COVID Stress Syndrome Was and Is the Real Pandemic
FEATURE
By David Seaman, DC
In the late fall of 2022, news outlets began to warn about a coming “tripledemic” or “tridemic,” which includes COVID, the seasonal flu, and RSV (respiratory syncytial virus). If we step back for a moment and think about life before COVID-19, we used to enter cold and flu season without much hype from the news outlets. COVID changed that because of the misinformation that was fed to the public, causing people to overestimate their chances of dying from COVID by 5000% \ which led to a level of fear and catastrophizing that was quite stunning. Indeed, this scenario led level-headed scientists to coin the term “COVID stress syndrome.” The day I wrote this article, a Google search came up with 162,000,000 results for “COVID stress syndrome.”
My personal view is that fear and catastrophizing about COVID is a mind virus that is more dangerous than actual viruses. Interestingly, most people who suffer from COVID stress syndrome, which can be likened to PTSD, will reject this notion because they no longer have access to mental faculties related to rational thinking due to the presence of chronic stress physiology.
It is well known that stress inhibits the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and enriches the amygdala. Do a Google search for “stress, prefrontal cortex, and amygdala,” and multiple scientific papers will appear. Consider the following quotes from a 2015 paper2:
“Research in animals has revealed how the prefrontal cortex goes ‘off-line’ during stress.”
“Chronic stress exposure leads to dendritic atrophy in PFC, dendritic extension in the amygdala, and strengthening of the noradrenergic (NE) system. High levels of NE released during stress engage low-affinity alpha-1 adrenoceptors (and likely beta-1 adrenoceptors), which rapidly reduce the firing of PFC neurons but strengthen amygdala function.”
Depending on the causes of their stressful state, many people can appear completely normal until they are presented with the inducing traumatic information. In the context of COVID, people can appear completely normal until they are presented with information that conflicts with the propaganda that caused them to overestimate dying from COVID by 5,000%.
A primary example of this is the notion of asymptomatic transmission of the COVID virus, which is the underlying driver of COVID stress syndrome and the reason for widespread lockdowns. Where is the evidence that COVID is spread asymptomatically? In fact, there is no evidence of this actually happening, and writing or saying that can bring out COVID stress symptoms in those who have become emotionally invested by the asymptomatic transmission propaganda.
To be clear, the potentiality of asymptomatic transmission was based only on theoretical models, rather than hard evidence from population studies, and we knew that from the very beginning. Here is a brief timeline of the evidence that clearly demonstrates that asymptomatic transmission of COVID had no appreciable impact on the so-called “pandemic”:
February 3, 2020
Science.org: Kupferschmidt K. Study claiming new coronavirus can be transmitted by people without symptoms was flawed.
A letter to the editor (it wasn’t a study) was published in the New England Journal of Medicine on January 30, 2020 that claimed an asymptomatic woman from Shanghai transmitted COVID to business colleagues during a meeting in Germany. Shockingly, the “scientists” only talked with the colleagues and not the infected individual, so they had no idea if the infected person had symptoms. After the letter to the editor (it wasn’t a study) was published, they tracked down the infected person, and she, in fact, had mild symptoms during her trip from Shanghai for which she was taking Tylenol. In other words, no asymptomatic transmission. Despite this fact, Dr. Anthony Fauci stated, “There’s no doubt after reading the [the NEJM] paper that there is no doubt that asymptomatic transmission is occurring,” and, “This study lays the question to rest.”
Dr. Fauci actually claimed that this letter to the editor (it wasn’t a study), in which the authors had not talked to the infected individual who had mild symptoms, was confirmatory evidence that asymptomatic transmission is occurring. Shame on Dr. Fauci.
To be clear, many people blow off very mild symptoms such as feeling a little “run down” or stressed. The big focus should have been on understanding the nature of very mild symptoms, the related transmissibility issue, and the appropriate measures to take. Instead, we were treated to an international frenzy of fear-mongering about asymptomatic transmission that never existed in the first place.
June 8, 2020
CNBC: Asymptomatic Spread of Coronavirus Is ‘Very Rare,’ WHO Says
This article was written based on what Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove said during a news briefing. She is the head of the WHO’s Emerging Diseases and Zoonosis unit. Here is her exact statement: “We have a number of reports from countries who are doing very detailed contact tracing... They’re following asymptomatic cases. They’re following contacts. And they’re not finding secondary transmission onward. It’s very rare.”
With Van Kerkhove’s statement in mind, consider that lockdowns and other draconian measures, like closing small businesses and shutting schools, were already happening based on Fauci’s shocking misrepresentation of the facts.
November 20, 2020
Cao S et al. Post-lockdown SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid screening in nearly ten million residents of Wuhan, China. Nat Commun. 2020; 11 (1)5917.
“There were no positive tests amongst 1,174 close contacts of asymptomatic cases... In summary, the detection rate of asymptomatic positive cases in the post-lockdown Wuhan was very low (0.303/10,000), and there was no evidence that the identified asymptomatic positive cases were infectious.“
December 14, 2020
Madewell ZJ et al. Household transmission of SARSCoV-2. A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Netw Open. 2020;3(12):e2031756.
“The lack of substantial transmission from observed asymptomatic index cases is notable...These findings are consistent with other household studies reporting asymptomatic index cases as having limited role in household transmission.”
April 2021
Bender JK et al. Analysis of asymptomatic and presymptomatic transmission of SARS-CoV-2 outbreak, Germany, 2020. Emerg Infect Dis. 2021;27:1159-63.
“We observed no transmission from asymptomatic case-patients and highest SAR through presymptomatic exposure. Rapid quarantine of close contacts with or without symptoms is needed to prevent presymptomatic transmission.”
Understand that presymptomatic refers to the non-classic COVID symptoms, such as the mild symptoms experienced by the Shanghai woman who infected her German colleagues.
The fact that asymptomatic transmission of COVID is clinically irrelevant should not surprise anyone because this same scenario applies to all other viral infections. Even Dr. Fauci stated this fact before the emergence of COVID.
So, why did Fauci and others misrepresent the asymptomatic transmission issue with COVID? Space does not permit a detailed analysis of the likely reasons, but all one needs do is “follow the money.” Just look at the people and institutions/organizations that have benefitted and compare them to those who have suffered financially and continue to suffer with COVID stress syndrome and prefrontal cortex inhibition.
In my opinion, the best thing for all of us to do is to get healthy. We know that obesity and hyperglycemia are drivers of viral infections, and this has been known since the Spanish Flu (3). We also know that key nutrients are beneficial, the most notable being vitamin C, vitamin D, and zinc, which have been shown to reduce the incidence of viral infections long before COVID emerged3.
David Seaman, DC, is consultant for Anabolic Laboratories and has designed several nutritional supplements. He has authored many articles on the topic of diet, inflammation, and pain. His most recent book written for laypeople is entitled The DeFlame Diet. He posts regular DeFlame nutrition updates at DeFlame Nutrition on YouTube and Facebook.
References
1. Desai S. On my mind: They blinded ns with science. From the Franklin Tempi eton-Gallup Economics of Recovery Study.
2. https://www.franklintempleton.com/articles/cio-views/on-my-mindthey-blinded-us-from-science
3. Arnsten AF, et al. The effects of stress exposure on prefrontal cortex: translating basic research into successful treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder. Neurobiol Stress. 2015:1:89-99.
4. Seaman DR. Die DeFlame Diet for Immune Health. Wilmington (NC): Shadow Panther Press, 2020
