious but not fatal,” Michelson asked why public health officials are still trying to control Omicron’s spread rather than promote the development of immunity.
“Serious question because I am not a doctor. If omicron is contagious but not fatal (25,000 cases in Africa without deaths) why are we trying to control it? Who won’t be vaccinated?” Mickelson said on Twitter.
Michelson’s question sparked a flurry of responses, which were both critical and supportive of Mickelson’s proposal.
- “Phil here makes more sense with one tweet than anyone else in sports, media or politics,” Clay Travis replied.
- “Hillary Clinton Dusts Off Her Hanging…”, Comedian Andrew Schultz replied.
- “Because Pfizer has better lobes than natural immunity,” someone else He said.
- “Because it neither generates billions of big pharma nor keeps tyrants in check with ’emergency powers,'” Tim Young He said.
- “Becasue (sic) nobody wants to hear that. It makes so much sense to follow the stats,” former NFL quarterback Matt Lennart He said.
- “Simple … natural immunity is not profitable. Next question, ‘Someone else He said.
- “Because our hospitals are full and health care workers are suffering. Stop. Overweight. Health care. Workers,” one critic. He said.
- Another critic He said.
- “Please stop pretending you’re coming up with an innocent idea – we’ve gotten two years into it. Take some responsibility,” said another critic He said.
- “If you’re really curious (and don’t ask questions of bad faith to bulls), talk to your doctor or contact a virologist, epidemiologist, or other critic He said.
- “No hate here, but you are contributing to the murderous disinformation that fascists are using to destroy American democracy… Delete this and apologise,” said another critic He said.
What about Omicron?
While the Omicron variant has been responsible for massive spikes in COVID-19 cases, the data suggest that the variant is milder than previous COVID-19 variants because it did not cause a similar rise in hospitalizations and deaths.
However, public health officials did not reciprocate. Instead, schools across the country are returning to distance learning, mask mandates are being reactivated, and Democratic leaders are implementing vaccine mandates and entry requirements that include booster shots. All in the spirit of Omicron’s risk mitigation, they say.
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