Two AP headlines in the 1 DEC Richmond, Va. newspaper just prepared us for a ruined Christmas: "Travel at Thanksgiving likely to cause a big surge of the coronavirus" and "Fearing post-Thanksgiving cases, officials order tough restrictions."  It appears that our new normal is here to stay.

Is there really a second wave of COVID deaths occurring in the European Union (E.U.), United Kingdom (U.K.), and U.S. to justify this?  The answer was found in the latest COVID-19 death rate trends in an interactive chart from Our World in Data. 

The second surge is now obvious.  This data source uses a seven-day moving average of daily deaths per million people to make it easier to directly compare per capita death trends regardless of population differences.  Sweden (a part of the E.U.) was included only because it alone shunned severe lockdowns and mask mandates in hopes that inaction would hasten the achievement of herd immunity and thereby help avoid a second surge.  Unfortunately, Sweden's hopes seem dashed. 

Most European countries imposed much harsher lockdowns than those in the U.S., where individual states and localities made widely different decisions.  This may partially explain why U.S. death rates never dropped as low as those in Europe.   Additionally, U.S. deaths from COVID are inflated due to including deaths with COVID. 

The science says extended lockdowns will only temporarily delay the spread of the virus.  It is like playing slow-motion whack-a-mole.  As soon as previously uninfected people re-emerge from hiding, the cycle repeats until herd immunity is achieved either naturally or from a vaccine.  A vaccine is preferable because it minimizes hospitalizations and deaths.  Thanks in part to Trump's Operation Warp Speed, vaccines should become available in the U.S. before the new year.  However, the MSM will likely claim that it is dangerous, and identity politics will cause disagreement over who has first priority. 

So far, the data confirm that there are real concerns.  However, a greater question is whether most of the total COVID-19 deaths and damage from lockdowns could have been avoided.  Evidence has existed from the start that an inexpensive drug was available that could have tamed the beast.  However, this drug's off-label use for COVID-19 has been discouraged in the U.S. and most Western nations.  Perhaps its early mention by President Trump inspired the leftist MSM to create the negative propaganda.  However, this may not explain its ban by most Western nations.

Many reputable doctors went on record supporting its use, but so far, they have succeeded only in risking their careers and getting censored.  Dr. Stella Immanuel is a member of the controversial "America's Frontline Doctors" and was interviewed at length by Candace Owens and dared to mention hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) as a key part of the solution.  For over 60 years, HCQ has been used as a malaria preventative and effective anti-inflammatory for rheumatoid arthritis and lupus patients. 

Note: It is the internal inflammation caused by an overreaction by the auto-immune system that is the primary cause of COVID deaths.  This virus is exceptionally good at triggering this overreaction, and susceptibility increases with age.  Administering HCQ early can calm this overreaction (AKA cytokine storm) before it becomes uncontrollable.   Administering it after reaching a severity requiring hospitalization is usually too late.

Dr. Immanuel has unique firsthand experience with HCQ.  She was born in Cameroon, received her medical degree in Nigeria, and took HCQ routinely as a child though adulthood with no ill effects.  Most people in that malaria-prone region of sub-Saharan Africa have taken it routinely and have done so for many years.  Coincidentally, Dr. Geoff Mitchell, also a member of America's Frontline Doctors, studied COVID-19 death rates in that region of Africa and discovered that a person is 35 times more likely to die from it in the U.S.  A totally separate analysis of the effectiveness of HCQ for COVID-19 identified India as another early user of HCQ for COVID-19. 

To test the above claims about HCQ use for COVID-19, I added Cameroon, Nigeria, and India to the above Our World in Data chart to see if there was a difference. 

The difference is significant.  Each of the HCQ-using countries reported virtually no deaths and zero surges.  Had Europe and the U.S. followed the same treatment protocols as these poorer and less technologically advanced countries, how many thousands of deaths could have been avoided?  How many billions of dollars in economic and social damage from lockdowns could have been prevented?  What "greater good" could have motivated so many wealthy Western countries to restrict its use?

The powerful World Economic Forum (WEF) is scheduled to reconvene in Davos in January 2021 to finalize its radical utopian "Great Reset" plans.  To get buy-in, they may need the continuation of the worldwide economic and social chaos resulting from the pandemic and concurrent reappearance of Marxist philosophy, support by the MSM, and armies of woke Antifa/BLM enforcers.  The people most heavily invested in this fundamental transformation know from the 2020 WEF summit that the Trump administration has no plans to involve the U.S., and without the U.S., nothing can happen.   

Therefore, these exceptionally powerful WEF progressives may believe that their cause is so essential that nothing would be off-limits to achieve a Biden victory and continuation of the worldwide chaos.  George Soros revealed the importance of the WEF's plan when he said, "The 2020 U.S. election will determine the fate of the whole world."  Democrat Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer made similar remarks. 

The former Vatican nuncio to the United States of America, Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, sent President Trump an open letter warning about the Great Reset.  His letter was later dramatized in a 12-minute YouTube video released shortly before the election.  The archbishop certainly reinforces the cause for concern.