Poll #1: Perspectives Related to the Covid Pandemic

[Valerie]

Well, Holmes County didn't fall for so much of this, the PLANdemic came & went through their communities, Holmes County was the first county to turn "yellow" (lowest cases) and i wholeheartedly disagree with you about what is quackery & what is not. We are turning to holitic & naturopathic doctors who have a great deal of success, and continue to watch people be harmed & die (and go broke, lining the pickets of BigPharma & insurance companies, etc). There's not time to pist all the true stories ive witnessed especially when people refuse to listen & learn, its a waste of time. But for those who are willing there is healing and life ahead for them, we are thankful for the path that God has led us on to other physicians

When I know of people that turned away from conventional treatments of cancer who had life threatening cancer and told they would die for example are good friend from Ireland and an Amish girl in our county who started conventional turned away from it and went to alternative treatments you can call it quackery but they're alive and well years later at a fraction of the cost of conventional cancer treatments. You can't tell them it's quackery when they are doing so well. We tried to convey this to our friend who had colon cancer who was beachy Amish he wouldn't listen he died left the family with over a thousand dollars medical bills which fortunately in his community they had a benefit auction and raised $82,000 towards his medical bill because they did not have insurance. My husband and I shake our heads when people call it quackery and yet are thriving in life because they didn't go conventional while others pass away. Of course we know we all have an appointed time but if people choose to live and want to live there are better ways to go. We don't rule out all conventional but we're very careful who we listen to anymore

Your belief in "alternative medicine" and contempt for "evidence based" (as opposed to anecdote based) medicine is becoming contentious. I will no longer discuss this with you.

I'm sorry you feel that way, but i realize why you do, i used to feel the same way

[Wade]

Not true.

Many in plain communities refuse to get tested. Where testing has been done the rates have been high. We do not know about the spread from a specific event like AIC if there has been no testing or reporting by participants.

I’ll cite the articles on Covid in Plain Communities later when I have access to my computer.

In the community, there is not much respect for “testing” or “cases”. What matters is severe illness or death, which simply hasn’t been a problem for quite some time.

If the government threatens to impose shutdowns if there are too many cases, an obvious response is to avoid getting tested. In any case, there is no evidence of any death spread from AIC. (And you can rest assured it was monitored by the relevant health department and local law enforcement.)

I honestly think that is why the state government seems to turn a blind eye in Holmes County & leaves them alone it seems. We've been visiting there just about weekly since the CoVid started. Eating at their restaurants sice they opened back up in May- with maskless servers, signs on doors stating if you're uncomfortable with that, please do not enter. Shopping in their stores, attending a couple crowded auctions ( they continued their auctions). One time we were in a grocery store early on. We were in line to pay at the register and I said to my husband's step back you're getting too close (social distancing) and the man ahead of us who was not Amish or mennonite, turn around and said we don't worry about that here.

I've known people in Holmes that had it, didn't hospitalize them but they did get tested.

I wondered if God wanted them to be an example- because at least in our parts, they have been

I believe your witness Valerie.

But for others you need to state some political sources or news sources and double blind test for your statements to be considered true.

[Valerie]

In the community, there is not much respect for “testing” or “cases”. What matters is severe illness or death, which simply hasn’t been a problem for quite some time.

If the government threatens to impose shutdowns if there are too many cases, an obvious response is to avoid getting tested. In any case, there is no evidence of any death spread from AIC. (And you can rest assured it was monitored by the relevant health department and local law enforcement.)

I honestly think that is why the state government seems to turn a blind eye in Holmes County & leaves them alone it seems. We've been visiting there just about weekly since the CoVid started. Eating at their restaurants sice they opened back up in May- with maskless servers, signs on doors stating if you're uncomfortable with that, please do not enter. Shopping in their stores, attending a couple crowded auctions ( they continued their auctions). One time we were in a grocery store early on. We were in line to pay at the register and I said to my husband's step back you're getting too close (social distancing) and the man ahead of us who was not Amish or mennonite, turn around and said we don't worry about that here.

I've known people in Holmes that had it, didn't hospitalize them but they did get tested.

I wondered if God wanted them to be an example- because at least in our parts, they have been

I believe your witness Valerie.

But for others you need to state some political sources or news sources and double blind test for your statements to be considered true.

So true. I am so content with those I now listen to. Its pretty futile here, i have a God given sense of who to trust as we continually ask God for discernment, and He is guiding our path, He is a perfect Father, kind to reveal and we can fully Trust Him.

I really am past needing to try to convince anyone here, if they are seeking Truth, God will guide them to it. In the meantime, i will watch with sadness at the masses.

[Josh]

Medical care in Holmes / Wayne county is phenomenal too; it’s worth (for me) driving from an hour away and skipping more local options. It really is a worthwhile question to ask why it’s so much better there.

According to some people rural health care is supposed to be really bad. The worst health care I’ve encountered was in Melbourne and Montréal, which are not exactly rural backwaters. The best I’ve encountered was in Holmes / Wayne Co. and in Coudersport, Pa,. which definitely is a rural backwater.

[Wayne in Maine]

Medical care in Holmes / Wayne county is phenomenal too; it’s worth (for me) driving from an hour away and skipping more local options. It really is a worthwhile question to ask why it’s so much better there.

According to some people rural health care is supposed to be really bad. The worst health care I’ve encountered was in Melbourne and Montréal, which are not exactly rural backwaters. The best I’ve encountered was in Holmes / Wayne Co. and in Coudersport, Pa,. which definitely is a rural backwater.

I’ll miss living in New England and I hope to keep some connections to the medical teams at Dana-Farber and Brigham and Women’s who are managing my cancer through their local affiliate here in Maine.

[Wayne in Maine]

Ohio Amish Shun COVID-19 Vaccines As Officials Fear A Surge In Cases

Ohio’s Amish Suffered a Lot From COVID-19, but Vaccines Are Still a Hard Sell

Holmes county went to Yellow status after achieving a 70% vaccination rate.

[Valerie]

Ohio Amish Shun COVID-19 Vaccines As Officials Fear A Surge In Cases

Ohio’s Amish Suffered a Lot From COVID-19, but Vaccines Are Still a Hard Sell

Holmes county went to Yellow status after achieving a 70% vaccination rate.

Hmmmm. Something fishy with these numbers about when they tirned yellow.

I think the Amish have the right attitude. Its silly of them to try to paint the picture they are, their numbers, as in PCR testin, really cant be trusted.

I truly understand why the Amish have a distrust for a lot of modern medicine having read the history of where it took its turn at the beginning of last century. The Amish were not on board with that direction. We completely understand why they were not although they don't rule out modern medicine altogether by and large they are quite wary of it as they tend to be of a lot of government, which they are intertwined.

As far as witchcraft goes, I don't see any of that in their stores. I'm at an Amish man and Holmes county that's been studying health for 20 years raised six children and told us that he only had to take one of his children to the doctor ever, because he had learned how to treat anything that happened to them. The only time he had to take one of his children to the doctor was by an infection from Poison ivy, I met his daughter who was also very knowledgeable in health I could have listened to her all day talk about things that she shares to help people with their health.

The symbol of the snake for pharmacy should indicate where the witchcraft really lies-

[Sudsy]

I've found it interesting to observe the responses of various people to this pandemic including my own response. I assume some of you have as well.

11. Other

I would have to go outside the choices also with 11. Other

I don't have a fear or concern, nor do I trust that anyone knows all the truth on this subject and time will probably shoot down some current understandings. I am taking the shots for reasons beyond my own life preservation. I would have chosen # 10 had it not been for the last sentence as I had no idea how this would play out.

[Josh]

Ohio Amish Shun COVID-19 Vaccines As Officials Fear A Surge In Cases

Ohio’s Amish Suffered a Lot From COVID-19, but Vaccines Are Still a Hard Sell

Holmes county went to Yellow status after achieving a 70% vaccination rate.

The Amish haven't "suffered a lot" (the plain world is about the most gossipy there is; for a while last summer, I got to hear when anybody in a 10 mile radius might have had COVID). Their elderly people suffered far less than those in NY & NJ.

As far as "yellow status", colour codes never mattered in Holmes Co. The hospitals were never full, and people were never dropping dead in the streets. The proper way to assess the health of the Amish (note that Holmes County is not 100% Amish) is to understand the current gossip in the community and to look at the hard facts - how many obituaries are in the Budget?

My own church conference has a population roughly the same as Holmes Co., which means another way to assess this metric is to just look at obituaries in our church periodical. The death rate is basically the same as it used to be; there was a notable spike in last spring. In particular, there aren't more deaths in places with less restrictions where people are ignoring lockdown mandates vs. Canada where it is not possible to flout lockdown mandates.

You know what the worst casualty of this is, Wayne? The panic-selling of COVID and the urgency placed on an experimental vaccine has destroyed a lot of trust that was already running thin from Amish and from other plain people towards mainstream medicine and science. Whenever someone in the community gets a vaccine and then gets sick, ends up in the hospital, or dies, the news spreads like wildfire. Trust in vaccines is at an all-time low.

If you really want people to believe in science and medicine and avoid the witch doctors, you'll have to stop pushing so hard for the largest witch doctor in town. It's very unfortunate that American mainstream medicine has decided to adopt the same tactics as Girod's Chickweed Salve - the only difference is that Girod didn't go and bribe the government to exempt him from normal FDA regulation.

[Szdfan]

The symbol of the snake for pharmacy should indicate where the witchcraft really lies-

So the snake in the pharmacy symbol (the Rod of Asclepius) has roots in Greek mythology, but it also comes from a biblical reference that predates the Greeks.

Numbers 21

4 They traveled from Mount Hor along the route to the Red Sea,[c] to go around Edom. But the people grew impatient on the way; 5 they spoke against God and against Moses, and said, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!”

6 Then the Lord sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. 7 The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against the Lord and against you. Pray that the Lord will take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.

8 The Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” 9 So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived.