Gov. Bill Lee and his wife Maria are in quarantine out of precaution after the governor tested negative for COVID-19 after a member of his security team contracted the virus.
Lee’s office on Wednesday released the following statement:
“Today, a member of the Governor’s Executive Security Detail has tested positive for COVID-19. Gov. Lee is feeling well and has tested negative for COVID-19 but out of an abundance of caution, he is quarantining at home with the First Lady until further notice. Governor’s Office protocol requires masks and social distancing and no staff are believed to be positive at this time. The regularly scheduled, in-person press briefing will be canceled and Gov. Lee will provide an update to reporters by phone this afternoon with Tennessee Department of Health Commissioner Dr. Lisa Piercey.”
Not long before that announcement, Lee tweeted that no one on his staff had tested positive: “Our office protocol requires masks and social distancing and no staff are believed to be positive at this time.”
Our office protocol requires masks and social distancing and no staff are believed to be positive at this time.
— Gov. Bill Lee (@GovBillLee) October 14, 2020
Lee and Health Commissioner Dr. Penny Schwinn held an online press conference later in the afternoon on Wednesday.
Lee revealed that both he and his wife had last been around the infected guard on Tuesday. The guards are tested every week, and the guard in question had tested negative last week. The guard did not report to work Wednesday because he was not feeling well, and so he got tested and received a positive result. Lee said he learned about it late in the morning.
Lee said his wife would be tested later on Wednesday. She had just returned from a school visit where she was was with Education Commissioner Penny Schwinn. The commissioner has not been around the guard, Lee said.
The governor said he assumes that he and his wife will be quarantined for 14 days, but they will check with the Health Department. Lee said he will work from home.
One of the few things that the Governor does right. To think that there is anything at all that I would agree with the otherwise reactionary Governor Lee on!
“…and no staff are believed to be positive at this time.”
Let me get this straight. He is quarantining himself even after testing negative “out of an abundance of caution”, i.e. they don’t believe the test that is being forced on the employees and asymptomatic people are infected spreaders even with their do-nothing masks and socialist distancing.
But we can just “believe” no one else has the virus?
As in, no symptoms = not sick? Sounds like the “old normal”.
How can we “believe” that when we have been told everyone is assumed to be an infected spreader, which is why we need our do-nothing masks?
A better question to ask is what was the cycle threshold on the guard’s test. Because these labs aren’t reporting it. If it was more than 30, he is likely false positive.
Lee could take this one step further. Resign and move out of the state for good. I’d be alright with that.
“Lee revealed that both he and his wife had last been around the infected guard on Tuesday.” There is a difference between a positive test and being infected/infectious. Hardly anyone talks about the ridiculous way we come up with positive “cases.” The PCR test does not detect live virus and was never designed to do so. The test looks for the virus by amplifying the RNA it detects. Every amplification is called a cycle. The more cycles the test uses, the higher likelihood of finding pieces of the virus’s RNA. In the United States, most labs go through 40 cycles, according to the NYT. Experts interviewed said this number of cycles is unnecessarily high. The more cycles, the more positive “cases” you find. You can read more below. So who came up with the 40 cycles? Surely there was modeling regarding the number of positive cases each cycle would identify. The CDC is aware of this and our local covid task force is as well.
https://pjmedia.com/columns/stacey-lennox/2020/10/05/why-is-fauci-wringing-his-hands-over-covid-cases-detected-by-prc-tests-n1004333
Alka Seltzer Cold Plus has always been my go to. Works like a champ.